Search results for: fine migration

Authors: Xiaolin Zeng, Lei Cheng, Zhirong Li, Xueping Liu

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Aiming at the problem of low accuracy and susceptibility to cultural relic diseases in the generation of high-resolution archaeology drawings by current image generation algorithms, an archaeology drawings generation algorithm based on a conditional generative adversarial network is proposed. An attention mechanism is added into the high-resolution image generation network as the backbone network, which enhances the line feature extraction capability and improves the accuracy of line drawing generation. A dual-branch parallel architecture consisting of two backbone networks is implemented, where the semantic translation branch extracts semantic features from orthophotographs of cultural relics, and the gradient screening branch extracts effective gradient features. Finally, the fusion fine-tuning module combines these two types of features to achieve the generation of high-quality and high-resolution archaeology drawings. Experimental results on the self-constructed archaeology drawings dataset of grotto temple statues show that the proposed algorithm outperforms current mainstream image generation algorithms in terms of pixel accuracy (PA), structural similarity (SSIM), and peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR) and can be used to assist in drawing archaeology drawings.

Keywords: archaeology drawings, digital heritage, image generation, deep learning

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Authors: Wolfram Jahn, Jose Manuel Munita

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While computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations of fire scenarios are commonly used in the design of buildings, less attention has been given to the use of CFD simulations as an operational tool for the fire services. The reason of this lack of attention lies mainly in the fact that CFD simulations typically take large periods of time to complete, and their results would thus not be available in time to be of use during an emergency. Firefighters often face uncertain conditions when entering a building to attack a fire. They would greatly benefit from a technology based on predictive fire simulations, able to assist their decision-making process. The principal constraint to faster CFD simulations is the fine grid necessary to solve accurately the physical processes that govern a fire. This paper explores the possibility of overcoming this constraint and using coarse grid CFD simulations for fire scenarios, and proposes a methodology to use the simulation results in a meaningful way that can be used by the fire fighters during an emergency. Data from real scale compartment fire tests were used to compare CFD fire models with different grid arrangements, and empirical correlations were obtained to interpolate data points into the grids. The results show that the strongly predominant effect of the heat release rate of the fire on the fluid dynamics allows for the use of coarse grids with relatively low overall impact of simulation results. Simulations with an acceptable level of accuracy could be run in real time, thus making them useful as a forecasting tool for emergency response purposes.

Keywords: CFD, fire simulations, emergency response, forecast

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Authors: Federica Di Marcantonio, Antoine Leblois, Wolfgang Göbel, Hervè Kerdiles

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Weather-related shocks can threaten the ability of farmers to maintain their agricultural output and food security levels. Informal coping mechanisms (i.e. migration or community risk sharing) have always played a significant role in mitigating the negative effects of weather-related shocks in Ethiopia, but they have been found to be an incomplete strategy, particularly as a response to covariate shocks. Particularly, as an alternative to the traditional risk pooling products, an innovative form of insurance known as Index-based Insurance has received a lot of attention from researchers and international organizations, leading to an increased number of pilot initiatives in many countries. Despite the potential benefit of the product in protecting the livelihoods of farmers and pastoralists against climate shocks, to date there has been an unexpectedly low uptake. Using information from current pilot projects on index-based insurance in Ethiopia, this paper discusses the determinants of uptake that have so far undermined the scaling-up of the products, by focusing in particular on weather data availability, price affordability and willingness to pay. We found that, aside from data constraint issues, high price elasticity and low willingness to pay represent impediments to the development of the market. These results, bring us to rethink the role of index insurance as products for enhancing smallholders’ response to covariate shocks, and particularly for improving their food security.

Keywords: index-based insurance, willingness to pay, satellite information, Ethiopia

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Authors: Jerman Madonsela, Wallace Matizamhuka, Akiko Yamamoto, Ronald Machaka, Brendon Shongwe

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In this study, biocompatibility evaluation of nanostructured near beta Ti-24Nb-4Zr-8Sn (Ti2448) alloy with non-toxic elements produced utilizing Spark plasma sintering (SPS) of very fine microsized powders attained through mechanical alloying was performed. The results were compared with pure titanium and Ti-6Al-4V (Ti64) alloy. Cell proliferation test was performed using murine osteoblastic cells, MC3T3-E1 at two cell densities; 400 and 4000 cells/mL for 7 days incubation. Pure titanium took a lead under both conditions suggesting that the presence of other oxide layers influence cell proliferation. No significant difference in cell proliferation was observed between Ti64 and Ti2448. Potentiodynamic measurement in Hanks, 0.9% NaCl and cell culture medium showed no distinct difference on the anodic polarization curves of the three alloys, indicating that the same anodic reaction occurred on their surface but with different rates. However, Ti2448 showed better corrosion resistance in cell culture medium with a slightly lower corrosion rate of 2.96 nA/cm2 compared to 4.86 nA/cm2 and 5.62 nA/cm2 of Ti and Ti64 respectively. Ti2448 adsorbed less protein as compared to Ti and Ti64 though no notable difference in surface wettability was observed.

