Search results for: demand trend of Algerian reinsurance

Authors: Sharon Kun-Amornpong

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In this paper, ASEAN financial integration will be discussed from the perspective of the rule of law. The methodology of the paper is comparative regionalism. It will compare the role of the rule of law in ASEAN financial integration with that of the European Union with particular focuses on, for example, institutions and values. The paper argues that in the realm of financial integration, the rule of law is one of the most important factors that could help strengthen and promote financial integration in ASEAN. This is despite the fact that the ‘ASEAN Way’ emphasises non-interference and utilises a consensus-based cooperation rather than formal institutions. Nevertheless, the rule of law for ASEAN financial integration should be situated in its own historical, cultural, and political contexts. In addition, in the case of ASEAN, the rule of law cannot take root if it does not come from the demand of the people in this region. For instance, a reform or creation of legal institutions should not be imposed by international financial institutions. The paper will conclude that law has a normative force. It could shape expectation of market participants and promote deeper financial integration if norms that the law generates have become a significant norm in the society or industry.

Keywords: Association of Southeast Asian Nations, ASEAN, comparative regionalism, financial integration, the rule of law

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Authors: Jeremy Schultz

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The purpose of this study was to understand the perceptions of vineyard managers in the Krasnodar Region of Southern Russia located between the city of Kransnodar and the Black Sea. In recent years, wine tourism throughout the region has seen tremendous growth due in part to the concurrent growth in the number of tourists vacationing at the Black Sea. This trend has contributed to the development of large-scale wine operations developing in numerous rural locations along the tourists’ travel path. Niche areas of tourism, such as wine tourism, have proven to provide economic viability for rural communities all around the world. Understanding their shared group characteristics while honoring their unique qualities as individuals aids in responsible wine tourism development that provides a sense of well-being for the communities and stakeholders involved. Semi-structured interviews and lived experience methodologies were used in locations that were associated with wine food tourism operations. By understanding management perspectives, it lends insight into sustainable destination management and wine tourism product development, furthering our progress toward ethical, responsible, and financially feasible operations. This research also represents a collaborative effort between Russia and the United States that supports an agenda of sustainable destination development and management. As a global community, we need to continue to investigate stakeholder perceptions and strategic management techniques that best support the pillars upon which responsible tourism was founded.

Keywords: wine tourism, tourism development, Russia, rural tourism

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Authors: Mahdi Amne Elahi, Marcus Koch, Peter Plapper

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Due to the demand of miniaturizing in automotive industry, the application of laser welding is quite promising. The current study focused on laser micro-welding of CuSn6 bronze and nickel wire for a miniature electromechanical hybrid component. Due to the advantages of laser welding, the welding can be tailored specifically for the requirements of the part. Scanning electron and optical microscopy were implemented to study the microstructure and tensile-shear test was selected to represent the mechanical properties. Different welding sides, beam oscillations, and speeds have been investigated to optimize the tensile-shear load and microstructure. The results show that the mechanical properties and microstructure of the joint is highly under the influence of the mentioned parameters. Due to the lack of intermetallic compounds, the soundness of the joint is achievable by manipulating the geometry of the weld seam and minimize weld defects.

Keywords: bronze, laser micro-welding, microstructure, nickel, tensile shear test

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Authors: Chien-Kuo Chang, Yu-Hsiang Lin, Yi-Yun Tang, Min-Chiu Wu

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With the trend of technological advancement, the harm caused by power outages is substantial, mostly due to problems in the power grid. This highlights the necessity for further improvement in the reliability of the power system. In the power system, gas-insulated switches (GIS) and power cables play a crucial role. Long-term operation under high voltage can cause insulation materials in the equipment to crack, potentially leading to partial discharges. If these partial discharges (PD) can be analyzed, preventative maintenance and replacement of equipment can be carried out, there by improving the reliability of the power grid. This research will diagnose defects by identifying three different defects in GIS and three different defects in straight cable joints, for a total of six types of defects. The partial discharge data measured will be converted through phase analysis diagrams and pulse sequence analysis. Discharge features will be extracted using convolutional image processing, and three different deep learning models, CNN, ResNet18, and MobileNet, will be used for training and evaluation. Class Activation Mapping will be utilized to interpret the black-box problem of deep learning models, with each model achieving an accuracy rate of over 95%. Lastly, the overall model performance will be enhanced through an ensemble learning voting method.

