Search results for: professional growth

Authors: Mohammad Muhebbullah Ibne Hoque, Zheng Jun, Wang Guoying

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Salinity stress is one of the most important abiotic factors contributing to crop growth and yield loss. Exploring the genetic basis is necessary to develop maize varieties with salinity tolerance. In order to discover the inherent basis for salinity tolerance traits in maize, 121 polymorphic SSR markers were used to analyze 163 F2 individuals derived from a single cross of inbred line B73 (a salt susceptible inbred line) and CZ-7 (a salt tolerant inbred line). A linkage map was constructed and the map covered 1195.2 cM of maize genome with an average distance of 9.88 cM between marker loci. Ten salt tolerance traits at seedling stage were evaluated for QTL analysis in maize seedlings. A total of 41 QTLs associated with seedling shoot and root traits were detected, with 16 and 25 QTLs under non-salinity and salinity condition, respectively. And only 4 major stable QTLs were detected in two environments. The detected QTLs were distributed on chromosomes 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and chromosome 10. Phenotypic variability for the identified QTLs for all the traits was in the range from 6.27 to 21.97%. Fourteen QTLs with more than 10% contributions were observed. Our results and the markers associated with the major QTL detected in this study have the potential application for genetic improvement of salt tolerance in maize through marker-assisted selection.

Keywords: salt tolerance, seedling stage, root shoot traits, quantitative trait loci, simple sequence repeat, maize

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Authors: Morteza Raei Dehaghi, Seyed Mohammad Mirhashemi

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The current study explored the effect of economic development, financial development and institutional quality on environmental destruction in upper-middle income countries during the time period of 1999-2011. The dependent variable is logarithm of carbon dioxide emissions that can be considered as an index for destruction or quality of the environment given to its effects on the environment. Financial development and institutional development variables as well as some control variables were considered. In order to study cross-sectional correlation among the countries under study, Pesaran and Friz test was used. Since the results of both tests show cross-sectional correlation in the countries under study, seemingly unrelated regression method was utilized for model estimation. The results disclosed that Kuznets’ environmental curve hypothesis is confirmed in upper-middle income countries and also, financial development and institutional quality have a significant effect on environmental quality. The results of this study can be considered by policy makers in countries with different income groups to have access to a growth accompanied by improved environmental quality.

Keywords: economic development, environmental destruction, financial development, institutional development, seemingly unrelated regression

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Authors: Maria Francesca Maunes

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Life is never the same when an adolescent becomes a teenage parent. Living in a developing country with the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in the Asia-Pacific region, it is necessary to address the psychological well-being of Filipino teenage parents and be put into consideration. Thus, this quantitative study used both descriptive statistics and quantitative techniques on a total of 70 participants, consisting of 32 teenage fathers and 38 teenage mothers to describe the level of psychological well-being among teenage parents according to the six domains of Ryff’s eudaimonic well-being—autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth, positive relations with others, purpose in life, and self-acceptance, and to determine the difference between the psychological well-being of teenage fathers and teenage mothers. Results show that there is no significant difference in the overall psychological well-being between the two groups of participants, yet, when compared by each domain, it is found that there is a significant difference between their purpose in life. While both teenage fathers and teenage mothers are high scorers across all the domains, this does not serve as an assurance that the sustained increase in the number of teenage pregnancies in the Philippines does not anymore pose as a national issue. This could only signify that despite dire circumstances, Filipino teenage parents are able to continue make meaning in their lives and strive to keep living in comfort and contentment, not only for themselves but for their children as well. Additional findings as well as its implications are further discussed. Recommendations and suggestions for further study are presented.

Keywords: adolescence, adolescent psychology, eudaimonic psychological well-being, positive psychology, teenage fathers, teenage mothers, teenage parents, teenage pregnancy in the Philippines

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Authors: M. Elham Ghabouli

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Intermediate cities which also called medium size cities have an important role in the process of globalization. It is argued that, in some cases this type of cities may be depopulated or in otherwise may be transformed as the periphery of metropolitans so that the personal identity of the city and its local cultural heritage could suffer from its neighbor metropolitan. Over the last decades, the role of tourism in development process and the cultural heritage is increased. The effect of tourism in socio-economic growth makes motivation for study on tourism development in regional and urban planning process. Tourism potentially has a specific role in promoting sustainable development especially by its economic and socio-cultural effects. The positive role of tourism in local development and in cultural heritage should be empowered by urban and regional planning. Damavand is an intermediate city located in Tehran province, Iran. Considering its local specific characteristic like social structure, antiquities and natural monuments made a suitable case study for studying on urban tourism planning method. Focusing on recognition of historical and cultural heritage of Damavand, this paper tried to peruse cultural-historical heritage protecting issue through “base plan methodology” which is introduced as a first step of urban planning for intermediate cities.

Keywords: urban planning, tourism, cultural heritage, intermediate cities

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Authors: Eftekhari M. H., Mozaffari-Khosravi H., Shidfar F.

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Background: Many Iranian adolescent girls are iron deficient, but it is unclear whether the iron deficiency is associated with other nutritional risk indicators. Objective: we aimed to investigate the association between iron deficiency and weight status (measured as BMI) among a reprehensive sample of teenage girls. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed in a region of southern I.R.Iran. One hundred eighty-seven iron-deficient participants (aged between 11 to 14) were selected by systematic random sampling among all students in grades 1 to 3 from high schools for girls. We assayed hemoglobin, hematocrit, serum ferritin, iron and total iron binding capacity and measured weight and height. Body mass index was calculated according to age and gender-specific BMI growth charts for children 2 to 20 years of age. Results: 13% were at risk for being overweight and 8.3% were overweight. The severity of iron deficiency increased as BMI increased from normal to at risk for overweight and overweight. Iron deficiency anemia was most prevalent among overweight adolescents than at risk for overweight and normal weight adolescents (28%, 18%, and 13%, respectively). Conclusions: The results of this study showed an inverse association of BMI with serum ferritin. Overweight adolescents demonstrated an increased prevalence of anemia. Because of the potentially harmful effects of iron deficiency, obese adolescents should be routinely screened and treated as necessary.

