Search results for: black rice bran extract

Authors: Kate Allman, Heather Maranges, Elise Dykhuis

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Moral Growth Mindset (MGM) is the belief that one has the capacity to become a more moral person, as opposed to a fixed conception of one’s moral ability and capacity (Han et al., 2018). Building from Dweck’s work in incremental implicit theories of intelligence (2008), Moral Growth Mindset (Han et al., 2020) extends growth mindsets into the moral dimension. The concept of MGM has the potential to help researchers understand how both mindsets and interventions can impact character development, and it has even been shown to have connections to voluntary service engagement (Han et al., 2018). Understanding the contexts in which MGM might be cultivated could help to promote the further cultivation of character, in addition to prosocial behaviors like service engagement, which may, in turn, promote larger scale engagement in social justice-oriented thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. In particular, college may be a place to intentionally cultivate a growth mindset toward moral capacities, given the unique developmental and maturational components of the college experience, including contextual opportunity (Lapsley & Narvaez, 2006) and independence requiring the constant consideration, revision, and internalization of personal values (Lapsley & Woodbury, 2016). In a semester-long, quasi-experimental study, we examined the impact of a pedagogical approach designed to cultivate college student character development on participants’ MGM. With an intervention (n=69) and a control group (n=97; Pre-course: 27% Men; 66% Women; 68% White; 18% Asian; 2% Black; <1% Hispanic/Latino), we investigated whether college courses that intentionally incorporate character education pedagogy (Lamb, Brant, Brooks, 2021) affect a variety of psychosocial variables associated with moral thoughts, feelings, identity, and behavior (e.g. moral growth mindset, honesty, compassion, etc.). The intervention group consisted of 69 undergraduate students (Pre-course: 40% Men; 52% Women; 68% White; 10.5% Black; 7.4% Asian; 4.2% Hispanic/Latino) that voluntarily enrolled in five undergraduate courses that encouraged students to engage with key concepts and methods of character development through the application of research-based strategies and personal reflection on goals and experiences. Moral Growth Mindset was measured using the four-item Moral Growth Mindset scale (Han et al., 2020), with items such as You can improve your basic morals and character considerably on a six-point Likert scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly agree). Higher scores of MGM indicate a stronger belief that one can become a more moral person with personal effort. Reliability at Time 1 was Cronbach’s ɑ= .833, and at Time 2 Cronbach’s ɑ= .772. An Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) was conducted to explore whether post-course MGM scores were different between the intervention and control when controlling for pre-course MGM scores. The ANCOVA indicated significant differences in MGM between groups post-course, F(1,163) = 8.073, p = .005, R² = .11, where descriptive statistics indicate that intervention scores were higher than the control group at post-course. Results indicate that intentional character development pedagogy can be leveraged to support the development of Moral Growth Mindset and related capacities in undergraduate settings.

Keywords: moral personality, character education, incremental theories of personality, growth mindset

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Authors: Sonia Anand Knowlton

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There are some cases where we as a society feel deeply uncomfortable with the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools in the judicial decision-making process, and justifiably so. A perfect example is COMPAS, an algorithmic model that predicts recidivism rates of offenders to assist in the determination of their bail conditions. COMPAS turned out to be extremely racist: it massively overpredicted recidivism rates of Black offenders and underpredicted recidivism rates of white offenders. At the same time, there are certain uses of AI in the judicial decision-making process that many would feel more comfortable with and even support. Take, for example, a “super-breathalyzer,” an (albeit imaginary) tool that uses AI to deliver highly detailed information about the subject of the breathalyzer test to the legal decision-makers analyzing their drunk-driving case. This article evaluates the point at which a judge’s use of AI tools begins to undermine the public’s trust in the administration of justice. It argues that the answer to this question depends on whether the AI tool is in a role in which it must perform a moral evaluation of a human being.

Keywords: artificial intelligence, judicial reasoning, morality, technology, algorithm

Procedia PDF Downloads 81

Authors: Y. Okumuş, A. Tuna, A. T. Seyhan, H. Çelebi

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Useful carbon fibers were derived from chicken feathers (PCFs) based on a two-step pyrolysis method. The collected PCFs were cleaned and categorized as black, white and brown. Differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) and thermo-gravimetric analyzer (TGA) were systemically used to design the pyrolysis steps. Depending on colors, feathers exhibit different glass transition (Tg) temperatures. Long-time heat treatment applied to the feathers emerged influential on the surface quality of the resulting carbon fibers. Fourier Transformation Infrared (FTIR) examination revealed that the extent of disulfide bond cleavage is highly associated with the feather melting stability. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) examinations were employed to evaluate the morphological changes of feathers after pyrolysis. Of all, brown feathers were found to be the most promising to turn into useful carbon fibers without any trace of melting and shape distortion when pyrolysis was carried out at 230°C for 24 hours and at 450°C for 1 hour.

