Search results for: nature- based design

Authors: Seyed Reza Mirmahdi, Seyedeh Maryam Hashemi Jabali

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This research was conducted to evaluate the effects of group spiritual therapy on increasing the life expectancy and mental health among the elderlies. This was a quasi-experimental research using a pretest-posttest design with a control group conducted over a population including all the elderly people of Tehran in 2012-13. A randomized sampling method was used to select 30 elderly people living in Parham nursing home that were then randomly assigned into two control and experimental groups of 15 people each. The instruments used were Miller’s life expectancy and mental health test (SCL.90.R) standard questionnaires. Individuals in experimental group received 12 sessions of group spiritual therapy while those in control group did not receive any kind of therapy. The tests were performed again for all the subjects (30 individuals) at the end of the experiment. To test the hypotheses, the data collected by questionnaires were analyzed using descriptive methods through relevant tables and charts and also inferential methods through the analysis of covariance using the SPSS software. Results showed that group spiritual therapy leads to a significant increase in both mental health and life expectancy in the experimental group of elderlies living in Parham nursing home compared to those in the control group.

Keywords: spiritual therapy, life expectancy, mental health, elderlies

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Authors: Ya-Hsuan Wang

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This project of intercultural education aimed to explore pluricultural people’s interpretation and evaluation of the transnational community in Taiwan. Based on transnationalism and transculturalism, this study concerns the human right issues for immigrants and pluricultural people. Research participants as immigrants in Taiwan were asked about their typical thinking styles in the transnational community, their cultural integration in terms of transnational behaviors, and their collective memory of the transnational community. Interview questions included what key factors were involved in their identity negotiation, what roles the transnational community and collective memory would be for their identity negotiation and what were the positive or negative aspects impacting cross-border identity. Based on the experiences of pluricultural people and transnational communities, this project expected to enhance the depth and width of developing transcultural knowledge in textbook reform on History in K-12 schools. It is to transform cross-border identity into knowledge embedded with local culture in response to globalization and localization. The purpose of this paper is to portrait the cross-cultural practice of transnational community for Taiwan’s immigrants. It is to report their external socio-cultural expectation of ethnic economics, to understand their internal life course of national identity, and to clarify transnational community in relation to their cross-border identity. In conclusion, the cross-cultural practice of transnational community combined the external contexts such as ethnic economic interaction among transnational communities, social report and ethnic industry, and the internal contexts such as ethnic identity, language use, and collective memory in ethnic history.

Keywords: cross-cultural practice, immigrants, pluricultural people, transnational community

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Authors: Tom S. Owens, Tom A. Calverley, Benjamin S. Stacey, Christopher J. Marley, George Rose, Lewis Fall, Gareth L. Jones, Priscilla Williams, John P. R. Williams, Martin Steggall, Damian M. Bailey

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Introduction and aims: Sports-related concussion (SRC) represents a significant and growing public health concern in rugby union, yet remains one of the least understood injuries facing the health community today. Alongside increasing SRC incidence rates, there is concern that prior recurrent concussion may contribute to long-term neurologic sequelae in later-life. This may be due to an accelerated decline in cerebral perfusion, a major risk factor for neurocognitive decline and neurodegeneration, though the underlying mechanisms remain to be established. The present study hypothesised that recurrent concussion in current professional rugby union players would result in elevated systemic oxidative-nitrosative stress, reflected by a free radical-mediated reduction in nitric oxide (NO) bioavailability and impaired cerebrovascular and cognitive function. Methodology: A longitudinal study design was adopted across the 2017-2018 rugby union season. Ethical approval was obtained from the University of South Wales Ethics Committee. Data collection is ongoing, and therefore the current report documents result from the pre-season and first half of the in-season data collection. Participants were initially divided into two subgroups; 23 professional rugby union players (aged 26 ± 5 years) and 22 non-concussed controls (27 ± 8 years). Pre-season measurements were performed for cerebrovascular function (Doppler ultrasound of middle cerebral artery velocity (MCAv) in response to hypocapnia/normocapnia/hypercapnia), cephalic venous concentrations of the ascorbate radical (A•-, electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy), NO (ozone-based chemiluminescence) and cognition (neuropsychometric tests). Notational analysis was performed to assess contact in the rugby group throughout each competitive game. Results: 1001 tackles and 62 injuries, including three concussions were observed across the first half of the season. However, no associations were apparent between number of tackles and any injury type (P > 0.05). The rugby group expressed greater oxidative stress as indicated by increased A•- (P < 0.05 vs. control) and a subsequent decrease in NO bioavailability (P < 0.05 vs. control). The rugby group performed worse in the Ray Auditory Verbal Learning Test B (RAVLT-B, learning, and memory) and the Grooved Pegboard test using both the dominant and non-dominant hands (visuomotor coordination, P < 0.05 vs. control). There were no between-group differences in cerebral perfusion at baseline (MCAv: 54 ± 13 vs. 59 ± 12, P > 0.05). Likewise, no between-group differences in CVRCO2Hypo (2.58 ± 1.01 vs. 2.58 ± 0.75, P > 0.05) or CVRCO2Hyper (2.69 ± 1.07 vs. 3.35 ± 1.28, P > 0.05) were observed. Conclusion: The present study identified that the rugby union players are characterized by impaired cognitive function subsequent to elevated systemic-oxidative-nitrosative stress. However, this appears to be independent of any functional impairment in cerebrovascular function. Given the potential long-term trajectory towards accelerated cognitive decline in populations exposed to SRC, prophylaxis to increase NO bioavailability warrants consideration.

