Search results for: gender issues

Authors: Mohamed Asaad Abdelrazek, Amir Taher El-Sheikh, M. Zayan, A.M. Elhady

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The successful realization of complex systems is dependent not only on the technology issues and the process for implementing them, but on the management issues as well. Managing the systems development lifecycle requires technical management. Systems engineering management is the technical management. Systems engineering management is accomplished by incorporating many activities. The three major activities are development phasing, systems engineering process and lifecycle integration. Systems engineering management activities are performed across the system development lifecycle. Due to the ever-increasing complexity of systems as well the difficulty of managing and tracking the development activities, new ways to achieve systems engineering management activities are required. This paper presents a systematic approach used as a design management tool applied across systems engineering management roles. In this approach, Transdisciplinary System Development Lifecycle (TSDL) Model has been modified and integrated with Quality Function Deployment. Hereinafter, the name of the systematic approach is the Transdisciplinary Quality System Development Lifecycle (TQSDL) Model. The QFD translates the voice of customers (VOC) into measurable technical characteristics. The modified TSDL model is based on Axiomatic Design developed by Suh which is applicable to all designs: products, processes, systems and organizations. The TQSDL model aims to provide a robust structure and systematic thinking to support the implementation of systems engineering management roles. This approach ensures that the customer requirements are fulfilled as well as satisfies all the systems engineering manager roles and activities.

Keywords: axiomatic design, quality function deployment, systems engineering management, system development lifecycle

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Authors: Gergely G. Karacsony

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Fundamental rights are the result of thousand years’ progress of legislation, adjudication and legal practice. They serve as the framework of peaceful cohabitation of people, protecting the individual from any abuse by the government or violation by other people. Artificial intelligence, however, is the development of the very recent past, being one of the most important prospects to the future. Artificial intelligence is now capable of communicating and performing actions the same way as humans; such acts are sometimes impossible to tell from actions performed by flesh-and-blood people. In a world, where human-robot interactions are more and more common, a new framework of peaceful cohabitation is to be found. Artificial intelligence, being able to take part in almost any kind of interaction where personal presence is not necessary without being recognized as a non-human actor, is now able to break the law, violate people’s rights, and disturb social peace in many other ways. Therefore, a code of peaceful coexistence is to be found or created. We should consider the issue, whether human rights can serve as the code of ethical and rightful conduct in the new era of artificial intelligence and human coexistence. In this paper, we will examine the applicability of fundamental rights to human-robot interactions as well as to the actions of artificial intelligence performed without human interaction whatsoever. Robot ethics has been a topic of discussion and debate of philosophy, ethics, computing, legal sciences and science fiction writing long before the first functional artificial intelligence has been introduced. Legal science and legislation have approached artificial intelligence from different angles, regulating different areas (e.g. data protection, telecommunications, copyright issues), but they are only chipping away at the mountain of legal issues concerning robotics. For a widely acceptable and permanent solution, a more general set of rules would be preferred to the detailed regulation of specific issues. We argue that human rights as recognized worldwide are able to be adapted to serve as a guideline and a common basis of coexistence of robots and humans. This solution has many virtues: people don’t need to adjust to a completely unknown set of standards, the system has proved itself to withstand the trials of time, legislation is easier, and the actions of non-human entities are more easily adjudicated within their own framework. In this paper we will examine the system of fundamental rights (as defined in the most widely accepted source, the 1966 UN Convention on Human Rights), and try to adapt each individual right to the actions of artificial intelligence actors; in each case we will examine the possible effects on the legal system and the society of such an approach, finally we also examine its effect on the IT industry.

Keywords: human rights, robot ethics, artificial intelligence and law, human-robot interaction

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Authors: Mai Ashraf Talaat

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Bullying is an aggressive behavior and a serious issue that should be addressed by everyone and should be avoided at all costs. It is very common among adolescents and schoolchildren and the effects can be devastating and long-lasting. Students are most commonly bullied about physical appearance, race, gender, disability, ethnicity, religion, and sexual orientation. Appearance-targeted bullying is a form of bullying that targets an aspect of a person's appearance, which includes facial and dental features. Deviation from accepted dentofacial aesthetics leads to elevated incidences of bullying in schoolchildren. The aim of this review article is to assess the prevalence of bullying due to dentofacial characteristics and evaluate the importance of dentofacial appearance on perceived social attractiveness based on multiple studies.

Keywords: dentofacial features, orthodontics, malocclusion, adolescents, bullying

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Authors: Marie Taylor, Catriona Murphy

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The aim of this paper is to identify the factors of success in community based heritage tourism initiatives. Heritage and community are central to many tourism initiatives with heritage tourism having the potential to act as a catalyst for community development. This paper presents the findings of research that examined the relationship between heritage tourism and community development. The findings recognised that heritage tourism had economic, social and cultural benefits for a community as well as a role in strengthening concepts such as sense of identity, place, and authenticity. In addition, this paper proposes an assessment framework for sustainable community based heritage tourism to identify factors and contextual influences involved in their success or failure. In evaluating the sustainability of such initiatives, a number of issues are investigated including the continued role of stakeholders, the role of funding, the influence of collaboration and the changing role of rural development and its impact on community engagement. The research is descriptive, evaluative and explanatory research, exploring and analysing issues such as the development of community structures in community based heritage tourism. Thus, it will contribute to the development of potential tourism and community development policies and strategies at a local, national and international level. An interpretative and inductive approach is utilised, and a mixed method approach followed as it encapsulates the best of quantitative and qualitative research methods. The case studies focus on social enterprises in relation to tourism and community based tourism cooperatives as there are limited study and knowledge of these. Consequently, this research will contribute to the discourse on community based heritage tourism as an aspect of community development.

