Showing papers by "Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur published in 2020"
TL;DR: The study presents specific cases for biomedical waste, plastic waste, and food waste management - all of which have been a major cause of concern during this crisis and suggests some key recommendations to the policymakers to help handle probable future pandemics if any holistically.
Abstract: The crisis brought upon by the COVID-19 pandemic has altered global waste generation dynamics and therefore has necessitated special attention. The unexpected fluctuations in waste composition and quantity also require a dynamic response from policymakers. This study highlights the challenges faced by the solid waste management sector during the pandemic and the underlying opportunities to fill existing loopholes in the system. The study presents specific cases for biomedical waste, plastic waste, and food waste management - all of which have been a major cause of concern during this crisis. Further, without active citizen participation and cooperation, commingled virus-laden biomedical waste with the regular solid waste stream pose significant negative health and safety issues to sanitation workers. Single-use plastic usage is set to bounce back due to growing concerns of hygiene, particularly from products used for personal protection and healthcare purposes. It is expected that household food waste generation may reduce due to increased conscious buying of more non-perishable items during lockdown and due to concerns of food shortage. However, there is a chance of increase in food waste from the broken supply chains such as food items getting stuck on road due to restriction in vehicle movements, lack of workers in the warehouse for handling the food products, etc. The study also stresses the need for building localized resilient supply chains to counter such situations during future pandemics. While offering innovative solutions to existing waste management challenges, the study also suggests some key recommendations to the policymakers to help handle probable future pandemics if any holistically.
440 citations
TL;DR: A detailed review of how renewable biomass can be effectively used to produce renewable energy by improving their inherent inferior characteristics is provided in this paper, which highlights bottlenecks that constrain the deployment of renewable energy using hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) methods.
Abstract: The energy demand of the world is expected to reach 739 quadrillions BTU in 2040, which therefore demand for exploring more alternative source of renewable energy. Waste biomass though vast in reserve for generating renewable energy has its own downside. High moisture, fibrous nature, high bulk volume, hydrophilic nature and low calorific value are some of the inferior quality of waste biomass which creates bottleneck for easy renewable energy generation. Pre-treatment of biomass to overcome these challenges has created a new research interest. Among the treatment options available, the hydrothermal carbonization (HTC) method, which can process wet waste has become the most preferred choice among researchers recently. The HTC eliminates energy-intensive pre-drying process needed for other treatment methods such as pyrolysis, dry torrefaction and incineration. Through this article, we attempt to provide a detailed review of how renewable biomass can be effectively used to produce renewable energy by improving their inherent inferior characteristics. The review also highlights bottlenecks that constrain the deployment of renewable energy using HTC methods. The scope of further research direction is well identified in this review. The paper also present recent advancements which are filling the knowledge gap of HTC technology that were there earlier. Critical analysis of microwave assisted HTC and conventional heated HTC is also presented in this review. The analysis in this paper reveals that biomass is a valuable resource, and should be explored to take advantage of its renewable energy generation potential. The HTC method of biomass upgradation improves transport, storage and fuel characteristics by improving grindability, pellets durability, hydrophobicity, energy density, combustion behaviour and calorific value, and also helps in improving the environmental performance of solid fuel produced. Despite the fact that the technology is in the early stage of development and there still exist knowledge gap and shortcomings, the vast literature reviewed suggests that it has a potential of being future technology. Therefore, it needs further investigation which should fill existing shortcoming of the technology.
232 citations
TL;DR: The remarkable Adsorption capacities with higher reusability characteristics for adsorption of organic pollutants as well as inorganic heavy metals entrusts this activated biochar as a potential cost-effective adsorbent to mitigate water pollution issue.
213 citations
Stanford University1, Goddard Space Flight Center2, University of Reading3, University of Sheffield4, University College London5, American University6, Indian Institute of Engineering Science and Technology, Shibpur7, Kiepenheuer Institut für Sonnenphysik8, University of Freiburg9, Virginia Tech10, Oklahoma Baptist University11, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur12, The Catholic University of America13, Microsoft14, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies15, Trinity College, Dublin16, Google17, Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute18, University of Oslo19, Marshall Space Flight Center20, Harvard University21, National University of Singapore22
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors proposed a solar physics division of the American Astronomical Society (AAS) Division of Astronomy Division of the University of Washington (U.W.
