Search results for: service life

Authors: Cheba Ben Amar

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Bacillus and Paenibacillus are Gram-positive aerobic endospore-forming bacteria (AEFB) and most abundant in the rhizosphere, they mediated plant growth promotion and disease protection by several complex and interrelated processes involving direct and indirect mechanisms that include nitrogen fixation, phosphate solubilization, siderophores production, phytohormones production and plant diseases control. In addition to their multiple PGPR properties, high secretory capacity, spore forming ability and spore resistance to unfavorable conditions enabling their extended commercial applications for long shelf-life. Due to these unique advantages, Bacillus species were the most an ideal candidate for developing efficient PGPR products such as biopesticides, fungicides and fertilizers. This review list all studied and reported plant growth promoting Bacillus species and strains, discuss their capacities to enhance plant growth and protection with special focusing on the most frequent species Bacillus subtilis, B. pumilus ,B. megaterium, B. amyloliquefaciens , B. licheniformis and B. sphaericus, furthermore we recapitulate the beneficial activities and mechanisms of several species and strains of the genus Paenibacillus involved in plant growth stimulation and plant disease control.

Keywords: bacillus, paenibacillus, PGPR, beneficial activities, mechanisms, growth promotion, disease control, agrobiotechnology

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Authors: Sindile Ngubane-Mokiwa

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This paper addresses two questions: (1) what barriers do the blind students face with assessment and feedback in open distance learning contexts? And (2) How can these barriers be removed? The paper focuses on the distance education through which most students with disabilities elevate their chances of accessing higher education. Lack of genuine inclusion is also evident in the challenges the blind students face during the assessment. These barriers are experienced at both formative and summative stages. The insights in this paper emanate from a case study that was carried out through qualitative approaches. The data was collected through in-depth interview, life stories, and telephonic interviews. The paper provides a review of local, continental and international views on how best assessment barriers can be removed. A group of five blind students, comprising of two honours students, two master's students and one doctoral student participated in this study. The data analysis was done through thematic analysis. The findings revealed that (a) feedback to the assignment is often inaccessible; (b) the software used is incompatible; (c) learning and assessment are designed in exclusionary approaches; (d) assessment facilities are not conducive; and (e) lack of proactive innovative assessment strategies. The article concludes by recommending ways in which barriers to assessment can be removed. These include addressing inclusive assessment and feedback strategies in professional development initiatives.

Keywords: assessment design, barriers, disabilities, blind students, feedback, universal design for learning

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Authors: Da-Hye Jang, Woo-Jeong Cho

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Marine leisure tourism contributes greatly to the national economy in which the sea is located nearby and many countries are using marine tourism to create value added. The interest and investment of government and local governments on marine leisure tourism growing as a major trend of marine tourism is steadily increasing. But indiscriminate investment in marine leisure tourism such as duplicated business wastes limited resources. In other words, government and local governments need to select and concentrate on the goal they pursue by drawing priority on maritime leisure tourism policies. The purpose of this study is to analyze development strategies on supplier for marine leisure tourism and thus provide a comprehensive and rational framework for developing marine leisure tourism. In order to achieve the purpose, this study is to analyze priorities for each evaluation criterion of marine leisure tourism development policies using Analytic Hierarchy Process. In this study, a questionnaire was used as the survey tool and was developed based on the previous studies, government report, regional report, related thesis and literature for marine leisure tourism. The questionnaire was constructed by verifying the validity of contents from the expert group related to marine leisure tourism after conducting the first and second preliminary surveys. The AHP survey was conducted to experts (university professors, researchers, field specialists and related public officials) from April 6, 2018 to April 30, 2018 by visiting in person or e-mail. This study distributed 123 questionnaires and 68 valid questionnaires were used for data analysis. As a result, 4 factors with 12 detail strategies were analyzed using Excel. Extracted factors of development strategies of marine leisure tourism are consist of 4 factors such as infrastructure, popularization, law & system improvement and advancement. In conclusion, the results of the pairwise comparison of the four major factor on the first class were infrastructure, popularization, law & system improvement and advancement in order. Second, marine water front space maintenance had higher priority than marina facilities expansion and the establishment of marine leisure education center. Third, marine leisure safety·culture improvement had higher priority than strengthening experience·education program and the upkeep and open promotion event. Fourth, specialization·cluster of marine leisure tourism had higher priority than business support system of marine leisure tourism. Fifth, the revision of water-related leisure activities safety act had higher priority than an enactment of marine tourism promotion act and the foster of marina service industry. Finally, marine water front space maintenance was the most important development plan to boost marine leisure tourism.

Keywords: marine leisure tourism, marine leisure, marine tourism, analytic hierarchy process

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Authors: Saeko Takahashi, Kazuo Hiraki

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Is it more fun to watch videos together than watching alone? Previous studies showed that synchronizing with others enhances subsequent prosocial behavior and affiliation, and conversely, prosocial individuals tend to coordinate with a partner to a greater extent. However, compared to adults, less is known about interpersonal coordination of young children in real-life situations because most studies have focused on children’s particular movement using specific tools or tasks in a laboratory setting. It has also been unclear if prosociality of young children affect the extent of interpersonal coordination within dyads. The present study examined data from motion capture of five body parts of 4-year-old dyads watching the same stimuli together or alone. A questionnaire survey including participants’ prosocial trait was also conducted. The wavelet coherence of each body parts within dyads was calculated as a measure of the extent of interpersonal coordination. Results showed that the dyads became significantly more coordinated in a social situation compared to a non-social situation. Moreover, dyads with averagely higher prosociality were more coordinated. These results shed some light on the development of interpersonal coordination in terms of social ability in young children. This study also offers a useful method for a study of spontaneous coordination in young children and infants without instructions or verbal responses.

