Search results for: torque distribution strategy

Authors: Fhajema Kunso

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People who live in the same region and who seemed to speak the same language still vary in some aspects of their language. The variation may occur in terms of pronunciation, lexicon, morphology, and syntax. This qualitative study described the phonological, morphological, and lexical variations of the Maguindanaon language among the ten Maguindanao municipalities. Purposive sampling, in-depth interviews, focus group discussion, and sorting and classifying of words according to phonological and morphological as well as lexical structures in data analysis were employed. The variations occurred through phonemic changes and other phonological processes and morphological processes. Phonological processes consisted of vowel lengthening and deletion while morphological processes included affixation, borrowing, and coinage. In the phonological variation, it was observed that there were phonemic changes in one dialect to another. For example, there was a change of phoneme /r/ to /l/. The phoneme /r/ was most likely to occur in Kabuntalan like /biru/, /kurIt/, and /kɘmɅr/ whereas in the rest of the dialects these were /bilu/, /kuIɪt/, and /kɘmɅl/ respectively. Morphologically, the affixation was the main way to know the tenses. For example, the root sarig (expect) when inserted with im becomes simarig, i.e. s + im + arig = simarig (expected). Lexical variation also existed in the Maguindanaon language. Results revealed that the variation in phonology, morphology, and lexicon were observed to be associated primarily on geographic distribution.

Keywords: applied linguistics, language, lexicon, Maguindanao, morphology, Philippines, phonology, processes, qualitative, variation

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Authors: Marwa M. Abu-Serie, Marwa M. Eltarahony

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The search for reliable, effective, and safe nanoparticles (NPs) as a treatment for cancer is a pressing priority. In this study, Cu-NPs were fabricated by Streptomyces cyaneofuscatus through simultaneous bioreduction strategy of copper nitrate salt. The as-prepared Cu-NPs subjected to structural analysis; energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, elemental mapping, X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, and ζ-potential. These biological synthesized Cu-NPs were mixed with disulfiram (DS), forming a nanocomplex of Cu-DS with a size of ~135 nm. The prepared nanocomplex (nanoCu-DS) exhibited higher anticancer activity than that of free complex of DS-Cu, Cu-NPs, and DS alone. This was illustrated by the lowest IC50 of nanoCu-DS (< 4 µM) against human breast and liver cancer cell lines comparing with DS-Cu, Cu-NPs, and DS (~8, 22.98-33.51 and 11.95-14.86, respectively). Moreover, flow cytometric analysis confirmed that higher apoptosis percentage range of nanoCu-DS-treated in MDA-MB 231, MCF-7, Huh-7, and HepG-2 cells (51.24-65.28%) than free complex of Cu-DS ( < 4.5%). Regarding inhibition potency of liver and breast cancer cell migration, no significant difference was recorded between free and nanocomplex. Furthermore, nanoCu-DS suppressed gene expression of β-catenine, Akt, and NF-κB and upregulated p53 expression (> 3, >15, > 5 and ≥ 3 folds, respectively) more efficiently than free complex (all ~ 1 fold) in MDA-MB 231 and Huh-7 cells. Our finding proved this prepared nano complex has a powerful anticancer activity relative to free complex, thereby offering a promising cancer treatment.

Keywords: biologically prepared Cu-NPs, breast cancer cell lines, liver cancer cell lines, nanoCu- disulfiram

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Authors: Anders Thorsén, Behrooz Sangchoolie, Peter Folkesson, Ted Strandberg

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As more parts of the power grid become connected to the internet, the risk of cyberattacks increases. To identify the cybersecurity threats and subsequently reduce vulnerabilities, the common practice is to carry out a cybersecurity risk assessment. For safety classified systems and products, there is also a need for safety risk assessments in addition to the cybersecurity risk assessment in order to identify and reduce safety risks. These two risk assessments are usually done separately, but since cybersecurity and functional safety are often related, a more comprehensive method covering both aspects is needed. Some work addressing this has been done for specific domains like the automotive domain, but more general methods suitable for, e.g., intelligent distributed grids, are still missing. One such method from the automotive domain is the Security-Aware Hazard Analysis and Risk Assessment (SAHARA) method that combines safety and cybersecurity risk assessments. This paper presents an approach where the SAHARA method has been modified in order to be more suitable for larger distributed systems. The adapted SAHARA method has a more general risk assessment approach than the original SAHARA. The proposed method has been successfully applied on two use cases of an intelligent distributed grid.

Keywords: intelligent distribution grids, threat analysis, risk assessment, safety, cybersecurity

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Authors: Oktofa Y. Sudrajad, Didier V. Caillie

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Association of Southeast Asian Countries Nations (ASEAN) is moving forward to the next level of regional integration by the initiation of ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) which is already started in 2015, 8 years after its declaration for the creation of AEC in 2007. This commitment imposes financial integration in the region is one of the main agenda which will be achieved until 2025. Therefore, the commitment to financial integration including banking integration will bring new landscape in the competition and business model in this region. This study investigates the effect of competition on bank business model using a sample of 324 banks from seven members of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries (Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam). We use market power approach and Boone indicator as competition measures, while income diversification and bank funding strategies are employed as bank business model representation. Moreover, we also evaluate bank business model based by grouping the banks based on the main banking characteristics. We use unbalanced bank-specific annual panel data over the period of 2003 – 2015. Our empirical analysis shows that the banking industries in ASEAN countries adapt their business model by increasing non-interest income proportion due to the level of competition increase in the sector.

