Search results for: small particle reagent (SPR)

Authors: Robert Smith, Omar Espinoza, Anna Pitta

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In the United States, trees felled in urban areas and wood generated through construction and demolition are primarily disposed of as low-value resources, such as biomass for energy, landscaping mulch, composting, or landfilled. An emerging industry makes use of these underutilized resources to produce high value-added products, with associated benefits for the environment, the local economy, and consumers. For the circular economy to be successful, markets must be created for sustainable, reusable natural materials. Research was carried out to increase the understanding of the marketing practices of urban and reclaimed wood industries. This paper presents the results of a nationwide survey of these companies. The results indicate that a majority of companies in this industry are small firms, operating for less than 10 years, which produce mostly to order and sell their products at comparatively higher prices than competing products made from virgin natural resources. Promotional messages included quality, aesthetics, and customization, conveyed through company webpages, word of mouth, and social media. Distribution channels used include direct sales, online sales, and retail sales. Partnerships are critical for effective raw material procurement. Respondents indicated optimistic growth expectations, despite barriers associated with urban and reclaimed wood materials and production.

Keywords: urban and reclaimed wood, circular economy, marketing, wood products

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Authors: Kshitij Bhardwaj, R.K. Trivedi, Shipra Dixit

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We used biological detoxification method that converts toxic residue waste of Jatropha curcas oil seeds (non edible oil seed) into industrial bio-products and animal feed material. Present study describes the complete degradation of phorbol esters by Aspergillus Niger strain during solid state fermentation (SSF) of deoiled Jatropha curcas seed cake. Phorbol esters were completely degraded in 15 days under the optimized SSF conditions viz deoiled cake 5.0 gm moistened with 5.0 ml distilled water; inoculum 2 ml of overnight grown Aspergillus niger; incubated at 30◦ C, pH 7.0. This method simultaneously induces the production of Protease enzyme by Aspergillus Niger which has high potential to be used in feedstuffs .The maximum Protease activities obtained were 709.16 mg/ml in Jatropha curcas oil seed cake. The protein isolate had small amounts of phorbol esters, phytic acid, and saponin without any lectin. Its minimum and maximum solubility were at pH 4.0&12.0. Water and oil binding capacities were 3.22 g water/g protein and 1.86 ml oil/g protein respectively.Emulsion activity showed high values in a range of basic pH. We concluded that Jatropha Curcas seed cake has a potential to be used as a novel source of functional protein for food or feed applications.

Keywords: solid state fermentation, Jatropha curcas, oil seed cake, phorbol ester

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Authors: Bahia Braktia, S. Anna Marcela Montenegro, Imene Abdessemed

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Adult education is still considered a crucial area of education. In a developing framework, it is regarded as a practical approach for social inclusion and poverty reduction. They are also perceived as a way to serve adults who did not have the chance to education in their early ages by providing them knowledge, skills and values. Non-formal adult education and trainings are critical means in a society to break poverty and unemployment, and to decrease the social inequality. This paper investigates the perception of women trainees about a series of workshops in natural beauty products, held in Algeria and Costa Rica and organized by a non-profit educational organization, to improve their socio-economic status. This research seeks to explore ways of empowering women by assessing their needs and providing them with skills to start their own business. A questionnaire is administered before the workshops and focus groups are held at the end. A qualitative research method is employed to analyze the data. Preliminary results show that the trainees aspire to create their businesses with the objectives of poverty reduction and social inclusion. The findings also reveal the need for small business funding programs and entrepreneurial training programs.

Keywords: adult education, non-formal education, socio-economic status, women empowerment

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Authors: Mohammad Alfaifi, Mohammed Alshehri

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Organophosphates are among the most widely used synthetic insect pesticides. The widespread use of organophosphates has stimulated research into the possible existence of effects related with their reproductive toxic activity. The present study aimed to assess the effects of diazinon (DIZ) on male reproductive system. DIZ at the dose levels of 1.5, 3.0 and 9.0 mg/kg b. wt./day was administered orally to male rats of Wistar strain for 30 days to evaluate the toxic alterations in testicular histology, biochemistry, sperm dynamics and testosterone levels. The body weight of animals did not show any significant changes; however, a significant reduction was observed in testes weight. DIZ also brought about a marked reduction in epididymal and testicular sperm counts in exposed males and a decrease in serum testosterone concentration. Histopathological examination of testes showed mild to severe degenerative changes in seminiferous tubules at various dose levels. Fertility test showed 79% negative results. All these toxic effects are moderate at low doses and become severe at higher dose levels. From the results of the present study, it is concluded that DIZ induces severe testicular damage and results in a reduction in sperm count and thus affect fertility. Small changes in sperm counts are known to have adverse effects on human fertility. Therefore, application of such insecticide should be limited to a designed programme.

