Search results for: Health Condition Modeling Tool

Authors: Domenico Chizzoniti, Monica Moscatelli, Letizia Cattani, Luca Preis

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A primary healthcare facility in developing countries should be a multifunctional space able to respond to different requirements: Flexibility, modularity, aggregation and reversibility. These basic features could be better satisfied if applied to an architectural artifact that complies with the typological, figurative and constructive aspects of the context in which it is located. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to identify a procedure that can define the figurative aspects of the architectural structure of the health prototype for the marginal areas of developing countries through a critical approach. The application context is the rural areas of the Northeast of Bahia in Brazil. The prototype should be located in the rural district of Quingoma, in the municipality of Lauro de Freitas, a particular place where there is still a cultural fusion of black and indigenous populations. Based on the historical analysis of settlement strategies and architectural structures in spaces of public interest or collective use, this paper aims to provide a procedure able to identify the categories and rules underlying typological and figurative aspects, in order to detect significant and generalizable elements, as well as materials and constructive techniques typically adopted in the rural areas of Brazil. The object of this work is therefore not only the recovery of certain constructive approaches but also the development of a procedure that integrates the requirements of the primary healthcare prototype with its surrounding economic, social, cultural, settlement and figurative conditions.

Keywords: Architectural typology, Developing countries, Local construction techniques, Primary health care.

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Authors: Budiyanto, Hening Widi Oetomo

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Magetan area is going to be the object of this research which is located in East Java, Indonesia. The data were obtained from 270 civil servants working at the Magetan District government. The data were analyzed using the Structural Equation Modeling with Partial Least Square program. The research showed the following findings: (1) job motivation variable has a positive and significant effect on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB); (2) work environment has positive and significant effect on OCB; (3) leadership variable has positive and significant effect on OCB; (4) job motivation variable has no significant effect on job satisfaction; (5) work environment variable has no significant effect on job satisfaction; (6) leadership variable has no significant effect on job satisfaction; (7) OCB is positively and significantly associated with job satisfaction; (8) job satisfaction variable is positively and significantly correlated with quality of public service at the Magetan District government.

Keywords: Job Satisfaction, Leadership, OrganizationalCitizenship Behavior (OCB), Quality of Public Service

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Authors: F. Arıkan, Z. Karakus

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Cancer is a widespread disease in the world and is the third reason of deaths among the chronic diseases. Educating patients and caregivers has a vital role for empowering them in managing disease and treatment's symptoms. Informing of the patients about their disease and treatment process decreases patient's distress and decisional conflicts, improves wellbeing of them, increase success of the treatment and survival. In this era, technological education methods are used for patients that have different chronic disease. Many studies indicated that especially web based patient education such as chronic obstructive lung disease; heart failure is more effective than printed materials. Web based education provide easiness to patients while they are reaching health services. It also has more advantages because of it decreases health cost and requirement of staff. It is thought that web based education may be beneficial method for cancer patient's empowerment in coping with the disease's symptoms. The aim of the study is evaluate the effectiveness of web based education for cancer patients' clinical outcomes.

Keywords: Cancer Patients, E-Learning, Nursing, Web Based Education.

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Authors: M. Fems Kurotimi, Agada Franklin, Godsave Aladei, Opigo Helen

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Within the last 30 years, entrepreneurship education (EE) has continued to gain massive interest both in the field of research and among policy makers. This surge in interest can be attributed to the perceived importance EE plays in the equipping of potential entrepreneurs and as a 21^st century strategy to foster economic growth and development. This paper sets out to ascertain the correlation between EE and economic growth and development. A desk research approach was adopted where a multiplicity of literatures in the field were studied intensely. The findings reveal that indeed EE has a positive effect on entrepreneurship engagement thereby fostering economic growth and development. However, some research studies reported the contrary. That although EE may be able to equip potential entrepreneurs with requisite entrepreneurial skills and competencies, it will only be successful in producing entrepreneurs if they are internally driven to become entrepreneurs, because we cannot make people what they are not. The findings also reveal that countries that adopted EE early have more innovations inspired by entrepreneurs and are more developed than those that only recently adopted EE as a viable tool for entrepreneurship and economic development.

Keywords: Entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship education, economic development, economic growth, sustainable development.