Keywords: collaboration, community-based heritage tourism, stakeholders, sustainable tourism

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Authors: Lakdar Sadi-Haddad

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The past few years study of very high speed electrical drives have seen a resurgence of interest. An inventory of the number of scientific papers and patents dealing with the subject makes it relevant. In fact democratization of magnetic bearing technology is at the origin of recent developments in high speed applications. These machines have as main advantage a much higher power density than the state of the art. Nevertheless particular attention should be paid to the design of the inverter as well as control and command. Surface mounted permanent magnet synchronous machine is the most appropriate technology to address high speed issues. However, it has the drawback of using a carbon sleeve to contain magnets that could tear because of the centrifugal forces generated in rotor periphery. Carbon fiber is well known for its mechanical properties but it has poor heat conduction. It results in a very bad evacuation of eddy current losses induce in the magnets by time and space stator harmonics. The three-phase inverter is the main harmonic source causing eddy currents in the magnets. In high speed applications such harmonics are harmful because on the one hand the characteristic impedance is very low and on the other hand the ratio between the switching frequency and that of the fundamental is much lower than that of the state of the art. To minimize the impact of these harmonics a first lever is to use strategy of modulation producing low harmonic distortion while the second is to introduce a sinus filter between the inverter and the machine to smooth voltage and current waveforms applied to the machine. Nevertheless, in very high speed machine the interaction of the processes mentioned above may introduce particular harmonics that can irreversibly damage the system: harmonics at the resonant frequency, harmonics at the shaft mode frequency, subharmonics etc. Some studies address these issues but treat these phenomena with separate solutions (specific strategy of modulation, active damping methods ...). The purpose of this paper is to present a complete new active harmonic compensation algorithm based on an improvement of the standard vector control as a global solution to all these issues. This presentation will be based on a complete theoretical analysis of the processes leading to the generation of such undesired harmonics. Then a state of the art of available solutions will be provided before developing the content of a new active harmonic compensation algorithm. The study will be completed by a validation study using simulations and practical case on a high speed machine.

Keywords: active harmonic compensation, eddy current losses, high speed machine

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Authors: Fatih Ercin Guney, Hami Karagol

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Day by day, humanity's energy needs increase, to facilitate access to energy sources by energy importing countries is of great importance in terms of issues both in terms of economic security and political security. The geographical location of the oil exporting countries in the Middle East (Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Qatar) today, it is observed that evaluated by emerging Arab Spring(from Tunisia to Egypt) and freedom battles(in Syria) with security issues arise sourced from terrorist activities(ISIS). Progresses related with limited natural resources, energy and it's transportation issues which worries the developing countries, the energy in the region is considered to how to transfer safely. North Region of the Black Sea , the beginning of the conflict in the regional nature formed between Russia and Ukraine (2010), followed by the relevant regions of the power transmission line (From Russia to Europe) the discovery is considered to be the east's hand began to strengthen in terms of both the economical and political sides. With the growing need for safe access to the west of the new energy transmission lines are followed by Turkey, re-interest is considered to be shifted to the Mediterranean and the Middle East by West. Also, Russia, Iran and China (three axis of east) are generally performing as carry out parallel policies about energy , economical side and security in both United Nations Security Council (Two of Five Permanent Members are Russia and China) and Shanghai Cooperation Organization. In addition, Eastern Mediterranean Region Tension are rapidly increasing about research new oil and natural gas sources by Israel, Egypt, Cyprus, Lebanon. This paper provides, new energy corridor(s) are needed to transfer sources (Oil&Natural Gas) by Europe from East to West. So The West needs either safe bridge country to transfer natural sources to Europe in region or is needed to discovery new natural sources in extraterritorial waters of Eastern Mediterranean Region. But in two opportunities are evaluated with secure transfer corridors form region to Europe in safely. Even if the natural sources can be discovered, they are considered to transfer in safe manner. This paper involved, Turkey’s importance as a leader country in region over both of political and safe energy transfer sides as bridge country between south and north of Turkey why natural sources shall be transferred over Turkey, Even if diplomatic issues-For Example; Cyprus membership in European Union, Turkey membership candidate duration, Israel-Cyprus- Egypt-Lebanon researches about new natural sources in Mediterranean - occurred. But politic balance in Middle-East is changing quickly because of lack of democratic governments in region. So it is evaluated that the alliance of natural sources researches may not be long-time relations due to share sources after discoveries. After evaluating over causes and reasons, aim to reach finding foresight about future of region for energy transfer periods in secure manner.

Keywords: Middle East, natural gas, oil, Turkey

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Authors: Fariba Ebrahimi, Mehdi Ghorbani

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Comprehensive water management considers economic, environmental, technical and social sustainability of water resources for future generations. Integrated water management implies cooperative approach and involves all stakeholders and also introduces issues to managers and decision makers. Solving these issues needs integrated and system approach according to the recognition of actors or key persons in necessary to apply cooperative management of water resources. Therefore, social network analysis can be used to demonstrate the most effective actors for environmental base decisions. The linkage of diverse sets of actors and knowledge systems across management levels and institutional boundaries often poses one of the greatest challenges in adaptive water management. Bridging stakeholder can facilitate interactions among actors in management settings by lowering the transaction costs of collaboration. This research examines how network connections between group members affect in co- management. Cohesive network structures allow groups to more effectively achieve their goals and objectives Strong; centralized leadership is a better predictor of working group success in achieving goals and objectives. Finally, geometric position of each actor was illustrated in the network. The results of the research based on between centrality index have a key and bridging actor in recognition of cooperative management of water resources in Darbandsar village and also will help managers and planners of water in the case of recognition to organization and implementation of sustainable management of water resources and water security.