Keywords: cognition, concussion, mild traumatic brain injury, rugby

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Authors: Saleem Z. Ramadan

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This paper discusses the effects of using progressive Type-I right censoring on the design of the Simple Step Accelerated Life testing using Bayesian approach for Weibull life products under the assumption of cumulative exposure model. The optimization criterion used in this paper is to minimize the expected pre-posterior variance of the PTH percentile time of failures. The model variables are the stress changing time and the stress value for the first step. A comparison between the conventional and the progressive Type-I right censoring is provided. The results have shown that the progressive Type-I right censoring reduces the cost of testing on the expense of the test precision when the sample size is small. Moreover, the results have shown that using strong priors or large sample size reduces the sensitivity of the test precision to the censoring proportion. Hence, the progressive Type-I right censoring is recommended in these cases as progressive Type-I right censoring reduces the cost of the test and doesn't affect the precision of the test a lot. Moreover, the results have shown that using direct or indirect priors affects the precision of the test.

Keywords: reliability, accelerated life testing, cumulative exposure model, Bayesian estimation, progressive type-I censoring, Weibull distribution

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Authors: Stephen J Futter, Michael I Okereke

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This paper presents an investigation of the premature in-service failure of the engine mounting towers that form part of the bedframe commonly used for industrial power generation applications. The client during a routine in-service assessment of the generator set observed that the engine mounting towers had cracked. Thus, this study has investigated in detail the origin of the crack and proffered solutions to prevent a re-occurrence. Seven step problem solving methodology was followed during this paper. The study used both experimental and numerical approaches to understand, monitor and evaluate the cause and evolution of the premature failure. Findings from this study indicated that the failure resulted from a combination of varied processes from procurement of material parts, material selection, welding processes and inaptly designed load-bearing mechanics of the generating set and its mounting arrangement. These in-field observations and experimental simulations provided insights to design and validate a numerical finite element sub-model of the cracked bedframe considering thermal cycling: designed as part of these investigations. Resulting findings led to a recommendation of several procedural changes that should be adopted by the manufacturer, in order to prevent the re-occurrence of such pre-mature failure in future industrial applications.

Keywords: Engine, Premature Failure, Failure Analysis, Finite Element Model

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Authors: Dammika Bandara Herath

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A group of people who inherits a long history of existence within a particular country may be known as early inhabitants or indigenous peoples. In other words, they have not migrated to the particular territory from another part of the world and at the same time, they have inhabited the territory in issue prior to the time of a major invasion/migration. According to the UN, there are a number of unique attributes of the indigenous peoples: Self-identification as indigenous people,Historical continuity with pre-colonial and/or pre-settler societies, Distinct social, economic or political systems, Distinct language, culture and beliefs, Form non-dominant groups of society, Resolve to maintain and reproduce their ancestral environments and systems as distinctive peoples and communities. Indigenous peoples constitute 5% of the world’s population. They are also known as tribal people, first people, native people, and indigenous people. Various indigenous communities can be found in about 90 countries in the world. Asia is home to approximately 70 % of these indigenous communities who have their own unique socio-cultural identities. Most indigenous communities remain isolated from the mainstream social, cultural, and economic institutions of their homeland. Yet, they inherited their own unique rights and responsible peculiar to their own group. These include: Protecting the socio-cultural heritage of the group, Protecting the unique identity of their community from socio-cultural changes in the mainstream communities,Protecting their land, Diffusing their cultural heritage to the future generation, Co-existing peacefully with other community .However, indigenous peoples encounter a lot of challenges as a result of socio-cultural change and legal restrictions in the world today. To assist the communities to face these challenges, the mass –media can play a significant role and the radio media has a purpose-built mechanism for this mission, known as the indigenous radio. In Sri Lanka, Dambana FM is such a radio channel based on the indigenous radio model. The target audience of this channel is the vedda / indigenous community of Sri Lanka. This study intends to the current role of the indigenous radio based on Dambana FM, of which the target audience is the indigenous community of Dambana. For the purpose of this study, interviews were conducted among fifty randomly selected respondents from the indigenous community of Dambana. As far as the findings of this study are concerned, problems in the quality of the programmed broadcasted and problems of transmission are the key issues faced by the indigenous radio in Sri Lanka. Based on the findings, the researcher seeks to develop a model to enhance the impact of the indigenous radio on its listeners in Sri Lanka.

Keywords: indigenous, communities, radio, vedda, culture

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Authors: Desmond Adair, Kairat Ismailov, Martin Jaeger

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Modelling of Timoshenko beams on elastic foundations has been widely used in the analysis of buildings, geotechnical problems, and, railway and aerospace structures. For the elastic foundation, the most widely used models are one-parameter mechanical models or two-parameter models to include continuity and cohesion of typical foundations, with the two-parameter usually considered the better of the two. Knowledge of free vibration characteristics of beams on an elastic foundation is considered necessary for optimal design solutions in many engineering applications, and in this work, the efficient and accurate variational iteration method is developed and used to calculate natural frequencies of a Timoshenko beam on a two-parameter foundation. The variational iteration method is a technique capable of dealing with some linear and non-linear problems in an easy and efficient way. The calculations are compared with those using a finite-element method and other analytical solutions, and it is shown that the results are accurate and are obtained efficiently. It is found that the effect of the presence of the two-parameter foundation is to increase the beam’s natural frequencies and this is thought to be because of the shear-layer stiffness, which has an effect on the elastic stiffness. By setting the two-parameter model’s stiffness parameter to zero, it is possible to obtain a one-parameter foundation model, and so, comparison between the two foundation models is also made.

Keywords: Timoshenko beam, variational iteration method, two-parameter elastic foundation model

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Authors: Mariusz Hofman

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The paper ‘Theoretical framework for value creation in Project-Oriented Companies’ is designed to determine, how organisations create value and whether this allows them to achieve market success. An assumption has been made that there are two routes to achieving this value. The first one is to create intangible assets (i.e. the resources of human, structural and relational capital), while the other one is to create added value (understood as the surplus of revenue over costs). It has also been assumed that the combination of the achieved added value and unique intangible assets translates to the success of a project-oriented company. The purpose of the paper is to present hypothetical and deductive model which describing the modus operandi of such companies and approach to model operationalisation. All the latent variables included in the model are theoretical constructs with observational indicators (measures). The existence of a latent variable (construct) and also submodels will be confirmed based on a covariance matrix which in turn is based on empirical data, being a set of observational indicators (measures). This will be achieved with a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Due to this statistical procedure, it will be verified whether the matrix arising from the adopted theoretical model differs statistically from the empirical matrix of covariance arising from the system of equations. The fit of the model with the empirical data will be evaluated using χ2, RMSEA and CFI (Comparative Fit Index). How well the theoretical model fits the empirical data is assessed through a number of indicators. If the theoretical conjectures are confirmed, an interesting development path can be defined for project-oriented companies. This will let such organisations perform efficiently in the face of the growing competition and pressure on innovation.