Keywords: partial discharge, gas-insulated switches, straight cable joint, defect identification, deep learning, ensemble learning

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Authors: M. Al-Roumi, A. Al-Yaqout, A. Al-Baz

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Recently, sea cucumbers have shown to be significant to global trade and incomes due to their high commercial value for the pharmaceutical and cosmetics industry. This rising demand for sea cucumber products has created increasing harvest stress on the natural populations and led to the depletion of sea cucumbers stocks worldwide and accordingly there is a big concern on the marine environment's health worldwide. Few species have been reported and identified via morophlogical features only. Several sea cucumber species were collected from the North West side reefs at Qaruh Island, and the north side of Umm Al-Maradem Island in Kuwait waters, in the north-western Arabian Gulf, in order to identify the sea cucumber species available in the Kuwaiti waters. The identified species were Holothuria atra, Holothuria arenicola, Holothuria hilla and Holothuria impatiens. Species identification was made using morphological keys and review of their ossicles. This paper reports the species Stichopus hermanni from Kuwait.

Keywords: Stichopus hermanni, Kuwait waters, Arabian Gulf, ossicles

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Authors: Azadeh Mohajer Milani

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Urbanization constitutes an irreversible global trend, presenting myriad challenges such as heightened energy consumption, pollution, congestion, and the depletion of natural resources. Today's urban landscapes have emerged as focal points for economic, social, and environmental challenges, underscoring the pressing need for sustainable development. This article delves into the realm of sustainable urban development, concentrating on the pivotal role played by integrated green spaces as an optimal solution to address environmental concerns within cities. The study utilizes Tehran as a case study. Our findings underscore the imperative of preserving and expanding green spaces in urban areas, coupled with the establishment of well-designed ecological networks, to enhance environmental quality and elevate the sustainability of cities. Notably, Tehran's urban green spaces exhibit a disjointed design, lacking a cohesive network to connect various patches and corridors, resulting in significant environmental impacts. The results emphasize the necessity of a balanced and proportional distribution of urban green spaces and the creation of a cohesive patch-corridor-matrix network tailored to the ecological and social needs of residents. This approach is crucial for fostering a more sustainable and livable urban environment for all species, with a specific focus on humans.

Keywords: ecology, sustainable urban development, sustainable landscape, urban green space network

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Authors: Jesús Antonio Puente Fernández, Luis Javier Garcia Villalba

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New trends on streaming videos such as series or films require a high demand of network resources. This fact results in a huge problem within traditional IP networks due to the rigidity of its architecture. In this way, Software Defined Networks (SDN) is a new concept of network architecture that intends to be more flexible and it simplifies the management in networks with respect to the existing ones. These aspects are possible due to the separation of control plane (controller) and data plane (switches). Taking the advantage of this separated control, it is easy to deploy a monitoring tool independent of device vendors since the existing ones are dependent on the installation of specialized and expensive hardware. In this paper, we propose a framework that optimizes the traffic monitoring in SDN networks that decreases the number of monitoring queries to improve the network traffic and also reduces the overload. The performed experiments (with and without the optimization) using a video streaming delivery between two hosts demonstrate the feasibility of our monitoring proposal.

Keywords: optimization, monitoring, software defined networking, statistics, query

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Authors: Han Hyuk Cho, Hanik Jo

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In recent years, coding education has been globally emphasized, and the Free Semester System and coding education were introduced to the public schools from the beginning of 2016 and 2018 respectively in Korea. With the introduction of the Free Semester System and the rising demand of Computational Thinking (CT) capacity, this paper aims to design ‘Coding Environment’ and Minecraft-like Turtlecraft in which learners can design and construct mathematical objects through mathematical symbolic expressions. Students can transfer the constructed mathematical objects to the Turtlecraft environment (open-source codingmath website), and also can print them out through 3D printers. Furthermore, we design learnable mathematics and coding curriculum by representing the figurate numbers and patterns in terms of executable expression in the coding context and connecting them to algebraic symbols, which will allow students to experience mathematical patterns and symbolic coding expressions.

