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Vol. 11 No. 1 (2015)

Published July 31, 2015 Pages: 1-150
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Articles in This Issue

Original Article
Independent Component Analysis for Separation of Speech Mixtures: A Comparison Among Thirty Algorithms
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Abstract

Vast number of researches deliberated the separation of speech mixtures due to the importance of this field of research . Whereas its applications became widely used in our daily life; such as mobile conversation, video conferences, and other distant communications. These sorts of applications may suffer from what is well known the cocktail party problem. Independent component analysis (ICA) has been extensively used to overcome this problem and many ICA algorithms based on different techniques have been developed in this context. Still coming up with some suitable algorithms to separate speech mixed signals into their original ones is of great importance. Hence, this paper utilizes thirty ICA algorithms for estimating the original speech signals from mixed ones, the estimation process is carried out with the purpose of testing the robustness of the algorithms once against a different number of mixed signals and another against different lengths of mixed signals. Three criteria namely Spearman correlation coefficient, signal to interference ratio, and computational demand have been used for comparing the obtained results. The results of the comparison were sufficient to signify some algorithms which are appropriate for the separation of speech mixtures.

Original Article
Unified P-Q based STATCOM Control for Wind Driven Induction Generator
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Abstract

This paper principally advises a simple and reliable control for Static Synchronous Compensator (STATCOM) in a stand-alone wind driven self-excited induction generator power system. The control was proposed based on instantaneous P-Q theory. The advised control enjoys the merits of robustness, reliability and simplicity. The paper also proposes a dimensioning procedure for the STATCOM that involves advising an annotative analytical expression for sizing the DC-link capacitor. This procedure has the advantages of applicability for different reactive power compensators that depend on a separate DC-link in its operation. Comprehensive simulation results in Matlab environment were illustrated for corroborating the performance of the advised control under rigorous operating scenarios. The results show the feasibility, reliability and practicability of the proposed controller.

Original Article
Security Issues of Solar Energy Harvesting Road Side Unit (RSU)
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Abstract

Vehicular network security had spanned and covered a wide range of security related issues. However solar energy harvesting Road Side Unit (RSU) security was not defined clearly, it is this aspect that is considered in this paper. In this work, we will suggest an RSU security model to protect it against different internal and external threats. The main goal is to protect RSU specific data (needed for its operation) as well as its functionality and accessibility. The suggested RSU security model must responds to many objectives, it should ensure that the administrative information exchanged is correct and undiscoverable (information authenticity and privacy), the source (e.g., VANET server) is who he claims to be (message integrity and source authentication) and the system is robust and available (using Intrusion Detection System (IDS)). In this paper, we suggest many techniques to strength RSU security and they were prototyped using an experimental model based on Ubicom IP2022 network processor development kit .

Original Article
Path Planning of Mobile Robot Using Fuzzy- Potential Field Method
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This paper deals with the navigation of a mobile robot in unknown environment using artificial potential field method. The aim of this paper is to develop a complete method that allows the mobile robot to reach its goal while avoiding unknown obstacles on its path. An approach proposed is introduced in this paper based on combing the artificial potential field method with fuzzy logic controller to solve drawbacks of artificial potential field method such as local minima problems, make an effective motion planner and improve the quality of the trajectory of mobile robot.

Original Article
Multilevel Permutation with Different Block Size/ Stream Cipher Image Encryption
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Abstract

In this work, a new image encryption method using a combined multilevel permutation with stream cipher is proposed. In the permutation algorithm, image is divided into blocks in each level and its blocks are rearranged by using pseudorandom permutation method. A new non linear stream cipher algorithm is also proposed that is based on combining several keys generated by Linear Feedback Shift Register (LFSR). The results shown that the proposed algorithm has a high security feature and it is efficient for image encryption. Practical tests proved that the proposed encryption algorithm is robust, provides high level of security and gives perfect reconstruction of the decrypted image.

