Search results for: right to life

Authors: Z. Honarvar, M. Farhoodi, M. R. Khani, S. Shojaee-Aliabadi

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The purpose of the present study was to evaluate carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC) coated polypropylene (PP) films containing Zataria multiflora (ZEO) essential oils (4%) as an antimicrobial packaging for chicken breast stored at 4 °C. To increase PP film hydrophilicity, it was treated by atmospheric cold plasma prior to coating by CMC. Then, different films including PP, PP/CMC, PP/CMC containing 4% of ZEO were used for the chicken meat packaging in vapor phase. Total viable count and pseudomonads population and oxidative (TBA) changes of the chicken breast were analyzed during shelf life. Results showed that the shelf life of chicken meat kept in films containing ZEO improved from three to nine days compared to the control sample without any direct contact with the film. Study of oxygen barrier properties of bilayer film without essential oils (0.096 cm³ μm/m² d kPa) in comparison with PP film (416 cm³ μm/m² d kPa) shows that coating of PP with CMC significantly reduces oxygen permeation of the obtained packaging (P<0.05), which reduced aerobic bacteria growth. Chemical composition of ZEO was also evaluated by gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS), and this shows that thymol was the main antimicrobial and antioxidant component of the essential oil. The results revealed that PP/CMC containing ZEO has good potential for application as active food packaging in indirect contact which would also improve sensory properties of product.

Keywords: shelf life, chicken breast, polypropylene, carboxymethyl cellulose, essential oil

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Authors: V. Sulakatko, F. U. Vogdt, I. Lill

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Construction technology and on-site construction activities have a direct influence on the life cycle costs of energy efficiently renovated apartment buildings. The systematic inadequacies of the External Thermal Insulation Composite System (ETICS) which occur during the construction phase increase the risk for all stakeholders, reduce mechanical durability and increase the life cycle costs of the building. The economic effect of these shortcomings can be minimised if the risk of the most significant on-site activities is recognised. The objective of the presented ETICS economic assessment concept is to evaluate the economic influence of on-site shortcomings and reveal their significance to the foreseeable future repair costs. The model assembles repair techniques, discusses their direct cost calculation methods, argues over the proper usage of net present value over the life cycle of the building, and proposes a simulation tool to evaluate the risk of on-site activities. As the technique is dependent on the selected real interest rate, a sensitivity analysis is anticipated to determine the validity of the recommendations. After the verification of the model on the sample buildings by the industry, it is expected to increase economic rationality of resource allocation and reduce high-risk systematic shortcomings during the construction process of ETICS.

Keywords: activity-based cost estimating, cost estimation, ETICS, life cycle costing

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Authors: Preeti Nakhat, Neeta Sinha

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Career plays an indispensable role in shaping one’s outlook on life. Choosing right career adds 'feathers to the life' whereas wrong career decision 'takes a toll 'in one’s life. It is pivotal for the students to know the career opportunities related to their field where they can escalate and excel. With the aim to comprehend certainty and indecisiveness in career decision among college students, a study will be conducted. The study focuses to gain insight on decisiveness and indecisiveness of career among the students. The hypotheses for the study are (1) There is no relation between the medium of education (vernacular/English medium) and career decisiveness among the college students. (2) There is no relation between the faculty(science, commerce, arts)chosen and career decisiveness. (3)There is no relation between father’s qualification and career decisiveness. To test the aforementioned hypotheses, a survey questionnaire will be used. The questionnaire is 'Career decision scale' by Samuel H. Osipow. This study will include 200 college going students. The data will be collected from first, second, third, and fourth year students. Statistical analysis of the data collected with be done through SPSS/Excel calculation and then the hypotheses will be tested.

Keywords: career decisiveness, career indecisiveness, college students, career

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Authors: G. S. Dangayach, Gaurav Gaurav, Alok Bihari Singh

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The popularity of vehicles in both industrialized and developing economies led to a rise in the production of tyres. People have become increasingly concerned about the tyre industry's possible environmental impact in the last two decades. The life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology was used to assess the environmental impacts of industrial tyres throughout their life cycle, which included four stages: manufacture, transportation, consumption, and end-of-life. The majority of prior studies focused on tyre recycling and disposal. Only a few studies have been conducted on the environmental impact of tyre production process. LCA methodology was employed to determine the environmental impact of tyre manufacture process (gate to gate) at an Indian firm. Comparative analysis was also conducted to identify the environmental hotspots in various stages of tire manufacturing. This study is limited to gate-to-gate analysis of manufacturing processes with the functional unit of a single tyre weighing 50 kg. GaBi software was used to do both qualitative and quantitative analysis. Different environmental impact indicators are measured in terms of CO2, SO2, NOx, GWP (global warming potential), AP (acidification potential), EP (eutrophication potential), POCP (photochemical oxidant formation potential), and HTP (toxic human potential). The results demonstrate that the major contributor to environmental pollution is electricity. The Banbury process has a very high negative environmental impact, which causes respiratory problems to workers and operators.