Keywords: child development, interpersonal coordination, prosociality, synchrony, wavelet transform

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Authors: Rachna, Uma Shanker

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Aromatic phenols, being priority pollutants, are found in various industrial effluents and seeking the attention of environmentalists worldwide, owing to their life-threatening effects. In the present study, the coupling of zinc oxide with Prussian blue was achieved involving co-precipitation synthesis process using Azadirachta indica plant extract. The fabricated nanocatalyst was employed for the sunlight mediated photodegradation of various phenols (Phenol, 3-Aminophenol, and 2,4-Dinitrophenol). Doping of zinc oxide with Prussian blue caused an increase in the surface area to value 80.109 m²g⁻¹ and also enhanced the semiconducting tendency of the nanocomposite with band gap energy 1.101 eV. The experiment was performed at different parameters of phenols concentration, catalyst amount, pH, time, and exposure of sunlight. The obtained results showed a lower elimination of 2,4-DNP (93%) than 3-AP (97%) and phenol (95%) owing to their molecular weight and basicity differences. In comparison to the starting material (zinc oxide and Prussian blue), nanocomposite was more capable in degrading the phenols and lowered the t1/2 value of phenol (4.405 h), 3-AP (4.04 h) and 2,4-DNP (4.68 h) to a greater extent. Effect of different foreign anions was also studied to check nanocomposite’s liability under natural conditions. The extent of charge recombination being the most limiting factor in the photodegradation of pollutants was determined through the photoluminescence. Sunlight active ZnO@FeHCF nanocomposite was proven to exhibit good catalytic ability up to 10 cycles.

Keywords: nanocomposite, phenols, photodegradation, sunlight, water

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Authors: Crescentia Ugwuona

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Appropriate language use has been central and critical in advancing education and human rights for women and girls in many countries the world over. Unfortunately, these lofty aims have often been violated by rural Igbo-Nigerians as they use stereotyping and dehumansing language in their cultural songs against women and girls. The psychological impact of the songs has a significant negative impact on education, human rights, quality of life, and opportunities for many rural Igbo-women and girls in Nigeria. This study, therefore, examines the forms, shades, and manifestations of derogatory and stereotypical language against women and girls the Igbo cultural songs; and how they impede education and human rights for females in Nigeria. Through Critical discourse analysis (CDA) of data collected via recording, the study identifies manifestations of women and girls’ stereotypes such as subjugations, male dominance, inequality in gender roles, suppression, and oppression, and derogatory use of the language against women and girls in the Igbo cultural songs. This study has a great promise of alerting the issues of derogatory and stereotypical language in songs, and contributes to an education aimed at gender equality, emancipator practice of appropriate language use in songs, equal education and human rights for both male and female, respect and solidarity in Nigeria and beyond.

Keywords: gender stereotypes, cultural songs, women and girls, language use in Nigeria, critical discourse analysis, CDA, education

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Authors: Muneeza Anwar, Muniba Raza, Zunahs Khalid

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The study discusses the communication gap that has been created due to excessive use of social networking websites such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Viber etc. In this growing world of technology and awareness among people about social media it has also increased its usage. The objective of this study is to measure the ways the internet is affecting the communications among individuals through social media and to check whether this is affecting the society in a positive manner. The study signifies the theoretical and practical aspects of communication gaps among the individuals through social media. The study is conducted to check whether social networking websites are the main causes of creating communication gap among individuals. In this world of fast growing technology every day, there is a new invention, affecting the lives of people both directly and indirectly. Moreover with the usage of technology people keep updating about themselves, about different events happening around their surrounding by creating events, uploading pictures, checking in different place, and creating awareness among people who are not aware of people about what is happening. From the study, we deduced how social media is affecting individual’s life. The findings suggest that social media is although creating communication gaps among people but is also bridging them. Showing that social media is one of the causes that is creating communication gap among the individuals. Communication gap has although increased on a daily basis but on average it has remained the same as they are communicating on social networking websites but eventually decreasing the communication on personal grounds.

Keywords: communication gaps, usage of social networking websites, interaction with friends and family, social media

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Authors: Shital Patil, Surendra Bhosale

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Cardiac diseases are the leading causes of mortality and morbidity in the world, from recent few decades accounting for a large number of deaths have emerged as the most life-threatening disorder globally. Machine learning and Artificial intelligence have been playing key role in predicting the heart diseases. A relevant set of feature can be very helpful in predicting the disease accurately. In this study, we proposed a comparative analysis of 4 different features selection methods and evaluated their performance with both raw (Unbalanced dataset) and sampled (Balanced) dataset. The publicly available Z-Alizadeh Sani dataset have been used for this study. Four feature selection methods: Data Analysis, minimum Redundancy maximum Relevance (mRMR), Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE), Chi-squared are used in this study. These methods are tested with 8 different classification models to get the best accuracy possible. Using balanced and unbalanced dataset, the study shows promising results in terms of various performance metrics in accurately predicting heart disease. Experimental results obtained by the proposed method with the raw data obtains maximum AUC of 100%, maximum F1 score of 94%, maximum Recall of 98%, maximum Precision of 93%. While with the balanced dataset obtained results are, maximum AUC of 100%, F1-score 95%, maximum Recall of 95%, maximum Precision of 97%.