Original Article
Wireless Sensor Network for Medical Applications
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Abstract

This work presents a healthcare monitoring system that can be used in an intensive care room. Biological information represented by ECG signals is achieved by ECG acquisition part . AD620 Instrumentation Amplifier selected due to its low current noise. The ECG signals of patients in the intensive care room are measured through wireless nodes. A base node is connected to the nursing room computer via a USB port , and is programmed with a specific firmware. The ECG signals are transferred wirelessly to the base node using nRF24L01+ wireless module. So, the nurse staff has a real time information for each patient available in the intensive care room. A star Wireless Sensor Network is designed for collecting ECG signals . ATmega328 MCU in the Arduino Uno board used for this purpose. Internet for things used For transferring ECG signals to the remote doctor, a Virtual Privet Network is established to connect the nursing room computer and the doctor computer . So, the patients information kept secure. Although the constructed network is tested for ECG monitoring, but it can be used to monitor any other signals. INTRODUCTION For elderly people, or the patient suffering from the cardiac disease it is very vital to perform accurate and quick diagnosis. Putting such person under continuous monitoring is very necessary. (ECG) is one of the critical health indicators that directly bene ¿ t from long-term monitoring. ECG signal is a time-varying signal representing the electrical activity of the heart. It is an effective, non- invasive diagnostic tool for cardiac monitoring[1]. In this medical field, a big improvement has been achieved in last few years. In the past, several remote monitoring systems using wired communications were accessible while nowadays the evolution of wireless communication means enables these systems to operate everywhere in the world by expanding internet benefits, applications, and services [2]. Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), as the name suggests consist of a network of wireless nodes that have the capability to sense a parameter of interest like temperature, humidity, vibration etc[3,4]. The health care application of wireless sensory network attracts many researches nowadays[ 5-7] . Among these applications ECG monitoring using smart phones[6,8], wearable Body sensors[9], remote patient mentoring[10],...etc. This paper presents wireless ECG monitoring system for people who are lying at intensive care room. At this room ECG signals for every patient are measured using wireless nodes then these signals are transmitted to the nursing room for remote monitoring. The nursing room computer is then connected to the doctors computer who is available at any location over the word by Virtual Privet Network (VPN) in such that the patients information is kept secure and inaccessible from unauthorized persons. II. M OTE H ARDWARE A RCHITECTURE The proposed mote as shown in Fig.1 consists of two main sections : the digital section which is represented by the Arduino UNO Board and the wireless module and the analog section. The analog section consists of Instrumentation Amplifier AD620 , Bandpass filter and an operational amplifier for gain stage, in addition to Right Leg Drive Circuit. The required power is supplied by an internal 3800MAH Lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery which has 3.7V output voltage.

Original Article
Reactive Power Contribution and Pricing for Restructured Power Industry
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Abstract

Competitive trend towards restructuring and unbundling of transmission services has resulted in the need renteto discover the impact of a particular generator to load. This paper initially presents the analysis of three diff reactive power valuation methods namely, Modified Y bus , Virtual flow approach and Modified Power flow tracing to compute the reactive power output from a particular generator to particular load. Among these methods, the modified power flow electricity tracing method is identified as the best because of its various features. Secondly, based on this Method, the opportunity cost for practical system is determined. Hence, this method can be useful in providing additional insight into power system operation and can be used to modify existing tariffs of charging for reactive power transmission loss and reactive power transmission services. Simulation and comparison results are shown by taking IEEE 30 bus system as test system.

Original Article
Matlab/Simulink Modeling of Parallel Resonant DC Link Soft-Switching Four-leg SVPWM Inverter
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Abstract

This paper suggests the use of the traditional parallel resonant dc link (PRDCL) circuit to give soft switching to the Four-leg Space Vector Pulse Width Modulation (SVPWM) inverter. The proposed circuit provides a short period of zero voltage across the inverter during the zero-vectors occurrence. The transition between the zero and active vectors accomplished with zero- voltage condition (ZVC), this reduces the switching losses. Moreover, the inverter output voltage Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) not affected by circuit operation, since the zero voltage periods occur simultaneously with zero-vector periods. To confirm the results, balanced and unbalanced loads are used. Matlab/Simulink model implemented for simulation.