Abstract: NSFNational Science Foundation (NSF) [AST-1715122]; DIRAC Institute in the Department of Astronomy at the University of Washington; STFC studentshipScience & Technology Facilities Council (STFC) [ST/N504336/1]; STFC grantScience & Technology Facilities Council (STFC) [ST/N000692/1]; Google; NumFocus; Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society; Space program
206 citations
TL;DR: The final issue advocates the transition of CDFT from an interpretative to a predictive mode; this is of utmost importance for promoting CDFT as a viable alternative to wave function-based methods for the practicing chemist.
Abstract: This paper results from a round table discussion at the CCTC2018 Conference in Changsha City, Hunan, China, in December 2018. It presents a report on the status, prospects, and issues of conceptual density functional theory (CDFT). After a short exposition on the history of CDFT, its fundamentals, philosophy, and successes are highlighted. Then ten issues for reflection on the future of conceptual DFT are formulated and discussed, ending with one or more summarizing statements on the present status of various concepts/principles/practices and proposed directions for future research. The issues include the further analysis of the energy functional, E[N,v], extended to include effects of temperature, solvent, and mechanical forces, basic requirements for physically acceptable response functions as reactivity descriptors, the use of the grand canonical ensemble, the relevance of CDFT for chemical kinetics and thermodynamics, the domain of validity of CDFT-based principles, the combination of CDFT with reaction path calculations, information-theoretic descriptors, and the treatment of excited states and time dependence. The final issue advocates the transition of CDFT from an interpretative to a predictive mode; we believe this is of utmost importance for promoting CDFT as a viable alternative to wave function-based methods for the practicing chemist, a separate issue treated in the final section.
200 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors describe the high overpotential, stability, and selectivity in the use of a stable catalyst for the conversion of carbon dioxide into selective hydrocarbons.
Abstract: Conversion of carbon dioxide into selective hydrocarbon using a stable catalyst remains a holy grail in the catalysis community. The high overpotential, stability, and selectivity in the use of a s...
198 citations
194 citations
Shri Guru Gobind Singhji Institute of Engineering and Technology1, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston2, Nike3, University of Oklahoma4, Sungkyunkwan University5, University of North Carolina at Charlotte6, Shandong Normal University7, Virginia Tech8, University at Buffalo9, University of Debrecen10, Zhejiang University11, University of Alberta12, National University of Singapore13, Shanghai Jiao Tong University14, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur15, University of Porto16, University of Florida17, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill18, French Institute of Health and Medical Research19, Universiti Teknologi Petronas20
TL;DR: The set-up and results of this challenge that is primarily based on Indian Diabetic Retinopathy Image Dataset (IDRiD), which received a positive response from the scientific community, have the potential to enable new developments in retinal image analysis and image-based DR screening in particular.
169 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors analyzed the determinants of renewable energy consumption in the panel data of 30 OECD countries for the period from 1970 to 2015 and found that a higher level of economic globalization promotes renewable energy.
165 citations
TL;DR: This paper is uniquely worked upon to review the different literature which brought all the discussions from the past including the recent innovations in assessing the freshness of different fishes with the help of various indicators as well as a complete study of spoilage and toxicity mechanism leading to deterioration in quality.
151 citations
20 Apr 2020
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigate the problem of fair recommendation in the context of two-sided online platforms, comprising customers on one side and producers on the other, and propose FairRec algorithm to guarantee at least Maximin Share (MMS) of exposure for most of the producers and Envy-Free up to One Good (EF1) fairness for every customer.
Abstract: We investigate the problem of fair recommendation in the context of two-sided online platforms, comprising customers on one side and producers on the other. Traditionally, recommendation services in these platforms have focused on maximizing customer satisfaction by tailoring the results according to the personalized preferences of individual customers. However, our investigation reveals that such customer-centric design may lead to unfair distribution of exposure among the producers, which may adversely impact their well-being. On the other hand, a producer-centric design might become unfair to the customers. Thus, we consider fairness issues that span both customers and producers. Our approach involves a novel mapping of the fair recommendation problem to a constrained version of the problem of fairly allocating indivisible goods. Our proposed FairRec algorithm guarantees at least Maximin Share (MMS) of exposure for most of the producers and Envy-Free up to One Good (EF1) fairness for every customer. Extensive evaluations over multiple real-world datasets show the effectiveness of FairRec in ensuring two-sided fairness while incurring a marginal loss in the overall recommendation quality.
