• Title/Summary/Keyword: Critical Structure

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Recent Progress in Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Research : A Review of Papers Published in the Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering in 2012 (설비공학 분야의 최근 연구 동향 : 2012년 학회지 논문에 대한 종합적 고찰)

  • Han, Hwataik;Lee, Dae-Young;Kim, Sa Ryang;Kim, Hyun-Jung;Choi, Jong Min;Park, Jun-Seok;Kim, Sumin
    • Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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    • v.25 no.6
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    • pp.346-361
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    • 2013
  • This article reviews the papers published in the Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering during 2012. It is intended to understand the status of current research in the areas of heating, cooling, ventilation, sanitation, and indoor environments of buildings and plant facilities. The conclusions are as follows : (1) The research works on thermal and fluid engineering have been reviewed as groups of fluid machinery, pipes and valves, fuel cells and power plants, ground-coupled heat pumps, and general heat and mass transfer systems. Research issues are mainly focused on new and renewable energy systems, such as fuel cells, ocean thermal energy conversion power plants, and ground-coupled heat pump systems. (2) Research works on the heat transfer area have been reviewed in the categories of heat transfer characteristics, pool boiling and condensing heat transfer, and industrial heat exchangers. Researches on heat transfer characteristics included the results for natural convection in a square enclosure with two hot circular cylinders, non-uniform grooved tube considering tube expansion, single-tube annular baffle system, broadcasting LED light with ion wind generator, mechanical property and microstructure of SA213 P92 boiler pipe steel, and flat plate using multiple tripping wires. In the area of pool boiling and condensing heat transfer, researches on the design of a micro-channel heat exchanger for a heat pump, numerical simulation of a heat pump evaporator considering the pressure drop in the distributor and capillary tubes, critical heat flux on a thermoexcel-E enhanced surface, and the performance of a fin-and-tube condenser with non-uniform air distribution and different tube types were actively carried out. In the area of industrial heat exchangers, researches on a plate heat exchanger type dehumidifier, fin-tube heat exchanger, an electric circuit transient analogy model in a vertical closed loop ground heat exchanger, heat transfer characteristics of a double skin window for plant factory, a regenerative heat exchanger depending on its porous structure, and various types of plate heat exchangers were performed. (3) In the field of refrigeration, various studies were executed to improve refrigeration system performance, and to evaluate the applicability of alternative refrigerants and new components. Various topics were presented in the area of refrigeration cycle. Research issues mainly focused on the enhancement of the system performance. In the alternative refrigerant area, studies on CO2, R32/R152a mixture, and R1234yf were performed. Studies on the design and performance analysis of various compressors and evaporator were executed. (4) In building mechanical system research fields, twenty-nine studies were conducted to achieve effective design of mechanical systems, and also to maximize the energy efficiency of buildings. The topics of the studies included heating and cooling, HVAC system, ventilation, renewable energy systems, and lighting systems in buildings. New designs and performance tests using numerical methods and experiments provide useful information and key data, which can improve the energy efficiency of buildings. (5) In the fields of the architectural environment, studies for various purposes, such as indoor environment, building energy, and renewable energy were performed. In particular, building energy-related researches and renewable energy systems have been mainly studied, reflecting interests in global climate change, and efforts to reduce building energy consumption by government and architectural specialists. In addition, many researches have been conducted regarding indoor environments.

Criticism of Landscape Urbanism - Focused on Internal Structures of the Discourse - (랜드스케이프 어바니즘의 비판적 견해에 대한 고찰 - 담론의 내재적 체계를 중심으로 -)