Original Article
Control Strategy for Three-Phase PWM Boost Rectifier Operating Under Different Supply Voltage Conditions
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Abstract

In this paper, a proposed control strategy is presented to improve the performance of the pulse width modulation (PWM) boost type rectifier when operating under different supply voltage conditions (balanced, unbalanced, and distorted three-phase supply voltages). The proposed control strategy is divided into two parts, the first part is voltage controller and the second part is current controller. In the voltage controller, Repetitive Controller (RC) is used to reduce the even order harmonics in the regulated output dc voltage so small output capacitor (filter) is used instead of large capacitor. RC also reduces the even order harmonics which appear in the reflected dc current (I MAX ), this leads to reduce the odd order harmonics which appear in the input currents. While in the current controller, Enhanced Phase Locked Loop (EPLL) technique is used to obtain sinusoidal and balanced three phases, to construct the reference currents, which are in phase with the fundamental supply voltages. Therefore, the supply-side power factor is kept close to unity. A proportional controller is used to give excellent tracking between the line and the reference currents. The complete system with the proposed control strategy are simulated using Matlab/Simulink. The results for the complete system using repetitive voltage controller are obtained and compared to the results of the system with the conventional voltage controller (Proportional-Integral (PI) controller connected in series with a Low Pass Filter (LPF)). The results with the repetitive controller show better response and stable operation in the steady state under different input voltage conditions, as well as in the transient response under changing the load condition. — Enhanced Phase Locked Loop,Repetitive Controller,Three-Phase PWM Boost Rectifier, Proportional-Integral controller. I. INTRODUCTION The boost type PWM rectifier has been increasingly employed in recent years since it offers the possibility of a low distortion line current withnear unity power factor for any load condition. Another advantage over traditional phase-controlled thyristor rectifiers is its capability for nearly instantaneous reversal of power flow. Unfortunately, the features of the PWM boost type rectifier are fully realized only when the supply three phase input voltages are balanced. It has been shown that unbalanced input voltages cause an abnormal second order harmonic at the dc output voltage, which reflects back to the input causing third-order harmonic current to flow. Next, the third-order harmonic current causes a fourth-order harmonic voltage on the dc bus, and so on. This results in the appearance of even harmonics at the dc output and odd harmonics in the input currents. An attempt was made to reduce low order harmonics at the input and the output of the PWM Boost Type Rectifier under unbalance input voltages [1]. The authors in [2] used two synchronous reference frames: a positive- sequence current regulated by a

Original Article
NTT: Network Topology Tool for Enhancing NS-2
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Abstract

Network Simulator-2(NS-2) is one of the most popular simulation systems that is widely used in the network community. C++ and the object-oriented Tool Command Language (TCL) are both used to write this simulator. C++ works as a background for this simulator, whereas TCL is responsible for scheduling discrete events and network configuration objects. The TCL language is used to write the code of the simulation scenario. NS-2 does not present enough graphical interfaces that could help a researcher reduce the time spent on writing long TCL scripts. Therefore, network researchers spend a great deal of time focusing on how to write the TCL simulation script, which consequently makes the simulation process more difficult. This study presents a novel tool that enhances simulation by using graphical interfaces. The graphical interface is used to create the network topology and convert it into a TCL script. Thus, the process is visualized easily, efficiently, and quickly. This work describes the Network Topology Tool(NTT),which is intended to help researchers who work under the network simulation environment of NS-2. In such a scenario, researchers can create the network topology through an interactive graphical user interface and also they can retrieve and edit it which considered a very important and unique service from the other previous works. This tool will allow professional users to focus on the development of new algorithms or architectures rather than spend time writing scripts for data processing. .

Original Article
Design and Develop an Information system for Court Data in the Republic of Iraq by using SSRS Reports with SSAS Cubes
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Abstract

Multidimensional Online analytical processing (MOLAP) technology is considered a good tool to produce meaningful and quality results by using a multidimensional cube. The term “multidimensional cube” is used to refer to the multiple layers of data that are used to show the result. This result is identified by high-level management to increase the Iraqi court work and to improve its quality. The Iraqi court needs an analytical report to make a strategic decision on case date, case type, case state, judge, criminal age, and criminal gender. Currently, MOLAP is known as the best and strongest technique because it provides rapid, dynamic, and multiple analyses of data; presents knowledge from different perspectives; comes up with data in time series intervals; and drills down into multiple levels of data layers to present different types of details. The SQL Server Reporting Service (SSRS) presents analysis reports based on the MOLAP cube. This paper focuses on designing and developing the analysis reports of the court data system of the Republic of Iraq by using SSRS with SQL Server Analysis Service to create the MOLAP cubes.