Keywords: life cycle assessment (LCA), environmental impact indicators, tyre manufacturing process, environmental impact assessment

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Authors: Diana Meeks

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The use of a virtual learning environment (VLE), via the Second Life Platform has been a positive experience to enhance critical thinking, for executive graduate nursing practicum students. Due to the interest of faculty and students, the opportunity to immerse students via a virtual learning environment to enhance critical thinking related to the nurse executive role was explored. The College of Nursing realized the potential to enhance critical thinking and incorporated the Second Life, virtual learning environment platform into their graduate nursing program within their executive practicum course. The results from students and faculty regarding this experience have been positive. Students state the VLE platform has enhanced their critical thinking and interaction with peers. To date, course refinement incorporating a Second Life, virtual learning environment for the nurse executive practicum students continues. As a result, a designated subject matter expert has been designated for this course. The development and incorporation of the VLE approach will be presented.

Keywords: nursing, virtual learning environment, critical thinking, VLE

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Authors: E. Erdogan, H. A. Erdogan

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FengShui, an old Chinese discipline, dates back to more than 5000 years, is one of the design principles that aim at creating habitable and sustainable spaces in harmony with nature by systematizing data within its own structure. Having emerged from Chinese mysticism and embodying elements of faith in its principles, FengShui argues that the positive energy in the environment channels human behavior and psychology. This argument is supported with the thesis of quantum physics that ‘everything is made up of energy’ and gains an important place. In spaces where living and working take place with several principles and systematized rules, FengShui promises a happier, more peaceful and comfortable life by influencing human psychology, acts, and soul as well as the professional and social life of the individual. Observing these design properties in houses, workplaces, offices, the environment, and daily life as a design paradigm is significant. In this study, how FengShui, a Central Asian culture emanated from Chinese mysticism, shapes design and how it is used as an element of sustainable design will be explained.

Keywords: Feng Shui, design principle, sustainability, philosophy

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Authors: M. Kosacka, I. Kudelska

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Vehicle is one of the most influential and complex product worldwide, which affects people’s life, state of the environment and condition of the economy (all aspects of sustainable development concept) during each stage of lifecycle. With the increase of vehicles’ number, there is growing potential for management of End of Life Vehicle (ELV), which is hazardous waste. From one point of view, the ELV should be managed to ensure risk elimination, but from another point, it should be treated as a source of valuable materials and spare parts. In order to obtain materials and spare parts, there are established recycling networks, which are an example of sustainable policy realization at the national level. The basic object in the polish recycling network is dismantling facility. The output material streams in dismantling stations include waste, which very often generate costs and spare parts, that have the biggest potential for revenues creation. Both outputs are stored into warehouses, according to the law. In accordance to the revenue creation and sustainability potential, it has been placed a strong emphasis on storage process. We present the concept of storage method, which takes into account the specific of the dismantling facility in order to support decision-making process with regard to the principles of sustainable development. The method was developed on the basis of case study of one of the greatest dismantling facility in Poland.

Keywords: dismantling, end of life vehicles, sustainability, storage

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Authors: Prathama Guha Chaudhuri, Arunima Datta, Ashis Mukhopadhyay

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Background: Visualization (guided imagery) is a set of techniques which induce relaxation and help people create positive mental images in order to reduce stress.It is relatively inexpensive and can even be practised by bed bound people. Studies have shown visualization to be an effective tool to improve cancer patients’ anxiety, depression and quality of life. The common images used with cancer patients in the developed world are those involving the individual’s body and its strengths. Since breast cancer patients in India are more family oriented and often their main concerns are the stigma of having cancer and subsequent isolation of their families, including their children, we figured that positive images involving acceptance and integration within family and society would be more effective for them. Method: Data was collected from 119 breast cancer patients on chemotherapy willing to undergo psychotherapy, with no history of past psychiatric illness. Their baseline stress, anxiety, depression and quality of life were assessed using validated tools. The participants were then randomly divided into three groups: a) those who received visualization therapy with standard imageries involving the body and its strengths (sVT), b) those who received visualization therapy using indigenous family oriented imageries (mVT) and c) a control group who received supportive therapy. There were six sessions spread over two months for each group. The psychological outcome variables were measured post intervention. Appropriate statistical analyses were done. Results:Both forms of visualization therapy were more effective than supportive therapy alone in reducing patients’ depression, anxiety and quality of life.Modified VT proved to be significantly more effective in improving patients’ anxiety and quality of life. Conclusion: Visualization is a valuable therapeutic option for reduction of psychological distress and improving quality of life of breast cancer patients.In order to be more effective, the images used need to be modified according to the sociocultural background and individual needs of the patients.