Keywords: coding education, computational thinking, mathematics education, TurtleMAL and Turtlecraft

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Authors: Daniel Edem Adzovie, Jakub Kudlac

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The subtle institutionalization of male dominance in the film industry in the 1930s and its rippling effect of gender imbalance especially, regarding female active participation in film industries across the globe in terms of number and influence, is a worrying trend. The main purpose of the study is to explore the role of gender themes, especially patriarchal themes in films, in influencing the disparity experienced in film industries. Partially, we examine the motivations vis-à-vis the demotivating factors that attract and or refract females from enrolling in film schools against their male contemporaries. Employing a qualitative inquiry with a specific focus on document analysis as well as experts’ opinions in order to ascertain the antecedents and consequences of patriarchal themes in films on female participation in film industries, we drew extant literature from reputable databases such as EBSCO, Scopus, Web of Science, ERIH Plus, Google Scholar as well as notable books on gender and film. Secondly, we conceptualized a research model for a future qualitative research design that could take into consideration a study from at least three different film industries and analyze using thematic analysis. This could help validate the proposed conceptual model of the study. The literature review revealed that culture, to a large extent, influences the patriarchal themes conveyed in films, which inhibits active female participation in film industries. Research implications have been discussed.

Keywords: film industry, female, gender, male dominance, patriarchal themes

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Authors: Jiajia Peng, Jianqing Qiu, Jianjun Ren, Yu Zhao

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Background: We aimed to compare clinical and survival differences between B-cell (B-NHL) and NKT-cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas (NKT-NHL) located in the nasal cavity, nasopharynx and paranasal sinuses, which are always categorized as one sinonasal type. Methods: Patients diagnosed with primary B-NHL and NKT-NHL in the nasal cavity, nasopharynx, and paranasal sinuses from the SEER database were included. We identified these patients based on histological types and anatomical sites and subsequently conducted univariate and multivariate Cox regression and Kaplan–Meier analyses to examine cancer-special survival (CSS) outcomes. Results: Overall, most B-NHL cases originated from the nasopharynx, while the majority of NKT-NHL cases occurred in the nasal cavity. Notably, the CSS outcomes improved significantly in all sinonasal B-NHL cases over time, whereas no such improvement trend was observed in each sinonasal NKT-NHL type. Additionally, increasing age was linked with an elevated risk of death in B-NHL, particularly in the nasal cavity (HR:3.37), rather than in NKT-NHL. Compared with B-NHL, the adverse effect of the higher stage on CSS was more evident in NKT-NHL, particularly in its nasopharynx site (HR: 5.12). Furthermore, radiotherapy was beneficial for survival in patients with sinonasal B-NHL and NKT-NHL, except in those with NKT-NHL in the nasopharynx site. However, chemotherapy has only been beneficial for CSS in patients with B-NHL in paranasal sinuses (HR: 0.42) since 2010, rather than in other types of B-NHL or NKT-NHL. Conclusions: Although B-NHL and NKT-NHL in the nasal cavity, nasopharynx and paranasal sinuses have similar anatomical locations, their clinic demographics and prognoses are largely different and should be treated and studied as distinct diseases.

Keywords: B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas, NKT-cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas, nasal cavity lymphomas, nasal sinuses lymphomas, nasopharynx lymphomas

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Authors: Salami Akeem Olanrewaju

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The transportation models or problems are primarily concerned with the optimal (best possible) way in which a product produced at different factories or plants (called supply origins) can be transported to a number of warehouses or customers (called demand destinations). The objective in a transportation problem is to fully satisfy the destination requirements within the operating production capacity constraints at the minimum possible cost. The objective of this study is to determine ways of minimizing transport cost in order to maximum profit. Data were gathered from the records of the Distribution Department of 7-Up Bottling Company Plc. Ilorin, Kwara State, Nigeria. The data were analyzed using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) while applying the three methods of solving a transportation problem. The three methods produced the same results; therefore, any of the method can be adopted by the company in transporting its final products to the wholesale dealers in order to minimize total production cost.

Keywords: cost minimization, resources utilization, distribution system, allocation problem

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Authors: Ahmad Saadiq, Neeraj Sahu

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The partial or full replacement of natural coarse aggregate by recycled concrete aggregate (RCA) is of great benefit to the environment, as the demand of natural coarse aggregate reduces. In the modern construction and practice, the use of RCA is limited to backfilling and road construction. The establishment of RCA for its wide application can only be done after having an understanding of the use of RCA in conventional concrete. To have an insight to this, various tests to determine the compressive strength, elastic strength, workability, durability and drying shrinkage tests can be done and the test results may be different from that obtained from natural coarse aggregates, by using natural coarse aggregate in concrete. This paper gives a comprehensive review of the said tests done on RCA concrete. The results obtained from the tests indicate that RCA concrete gives comparable compressive strength, stiffness, and workability relative to the corresponding results obtained from the natural coarse aggregates. However, the durability and drying shrinkage had more variance but well within recommended limits.

