Metacognitive Instruction and Students’ Achievement in Solving Mathematical Word Problems

Mathematics is considered as an important subject of elementary curriculum throughout the world due to its use in different fields of life. The compulsory component of mathematics is mathematical word problems. Word problems are considered as the difficult part of mathematics not only by students but mathematics teachers as well. Special teaching strategies are required to teach mathematical word problems to cope with the recent educational standards. Metacognitive instruction for teaching word problems has been proved affective by different educationists and researchers of world. Metacognitive instruction uses the hypothetical definition of metacognition, metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive skills and practicing of self addressed questions. Students are practiced to ask a series of self addressed questions while solving word problems about: understanding, connection, strategies, and reflection. The present study was an attempt to experiment metacognitive instruction for teaching mathematical word problems on sixth class students at Govt. High School Abbottabad and to check its effectiveness as compared to traditional method of teaching. The study used true experimental research design; specifically the pretest-posttest control group design with 80 subjects (40 + 40) and data was collected and analyzed by t-test and descriptive analysis. The finding of study proved metacognitive instruction as an effective method for teaching mathematical word problems at elementary level

Use of Gastrocnemius Muscle and Musculocutaneous Flaps for Coverage of Soft Tissue Defects in Leg

Objective: To share our experience of proximally based gastrocnemius flap use, recipient-site variables, donor-site management, complications, and outcomes. Patients and Methods: This retrospective study was conducted at Pak Italian Modern Burn Center Nishtar Hospital Multan from January 2009 to December 2014. The records of 139 patients were retrieved from the departmental medical record system and the required information regarding the demographic, diagnostic, and clinical data (like patients' particulars---age and sex, history of occupation, any previous surgery , causes of the defects , the extent and dimensions of the defects, time since injury, exposure of bone or tendons, presence of chronic osteomyelitis, , any co-morbid conditions, postoperative course regarding wound-healing difficulties, flap loss, postoperative palsy of the peroneal nerve after elevation of lateral gastrocnemius and walking limitations) were noted. Pre and post-operative photographs and radiographs were also evaluated along with follow up of at least 6 weeks. Results: Out of 139 our 134 flaps survived with only 1 flap having partial necrosis and 4 flaps with marginal necrosis. The complication rate is low Conclusion: GC is a robust flap and is number one choice in proximal tibial defects as even in extensive trauma this flap can be elevated and used safely.&nbsp

Molecular Survey of Campylobacter jejuni in Broiler Chicken Farms in East Coast of Peninsular, Malaysia

Campylobacter spp. is responsible for food borne illness in humans while Campylobacter jejuni is the most common species for majority of human enteritis cases. The present study was conducted to determine the prevalence of C. jejuni, risk factors associated with the occurrence, identification control and preventive measure to reduce the prevalence in broiler chicken farms in Kelantan state located at east coast region of peninsula Malaysia. Eighty cloacal swab samples were collected from 4 different broiler chicken farms in district Tumpat, Machang and Bachok. The samples were processed for identification of C. jejuni followed by PCR to detect the presence of C. jejuni. Overall, 65% in total (80 samples) of cloacal swab samples showed positive reactions, where prevalence in farms A, B, C and D was 70%, 70%, 75% and 45%, respectively. Among, 2 of 5 identified risk factors through questionnaire showed significant difference which were open house system and untreated water source. Other risk factors which includes small scale, not using probiotic and poor biosecurity were not significant enough in association to occurrence of C. jejuni. Based on the risk factors that have been identified, control measure to reduce the occurrence was; by changing the open housing system into close housing system, using treated water source, use of probiotics, implementing strict biosecurity and good hygiene practices. In conclusion, the prevalence of C. jejuni in broiler chicken farms in Kelantan was high. Therefore, the farmer should always aware with this public health threat by avoiding those potential risk factors that are associated with the colonization of Campylobacter

Recent Advances in Seed Enhancements

Seed quality is vital to sustainable crop production and food security. Seed enhancements include physical, physiological and biological treatments to overcome germination constraints by uniform stands, earlier crop development and better yields. Improved germination rates and seedling vigour are due to reduced emergence time by earlier start of metabolic activities of hydrolytic enzymes and resource mobilization. Nutrient homeostasis, ion uptake, hormonal regulation, activation of antioxidant defence system, reduced lipid peroxidation and accumulation of compatible solutes are some mechanisms conferring biotic and abiotic stress tolerance. Several transcription factors for aquaporins, imbibitions, osmotic adjustment, antioxidant defence and phenylpropanoid pathway have been identified. However, the knowledge of molecular pathways elucidating mode of action of these effects, reduced longevity of primed or other physical and biological agents for seed treatments and market availability of high-quality seeds are some of the challenges for scientists and seed industry. In this scenario, there is need to minimize the factors associated with reduced vigour during seed production, improve seed storage and handling, develop high-tech seeds by seed industry at appropriate rates and integrate agronomic, physiological and molecular seed research for the effective regulation of high-quality seed delivery over next generations

Condition Survey for Evaluation of Pavement Condition Index of a Highway

Pavements are major means of highway infrastructure. Maintenance and rehabilitation of these pavements for the required serviceability is a routine problem faced by highway engineers and organizations. Improvement in road management system results in reduction of time and cost, the pavement condition survey plays a big role in the pavement management. The initial phase in setting up a pavement management system (PMS) is road network identification. A vital element of a PMS is the capacity to assess the present condition of a pavement network and anticipation of future condition. The pavement condition index (PCI) is a numerical index generally utilized for the assessment of the operational condition & structural reliability of pavements. Estimation of the PCI is dependent on the results of a visual inspection in which the type, severity, and quantity of distresses are distinguished. In this research, a pavement distress condition rating strategy was utilized to accomplish the goals of this study. The main targets of this research were to categorize the common types of distress that exist on “Lakhi Larkana National Highway (N-105)”, and to estimate the pavement condition index. Using these data, Average PCI for the highway section was calculated. PCI to assess the pavement performance, 10 out of 19 defects were recognized in the pavement, as stated by the PCI method. Results indicated that the common pavement distress types were depressions, polished aggregate, rutting, potholes, block cracking, and alligator cracking

