Search results for: social control.

Authors: Rawad Asfour, Salam Khamas, Edward A. Ball

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This paper is focused on the design of an mm-wave phased array. To date, linear polarization is adapted in the reported designs of phased arrays. However, linear polarization faces several well-known challenges. As such, an advanced design for phased array antennas is required that offers circularly polarized (CP) radiation. A feasible solution for achieving CP phased array antennas is proposed using open-circular loop antennas. To this end, a 3-element circular loop phased array antenna is designed to operate at 28 GHz. In addition, the array ability to control the direction of the main lobe is investigated. The results show that the highest achievable field of view (FOV) is 100°, i.e. 50° to the left and 50° to the right-hand side directions. The results are achieved with a CP bandwidth of 15%. Furthermore, the results demonstrate that a high broadside gain of circa 11 dBi can be achieved for the steered beam. Besides, radiation efficiency of 97% can also be achieved based on the proposed design.

Keywords: loop antenna, phased array, beam steering, wide bandwidth, circular polarization, CST

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Authors: Muhaimin Bin Sulam, Abdul Mutalib Embong, Azelin Mohamed Noor

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This paper presents the reinvention of the role of education (tarbiyyah) in the social influence of organizations focusing on the sustainability of a specific religio-political organization. The objective of the paper is to describe how the position secured by education could transform the organization while maintaining its objective and vision. The study employed the qualitative approach that involves data from conducted interviews. An analysis on the role political leaders play in educating the organization in the context of ideological struggle is also analyzed. The process description also evaluates how education could intellectualize its followers and members which inspires them to submit to their leaders and the organization. This extensive cultivation of religio-political doctrine could offer a new interpretation on politics.

Keywords: Religio-political organization. Malaysia, education (tarbiyyah), followers, political movement.

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Authors: Raed Abendeh, Mousa Bani Baker, Zaydoun Abu Salem, Heham Ahmad

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The using of waste materials in the construction industry can reduce the dependence on the natural aggregates which are going at the end to deplete. The glass waste is generated in a huge amount which can make one of its disposals in concrete industry effective not only as a green solution but also as an advantage to enhance the performance of mechanical properties and durability of concrete. This article reports the performance of concrete specimens containing different percentages of milled glass waste as a partial replacement of cement (Powder), when they are subject to cycles of freezing and thawing. The tests were conducted on 75-mm cubes and 75 x 75 x 300-mm prisms. Compressive strength based on laboratory testing and non-destructive ultrasonic pulse velocity test were performed during the action of freezing-thawing cycles (F/T). The results revealed that the incorporation of glass waste in concrete mixtures is not only feasible but also showed generally better strength and durability performance than control concrete mixture. It may be said that the recycling of waste glass in concrete mixes is not only a disposal way, but also it can be an exploitation in concrete industry.

Keywords: Durability, glass waste, freeze-thaw cycles, nondestructive test.

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Authors: Saowaluck Ukrisdawithid

Abstract:

The thermal conductivity of thermal insulation materials are measured by Heat Flow Meter (HFM) apparatus. The components of uncertainty are complex and difficult on routine measurement by modelling approach. In this study, uncertainty of thermal conductivity measurement was estimated by single laboratory validation approach. The within-laboratory reproducibility was 1.1%. The standard uncertainty of method and laboratory bias by using SRM1453 expanded polystyrene board was dominant at 1.4%. However, it was assessed that there was no significant bias. For sample measurement, the sources of uncertainty were repeatability, density of sample and thermal conductivity resolution of HFM. From this approach to sample measurements, the combined uncertainty was calculated. In summary, the thermal conductivity of sample, polystyrene foam, was reported as 0.03367 W/m·K ± 3.5% (k = 2) at mean temperature 23.5 °C. The single laboratory validation approach is simple key of routine testing laboratory for estimation uncertainty of thermal conductivity measurement by using HFM, according to ISO/IEC 17025-2017 requirements. These are meaningful for laboratory competent improvement, quality control on products, and conformity assessment.

Keywords: Single laboratory validation approach, within-laboratory reproducibility, method and laboratory bias, certified reference material.

