Search results for: straw paper

Authors: Okike Benjamin

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Terrorism is the use of violence and threat to intimidate or coerce a person, group, society or even government especially for political purposes. Terrorism may be a way of resisting government by some group who may feel marginalized. It could also be a way of expressing displeasure over the activities of government. On 26th December, 2009, US placed Nigeria as a terrorist nation. Recently, the occurrences of terrorism in Nigeria have increased considerably. In Jos, Plateau state, Nigeria, there was a bomb blast which claimed many lives on the eve of 2010 Christmas. Similarly, there was another bomb blast in Mugadishi (Sani Abacha) Barracks Mammy market on the eve of 2011 New Year. For some time now, it is no longer news that bomb exploded in some Northern part of Nigeria. About 25 years ago, stopping terrorism in America by the Americans relied on old-fashioned tools such as strict physical security at vulnerable places, intelligence gathering by government agents, or individuals, vigilance on the part of all citizens, and a sense of community in which citizens do what could be done to protect each other. Just as technology has virtually been used to better the way many other things are done, so also this powerful new weapon called computer technology can be used to detect and prevent terrorism not only in Nigeria, but all over the world. This paper will x-ray the possible causes and effects of bomb blast, which is an act of terrorism and suggest ways in which Explosive Detection Devices (EDDs) and computer software technology could be deployed to reduce the occurrences of terrorism in Nigeria. This become necessary with the abduction of over 200 schoolgirls in Chibok, Borno State from their hostel by members of Boko Haram sect members on 14th April, 2014. Presently, Barrack Obama and other world leaders have sent some of their military personnel to help rescue those innocent schoolgirls whose offence is simply seeking to acquire western education which the sect strongly believe is forbidden.

Keywords: terrorism, bomb blast, computer technology, explosive detection devices, Nigeria

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Authors: R. Al-Dujele, K. A. Cashell

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A tubular flange girder is an I-shaped steel girder with either one of both of the usual flat flange plates replaced with a hollow section. Typically, these hollow sections are either rectangular or circular in shape. Concrete filled tubular flange girders (CFTFGs) are unconventional I-shaped beams that use a hollow structural section as the top flange which is filled with concrete. The resulting section offers very high lateral torsional buckling strength and stiffness compared with conventional steel I-beams of similar depth, width and weight, typically leading to a reduction in lateral bracing requirements. This paper is focussed on investigating the ultimate capacity of concrete filled rectangular tubular flange girders (CFRTFGs). These are complex members and their behaviour is governed by a number of inter-related parameters. The FE model is developed using ABAQUS software, 3-D finite element (FE) model for simply supported CFRTFGs subjected to two point loads applied at the third-span points is built. An initial geometrical imperfection of (L/1000), as well as geometrical and material nonlinearities, are introduced into the model, where L denotes the span of the girder. In this numerical model, the concrete and steel materials are modelled using eight-node solid and four-node shell elements, respectively. In addition to the FE model, simplified analytical expressions for the flexural capacity are also proposed, and the results are compared to those from the FE analyses. The analytical expressions, which are suitable for design, are also shown to be capable of providing an accurate depiction of the bending moment capacity.

Keywords: concrete-filled rectangular tubular flange girders, ultimate capacity, confining effect, finite element analysis

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Authors: Kenneth Nhundu, Leocadia Zhou, Farhad Aghdasi, Voster Muchenje

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Climate change poses increased risks to rural communities that rely on natural resources, such as forests, cropland and rangeland, waterways, and open spaces Because of their connection to the land and the potential for climate change to impact natural resources and disrupt ecosystems and seasons, rural livelihoods and well-being are disproportionately vulnerable to climate change. Climate change has the potential to affect the environment in a number of ways that place increased stress on everyone, but disproportionately on the most vulnerable populations, including the young, the old, those with chronic illness, and the poor. The communities in the study area are predominantly rural, resource-based and are generally surrounded by public or private lands that are dominated by natural resources, including forests, rangelands, and agriculture. The livelihoods of these communities are tied to natural resources. Therefore, targeted strategies to cope will be required. This paper assessed the household socio-economic characteristics and their implications to household vulnerability to climate change impacts in the rural Eastern Cape Province, South Africa. The results indicate that the rural communities are climate-vulnerable populations as they have a large proportion of people who are less economically or physically capable of adapting to climate change. The study therefore recommends that at each level, the needs, knowledge, and voices of vulnerable populations, including indigenous peoples and resource-based communities, deserve consideration and incorporation so that climate change policy (1) ensures that all people are supported and able to act, (2) provides as robust a strategy as possible to address a rapidly changing environment, and (3) enhances equity and justice.

Keywords: climate change, vulnerable, socio-economic, livelihoods

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Authors: Samuel Asiedu-Addo, Jonathan Annan, Yarhands Dissou Arthur

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The study aims to explore the relational effect of lecturers’ personal attribute on student’s interest in statistics. In this study personal attributes of lecturers’ such as lecturer’s dynamism, communication strategies and rapport in the classroom as well as applied knowledge during lecture were examined. Here, exploratory research design was used to establish the effect of lecturer’s personal attributes on student’s interest. Data were analyzed by means of confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling (SEM) using the SmartPLS 3 program. The study recruited 376 students from the faculty of technical and vocational education of the University of Education Winneba Kumasi campus, and Ghana Technology University College as well as Kwame Nkrumah University of science and Technology. The results revealed that personal attributes of an effective lecturer were lecturer’s dynamism, rapport, communication and applied knowledge contribute (52.9%) in explaining students interest in statistics. Our regression analysis and structural equation modeling confirm that lecturers personal attribute contribute effectively by predicting student’s interest of 52.9% and 53.7% respectively. The paper concludes that the total effect of a lecturer’s attribute on student’s interest is moderate and significant. While a lecturer’s communication and dynamism were found to contribute positively to students’ interest, they were insignificant in predicting students’ interest. We further showed that a lecturer’s personal attributes such as applied knowledge and rapport have positive and significant effect on tertiary student’s interest in statistic, whilst lecturers’ communication and dynamism do not significantly affect student interest in statistics; though positively related.

