2021 4th International Symposium on Advanced Electrical and Communication Technologies (ISAECT), 2021
In this work, we present an effective method for automatic Arabic Sign Language recognition that ... more In this work, we present an effective method for automatic Arabic Sign Language recognition that uses a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) for feature extraction and a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) for classification. AlexNet, a CNN architecture, is used to extract deep features from the input image while the LSTM is used to preserve the sequential structure of the video frames. The method was tested on a data set consisting of 50 repetitions of 150 signs commonly used in daily activities performed by three signers. The proposed method achieved an overall recognition accuracy of 95.9% for the signer-dependent case, and 43.62% for the more difficult signer-independent case.
2021 4th International Symposium on Advanced Electrical and Communication Technologies (ISAECT), 2021
Accurate wind speed prediction is important for wind energy integration into the power grid. Whil... more Accurate wind speed prediction is important for wind energy integration into the power grid. While most wind turbines have hub heights of about 80 - 140m, wind speeds are usually measured up to 40mm and in exceptional cases up to 100m. This paper analyzes the predictability of wind speed with heights. To achieve this, a Laser Illuminated Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) system, ZephIR 300, was acquired and installed at the beach of King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals. The ZephIR 300 device is widely accepted for wind resource assessment and its wind speed measurements have been validated and found to be accurate for heights from 10 to 300m. Wind speed data was collected at 20, 40, 50, 60, 80, 100, 120, 140, 160, and 180m heights for three months. The collected data was used for training and testing the performance of the RNN model for predicting the wind speed 12 hours ahead of time using 48 previous hourly values. Careful analyses of short-term wind speed prediction at different heights and future hours showed that wind speed is predicted more accurately at higher heights. For example, the mean absolute percent error decreased from 0.15 to 0.11 corresponding to heights 20 and 180m; respectively.
2015 IEEE 12th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals & Devices (SSD15), 2015
Sign language is important for facilitating communication between hearing impaired and the rest o... more Sign language is important for facilitating communication between hearing impaired and the rest of society. However, most vocal people do not understand sign language, hence, the need to develop system capable of translating sign language. Two approaches have traditionally been used in the literature: image-based and glove-based systems. Glove-based systems require the user to wear electronic gloves while performing the signs. The glove includes a number of sensors detecting different hand and finger articulations. Image-based systems use camera(s) to acquire a sequence of images of the hand. Each of the two approaches has its own disadvantages. The glove-based method is not natural as the user must wear a cumbersome instrument while the camera-based system requires specific background and environmental conditions to achieve high accuracy. In this paper, we propose a new approach for Arabic Sign Language Recognition (ArSLR) which involves the use of two Leap Motion Controllers (LMC) to prevent the case of one finger being occluded by another finger or hand. This device detects and tracks the hand and fingers to provide position and motion information. We propose to use the two LMCs as a backbone of the ArSLR system. In addition to data acquisition, the system includes a preprocessing stage, a feature extraction stage, and a classification stage. Fusion of evidences from the two LMCs at the feature extraction and classification stage was also investigated using Dempster-Shafer theory of evidence. Features fusion from the two LMCs gives 97.7% classification accuracy with Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) classifier and 97.1% with classifier level fusion. This gives better recognition over the use of a single LMC.
2020 17th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals & Devices (SSD), 2020
Images and videos are seen as the most reliable source of visual information as they are a fundam... more Images and videos are seen as the most reliable source of visual information as they are a fundamental part of the multimedia world. For instance, face recognition technology utilizes images for security purposes. However, due to either the physical properties of the acquisition equipment (internal) or the nature of the environment (external), images can be affected by a wide range of distortions. Researchers have enumerated more than 24 distortions that can affect images. Among which four types are the most prominent ones. In this paper, a novel no-reference color image quality assessment technique is introduced. The technique is based on extracting a set of features from the High Order Singular Value Decomposition (HOSVD) of images. Such features are then used with a neural network regressor to predict the quality score. The results show excellent performance exceeding traditional techniques based only on gray-scale images.
2021 4th International Symposium on Advanced Electrical and Communication Technologies (ISAECT)
In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, sandstorms are quite frequent and cause dust accumulation on PV p... more In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, sandstorms are quite frequent and cause dust accumulation on PV panel surfaces that act as a barrier to solar radiation. This decreases of the solar radiation energy absorption and subsequently reduces the energy output of the panels. The present effort aims at reducing the dust accumulation on PV panels by flying the drone above these panels at certain heights and time intervals. This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of a drone flying over photovoltaic (PV) panels to remove accumulated dust and improve their efficiency. The downward thrust of the drone due to its cruise at a certain height above the PV panels is able to remove most of the accumulated dust if performed regularly. The tests were conducted at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) beach, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia by loading each panel uniformly with 20, 50, and 100 CC of dust.
