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The purpose of this paper is to identify the ideal process parameters to be set for the drilling of hybrid fibre-reinforced polymer (FRP) (kenaf and banana) composite using High-Speed Steel drill bits (5, 10, 15 mm) coated with tungsten carbide by means of statistical reproduction of the delamination factor and machining force using Taguchi–Grey Relational Analysis.

The contemplated process parameters are Feed, Speed and Drill Diameter. The trials were carried out by taking advantage of the L-27 factorial design by Taguchi. Three factors, the three level Taguchi Orthogonal Array design in Grey Relational Analysis was used to carry out the trial study. Video Measuring System was used to identify the damage around the drill region. “Minitab 18” was used to examine the data collected by taking advantage of the various statistical and graphical tools available. Examination of variance is used to legitimize the model in identifying the most notable parameter.

The optimised set of input parameters were found out successfully which are as follows: Feed Rate: 450 mm/min, Cutting Speed: 3,000 rpm and Drill Diameter of 5 mm. When these values are fed in as input the optimised output is being obtained. From ANOVA analysis, it is apparent that the Speed (contribution of 92.6%) is the most influencing parameter on the delamination factor and machining force of the FRP material.

Optimization of process parameters on drilling of natural fibres reinforced in epoxy resin matrices using Taguchi–Grey Relational Analysis has not been previously explored.

Bantul in Central Java was the most severely damaged area by a devastating earthquake in May 2006. Even after being victims themselves, nurses and midwives at public health centers worked devotedly. The purpose of this paper is to identify the nurses’ and midwives’ perceptions and understanding of their roles, as well as the needs of training in disaster preparedness and management.

Focus group discussions and questionnaire survey were conducted with 11 nurses and 11 midwives of public health centers in Bantul. Content analysis was applied to analyze transcripts of the focus group discussions and the responses to questionnaire.

Health care for survivors and community were provided by highly committed health professionals supported in strong community resilience. Donors driven relief programs tended to be unorganized and insensitive for local health providers. Besides, organized disaster management trainings are strongly needed to develop disaster nursing and preparedness.

Embedded problems of local health system and current nursing practice were highlighted.

Focus group discussions provided vital information that can and must be used to improve disaster response capabilities. Moreover, it was equally it is crucial to examine carefully what unfolded during post-disaster intervention.

This paper aims to investigate the forces that influence the shifting of professional boundaries on the entry of a new medical occupation in Dutch hospitals – non‐specialist emergency physicians.

Five case studies of Dutch hospitals were conducted and the emergency physicians' implementation process was analyzed by means of force field analysis.

Emergency physicians were conceptualized as being the answer to unequivocal contextual changes. However, their contribution to better performance varies due to problems in the implementation process. Strong socio‐political forces between traditional specialties and these new doctors mediate the intended improvement. The emergency physicians aim to establish their own organizational‐, patient‐ and knowledge‐domain by redrawing professional boundaries but they are not on a par with the specialists who set these boundaries. Consequently, emergency physicians only gradually redraw the existing boundaries, resulting in limited added value. Their reaction is to obtain power by striving to develop into a recognized specialty; ironically, by becoming an additional layer in the traditional medical hierarchy they might lose their envisaged added value.

This paper is based on the first Dutch hospitals that implemented emergency physicians. The number of cases is therefore limited. Moreover, the study took place at an early stage of emergency physician implementation.

The extent of successful redrawing depends on the implementation's transition logic, the existing degree of differentiation and boundary permeability and on the ideological power developed by the leaders.

The introduction of emergency physicians is currently being discussed in many countries worldwide, and some countries consider following the Dutch example of non‐specialist doctors. This paper supports health professionals and hospital managers in not falling prey to the same pitfalls as some Dutch hospitals.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a theoretical framework for renewable energy (RE) technology commercialization and partnership synergy. The interrelations/influences between external/internal factors, stakeholders’ partnership synergy, and resources in the form of dynamic capabilities and implementation mechanisms are used in this framework to explore the path toward overcoming non-technical barriers for RE technologies commercialization success.