Keywords: student interest, effective teacher, personal attributes, regression and SEM

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Authors: Ilgoun Kim, Jongpil Jeong

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Recently, a connected industrial parks (CIPs) architecture using new technologies such as RFID, cloud computing, CPS, Big Data, 5G 5G, IIOT, VR-AR, and ventral AI algorithms based on IoT has been proposed. This researcher noted the vehicle junction problem (VJP) as a more specific detail of the CIPs architectural models. The VJP noted by this researcher includes 'efficient AI physical connection challenges for vehicles' through ventilation, 'financial and financial issues with complex vehicle physical connections,' and 'welfare and working conditions of the performing personnel involved in complex vehicle physical connections.' In this paper, we propose a public solution architecture for the 'electronic financial problem of complex vehicle physical connections' as a detailed task during the vehicle junction problem (VJP). The researcher sought solutions to businesses, consumers, and Korean social problems through technological advancement. We studied how the beneficiaries of technological development can benefit from technological development with many consumers in Korean society and many small and small Korean company managers, not some specific companies. In order to more specifically implement the connected industrial parks (CIPs) architecture using the new technology, we noted the vehicle junction problem (VJP) within the smart factory industrial complex and noted the process of achieving the vehicle junction problem performance among several electronic processes. This researcher proposes a more detailed, integrated public finance enterprise architecture among the overall CIPs architectures. The main details of the public integrated financial enterprise architecture were largely organized into four main categories: 'business', 'data', 'technique', and 'finance'.

Keywords: enterprise architecture, IT Finance, smart logistics, CIPs

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Authors: Renato Roda

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With the emergence of the so-called 'Knowledge Society', the implementation of policies to attract, grow and retain talents, in an academic context as well, has become critical –both in the perspective of didactics and research and as far as administration and institutional management are concerned. At the same time, the contemporary philanthropic entities/organizations, which are evolving from traditional types of social support towards new styles of aid, envisaged to go beyond mere monetary donations, face the challenge of brand-new forms of complexity in supporting such specific dynamics of the global human capital market. In this sense, it becomes unavoidable for the philanthropic foundation, while carrying out their daily charitable tasks, to resort to innovative ways to facilitate the acquisition and the promotion of talents by academic and research institutions. In order to deepen such a specific perspective, this paper features the case of Turin, former 'factory city' of Italy’s North West, headquarters -and main reference territory- of Italy’s largest and richest private formerly bank-based philanthropic foundation, the Fondazione Compagnia di San Paolo. While it was assessed and classified as 'medium' in the city Global Talent Competitiveness Index (GTCI) of 2020, Turin has nevertheless acquired over the past months status of impact laboratory for a whole series of innovation strategies in the competition for the acquisition of excellence human capital. Leading actors of this new city vision are the foundations with their specifically adjusted financial engagement and a consistent role of stimulus towards innovation for research and education institutions.

Keywords: human capital, post-Fordism, private foundation, war on talents

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Authors: Isaac Kofi Mensah

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Governments around the world are adopting Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) because of the important opportunities it provides through E-government (EG) to modernize government public administration processes and delivery of quality and efficient public services. Almost every country in the world is adopting ICT in its public sector administration (EG) to modernize and change the traditional process of government, increase citizen engagement and participation in governance, as well as the provision of timely information to citizens. This paper, therefore, seeks to present the adoption, development and implementation of EG in regions globally, as well as the ICT indicators around the world, which are making EG initiatives successful. Europe leads the world in its EG adoption and development index, followed by the Americas, Asia, Oceania and Africa. There is a gradual growth in ICT indicators in terms of the increase in Internet access and usage, increase in broadband penetration, an increase of individuals using the Internet at home and a decline in fixed telephone use, while the mobile cellular phone has been on the increase year-on-year. Though the lack of ICT infrastructure is a major challenge to EG adoption and implementation around the world, in Africa it is very pervasive, hampering the expansion of Internet access and provision of broadband, and hence is a barrier to the successful adoption, development, and implementation of EG initiatives in countries on the continent. But with the general improvement and increase in ICT indicators around the world, it provides countries in Europe, Americas, Asia, Arab States, Oceania and Africa with the huge opportunity to enhance public service delivery through the adoption of EG. Countries within these regions cannot fail their citizens who desire to enjoy an enhanced and efficient public service delivery from government and its many state institutions.

Keywords: e-government development index, e-government, indicators, information and communication technologies (ICTs)

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Authors: Yuekun Chen, Yousef Sardahi, Salam Hajjar, Christopher Greer

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This paper presents a multi-objective optimal design of a cascade control system for an underactuated mechanical system. Cascade control structures usually include two control algorithms (inner and outer). To design such a control system properly, the following conflicting objectives should be considered at the same time: 1) the inner closed-loop control must be faster than the outer one, 2) the inner loop should fast reject any disturbance and prevent it from propagating to the outer loop, 3) the controlled system should be insensitive to measurement noise, and 4) the controlled system should be driven by optimal energy. Such a control problem can be formulated as a multi-objective optimization problem such that the optimal trade-offs among these design goals are found. To authors best knowledge, such a problem has not been studied in multi-objective settings so far. In this work, an underactuated mechanical system consisting of a rotary servo motor and a ball and beam is used for the computer simulations, the setup parameters of the inner and outer control systems are tuned by NSGA-II (Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm), and the dominancy concept is used to find the optimal design points. The solution of this problem is not a single optimal cascade control, but rather a set of optimal cascade controllers (called Pareto set) which represent the optimal trade-offs among the selected design criteria. The function evaluation of the Pareto set is called the Pareto front. The solution set is introduced to the decision-maker who can choose any point to implement. The simulation results in terms of Pareto front and time responses to external signals show the competing nature among the design objectives. The presented study may become the basis for multi-objective optimal design of multi-loop control systems.