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Authors: N. P. Dhanalakshmi, R. Nagarajan

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The sonochemical decolorization and degradation of azo dye Methyl violet using Fenton-s reagent in the presence of a high-frequency acoustic field has been investigated. Dyeing and textile effluents are the major sources of azo dyes, and are most troublesome among industrial wastewaters, causing imbalance in the eco-system. The effect of various operating conditions (initial concentration of dye, liquid-phase temperature, ultrasonic power and frequency and process time) on sonochemical degradation was investigated. Conversion was found to increase with increase in initial concentration, temperature, power level and frequency. Both horntype and tank-type sonicators were used, at various power levels (250W, 400W and 500W) for frequencies ranging from 20 kHz - 1000 kHz. A 'Process Intensification' parameter PI, was defined to quantify the enhancement of the degradation reaction by ultrasound when compared to control (i.e., without ultrasound). The present work clearly demonstrates that a high-frequency ultrasonic bath can be used to achieve higher process throughput and energy efficiency at a larger scale of operation.

Keywords: Fenton oxidation, process intensification, sonochemical degradation of MV, ultrasonic frequency.

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Authors: A. Akin

Abstract:

This study was carried out on Italia grape variety (Vitis vinifera L.) in Konya province, Turkey in 2016. The cultivar is five years old and grown on 1103 Paulsen rootstock. It was determined the effects of applications of the Control (C), 1/3 Cluster Tip Reduction (1/3 CTR), 1/6 Cluster Tip Reduction (1/6 CTR), 1/9 Cluster Tip Reduction (1/9 CTR), 1/3 CTR+Boric Acid (BA), 1/6 CTR+BA, 1/9 CTR+BA, on yield and yield components of the Italia grape variety. The results were obtained as the highest fresh grape yield (4.74 g) with 1/9 CTR+BA application; the highest cluster weight (220.08 g) with 1/3 CTR application; the highest 100 berry weight (565.85 g) with 1/9 CTR+BA application; as the highest maturity index (49.28) with 1/9 CTR+BA application; as the highest must yield (685.33 ml/kg) with 1/3 CTR+BA and (685.33 ml/kg) with 1/9 CTR+BA applications. To increase the fresh grape yield, 100 berry weight and maturity index in the Italia grape variety, the 1/9 CTR+BA application can be recommended.

Keywords: Italia grape variety, boric acid, cluster tip reduction, yield, yield components.

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Authors: Penghui Zhang, Hua Zhang, Jun-Bo Wang, Cheng Zeng, Zijian Cao

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With the development of software-defined networks and programmable data planes, in-band network telemetry (INT) has become an emerging technology in communications because it can get accurate and real-time network information. However, due to the expansion of the network scale, existing telemetry systems, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, have difficulty in meeting the common requirements of low overhead, low latency and full coverage for traffic measurement. This paper proposes a network-wide telemetry system with a low-latency low-overhead path planning (INT-LLPP). This paper builds a mathematical model to analyze the telemetry overhead and latency of INT systems. Then, we adopt a greedy-based path planning algorithm to reduce the overhead and latency of the network telemetry with the full network coverage. The simulation results show that network-wide telemetry is achieved and the telemetry overhead can be reduced significantly compared with existing INT systems. INT-LLPP can control the system latency to get real-time network information.

Keywords: Network telemetry, network monitoring, path planning, low latency.

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Authors: A. Sarıkaya, A. Akın

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This study was carried out to investigate effects of Control (C), 18 bud/vine, 23 bud/vine, 28 bud/vine, 18 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil), 23 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil), 28 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil) applications on yield and yield components of Alphonse Lavallee grape cultivar. The results were obtained as the highest cluster weight (302.31 g) with 18 bud/vine application; the highest berry weight (6.31 g) with 23 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil) and (6.79 g) with 28 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil) applications; the highest maturity index (36.95) with 18 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil) application; the highest L* color intensity (33.99) with 18 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil); the highest a* color intensity (1.53) with 23 bud/vine + TKI-Humas (soil) application. The effects of applications on grape fresh yield, grape juice yield and b* color intensity values were not found statistically significant.

Keywords: Alphonse Lavallee grape cultivar, crop load, TKI-Humas substances (soil), yield, quality.