Keywords: cardio vascular diseases, machine learning, feature selection, SMOTE

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Authors: Natasha Mandal, Rakesh Singh Moirangthem

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The present work reports a theoretical model to develop a plasmonic biosensor for the detection of glucose concentrations in human blood and urine as the abnormality of glucose label is the major cause of diabetes which becomes a life-threatening disease worldwide. This study is based on the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) sensor applications which is a well-established, highly sensitive, label-free, rapid optical sensing tool. Here we have introduced a sandwich assay of two dielectric spacer layers of MgF2 and BaTiO3which gives better performance compared to commonly used SiO2 and TiO2 dielectric spacers due to their low dielectric loss and higher refractive index. The sensitivity of our proposed sensor was found as 3242 nm/RIU approximately, with an excellent linear response of 0.958, which is higher than the conventional single-layer Au SPR sensor. Further, the sensitivity enhancement is also optimized by coating a few layers of two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials (e.g., Graphene, h-BN, MXene, MoS2, WS2, etc.) on the sensor chip. Hence, our proposed SPR sensor has the potential for the detection of glucose concentration in blood and urine with enhanced sensitivity and high affinity and could be utilized as a reliable platform for the optical biosensing application in the field of medical diagnosis.

Keywords: biosensor, surface plasmon resonance, dielectric spacer, 2D nanomaterials

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Authors: Hassan S. Naeini

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Nowadays a lot of people are working in several sorts of industrial sectors in which there are some risk factors which threaten human being especially in developing countries. One of the main problems which effect on workers’ health refers to Ergonomics. Ergonomics as multidisciplinary science concerns workers’ health and safety in terms of somatic and mental concepts. Surely ergonomics interventions and improvement make a better condition for workers and change the quality of working life to better condition. In this study, one of the factories in Iran which is producing some kinds of small and medium size of refrigerators was chosen as the sample. The preliminary ergonomics observation of the mentioned factory showed that there are some risk factors in terms of ergonomics aspects, so an ergonomic intervention was defined, then some ergonomic assessment methods such as NMQ,OWAS, and Environmental Ergonomic Assessment were used. Also Anthropometric measurement was done. This study shows that there are some workstations and plants which suffer some degrees of ergonomic problems. Considering with the gathered data, illumination, noise control and workstation design in metal workstation are known as the priority actions. Some parts of the mentioned interventions are ongoing actions. it seems that the mentioned intervention and workstations design make a better condition for workers, because ergonomics make a safer and more sustainable environments for human being.

Keywords: anthropometry, ergonomics, health, NMQ, OWAS

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Authors: Ikenna Stephen Ezennia, Sebnem Onal Hoscara

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Successive governments in Nigeria are faced with the pressing problem of how to house an ever-expanding urban population, usually low-income earners. The question of housing and affordability presents a complex challenge for these governments, as the commodification of housing links it inextricably to markets and capital flows. Therefore, placing it as at the center of the government’s agenda. However, the provision of decent and affordable housing for average Nigerians has remained an illusion, despite copious schemes, policies and programs initiated and carried out by various successive governments. Similarly, this phenomenon has also been observed in many countries of Africa, which is largely a result of economic unpredictability, lack of housing finance and insecurity, among other factors peculiar to a struggling economy. This study reviews recent dynamics and factors challenging the provision and development of affordable housing for the low income urban populace of Nigeria. Thus, the aim of the study is to present a comprehensive approach for understanding recent trends in the provision of affordable housing for Nigerians. The approach is based on a new paradigm of research: transdisciplinarity; a form of inquiry that crosses the boundaries of different disciplines. Therefore, the review takes a retrospective gaze at the various housing development programs/schemes/policies taken by successive governments of Nigeria within the last few decades and exams recent efforts geared towards eradicating the problems of housing delivery. Sources of data included relevant English language articles and the results of literature search of Elsevier Science Direct, ISI Web of Knowledge, Pro Quest Central, Scopus, and Google Scholar. The findings reveal that factors such as; rapid urbanization, inadequate planning and land use control, lack of adequate and favorable finance, high prices of land, high prices of building material, youth/touts harassment of developers, poor urban infrastructure, multiple taxation, and risk share are the major factors posing as a hindrance to adequate housing delivery. The results show that the majority of Nigeria’s affordable housing schemes, programs and policies are in most cases poorly implemented and abandoned without proper coordination. Consequently, the study concludes that the affordable housing delivery strategies in Nigeria are an epitome of lip service politics by successive governments; and the current trend of leaving housing provision to the vagaries of market forces cannot be expected to support affordable housing especially for the low income urban populace.

Keywords: affordable housing, housing delivery, national housing policy, urban poor

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Authors: Abderrahman Hassi, Omar Bacadi, Khaoula Zitouni

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Abdelkader El Mouaziz is a Moroccan long-distance runner with a career-best time of 2:06:46 in the Chicago Marathon. El Mouaziz is a winner of the Madrid Marathon in 1994, the London Marathon in 1999 and 2001, as well as the New York Marathon in 2001. While he was playing for the Moroccan national team, he used to train in the Ifrane-Azrou region owing to its altitude, fresh forests, non-polluted air and quietness. After winning so many international competitions and retiring, he left his native Casablanca and went back to the Ifrane-Azrou region and started a business that employs ten people. In March 2010, El Mouaziz opened a bed and breakfast called Tourtite with a nice view on the mountain near the city of Ifrane in the way to Azrou. He wanted to give back to the region that helped him become a sport legend. His management style is not different than his sport style: performance and competitiveness combined with fair play. The objective of the present case study is to further enhance the understanding of the dynamics of transferring athletic championship-winning principles to entrepreneurial activities. The case study is a real-life situation and experience designed to provoke and stimulate reflections about a particular approach of management, especially for start-up businesses.