Prior relevant research/literature is reviewed to derive the proposed theoretical framework constructs, while insight information on relationship between them is gained through case study methodology. The results of four case studies along with 16 validity/checkpoint interviews were used to support/reject 25 propositions linking the constructs.

The findings of the study supported 24 out of 25 propositions representing these relations, whereas one was rejected. The framework suggests that partnership synergy, if achieved, produces a unique internal and external resource combination that will result in successful technology commercialization.

This study is limited to RE technologies and did not focus individually on non-technical barriers. Future research may extend into other industries and explore the impact of partnership synergy on each non-technical barrier of technology commercialization.

Due to absence of economic theory of synergy there is a gap in academic literature regarding partnership between stakeholders of innovative technologies, the level of its synergy and their relation to successful commercialization. The study attempts to fill this gap to some extent through the produced theoretical framework, which might also help a broad array of RE projects’ participants maximize the returns by realizing full advantage of collaboration with other stakeholders.

This paper aims to present an effective approach to integrated circuit (IC) throughput enhancement, called TΔT thermal control. It does not require any micro-architectural change of the IC. The only modification is the attachment of an additional temperature sensor at the heatsink boundary. TΔT control technique enables assessment of changes in the dimension of cooling conditions and quick reaction to the dynamic changes in the surrounding environment. As a result, the chip can operate flexibly while minimizing thermal violation.

Using additional knowledge about the surroundings, the on-chip temperature is regulated. The approach is first investigated theoretically. To validate the utilized thermal model, the measured temperature values of the designed and fabricated testing device are compared with the simulated one. The authors evaluated the impact of the additional sensor location on the reaction time (RT). Using the Spice model, further investigation helps to verify the hypothesis.

The control technique described in this paper showed that the temperature of the chip can be regulated using an additional knowledge of the surrounding environment. It has also been demonstrated that the attachment of an additional temperature sensor close to the cooled surface of the package enables TΔT thermal control technique to react faster (rapid powering up/down of the IC). Therefore, this lowers the risk of shutdown while keeping the temperature close to the thermal limit (the maximal temperature of the chip) for a significant period. The simulation results showed that a higher ambient temperature leads to diminution of the interval in which the on-chip temperature stays almost constant when TΔT technique is used (time shift).

In this study, a new thermal throttling technique that uses the full physical ability of the chip operating under thermal constraint has been evaluated.

The aim of this paper is to define pracademia and conceptualise it in relation to educational contexts. This paper contributes to and stimulates a continuing and evolving conversation around pracademia and its relevance, role and possibilities.

This paper is a conceptual exploration. It draws upon existing and emerging pieces of literature, the use of metaphor as a meaning-making tool, and the positionalities of the authors, to develop the concept of pracademia.

The authors posit that pracademics who simultaneously straddle the worlds of practice, policy, and academia embody new possibilities as boundary spanners in the field of education for knowledge mobilization, networks, community membership, and responding to systemic challenges. However, being a pracademic requires the constant reconciling of the demands of multi-membership and ultimately, pracademics must establish sufficient legitimacy to be respected in two or more currently distinct worlds.

This paper has implications for knowledge mobilization, networks, boundary spanners, leadership, professional learning, and connecting practice, policy, and research. While the authors are in the field of education, this exploration of pracademia is relevant not only to the field of education but also to other fields in which there is a clear need to connect practice/policy with scholarship.

This paper provides a new definition of pracademia and argues that pracademia identifies an important yet relatively unknown space with many possibilities in the field of education.

This paper aims to demonstrate the complex inter-relationship of non-technical barriers involved in the implementation of decentralised energy (DE) projects. To meet its ambitious 2050 target of 80 per cent carbon emission reduction, the UK needs to increase dramatically the wider uptake of DE systems. Many examples exist internationally of DE systems leading to enhanced carbon emissions reductions, including systems based not only on technological but also on more innovative policy, financial and social-economic approaches.

Following semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders and thematic analysis with NVivo8, four exemplar international DE case studies have been investigated.