  • Kim, Youngmin
    • Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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    • v.43 no.2
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    • pp.87-104
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    • 2015
  • As the influence of Landscape Urbanism has grown, various criticisms on the discourse also have increased. A study on critical opinions of Landscape Urbanism is necessary to fully comprehend the theoretical structure of the discourse and its limitations. This study introduced the concept of Intension and Extension, which is used in the field of Logics and Semiotic, as an analytical tool to interpret various criticisms based on different views in a more objective and synthetic way. After examining the development of criticisms of Landscape Urbanism, 30 texts with important critiques on the theory were selected and analyzed. Criticisms can be classified as internal criticism and external criticism according to specific topics they are engaged with. The study only covers internal criticism as a research scope. The internal criticisms on Landscape Urbanism are re-categorized into topics of theory, practice and the relation between theory and practice. Vagueness of concepts and error in concepts are two types criticism related to the issue of theory. Lexical Ambiguity and Intensional Vagueness are the main causes of conceptual vagueness in Landscape Urbanism. Conceptual vagueness related with the problem of redefining an existing concept through expanding its meaning reveals a structural dilemma. There are three types of criticism included in the topic of practice: absence of practical results, form-oriented practice, and ambiguous identity in practical results. Ambiguous identity is caused by Extensional Vagueness allowing borderline cases. Because these borderline cases overlap with extensions of landscape architecture, it is hard to differentiate projects of Landscape Urbanism and those of conventional landscape architecture. Most criticisms on the relation between theory and practice raise the question on the practical method. Two types of criticism are engaged with the topic of the practical method: errors in practical methods and absence of practical methods. The absence of practical methods is a fundamental problem of Landscape Urbanism which is hard to solve by the proposed solutions. However, these structural problems are not only the weak point but also the factor that is able to prove the potentials expand the scope of Landscape Urbanism. In addition to the results of the study, internal criticisms on Landscape Urbanism should be examined in the following studies in order to predict the next direction of Landscape Urbanism.

Effect of an Offshore Fish Culture System on the Benthic Polychaete Community (외해가두리 양식이 저서다모류군집에 미치는 영향)

  • Jung, Rae-Hong;Yoon, Sang-Pil;Kim, Youn-Jung;Lee, Won-Chan;Hong, Sok Jin;Park, Sung-Eun;Oh, Hyung Taik
    • The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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    • v.18 no.4
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    • pp.195-205
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    • 2013
  • Excessive input of organic matters from fish cage farming has been considered as one of the major factors disturbing benthic ecosystem, especially in semi-enclosed coastal waters. Recently offshore aquaculture in the vicinity of Jeju-do has been introduced to minimize that kind of negative impact. This study was conducted to investigate the ecological impacts of offshore aquaculture on the macrobenthic polychaete communities. A total of ten sampling works were carried out for 28 months, spanning from 10 days after starting giving feed to 3 months after stopping giving feed. During the study period, mean current velocity was quite strong with the range of 50 cm/s to 70 cm/s. TOC of surface sediment was constantly low. Significant changes in polychaete community were detected just three months after starting giving feed, which were the increase of the number of species and density at all stations. Up to 18 months after the start of farming, the amount of feed provided played an important role in the fluctuation of the number of species and density, especially at 0 m and 10 m stations. After reducing the amount of feed provided, dominance of some opportunistic species within 10 m distance from fish cages still lasted to the end of aquaculture. However, opportunistic species disappeared 3 months after the end of farming, which indicated the sign of recovery from the disturbance. From these results, the amount of food input and the period of cultivation were critical factors disturbing polychaete community and ensuing changes in this offshore and oligotrophic waters as well. In addition, study on the changes of polychaete community structure before and after fish farming showed more detailed changes in benthic ecological state than geochemical approach did.

A Study of Iljiam Tea Garden of Daeheung-sa at Mt. Dooryun - Focusing on the Comparison between Poetry and Current State - (두륜산 대흥사 일지암 다정(茶庭)의 일고찰(一考察) - 시문과 현황 비교를 중심으로 -)