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Authors: GangHeok Kim, SungHoon Seo, JooSeok Song

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Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) has been proposed to provide reliable transport of real-time communications. Due to its attractive features, such as multi-streaming and multihoming, the SCTP is often expected to be an alternative protocol for TCP and UDP. In the original SCTP standard, the secondary path is mainly regarded as a redundancy. Recently, most of researches have focused on extending the SCTP to enable a host to send its packets to a destination over multiple paths simultaneously. In order to transfer packets concurrently over the multiple paths, the SCTP should be well designed to avoid unnecessary fast retransmission and the mis-estimation of congestion window size through the paths. Therefore, we propose an Enhanced Cooperative ACK SCTP (ECASCTP) to improve the path recovery efficiency of multi-homed host which is under concurrent multiple transfer mode. We evaluated the performance of our proposed scheme using ns-2 simulation in terms of cwnd variation, path recovery time, and goodput. Our scheme provides better performance in lossy and path asymmetric networks.

Keywords: SCTP, Concurrent Multiple Transfer, CooperativeSack, Dynamic ack policy

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Authors: Vivian Guo, Yan Qu

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Online marketplaces are not only digital places where consumers buy and sell merchandise, and they are also destinations for brands to connect with real consumers at the moment when customers are in the shopping mindset. For many marketplaces, brands have been important partners through advertising. There can be, however, a risk of advertising impacting a consumer’s shopping journey if it hurts the use experience or takes the user away from the site. Both could lead to the loss of transaction revenue for the marketplace. In this paper, we present user-based methods for cannibalization control by selectively turning off ads to users who are likely to be cannibalized by ads subject to business objectives. We present ways of measuring cannibalization of advertising in the context of an online marketplace and propose novel ways of measuring cannibalization through purchase propensity and uplift modeling. A/B testing has shown that our methods can significantly improve user purchase and engagement metrics while operating within business objectives. To our knowledge, this is the first paper that addresses cannibalization mitigation at the user-level in the context of advertising.

Keywords: Cannibalization, machine learning, online marketplace, revenue optimization, yield optimization.

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Authors: Ibrahim Shaker, Amr El Hossany, Moustafa Osman, Mohamed El Raey

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This paper will explore integration model between GIS–SCADA system and enclosure quantification model to approach the impact of failure-safe event. There are real demands to identify spatial objects and improve control system performance. Nevertheless, the employed methodology is predicting electro-mechanic operations and corresponding time to environmental incident variations. Open processing, as object systems technology, is presented for integration enclosure database with minimal memory size and computation time via connectivity drivers such as ODBC:JDBC during main stages of GIS–SCADA connection. The function of Geographic Information System is manipulating power distribution in contrast to developing issues. In other ward, GIS-SCADA systems integration will require numerical objects of process to enable system model calibration and estimation demands, determine of past events for analysis and prediction of emergency situations for response training.

Keywords: Air dispersion model, integration power system, SCADA systems, GIS system, environmental management.

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Authors: Hamid. Gholami, Mohammad. Chamani, Armin. Towhidi, Mohammad. H. Fazeli

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The aim of current study was to investigate the changes in the quality parameters of Holstein bull semen during the heat stress and the effect of feeding a source of omega-3 fatty acids in this period. Samples were obtained from 19 Holstein bulls during the expected time of heat stress in Iran (June to September 2009). Control group (n=10) were fed a standard concentrate feed while treatment group (n=9) had this feed top dressed with 100 g of an omega-3 enriched nutriceutical. Semen quality was assessed on ejaculates collected after 1, 5, 9 and 12 weeks of supplementation. Computer-assisted assessment of sperm motility, viability (eosinnigrosin) and hypo-osmotic swelling test (HOST) were conducted. Heat stress affected sperm quality parameters by week 5 and 9 (p<0.05). Supplementation has significantly increased total motility, progressive motility, HOST and average path velocity in the fresh semen of bulls (P<0.05).

Keywords: Bull, heat stress, omega-3 fatty acids, spermatozoa.

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Authors: Nariman O. Kandil, Ehab K. Abou-Elkheir, Amr M. Kotb

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Effective IT governance guarantees the strategic alignment of IT and business goals, risk mitigation control, and better IT and business performance. This study seeks to examine empirically the extent of IT governance implementation within the firms listed on the Egyptian Stock Exchange (EGX30) and its determinants. Accordingly, 18 semi-structured interviews, face to face, phone, and video-conferencing, using various tools (e.g., WebEx, Zoom, and Microsoft Teams) were undertaken at the interviewees’ offices in Egypt between the end of November 2019 and the end of August 2020. Results suggest that there are variances in the extent of IT Governance (ITG) implementation within the firms listed on the EGX30, mainly caused by the industry type and internal and external triggers. The results also suggest that the organization size, the type of auditor, the criticality of the industry, the effective processes & key performance indicators (KPIs), and the information intensity expertise of the chief information officers (CIOs) have a significant impact on ITG implementation within the firms.