ACM Transactions on Asian and Low-Resource Language Information Processing
Sign language is the major means of communication for the deaf community. It uses body language a... more Sign language is the major means of communication for the deaf community. It uses body language and gestures such as hand shapes, lib patterns, and facial expressions to convey a message. Sign language is geography-specific, as it differs from one country to another. Arabic Sign language is used in all Arab countries. The availability of a comprehensive benchmarking database for ArSL is one of the challenges of the automatic recognition of Arabic Sign language. This article introduces KArSL database for ArSL, consisting of 502 signs that cover 11 chapters of ArSL dictionary. Signs in KArSL database are performed by three professional signers, and each sign is repeated 50 times by each signer. The database is recorded using state-of-art multi-modal Microsoft Kinect V2. We also propose three approaches for sign language recognition using this database. The proposed systems are Hidden Markov Models, deep learning images’ classification model applied on an image composed of shots of the...
The objective of this work is to understand the fluctuating nature of wind speed characteristics ... more The objective of this work is to understand the fluctuating nature of wind speed characteristics on different time scales and to find the long-term annual trends of wind speed at different locations in South Africa. The hourly average mean wind speed values over a period of 20 years are used to achieve the set objective. Wind speed frequency, directional availability of maximum mean wind speed, total energy, annual energy yield and plant capacity factors are determined for seven locations situated both inland and along the coast of South Africa. The highest mean wind speed (6.01 m/s) is obtained in Port Elizabeth and the lowest mean wind speed (3.86 m/s) is obtained in Bloemfontein. Wind speed increased with increasing latitudes at coastal sites (Cape Town, Durban, East London and Port Elizabeth), while the reverse trend was observed at inland locations (Bloemfontein, Johannesburg and Pretoria). Noticeable annual changes and relative wind speed values are found at coastal locations compared to inland sites. The energy pattern factor, also known as the cube factor, varied between a minimum of 1.489 in Pretoria and a maximum of 1.858 in Cape Town. Higher energy pattern factor (EPF) values correspond to sites with fair to good wind power potential. Finally, Cape Town, East London and Port Elizabeth are found to be good sites for wind power deployments based on the wind speed and power characteristics presented in this study.
Proceedings. 2004 International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies: From Theory to Applications, 2004., 2004
... 104-1 1 1. [2] EMC, Wong, phone-based remote controller for home and office automation, IEE... more ... 104-1 1 1. [2] EMC, Wong, phone-based remote controller for home and office automation, IEEE Transactions on Consumer ... [4] Liang, Li-Chen Fu and Chao-Lin W, An integrated, flexible, and Internet-based control architecture for home automation system in the ...
ABSTRACT We consider the problem of over-the-horizon multiradar track association. The operation ... more ABSTRACT We consider the problem of over-the-horizon multiradar track association. The operation center receives the registration of tracks from three different over-the-horizon radars. The fusion of these tracks presents a large operator workload. We investigate automating this process. We propose two methods for feature extraction. The first uses the Hough transform and the second uses some track affinity measures. For every case, we consider two systems, one using the multilayer perceptron and the other assuming independence of the features and combining the probabilities. For the Hough transform, we consider the range-time image of the tracks and transform all track data to a unified coordinate system. In the second method, we consider a set of affinity measures and study their relative and cumulative frequencies for associated and nonassociated pairs of tracks. Error rates of less than 7% were achieved with the Hough transform method and less than 1% using track affinity measures.
ABSTRACT This paper describes a system for tracking and identifying pilgrims in the Holy areas in... more ABSTRACT This paper describes a system for tracking and identifying pilgrims in the Holy areas in Makkah, Saudi Arabia and the surroundings, during Hajj season (Pilgrimage) using the mobile phone. It utilizes an internet enabled 3.5 G mobile wireless network, as service providers have already covered the Holy area with such networks. The performance of the developed system is compared with a system that uses a Wireless Sensor Network and is interfaced to the internet through a gateway available from a service provider. The developed system uses a regular mobile phone equipped with a Global Positioning System (GPS) that is available with most pilgrims, while in the second system a small and light weight mobile sensor unit is given to each pilgrim to be fixed on his Hajj cloths. The sensor unit includes a GPS chip, a microcontroller, antennas, and a battery. A network of fixed master units is installed throughout the Holy area for receiving and forwarding data. In both systems, upon request or periodically, the mobile sensor unit or the mobile phone sends its User IDentification number, latitude, longitude, and a time stamp. A server maps the location information on a Google map or a similar geographical information system. If the internet connection is lost, the mobile unit stores the location information in its memory. Once the internet connection is restored, the mobile unit sends all stored location information and clears this information from the memory. Both systems can be used to track a specific pilgrim. Alternatively, any pilgrim can request emergency help. Identification of pilgrims can be achieved by a separate Near Field Communication (NFC) tags if the mobile phone is not NFC enabled. Pilot experiments were carried out successfully during the recent pilgrimage seasons.
IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing
This paper develops a new framework for data compression in seismic sensor networks by using the ... more This paper develops a new framework for data compression in seismic sensor networks by using the distributed principal component analysis (DPCA). The proposed DPCA scheme compresses all seismic traces in the network at the sensor level. First of all, the statistics of the seismic traces acquired at all sensors are represented by a mixture model of a number of probability density functions. Based on this mixture model, the DPCA finds the global PCs at the fusion center. These PCs are then sent back to all sensors so that each sensor projects its own traces over these PCs. This scheme does not require transmitting the original traces, here, leading to a low computational load and a high compression ratio, compared with compression obtained using the local PC analysis (LPCA). Furthermore, we develop an efficient communication solution for the DPCA implementation on practical sensor networks. Finally, the proposed scheme is evaluated using real and synthetic seismic data showing improved performance over the LPCA and the traditional 2-D discrete cosine transform (DCT-2-D) compression. Specifically, to preserve a given signal energy during the compression, the DPCA is shown to achieve a higher compression ratio than the LPCA and the DCT-2-D.
a series of events addressing the fundamentals advanced scientific computing and specific mechani... more a series of events addressing the fundamentals advanced scientific computing and specific mechanisms and algorithms for particular sciences. The conference provided a forum where researchers were able to present recent research results and new research problems and directions related to them. With the advent of high performance computing environments, virtualization, distributed and parallel computing, as well as the increasing memory, storage and computational power, processing particularly complex scientific applications and voluminous data is more affordable. With the current computing software, hardware and distributed platforms effective use of advanced computing techniques is more achievable. The event was very competitive in its selection process and very well perceived by the international scientific and industrial communities. As such, it has attracted excellent contributions and active participation from all over the world. We were very pleased to receive a large amount of...
2021 4th International Symposium on Advanced Electrical and Communication Technologies (ISAECT), 2021
In this work, we present an effective method for automatic Arabic Sign Language recognition that ... more In this work, we present an effective method for automatic Arabic Sign Language recognition that uses a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) for feature extraction and a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) for classification. AlexNet, a CNN architecture, is used to extract deep features from the input image while the LSTM is used to preserve the sequential structure of the video frames. The method was tested on a data set consisting of 50 repetitions of 150 signs commonly used in daily activities performed by three signers. The proposed method achieved an overall recognition accuracy of 95.9% for the signer-dependent case, and 43.62% for the more difficult signer-independent case.
2021 4th International Symposium on Advanced Electrical and Communication Technologies (ISAECT), 2021
Accurate wind speed prediction is important for wind energy integration into the power grid. Whil... more Accurate wind speed prediction is important for wind energy integration into the power grid. While most wind turbines have hub heights of about 80 - 140m, wind speeds are usually measured up to 40mm and in exceptional cases up to 100m. This paper analyzes the predictability of wind speed with heights. To achieve this, a Laser Illuminated Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) system, ZephIR 300, was acquired and installed at the beach of King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals. The ZephIR 300 device is widely accepted for wind resource assessment and its wind speed measurements have been validated and found to be accurate for heights from 10 to 300m. Wind speed data was collected at 20, 40, 50, 60, 80, 100, 120, 140, 160, and 180m heights for three months. The collected data was used for training and testing the performance of the RNN model for predicting the wind speed 12 hours ahead of time using 48 previous hourly values. Careful analyses of short-term wind speed prediction at different heights and future hours showed that wind speed is predicted more accurately at higher heights. For example, the mean absolute percent error decreased from 0.15 to 0.11 corresponding to heights 20 and 180m; respectively.