Keywords: adolescent, over weight, iron deficiency, Iran

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Authors: A. Pokharel, A. Farooque, B. Acharya

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Pyrolysis can be used for energy production from waste biomass of agriculture and forestry. Biochar is the solid byproduct of pyrolysis and its cascading use can offset the cost of the process. A wide variety of research on biochar has highlighted its ability to absorb nutrients, metal and complex compounds; filter suspended solids; enhance microorganisms’ growth; retain water and nutrients as well as to increase carbon content of soil. In addition, sustainable biochar systems are an attractive approach for carbon sequestration and total waste management cycle. Commercially available biochar from Sigma Aldrich was studied for adsorption of nitrogen from effluent of municipal wastewater treatment plant. Adsorption isotherm and breakthrough curve were determined for the biochar. Similarly, biochar’s effects in aerobic as well as anaerobic bioreactors were also studied. In both cases, the biomass was increased in presence of biochar. The amount of gas produced for anaerobic digestion of fruit mix (apple and banana) was similar but the rate of production was significantly faster in biochar fed reactors. The cumulative goal of the study is to use biochar in various wastewater treatment units like aeration tank, secondary clarifier and tertiary nutrient recovery system as well as in anaerobic digestion of the sludge to optimize utilization and add value before being used as a soil amendment.

Keywords: biochar, nutrient recyling, wastewater treatment, soil amendment

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Authors: Frankie Burgos, Emely Munar, Conrado Basa

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This paper aimed at developing an artificial neural network (ANN) model specifically for the Philippine Stock Exchange index closing value. The inputs to the ANN are US Dollar and Philippine Peso(USD-PHP) exchange rate, GDP growth of the country, quarterly inflation rate, 10-year bond yield, credit rating of the country, previous open, high, low, close values and volume of trade of the Philippine Stock Exchange Index (PSEi), gold price of the previous day, National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (NASDAQ), Standard and Poor’s 500 (S & P 500) and the iShares MSCI Philippines ETF (EPHE) previous closing value. The target is composed of the closing value of the PSEi during the 627 trading days from November 3, 2011, to May 30, 2014. MATLAB’s Neural Network toolbox was employed to create, train and simulate the network using multi-layer feed forward neural network with back-propagation algorithm. The results satisfactorily show that the neural network developed has the ability to model the PSEi, which is affected by both internal and external economic factors. It was found out that the inputs used are the main factors that influence the movement of the PSEi closing value.

Keywords: artificial neural networks, artificial intelligence, philippine stocks exchange index, stocks trading

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Authors: Lama Ajinah

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Luxury brands witnessed continuous growth which followed women’s desire towards individual distinctiveness and social glare. Bags are a woman’s best friend either for aesthetic or functional purposes when she leaves her home for leisure or work. One way of women constant aspiration for being distinguished while reflecting their wealth is through handbags. Subsequently, the demand and attraction by consumers towards the dazzle of luxurious brands for personal pleasure and social status have flourished. According to the literature review, a visual analysis on luxury brands has been explored yet a focus on bags was not discussed in details. Hence, a deep analysis will be dedicated on the two segments by showcasing examples of high-end bag advertising. The research is conducted to understand advertising strategies used in promoting for luxurious products. Furthermore, the paper explores the definition of the term luxury, the condition in which it is used in, and the visual language used along with the term. As luxury is an indicator of superior satisfaction, it is obtained on two levels: a personal and a social level. The examples of luxury brand ads are selected from the last five years to uncover the latest, most common strategies used to promote for luxurious brands. The methods employed in this paper consist of literature review, semiotic analysis, and content analysis. The researcher concludes with revealing the methods used in advertising while categorizing them into various themes.

Keywords: advertising, brands, fashion, graphic design, luxury, semiotic analysis, semiology, visual analysis, visual communication

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Authors: Hajra Hussain

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Positive education, the inclusion of social, emotional and intellectual skills across a curriculum, is fundamental to the optimal functioning of young people in any society because it combines the best teaching practices with the principles of positive psychology. While learning institutions foster academic skills, little attention is being paid to the identification and development of character strengths and their integration into teaching. There is an increasing recognition of the important role education plays in equipping today’s youth with 21st century social skills. For youth to succeed in this highly competitive environment, there is a need for positive education that is focused on character strengths such as the growth of social, emotional and intellectual skills that promote the flourishing of well-rounded individuals. Character strength programs and awareness are a necessity if the human capital within a region is to be competitive, productive and happy. The Counselling & Wellbeing Centre at Amity University Dubai has consistently implemented Character Strength awareness workshops and has found that such workshops have increased student life satisfaction due to individual awareness of signature strengths. A positive education/positive psychology framework with its key focus on the development of character strengths can be fundamental to individual's confidence and self-awareness; thus allowing both optimum flourishing and functioning.

