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As one of the key techniques in the fully mechanized mining process, equipment selection and matching has a great effect on security, production and efficiency. The selection and matching of fully mechanized mining equipment in thin coal seam are restricted by many factors. In fully mechanized mining (FMM) faced in thin coal seams (TCS), to counter the problems existing in equipment selection, such as many the parameters concerned and low automation, an expert system (ES) of equipment selection for fully mechanized mining longwall face was established. A database for the equipment selection and matching expert system in thin coal seam, fully mechanized mining face has been established. Meanwhile, a decision-making software matching the eS was developed. Based on several real world examples, the reliability and technical risks of the results from the ES was discussed. Compared with the field applications, the shearer selection from the ES is reliable. However, some small deviations existed in the hydraulic support and scraper conveyor selection. Then, the eS was further improved. As a result, equipment selection in fully mechanized mining longwall face called 4301 in the Liangshuijing coal mine was carried out by the improved eS. equipment selection results of the interface in the improved eS is consistent with the design proposal of the 4301 FMM working face. The reliability of the improved eS can meet the requirements of the engineering. It promotes the intelligent and efficient mining of coal resources in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the increasing pervasiveness of today's digital society, mobile devices are changing the face of education. Students can interact with mobile devices in context‐aware environment. This paper presents a mobile application based on expert system (Plant‐E) for students to acquire knowledge about plant classification by answering decision‐making questions. In order to study effectiveness of Plant‐E and cognitive load of students who experience different kinds of interaction in learning process, another mobile application (Plant‐G) only providing information pages of plants was developed. A quasi‐experiment was conducted with three classes of 137 seventh graders. The three classes, Class A with 46 students using Plant‐E in campus, Class B with 44 students using Plant‐G in campus, and Class C with 47 students using Plant‐G in a traditional classroom, constitute three groups with different interaction complexity. The research conducted pretest, posttest, and delayed test to evaluate learning performance of students in three classes and used a questionnaire to investigate their perceptions and attitudes towards proposed system. Results show that interaction complexity has an impact on students' learning performance and mental effort in mobile learning; the higher the interaction complexity is, the higher mental effort and the better learning performance in mobile learning will be. Lay Description: What is already known about this topic: Mobile devices can be used to meet the urgency of learning need and can provide guidance and clues for learners in context‐aware environment.During mobile learning in context‐aware environment, students need to interact with mobile devices and environment.Mental effort reflects cognitive load related to interaction complexity, and it can affect learning performance.Self‐efficacy affects the degree of mental effort by affecting the firmness of performance goal.Cognitive load and learning performance are the main concerns that need to be considered when evaluating the effectiveness of mobile learning. What this paper adds: Interaction complexity has an impact on students' learning performance and mental effort in mobile learning.In terms of the three levels of interaction complexity in this study, the higher the interaction complexity is, the better the results that students will get in mobile learning.The higher the interaction complexity is, the higher the mental effort that students invested into in mobile learning would be.The medium self‐efficacy group invested the most mental effort and got the best grades, rather than the high or low group.Rule‐based mobile learning expert system is feasible and effective for students to learn by interacting with learning objects in context‐aware environment. Implications for practice and/or policy: Efforts should be made to make mobile learning systems more interactive; for example, learners can learn more effectively by interacting with mobile system, which can improve the frequency of observing learning objects.Rule‐based mobile learning expert system can give learners more opportunities to know how experts do when solving problems and can provide a potential method for students to learn in context‐aware environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Ice accretion of overhead conductors is a serious problem for power utilities. Among various de-icing approaches, short circuit based de-icing is one of the most frequently used ones. Since the short circuit based de-icing requires cumbersome and tricky operations, and some lines are taken out of service, pre-planned short circuit schemes are usually adopted in order to prevent mis-operation. Whereas, since some transmission lines might be tripped and system topology varies notably during ice storm, fast forming of short circuit de-icing scheme is not a simple task. Based on thorough investigation of pre-established de-icing schemes in Changsha power grid, rules to set up de-icing schemes are concluded. An expert system combining the power of graph theory has been developed in the paper to enumerate all the feasible de-icing routes. Thereafter, short circuit current and de-icing time of each route are calculated to single out candidate routes, and thus, dispatchers can form de-icing scheme at easy. