Transportation networks play a significant role in the economy of Canadians during winter seasons; thus, maintaining a safe and economic flow of traffic on Canadian roads is crucial. Winter contaminants such as freezing rain, snow, and ice cause reduced friction between vehicle tires and pavement and thus increased accident-risk and decreased road capacity. The formation of ice and frost caused by snowfall and wind chill makes driving a very difficult task. Pavement surface temperature is an important indicator for road authorities when they are deciding the optimal time to apply anti-icer/deicer chemicals and when estimating their effect and the optimal amounts to apply. By forecasting pavement temperature, maintenance crews can figure out road surface conditions ahead of time and start their operations in a timely manner, thereby reducing salt use and increasing the safety and security of road users by eliminating accidents caused by slipperiness. This research investigates the feasibility of applying simple statistical models for forecasting road surface temperatures at locations where RWIS data are available. Two commonly used modeling techniques were considered: time-series analysis and artificial neural networks (ANN). A data set from an RWIS station is used for model calibration and validation. The analysis indicates that multi-variable SARIMA is the most competitive technique and has the lowest number of forecasting errors.

Power Amplifiers (PAs) are the key building blocks of the emerging wireless radios systems. They dominate the power consumption and sources of distortion, especially when driven with modulated signals. Several approaches have been devised to characterize the nonlinearity of a PA. Among these approaches, dynamic amplitude (AM/AM) and phase (AM/PM) distortion characteristics are widely used to characterize the PA nonlinearity and its effects on the output signal in power, frequency or time domains, when driven with realistic modulated signals. The inherent nonlinear behaviour of PAs generally yield output signals with an unacceptable quality, an undesirable level of out-of-band emission, high Error Vector Magnitudes (EVMs) and low Adjacent Channel Power Ratios (ACPRs), which usually fail to meet the established performance standards. Traditionally, PAs are forced to operate deeply in their back-off region, far from their power capacity, in order to pass the mandatory spectrum mask (ACPR requirement) and to achieve acceptable EVM. Despite its simplicity, this solution is increasingly discarded, as it leads to cost and power inefficient radios. Alternatively, several linearization techniques, such as feedback, feed-forward and predistortion, have been devised to tackle PA nonlinearity and, consequently, improve the achievable the linearity versus power efficiency trade-off. Among these linearization techniques, the Digital Pre-Distortion (DPD) technique consists of incorporating an extra nonlinear function before the PA, in order to preprocess the input signal to the PA, so that the overall cascaded systems behave linearly. The overall linearity of the cascaded system (DPD plus PA) relies primarily on the ability of the DPD function to produce nonlinearities that are equal in magnitude and out-of-phase to those generated by the PA. Hence, a good understanding and accurate modeling of PA distortions is a crucial step in the construction of an adequate DPD function. This thesis explores DPD through techniques based on Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs). The choice of ANN as a modeling tool was motivated by its proven strength in modeling dynamic nonlinear systems. This thesis starts by providing a summary of the PA nonlinearity problem background, as well as an overview of the most well-known linearization techniques, with a special focus on DPD techniques. The thesis then discusses ANN structures and the learning parameters. Finally, a novel Two Hidden Layers ANN (2HLANN) model is suggested to predict the dynamic nonlinear behaviour of wideband PAs. An extensive validation of the 2HLANN model demonstrates its excellent modeling accuracy and linearization capability.