Keywords: positive psychology, positive education, strengths, youth, happiness

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Authors: Abdelghani Tahiri, Youssef Karra, Naima Ait Aabd, Abdelaziz Mimouni

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Saffron (Crocus sativus L.), the most expensive spice in the world derived from the stigmas, is an autumn-flowering and sterile triploid (2n=3x=24) geophyte species that belong to the Iridaceae family. This plant species is mainly propagated vegetatively through the formation of daughter corms from the mother one. Low multiplication rates of daughter corms under natural conditions, along with fungal contamination, significantly reduce the productivity and quality of saffron corms. The development of efficient and sustainable strategies for rapid and large-scale production of selected cultivars of saffron will be desired. For this, the main objective of this work is to improve the vegetative propagation of saffron under ex-vitro conditions. Preliminary results of the influence of increasing doses of humic substances (HS) on the growth and multiplication of corms under greenhouse conditions are evaluated. The obtained data shows that the effect of HS depends on the concentration used and the mode of application. Indeed, the application through irrigation has increased the number of shoots and corms, but it has reduced other parameters. On the other hand, the temporary treatment has improved all observed parameters except for the number of shoots and corms. Results obtained in this work suggest that it is possible to improve the propagation of saffron corms under greenhouse conditions.

Keywords: saffron, Crocus sativus L., corm, humic substances

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Authors: Matteo Bonaventura, Giancarlo Giudici

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This paper analyses the valuation process of companies listed on the Italian Exchange in the period 2000-2009 at their Initial Public Offering (IPO). One the most common valuation techniques declared in the IPO prospectus to determine the offer price is the Discounted Cash Flow (DCF) method. We develop a ‘reverse engineering’ model to discover the short term profitability implied in the offer prices. We show that there is a significant optimistic bias in the estimation of future profitability compared to ex-post actual realization and the mean forecast error is substantially large. Yet we show that such error characterizes also the estimations carried out by analysts evaluating non-IPO companies. The forecast error is larger the faster has been the recent growth of the company, the higher is the leverage of the IPO firm, the more companies issued equity on the market. IPO companies generally exhibit better operating performance before the listing, with respect to comparable listed companies, while after the flotation they do not perform significantly different in term of return on invested capital. Pre-IPO book building activity plays a significant role in partially reducing the forecast error and revising expectations, while the market price of the first day of trading does not contain information for further reducing forecast errors.

Keywords: initial public offerings, DCF, book building, post-IPO profitability drop

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Authors: Levente Varga, Dávid Deritei, Mária Ercsey-Ravasz, Răzvan Florian, Zsolt I. Lázár, István Papp, Ferenc Járai-Szabó

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One of the major shortcomings of widely used scientometric indicators is that different disciplines cannot be compared with each other. The issue of cross-disciplinary normalization has been long discussed, but even the classification of publications into scientific domains poses problems. Structural properties of citation networks offer new possibilities, however, the large size and constant growth of these networks asks for precaution. Here we present a new tool that in order to perform cross-field normalization of scientometric indicators of individual publications relays on the structural properties of citation networks. Due to the large size of the networks, a systematic procedure for identifying scientific domains based on a local community detection algorithm is proposed. The algorithm is tested with different benchmark and real-world networks. Then, by the use of this algorithm, the mechanism of the scientometric indicator normalization process is shown for a few indicators like the citation number, P-index and a local version of the PageRank indicator. The fat-tail trend of the article indicator distribution enables us to successfully perform the indicator normalization process.

Keywords: citation networks, cross-field normalization, local cluster detection, scientometric indicators

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Authors: Hossein Rezaie

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Academic institutions, esp. universities, have been known as cradles of learning and teaching great thinkers while creating the type of knowledge that is supposed to be bereft of utilitarian motives. Nonetheless, it seems that such intellectual centers have entered into a competition with each other for attracting the attention of potential clients. The traditional values of (higher) education such as nurturing criticality and fostering intellectuality in students have been replaced with strategic planning, quality assurance, performance assessment, and academic audits. Not being immune from the whims and wishes of marketization, the system of higher education in the UK has been recalibrated by policy makers to address the demand and supply of student education, academic research and other university activities on the basis of monetary factors. As an immediate example in this vein, the Russell Group in the UK, which is comprised of 24 leading UK research universities, has explicitly expressed it policy on its official website as follows: ‘Russell Group universities are global businesses competing for staff, students and funding with the best in the world’. Furthermore, certain attempts have been made to corporatize the system of HE which have been manifested in remodeling of university governing bodies on corporate lines and developing measurement scales for indicating the performance of teaching practitioners. Nevertheless, it seems that such structural changes in policies toward the system of HE have bearing on the practices of practitioners and educators as well as the identity of students who are the customers of educational services. The effects of marketization have been examined mainly in terms of students’ perceptions and motivation, institutional policies and university management. However, the teaching practitioner side seems to be an under-studied area with regard to any changes in its expectations, satisfaction and perception of professional identity in the aftermath of introducing market-wise values into HE of the UK. As a result, this research aims to investigate the possible outcomes of market-driven values on the practitioner side of HE in the UK and finally seeks to address the following research questions: 1-How is the change in the mission of HE in the UK reflected in institutional documents? 1-A- How is the change of mission represented in job adverts? 1-B- How is the change of mission represented in university prospectuses? 2-How are teaching practitioners represented regarding their roles and obligations in the prospectuses and job ads published by UK HE institutions? In order to address these questions, the researcher will analyze 30 prospectuses and job ads published by Russel Group universities by taking Critical Discourse Analysis as his point of departure and the analytical methods of genre analysis and Systemic Functional Linguistics to probe into the generic features and representation of participants, in this case teaching practitioners, in the selected corpus.