Keywords: breast cancer, visualization therapy, quality of life, anxiety, depression

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Authors: Francesco Colcerasa, Fabio Pisani

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We contribute to the subjective well-being literature testing the relationship between life satisfaction and inequality of opportunity in health, measured through the Human Opportunity Index calculated at the national level using individual socio-economic data from the cross-country European Social Survey sample. We compute several indexes of opportunity inequality in health, each obtained according to a different combination of circumstances (gender, immigrant status, parents’ education). We find a robust and significant relationship where life satisfaction is higher in correspondence with low levels of health opportunity inequality. The result is twofold. On the one hand, the importance of the well-being of other types of inequality than income inequality emerges. On the other hand, the socioeconomic roots of inequality in health are investigated, suggesting that circumstances at birth have a role in future well-being. Several rationales for the nexus between life satisfaction and inequality of opportunity in health are possible, which we investigate by splitting the sample. Among others, we find a prominent role of pro-social preferences – formalized as interest towards own offspring (which can be interpreted as intergenerational justice) – as a mediating factor of the relationship.

Keywords: Inequality of opportunity, subjective wellbeing, health, health inequality, inequality of opportunity in health

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Authors: Thomas Schalow

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It is commonly recognized that our present curriculum is not preparing students to function in the 21st century. This is particularly true in regard to communication needs across cultures - both human and non-human. In this paper, a comprehensive theory of communication-based on communication with non-human cultures and intelligences is presented to meet the following three imminent contingencies: communicating with sentient biological intelligences, communicating with extraterrestrial intelligences, and communicating with artificial super-intelligences. The paper begins with the argument that we need to become much more serious about communicating with the non-human, intelligent life forms that already exists around us here on Earth. We need to broaden our definition of communication and reach out to other sentient life forms in order to provide humanity with a better perspective of its place within our ecosystem. The paper next examines the science and philosophy behind CETI (communication with extraterrestrial intelligences) and how it could prove useful even in the absence of contact with alien life. However, CETI’s assumptions and methodology need to be revised in accordance with the communication theory being proposed in this paper if we are truly serious about finding and communicating with life beyond Earth. The final theme explored in this paper is communication with non-biological super-intelligences. Humanity has never been truly compelled to converse with other species, and our failure to seriously consider such intercourse has left us largely unprepared to deal with communication in a future that will be mediated and controlled by computer algorithms. Fortunately, our experience dealing with other cultures can provide us with a framework for this communication. The basic concepts behind intercultural communication can be applied to the three types of communication envisioned in this paper if we are willing to recognize that we are in fact dealing with other cultures when we interact with other species, alien life, and artificial super-intelligence. The ideas considered in this paper will require a new mindset for humanity, but a new disposition will yield substantial gains. A curriculum that is truly ready for the 21st century needs to be aligned with this new theory of communication.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, CETI, communication, language

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Authors: Komol Phaisarn, Anuphan Suttimarn, Vitchanan Keawtong, Kittisak Thongyoun, Chaiyos Jamsawang

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This article is intended to analyze insurance information which contains information on the customer decision when purchasing life insurance pay package. The data were analyzed in order to present new customers with Life Insurance Perfect Pay package to meet new customers’ needs as much as possible. The basic data of insurance pay package were collect to get data mining; thus, reducing the scattering of information. The data were then classified in order to get decision model or decision tree using Algorithm C4.5 (J-48). In the classification, WEKA tools are used to form the model and testing datasets are used to test the decision tree for the accurate decision. The validation of this model in classifying showed that the accurate prediction was 68.43% while 31.25% were errors. The same set of data were then tested with other models, i.e. Naive Bayes and Zero R. The results showed that J-48 method could predict more accurately. So, the researcher applied the decision tree in writing the program used to introduce the product to new customers to persuade customers’ decision making in purchasing the insurance package that meets the new customers’ needs as much as possible.

Keywords: decision tree, data mining, customers, life insurance pay package

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Authors: Jeoffrey Oostrom, Robbert James Schlingmann, Hani Alers

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This document depicts the research into the indicators of dementia progression, the automation of quality of life assignments, and the visualization of it. To do this, the Smart Teddy project was initiated to make a smart companion that both monitors the senior citizen as well as processing the captured data into an insightful dashboard. With around 50 million diagnoses worldwide, dementia proves again and again to be a bothersome strain on the lives of many individuals, their relatives, and society as a whole. In 2015 it was estimated that dementia care cost 818 billion U.S Dollars globally. The Smart Teddy project aims to take away a portion of the burden from caregivers by automating the collection of certain data, like movement, geolocation, and sound-levels. This paper proves that the Smart Teddy has the potential to become a useful tool for caregivers but won’t pose as a solution. The Smart Teddy still faces some problems in terms of emotional privacy, but its non-intrusive nature, as well as diversity in usability, can make up for it.

Keywords: dementia care, medical data visualization, quality of life, smart companion

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Authors: Ahmadur Rahman, Showkat Ahmad Lone, Ariful Islam

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In this article, we have estimated the parameters for the failure times of units based on the sampling technique adaptive type-I progressive hybrid censoring under the step-stress partially accelerated life tests for competing risk. The failure times of the units are assumed to follow an exponential distribution. Maximum likelihood estimation technique is used to estimate the unknown parameters of the distribution and tampered coefficient. Confidence interval also obtained for the parameters. A simulation study is performed by using Monte Carlo Simulation method to check the authenticity of the model and its assumptions.