Keywords: aggregate, compressive strength, durability, modulus of elasticity, recycled concrete, shrinkage, workability

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Authors: Lorna Martha Dreyer

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Consistent with the changing paradigm on the rights of people with disabilities and in pursuit of social justice, there is internationally an increase in students with disabilities enrolling at Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). This trend challenges HEI’s to transform and attain Education for All (EFA) as a global imperative. However, while physical and sensory disabilities are observable, students with specific learning disabilities (SLD) do not present with any visible indications and are often referred to as “hidden” or “invisible” disabilities. This qualitative case study aimed to illuminate the experiences of students with SLDs at a South African university. The research was, therefore, guided by Vygotsky’s social-cultural theory (SCT). This research was conducted within a basic qualitative research methodology embedded in an interpretive paradigm. Data was collected through an online background survey and semi-structured interviews. Thematic qualitative content analysis was used to analyse the collected data systematically. From a social justice perspective, the major findings suggest that there are several factors that impede equal education for students with SLDs at university. Most participants in this small-scale study experienced a lack of acknowledgment and support from lecturers. They reported valuing the support of family and friends more than that of lecturers. It is concluded that lecturers need to be reflective of their pedagogical practices if authentic inclusion is to be realised.

Keywords: higher education, inclusive education, pedagogy, social-cultural theory, specific learning disabilities

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Authors: Santosh Ghosh, Vinod Kumar Yadav, Vivekananda Mukherjee, Ishta Garg

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India, akin to the rest of the world today, is grappling with balancing act between ever increasing demand for energy and alarmingly high level of green house gas emission, which is inevitable corollary of energy production in the conventional way. Researchers and energy policy makers around the world are now focusing on renewable energy (RE) technologies to find solution to this crisis. In India various agencies at both national and state level has been set up and bestowed with responsibility of development of renewable energy technologies, viz. Ministry of New Renewable Energy (MNRE), National Vidyut Vyapar Nigam Ltd. (NVVNL), Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency Limited (IREDA) and RE Development Agencies in respective states. In the present work, the preparedness of India in terms of forming institutional and policy frame work briefly discussed. Status of implementation of RE technologies state wise and of India as a whole, critically reviewed.

Keywords: energy policy, energy sustainability, renewable energy, IREDA

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Authors: Amin Eslami, Jafar Bolouri Bazaz

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Under active stress conditions, a rigid cantilever retaining wall tends to rotate about a pivot point located within the embedded depth of the wall. For purely granular and cohesive soils, a methodology was previously reported called minimization of moment ratio to determine the location of the pivot point of rotation. The usage of this new methodology is to estimate the rotational stability safety factor. Moreover, the degree of improvement required in a backfill to get a desired safety factor can be estimated by the concept of the shear strength demand. In this article, the accuracy of this method for another type of cantilever walls called Contiguous Bored Pile (CBP) retaining wall is evaluated by using physical modeling technique. Based on observations, the results of moment ratio minimization method are in good agreement with the results of the carried out physical modeling.

Keywords: cantilever retaining wall, physical modeling, minimization of moment ratio method, pivot point

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Authors: Zahid O. Alibrahim, Craig D. Williams, Clive L. Roberts

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The study area (Ecton mining area) is located in the southern part of the Peak District in Derbyshire, England. It is bounded by the River Manifold from the west. This area has been mined for a long period. As a result, huge amounts of potentially toxic metals were released into the surrounding area and are most likely to be a significant source of heavy metal contamination to the local soil, water and vegetation. In order to appraise the potential heavy metal pollution in this area, 37 topsoil samples (5-20 cm depth) were collected and analysed for their total content of Cu, Pb, Zn, Mn, Cr, Ni and V using ICP (Inductively Coupled Plasma) optical emission spectroscopy. Multivariate Geospatial analyses using the GIS technique were utilised to draw geochemical maps of the metals of interest over the study area. A few hotspot points, areas of elevated concentrations of metals, were specified, which are presumed to be the results of anthropogenic activities. In addition, the soil’s environmental quality was evaluated by calculating the Mullers’ Geoaccumulation index (I geo), which suggests that the degree of contamination of the investigated heavy metals has the following trend: Pb > Zn > Cu > Mn > Ni = Cr = V. Furthermore, the potential ecological risk, using the enrichment factor (EF), was also specified. On the basis of the calculated amount or the EF, the levels of pollution for the studied metals in the study area have the following order: Pb>Zn>Cu>Cr>V>Ni>Mn.