Keywords: Effective IT governance, Egyptian Market, information security, risk controls.

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Authors: Bassam Shaikh, R. S. A. Jumain

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Game addiction has become an extremely important topic in psychology researchers, particularly in understanding and explaining why individuals become addicted (to video games). In previous studies, effect of online game addiction on social responsibilities, health problems, government action, and the behaviors of individuals to purchase and the causes of making individuals addicted on the video games has been discussed. Extending these concepts in marketing, it could be argued than the phenomenon could enlighten and extending our understanding on consumer loyalty. This study took the Grounded Theory approach, and found that motivation, satisfaction, fulfillments, exploration and achievements to be part of the important elements that builds consumer loyalty.

Keywords: Consumer Loyalty, Video Games Addiction, Video Games, Grounded Theory.

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Authors: R. Nadlene, H. Esah, S. Norliana, M.A. Mohd Irwan

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The objective of this project is to study the corrosion behaviour and hardness based on the presence of martensite in dual phase steel. This study was conducted on six samples of dual phase steel which have different percentage of martensite. A total of 9 specimens were prepared by intercritical annealing process to study the effect of temperature to the formation of martensite. The low carbon steels specimens were heated for 25 minutes in a specified temperature ranging from 7250C to 8250C followed by rapid cooling in water. The measurement of corrosion rate was done by using extrapolation tafel method, while potentiostat was used to control and measured the current produced. This measurement is performed through a system named CMS105. The result shows that a specimen with higher percentage of martensite is likely to corrode faster. Hardness test for each specimen was conducted to compare its hardness with low carbon steel. The results obtained indicate that the specimen hardness is proportional to the amount of martensite in dual phase steel.

Keywords: dual phase steel, corrosion behaviour, hardness, intercritical annealing, martensite

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Authors: Muhibul Haque Bhuyan

Abstract:

Diabetes disease that arises from the higher glucose level due to insulin shortage or insulin opposition in the human body has become a common disease in the world. No medicine can cure it completely. However, by taking medicine, maintaining diets, and having exercises regularly, a diabetes patient can keep his glucose level within the specified limits and in this way, he/she can lead a normal life like a healthy person. But to control glucose levels, a patient needs to monitor them regularly. Various techniques are being used over the last four decades. This modern review article aims to provide a comparative study report on various blood glucose monitoring techniques in a very concise and organized manner. The review mainly emphasizes working principles, cost, technology, sensors, measurement types, measurement accuracy, advantages, and disadvantages, etc. of various techniques and then compares among each other. Besides, the use of algorithms and simulators for the growth of this technology is also presented. Finally, current research trends of this measurement technology have also been discussed.

Keywords: blood glucose measurement, sensors, measurement devices, invasive and non-invasive techniques

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Authors: Nadine Ali Hassan, Ngoc Son Nguyen, Didier Marot, Fateh Bendahmane

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This paper aims at presenting a study of the effect of scalping methods on the mechanical properties of coarse soils by resorting to numerical simulations based on the discrete element method (DEM) and experimental triaxial tests. Two reconstitution methods are used, designated as scalping method and substitution method. Triaxial compression tests are first simulated on a granular materials with a grap graded particle size distribution by using the DEM. We study the effect of these reconstitution methods on the stress-strain behavior of coarse soils with different fine contents and with different ways to control the densities of the scalped and substituted materials. Experimental triaxial tests are performed on original mixtures of sands and gravels with different fine contents and on their corresponding scalped and substituted samples. Numerical results are qualitatively compared to experimental ones. Agreements and discrepancies between these results are also discussed.

Keywords: Coarse soils, scalping, substitution, discrete element method, triaxial test.