Keywords: adaptive type-I hybrid progressive censoring, competing risks, exponential distribution, simulation, step-stress partially accelerated life tests

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Authors: Alyaa Farouk AbdelFattah Ibrahim, Agnes Monica, Dolores I. Cabansag

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The prevalence of diabetes mellitus is reaching epidemic proportions in many parts of the world causing an increasing public health concern. Cases of Type 2 diabetes are rapidly increasing in the Middle East region. Deprived of lifestyle deviations, a section of the Middle East’s inhabitants will be pretentious by 2035. As all sociocultural factors have created unhealthy lifestyles, which have become part of the social norms within Saudi society, thereby increased the prevalence of sedentary lifestyle and obesity in women living in Saudi Arabia. So, this study aimed to assess the impact of diabetes mellitus on quality of life of female nursing students in King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences, Riyadh. In a crossectional study design, 151 nursing students at King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for health sciences in Riyadh were included in the study. Biosociodemographic questionnaire and Short-Form 36 (SF-36) Health Related Quality of life Survey Arabic version were used for data collection, and all included students were screened for random blood glucose level. Results depicted that among 151 subjects included in the study 17 (11.3%) had diagnosed medical problems, and 29.4% of those participants with medical problems were diabetics. Univariate regression model for the relation between diabetes mellitus and overall percent score of SF-36 health survey domains showed no statistically significant difference between diabetic and non-diabetic subjects 0.990(0.931-1.053). In conclusion, although the diabetes prevalence was high among the study subjects it did not affect their quality of life may be due to age of the study population.

Keywords: diabetes mellitus, diabetes prevalence, quality of life, university students' health

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Authors: C. E. Sutton, A. Varvani-Farahani

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Fatigue damage and life prediction of particle metal matrix composites (PMMCs) under uniaxial and multiaxial loading conditions were investigated. Three PMM composite materials of Al6061/Al2O3/20p-T6, Al6061/Al2O3/22p-T6 and Al6061/SiC/17w-T6 tested under tensile, torsion, and combined tension-torsion fatigue cycling were evaluated with various fatigue damage models. The fatigue damage models of Smith-Watson-Topper (S. W. T.), Ellyin, Brown-Miller, Fatemi-Socie, and Varvani were compared for their capability to assess the fatigue damage of materials undergoing various loading conditions. Fatigue life predication results were then evaluated by implementing material-dependent coefficients that factored in the effects of the particle reinforcement in the earlier developed Varvani model. The critical plane-energy approach incorporated the critical plane as the plane of crack initiation and early stage of crack growth. The strain energy density was calculated on the critical plane incorporating stress and strain components acting on the plane. This approach successfully evaluated fatigue damage values versus fatigue lives within a narrower band for both uniaxial and multiaxial loading conditions as compared with other damage approaches studied in this paper.

Keywords: fatigue damage, life prediction, critical plane approach, energy approach, PMM composites

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Authors: Srinivasan Chandrasekaran, Manda Hari Venkata Ramachandra Rao

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Increase in the oil and gas exploration in ultra deep-water demands an adaptive structural form of the platform. Triceratops has superior motion characteristics compared to that of the Tension Leg Platform and Single Point Anchor Reservoir platforms, which is well established in the literature. Buoyant legs that support the deck are position-restrained to the sea bed using tethers with high axial pretension. Environmental forces that act on the platform induce dynamic tension variations in the tethers, causing the failure of tethers. The present study investigates the dynamic response behavior of the restraining system of the platform under the failure of a single tether of each buoyant leg in high sea states. Using the rain-flow counting algorithm and the Goodman diagram, fatigue damage caused to the tethers is estimated, and the fatigue life is predicted. Results shows that under failure conditions, the fatigue life of the remaining tethers is quite alarmingly low.

Keywords: fatigue life, pm spectrum, rain flow counting, triceratops, failure analysis

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Authors: Ritwik Saha, Anindita Chaudhuri

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The psychological dimension of work-based mobility of the contemporary time in the context of the ever-changing socio-economic process mounting the interest to address the consequential issues of quality of life and well-being of the migrant section of society. The negotiation with the fluidity of the job market and the changing psychosocial dimensions within and between psychosocial relations may disentangle the resilience as well as the mechanism of diligence toward migrant (marginal) life. The work-based mobility and its associated phenomena have highly impacted the migrant’s quality of life especially the marginalized (socioeconomically weak) ones along with their family members staying away from them. The subjective experiences of the journey of their migrant life and reconstruction of the psychosocial being in terms of existence and well-being at the host place are the minimal addressed issues in migrant literature. Hence this gap instigates to bring forth the issue with the present study exploring the phenomenal aspects of lived experiences, resilience, and sense-making of the well-being of migrant living by the marginalized migrant people engaging in unorganized space. In doing so qualitative research method was followed, and semi-structured interviews were used for data collection from the four selected migrant groups (Fuchkawala, Bhunjawala, Bhari - drinking water supplier, Construction worker) as they migrated to Kolkata and its metropolis area from different states of India, Five participants from each group (20 participants in total) age range between 20 to 45 were interviewed physically and participants’ observatory notes were taken to capture their lived experiences, audio recordings were transcribed and analyzed systematically following Charmaz’s three-layer coding of grounded theory. Being truthful to daily industry, the strong desire to build children’s future, the mastering mechanism to dual existence, use of traditional social network these four themes emerges after analysis of the data. However, incorporating fate as their usual way of life and making sense of well-being through their assertion is another evolving aspect of migrant life.