Keywords: sport, winning principles, entrepreneurship, Abdelkader El Mouaziz

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Authors: Mario Pérez-Won, Anais Palma-Acevedo, Luis González-Cavieres, Roberto Lemus-Mondaca, Gipsy Tabilo-Munizaga

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The Chilean abalone (Concholepas Concholepas) is a gastropod mollusk; it has a high commercial value due to the qualities of its meat, especially hardness, as a critical acceptance parameter. However, its main problem is its short shelf-life which is usually extended using traditional technologies with high energy consumption. Therefore, applying different technologies for the pre-treatment and drying process is necessary. In this research, pulsed electric field (PEF) was used as a pre-treatment for vacuum microwave drying (VMD), freeze-drying (FD), and hot-air drying (HAD). Drying conditions and characteristics were set according to previous experiments. The Drying samples were analyzed in terms of physical quality (color, texture, microstructure, and rehydration capacity), protein quality (degree of hydrolysis and computer protein efficiency ratio), and energy parameters. Regarding quality, the treatment that obtained lower harness was PEF+FD (195 N ± 10), the lowest change of color was for treatment PEF+VMD (ΔE: 17 ± 1.5), and the best rehydration capacity was for treatment PEF+VMD (1.2 h for equilibrium). For protein quality, the highest Computer-Protein Efficiency Ratio was the sample 2.0 kV/ cm of PEF (index of 4.18 ± 0.26 at the end of the digestion). Moreover, about energetic consumption, results show that VMD decreases the drying process by 97% whether PEF was used or not. Consequently, it is possible to conclude that using PEF as a pre-treatment for VMD and FD treatments has advantages that must be used following the consumer’s needs or preferences.

Keywords: chilean abalone, freeze-drying, proteins, pulsed electric fields

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Authors: Sanaa Mekdad, Leenah Alsayed

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Pharmacists play an important role in the CDTM in the care of patients with heart failure (HF). CDTM allows specialized, dedicated clinical pharmacists in a formal agreement in collaborative practice with physicians. Thus, the aim of this study is to investigate the role of cardiology clinical pharmacists in CDTM in decreasing hospitalization and cost. We studied patients with left ventricular systolic dysfunction in a cluster-randomized selection in a tertiary care center. We allocated 296 patients to pharmacist intervention from 1480 patients. Results: With an acceptance rate of 86%, we documented 696 interventions carried out by clinical pharmacists in cardiology. The average intervention was 2.4 patients, and the admission after interventions decreased from 0.79 to. 0.24 (p value = 0.001). Conclusions: In HF CDTM, clinical pharmacists play a crucial role in enhancing medication management, patient education, and lifestyle modification of patients with chronic heart failure. These efforts improve patients' outcomes and lower costs by reducing hospitalization and other associated expenses.

Keywords: cardiology, medication management, heart failure, outpatient therapy, pharmacist-based services, chronic heart failure, heart failure recommendations, CDTM, Middle East, pharmacist-based services, quality of life, pharmacist

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Authors: Ranjith Ihalanayake, Lalith Seelanatha, John Breen

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In this study, we explored the current working capital management practices as applied in small businesses in Victoria, filling an existing theoretical and empirical gap in literature in general and in Australia in particular. Amidst the current global competitive and dynamic environment, the short term insolvency of small businesses is very critical for the long run survival. A firm’s short-term insolvency is dependent on the availability of sufficient working capital for feeding day to day operational activities. Therefore, given the reliance for short-term funding by small businesses, it has been recognized that the efficient management of working capital is crucial in respect of the prosperity and survival of such firms. Against this background, this research was an attempt to understand the current working capital management strategies and practices used by the small scale businesses. To this end, we conducted an internet survey among 220 small businesses operating in Victoria, Australia. The survey results suggest that the majority of respondents are owner-manager (73%) and male (68%). Respondents participated in this survey mostly have a degree (46%). About a half of respondents are more than 50 years old. Most of respondents (64%) have business management experience more than ten years. Similarly, majority of them (63%) had experience in the area of their current business. Types of business of the respondents are: Private limited company (41%), sole proprietorship (37%), and partnership (15%). In addition, majority of the firms are service companies (63%), followed by retailed companies (25%), and manufacturing (17%). Size of companies of this survey varies, 32% of them have annual sales $100,000 or under, while 22% of them have revenue more than $1,000,000 every year. In regards to the total assets, majority of respondents (43%) have total assets $100,000 or less while 20% of respondents have total assets more than $1,000,000. In regards to WCMPs, results indicate that almost 70% of respondents mentioned that they are responsible for managing their business working capital. The survey shows that majority of respondents (65.5%) use their business experience to identify the level of investment in working capital, compared to 22% of respondents who seek advice from professionals. The other 10% of respondents, however, follow industry practice to identify the level of working capital. The survey also shows that more than a half of respondents maintain good liquidity financial position for their business by having accounts payable less than accounts receivable. This study finds that majority of small business companies in western area of Victoria have a WCM policy but only about 8 % of them have a formal policy. Majority of the businesses (52.7%) have an informal policy while 39.5% have no policy. Of those who have a policy, 44% described their working capital management policies as a compromise policy while 35% described their policy as a conservative policy. Only 6% of respondents apply aggressive policy. Overall the results indicate that the small businesses pay less attention into the management of working capital of their business despite its significance in the successful operation of the business. This approach may be adopted during favourable economic times. However, during relatively turbulent economic conditions, such an approach could lead to greater financial difficulties i.e. short-term financial insolvency.