TL;DR: This paper introduces a blockchain-based access control scheme in the IoD environment that allows secure communication among the drones, and also among therones and the G S S and provides all sorts of security analysis including formal security under the random oracle model, informal security and simulation-based formal security verification.
TL;DR: The results suggest the existence of cointegration between CO2 emissions and its determinants, and suggest policy prescriptions by using financial development and R&D expenditures as the key tools to meet the emissions target.
03 Jul 2020
TL;DR: The COVID-19 outbreak due to SARS-CoV-2 has raised several concerns for its high transmission rate and unavailability of any treatment to date Although major routes of its transmission involve respiratory droplets and direct contact, the infection through faecal matter is also possible.
Abstract: The COVID-19 outbreak due to SARS-CoV-2 has raised several concerns for its high transmission rate and unavailability of any treatment to date Although major routes of its transmission involve respiratory droplets and direct contact, the infection through faecal matter is also possible Conventional sewage treatment methods with disinfection are expected to eradicate SARS-CoV-2 However, for densely populated countries like India with lower sewage treatment facilities, chances of contamination are extremely high; as SARS-CoVs can survive up to several days in untreated sewage; even for a much longer period in low-temperature regions With around 18 billion people worldwide using faecal-contaminated source as drinking water, the risk of transmission of COVID-19 is expected to increase by several folds, if proper precautions are not being taken Therefore, preventing water pollution at the collection/distribution/consumption point along with proper implementation of WHO recommendations for plumbing/ventilation systems in household is crucial for resisting COVID-19 eruption
01 Nov 2020
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the effect of socio-demographic characteristics of the travelers on the mode-specific trip frequencies before (January 2020) and during the early stages of COVID-19 spread in India (March 2020).
Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in unprecedented changes in the activity patterns and travel behaviour around the world. Some of these behavioural changes are in response to restrictive measures imposed by the Government (e.g. full or partial lock-downs), while others are driven by perceptions of own safety and/or commitment to slow down the spread (e.g. during the preceding and following period of a lock-down). Travel behaviour amidst the stricter of these measures is quite straightforward to predict as people have very limited choices, but it is more challenging to predict the behavioural changes in the absence of restrictive measures. The limited research so far has demonstrated that different socio-demographic groups of different countries have changed travel behaviour in response to COVID-19 in different ways. However, no studies to date have either (a) investigated the changes in travel behaviour in the context of the Global South, or (b) modelled the relationship between changes in transport mode usage and traveller characteristics in order to quantify the associated heterogeneity. In this paper, we address these two gaps by developing mathematical models to quantify the effect of the socio-demographic characteristics of the travellers on the mode-specific trip frequencies before (January 2020) and during the early stages of COVID-19 spread in India (March 2020). Primary data collected from 498 respondents participating in online surveys have been used to estimate multiple discrete choice extreme value (MDCEV) models in this regard. Results indicate – a) significant inertia to continue using the pre-COVID modes, and b) high propensity to shift to virtual (e.g. work from home, online shopping, etc.) and private modes (e.g. car, motorcycle) from shared ones (e.g. bus and ride-share options). The extent of inertia varies with the trip purpose (commute and discretionary) and trip lengths. The results also demonstrate significant heterogeneity based on age, income, and working status of the respondents. The findings will be directly useful for planners and policy-makers in India as well as some other countries of the Global South in better predicting the mode-specific demand levels and subsequently, making better investment and operational decisions during similar disruptions.
TL;DR: The fuzzy logic-based decision-making approach (FGQI) is more reliable and pragmatic for groundwater-quality assessment and analysis at a larger scale and can serve as a useful tool for the water planners and decision makers in efficiently monitoring and managing groundwater quality at watershed or basin scales.
TL;DR: From this study, it may be established that the proposed SPBO works very well in all the studied test cases and it is able to obtain an optimum solution with faster convergence mobility.
TL;DR: In this article, a low cost proton exchange membrane (PEM) was synthesized, using biochar derived from food waste by pyrolysis at 600°C followed by sulphonation and using a poly vinyl alcohol based matrix, named as SBC-600, for application in microbial fuel cell (MFC).
TL;DR: In this paper, a review of the promising characteristics and recent advances in the use of silk fibroin for skin wound healing and/or soft-tissue repair applications is presented.