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Authors: Khaled Alawadhi, Abdulkareem Aloraier, Suraj Joshi, Jalal Alsarraf

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The aim of this paper is to compare the effectiveness and electrochemical behavior of typical oilfield corrosion inhibitors with previous oilfield corrosion inhibitors under the same electrochemical techniques to control preferential weld corrosion of X65 pipeline steel in artificial seawater saturated with carbon dioxide at a pressure of one bar. A secondary aim is to investigate the conditions under which current reversal takes place. A flow channel apparatus was used in the laboratory to simulate the actual condition that occurs in marine pipelines. Different samples from the parent metal, the weld metal and the heat affected zone in the pipeline steel were galvanically coupled. The galvanic currents flowing between the weld regions were recorded using zero-resistance ammeters and tested under static and flowing conditions in both inhibited and uninhibited media. The results show that a current reversal took place when 30ppm of both green oilfield inhibitors were present, resulting in accelerated weld corrosion.

Keywords: Carbon dioxide, carbon steel, current reversal, inhibitor, weld corrosion.

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Authors: Sera Syarmila Sameon, Rohaini Ramli

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A trustworthy voting process in democratic is important that each vote is recorded with accuracy and impartiality. The accuracy and impartiality are tallied in high rate with biometric system. One of the sign is a fingerprint. Fingerprint recognition is still a challenging problem, because of the distortions among the different impression of the same finger. Because of the trustworthy of biometric voting technologies, it may give a great effect on numbers of voter-s participation and outcomes of the democratic process. Hence in this study, the authors are interested in designing and analyzing the Electronic Voting System and the participation of the users. The system is based on the fingerprint minutiae with the addition of person ID number. This is in order to enhance the accuracy and speed of the voting process. The new design is analyzed by conducting pilot election among a class of students for selecting their representative.

Keywords: Biometric, FAR and FRR, democratic, voting

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Authors: Bárbara Dantas

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Nicolas-Antoine Taunay had everything to have a quiet life with his family, his colleagues from the Paris Academy of Art, and as a renowned painter of the French Court, but the conjuncture was quite complicated in those final years of the eighteenth century and first decades of the 19th century. The painter had to adapt to various political and social ruptures: from royalty to the French Revolution, from the empire of Napoleon Bonaparte to the empire of King John VI. We wish to insert Taunay in its context through the analysis of his portrait made by a colleague of the profession and of a Brazilian landscape painted of his own (1816-1821) and, in which he represented himself. Finally, the intention is to find in these two paintings how Nicolas-Antoine Taunay faced himself and in the middle that surrounded him in the traffic that was forced to make it between Paris and Rio de Janeiro.

Keywords: Nicolas-Antoine Taunay, politic iconography, French Art, Brazilian Art, 19th century.

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Authors: C. Rajan, N. Shanthi, C. Rasi Priya, K. Geetha

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Routing in MANET is extremely challenging because of MANETs dynamic features, its limited bandwidth, frequent topology changes caused by node mobility and power energy consumption. In order to efficiently transmit data to destinations, the applicable routing algorithms must be implemented in mobile ad-hoc networks. Thus we can increase the efficiency of the routing by satisfying the Quality of Service (QoS) parameters by developing routing algorithms for MANETs. The algorithms that are inspired by the principles of natural biological evolution and distributed collective behavior of social colonies have shown excellence in dealing with complex optimization problems and are becoming more popular. This paper presents a survey on few meta-heuristic algorithms and naturally-inspired algorithms.

Keywords: Ant colony optimization, genetic algorithm, Naturally-inspired algorithms and particle swarm optimization.

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Authors: Masoud Rafiee, Fatemeh Abdipoor, Hosain Lari

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An attempt was made to study of nitrogen components response of corn (Zea mays L.) to drought stress. A farm research was done in RCBD as split-plot with four replications in Khorramabad, west Iran. Drought stress levels as irrigation regimes after 75 (control), 100, and 120 (stress) mm cumulative evaporation were in main plots, and four seed corn varieties include 500 (medium maturity), 647, 700, and 704 (long maturity) were as subplots. Soluble protein, nitrate and proline amino acid were measured in shoot and root at flowering stage, and grain yield was measured in harvesting stage. As the drought progressed, the amount of nitrate and proline followed an increasing trend, but soluble protein decreased in shoot and root. The highest amount of nitrate and proline was observed in longer maturity varieties than shorter ones, but decrease yield of long maturity varieties was higher than medium maturity varieties in drought condition, because of long duration of stress.