  • Rho, Jae-Hyun
    • Journal of the Korean Institute of Traditional Landscape Architecture
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    • v.30 no.3
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    • pp.97-110
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    • 2012
  • This study aimed at considering the original shape of Iljiam Tea Garden at Mt. Daedun. In order to accomplish our goal, we tried to strengthen the authenticity of construction of Iljiam by comparing its space structure depicted in the poetry of Choeui(艸衣) the monk with its current restored state. According to the clues and situation in the poetry along with symbolic words like 'Choeui' and 'Ilji(一枝)', Iljiam seemed to be a tea garden with elegant and celestial beauties, and with a nice view where Choeui the famous monk searched for the highest state of enlightenment by enjoying and living in nature. When we compared the plural aspects of Iljiam like Dacheon(茶泉), Dajo, Mulhwak, Darim(茶林), Chaewon(菜園), and Yeonji(蓮池) with those of Dasan Tea Garden[茶山草堂], we could see that the basic components of tea-culture space of both gardens are the same, showing the organizational principle of the top and bottom area to stress reading and studying. When it is restored, the authenticity of Iljiam should be pursued by linking spatial, historical, and landscaping characteristics as the space of which Choeui the monk carried out Zen meditation and mastered tea. However, the recent grand scale Buddhist business like the expansion of access road and construction of Buddhist sanctuary and Seolimdang became the biggest threat to the authenticity. Especially, it was emphasized many times in various poetry that the view from Iljiam and its surroundings is extraordinary, so it is critical to get rid of obstacles to the view from Iljiam and its surroundings in order to restore Iljiam as its genuine form. The current Iljiam should be re-made because it is like a leaf-roofed garden, not like a hermitage. However, the opinion that Jawoohongryeon-sa(紫芋紅蓮社) is somewhat a Taoistic and Taoist hermit space with a special shape adopted the pattern of building of the Joseon period rather than a Buddhist building can be accepted as long as other convincing historical evidences are found out, considering the ideology of uniting Confucianism and Buddhism and the spirit of Taoist hermit found out from poetry of Choeui and his friends. In conclusion, the restoration of Iljiam in 1979 was carried out to restore the place of Iljiam rather than to restore the originality of Iljiam by combining and referring domestic cases of tea gardens. However, there is not much material for restoration even though the main frame of Iljiam was distorted. Nevertheless, the top and bottom ponds should be constructed as a rectangle shape. In addition, it can be improved much in terms of plants and trees. It is necessary to restore bamboo forest, which was razed in order to make a tea plantation around Seolimdang, to set vines of arbors above the upper limbs, to plant pine trees and willow trees inside of the garden, and to put Dajeolgu under the corner of the eaves. Especially, the bamboo forest emphasized in poetry and took care of by Choeui himself should be restored inside of the garden.

The Usage of the Vulgate Bible in the European Catholicism: from the Council of Trent until the Second Council of Vatican (유럽 천주교의 불가타 성경 사용 양상: 트렌토 공의회 이후부터 2차 바티칸 공의회 이전까지)

  • CHO, Hyeon Beom
    • The Critical Review of Religion and Culture
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    • no.32
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    • pp.257-287
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    • 2017
  • It seems to be quite an ambitious endeavor to trace back the translation history of Catholic Vulgate Bible from Latin language to Asian languages since 16th century. I try to bring out the translation(translative) procedure of Latin Bible to the Chinese Version, which is eventually come up (and the latter)to the Korean Version. It has been supported and funded by the National Research Foundation of Korea. This task has a three-year plan. For the first step(operation), I examined and searched the European situation of the Vulgate Bible in the Catholic Church, i.e. the ritual use of Vulgate Bible in the Mass and the religious retreat. The liturgical texts, to begin with, were analysed to disclose how the Vulgate Bible was reflected in them. The Lectionary and the Evangeliary were the typical ones. The structure or the formation system of the Lectionaries for Mass was based on the liturgical year cycle. From this point, the Vulgate Bible was rooted in the religious life of European Catholics after the Council of Trent which had proclaimed the Vulgate to be authentic source of the Revelation, therefore, to be respected as the only authoritative Bible. How did the Catholic Church use the Vulgate Bible out of the context and the boundary (sphere) of liturgy? The Meditation guide books for the purpose of instructing the religious retreat was published and (diffused) circulated among the priests, the religious persons and even the laymen. In those books also were included (found) the citation, the interpretation and the commentaries of the Vulgate Bible. The most of the devotees in Europe read the biblical phrases out of the meditation guide books. There are still remained the unsolved problems of how to understand (for understanding) the actual aspect of the Vulgate Bible in the European Catholic Church. All the Biblical verses were translated into French and included in the meditation guide books published in France. What did the Holy See think the French translation of the Vulgate Bible? Unfortunately, there were not found the Vatican Decrees about the European translation of the Vulgate Bible. The relationship between the Vulgate Bible and the Meditation guide (Those) will be much important for the study of Chinese translation of it. The search for the Decrees and the researches on it and the European and the non-European translations of the Vulgate Bible will be a continuous task for me as well as the other researchers on these subjects in the future.