Keywords: value creation, project-oriented company, structural equation modelling

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Authors: Leyla Noroozbabaee, David Nickerson

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We introduce a modular, consistent, reusable bond graph model of the renal nephron’s proximal convoluted tubule (PCT), which can reproduce biological behaviour. In this work, we focus on ion and volume transport in the proximal convoluted tubule of the renal nephron. Modelling complex systems requires complex modelling problems to be broken down into manageable pieces. This can be enabled by developing models of subsystems that are subsequently coupled hierarchically. Because they are based on a graph structure. In the current work, we define two modular subsystems: the resistive module representing the membrane and the capacitive module representing solution compartments. Each module is analyzed based on thermodynamic processes, and all the subsystems are reintegrated into circuit theory in network thermodynamics. The epithelial transport system we introduce in the current study consists of five transport membranes and four solution compartments. Coupled dissipations in the system occur in the membrane subsystems and coupled free-energy increasing, or decreasing processes appear in solution compartment subsystems. These structural subsystems also consist of elementary thermodynamic processes: dissipations, free-energy change, and power conversions. We provide free and open access to the Python implementation to ensure our model is accessible, enabling the reader to explore the model through setting their simulations and reproducibility tests.

Keywords: Bond Graph, Epithelial Transport, Water Transport, Mathematical Modeling

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Authors: G. Culache, M. P. Byfield, N. S. Ferguson, A. Tyas

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Steel joints in building structures represent a weak link in the case of accidental transient loading. This type of loading can occur due to blast effects or impact with moving vehicles and will result in large deformations in the material as well as large rotations. This paper addresses the lack of experimental investigations into the response of moment resisting connections subjected to such loading. The current design philosophy was used to create test specimens with flush and extended end plates. The specimens were tested in a specially designed testing rig capable of delivering the sustained loading even beyond the point of failure. Types of failure that the authors attempted to obtain were bolt fracture, flange crushing and end plate fracture. Experimental data is presented, described and analyzed. The tests show that the strength and ductility can be significantly improved by replacing ordinary mild-steel bolts with their stainless steel equivalents. This minor modification is demonstrated to significantly improve the robustness when subjected to loading that results in high deformations and rotation, where loading is maintained during failure. Conclusions are drawn about the wider implications of this research and recommendations made on the direction of future research in this field.

Keywords: steel moment connections, high strain rates, dynamic loading, experimental testing

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Authors: Oznur Ispir, Oya Celebi Cakiroglu, Esengul Elibol, Emine Ceribas, Gizem Acikgoz, Hande Yesilbas, Merve Tarhan

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This study was conducted to evaluate the academic staff teaching the 'Nursing Management' course in the undergraduate nursing programs of the state universities in Turkey and to assess the current content of the course. Design of the study is descriptive. Population of the study consists of seventy-eight undergraduate nursing programs in the state universities in Turkey. The questionnaire/survey prepared by the researchers was used as a data collection tool. The data were obtained by screening the content of the websites of nursing education programs between March and May 2016. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. The research performed within the study indicated that 58% of the undergraduate nursing programs from which the data were derived were included in the school of health, 81% of the academic staff graduated from the undergraduate nursing programs, 40% worked as a lecturer and 37% specialized in a field other than the nursing. The research also implied that the above-mentioned course was included in 98% of the programs from which it was possible to obtain data. The full name of the course was 'Nursing Management' in 95% of the programs and 98% stated that the course was compulsory. Theory and application hours were 3.13 and 2.91, respectively. Moreover, the content of the course was not shared in 65% of the programs reviewed. This study demonstrated that the experience and expertise of the academic staff teaching the 'Nursing Management' course was not sufficient in the management area, and the schedule and content of the course were not sufficient although many nursing education programs provided the course. Comparison between the curricula of the course revealed significant differences.

Keywords: nursing, nursing management, nursing management course, undergraduate program

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Authors: Qiyao Han, Xianhai Meng

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Urban infrastructures refer to the fundamental facilities and systems that serve cities. Due to the global climate change and human activities in recent years, many urban areas around the world are facing enormous challenges from natural and man-made disasters, like flood, earthquake and terrorist attack. For this reason, urban resilience to disasters has attracted increasing attention from researchers and practitioners. Given the complexity of infrastructure systems and the uncertainty of disasters, this paper suggests that studies of resilience could focus on urban functional sustainability (in social, economic and environmental dimensions) supported by infrastructure systems under disturbance. It is supposed that urban infrastructure systems with high resilience should be able to reconfigure themselves without significant declines in critical functions (services), such as primary productivity, hydrological cycles, social relations and economic prosperity. Despite that some methods have been developed to integrate the resilience and sustainability of individual infrastructure components, more work is needed to enable system-level integration. This research presents a conceptual analysis framework for integrating resilience and sustainability based on fractal theory. It is believed that the ability of an ecological system to maintain structure and function in face of disturbance and to reorganize following disturbance-driven change is largely dependent on its self-similar and hierarchical fractal structure, in which cross-scale resilience is produced by the replication of ecosystem processes dominating at different levels. Urban infrastructure systems are analogous to ecological systems because they are interconnected, complex and adaptive, are comprised of interconnected components, and exhibit characteristic scaling properties. Therefore, analyzing resilience of ecological system provides a better understanding about the dynamics and interactions of infrastructure systems. This paper discusses fractal characteristics of ecosystem resilience, reviews literature related to system-level infrastructure resilience, identifies resilience criteria associated with sustainability dimensions, and develops a conceptual analysis framework. Exploration of the relevance of identified criteria to fractal characteristics reveals that there is a great potential to analyze infrastructure systems based on fractal. In the conceptual analysis framework, it is proposed that in order to be resilient, urban infrastructure system needs to be capable of “maintaining” and “reorganizing” multi-scale critical functions under disasters. Finally, the paper identifies areas where further research efforts are needed.