Keywords: higher education, job advertisements, marketization of higher education, prospectuses

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Authors: Mohammad Besharatloo

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Intrusion detection is an important research topic in network security because of increasing growth in the use of computer network services. Intrusion detection is done with the aim of detecting the unauthorized use or abuse in the networks and systems by the intruders. Therefore, the intrusion detection system is an efficient tool to control the user's access through some predefined regulations. Since, the data used in intrusion detection system has high dimension, a proper representation is required to show the basis structure of this data. Therefore, it is necessary to eliminate the redundant features to create the best representation subset. In the proposed method, a hybrid model of differential evolution and firefly algorithms was employed to choose the best subset of properties. In addition, decision tree and support vector machine (SVM) are adopted to determine the quality of the selected properties. In the first, the sorted population is divided into two sub-populations. These optimization algorithms were implemented on these sub-populations, respectively. Then, these sub-populations are merged to create next repetition population. The performance evaluation of the proposed method is done based on KDD Cup99. The simulation results show that the proposed method has better performance than the other methods in this context.

Keywords: intrusion detection system, differential evolution, firefly algorithm, support vector machine, decision tree

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Authors: Hyoshin Kim

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Most post-secondary educational institutions have offered a wide variety of professional development programs and resources in order to advance the quality of education. Such programs are designed to support faculty members by focusing on topics such as course design, behavioral learning objectives, class discussion, and evaluation methods. These are based on good intentions and might help both new and experienced educators. However, the fundamental flaw is that these ‘effective methods’ are assumed to work regardless of what we teach and whom we teach. This paper is focused on intercultural intelligence and its application to education. It presents a comprehensive literature review on context and cultural diversity in terms of beliefs, values and worldviews. What has worked well with a group of homogeneous local students may not work well with more diverse and international students. It is because students hold different notions of what is means to learn or know something. It is necessary for educators to move away from certain sets of generic teaching skills, which are based on a limited, particular view of teaching and learning. The main objective of the research is to expand our teaching strategies by incorporating what students bring to the course. There have been a growing number of resources and texts on teaching international students. Unfortunately, they tend to be based on the deficiency model, which treats diversity not as strengths, but as problems to be solved. This view is evidenced by the heavy emphasis on assimilationist approaches. For example, cultural difference is negatively evaluated, either implicitly or explicitly. Therefore the pressure is on culturally diverse students. The following questions reflect the underlying assumption of deficiencies: - How can we make them learn better? - How can we bring them into the mainstream academic culture?; and - How can they adapt to Western educational systems? Even though these questions may be well-intended, there seems to be something fundamentally wrong as the assumption of cultural superiority is embedded in this kind of thinking. This paper examines how educators can incorporate intercultural intelligence into the course design by utilizing a variety of tools such as pre-course activities, peer learning and reflective learning journals. The main goal is to explore ways to engage diverse learners in all aspects of learning. This can be achieved by activities designed to understand their prior knowledge, life experiences, and relevant cultural identities. It is crucial to link course material to students’ diverse interests thereby enhancing the relevance of course content and making learning more inclusive. Internationalization of higher education can be successful only when cultural differences are respected and celebrated as essential and positive aspects of teaching and learning.

Keywords: intercultural competence, intercultural intelligence, teaching and learning, post-secondary education

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Authors: Anita Yus

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Several Elementary Schools (SD) ‘favored’ by parents, especially those live in big cities in Indonesia, implicitly demand each child enrolled in the first grade of SD to be able to read, write and calculate. This condition urges the parents to push the teachers in PAUD (Kindergarten) to train their children to read, write, and calculate so they have a set of knowledge. According to Piaget, each child is capable of acquiring knowledge when he is given the opportunity to interact with his environment (things, people, and atmosphere). Teachers can make the interaction occur. There are several learning approaches suitable for the characteristics and needs of child’s growth. This paper talks about a research result conducted to investigate how twelve teachers of early childhood program comprehend the constructivist theory of Piaget, and how they inquire, how the children acquire and construct a number of knowledge through occurred interactions. This is a qualitative research with an observation method followed up by a focus group discussion (FGD). The research result shows that there is a reciprocal interaction between the behaviors of teachers and children affected by the size of the classroom and learning source, teaching experiences, education background, teachers’ attitude and motivation, as well as the way the teachers interpret and support the children’s needs. The teachers involved in this research came up with varied perspective on how knowledge acquired by children at first and how they construct it. This research brings a new perspective in understanding children as scientists.

Keywords: constructivist approach, young children as a scientist, teacher practice, teacher education

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Authors: Retno A. S. Lestari, Wahyudi B. Sediawan, Siti Syamsiah, Sarto

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Sulfur-oxidizing bacteria were isolated and then grown on salak fruit seeds forming a biofilm on the surface. Their performances in sulfide removal were experimentally observed. In doing so, the salak fruit seeds containing biofilm were then used as packing material in a cylinder. Biogas obtained from biological treatment, which contains 27.95 ppm of hydrogen sulfide was flown through the packed bed. The hydrogen sulfide from the biogas was absorbed in the biofilm and then degraded by the microbes in the biofilm. The hydrogen sulfide concentrations at a various axial position and various times were analyzed. A set of simple kinetics model for the rate of the sulfide removal and the bacterial growth was proposed. Since the biofilm is very thin, the sulfide concentration in the Biofilm at a certain axial position is assumed to be uniform. The simultaneous ordinary differential equations obtained were then solved numerically using Runge-Kutta method. The values of the parameters were also obtained by curve-fitting. The accuracy of the model proposed was tested by comparing the calculation results using the model with the experimental data obtained. It turned out that the model proposed can describe the removal of sulfide liquid using bio-filter in the packed bed. The biofilter could remove 89,83 % of the hydrogen sulfide in the feed at 2.5 hr of operation and biogas flow rate of 30 L/hr.