Keywords: cascade control, multi-Loop control systems, multiobjective optimization, optimal control

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Authors: Selman Cagman

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A detailed analysis is made within an organized industrial zone (OIZ) that has 1165 production facilities such as manufacturing of furniture, fabricated metal products (machinery and equipment), food products, plastic and rubber products, machinery and equipment, non-metallic mineral products, electrical equipment, textile products, and manufacture of wood and cork products. In this OIZ, a field study is done by choosing some facilities that can represent the whole OIZ sectoral distribution. In this manner, there are 207 facilities included to the site visit, and there is a 17 questioned survey carried out with each of them to assess their inputs, outputs, and waste amounts during manufacturing processes. The survey result identify that MDF/Particleboard and chipboard particles, textile, food, foam rubber, sludge (treatment sludge, phosphate-paint sludge, etc.), plastic, paper and packaging, scrap metal (aluminum shavings, steel shavings, iron scrap, profile scrap, etc.), slag (coal slag), ceramic fracture, ash from the fluidized bed are the wastes come from these facilities. As a result, there are 5 industrial symbiosis projects established with this study. One of the projects is a 2.840 kW capacity Integrated Biomass Based Waste Incineration-Energy Production Facility running on 35.000 tons/year of MDF particles and chipboard waste. Another project is a biogas plant with 225 tons/year whey, 100 tons/year of sesame husk, 40 tons/year of burnt wafer dough, and 2.000 tons/year biscuit waste. These two plants investment costs and operational costs are given in detail. The payback time of the 2.840 kW plant is almost 4 years and the biogas plant is around 6 years.

Keywords: industrial symbiosis, energy, biogas, waste to incineration

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Authors: Yang Liandong

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The rapid development of cities has triggered a series of urban health problems. Residents' daily lives have generally changed to long-term unhealthy work and rest, and the prevalence of chronic diseases in the population is on the rise. Promoting physical activity is an effective way to enhance the population's health and reduce the risk of various chronic diseases. As the most basic unit of the city, the community is the living space where residents use the highest frequency of daily activities and also the best space carrier for people to carry out all kinds of physical activities, and its planning research is of great significance for promoting physical activities. Under special conditions, the old communities in mountainous cities present compact and three-dimensional spatial characteristics, and there are problems such as disordered spatial organization, scattered distribution, and low utilization rates. This paper selects four communities in Daxigou Street, Yuzhong District, Chongqing as the research object, analyzes the current situation of the research cases through literature combing and field investigation and interviews, and puts forward the planning strategies for promoting physical activity in old communities in mountain cities from four aspects: building a convenient and smooth public space system, creating a diversified and shared activity space, creating a beautiful and healing community landscape, and providing convenient and perfect supporting facilities, to provide a certain reference for the healthy development of old communities in mountain cities.

Keywords: physical activity, community planning, old communities in mountain cities, public space optimization, spatial fairness

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Authors: Fernando Seabra, Giulia P. Flores, Karolina C. Gomes

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Trade liberalizations measures, as import tariff cuts, are not a sufficient trigger for trade growth. Given that price margins are narrow, traders and cargo operators tend to opt out of markets where the process of goods clearance is slow and costly. Excess paperwork and slow customs dispatch not only lead to institutional breakdowns and corruption but also to increasing transaction cost and trade constraints. The objective of this paper is, therefore, two-fold: First, to evaluate the relationship between institutional and infrastructural performance indexes and trade growth in container throughput; and, second, to investigate the causes for differences in container demurrage and detention fees in Latin American countries (using other emerging countries as benchmarking). The analysis is focused on manufactured goods, typically transported by containers. Institutional and infrastructure bottlenecks and, therefore, the country logistics efficiency – measured by the Logistics Performance Index (LPI, World Bank-WB) – are compared with other indexes, such as the Doing Business index (WB) and the Corruption Perception Index (Transparency International). The main results based on the comparison between Latin American countries and the others emerging countries point out in that the growth in containers trade is directly related to LPI performance. It has also been found that the main hypothesis is valid as aspects that more specifically identify trade facilitation and corruption are significant drivers of logistics performance. The exam of port efficiency (demurrage and detention fees) has demonstrated that not necessarily higher level of efficiency is related to lower charges; however, reductions in fees have been more significant within non-Latin American emerging countries.

Keywords: corruption, logistics performance index, container throughput, Latin America

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Authors: Zakir H. Shaik, Punam L. Vartak

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Management By Objectives (MBO) is a management technique in which objectives of an organisation are conveyed to the employees to establish the individual goals. These objectives and goals are then monitored and assessed jointly by management and the employee time to time. This tool can be used for planning, monitoring as well as for performance appraisal. The success of an organisation is largely dependent on its’s Vision. Thus, it is of paramount importance to achieve the realm of vision through a mission which is well crafted within the organisation to address the objectives. The success of the mission depends upon how realistic and action oriented philosophical approach, an organisation caters to; and how the individual goals are set to track and meet the objectives. Thus, focused and passionate efforts of the team, assigned for the mission, are an absolute obligation for achieving the vision of any organisation. Any construction site is generally a controlled disorder having huge investments, resources and logistics involved. The Construction progression is time-consuming with many isolated as well as interconnected activities. Traditional MBO approach can be unsuccessful if planning and control is non-realistic and inflexible. Moreover, the Construction Industry is far behind understanding these concepts. It is important to address the employee engagement in defining and creating awareness to achieve the targets. Besides, current economic environment and competitive world demands refined management tools to achieve profit, growth and survival of the business. Therefore, the necessity of rational MBO becomes vital part towards the success of an organisation. This paper details about the philosophical assumptions to develop the grounded theory in lieu of achieving objectives through RATIONAL MBO approach in Construction Contracting Organisations. The goals and objectives of the Construction Contracting Organisations can be achieved efficiently by adopting this RATIONAL MBO approach, as those are based on realistic, logical and balanced assumptions.

