Poetic and Pictorial Splendor-Expression of Traditional Chinese Literati in Chinese Architecture

The expression of traditional Chinese literati is based on connection, seeking emotion and harmony. With various forms, though, this style of expression shares the same value in some art forms, like traditional Chinese poetry, calligraphy and paintings, and Chinese architecture. Based on the commonalities of various forms of literature and art, this paper offered an insight into Chinese architecture in light of poetic and pictorial expression of traditional Chinese literati. In order to illuminate the corresponding connection between traditional Chinese poetry, calligraphy and paintings, and Chinese architecture, this paper discussed the expression of Chinese architecture corresponding to the essence of traditional Chinese poetry, calligraphy and paintings respectively from the perspective of philosophy, aesthetics, and culture study of Chinese architecture. Via analogous analysis, which includes the analogy between the emotion of architecture and the feelings in traditional poetry, the analogy between the order of architecture and the spirit of calligraphy, and the analogy between the artistic conception and the picturesque scene, the poetic and pictorial expression of Chinese architecture was clarified. This paper emphasized that Chinese architecture needs to jump out of the concrete image, eradicate the interdisciplinary boundaries, and stress the integration of arts and humanities in a higher level, to express Chinese architecture in a Chinese way. That means making Chinese architecture modern in forms and techniques, and traditional in spirit and artistic conception.

OPTIMAL ENERGY DESIGN AND RETROFIT RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE TURKISH BUILDING SECTOR

This paper introduces methodologies and optimal strategies to reduce the energy consumption of the building sector with the aim to reduce global energy usage of a given region or country.Many efforts are underway to develop investment strategies for large-scale energy retrofits and stricter energy design standards for existing and future buildings.This paper presents a study that informs these strategies in a novel way.It introduces support for the cost-optimized retrofits of existing,and design improvements of new buildings in Turkey with the aim to offer recommendations to individual building owners as well as guidance to the market.Three building types,apartment,single-family house and office are analyzed with a novel optimiza-tion approach.The energy performance of each type is simulated in five different climate regions of Turkey and four different vintages.For each vintage,the building is modelled corresponding to local Turkish regulations that applied at the time of construction.Optimum results are produced for different goals in terms of energy saving targets.The optimization results reveal that a 50%energy saving target is attainable for the retrofit and a 40%energy saving target is attainable for new design improvements for each building type in all climate regions.

Sustainability of Touristic Potential of the Old Van City and Castle of Van in Terms of Cultural, Historical and Natural Values

Tourism has become the world＇s fastest growing sector due to acceleration of technology and information flow in the globalized world of today, development of the modem mass transport system and increase in people＇s disposable income. Upon tourism＇s being considered as a serious development strategy in the developments of the countries, all the countries of the world have begun to accelerate their investments in this area through utilizing the natural and cultural assets of their countries （heritage） with a view to provide revenue to their economy as well as creation of jobs. This situation, which has emerged as a result of the globalization of supply and demand in tourism, has created certain problems in terms of environmental balance and the living conditions of local people as a result of poor management of the utilization of natural and cultural resources. The objective of this paper is to examine the concepts and principles germane to sustainable tourism which has significant contribution to the development of the countries, made at the macro level both in the world and in Turkey. The aim of this paper, at the micro level, is to create awareness incident to the tourism resources of the Van Region and the Old Van province and ensure the utilization of these resources through protection thereof. At the end of the study, the importance of the protection of heritage resources as well as fair use thereof in terms of increasing the competitiveness of Turkey on a global scale in tourism is addressed in the light of the overall evaluations.