Keywords: bank business model, banking competition, Boone indicator, market power

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Authors: Ahmed Mohamed Nasr, Waseim Ragab Azzam, Nada Osama Ramadan

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Contaminated soil can weaken the stability of buildings and infrastructure, posing serious risks to their structural integrity. Therefore, this study aims to understand how oil contamination affects the torsion behavior of model steel piles at different soil densities. This research is crucial for evaluating the structural integrity and stability of piles in oil-contaminated environments. Clean sand samples and heavy motor oil were mixed in amounts ranging from 0 to 6% of the soil's dry weight. The mixture was thoroughly mixed to ensure uniform distribution of the oil throughout the sandy soil for simulating the field conditions. In these investigations, the relative densities (Dr), pile slenderness ratio (Lp/Dp), oil content (O.C%), and contaminated sand layer thickness (LC) were all different. Also, the paper presents an analysis of piles that are loaded both vertically and torsionally. The findings demonstrated that the pre-applied torsion load led to a decrease in the vertical bearing ability of the pile. Also, at Dr = 80%, the ultimate vertical load under combined load at constant torsional load T = (1/3Tu, 2/3Tu, and Tu) in the cases of (Lc/Lp) = 0.5 and (Lp/Dp) =13.3 was found to be reduced by (1.48, 2.78, and 4.15%) less than piles under independent vertical load, respectively so it is crucial to consider the torsion load during pile design.

Keywords: torsion-vertical load, oil-contaminated sand, twist angle, steel pile

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Authors: Jutamas Wisansing, Thanakarn Vongvisitsin, Udom Hongchatikul

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Food could be used to open up a dialogue about local heritage. Contributing to the world sustainable consumption mission, this research aims to explore the linkages between agriculture, senses of place and performing arts. Thailand and its destination marketing ‘Discover Thainess’ was selected as a working principle, enabling a case example of how the three elements could be conceptualized. The model offered an integrated institutional arrangement where diverse entities could be formed to design how Thainess (local heritage) could be interpreted and embedded into an art of food. Using case study research approach, three areas (Chiangmai, Samutsongkram and Ban Rai Gong King) representing 3 different scales of tourism development were selected. Based on a theoretical analysis, a working model was formulated. An action research was then designed to experiment how the model could be materialized. Brainstorming elicitation and in-depth interview were employed to reflect on how each element could be integrated. The result of this study offered an innovation on how food tourism could be profoundly interpreted and how tourism development could enhance value creation for agricultural based community. The outcomes of the research present co-creative multi-stakeholder model and the value creation method through the whole supply chain of Thai gastronomy. The findings have been eventually incorporated into ‘gastro-diplomacy’ strategy for Thai tourism.

Keywords: community-based tourism, gastro-diplomacy, gastronomy tourism, sustainable tourism development

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Authors: Xinrong Li, Jiawei Dai

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Food production, food safety, and the food supply chain are causing a great challenge to human health and the environment. Different kinds of food have different environmental costs. Therefore, a healthy diet can alleviate this problem to a certain extent. In this project, an online questionnaire was conducted to understand the purchase behaviour of consumers and their attitudes towards basic food information. However, the data shows that the public's current consumption habits and ideology do not meet the long-term development of sustainable social needs. In order to solve the environmental problems caused by the unbalanced diet of the public and the social problems of unequal food distribution, the purpose of this paper is to explore how to use the emerging media of VR to visualize food supply chain information so as to attract users' attention to the environmental cost of food. In this project, the food supply chain of imported and local cheese was compared side-by-side in the virtual reality environment, including the origin, transportation, sales, and other processes, which can effectively help users understand the difference between the two processes and environmental costs. Besides, the experimental data demonstrated that the participant would like to choose low environmental cost food after experiencing the whole process.

Keywords: virtual reality, information design, food supply chain, environmental cost

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Authors: Nahla S. Abdel-Azim, Khaled A. Shams, Elsayed A. Omer, Mahmoud M. Sakr

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Medicinal plants play a significant role in the health care system in Egypt. Knowledge developed over the years by people is mostly unrecorded and orally passes on from one generation to the next. This knowledge is facing the danger of becoming extinct. Therefore there is an urgent need to document the medicinal and aromatic plants associated with traditional knowledge. The Egyptian Encyclopedia of wild medicinal plants (EEWMP) is the first attempt to collect most of the basic elements of the medicinal plant resources of Egypt and their traditional uses. It includes scientific data on about 500 medicinal plants in the form of monographs. Each monograph contains all available information and scientific data on the selected species including the following: names, description, distribution, parts used, habitat, conservational status, active or major chemical constituents, folk medicinal uses and heritage resources, pharmacological and biological activities, authentication, pharmaceutical products, and cultivation. The DNA bar-coding is also included (when available). A brief Arabic summary is given for every monograph. This work revealed the diversity in plant parts used in the treatment of different ailments. In addition, the traditional knowledge gathered can be considered a good starting point for effective in situ and ex-situ conservation of endangered plant species.