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Authors: L. Hamsaveni, Navya Prakash, Suresha

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Document Image Analysis recognizes text and graphics in documents acquired as images. An approach without Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for degraded document image analysis has been adopted in this paper. The technique involves document imaging methods such as Image Fusing and Speeded Up Robust Features (SURF) Detection to identify and extract the degraded regions from a set of document images to obtain an original document with complete information. In case, degraded document image captured is skewed, it has to be straightened (deskew) to perform further process. A special format of image storing known as YCbCr is used as a tool to convert the Grayscale image to RGB image format. The presented algorithm is tested on various types of degraded documents such as printed documents, handwritten documents, old script documents and handwritten image sketches in documents. The purpose of this research is to obtain an original document for a given set of degraded documents of the same source.

Keywords: Grayscale image format, image fusing, SURF detection, YCbCr image format.

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Authors: Mostafa Jafarian Abyaneh, Khashayar Jafari, Vahab Toufigh

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The cost of experiments on different types of concrete has raised the demand for prediction of their behavior with numerical analysis. In this research, an advanced numerical model has been presented to predict the complete elastic-plastic behavior of polymer concrete (PC), high-strength concrete (HSC), high performance concrete (HPC) along with different steel fiber contents under uniaxial compression. The accuracy of the numerical response was satisfactory as compared to other conventional simple models such as Mohr-Coulomb and Drucker-Prager. In order to predict the complete elastic-plastic behavior of specimens including softening behavior, disturbed state concept (DSC) was implemented by nonlinear finite element analysis (NFEA) and hierarchical single surface (HISS) failure criterion, which is a failure surface without any singularity.

Keywords: Disturbed state concept, hierarchical single surface, failure criterion, high performance concrete, high-strength concrete, nonlinear finite element analysis, polymer concrete, steel fibers, uniaxial compression test.

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Authors: Ali Hussian Ali AlTimemy, Fawzi M. Al Naima

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This paper presents the prediction of kidney dysfunction using different neural network (NN) approaches. Self organization Maps (SOM), Probabilistic Neural Network (PNN) and Multi Layer Perceptron Neural Network (MLPNN) trained with Back Propagation Algorithm (BPA) are used in this study. Six hundred and sixty three sets of analytical laboratory tests have been collected from one of the private clinical laboratories in Baghdad. For each subject, Serum urea and Serum creatinin levels have been analyzed and tested by using clinical laboratory measurements. The collected urea and cretinine levels are then used as inputs to the three NN models in which the training process is done by different neural approaches. SOM which is a class of unsupervised network whereas PNN and BPNN are considered as class of supervised networks. These networks are used as a classifier to predict whether kidney is normal or it will have a dysfunction. The accuracy of prediction, sensitivity and specificity were found for each type of the proposed networks .We conclude that PNN gives faster and more accurate prediction of kidney dysfunction and it works as promising tool for predicting of routine kidney dysfunction from the clinical laboratory data.

Keywords: Kidney Dysfunction, Prediction, SOM, PNN, BPNN, Urea and Creatinine levels.

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Authors: Chit Su Htwe, Win Htay

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The iris recognition technology is the most accurate, fast and less invasive one compared to other biometric techniques using for example fingerprints, face, retina, hand geometry, voice or signature patterns. The system developed in this study has the potential to play a key role in areas of high-risk security and can enable organizations with means allowing only to the authorized personnel a fast and secure way to gain access to such areas. The paper aim is to perform the iris region detection and iris inner and outer boundaries localization. The system was implemented on windows platform using Visual C# programming language. It is easy and efficient tool for image processing to get great performance accuracy. In particular, the system includes two main parts. The first is to preprocess the iris images by using Canny edge detection methods, segments the iris region from the rest of the image and determine the location of the iris boundaries by applying Hough transform. The proposed system tested on 756 iris images from 60 eyes of CASIA iris database images.

Keywords: Canny, C#, hough transform, image preprocessing.

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Authors: Pisit Potjanajaruwit

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This study aims to (1) investigate the corporate vision factor influencing Rajabhat University brand building in Thailand and (2) explore influences of brand building upon Rajabhat University stakeholders’ loyalty, and the research method will use mixed methods to conduct qualitative research with the quantitative research. The qualitative will approach by Indebt-interview the executive of Rathanagosin Rajabhat University group for 6 key informants and the quantitative data was collected by questionnaires distributed to stakeholder including instructors, staff, students and parents of the Rathanagosin Rajabhat University group for 400 sampling were selected by multi-stage sampling method. Data was analyzed by Structural Equation Modeling: SEM and also provide the focus group interview for confirming the model. Findings corporate vision had a direct and positive influence on Rajabhat University brand building were showed direct and positive influence on stakeholder’s loyalty and stakeholder’s loyalty was indirectly influenced by corporate vision through Rajabhat University brand building.