Keywords: poultry chicken feather, keratin protein fiber, pyrolysis, high carbonaceous fibers

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Authors: Ploysai Ohama, Nuttawadee Hanchengchai, Thiva Saksri

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Natural dye extracted from Pterocarpus indicus was applied to a cotton fabric and silk yarn by dyeing processing different eco-friendly mordants. Analytical studies such as UV–VIS spectrophotometry and gravimetric analysis were performed on the extracts. The color of each dyed material was investigated in terms of the CIELAB (L*, a* and b*) and K/S values. Cotton fabric dyed without mordants had a shade of greenish-brown, while those post-mordanted with selected eco-friendly mordants such as alum, lemon juice and limewater result in a variety of brown and darker color shade of fabric.

Keywords: natural dyes, plant materials, dyeing, mordant

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Authors: S. O. Oladeji, I. Saleh, A. U. Adamu, S. A. Fowotade

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The proximate composition, trace metal level and amino acid composition of Amaranthus hybridus, Celosia argentea and Solanum nigrum were determined. These vegetables were high in their ash contents. Twelve elements were determined: calcium, chromium, copper, iron, lead, magnesium, nickel, phosphorous, potassium, sodium and zinc using flame photometer, atomic absorption and UV-Visible spectrophotometers. Calcium levels were highest ranged between 145.28±0.38 to 235.62±0.41mg/100g in all the samples followed by phosphorus. Quantitative chromatographic analysis of the vegetables hydrolysates revealed seventeen amino acids with concentration of leucine (6.51 to 6.66±0.21g/16gN) doubling that of isoleucine (2.99 to 3.33±0.21g/16gN) in all the samples while the limiting amino acids were cystine and methionine. The result showed that these vegetables were of high nutritive values and could be adequate used as supplement in diet.

Keywords: proximate, amino acids, Amaranthus hybridus, Celosia argentea, Solanum nigrum

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Authors: Siziwe Monica Zuma

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The Expanded Public Works Program (EPWP) is an instrument that the South African Government uses to reduce unemployment and poverty and also stimulate economic growth. However, due to the limited budget and programs in the EPWP, the program has had challenges in reducing unemployment, poverty and stimulating economic growth. The EPWP Vuk’uphile program had positive outcomes in developing Black emerging contractors, in order for them to participate in the main stream economy far better than when the EPWP program was not introduced. The Skills component of the program particularly the EPWP Infrastructure, which is the most funded program under EPWP has had limited success in transferring appropriate skills to ensure labour participants can penetrate the labour market after participating in the EPWP. Education and skills are important attributes that can contribute to labour absorption, however, the EPWP particularly the infrastructure program needs to strengthen skills development over a longer period of time suggested a year with multi skills relevant to the labour market. Longer and more sustained employment provides a safety net and reduces poverty better that short term employment. The EPWP program can be expanded in the infrastructure sector, focusing on rural infrastructure, agricultural infrastructure, infrastructure related components like property, ownership, management, and other services. These can stimulate the Economic sector Infrastructure of EPWP, offer longer term and more sustained employment and rural enterprise development and further employment. The Expanded Public Works Program (EPWP) is an instrument that the South African Government uses to reduce unemployment and poverty and also stimulate economic growth. However, due to the limited budget and programs in the EPWP, the program has had challenges in reducing unemployment, poverty and stimulating economic growth. The EPWP Vuk’uphile program has had positive outcomes in developing Black emerging contractors, in order for them to participate in the main stream economy far better than when the EPWP program was not introduced. The Skills component of the program particularly the EPWP Infrastructure, which is the most funded program under EPWP has had limited success in transferring appropriate skills to ensure labour participants are able to penetrate the labour market after participating in the EPWP. Education and skills are important attributes that can contribute to labour absorption, however, the EPWP particularly the infrastructure program needs to strengthen skills development over a longer period of time suggested a year with multi skills relevant to the labour market. Longer and more sustained employment provides a safety net and reduces poverty better that short term employment. The EPWP program can be expanded in the infrastructure sector, focusing on rural infrastructure, agricultural infrastructure, infrastructure related components like property, ownership, management, and other services. These can stimulate the Economic sector Infrastructure of EPWP, offer longer term and more sustained employment and rural enterprise development and further employment.

Keywords: Expanded Public Works Program (EPWP), VUKÚPHILE, youth, Public Works Programs (PWP), Infrastructure Sector of EPWP (EPWP Infrastructure)

Procedia PDF Downloads 218

Authors: Imad Eddine Rezouani, Khalil Draidi, Badis bakhouche, Selman Anes Chabani

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The Algerian coast is an important site for wintering and migratory birds. Four species of shorebirds were surveyed, including Kentish plover Charadrius alexandrinus, Little ringed plover Charadrius dubius, Common ringed plover Charadrius hiaticula, and black-winged stilt Himantopus hilarious in three different sites, two important wetlands: Reghaia lake and Macta and a small area Sublette promenade to provide a new data about time activity budget. The study found a higher frequency of abundance in April during the study period (February to May), with a mean of 49. Estimating the temporal activity budget of these coastal birds, it was found that there were three main activities in different proportions between males and females: Pecking (29.51 ％) for males, (26.59％) for females, Looking above (28.01％) for males, (19.54 ％) for females And Away (9.95％) for males, (11.75％), contrarily the two previous one. Differences between study areas revealed differences in species behavior and distribution.