Keywords: encyclopedia, medicinal plant, traditional medicine, wild flora

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Authors: Harish Rajak, Preeti Patel

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The application of histone deacetylase inhibitors is a well-known strategy in prevention of cancer which shows acceptable preclinical antitumor activity due to its ability of growth inhibition and apoptosis induction of cancer cell. Molecular docking were performed using Histone Deacetylase protein (PDB ID:1t69) and prepared series of hydroxamic acid based HDACIs. On the basis of docking study, it was predicted that compound 1 has significant binding interaction with HDAC protein and three hydrogen bond interactions takes place, which are essential for antitumor activity. On docking, most of the compounds exhibited better glide score values between -8 to -10 which is close to the glide score value of suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid. The pharmacophore hypotheses were developed using e-pharmacophore script and phase module. The 3D-QSAR models provided a good correlation between predicted and actual anticancer activity. Best QSAR model showed Q2 (0.7974), R2 (0.9200) and standard deviation (0.2308). QSAR visualization maps suggest that hydrogen bond acceptor groups at carbonyl group of cap region and hydrophobic groups at ortho, meta, para position of R9 were favorable for HDAC inhibitory activity. We established structure activity correlation using docking, pharmacophore modeling and atom based 3D QSAR model for hydroxamic acid based HDACIs.

Keywords: HDACIs, QSAR, e-pharmacophore, docking, suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid

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Authors: Suranath Chomcheon, Nathnarong Khajohnsaksumeth, Benchawan Wiwatanapataphee

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Carbon monoxide is one of the harmful gases which have colorless, odorless, and tasteless. Too much carbon monoxide taken into the human body causes the reduction of oxygen transportation within human body cells leading to many symptoms including headache, nausea, vomiting, loss of consciousness, and death. Carbon monoxide is considered as one of the air pollution indicators. It is mainly released as soot from the exhaust pipe of the incomplete combustion of the vehicle engine. Nowadays, the increase in vehicle usage and the slowly moving of the vehicle struck by the traffic jam has created a large amount of carbon monoxide, which accumulated in the street canyon area. In this research, we study the effect of parameters such as wind speed and aspect ratio of the height building affecting the ventilation. We consider the model of the pollutant under the Bangkok Transit System (BTS) stations in a two-dimensional geometrical domain. The convention-diffusion equation and Reynolds-averaged Navier-stokes equation is used to describe the concentration and the turbulent flow of carbon monoxide. The finite element method is applied to obtain the numerical result. The result shows that our model can describe the dispersion patterns of carbon monoxide for different wind speeds.

Keywords: air pollution, carbon monoxide, finite element, street canyon

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Authors: Sheng-Che Chen, Keng-Ren Lin, Che-Hsin Lin, Hao-Yuan Tseng, Chih-Han Chang

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Teeth play an important role in providing the essential nutrients. The force loading of chewing on the crow is important condition to evaluate long-term success of many dental treatments. However, the quantification of the force regarding forces are distributed over the dental crow is still not well recognized. This study presents an industrial-grade piezoelectric-based multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) force sensor for measuring the distribution of the force distribute over the first molar. The developed sensor array is based on a flexible polyimide electrode and barium titanate-based MLCCs. MLCCs are commonly used in the electronic industry and it is a typical electric component composed of BaTiO₃, which is used as a capacitive material. The most important is that it also can be used as a force-sensing component by its piezoelectric property. In this study, to increase the sensitivity as well as to reduce the variation of different MLCCs, a treatment process is utilized. The MLCC force sensors are able to measure large forces (above 500 N), making them suitable for measuring the bite forces on the tooth crown. Moreover, the sensors also show good force response and good repeatability.

Keywords: force sensor array, multilayer ceramic capacitors, occlusal force, piezoelectric

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Authors: Mohammad Muntasir Maruf, Muhammad Zillur Rahman Khan, Nasim Jahan, Md. Waziul Alam Chowdhury, Satparkash, Md. Nozrul Islam

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Background: Substance use disorders have become a major public health problem in Bangladesh. Objectives: The present study was designed to assess the pattern of substance use and factors related to it among the hospitalized patients. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study. All the patients who were admitted in a private drug de-addiction clinic in the capital city (Dhaka) of Bangladesh during 1 July-31 December, 2013 and diagnosed as a case of substance use disorder by applying Structured Clinical Interview for DSM- Clinician Version were enrolled in the study. Data were collected through face to face interview by a semi-structured questionnaire and the information was complemented by the case-notes. Study subjects were 105 in number. Data analysis was performed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Results: Most (90.5%) of the respondents were male. The mean age of the respondents was 28.8 (± 8.0) years. Majority (91.4%) were poly-substance users. Most (27.6%) respondents used 3 types of substances. Smoking or inhalation was the route used by most (90.5%) respondents. More than three-fourth (81%) of the respondents used nicotine. Among the other substances, majority (79%) used opiates group, followed by cannabinoids group (55.2%) and alcohol (41%). Curiosity, peer pressure and to have enjoyment or fun were identified as the common reasons for initiating substance use. Conclusions: A high proportion of poly-substance use was found. The study findings would help in management and prevention strategy of substance use in Bangladesh.