Keywords: Brand building, corporate vision, Rajabhat University, stakeholders’ loyalty.

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Authors: Mohammed I. Ali, Feng Fan, Peter N. Khakina, Ma H.H

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In construction of any structure, the aesthetic and utility values should be considered in such a way as to make the structure cost-effective. Most structures are composed of elements and joints which are very critical in any skeletal space structure because they majorly determine the performance of the structure. In early times, most space structures were constructed using rigid joints which had the advantage of better performing structures as compared to pin-jointed structures but with the disadvantage of requiring all the construction work to be done on site. The discovery of semi-rigid joints now enables connections to be prefabricated and quickly assembled on site while maintaining good performance. In this paper, cost-effective is discussed basing on strength of connectors at the joints, buckling of joints and overall structure, and the effect of initial geometrical imperfections. Several existing joints are reviewed by classifying them into categories and discussing where they are most suited and how they perform structurally. Also, finite element modeling using ABAQUS is done to determine the buckling behavior. It is observed that some joints are more economical than others. The rise to span ratio and imperfections are also found to affect the buckling of the structures. Based on these, general principles that guide the design of cost-effective joints and structures are discussed.

Keywords: Buckling, Connectors, Joint stiffness, Eccentricity, Second moment of area, Semi-rigid joints.

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Authors: D.Venkatesan, K.Kannan, S. Raja Balachandar

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In this paper a new Genetic Algorithm based on a heuristic operator and Centre of Mass selection operator (CMGA) is designed for the unbounded knapsack problem(UKP), which is NP-Hard combinatorial optimization problem. The proposed genetic algorithm is based on a heuristic operator, which utilizes problem specific knowledge. This center of mass operator when combined with other Genetic Operators forms a competitive algorithm to the existing ones. Computational results show that the proposed algorithm is capable of obtaining high quality solutions for problems of standard randomly generated knapsack instances. Comparative study of CMGA with simple GA in terms of results for unbounded knapsack instances of size up to 200 show the superiority of CMGA. Thus CMGA is an efficient tool of solving UKP and this algorithm is competitive with other Genetic Algorithms also.

Keywords: Genetic Algorithm, Unbounded Knapsack Problem, Combinatorial Optimization, Meta-Heuristic, Center of Mass

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Authors: Lalla Nezha Lakmiti, Abdelkahar Zahid

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Due to the setbacks on the international scene and the wave of cacophonic financial scandals affecting large international groups, the new Islamic finance industry is not immune despite its initial resistance. The purpose of this paper is to understand and analyze the meaning of the Corporate Governance (CG) concept in Moroccan Islamic banking systems with specific reference to their institutions. The research objective is to identify also the path taken and adopted by these banks recently set up in Morocco. The foundation is rooted in shari'a, in particular, no stakeholder (the shareholding approach) must be harmed, and the ethical value is reflected into these parties’ behavior. We chose a qualitative method, semi-structured interviews where six managers provided answers about their banking systems. Since these respondents held a senior position (directors) within their organizations, it is felt that they are well placed and have the necessary knowledge to provide us with information to answer the questions asked. The results identified the orientation of participating banks and assessing how governance works, while determining which party is fovoured: shareholders, stakeholders or both. This study discusses the favorable condition to the harmonization of the regulations and therefore a better integration between Islamic finance and conventional ones in the economic context of Morocco.

Keywords: Corporate governance, participating banks, stakeholders, shareholders, and interests.