Keywords: fractal, urban infrastructure, sustainability, system-level resilience

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Authors: Nino Abesadze, Marine Mindorashvili, Nino Paresashvili

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At present actual tourism indicators cannot be calculated in Georgia, making it impossible to perform their quantitative analysis. Therefore, the study conducted by us is highly important from a theoretical as well as practical standpoint. The main purpose of the article is to make complex statistical analysis of tourist expenses of foreign visitors and to calculate statistical attractiveness indices of the tourism potential of Georgia. During the research, the method involving random and proportional selection has been applied. Computer software SPSS was used to compute statistical data for corresponding analysis. Corresponding methodology of tourism statistics was implemented according to international standards. Important information was collected and grouped from major Georgian airports, and a representative population of foreign visitors and a rule of selection of respondents were determined. The results show a trend of growth in tourist numbers and the share of tourists from post-soviet countries are constantly increasing. The level of satisfaction with tourist facilities and quality of service has improved, but still we have a problem of disparity between the service quality and the prices. The design of tourist expenses of foreign visitors is diverse; competitiveness of tourist products of Georgian tourist companies is higher. Attractiveness of popular cities of Georgia has increased by 43%.

Keywords: tourist, expenses, indexes, statistics, analysis

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Authors: Eleni Karasavvidou

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Social and anthropological research, parallel to Gender Studies, highlighted the relationship between social structures and symbolic forms as an important field of interaction and recording of 'social trends.' Since the study of representations can contribute to the understanding of the social functions and power relations, they encompass. This ‘mirage,’ however, has not only to do with the representations themselves but also with the ways they are received and the film or critical narratives that are established as dominant or alternative. Cinema and the criticism of its cultural products are no exception. Even in the rapidly changing media landscape of the 21st century, movies remain an integral and widespread part of popular culture, making films an extremely powerful means of 'legitimizing' or 'delegitimizing' visions of domination and commonsensical gender stereotypes throughout society. And yet it is film criticism, the 'language per se,' that legitimizes, reinforces, rewards and reproduces (or at least ignores) the stereotypical depictions of female roles that remain common in the realm of film images. This creates the need for this issue to have emerged (also) in academic research questioning gender criteria in film reviews as part of the effort for an inclusive art and society. Qualitative content analysis is used to examine female roles in selected Oscar-nominated films against their reviews from leading websites and newspapers. This method was chosen because of the complex nature of the depictions in the films and the narratives they evoke. The films were divided into basic scenes depicting social functions, such as love and work relationships, positions of power and their function, which were analyzed by content analysis, with borrowings from structuralism (Gennette) and the local/universal images of intercultural philology (Wierlacher). In addition to the measurement of the general ‘representation-time’ by gender, other qualitative characteristics were also analyzed, such as: speaking time, sayings or key actions, overall quality of the character's action in relation to the development of the scenario and social representations in general, as well as quantitatively (insufficient number of female lead roles, fewer key supporting roles, relatively few female directors and people in the production chain and how they might affect screen representations. The quantitative analysis in this study was used to complement the qualitative content analysis. Then the focus shifted to the criteria of film criticism and to the rhetorical narratives that exclude or highlight in relation to gender identities and functions. In the criteria and language of film criticism, stereotypes are often reproduced or allegedly overturned within the framework of apolitical "identity politics," which mainly addresses the surface of a self-referential cultural-consumer product without connecting it more deeply with the material and cultural life. One of the prime examples of this failure is the Bechtel Test, which tracks whether female characters speak in a film regardless of whether women's stories are represented or not in the films analyzed. If perceived unbiased male filmmakers still fail to tell truly feminist stories, the same is the case with the criteria of criticism and the related interventions.

Keywords: representations, context analysis, reviews, sexist stereotypes

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Authors: Umukoro Omonigho Simon, Ashaolu David ‘Diya, Aroyewun-Olaleye Temitope Folashade

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The VELMA Action to Reduce Cybercrime (ARC) is an initiative, the first of its kind in Nigeria, designed to identify, rehabilitate and empower repentant cybercrime offenders popularly known as ‘yahoo boys’ in Nigerian parlance. Velma ARC provides social inclusion boot camps with the goal of rehabilitating cybercriminals via psychotherapeutic interventions, improving their IT skills, and empowering them to make constructive contributions to society. This report highlights the psychological interventions provided for participants of the maiden edition of the Velma ARC boot camp and presents the outcomes of these interventions. The boot camp was set up in a hotel premises which was booked solely for the 1 month event. The participants were selected and invited via the Velma online recruitment portal based on an objective double-blind selection process from a pool of potential participants who signified interest via the registration portal. The participants were first taken through psychological profiling (personality, symptomology and psychopathology) before the individual and group sessions began. They were profiled using the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory -2- Restructured Form (MMPI-2-RF), the latest version of its series. Individual psychotherapy sessions were conducted for all participants based on what was interpreted on their profiles. Focus group discussion was held later to discuss a movie titled ‘catch me if you can’ directed by Steven Spielberg, featuring Leonardo De Caprio and Tom Hanks. The movie was based on the true life story of Frank Abagnale, who was a notorious scammer and con artist in his youthful years. Emergent themes from the movie were discussed as psycho-educative parameters for the participants. The overall evaluation of outcomes from the VELMA ARC rehabilitation boot camp stemmed from a disaggregated assessment of observed changes which are summarized in the final report of the clinical psychologist and was detailed enough to infer genuine repentance and positive change in attitude towards cybercrime among the participants. Follow up services were incorporated to validate initial observations. This gives credence to the potency of the psycho-educative intervention provided during the Velma ARC boot camp. It was recommended that support and collaborations from the government and other agencies/individuals would assist the VELMA foundation in expanding the scope and quality of the Velma ARC initiative as an additional requirement for cybercrime offenders following incarceration.