Keywords: growth, leadership, management by objectives, Management By Objectives (MBO), profit, rational

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Authors: V. Prodocimo, A. Malucelli, S. Reinehr

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Organizations, driven by business digitization, have in software the main core of value generation and the main channel of communication with their clients. The software, as well as responding to momentary market needs, spans an extensive product family, ranging from mobile applications to multilateral platforms. Thus, the software specification needs to represent solutions focused on consumer problems and market needs. However, requirements engineering, whose approach is strongly linked to technology, becomes deficient and ineffective when the problem is not well defined or when looking for an innovative solution, thus needing a complementary approach. Research has cited the combination of design thinking and requirements engineering, many correlating design thinking as a support technique for the elicitation step, however, little is known about the real benefits and challenges that this combination can bring. From the point of view of the development process, there is little empirical evidence of how Design Thinking interactions with requirements engineering occur. Given this scenario, this paper aims to understand how design thinking practices are applied in each of the requirements engineering stages in software projects. To elucidate these interactions, a qualitative and exploratory research was carried out through the application of the case study method in IT organizations in Brazil that work in the development of software projects. The results indicate that design thinking has aided requirements engineering, both in projects that adopt agile methods and those that adopt the waterfall process, bringing a complementary thought that seeks to build the best software solution design for business problems. It was also possible to conclude that organizations choose to use design thinking not based on a specific software family (e.g. mobile or desktop applications), but given the characteristics of the software projects, such as: vague nature of the problem, complex problems and/or need for innovative solutions.

Keywords: software engineering, requirements engineering, design thinking, innovative solutions

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Authors: Arzyana Sunkar, Yanto Santosa

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The expansions of independent smallholdings in Indonesia are feared to increase the negative ecological impacts of oil palm plantation on biodiversity. Hence, research is required to identify the conservation importance of independent smallholder oil palm plantations on biodiversity. This paper discussed the role of independent smallholdings in the conservation of biodiversity in oil palm plantations and to compare it with High Conservation Value Forest as a conservation standard of RSPO. The research was conducted from March to April 2016. Data on biodiversity were collected on 16 plantations and 8 private oil palm plantations in the Districts of Kampar, Pelalawan, Kuantan, Singingi and Siak of Riau Province, Indonesia. In addition, data on community environmental perceptions of both smallholder plantation and High Conservation Value (HCV) Forest were also collected. Species that were observed were birds and earthworms. Data on birds were collected using transect method, while identification of earthworm was determine by taking some soil samples and counting the number of individual earthworm found for each worm species. The research used direct interview with oil palm owners and community members, as well as direct observation to examine the environmental conditions of each plantation. In general, field observation and measurement have found that birds species richness was higher in the forested HCV Forest. Nevertheless, if compared to non-forested HCV, bird’s species richness was higher in the independent smallholdings. On the other hand, different results were observed for earthworm, where the density was higher in the independent smallholdings than in the HCV. It can be concluded from this research that managing independent smallholder oil palm plantations and forested HCV forest could enhance biodiversity conservation. The results of this study justified the importance of retaining forested area to safeguard biodiversity in oil palm plantation.

Keywords: biodiversity conservation, high conservation value forest, independent smallholdings, oil palm plantations

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Authors: Thais Cavalheri Santos, Pedro Jose Gabriel Ferreira, Alexandre Daliberto Frugoli, Lucio Leonardo, Pedro Americo Frugoli

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This paper presents a low cost education proposal to be used in engineering courses. The engineering education in universities of a developing country that is in need of an increasing number of engineers carried out with quality and affordably, pose a difficult problem to solve. In Brazil, the political and economic scenario requires academic managers able to reduce costs without compromising the quality of education. Within this context, the elaboration of a physics principles teaching method with the construction of an electronic balance is proposed. First, a method to develop and construct a load cell through which the students can understand the physical principle of strain gauges and bridge circuit will be proposed. The load cell structure was made with aluminum 6351T6, in dimensions of 80 mm x 13 mm x 13 mm and for its instrumentation, a complete Wheatstone Bridge was assembled with strain gauges of 350 ohms. Additionally, the process involves the use of a software tool to document the prototypes (design circuits), the conditioning of the signal, a microcontroller, C language programming as well as the development of the prototype. The project also intends to use an open-source I/O board (Arduino Microcontroller). To design the circuit, the Fritizing software will be used and, to program the controller, an open-source software named IDE®. A load cell was chosen because strain gauges have accuracy and their use has several applications in the industry. A prototype was developed for this study, and it confirmed the affordability of this educational idea. Furthermore, the goal of this proposal is to motivate the students to understand the several possible applications in high technology of the use of load cells and microcontroller.