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This study aims at developing and testing a pragmatic expert system for HIV voluntary counseling (VCT-ES) that leverages best practices. The VCT-ES was developed via evolutionary prototyping and piloted in 10 voluntary HIV counseling and testing (VCT) clinics from Anhui and Beijing representative of prefecture and county level VCT clinics in China. All counselors with the clinics and the clients to the clinics within selected two weeks at baseline and the end of study were invited to participate. Assessment measures included essential counseling procedures (ECPs); clients' satisfaction, knowledge, and behavior efficacy. VCT-ES was developed which tries to model and facilitate standard VCT operation procedures and best practices. One hundred and eighty-two (96 at baseline vs. 86 after intervention) cases recordings, 172 (96 vs. 76) client questionnaires, 10 counselor, and 2 expert rating instruments were collected; and 17 clients and 8 counselors participated in qualitative interviews. VCT-ES increased delivery of ECPs from 18.94% to 66.39% on average; increased clients' knowledge from 40.51% to 86.34% and self-efficacy by 22.42%. The VCT-ES applications listed were rated 9.1 on average (maximum = 10). The VCT-ES could be an easy and effective solution to better routine VCT and merits further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Sustainable development is of great significance in rural areas of China, which are under coupled pressures of poverty reduction, environmental protection and economic development. In these areas, agriculture is the primary sector in supporting their economies, where a number of the relevant production and processing practices cause many adverse impacts on environment and ecosystem. This poses many challenges for decision makers in formulating sustainable development strategies without invoking potential controversies or objections from the public. In this study, a two-level expert system (TES) for facilitating the investigation of public’s perception towards sustainable development in rural areas was developed. Interactive relationships among objectives of socio-economic development and environmental protection, as well as the related policy implications and public responses, were comprehensively examined and incorporated within TES. A two-level system was particularly adopted for facilitating participation of various stakeholders, including decision makers and farmers. The Yongxin County of the Shanjianghu Region in Jiangxi Province, China was selected to demonstrate the applicability of the developed TES. A series of questionnaire surveys were conducted both for acquiring knowledge about the interrelationships among sustainable development, agricultural production, poverty reduction and environmental protection. Public’s perception towards various system components of rural sustainable development were efficiently acquired and analyzed. The results indicated that sustainable development would be very significant on rural areas in China. Also, public awareness to the concept and profile of rural sustainable development was still at a low level, especially for farmers. The developed TES can be not only used for acquiring knowledge of sustainable development, but also providing basic information for the formulation of relevant policies and strategies in rural areas of China. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

A hypermedia-enabled agricultural expert system is new in practice. This paper introduces an attempt to develop a system that integrates hypermedia technology into expert system technology for the purpose of veterinary medical education. Following the pedagogical trend in education development, the conceptual architecture is designed to provide the learner with globally structured domain knowledge. Access to such knowledge is guided in the system with two basic modules: veterinary diagnosis (Vet-diagnosis), which mainly integrates the expert system for veterinary clinical diagnosis for self-practice; and veterinary medicine reference (Vet-reference), which mainly applies hypermedia system technology for self-learning, The necessary explanation of the key components of the systems and basic considerations for future system development are also given. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A rule-based expert system has been built for selection of both retaining wall types and groundwater control methods in deep excavations in Wuhan city. For this expert system, a new type of generation rule is developed in which one condition is able to be defined with a “third state” that not only contributes directly to reaching the conclusion in a rule, but also factors into calculating the reliability of the conclusion. The traditional backward chaining technique has been improved to accommodate the change of a rule type and a fuzzy backward chaining method IRO has been established to increase reasoning flexibility. Using IRO as a fundamental element, it is convenient to form a complicated reasoning network in the inference engine. Finally, two knowledge bases are built from more than 100 case histories and other resources, and the new expert system proves to be effective in case studies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• A computer-aided expert system was developed to distinguish edible oils. • The contents of fatty acids and quality parameters of edible oils were assessed. • All the unqualified edible oils were screened out and identified. • The identification accuracy for pure and mixed edible oils are over 90%. • The quality information of the edible oils was provided. The advantages of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) such as nondestructive and simultaneous detection, high reproducibility and rapidity make it easily develop the objective and credible methods for food analysis and identification. In this study, we developed a computer-aided, MATLAB-scripted expert system which enables NMR data to distinguish different edible oils and evaluate the quality of edible oils. The NMR spectral data of seven species of most popular vegetable edible oils in China were used to establish the assessment criterions including the content percentage of fatty acids and the quality parameters of edible oils. In our case, the identification accuracy of vegetable origin for the pure edible oils is 95.83% and that for the mixed edible oils is 89.58%, and all the recycled waste cooking oils and fried oils were correctly screened out and identified by the expert system. Further, the quality information of the edible oils was also provided. Our results show that the current expert system is a fast, easy-operated and convenient tool for the adulteration identification and quality control of edible oils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]