Keywords: wetland, behavioral, algerian coast, shorebirds, time budget activity

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Authors: Maryam Kiani, Abdul Basit Kiani

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At larger scales, the performance of cementitious materials is impacted by processes occurring at the nanometer scale. These materials boast intricate hierarchical structures with random features that span from the nanometer to millimeter scale. It is fascinating to observe how the nanoscale processes influence the overall behavior and characteristics of these materials. By delving into and manipulating these processes, scientists and engineers can unlock the potential to create more durable and sustainable infrastructure and construction materials. It's like unraveling a hidden tapestry of secrets that hold the key to building stronger and more resilient structures. The present work employs simulations as the computational modeling methodology to predict mechanical properties for carbon/silica based cementitious materials at the molecular/nano scale level. Studies focused on understanding the effect of higher mechanical properties of cementitious materials with carbon silica nanoparticles via Material Studio materials modeling.

Keywords: nanomaterials, SiO₂, carbon black, mechanical properties

Procedia PDF Downloads 139

Authors: Vahid Hosseinzadeh

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Salafism is a movement of thought-religion that was born into Sunni Islam and Hanbali sect. However, many groups and different attitudes call themselves Salafis, but they all have common characteristics, the main of which is radical and retrograde interpretation of Islamic sources. Taqi Ad-Din Ahmad ibn Taymiyyah in the Muslim world was the first thinker who established these thoughts. The authors of this article initially tried to express the meaning of Salafism and its appellation in order to focus on the beliefs and thoughts of Ibn Taymiyyah. In this way, it was tried to extract the intellectual foundations of Ibn Taymiyya from the literature and scientific works of his own using a descriptive-analytical method. Extreme focus on the appearance of Quranic phrases and opposition to any new thing that did not exist in Qur'an, Sunnah and the first 3 centuries of Islam, are among the central feature of his thoughts.

Keywords: Salafism, Ibn Taymiyyah, radical literalism, monotheism, polytheism, takfir

Procedia PDF Downloads 619

Authors: Chioma Ifeoma Agbasimelo, Stephen Afam Kenechukwu

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The study examined consumers’ responses to non-traditional marketing communication strategies in advertising herbal products. The study identified the following non-traditional marketing communication strategies: (a) trado-instrumental marketing strategy, (b) trado-demonstrative marketing strategy, and (c) trado-iconographic marketing strategy. Anchored on the Black Box Theory, it adopted the survey design of three metropolises (Awka, Onitsha, and Nnewi) in Anambra State, Nigeria. Major findings indicated that among the identified strategies, the trado-instrumental marketing strategy is the most dominant strategy. Other strategies: (b) trado-demonstrative marketing strategy and (c) trado-iconographic marketing strategy are sparingly used in semi-urban cities. It also found that consumers’ preferences and adoption of non-traditional marketing communication were minimal. Based on the findings, there is a need to create a unified system of integration of both traditional and non-traditional marketing communication strategies due to technology interfaces.

Keywords: advertising, consumers’ responses, herbal products, non-traditional marketing communication strategies

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Authors: Patricia Jiménez, Rafael Corchuelo, Hassan A. Sleiman

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Web mining is gaining importance at an increasing pace. Currently, there are many complementary research topics under this umbrella. Their common theme is that they all focus on applying knowledge discovery techniques to data that is gathered from the Web. Sometimes, these data are relatively easy to gather, chiefly when it comes from server logs. Unfortunately, there are cases in which the data to be mined is the data that is displayed on a web document. In such cases, it is necessary to apply a pre-processing step to first extract the information of interest from the web documents. Such pre-processing steps are performed using so-called information extractors, which are software components that are typically configured by means of rules that are tailored to extracting the information of interest from a web page and structuring it according to a pre-defined schema. Paramount to getting good mining results is that the technique used to extract the source information is exact, which requires to evaluate and compare the different proposals in the literature from an empirical point of view. According to Google Scholar, about 4 200 papers on information extraction have been published during the last decade. Unfortunately, they were not evaluated within a homogeneous framework, which leads to difficulties to compare them empirically. In this paper, we report on an original information extraction evaluation method. Our contribution is three-fold: a) this is the first attempt to provide an evaluation method for proposals that work on semi-structured documents; the little existing work on this topic focuses on proposals that work on free text, which has little to do with extracting information from semi-structured documents. b) It provides a method that relies on statistically sound tests to support the conclusions drawn; the previous work does not provide clear guidelines or recommend statistically sound tests, but rather a survey that collects many features to take into account as well as related work; c) We provide a novel method to compute the performance measures regarding unsupervised proposals; otherwise they would require the intervention of a user to compute them by using the annotations on the evaluation sets and the information extracted. Our contributions will definitely help researchers in this area make sure that they have advanced the state of the art not only conceptually, but from an empirical point of view; it will also help practitioners make informed decisions on which proposal is the most adequate for a particular problem. This conference is a good forum to discuss on our ideas so that we can spread them to help improve the evaluation of information extraction proposals and gather valuable feedback from other researchers.