Keywords: small business, working capital management, Australia, sufficient, financial insolvency

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Authors: Yi Hu

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House Made of Dawn is famous novelist N. Scott Momaday’s Pulitzer-winning novel in 1968. The novel tells a story of the struggling life of an Indian named Abel, following the pattern of leaving home, coming home, leaving again, and returning home at the closure of the story. It touches upon the theme of the relationship between Indianness, identity, and tradition. Abel’s confusion over his identity and his constant struggle and exploration of his identity are pivoted on the tradition of oral literature in the form of story-telling. Therefore, this paper aims to analyze the important role of oral tradition in constructing Abel’s Indian cultural identity. The significance of the research lies in two aspects: first of all, the research aims to provide an enlightening perspective for Momaday’s House Made of Dawn in order to gain a better understanding of the novel. Secondly, by emphasizing the importance of traditional culture in identity construction, the research hopes to provide some referential value for people who suffer from identity predicament in modern society. Finally, the paper draws a conclusion that alienation from traditional tribal culture will result in a serious physical and psychological crisis for Indian people. Indian people should adhere to their traditional culture in order to construct their unique cultural identity.

Keywords: House Made of Dawn, identity, N.Scott.Momaday, oral tradition

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Authors: Bruce Hunter

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Background: The transition for student veterans from military service to higher education can be a challenging endeavor, especially for those pursuing an education in nursing. While the experiences and perspectives of each student veteran is unique, their successful integration into an academic environment can be influenced by a complex array of barriers and facilitators. This mixed-methods study aims to explore the themes and concepts that can be found in the transition experiences of student veterans in nursing education, with a focus on identifying the barriers they face and the facilitators that support their success. Methods: This study utilizes an explanatory mixed-methods approach. The research participants include student veterans enrolled in nursing programs across three academic institutions in the Southeastern United States. Quantitative Phase: A Likert scale instrument is distributed to a sample of student veterans in nursing programs. The survey assesses demographic information, academic experiences, social experiences, and perceptions of institutional support. Quantitative data is analyzed using descriptive statistics to assess demographics and to identify barriers and facilitators to the transition. Qualitative Phase: Two open-ended questions were posed to student veterans to explore their lived experiences, barriers, and facilitators during the transition to nursing education and to further explain the quantitative findings. Thematic analysis with line-by-line coding is employed to identify recurring themes and narratives that may shed light on the barriers and facilitators encountered. Results: This study found that the successful academic integration of student veterans lies in recognizing the diversity of values and attitudes among student veterans, understanding the potential challenges they face, and engaging in initiative-taking steps to create an inclusive and supportive academic environment that accommodates the unique experiences of this demographic. Addressing these academic and social integration concerns can contribute to a more understanding environment for student veterans in the BSN program. Conclusion: Providing support during this transitional period is crucial not only for retaining veterans, but also for bolstering their success in achieving the status of registered nurses. Acquiring an understanding of military culture emerges as an essential initial step for nursing faculty in student veteran retention and for successful completion of their programs. Participants found that their transition experience lacked meaningful social interactions, which could foster a positive learning environment, enhance their emotional well-being, and could contribute significantly to their overall success and satisfaction in their nursing education journey. Recognizing and promoting academic and social integration is important in helping veterans experience a smooth transition into and through the unfamiliar academic environment of nursing education.

Keywords: nursing, education, student veterans, barriers, facilitators

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Authors: Y. N. Phang, E. F. Loh

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Many researchers have suggested the use of zero inflated Poisson (ZIP) and zero inflated negative binomial (ZINB) models in modeling over-dispersed medical count data with extra variations caused by extra zeros and unobserved heterogeneity. The studies indicate that ZIP and ZINB always provide better fit than using the normal Poisson and negative binomial models in modeling over-dispersed medical count data. In this study, we proposed the use of Zero Inflated Inverse Trinomial (ZIIT), Zero Inflated Poisson Inverse Gaussian (ZIPIG) and zero inflated strict arcsine models in modeling over-dispersed medical count data. These proposed models are not widely used by many researchers especially in the medical field. The results show that these three suggested models can serve as alternative models in modeling over-dispersed medical count data. This is supported by the application of these suggested models to a real life medical data set. Inverse trinomial, Poisson inverse Gaussian, and strict arcsine are discrete distributions with cubic variance function of mean. Therefore, ZIIT, ZIPIG and ZISA are able to accommodate data with excess zeros and very heavy tailed. They are recommended to be used in modeling over-dispersed medical count data when ZIP and ZINB are inadequate.

Keywords: zero inflated, inverse trinomial distribution, Poisson inverse Gaussian distribution, strict arcsine distribution, Pearson’s goodness of fit

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Authors: Ali Reza Tahavvor, Saeed Hosseini, Nazli Jowkar, Afshin Karimzadeh Fard

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Experimental & numeral study of temperature distribution during milling process, is important in milling quality and tools life aspects. In the present study the milling cross-section temperature is determined by using Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) according to the temperature of certain points of the work piece and the points specifications and the milling rotational speed of the blade. In the present work, at first three-dimensional model of the work piece is provided and then by using the Computational Heat Transfer (CHT) simulations, temperature in different nods of the work piece are specified in steady-state conditions. Results obtained from CHT are used for training and testing the ANN approach. Using reverse engineering and setting the desired x, y, z and the milling rotational speed of the blade as input data to the network, the milling surface temperature determined by neural network is presented as output data. The desired points temperature for different milling blade rotational speed are obtained experimentally and by extrapolation method for the milling surface temperature is obtained and a comparison is performed among the soft programming ANN, CHT results and experimental data and it is observed that ANN soft programming code can be used more efficiently to determine the temperature in a milling process.