Large-scale mining practices have disturbed many natural watersheds in northern Alberta, Canada. To restore disturbed landscapes and ecosystems functions, reconstruction strategies have been adopted with the aim of establishing sustainable reclaimed lands. The success of the reconstruction process depends on the design of reconstruction strategies, which can be optimized by improving the understanding of the controlling hydrological processes in the reconstructed watersheds. Evapotranspiration is one of the important components of the hydrological cycle; its estimation and analysis are crucial for better assessment of the reconstructed landscape hydrology, and for more efficient design. The complexity of the evapotranspiration process and its variability in time and space has imposed some limitations on previously developed evapotranspiration estimation models. The vast majority of the available models estimate the rate of potential evapotranspiration, which occurs under unlimited water supply condition. However, the rate of actual evapotranspiration (AET) depends on the available soil moisture, which makes its physical modeling more complicated than the potential evapotranspiration. The main objective of this study is to estimate and analyze the AET process in a reconstructed landscape.<p> Data driven techniques can model the process without having a complete understanding of its physics. In this study, three data driven models; genetic programming (GP), artificial neural networks (ANNs), and multilinear regression (MLR), were developed and compared for estimating the hourly eddy covariance (EC)-measured AET using meteorological variables. The AET was modeled as a function of five meteorological variables: net radiation (Rn), ground temperature (Tg), air temperature (Ta), relative humidity (RH), and wind speed (Ws) in a reconstructed landscape located in northern Alberta, Canada. Several ANN models were evaluated using two training algorithms of Levenberg-Marquardt and Bayesian regularization. The GP technique was employed to generate mathematical equations correlating AET to the five meteorological variables. Furthermore, the available data were statistically analyzed to obtain MLR models and to identify the meteorological variables that have significant effect on the evapotranspiration process. The utility of the investigated data driven models was also compared with that of HYDRUS-1D model, which is a physically based model that makes use of conventional Penman-Monteith (PM) method for the prediction of AET. HYDRUS-1D model was examined for estimating AET using meteorological variables, leaf area index, and soil moisture information. Furthermore, Wavelet analysis (WA), as a multiresolution signal processing tool, was examined to improve the understanding of the available time series temporal variations, through identifying the significant cyclic features, and to explore the possible correlation between AET and the meteorological signals. WA was used with the purpose of input determination of AET models, a priori.<p> The results of this study indicated that all three proposed data driven models were able to approximate the AET reasonably well; however, GP and MLR models had better generalization ability than the ANN model. GP models demonstrated that the complex process of hourly AET can be efficiently modeled as simple semi-linear functions of few meteorological variables. The results of HYDRUS-1D model exhibited that a physically based model, such as HYDRUS-1D, might perform on par or even inferior to the data driven models in terms of the overall prediction accuracy. The developed equation-based models; GP and MLR, revealed the larger contribution of net radiation and ground temperature, compared to other variables, to the estimation of AET. It was also found that the interaction effects of meteorological variables are important for the AET modeling. The results of wavelet analysis demonstrated the presence of both small-scale (2 to 8 hours) and larger-scale (e.g. diurnal) cyclic features in most of the investigated time series. Larger-scale cyclic features were found to be the dominant source of temporal variations in the AET and most of the meteorological variables. The results of cross wavelet analysis indicated that the cause and effect relationship between AET and the meteorological variables might vary based on the time-scale of variation under consideration. At small time-scales, significant linear correlations were observed between AET and Rn, RH, and Ws time series, while at larger time-scales significant linear correlations were observed between AET and Rn, RH, Tg, and Ta time series.

Guided ultrasonic detection system has the ability to inspect long range and not accessible pipelines. Especially, the T(0,1) mode guided wave was used widely at the detection, because the property of non-dispersive. For rapidly judge common features on pipe, this thesis makes an artificial neural network diagnosis system to separate and recognize the signals on pipeline. In the experimental setup, the torsional mode signal are excited by using an array of transducers distributed around the circumference of the 6-inch standard pipe, and the reflected signals contain flange, weld, elbow, and defect on elbow. These features are extracted and have been further processed to limit the size of the neural network; then, the feature signal classify as axisymmetric called black, non-axisymmetric called red, and dividing between the two called R/B ratio. The research also uses finite element method to simulate the weld by building up different kind of profile to analyze its amplitude and simulate the flange, elbow, and defect on the elbow. Because the reflection waves of simulation are too idealize to be the network data, the training data and validation data are collected from the experimental wave. In the recognition of artificial neural network, the signals were getting from two pipes of industry. One has bitumen on it, which makes signals attenuation. The other has a clear elbow and a notch on elbow. The two-class recognition method successfully separates flange and weld in low frequency; but in high frequency, the weld signal amplitude is close to flange signal, because the signals decay when guided waves pass to bitumen, and this makes the judge become error. Furthermore, the network recognizes defects on elbow, where the signals have 3 peaks and 2 peaks when the elbow has defect on it. The training result shows that the 3 peaks have better convergent than the 2 peaks in the network. Finally, the developed method can recognize those defects on the elbow when the reflection signals have 2 peaks, and when reflection signals have 3 peaks, it could not make a good judge because the network limit by sample data.