Keywords: Velma-ARC, cybercrime offenders, rehabilitation, Nigeria

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Authors: E. Feulefack Songong, A. Zingoni

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A vibration is a mechanical phenomenon whereby oscillations occur about an equilibrium point. Although vibrations can be linear or nonlinear depending on the basic components of the system, the interest is mostly pointed towards nonlinear vibrations. This is because most structures around us are to some extent nonlinear and also because we need more accurate values in an analysis. The goal of this research is the integration of nonlinearities in the development and validation of structural models and to ameliorate the resistance of structures when subjected to loads. Although there exist many types of nonlinearities, this thesis will mostly focus on the vibration of free and undamped systems incorporating nonlinearity due to stiffness. Nonlinear stiffness has been a concern to many engineers in general and Civil engineers in particular because it is an important factor that can bring a good modification and amelioration to the response of structures when subjected to loads. The analysis of systems will be done analytically and then numerically to validate the analytical results. We will first show the benefit and importance of stiffness nonlinearity when it is implemented in the structure. Secondly, We will show how its integration in the structure can improve not only the structure’s performance but also its response when subjected to loads. The results of this study will be valuable to practicing engineers as well as industry practitioners in developing better designs and tools for their structures and mechanical devices. They will also serve to engineers to design lighter and stronger structures and to give good predictions as for the behavior of structures when subjected to external loads.

Keywords: elastic foundation, nonlinear, plates, stiffness, structures, vibration

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Authors: Temitope D. Awobusuyi, Eric O. Amonsou, Muthulisi Siwela

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Amahewu, a lactic acid fermented non-alcoholic maize based beverage is widely consumed in Southern Africa. It is traditionally made with white maize which is deficient in vitamin A. Provitamin A-biofortified maize has been developed for use as a complementary strategy to alleviate vitamin A deficiency. In this study the nutritional composition and protein digestibility of amahewu produced using provitamin A-biofortified maize was determined. Provitamin A-biofortified amahewu was processed by fermenting cooked maize porridge using malted provitamin A-biofortified maize, wheat bran and lactobacillus mixed starter culture with either malted maize or wheat bran. The total provitamin A content in amahewu products ranged from 3.3-3.8 μg/g (DW). The % retention of total provitamin A ranged from 79 %- 90 % μg/g (DW). The lowest % retention was observed in products fermented with the addition of starter culture. The gross energy of amahewu products were approx. 20 MJ/kg. There was a slight increase in the lysine content of amahewu after fermentation. Protein digestibility of amahewu (approx.91%) was slightly higher compared to unprocessed provitamin A maize (86%). However, a general decrease was observed in the minerals when compared to the unprocessed provitamin A maize. Amahewu processed using starter cultures has higher iron content than those processed with the addition of malt. These result suggests that provitamin A-biofortified amahewu has the potential to make a significant contribution towards alleviating Vitamin A Deficiency in rural communities who are also the most vulnerable to VAD.

Keywords: vitamin A deficiency, provitamin A maize, biofortification, fermentation

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Authors: M. Bredice, M. B. Forleo, L. Quici

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Coastal tourism is currently facing huge challenges on how to balance environmental problems and tourist activities. Recent literature shows a growing interest in the issue of sustainable tourism from a so-called civilized tourists’ perspective by investigating opinions, perceptions, and behaviors. This study investigates the opinions of youth on what makes them responsible tourists and the ability of coastal marine areas to support tourism in future scenarios. A sample of 778 Italians attending the last year of high school was interviewed. Descriptive statistics, tests, and cluster analyses are applied to highlight the distribution of opinions among youth, detect significant differences based on demographic characteristics, and make segmentation of the different profiles based on students’ opinions and behaviors. Preliminary results show that students are largely convinced (62%) that by 2050 the quality of coastal environments could limit seaside tourism, while 10% of them believe that the problem can be solved simply by changing the tourist destination. Besides the cost of the holiday, the most relevant aspect respondents consider when choosing a marine destination is the presence of tourist attractions followed by the quality of the marine-coastal environment, the specificity of the local gastronomy and cultural traditions, and finally, the activities offered to guests such as sports and events. The reduction of waste and lower air emissions are considered the most important environmental areas in which marine-coastal tourism activities can contribute to preserving the quality of seas and coasts. Areas in which, as a tourist, they believe possible to give a personal contribution were (responses “very much” and “somewhat”); do not throw litter in the sea and on the beach (84%), do not buy single-use plastic products (66%), do not use soap or shampoo when showering in beaches (53%), do not have bonfires (47%), do not damage dunes (46%), and do not remove natural materials (e.g., sand, shells) from the beach (46%). About 6% of the sample stated that they were not interested in contributing to the aforementioned activities, while another 7% replied that they could not contribute at all. Finally, 80% of the sample has never participated in voluntary environmental initiatives or citizen science projects; moreover, about 64% of the students have never participated in events organized by environmental associations in marine or coastal areas. Regarding the test analysis -based on Kruskal-Wallis and Mann and Whitney tests - gender, region, and studying area of students reveals significance in terms of variables expressing knowledge and interest in sustainability topics and sustainable tourism behaviors. The classification of the education field is significant for a great number of variables, among which those related to several sustainable behaviors that respondents declare to be able to contribute as tourists. The ongoing cluster analysis will reveal different profiles in the sample and relevant variables. Based on preliminary results, implications are envisaged in the fields of education, policy, and business strategies for sustainable scenarios. Under these perspectives, the study has the potential to contribute to the conference debate about marine and coastal sustainable development and management.