Use Energy Efficiency, Eco-Design, and Eco-Friendly Materials to Support Eco-Tourism

The term “Eco-lodge” is used to identify a type of nature-based tourism facility that will respond to the principles of ecotourism. The research aims to study, develop and design such types of facilities in an environmentally sensitive manner, using local materials or recycled materials, with a design that serves the environment and is consistent with the nature and cultural background of the place, through Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energies. This leads us to the ideas and foundations of seeking to preserve natural energy, respect the environment and reduce the impact of construction thereon. The research applies environmental and sustainable design standards to a proposed model designed by the Author for desert lodges, and the most important advantages of supporting ecotourism, by observing the principles of good design consistent with the local environment and culture, preventing the use of internal pollution sources, adapting to the climate, using alternative environmentally friendly materials, the efficiency of production and use of energy to promote the use of clean renewable energy. As important elements in the development of tourism and to help to preserve natural heritage and biodiversity. Such architectural solutions aim to achieve the objectives of eco-design, in terms of reducing the cost of energy in buildings, using natural energy instead of mechanical power systems, in addition to creating a healthy and comfortable environment.

＂Universal Design＂ Approach for the Participation of the Disabled in Urban Life

Disability can occur to anyone and anyone can have difficulties in fulfilling daily activities in a certain part of their lives. Accessibility is a crucial matter and a basic human right for the disabled people in order to join the urban life. For this reason, the physical environment must be set, starting with the planning and design stage, in a form that can satisfy the utility and accessibility requirements of disabled people. One of the most important recent concepts to enable accessible and useful spaces for the disabled is the ＂universal design＂. Nowadays, even though there is an increase in the number of scientific publications, meetings and decisions taken, the regulatory process on our current living environment is developing slowly regarding the physical accessibility. At this point, the most important role regarding the handling of social and political paradigms of disability, addressing different users, application of the principals of universal design and creating knowledge in order to increase social awareness belongs to the departments of universities that offer design courses. The subject of the study in this context is to determine the contents and the proportion of the courses （compulsory and elective） related to ＂universal design and ＂disability design＂, which will ensure our living environment to be accessible and independently utilized for everyone, in the course plan of the architecture, interior architecture, urban planning and landscape architecture departments in Turkey.

Housing Policies in Turkey： Evolution of TOKI （Governmental Mass Housing Administration） as an Urban Design Tool

With the mission of absorption of the capital through urban renovation, AKP （the Justice and Welfare Party） took over the metropolitan municipality administrations in big cities in 1995, and the Government of the Republic of Turkey in 2002. Together with the 2003 Mass Housing Act, 14 legal regulations were enacted between 2002 and 2008 to expand the field of activity and increase the funds of TOKI （Governmental Mass Housing Administration） which was already established during ANAP （the Motherland Party） Government in 1980s. As a result of those regulations, TOKI, as the ＂latest goddess of the construction myth＂, became the only authorized organization in the field of housing and land production in AKP＇s cities. It acquired new duties from generating profit-oriented projects to protecting historical texture, and it was authorized to make and approve zoning plans for the lands and plots handed over to TOKI of the last government （the Justice and Welfare Party） created as an investor-entrepreneur-contractor-performer group. This paper＇s aim is to indicate the transformation of TOKI foundation during the last twenty years, and also to prove that TOKI, as a governmental profit-oriented design tool, has demolished the unique DNA/morphological textures of the contemporary Turkish big cities by producing low profiled similar architecture and urbanity in the recent past.

A LIFE CYCLE ENERGY COMPARISON OF THREE WORLD EXPO BUILDINGS The Crystal Palace,Shanghai Exhibition Centre,and Dutch Pavilion

Over the last hundred years the booming exhibition industry has promoted development,which in turn has led to environmental damage.The construction of exhibition buildings has been part of this phenomenon.At first sight improvement in energy efficiency techniques would seem to offset the increased energy demand from both exhibitions and exhibition buildings.However,whether energy efficiency technologies truly help to improve building performance to the point where a building is‘environmentally friendly’throughout its whole life-cycle is uncertain.This research is part of investigating whether energy efficiency technologies are really the easiest means to lower costs and energy requirements when the whole useful life of an exhibition building is considered.This article investigates the energy use of three case study buildings based on their operating and embodied energy flows.The results suggest that modern technologies for making exhibition buildings more sustainable may not be as effective as the simpler strategies used over 100 years ago.This suggests a different approach may be needed for sustainable development in the twenty first century.