Keywords: enrichment factor, geoaccumulation index, GIS, heavy metals, multivariate analysis

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Authors: Christopher Baiyegunhi, Oswald Gwavava

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The location/source of the Beattie magnetic anomaly (BMA) and interconnectivity of geologic structures at depth have been a topic of investigation for over 30 years. Up to now, no relationship between geological structures (interconnectivity of dolerite intrusions) at depth has been established. Therefore, the environmental impact of fracking the Karoo for shale gas could not be assessed despite the fact that dolerite dykes are groundwater localizers in the Karoo. In this paper, we shed more light to the unanswered questions concerning the possible location of the source of the BMA, the connectivity of geologic structures like dolerite dykes and sills at depth and this relationship needs to be established before the tectonic evolution of the Karoo basin can be fully understood and related to fracking of the Karoo for shale gas. The result of the magnetic investigation and modelling of four gravity profiles that crosses the BMA in the study area reveals that the anomaly, which is part of the Beattie magnetic anomaly tends to divide into two anomalies and continue to trend in an NE-SW direction, the dominant gravity signatures is of long wavelength that is due to a deep source/interface inland and shallows towards the coast, the average depth to the top of the shallow and deep magnetic sources was estimated to be approximately 0.6 km and 15 km, respectively. The BMA become stronger with depth which could be an indication that the source(s) is deep possibly a buried body in the basement. The bean-shaped anomaly also behaves in a similar manner like the BMA thus it could possibly share the same source(s) with the BMA.

Keywords: Beattie magnetic anomaly, magnetic sources, modelling, Karoo Basin

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Authors: Syamsul Syafiq, Maslina Daud, Hafizah Hasan, Ahmad Zairi, Shazil Imri, Ezaini Akmar, Norbazilah Rahim

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Over recent years, web development has changed significantly. Driven largely by the rise of trends like mobiles, the world of development is rapidly evolving. The rise of the Internet makes web applications crucial nowadays. The web application has been an interface for a company and one of the ways they present their portfolio to the client. On the other hand, the web has become part of the file management system which takes over the role of paper. Due to high demand in web applications, developers are required to develop a web application that are cost-effective, secure and well coded. A framework has been proposed to develop an application rather than using library style development. The framework is helping the developer in creating the structure of a web automatically. This paper will compare the advantages and disadvantages of web development using framework against library-style development. This comparison is based on a previous research paper focusing on two main indicators, which are the impact to management and impact to the developer.

Keywords: framework, library style development, web application development, traditional web, static web, dynamic web

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Authors: Mehdi Damaliamiri, Firouzeh Akbari

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Teaching literature to children at an early age is of great importance, and there have been different methods to facilitate learning literature. Based on the law, all children going to school in Iran should learn the Persian language and literature. This has been concomitant with two different levels of learning related to urban or rural bilingualism. For bilingual children living in the villages, learning literature and a new language (Persian) turns into a big challenge as it is done based on the translation the teacher does while in the city, it is easier as the confrontation of children with the Persian language is more. Over recent years, to change the trend of learning Persian by children speaking another language, the TV and radio programs have been considered to be effective, but the scores of the students in Persian language national exams show that these programs have not been so effective for the bilingual students living in the villages. To identify the determinants of weak learning of Persian by bilingual children, two different regions were chosen, Turkish-speaking and Kurdish-speaking communities, to compare their learning of Persian at the first and second levels of elementary school. The criteria of learning was based on the syllabification of Persian words, word order in the sentence, and compound sentences. Students were taught in Persian how to recognize syllabification without letting them translate the words in their own languages and were asked to produce simple sentences in Persian in response to situational questions. Teaching methods, language relatedness with Persian, and exposure to social media programs, especially TV and radio, were the factors that were considered to affect the potential of children in learning Persian.

Keywords: bilingualism, persian, education, Literature

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Authors: Kamarul Fairuz Hassim, Sharifah Fatimah Syed-Ahmad

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New managerialism has become the current trend in managing public sector which emphasizes on efficiency, effectiveness, and accountability. Public universities are not exempted from experiencing this new system. This study tries to explore the direct impact of new managerialism towards work performance of the employees in a public university in Malaysia and the indirect impact through a mediating factor – Organizational Commitment. Feedback were gathered from 204 respondents comprises of academics and non-academics managers in the University of Malaya using a 39 items, self-administered questionnaire. Respondents’ views were asked in the aspects of managerialism level of the university, their organizational commitment, and self-rated work performance level. The findings exhibit that there is a direct impact of new managerialism towards employees’ work performance in a positive way. This is contradicting to the established Hypotheses of this study. Furthermore, there is no significant finding on the role of all three components of organizational commitment – affective, normative, and continuance as the mediating factors in new managerialism approach that gave impact towards work performance. Consequently these insignificant found failed to corroborate the remaining six hypotheses in this study. On another note, findings gathered from this study show some contradiction to the original research conducted earlier by Smeenk et al. in 2009. Therefore, results obtained from this study do contribute to the existing pool of knowledge as previous studies on this topic are scarce especially in the Malaysia’s context.