Keywords: biocompatibility, osteoblast, corrosion, surface wettability, protein adsorption

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Authors: Anton James

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This study explored the contribution of parenting styles in the Maternal Perception of Compliance Model (MPCM). This model explores maternal expectations to illustrate the formation of maternal perception of severity of noncompliance in adolescent children. The methodology consisted of three stages: In the first stage, a focus group was held, and the data was analysed to fine-tune the interview schedule. In the second stage, a single interview was held, and the interview schedule was further modified. The third and the final stage consisted of interviewing six mothers who had adolescent children. They were chosen with ‘maximum variation’ approach to represent three tiered socioeconomic statuses, and Asian, white and black ethnicities. The data was thematically analysed in a hybrid fashion: inductive coding and deductive assignment of codes into discrete parenting styles. The study found: a) parenting styles are not always discrete and sometimes it can be mixed. b) The parenting styles are influenced by culture, socioeconomic status, transgenerational knowledge, academic knowledge, observational knowledge, self-reflective knowledge, and parental anxiety. c) The parenting style functioned a mediating mechanism where it attempted to converge discrepancies between parental expectations of compliance with maternal perception of severity of noncompliance. The findings of parenting styles were discussed in relation to MPCM.

Keywords: compliance, expectation, parenting styles, perception

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Authors: Obsi Terfasa, Bhanupriya Das, Mithilish Passawan

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The large-scale application of microbial fuel cell (MFC) technology is significantly hindered by the high cost of the commonly used proton exchange membrane, Nafion. This has led to the recent development of ceramic membranes using various clay minerals. This study evaluates the characteristics and potential use of a new ceramic membrane made from potter’s clay © mixed with different proportions (0, 5, 10 wt%) of fly ash (FA), labeled as CFA0, CFA5, CFA10, for cost-effective and sustainable MFC use. Among these, the CFA10 membrane demonstrated superior quality with a fine pore size distribution (average 0.41 μm), which supports higher water uptake and reduced oxygen diffusion. Its oxygen mass transfer coefficient was 4.13 ± 0.13 × 10⁻⁴ cm/s, about 40% lower than the control. X-ray diffraction analysis revealed that the CFA membrane is rich in quartz, which enhances proton conductance and water retention. Electrochemical kinetics studies, including cyclic voltammetry and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS), also confirmed the effectiveness of the CFA10 membrane in MFC, showing a peak current output of 15.35 mA and low ohmic resistance (78.2 Ω). The novel CFA10 ceramic membrane, incorporating coal fly ash, a waste material, shows promise for high MFC performance at a significantly reduced cost (96%), making it suitable for sustainable scaling up of the technology.

Keywords: ceramic membrane, Coulombic efficiency, electro-chemical kinetics, fly ash, proton conductivity, microbial fuel cell

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Authors: Monalisha Nayak, T. G. Sitharam

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Liquefaction is a major threat for sites consists of or on sandy soil. But this present study concentrates on the behavior of fine soil under cyclic loading. This paper presents the study of liquefaction susceptibility of marine silty clay to clayey silt for an offshore site near western Yemen. The submerged and loose sediment condition of marine soil of an offshore site can favour liquefaction during earthquakes. In this regard, the liquefaction susceptibility of the site was carried out based on both field test results and laboratory test results. From field test results of seismic cone penetration test (SCPT), liquefaction susceptibility was assessed considering normalized cone tip resistance, and normalized friction ratio and results give an idea regarding both cyclic mobility and flow liquefaction. Laboratory cyclic triaxial tests were also conducted on saturated undisturbed and remoulded sample to study the effect of cyclic loading on strength and strain characteristics. Liquefaction susceptibility of the marine soft soil was also carried out based on index properties like grain size distribution, natural moisture content and liquid limit of soil.

Keywords: index properties, liquefaction, marine soil, seismic cone penetration test (SCPT)

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Authors: P. S. Jagadeesh Kumar, Yang Yung, Wenli Hu

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Speech emotion classification is a dominant research field in finding a sturdy and profligate classifier appropriate for different real-life applications. This effort accentuates on classifying different emotions from speech signal quarried from the features related to pitch, formants, energy contours, jitter, shimmer, spectral, perceptual and temporal features. Tensor deep stacking neural networks were supported to examine the factors that influence the classification success rate. Facial electromyography signals were composed of several forms of focuses in a controlled atmosphere by means of audio-visual stimuli. Proficient facial electromyography signals were pre-processed using moving average filter, and a set of arithmetical features were excavated. Extracted features were mapped into consistent emotions using bilinear mapping. With facial electromyography signals, a database comprising diverse emotions will be exposed with a suitable fine-tuning of features and training data. A success rate of 92% can be attained deprived of increasing the system connivance and the computation time for sorting diverse emotional states.