Keywords: web information extractors, information extraction evaluation method, Google scholar, web

Procedia PDF Downloads 247

Authors: J. G. Batista, T. S. Santiago, E. A. Ribeiro, G. A. P. Thé

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This work deals with parameter identification of permanent magnet motors, a class of ac motor which is particularly important in industrial automation due to characteristics like applications high performance, are very attractive for applications with limited space and reducing the need to eliminate because they have reduced size and volume and can operate in a wide speed range, without independent ventilation. By using experimental data and genetic algorithm we have been able to extract values for both the motor inductance and the electromechanical coupling constant, which are then compared to measure and/or expected values.

Keywords: modeling, AC servomotor, permanent magnet synchronous motor-PMSM, genetic algorithm, vector control, robotic manipulator, control

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Authors: A. Karadeniz, Belgin Kucukomeroglu

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In this study natural gamma radioactivity levels are determined on sands along the coastal regions of Giresun/Turkey. The coast of Giresun about 290 km long in investigated to collect 101 sand samples. Natural and artificial radioactivity concentrations of sand samples were measured by using HPGe gamma spectrometry. The average activity concentrations of 238U, 232Th, 40K and 137Cs on sand samples of Giresun were found to be 10.83±2.92 Bq/kg, 21.28±3.22 Bq/kg, 6.42±1.06 Bq/kg, 230.94±10.67 Bq/kg respectively. The average activity concentrations for these radionuclides were compared with the reported data of other parts of Turkey and other countries. The average absorbed dose rate for Giresun was calculated to be 38.68 nGy/h respectively. This value is significantly lower than the World averaged value of 60 nGy/h. The external annual effective dose rate concentration in Giresun was found to be 0.047 mSv/y respectively. This result is much lower than the recommeded limit of 5 mSv/y. The external hazard dose rate for Giresun weas calculated to be 0.21 respectively. This result is much lower than the recommended limit of 1.0.

Keywords: concentration, radioactivity, Giresun, natural gamma radioactivity

Procedia PDF Downloads 390

Authors: Luís R. Silva, Fábio Jesus, Catarina Bento, Ana C. Gonçalves

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Over the last few years, the traditional medicine has gained ground at nutritional and pharmacological level. The natural products and their derivatives have great importance in several drugs used in modern therapeutics. Plant-based systems continue to play an essential role in primary healthcare. Additionally, the utilization of their plant parts, such as leaves, stems and flowers as nutraceutical and pharmaceutical products, can add a high value in the natural products market, not just by the nutritional value due to the significant levels of phytochemicals, but also by to the high benefit for the producers and manufacturers business. Stems of Prunus avium L. are a byproduct resulting from the processing of cherry, and have been consumed over the years as infusions and decoctions due to its bioactive properties, being used as sedative, diuretic and draining, to relief of renal stones, edema and hypertension. In this work, we prepared a hydroethanolic and infusion extracts from stems of P. avium collected in Fundão Region (Portugal), and evaluate the phenolic profile by LC/DAD, antioxidant capacity, α-glucosidase inhibitory activity and protection of human erythrocytes against oxidative damage. The LC-DAD analysis allowed to the identification of 19 phenolic compounds, catechin and 3-O-caffolquinic acid were the main ones. In a general way, hydroethanolic extract proved to be more active than infusion. This extract had the best antioxidant activity against DPPH• (IC50=22.37 ± 0.28 µg/mL) and superoxide radical (IC50=13.93 ± 0.30 µg/mL). Furthermore, it was the most active concerning inhibition of hemoglobin oxidation (IC50=13.73 ± 0.67 µg/mL), hemolysis (IC50=1.49 ± 0.18 µg/mL) and lipid peroxidation (IC50=26.20 ± 0.38 µg/mL) on human erythrocytes. On the other hand, infusion revealed to be more efficient towards α-glucosidase inhibitory activity (IC50=3.18 ± 0.23 µg/mL) and against nitric oxide radical (IC50=99.99 ± 1.89 µg/mL). The Sweet cherry sector is very important in Fundão Region (Portugal), and taking profit from the great wastes produced during processing of the cherry to produce added-value products, such as food supplements cannot be ignored. Our results demonstrate that P. avium stems possesses remarkable antioxidant and free radical scavenging properties. It is therefore, suggest, that P. avium stems can be used as a natural antioxidant with high potential to prevent or slow the progress of human diseases mediated by oxidative stress.

Keywords: stems, Prunus avium, phenolic compounds, biological potential

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Authors: Mohsen Rezaei Aghdam

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Recombinant DNA technology has meaningfully augmented the conventional crop improvement and has a great possibility to contribution plant breeders to encounter the augmented food request foretold for the 21st century. Predictable changes in weather and its erraticism, chiefly extreme fevers and vicissitudes in rainfall are expected to brand crop upgrading even more vital for food manufacture. Tissue attitude has been downtrodden to create genetic erraticism from which harvest plants can be better, to improve the state of health of the recognized physical and to upsurge the number of wanted germplasms obtainable to the plant breeder. This appraisal delivers an impression of the chances obtainable by the integration of vegetable biotechnology into plant development efforts and increases some of the social subjects that need to be considered in their application. Public-private companies offer chances to catalyze new approaches and investment while accelerating integrated research and development and commercial supply chain-based solutions. Novel varieties derivative by encouraged mutatgenesis are used commonly: rice in Thailand. These paper combinations obtainable data about the influence of change breeding-derived crop changes around the world, traveler magnetism the possibility of mutation upbringing as a flexible and feasible approach appropriate to any crop if that suitable objectives and selection approaches are used.