Keywords: Arduino, load cell, low-cost education, strain gauge

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Authors: Reiko Yamamoto

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This paper reports on how synchrony occurs between children and their teacher, and what prevents or facilitates synchrony. The aim of the experiment conducted in this study was to precisely analyze their movements and synchrony and reveal the process of synchrony in a real-world classroom. Specifically, the experiment was conducted for around 20 minutes during an English as a foreign language (EFL) lesson. The participants were 11 fourth-grade school children and their classroom teacher in a public elementary school in Japan. Previous researchers assert that synchrony causes the state of flow in a class. For checking the level of flow, Short Flow State Scale (SFSS) was adopted. The experimental procedure had four steps: 1) The teacher read aloud the first half of an English storybook to the children. Both the teacher and the children were at their own desks. 2) The children were subjected to an SFSS check. 3) The teacher read aloud the remaining half of the storybook to the children. She made the children remove their desks before reading. 4) The children were again subjected to an SFSS check. The movements of all participants were recorded with a video camera. From the movement analysis, it was found that the children synchronized better with the teacher in Step 3 than in Step 1, and that the teacher’s movement became free and outstanding without a desk. This implies that the desk acted as a barrier between the children and the teacher. Removal of this barrier resulted in the children’s reactions becoming synchronized with those of the teacher. The SFSS results proved that the children experienced more flow without a barrier than with a barrier. Apparently, synchrony is what caused flow or social emotions in the classroom. The main conclusion is that synchrony leads to cognitive outcomes such as children’s academic performance in EFL learning.

Keywords: engagement in a class, English as a foreign language (EFL) learning, interactional synchrony, social emotions

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Authors: Chen Jun-Hong, He Pu, Tao Wen-Quan

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Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) is the most promising future energy source owing to its low operating temperature, high energy efficiency, high power density, and environmental friendliness. In this paper, a comprehensive PEMFC system control-oriented model is developed in the Matlab/Simulink environment, which includes the hydrogen supply subsystem, air supply subsystem, and thermal management subsystem. Besides, Improved Artificial Bee Colony (IABC) is used in the parameter identification of PEMFC semi-empirical equations, making the maximum relative error between simulation data and the experimental data less than 0.4%. Operation temperature is essential for PEMFC, both high and low temperatures are disadvantageous. In the thermal management subsystem, water pump and fan are both controlled with the PID controller to maintain the appreciate operation temperature of PEMFC for the requirements of safe and efficient operation. To improve the control effect further, fuzzy control is introduced to optimize the PID controller of the pump, and the Radial Basis Function (RBF) neural network is introduced to optimize the PID controller of the fan. The results demonstrate that Fuzzy-PID and RBF-PID can achieve a better control effect with 22.66% decrease in Integral Absolute Error Criterion (IAE) of T_st (Temperature of PEMFC) and 77.56% decrease in IAE of T_in (Temperature of inlet cooling water) compared with traditional PID. In the end, a novel thermal management structure is proposed, which uses the cooling air passing through the main radiator to continue cooling the secondary radiator. In this thermal management structure, the parasitic power dissipation can be reduced by 69.94%, and the control effect can be improved with a 52.88% decrease in IAE of T_in under the same controller.

Keywords: PEMFC system, parameter identification, temperature control, Fuzzy-PID, RBF-PID, parasitic power

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Authors: Myisha Ahmad, G. M. Jahid Hasan

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Electricity is the pinnacle of human civilization. At present, the growing concerns over significant climate change have intensified the importance of the use of renewable energy technologies for electricity generation. The interest is primarily due to better energy security, smaller environmental impact and providing a sustainable alternative compared to the conventional energy sources. Solar power, wind, biomass, tidal power, and wave power are some of the most reliable sources of renewable energy. Ocean approximately holds 2×10³ TW of energy and has the largest renewable energy resource on the planet. Ocean energy has many forms namely, encompassing tides, ocean circulation, surface waves, salinity and thermal gradients. Ocean tide in particular, associates both potential and kinetic energy. The study is focused on the latter concept that deals with tidal current energy conversion technologies. Tidal streams or marine currents generate kinetic energy that can be extracted by marine current energy devices and converted into transmittable energy form. The principle of technology development is very comparable to that of wind turbines. Conversion of marine tidal resources into substantial electrical power offers immense opportunities to countries endowed with such resources and this work is aimed at addressing such prospects of Bangladesh. The study analyzed the extracted current velocities from numerical model works at several locations in the Bay of Bengal. Based on current magnitudes, directions and available technologies the most fitted locations were adopted and possible annual generation capacity was estimated. The paper also examines the future prospects of tidal current energy along the Bay of Bengal and establishes a constructive approach that could be adopted in future project developments.

Keywords: bay of Bengal, energy potential, renewable energy, tidal current

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Authors: Hussain Sajid, Jung-Hun Shin, Kum-Won Cho

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Image super-resolution is the most common computer vision problem with many important applications. Generative adversarial networks (GANs) have promoted remarkable advances in single-image super-resolution (SR) by recovering photo-realistic images. However, high memory requirements of GAN-based SR (mainly generators) lead to performance degradation and increased energy consumption, making it difficult to implement it onto resource-constricted devices. To relieve such a problem, In this paper, we introduce an optimized and highly efficient architecture for SR-GAN (generator) model by utilizing model compression techniques such as Knowledge Distillation and pruning, which work together to reduce the storage requirement of the model also increase in their performance. Our method begins with distilling the knowledge from a large pre-trained model to a lightweight model using different loss functions. Then, iterative weight pruning is applied to the distilled model to remove less significant weights based on their magnitude, resulting in a sparser network. Knowledge Distillation reduces the model size by 40%; pruning then reduces it further by 18%. To accelerate the learning process, we employ the Horovod framework for distributed training on a cluster of 2 nodes, each with 8 GPUs, resulting in improved training performance and faster convergence. Experimental results on various benchmarks demonstrate that the proposed compressed model significantly outperforms state-of-the-art methods in terms of peak signal-to-noise ratio (PSNR), structural similarity index measure (SSIM), and image quality for x4 super-resolution tasks.