Keywords: Nitrate, Proline, Soluble protein, Yield

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Authors: Rashid Farooq, Abdul Razzaq Ghumman, Hashim Nisar Hashmi

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Bridge piers often fail all over the world and the whole structure may be endangered due to scouring phenomena. Scouring has been linked to catastrophic failures that lead into the loss of human lives. Various techniques have been employed to extenuate the scouring process in order to assist the bridge designs. Pier modifications plays vital role to control scouring at the vicinity of the pier. This experimental study aims at monitoring the effectiveness of pier modification and temporal development of scour depth around a bridge pier by providing a collar, a cable or openings under the same flow conditions. Provision of a collar around the octagonal pier reduced more scour depth than that for other two configurations. Providing a collar around the octagonal pier found to be the best in reducing scour. The scour depth in front of pier was found to be 19.5% less than that at the octagonal pier without any modifications. Similarly, the scour depth around the octagonal pier having provision of a cable was less than that at pier with provision of openings. The scour depth around an octagonal pier was also compared with a plain circular pier and found to be 9.1% less.

Keywords: Scour, octagonal pier, collar, cable, openings.

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Authors: Rihards Balodis, Inara Opmane

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Deep and radical social reforms of the last century-s nineties in many Eastern European countries caused changes in Information Technology-s (IT) field. Inefficient information technologies were rapidly replaced with forefront IT solutions, e.g., in Eastern European countries there is a high level penetration of qualitative high-speed Internet. The authors have taken part in the introduction of those changes in Latvia-s leading IT research institute. Grounding on their experience authors in this paper offer an IT services based model for analysis the mentioned changes- and development processes in the higher education and research fields, i.e., for research e-infrastructure-s development. Compare to the international practice such services were developed in Eastern Europe in an untraditional way, which provided swift and positive technological changes.

Keywords: Computing, data networking, e-infrastructure, IT services.

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Authors: Firas A. Al Laban, Mohamed Chabi, Sammani Danwawu Abdullahi

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There are real needs to integrate types of Open Educational Resources (OER) with an intelligent system to extract information and knowledge in the semantic searching level. The needs came because most of current learning standard adopted web based learning and the e-learning systems do not always serve all educational goals. Semantic Web systems provide educators, students, and researchers with intelligent queries based on a semantic knowledge management learning system. An ontology-based learning system is an advanced system, where ontology plays the core of the semantic web in a smart learning environment. The objective of this paper is to discuss the potentials of ontologies and mapping different kinds of ontologies; heterogeneous or homogenous to manage and control different types of Open Educational Resources. The important contribution of this research is that it uses logical rules and conceptual relations to map between ontologies of different educational resources. We expect from this methodology to establish an intelligent educational system supporting student tutoring, self and lifelong learning system.

Keywords: Knowledge Management Systems, Ontologies, Semantic Web, Open Educational Resources.

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Authors: Md. Emaj Uddin

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Family structure that is culturally constructed in every society is the basic unit of social structure. Purpose of the study was to compare family structure, including marriage, residence, family size, type, role sharing, authority, and communication patterns between Muslim and Santal communities in rural Bangladesh. For this we assumed that family structure with the elements was significantly different between the two communities in rural Bangladesh. In so doing, 288 active couples (145 for Muslim and 143 for Santal) selected by cluster random sampling were intensively interviewed with a semi-structured questionnaire method. The results of Pearson Chi-Squire Test reveal that there were significant differences in the family structure followed by the two communities in the study area. Further cross-cultural study should be done on why family structure varies between the communities in Bangladesh.

Keywords: Bangladesh, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Family Structure, Muslim, Santal.

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Authors: Tahvilian R., Siahi Shadbad MR., Hamishehkar H., Aghababa Gharehbagh V.

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Nowadays pharmaceutical care departments located in hospitals are amongst the important pillars of the healthcare system. The aim of this study was to evaluate quality of hospital drugstores affiliated with Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences. In this cross-sectional study a validated questionnaire was used. The questionnaire was filled in by the one of the researchers in all seventeen hospital drugstores located in the teaching and nonteaching hospitals affiliated with Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences. The results shows that in observed hospitals,24% of pharmacy environments, 25% of pharmacy store and storage conditions, 49% of storage procedure, 25% of ordering drugs and supplies, 73% of receiving supplies (proper procedure are fallowed for receiving supplies), 35% of receiving supplies (prompt action taken if deterioration of drugs received is suspected), 23.35% of drugs delivery to patients and finally 0% of stock cards are used for proper inventory control have full compliance with standards.

