Deterioration In Overall Performance Research Articles

Shortcomings of Current Performance Measurement and Management Systems: A Literature Review

The performance measurement system as a tool for knowledge sharing and continuous improvement plays a key role in the knowledge management development. Previous research indicates that performance measurement and management systems are not always successfully implemented to improve decision-making or knowledge management. Many failures relate to the behavioural aspects of performance management, but a systematic review of this topic is lacking. Therefore, the main aim of the paper is to explore the shortcomings of current performance measurement and management systems. The study conducted a systematic review of the literature of peer-reviewed articles over the past 20 years. The main shortcomings are analysed within the individual categories of technical and social control, especially in terms of design, implementation, and behavioural aspects. The findings revealed that the most common causes of shortcomings of measurement and management performance systems include technical problems, insufficient or late knowledge sharing, or the inability to effectively implement the entire system. An ineffective performance measurement and management system encourages bad decisions and wastes resources by misallocating them. Subsequently, this results in dysfunctional employee behaviour and deterioration in overall performance, which often even increases fear, reduces employee trust, and engagement. Based on the synthesis of the results, the paper suggests how to prevent the identified shortcomings to cause a rapid change in the behaviour of employees. From a theoretical contribution point of view, the research provides a comprehensive and clear view of the currently available theory of performance measurement and management systems. In terms of managerial implications, point out the shortcomings of current performance measurement and management systems and outline how to overcome them.

Optimal Morphologies of n-Omino-Based Reconfigurable Robot for Area Coverage Task Using Metaheuristic Optimization

Reconfigurable robots design based on polyominos or n-Omino is increasingly being explored in cleaning and maintenance (CnM) tasks due to their ability to change shape using intra- and inter-reconfiguration, resulting in various footprints of the robot. On one hand, reconfiguration during a CnM task in a given environment or map results in enhanced area coverage over fixed-form robots. However, it also consumes more energy due to the additional effort required to continuously change shape while covering a given map, leading to a deterioration in overall performance. This paper proposes a new strategy for n-Omino-based robots to select a range of optimal morphologies that maximizes area coverage and minimizes energy consumption. The optimal “morphology” is based on two factors: the shape or footprint obtained by varying the angles between the n-Omino blocks and the number of n-Omino blocks, i.e., “n”. The proposed approach combines a Footprint-Based Complete coverage Path planner (FBCP) with a metaheuristic optimization algorithm to identify an n-Omino-based reconfigurable robot’s optimal configuration, assuming energy consumption is proportional to the path length taken by the robot. The proposed approach is demonstrated using an n-Omino-based robot named Smorphi, which has square-shaped omino blocks with holonomic locomotion and the ability to change from monomino to tetromino. Three different simulated environments are used to find the optimal morphologies of Smorphi using three metaheuristic optimization techniques, namely, MOEA/D, OMOPSO, and HypE. The results of the study show that the morphology produced by this approach is energy efficient, minimizing energy consumption and maximizing area coverage. Furthermore, the HypE algorithm is identified as more efficient for generating optimal morphology as it took less time to converge than the other two algorithms.

Area and energy efficient shift and accumulator unit for object detection in IoT applications

Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) exhibit significant performance enhancements in several machine learning tasks such as surveillance, intelligent transportation, smart grids and healthcare systems. With the proliferation of physical things being connected to internet and enabled with sensory capabilities to form an Internet of Thing (IoT) network, it is increasingly important to run CNN inference, a computationally intensive application, on the resource constrained IoT devices. Object detection is a fundamental computer vision problem that provides information for image understanding in several artificial intelligence (AI) applications in smart cities. Among various object detection algorithms, CNN has emerged as a new paradigm to improve the overall performance. The Multiply-accumulate (MAC) operations, which are used repeatedly in the convolution layers of CNN, hold extreme computational complexity. Hence, the overall computational workloads and their respective energy consumption of any CNN applications are on the rise. To overcome these escalating challenges, approximate computing mechanism has played a vital role in reducing power and area of computation intensive CNN applications. In this paper, we have designed an approximate MAC architecture, termed Shift and Accumulator Unit (SAC), for the error-resilient CNN based object detection algorithm targeting embedded platforms. The proposed computing unit deliberately trades accuracy to reduce design complexity and power consumption, thus suiting the resource constrained IoT devices. The pipeline architecture of the SAC unit saves approximately 1.8× clock cycles than the non-pipeline SAC architecture. The performance evaluation shows that the proposed computing unit has better energy efficiency and resource utilization than the accurate multiplier and state-of-the-art approximate multipliers without noticeable deterioration in overall performance.

Effects of compensating the temperature coefficient of frequency with the acoustic reflector layers on the overall performance of solidly mounted resonators

Thin film acoustic wave resonator based devices require compensation of temperature coefficient of frequency (TCF) in many applications. This work presents the design and fabrication of temperature compensated solidly mounted resonators (SMRs). The characteristics of each material of the layered structure have an effect on the device TCF but depending on the relative position with respect to the piezoelectric material in the stack. The influence of material properties of the different layers composing the device on the TCF is discussed in detail. TCF behavior simulation is done with Mason’s model and, to take into account the deterioration of overall performance due to the finite lateral size and shape of the resonator, we have used 2D and 3D finite element modelling of the resonators. The overall behavior of the device for external loads is predicted. SMRs are designed according to simulations and fabricated with different configurations to obtain TCF as near to zero as possible with an optimized response. Resonators are made by depositing Mo/AlN/Mo piezoelectric stacks on acoustic reflectors. As reflector materials, conductive W and insulating WOx films have been used as high acoustic impedance materials. SiO2 films are used as low acoustic impedance material.