Assessment of Multi-Satellite Precipitation Products over the Himalayan Mountains of Pakistan, South Asia

Gefördert durch den Publikationsfonds der Universität Kasse

Generation of Controlled Synthetic Samples and Impact of Hyper-Tuning Parameters to Effectively Classify the Complex Structure of Overlapping Region

The classification of imbalanced and overlapping data has provided customary insight over the last decade, as most real-world applications comprise multiple classes with an imbalanced distribution of samples. Samples from different classes overlap near class boundaries, creating a complex structure for the underlying classifier. Due to the imbalanced distribution of samples, the underlying classifier favors samples from the majority class and ignores samples representing the least minority class. The imbalanced nature of the data—resulting in overlapping regions—greatly affects the learning of various machine learning classifiers, as most machine learning classifiers are designed to handle balanced datasets and perform poorly when applied to imbalanced data. To improve learning on multi-class problems, more expertise is required in both traditional classifiers and problem domain datasets. Some experimentation and knowledge of hyper-tuning the parameters and parameters of the classifier under consideration are required. Several techniques for learning from multi-class problems have been reported in the literature, such as sampling techniques, algorithm adaptation methods, transformation methods, hybrid methods, and ensemble techniques. In the current research work, we first analyzed the learning behavior of state-of-the-art ensemble and non-ensemble classifiers on imbalanced and overlapping multi-class data. After analysis, we used grid search techniques to optimize key parameters (by hyper-tuning) of ensemble and non-ensemble classifiers to determine the optimal set of parameters to enhance the learning from a multi-class imbalanced classification problem, performed on 15 public datasets. After hyper-tuning, 20% of the dataset samples are synthetically generated to add to the majority class of each respective dataset to make it more overlapped (complex structure). After the synthetic sample’s addition, the hyper-tuned ensemble and non-ensemble classifiers are tested over that complex structure. This paper also includes a brief description of tuned parameters and their effects on imbalanced data, followed by a detailed comparison of ensemble and non-ensemble classifiers with the default and tuned parameters for both original and synthetically overlapped datasets. We believe that the underlying paper is the first kind of effort in this domain, which will furnish various research aspects to with a greater focus on the parameters of the classifier in the field of learning from imbalanced data problems using machine-learning algorithms

Awareness to Handle Research and Healthcare Waste (RHCW) in teaching and research institutes; a comprehensive review

Environmental pollution has become the major challenge not only for developing countries but also for developed ones Worldwide. The major goal of this comprehensive review is to compile the reference data regarding the different types of waste generated in teaching, research, and healthcare institutes and specific strategy to manage such wastes. In addition to the pharmaceutical, leather, chemicals, food, and paper industries, teaching, research, and healthcare institutions are also significant sources of different types of Non-hazardous as well as hazardous wastes. Therefore, a simple and implementable guideline for cleaning and waste disposal services in such institutions requires strict adherence to applicable policies and procedures. Research and healthcare waste (RHCW) management is a joint effort among Research Laboratory Personnel, Healthcare facilitators, Building Services Personnel, and Local Environmental Health and Safety Personnel. As Pakistan is among the developing countries situated in South Asia, most of the institutes, including teaching, research, and healthcare, try to follow the WHO guidance or manage hazardous and non-hazardous wastes with self-planned strategies. Although most of the local Governing bodies and Institutional bodies are trying to handle the wastes at their levels by following different protocols, introducing a protocol at the National level is the need of the current era to fight against environmental pollutants.

Synthesis, Characterization and Antimicrobial Activity of Bacillus subtilis-Derived Silver Nanoparticles Against Multidrug-Resistant Bacteria

Background: Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) have received great attention in the biomedical field because of their intrinsic therapeutic properties. Nanoparticles synthesized from silver have been studied as antimicrobial, antiviral and anticancer agents and found particularly an attractive source for the development of a new and advance group of antimicrobial agents. Objectives: In the present study, silver nanoparticles were synthesized from non-pathogenic Bacillus subtilis strain to assess their antimicrobial activity. Methods: Different strains of Bacillus spp. were selected and screened against silver nitrate (AgNO3) toxicity. Finally, B. subtilis strain (FCBP-WB-0174) was selected based on its silver resistant nature, among other strains. Silver nanoparticles were synthesized and optimized from the supernatant of B. subtilis culture at 37°C by the reduction of silver ions using the various molar concentration of AgNO3. The synthesized AgNPs were characterized by UV-Vis spectrophotometry and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). These synthesized AgNPs were used for evaluating antimicrobial activity against four multidrug-resistant bacterial strains. Results: The silver ion reduction was found at a ratio of 1:1 from all the three molar concentrations (1, 2, and 3 mM) of AgNO3. The characterized nanoparticles were found to have a characteristic absorption peak at 426 nm, and the particles were found to have spherical shape under SEM with an average diameter of about 80 ± 0.18 nm, which was also reconfirmed using Zeta Sizer Nano. Prepared Silver nanoparticles have found potential antimicrobial activities against all tested pathogenic, including strains, e.g., Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Escherichia coli. Conclusions: Effective AgNP’s were produced from selected B. subtilis strain, and the strain itself was resistant to AgNO3. The current study evidenced that biologically synthesized silver nanoparticles from B. subtilis has promising antimicrobial activities against pathogenic and multidrug-resistant bacteri