A Proposal for the Restitution of the World’s First Baptistry and University, Mor Yakup Church, Turkey

The structure known today as St.Jacob’s Church represents one of the oldest Christian medieval monuments in the region.With the emergence of findings suggesting that the structure was the world’s first university during recent excavation efforts,it has gained even more significance.Since 2006,the excavation works conducted by the Mardin Museum Directorate in the vicinity of Mor Yakup Church have yielded information about various phases of the structure.However,assessments regarding the nature of the structure are still debated within the academic environment.This study aimed to thoroughly investigate the functional changes and periods that St.Jacob’s Church underwent throughout history and to provide a detailed description and restitution for each period.In this study,we utilized excavation reports,data from written sources related to the settlement and structure,information obtained from the structure itself,traces existing on the structure,and data derived from architectural necessities(logic/scenario).The results indicate that this structure served three different functions(baptistry,church,university)and went through two main periods(pre-Christianity and post-Christianity).

A Novel Hybrid Architecture for Superior IoT Threat Detection through Real IoT Environments

As the Internet of Things(IoT)continues to expand,incorporating a vast array of devices into a digital ecosystem also increases the risk of cyber threats,necessitating robust defense mechanisms.This paper presents an innovative hybrid deep learning architecture that excels at detecting IoT threats in real-world settings.Our proposed model combines Convolutional Neural Networks(CNN),Bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory(BLSTM),Gated Recurrent Units(GRU),and Attention mechanisms into a cohesive framework.This integrated structure aims to enhance the detection and classification of complex cyber threats while accommodating the operational constraints of diverse IoT systems.We evaluated our model using the RT-IoT2022 dataset,which includes various devices,standard operations,and simulated attacks.Our research’s significance lies in the comprehensive evaluation metrics,including Cohen Kappa and Matthews Correlation Coefficient(MCC),which underscore the model’s reliability and predictive quality.Our model surpassed traditional machine learning algorithms and the state-of-the-art,achieving over 99.6%precision,recall,F1-score,False Positive Rate(FPR),Detection Time,and accuracy,effectively identifying specific threats such as Message Queuing Telemetry Transport(MQTT)Publish,Denial of Service Synchronize network packet crafting tool(DOS SYN Hping),and Network Mapper Operating System Detection(NMAP OS DETECTION).The experimental analysis reveals a significant improvement over existing detection systems,significantly enhancing IoT security paradigms.Through our experimental analysis,we have demonstrated a remarkable enhancement in comparison to existing detection systems,which significantly strength-ens the security standards of IoT.Our model effectively addresses the need for advanced,dependable,and adaptable security solutions,serving as a symbol of the power of deep learning in strengthening IoT ecosystems amidst the constantly evolving cyber threat landscape.This achievement marks a significant stride towards protecting the integrity of IoT infrastructure,ensuring operational resilience,and building privacy in this groundbreaking technology.

Determination of fire-access zones along road networks in firesensitive forests

Wild forest fires are one of the greatest environmental disasters affecting forest resources. Along the coastal zone of the Mediterranean region in Turkey, forested areas are classified as first-degree, fire-sensitive areas. Every year, thousands of hectares of forests have been destroyed in Turkey. In this study, fire-access zones were determined in the Mediterranean forests of Turkey, by utilizing geographic information systems （GIS） technology. The effective reach distance of fire hoses from both sides of roads was considered in order to delineate fireaccess zones. The effective reach distance can vary based on the technical capabilities and hydraulic capacity of fire trucks （minimum and maximum pressures on water pump）; terrain structures （uphill, downhill and flat）; and ground slope. These factors and their influences were studied in fire sensitive forest areas located in the eastern Mediterranean city of Kahramanmaras in Turkey. First, terrain structures on both sides of the road network and groundslope classes were determined based on GIS data layers. Then, fire access zones were delineated according to water pressure data, terrain structures, and ground-slope classes. The results indicated that 69.30 % of the forested areas were within the fire-access zones, while the rest of the forest was out of reach the fire hoses. The accessible areas were also calculated for forested areas with different fire- sensitivity degrees. The accessible areas were 69.59, 69.96, and 67.16 % for the forested areas that are sensitive to fires at the first, second, and third degrees, respectively. This finding has implications for the monitoring and management of fire threats in areas outside of the reach distance. The outside areas should receive extra attention and monitoring during the fire season so that fires are detected ahead of time and management has sufficient time to react. Besides, new roads should be considered for these areas in order to access more lands in a shorter amount of time.