Keywords: co-management, water management, social network, bridging stakeholder, darbandsar village

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Authors: Menonjyoti Kalita, Pradip Baishya

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In recent times, the world has been facing serious environmental concerns and issues, such as sustainability and cost, due to the overproduction of synthetic materials and their participation in degrading the environment by means of industrial waste and non-biodegradable characteristics. As such, biocomposites come in handy to ease such troubles. Bio-based composites are promising materials for future applications for substituting synthetic packaging materials. The challenge of making packaging materials lighter, safer and cheaper leads to investigating advanced materials with desired properties. Also, awareness of environmental issues forces researchers and manufacturers to spend effort on composite and bio-composite materials fields. This paper explores and tests some nature-friendly materials has been done which can replace low-density plastics. The materials selected included sugarcane bagasse, areca palm, and bamboo leaves. Sugarcane bagasse bamboo leaves and areca palm sheath are the primary material or natural fibre for testing. These products were processed, and the tensile strength of the processed parts was tested in Micro UTM; it was found that areca palm can be used as a good building material in replacement to polypropylene and even could be used in the production of furniture with the help of epoxy resin. And for bamboo leaves, it was found that bamboo and cotton, when blended in a 50:50 ratio, it has great tensile strength. For areca, it was found that areca fibres can be a good substitute for polypropylene, which can be used in building construction as binding material and also other products.

Keywords: biodegradable characteristics, bio-composites, areca palm sheath, polypropylene, micro UTM

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Authors: Dammak Saida, Mbarek Sonia

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This paper aims to examine the impact of public interest commitment, the attitude towards independence enforcement, and organizational ethical culture on auditors' ethical behavior. It also tests the moderating effect of gender diversity on these relationships. The sample consisted of 100 Tunisian chartered accountants. An online survey was used to collect the data. Data analysis techniques used to test hypotheses The findings of this study provide practical implications for accounting professionals, regulators, and audit firms as they help understand auditors' beliefs and behaviors, which implies more effective mechanisms for improving their ethical values.

Keywords: public interest, independence, organizational culture, professional behavior, Tunisian auditors

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Authors: Salman Naseer

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One of the main challenges of operating a smart city (SC) is collecting the massive data generated from multiple data sources (DS) and to transmit them to the control units (CU) for further data processing and analysis. These ever-increasing data demands require not only more and more capacity of the transmission channels but also results in resource over-provision to meet the resilience requirements, thus the unavoidable waste because of the data fluctuations throughout the day. In addition, the high energy consumption (EC) and carbon discharges from these data transmissions posing serious issues to the environment we live in. Therefore, to overcome the issues of intensive EC and carbon emissions (CE) of massive data dissemination in Smart Cities, we propose an energy efficient and carbon reduction approach by utilizing the daily mobility of the existing vehicles as an alternative communications channel to accommodate the data dissemination in smart cities. To illustrate the effectiveness and efficiency of our approach, we take the Auckland City in New Zealand as an example, assuming massive data generated by various sources geographically scattered throughout the Auckland region to the control centres located in city centre. The numerical results show that our proposed approach can provide up to 5 times lower delay as transferring the large volume of data by utilizing the existing daily vehicles’ mobility than the conventional transmission network. Moreover, our proposed approach offers about 30% less EC and CE than that of conventional network transmission approach.

Keywords: smart city, delay tolerant network, infrastructure offloading, opportunistic network, vehicular mobility, energy consumption, carbon emission

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Authors: Ibrahim A. Al-Sulaihi, Khalid S. Al-Gahtani, Abdullah M. Al-Sugair, Aref A. Abadel

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Achieving environmental sustainability is one of the important issues considered in many countries’ vision. Green/Sustainable building is widely used terminology for describing a friendly environmental construction. Applying sustainable practices has a significant importance in various fields, including construction field that consumes an enormous amount of resource and causes a considerable amount of waste. The need for sustainability is increased in the regions that suffering from the limitation of natural resource and extreme weather conditions such as Saudi Arabia. Since buildings designs are getting sophisticated, the need for tools, which support decision-making for sustainability issues, is increasing, especially in the design and preconstruction stages. In this context, Building Information Modeling (BIM) can aid in performing complex building performance analyses to ensure an optimized sustainable building design. Accordingly, this paper introduces a roadmap towards developing a systematic approach for presenting the sustainability of buildings using BIM. The approach includes set of main processes including; identifying the sustainability parameters that can be used for sustainability assessment in Saudi Arabia, developing sustainability assessment method that fits the special circumstances in the Kingdom, identifying the sustainability requirements and BIM functions that can be used for satisfying these requirements, and integrating these requirements with identified functions. As a result, the sustainability-BIM approach can be developed which helps designers in assessing the sustainability and exploring different design alternatives at the early stage of the construction project.