Keywords: crop, improve, genetic, agricultural

Procedia PDF Downloads 166

Authors: Sonika Sharma, Mohan G. Vairale, Sibnarayan Datta, Soumya Chatterjee, Dharmendra Dubey, Rajesh Prasad, Raghvendra Budhauliya, Bidisha Das, Vijay Veer

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Bacteriophages are viruses that parasitize specific bacteria and multiply in metabolising host bacteria. Bacteriophages hunt for a single or a subset of bacterial species, making them potential antibacterial agents. Utilizing the ability of phages to control bacterial populations has several applications from medical to the fields of agriculture, aquaculture and the food industry. However, harnessing phage based techniques in wastewater treatments to improve quality of effluent and sludge release into the environment is a potential area for R&D application. Phage mediated bactericidal effect in any wastewater treatment process has many controlling factors that lead to treatment performance. In laboratory conditions, titer of bacteriophages (coliphages) isolated from effluent water of a specially designed anaerobic digester of human night soil (DRDO Biotoilet) was successfully increased with a modified protocol of the classical double layer agar technique. Enrichment of the same was carried out and efficacy of the phage enriched medium was evaluated at different conditions (specific media, temperature, storage conditions). Growth optimization study was carried out on different media like soybean casein digest medium (Tryptone soya medium), Luria-Bertani medium, phage deca broth medium and MNA medium (Modified nutrient medium). Further, temperature-phage yield relationship was also observed at three different temperatures 27˚C, 37˚C and 44˚C at laboratory condition. Results showed the higher activity of coliphage 27˚C and at 37˚C. Further, addition of divalent ions (10mM MgCl2, 5mM CaCl2) and 5% glycerol resulted in a significant increase in phage titer. Besides this, effect of antibiotics addition like ampicillin and kanamycin at different concentration on plaque formation was analysed and reported that ampicillin at a concentration of 1mg/ml ampicillin stimulates phage infection and results in more number of plaques. Experiments to test viability of phage showed that it can remain active for 6 months at 4˚C in fresh tryptone soya broth supplemented with fresh culture of coliforms (early log phase). The application of bacteriophages (especially coliphages) for treatment of effluent of human faecal matter contaminated effluent water is unique. This environment-friendly treatment system not only reduces the pathogenic coliforms, but also decreases the competition between nuisance bacteria and functionally important microbial populations. Therefore, the phage based cocktail to treat fecal pathogenic bacteria present in black water has many implication in wastewater treatment processes including ‘DRDO Biotoilet’, which is an ecofriendly appropriate and affordable human faecal matter treatment technology for different climates and situations.

Keywords: wastewater, microbes, virus, biotoilet, phage viability

Procedia PDF Downloads 435

Authors: Bulcha Belay Etana, Benny Malengier, Debelo Oljira, Janarthanan Krishnamoorthy, Lieva Vanlangenhove

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Electromyography (EMG) is a technique used to measure the electrical activity of muscles. EMG can be used to assess muscle function in a variety of settings, including clinical, research, and sports medicine. The aim of this study was to develop a wearable textile sensor for EMG monitoring. The sensor was designed to be soft, stretchable, and washable, making it suitable for long-term use. The sensor was fabricated using a conductive thread material that was embroidered onto a fabric substrate. The sensor was then connected to a microcontroller unit (MCU) and a Wi-Fi-enabled module. The MCU was programmed to acquire the EMG signal and transmit it wirelessly to the Wi-Fi-enabled module. The Wi-Fi-enabled module then sent the signal to a server, where it could be accessed by a computer or smartphone. The sensor was able to successfully acquire and transmit EMG signals from a variety of muscles. The signal quality was comparable to that of commercial EMG sensors. The development of this sensor has the potential to improve the way EMG is used in a variety of settings. The sensor is soft, stretchable, and washable, making it suitable for long-term use. This makes it ideal for use in clinical settings, where patients may need to wear the sensor for extended periods of time. The sensor is also small and lightweight, making it ideal for use in sports medicine and research settings. The data for this study was collected from a group of healthy volunteers. The volunteers were asked to perform a series of muscle contractions while the EMG signal was recorded. The data was then analyzed to assess the performance of the sensor. The EMG signals were analyzed using a variety of methods, including time-domain analysis and frequency-domain analysis. The time-domain analysis was used to extract features such as the root mean square (RMS) and average rectified value (ARV). The frequency-domain analysis was used to extract features such as the power spectrum. The question addressed by this study was whether a wearable textile sensor could be developed that is soft, stretchable, and washable and that can successfully acquire and transmit EMG signals. The results of this study demonstrate that a wearable textile sensor can be developed that meets the requirements of being soft, stretchable, washable, and capable of acquiring and transmitting EMG signals. This sensor has the potential to improve the way EMG is used in a variety of settings.