Unconstrained Hand Dorsal Veins Image Database and Recognition System

Hand veins can be used effectively in biometric recognition since they are internal organs that,in contrast to fingerprints,are robust under external environment effects such as dirt and paper cuts.Moreover,they form a complex rich shape that is unique,even in identical twins,and allows a high degree of freedom.However,most currently employed hand-based biometric systems rely on hand-touch devices to capture images with the desired quality.Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic,most handbased biometric systems have become undesirable due to their possible impact on the spread of the pandemic.Consequently,new contactless hand-based biometric recognition systems and databases are desired to keep up with the rising hygiene awareness.One contribution of this research is the creation of a database for hand dorsal veins images obtained contact-free with a variation in capturing distance and rotation angle.This database consists of 1548 images collected from 86 participants whose ages ranged from 19 to 84 years.For the other research contribution,a novel geometrical feature extraction method has been developed based on the Curvelet Transform.This method is useful for extracting robust rotation invariance features from vein images.The database attributes and the veins recognition results are analyzed to demonstrate their efficacy.

Achieving the Visual Perception and Gestalt Psychology in Sultan Hassan Mosque Building

The gestalt principles are perception and what is visually communicated by objects. These principles describe the visual language within which we work. Understanding how a designer realizes things visually will help designers communicate better. Many designers use Gestalt principles to have a structure visual stimulus, so as to create interfaces that are easy for users to understand. Because the understanding of visual perception is a critical item in any designer’s toolkit. Islamic heritage buildings also contain many architectural values, especially the Sultan Hassan Mosque in Cairo. Through this paper, we will verify the use of gestalt principles of visual perception in the building design. Because the psychological organization of the design, achieves the understanding and awareness of the current relationships between the elements, depending on the extent of regularity, accuracy, and consistency of the design elements. This makes us recognize the esthetic values of Sultan Hassan’s building and mosque. The visual delight we get from architecture begins with how we perceive it. So, in order to understand how visual delight arises, we must first understand how we perceive and interpret visual stimuli. Especially since the principles of gestalt confirm that the human brain tends to make tricks and illusions. Therefore, we found the mosque designer had exploited this fact during the design process, to exclude any possibility of the resulting misunderstanding. The designer achieved the psychological preparation of the visitor by using some principles of visual perception of the Gestalt theory, such as growth, continuity, and hierarchy.

Analysis of Urban Morphology in Core Towns＇ Neighborhoods of Mexico： Santa Barbara＇s Neighborhood as a Case Study

Cities＇ urban morphology is the result of historic, cultural, political and social processes. The historical cores in Mexican cities have high cultural diversity, which also intermingle pre-Hispanic cultures with colonial forms, as well with modernity and post-modernity irruption. The case study is Santa Barbara＇s neighborhood in Toluca City, which was founded in 1524, and the case study was the first neighborhood in Toluca＇s historical core. At present time, this neighborhood is considered as one of the most dangerous places in the city＇s historical core, therefore, it has been abandoned. This paper will display the changes in urban morphology of the neighborhood through the years from 1877 to 2010. For site evaluation, the methodologies of Ashihara （1982） and Lynch＇s （1961） were used in order to analyze positive and negative spaces, as well as main street visual features, street and avenue directions, street circulation and street circulation path configuration. The results show that the focal nodes are a key factor for economic and social reactivation, with which, through urban activation of vacant lots and the traditional use of the streets as public space, is possible to generate centripetal development to restructure the neighborhood.