Keywords: green buildings, sustainability, BIM, rating systems, environment, Saudi Arabia

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Authors: María de los Ángeles Zárate López, Juan Antonio Pitones Rubio

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Quality of life and sustainability in cities are among the most important challenges faced by designers, city planners and urban managers. The Mexican city of Tijuana has a particular dynamic in its demographics which has been accelerated by its border city condition, putting to the test the ability from authorities to provide the population with the necessary services to aspire for a deserving quality of life. In the recent story of Tijuana, we found that the housing policy and the solutions presented by private housing developers have not met the best living conditions for end users by far, thereby adding issues to current social problems which impact the whole metropolitan area, including damage to the natural environment. Therefore this research presents the case study about the situation of a suburban housing development near Tijuana named “Villa del Campo” and exposes the problems of this specific project (originally labelled as a “sustainable” proposal) demonstrating that, once built, the place does not reflect the quality of life that it promised as a project. Currently, this housing development has a number of problematic issues such as the faulty operating conditions of public utilities and serious cases of crime inside the neighborhood. There is no intention to only expose the negative side of this case study, but to explore some alternatives which could help solving the most serious problems at the place, considering possible architectural and landscape interventions within the housing complex to help achieve the optimal conditions of livability and sustainability required by their inhabitants.

Keywords: suburban, housing, quality of life, sustainability, Tijuana, demographics

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Authors: Gheorghe Braniste

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Gender gap has always been in dispute when comparing records and has been a major factor influencing best performances in various sports. Consequently, our study registers the evolution of the difference between men's and women’s best performances within either cyclic or acyclic sports, considering the fact that the training sessions of high performance athletes prove both similarities and differences in long-term adaptation of their body to stress and effort in breaking limits and records. Firstly, for a correct interpretation of the data and tables included in this paper, we must point out that the intense muscular activity has a considerable impact on the structural organization of the organs and systems of the performer's body through the mechanism of motor-visceral reflexes, forming a high working capacity suitable for intense muscular activity. The opportunity to obtaine high sports results during the official competitions is due, on the one hand, to the genetic characteristics of the athlete's body, and on the other hand, to the fact that playing professional sports leaves its mark on the vital morphological and functional parameters. The aim of our research is to study the landmarking differences between male and female athletes and their physical development, together with their growing capacity to stand up to the functional training during the competitive period of their annual training cycle. In order to evaluate the physical development of the athletes, the data of the anthropometric screenings obtained at the Olympic Training Center of the selected teams of the Republic of Moldova were interpreted and rated. During the study of physical development in terms of body height and weight, vital capacity, thoracic excursion, maximum force (Fmax), dynamometry of the hand and back, a further evaluation of the physical development indices that allow an evaluation of complex physical development were registered. The interdependence of the results obtained in performance sports with the morphological and functional particularities of the athletes' body is firmly determined and cannot be disputed. Nevertheless, registered data proved that with the increase of the training capacity, the morphological and functional abilities of the female body increase and, in some respects, approach and even slightly surpass the men in certain sports.

Keywords: physical development, indices, parameters, active body weight, morphological maturity, physical performance

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Authors: Y. Bai, M. Bodlak, V. Frolov, S. Huber, V. Jary, I. Konorov, D. Levit, J. Novy, D. Steffen, O. Subrt, M. Virius

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In general, state-of-the-art Data Acquisition Systems (DAQ) in high energy physics experiments must satisfy high requirements in terms of reliability, efficiency and data rate capability. This paper presents the development and deployment of a debugging tool named DAQ Debugger for the intelligent, FPGA-based Data Acquisition System (iFDAQ) of the COMPASS experiment at CERN. Utilizing a hardware event builder, the iFDAQ is designed to be able to readout data at the average maximum rate of 1.5 GB/s of the experiment. In complex softwares, such as the iFDAQ, having thousands of lines of code, the debugging process is absolutely essential to reveal all software issues. Unfortunately, conventional debugging of the iFDAQ is not possible during the real data taking. The DAQ Debugger is a tool for identifying a problem, isolating the source of the problem, and then either correcting the problem or determining a way to work around it. It provides the layer for an easy integration to any process and has no impact on the process performance. Based on handling of system signals, the DAQ Debugger represents an alternative to conventional debuggers provided by most integrated development environments. Whenever problem occurs, it generates reports containing all necessary information important for a deeper investigation and analysis. The DAQ Debugger was fully incorporated to all processes in the iFDAQ during the run 2016. It helped to reveal remaining software issues and improved significantly the stability of the system in comparison with the previous run. In the paper, we present the DAQ Debugger from several insights and discuss it in a detailed way.

Keywords: DAQ Debugger, data acquisition system, FPGA, system signals, Qt framework

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Authors: Ioannis N. Sergentanis, Stavroula Papadodima, Maria Tsellou, Dimitrios Vlachodimitropoulos, Sotirios Athanaselis, Chara Spiliopoulou

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Introduction: The aim of this study is the investigation of characteristics of suicide, as documented in autopsies during a five-year interval in the greater area of Attica, including the city of Athens. This could reveal possible protective or aggravating factors for suicide risk during a period strongly associated with the Greek debt crisis. Materials and Methods: Data was obtained following registration of suicide cases among autopsies performed in the Forensic Medicine and Toxicology Department, School of Medicine, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece, during the time interval from January 2011 to December 2015. Anonymity and medical secret were respected. A series of demographic and social factors in addition to special characteristics of suicide were entered into a specially established pre-coded database. These factors include social data as well as psychiatric background and certain autopsy characteristics. Data analysis was performed using descriptive statistics and Fisher’s exact test. The software used was STATA/SE 13 (Stata Corp., College Station, TX, USA). Results: A total of 162 cases were studied, 128 men and 34 women. Age ranged from 14 to 97 years old with an average of 53 years, presenting two peaks around 40 and 60 years. A 56% of cases were single/ divorced/ widowed. 25% of cases occurred during the weekend, and 66% of cases occurred in the house. A predominance of hanging as the leading method of suicide (41.4%) followed by jumping from a height (22.8%) and firearms (19.1%) was noted. Statistical analysis showed an association was found between suicide method and gender (P < 0.001, Fisher’s exact test); specifically, no woman used a firearm while only one man used medication overdose (against four women). Discussion: Greece has historically been one of the countries with the lowest suicide rates in Europe. Given a possible change in suicide trends during the financial crisis, further research seems necessary in order to establish risk factors. According to our study, suicide is more frequent in men who are not married, inside their house. Gender seems to be a factor affecting the method of suicide. These results seem in accordance with the international literature. Stronger than expected predominance in male suicide can be associated with failure to live up to social and family expectations for financial reasons.