Keywords: organophosphates, reproductive toxicity, diazinon, fertility

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Authors: Parul Jain, Jitendra Saha, L. C. Gupta, Satyabrata Patnaik, Ashok K. Ganguli, Ratnamala Chatterjee

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This study shows how sensitively and drastically multiferroic properties of CaMn₇O₁₂ get modified by isovalent Sr-doping, namely, in Ca₁₋ₓSrₓMn₇O₁₂ for x as small as 0.01 and 0.02. CaMn₇O₁₂ is a type-II multiferroic, wherein polarization is caused by magnetic spin ordering. In this report magnetic and ferroelectric properties of Ca₁₋ₓSrₓMn₇O₁₂ (0 ≤ x ≤ 0.1) are investigated. Samples were prepared by wet sol gel technique using their respective nitrates; powders thus obtained were calcined and sintered in optimized conditions. The X-ray diffraction patterns of all samples doped with Sr concentrations in the range (0 ≤ x ≤ 10%) were found to be free from secondary phases. Magnetization versus temperature and magnetization versus field measurements were carried out using Quantum Design SQUID magnetometer. Pyroelectric current measurements were done for finding the polarization in the samples. Findings of the measurements are: (i) increase of Sr-doping in CaMn₇O₁₂ lattice i.e. for x ≤ 0.02, increases the polarization, whereas decreases the magnetization and the coercivity of the samples; (ii) the material with x = 0.02 exhibits ferroelectric polarization Ps which is more than double the Ps in the un-doped material and the magnetization M is reduced to less than half of that of the pure material; remarkably (iii) the modifications in Ps and M are reversed as x increases beyond x = 0.02 and for x = 0.10, Ps is reduced even below that for the pure sample; (iv) there is no visible change of the two magnetic transitions TN1 (90 K) and TN2 (48 K) of the pure material as a function of x. The strong simultaneous variations of Ps and M for x = 0.02 strongly suggest that either a basic modification of the magnetic structure of the material or a significant change of the coupling of P and M or possibly both.

Keywords: ferroelectric, isovalent, multiferroic, polarization, pyroelectric

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Authors: Johannes Mertl

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Our surrounding air contains various particles. Besides typical representatives of inorganic dust, such as soot and ash, also particles originating from animals, microorganisms or plants are floating through the air, so-called bioaerosols. The group of bioaerosols consists of a broad spectrum of particles of different size, including fungi, bacteria, viruses, spores, or tree, flower and grass pollen that are of high relevance for allergy sufferers. In dependence of the environmental climate and the actual season, these allergenic particles can be found in enormous numbers in the air and are inhaled by humans via the respiration tract, with a potential for inflammatory diseases of the airways, such as asthma or allergic rhinitis. As a consequence air filter systems of ventilation and air conditioning devices are required to meet very high standards to prevent, or at least lower the number of allergens and airborne germs entering the indoor air. Still, filter systems are merely classified for their separation rates using well-defined mineral test dust, while no appropriate sufficiently standardized test methods for bioaerosols exist. However, determined separation rates for mineral test particles of a certain size cannot simply be transferred to bioaerosols, as separation efficiency of particularly fine and respirable particles (< 10 microns) is dependent not only on their shape and particle diameter, but also defined by their density and physicochemical properties. For this reason, the OFI developed a test method, which directly enables a testing of filters and filter media for their separation rates on bioaerosols, as well as a classification of filters. Besides allergens from an intact or fractured tree or grass pollen, allergenic proteins bound to particulates, as well as allergenic fungal spores (e.g. Cladosporium cladosporioides), or bacteria can be used to classify filters regarding their separation rates. Allergens passing through the filter can then be detected by highly sensitive immunological assays (ELISA) or in the case of fungal spores by microbiological methods, which allow for the detection of even one single spore passing the filter. The test procedure, which is carried out in laboratory scale, was furthermore validated regarding its sufficiency to cover real life situations by upscaling using air conditioning devices showing great conformity in terms of separation rates. Additionally, a clinical study with allergy sufferers was performed to verify analytical results. Several different air conditioning filters from the car industry have been tested, showing significant differences in their separation rates.

Keywords: airborne germs, allergens, classification of filters, fine dust

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Authors: Lorna Martha Dreyer

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Consistent with the changing paradigm on the rights of people with disabilities and in pursuit of social justice, there is internationally an increase in students with disabilities enrolling at Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). This trend challenges HEI’s to transform and attain Education for All (EFA) as a global imperative. However, while physical and sensory disabilities are observable, students with specific learning disabilities (SLD) do not present with any visible indications and are often referred to as “hidden” or “invisible” disabilities. This qualitative case study aimed to illuminate the experiences of students with SLDs at a South African university. The research was, therefore, guided by Vygotsky’s social-cultural theory (SCT). This research was conducted within a basic qualitative research methodology embedded in an interpretive paradigm. Data was collected through an online background survey and semi-structured interviews. Thematic qualitative content analysis was used to analyse the collected data systematically. From a social justice perspective, the major findings suggest that there are several factors that impede equal education for students with SLDs at university. Most participants in this small-scale study experienced a lack of acknowledgment and support from lecturers. They reported valuing the support of family and friends more than that of lecturers. It is concluded that lecturers need to be reflective of their pedagogical practices if authentic inclusion is to be realised.

Keywords: higher education, inclusive education, pedagogy, social-cultural theory, specific learning disabilities

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Authors: Berrachid Dounia, Bellihi Hassan