Keywords: speech emotion classification, tensor deep stacking neural networks, facial electromyography, bilinear mapping, audio-visual stimuli

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Authors: Liudmila A.Guzikova

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Being federative state Russia includes more than 80 subjects which are widely diverse by climatic conditions, demographic characteristics, cultural traditions, intensity of migration, economic development and investment attraction and other parameters. Now, in the regions of the country all forms of housing problem are present - housing mismatch to sanitary and hygienic standards, overcrowding, forced residence in financially burdensome housing, homelessness, -although the extent of these symptoms varies widely. Heterogeneity of regional conditions in combination with specifics of regional housing situation requires to concentrate the study of housing problem on the regional level. Traditionally housing market and mortgage are considered as the instruments of housing problem solving. The question arises how the housing market and mortgage market contribute to solving the housing problem in the regions of Russia. Though the purchase of dwelling in ownership should not be regarded as a universal method of the housing problem solving, the purchase of dwelling both by own funds or by use of mortgage can reduce the problem and enhance public satisfaction of living conditions. The aim of the study is to identify differences and similarities in the development of regional housing markets and mortgage lending in the regions of Russia and to evaluate their impact on the status of the housing problem. To achieve the aim of the study the methods of correlation and regression analysis are used. The data of federal statistics constitutes the information base of research. The results of the study contribute to better understanding of the interrelations in housing sphere and can be used to work out social and economic development programs in the regions.

Keywords: housing market, housing problem, mortgage, regional economy

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Authors: Liliane Clark

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Immigrating to a different country may imply having to handle many difficult exertions. There is a particular issue that has to be endured by some immigrants: the children they had to leave behind. It is a phenomenon that occurs with certain frequency. Surprisingly, despite the fact that immigration in the United States is such a large proceeding, there is not much research about the topic in America exploring the trauma of the abandonment caused by this separation and its consequences on the mental health of those children. The term “left behind children” is usually applied to children who were left behind by their parents in their original nation under the care of a noteworthy relative, frequently the grandparents, when they moved to another country. This preliminary research, which is a partial study projected for a doctoral thesis, investigated whether the trauma of abandonment experienced by ten left behind children had affected their emotional development. The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and a brief interview were utilized to assess the information. The SDQ explored scales such as emotional symptoms, conduct problems, hyperactivity, peer problems and prosocial behavior. In this pilot study, the results indicated that all these issues had some sort of significant correlation between them. During the interviews, the participants or their parents identified a range of symptoms: anxiety disorder, eating disorders, panic attacks, psychotic-like experiences, drug use and depression. Hence, it seems that there is a connection between the trauma of abandonment suffered due to the separation and the children’s consequent symptomatic behavior. Further studies are indeed necessary to validate the initial results of this investigation.

Keywords: abandonment, parent migration, psychological problems, trauma

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Authors: Pravin M. Tirmali, Sagar M. Mane, Snehal L. Kadam, Shriniwas B. Kulkarni

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The La₂NiMnO₆ has been extensively studied for its ferromagnetic and magneto-dielectric properties. The La₂NiMnO₆ double perovskite is modified by partial substitution at B site by Fe transition metal. The La₂Ni₁₋ₓFeₓMnO₆ powder samples were synthesized by hydroxide co-precipitation method. The precipitate was dried and fine griended to form powder and pellet samples (2cm dia.) using hydraulic press. The powder and pellet samples of La₂Ni₁₋ₓFeₓMnO₆ were calcined at high temperature 1200°C to form a pure and stable composition. The nano polar regions (NPR) around Ni²⁺ or Mn⁴⁺ ions due to the cationic antisite disorder gives dielectric relaxation through their mutual interaction. The magneto-dielectric behavior is observed in substituted La₂NiMnO₆ shows Maxwell-Wagner and Debye relaxation due to grain boundary, interface and antisite defects. The magneto-dielectric properties of substituted La₂NiMnO₆ pellet sample were probed by Impedance spectroscopy measurements. The structural and magnetic investigations were also carried out by XRD, FESEM and VSM measurements of substituted La₂NiMnO₆ of powder samples. The synthesized La₂Ni₁₋ₓFeₓMnO₆ powder samples are polycrystalline and ferromagnetic in nature. The La₂Ni₁₋ₓFeₓMnO₆ samples exhibit ferromagnetic disorder with transition temperature near room temperature.