Keywords: autopsy, Greece, risk factors, suicide

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Authors: Azher Jameel, Ghulam Ashraf Harmain

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In the recent years, the enriched techniques like the extended finite element method, the element free Galerkin method, and the Coupled finite element-element free Galerkin method have found wide application in modeling different types of discontinuities produced by cracks, contact surfaces, and bi-material interfaces. The extended finite element method faces severe mesh distortion issues while modeling large deformation problems. The element free Galerkin method does not have mesh distortion issues, but it is computationally more demanding than the finite element method. The coupled FE-EFGM proves to be an efficient numerical tool for modeling large deformation problems as it exploits the advantages of both FEM and EFGM. The present paper employs the coupled FE-EFGM to model large elastoplastic deformations in bi-material engineering components. The large deformation occurring in the domain has been modeled by using the total Lagrangian approach. The non-linear elastoplastic behavior of the material has been represented by the Ramberg-Osgood model. The elastic predictor-plastic corrector algorithms are used for the evaluation stresses during large deformation. Finally, several numerical problems are solved by the coupled FE-EFGM to illustrate its applicability, efficiency and accuracy in modeling large elastoplastic deformations in bi-material samples. The results obtained by the proposed technique are compared with the results obtained by XFEM and EFGM. A remarkable agreement was observed between the results obtained by the three techniques.

Keywords: XFEM, EFGM, coupled FE-EFGM, level sets, large deformation

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Authors: Staci McGill, Morgan Hayes, Robert Coleman, Kimberly Tumlin

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The interaction and relationships between horses and humans have been shown to be positive for physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing, however equine spaces where these interactions occur do include some environmental risks. There are 1.7 million jobs associated with the equine industry in the United States in addition to recreational riders, owners, and volunteers who interact with horses for substantial amounts of time daily inside built structures. One specialized facility, an “indoor arena” is a semi-indoor structure used for exercising horses and exhibiting skills during competitive events. Typically, indoor arenas have a sand or sand mixture as the footing or surface over which the horse travels, and increasingly, silica sand is being recommended due to its durable nature. It was previously identified in a semi-qualitative survey that the majority of individuals using indoor arenas have environmental concerns with dust. 27% (90/333) of respondents reported respiratory issues or allergy-like symptoms while riding with 21.6% (71/329) of respondents reporting these issues while standing on the ground observing or teaching. Frequent headaches and/or lightheadedness was reported in 9.9% (33/333) of respondents while riding and in 4.3% 14/329 while on the ground. Horse respiratory health is also negatively impacted with 58% (194/333) of respondents indicating horses cough during or after time in the indoor arena. Instructors who spent time in indoor arenas self-reported more respiratory issues than those individuals who identified as smokers, highlighting the health relevance of understanding these unique structures. To further elucidate environmental concerns and self-reported health issues, 35 facility assessments were conducted in a cross-sectional sampling design in the states of Kentucky and Ohio (USA). Data, including air speeds, were collected in a grid fashion at 15 points within the indoor arenas and then mapped spatially using krigging in ARCGIS. From the spatial maps, standard variances were obtained and differences were analyzed using multivariant analysis of variances (MANOVA) and analysis of variances (ANOVA). There were no differences for the variance of the air speeds in the spaces for facility orientation, presence and type of roof ventilation, climate control systems, amount of openings, or use of fans. Variability of the air speeds in the indoor arenas was 0.25 or less. Further analysis yielded that average air speeds within the indoor arenas were lower than 100 ft/min (0.51 m/s) which is considered still air in other animal facilities. The lack of air movement means that dust clearance is reliant on particle size and weight rather than ventilation. While further work on respirable dust is necessary, this characterization of the semi-indoor environment where animals and humans interact indicates insufficient air flow to eliminate or reduce respiratory hazards. Finally, engineering solutions to address air movement deficiencies within indoor arenas or mitigate particulate matter are critical to ensuring exposures do not lead to adverse health outcomes for equine professionals, volunteers, participants, and horses within these spaces.

Keywords: equine, indoor arena, ventilation, particulate matter, respiratory health

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Authors: Mazifah Simis, Azahan Awang, Kadir Arifin

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The brownfield regeneration is being implemented in developped countries. However, as a group 1 developing country in the South East Asia, the rapid development and increasing number of urban population in Malaysia have urged the needs to incorporate the brownfield regeneration into its physical planning development. The increasing number of urban ex-landfills is seen as a new resource that could overcome the issues of inadequate urban green space provisions. With regards to the new development approach in urban planning, this perception study aims to identify the sustainable planning approach based on what the stakeholders have in mind. Respondents consist of 375 local communities within four urban ex-landfill areas and 61 landscape architect and town planner officers in the Malaysian Local Authorities. Three main objectives are set to be achieved, which are (i) to identify ex-landfill issues that need to be overcome prior to the ex-landfill redevelopment (ii) to identify the most suitable types of ex-landfill redevelopment, and (iii) to identify the priority function for ex-landfill redevelopment as the public parks. From the data gathered through the survey method, the order of priorities based on stakeholders' perception was produced. The results show different perception among the stakeholders, but they agreed to the development of the public park as the main development. Hence, this study attempts to produce an integrated approach as a model for sustainable ex-landfill redevelopment that could be accepted by the stakeholders as a beneficial future development that could change the image of 296 ex-landfills in Malaysia into the urban public parks by the year 2020.