A Preliminary Study on the Post-magmatic Activities Occurring at the Gonamsan Gabbroic Rocks in the Pocheon Area (포천지역 고남산 반려암질암 내 발생하는 후기 화성활동에 관한 예비 연구)

  • Lee, Ji-Hyun;Kim, Eui-Jun;Shin, Dongbok
    • Economic and Environmental Geology
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    • v.55 no.1
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    • pp.77-95
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    • 2022
  • The Gonamsan gabbroic complex in the Pocheon area, northwestern region of South Korea consists of a variety types of gabbroic rocks and associated Fe-Ti oxide deposits caused by magmatic differentiation. Post-magmatic intrusions (i.e., gabbroic pegmatite and pyroxene-apatite-zircon rocks) partly intruded into the gabbroic rocks. The gabbroic pegmatite occurs in monzodiorite and oxide gabbro of the complex, intimately and spatially associated with high-grade lenticular Fe-Ti oxide mineralization. The pegmatite can be subdivided into plagioclase-amphibole and pyroxene-olivine pegmatite, in which the contact surface is sharp. The plagioclase-amphibole pegmatite comprises plagioclase and amphibole, with lesser amount of pyroxene, ilmenite, sphene, apatite, and biotite. The pegmatite shows plagioclase-amphibole intergranular texture, in which the open space formed by large plagioclase laths (An2-26Ab72-98Or0-2) are infilled by amphibole. The pyroxene-olivine pegmatite is dark gray to black in color and also contains magnetite, ilmenite, spinel, apatite, and calcite as a minor component. The pyroxene (En35-36Fs8-9Wo55) and olivine (Fo84-85Fa15-16) partly show a poikilitic texture defined by smaller euhedral olivine enclosed by coarser clinopyroxene. Fe-Ti oxide minerals consist mainly of magnetite and ilmenite that are found interstitially to earlier formed silicates. Subsequently, they are encompassed by reaction rim (almost of amphibole and biotite) along the boundary with surrounding silicate minerals. Under the microscope, magnetite contains a lot of oxyexsolved ilmenite (trellis type) and spinel, and thereby is weakly enriched in magnetite-compatible elements such as Ti, Al, Mg, and V. The structure and textures at the contact zone as well as mineralogical disequilibrium between gabbroic pegmatite and the host gabbroic rocks suggest that the pegmatite may form as a result of accumulation from Fe-rich melt (or liquid) that occurred somewhere rather than in situ form from the host gabbroic rock during the magmatic differentiation. Consequently, the preliminary study suggests that further study on the post-magmatic activities can not only help us improve our understanding on magmatic fractionation but also provide critical information on Fe-Ti oxide mineralization in gabbroic rocks resulting from the magmatic differentiation.