Keywords: cluster analysis, education, knowledge, young people

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

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

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

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Authors: A. Elsayed, M. H. Dewaidar, M. Ghali

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We report on deposition of smooth, pinhole-free, low-surface roughness ( < 4nm) and high optical quality cadmium sulfide (CdS) thin films on glass substrates using our new method based on chemical surface deposition principle. In this method, cadmium acetate and thiourea are used as reactants under special growth conditions for deposition of CdS films. X-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements were used to examine the crystal structure properties of the deposited CdS films. In addition, UV-vis transmittance and low-temperature (4K) photoluminescence (PL) measurements were performed for quantifying optical properties of the deposited films. Interestingly, we found that XRD pattern of the deposited films has dramatically changed when the growth temperature was raised during the reaction. Namely, the XRD measurements reveal a structural change of CdS film from Cubic to Hexagonal phase upon increase in the growth temperature from 75 °C to 200 °C. Furthermore, the deposited films show high optical quality as confirmed from observation of both sharp edge in the transmittance spectra and strong PL intensity at room temperature. Also, we found a strong effect of the growth conditions on the optical band gap of the deposited films; where remarkable red-shift in the absorption edge with temperature is clearly seen in both transmission and PL spectra. Such tuning of both optical band gap and crystal structure of the deposited CdS films; can be utilized for tuning the electronic bands alignments between CdS and other light harvesting materials, like CuInGaSe or CdTe, for potential improvement in the efficiency of all-solution processed solar cells devices based on these heterostructures.

Keywords: thin film, CdS, new method, optical properties

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Authors: A. Flora, A. Di Lascio, D. Cardone, G. Gesualdi, G. Perrone

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This paper considers the seismic assessment and retrofit of a pilotis-type RC frame building, which was designed for gravity loads only, prior to the introduction of seismic design provisions. Pilotis-type RC frame buildings, featuring an uniform infill throughout the height and an open ground floor, were, and still are, quite popular all over the world, as they offer large open areas very suitable for retail space at the ground floor. These architectural advantages, however, are of detriment to the building seismic behavior, as they can determine a soft-storey collapse mechanism. Extensive numerical analyses are carried out to quantify and benchmark the performance of the selected building, both in terms of overall collapse capacity and expected losses. Alternative retrofit strategies are then examined, including: (i) steel jacketing of RC columns and beam-column joints, (ii) steel bracing and (iv) seismic isolation. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) of the selected case-study building, pre- and post-rehabilitation, is evaluated, following a probabilistic approach. The breakeven time of each solution is computed, comparing the initial cost of the retrofit intervention with expected benefit in terms of EAL reduction.

Keywords: expected annual loss, reinforced concrete buildings, seismic loss assessment, seismic retrofit

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Authors: Peifei Zhu, Zisheng Li, Yasuki Kakishita, Mayumi Suzuki, Tomoaki Chono

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Segmentation of left ventricle (LV) from cardiac ultrasound images provides a quantitative functional analysis of the heart to diagnose disease. Active Shape Model (ASM) is a widely used approach for LV segmentation but suffers from the drawback that initialization of the shape model is not sufficiently close to the target, especially when dealing with abnormal shapes in disease. In this work, a two-step framework is proposed to improve the accuracy and speed of the model-based segmentation. Firstly, a robust and efficient detector based on Hough forest is proposed to localize cardiac feature points, and such points are used to predict the initial fitting of the LV shape model. Secondly, to achieve more accurate and detailed segmentation, ASM is applied to further fit the LV shape model to the cardiac ultrasound image. The performance of the proposed method is evaluated on a dataset of 800 cardiac ultrasound images that are mostly of abnormal shapes. The proposed method is compared to several combinations of ASM and existing initialization methods. The experiment results demonstrate that the accuracy of feature point detection for initialization was improved by 40% compared to the existing methods. Moreover, the proposed method significantly reduces the number of necessary ASM fitting loops, thus speeding up the whole segmentation process. Therefore, the proposed method is able to achieve more accurate and efficient segmentation results and is applicable to unusual shapes of heart with cardiac diseases, such as left atrial enlargement.

Keywords: hough forest, active shape model, segmentation, cardiac left ventricle

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Authors: Hadjer Chellia

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In the light of the recent global pandemic, different issues in educational research seem to invite careful considerations. Following this perspective, this study sets out to question the concept of classroom management in an EFL higher education context during Covid-19. In order to gain an in-depth understanding of their experiences, 6 EFL teachers from different Algerian universities took part in semi-structured interviews. The main emerging themes revealed that EFL teachers have different pedagogical practices in relation to classroom management during the global crisis than those of normal times. In relation to flexible education theory, the teachers’ experiences suggest flexible classroom management during Covid-19; flexibility in the teaching methods, approach and design, flexibility in time, flexibility in space and pace (speed), flexibility in assessment modes and flexibility in coping with students’ well-being. The flexibility awareness helps them to develop readiness towards the future, mainly in terms of maintaining an appropriate pedagogy to face the future crisis. In terms of theoretical concepts, working on classroom management under unusual circumstances in relation to flexible education helped come out with the concept of flexible classroom management (FCM) and virtual classroom management (VCM). It is then important for educators and researchers to rethink different pedagogical concepts and mind a careful application in the case of unusual times.

Keywords: Covid-19, EFL educators, flexible classroom management, flexible education, virtual classroom management