Keywords: EMG, electrode position, smart wearable, textile sensor, IoT, IoT-integrated textile sensor

Procedia PDF Downloads 73

Authors: Avi Harel

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Most accidents are commonly attributed in hindsight to human errors, yet most methodologies for safety focus on technical issues. According to the Black Swan theory, this paradox is due to insufficient data about the ways systems fail. The article presents a study of the sources of errors, and proposes a methodology for utility-oriented design, comprising methods for coping with each of the sources identified. Accident analysis indicates that errors typically result from difficulties of operating in exceptional conditions. Therefore, following STAMP, the focus should be on preventing exceptions. Exception analysis indicates that typically they involve an improper account of the operational scenario, due to deficiencies in the system integration. The methodology proposes a model, which is a formal definition of the system operation, as well as principles and guidelines for safety-oriented system integration. The article calls to develop and integrate tools for recording and analysis of the system activity during the operation, required to implement validate the model.

Keywords: accidents, complexity, errors, exceptions, interaction, modeling, resilience, risks

Procedia PDF Downloads 195

Authors: Gia Surguladze, Nino Topuria, Lily Petriashvili, Giorgi Surguladze

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Modeling of building processes of a multimodal freight transportation support information system is discussed based on modern CASE technologies. Functional efficiencies of ports in the eastern part of the Black Sea are analyzed taking into account their ecological, seasonal, resource usage parameters. By resources, we mean capacities of berths, cranes, automotive transport, as well as work crews and neighbouring airports. For the purpose of designing database of computer support system for Managerial (Logistics) function, using Object-Role Modeling (ORM) tool (NORMA – Natural ORM Architecture) is proposed, after which Entity Relationship Model (ERM) is generated in automated process. The software is developed based on Process-Oriented and Service-Oriented architecture, in Visual Studio.NET environment.

Keywords: seaport resources, business-processes, multimodal transportation, CASE technology, object-role model, entity relationship model, SOA

Procedia PDF Downloads 428

Authors: H. M. El-Rafie, A. H. Abou Zeid, R. S. Mohammed, A. A. Sleem

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Acrocarpus is a genus of flowering plants in the legume family Fabaceae which considered as a large and economically important family. This study aimed to investigate the phytoconstituents of the petroleum ether extract (PEE) of Acrocarpus fraxinofolius bark by Gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (GC/MS) analysis of its fractions (fatty acid and unsaponifiable matter). Concerning this, identification of 52 compounds constituting 97.03 % of the total composition of the unsaponifiable matter fraction. Cycloeucalenol was found to be the major compound representing 32.52% followed by 4a, 14a-dimethyl-A8~24(28)-ergostadien (26.50%) and ß-sitosterol(13.74%), furthermore Gas liquid chromatography (GLC) analysis of the sterol fraction revealed the identification of cholesterol (7.22 %), campesterol (13.30 %), stigmasterol (10.00 %) and β - sitosterol (69.48 %). Meanwhile, the identification of 33 fatty acids representing 90.71% of the total fatty acid constituents. Methyl-9,12-octadecadienoate (40.39%) followed by methyl hexadecanoate (23.64%) were found to be the major compounds. On the other hand, column chromatography and Thin layer chromatography (TLC) fractionation of PEE separate the triterpenoid: 21β-hydroxylup-20(29)-en-3-one and β- amyrin which were structurally identified by spectroscopic analysis (NMR, MS and IR). PEE has been biologically evaluated for 1: management of diabetes in alloxan induced diabetic rats 2: cytotoxic activity against four human tumor cell lines (Cervix carcinoma cell line[HELA], Breast carcinoma cell line [MCF7], Liver carcinoma cell line[HEPG2] and Colon carcinoma cell line[HCT-116] 3: hepatoprotective activity against CCl4-induced hepatotoxicity in rats and the activity was studied by assaying the serum marker enzymes like AST, ALT, and ALP. Concerning this, the anti-diabetic activity exhibited by 100mg of PEE extract was 74.38% relative to metformin (100% potency). It also showed a significant anti-proliferative activity against MCF-7 (IC50= 2.35µg), Hela(IC50=3.85µg) and HEPG-2 (IC50= 9.54µg) compared with Doxorubicin as reference drug. The hepatoprotective activity was evidenced by significant decrease in liver function enzymes, i.e. AST, ALT and ALP by (29.18%, 28.26%, and 34.11%, respectively using silymarin as the reference drug, compared to their concentration levels in an untreated group with liver damage induced by CCl₄. This study was performed for the first time on the bark of this species.

Keywords: Acrocarpus fraxinofolius, antidiabetic, cytotoxic, hepatoprotective

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Authors: Wipharat Saimo, Benjawan Thumthanaruk, Panida Banjongsinsiri, Nowwapan Noojuy

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Thai northern style sausage (sai-ou) is originally cuisine made of chili paste, pork, and lard. It always serves with curry paste, vegetable, and rice. The meat and lard ingredients used can be substituted by Shiitake mushroom (Lentinus edodes) and King oyster (Pleurotus eryngii) mushroom (50:50 w/w) which is suitable for all people, especially vegetarians. However, the texture of mushroom type sai-ou had no homogenous texture due to no adhesiveness property of mushroom. Therefore, this research aimed to study the ratio of hydrocolloids (konjac flour (0-100%), konjac gel (0-100%) and Citri-fi®100 FG (0-2%)) on the physicochemical properties mushroom type sai-ou. The mixture design was applied by using Minitab 16 software. Nine formula were designed for the test. The values of moisture content and water activity of nine formula were ranged from 66.25-72.17% and 0.96-0.97. The pH values were 5.44-5.89. The optimal ratio of konjac flour, konjac gel and Citri-fi®100 FG (74.75:24.75:0.5 (w/w)) yielded the highest texture profiles (hardness, springiness, cohesiveness, gumminess and chewiness) as well as color parameters (L*, a* and b*). Sensory results showed had higher acceptability scores in term of overall liking with the level of ‘like moderately’ (5.9 on 7 pointed scale). The mushroom type sai-ou sausage could be an alternative food for health-conscious consumers.