The Genealogy of Forbidden Sound -Political Aesthetics of Ambiguity in the Criticism of Japanese Style in Korean Society of the 1960s (일본적인 것, 혹은 금지된 '소리'의 계보 -한일국교정상화 성립기 '왜색(倭色)' 비판담론과 양의성의 정치미학)

  • Jeong, Chang-Hoon
    • Journal of Popular Narrative
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    • v.25 no.1
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    • pp.349-392
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    • 2019
  • In the 1960s of Korea, the normalization of diplomatic relations between Korea and Japan led to a sense of a vigorous anxiety and fear that "Japan will once again come to the Korean peninsula". As a reaction to this, the discourse on the criticism of 'Japanese Style' strongly emerged. If the prior discourse of criticism was to express the national antipathy toward the colonial remnants that had not yet been disposed of, the critical discourse of the 1960s was the wariness of the newly created 'Japanese Style' in popular culture, and to grasp it as a symptomatic phenomenon that 'evil-minded Japan' was revealed. Thus, this new logic of criticism of the 'Japanese Style' had a qualitative difference from the existing ones. It was accompanied by a willingness to inspect and censor the 'masses' that grew up as consumers of transnational 'mass culture' that flowed and chained in the geopolitical order under the Cold War system. Therefore, the topology of 'popular things=Japanese things=consuming things' reveals the paradox of moral demands that existed within Korean society in the 1960s. This was to solidify the divisive circulation structure that caused them to avoid direct contact with the other called 'Japan', but at the same time, get as close to it as ever. It is a repetitive obsession that pushes the other to another side through the moral segregation that strictly draws a line of demarcation between oneself and the other, but on the other hand is attracted to the object and pulls it back to its side. This paper intends to listen to the different voices that have arisen in the repetitive obsession to understand the significance of the dissonance that has been repeated in the contemporary era. This will be an examination of the paradoxical object of Japan that has been repeatedly asked to build the internal control principle of Korean society, or to hide the oppressive and violent side of the power, and that can neither be accepted nor destroyed completely as part of oneself.

LINAC-based Stereotactic Radiosurgery for Meningiomas (수막종에 대한 선형가속기형 정위방사선수술)

  • Shin Seong Soo;Kim Dae Yong;Ahn Yong Chan;Lee Jung Il;Nam Do-Hyun;Lim Do Hoon;Huh Seung Jae;Yeo Inhwan J;Shin Hyung Jin;Park Kwan;Kim BoKyoung;Kim Jong Hyun
    • Radiation Oncology Journal
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    • v.19 no.2
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    • pp.87-94
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    • 2001
  • Purpose : To evaluate the role of LINAC-based stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) in the management of meningiomas, we reviewed clinical response, image response, neurological deficits for patients treated at our institution. Methods and materials : Between February 1995 and December 1999, twenty-six patients were treated with SRS. Seven patients had undergone prior resection. Nineteen patients received SRS as the initial treatment. There were 7 male and 19 female patients. The median age was 51 years (range, $14\~67\;years$). At least one clinical symptom presented at the time of SRS in 17 patients and cranial neuropathy was seen in 7 patients. The median tumor volume was $4.7\;cm^3\;(range,\;0.7\~16.5\;m^3)$. The mean marginal dose was 15 Gy (range, $10\~20\;Gy$), delivered to the $80\%$ isodose surface (range, $46\~90\%$). The median clinical and imaging follow-up periods were 27 months (range, 1-71 months) and 25 months (range, $1\~52\;months$), respectively. Results : Of 14 patients who had clinical follow-up of one year or longer, thirteen patients $(93\%)$ were improved clinically at follow-up examination. Clinical symptom worsened in one patient at 4 months after SRS as a result of intratumoral edema, who underwent surgical resection at 7 months. OF 14 patients who had radiologic follow-up of one year or longer, tumor volume decreased in 7 patients $(50\%)$ at a median of 11 months (range, $6\~25\;months$), remained stable in 6 patients $(43\%)$, and increased in one patient $(7\%)$, who underwent surgical resection at 44 months. New radiation-induced neurological deficits developed in six patients $(23\%)$. Five patients $(19\%)$ had transient neurological deficits, completely resolved by conservative treatment including steroid therapy. Radiation-induced brain necrosis developed in one patient $(3.8\%)$ at 9 months after SRS who followed by surgical resection of tumor and necrotic tissue. Conclusions : LINAC-based SRS proves to be an effective and safe management strategy for small to moderate sized meningiomas, inoperable, residual, and recurrent, but long-term follow-up will be necessary to fully evaluate its efficacy. To reduce the radiation-induced neurological deficit for large size meningioma and/or in the proximity of critical and neural structure, more delicate treatment planning and optimal decision of radiation dose will be necessary.