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Authors: Binay Pattanayak

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Multilingual state, Jharkhand is home to more than 19 tribal and regional languages. These are used by more than 33 communities in the state. The state has declared 12 of these languages as official languages of the state. However, schools in the state do not recognize any of these community languages even in early grades! Children, who speak in their mother tongues at home, local market and playground, find it very difficult to understand their teacher and textbooks in school. They fail to acquire basic literacy and numeracy skills in early grades. Out of frustration due to lack of comprehension, the majority of children leave school. Jharkhand sees the highest dropout in early grades in India. To address this, the state under the guidance of the author designed a mother tongue based pre-school education programme named Bhasha Puliya and bilingual picture dictionaries in 9 tribal and regional mother tongues of children. This contributed significantly to children’s school readiness in the school. Followed by this, the state designed a mother-tongue based multilingual education programme (MTB-MLE) for multilingual context. The author guided textbook development in 5 tribal (Santhali, Mundari, Ho, Kurukh and Kharia) and two regional (Odia and Bangla) languages. Teachers and community members were trained for MTB-MLE in around 1,000 schools of the concerned language pockets. Community resource groups were constituted along with their academic calendars in each school to promote story-telling, singing, painting, dancing, riddles, etc. with community support. This, on the one hand, created rich learning environments for children. On the other hand, the communities have discovered a great potential in the process of developing a wide variety of learning materials for children in own mother-tongue using their local stories, songs, riddles, paintings, idioms, skits, etc. as a process of their literary, cultural and technical enrichment. The majority of children are acquiring strong early grade reading skills (basic literacy and numeracy) in grades I-II thereby getting well prepared for higher studies. In a phased manner they are learning Hindi and English after 4-5 years of MTB-MLE using the foundational language learning skills. Community members have started designing new books, audio-visual learning materials in their mother-tongues seeing a great potential for their cultural and technological rejuvenation.

Keywords: community resource groups, MTB-MLE, multilingual, socio-linguistic survey, learning

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Authors: Ernest Tambo, Ghislaine Madjou, Jeanne Y. Ngogang, Shenglan Tang, Zhou XiaoNong

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Implementing national to community-based 'One Health' surveillance approach for human, animal and environmental consequences mitigation offers great opportunities and value-added in sustainable development and wellbeing. 'One Health' surveillance approach global partnerships, policy commitment and financial investment are much needed in addressing the evolving threats and epidemics crises mitigation in African countries. The paper provides insights onto how China-Africa health development cooperation in promoting “One Health” surveillance approach in response advocacy and mitigation. China-Africa health development initiatives provide new prospects in guiding and moving forward appropriate and evidence-based advocacy and mitigation management approaches and strategies in attaining Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Early and continuous quality and timely surveillance data collection and coordinated information sharing practices in malaria and other diseases are demonstrated in Comoros, Zanzibar, Ghana and Cameroon. Improvements of variety of access to contextual sources and network of data sharing platforms are needed in guiding evidence-based and tailored detection and response to unusual hazardous events. Moreover, understanding threats and diseases trends, frontline or point of care response delivery is crucial to promote integrated and sustainable targeted local, national “One Health” surveillance and response approach needs implementation. Importantly, operational guidelines are vital in increasing coherent financing and national workforce capacity development mechanisms. Strengthening participatory partnerships, collaboration and monitoring strategies in achieving global health agenda effectiveness in Africa. At the same enhancing surveillance data information streams reporting and dissemination usefulness in informing policies decisions, health systems programming and financial mobilization and prioritized allocation pre, during and post threats and epidemics crises programs strengths and weaknesses. Thus, capitalizing on “One Health” surveillance and response approach advocacy and mitigation implementation is timely in consolidating Africa Union 2063 agenda and Africa renaissance capabilities and expectations.

Keywords: Africa, one health approach, surveillance, response

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Authors: Amna Khaliq

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This research project centers on Canadian business leaders’ phenomenological online education expansion by navigating the challenges faced by strategic leaders concerning the expansion of online education in the Canadian higher education sector from a business perspective. The study identifies the problems and opportunities of faculty members’ transition from traditional face-to-face to online instruction, particularly in the context of technology-enhanced learning (TEL), and their influence on the growth strategies of Canadian educational institutions. It explores strategic leaders’ approaches and the impact of emerging technologies to assist with developing and executing business strategies to expand online education in Canada. As online education has gained prominence in the country, this research addresses a relevant business problem for educational institutions. The research employs a phenomenological approach in the qualitative research design to conduct this investigation. The study interviews eighteen faculty members engaged in online education in Canada. The interview data is analyzed to answer the three research questions for strategic leaders to expand online education with higher education institutions in Canada. The recommendations include 1) data privacy, infrastructure, security, and technology, 2) support and training for student engagement, 3) accessibility and inclusion, and 4) collaboration among institutions associated with expanding online education.

Keywords: strategic leadership, Canada, education, technology

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Authors: Zamira Sattinova, Tassybek Bekenov

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The article is devoted to modeling the technology of hot casting of beryllium oxide ceramics. The stages of ultrasonic activation of beryllium oxide slurry in the plant vessel to improve the rheological property, hot casting in the moulding cavity with cooling and solidification of the casting are described. Thermoplastic slurry (hereinafter referred to as slurry) shows the rheology of a non-Newtonian fluid with yield and plastic viscosity. Cooling-solidification of the slurry in the forming cavity occurs in the liquid, taking into account crystallization and solid state. In this work is the method of calculation of hot casting of the slurry using the method of effective molecular viscosity of viscoplastic fluid. It is shown that the slurry near the cooled wall is in a state of crystallization and plasticity, and the rest may still be in the liquid phase. Nonuniform distribution of temperature, density and concentration of kinetically free binder takes place along the cavity section. This leads to compensation of shrinkage by the influx of slurry from the liquid into the crystallization zones and plasticity of the castings. In the plasticity zone, the shrinkage determined by the concentration of kinetically free binder is compensated under the action of the pressure gradient. The solidification mechanism, as well as the mechanical behavior of the casting mass during casting, the rheological and thermophysical properties of the thermoplastic BeO slurry due to ultrasound exposure have not been well studied. Nevertheless, experimental data allow us to conclude that the effect of ultrasonic vibrations on the slurry mass leads to it: a change in structure, an increase in technological properties, a decrease in heterogeneity and a change in rheological properties. In the course of experiments, the effect of ultrasonic treatment and its duration on the change in viscosity and ultimate shear stress of the slurry depending on temperature (55-75℃) and the mass fraction of the binder (10 - 11.7%) have been studied. At the same time, changes in these properties before and after ultrasound exposure have been analyzed, as well as the nature of the flow in the system under study. The experience of operating the unit with ultrasonic impact has shown that at the same time, the casting capacity of the slurry increases by an average of 15%, and the viscosity decreases by more than half. Experimental study of physicochemical properties and phase change with simultaneous consideration of all factors affecting the quality of products in the process of continuous casting is labor-intensive. Therefore, an effective way to control the physical processes occurring in the formation of articles with predetermined properties and shapes is to simulate the process and determine its basic characteristics. The results of the calculations show the whole stage of hot casting of beryllium oxide slurry, taking into account the change in its state of aggregation. Ultrasonic treatment improves rheological properties and increases the fluidity of the slurry in the forming cavity. Calculations show the influence of velocity, temperature factors and structural data of the cavity on the cooling-solidification process of the casting. In the calculations, conditions for molding with shrinkage of the slurry by hot casting have been found, which makes it possible to obtain a solidifying product with a uniform beryllium oxide structure at the outlet of the cavity.