Keywords: new managerialism, Malaysia public universities, organizational commitment, work performance

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Authors: H. M. Farghally, N. M. Ahmed, H. T. El-Madany, D. M. Atia, F. H. Fahmy

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Energy is required in almost every aspect of human activities and development of any nation in this world. Increasing fossil fuel price, energy security and climate change have important bearings on sustainable development of any nation. The renewable energy technology is considered one of the drastic approaches taken over the world to reduce the energy problem. The preservation of vegetables by freezing is one of the most important methods of retaining quality in agricultural products over long-term storage periods. Freezing factories show high demand of energy for both heat and electricity; the hybrid Photovoltaic/Thermal (PV/T) systems could be used in order to meet this requirement. This paper presents PV/T system design for freezing factory. Also, the complete mathematical modeling and Matlab Simulink of PV/T collector is introduced. The sensitivity analysis for the manufacturing parameters of PV/T collector is carried out to study their effect on the thermal and electrical efficiency.

Keywords: renewable energy, hybrid PV/T system, sensitivity analysis, ecological sciences

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Authors: Kuo-Wei Hsu, Yen-Ting, Wu

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Recently, green marketing issues have emerged as the developing direction for local governments and social enterprises. At the same time, many social enterprises have considered how to effectively create a low-carbon and sustainable environment. Local government has a role to play in promoting low-carbon life styles and creating a green sustainable environment within this green marketing trend. Therefore, urban commercial centers have implemented relevant plans such as: Green Store, Green Action Shops, Green Restaurants and Green Hotels. The purpose of these plans to select the commercial center organizations have potential energy saving demonstration and environmental greenification. These organizations are willing to provide assistance counseling and become a green demonstration district, thereby promoting the major shopping district to take the initiative to enhance its green competitiveness. Finally, they create a new landscape for the commercial center. Studies on green marketing in commercial centers are seen as less attractive and only a few studies for commercial centers have focused on green marketing strategies. There is no empirical evidence for how commercial center managers evaluate a commercial center green marketing strategy. This research investigated the major commercial centers in Taichung City and found green marketing helps to enhance the connection between the urban commercial center value and society value, shape corporate image with social responsibility and create brand value, and therefore impact the increase of economic value.

Keywords: economic value added, green marketing, sustainable environment, urban commercial center.

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Authors: Djamila Chabane, Asma Rouane, Karim Arab

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Depending of the chemical substances responsible for the pharmacological effects, a future therapeutic drug might be produced by extraction from whole plants or by callus initiated from some parts. The optimized callus culture protocols now offer the possibility to use cell culture techniques for vegetative propagation and open minds for further studies on secondary metabolites and drug establishment. In Algerian traditional medicine, Pulicaria incisa (Asteraceae) is used in the treatment of daily troubles (stomachache, headhache., cold, sore throat and rheumatic arthralgia). Field findings revealed that many healers use some fresh parts (leaves, flowers) of this plant to treat skin wounds. This study aims to evaluate the healing efficiency of artisanal cream prepared from sticky mucilage isolated from calluses on dermal wounds of animal models. Callus cultures were initiated from reproductive explants (young inflorescences) excised from adult plants and transferred to a MS basal medium supplemented with growth regulators and maintained under dark for for months. Many calluses types were obtained with various color and aspect (friable, compact). Several subcultures of calli were performed to enhance the mucilage accumulation. After extraction, the mucilage extracts were tested on animal models as follows. The wound healing potential was studied by causing dermal wounds (1 cm diameter) at the dorsolumbar part of Rattus norvegicus; different samples of the cream were applied after hair removal on three rats each, including two controls (one treated by Vaseline and one without any treatment), two experimental groups (experimental group 1, treated with a reference ointment "Madecassol® and experimental group 2 treated by callus mucilage cream for a period of seventeen days. The evolution of the healing activity was estimated by calculating the percentage reduction of the area wounds treated by all compounds tested compared to the controls by using AutoCAD software. The percentage of healing effect of the cream prepared from callus mucilage was (99.79%) compared to that of Madecassol® (99.76%). For the treatment time, the significant healing activity was observed after 17 days compared to that of the reference pharmaceutical products without any wound infection. The healing effect of Madecassol® is more effective because it stimulates and regulates the production of collagen, a fibrous matrix essential for wound healing. Mucilage extracts also showed a high capacity to heal the skin without any infection. According to this pharmacological activity, we suggest to use calluses produced by in vitro culture to producing new compounds for the skin care and treatment.