In response to organic contaminations pollutating water sources of drinking water, domestic water treatment plants (WTP) were transforming from traditional chlorination disinfecton method to advanced ozone-based disinfection processes. However, the effectiveness of water purification procedures n removing AOC (Assimilable Organic Carbon) and DBPsFP (Disinfection By-Products Formation Potential) can be improved. Additionally, the quality of clean water purified at WTP may deteriorate in the water distribution network for various reasons, primarily resulting from the regrowth of microorganisms in the water distribution pipelines. This study investigates and researches the essential water quality items of effluent before and after the advanced water purification treatment plants and water movement to end users through water distribution networks. The investigation proceeded in four directions: (1) the efficiency of removing AOC from raw water using powdered and granular activated carbon biological systems, and the development of an AOC prediction model based on water quality monitoring items using the AutoNet (6.03) method of the artificial neural network system; (2) removal of the byproducts of disinfection from raw water using powdered activated carbon biological systems; (3) examining the relationship between ozone-based and chlorination-based water disinfection methods by comparing the number of coliform bacteria and total bacteria population in traditional and advanced processing units; (4) regarding the water distribution storage facilities for users, water reservoir towers were examined for water quality sampling and analysis and water tower cleaning frequencies. Regression analysis was performed using SPSS ¡]Statistical Product and Service Solutions¡^ statistical software, with the correlation coefficient denoting the closeness of relationships. We anticipate understanding the water quality situation for current users of tap water, and demands for cleaning frequencies, thereby achieving the purpose of improving drinking water safety. Regarding the efficiency of removing AOC from raw water, the results showed powdered and granular activated carbon biological systems performed well, with the AOC removal rate reaching 53% and 54%, respectively, and the SUVA (Specific Ultraviolet Absorbance) value (showed by UV254/DOC) being reduced by 15-18% and 22-23%, respectively. The correlation analysis of the AOC prediction model shows that the GAC (Granular Activated Carbon) had high predictive and actual value R values (R2 = 0.772) after model regressing, and the PAC (Powder Activated Carbon) had higher predictive and actual value R values (R2 = 0.856) after model regressing as well. That the PAC system AOC prediction model has a slightly higher correlation that may be attributed to water contaminations resulting from domestic sewage, agricultural fertilizers, and livestock excretions. In the use of powdered activated carbon biological systems to remove disinfection byproducts, THMsFP (Trihalomethanes Formation Potential) and HAAsFP (Haloacetic acids Formation Potential) functioned with a certain removal efficiency, with the average effluent concentrations being under the regulatory standard of 80£gg/L, respectively, which reduces carcinogenic risks. Correlation analyses conducted using SUVA on the three water quality concentrations (HAA5FP, HAA9FP, and THMsFP) obtained R2 values of 0.805, 0.820, and 0.823, respectively, indicating high levels of correlation. For the results of microbial assessment using ozone and chlorine to process drinking water, the advanced and conventional WTP achieved a removal rate greater than 99% for microbial removal (coliform bacteria and total bacteria population). The correlation analysis between cleaning frequencies and water quality parameters showed the frequency at which the water reservoirs and towers were cleaned has a significant impact on tap water quality in residential compounds and schools that accommodated more than 100 households or less than 99 households. Higher cleaning frequency (more than four cleanings a year) results in better the water quality.

Bidding is a very competitive process in the construction industry; each competitor’s business is based on winning or losing these bids. Contractors would like to predict the bids that may be submitted by their competitors. This will help contractors to obtain contracts and increase their business. Unit prices that are estimated for each quantity differ from contractor to contractor. These unit costs are dependent on factors such as historical data used for estimating unit costs, vendor quotes, market surveys, amount of material estimated, number of projects the contractor is working on, equipment rental costs, the amount of equipment owned by the contractor, and the risk averseness of the estimator. These factors are nearly similar when estimators are estimating cost of similar projects. Thus, there is a relationship between the projects that a particular contractor has bid in previous years and the cost the contractor is likely to quote for future projects. This relationship could be used to predict bids that the contractor might quote for future projects. For example, a contractor may use historical data for a certain year for bidding on certain type of projects, the unit prices may be adjusted for size, time and location, but the basis for bidding on projects of similar types is the same. Statistical tools can be used to model the underlying relationship between the final cost of the project quoted by a contractor to the quantities of materials or amount of tasks performed in a project. There are a number of statistical modeling techniques, but a model used for predicting costs should be flexible enough that it could adjust to depict any underlying pattern. Data such as amount of work to be performed for a certain line item, material cost index, labor cost index and a unique identifier for each participating contractor is used to predict bids that a contractor might quote for a certain project. To perform the analysis, artificial neural networks and multivariate adaptive regression splines are used. The results obtained from both the techniques are compared, and it is found that multivariate adaptive regression splines are able to predict the cost better than artificial neural networks.