Keywords: Bangladesh, de-addiction clinic, poly-substance users, substance use disorder

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Authors: Keiji Komatsu，Tetsuo Sekiya, Ayumu Toyama, Atsushi Nakamura, Ikumi Toda, Shigeo Ohshio, Hiroyuki Muramatsu, Hidetoshi Saitoh

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Yttrium oxide (Y2O3) films have been successfully deposited with yttrium-ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA･Y･H) complexes prepared by various milling techniques. The effects of the properties of the EDTA･Y･H complex on the properties of the deposited Y2O3 films have been analyzed. Seven different types of the raw EDTA･Y･H complexes were prepared by various commercial milling techniques such as ball milling, hammer milling, commercial milling, and mortar milling. The milled EDTA･Y･H complexes exhibited various particle sizes and distributions, depending on the milling method. Furthermore, we analyzed the crystal structure, morphology and elemental distribution profile of the metal oxide films deposited on stainless steel substrate with the milled EDTA･Y･H complexes. Depending on the milling technique, the flow properties of the raw powders differed. The X-ray diffraction pattern of all the samples revealed the formation of Y2O3 crystalline phase, irrespective of the milling technique. Of all the different milling techniques, the hammer milling technique is considered suitable for fabricating dense Y2O3 films.

Keywords: powder sizes and distributions, flame spray coating techniques, Yttrium oxide

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Authors: Maaly Jarrah

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In a study abroad context, students have the advantage of immersing themselves in the environment of the target language and being exposed to it. However, in and a stay home context, where English is not the mother tongue, students’ exposure to the second language is often times restricted to the classroom. Although language teachers are keen to develop inside class room activities and practices that increase the suitability of students to acquire a second language (Cook & Singleton, 2014), many would agree that class time is too limited to enhance students’ oral fluency skills. Consequently, creating opportunities outside the classroom for students to speak English is an effective strategy in compensating for students’ limited use of the L2. In an argument by Ortega (2012) external classroom activities have equal significance in enabling students learn English as a second language. The author further asserts that the activities provide a non-educational environment from which a student may feel free and comfortable to acquire new language skills. This study investigates the significance of outside classroom activities in promoting students’ oral proficiency. In addition, it reports on students’ perceptions of such activities. 15 participants from the American University of Kuwait took part in this study. Open-ended interviews were done to find out what the participants thought of these activities, and what they gained from them. Interview results show that students found outside classroom activities very effective in improving not only their oral fluency skills, but their confidence and critical thinking skills as well. The implications of this research study are for language practitioners and language programs in the EFL context to be aware of the benefits of incorporating outside classroom activities in language teaching.

Keywords: language teaching, oral fluency, outside classroom activities

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Authors: Guangtong Xu, Yi He

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Like most historic and cultural cities in China, the historic urban area of Jingmen city is facing a typical spatial problem of fragmentation and fuzzification. This study focuses on exploring a method for evaluating the existing values of historic urban area based on spatial prototype, a concept introduced into urban morphology from 'Archetype' in architectural typology. As the spatial elements and built-up relationship of historic city, spatial prototype has habitual structural characteristics and formal modulus. It is the inherent logic and order rules behind the scattered historic environment, providing a clue to understand the spatial characteristics and a basis for guiding the construction and conservation in historic urban areas. Three criteria, the resolution of historical elements, the completeness of historical structure and the renewal potential of associated land, were selected to construct the integrated assessment system. These three dimensions are linked to the spatial prototype and its constituent elements, as well as the transformation relationship in ancient and present day. The results showed that historic urban areas have changed from a holistic city to different existing types dominated by their historic structure elements. It is necessary to improve the pertinence of planning strategies and develop diversified management measures in the conservation scope of historic urban area. Moreover, a constructive-conservation strategy should be put forward to enhance the integrity of historic urban area based on the trace of spatial prototype and evaluation results.

