• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.6 no.4
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• pp.298-306
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• 1997

Ultrasonic sensors are widely used in various applications due to advantages of low cost, simplicity in construction, mechanical robustness, and little environmental restriction in usage. But the main purposes of the noncontact sensors are rather narrowly confined within object detection and distance measurement. For the application of object recognition, ultrasonic sensors exhibit several shortcomings of poor directionality which results in low spatial resolution of an object, and specularity which gives frequent erroneous range readings. To resolve these problems in object recognition, an array of the sensors has been used. To improve the spatial resolution, more number of sensors are used in essence throughout the various devices of the sensor arrays. Under the disguise of a fixed number of the sensors, the array can be shifted mechanically in several steps. In this paper we propose a practical sensor resolution enhancement method using an electronic circuit accompanying the sensor array. The circuit changes the transmitter output voltage in several steps. Using the known sensor characteristics, a set of different return echo signals provide enhanced spatial resolution. The improvement is obtained without the cost of the increased number of the sensors nor extra mechanical devices.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.7 no.7
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• pp.15-25
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• 2020

This empirical research aims to identify the relationship between fiscal and financial macroeconomic fundamentals and the volatility of government bonds' borrowing cost in an emerging country - Vietnam. The study covers the period from July 2006 to December 2019 and it is based on a sample of 1-year, 3-year, and 5-year government bonds, which represent short-term, medium-term and long-term sovereign bonds in Vietnam, respectively. The Generalized AutoRegressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH) model and its derivatives such as EGARCH and TGARCH are applied on monthly dataset to examine and suggest a significant effect of fiscal and financial determinants of bond yield volatility. The findings of this study indicate that the variation of Vietnam government bond yields is in compliance with the theories of term structure of interest rate. The results also show that a proportion of the variation in the yields on Vietnam government bonds is attributed to the interest rate itself in the previous period, base rate, foreign interest rate, return of the stock market, fiscal deficit, public debt, and current account balance. Our results could be helpful in the macroeconomic policy formulation for policy-makers and in the investment practice for investors regarding the prediction of bond yield volatility.

• Journal of Forest and Environmental Science
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.35-41
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• 2009

Agroforestry combines agriculture and forestry technologies to create more integrated, diverse, productive, profitable, healthy and sustainable land-use systems. This study was performed in three union of Chhagalnaiya Upazila (Sub-district; administrative entity) under Feni district, Southern Bangladesh with a view to identify the tree resources, utilization pattern and economic return of major fruit and timber tree species. Information collected from a total of 45 households ranging from marginal, small, medium and large categories. Number of plant species increased with the increase of homestead area. A total of 39 plant species were recorded from the homegarden, of which 23 were fruit and 16 were timber tree species. Considerable number of vegetables was also planted under the shade of the homestead trees. The investment analysis showed that average benefit-cost ratios were greater than one, net present values were positive and internal rate of returns were more than 10%. Long term investment on horticulture and timber tree species is highly profitable if species like Swietenia mahagoni and Tectona grandis, Spondias pinnata, Syzygium cumini and Areca catechu were planted.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.7 no.8
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• pp.695-704
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• 2020

Bitcoin and other prominent cryptocurrencies have gained much attention since the last several years. Globally known as digital coin and virtual currency, this cryptocurrency is gained and traded within the blockchain system. The blockchain technology adopted in using the cryptocurrency has raised the eyebrows within the banking sector, government, stakeholders and individual investors. The rise of the cryptocurrency within this decade since the inception of Bitcoin in 2009 has taken the market by storm. Cryptocurrency is anticipated as the future currency that might replace the current paper currency worldwide. Even though the interest has caught the attention of users, many are not aware of its opportunities, drawbacks and challenges for the future. Researches on cryptocurrencies are still lacking and still at its infancy stage. In providing substantial guide and view to the academic field and users, this paper will discuss the opportunities in the cryptocurrency such as the security of its technology, low transaction cost and high investment return. The originality of this paper is on the discussion within law and regulation, high energy consumption, possibility of crash and bubble, and attacks on network. The future undertakings of cryptocurrency and its application will be systematically reviewed in this paper.

• Asian Journal of Business Environment
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.35-44
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• 2022

Purpose: The main purpose of this study is to find out the impact of ownership structure on firm performance in the pharmaceutical and chemical industry of Bangladesh. Research design, data and methodology: The study has been conducted on 28 listed pharmaceutical and chemical companies from 2012 to 2020. Return on Assets (ROA) and Tobin's Q are selected as indicators of internal and market performance of the firms respectively whereas institutional ownership, directors' ownership and foreign ownership are selected as proxies of ownership structure. Panel analysis using random effects, lag method and time dummy method is used to analyse the relationship. Results: The study has found the existence of highly concentrated directors' ownership, a low percentage of institutional ownership and a very insignificant proportion of foreign ownership in the industry. The regression results show that directors' ownership has a positive and significant impact on firm performance, supporting the concept of agency theory. The study has also found a positive and significant impact of foreign ownership on firm performance. Unfortunately, the impact of institutional ownership is found to be insignificant. Conclusions: Directors' ownership and foreign ownership decreases agency cost that ultimately increases firm performance. However, the role of institutional investors is not significant enough to improve firm performance. It is suggested that institutional investors should be more active and involved in monitoring the activities of the organisations to improve performance.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.61-68
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• 2017