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Authors: Syed Fahad Tahir, Asifullah Khan, Abdul Majid, Anwar M. Mirza

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In this paper, we present an innovative scheme of blindly extracting message bits from an image distorted by an attack. Support Vector Machine (SVM) is used to nonlinearly classify the bits of the embedded message. Traditionally, a hard decoder is used with the assumption that the underlying modeling of the Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) coefficients does not appreciably change. In case of an attack, the distribution of the image coefficients is heavily altered. The distribution of the sufficient statistics at the receiving end corresponding to the antipodal signals overlap and a simple hard decoder fails to classify them properly. We are considering message retrieval of antipodal signal as a binary classification problem. Machine learning techniques like SVM is used to retrieve the message, when certain specific class of attacks is most probable. In order to validate SVM based decoding scheme, we have taken Gaussian noise as a test case. We generate a data set using 125 images and 25 different keys. Polynomial kernel of SVM has achieved 100 percent accuracy on test data.

Keywords: Bit Correct Ratio (BCR), Grid Search, Intelligent Decoding, Jackknife Technique, Support Vector Machine (SVM), Watermarking.

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Authors: M. M. Bagheri, G. Doudak, M. Gong

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The in-plane rigidity of light frame diaphragms has been investigated by researchers due to the importance of this subsystem regarding lateral force distribution between the lateral force resisting system (LFRS). Where research has lacked is in evaluating the impact of out-of-plane raigidity of the diaphragm on the deflection of shear walls. This study aims at investigating the effect of the diaphragm on the behavior of wood light-frame shear walls, in particular its out-of-plane rigidity was simulated by modeling the floors as beam. The out of plane stiffness of the diaphragm was investigated for idealized (infinitely stiff or flexible) as well as “realistic”. The results showed reductions in the shear wall deflection in the magnitude of approximately 80% considering the out of plane rigidity of the diaphragm. It was also concluded that considering conservative estimates of out-of-plane stiffness might lead to a very significant reduction in deflection and that assuming the floor diaphragm to be infinitely rigid out of plan seems to be reasonable. For diaphragms supported on multiple panels, further reduction in the deflection was observed. More work, particularly at the experimental level, is needed to verify the finding obtained in the numerical investigation related to the effect of out of plane diaphragm stiffness.

Keywords: Deflection of light-frame wood shear walls, out-of-plane stiffness of the diaphragm, initial stiffness.

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Authors: Umair Baig, Kohei Nagai

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At highly congested reinforcement regions, which is common at beam-column joint area, clear spacing between parallel bars becomes less than maximum normal aggregate size (20mm) which has not been addressed in any design code and specifications. Limited clear spacing between parallel bars (herein after thin cover) is one of the causes which affect anchorage performance. In this study, an experimental investigation was carried out to understand anchorage performance of reinforcement in Self-Compacting Concrete (SCC) and Normal Concrete (NC) at highly congested regions under uni-axial tensile loading.  Column bar was pullout whereas; beam bars were offset from column reinforcement creating thin cover as per site condition. Two different sizes of coarse aggregate were used for NC (20mm and 10mm). Strain gauges were also installed along the bar in some specimens to understand the internal stress mechanism. Test results reveal that anchorage performance is affected at highly congested reinforcement region in NC with maximum aggregate size 20mm whereas; SCC and Small Aggregate (10mm) gives better structural performance. 

Keywords: Anchorage capacity, bond, Normal Concrete, self-compacting concrete.

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Authors: H. Abdizadeh, Y. Vahidshad

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The present paper discusses the selection of process parameters for obtaining optimal nanocrystallites size in the CuOZrO2 catalyst. There are some parameters changing the inorganic structure which have an influence on the role of hydrolysis and condensation reaction. A statistical design test method is implemented in order to optimize the experimental conditions of CuO-ZrO2 nanoparticles preparation. This method is applied for the experiments and L16 orthogonal array standard. The crystallites size is considered as an index. This index will be used for the analysis in the condition where the parameters vary. The effect of pH, H2O/ precursor molar ratio (R), time and temperature of calcination, chelating agent and alcohol volume are particularity investigated among all other parameters. In accordance with the results of Taguchi, it is found that temperature has the greatest impact on the particle size. The pH and H2O/ precursor molar ratio have low influences as compared with temperature. The alcohol volume as well as the time has almost no effect as compared with all other parameters. Temperature also has an influence on the morphology and amorphous structure of zirconia. The optimal conditions are determined by using Taguchi method. The nanocatalyst is studied by DTA-TG, XRD, EDS, SEM and TEM. The results of this research indicate that it is possible to vary the structure, morphology and properties of the sol-gel by controlling the above-mentioned parameters.

Keywords: CuO-ZrO2 Nanoparticles, Sol-gel, Taguchi method.