Keywords: sulfur-oxidizing bacteria, salak fruit seeds, biofilm, packing material, biogas

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Authors: Anette Forssten Seiser, Ulf Blossing, Mats Ekholm

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The expectation on principals to manage, lead and develop their schools and teachers are high. However, principals are not left alone without guidelines. Policy texts, curricula and syllabuses guide the orientation of their leadership. Moreover, principals’ traits and experience as well as professional norms, are decisive. However, in this study we argue for the importance to deepen the knowledge of how the practice of leadership is shaped in the daily social working life with the teachers at the school. Teachers’ experiences and expectations of leadership influence the principal’s actions, sometimes perhaps contrary to what is emphasized in official texts like the central guidelines. The expectations of teachers make up the norms of the school and thus constitute the local school culture. The aim of this study is to deepen the knowledge of teachers’ expectations on their principals to manage, lead and develop their schools. Two questions are used to guide the study: 1) How do teachers’ and principals’ expectations differ in realistic situations? 2) How do teachers’ experience-based expectations differ from more ideal expectations? To investigate teachers’ expectations of their principals, we use a social psychological perspective framed within an organisational development perspective. A social role is defined by the fact that, within the framework of the role, different people who fulfil the same role exhibit greater similarities than differences in their actions. The way a social role is exercised depends on the expectations placed on the role’s position but also on the expectations of the function of the role. The way in which the social role is embodied in practice also depends on how the person fulfilling the role perceives and understands those expectations. Based on interviews with school principals a questionnaire was constructed. Nine possible real-life and critical incidents were described that are important when it comes to role shaping in the dynamics between teachers and principals. Teachers were asked to make a choice between three, four, or five possible and realistic courses of action for the principal. The teachers were also asked to make two choices between these different options in real-life situations, one ideal as if they were working as a principal themselves, and one experience based – how they estimated that their own principal would act in such a situation. The sample consist of two elementary schools in Sweden. School A consists of two principals and 38 teachers and school B of two principals and 22 teachers. The response rate among the teachers is 95 percent in school A and 86 percent in school B. All four principals answered our questions. The results show that the expectations of teachers and principals can be understood as variations of being harmonic or disharmonic. The harmonic expectations can be interpreted to lead to an attuned leadership, while the disharmonic expectations lead to a more tensed leadership. Harmonious expectations and an attuned leadership are prominent. The results are compared to earlier research on leadership. Attuned and more tensed leadership are discussed in relation to school development and future research.

Keywords: critical incidents, principal leadership, school culture, school development, teachers' expectations

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Authors: Pawasuth Saengdee, Chamras Promptmas, Ting Zeng, Silke Leimkühler, Ulla Wollenberger

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Sulfite has been used as a versatile preservative to limit the microbial growth and to control the taste in some food and beverage. However, it has been reported to cause a wide spectrum of severe adverse reactions. Therefore, it is important to determine the amount of sulfite in food and beverage to ensure consumer safety. An efficient electrocatalytic biosensor for sulfite detection was developed by immobilizing of human sulfite oxidase (hSO) on 3-aminoproplytriethoxysilane (APTES) modified indium tin oxide (ITO) electrode. Cyclic voltammetry was employed to investigate the electrochemical characteristics of the hSO modified ITO electrode for various pretreatment and binding conditions. Amperometry was also utilized to demonstrate the current responses of the sulfite sensor toward sodium sulfite in an aqueous solution at a potential of 0 V (vs. Ag/AgCl 1 M KCl). The proposed sulfite sensor has a linear range between 0.5 to 2 mM with a correlation coefficient 0.972. Then, the additional polymer layer of PVA was introduced to extend the linear range of sulfite sensor and protect the enzyme. The linear range of sulfite sensor with 5% coverage increases from 2.8 to 20 mM at a correlation coefficient of 0.983. In addition, the stability of sulfite sensor with 5% PVA coverage increases until 14 days when kept in 0.5 mM Tris-buffer, pH 7.0 at 4 8C. Therefore, this sensor could be applied for the detection of sulfite in the real sample, especially in food and beverage.

Keywords: sulfite oxidase, bioelectrocatalytsis, indium tin oxide, direct electrochemistry, sulfite sensor

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Authors: Ishak Kamal Baskhayroun

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This study examines consumer attitudes toward mobile marketing, especially toward SMS marketing. Unlike similar studies, this study does not focus on the young, but includes consumers who are in the 18-70 age range to the field research. According to the results, it has been concluded that most participants think SMS marketing is disturbing. Most important problems with SMS marketing are about getting subscribed to message lists without the permission of the receiver; the high number of messages sent; and the irrelevancy of the message content. The emergence of sponsorship as a new marketing communication tool and a source of competitive advantage in the marketplace has changed the entire marketing communication process. Sponsorship has overtaken other marketing communication tools in terms of growth and expenditure. This paper seeks to evaluate the role of sponsorship in marketing communication tools. The study recommends that proper measures be taken before the company embarks into sponsorship programs. This is necessary because investment in sponsorship does not always guarantee sustainable competitive advantage in the marketplace.Mobile phones are one of the direct marketing tools that can be used to reach today’s hard to reach consumers. Mobile phones are very personal devices and they are always carried with the consumer, where ever they go. This creates an opportunity for marketers to create personalized marketing communications messages and send them on the right time and place.