Keywords: La₂NiMnO₆, nano polar regions (NPR), antisite defects, magnetodielctric

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Authors: Bao Shu-Feng, Lou Yan, Dong Zhi-Liang, Mo Hai-Hong, Chen Ping-Shan

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For soft foundation filled by newly dredged mud, after improved by Vacuum Preloading Technology (VPT), the soil strength was increased only a little, the effective improved depth was small, and the ground bearing capacity is still low. To analyze the causes in depth, it was conducted in laboratory of several comparative single well model experiments of VPT. It was concluded: (1) it mainly caused serious clogging problem and poor drainage performance in vertical drains of high content of fine soil particles and strong hydrophilic minerals in dredged mud, too fast loading rate at the early stage of vacuum preloading (namely rapidly reaching-80kPa) and too small characteristic opening size of the filter of the existed vertical drains; (2) it commonly reduced the drainage efficiency of drainage system, in turn weaken vacuum pressure in soils and soil improvement effect of the greater partial loss and friction loss of vacuum pressure caused by larger curvature of vertical drains and larger transfer resistance of vacuum pressure in horizontal drain.

Keywords: newly dredged mud, single well model experiments of vacuum preloading technology, poor drainage performance of vertical drains, poor soil improvement effect, causes analysis

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Authors: Ema Septaria, Muhammad Yamani, N. S. B. Ambarini

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The problem begins with the imposition of fine penalties by Ipuh small fishermen for customary fishing vessels encroaching catchment area in the Ipuh, a village in Muko-Muko, Bengkulu, Indonesia. Two main reasons for that are fishermen from out of Ipuh came and fished in Ipuh water using trawl as the gear and the number of fish decrease time by time as a result of irresponsible fishing practice. Such conflict has lasted since long ago. Indonesia Governing laws do not rule the utilization of sea territory by small fishermen that when the conflict appears there is a rechtvacuum on how to solve the conflict and this leads to a chaos in society. In Ipuh itself, there has been a local law in fisheries which they still adhere up to present because they believe holding to the law will keep the fish sustain. This is an empirical legal research with socio legal approach. The results of this study show even though laws do not regulate in detail about the utilization of sea territory by small fishermen, there is an article in Fisheries Act stating fisheries activity has to put attention to local law and community participation. Furthermore, constitution governs that the land, the waters and the natural resources within shall be under the powers of the State and shall be used to the greatest benefit of the people. With the power, Government has to make a policy that reinforces what has been ruled in Ipuh local law. Besides, Bengkulu Governor has to involve Ipuh community directly in managing their fisheries to ensure the fisheries sustainability therein.

Keywords: local law, reinforcement, conflict, sea utilization, small fishermen

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Authors: Ahmed Tafraoui, Gilles Escadeillas, Thierry Vidal

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The southern Algeria is known for its huge sand dunes that cover part of its territory (Sahara). This sand has features that allow a glimpse of a recovery in the construction field in the form of Ultra High Performance Concrete (UHPC). This type of concrete using a large amount of silica fume, ultra fine addition that gives very high performance but is also relatively rare and expensive. Replacing it with another addition to equivalent properties, such as metakaolin, can also be considered. The objective of this study is to both enhance the sand dunes of Erg south west western Algeria but also reduce manufacturing costs of Ultra High Performance Concrete to incorporating metakaolin to instead of silica fume. Performances to determine mechanical performance are instantaneous, compression and bending. Initially, we characterized the Algerian sand dune. Then, we have to find a formulation of UHPC, adequate in terms of implementation and to replace silica fume by metakaolin. Finally, we studied the actual value of the sand dune. Concrete obtained have very high mechanical performance, up to a compressive strength of 250 MPa, a tensile strength of 45 MPa by bending with the method of heat treatment. This study shows that the enhancement of dune sand studied is quite possible in UHPC, and in particular UHPC bundles and the replacement of silica fume by metakaolin do not alter the properties of these concretes.

Keywords: Ultra High Performance Concrete, sand dune, formulations, silica fume, metakaolin, strength

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Authors: Fatemeh Rezaei, Afsaneh Amouei, Iman Bakouei, Mahdi Sharif, Shahabeddin Sarvi, Mohammad Taghi Rahimi, Ahmad Daryani

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Background: Rodents act as reservoir host and important potential source for many zoonotic pathogens which pose a public health risk to humans. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the prevalence of gastrointestinal and ectoparasites among rodents. Materials and Methods: 118 Rattus rattus were captured using snap live traps. Each rat was combed with a fine tooth comb to dislodge ectoparasite and studied. Various samples were collected from feces, examined wet smear, formalin-ether method and stained with modified acid-fast staining and trichrome. Result: The overall prevalence of gastrointestinal parasites of examined rats was 75.4%. Cryptosporidium 30.5%, was the most prevalent protozoan which was followed by Giardia 20.3% and Entamoeba muris 13.5%, Trichomonas muris 10.1% and Spironucleus muris 3.3%. The prevalence of helminth egg was as following Syphacia obvelata 24.5%, Hymenolepis diminuta 10.1% and Trichuris muris 9.3%. 86.4% rodents were found to be infested with ectoparasites including mite 35.6%, flea 28.4%, and lice 42.7%. A significant statistical difference was observed between prevalence and gender of infected individuals. Conclusions: The prevalence of gastrointestinal and ectoparasites of collected rats in studied area is remarkably high. In addition, Rattus rattus can be considered as potential risk for human health.