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Authors: Dongseok Cho, Mitchell Driedger, Sera Han, Noman Khan, Mohammed Elmorsy, Mohamad El-Hajj

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Since the approval of the COVID-19 vaccine in late 2020, vaccination rates have varied around the globe. Access to a vaccine supply, mandated vaccination policy, and vaccine hesitancy contribute to these rates. This study used COVID-19 vaccination data from Our World in Data and the Multilateral Leaders Task Force on COVID-19 to create two COVID-19 vaccination indices. The first index is the Vaccine Utilization Index (VUI), which measures how effectively each country has utilized its vaccine supply to doubly vaccinate its population. The second index is the Vaccination Acceleration Index (VAI), which evaluates how efficiently each country vaccinated their populations within their first 150 days. Pearson correlations were created between these indices and country indicators obtained from the World Bank. Results of these correlations identify countries with stronger Health indicators such as lower mortality rates, lower age-dependency ratios, and higher rates of immunization to other diseases display higher VUI and VAI scores than countries with lesser values. VAI scores are also positively correlated to Governance and Economic indicators, such as regulatory quality, control of corruption, and GDP per capita. As represented by the VUI, proper utilization of the COVID-19 vaccine supply by country is observed in countries that display excellence in health practices. A country’s motivation to accelerate its vaccination rates within the first 150 days of vaccinating, as represented by the VAI, was largely a product of the governing body’s effectiveness and economic status, as well as overall excellence in health practises.

Keywords: Data mining, Pearson Correlation, COVID-19, vaccination rates, hesitancy.

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Authors: L. Parvizsedghy, I. Gkountis, A. Senouci, T. Zayed, M. Alsharqawi, H. El Chanati, M. El-Abbasy, F. Mosleh

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The aging and deterioration of water pipelines in cities worldwide result in more frequent water main breaks, water service disruptions, and flooding damage. Therefore, there is an urgent need for undertaking proper maintenance procedures to avoid breaks and disastrous failures. However, due to budget limitations, the maintenance of water pipeline networks needs to be prioritized through efficient deterioration assessment models. Previous studies focused on the development of structural or physical deterioration assessment models, which require expensive inspection data. But, this paper aims at developing deterioration assessment models for water pipelines using statistical techniques. Several deterioration models were developed based on pipeline size, material type, and soil type using linear regression analysis. The categorical nature of some variables affecting pipeline deterioration was considered through developing several categorical models. The developed models were validated with an average validity percentage greater than 95%. Moreover, sensitivity analysis was carried out against different classifications and it displayed higher importance of age of pipes compared to other factors. The developed models will be helpful for the water municipalities and asset managers to assess the condition of their pipes and prioritize them for maintenance and inspection purposes.

Keywords: Water pipelines, deterioration assessment models, regression analysis.

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Authors: Jaya Mahar Maligan, Teti Estiasih, Joni Kusnadi

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Structured phospholipids from commercial soybean lecithin with oil enriched omega-3 fatty acid form by product of tuna canning is alternative procedure to provides the stability of omega-3 fatty acid structure and increase these bioactive function in metabolism. Best treatment condition was obtain in 18 hours acidolysis reaction with 30% enzyme concentration, which EPADHA incorporation level was 127,47 mg/g and incorporation percentage of EPA-DHA was 51,04% at phospholipids structure. This structured phospolipids could reduce atherosclerosis risk in male Sprague dawley rat. Provision of structured phospholipids has significant effect (α = 0.05) on changes in lipid profile, intima-media thickness of aorta rats (male Sprague dawley) fed atherogenic diet. Structured phospholipids intake can lower total cholesterol 78.36 mg/dL, total triglycerides 94,57 mg/dL, LDL levels 87.08 mg/dL and increased HDL level as much as 12,64 mg/dL in 10 weeks cares. Structured phospholipids intake also can prevent the thickening of the intima-media layer of the aorta.

Keywords: Structured phospholipids, commercial soybean lecithin, omega-3 fatty acid, atherosclerosis risk.