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Relationships on Magnitude and Frequency of Freshwater Discharge and Rainfall in the Altered Yeongsan Estuary (영산강 하구의 방류와 강우의 규모 및 빈도 상관성 분석)

  • Rhew, Ho-Sang;Lee, Guan-Hong
    • The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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    • v.16 no.4
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    • pp.223-237
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    • 2011
  • The intermittent freshwater discharge has an critical influence upon the biophysical environments and the ecosystems of the Yeongsan Estuary where the estuary dam altered the continuous mixing of saltwater and freshwater. Though freshwater discharge is controlled by human, the extreme events are mainly driven by the heavy rainfall in the river basin, and provide various impacts, depending on its magnitude and frequency. This research aims to evaluate the magnitude and frequency of extreme freshwater discharges, and to establish the magnitude-frequency relationships between basin-wide rainfall and freshwater inflow. Daily discharge and daily basin-averaged rainfall from Jan 1, 1997 to Aug 31, 2010 were used to determine the relations between discharge and rainfall. Consecutive daily discharges were grouped into independent events using well-defined event-separation algorithm. Partial duration series were extracted to obtain the proper probability distribution function for extreme discharges and corresponding rainfall events. Extreme discharge events over the threshold 133,656,000 $m^3$ count up to 46 for 13.7y years, following the Weibull distribution with k=1.4. The 3-day accumulated rain-falls which occurred one day before peak discharges (1day-before-3day -sum rainfall), are determined as a control variable for discharge, because their magnitude is best correlated with that of the extreme discharge events. The minimum value of the corresponding 1day-before-3day-sum rainfall, 50.98mm is initially set to a threshold for the selection of discharge-inducing rainfall cases. The number of 1day-before-3day-sum rainfall groups after selection, however, exceeds that of the extreme discharge events. The canonical discriminant analysis indicates that water level over target level (-1.35 m EL.) can be useful to divide the 1day-before-3day-sum rainfall groups into discharge-induced and non-discharge ones. It also shows that the newly-set threshold, 104mm, can just separate these two cases without errors. The magnitude-frequency relationships between rainfall and discharge are established with the newly-selected lday-before-3day-sum rainfalls: $D=1.111{\times}10^8+1.677{\times}10^6{\overline{r_{3day}}$, (${\overline{r_{3day}}{\geqq}104$, $R^2=0.459$), $T_d=1.326T^{0.683}_{r3}$, $T_d=0.117{\exp}[0.0155{\overline{r_{3day}}]$, where D is the quantity of discharge, ${\overline{r_{3day}}$ the 1day-before-3day-sum rainfall, $T_{r3}$ and $T_d$, are respectively return periods of 1day-before-3day-sum rainfall and freshwater discharge. These relations provide the framework to evaluate the effect of freshwater discharge on estuarine flow structure, water quality, responses of ecosystems from the perspective of magnitude and frequency.

Memory Organization for a Fuzzy Controller.