Keywords: employee organizational performance, internal marketing, internal customer, direct marketing, mobile phones mobile marketing, sms advertising, marketing sponsorship, marketing communication theories, marketing communication tools corporate responsibility

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Authors: Mei Yuin Joanne Wee, Rosli Md. Illias

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Cell surface display is the expression of a protein with an anchoring motif on the surface of the cell. This approach offers advantages when used in bioconversion in terms of easier purification steps and more efficient enzymatic reaction. A surface display system using ice nucleation protein (InaA) from Erwina ananas as an anchoring motif has been constructed to display xylanase (xyl) on the surface of Escherischia coli. The InaA was truncated so that it is made up of the N- and C-terminal domain (INPANC-xyl) and it has successfully directed xylanase to the surface of the cell. A study was also done on xylanase fused to two other ice nucleation proteins, InaK (INPKNC-xyl) and InaZ (INPZNC-xyl) from Pseudomonas syringae KCTC 1832 and Pseudomonas syringae S203 respectively. Surface localization of the fusion protein was verified using SDS-PAGE and Western blot on the cell fractions and all anchoring motifs were successfully displayed on the outer membrane of E. coli. Upon comparison, whole-cell activity of INPANC-xyl was more than six and five times higher than INPKNC-xyl and INPZNC-xyl respectively. Furthermore, the expression of INPANC-xyl on the surface of E. coli did not inhibit the growth of the cell. This is the first report of surface display system using ice nucleation protein, InaA from E. ananas. From this study, this anchoring motif offers an attractive alternative to the current surface display systems.

Keywords: cell surface display, Escherischia coli, ice nucleation protein, xylanase

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Authors: Veronica Botero, Karen Ortiz

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The Faculty of Mines, of the National University of Colombia, Medellín Campus, is a faculty that has 136 years of history and represents one of the most important study centers in the country in the field of engineering and scientific research, as well as a reference at a global, national, and Latin American level in this matter. Despite being a faculty with so many years of history and having trained a large number of graduates under the traditional mechanistic and androcentric paradigm, which reproduces the logic of the traditional scientific method and the differentiated and severe look between subject-object of research among other binarisms, has also been the place where professors and students have become aware of the need to transform this paradigm into engineering, and focus on the sustainability of diversity and the well-being of the natural and social systems that inhabit the territories and has opened possibilities for the implementation of classes that address feminist pedagogical theories and practices. The class: The return of the witches, is an initiative that constitutes an important training exercise that provides students with the study of feminisms, the importance of closing gender gaps and critical readings on the traditional paradigm of engineering. The objective of this article is to present a systematization of the experience of design, implementation and development of this elective class, describing the tensions that arose at the time when a subject of this style was created and proposed in the Department of Geosciences and Environment, from the Faculty of Mines in 2022; the reactions of the groups of students who have taken it and their perceptions and opinions about ecofeminism as proposals for critical analysis and practices in relation to the environment and, above all, how their readings of the world have changed after having studied this subject for a semester. The pedagogical journey and the feminist methodologies that have been designed and adjusted over two years of work will be explained based on the sharing of situated knowledge of the students and the two teachers who teach the course, who pose challenges to the dominant ideology in engineering since one of them is trained in human sciences and feminist studies and the other, although trained in civil engineering and geosciences, is a woman with diverse sexual orientation and is the first professor to have assumed the position of dean in the 135 years of history of the Faculty. The transformations in the life experience of the students are revealing since they affirm that the training process is forceful and powerful to outline a much more qualified and critical professional profile that contributes to the transformation of gender gaps in the country. This class is therefore a challenge in this Faculty of Engineering that still presents a dominant ideology on gender that has not been questioned or challenged before.

Keywords: feminisms, gender equality, gender bias, engineering for life Manifiesto.

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Authors: Z. E. Battakova , G. Z. Tokmurziyeva, S. Z. Abdrakhmanova, A. A. Akimbaeva, A. A. Adaeva

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Introduction: In the Republic of Kazakhstan few studies have quantified overweight rates among children. Assessment of overweight and obesity in school children based on measured inter country comparable data has not been implemented. In this regard, in a pilot region, Aktobe oblast, prevalence of obesity among school children was studied based on the protocol of the World Health Organization (WHO) European Childhood Obesity Surveillance Initiative. Methods: The study was conducted on sample of 800 children of 2-3 grades in September 2014. The anthropometric variables were measured by standardized equipment to calculate body mass index. Prevalence of overweight and obesity was determined for 8 and 9 year old children by gender using WHO growth reference 2007. Results: 21,4% of children aged 8 years old were overweight, and 8,7% were obese. Among 8 year old boys the prevalence of overweight and obesity was 23,7% and 10,6% respectively, among girls 18,9% and 6,7% respectively. The prevalence of overweight was 25,7% and obesity was 10,8% for 9 year old children. 29,6% boys of 9 years of age were overweight and 8,6% were obese respectively.20,9% of 9 year old girls were overweight and 13,4% were obese. Conclusion: Thus, 22,6% of children 8-9 years of age at the study population were overweight and 9,3% obese. The results of the survey demonstrate the need for further study of indicators at the national level for internationally comparable data and actions to tackle childhood obesity epidemic as well as the need for monitoring trends of overweight and obesity among children.