Keywords: prevalence, rodent, intestinal parasites, ecto-parasites, zoonose

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Authors: Geetanjali Sharma

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There are always provincial variations which deserve more detailed treatment. Before the arrival of modern era, geography and cultural homogeneity were determining factors of human habitat and migration. Boundaries as if we see them, did not exist earlier. The connectivity of the world was also different as of now. The reinforcement of the old silk route will improve economic cooperation and connectivity between Asian, European and African countries, but obviously, it is designed to improve China’s geopolitical and geostrategic position in the world. The paper is based on the secondary sources of data. Analytical and historical approach has been used to clarify the ties between the old silk routes and new One-Belt-One-Road initiative China. The paper begins with an explanation of the historical background of the old Silk Route, its origin and development, trailed by an analysis of latest declarations by the Chinese leaders to revive it. It also discusses the impacts of this initiative on India’s economy and cultural exchange between associated regions. Lastly, the paper sums up the findings and suggestions for keeping a balance between the security and economic relationship between the countries. It concludes that the silk route is an effort in commencing a ‘grand strategy’ for global trade and cooperation with hidden objectives of China to increase the investment of China in other continents as well. The revival of silk route may prove to be a very helpful in reinforcing cooperation and raising it to a new level of economic establishments. However, China has yet to promote the much-needed political and strategic trust.

Keywords: OBOR (One-Belt-One-Road), geopolitics, economic relation, security concerns

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Authors: Jalila Jbilou, Salaheddine El Adlouni, Pierre Gosselin

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Background: West Nile virus is increasingly an important public health issue in North America. In Canada, WVN was officially reported in Toronto and Montréal for the first time in 2001. During the last decade, several WNV events have been reported in several Canadian provinces. The main objective of the present study is to update the frequency of the climate conditions favorable to WNV outbreaks in Canada. Method: Statistical frequency analysis has been used to estimate the return period for climate conditions associated with WNV outbreaks for the 1961–2050 period. The best fit is selected through the Akaike Information Criterion, and the parameters are estimated using the maximum likelihood approach. Results: Results show that the climate conditions related to the 2002 event, for Montreal and Toronto, are becoming more frequent. For Saskatoon, the highest DD20 events recorded for the last few decades were observed in 2003 and 2007. The estimated return periods are 30 years and 70 years, respectively. Conclusion: The emergence of WNV was related to extremely high DD values in the summer. However, some exceptions may be related to several factors such as virus persistence, vector migration, and also improved diagnosis and reporting levels. It is clear that such climate conditions have become much more common in the last decade and will likely continue to do so over future decades.

Keywords: West Nile virus, climate, North America, statistical frequency analysis, risk estimation, public health, modeling, scenario, temperature, precipitation

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Authors: Qisheng Hu, Jianglei Han, Yue Yang, My Hoa Ha

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When a company is considering purchasing software for commercial use, contract risk assessment is critical to identify risks to mitigate the potential adverse business impact, e.g., security, financial and regulatory risks. Contract risk assessment requires reviewers with specialized knowledge and time to evaluate the legal documents manually. Specifically, validating contracts for a software vendor requires the following steps: manual screening, interpreting legal documents, and extracting risk-prone segments. To automate the process, we proposed a framework to assist legal contract document risk identification, leveraging pre-trained deep learning models and natural language processing techniques. Given a set of pre-defined risk evaluation problems, our framework utilizes the pre-trained transformer-based models for question-answering to identify risk-prone sections in a contract. Furthermore, the question-answering model encodes the concatenated question-contract text and predicts the start and end position for clause extraction. Due to the limited labelled dataset for training, we leveraged transfer learning by fine-tuning the models with the CUAD dataset to enhance the model. On a dataset comprising 287 contract documents and 2000 labelled samples, our best model achieved an F1 score of 0.687.

Keywords: contract risk assessment, NLP, transfer learning, question answering

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Authors: Dong-ping Yuan, Lin Gu, Jun Long, Jie Chen, Ni Jie, Ying-Li Shi