Keywords: Hospital pharmacy standards, Kermanshah, pharmacy management

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Authors: Saska Alexandria Hayes

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Multiple Convention Refugees in New Zealand are stuck in a state of immigration limbo due to a lack of defined immigration policies. The Refugee Convention of 1951 does not give the right to be issued a permanent right to live and work in the country of asylum. A gap in New Zealand's immigration law and policy has left Convention Refugees without the right to obtain a resident or temporary entry visa. The significant lack of literature on this topic suggests that the lack of visa options for Convention Refugees in New Zealand is a widely unknown or unacknowledged issue. Refugees in New Zealand enjoy the right of non-refoulement contained in Article 33 of the Refugee Convention 1951, whether lawful or unlawful. However, a number of rights contained in the Refugee Convention 1951, such as the right to gainful employment and social security, are limited to refugees who maintain lawful immigration status. If a Convention Refugee is denied a resident visa, the only temporary entry visa a Convention Refugee can apply for in New Zealand is discretionary. The appeal cases heard at the Immigration Protection Tribunal establish that Immigration New Zealand has declined resident and discretionary temporary entry visa applications by Convention Refugees for failing to meet the health or character immigration instructions. The inability of a Convention Refugee to gain residency in New Zealand creates a dependence on the issue of discretionary temporary entry visas to maintain lawful status. The appeal cases record that this reliance has led to Convention Refugees' lawful immigration status being in question, temporarily depriving them of the rights contained in the Refugee Convention 1951 of lawful refugees. In one case, the process of applying for a discretionary temporary entry visa led to a lawful Convention Refugee being temporarily deprived of the right to social security, breaching Article 24 of the Refugee Convention 1951. The judiciary has stated a constant reliance on the issue of discretionary temporary entry visas for Convention Refugees can lead to a breach of New Zealand's international obligations under Article 7 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The appeal cases suggest that, despite successful judicial proceedings, at least three persons have been made to rely on the issue of discretionary temporary entry visas potentially indefinitely. The appeal cases establish that a Convention Refugee can be denied a discretionary temporary entry visa and become unlawful. Unlawful status could ultimately breach New Zealand's obligations under Article 33 of the Refugee Convention 1951 as it would procedurally deny Convention Refugees asylum. It would force them to choose between the right of non-refoulement or leaving New Zealand to seek the ability to access all the human rights contained in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights elsewhere. This paper discusses how the current system has given rise to these breaches and emphasizes a need to create a designated temporary entry visa category for Convention Refugees.

Keywords: Domestic policy, immigration, migration, New Zealand.

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Authors: Musa Bala Zakari, Mark Button

Abstract:

This paper explores the extent, nature, and characteristics of public sector corruption in Nigeria and the enhancement of the major anti-corruption initiatives (reforms), thereby providing insight into the types, forms and causes of corruption in Nigeria. This paper argues that attempts to devise and suggest effective anti-corruption reforms to control systemic corruption in Nigeria require identifying the most prevalent types of corruption targeted and tackling the fundamental country specific causes. It analyses two types of public sector corruption as it relates to Nigeria and the workings of its inefficient governance system. This paper concludes with the imperative of a collective action against corruption supported by considerable amount of domestic political will existing in a favourable policy context. In undertaking this, the paper draws upon publicly available documents, case laws review and semi-structured interviews conducted with various personnel working in the field of corruption in the dedicated anticorruption agencies, academics, and practitioners from other relevant institutions of accountability.

Keywords: Corruption, development, good governance, public sector.

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Authors: Samson Henry Dogo, Allan Clark, Elena Kulinskaya

Abstract:

The objective of meta-analysis is to combine results from several independent studies in order to create generalization and provide evidence base for decision making. But recent studies show that the magnitude of effect size estimates reported in many areas of research significantly changed over time and this can impair the results and conclusions of meta-analysis. A number of sequential methods have been proposed for monitoring the effect size estimates in meta-analysis. However they are based on statistical theory applicable only to fixed effect model (FEM) of meta-analysis. For random-effects model (REM), the analysis incorporates the heterogeneity variance, τ 2 and its estimation create complications. In this paper we study the use of a truncated CUSUM-type test with asymptotically valid critical values for sequential monitoring in REM. Simulation results show that the test does not control the Type I error well, and is not recommended. Further work required to derive an appropriate test in this important area of applications.

Keywords: Meta-analysis, random-effects model, sequential testing, temporal changes in effect sizes.

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