Keywords: single-image super-resolution, generative adversarial networks, knowledge distillation, pruning

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Authors: K. Omkar, D. Nayan

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Rapid urbanization is one of the consequences of rapid population explosion, which has also led to massive increase in number of motorized vehicles essential for carrying out all activities needed for sustaining urban livelihood. With this increased use of motorized vehicles over the time there has also been an increase in number of accidents. Study of road network and geometric features are essential to tackle problems of road accidents in any district or town. The increase in road accidents is one of the burning issues in the present society. Records show that there is one death at every 3.7 minutes because of road accident. It has been found from the research that, accidents occur due to, mistakes of the driver (86%) followed by bad street condition (5%), mistake of pedestrian (4%), as well as technical and maintenance defects (1%). Here, case study of Ahmedabad, Gujarat is taken up where first road safety level is assessed considering various parameters. The study confined to accident characteristics of all types of vehicles. For deeper analysis, road safety index for various stretches in Ahmedabad was found out. Crash rate for same stretches was found out. Based on various parameters priority was decided so that which stretch should be look out first to minimize road accidents on that stretch and which stretch should look out last. The major findings of the study are that accident severity of Ahmedabad has increased, but accident fatality risk has decreased; thus there is need to undertake some traffic engineering measures or make some traffic rules that are strictly followed by traffic. From the above study and literature studied it is found that Ahmedabad is suffering from similar problem of accidents and injuries and deaths caused by them, after properly investigating the issue short-term and long-term solutions to minimize road accidents have been presented in this paper.

Keywords: accident severity index, accident fatality rate, accident fatality risk, accident risk, road safety index

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Authors: Gunay Imanguliyeva

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Burnout is one of the concerning issues in education. The present paper aimed to explore the concept of burnout among program directors and faculty working in three higher education institutions (HEIs) in Azerbaijan and identify the factors contributing to burnout and the possible consequences of this syndrome on research participants’ professional and personal life. The researcher believed that if the concept of burnout was defined precisely and explored among more faculty, administration, and educational institutions, university leadership may have looked for the ways to support program directors and faculty, which would increase job satisfaction and decrease turnover. An exploratory qualitative research design was chosen for this study. The conceptual framework of this study was based on the Maslach Burnout Inventory. The instruments of the research were semi-structured interviews, observation, and document review. Three EFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) instructors and three program directors of the English Language Department working in three higher educational institutions in Azerbaijan participated in this study. The major findings of this study showed that both program directors and faculty suffered from burnout. Though they were aware of the factors that caused burnout, they did not know how to deal with this feeling. While research participants had high feeling of Emotional Exhaustion and Depersonalization, they had a low feeling of Personal Accomplishment. The researcher suggests that further research is important to measure the level of burnout and to enable HEIs to increase the productivity of program directors’ and faculty’s work as well as decrease the rate of retention in future. Also, in order to help program directors and faculty to cope with burnout, the research recommends the university leadership to meet their psycho-social needs, emotional-physical needs, and personal-intellectual needs. Keywords: burnout, emotional exhaustion, factors, well-being, higher education

Keywords: burnout, well-being, higher education, factors

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Authors: Delna Shroff

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Merchant shipping is an occupation with a high rate of fatal injuries caused by organizational accidents and maritime disasters. In most accident investigations, the leader’s actions are under scrutiny and point out the necessity to investigate the leader’s decisions in critical conditions. While several leadership studies have been carried out in the past, there is a tendency for most research to focus on holders of formal positions. The unit of analysis in most studies has been the ‘individual.’ A need is, therefore, felt to adopt a practice-based perspective of leadership, understand how leadership emerges to affect maritime safety. This paper explores the phenomenon of distributed leadership among seafarers more holistically. It further examines the role of one form of distributed leadership, that is, planfully aligned leadership in the emergency response of the team. A mixed design will be applied. In the first phase, the data gathered by way of semi-structured interviews will be used to explore the seafarer’s implicit understanding of leadership. The data will be used to develop a conceptual framework of distributed leadership, specific to the maritime context. This framework will be used to develop a simulation. Experimental design will be used to examine the relationship between planfully aligned leadership and emergency response of the team members during navigation. Findings show that planfully aligned leadership significantly and positively predicts the emergency response of team members. Planfully aligned leadership leads to a better emergency response of the team members as compared to authoritarian leadership. In the third qualitative phase, additional data will be gathered through semi-structured interviews to further validate the findings to gain a more complete understanding of distributed leadership and its relation to emergency response. Above are the predictive results; the study expects to be a cornerstone of safety leadership research and has important implications for leadership development and training within the maritime industry.

Keywords: authoritarian leadership, distributed leadership, emergency response , planfully aligned leadership

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Authors: Nguyen Tien Thanh, Günter Meon

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Precipitation plays a key role in water cycle, defining the local climatic conditions and in ecosystem. It is also an important input parameter for water resources management and hydrologic models. With spatial continuous data, a certainty of discharge predictions or other environmental factors is unquestionably better than without. This is, however, not always willingly available to acquire for a small basin, especially for coastal region in Vietnam due to a low network of meteorological stations (30 stations) on long coast of 3260 km2. Furthermore, available gridded precipitation datasets are not fine enough when applying to hydrologic models. Under conditions of global warming, an application of spatial interpolation methods is a crucial for the climate change impact studies to obtain the spatial continuous data. In recent research projects, although some methods can perform better than others do, no methods draw the best results for all cases. The objective of this paper therefore, is to investigate different spatial interpolation methods for daily precipitation over a small basin (approximately 400 km2) located in coastal region, Southern Vietnam and find out the most efficient interpolation method on this catchment. The five different interpolation methods consisting of cressman, ordinary kriging, regression kriging, dual kriging and inverse distance weighting have been applied to identify the best method for the area of study on the spatio-temporal scale (daily, 10 km x 10 km). A 30-year precipitation database was created and merged into available gridded datasets. Finally, observed changes in constructed precipitation were performed. The results demonstrate that the method of ordinary kriging interpolation is an effective approach to analyze the daily precipitation. The mixed trends of increasing and decreasing monthly, seasonal and annual precipitation have documented at significant levels.