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Authors: H. Zare Aliabadi

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The equilibrium chemical reactions taken place in a converter reactor of the Khorasan Petrochemical Ammonia plant was studied using the minimization of Gibbs free energy method. In the minimization of the Gibbs free energy function the Davidon– Fletcher–Powell (DFP) optimization procedure using the penalty terms in the well-defined objective function was used. It should be noted that in the DFP procedure along with the corresponding penalty terms the Hessian matrices for the composition of constituents in the Converter reactor can be excluded. This, in fact, can be considered as the main advantage of the DFP optimization procedure. Also the effect of temperature and pressure on the equilibrium composition of the constituents was investigated. The results obtained in this work were compared with the data collected from the converter reactor of the Khorasan Petrochemical Ammonia plant. It was concluded that the results obtained from the method used in this work are in good agreement with the industrial data. Notably, the algorithm developed in this work, in spite of its simplicity, takes the advantage of short computation and convergence time.

Keywords: Gibbs free energy, converter reactors, Chemical equilibrium

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Authors: M. M. Shabani, O. J. Nydal, R. Larsen

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Gas hydrates can agglomerate and block multiphase oil and gas pipelines when water is present at hydrate forming conditions. Using "Cold Flow Technology", the aim is to condition gas hydrates so that they can be transported as a slurry mixture without a risk of agglomeration. During the pipeline shut down however, hydrate particles may settle in bends and build hydrate plugs. An experimental setup has been designed and constructed to study the flow of such plugs at start up operations. Experiments have been performed using model fluid and model hydrate particles. The propagations of initial plugs in a bend were recorded with impedance probes along the pipe. The experimental results show a dispersion of the plug front. A peak in pressure drop was also recorded when the plugs were passing the bend. The evolutions of the plugs have been simulated by numerical integration of the incompressible mass balance equations, with an imposed mixture velocity. The slip between particles and carrier fluid has been calculated using a drag relation together with a particle-fluid force balance.

Keywords: Cold Flow Technology, Gas Hydrate Plug Flow Experiments, One Dimensional Incompressible Two Fluid Model, Slurry Flow in Inclined Pipes and Bends, Transient Slurry Flow.

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Authors: Vriddhi Prasad

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The paper briefly outlines the nature of contemporary Architecture Education in India and its present challenges with theoretically feasible solutions. It explores in detail the arduous position of architecture education owing to, privatization of higher education institutes in India, every changing demand of the technology driven industry and discipline, along with regional and cultural resources that should be explored academically for the enrichment of graduates. With the government's education policy of supporting privatization, a comprehensive role for the regulating body of Architecture Education becomes imperative. The paper provides key insights through empirical research into the nature of these roles and the areas which need attention in light of the problems. With the aid of critically acclaimed education model like Design Build, contextual retrofits for Indian institutes can be stressed for inclusion in the curriculum. The pairing of a private institute and public industry/research body and vice versa can lead to pro-economic and pro-social research environment. These reforms if stressed by an autonomous nationwide regulating body rather than the state will lead to uniformity and flexibility of curriculum which promotes the creation of fresh graduates who are adaptable to the changing needs.

Keywords: Architecture education, building information modeling, design build, pedagogy.

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Authors: Anthony Bawa, Konstantinos Banitsas

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Rheumatism is a muscular disorder that affects the muscles of the upper and lower limbs. This condition could potentially progress to impair the movement of patients. This study aims to investigate the hip muscular imbalance in patients with chronic rheumatism. A clinical trial involving a total of 15 participants, made up of 10 patients and five control subjects, took place in KATH Hospital between August and September. Participants recruited for the study were of age 54 ± 8 years, weight 65 ± 8 kg, and height 176 ± 8 cm. Muscle signals were recorded from the rectus femoris, and vastus lateralis on the right and left hip of participants. The parameters used in determining the hip muscular imbalances were the maximum voluntary contraction (MVC%), the mean difference, and hip muscle fatigue levels. The mean signals were compared using a t-test, and the metrics for muscle fatigue assessment were based on the root mean square (RMS), mean absolute value (MAV) and mean frequency (MEF), which were computed between the hip muscles of participants. The results indicated that there were significant imbalances in the muscle coactivity between the right and left hip muscles of patients. The patients’ MVC values were observed to be above 10% when compared with control subjects. Furthermore, the mean difference was seen to be higher with p > 0.002 among patients, which indicated clear differences in the hip muscle contraction activities. The findings indicate significant hip muscular imbalances for patients with rheumatism compared with control subjects. Information about the imbalances among patients will be useful for clinicians in designing therapeutic muscle-strengthening exercises.

Keywords: Muscular, imbalances, rheumatism, hip.