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Endometriosis is a common disease in women of reproductive age, whose classic characteristic is mononuclear cell infiltration into lesions. Shikonin is an anti-inflammatory phytocompound from Lithospermum erythrorhizon, whose potential therapeutic effects for the endometriosis remain unclear. The working hypothesis was that shikonin can inhibit the development of endometriosis by the inhibition of chemotactic effect. Shikonin significantly inhibited the growth of human endometrial tissue implanted into mice (P<0.05). No observable adverse effects were found. The mouse regulated upon activation normal T-cell expressed and secreted (mRANTES) level in peritoneal fluid of animal endometriosis model was higher than that in normal SCID mice (P<0.05), and decreased dramatically after shikonin treatment in a dose-dependent manner (P<0.05). Peritoneal fluid from NOD/SCID mice treated with shikonin inhibited monocytes chemotaxis, which could be abolished by mRANTES antibody. In vitro, shikonin significantly inhibited RANTES expression of U937 cells cultured alone or co-cultured with human methothelail cells and endometrial stromal cells, and inhibited RANTES-induced chemotaxis of U937 cells (P<0.05). The present results suggest that shikonin can inhibit the development of endometriosis by mechanisms that at least include the inhibition of RANTES expression and decreased migration of mononuclear cells to lesions. Shikonin may be a useful and safe new approach for treating endometriosis.

Keywords: endometriosis, shikonin, RANTES chemotaxis

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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: M. M. Morgham, A. A. Hameda, N. A. Zriba, H. A. Jawan

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This paper aims to study the effect of cold work condition on the microstructure of Cu-1.5wt%Ti, and Cu-3.5wt%Ti and hence mechanical properties. The samples under investigation were machined and solution heat treated. X-ray diffraction technique is used to identify the different phases present after cold deformation by compression and also different heat treatment and also measuring the relative quantities of phases present. Metallographic examination is used to study the microstructure of the samples. The hardness measurements were used to indicate the change in mechanical properties. The results are compared with the mechanical properties obtained by previous workers. Experiments on cold compression followed by aging of Cu-Ti alloys have indicated that the most effective hardening of the material results from continuous precipitation of very fine particles within the matrix. These particles were reported to be β`-type, Cu4Ti phase. The β`-β transformation and particles coarsening within the matrix as well as a long grain boundaries were responsible for the averaging of Cu-1.5wt%Ti and Cu-3.5wt%Ti alloys. It is well know that plate like particles are β – type, Cu3Ti phase. Discontinuous precipitation was found to start at the grain boundaries and expand into grain interior. At the higher aging temperature a classic widmanstätten morphology forms giving rise to a coarse microstructure comprised of α and the equilibrium phase β. Those results were confirmed by X-ray analysis, which found that a few percent of Cu3Ti, β precipitates are formed during aging at high temperature for long time for both Cu- Ti alloys (i.e. Cu-1.5wt%Ti and Cu-3.5wt%Ti).

Keywords: metallographic, hardness, precipitation, aging

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Authors: Tzu-Wen Liu, Yi-Feng Lin, Yu-Shao Chen

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CO_2 is believed to be partly responsible for changes to the global climates. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is one way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in the past. Recently, how to convert the captured CO_2 into fine chemicals gets lots of attention owing to reducing carbon dioxide emissions and providing greener feedstock for the chemicals industry. A variety of products can be manufactured from carbon dioxide and the most attractive products are cyclic carbonates. Therefore, the kind of catalyst plays an important role in cycloaddition of carbon dioxide to epoxides. Magnesium oxide can be an efficiency heterogeneous catalyst for the cycloaddition of carbon dioxide to epoxides because magnesium oxide has both acid and base active sites and can provide the adsorption of carbon dioxide, promoting ring-opening reaction. Spinning disk reactor (SDR) is one of the device of high-gravity technique and has successfully used for synthesis of nanoparticles by precipitation methods because of the high mass transfer rate. Synthesis of nanoparticles in SDR has advantages of low energy consumption and easy to scale up. The aim of this research is to synthesize magnesium hydroxide nanoparticles in SDR as precursors for magnesium oxide. Experimental results showed that the calcination temperature of magnesium hydroxide to magnesium oxide, and the pressure and temperature of cycloaddition reaction had significantly effect on the conversion and selectivity of the reaction.

Keywords: magnesium oxide, catalyst, cycloaddition, spinning disk reactor, carbon dioxide

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Authors: A. A. Balkhi, G. M. Mir, Javid A. Sheikh

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To cater the demands of increasing traffic with new applications the cellular mobile networks face new changes in deployment in infrastructure for making cellular networks heterogeneous. To reduce overhead processing the densely deployed cells require smart behavior with self-organizing capabilities with high adaptation to the neighborhood. We propose self-organization of unused resources usually excessive unused channels of neighbouring cells with densely populated cells to reduce handover failure rates. The neighboring cells share unused channels after fulfilling some conditional candidature criterion using threshold values so that they are not suffered themselves for starvation of channels in case of any abrupt change in traffic pattern. The cells are classified as ‘red’, ‘yellow’, or ‘green’, as per the available channels in cell which is governed by traffic pattern and thresholds. To combat the deficiency of channels in red cell, migration of unused channels from under-loaded cells, hierarchically from the qualified candidate neighboring cells is explored. The resources are returned back when the congested cell is capable of self-contained traffic management. In either of the cases conditional sharing of resources is executed for enhanced traffic management so that User Equipment (UE) is provided uninterrupted services with high Quality of Service (QoS). The fuzzy logic-based simulation results show that the proposed algorithm is efficiently in coincidence with improved successful handoffs.