Keywords: interpolation, precipitation, trend, vietnam

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Authors: Bushra

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This paper explores the historical significance, ecological benefits, and contemporary applications of natural dyes in textile dyeing, aiming to provide a comprehensive overview of their potential to contribute to a sustainable fashion industry while minimizing ecological footprints. This research explores the potential of natural dyes as a sustainable alternative to synthetic dyes in the textile industry, examining their historical context, sources, and environmental benefits. Natural dyes come from plants, animals, and minerals, including roots, leaves, bark, fruits, flowers, insects, and metal salts, used as mordants to fix dyes to fabrics. Natural dyeing involves extraction, mordanting, and dyeing techniques. Optimizing these processes can enhance the performance of natural dyes, making them viable for contemporary textile applications based on experimental research. Natural dyes offer eco-friendly benefits like biodegradability, non-toxicity, and resource renewables, reducing pollution, promoting biodiversity, and reducing reliance on petrochemicals. Natural dyes offer benefits but face challenges in color consistency, scalability, and performance, requiring industrial production to meet modern consumer standards for durability and colorfastness. Contemporary initiatives in the textile industry include fashion brands like Eileen Fisher and Patagonia incorporating natural dyes, artisans like India Flint's Botanical Alchemy promoting traditional dyeing techniques, and research projects like the European Union's Horizon 2020 program. Natural dyes offer a sustainable textile industry solution, reducing environmental impact and promoting harmony with nature. Research and innovation are paving the way for widespread adoption, transforming textile dyeing.

Keywords: historical significance, textile industry, natural dyes, sustainability

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Authors: Belal Almassri, Amjad Kreit, Firas Al Mahmoud, Raoul François

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Corrosion of steel in reinforced concrete leads to several major defects. Firstly, a reduction in the crosssectional area of the reinforcement and in its ductility results in premature bar failure. Secondly, the expansion of the corrosion products causes concrete cracking and steel–concrete bond deterioration and also affects the bending stiffness of the reinforced concrete members, causing a reduction in the overall load-bearing capacity of the reinforced concrete beams. This paper investigates the validity of a repair technique using Near Surface Mounted (NSM) carbon-fibre-reinforced polymer (CFRP) rods to restore the mechanical performance of corrosion-damaged RC beams. In the NSM technique, the CFRP rods are placed inside pre-cut grooves and are bonded to the concrete with epoxy adhesive. Experimental results were obtained on two beams: a corroded beam that had been exposed to natural corrosion for 25 years and a control beam, (both are 3 m long) repaired in bending only. Each beam was repaired with one 6-mm-diameter NSM CFRP rod. The beams were tested in a three-point bending test up to failure. Overall stiffness and crack maps were studied before and after the repair. Ultimate capacity, ductility and failure mode were also reviewed. Finally some comparisons were made between repaired and non-repaired beams in order to assess the effectiveness of the NSM technique. The experimental results showed that the NSM technique improved the overall characteristics (ultimate load capacity and stiffness) of the control and corroded beams and allowed sufficient ductility to be restored to the repaired corroded elements, thus restoring the safety margin, despite the non-classical mode of failure that occurred in the corroded beam, with the separation of the concrete cover due to corrosion products.

Keywords: carbon fibre, corrosion, strength, mechanical testing

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Authors: Sze Yee Lee

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The death of a sibling in childhood leads to significant impacts on both the personal and family development of the surviving siblings. Yet, the effects of sibling loss in Chinese societies such as Hong Kong have been inadequately documented in the literature. In particular, there is a gap in the literature about the long term impacts on surviving siblings. This paper explores the experience of adult siblings encountering siblings’ death during childhood with the use of in-depth interviews. Through thematic analysis and in-depth interviews, the author explores the impacts on surviving siblings’ emotions, coping styles, struggles and challenges, and personal development. Furthermore, the influences on family dynamics are explored thoroughly, including the changes in a family atmosphere, family roles, family relationships, family communication, and parenting styles. More importantly, the author identifies (i) existing continuing bonds, (ii) crying, (iii) adequate social support, (iv) hiding own emotions as a gesture of protecting parents as the crucial elements pertinent to surviving siblings’ successful adaptation in the face of sibling loss. In addition, 'child-centered' and 'family-centered' interventions for families with siblings' death in a Chinese context are discussed. With the use of age-appropriate language and children’s participation in the preparation of death and after-death arrangements, surviving siblings could be assisted in transforming bereavement into opportunities for growth. In addition, the bereaved family could better cope with grief with open communication platforms, adequate social support, and family education resources. Meanwhile, life-and-death education at both school and community levels could enhance the public’s awareness and understanding of the bereaved individuals to prevent creating further harm to them.