Extreme Adaptation to Extreme Environments in Hot Dry, Hot Sub-humid and Hot Humid Climates in Mexico

The paper discusses the results of a field study carried out in four cities in Mexico： Hermosillo, Mexicali, Merida and Colima, during the warmest seasons of 2006-2007. The survey is according to the adaptive approach of thermal comfort. The cities＇ climates are hot dry, hot sub-humid and hot humid. The respondents were inhabitants of low cost housings without air conditioning. The research was performed during warm seasons and according to ISO 10551. The measurements were processed by the common method of linear regression and also by alternative methods, useful for asymmetric climates. Individuals declared comfort at very high temperatures, either high or low humidity, therefore, the resulting neutral temperatures are higher than 30 ℃, except in Colima （28.8 ℃）. The upper limits of comfort ranges achieved temperatures up to 35 ℃. The results suggest how great is the capacity of humans to adapt to conditions as extreme as those measured in the study.

Gentrification Within the Law of Transformation of Areas at Disaster Risks in Turkey Sulukule,Istanbul Example

With coming in force of The Law of Transformation of Areas at Disaster Risks numbered 16.5.2012/6306 by Ministry of Environment and Urbanization,the concept of urban transformation has entered to our life in Turkey.Gentrification as one of the forms of urban transformation brought the existence of liberated zones produced by neo-liberal mentality.Sulukule area(Neslisah Sultan settlement)which is subject to research is counted among“the areas to be renewed and to be put under preservation”by numbered 2006/10299 decision of Council of Ministers.Due to the shortage of lands in the city,it is observed especially in 1980s that the families in high-income group have preferred to live in horizontally expending villa towns far from the center.While these residential areas are deepening the distance from the center in time,the pressure of housing demand of middle-income people and rent circles who are not planning to leave the city center caused to have an eye on these areas which are residential areas of mostly low-income people and appeared in certain regions as they are established without infrastructure and healthy conditions.With this law,the transformation has started in the areas such as Fikirtepe,Dolapdere,Esenler,and Banks of Halic(Golden Horn)where structural life is completed,and floor area ratio has been raised to 4.0 from 2.07.Vertical housing is stimulated by adding the street between the parcels to the blocks,it has been tried to prevent the victimization of local people to unearned income.There are some quarters that,under the name of gentrification,Romany citizens who passed to permanent settlement from nomadic culture at the Ottoman era,and who are engaged in activities such as handicraft,adornments,shoe making,weaving beside the show business at Fatih Sulukule district are convicted to lodge in the houses built in suburban if they have title deed,and in jerry-built tents if they don’t have deed.Chamber of Architects,Chamber of City Planners Istanbul Branch and Roma Culture Development and Solidarity Association filed“nullity suit”and“stay of execution”.Despite the continuing judicial process,the demolition started in 2009,and starting the constructing the villas in 2010 breaking the resistance of Romany citizens,the area was victimized to rent.

IN PRAISE OF SHARING AS A STRATEGY FOR SUSTAINABLE HOUSING

A central theoretical principle of sustainability is the interdependence of economic,socio-cultural,environmental,and equity issues.The core idea is that sustainability is achieved only by balancing these elements.In practice,however,this balance is rarely evidenced in the design and production of housing,despite the mass of research into sustainable housing.This paper discusses some of the political,economic and socio-cultural issues at work in sustainable housing typologies.It illustrates how the notion of sustainability has come to be represented by ecologically-focused models,while other approaches to sustainable housing design,such as shared housing models,are barely mentioned in the literature.The paper argues that modernist imperatives,such as demands for speed and status undermine sustainable housing design and obscure its meaning.The authors suggest that in the planning and design of sustainable housing attention should be given to the sharing of resources and space as an added method of conservation,and conclude that current imbalances in research agendas and socio-cultural practices create a blind spot in the sustainable housing debate.