Keywords: lived experiences, marginal living, resilience, sense-making process, well-being

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Authors: Shoaib Rasool

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Migration trends in rural areas of Gujrat are increasing day by day among illiterate people as they consider it as a source of attraction and charm of destination. It affects the life standard both positive and negative way to their families left behind in the context of poverty, socio-economic status and life standards. It also promotes material items and as well as social indicators of living, housing conditions, schooling of their children’s, health seeking behavior and to some extent their family environment. The nature of the present study is to analyze socio-economic conditions regarding life standard of emigrant families left behind in rural areas of Gujrat district, Pakistan. A survey design was used on 150 families selected from rural areas of Gujrat districts through purposive sampling technique. A well-structured questionnaire was administered by the researcher to explore the nature of the study and for further data collection process. The measurement tool was pretested on 20 families to check the workability and reliability before the actual data collection. Statistical tests were applied to draw results and conclusion. The preliminary findings of the study show that emigration has left deep social-economic impacts on life standards of rural families left behind in Gujrat. They improved their life status and living standard through remittances. Emigration is one of the major sources of development of economy of household and it also alleviate poverty at house household level as well as community and country level. The rationale behind migration varies individually and geographically. There are popular considered attractions in Pakistan includes securing high status, improvement in health condition, coping other, getting married then to acquire nationality, using the unfair means, opting educational visas etc. Emigrants are not only sending remittances but also returning with newly acquired skills and valuable knowledge to their country of origin because emigrants learn new methods of living and working. There are also women migrants who experience social downward mobility by engaging in jobs that are beneath their educational qualifications.

Keywords: emigration, life standard, families, left behind, rural area, Gujrat

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Authors: Nourhane Mohamed El Haridi, Mostafa El Arabi, Zeyad El Sayad

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Biomimicry is defined, by Benyus the natural sciences writer, as imitating or taking inspiration from nature’s forms and processes to solve human problems. Biomimicry is the conscious emulation of life’s genius. As the design community realizes the tremendous impact human constructions have on the world, environmental designers look to new approaches like biomimicry to advance sustainable design. Building leading the declaration made by biomimicry scientists that a full imitation of nature engages form, ecosystem, and process; this paper uses a logic approach to interpret human and environmental wholeness. Designers would benefit from both integrating social theory with environmental thinking and from combining their substantive skills with techniques for getting sustainable biomimic urban design. Integrating biomimicryʹs “Life’s Principles” into a built environment process model will make biomimicry more accessible and thus more widely accepted throughout the industry, and the sustainability of all species will benefit. The Biomimicry Guild hypothesizes the incorporation of these principles, called Lifeʹs Principles, increase the likelihood of sustainability for a respective design, and make it more likely that the design will have a greater impact on sustainability for future generations of all species as mentioned by Benyus in her book. This thesis utilizes Life’s Principles as a foundation for a design process model intended for application on built environment projects at various scales. This paper takes a look at the importance of the integration of biomimicry in urban design to get more sustainable cities and better life, by analyzing the principles of both sustainability and biomimicry, and applying these ideas on futuristic or existing cities to make a biomimic sustainable city more healthier and more conductive to life, and get a better biomimic urban design. A group of experts, architects, biologists, scientists, economists and ecologists should work together to face all the financial and designing difficulties, to have better solutions and good innovative ideas for biomimic sustainable urban design, it is not the only solution, but it is one of the best studies for a better future.

Keywords: biomimicry, built environment, sustainability, urban design

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Authors: Noof Eid Al Shammari

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Background: Living with haemodialysis (HD) can impose several physical and social restrictions on the lives of individuals. Usually, the patient has three dialysis sessions per week that each run for three to four hours. This limits the social life of patients and causes a lower quality of life, in conjunction with the fact that people with chronic kidney disease must follow strict fluid and food regimens and use multiple medications. Given these factors, patients undergoing HD generally need psychological support. Objective: This scoping review study aims to evaluate the effectiveness of physical and breathing exercises on quality of life (QOL) and psychophysical status in patients undergoing HD. Methodology: Searches for relevant studies were performed in four databases (MEDLINE, CINAHL, Google Scholar, and PubMed) for articles published between 2011 and 2021. Out of all the searched literature, ten studies met the inclusion criteria (8 randomised controlled trials, one quasi-experimental study, and one pilot study), with a total of 588 patients. Different types of physical and breathing exercises were used (breathing, cardiopulmonary, and physical exercises). Results: All included studies in this scoping review revealed that most of the aerobic or anaerobic exercises, as well as breathing exercises, had a positive effect and significantly improved patients’ QOL, physical functioning, and psychological status. Conclusions: In this review, most of the articles demonstrated a positive effect of physical and breathing exercises on the QOL and psychophysical status of HD patients. Based on the findings of these studies, physical and breathing exercises were shown to improve muscle strength and other health-related aspects of QOL, including sexual, social, cognitive, and physical functions. However, more studies will need to be conducted with a larger sample to determine the best intervention that could be implemented and standardised in nursing care for patients undergoing HD.