Keywords: children and adolescent bereavement, children-centered, family-centered, sibling’s death

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Authors: Fernanda M. Assef, Maria Teresinha A. Steiner

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The aim of this paper is to compare and discuss better classifier algorithm options for credit risk assessment by applying different Machine Learning techniques. Using records from a Brazilian financial institution, this study uses a database of 5,432 companies that are clients of the bank, where 2,600 clients are classified as non-defaulters, 1,551 are classified as defaulters and 1,281 are temporarily defaulters, meaning that the clients are overdue on their payments for up 180 days. For each case, a total of 15 attributes was considered for a one-against-all assessment using four different techniques: Artificial Neural Networks Multilayer Perceptron (ANN-MLP), Artificial Neural Networks Radial Basis Functions (ANN-RBF), Logistic Regression (LR) and finally Support Vector Machines (SVM). For each method, different parameters were analyzed in order to obtain different results when the best of each technique was compared. Initially the data were coded in thermometer code (numerical attributes) or dummy coding (for nominal attributes). The methods were then evaluated for each parameter and the best result of each technique was compared in terms of accuracy, false positives, false negatives, true positives and true negatives. This comparison showed that the best method, in terms of accuracy, was ANN-RBF (79.20% for non-defaulter classification, 97.74% for defaulters and 75.37% for the temporarily defaulter classification). However, the best accuracy does not always represent the best technique. For instance, on the classification of temporarily defaulters, this technique, in terms of false positives, was surpassed by SVM, which had the lowest rate (0.07%) of false positive classifications. All these intrinsic details are discussed considering the results found, and an overview of what was presented is shown in the conclusion of this study.

Keywords: artificial neural networks (ANNs), classifier algorithms, credit risk assessment, logistic regression, machine Learning, support vector machines

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Authors: Xia Luo, Cheng Zeng

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Under the promotion of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council in 2017, Xiong'an New Area is the third crucial new area in China established after Shenzhen and Shanghai. Its constructions' significance lies in mitigating Beijing's non-capital functions and exploring a new mode of optimizing development in densely populated and economically intensive areas. For this purpose, developing underground logistics can assume the role of goods distribution in the capital, relieve the road transport pressure in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Urban Agglomeration, adjust and optimize the urban layout and spatial structure of it. Firstly, the construction planning of Xiong'an New Area and underground logistics development are summarized, especially the development status abroad, the development trend, and bottlenecks of underground logistics in China. This paper explores the technicality, feasibility, and necessity of four modes of transportation. There are pneumatic capsule pipeline (PCP) technology, the CargoCap technology, cable hauled mule, and automatic guided vehicle (AGV). The above technical parameters and characteristics are introduced to relevant experts or scholars. Through establishing an indicator system, carrying out a questionnaire survey with the Delphi method, the final suggestion is obtained: China should develop logistics vehicles similar to CargoCap, adopting rail mode and driverless mode. Based on China's temporal and spatial logistics demand and the geographical pattern of Xiong'an New Area, the construction scale, technical parameters, node location, and other vital parameters of underground logistics are planned. In this way, we hope to speed up the new area's construction and the logistics industry's innovation.

Keywords: the Xiong'an new area, underground logistics, contrastive analysis, CargoCap, logistics planning

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Authors: Behnoush Moghiminia, Jesus Anaya Diaz

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The current study attempts to present the relationship between the structure development and Patkaneh as one of the Iranian geometric patterns and parametric algorithms by introducing two practical methods. While having a structural function, Patkaneh is also used as an ornamental element. It can be helpful in the scientific and practical review of Patkaneh. The current study aims to use Patkaneh as a parametric form generator based on the algorithm. The current paper attempts to express how can a more complete algorithm of this covering be obtained based on the parametric study and analysis of a sample of a Patkaneh and also investigate the relationship between the development of the geometrical pattern of Patkaneh as a structural-decorative element of Iranian architecture and digital design. In this regard, to achieve the research purposes, researchers investigated the oldest type of Patkaneh in the architecture history of Iran, such as the Northern Entrance Patkaneh of Oshtorjan Jame’ Mosque. An accurate investigation was done on the history of the background to answer the questions. Then, by investigating the structural behavior of Patkaneh, the decorative or structural-decorative role of Patkaneh was investigated to eliminate the ambiguity. Then, the geometrical structure of Patkaneh was analyzed by introducing two practical methods. The first method is based on the constituent units of Patkaneh (Square and diamond) and investigating the interactive relationships between them in 2D and 3D. This method is appropriate for cases where there are rational and regular geometrical relationships. The second method is based on the separation of the floors and the investigation of their interrelation. It is practical when the constituent units are not geometrically regular and have numerous diversity. Finally, the parametric form algorithm of these methods was codified.

Keywords: geometric properties, parametric design, Patkaneh, structural analysis

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Authors: Linda Muswaka

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The Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996 ranks the Constitution as the Supreme law of the Republic. Law or conduct, inconsistent with the provisions of the Constitution is invalid to the extent of the inconsistency. The Constitution binds all persons and legislative, executive and judicial organs of the State at all levels of government. The Constitution embodies a Bill of Rights and expressly allows for judicial review. The introduction of a chapter of rights requires the judiciary to examine the decisions of the legislature and the executive. In a situation where these conflicts with the Bill of Rights, the judiciary have the constitutional power to overrule such decisions. In exercising its adjudicatory and interpretative powers, the judiciary sometimes arrives at unpopular decisions and accusations of judicial overreach are made. A problem, therefore, emerges on the issue of the separation of powers and judicial review. This paper proposes to, through the South African perspective, investigate the application of the doctrine of separation of powers and judicial review. In this regard, the qualitative method of research will be employed. The reason is that it is best suited to this type of study which entails a critical analysis of legal issues. The following findings are made: (i) a complete separation of powers is not possible. This is because some overlapping of the functions of the three branches of state are unavoidable; (ii) the powers vested in the judiciary does not make it more powerful than the executive and the legislature; (iii) interference by the judiciary in matters concerning other branches is not automatically, judicial overreach; and (iv) if both the executive and legislative organs of government adhere to their constitutional obligations there would be a decrease in the need for judicial interference through court adjudication. The researcher concludes by submitting that the judiciary should not derogate from their constitutionally mandated function of judicial review. The rationale being that that if the values contained in the Constitution are not scrupulously observed and their precepts not carried out conscientiously, the result will be a constitutional crisis of great magnitude.

Keywords: constitution, judicial review, judicial overreach, separation of powers

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