Adaptive Segmentation for Unconstrained Iris Recognition

In standard iris recognition systems,a cooperative imaging framework is employed that includes a light source with a near-infrared wavelength to reveal iris texture,look-and-stare constraints,and a close distance requirement to the capture device.When these conditions are relaxed,the system’s performance significantly deteriorates due to segmentation and feature extraction problems.Herein,a novel segmentation algorithm is proposed to correctly detect the pupil and limbus boundaries of iris images captured in unconstrained environments.First,the algorithm scans the whole iris image in the Hue Saturation Value(HSV)color space for local maxima to detect the sclera region.The image quality is then assessed by computing global features in red,green and blue(RGB)space,as noisy images have heterogeneous characteristics.The iris images are accordingly classified into seven categories based on their global RGB intensities.After the classification process,the images are filtered,and adaptive thresholding is applied to enhance the global contrast and detect the outer iris ring.Finally,to characterize the pupil area,the algorithm scans the cropped outer ring region for local minima values to identify the darkest area in the iris ring.The experimental results show that our method outperforms existing segmentation techniques using the UBIRIS.v1 and v2 databases and achieved a segmentation accuracy of 99.32 on UBIRIS.v1 and an error rate of 1.59 on UBIRIS.v2.

Narratives in Mamluk architecture： Spatial and perceptual analyses of the madrassas and their mausoleums

Mamluk sultans were known for their patronage of the arts and architecture. Their educational institutions were among the wide array of architectural projects that linked them as ruling elites to the religious scholars of their times. Their tombs were placed in a mausoleum attached to their educational-religious complexes to attest to their legacy. The evolution of their buildings such that both educational and memorial functions are integrated with the dense surroundings is scrutinized through chronological-spatial analysis. The configuration of the built form, the disposition of its boundaries, its patterns of accessibility, and its visual properties are the features that present the buildings to one＇s experience and bring certain perceptions into play. In this study, various spatial descriptor tools of space syntax are employed to analyze the data of 14 Mamluk examples （1260-1517A.D.） and capture the differences in the experience where the expression is preserved. Analyses of the configurational characteristics, axial attributes, visibility structures, and isovists highlight how the spatial and formal properties of the layouts were used to express certain representational relationships. The advantages of combining different spatial investigations allows for understanding historical design principles and how the geometry of forms could hide in its abstract rules, conceptual and perceptual qualities.

Neuroscience and architecture:What does the brain tell to an emotional experience of architecture via a functional MR study?

Environment psychologically affects individuals.According to the base of cognitive psychology,there is a direct relationship between human behavior,environment,and emotional process.Assuming that pleasantness and unpleasantness are associated with peripheral nervous system activation,the current study aims to explore if the pleasant or unpleasant architectural places can stimulate the brain regions engaged in emotions or not.As the main contribution,we used functional magnetic resonance imaging(fMRI)measuring blood oxygenation level-dependent(BOLD)changes to effectively detect the brain’s region that mainly responds to the emotional-perceptual processes.Based on the results of examining the emotional assessment model of “Pleasure-Arousal”applied to 140 students,30 most-rated images representing 15 pleasant and 15 unpleasant places were shown to 32 participants in a 1.5-T MRI scanner.After applying standard preprocessing steps(re-alignment,slice-timing,coregistration,segmentation,normalization,and smoothing)to functional MR images,first-level analysis was applied to each subject.The results were evaluated using statistical corrections at different levels for female and male participants with the second-level analysis.In conclusion,it has been shown that there is a significant linkage between environmental experience and brain activation so that the architectural qualities can change blood flow in specific brain regions.

Cultural schema and design activity in an architectural design studio

Research on the cognitive activities and on the structure and quality of knowledge flow involved in architectural design education is increasing. These studies generally focus on the interaction between student and instructor, including processes such as producing ideas, solving display problems, and integrating design strategies. These studies commonly include computational evaluations and confirmation of the coding of knowledge. They may also include the determination of designer＇s thoughts and cognitive actions of design process, as welt as the analysis and digitization of verbal protocols during the design process. In most of these studies, the designer＇s cultural and psychological components are not considered. Accordingly, research on the effects of designers＇ cultural schema on design activity in design studios is limited. This study aimed to solve this problem by analyzing the relationship between design activity and the designer＇s cultural schema in a design studio. We performed an experimental study based on a specific conceptual framework and a research model aimed at identifying the relationships among cultural schemas, the architectural design process, and design studios.