Original Article
A comparative Study of Forecasting the Electrical Demand in Basra city using Box-Jenkins and Modern Intelligent Techniques
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Abstract

The electrical consumption in Basra is extremely nonlinear; so forecasting the monthly required of electrical consumption in this city is very useful and critical issue. In this Article an intelligent techniques have been proposed to predict the demand of electrical consumption of Basra city. Intelligent techniques including ANN and Neuro-fuzzy structured trained. The result obtained had been compared with conventional Box-Jenkins models (ARIMA models) as a statistical method used in time series analysis. ARIMA (Autoregressive integrated moving average) is one of the statistical models that utilized in time series prediction during the last several decades. Neuro- Fuzzy Modeling was used to build the prediction system, which give effective in improving the predict operation efficiency. To train the prediction system, a historical data were used. The data representing the monthly electric consumption in Basra city during the period from (Jan 2005 to Dec 2011). The data utilized to compare the proposed model and the forecasting of demand for the subsequent two years (Jan 2012-Dec 2013). The results give the efficiency of proposed methodology and show the good performance of the proposed Neuro-fuzzy method compared with the traditional ARIMA method.

Original Article
Off-line Signature Recognition Using Weightless Neural Network and Feature Extraction
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Abstract

The problem of automatic signature recognition and verification has been extensively investigated due to the vitality of this field of research. Handwritten signatures are broadly used in daily life as a secure way for personal identification. In this paper a novel approach is proposed for handwritten signature recognition in an off-line environment based on Weightless Neural Network (WNN) and feature extraction. This type of neural networks (NN) is characterized by its simplicity in design and implementation. Whereas no weights, transfer functions and multipliers are required. Implementing the WNN needs only Random Access Memory (RAM) slices. Moreover, the whole process of training can be accomplished with few numbers of training samples and by presenting them once to the neural network. Employing the proposed approach in signature recognition area yields promising results with rates of 99.67% and 99.55% for recognition of signatures that the network has trained on and rejection of signatures that the network has not trained on, respectively.

Original Article
Fuzzy Petri Net Controller for Quadrotor System using Particle Swam Optimization
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Abstract

In this paper, fuzzy Petri Net controller is used for Quadrotor system. The fuzzy Petrinet controller is arranged in the velocity PID form. The optimal values for the fuzzy Petri Net controller parameters have been achieved by using particle swarm optimization algorithm. In this paper, the reference trajectory is obtained from a reference model that can be designed to have the ideal required response of the Quadrotor, also using the quadrotor equations to find decoupling controller is first designed to reduce the effect of coupling between different inputs and outputs of quadrotor. The system performance has been measured by MATLAB. Simulation results showed that the FPN controller has a reasonable robustness against disturbances and good dynamic performance.

Original Article
Identification of RBC and WBC Count in Human Blood Using ARM Based Instrumentation
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Abstract

The rapid growth in microelectronics and crunching RISC in the field of bio-medical sciences incorporated of soft tools to diagnose various parameters of human fluids. Conventional method of blood sample analysis makes use of laboratory technique of titration, which is operator-dependent and results in lot of errors depending on the skill of the technician. In order to eliminate the human errors involved in the conventional method, in this paper an attempt has been made to present a capillary centrifuge technique driven by high speed DC motor fed by Morgan chopper and controlled by powerful ARM processor. It results in accurate analysis of the blood samples. The various techniques involved in accurate sensing of speed using timer and generation of firing pulses to thyristor in the Morgan chopper is judiciously achieved. This paper clearly brings out the advantages of the proposed blood measurement technique which effectively gives blood analysis faster and at a low cost.