Keywords: constructive conservation, existing value, historic urban area, spatial prototype

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Authors: Marzia Hoque Tania, Oishy Roy, ASW Kurny, Fahmida Gulshan

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This paper presents results of the investigation on the characterization of silica sand of northern region of Bangladesh on the basis of material composition, particle shape, and size, density, transportation, crystallinity, etc. before and after upgradation. The raw sand samples collected from Nilphamari and Lalmonirhat district were studied and compared for the prospect silica as a high valued commodity rather than heavy minerals. The raw sand particles were colorful in appearance with varying particle size distribution. Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) showed uniformity in grain size and mineralogical composition. X-ray fluorescence (XRF) analysis indicated the silica content of the as-received sample to be 75%. Thermogravimetric and Differential Thermal Analysis (DTA) did not detect the presence of any organic material. These tests revealed the sample to be alpha-quartz. Samples were washed with organic and inorganic acid with a combination of varying rotation speed, concentration, solid-liquid ratio. Experiments showed the silica content could be enhanced to more than 85% by washing with 15% sulphuric acid in room temperature. Beneficiation can be improved in further work considering the effect of varying temperature or advanced technology.

Keywords: beneficiation, characterization, commercial grade sand, glass sand, silica, upgradation

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Authors: Saiyeed Jakaria Baksh Imran

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The earth is being endangered by many of the climate related issues today. The most serious issue for the world today is the global warming. Increase in Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions post-industrial revolution period is the prime reason for global warming. Shipping is the fifth largest GHG emitting sector worldwide. The key reason for this is because, over 90% of the world trade is conducted through ocean as the ocean alone covers 70% of the earth surface. While the countries continue to develop, trade and commerce continue to increase between them simultaneously. However, there is no sign of reduction in GHG emission from shipping because of many concerned issues. Firstly, there is technological barrier for which ships cannot just become environment friendly immediately. Secondly, there is no alternative fuel available as well. Thirdly, there is no proper mechanism to measure how much ships emit as emission from ships vary according to the size, engine type and loading capacity of ships. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) being the governing body of the international shipping has implemented MARPOL Annex VI. However, the policy alone is not enough unless there is a proper data available regarding ship emissions, which the IMO is yet to figure out. This paper will present a critical analysis of existing IMO policies such as the Energy Efficiency Design Index (EEDI), Ship Energy Efficiency Management Plan (SEEMP), Data Collection System (SEEMP) and the IMO’s Initial Strategy on Reduction of Greenhouse Gas emissions from shipping. Also, the challenges exist in implementing such policies have been presented in the paper.

Keywords: GHG, IMO, EEDI, SEEMP, DCS, greenhouse gas, decarbonization, shipping

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Authors: M. Y. Ismail, M. Inam

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This paper presents the design and analysis of Liquid Crystal (LC) based tunable reflectarray antenna with slot embedded patch element configurations within X-band frequency range. The slots are shown to modify the surface current distribution on the patch element of reflectarray which causes the resonant patch element to provide different resonant frequencies depending on the slot dimensions. The simulated results are supported and verified by waveguide scattering parameter measurements of different reflectarray unit cells. Different rectangular slots on patch element have been fabricated and a change in resonant frequency from 10.46GHz to 8.78GHz has been demonstrated as the width of the rectangular slot is varied from 0.2W to 0.6W. The rectangular slot in the center of the patch element has also been utilized for the frequency tunable reflectarray antenna design based on K-15 Nematic LC. For the active reflectarray antenna design, a frequency tunability of 1.2% from 10GHz to 9.88GHz has been demonstrated with a dynamic phase range of 103° provided by the measured scattering parameter results. Time consumed by liquid crystals for reconfiguration, which is one of the drawback of LC based design, has also been disused in this paper.

Keywords: liquid crystal, tunable reflectarray, frequency tunability, dynamic phase range

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Authors: Watchawin Ekphinitphithaya, Patompong Satapornpong

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Introduction: Carbamazepine (CBZ) is one of the most prescribed antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) by neurologists and non-neurologist worldwide. CBZ is usually prescribed along with other drugs, leading to the possibility of severe cutaneous adverse drug reactions (SCARs). The HLA-B*15:02 is strongly associated with CBZ-induced Stevens-Johnson syndrome and toxic epidermal necrolysis (SJS–TEN) in the Han Chinese and other Asian populations but not in European populations, while HLA-A*31:01 allele has been reported to be associated with CBZ-induced SCARs in European population and Japanese. Objective: The aim of this study is to investigate the distribution of pharmacogenetics HLA-A*31:01 marker in a healthy Thai population associated with Carbamazepine-induced SCARs. Materials and Methods: Prospective study, 350 unrelated healthy Thais were recruited in this study. Human leukocyte antigen-A alleles were genotyped using PCR-sequence specific oligonucleotides (PCR-SSOs). Results: The frequency of HLA-A alleles were HLA-A*11:01 (190 alleles, 27.14%), HLA-A*24:02 (82 alleles, 11.71%), HLA-A*02:03 (80 alleles, 11.43%), HLA-A*33:03 (76 alleles, 10.86%), HLA-A*02:07 (58 alleles, 8.29%), HLA-A*02:01 (35 alleles, 5.00%), HLA-A*24:07 (29 alleles, 4.14%), HLA-A*02:06 – HLA-A*30:01 (15 alleles, 2.14%), and HLA-A*01:01 (14 alleles, 2.00%). Particularly, the number of HLA-A*31:01 alleles was 6 of 700 (0.86%) in the healthy Thai population. Many research presented varying distributions of HLA-A*31:01 in Asians, including 2% of Han Chinese, 9% of Japanese and 5% of Koreans. In addition, this allele was found approximately 2-5% in the Caucasian population. Conclusions: Thus, the pharmacogenetics database is vital to support in many populations, especially in Thais, for screening HLA-A*31:01 allele to avoid CBZ-induced SCARs before initiating treatments in each population.