TL;DR: The technological functionality and biological properties of glycoconjugates in food model systems and products are highlighted and recent applications of MRPs in medical sciences are presented.
TL;DR: Simulation results are shown to show the advantages of fast converging properties of GOA over GA and PSO techniques and the effect of EV load growth and the effects of uncertainties in DGs and distribution system load are shown on the distribution system performance.
Abstract: In this paper a two stage Grasshopper Optimization Algorithm (GOA) based Fuzzy multiobjective approach is proposed for optimum sizing and placement of Distributed Generations (DGs), Shunt Capacitors (SCs) and Electric Vehicle (EV) charging stations for distribution systems. In the first stage Fuzzy GOA approach is used for optimum sizing and allocation of DGs and SCs for improving the substation power factor, real power loss reduction and voltage profile improvement of the distribution system. In the second stage distribution system integrated with DGs and SCs is considered and fuzzy GOA approach is used for identifying optimum locations for EV charging stations and number of vehicles at the charging stations. EV battery charging load models are developed from the Lithium ion battery charging characteristic curves for load flow analysis. Simulation results are shown to show the advantages of fast converging properties of GOA over GA and PSO techniques. Simulation results are demonstrated on 51 bus and 69 bus distribution networks to show the advantages of proposed methodology compared to conventional objective based simultaneous optimization approach. The effect of EV load growth and the effect of uncertainties in DGs and distribution system load are shown on the distribution system performance.
TL;DR: An AI-enabled portal is introduced that presents an excellent visualization of Mahatma Gandhi's life events by constructing temporal and spatial social networks from the Gandhian literature by applying an ensemble of methods drawn from NLTK, Polyglot and Spacy.
Abstract: We introduce an AI-enabled portal that presents an excellent visualization of Mahatma Gandhi's life events by constructing temporal and spatial social networks from the Gandhian literature. Applying an ensemble of methods drawn from NLTK, Polyglot and Spacy we extract the key persons and places that find mentions in Gandhi's written works. We visualize these entities and connections between them based on co-mentions within the same time frame as networks in an interactive web portal. The nodes in the network, when clicked, fire search queries about the entity and all the information about the entity presented in the corresponding book from which the network is constructed, are retrieved and presented back on the portal. Overall, this system can be used as a digital and user-friendly resource to study Gandhian literature.
TL;DR: In this article, to improve the methane production potential, YW was thermally pretreated to reduce its recalcitrance nature and then the pretreated YW is co-digested with food waste to balance nutrient for anaerobic codigestion.
TL;DR: This work proposes a novel integrated MCDM approach by combining Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process (FAHP) with the modified FBuzzy Multi-Attribute Ideal Real Comparative Analysis (modified FMAIRCA), which is computationally inexpensive and able to provide more viable decisions.
TL;DR: A comprehensive classification of the most popular steady-state based leak detection methods is carried out, based on the core methodology utilised in each technique and without emphasizing on their individual technical detailing.
TL;DR: This paper presents a survey on the progress in and around SIM Problem, and discusses current research trends and future research directions as well.
Abstract: Given a social network with diffusion probabilities as edge weights and a positive integer k, which k nodes should be chosen for initial injection of information to maximize the influence in the network? This problem is popularly known as the Social Influence Maximization Problem (SIM Problem). This is an active area of research in computational social network analysis domain, since one and half decades or so. Due to its practical importance in various domains, such as viral marketing, target advertisement and personalized recommendation, the problem has been studied in different variants, and different solution methodologies have been proposed over the years. This paper presents a survey on the progress in and around SIM Problem. At last, it discusses current research trends and future research directions as well.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors have reviewed the challenges revealed hitherto such as weak interfacial transition zone, high water absorption and presence of micro cracks in the use of C&D wastes as the recycled aggregate (RA). Methods of mitigation of these weaknesses through various treatments have been reported.
TL;DR: In this paper, constructed wetlands (CWs) were used to remove the recalcitrant organic fraction of the wastewater because of the various inherent mechanisms involved, such as phytodegradation, rhizofiltration, microbial degradation, sorption, etc.
TL;DR: The proposed hybrid valuation method aggregates biophysical and economic estimates of ESs and addresses methodological biases existing in the valuation process and can be generalized and applied to other ecosystems at different scales.