Keywords: physical exercise, breathing exercises, quality of life, depression, hemodialysis

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Authors: Ozge Yilmaz Kusbeci, Ipek Inci

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Aim: Musculoskeletal problems are very common in Parkinson’s disease (PD). They affect quality of life and cause disabilities. However they are under-evaluated, and under-treated. The aim of this study is to evaluate the prevalence and clinical features of musculoskeletal problems in patients with Parkinson disease (PD) compared to controls. Methods: 50 PD patients and 50 age and sex matched controls were interviewed by physicians about their musculoskeletal problems. Results: The prevalence of musculoskeletal problems was significantly higher in the PD group than in the control group (p < 0.05). Commonly involved body sites were the shoulder, low back, and knee. The shoulder and low back was more frequently involved in the PD group than in the control group. However, the knee was similarly involved in both groups. Among the past diagnoses associated with musculoskeletal problems, frozen shoulder, low back pain and osteoporosis more common in the PD group than in the control group (p < 0.05). Furthermore, musculoskeletal problems in the PD group tended to receive less treatment than that of the control group. Conclusion: Musculoskeletal problems were more common in the PD group than in the controls. Therefore assessment and treatment of musculoskeletal problems could improve quality of life in PD patients.

Keywords: parkinson disease, musculoskeletal problems, quality of life, PD disease

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Authors: Nik Siti Hanifah Nik Ahmad

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This research discuss about teaching cupping therapy or hijama by using an online 3D Virtual Learning Environment. The experimental platform was using of flash and Second Life as 2D and 3D comparison. 81 samples have been used in three experiments with 21 in the first and 30 in each second and third. The design of the presentation was tested in five categories such as effectiveness, ease of use, efficacy, aesthetic and users’ satisfaction. The results from three experiments had shown promising outcome for usage of the technique to be implement in teaching Cupping Therapy as well as other alternative or conventional medicine knowledge especially for training.

Keywords: medical and health, cupping therapy or hijama, second life, online 3D VLE, virtual worlds

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Authors: Prachi Chavda

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The world, as of today, is smaller than it was for those who lived few decades ago. Internet, media and telecommunications have impacted the world like never before. Culture is the pillar upon which a society mushrooms. A culture develops with human creativity over the years and also by the exchange and intermixing of ideas and way of life across different civilizations and we can say that one of the influencing medium of exchange and intermixing of these ideas is cinema. Cinema has been the wonderful as well as important medium of communication since it has been emerged. Change is the thumb rule of life and so have been Indian cinema. As society has evolved from time to time so has the stories of Indian Cinema and its characters, hence it directly effects to the Indian culture as cinema has been very strong mediator for information exchange. The paper tries to discuss deeply how Indian cinema (reel life) and Indian culture (real life) has been influencing each other that results into a constant modification in both. Moreover, the research tries to deal with the issue with some examples that as a outcome how movies impact the Indian culture positively and negatively on culture. Therefore, it spreads the wave of change in cultural settings of society. The paper also tries to light the psychology of youth of India. Today, children and youth greatly admire the ostentatious materialistic display of outfits and style of the actors in the movies. Also, the movies bearing romanticism and showcasing disputatious issues like pre-marital sex, live-in relationship, homo-sexuality etc. though without highlighting them extensively have indeed inspired the commoners. Pros and cons always exist. Such revelation of issues certainly give a spark in the minds of those who are in their formative years and the effect of which is seen with the passage of time Thus, we can say that emergence of cinema as a strong tool of social change as well as culture as a triggering factor for transformation in cinema. As, a finding we can say that culture and cinema of India are influencing factors for each other. Cinema and culture are two sides of a coin, where both are responsible for evolution of each other.

Keywords: cinema, culture, influence, transformation

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Authors: Hanan Bishara

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This study deals with the subject of Popular Arabic Proverbs and the stereotypical roles and images that they create about the woman in general and Arab woman in particular. Popular proverbs in general are considered to be essence of experiences of society and the extract of its collective thought establish wisdom in a distinguished concise tight mold or style that affects the majority of people and keep them alive by virtue of constant use and oral currency through which they are transmitted from one generation to another. Proverbs deal with different aspects and types of people, different social relations, including the society's attitude about the woman. Proverbs about women in the human heritage in general and the Arab heritage in particular are considered of a special characteristics and remarkable in their being dynamic ones that move in all directions of life. Most of them carry the essence of the social issues and are distributed in such a way that they have become part of the private life of the general public. This distribution covers all periods and fields of the woman's life, the social, the economic and psychological ones. The woman occupies a major space in the Popular Proverbs because she is the center of social life inside and outside the house. The woman's statuses and images in the provers are numerous and she is often described in parallel images but each one differs from the other. These images intertwine due to their varieties and multiplicity and ultimately, they constitute a general stereotypical image of the woman, which degrades her status as a woman, a mother and a wife. The study shows how Popular Proverbs in Arabic reflect the Arab woman's position and status in her society.