Keywords: Carbamazepine, HLA-A*31:01, Thai population, pharmacogenetics

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Authors: Fatemeh Torabi, Jamal El-Den, Narumon Sriratanviriyakul

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Perpetual changes in the workplace and daily business activities bring a need for imbedding organizational knowledge sharing within the organizations’ culture, routines and processes. Organizations should adapt to the changing in the environment in order to survive. Accordingly, the management should promote a knowledge sharing culture which might result in knowledge accumulation, hence better response to these changing environmental conditions. Researchers in the field of strategy and marketing stressed that employees’, as well as the overall performance of the organization, would improve as a result of implementing a knowledge-oriented culture. The research investigated the significant impact of knowledge sharing on market response and the competitiveness of organizations. A knowledge sharing framework was developed based on current literary frameworks with additional constructs such as employees’ learning commitments, experiences and prior knowledge. Linear regression was used to analyze the relationships among dependent and independent variables. The research’s results indicated strong positive correlation between the dependent and independent variables, especially in organizational market sharing. We anticipate that this correlation would improve organizational knowledge sharing related practices and the associated knowledge entities. The research posits the introduced framework could be a solid ground for further investigations on how some organizational factors would influence the organization’s response to the market as well as on competitiveness. Final results support all hypotheses. Finding of this research show that knowledge sharing intention had the significant and positive effect on market response and competitiveness of organizations.

Keywords: knowledge management, knowledge sharing, market response, organizational competitiveness

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Authors: Lee Siong Wee, Tan Kang Hai, Yang En-Hua

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This paper presents the results of an experimental study undertaken to evaluate the local bond stress-slip response of short embedment of reinforcing bars in normal concrete (NC) and high performance fiber reinforced cement composites (HPFRCC) blocks. Long embedment was investigated as well to gain insights on the distribution of strain, slip, bar stress and bond stress along the bar especially in post-yield range. A total of 12 specimens were tested, by means of pull-out of the reinforcing bars from concrete blocks. It was found that the enhancement of local bond strength can be reached up to 50% and ductility of the bond behavior was improved significantly if HPFRCC is used. Also, under a constant strain at loaded end, HPFRCC has delayed yielding of bars at other location from the loaded end. Hence, the reduction of bond stress was slower for HPFRCC in comparison with NC. Due to the same reason, the total slips at loaded end for HPFRCC was smaller than NC as expected. Test results indicated that HPFRCC has better bond slip behavior which makes it a suitable material to be employed in anchorage zone such as beam-column joints.

Keywords: bond stress, high performance fiber reinforced cement composites, slip, strain

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Authors: Sunil Mekale, Debasish Chowdhury, Sanchita Patnaik, Amitav Das, Ashok Agarwal

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Background: Odisha is a low HIV prevalence state in India (ANC-HIV positivity of 0.42% as per HIV sentinel surveillance 2010-2011); however, it is an important source migration state with 3.2% of male migrants reporting to be PLHIV. USAID Public Health Foundation of India -PIPPSE project is piloting a source-destination corridor programme between Odisha and Gujarat. In Odisha, the focus has been on developing a comprehensive strategy to reach out to the out migrants and their spouses in the place of their origin based on their availability. The project has made concerted attempts to identify vulnerable districts with high out migration and high positivity rate. Description: 48 out of 97 ICTCs were selected from nine top high out migration districts through multistage sampling. A retrospective descriptive analysis of HIV positive male migrants and their spouses for two years (April 2013-March 2015) was conducted. A total of 3,645 HIV positive records were analysed. Findings: Among 34.2% detected HIV positive in the ICTCs, 23.3% were male migrants and 11% were spouses of male migrants; almost 50% of total ICTC attendees. More than 70% of the PLHIV male migrants and their spouses were less than 45 years old. Conclusions: Couple HIV testing approach may be considered for male migrants and their spouses. ICTC data analysis could guide in identifying the locations with high HIV positivity among male migrants and their spouses.