  • Jee, K.D.S.;Poluzzi, R.;Russo, B.
    • Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems Conference
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    • 1993.06a
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    • pp.1041-1043
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    • 1993
  • Fuzzy logic based Control Theory has gained much interest in the industrial world, thanks to its ability to formalize and solve in a very natural way many problems that are very difficult to quantify at an analytical level. This paper shows a solution for treating membership function inside hardware circuits. The proposed hardware structure optimizes the memoried size by using particular form of the vectorial representation. The process of memorizing fuzzy sets, i.e. their membership function, has always been one of the more problematic issues for the hardware implementation, due to the quite large memory space that is needed. To simplify such an implementation, it is commonly [1,2,8,9,10,11] used to limit the membership functions either to those having triangular or trapezoidal shape, or pre-definite shape. These kinds of functions are able to cover a large spectrum of applications with a limited usage of memory, since they can be memorized by specifying very few parameters ( ight, base, critical points, etc.). This however results in a loss of computational power due to computation on the medium points. A solution to this problem is obtained by discretizing the universe of discourse U, i.e. by fixing a finite number of points and memorizing the value of the membership functions on such points [3,10,14,15]. Such a solution provides a satisfying computational speed, a very high precision of definitions and gives the users the opportunity to choose membership functions of any shape. However, a significant memory waste can as well be registered. It is indeed possible that for each of the given fuzzy sets many elements of the universe of discourse have a membership value equal to zero. It has also been noticed that almost in all cases common points among fuzzy sets, i.e. points with non null membership values are very few. More specifically, in many applications, for each element u of U, there exists at most three fuzzy sets for which the membership value is ot null [3,5,6,7,12,13]. Our proposal is based on such hypotheses. Moreover, we use a technique that even though it does not restrict the shapes of membership functions, it reduces strongly the computational time for the membership values and optimizes the function memorization. In figure 1 it is represented a term set whose characteristics are common for fuzzy controllers and to which we will refer in the following. The above term set has a universe of discourse with 128 elements (so to have a good resolution), 8 fuzzy sets that describe the term set, 32 levels of discretization for the membership values. Clearly, the number of bits necessary for the given specifications are 5 for 32 truth levels, 3 for 8 membership functions and 7 for 128 levels of resolution. The memory depth is given by the dimension of the universe of the discourse (128 in our case) and it will be represented by the memory rows. The length of a world of memory is defined by: Length = nem (dm(m)+dm(fm) Where: fm is the maximum number of non null values in every element of the universe of the discourse, dm(m) is the dimension of the values of the membership function m, dm(fm) is the dimension of the word to represent the index of the highest membership function. In our case then Length=24. The memory dimension is therefore 128*24 bits. If we had chosen to memorize all values of the membership functions we would have needed to memorize on each memory row the membership value of each element. Fuzzy sets word dimension is 8*5 bits. Therefore, the dimension of the memory would have been 128*40 bits. Coherently with our hypothesis, in fig. 1 each element of universe of the discourse has a non null membership value on at most three fuzzy sets. Focusing on the elements 32,64,96 of the universe of discourse, they will be memorized as follows: The computation of the rule weights is done by comparing those bits that represent the index of the membership function, with the word of the program memor . The output bus of the Program Memory (μCOD), is given as input a comparator (Combinatory Net). If the index is equal to the bus value then one of the non null weight derives from the rule and it is produced as output, otherwise the output is zero (fig. 2). It is clear, that the memory dimension of the antecedent is in this way reduced since only non null values are memorized. Moreover, the time performance of the system is equivalent to the performance of a system using vectorial memorization of all weights. The dimensioning of the word is influenced by some parameters of the input variable. The most important parameter is the maximum number membership functions (nfm) having a non null value in each element of the universe of discourse. From our study in the field of fuzzy system, we see that typically nfm 3 and there are at most 16 membership function. At any rate, such a value can be increased up to the physical dimensional limit of the antecedent memory. A less important role n the optimization process of the word dimension is played by the number of membership functions defined for each linguistic term. The table below shows the request word dimension as a function of such parameters and compares our proposed method with the method of vectorial memorization[10]. Summing up, the characteristics of our method are: Users are not restricted to membership functions with specific shapes. The number of the fuzzy sets and the resolution of the vertical axis have a very small influence in increasing memory space. Weight computations are done by combinatorial network and therefore the time performance of the system is equivalent to the one of the vectorial method. The number of non null membership values on any element of the universe of discourse is limited. Such a constraint is usually non very restrictive since many controllers obtain a good precision with only three non null weights. The method here briefly described has been adopted by our group in the design of an optimized version of the coprocessor described in [10].

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