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The financial crisis made a barrier in front of small projects that are looking for funding, but in the other hand it has had at least an interesting side effect which is the rise of alternative and increasingly creative forms of financing. The traditional forms of financing has known a recession due to the new difficult situation of economical recession that all parts of the world have known. Having an innovating idea that has an effect on both sides, the economic one and social one is very beneficial for those who wants to get rid of the economical crisis. In this case, entrepreneurs who want to be successful are looking for the means of financing that are going to get their projects to the reality. The financing could be various, whether the entrepreneur can use his own resources, or go to the three “Fs”(Family, friends, and fools),look for Angel Investors, or try for the academic solution like universities and private incubators, but sometimes, entrepreneurs feels uncomfortable about those means and start looking to newer, less traditional forms of financing their projects. In the last few years, people have shown a great interest to the use of internet for many reasons (information, social networking, communication, entertainment, transaction, etc.). The use of internet facilitates relations between people and eases the maintenance of existing relationships ,it increases also the number of exchanges which leads to a “collective creativity”, moreover, internet gives an opportunity to create new tool for mobilizing civil society, which makes the participation in a project company much easier. The new atmosphere of business forces the project leaders to look for new solution of financing that cut out the financial intermediaries. Using platforms in order to finance projects is an alternative that is changing the traditional solutions of financing projects. New creative ways of lending money appears like Peer to Peer (person to person or P2P)lending. This digital directly intermediary got his origins from microcredit principles. Crowdfunding also, like P2P, involves getting individuals to pool their resources to finance a project without a typical financial intermediary. For Lambert and Schwienbacher "Crowdfunding involves an open call, essentially through the Internet, for the provision of financial resources either in the form of donations (without rewards) or in exchange for some form of reward and/or voting rights in order to support initiatives for specific purposes". The idea of this proposal for investors and entrepreneurs is to encourage small contributions from a large number of funders "the crowd" in order to raise money to fund projects. All those conditions made from crowdfunding a useful alternative to project leaders, and especially the ones who are carrying special ideas that need special funds. As mentioned before by Laflamme. S. et Lafortune. S. internet is a tool for mobilizing civil society. In our case, the crowdfunding is the tool that funds social entrepreneurship, in the case of not for profit organizations, it focuses his attention on social problems which could be resolved by mobilizing different resources, creating innovative initiatives, and building new social arrangements which call up the civil society. Social entrepreneurs are mostly the ones who goes onto crowdfunding web site, so they propose the amount which is expected to realize their project and then they receive the funds from crowd funders. Something the crowd funders expect something in return, like a product from the business (a sample from a product (case of a cooperative) or a CD (in the case of films or songs)), but not their money back. Thus, we cannot say that their lands are donations, because a donator did not expect anything back. However, in order to encourage "crowd-funders", rewards motivates people to get interested by projects and made some money from internet. The operation of crowd funding is making all parts satisfied investors, entrepreneurs and also crowdfunding sites owners. This paper aims to give a view of the mechanism of crowdfunding, by clarifying the techniques and its different categories, and social entrepreneurship as a sponsor of social development. Also, it aims to show how this alternative of financing could be beneficial for social entrepreneurs and how it is bringing a solution to fund social projects. The article concludes with a discussion of the contribution of crowdfunding in social entrepreneurship especially in the Moroccan context.

Keywords: crowd-funding, social entrepreneurship, projects funding, financing

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Authors: M. Bonopera, N. Tullini, C. C. Chen, T. K. Lin, K. C. Chang

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This paper presents the extension of a static method for the axial load identifications in prismatic beam-columns with uncertain length and unknown boundary conditions belonging to generic space structures, such as columns of space frames or struts and ties of space trusses. The non-destructive method requires the knowledge of the beam-column flexural rigidity only. Flexural displacements are measured at five cross sections along the beam-column subjected to an additional vertical load at the mid-span. Unlike analogous dynamic methods, any set of experimental data may be used in the identification procedure. The method is verified by means of many numerical and experimental tests on beam-columns having unknown boundary conditions and different slenderness belonging to three different space prototypes in small-scale. Excellent estimates of the tensile and compressive forces are obtained for the elements with higher slenderness and when the greatest possible distance between sensors is adopted. Moreover, the application of larger values of the vertical load and very accurate displacement measurements are required. The method could be an efficacious technique in-situ, considering that safety inspections will become increasingly important in the near future, especially because of the improvement of the material properties that allowed designing space structures composed of beam-columns with higher slenderness.

Keywords: force identification, in-situ test, space structure, static test

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Authors: G. A. Adamu, M. S. Sallau, S. O. Idris, E. B. Agbaji

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Drinking water is supplied to Danbatta, Makoda and some parts of Minjibir local government areas of Kano State from the surface water of Thomas Reservoir. The present land use in the catchment area of the reservoir indicates high agricultural activities, fishing, as well as domestic and small scale industrial activities. To study and monitor the quality of surface and drinking water of the area, water samples were collected from the reservoir, treated water at the treatment plant and potable water at the consumer end in three seasons November - February (cold season), March - June (dry season) and July - September (rainy season). The samples were analyzed for physical and chemical parameters, pH, temperature, total dissolved solids (TDS), conductivity, turbidity, total hardness, suspended solids, total solids, colour, dissolved oxygen (DO), biological oxygen demand (BOD), chloride ion (Cl^-) nitrite (NO₂^-), nitrate (NO₃^-), chemical oxygen demand (COD) and phosphate (PO₄^3-). The higher values obtained in some parameters with respect to the acceptable standard set by World Health Organization (WHO) and Nigerian Industrial Standards (NIS) indicate the pollution of both the surface and drinking water. These pollutants were observed to have a negative impact on water quality in terms of eutrophication, largely due to anthropogenic activities in the watershed.