Keywords: candidate cell, channel sharing, fuzzy logic, handover, small cells

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Authors: Soottawat Benjakul, Phakawat Tongnuanchan, Thummanoon Prodpran

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Edible pouches made from fish gelatin film incorporated without and with palm oil (PO), basil essential oil (BEO) or oil mixture (M) were prepared and used to store chicken powder and chicken skin oil in comparison with nylon/low-density polyethylene (Nylon/LDPE) pouch during storage of 15 days. The moisture content of chicken powder packaged in pouches from fish gelatin films incorporated without and with various oils increased during 15 days of storage (p > 0.05). However, there was a non-significant change in moisture content of sample packaged in Nylon/LDPE pouch (p > 0.05). Samples packaged in pouches from fish gelatin films incorporated with oils had lower moisture content than those stored in pouch from gelatin film without oil added throughout the storage (p < 0.05). This coincided with the higher increases in darkness and yellowness for the latter. All samples packaged in pouches made from all films had the slight increase in PV, whereas a drastic increase in TBARS was observed for all samples during 15 days of storage. During 15 days of storage, chicken skin oil packaged in Nylon/LDPE pouch had higher TBARS and p-anisidine value than those stored in pouches made from fish gelatin, regardless of oil incorporated (p< 0.05). Therefore, pouches from gelatin film incorporated with oils could lower water migration and lipid oxidation in fat containing foods and oils.

Keywords: edible pouch, fish gelatin, quality changes, storage stability

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Authors: Talal Al-Bazali, S. Mohammad

Abstract:

The threshold capillary pressure of shale caprocks is an important parameter in CO₂ storage modeling. A correct estimation of the threshold capillary pressure is not only essential for CO₂ storage modeling but also important to assess the overall economical and environmental impact of the design process. A standard step by step approach has to be used to measure the threshold capillary pressure of shale and non-wetting fluids at different temperatures. The objective of this work is to assess the impact of high temperature on the threshold capillary pressure of four different shales as they interacted with four different oil based muds, air, CO₂, N₂, and methane. This study shows that the threshold capillary pressure of shale and non-wetting fluid is highly impacted by temperature. An empirical correlation for the dependence of threshold capillary pressure on temperature when different shales interacted with oil based muds and gasses has been developed. This correlation shows that the threshold capillary pressure decreases exponentially as the temperature increases. In this correlation, an experimental constant (α) appears, and this constant may depend on the properties of shale and non-wetting fluid. The value for α factor was found to be higher for gasses than for oil based muds. This is consistent with our intuition since the interfacial tension for gasses is higher than those for oil based muds. The author believes that measured threshold capillary pressure at ambient temperature is misleading and could yield higher values than those encountered at in situ conditions. Therefore one must correct for the impact of temperature when measuring threshold capillary pressure of shale at ambient temperature.

Keywords: capillary pressure, shale, temperature, thresshold

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Authors: Tidarat Sanphom

Abstract:

Aim of this research is to development of Standard Layer pudding (Khanom-Chan) recipe to healthy Thai dessert. The objective are to study about standard recipe in multi-layer sweet. It was found that the appropriate recipe in multi-layer sweet, was consisted of rice starch 56 grams, tapioca starch 172 grams, arrowroot flour 98 grams, mung been-flour 16 grams, coconut milk 774 grams, fine sugar 374 grams, pandan leaf juice 47 grams and oil 5 grams.Then the researcher studied about the ratio of rice-berries flour to rice starch in multi-layer sweet at level of 30:70, 50:50, and only rice-berry flour 100 percentage. Result sensory evaluation, it was found the ratio of rice-berry flour to rice starch 30:70 had well score. The result of multi-layer sweet with rice-berry flour reduced sugar 20, 40 and 60 percentage found that 20 percentage had well score. Calculated total calories and calories from fat in Sweet layer cake with rice-berry flour reduced sugar 20 percentage had 250.04 kcal and 65.16 kcal.

Keywords: multi-layer sweet (Khanom-Chan), rice-berry flour, leaf juice, desert

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Authors: Gaurav Bisht, Rahul Rathnakumar, Ravikumar Duggirala

Abstract:

Predictive simulations are one of the key focus areas in safety-critical industries such as aerospace and high-performance automotive engineering. The stone-chipping study is one such effort taken up by the industry to predict and evaluate the damage caused due to gravel impact on vehicles. This paper describes a finite elements based method that can simulate the ejection of gravel chips from a vehicle tire. The FE simulations were used to obtain the initial ejection velocity of the stones for various driving conditions using a computational contact mechanics approach. To verify the accuracy of the tire model, several parametric studies were conducted. The FE simulations resulted in stone loft velocities ranging from 0–8 m/s, regardless of tire speed. The stress on the tire at the instant of initial contact with the stone increased linearly with vehicle speed. Mesh convergence studies indicated that a highly resolved tire mesh tends to result in better momentum transfer between the tire and the stone. A fine tire mesh also showed a linearly increasing relationship between the tire forward speed and stone lofting speed, which was not observed in coarser meshes. However, it also highlighted a potential challenge, in that the ejection velocity vector of the stone seemed to be sensitive to the mesh, owing to the FE-based contact mechanical formulation of the problem.