Keywords: Arab, proverb, popular, society, woman

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Authors: Yuanyuan Liu, Yuanqing Wang, Di Li

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Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions mitigation from road construction activities is one of the potential pathways to deal with climate change due to its higher use of materials, machinery energy consumption, and high quantity of vehicle and equipment fuels for transportation and on-site construction activities. Aiming to assess the environmental impact of the road infrastructure construction activities and to identify hotspots of emissions sources, this study developed a life-cycle CO2 emissions assessment framework covering three stages of material production, to-site and on-site transportation under the guidance of the principle of LCA ISO14040. Then streamlined inventory analysis on sub-processes of each stage was conducted based on the budget files from cases of highway projects in China. The calculation results were normalized into functional unit represented as ton per km per lane. Then a comparison between the amount of emissions from each stage, and sub-process was made to identify the major contributor in the whole highway lifecycle. In addition, the calculating results were used to be compared with results in other countries for understanding the level of CO2 emissions associated with Chinese road infrastructure in the world. The results showed that materials production stage produces the most of the CO2 emissions (for more than 80%), and the production of cement and steel accounts for large quantities of carbon emissions. Life cycle CO2 emissions of fuel and electric energy associated with to-site and on-site transportation vehicle and equipment are a minor component of total life cycle CO2 emissions from highway project construction activities. Bridges and tunnels are dominant large carbon contributor compared to the road segments. The life cycle CO2 emissions of road segment in highway project in China are slightly higher than the estimation results of highways in European countries and USA, about 1500 ton per km per lane. In particularly, the life cycle CO2 emissions of road pavement in majority cities all over the world are about 500 ton per km per lane. However, there is obvious difference between the cities when the estimation on life cycle CO2 emissions of highway projects included bridge and tunnel. The findings of the study could offer decision makers a more comprehensive reference to understand the contribution of road infrastructure to climate change, especially understand the contribution from road infrastructure construction activities in China. In addition, the identified hotspots of emissions sources provide the insights of how to reduce road carbon emissions for development of sustainable transportation.

Keywords: carbon dioxide emissions, construction activities, highway, life cycle assessment

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Authors: Noman Shahzad, Amyn Pardhan, Hasnain Zafar

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Introduction: Though short term survival advantage of damage control laparotomy in management of critically ill trauma patients is established, there is little known about the long-term quality of life of these patients. Facial closure rate after damage control laparotomy is reported to be 20-70 percent. Abdominal wall reconstruction in those who failed to achieve facial closure is challenging and can potentially affect quality of life of these patients. Methodology: We conducted retrospective matched cohort study. Adult patients who underwent damage control laparotomy from Jan 2007 till Jun 2013 were identified through medical record. Patients who had concomitant disabling brain injury or limb injuries requiring amputation were excluded. Age, gender and presentation time matched non exposure group of patients who underwent laparotomy for trauma but no damage control were identified for each damage control laparotomy patient. Quality of life assessment was done via telephonic interview at least one year after the operation, using Urdu version of EuroQol Group Quality of Life (QOL) questionnaire EQ5D after permission. Wilcoxon signed rank test was used to compare QOL scores and McNemar test was used to compare individual parameters of QOL questionnaire. Study was approved by institutional ethical review committee. Results: Out of 32 patients who underwent damage control laparotomy during study period, 20 fulfilled the selection criteria for which 20 matched controls were selected. Median age of patients (IQ Range) was 33 (26-40) years. Facial closure rate in damage control laparotomy group was 40% (8/20). One third of those who did not achieve facial closure (4/12) underwent abdominal wall reconstruction. Self-reported QOL score of damage control laparotomy patients was significantly worse than non-damage control group (p = 0.032). There was no statistically significant difference in two groups regarding individual QOL measures. Significantly, more patients in damage control group were requiring use of abdominal binder, and more patients in damage control group had to either change their job or had limitations in continuing previous job. Our study was not adequately powered to detect factors responsible for worse QOL in damage control group. Conclusion: Quality of life of damage control patients is worse than their age and gender matched patients who underwent trauma laparotomy but not damage control. Adequately powered studies need to be conducted to explore factors responsible for this finding for potential improvement.