Keywords: surface water, drinking water, water quality, pollution, Thomas reservoir, Kano

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Authors: Rebecca Dunne, Cormac Small, Geraldine O'Boyle, Nazir Ibrahim, Anisha

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Prostate cancer is the most common cancer among men, excluding non-melanoma skin cancers. It is estimated that approximately 12% of men will develop prostate cancer during their lifetime. Patients with intermediate, high risk, and very-high risk prostate cancer often undergo a combination of radiation treatments. These treatments include external beam radiotherapy with a low-dose rate or high-dose rate brachytherapy boost, often with concomitant androgen deprivation therapy. The literature on follow-up of patients that receive brachytherapy is scarce, particularly follow-up of patients that undergo high-dose rate brachytherapy. This retrospective study aims to investigate the biochemical failure and toxicities associated with triple therapy and external beam radiotherapy given in combination with brachytherapy. Reported toxicities and prostate specific antigen (PSA) were retrospectively evaluated in eighty patients that previously underwent external beam radiotherapy with a low-dose rate or high dose-rate brachytherapy boost. The severity of toxicities were correlated with intra-operative dosing during brachytherapy on ultrasound and CT scan. The results of this study will provide further information for clinicians and patients when considering treatment options.

Keywords: toxicities, combination, brachytherapy, intra-operative dosing, biochemical failure

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Authors: Arowosafe Folusade Catherine, Arowosafe Olubunmi, Aina Samson

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In many countries, tourism has been portrayed as a contributor to small-scale enterprises, contributing to improved standards of living, a catalyst for community development, and poverty alleviation. This study assessed the willingness of the host communities to provide homestay accommodation and also identified the homestay facilities available to host visitors to the community. A random sampling method was used to administer 150 copies of the questionnaire to the residents in Idanre. Data collected were subjected to descriptive and inferential statistical analysis, and results were presented using frequency and percentage tables. Results: Findings revealed that the majority of the residents were above 60 years (47.3%), with 33% of them aware of the concept of homestay accommodation, and 32% had primary education. The majority were self-employed (43.3%), earning less than ₦30,000 per month; it also revealed that 80.7% of the residents owned at least one house and had adequate water supply facility (100%) and electricity (99.3%). Some constraints observed revealed that safety for the host family (mean 4.81) was ranked high as a possible deterrent to providing homestay accommodation to strangers. Results revealed a correlation between the resident’s awareness and willingness to provide homestay accommodation services (r.0.05, p<0.05). This study recommends that sensitization programs to create awareness of the potential benefits of homestay accommodation in the host communities of Idanre Hills should be carried out by the relevant stakeholders.

Keywords: accommodation, benefits, homestay, Idanre Hills

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Authors: Daniel Francis, Mo Yassin

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Transverse patella fractures are routinely fixed using tension band wiring (TBW) using Kirschner wires and a wire in the shape of a figure of 8. The idea of the study was to compare the outcomes of the traditional technique against the more recently used cannulated screws and fiber tape in the shape of a figure of 8. We performed a retrospective cohort study of all the surgically fixed patella fractures from the year 2019 to 2022. The patients were divided into two groups TBW group and cannulated screws group. The primary outcome measure was the failure of fixation and the need for the removal of metalwork. Twenty-six patellar fractures were studied. TBW was used in 14 (53.8%), and cannulated screws were used for fixation in 12 (46.2%). There was one incident of metalwork failure in the TBW and one incident in the cannulated screws group. Five (35.7%) of patients in the TBW needed symptomatic metal work removed and One (8.3%) in the cannulated screw group. In both groups, the rate of fixation failure was low. Symptomatic implants, the most common complication observed, were higher in the TBW group in our practice. Although the small numbers in both groups, the hope of this study is to shine the light on the use of cannulated screws for patella fractures as it would reduce the need for a second operation and reduce the load on the already stretched services as well as improving the patient experience by not requiring further surgery. Although this is not a brand-new technique, it is not commonly used as there have not yet been any studies that demonstrate the lower rates of second surgery needed.

Keywords: patella, tension band wiring, randomised, new technique

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Authors: Aïssa Rezzoug

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This paper is aimed to bring new elements that demonstrate the tide caused the groundwater to rise in the shoreline band, on which the urban areas occurs, especially in the western coastal cities of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia like Jeddah. The reason for the last events of Jeddah inundation was the groundwater rise in the city coupled at the same time to a strong precipitation event. This paper will illustrate the tide participation in increasing the groundwater level significantly. It shows that the reason for internal groundwater recharge within the urban area is not only the excess of the water supply coming from surrounding areas, due to the human activity, with lack of sufficient and efficient sewage system, but also due to tide effect. The research study follows a quantitative method to assess groundwater level rise risks through many in-situ measurements and mathematical modelling. The proposed approach highlights groundwater level, in the urban areas of the city on the shoreline band, reaching the high tide level without considering any input from precipitation. Despite the small tide in the Red Sea compared to other oceanic coasts, the groundwater level is considerably enhanced by the tide from the seaside and by the freshwater table from the landside of the city. In these conditions, the groundwater level becomes high in the city and prevents the soil to evacuate quickly enough the surface flow caused by the storm event, as it was observed in the last historical flood catastrophe of Jeddah in 2009.

Keywords: flood, groundwater rise, Jeddah, tide

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Authors: Abdul Mannan Akhtar

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In this paper a novel concept of a self learning smart personalized computer assistant (ACPCA) is established which is a context aware system. Based on user habits, moods, and other routines/situational reactions the system will manage various services and suggestions at appropriate times including what schedule to follow, what to watch, what software to be used, what should be deleted etc. This system will utilize a hybrid fuzzyNeural model to predict what the user will do next and support his actions. This will be done by establishing fuzzy sets of user activities, choices, preferences etc. and utilizing their combinations to predict his moods and immediate preferences. Various application of context aware systems exist separately e.g. on certain websites for music or multimedia suggestions but a personalized autonomous system that could adapt to user’s personality does not exist at present. Due to the novelty and massiveness of this concept, this paper will primarily focus on the problem establishment, product features and its functionality; however a small mini case is also implemented on MATLAB to demonstrate some of the aspects of ACPCA. The mini case involves prediction of user moods, activity, routine and food preference using a hybrid fuzzy-Neural soft computing technique.