Keywords: Citri-fi® 100 FG, konjac flour, konjac gel, Thai northern style sausages

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Authors: Sofia Matoug, Amr Abdel-Dayem

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This paper presents a comprehensive survey of recent research studies to segment and classify brain MR (magnetic resonance) images in order to detect significant changes to brain ventricles. The paper also presents a general framework for detecting regions that atrophy, which can help neurologists in detecting and staging Alzheimer. Furthermore, a prototype was implemented to segment brain MR images in order to extract the region of interest (ROI) and then, a classifier was employed to differentiate between normal and abnormal brain tissues. Experimental results show that the proposed scheme can provide a reliable second opinion that neurologists can benefit from.

Keywords: Alzheimer, brain images, classification techniques, Magnetic Resonance Images MRI

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Authors: Al-Yaqdhan Al-Rawahi, Kaneez Fatima Sadriwala

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The purpose of this paper is to discover the readiness of Civil Service Employee Pension Fund (CSEPF), a governmental organization, in motivating its staff. Exploratory survey has been conducted in order to extract needed information. For this purpose we proposed a questionnaire to understand staff viewpoint of motivation. Data was analyzed by using SPSS 15.0 for Windowsand Excel. Major results prove that good working conditions is the most important factor of staff and sympathetic help with personal problem is the least important one. Also the relationship between financial motivation and employee motivation is very weak, whereas with non-financial motivation and employee motivation is moderate. Future research may focus on studying all departments of CSEPF.

Keywords: financial motivation, non-financial motivation, employee motivation

Procedia PDF Downloads 385

Authors: Gizem Kodak

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The Strait of Çanakkale, together with the Strait of Istanbul and the Sea of Marmara, form the Turkish Straits System. In other words, the Strait of Çanakkale is the southern gate of the system that connects the Black Sea countries with the other countries of the world. Due to the heavy maritime traffic, it is important to scientifically examine the accident characteristics in the region. In particular, the results indicated by the descriptive statistics are of critical importance in order to strengthen the safety of navigation. At this point, exploratory data analysis offers strategic outputs in terms of defining the problem and knowing the strengths and weaknesses against possible accident risk. The study aims to determine the accident characteristics in the Strait of Çanakkale with temporal and spatial analysis of historical data, using Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA) as the research method. The study's results will reveal the general characteristics of maritime accidents in the region and form the infrastructure for future studies. Therefore, the text provides a clear description of the research goals and methodology, and the study's contributions are well-defined.

Keywords: maritime accidents, EDA, Strait of Çanakkale, navigational safety

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Authors: Jia-Ling Ho, Xiu-Ru Zhang, Zwe-Ling Kong

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Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a major health problem that affects patients’ life quality throughout the world due to its many complications. It characterized by chronic hyperglycemia with oxidative stress, which impaired male reproductive function. Fibroblast growth factor 21 (FGF21) is a metabolic regulator that is required for normal spermatogenesis and protects against diabetes-induced germ cell apoptosis. Echinacea purpurea ethanol extract (EE), which contain phenolic acid and isobutylamide, had been proven to have antidiabetic property. Silica-chitosan nanoparticles (Nano-CS) has drug delivery and controlled release properties. This study aims to investigate whether silica-chitosan nanoparticles encapsulated EE (Nano-EE) had more ameliorating male infertility by analyzing the effect of testicular FGF21. The Nano-EE was characterized before used to treatment the diabetic rat model. Male Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats were obtained and divided into seven groups. A group was no induced Streptozotocin (STZ), marked as normal group. Diabetic rats were induced into diabetes by STZ (33 mg/kg). A diabetic group was no treatment with sample (diabetic control group), and other groups were treatment by Nano-CS (465 mg/kg), Nano-EE (93, 279, 465 mg/kg), and metformin (Met) (200 mg/kg) used as reference drug for 7 weeks. Our results indicated that the average nanoparticle size and zeta potential of Nano-EE were 2630 nm and -21.3 mV, respectively. The encapsulation ratio of Nano-EE was about 70%. It also confirmed the antioxidative activity was unchanged by comparing the DPPH and ABTS scavenging of Nano-EE and EE. In vivo test, Nano-EE can improve the STZ induced hyperglycemia, insulin resistance, and plasma FGF21 levels. Nano-EE has increased sperm motility, mitochondria membrane potential (MMP), plasma testosterone level, and reduction of abnormal sperm, nitric oxide (NO), superoxide production as well as reactive oxygen species (ROS). In addition, in plasma antioxidant enzymes glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and superoxide dismutase (SOD) was increased whereas pro-inflammatory cytokines TNF-α, and IL-1β were decreased. Further, in testis, protein content of FGF21, PGC-1α, and SIRT1 were improved. Nano-EE might improve diabetes-induced down-regulation of testicular FGF21 and SIRT1/PGC-1α signaling hence maintain spermatogenesis.