Keywords: hot casting, thermoplastic slurry molding, shrinkage, beryllium oxide

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Authors: Rita Ghosh, Joykrishna Dey

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PEG-based amphiphiles are of tremendous importance for its widespread applications in pharmaceutics, household purposes, and drug delivery. Previously, a number of single PEG-tailed amphiphiles having significant applications have been reported from our group. Therefore, it was of immense interest to explore the properties and application potential of PEG-based double tailed amphiphiles. Herein, for the first time, two novel double PEG-tailed amphiphiles having different PEG chain lengths have been developed. The self-assembly behavior of the newly developed amphiphiles in aqueous buffer (pH 7.0) was thoroughly investigated at 25 oC by a number of techniques including, 1H-NMR, and steady-state and time-dependent fluorescence spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering, transmission electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, and isothermal titration calorimetry. Despite having two polar PEG chains both molecules were found to have strong tendency to self-assemble in aqueous buffered solution above a very low concentration. Surprisingly, the amphiphiles were shown to form stable vesicles spontaneously at room temperature without any external stimuli. The results of calorimetric measurements showed that the vesicle formation is driven by the hydrophobic effect (positive entropy change) of the system, which is associated with the helix-to-random coil transition of the PEG chain. The spectroscopic data confirmed that the bilayer membrane of the vesicles is constituted by the PEG chains of the amphiphilic molecule. Interestingly, the vesicles were also found to exhibit structural transitions upon addition of salts in solution. These properties of the vesicles enable them as potential candidate for drug delivery.

Keywords: double-tailed amphiphiles, fluorescence, microscopy, PEG, vesicles

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Authors: Ahmed Alghurabi, Mysara Mohyaldinn, Shiferaw Jufar, Obai Younis, Abdullah Abduljabbar

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Erosion modeling equations were typically acquired from regulated experimental trials for solid particles entrained in single-phase or multi-phase flows. Evidently, those equations were later employed to predict the erosion damage caused by the continuous impacts of solid particles entrained in streamflow. It is also well-known that the particle impact angle and velocity do not change drastically in gas-sand flow erosion prediction; hence an accurate prediction of erosion can be projected. On the contrary, high-density fluid flows, such as water flow, through complex geometries, such as sand screens, greatly affect the sand particles’ trajectories/tracks and consequently impact the erosion rate predictions. Particle tracking models and erosion equations are frequently applied simultaneously as a method to improve erosion visualization and estimation. In the present work, computational fluid dynamic (CFD)-based erosion modeling was performed using a commercially available software; ANSYS Fluent. The continuous phase (water flow) behavior was simulated using the realizable K-epsilon model, and the secondary phase (solid particles), having a 5% flow concentration, was tracked with the help of the discrete phase model (DPM). To accomplish a successful erosion modeling, three erosion equations from the literature were utilized and introduced to the ANSYS Fluent software to predict the screen wire-slot velocity surge and estimate the maximum erosion rates on the screen surface. Results of turbulent kinetic energy, turbulence intensity, dissipation rate, the total pressure on the screen, screen wall shear stress, and flow velocity vectors were presented and discussed. Moreover, the particle tracks and path-lines were also demonstrated based on their residence time, velocity magnitude, and flow turbulence. On one hand, results from the utilized erosion equations have shown similarities in screen erosion patterns, locations, and DPM concentrations. On the other hand, the model equations estimated slightly different values of maximum erosion rates of the wire-wrapped screen. This is solely based on the fact that the utilized erosion equations were developed with some assumptions that are controlled by the experimental lab conditions.

Keywords: CFD simulation, erosion rate prediction, material loss due to erosion, water-sand flow

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Authors: Evgeny E. Tereshatov, C. M. Folden

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Ionic liquids and deep eutectic mixtures represent so-called non-conventional solvents. The former, composed of discrete ions, is a salt with a melting temperature below 100°С. The latter, consisting of hydrogen bond donors and acceptors, is a mixture of at least two compounds, resulting in a melting temperature depression in comparison with that of the individual moiety. These systems also can be water-immiscible, which makes them applicable for metal extraction. This work will cover interactions of In, Tl, Ir, and Rh in hydrochloric acid media with eutectic mixtures and Er, Ir, and At in a gas phase with chemically modified α-detectors. The purpose is to study chemical systems based on non-conventional solvents in terms of their interaction with metals. Once promising systems are found, the next step is to modify the surface of α-detectors used in the online element production at cyclotrons to get the detector chemical selectivity. Initially, the metal interactions are studied by means of the liquid-liquid extraction technique. Then appropriate molecules are chemisorbed on the surrogate surface first to understand the coating quality. Finally, a detector is covered with the same molecule, and the metal sorption on such detectors is studied in the online regime. It was found that chemical treatment of the surface can result in 99% coverage with a monolayer formation. This surface is chemically active and can adsorb metals from hydrochloric acid solutions. Similarly, a detector surface was modified and tested during cyclotron-based experiments. Thus, a procedure of detectors functionalization has been developed, and this opens an interesting opportunity of studying chemisorption of elements which do not have stable isotopes.

Keywords: mechanism, radioisotopes, solvent extraction, gas phase sorption

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