Keywords: brownfield regeneration, ex-landfill redevelopment, integrated approach, stakeholders' perception

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Authors: Nayer Fardows, Zarash Nayer, Sarah Nayer Jaffar, Daud Nayer

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This paper analyses the issues related to communal properties of minorities in the cantonment area of Pakistan allotted in the mid-eighteenth centuries by the British Government to facilitate soldiers. These properties were old grants on which churches, institutes, hospitals, and residences were built. The ownership of these properties remained with British Government, but after the creation of Pakistan, changes by putting Government of Pakistan as the landlord of the property disturbed the inheritors as they remained as, holder of occupancy. The government of Pakistan issued a policy in 1997 to convert the status of old grant properties to regular lease. However, heavy taxes and high court’s decisions made it difficult to solve the issue. The study was conducted on six old grant properties of Edwardes College Peshawar cantonment situated in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. The paper is descriptive research with a qualitative approach collecting data through government rules, acts, ordinance and decisions of the high courts. The result leads to three aspects; 1) holder of occupancy status of old grant properties in cantonment is similar as allotment of other properties by the government, 2) imposition of heavy taxes on conversion of property from old grant to regular lease restricted inheritors to further construct or transfer, 3) imposition of higher courts ban on conversion of communal properties contradict government policy of conversion. The paper recommends the Government of Pakistan a solution to maintain the status quo for communal properties that fall within the old grant.

Keywords: British Government, communal properties, cantonment, old grant, institutions

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Authors: Zahra Heydari

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Introduction: One of the major clinical issues is acute renal failure, which is caused by ischemia-reperfusion of the kidney and is associated with high mortality. Despite advances in this area, important issues such as tissue necrosis, cell apoptosis, and so on in damaged tissue are suggestive for more researches and study on this subject. Objective: Evaluation of the potential utility of Ezetimibe in reducing injuries and cell death induced by kidney ischemia/ reperfusion through inducing expression changes of different cellular pathways in adult Sprague-Dawley rats. Materials and methods: Forty rats weighing 180-200g were divided into 4 groups. For this purpose, the first right kidneys of the rats were removed during surgery. After 20 days, the left renal artery was closed with a soft clamp and reperfusion was performed. After 24 hours, blood samples were collected and sent to the laboratory with kidneys to measure bax and bcl-2 by Western blotting and histopathological tests. Results: Quantitative damage reviews of Kidney tissue indicates damage Acute and severe tubular lesions were observed in the ischemia group. Also, the amount of injury was significantly reduced in the treatment group. There was also a significant difference between the ischemia and sham groups. In general, the results show that a single dose of 1.2 mg/kg of ezetimibe can reduce the bax/ bcl-2 ratio compared to the ischemia group. In general, the results showed Ezetimibe is effective in reducing cell damage and death due to ischemia/ reperfusion after renal ischemia through changes in the expression of various cellular pathways in rats.

Keywords: acute renal failure, renal ischemia-reperfusion injury, ezetimibe, apoptosis

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Authors: Pushplata Garg

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Mobility, is an integral part of living and sustainability of urban mobility, is essential not only for, but also for addressing global warming and climate change. However, very little is understood about the obstacles/hurdles and likely challenges in the success of plans for sustainable urban mobility in Indian cities from the public perspective. Whereas some of the problems and issues are common to all cities, others vary considerably with financial status, function, the size of cities and culture of a place. Problems and issues similar in all cities relate to availability, efficiency and safety of public transport, last mile connectivity, universal accessibility, and essential planning and design requirements of pedestrians and cyclists are same. However, certain aspects like the type of means of public transportation, priority for cycling and walking, type of roadside activities, are influenced by the size of the town, average educational and income level of public, financial status of the local authorities, and culture of a place. The extent of public awareness, civic sense, maintenance of public spaces and law enforcement vary significantly from large metropolitan cities to small and medium towns in countries like India. Besides, design requirements for shading, location of public open spaces and sitting areas, street furniture, landscaping also vary depending on the climate of the place. Last mile connectivity plays a major role in success/ effectiveness of public transport system in a city. In addition to the provision of pedestrian footpaths connecting important destinations, sitting spaces and necessary amenities/facilities along footpaths; pedestrian movement to public transit stations is encouraged by the presence of quality roadside public spaces. It is not only the visual attractiveness of streetscape or landscape or the public open spaces along pedestrian movement channels but the activities along that make a street vibrant and attractive. These along with adequate spaces to rest and relax encourage people to walk as is observed in cities with successful public transportation systems. The paper discusses problems and issues of pedestrians for last mile connectivity in the context of Delhi, Chandigarh, Gurgaon, and Roorkee- four Indian cities representing varying urban contexts, that is, of metropolitan, large and small cities.