Keywords: diabetes mellitus, Echinacea purpurea, reproductive dysfunction, silica-chitosan nanoparticles

Procedia PDF Downloads 191

Authors: Shivam Yadav, Neelam Atri

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Cyanobacteria, the photosynthetic prokaryotes are indispensable components of paddy soil contribute substantially to the nitrogen economy however often appended with metal load. They are well known to play crucial roles in maintenance of soil fertility and rice productivity. Nickel is one such metal that plays a vital role in the cellular physiology, however at higher concentrations it exerts adverse effects. Arsenic is another toxic metalloid that negatively affects the cyanobacterial proliferation. However species-specific comparative responses under As and Ni is largely unknown. The present study focuses on the comparative effects of nickel (Ni2+) and arsenite (As(III)) on two diazotrophic cyanobacterial species (Anabaena doliolum and Anabaena sp. PCC7120) in terms of antioxidative aspects. Oxidative damage measured in terms of lipid peroxidation and peroxide content was significantly higher after As(III) than Ni treatment as compared to control. Similarly, all the studied enzymatic and non-enzymatic parameters of antioxidative defense system except glutathione reductase (GR) showed greater induction against As(III) than Ni. Moreover, integrating comparative analysis of all studied parameters also demonstrated interspecies variation in terms of stress adaptive strategies reflected through higher sensitivity of Anabaena doliolum over Anabaena PCC7120.

Keywords: antioxidative system, arsenic, cyanobacteria, nickel

Procedia PDF Downloads 152

Authors: Haodong Huang, Zida Zhao, Shilong Sun, Chiyao Li, Wenfu Xu

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The control methods for legged robots based on deep reinforcement learning have seen widespread application; however, the inherent black-box nature of neural networks presents challenges in understanding the decision-making motives of the robots. To address this issue, we propose a fully interpretable deep reinforcement learning training method to elucidate the underlying principles of legged robot motion. We incorporate the dynamics of legged robots into the policy, where observations serve as inputs and actions as outputs of the dynamics model. By embedding the dynamics equations within the multi-layer perceptron (MLP) computation process and making the parameters trainable, we enhance interpretability. Additionally, Bayesian optimization is introduced to train these parameters. We validate the proposed fully interpretable motion control algorithm on a legged robot, opening new research avenues for motion control and learning algorithms for legged robots within the deep learning framework.

Keywords: deep reinforcement learning, interpretation, motion control, legged robots

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Authors: Sohail Imran, Tariq Mahmood

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In complex healthcare diagnostic investigation process, medical practitioners have to focus on ways to standardize their processes to perform high quality care and optimize the time and costs. Process mining techniques can be applied to extract process related knowledge from data without considering causal and dynamic dependencies in business domain and processes. The application of process mining is effective in diagnostic investigation. It is very helpful where a treatment gives no dispositive evidence favoring it. In this paper, we applied process mining to discover important process flow of diagnostic investigation for hepatitis patients. This approach has some benefits which can enhance the quality and efficiency of diagnostic investigation processes.

Keywords: process mining, healthcare, diagnostic investigation process, process flow

Procedia PDF Downloads 519

Authors: Lim Lie Pin, Lin Hui Wen

Abstract:

Rural tourism has become popular in Taiwan, the villages based on agriculture including fishery have to follow the trend to develop the local economy and achieve the sustainable development of the rural areas. Through cultural festivals, the tourist could experience the benefit while promoting and stimulating the local development of rural tourism. Cigu is famous for salt history and abundant natural resources, such as lagoon, black-faced spoonbills and other fishery products. Digging clam has become the most special parent-child activities in Tainan and increasing awareness since it was initiated. Therefore, festival organizers and regional destination marketers need to identify visitors’ experiences attributes which lead to opportunities for industry professionals, community involvement to plan and organize regional festivals and their programmes for effective destination branding finding out more potential rural resources encouraging the local industry growth and sustainable development.

Keywords: rural tourism, cultural festival, destination branding, tourist experience, sustainable development

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Authors: Amjad Khan

Abstract:

The security of Vehicular ad hoc networking is of great importance as it involves serious life threats. Thus to provide secure communication amongst Vehicles on road, the conventional security system is not enough. It is necessary to prevent the network resources from wastage and give them protection against malicious nodes so that to ensure the data bandwidth availability to the legitimate nodes of the network. This work is related to provide a non conventional security system by introducing some constraints to minimize the DoS (Denial of services) especially data and bandwidth. The data packets received by a node in the network will pass through a number of tests and if any of the test fails, the node will drop those data packets and will not forward it anymore. Also if a node claims to be the nearest node for forwarding emergency messages then the sender can effectively identify the true or false status of the claim by using these constraints. Consequently the DoS(Denial of Services) attack is minimized by the instant availability of data without wasting the network resources.

Keywords: black hole attack, grey hole attack, intransient traffic tempering, networking

Procedia PDF Downloads 283