Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Working From Home: A Double Edged Sword, Kathleen Farrell

Conference papers

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how working from home can be optimally managed to achieve greater work/ home harmony. Critics assert that employees who are not office-based are "actually not working". The following are challenges of working from home

-The difficulty in separating home from work

-Self- imposed pressure of working endlessly and

-The feeling of being alienated from companies’ major decisions and sometimes promotions.

Otani (2015) argues for flexibility and cites Sheryl Sandberg, Facebooks Chief Operating Officer as making the point that it is more important to measure the results rather than watching people "try". Even …

Heineken's Acquisition Of Asia Pacific Breweries: Accounting For Business Combinations And Ownership Interests, Pearl Hock Neo Tan, Chu Yeong Lim

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

On July 20, 2012, Heineken, a Dutch brewery offered S$5.125 billion (Singapore dollars; approximately US$4.1 billion) to buy Asia Pacific Breweries Ltd (APB; formerly, Malayan Breweries Limited) from its Singapore-based joint venture partner, Fraser and Neave, Limited. (F&N). At that point, Heineken and F&N had joint control over APB through the joint venture vehicle Asia Pacific Investments Pte Ltd (APIPL). Brewery business under the joint arrangement had moved on quite predictably from the time APB was formed in 1931. However, the calm changed to high drama when Thai Beverage, owned by one of Thailand's tycoons, made a bid for F&N …

Optimal Control Based Stiffness Identification Of An Ankle-Foot Orthosis Using A Predictive Walking Model, Manish Sreenivasa, Matthew Millard, Martin Felis, Katja Mombaur, Sebastian I. Wolf

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

Predicting the movements, ground reaction forces and neuromuscular activity during gait can be a valuable asset to the clinical rehabilitation community, both to understand pathology, as well as to plan effective intervention. In this work we use an optimal control method to generate predictive simulations of pathological gait in the sagittal plane. We construct a patient-specific model corresponding to a 7-year old child with gait abnormalities and identify the optimal spring characteristics of an ankle-foot orthosis that minimizes muscle effort. Our simulations include the computation of foot-ground reaction forces, as well as the neuromuscular dynamics using computationally efficient muscle torque …

Technologies For The Control Of Heat And Light In The Vézère Valley Aurignacian, Randall White, Romain Mensan, Amy E. Clark, Elise Tartar, Laurent Marquer, Raphaelle Bourrillon, Paul Goldberg, Laurent Chiotti, Catherine Cretin, William Rendu, Anne Pike-Tay, Sarah Ranlett

Faculty of Science, Medicine and Health - Papers: part A

We can trace the beginnings of our knowledge of early Upper Paleolithic (Aurignacian) use of fire to the pioneering 1910-1911 excavations at Abri Blanchard undertaken by Louis Didon and Marcel Castanet. At Blanchard, the excavators recognized and described fire structures that correspond in many ways to features excavated more recently in Western and Central Europe. Here, we address the issue of heat and light management in the early Upper Paleolithic, demonstrating a pattern that builds on these early excavations but that is refined through our recent field operations. Topics to be discussed include (1) recently excavated fire structures that suggest …

The Impact Of Structured Physical Activity On Glycaemic Control In Diabetes Prevention Programs: A Systematic Review, Joseph Edwards, Hassan Hosseinzadeh

Faculty of Social Sciences - Papers (Archive)

Background: Seven landmark randomised controlled trials, with some that began as early as the 1990s, observed the prediabetic state, namely, impaired glucose tolerance and impaired fasting glucose conditions, against the impact of lifestyle interventions such as physical activity, to prevent or delay the onset of type 2 diabetes mellitus. In addition to the landmark trials, this systematic review examines 14 studies that retained a focus on prediabetic individuals and measured the efficacy of physical activity on improving glucose tolerance. Results: Type, duration and intensity of structured physical activity can have unique benefits to prediabetic individuals. It is posited that diabetes …

Hybrid Model Predictive Control Of A Residential Hvac System With On-Site Thermal Energy Generation And Storage, Massimo Fiorentini, Josh Wall, Zhenjun Ma, Julio H. Braslavsky, Paul Cooper

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part A

This paper describes the development, implementation and experimental investigation of a Hybrid Model Predictive Control (HMPC) strategy to control solar-assisted heating, ventilation and air-conditioning (HVAC) systems with on-site thermal energy generation and storage. A comprehensive approach to the thermal energy management of a residential building is presented to optimise the scheduling of the available thermal energy resources to meet a comfort objective. The system has a hybrid nature with both continuous variables and discrete, logic-driven operating modes. The proposed control strategy is organized in two hierarchical levels. At the high-level, an HMPC controller with a 24-h prediction horizon and a …

Gas Reservoir And Emission Modelling To Evaluate Gas Drainage To Control Tailgate Gas Concentrations And Fugitive Emissions, Dennis J. Black