Keywords: pedestrianisation, roadside public spaces, last mile connectivity, sustainable urban mobility

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Authors: Miguel Limbert Ramos, Joseph Amado Galvez

Abstract:

Background: The nasal septal cartilage is an autologous graft that is widely used in different otolaryngologic procedures of the different subspecialties, such as in septorhinoplasty and ear rehabilitation procedures. The cartilage can be easily accessed and harvested to be utilized for such procedures. However, the dimension of the nasal septal cartilage differs, corresponding to race, gender, and age. Measurements can be done via direct measurement of harvested septal cartilage in cadavers or utilizing radiographic imaging studies giving baseline measurement of the nasal septal cartilage distinct to every race. A preliminary baseline measurement of the dimensions of Filipino nasal septal cartilage was previously established by measuring harvested nasal septal cartilage in Filipino Malay cadavers. This study intends to reinforce this baseline measurement by utilizing computed tomography (CT) scans of adult Filipinos in a tertiary government hospital in the City of Manila, Philippines, which will cover a larger sampling population. Methods: The unit of observation and analysis will be the computed tomography (CT) scans of patients ≥ 18years old who underwent cranial, facial, orbital, paranasal sinus, and temporal bone studies for the year 2019. The measurements will be done in a generated best midsagittal image (155 subjects) which is a view through the midline of the cerebrum that is simultaneously viewed with its coronal and axial views for proper orientation. The view should reveal important structures that will be used to plot the anatomic boundaries, which will be measured by a DICOM image viewing software (RadiAnt). The measured area of nasal septal cartilage will be compared by gender and age. Results: The total area of the nasal septal cartilage is larger in males compared to females, with a mean value of 6.52 cm² and 5.71 cm², respectively. The harvestable nasal septal cartilage area is also larger in males with a mean value of 3.57 cm² compared to females with only a measured mean value of 3.13 cm². The total and harvestable area of the nasal septal cartilage is largest in the 18-30 year-old age group with a mean value of 6.47 cm² and 3.60 cm² respectively and tends to decrease with the advancement of age, which can be attributed to continuous ossification changes. Conclusion: The best time to perform septorhinoplasty and other otolaryngologic procedures which utilize the nasal septal cartilage as graft material is during post-pubertal age, hence surgeries should be avoided or delayed to allow growth and maturation of the cartilage. A computed tomography scan is a cost-effective and non-invasive tool that can provide information on septal cartilage areas prior to these procedures.

Keywords: autologous graft, computed tomography, nasal septal cartilage, septorhinoplasty

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Authors: Saurabh Agarwal

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This paper attempts to formalise the effect of demographic variables like marital status, gender, occupation and age on the source of investment advice which, in turn, affect the herd behaviour of investors and probability of investment in near future. Further, postulations have been made for most preferred investment option and purpose of saving and source of investment. Impact of theoretical analysis on choice among investment alternatives has also been investigated. The analysis contributes to understanding the different investment choices made by households in India. The insights offered in the paper indirectly contribute in uncovering the various unexplained asset pricing puzzles.

Keywords: portfolio choice, investment decisions, investor’s behaviour, Indian securities market

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Authors: Bander Alzahrani

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Information-centric networking (ICN) using architectures such as Publish-Subscribe Internet Routing Paradigm (PSIRP) is one of the promising candidates for a future Internet, has recently been under the spotlight by the research community to investigate the possibility of redesigning the current Internet architecture to solve many issues such as routing scalability, security, and quality of services issues.. The Bloom filter-based forwarding is a source-routing approach that is used in the PSIRP architecture. This mechanism is vulnerable to brute force attacks which may lead to denial-of-service (DoS) attacks. In this work, we present a new forwarding approach that keeps the advantages of Bloom filter-based forwarding while mitigates attacks on the forwarding mechanism. In practice, we introduce a special type of forwarding nodes called Edge-FW to be placed at the edge of the network. The role of these node is to add an extra security layer by validating and inspecting packets at the edge of the network against brute-force attacks and check whether the packet contains a legitimate forwarding identifier (FId) or not. We leverage Certificateless Aggregate Signature (CLAS) scheme with a small size of 64-bit which is used to sign the FId. Hence, this signature becomes bound to a specific FId. Therefore, malicious nodes that inject packets with random FIds will be easily detected and dropped at the Edge-FW node when the signature verification fails. Our preliminary security analysis suggests that with the proposed approach, the forwarding plane is able to resist attacks such as DoS with very high probability.

Keywords: bloom filter, certificateless aggregate signature, denial-of-service, information centric network

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Authors: Esther Ushike Akashie

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No matter who you are, where you are from and irrespective of age and gender, there is a universal need for power and energy. Every year, this need grows even more urgent the more scientific and technological inventions advance. Due to this fact, we find that majority of the research related to energy and power has been focused on finding new and innovative ways to produce power. Furthermore, we observe that because of the environmental state of our world today and the impact of climate change, one of the most explored routes of study has been the use of renewable energies. In this paper, we will be looking at one of the oldest forms of renewable energy, hydroelectric energy. First off, an overview of its history, sources, technical aspects, and applications will be evaluated. After which, we will then proceed to understand the main benefits and drawbacks of this form of renewable energy and offer insights on how it can be better utilized in our world today.