Keywords: calluses, Pulicaria incisa, mucilage, Wounds

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Authors: Yousef S. Kh. S. Hashem

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Accurate estimation of initial gas in place (IGIP) plays an important factor in the decision to develop a gas field. One of the methods that are available in the industry to estimate the IGIP is material balance. This method required that the well has to be shut-in while pressure is measured as it builds to average reservoir pressure. Since gas demand is high and shut-in well surveys are very expensive, flowing gas material balance (FGMB) is sometimes used instead of material balance. This work investigated the effect of reservoir properties (pressure, permeability, and reservoir size) on the estimation of IGIP when using FGMB. A gas reservoir simulator that accounts for friction loss, wellbore storage, and the non-Darcy effect was used to simulate 165 different possible causes (3 pressures, 5 reservoir sizes, and 11 permeabilities). Both tubing pressure and bottom-hole pressure were analyzed using FGMB. The results showed that the FGMB method is very sensitive for tied reservoirs (k < 10). Also, it showed which method is best to be used for different reservoir properties. This study can be used as a guideline for the application of the FGMB method.

Keywords: flowing material balance, gas reservoir, reserves, gas simulator

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Authors: Mohammad Al-Smairan

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Jordan has no fossil fuel resources like coal, oil, or natural gas but has plenty of renewable energy resources like solar and wind energy. The potential of solar energy is very good where Jordan is located in the sunbelt area that possesses the highest solar radiation in the world, especially in the Northern hemisphere, while the potential of wind energy is good in the southern part of the country where wind projects are installed. Al al-Bayt University is located in the northern part of the country, where solar energy potential is high and wind energy potential is low. This research was carried out to investigate the best option for renewable energy systems to meet the load demand of the University. By using the SAM simulation model and HOMER Pro simulation model and depending on the results obtained, the stand-alone photovoltaic (PV) system is the best option, which completely matches the renewable energy resources available in the area.

Keywords: PV, wind, hybrid, Al al-Bayt University, Jordan

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Authors: Syazwani Idrus, S. Charles J. Banks, Sonia Heaven

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The study compared the performance of upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactors and anaerobic filters (AF) for the treatment of wheat straw washwater (WSW) which has a high concentration of Potassium ions. The trial was conducted at mesophilic temperatures (37 °C). The digesters were started up over a 48-day period using a synthetic wastewater feed and reached an organic loading rate (OLR) of 6 g COD L^-1 day^-1 with a specific methane production (SMP) of 0.333 L CH4 g^-1 COD. When the feed was switched to WSW it was not possible to maintain the same loading rate as the SMP in all reactors fell sharply to less than 0.1 L CH4 g^-1 COD, with the AF affected more than the UASB. On reducing the OLR to 3 g COD L^-1 day^-1 the reactors recovered to produce 0.21 L CH4 g^-1 CODadded and gave 82% COD removal. A discrepancy between the COD consumed and the methane produced could be accounted for through increased maintenance energy requirement of the microbial community for osmo-regulation as K+ was found to accumulate in the sludge and in the UASB reached a concentration of 4.5 mg K g^-1 wet weight of granules.

Keywords: anaerobic digestion, osmotic stress, chemical oxygen demand, specific methane production

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Authors: M. Cizmesija, N. Erjavec, V. Bahovec

Abstract:

While the European Union (EU) harmonized methodology is a benchmark of worldwide used business survey (BS) methodology, the choice of variables that are components of the confidence indicators, as the leading indicators, is not strictly determined and unique. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to investigate and to quantify the relationship between all business survey variables in manufacturing industry and industrial production as a reference macroeconomic series in Croatia. The assumption is that there are variables in the business survey, that are not components of Industrial Confidence Indicator (ICI) and which can accurately (and sometimes better then ICI) predict changes in Croatian industrial production. Empirical analyses are conducted using quarterly data of BS variables in manufacturing industry and Croatian industrial production over the period from the first quarter 2005 to the first quarter 2013. Research results confirmed the assumption: three BS variables which is not components of ICI (competitive position, demand and liquidity) are the best leading indicator then ICI, in forecasting changes in Croatian industrial production instantaneously, with one, two or three quarter ahead.