Keywords: 8-9 year old school children, obesity, overweight, body mass index

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Authors: Ibitoye Olabode Clement

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The huge amount of grants for infrastructures development in Tertiary Institutions in Nigeria calls for transparency and accountability in the procurement process. However, questions have been raised concerning the judicious and appropriate use of the funds, and it was doubtful if the institutions complied with due process. This paper examined the causes of non-compliance with the Public Procurement Act (2007) in the procurement of Goods, Works, and Services through either direct or indirect processes of procurement, mostly in Tertiary Institutions of State government subvention institutions in Nigeria. Nigeria has over 120 public universities, polytechnics, and colleges of Education. This paper will take samples of some selected Institutions in southwest Nigeria. The institutions comprise 5 Universities, 5 Polytechnics, and 5 Colleges of Education / Health and Technology. The opinions of the institutions’ Procurement Officers on the tremendous investment through grants and interventions for infrastructure development in Tertiary Education Institutions (TEI) in Nigeria call for transparency and accountability in the procurement process. However, there are a lot of questions have been raised as to the judicious use of the funds, and it was doubtful if the institutions complied with due process. This study examined the causes of non-compliance with the Public Procurement Act (2007) in the procurement of Goods, Works, and Services in most State Government Public Institutions in Southwest Nigeria. Over, 120 public institutions comprising 5 Universities, 5 Polytechnics, and 5 Colleges of Education / Health and Technology were used for the study. The opinions of the institutions’ Procurement Officers on the causes of non-compliance with the Act in their procurement process were sought using a structured questionnaire. The results revealed that non-independent of Procurement Officers, non-compliance with the Act by some at the managerial level, claiming inadequate knowledge of the Act, non-employment of qualified and experienced Procurement officers, insufficient publicity of the Act, and non-existence of corporate governance led to poor management of procurement record and non-provision of incentive, Inability to separate the duties of Internal Auditors and Procurement Officers, Inability to translate procurement entity at large which makes nearly all at departmental level believe they procurement officers. Conclusively, on taking the Procurement Officers through interviewing having it that: the right educational and professional qualifications, understanding of the Act, sufficient cognate working experience, recruiting most professionals needed if not all, and occupying management position will enhance compliance. Hence, in addition, adopting an external empowered department from the Bureau should raise for monitoring the compliance mostly in State Government Tertiary Education Institution. Also, an organizational culture with a corporate governance structure that supports the engagement of the right and qualified personnel to handle procurement, encourages them to perform at their best and rewards excellent service by giving incentives, and operates within an administrative environment devoid of corruption.

Keywords: non compliance of procurement act, tertiary education institution, university, polytechnic and college of education/ health science and technology, Nigeria

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Authors: Ogunnaiya Racheal Taiwo

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Children's formative years are crucial to their growth; it is, therefore, necessary for all the stakeholders to ensure that the pupils have an enabling quality of life which is essential for realizing their potential. For children to live and grow, they need a secure home, nutritious food, good health care, and quality education. This paper, therefore, investigates the implications of a depressed economy on the classroom learning of Nigerian children as it is clear that Nigeria is currently experiencing the worst economic depression in several decades, which affects a substantial proportion of children. The study is qualitative research, and it adopts a phenomenological approach where the experiences of respondents are examined qualitatively. Three senatorial districts in Oyo State were considered, and 50 teachers, both male, and female were chosen from each senatorial district for an interview through conversational key informants' interviews. The interviewees were recorded, transcribed, and presented using thematic analysis. Findings showed that more children have dropped out since the beginning of the year than in previous years. It was also recorded that learning has become challenging as children now find it harder to acquire learning materials. It was recommended that the government should reimburse early childhood schools to lessen the effect of the inability to purchase materials and pay school fees. It was also recommended that an intervention be made to approach and resolve issues associated with out-of-school children.

Keywords: childhood, classroom, education, depressed economy, poverty

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Authors: M. J. Alcedo, K. Ito, K. Maeda

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Measuring animal welfare is a newly emerging area of research and it needs multi-disciplinary way to do it. Due to the diversity of what constitutes the definition of animal welfare, different methods and models were developed and mostly conducted in semi and commercial farms in developed countries. Few studies have been conducted in developing countries and in backyard livestock operation. Recognizing that majority of livestock operations are categorized as backyard in developing countries, it is crucial to come up with parameters that can assess the welfare of the animal in the backyard level. This research had made use of stockmanship competence as the proxy indicator to assess animal welfare. Stockmanship competence in this study refers to the capacity of the animal owner to ensure the welfare of their animal by providing their needs for growth and reproduction. The Philippine recommend on goat production, tips on goat raising and goat scientific literatures were used as references to come up with indicators that are known to be important in meeting the needs of the animal and ensuring its welfare. Scores from -1 to +2 were assigned depending on how close it is of satisfying the animal’s need. It is hoped that this assessment method could contribute to the growing body of knowledge on animal welfare and can be utilized as logical and scientific framework in assessing welfare in backyard goat operation. It is suggested that further study needs to be conducted to refine and standardize indicators and identify other indicators for goat welfare assessment.