Keywords: hydropower, hydroelectric energy, advantages, disadvantages

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Authors: Cherry Yieng Siang Ling, Joong Hee Lee, Myung Hwan Yun

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The quality of a product to be usable has become the basic requirement in consumer’s perspective while failing the requirement ends up the customer from not using the product. Identifying usability issues from analyzing quantitative and qualitative data collected from usability testing and evaluation activities aids in the process of product design, yet the lack of studies and researches regarding analysis methodologies in qualitative text data of usability field inhibits the potential of these data for more useful applications. While the possibility of analyzing qualitative text data found with the rapid development of data analysis studies such as natural language processing field in understanding human language in computer, and machine learning field in providing predictive model and clustering tool. Therefore, this research aims to study the application capability of text processing algorithm in analysis of qualitative text data collected from usability activities. This research utilized datasets collected from LG neckband headset usability experiment in which the datasets consist of headset survey text data, subject’s data and product physical data. In the analysis procedure, which integrated with the text-processing algorithm, the process includes training of comments onto vector space, labeling them with the subject and product physical feature data, and clustering to validate the result of comment vector clustering. The result shows 'volume and music control button' as the usability feature that matches best with the cluster of comment vectors where centroid comments of a cluster emphasized more on button positions, while centroid comments of the other cluster emphasized more on button interface issues. When volume and music control buttons are designed separately, the participant experienced less confusion, and thus, the comments mentioned only about the buttons' positions. While in the situation where the volume and music control buttons are designed as a single button, the participants experienced interface issues regarding the buttons such as operating methods of functions and confusion of functions' buttons. The relevance of the cluster centroid comments with the extracted feature explained the capability of text processing algorithms in analyzing qualitative text data from usability testing and evaluations.

Keywords: usability, qualitative data, text-processing algorithm, natural language processing

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Authors: Sasitorn Chetanont

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The objectives of this study are to study Chinese tourist’s Behaviors towards travel and shopping in Bangkok. The research methodology was a quantitative research. The sample of this research was 400 Chinese tourists in Bangkok chosen by the accidental sampling and the purposive sampling. Inferential Statistics Analysis by using the Chi-square statistics. As for the results of this study the researcher found that differences between personal, social and cultural information, i.e., gender, age, place of residence, educational level, occupation, income, family, and main objectives of tourism with behaviors of Chinese tourists in Bangkok towards travel and shopping in Bangkok.

Keywords: tourists’ behavior, Chinese tourists, travelling, expenses in travels

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Authors: Salisu Abdullahi Dalhat, Ibrahim Aliyu Adamu, Abubakar Magaji, Ridwan Adebola Adedigba

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The paper examined the municipal solid waste disposal methods and the environmental issues associated with the management of solid waste in Bauchi Metropolis, Nigeria. Data were obtained through the administration of structured questionnaires, oral interviews, and field observations, as well as the desk review method. The research identifies how the city was composed of both biodegradable and non-biodegradable materials, which are mostly paper waste, polythene, and plastic materials. Most of the solid wastes are left unattended for a long period. Poor design of dump sites, ineffective management of urban development plans, and poor enforcement of environmental laws were observed to be the major causes of poor waste management, and in a few areas where large waste containers are provided, they are hardly used by the community. The major environmental issues resulting from improper disposal and poor management of solid waste in the Bauchi metropolis are a nuisance of the waste to the environment, emitting of methane gas which contributes to climate change, blockage of drainages during rainstorms causing flooding within the metropolis as well as the decomposition of such waste leading to contamination of groundwater thereby leading to the cholera outbreak. Relevant stakeholders should, without compromise, design enforceable short, workable bye-laws; local supervisors should be stationed at the designated dump sites across the city as well as public enlightenment/sensitization campaigns could be the way out.

Keywords: biodegradable, contamination, cholera outbreak, solid waste, solid waste management, urban development

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Authors: Zeinab Hmama

Abstract:

Much recent discourse has highlighted the supporting role of social entrepreneurs in solving social problems. However, the identification of social enterprise’s characteristics in emerging countries has not yet been thoroughly examined. This research seeks to explores the profile of social enterprises in Morocco. In this perspective, we conduct a quantitative study on a sample of 87 social enterprises. This study was undertaken in Morocco based on a quantitative study lead among sample consists of 82 organizations qualified as social enterprises. Therefore, the response rate was 45.12% (37/82). Participants in the study were described on the basis of the following demographic characteristics: Gender, Age, Education Level and field, Entrepreneurial activity age, Legal forms, Line of business.

Keywords: social entrepreneurship, social enterprise, problem resolution, value creation

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Authors: Efil Yusrianto, Noraini Marsi, Noraniah Kassim, Izzati Abdul Manaf, Hafizuddin Hakim Shariff

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Today, municipal solid waste (MSW), noise pollution, and attack fire are three ongoing issues for inhabitants of urban including in Malaysia. To solve these issues, eco-friendly autoclaved aerated concrete (AAC) containing recycled ceramic and gypsum waste (CGW) as a partial replacement for sand with different ratios (0%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, and 25% wt) has been prepared. The performance of samples, such as the physical, mechanical, sound absorption coefficient, and direct fire resistance, has been investigated. All samples showed normal color behavior, i.e., grey and free crack. The compressive strength was increased in the range of 6.10% to 29.88%. The maximum value of compressive strength was 2.13MPa for 15% wt of CGW. The positive effect of CGW on the compressive strength of AAC has also been confirmed by crystalline phase and microstructure analysis. The acoustic performances, such as sound absorption coefficients of samples at low frequencies (500Hz), are higher than the reference sample (RS). AAC-CGW samples are categorized as AAC material classes B and C. The fire resistance results showed the physical surface of the samples had a free crack and was not burned during the direct fire at 950ºC for 300s. The results showed that CGW succeeded in enhancing the performance of fresh AAC, such as compressive strength, crystalline phase, sound absorption coefficient, and fire resistance of samples.

Keywords: physical, mechanical, acoustic, direct fire resistance performance, autoclaved aerated concrete, recycled ceramic-gypsum waste

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