Power quality has attracted considerable attentions from utilities and customers due to the popular uses of the sensitive electronic equipment. Harmonics, voltage swell, voltage sag, and power interruption could downgrade the service quality. Harmonic currents injected by non-linear loads throughout the network could degrade the quality of services to sensitive high-tech customers such as the science park of Xin-Zhu and Tai-Nan in Taiwan. In recent years, massive rapid transit system (MRT) and high speed railway (HSR) have been rapidly developed, with the applications of wide-spread semi-conductor technologies in the auto-traction system. Swell and sag could occur from thundering, capacitor switching, motor starting, nearby circuit faults, or artificial calamity, and could also attribute to the power interruption. To ensure the power quality, harmonic and voltage disturbances detection becomes important. Fourier transformation is used to analyze distorted waves in the frequency domain, with low-pass filter used to eliminate the fundamental component, and then characteristic harmonics can be detected. The complicated process is difficult to operate in real-time. The method-based processing model with physical harmonic data is needed to simplify the processing architecture. The thesis proposes to use wavelet transformation (WT) and probabilistic neural network (PNN) for power quality and characteristic harmonics detection. Wavelet-probabilistic network (WPN) is first used to extract distorted waves. PNN based processing model will then analyze the harmonic components. Computer simulation shows a simplified model to shorten the processing time in this study.

The paper proposes a model of detection for voltages and harmonics using wavelet-probabilistic network (WPN). WPN is a two-layer structure, containing the wavelet layer and probabilistic network. It uses the wavelet transformation (WT) and probabilistic neural network (PNN) to analyze distorted waves and classify tasks. In this thesis, the field programmable gate array (FPGA) is employed for the hardware realization of WPN. In the implementation process, by the use of the hardware description language, the WPN algorithm has been embedded into the FPGA chip. Firstly, we divide the mathematical formula of basic WPN algorithm into several parts in order to set up each module individually, then we integrate all modules to complete the design of basic WPN algorithm with digital circuits by the bottom-up process.

The Finite-Difference Time-Domain Method (FDTD) is a very powerful numerical method for the full wave analysis electromagnetic phenomena. Due to its flexibility, it can be used to solve numerous electromagnetic scattering problems on microwave circuits, dielectrics, and electromagnetic absorption in biological tissue at microwave frequencies. However, it needs so much computation time to simulate microwave integral circuits by applying the FDTD method. If the structure we simulated is complicated and we want to obtain accurate frequency domain scattering parameters, the simulation time will be so much longer that the efficiency of simulation will be bad as well. Therefore, in the thesis, we introduce an artificial neural networks (ANN) method called ¡§Finite Impulse Response Neural Networks (FIRNN)¡¨ can speed up the FDTD simulation time. In order to boost the efficiency of the FDTD simulation time by stopping the simulation after a sufficient number of time steps and using FIRNN as a predictor to predict time series signal.

Power system protection is important for service reliability and quality assurance. Various faults may occur due to natural and artificial calamity. Dispatchers are use the changed statuses of protection devices from the Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system to identify the fault. To reduce the outage duration and promptly restore power services, fault section detection has to be done effectively and accurately with fault alarms. In this thesis, artificial neural networks (ANN) and Grey Relational Analysis (GRA) are used to develop the restoration schemes for emergency operation in a power system including fault section detection (FSD), restoration strategy(RS), and voltage correction(VC). The optimal power flow (OPF) is responsible for verifying the proposed schemes by off-line analysis. With a IEEE 30-Bus power system, computer simulations were conducted to show the effectiveness of the proposed restoration schemes.