Keywords: context aware systems, APCPCA, soft computing techniques, artificial intelligence, fuzzy logic, neural network, mood detection, face detection, activity detection

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Authors: Muhammad Akbar Hussain, Muhammad Mehdi Hussain, Waqar Haider

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There are tens of thousands of undetected and uncatalogued pieces of space debris in the Low Earth Orbit (LEO). They are not only difficult to be detected and tracked, their sheer number puts active satellites and humans in orbit around Earth into danger. With the entry of more governments and private companies into harnessing the Earth’s orbit for communication, research and military purposes, there is an ever-increasing need for not only the detection and cataloguing of these pieces of space debris, it is time to take measures to take them out and clean up the space around Earth. Current optical and radar-based Space Situational Awareness initiatives are useful mostly in detecting and cataloguing larger pieces of debris mainly for avoidance measures. Smaller than 10 cm pieces are in a relatively dark zone, yet these are deadly and capable of destroying satellites and human missions. A network of mobile observatories, connected to each other in real time and working in unison as a single instrument, may be able to detect small pieces of debris and achieve effective triangulation to help create a comprehensive database of their trajectories and parameters to the highest level of precision. This data may enable ground-based laser systems to help deorbit individual debris. Such a network of observatories can join current efforts in detection and removal of space debris in Earth’s orbit.

Keywords: space debris, low earth orbit, mobile observatories, triangulation, seamless operability

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Authors: S. Alyami, S. Mohammad

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These Risk management practices have a significant impact on construction SMEs. The effective utilisation of these practices depends on culture change in order to optimise decision making for critical activities within construction projects. Thus, successful implementation of empowerment strategies would enhance operational employees to participate in effective decision making. However, there remain many barriers to individuals and organisations within empowerment strategies that require empirical investigation before the industry can benefit from their implementation. Gaps in understanding the relationship between employee empowerment and risk management practices still exist. This research paper aims to examine the impact of the structural empowerment on risk management practices in construction SMEs. The questionnaire has been distributed to participants (162 employees) that involve projects and civil engineers within a case study from Saudi construction SMEs. Partial least squares based structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was utilised to perform analysis. The results reveal a positive relationship between empowerment and risk management practices. The study shows how structural empowerment contributes to operational employees in risk management practices through involving activities such as decision making, self-efficiency, and autonomy. The findings of this study will contribute to close the current gaps in the construction SMEs context.

Keywords: construction SMEs, culture, decision making, empowerment, risk management

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Authors: Yunseok Noh, Chang-Uk Kwak, Sun-Joong Kim, Seong-Bae Park

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Scripts are one of the basic text resources to understand broadcasting contents. Since broadcast media wields lots of influence over the public, tools for understanding broadcasting contents are more required. Topic modeling is the method to get the summary of the broadcasting contents from its scripts. Generally, scripts represent contents descriptively with directions and speeches. Scripts also provide scene segments that can be seen as semantic units. Therefore, a script can be topic modeled by treating a scene segment as a document. Because scripts consist of speeches mainly, however, relatively small co-occurrences among words in the scene segments are observed. This causes inevitably the bad quality of topics based on statistical learning method. To tackle this problem, we propose a method of learning with additional word co-occurrence information obtained using scene similarities. The main idea of improving topic quality is that the information that two or more texts are topically related can be useful to learn high quality of topics. In addition, by using high quality of topics, we can get information more accurate whether two texts are related or not. In this paper, we regard two scene segments are related if their topical similarity is high enough. We also consider that words are co-occurred if they are in topically related scene segments together. In the experiments, we showed the proposed method generates a higher quality of topics from Korean drama scripts than the baselines.

Keywords: broadcasting contents, scripts, text similarity, topic model

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Authors: Nadia A. Mohamed, Zakaria El-Khayat, Wagdy K. B. Khalil, Mehrez E. El-Naggar

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Drug nephrotoxicity is still a problem for patients who have taken drugs for elongated periods or permanently. Ultrasound-assisted sol−gel method was used to prepare hollow structured poroussilica nanoemulsion loaded with sodium salicylate as a model drug. The work was extended to achieve the target of the current work via investigating the protective role of this nanoemulsion model as anti-inflammatory drug or ginger for its antioxidant effect against cisplatin-induced nephrotoxicity in male albino rats. The results clarify that the nanoemulsion model was synthesized using ultrasonic assisted with small size and well stabilization as proved by TEM and DLS analysis. Additionally, blood urea nitrogen (BUN), Serum creatinine (SC) and Urinary total protein (UTP) were increased, and the level of creatinine clearance (Crcl) was decreased. All those were met with disorders in oxidative stress and downregulation in the expression of the nephrin gene. Also, histopathological changes of the kidney tissue were observed. These changes back to normal by treatment with silica nanoparticles loaded sodium salicylate (Si-Sc-NPs), ginger or both. Conclusions oil/water nanoemulsion of (Si-Sc NPs) and ginger showed a protective and promising preventive strategy against nephrotoxicity due to their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects, and that offers a new approach in attenuating drug induced nephrotoxicity.