Keywords: HIV testing, migrants, spouse of migrants, Integrated Counselling and Testing Centre (ICTC)

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Authors: Ali A. Hammadi

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In this work, a practical study on a commissioned Giga Passive Optical Network (GPON) fiber to the home access network in Kuwait is presented. The work covers the framework of the conceptual design of the deployed Passive Optical Networks (PONs), access network, optical fiber cable network distribution, technologies, and standards. The work also describes methodologies applied by system engineers for design of Optical Network Terminals (ONTs) and Optical Line Terminals (OLTs) transceivers with respect to the distance, operating wavelengths, splitting ratios. The results have demonstrated and justified the limitation of transmission distance of a PON link in Fiber to The Premises (FTTP) to not exceed 20 km. Optical Time Domain Reflector (OTDR) test has been carried for this project to confirm compliance with International Telecommunication Union (ITU) specifications regarding the total length of the deployed optical cable, total loss in dB, and loss per km in dB/km with respect to the operating wavelengths. OTDR test results with traces for segments of implemented fiber network will be provided and discussed.

Keywords: passive optical networks (PONs), fiber to the premises (FTTx), access network, OTDR

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Authors: M. C. Venter, G. Hitge, S. C. Krygsman, J. Thiart

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For decades, South Africa has been planning transportation systems from a supply, rather than a demand side, perspective. In terms of parking, this relates to requiring the minimum parking provision that is enforced by city officials. Newer insight is starting to indicate that South Africa needs to re-think this philosophy in light of a new policy environment that desires a different outcome. Urban policies have shifted from reliance on the private car for access, to employing a wide range of alternative modes. Car dominated travel is influenced by various parameters, of which the availability and location of parking plays a significant role. The question is therefore, what is the right strategy to achieve the desired transport outcomes for SA. The focus of this paper is used to assess this issue with regard to parking provision, and specifically at a tertiary institution. A parking audit was conducted at the Stellenbosch campus of Stellenbosch University, monitoring occupancy at all 60 parking areas, every hour during business hours over a five-day period. The data from this survey was compared with the prescribed number of parking bays according to the Stellenbosch Municipality zoning scheme (requiring a minimum of 0.4 bays per student). The analysis shows that by providing 0.09 bays per student, the maximum total daily occupation of all the parking areas did not exceed an 80% occupation rate. It is concluded that the prevailing parking standards are not supportive of the new urban and transport policy environment, but that it is extremely conservative from a practical demand point of view.

Keywords: parking provision, parking requirements, travel behaviour, travel demand management

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Authors: Sabreen Al Shamli, Abdul Rahman Al azure

Abstract:

Microscopic examination by histopathology is the gold standard for diagnosing many oral and maxillofacial pathologies. Current clinical guidelines and medicolegal regulations recommend the utilization of histopathology services for confirming pathologies being treated. The goal of this study was to determine the prevalence and distribution of oral and maxillofacial biopsies that had been histopathologically diagnosed at Anahdha Hospital (ANH). A total of 512 biopsies randomly selected from a ground total of 3310 biopsies, which were submitted for oral and maxillofacial histopathological specimens, were analyzed at Nahdha Hospital in Oman between January 2010 and December 2022. Data collected retrospectively selected from all case notes of patients who had oral histopathology examinations performed as part of their treatment. Data collected from the Shifa system was transferred to Microsoft Excel and analyzed using SPSS. Research ethics approval was obtained from the research committee of the hospital. This study provides background information on oral histopathology prevalence that could be helpful in future research in Oman. The findings of the present study are in agreement with the reported data from other investigations, even when it is taken into account how difficult it is to compare prevalence rates from different studies.

Keywords: oral biopsy, maxillofacial histopathology, oral disease, maxillofacial specimens

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Authors: Srinivasapriyan Vijayan

Abstract:

Phenol is one of the most vital chemical in industry. Nowadays, phenol production is based upon the three-step cumene process, which involves a hazardous cumene hydroperoxide intermediate and produces nearly equimolar amounts of acetone as a coproduct. An attractive route in phenol production is the direct one-step selective hydroxylation of benzene using eco-friendly oxidants such as O2, N2O, and H2O2. In particular, the direct hydroxylation of benzene to form phenol with O2 has recently attracted extensive research attention because this process is green clean and eco-friendly. However, most of the catalytic systems involving O2 have a low rate of hydroxylation because the direct introduction of hydroxyl functionality into benzene is challenging. Almost all the developed catalytic systems require an elevated temperature and suffer from low conversion because of the notoriously low reactivity of aromatic C–H bonds. Moreover, increased reactivity of phenol relative to benzene makes the selective oxidation of benzene to phenol very difficult, especially under heating conditions. Hollow spheres, a very fascinating class of materials with good permeation and low density, highly monodisperse MOF hollow sandwich spheres have been rationally synthesized using monodisperse polystyrene (PS) nanoparticles as templates through a versatile step-by-step self-assembly strategy. So, our findings could pave the way toward highly efficient nonprecious catalysts for low-temperature oxidation reactions in heterogeneous catalysis. Because it is easy post-reaction separation, its cheap, green and recyclable.