Keywords: artificial neural networks, milling process, rotational speed, temperature

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Authors: Orawan Vichiansan, J. Kraipoj, K.Phandech, P. Sirasaporn

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Generally, frozen shoulder will improve over time, although it may take a long time up to year. The symptoms of frozen shoulder present by pain around shoulder and consequently limit range of motions. The effect of frozen shoulder leads to limit activities daily living life and high medical care cost. Physiotherapy is well known treatment for frozen shoulder but there was no data about the treatment of physiotherapy in frozen shoulder and length of follow up. Thus the aim of this study was to investigate physiotherapy program for frozen shoulder on range of motion and length of follow up. A retrospective study design was conducted. 469 medical records of patients with frozen shoulder were reviewed. These frozen shoulders were treated at physiotherapy unit, department of Rehabilitation last 3 years (January, 2014- December, 2016). The data consist of range of motions and length of follow up was recorded. The medical record of 183 males and 286 females with average aged 57.82±12.32 years were reviewed in this study. There was a statistically significant increase in shoulder flexion [mean difference 30.24 with 95%CI were [24.37-36.12], shoulder abduction [mean difference 34.93 with 95%CI were 27.8-42.0], shoulder internal rotation [mean difference 17.25 with 95%CI were 12.55-21.95] and shoulder external rotation [mean difference 17.71 with 95%CI were [13.07-22.36] respectively. In addition, the length of follow up averaged 84 days. In summary, the retrospective study show physiotherapy program likely to be benefit for patients with frozen shoulder in term of range of motion and short length of follow up.

Keywords: frozen shoulder, physiotherapy, range of motions, length of follow up

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Authors: K. Y. Chen, H. Chua, C. W. Kan

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Japan is a well-developed country but the environmental issues are still a hot issue. In this study, we will analyse how the environmental investment affects the sustainable development in Japan. This paper will first describe the environmental policy of Japan and the effort input by the Japan government. Then, we will collect the yearly environmental data and also information about the environmental investment. Based on the data collected, we try to figure out the relationship between environmental investment and sustainable development in Japan. In addition, we will analyse the SWOT of environmental investment in Japan. Based on the economic information collected, Japan established a sound material-cycle society through changes in business and life styles. A comprehensive legal system for this kind of society was established in Japan. In addition, other supporting measures, such as financial measures, utilization of economic instruments, implementation of research and promotion of education and science and technology, help Japan to cope with the recent environmental challenges. Japan’s excellent environmental technologies changed its socioeconomic system. They are at the highest global standards. This can be reflected by the number of patents registered in Japan which has been on the steady growth. Country by country comparison in the application for patents on environmental technologies also indicates that Japan ranks high in such areas as atmospheric pollution and water quality management, solid waste management and renewable energy. This is a result of the large expenditure invested on research and development.

Keywords: Japan, environmental investment, sustainable development, analysis

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Authors: Manjunatha Bangeppagari, Lee Sang Joon

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Recently, graphene-related nanomaterials are receiving fast-increasing attention with augmented applications in various fields. Especially, graphene-related materials have been widely applied to the biomedical field in the past years. In the present study, we evaluated the adverse effects of pristine graphene (pG) in zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryos in various aspects, such as mortality rate, heart rate, hatching rate, cardiotoxicity, cardiovascular defect, cardiac looping, apoptosis, and globin expression. For various trace concentrations of pG (1, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, and 50 μg/L), early life-stage parameters were observed at 24, 48, 72, and 96 hpf. As a result, pG induces significant developmental defects including yolk sac edema, pericardial edema, embryonic mortality, delayed hatching, heartbeat, several morphological defects, pericardial toxicity, and bradycardia. Moreover, the exposure to pG was found to be a potential risk factor to the cardiovascular system of zebrafish embryos. However, further study on their properties which vary according to production methods and surface functionalization is essentially required. In addition, the possible risks of pG flakes to aquatic animals, and public health should be evaluated before releasing them to the surrounding environment.

Keywords: apoptosis, cardiovascular toxicity, globin expression, pristine graphene, zebrafish embryos

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Authors: Shams Ul Hussain Zaheer, Bibi Alia, Shehla Shams

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With the creation of human beings, almost all of them are blessed with the award of the power of expression, and this series starts from the life of Adam (A.S) in Paradise when he was blesses with language and knowledge and given priority upon the Angels. Later on, when the population spread and many other languages came into being, the method of the different people of different regions remained various. And when the Arabic was formed as a language after Ismail (A.S) and his sons spread in the gulf area, the words adopted from other gulf languages also became a part of this new language with it immense. Beside this, the tone of expression in other areas of the word was different, but the incidents, norms of bad and good, parameters for like and dislike, thinking styles, and rules of good and bad governance with social values remained round about the same. People practiced their lives according to the set norms everywhere in the world. Especially the two built, i.e., Hijaz and Khurasan, wherein Arabs and Pashtun accordingly were dwelling; it seems that their social values were much closed to each other. These norms reflect in various kinds of literature of both of the nations, but this article deals in with their proverbs specifically. This article discusses the intellectual telepathic between them in a research way. And put the defined similarities and dissimilarities between both in the proverb. And it also draws a sketch in front of readers that how the thinking and expression styles remains same in humans. As it belongs to a comparative analysis of the proverbs so, the same methodology has been adopted in the articles.

Keywords: intellectual telepathy, hijaz, arab, khurasan, pashtun, proverbs, comparison

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Authors: Farrokh Taherkhani, Thomas Pinger, Max Gündel

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The total economic damage caused by corrosion in Germany is estimated to be more than 3% of the GDP per year. Additionally, corrosion and suitable corrosion protection systems are also significant factors in the consideration of life cycle costs for steel hydraulic structures. In addition to classic coating systems (for example, epoxy resin or polyurethane), zinc and its alloys offer effective and very durable corrosion protection for steels. As a protective layer, hot-dip galvanizing prevents the corrosive media from penetrating into the steel matrix and acts as a sacrificial anode, which corrodes in preference to the steel. However, hot-dip galvanizing as a corrosion protection system has not yet been approved by the relevant authority, the Federal Waterways Engineering and Research Institute (BAW) in Germany. In order to make hot-dip galvanizing usable as a corrosion protection system for steel hydraulic structures in the future, different factors must be considered. These factors are (i) corrosion protection type, (ii) resistance to mechanical stress (i.e., abrasion resistance), (iii) combinability with cathodic corrosion protection, (iv) environmental effects and (v) the crack formation and propagation during hot-dip galvanizing. In this work, hot-dip galvanizing as a corrosion protection system for steel hydraulic steel structures, as well as open questions, are discussed. This paper is based on initial long-term exposure tests with corrosion protection systems consisting of hot-dip galvanizing and duplex systems.

