Tainan University of Technology

About: Tainan University of Technology is a education organization based out in Tainan City, Taiwan. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Password & Authentication. The organization has 311 authors who have published 641 publications receiving 10826 citations.

Elevated aminotransferases are predictors of hepatic injury in blunt abdominal trauma patients

Abstract: Objective: Computed tomography (CT) scan is currently the most commonly used tool for evaluating solid organ injuries in trauma management. However, liberal use of CT scanning increases the risk of excess radiation exposure and toxicity from contrast material. Animal studies and clinical research on the paediatric population indicated that liver enzymes elevations were related to hepatic injury. The present study was undertaken to determine whether elevated liver enzymes were associated with the occurrence of hepatic injury in adult patients with blunt abdominal trauma. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study from August 2003 to October 2006. All adult patients with blunt injury to abdomino-pelvic organs documented by CT or surgery who were admitted to Chi-Mei Medical Centre in the captioned period were included. The study population sorted to hepatic injury (HI) and no hepatic injury (NHI) groups according to the presence or absence of hepatic injury. Variables including liver enzymes were compared between the groups. Results: Totally 419 patients were included, including 150 patients in the HI group and 269 patients in the NHI group. The HI group was younger and had a lower rate of laparotomy (36.3 years old vs 41.4 years old; 26% vs 42%, respectively). The mean levels of aspartate aminotransferase (AST) and alanine aminotransferase (ALT) in the HI group were significantly higher than levels in the NHI group (439.6 IU/L vs 104.7 IU/L; 353.5 IU/L vs 76.6 IU/L, p 200 IU/L or ALT level >125 IU/L as abnormal according to previous studies. The diagnostic characteristics of hepatic injury were 87.3% sensitivity, 80.3% specificity, 71.2% positive predictive value, and 91.9% negative predictive value. Conclusion: In adults who have experienced blunt abdominal trauma, AST >200 U/L or of ALT >125 U/L are practical predictors of hepatic injury. Screening serum aminotransferases will have a role in detecting occult hepatic injury and may reduce the hazards of excessive CT scanning.

Analysis on Microclimate and Construction of the Vernacular Architecture in Minangkabau of Sumatra, Indonesia

Abstract: Minangkabau architecture is one of the most identical vernacular architectures in Austronesian world. This research aims to compare and analyze the microclimate of two Minangkabau vernacular houses in villages of Balimbing of Bukittinggi, Sumatra, Indonesia. One of them is covered with palm-sheath roof, and the other is covered with zinc roof. After investigation and a series of measuring assessment, we discover that as human residence, the interior environment of the house with the palm-roof is more comfortable than the zinc-roofed house. Due to a more successful prevention and reduction to high temperature and humidity of the inner space, the palm-roof is recognized as the better housing model to be pursued and using natural material as the efficient resource for the local community.

A Secure Authentication Protocol for Wireless Sensor Network in Smart Vehicular System

Abstract: As wireless sensor networks (WSN) and Internet of things (IoT) have rapidly developed over recent years, the smart vehicular system is designed in the environment of WSN to provide vehicle related applications such as traffic safety for drivers, controlling traffic signal, broadcasting traffic information and speed monitoring etc. Recently, Mohit et al. have proposed an authentication protocol for WSN-based smart vehicular system. Their protocol consists of three main entities namely vehicle sensor, sink node and user. Vehicle sensors collected traffic data and send it to a sink node of WSN. User used traffic data from sink node in off-line mode for the traffic management. Mohit et al. claimed that the proposed protocol is secure against various attacks such as untraceable, impersonation and password guessing attacks. However, their proposed protocol still has some vulnerabilities such as absence of session key, suffering user duplication and sink node impersonation attacks. Thus their protocol cannot guarantee complete security. In this paper, we aim to propose an improved protocol based on their work which overcomes these security loopholes in their protocol. The informal security analysis shows that our proposed protocol is cable to defend the security weaknesses found in Mohit et al.’s authentication protocol.

Solar water heaters as a pre-heating system for industrial processes

Abstract: Although solar heating for hot-water production is a mature technology, the general public’s knowledge is mostly confined to domestic uses such as cleaning and washing. In the industrial sector, there is a demand for thermal energy of lower than 250 °C, but to develop applications for industrial heat processes, real energy savings are one of the key issues determining customers’ choice of energy. However, the solar gain from solar water heaters based on the lab tests may be misleading, so field measurements are important to evaluate a system’s financial viability. This study presents 1 year of field measurements for solar water heaters installed as the pre-heating system in a poultry slaughterhouse. The system efficiency is compared with that installed in a dormitory, where the hot-water consumption pattern is similar to that in the domestic sector. These results demonstrate that the amount of global solar radiation and hot-water consumption patterns have a significant effect on the system’s efficiency. A simple cost-to-benefit analysis is also presented based on this real application for solar water heaters.

A system for the sharing and reuse of learning objects

Abstract: Nowadays, Web-based learning become one of the most important components in educational technologies and has been widely employed in both educational and non-educational institutions. However, many of the Web-based learning systems are closed system and use private internal format. The learning materials may be dispersed and stored in database or on the server's file system, therefore the learning materials are not easy to be extracted and reused. The downloaded content often cannot be operated as they were on the server. Therefore, sharing and reusing learning materials is an important issue but not an easy task in real world applications. In addressing the above problem, we proposed the information object model used to construct an information system for the mothballing, sharing, and reusing of digital contents. In our developments, two subsystems were implemented. The two subsystems developed apply the information object model to build and share the learning objects which comes with the benefits of portability, extensibility and reusability. One of the subsystems is used to build and compose learning objects. The other subsystem implementing a information object storage service can be used for sharing learning objects on a large scale. In this paper we will describe the important concepts and principles in the design of the system. We will present concisely the system used to build and share reusable learning objects.