Keywords: backyard goat production, stockmanship competence, animal welfare, Philippines

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Authors: Abdulsamad Qadir Hussien

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The development of new technology in recent years has offered ordinary people various online digital platform tools and internet access to provide news stories, information, and subjects of public interest in the Kurdistan Region Government-Iraq (KRI). This shifting aspect has offered more chances for ordinary people to engage with other individuals on many issues in order to discuss and argue matters relating to their everyday lives. The key purpose of this research project will examine the role of citizen journalism in the increase of public awareness in the Kurdish community in the KRi; particularly, citizen journalism provides a new opportunity for ordinary people to raise their voices about problems and public matters in the KRI. The sample of this research project encompasses ordinary people who use social media platforms as sources of information and news concerning the KRI government policy. In the research project, the focus is on the ordinary people who are interacting with the blogs, posts, and footage that are produced by citizen journalism. The questionnaire was sent to more than 1,000 participants in the Kurdish community; this aspect produces statistically acceptable numbers to obtain a significant result for this research project. The sampling process is mainly based on the survey method in this study. The online questionnaire form includes many sections, which are divided into four key sections. The first section contains socio-demographic questions, including gender, age, and level of education. The research project applied the survey method in order to gather data and information surrounding the role of citizen journalism in increasing awareness of individuals in the Kurdish community. For this purpose, the researcher designed a questionnaire as the primary tool for the data collection process from ordinary people who use social media as a source of news and information. During the research project, online questionnaires were mailed in two ways – via Facebook and email – to participants in the Kurdish community, and this questionnaire looked for answers to questions from ordinary people, such as to what extent citizen journalism helps users to obtain information and news about public affairs and government policy. The research project found that citizen journalism has an essential role in increasing awareness of the Kurdish community, especially mainstream journalism has helped ordinary people to raise their voices in the KRI. Furthermore, citizen journalism carries more advantages as digital sources of news, footage, and information related to public affairs. This study provides useful tools to fore the news stories that are unreachable to professional journalists in the KRI.

Keywords: citizen journalism, public awareness, demonstration and democracy, social media news

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Authors: Shaherah Jordan, Paula Vandergert

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The discussion on public charging infrastructure is usually framed around the ‘chicken-egg’ challenge of consumers feeling reluctant to purchase without the necessary infrastructure and policymakers reluctant to invest in the infrastructure without the demand. However, public charging infrastructure may be more crucial to electric vehicle (EV) adoption than previously thought. Historically, access to residential charging was thought to be a major factor in potential for growth in the EV market as it offered a guaranteed place for a vehicle to be charged. The purpose of this study is to understand how the built environment may encourage uptake of EVs by seeking a correlation between EV ownership and public charging points in an urban and densely populated city such as London. Using a statistical approach with data from the Department for Transport and Zap-Map, a statistically significant correlation was found between the total (slow, fast and rapid) number of public charging points and a number of EV registrations per borough – with the strongest correlation found between EV registrations and rapid chargers. This research does not explicitly prove that there is a cause and effect relationship between public charging points EVs but challenges some of the previous literature which indicates that public charging infrastructure is not as important as home charging. Furthermore, the study provides strong evidence that public charging points play a functional and psychological role in the adoption of EVs and supports the notion that the built environment can influence human behaviour.

Keywords: behaviour change, electric vehicles, public charging infrastructure, transportation

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Authors: Ashraf Y. Z. Khalifa, Mohammed A. Almalki

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Medicago sativa (Alfalfa) is an important forage crop legume worldwide including Saudia Arabia due to its high nutritive value. Soil bacteria exist in root or root-nodules of Medicago sativa in either symbiotic relationships or in associations. The aim of the present study was to isolate and characterize endophytic bacteria that live in association with non-nodulated roots of Medicago sativa growing in Al-Ahsaa region, Saudia Arabia. Several bacterial strains were isolated from sterilized roots of Medicago sativa. Strains were characterized using 16S rRNA gene sequences, phylogenetic relationships analysis, morphological and biochemical characteristics. The strains utilized 50% (10 out of 20) of the different chemical substrates contained in the API20E strip. In general, many strains had the ability to ferment/oxidise all the carbohydrate tested except for rhamnose and the polyol carbohydrate, inositol. Comparative sequence analysis of the 16S rDNA gene indicated that the strains were closely related to the genus Bacillus. Furthermore, the growth parameters of Vigna sinensis were enhanced upon single-inoculation of the isolated strains, compared to the uninoculated control plants. The results highlighted that the root-nodules of Medicago sativa harbor non-nodulating bacterial strains that could have significant agricultural applications.

Keywords: Medicago sativa, endophytic bacteria, Pisum sativum, Vigna sinensis

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Authors: P. Christodoulou, M. Gerasimou, S. Mantzoukis, N. Varsamis, G. Kolliopoulou, N. Zotos

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Abstract— Purpose: The Intensive Care Unit (ICU) environment is conducive to the growth of microorganisms. A variety of microorganisms gain access to the intravascular area and are transported throughout the circulatory system. Therefore, examination of the catheters used in ICU patients is of paramount importance. Material and Method: The culture medium is a catheter tip, which is enriched with Tryptic soy broth (TSB). After one day of incubation, the broth is passaged in the following selective media: Blood, Mac conkey No. 2, chocolate, Mueller Hinton, Chapman, and Saboureaud agar. The above selective media is incubated for 2 days. After this period, if any number of microbial colonies is detected, gram staining is performed and then the microorganisms are identified by biochemical techniques in the automated Microscan (Siemens) system followed by a sensitivity test in the same system using the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) technique. The sensitivity test is verified by a Kirby Bauer test. Results: In 2017, the Microbiology Laboratory received 84 catheters from the ICU. 42 were found positive. Of these, S. epidermidis was identified at 8, A. baumannii in 10, K. pneumoniae in 6, P. aeruginosa in 6, P. mirabilis in 3, S. simulans in 1, S. haemolyticus in 4, S. aureus in 3 and S. hominis in 1. Conclusions: The results show that the placement and maintenance of the catheters in ICU patients are relatively successful, despite the unfavorable environment of the unit.

Keywords: culture, intensive care unit, microorganisms, vascular catheters

Procedia PDF Downloads 281