Keywords: steel hydraulic structure, hot-dip galvanizing, corrosion, corrosion resistance, zinc coating, organic coating, duplex sytems

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Authors: Tianyu Zhang

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China has become one of the markets with the biggest potential for UK exporters, but it remains difficult for outsiders to explore Chinese media’s inner workings due to a lack of access. Having worked in Chinese media, the author conducted six month’s participant-observation in China Central Television (CCTV) and three independent production companies. This paper mainly explores how TV production ethics were implemented in the casting process of three Chinese reality shows that are well-known within the country. The three production teams had issues in common: unorganised management, subjective casting standards and lack of production ethics. Casting directors, who were multitasking, could only rely on their professional experience and ad-hoc demands from the management. More concerning phenomena such as borderline corruption, passive-aggressiveness, and blame cultures were prevalent during the entire production, especially during casting. The casting process also often involved the celebrity status of the many ‘ordinary’ participants who were not that ‘ordinary’ as they claimed. Many of these participants were professional talents who were not famous enough but worked as many other well-known celebrities who had their own employees. On the other hand, as comprehensive production and ethics guidelines were missing, junior television practitioners struggled between their ideal professional standards and real-life events that fell into grey areas – telling white lies, bribery, shifting blame, and lack of employee training. Although facing challenges, many practitioners came up with self-management solutions and worked with positivity.

Keywords: production studies, ethics, television production, ethnography, reality TV, Chinese TV

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Authors: Saeed Dehnavi, Zahra Dehnavi

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Background: Psychodrama, as a form of art therapy, helps people to enact and use role-plays for a specific problem, rather than just talking about it, in an effort to review the problem, gain feedback from group members, find appropriate solutions, and practice them for their life. This paper evaluated the effectiveness of psychodrama on enhancing self-esteem of young adolescent boys. Methodology: This is aquasi-experimental research study, using a pre-post testing plan with control group.From four secondary schools in Kermanshah – Iran, 210 adolescent boys (aged 13 and 14 years) were asked to complete Koper Smith's self-esteem measure scale. Given the low self-esteem scores (less than the cut-off of 23), a number of 20 individuals were selected and randomly placed into two control and experimental groups. The experimental group participated in a twelve-session psychodrama therapy plan for 6 weeks, while the control group received no intervention. Data analysis was carried out by the analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). Results: The results of ANCOVA analysis showed an increase in the post-test scores for self-esteem, and such increase was statistically significant. Conclusion: The findings indicated the effectiveness of psychodrama on self-esteem enhancement of young boys. During psychodrama sessions, the adolescents learned to take the initiative, communicate with others in an excited state, and improve their self-esteem with positive and constructive experiences.

Keywords: psychodrama, self-esteem, young adolescents, boys

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Authors: L. Diogo, A. Legrand, J. Nguyen-Cao, J. Rogeau, S. Bornhofen

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Lenia is a system of cellular automata with continuous states, space and time, which surprises not only with the emergence of interesting life-like structures but also with its beauty. This paper reports ongoing research on a GPU implementation of Lenia using CUDA C++ and OpenGL Interoperability. We demonstrate how CUDA as a low-level GPU programming paradigm allows optimizing performance and memory usage of the Lenia algorithm. A comparative analysis through experimental runs with existing implementations shows that the CUDA implementation outperforms the others by one order of magnitude or more. Cellular automata hold significant interest due to their ability to model complex phenomena in systems with simple rules and structures. They allow exploring emergent behavior such as self-organization and adaptation, and find applications in various fields, including computer science, physics, biology, and sociology. Unlike classic cellular automata which rely on discrete cells and values, Lenia generalizes the concept of cellular automata to continuous space, time and states, thus providing additional fluidity and richness in emerging phenomena. In the current literature, there are many implementations of Lenia utilizing various programming languages and visualization libraries. However, each implementation also presents certain drawbacks, which serve as motivation for further research and development. In particular, speed is a critical factor when studying Lenia, for several reasons. Rapid simulation allows researchers to observe the emergence of patterns and behaviors in more configurations, on bigger grids and over longer periods without annoying waiting times. Thereby, they enable the exploration and discovery of new species within the Lenia ecosystem more efficiently. Moreover, faster simulations are beneficial when we include additional time-consuming algorithms such as computer vision or machine learning to evolve and optimize specific Lenia configurations. We developed a Lenia implementation for GPU using the C++ and CUDA programming languages, and CUDA/OpenGL Interoperability for immediate rendering. The goal of our experiment is to benchmark this implementation compared to the existing ones in terms of speed, memory usage, configurability and scalability. In our comparison we focus on the most important Lenia implementations, selected for their prominence, accessibility and widespread use in the scientific community. The implementations include MATLAB, JavaScript, ShaderToy GLSL, Jupyter, Rust and R. The list is not exhaustive but provides a broad view of the principal current approaches and their respective strengths and weaknesses. Our comparison primarily considers computational performance and memory efficiency, as these factors are critical for large-scale simulations, but we also investigate the ease of use and configurability. The experimental runs conducted so far demonstrate that the CUDA C++ implementation outperforms the other implementations by one order of magnitude or more. The benefits of using the GPU become apparent especially with larger grids and convolution kernels. However, our research is still ongoing. We are currently exploring the impact of several software design choices and optimization techniques, such as convolution with Fast Fourier Transforms (FFT), various GPU memory management scenarios, and the trade-off between speed and accuracy using single versus double precision floating point arithmetic. The results will give valuable insights into the practice of parallel programming of the Lenia algorithm, and all conclusions will be thoroughly presented in the conference paper. The final version of our CUDA C++ implementation will be published on github and made freely accessible to the Alife community for further development.