Keywords: balance, business survey, confidence indicators, industrial production, forecasting

Procedia PDF Downloads 474

Authors: A. Aravind, M. Vetrivel, P. Abhimanyu, C. A. Akaash Emmanuel Raj, K. Sundararaj, V. R. S. Kumar

Abstract:

The choice of high-speed, low budget hatchback car with diversified options is increasing for meeting the new generation buyers trend. This paper is aimed to augment the current speed of the hatchback cars through the aerodynamic drag reduction technique. The inverted airfoils are facilitated at the bottom of the car for generating the downward force for negating the lift while increasing the current speed range for achieving a better road performance. The numerical simulations have been carried out using a 2D steady pressure-based    k-ɛ realizable model with enhanced wall treatment. In our numerical studies, Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes model and its code of solution are used. The code is calibrated and validated using the exact solution of the 2D boundary layer displacement thickness at the Sanal flow choking condition for adiabatic flows. We observed through the parametric analytical studies that the inverted airfoil integrated with the bottom surface at various predesigned locations of Hatchback cars can improve its overall aerodynamic efficiency through drag reduction, which obviously decreases the fuel consumption significantly and ensure an optimum road performance lucratively with maximum permissible speed within the framework of the manufactures constraints.

Keywords: aerodynamics of commercial cars, downward force, hatchback car, inverted airfoil

Procedia PDF Downloads 275

Authors: Krasimir Ivanov, Elitsa Kolentsova, Dimitar Dimitrov, Petya Petrova, Tatyana Tabakova

Abstract:

This work studies the effect of chemical composition on the activity and selectivity of γ–alumina supported CuO/ MnO2/Cr2O3 catalysts toward deep oxidation of CO, dimethyl ether (DME) and methanol. The catalysts were prepared by impregnation of the support with an aqueous solution of copper nitrate, manganese nitrate and CrO3 under different conditions. Thermal, XRD and TPR analysis were performed. The catalytic measurements of single compounds oxidation were carried out on continuous flow equipment with a four-channel isothermal stainless steel reactor. Flow-line equipment with an adiabatic reactor for simultaneous oxidation of all compounds under the conditions that mimic closely the industrial ones was used. The reactant and product gases were analyzed by means of on-line gas chromatographs. On the basis of XRD analysis it can be concluded that the active component of the mixed Cu-Mn-Cr/γ–alumina catalysts consists of at least six compounds – CuO, Cr2O3, MnO2, Cu1.5Mn1.5O4, Cu1.5Cr1.5O4 and CuCr2O4, depending on the Cu/Mn/Cr molar ratio. Chemical composition strongly influences catalytic properties, this influence being quite variable with regards to the different processes. The rate of CO oxidation rapidly decrease with increasing of chromium content in the active component while for the DME was observed the reverse trend. It was concluded that the best compromise are the catalysts with Cu/(Mn + Cr) molar ratio 1:5 and Mn/Cr molar ratio from 1:3 to 1:4.

Keywords: Cu-Mn-Cr oxide catalysts, volatile organic compounds, deep oxidation, dimethyl ether (DME)

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Authors: T. Bettaieb, S. Soufi, S. Arbaoui

Abstract:

Stevia rebaudiana Bert. is a natural sweet plant. The leaves contain diterpene glycosides stevioside, rebaudiosides A-F, steviolbioside and dulcoside, which are responsible for its sweet taste and have commercial value all over the world as sugar substitute in foods and medicines. Stevia rebaudiana Bert. is sensitive temperature lower than 9°C. The possibility of its outdoor culture in Tunisian conditions demand genotypes tolerant to low temperatures. In order to evaluate the low temperature tolerance of eight genotypes of Stevia rebaudiana, the activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD), ascorbate peroxidase (APX) and catalases (CAT) were measured. Before carrying out the analyses, three genotypes of Stevia were exposed for 1 month at a temperature regime of 18°C during the day and 7°C at night similar to winter conditions in Tunisia. In response to the stress generated by low temperature, antioxidant enzymes activity revealed on native gel and quantified by spectrophotometry showed variable levels according to their degree of tolerance to low temperatures.

Keywords: chilling tolerance, enzymatic activity, stevia rebaudiana bert, low thermal stress

Procedia PDF Downloads 442