Keywords: sodium salicylate nanoencapsulation, nephrin mRNA, drug nephrotoxicity, cisplatin, experimental rats

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Authors: K. Doi, T. Nishimura, H. Fujimoto

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The number of people who become visually impaired and do not have sufficient tactile experiences has increased by various disease. Especially, many acquired visually impaired persons due to accidents, disorders, and aging cannot adequately read Braille. It is known that learning Braille requires a great deal of time and the acquisition of various skills. In our previous studies, we reported one of the problems in learning Braille. Concretely, the standard Braille size is too small for Braille beginners. And also we are short of the objective data regarding easily readable Braille size. Therefore, it is necessary to conduct various experiments for evaluating Braille size that would make learning easier for beginners. In this study, for the purpose of investigating easy-to-read conditions of vertical and horizontal dot spacing for beginners, we conducted one Braille reading experiment. In this our experiment, we prepared test pieces by use of our original Braille printer with controlling function of Braille size. We specifically considered Braille beginners with acquired visual impairments who were unfamiliar with Braille. Therefore, ten sighted subjects with no experience of reading Braille participated in this experiment. Size of vertical and horizontal dot spacing was following conditions. Each dot spacing was 2.0, 2.3, 2.5, 2.7, 2.9, 3.1mm. The subjects were asked to read one Braille character with controlled Braille size. The results of this experiment reveal that Braille beginners can read Braille accurately and quickly when both vertical and horizontal dot spacing are 3.1 mm or more. This knowledge will be helpful data in considering Braille size for acquired visually impaired persons.

Keywords: paper-based Braille, vertical and horizontal dot spacing, readability, acquired visual impairment, Braille beginner

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Authors: Jyh Sheen, Yong-Lin Wang

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This research dedicates to find a different measurement procedure of microwave dielectric properties of ceramic materials with high dielectric constants. For the composite of ceramic dispersed in the polymer matrix, the dielectric constants of the composites with different concentrations can be obtained by various mixture equations. The other development of mixture rule is to calculate the permittivity of ceramic from measurements on composite. To do this, the analysis method and theoretical accuracy on six basic mixture laws derived from three basic particle shapes of ceramic fillers have been reported for dielectric constants of ceramic less than 40 at microwave frequency. Similar researches have been done for other well-known mixture rules. They have shown that both the physical curve matching with experimental results and low potential theory error are important to promote the calculation accuracy. Recently, a modified of mixture equation for high dielectric constant ceramics at microwave frequency has also been presented for strontium titanate (SrTiO3) which was selected from five more well known mixing rules and has shown a good accuracy for high dielectric constant measurements. However, it is still not clear the accuracy of this modified equation for other high dielectric constant materials. Therefore, the five more well known mixing rules are selected again to understand their application to other high dielectric constant ceramics. The other high dielectric constant ceramic, TiO2 with dielectric constant 100, was then chosen for this research. Their theoretical error equations are derived. In addition to the theoretical research, experimental measurements are always required. Titanium dioxide is an interesting ceramic for microwave applications. In this research, its powder is adopted as the filler material and polyethylene powder is like the matrix material. The dielectric constants of those ceramic-polyethylene composites with various compositions were measured at 10 GHz. The theoretical curves of the five published mixture equations are shown together with the measured results to understand the curve matching condition of each rule. Finally, based on the experimental observation and theoretical analysis, one of the five rules was selected and modified to a new powder mixture equation. This modified rule has show very good curve matching with the measurement data and low theoretical error. We can then calculate the dielectric constant of pure filler medium (titanium dioxide) by those mixing equations from the measured dielectric constants of composites. The accuracy on the estimating dielectric constant of pure ceramic by various mixture rules will be compared. This modified mixture rule has also shown good measurement accuracy on the dielectric constant of titanium dioxide ceramic. This study can be applied to the microwave dielectric properties measurements of other high dielectric constant ceramic materials in the future.

Keywords: microwave measurement, dielectric constant, mixture rules, composites

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Authors: Mastaneh Safarnejad Shad, Wim Dehaen, Steven De Jonghe

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Since CXCR4 is the main coreceptor of HIV-1 and plays an important role in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) entry, numerous efforts were directed towards the discovery of new classes of small molecules that act as CXCR4 antagonists. In addition, CXCR4 antagonists are potentially useful in the treatment of several other disorders, such as cancer cell metastasis, leukemia cell proliferation, rheumatoid arthritis, and pulmonary fibrosis. Since AMD3100 (plerixafor) is the only CXCR4 antagonist which obtained approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), we were motivated to investigate a new category of molecules as CXCR4 antagonists. Most of the scaffolds which have been studied so far as CXCR4 antagonists are based on the tetrahydroquinoline (THQ) moiety in which AMD11070 (mavorixafor), GSK-812394, and TIQ15 displayed the most potent CXCR4 antagonism. Due to the high potency of these scaffolds, two different series of compounds were prepared in this work. In the first set, the THQ moiety is coupled to an amine chain and various isoquinoline derivatives (prepared by an in-house developed triazolization strategy), of which the upper part of molecules is identical to AMD11070 and TIQ15. In the second category of compounds, the THQ moiety was simplified by the synthesis of a substituted pyridine moiety. In order to investigate if CXCR4 antagonism requires the presence of an isoquinoline moiety, the corresponding pyridine analogues were also prepared. In both series of compounds, potent CXCR4 antagonism was noticed.