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Authors: E. Binaeian, SH. Soroushnia

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Acute toxicity of nano SiO2, ZnO, MCM-41 (Meso pore silica), Cu, Multi Wall Carbon Nano Tube (MWCNT), Single Wall Carbon Nano Tube (SWCNT) , Fe (Coated) to bacteria Vibrio fischeri using a homemade luminometer , was evaluated. The values of the nominal effective concentrations (EC), causing 20% and 50% inhibition of biouminescence, using two mathematical models at two times of 5 and 30 minutes were calculated. Luminometer was designed with Photomultiplier (PMT) detector. Luminol chemiluminescence reaction was carried out for the calibration graph. In the linear calibration range, the correlation coefficients and coefficient of Variation (CV) were 0.988 and 3.21% respectively which demonstrate the accuracy and reproducibility of the instrument that are suitable. The important part of this research depends on how to optimize the best condition for maximum bioluminescence. The culture of Vibrio fischeri with optimal conditions in liquid media, were stirring at 120 rpm at a temperature of 150C to 180C and were incubated for 24 to 72 hours while solid medium was held at 180C and for 48 hours. Suspension of nanoparticles ZnO, after 30 min contact time to bacteria Vibrio fischeri, showed the highest toxicity while SiO2 nanoparticles showed the lowest toxicity. After 5 min exposure time, the toxicity of ZnO was the strongest and MCM-41 was the weakest toxicant component.

Keywords: Bioluminescence, effective concentration, nanomaterials, toxicity, Vibrio fischeri.

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Authors: Felix David

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The use of virtual reality (VR) technology is still in its infancy. This is especially true in a Japanese educational context with very little to no exposition of VR technology inside classrooms. Technology is growing and changing rapidly in America, but Japan seems to be lagging behind in integrating VR into its curriculum. The aim of this research was to expose 111 students from Hiroshima Jogakuin University (HJU) to seven classes that involved VR content and assess students’ attitudinal responses toward this new technology. The students are all female, and they are taking the “Kiso Eigo/基礎英語” or Foundation English course, which is mandatory for all first- and second-year students. Two surveys were given, one before the treatment and a second survey after the treatment, which in this case means the seven VR classes. These surveys first established that the technical environment could accommodate VR activities in terms of internet connection, VR headsets, and the quality of the smartphone’s screen. Based on the attitudinal responses gathered in this research, VR is perceived by students as “fun,” useful to “learn about the world,” as well as being useful to “learn about English.” This research validates VR as a worthy educational tool and it should therefore continue being an integral part of the mandatory English course curriculum at HJU.

Keywords: Virtual Reality, smartphone, English Learning, curriculum.

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Authors: A. Thakur, P. S. Panesar, M. S. Saini

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Extraction of lactic acid by emulsion liquid membrane technology (ELM) using n-trioctyl amine (TOA) in n-heptane as carrier within the organic membrane along with sodium carbonate as acceptor phase was optimized by using response surface methodology (RSM). A three level Box-Behnken design was employed for experimental design, analysis of the results and to depict the combined effect of five independent variables, vizlactic acid concentration in aqueous phase (c_l), sodium carbonate concentration in stripping phase (c_s), carrier concentration in membrane phase (ψ), treat ratio, and batch extraction time (τ)  with equal volume of organic and external aqueous phase on lactic acid extraction efficiency. The maximum lactic acid extraction efficiency (ηext) of 98.21%from aqueous phase in a batch reactor using ELM was found at the optimized values for test variables, cl, cs, ψ,
and τ as 0.06 [M], 0.18 [M], 4.72 (%,v/v), 1.98 (v/v) and 13.36 min respectively. 

Keywords: Emulsion liquid membrane, extraction, lactic acid, n-trioctylamine, response surface methodology.

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Authors: Mohsen Pirdashti, Masoomeh Omidi, Hemmatollah Pidashti

Abstract:

Today, advantage of biotechnology especially in environmental issues compared to other technologies is irrefragable. Kimia Gharb Gostar Industries Company, as a largest producer of citric acid in Middle East, applies biotechnology for this goal. Citrogypsum is a by–product of citric acid production and it considered as a valid residuum of this company. At this paper summary of acid citric production and condition of Citrogypsum production in company were introduced in addition to defmition of Citrogypsum production and its applications in world. According to these information and evaluation of present conditions about Iran needing to Citrogypsum, the best priority was introduced and emphasized on strategy selection and proper programming for self-sufficiency. The Delphi technique was used to elicit expert opinions about criteria for evaluating the usages. The criteria identified by the experts were profitability, capacity of production, the degree of investment, marketable, production ease and time production. The Analytical Hierarchy Process (ARP) and Expert Choice software were used to compare the alternatives on the criteria derived from the Delphi process.