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

The process of longwall coal extraction coal causes fractures in the overlying and underlying strata and these fractures become pathways for gas released from adjacent coal seams to flow into the mine workings and contaminate the ventilation air. If the rate of gas emission exceeds the diluting capacity of the ventilation air, the gas concentration will increase and exceed the statutory limit resulting in production delays.All potential gas sources within the planned mining area, including coal seams located above and below the working seam, should be identified and sufficient gas data collected and used to determine the specific gas emission …

Ventilative Cooling Through Automated Window Opening Control Systems To Address Thermal Discomfort Risk During The Summer Period: Framework, Simulation And Parametric Analysis, Theofanis Psomas, Massimo Fiorentini, Georgios Kokogiannakis, Per K. Heiselberg

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

Automated window opening control systems with integrated ventilative cooling strategies may significantly diminish the thermal discomfort and overheating risk of dwellings during cooling periods in temperate climates. One of the challenges with demonstrating the benefits of the systems is the lack of building performance simulation (BPS) tools which may represent precisely how actual algorithms are applied.

The study supported herein aims to present a framework of how to simulate an advanced ventilative cooling algorithm of a window system on coupled BPS environments (ESP-r and BCVTB tools). Parametric analysis has been conducted to verify specific operational functions of the system. The …

Review On Design And Control Aspects Of Robotic Shoulder Rehabilitation Orthoses, Aibek Niyetkaliyev, Shahid Hussain, Mergen Hmcgill University, Ghayesh, Gursel Alici

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

Robotic rehabilitation devices are more frequently used for the physical therapy of people with upper limb weakness, which is the most common type of stroke-induced disability. Rehabilitation robots can provide customized, prolonged, intensive, and repetitive training sessions for patients with neurological impairments. In most cases, the robotic exoskeletons have to be aligned with the human joints and provide natural arm movements. This is a challenging task to achieve for one of the most biomechanically complex joints of human body, i.e., the shoulder. Therefore, specific considerations have been made in the development of various existing robotic shoulder rehabilitation orthoses. Different types …

Predicting The Motions And Forces Of Wearable Robotic Systems Using Optimal Control, Matthew Millard, Manish Sreenivasa, Katja Mombaur

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

Wearable robotic systems are being developed to prevent injury to the low back. Designing a wearable robotic system is challenging because it is difficult to predict how the exoskeleton will affect the movement of the wearer. To aid the design of exoskeletons, we formulate and numerically solve an optimal control problem (OCP) to predict the movements and forces of a person as they lift a 15 kg box from the ground both without (human-only OCP) and with (with-exo OCP) the aid of an exoskeleton. We model the human body as a sagittal-plane multibody system that is actuated by agonist and …

Optimizing Wearable Assistive Devices With Neuromuscular Models And Optimal Control, Manish Sreenivasa, Matthew Millard, Paul Manns, Katja Mombaur

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

The coupling of human movement dynamics with the function and design of wearable assistive devices is vital to better understand the interaction between the two. Advanced neuromuscular models and optimal control formulations provide the possibility to study and improve this interaction. In addition, optimal control can also be used to generate predictive simulations that generate novel movements for the human model under varying optimization criterion.

Modelling And Control Of A Novel Walker Robot For Post-Stroke Gait Rehabilitation, Emre Sariyildiz, Hsiao-Ju Cheng, Gokhan M. Yagli, Haoyong Yu

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

In this paper, a novel walker robot is proposed for post-stroke gait rehabilitation. It consists of an omni-directional mobile platform which provides high mobility in horizontal motion, a linear motor that moves in vertical direction to support the body weight of a patient and a 6-axis force/torque sensor to measure interaction force/torque between the robot and patient. The proposed novel walker robot improves the mobility of pelvis so it can provide more natural gait patterns in rehabilitation. This paper analytically derives the kinematic and dynamic models of the novel walker robot. Simulation results are given to validate the proposed kinematic …

Observer-Based Load Frequency Control For Island Microgrid With Photovoltaic Power, Chaoxu Mu, Weiqiang Liu, Wei Xu, Md Rabiul Islam

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part B

As renewable energy is widely integrated into the power system, the stochastic and intermittent power generation from renewable energy may cause system frequency deviating from the prescribed level, especially for a microgrid. In this paper, the load frequency control (LFC) of an island microgrid with photovoltaic (PV) power and electric vehicles (EVs) is investigated, where the EVs can be treated as distributed energy storages. Considering the disturbances from load change and PV power, an observer-based integral sliding mode (OISM) controller is designed to regulate the frequency back to the prescribed value, where the neural network observer is used to online …

Saudi Women's Experiences Of Control And Engagement As Employees In Private Universities, Kimberly Dawn Deatherage

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Saudi women have higher rates of graduation from college than their male counterparts, but are underrepresented as employees in the private higher education sector. Saudi women working in higher education report a lack of involvement in the planning of their work, challenges in balancing family and career, and low wages. Yet, no research has explored how Saudi women in administrative support staff positions in private universities perceive control and how their perceptions of control affect their engagement in the workplace. Therefore, based on locus of control theory, the 2-process model of perceived control, and compensatory control theory, the purpose of …