Keywords: CXCR4 coreceptor, CXCR4 antagonists, HIV inhibitor, tetrahydroquinoline

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Authors: Hatice Yildirim

Abstract:

This study is an investigation into ‘The role of teaching assistants (TAs) for deaf pupils in an English primary school’, in order not only to contribute to the education of deaf pupils but also contribute to the literature, in which there has been a lack of attention paid to the role of TAs for deaf pupils. With this in mind, the research design was planned based on using a case study as a qualitative research approach in order to have a deep and first-hand understanding of the case for ‘the role of TAs for deaf pupils’ in a real-life context. 12 semi-structured classroom observations and six semi-structured interviews were carried out with four TAs and two teachers in one English mainstream primary school. The data analysis followed a thematic analysis framework. The results indicated that TAs are utilised based on a one-on-one support model and are deployed under the class teacher in the classroom. Out of the classroom activities are carried out in small groups with the agreement of the TAs and the class teacher, as per the policy of the school. Due to the one-on-one TA support model, the study pointed out the seven different roles carried out by TAs in the education of deaf pupils in an English mainstream primary school. While supporting deaf pupils academically and socially are the main roles of TAs, they also support deaf pupils by recording their progress, communicating with their parents, taking on a pastoral care role, tutoring them in additional support lessons, and raising awareness of deaf pupils’ issues.

Keywords: deaf, mainstream, teaching assistant, teaching assistant's roles

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Authors: Jannes Quer, Amir Niknejad, Marcus Weber

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Computational Drug Design is often based on Molecular Dynamics simulations of molecular systems. Molecular Dynamics can be used to simulate, e.g., the binding and unbinding event of a small drug-like molecule with regard to the active site of an enzyme or a receptor. However, the time-scale of the overall binding event is many orders of magnitude longer than the time-scale of simulation. Thus, there is a need to speed-up molecular simulations. In order to speed up simulations, the molecular dynamics trajectories have to be ”steared” out of local minimizers of the potential energy surface – the so-called metastabilities – of the molecular system. Increasing the kinetic energy (temperature) is one possibility to accelerate simulated processes. However, with temperature the entropy of the molecular system increases, too. But this kind ”stearing” is not directed enough to stear the molecule out of the minimum toward the saddle point. In this article, we give a new mathematical idea, how a potential energy surface can be changed in such a way, that entropy is kept under control while the trajectories are still steared out of the metastabilities. In order to compute the unsteared transition behaviour based on a steared simulation, we propose to use extrapolation methods. In the end we mathematically show, that our method accelerates the simulations along the direction, in which the curvature of the potential energy surface changes the most, i.e., from local minimizers towards saddle points.

Keywords: extrapolation, Eyring-Kramers, metastability, multilevel sampling

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Authors: Reza Hosseinpourpia, Stergios Adamopoulos, Carsten Mai

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Medium density fiberboard (MDF) is a common category of wood-based panels that are widely used in the furniture industry. Fine lignocellulosic fibres are combined with a synthetic resin, mostly urea formaldehyde (UF), and joined together under heat and pressure to form panels. Like solid wood, MDF is a hygroscopic material; therefore, its moisture content depends on the surrounding relative humidity and temperature. In addition, UF is a hydrophilic resin and susceptible to hydrolysis under certain conditions of elevated temperatures and humidity, which cause dimensional instability of the panels. The latter directly affect the performance of final products such as furniture, when they are used in situations of high relative humidity. Existing water-repellent formulations, such as paraffin, present limitations related to their non-renewable nature, cost and highest allowed added amount. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to test the suitability of renewable water repellents as alternative chemicals for enhancing the dimensional stability of MDF panels. A small amount of tall oil based formulations were used as water-repellent agents in the manufacturing of laboratory scale MDF. The effects on dimensional stability, internal bond strength and formaldehyde release of MDF were tested. The results indicated a good potential of tall oil as a bio-based substance of water repellent formulations for improving the dimensional stability of MDF.

Keywords: dimensional stability, medium density fiberboard, tall oil, urea formaldehyde

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Authors: Taysir Soliman

Abstract:

One of the current popular clustering techniques is Spectral Clustering (SC) because of its advantages over conventional approaches such as hierarchical clustering, k-means, etc. and other techniques as well. However, one of the disadvantages of SC is the time consuming process because it requires computing the eigenvectors. In the past to overcome this disadvantage, a number of attempts have been proposed such as the Power Iteration Clustering (PIC) technique, which is one of versions from SC; some of PIC advantages are: 1) its scalability and efficiency, 2) finding one pseudo-eigenvectors instead of computing eigenvectors, and 3) linear combination of the eigenvectors in linear time. However, its worst disadvantage is an inter-class collision problem because it used only one pseudo-eigenvectors which is not enough. Previous researchers developed Deflation-based Power Iteration Clustering (DPIC) to overcome problems of PIC technique on inter-class collision with the same efficiency of PIC. In this paper, we developed Parallel DPIC (PDPIC) to improve the time and memory complexity which is run on apache spark framework using sparse matrix. To test the performance of PDPIC, we compared it to SC, ESCG, ESCALG algorithms on four small graph benchmark datasets and nine large graph benchmark datasets, where PDPIC proved higher accuracy and better time consuming than other compared algorithms.