Endoscopic Horizon Stabilization in Natural Orifice Translumenal Endoscopic Surgery

Spatial orientation in natural orifice translumenal endoscopic surgery (NOTES) has been identified as a potential barrier to clinical application. We aim to evaluate a triaxial inertial sensor and software that automatically corrects any movements on the roll axis of the flexible endoscope, allowing for stabilization of the image horizon during NOTES operations in a randomized controlled trial. A total of 18 participants (11 surgeons/7 gastroenterologists) performed a transgastric task in the ELITE simulator, which included navigation to the appendix and gallbladder, diathermy of the appendix base and gallbladder fossa, and clipping of the cystic duct using a single-channel gastroscope. Each participant performed the task twice with randomization to horizon stabilization occurring at the second attempt. The primary end point was change in overall performance (time taken and errors made) between the first and second attempt, and secondary end points were absolute performances in the second attempt and subjective evaluation. Without horizon stabilization, there was a median improvement of 42.4% in time taken and 38% in number of errors made from the first to the second attempt; however, with the software turned on, there was a statistically significant deterioration of 4.9% (P = .038) in time taken and an increase in errors made of 183% (P = ns). Although the software corrects the view to that preferred during surgery, the endoscopic control mechanism as well as the exit point of the instrument are altered in this process, leading to a deterioration of overall performance. Potential solutions include deploying intermittent horizon stabilization or using a robotic interface to achieve fully aligned perceptual-motor control.

Microbial response and elimination capacity in biofilters subjected to high toluene loadings

Elimination capacity (EC) is frequently used as a performance and design criterion for vapor-phase biofilters without further verification of the microbial quantity and activity. This study was conducted to investigate how biofilters respond to high pollutant loadings and ultimately how this affects the EC of the biofilter. Two identical laboratory-scale biofilters were maintained at an initial toluene loading rate of 46 g m-3 h-1 for a period of 24 days. After the initial biofilm development stage, the loading rates were increased to 91 g m-3 h-1 and 137 g m-3 h-1, respectively. Following a short period of pseudo-steady state, toluene removal efficiencies rapidly declined in both biofilters, with a concurrent decline in both critical and maximum ECs. The decline was mainly due to deterioration in the biodegradation activity of the biofilm and a decline in the toluene-degrading bacterial population within the biofilm phase. The findings imply that high toluene loadings accelerated the deterioration in overall performance due to a rapid accumulation of inactive biomass. As a result, care must be used when relying on EC values for biofilter design and operational purposes, since the values do not appropriately reflect the temporal changes in biodegradation activity and active biomass quantities that can occur in biofilters subjected to high inlet loadings.

Nutritional evaluation of soya beans (glycine max): Nitrogen balance and fractionation studies

AbstractThe poor nutritional performance of rats fed raw soya‐bean‐containing diets appeared to be due to reduced apparent digestion and absorption of dietary protein, coupled to changes in systemic metabolism leading to a poor overall nitrogen balance. Aqueous heat treatment greatly reduced but did not eliminate the antinutritional effect. Heat treatment with aqueous ethanol was more effective. The whey protein (pH 4.8 soluble extract) fraction contained the bulk of the trypsin inhibitor and haemagglutination activity and gave the poorest net protein utilisation value. However, an eight‐fold increase in trypsin inhibitor content did not significantly effect apparent nitrogen digestibility. Therefore inhibition of gut proteolytic enzyme activity in vivo by soya bean trypsin inhibitors did not account fully for the poor nutritional performance. The problems elicited by soya bean are not transitory and thus there was a cumulative deterioration in overall performance for 16 weeks as a result of continuous exposure to soya bean.

The dehydrocyclization-controlling site in bifunctional reforming catalysts

Bifunctional catalysts which contain Pt or Pt and a second metal supported on an acidic carrier such as y-Al203 are widely used in the catalytic reforming of petroleum naphtha. In the classical scheme of bifunctional catalysis proposed by Mills et al. [I], the metal function catalyzes (dejhydrogenation reactions of paraffins into olefins and naphthenes into aromatics while the acid function catalyzes skeletal rearrangements of olefins. Such a scheme gives a good qualitative description of the macroscopic phenomena observed in catalytic reforming. However, the reality is known to be much more complex. The metal function alone can catalyze hydrogenolysis, closure and opening of fiveand six-membered rings, and dehydrocyclization as well as isomerization [2]. Similarly, the acid function can catalyze isomerization, ring opening, ring closure and ring enlargement. reactions. It has also been found that. dihydrogen dissociatively adsorbed on the Pt function can volatilize some of the coke on the acid function, presumably by spillover of adsorbed H atoms [3]. So, a myriad of reactions occur on the surface of a bifunctional reforming catalyst. In some of these reactions, the reacting species uses only one type of site during its residence on the surface, while in others it seems to shuttle between two different types of sites. If, during time-on-stream, one catalyst function is poisoned preferentially, the deterioration in overall performance will depend on the quantitative contribution of this particular function to the overall conversion. In the extreme case where the multiplicative product of the number of sites and the turnover frequency for function A is several orders of magnitude larger than that for function B, a partial poisoning of B will result in a proportional decrease of the overall conversion for all reactions involving B, while a similar poisoning of A will have little or no effect on these reactions. In the light of these considerations, it is of interest to know which one of the two functions, acid or metal, is the critical function of a reforming catalyst. Contradictory claims exist in the literature. It has been reported that (i) coking of the acid function controls deactivation [4], (ii) coking of the metal function controls deactivation [5], (iii) coking of both functions may be important in controlling deactivation [6],