This study investigates the differences in medical practices and medical cost according to auto insurance companies based on 8,589,602 cases that were treated by auto insurance corporation for the year of 2015, from the beginning of January to the end of December. The results of this study can be summarized following. First, in terms of the general characteristic in medical treatment, especially the age, the highest figure in both non-life insurance and mutual aid cooperative was shown in the age of 50 to 59 at 22.8 per cent(p<0.001). Second, in terms of a medical cost per a hospital care, classified by clinic, the costs in the department of internal medicine were much higher than those in the surgical department, and the thoracic surgery among parts of the surgical department showed the highest figures in both non-life insurance and mutual aid cooperative. According to the above summarized results of this study, it can be concluded that Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service has to address the problem on the increase of unnecessary costs and the occurrence of social expenses caused by the delay of patients' rehabilitation and return to their daily lives, by carrying out the evaluation for the appropriateness to organizations that ask for payments of auto insurance.

• Proceedings of the Korea Electromagnetic Engineering Society Conference
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• 2005.11a
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• pp.371-374
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• 2005

This paper presents the design and fabrication of a cost effective and broad band 8$\times$8 stacked patch array antenna which are backed by a metal cavity operating at 400Hz based on 4 layers LTCC technology. Gain of antenna can be enhanced by using a metal cavity, which can be easily implemented by using LTCC substrates and vias. The broadband performance can be obtained by varying the dimension of patch and the number of layers. Furthermore, to keep the feeding network as smal1 as possible and reduce radiation from feeding network a mirrored patch orientation and embedded micro strip line are adopted, The fabricated antenna is $40\times45\times0.4$ $mm^3$in size. It shows gain 20.4dBi, beam width 10.7deg and impedance bandwidth of l0dE return loss 3.35GHz (40.9$\sim$44.25 GHz), which is about 8% of a center frequency.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.56-61
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• 2005

Economic feasibility for retrofitting the wet bottom ash handling system to the dry system in a existing 500MW${\times}$2 units pulverized coal thermal power plant in Korea was studied. Replacing to the dry system requires the initial capital costs of 13,415,127,000\, and saves the operating costs of 935,345,000\ per year. Economic analyses based on these results showed that the initial capital cost would not be recovered within the service life of the facilities at the interest rate of 10%, and the internal rate of return of 5.6% were obtained. Thus, the retrofitting to the dry system was not economically favorable in the current condition. However, the retrofitting would be profitable when the ash disposal cost and ash selling price were increased over 15,000\/MT or 17,000\/MT, respectively.

• Journal of Construction Engineering and Project Management
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.41-46
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• 2014

Indian Construction industry is large, volatile, and requires tremendous capital outlays. Typically, the work offers low rates of return in relation to the amount of risk involved. A unique element of risk in the industry is the manner in which disputes and claims are woven through the fibre of the construction process. Delay is generally acknowledged as the most common, costly, complex and risky problem encountered in construction projects. Because of the overriding importance of time for both the Owner and the Contractor, it is the source of frequent disputes and claims leading to lawsuits. The growing rate of delays is adversely affecting the timely delivery of construction projects. Presently construction industries are facing a lot of problems, considering that a paper assess construction stakeholder's perception to the causes of delays and its effects on project delivery. And also one case study is considered in this paper to elicit responses from construction stakeholders. The primary aim of this paper is to identify the perceptions of the different parties regarding causes of delays, the allocation of responsibilities and the types of delays, and method of minimizing the construction delays.

• International Journal of Quality Innovation
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.137-153
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• 2007

Failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA) is a preventive technique in reliability management field. The successful implementation of FMEA technique can avoid or reduce the probability of system failure and achieve good product quality. The FMEA technique had applied in vest scopes which include aerospace, automatic, electronic, mechanic and service industry. The marking process is one of the back ends testing process that is the final process in semiconductor process. The marking process failure can cause bad final product quality and return although is not a primary process. So, how to improve the quality of marking process is one of important production job for semiconductor testing factory. This research firstly implements FMEA technique in laser marking process improvement on semiconductor testing factory and finds out which subsystem has priority failure risk. Secondly, a CCD position solution for priority failure risk subsystem is provided and evaluated. According analysis result, FMEA and CCD position implementation solution for laser marking process improvement can increase yield rate and reduce production cost. Implementation method of this research can provide semiconductor testing factory for reference in laser marking process improvement.