Keywords: benzene hydroxylation, Fe-based metal organic frameworks, molecular oxygen, phenol

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Authors: Mousa Keshavarz, Abdul-Reza Dabbagh, Maryam Soyuf Jahromi

Abstract:

The diversity of mangrove macrobenthos assemblages at mudflat and mangrove ecosystems of Port Khamir, Iran were investigated for one year. During this period, we measured physicochemical properties of water temperature, salinity, pH, DO and the density and distribution of the macrobenthos. We sampled a total of 9 transects, at three different topographic levels along the intertidal zone at three stations. Assemblages at class level were compared. The five most diverse and abundant classes were Foraminifers (54%), Gastropods (23%), Polychaetes (10%), Bivalves (8%) & Crustaceans (5%), respectively. Overall densities were 1869 ± 424 ind/m2 (26%) in spring, 2544 ± 383 ind/m2(36%) in summer, 1482 ± 323 ind/m2 (21%) in autumn and 1207 ± 80 ind/m2 (17%) in winter. Along the intertidal zone, the overall relative density of individuals at high, intermediate, and low topographic levels was 40, 30, and 30% respectively. Biodiversity indices were used to compare different classes: Gastropoda (Shannon index: 0.33) and Foraminifera (Simpson index: 0.28) calculated the highest scores. It was also calculated other bio-indices. With the exception of bivalves, filter feeders were associated with coarser sediments at higher intertidal levels, while deposit feeders were associated with finer sediments at lower levels. Salinity was the most important factor acting on community structure, while DO and pH had little influence.

Keywords: macrobenthos, biodiversity, mangrove forest, Khamir Port

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Authors: Woo-seok Choi, Eun-sup Kim, Nam-Seo Park

Abstract:

The demand for new technique in soft ground improvement continuously increases as general soft ground methods like PBD and DCM have a application problem in soft grounds with deep depth and wide distribution in Southern coast of Korea and Southeast. In this study, partial cement mixing method utilizing geogrid and fixing unit(CMG) is suggested and Finite element analysis is performed for analyzing the depth of surface soil and deep soil stabilization and comparing with DCM method. In the result of the experiment, the displacement in DCM method were lower than the displacement in CMG, it's because the upper load is transferred to deep part soil not treated by cement in CMG method case. The differential settlement in DCM method was higher than the differential settlement in CMG, because of the effect load transfer effect by surface part soil treated by cement and geogrid. In conclusion, CMG method has the advantage of economics and constructability in embankment road, railway, etc in which differential settlement is the important consideration.

Keywords: soft ground, geogrid, fixing unit, partial cement mixing, finite element analysis

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Authors: E. M. AbdelRazek, G. S. ElBahy, M. A. Allam, A. M. Abdelghany, A. M. Hezma

Abstract:

Polymeric biocomposite of hydroxyapatite/polyacrylic acid were prepared and their thermal and mechanical properties were improved by addition of cellulose acetate. FTIR spectroscopy technique and X-ray diffraction analysis were employed to examine the physical and chemical characteristics of the biocomposites. Scanning electron microscopy shows a uniform distribution of HAp nano-particles through the polymeric matrix of two organic/inorganic composites weight ratios (60/40 and 70/30), at which the material crystallinity reaches a considerable value appropriate for the needed applications were studied and revealed that the HAp nano-particles are uniformly distributed in the polymeric matrix. Kinetic parameters were determined from the weight loss data using non isothermal thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Also, the main degradation steps were described and discussed. The mechanical properties of composites were evaluated by measuring tensile strength and elastic modulus. The data indicate that the addition of cellulose acetate can make homogeneous composites scaffold significantly resistant to higher stress. Elastic modulus of the composites was also improved by the addition of cellulose acetate, making them more appropriate for bioapplications.

Keywords: biocomposite, chemical synthesis, infrared spectroscopy, mechanical properties

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Authors: Hai Hoang, Thanh Xuan Nguyen Thi, Guillaume Galliero

Abstract:

Coarse-Grained (CG) molecular simulations have shown to be an efficient way to estimate thermophysical (static and dynamic) properties of fluids. Several strategies have been developed and reported in the literature for defining CG molecular models. Among them, those based on a top-down strategy (i.e. CG molecular models related to macroscopic observables), despite being heuristic, have increasingly gained attention. This is probably due to its simplicity in implementation and its ability to provide reasonable results for not only simple but also complex systems. Regarding simple Force-Fields associated with these CG molecular models, it has been found that the four parameters Mie chain model is one of the best compromises to describe thermophysical static properties (e.g. phase diagram, saturation pressure). However, parameterization procedures of these Mie-chain GC molecular models given in literature are generally insufficient to simultaneously provide static and dynamic (e.g. viscosity) properties. To deal with such situations, we have extended the corresponding states by using a quantity associated with the liquid viscosity. Results obtained from molecular simulations have shown that our approach is able to yield good estimates for both static and dynamic thermophysical properties for various real non-associating fluids. In addition, we will show that on simple (e.g. phase diagram, saturation pressure) and complex (e.g. thermodynamic response functions, thermodynamic energy potentials) static properties, results of our scheme generally provides improved results compared to existing approaches.

Keywords: coarse-grained model, mie potential, molecular simulations, thermophysical properties, phase equilibria

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