2015 IEEE 12th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals & Devices (SSD15), 2015
Sign language is important for facilitating communication between hearing impaired and the rest o... more Sign language is important for facilitating communication between hearing impaired and the rest of society. However, most vocal people do not understand sign language, hence, the need to develop system capable of translating sign language. Two approaches have traditionally been used in the literature: image-based and glove-based systems. Glove-based systems require the user to wear electronic gloves while performing the signs. The glove includes a number of sensors detecting different hand and finger articulations. Image-based systems use camera(s) to acquire a sequence of images of the hand. Each of the two approaches has its own disadvantages. The glove-based method is not natural as the user must wear a cumbersome instrument while the camera-based system requires specific background and environmental conditions to achieve high accuracy. In this paper, we propose a new approach for Arabic Sign Language Recognition (ArSLR) which involves the use of two Leap Motion Controllers (LMC) to prevent the case of one finger being occluded by another finger or hand. This device detects and tracks the hand and fingers to provide position and motion information. We propose to use the two LMCs as a backbone of the ArSLR system. In addition to data acquisition, the system includes a preprocessing stage, a feature extraction stage, and a classification stage. Fusion of evidences from the two LMCs at the feature extraction and classification stage was also investigated using Dempster-Shafer theory of evidence. Features fusion from the two LMCs gives 97.7% classification accuracy with Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) classifier and 97.1% with classifier level fusion. This gives better recognition over the use of a single LMC.
2020 17th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals & Devices (SSD), 2020
Images and videos are seen as the most reliable source of visual information as they are a fundam... more Images and videos are seen as the most reliable source of visual information as they are a fundamental part of the multimedia world. For instance, face recognition technology utilizes images for security purposes. However, due to either the physical properties of the acquisition equipment (internal) or the nature of the environment (external), images can be affected by a wide range of distortions. Researchers have enumerated more than 24 distortions that can affect images. Among which four types are the most prominent ones. In this paper, a novel no-reference color image quality assessment technique is introduced. The technique is based on extracting a set of features from the High Order Singular Value Decomposition (HOSVD) of images. Such features are then used with a neural network regressor to predict the quality score. The results show excellent performance exceeding traditional techniques based only on gray-scale images.
2021 4th International Symposium on Advanced Electrical and Communication Technologies (ISAECT)
In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, sandstorms are quite frequent and cause dust accumulation on PV p... more In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, sandstorms are quite frequent and cause dust accumulation on PV panel surfaces that act as a barrier to solar radiation. This decreases of the solar radiation energy absorption and subsequently reduces the energy output of the panels. The present effort aims at reducing the dust accumulation on PV panels by flying the drone above these panels at certain heights and time intervals. This paper demonstrates the effectiveness of a drone flying over photovoltaic (PV) panels to remove accumulated dust and improve their efficiency. The downward thrust of the drone due to its cruise at a certain height above the PV panels is able to remove most of the accumulated dust if performed regularly. The tests were conducted at King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) beach, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia by loading each panel uniformly with 20, 50, and 100 CC of dust.
ACM Transactions on Asian and Low-Resource Language Information Processing
Sign language is the major means of communication for the deaf community. It uses body language a... more Sign language is the major means of communication for the deaf community. It uses body language and gestures such as hand shapes, lib patterns, and facial expressions to convey a message. Sign language is geography-specific, as it differs from one country to another. Arabic Sign language is used in all Arab countries. The availability of a comprehensive benchmarking database for ArSL is one of the challenges of the automatic recognition of Arabic Sign language. This article introduces KArSL database for ArSL, consisting of 502 signs that cover 11 chapters of ArSL dictionary. Signs in KArSL database are performed by three professional signers, and each sign is repeated 50 times by each signer. The database is recorded using state-of-art multi-modal Microsoft Kinect V2. We also propose three approaches for sign language recognition using this database. The proposed systems are Hidden Markov Models, deep learning images’ classification model applied on an image composed of shots of the...
The objective of this work is to understand the fluctuating nature of wind speed characteristics ... more The objective of this work is to understand the fluctuating nature of wind speed characteristics on different time scales and to find the long-term annual trends of wind speed at different locations in South Africa. The hourly average mean wind speed values over a period of 20 years are used to achieve the set objective. Wind speed frequency, directional availability of maximum mean wind speed, total energy, annual energy yield and plant capacity factors are determined for seven locations situated both inland and along the coast of South Africa. The highest mean wind speed (6.01 m/s) is obtained in Port Elizabeth and the lowest mean wind speed (3.86 m/s) is obtained in Bloemfontein. Wind speed increased with increasing latitudes at coastal sites (Cape Town, Durban, East London and Port Elizabeth), while the reverse trend was observed at inland locations (Bloemfontein, Johannesburg and Pretoria). Noticeable annual changes and relative wind speed values are found at coastal locations compared to inland sites. The energy pattern factor, also known as the cube factor, varied between a minimum of 1.489 in Pretoria and a maximum of 1.858 in Cape Town. Higher energy pattern factor (EPF) values correspond to sites with fair to good wind power potential. Finally, Cape Town, East London and Port Elizabeth are found to be good sites for wind power deployments based on the wind speed and power characteristics presented in this study.