Keywords: spectral clustering, power iteration clustering, deflation-based power iteration clustering, Apache spark, large graph

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Authors: Hui Shi

Abstract:

This study investigates a newly emerged usage of Chinese numeral classifier mei (枚) in the cyberspace. In modern Chinese grammar, mei as a classifier should occupy the pre-nominal position, and its valid accompanying nouns are restricted to small, flat, fragile inanimate objects rather than humans. To examine the semantic change of mei, two types of data from Weibo.com were collected. First, 500 mei-included Weibo posts constructed a corpus for analyzing this classifier's word order distribution (post-nominal or pre-nominal) as well as its accompanying nouns' semantics (inanimate or human). Second, considering that mei accompanies a remarkable number of human nouns in the first corpus, the second corpus is composed of mei-involved Weibo IDs from users located in first and third-tier cities (n=8 respectively). The findings show that in the cyber community, mei frequently classifies human-related neologisms at the archaic post-normal position. Besides, the 23 to 29-year-old females as well as Weibo users from third-tier cities are the major populations who adopt mei in their user IDs for self-description and identity expression. This paper argues that the creative usage of mei gains popularity in the Chinese internet due to a humor effect. The marked word order switch and semantic misapplication combined to trigger incongruity and jocularity. This study has significance for research on Chinese cyber neologism. It may also lay a foundation for further studies on Chinese classifier change and Chinese internet communication.

Keywords: Chinese classifier, humor, neologism, semantic change

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Authors: Diana Serbezeanu, Ionela-Daniela Carja, Tachita Vlad-Bubulac, Sergiu Sova

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New phosphorus-containing monomers having methoxy end functional groups were prepared from methyl 4-hydroxybenzoate and two different dichlorides with phosphorus, namely phenyl phosphonic dichloride and phenyl dichlorophosphate. The structures of the monomers were confirmed by FTIR and NMR spectroscopy. The assignments for the 1H, 13C and 31P chemical shifts are based on 1D and 2D NMR homo- and heteronuclear correlations (H,H-COSY (Correlation Spectroscopy), H,C-HMQC (Heteronuclear Multiple Quantum Correlation and H,C-HMBC (Heteronuclear Multiple Bond Correlation)) and 31P-13C couplings. The monomers exhibited good solubility in common organic solvents. Dimethyl sulfoxide was to be a good solvent to grow crystals of considerable size which were investigated by X-ray analysis. One of these two new monomers presented thermotropic liquid crystalline behaviour, as revealed by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), polarized light microscopy (PLM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The transition temperature from crystal to liquid crystalline state (K→LC) was 143°C and from the LC to isotropic state (LC→I) was 167°C. Upon heating, bis(4-(methoxycarbonyl)phenyl formed fine textures, difficult to be ascribed to smectic or nematic phases. Upon cooling from the isotropic state, bis(4-(methoxycarbonyl)phenyl exhibited a mosaic-type texture. X-ray diffraction measurements at small angles (SAXS) of bis(4-(methoxycarbonyl)phenyl showed two peaks at 1.8 Å and 3.5 Å, respectively suggesting organization at supramolecular level.

Keywords: phosphorus-containing monomers, polarized light microscopy, structure investigation, thermotropic liquid crystalline properties

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Authors: Sandor Levai, Valentin Juhasz, Miklos Gasz

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Rising damp is an extremely complex phenomenon that is of great practical interest to the field of building conservation due to the irreversible damages it can make to old and historic structures. The electrical effects occurring in damp masonry have been scarcely researched and are a largely unknown aspect of rising damp. Present paper describes the typical electrical patterns occurring in porous brickwork during a wetting and drying cycle. It has been found that in contrast with dry masonry, where electrical phenomena are virtually non-existent, damp masonry exhibits a wide array of electrical effects. Long-term real-time measurements performed in the lab on small-scale brick structures, using an array of embedded micro-sensors, revealed significant voltage, current, capacitance and resistance variations which can be linked to the movement of moisture inside porous materials. The same measurements performed on actual old buildings revealed a similar behaviour, the electrical effects being more significant in areas of the brickwork affected by rising damp. Understanding these electrical phenomena contributes to a better understanding of the driving mechanisms of rising damp, potentially opening new avenues of dealing with it in a less invasive manner.

Keywords: brick masonry, electrical phenomena in damp brickwork, porous building materials, rising damp, spontaneous electrical potential, wetting-drying cycle

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Authors: Minase Yitbarek Mengistu, Abrham Melkamu, Dawit Yisfaw, Bisrat Belihu, Abdulhakim Lalega

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This research was aimed at reducing and recycling waste paper and sawdust from our environment, thereby reducing environmental pollution resulting from the management/disposal of these waste materials. In this research, some mechanical properties of composite ceiling board materials made from waste paper, sawdust, and pineapple leaf fibers were investigated to determine their suitability for use in low-cost construction work. The ceiling board was obtained from the waste of paper, sawdust chips, and pineapple leaf fibers by manual mechanical bonding techniques using dissolved polystyrene films as a binding agent. The results obtained showed that the water absorption values of between 6 % and 8.1 %; as well as density values of 500 kg/mm3 and 611.1 kg/mm3.From our result, the better one is a ratio of pineapple leaf fiber 25%, sawdust 40%, binder 25%, and waste paper 10%. The composite ceiling boards were successfully nailed with firm grips. These values obtained were compared with those of the conventional ceiling boards and it was observed that these composite materials can be used for internal low-cost construction work and Insulation (acoustic and thermal) performance. It is highly recommended that small and medium enterprises be encouraged to venture into waste recycling and the production of these composite ceiling materials to create jobs for skilled and unskilled labor that are locally available.

Keywords: composite material, environment, textile, ceiling board

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