Keywords: damage control laparotomy, laparostomy, quality of life

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Authors: Rahat Zaman

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The present study was conducted to investigate psychological well-being and positive and negative affect among adults. The sample comprised 221 adults; the sample was collected from all over Pakistan. Psychological well-being was measured with the help of the psychological well-being scale developed by Ryff and Keyes (1995). Lifestyle was measured with the help of the Health Promoting Lifestyle Profile Scale developed by Walker et al. (1995). Positive and negative effects were measured by PANAS, developed by Watson, Clark, and Tellegen (1998). To check the properties of scale, the alpha reliability coefficient was calculated. To test the hypotheses of the research, correlation, independent sample t-rest, and ANOVA were computed. It was hypothesized that there would be a positive relationship between psychological well-being and lifestyles and positive affect. The results show that psychological well-being, lifestyle, and positive affect are positively related. This also supports our hypothesis. The research also searched for relationships in the study variables according to the demographics of the sample. The respondents varied according to their dominant affect levels with respect to their psychological well-being and lifestyles. The research found significant differences for the genders in life appreciation, nutrition, and negative affect. Single and married individuals differed significantly on autonomy, environmental mastery, life appreciation, nutrition, and stress management. Individuals showed significant differences with respect to their living situation, joint and nuclear family members showed significant differences in personal growth, autonomy, health responsibilities, social support, physical activities, and stress management. The sample showed significant differences in environmental mastery, personal growth, purpose in life, life appreciation, health responsibilities, physical activities, stress management, and negative affect when divided in socioeconomic status. Age-wise analysis showed significant differences in autonomy, personal growth, purpose in life, life appreciation, nutrition, and stress management. Provincially significant differences were found in life appreciation, nutrition, social support, physical activities, and stress management, and both positive and negative effects were experienced. Implications of the results are discussed.

Keywords: wellbeing, healthy lifestyle, self acceptance, positive

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Authors: Satoshi Nishimura

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Although much information has been garnered from the genomes of humans and mice, it remains difficult to extend that information to explain physiological and pathological phenomena. This is because the processes underlying life are by nature stochastic and fluctuate with time. Thus, we developed novel "in vivo molecular imaging" method based on single and two-photon microscopy. We visualized and analyzed many life phenomena, including common adult diseases. We integrated the knowledge obtained, and established new models that will serve as the basis for new minimally invasive therapeutic approaches.

Keywords: two photon microscope, intravital visualization, thrombus, artery

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Authors: Diana Bardhi

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Road safety is an essential part of the economic and social development of any industrialized country. Decisions to maintain and improve the reliability, functionality of infrastructure structures can only be achieved through integrated road life cycle planning and management. There has always been a tendency to review road maintenance strategies, but there is still no serious and reliable administration due to not only insufficient funds but also problems in the proper reorganization of this system. The safety and performance of the road system depend on the ongoing activity of road maintenance management. For it to be effective, it is necessary to intervene before the degradation has caused irreparable damage or damage with a high economic cost of repairs. Investments in road infrastructure during 2006-2014 show that the life of these projects presents problems related to the maintenance and management of life cycle performance in a wide range of constituent elements. Maintenance planning includes various problems that depend on the degree of degradation of asphalt layers, the degree of damage to road structures (bridges, tunnels, culverts, and the economic planning of resources for their repair). The purpose of this study is first to provide a brief overview of the problems in the field of maintenance and life cycle management of road infrastructure investments, proposing ways to reorganize the sector of administration and maintenance of ongoing roads and secondly testing and evaluating the work and nature of standards of different types of road infrastructure projects, through a methodology consisting of a) development, b) data collection, and c) analysis.

Keywords: infrastructure, maintenance, depreciation, efficiency

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Authors: Armando Cuspinera

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Humans are nature itself, being with non-human species part of the same ecosystem, but the praxis reflects that not all relations are the same. In fields of design such as Biomimicry, Biodesign, and Biophilic design exist different approaches towards nature, nevertheless, anthropocentric principles such as domination, objectivization, or exploitation are defined in the same as ecocentric principles of inherent importance in life itself. Anthropocentrism has showed humanity with pollution of the earth, water, air, and the destruction of whole ecosystems from monocultures and rampant production of useless objects that life cannot outstand this unaware rhythm of life focused only for the human benefits. Even if by nature the biosphere is resilient, studies showed in the Paris Agreement explain that humanity will perish in an unconscious way of praxis. This is why is important to develop a differentiation between anthropocentric and ecocentricprinciples in the praxis of design, in order to enhance respect, valorization, and positive affectivity towards other life forms is necessary to analyze what principles are reproduced from each practice of design. It is only from the study of immaterial dimensions of design such as symbolism, epistemology, and ontology that the relation towards nature can be redesigned, and in order to do so, it must be studies from the dimensions of ontological design what principles –anthropocentric or ecocentric- through what the objects enhance or focus the perception humans have to its surrounding. The things we design also design us is the principle of ontological design, and in order to develop a way of ecological design in which is possible to consider other species as users, designers or collaborators is important to extend the studies and relation to other living forms from a transdisciplinary perspective of techniques, knowledge, practice, and disciplines in general. Materials, technologies, and any kind of knowledge have the principle of a tool: is not good nor bad, but is in the way of using it the possibilities that exist within them. The collaboration of disciplines and fields of study gives the opportunity to connect principles from other cultures such as Deep Ecology and Environmental Humanities in the development of methodologies of design that study nature, integrates their strategies to our own species, and considers life of other species as important as human life, and is only form the studies of ontological design that material and immaterial dimensions can be analyzed and imbued with structures that already exist in other fields.

Keywords: design, antropocentrism, ecocentrism, ontological design

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