The main non-technical barriers were not necessarily financial, as is often believed; governance barriers, such as out-of-date regulations or unreliable partners, can also play a critical role in a project’s success or failure. Social barriers such as public apathy and misinformation often affect a project’s operation. It is further hypothesised that non-technical barriers are often shaped by personal and/or organisational values related to consumption, abundance, trust and control. Finally, recommendations are provided on overcoming these barriers with regards replicating similar DE projects in the UK context.

A systematic perspective is presented, which takes into account the possible interactions between the various barriers and demonstrates that to remove some of these barriers, it is important to understand and account for their varied and interconnected nature.

This study aims to explore the level of independence among persons with disabilities (PWDs) towards their use of public buildings’ facilities, as well as assess the anxiety and relevant challenges regarding such use.

In a cross-sectional survey design, 91 consenting PWDs were recruited via purposive sampling at diverse locations and invited to complete self-report questionnaires on their use of public buildings’ facilities.

Only 19 PWDs (20.9%) were able to independently use such facilities. The participants’ level of anxiety, observed to be mostly severe (41.7%), was significantly associated with sex and affected body region (p < 0.05). Most PWDs identified “lack of amenities” (85.7%), “inconvenience” (78%) and “safety issues” (59.4%) as relevant challenges towards the use of public buildings’ facilities.

This research emphasises the urgent need to universally improve PWDs’ level of independence towards the use of public buildings’ facilities alongside eradicating anxiety and challenges experienced towards such use. Accessibility ought to be promoted among PWDs, with specific attention given to women and those affected in multiple body regions; as such populations are prone to experiencing substantial anxiety. This approach should entail the provision of barrier-free facilities as well as ensuring their safe and convenient use by PWDs.

This study sought and provided key feedback from PWDs on the current built environment, which ought to be considered by relevant stakeholders to improve accessibility, promote well-being and contribute towards meeting the global goals of reducing inequality and making cities/communities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.

Persons with disabilities (PwD) are generally less likely to be employed than the general population. The paper aims to investigate whether access to assistive technologies (AT) impacts labour force participation in the disabled population.

The study utilises the nationally representative survey on disability in India conducted in 2018 through multi-stage sampling by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MOSPI), Government of India. The instrumental variable (IV) approach has been employed to infer causality between AT and labour market participation.

The study found that the labour force participation rate (LFPR) in India amongst the disabled population was 29% in the age group of 15–65 years in 2017–2018, as compared to 52% in the general population. Around two-thirds of the PwD respondents who were advised to acquire aid appliances acquired them, implying limited access to AT. The probability of LFPR in disabled population increases by 26.6% with access to AT particularly in urban areas.

Persistent issues such as lack of adequate amenities, poor literacy and a lack of vocational skills need to be addressed to improve labour market outcomes for the disabled population in rural areas.

Despite its role in promoting distributive justice and inclusive development, research on equity gaps in access to AT and its impact on labour market outcomes is scant. This is the first paper that provides empirical evidence on the impact of access to AT on LFPR in the context of low- and middle-income countries.

The aim of the study is to show that merging two areas of mathematics – topology and discrete optimization – could result in a viable option to solve classical or specialized integer problems.

In the paper, discrete topology concepts are applied to propose a metaheuristic algorithm that is capable to solve binary programming problems. Particularly, some of the homotopy for paths principles are used to explore the solution space associated with four well-known NP-hard problems herein considered as follows: knapsack, set covering, bi-level single plant location with order and one-max.

Computational experimentation confirms that the proposed algorithm performs in an effective manner, and it is able to efficiently solve the sets of instances used for the benchmark. Moreover, the performance of the proposed algorithm is compared with a standard genetic algorithm (GA), a scatter search (SS) method and a memetic algorithm (MA). Acceptable results are obtained for all four implemented metaheuristics, but the path homotopy algorithm stands out.

A novel metaheuristic is proposed for the first time. It uses topology concepts to design an algorithmic framework to solve binary programming problems in an effective and efficient manner.