The first book to discuss efficient ways to implement the systems currently being developed--written by the co-author of Expert Systems: Artificial Intelligence in Business, generally regarded as the best non-technical guide to expert systems for business people. Gives innovative ideas for using expert systems to facilitate business operations. Appropriate as a text or supplement for data base, decision support, or special-topic courses that cover expert systems. Clearly explains new applications of automatic decision-making in management, sales, operations, programming, research, and service industries. Text supported by extensive examples and graphs.
This publication deals with key issues in land tenure, especially as they relate to food insecurity and rural development situations. Land tenure issues are frequently ignored in rural development interventions, with often long-lasting, negative results. This guide is designed to assist technical officers in governments and civil society in understanding why and how land tenure issues should be considered in rural development projects. It analyses important contexts such as environmental degradation, gender discrimination, and conflicts, where land tenure is currently of critical concern.
Approach; Major ecosystem types, major habitat types, and ecoregions of LAC; Conservation status of terretrial ecoregions of LAC; Biological distinctiveness of territorial ecoregions of LAC at different biogeographic scales results; Integrating biological distinctiveness and conservation status; Conservation assessment of mangrove ecosystems.
This book presents key recent developments in biofuel policy, products, processes, patents and innovative technologies. It presents several case studies, which maximize reader insights into how innovative green energy technologies can be implemented on an industrial scale, with illustrations, photos and new approaches. It also analyzes in detail several different technological aspects of the research into and production of green fuels from the first, second and third generation, such as, bioethanol, biogas, biohydrogen, biobutanol, biofuels from pyrolysis, and discusses their economic and environmental impacts. A new source of information for engineers, technicians and students involved in production and research in the biofuels sector, this book also provides a valuable resource for industry, covering the current and future status of biofuels.
In this expanded and revised edition of a fresh and original case-study textbook on environmental ethics, Christine Gudorf and James Huchingson continue to explore the line that separates the current state of the environment from what it should be in the future. Boundaries begins with a lucid overview of the field, highlighting the key developments and theories in the environmental movement. Specific cases offer a rich and diverse range of situations from around the globe, from saving the forests of Java and the use of pesticides in developing countries to restoring degraded ecosystems in Nebraska. With an emphasis on the concrete circumstances of particular localities, the studies continue to focus on the dilemmas and struggles of individuals and communities who face daunting decisions with serious consequences. This second edition features extensive updates and revisions, along with four new cases: one on water privatization, one on governmental efforts to mitigate global climate change, and two on the obstacles that teachers of environmental ethics encounter in the classroom. Boundaries also includes an appendix for teachers that describes how to use the cases in the classroom.
This book discusses the commercialization of biofuels and the Brazilian government policies for the promotion of renewable energy program in Brazil, which could be a learning module for several countries for implementing biofuels policy to improve their socioeconomic status and make them energy independent. Researchers in academia and industries, policy makers, and economic analysts will be assisted by important source of information in their ongoing research and future perspectives. This book will benefit graduate and postgraduate students of chemical and biochemical engineering, forestry, microbiology, biochemistry, biotechnology, applied chemistry, environmental science, sustainable energy, and biotech business disciplines by signifying the applied aspects of bioenergy production from various natural sources and their implications. Graduate and postgraduate students as well as postdoctoral researchers will find clear concepts of feedstock analysis, feedstock degradation, microbial fermentation, genetic engineering, renewable energy generation and storage, climate changes, and techno-economic analysis of biofuels production technologies.
Completely reorganised and comprehensively rewritten for its second edition, this guide to reliability-centred maintenance develops techniques which are practised by over 250 affiliated organisations worldwide.
Designing Software Architectures will teach you how to design any software architecture in a systematic, predictable, repeatable, and cost-effective way. This book introduces a practical methodology for architecture design that any professional software engineer can use, provides structured methods supported by reusable chunks of design knowledge, and includes rich case studies that demonstrate how to use the methods. Using realistic examples, you’ll master the powerful new version of the proven Attribute-Driven Design (ADD) 3.0 method and will learn how to use it to address key drivers, including quality attributes, such as modifiability, usability, and availability, along with functional requirements and architectural concerns. Drawing on their extensive experience, Humberto Cervantes and Rick Kazman guide you through crafting practical designs that support the full software life cycle, from requirements to maintenance and evolution. You’ll learn how to successfully integrate design in your organizational context, and how to design systems that will be built with agile methods. Comprehensive coverage includes Understanding what architecture design involves, and where it fits in the full software development life cycle Mastering core design concepts, principles, and processes Understanding how to perform the steps of the ADD method Scaling design and analysis up or down, including design for pre-sale processes or lightweight architecture reviews Recognizing and optimizing critical relationships between analysis and design Utilizing proven, reusable design primitives and adapting them to specific problems and contexts Solving design problems in new domains, such as cloud, mobile, or big data
These proceedings represent the work of researchers participating in the International Conference on Gender Research (ICGR 2018) which is being hosted this year by the ISCAP in Porto, Portugal on 12-13 April 2018. ICGR is a new event on the international research conferences calendar and provides a valuable platform for individuals to present their research findings, display their work in progress and discuss conceptual and empirical advances in the areas surrounding Gender Research. It provides an important opportunity for researchers across a diverse range of fields all looking at aspects relating to Gender to come together with peers to share their varied and valuable experiences. The first day will be opened with a keynote presentation by Bruce I Newman from DePaul University in Chicago, USA who will address the topic Gender and Democracy. In the afternoon, there will be an additional keynote address on Empowering women in the IT/IS research: the importance of role models given by Isabel Ramos from, University of Minho, Portugal. The second day of the conference will be opened by Paola Paoloni from "NiccolÒ Cusano" University, Rome, Italy. Paola will be talking about A Relational Capital Dimension in Universities. In this event, participants will have the opportunity to have access to the latest research and developments concerning Gender Research and after an initial submission of 180 Abstracts, there will be 62 Research Papers, 8 PhD Research Papers, 2 Masters Papers, 1 Non-Academic and 4 Work in Progress Paper published in these Conference Proceedings. These papers represent truly global research in the field, with contributions from Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Iran, Italy, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mexico, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand, The Netherlands, Turkey, UAE, UK and USA.
Multistage Fuzzy Control a model-based approach to fuzzy control and decision making Fuzzy techniques are used to cope with imprecision in the control process. This authoritative book explains the essential principles of fuzzy logic and describes both the theoretical and practical advantages of the new model-based, prescriptive approach. Professor Kacprzyk offers a comprehensive and in depth examination of the issues underlying multistage control and decision analysis, addressing in particular fuzzy dynamic systems, fuzzy events, fuzzy probabilities and fuzzy quantifiers. The text also comprises an introduction to the basic concepts of fuzzy sets, fuzzy logic and fuzzy systems, complemented by real-world examples of the use of the model-based prescriptive approach to improve the efficiency of fuzzy control systems. Highly experienced in fuzzy control research, the author identifies new trends in the development of fuzzy sets and their direct application to decision-making processes. Fuzzy control engineers, researchers and postgraduate students will find this an ideal reference, offering a wealth of ideas for enhancing the performance of fuzzy control systems and equipping them with the tools to resolve genuine problems. Multistage Fuzzy Control is an essential handbook for those wishing to resolve real-world problems in control and decision analysis through the use of fuzzy-logic-based methods.