Proceedings. 2004 International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies: From Theory to Applications, 2004., 2004
... 104-1 1 1. [2] EMC, Wong, phone-based remote controller for home and office automation, IEE... more ... 104-1 1 1. [2] EMC, Wong, phone-based remote controller for home and office automation, IEEE Transactions on Consumer ... [4] Liang, Li-Chen Fu and Chao-Lin W, An integrated, flexible, and Internet-based control architecture for home automation system in the ...
ABSTRACT We consider the problem of over-the-horizon multiradar track association. The operation ... more ABSTRACT We consider the problem of over-the-horizon multiradar track association. The operation center receives the registration of tracks from three different over-the-horizon radars. The fusion of these tracks presents a large operator workload. We investigate automating this process. We propose two methods for feature extraction. The first uses the Hough transform and the second uses some track affinity measures. For every case, we consider two systems, one using the multilayer perceptron and the other assuming independence of the features and combining the probabilities. For the Hough transform, we consider the range-time image of the tracks and transform all track data to a unified coordinate system. In the second method, we consider a set of affinity measures and study their relative and cumulative frequencies for associated and nonassociated pairs of tracks. Error rates of less than 7% were achieved with the Hough transform method and less than 1% using track affinity measures.
ABSTRACT This paper describes a system for tracking and identifying pilgrims in the Holy areas in... more ABSTRACT This paper describes a system for tracking and identifying pilgrims in the Holy areas in Makkah, Saudi Arabia and the surroundings, during Hajj season (Pilgrimage) using the mobile phone. It utilizes an internet enabled 3.5 G mobile wireless network, as service providers have already covered the Holy area with such networks. The performance of the developed system is compared with a system that uses a Wireless Sensor Network and is interfaced to the internet through a gateway available from a service provider. The developed system uses a regular mobile phone equipped with a Global Positioning System (GPS) that is available with most pilgrims, while in the second system a small and light weight mobile sensor unit is given to each pilgrim to be fixed on his Hajj cloths. The sensor unit includes a GPS chip, a microcontroller, antennas, and a battery. A network of fixed master units is installed throughout the Holy area for receiving and forwarding data. In both systems, upon request or periodically, the mobile sensor unit or the mobile phone sends its User IDentification number, latitude, longitude, and a time stamp. A server maps the location information on a Google map or a similar geographical information system. If the internet connection is lost, the mobile unit stores the location information in its memory. Once the internet connection is restored, the mobile unit sends all stored location information and clears this information from the memory. Both systems can be used to track a specific pilgrim. Alternatively, any pilgrim can request emergency help. Identification of pilgrims can be achieved by a separate Near Field Communication (NFC) tags if the mobile phone is not NFC enabled. Pilot experiments were carried out successfully during the recent pilgrimage seasons.
IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing
This paper develops a new framework for data compression in seismic sensor networks by using the ... more This paper develops a new framework for data compression in seismic sensor networks by using the distributed principal component analysis (DPCA). The proposed DPCA scheme compresses all seismic traces in the network at the sensor level. First of all, the statistics of the seismic traces acquired at all sensors are represented by a mixture model of a number of probability density functions. Based on this mixture model, the DPCA finds the global PCs at the fusion center. These PCs are then sent back to all sensors so that each sensor projects its own traces over these PCs. This scheme does not require transmitting the original traces, here, leading to a low computational load and a high compression ratio, compared with compression obtained using the local PC analysis (LPCA). Furthermore, we develop an efficient communication solution for the DPCA implementation on practical sensor networks. Finally, the proposed scheme is evaluated using real and synthetic seismic data showing improved performance over the LPCA and the traditional 2-D discrete cosine transform (DCT-2-D) compression. Specifically, to preserve a given signal energy during the compression, the DPCA is shown to achieve a higher compression ratio than the LPCA and the DCT-2-D.
a series of events addressing the fundamentals advanced scientific computing and specific mechani... more a series of events addressing the fundamentals advanced scientific computing and specific mechanisms and algorithms for particular sciences. The conference provided a forum where researchers were able to present recent research results and new research problems and directions related to them. With the advent of high performance computing environments, virtualization, distributed and parallel computing, as well as the increasing memory, storage and computational power, processing particularly complex scientific applications and voluminous data is more affordable. With the current computing software, hardware and distributed platforms effective use of advanced computing techniques is more achievable. The event was very competitive in its selection process and very well perceived by the international scientific and industrial communities. As such, it has attracted excellent contributions and active participation from all over the world. We were very pleased to receive a large amount of...
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Papers by Mohamed Mohandes