Keywords: abaqus, contact mechanics, foreign object debris, stone chipping

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Authors: Sihem Salmi Laouar, Khoudair Chabane, Rabah Laouar, Adrian J. Boyce et Anthony E. Fallick

Abstract:

The solid mass of Essouabaa belongs paléogéography to the field téthysian and belonged to the area of the Mounts of Mellègue. This area was not saved by the oceanic-2 event anoxic (EAO-2) which was announced, over one short period, around the limit cénomanian-turonian. In the solid mass of Essouabba, the dominant sediments, pertaining to this period, are generally fine, dark, laminated and sometimes rolled deposits. They contain a rather rich planktonic microfaune, pyrite, and grains of phosphate, thus translating an environment rather deep and reducing rather deep and reducing. For targeting well the passage Cénomanian-Turonian (C-T) in the solid mass of Essouabaa, of the studies lithological and biostratigraphic were combined with the data of the isotopic analyses carbon and oxygen like with the contents of CaCO3. The got results indicate that this passage is marked by a biological event translated by the appearance of the "filaments" like by a positive excursion of the δ13C and δ18O. The cénomanian-turonian passage in the solid mass of Essouabaa represents a good example where during the oceanic event anoxic a facies with organic matter with contents of COT which can reach 1.36%. C E massive presents biostratigraphic and isotopic similarities with those obtained as well in the areas bordering (ex: Tunisia and Morocco) that throughout the world.

Keywords: limit cénomanian-turonian (C-T), COT, filaments, event anoxic 2 (EAO-2), stable isotopes, mounts of Mellègue, Algeria

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Authors: Girlly Marchlina Listyono, Abdurrokhim Abdurrokhim, Emi Sukiyah, Pulung Arya Pranantya

Abstract:

Jakarta Area is composed by deposit which has various lithology characteristics. Based on its lithology types, colors, textures, mineral dan organic content from 22 wells scattered on Jakarta, lithofacies analysis and intra-wells data correlation can be done. From the analysis, it can be interpretated that Jakarta deposit deposited in marine, transition and terrestrial depositional environments. Terrestrial deposit characterized by domination of relatively coarse clastics and content of remaining roots, woods, plants, high content of quartz, lithic fragment, calcareous and oxidated appearace. The thickness of terrestrial deposit is thickening to south. Transitional deposit characterized by fine to medium clastics with dark color, high content of organic matter, various thickness in any ways. Marine deposit characterized by finer clastics, contain remain of shells, fosil, coral, limestone fragments, glauconites, calcareous. Marine deposit relatively thickening to north. Those lateral variety caused by tectonic, subsidence and stratigraphic condition. Deposition of Jakarta deposit from the data research was started on marine depositional environment which surrounded by the event of cycle of regression and transgression then ended with regression which ongoing until form shore line in north Jakarta nowadays.

Keywords: deposit, Indonesia, Jakarta, sediment, stratigraphy

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Authors: Arman Ovla, Satyaki Roy, Shatrupa T. Roy

Abstract:

India is known for the richness of its tradition and cultural heritage. The practice of crafts like pottery and terracotta has a long-standing history. Some of the oldest specimens of fine pottery were excavated from the ancient sites of Indus-valley settlements dating back to 4000 years. There are so many techniques and styles which have developed through time. Pottery with red clay and low firing is one of the oldest branches of ceramic which is still being made in India in large quantities. This study is based on field research carried out in two large pottery clusters. The traditional potters of Pahari in Rajasthan and Nizamabad in Uttar Pradesh are baking pots with the help of saggar containers and creating products quite different from others. The potters of Prajapati community residing in both places have been engaged in the art of making pottery for ages. The knowledge of pottery and associated skills are passed on from one generation to the next. They use only the local material available in their vicinity and adapt the design and decorations to create an identity that is deeply rooted in their origins. For the purpose of this research, pure qualitative research methodology was followed with field visits and data collection from Pahari and Nizamabad. Observations and notes made from non-intrusive techniques and direct interview methods of existing potters residing in the region. This paper on Saggar pottery describes the tools and techniques, methods and materials, the firing process, and indigenous stylistic attributes.

Keywords: Saggar, smoke firing, black pottery, Nizamabad, Pahari

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