Keywords: Analytical Hierarchy Process, ARP, Delphi, Multi- criteria decision making, Citrogypsum

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Authors: Ahmed M. Al-Mahbashi, Mosleh A. Al-Shamrani, Muawia Dafalla

Abstract:

Mixtures of sand and clay are frequently used to serve for specific purposes in several engineering practices. In environmental engineering, liner layers and cover layers are common for controlling waste disposal facilities. These layers are exposed to moisture and temperature fluctuation specially when existing in unsaturated condition. The relationship between soil suction and water content for these materials is essential for understanding their unsaturated behavior and properties such as retention capacity and unsaturated follow (hydraulic conductivity). This study is aimed at investigating retention capacity for two sand-natural expansive clay mixtures (15% (C15) and 30% (C30) expansive clay) at two ambient temperatures within the range of 5 -50 °C. Soil water retention curves (SWRC) for these materials were determined at these two ambient temperatures using different salt solutions for a wide range of suction (up to 200MPa). The results indicate that retention capacity of C15 mixture underwent significant changes due to temperature variations. This effect tends to be less visible when the clay fraction is doubled (C30). In addition, the overall volume change is marginally affected by high temperature within the range considered in this study.

Keywords: Soil water retention curve, sand-expansive clay mixture, suction, temperature.

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Authors: Eleni Galiotou, Angela Ralli

Abstract:

In this paper we propose a computational model for the representation and processing of morpho-phonological phenomena in a natural language, like Modern Greek. We aim at a unified treatment of inflection, compounding, and word-internal phonological changes, in a model that is used for both analysis and generation. After discussing certain difficulties cuase by well-known finitestate approaches, such as Koskenniemi-s two-level model [7] when applied to a computational treatment of compounding, we argue that a morphology-based model provides a more adequate account of word-internal phenomena. Contrary to the finite state approaches that cannot handle hierarchical word constituency in a satisfactory way, we propose a unification-based word grammar, as the nucleus of our strategy, which takes into consideration word representations that are based on affixation and [stem stem] or [stem word] compounds. In our formalism, feature-passing operations are formulated with the use of the unification device, and phonological rules modeling the correspondence between lexical and surface forms apply at morpheme boundaries. In the paper, examples from Modern Greek illustrate our approach. Morpheme structures, stress, and morphologically conditioned phoneme changes are analyzed and generated in a principled way.

Keywords: Morpho-Phonology, Natural Language Processing.

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Authors: Imad M. Assali

Abstract:

Recently, the world main problem is a global warming and climate change affecting both outdoor and indoor environments, especially the air quality (AQ) as a result of vast migration of people from rural areas to urban areas. Therefore, cities became more crowded and denser from an irregular population increase, along with increasing urbanization caused many problems for the environment such as increasing the land prices, changes in life style, and the new buildings are not adapted to the climate producing uncomfortable and unhealthy indoor building conditions. As interior environments are the places that create the most intimate relationship with the user. Consequently, the indoor environment quality (IEQ) for buildings became uncomfortable and unhealthy for its occupants. The symptoms commonly associated with poor indoor environment such as itchy, headache, fatigue, and respiratory complaints such as cough and congestion, etc. The symptoms tend to improve over time or even disappear when people are away from the building. Therefore, designing a healthy indoor environment to fulfill human needs is the main concern for architects and interior designer. However, this research explores how occupant expectations and environmental attitudes may influence occupant health and satisfaction within the context of the indoor environment. In doing so, it reviews and contributes to the methods and tools used to evaluate only the indoor environment quality (IEQ) components of building performance. Its main aim is to review the literature on indoor human comfort. This is followed by a review of previous papers published related to human comfort. Finally, this paper will provide possible approaches in design level of healthy buildings.

Keywords: Sustainable building, indoor environment quality (IEQ), occupant's health, active system, sick building syndrome (SBS).

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