Keywords: artificial life, cellular automaton, GPU optimization, Lenia, comparative analysis.

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Authors: Khaled Ali Soltan

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Iran can be considered a triangle that is affected by 3 forces: the government, the elite, and the people. Over the last 100 years, these three forces have been at odds with each other. This lack of coordination and sometimes antagonism among these three forces has led to lawlessness in Iran (both the government and the people have entered the cycle of lawlessness) and the spread of destructive processes in the country and the destruction of resources, both natural and human resources. The direct and negative impact of this issue on people's lives as well as the environment highlights the importance of this article. This article descriptively deals with the issue and suggests solutions and examines possible problems and obstacles. There seems to be a way to establish a connection’ closeness and coordination among these three forces and put them on the path of development. ELITE RAIN is a scientific-popular process that can create coordination and cooperation between these forces, prevent destructive processes in the country and put it on the path of sustainable development and a better life. This solution is a more advanced model of brainstorming technique introduced by Alex Osborn in 1953. Given that people have tried different types of protests to improve the status quo, such as the change of government in 1979 which led to the establishment of the theocracy, participating in elections that resulted in more frustration and corruption due to the lack of real parties, and sporadic street protests that resulted in nothing more than repression, it seems that this solution can be successful.

Keywords: corruption, destruction of resources, elite rain, Iran, legal complaints, sustainable development, the elite

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Authors: Omer Ibrahim Abdallh Omer

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Cancer patients often face complex medication regimens, leading to challenges in treatment adherence and clinical outcomes. Pharmacist-led medication therapy management (MTM) has emerged as a potential solution to optimize medication use and improve patient outcomes in oncology settings. In this prospective intervention study, we aimed to evaluate the impact of pharmacist-led MTM on treatment adherence and clinical outcomes among cancer patients. Participants were randomized to receive either pharmacist-led MTM or standard care, with assessments conducted at baseline and follow-up visits. Pharmacist interventions included medication reconciliation, adherence counseling, and personalized care plans. Our findings reveal that pharmacist-led MTM significantly improved medication adherence rates and clinical outcomes compared to standard care. Patients receiving pharmacist interventions reported higher satisfaction levels and perceived value in pharmacist involvement in their cancer care. These results underscore the critical role of pharmacists in optimizing medication therapy and enhancing patient-centered care in oncology settings. Integration of pharmacist-led MTM into routine cancer care pathways holds promise for improving treatment outcomes and quality of life for cancer patients.

Keywords: cancer, medications adherence, medication therapy management, pharmacist

Procedia PDF Downloads 39

Authors: Maria E. V. Amarante, Carolina L. Cerdeira, Julia V. Cortes, Fiorita G. L. Mundim

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Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most prevalent type of skin cancer in humans. It arises from the basal cells of the epidermis and cutaneous appendages. The role of sunlight exposure as a risk factor for BCC is very well defined due to its power to influence genetic mutations, in addition to having a suppressor effect on the skin immune system. Despite showing low metastasis and mortality rates, the tumor is locally infiltrative, aggressive, and destructive. Considering the high prevalence rate of this carcinoma and the importance of early detection, a retrospective study was carried out in order to correlate the clinical data available on BBC, characterize it epidemiologically, and thus enable effective prevention measures for the population. Data on the period from January 2015 to December 2019 were collected from the medical records of patients registered at one pathology service located in the southeast region of Brazil, known as SVO, which delivers skin biopsy results. The study was aimed at correlating the variables, sex, age, and subtypes found. Data analysis was performed using the chi-square test at a nominal significance level of 5% in order to verify the independence between the variables of interest. Fisher's exact test was applied in cases where the absolute frequency in the cells of the contingency table was less than or equal to five. The statistical analysis was performed using the R® software. Ninety-three basal cell carcinoma were analyzed, and its frequency in the 31-to 45-year-old age group was 5.8 times higher in men than in women, whereas, from 46 to 59 years, the frequency was found 2.4 times higher in women than in men. Between the ages of 46 to 59 years, it should be noted that the sclerodermiform subtype appears more than the solid one, with a difference of 7.26 percentage points. Reversely, the solid form appears more frequently in individuals aged 60 years or more, with a difference of 8.57 percentage points. Among women, the frequency of the solid subtype was 9.93 percentage points higher than the sclerodermiform frequency. In males, the same percentage difference is observed, but sclerodermiform is the most prevalent subtype. It is concluded in this study that, in general, there is a predominance of basal cell carcinoma in females and in individuals aged 60 years and over, which demonstrates the tendency of this tumor. However, when rarely found in younger individuals, the male gender prevailed. The most prevalent subtype was the solid one. It is worth mentioning that the sclerodermiform subtype, which is more aggressive, was seen more frequently in males and in the 46-to 59-year-old range.

Keywords: basal cell carcinoma, epidemiology, sclerodermiform basal cell carcinoma, skin cancer, solar radiation, solid basal cell carcinoma

Procedia PDF Downloads 128