The factors influencing municipal solid waste generation in bauchi town, Nigeria

This study investigated the factors influencing municipal solid waste generation (MSWG) in Bauchi town, the administrative headquarters of Bauchi state, Nigeria. The study used quantitative method, while experiments and questionnaire surveys, were used as the major instruments for data collection. Data on solid waste generation and the socioeconomic attributes of residents from 400 households were collected from residential zones within Bauchi town, the study area. Descriptive statistics, Correlations and Standard Multiple Regressions (SMR) were computed for data analysis using SPSS 2.2 software. Twelve (12) socioeconomic factors were computed in SMR to determine the significant factors of MSWG in the study. The results showed that five factors, namely: household size, income, education, house head age and occupation have exerted significant influence on MSWG in the study area. The results also showed that F (5:362) = 84.058 at p ≤ 0.01 and adjusted R² = 0.531; which indicated that the factors in the SMR model have sufficiently explained the variance in MSWG in Bauchi town. The study concluded that the five significant predictor factors have adequately explained the variance of MSWG in the study area. Therefore, the factors have implications for planning of effective waste management system in Bauchi town, Nigeria

Physico-chemical parameters of soil in some selected dumpsites in Zaria and its environs

Physico-chemical parameters of soil were found to have influence on the availability of heavy metals in plants. pH values recorded in the control site ranges from 7.8 to 9.2 indicating that all the soils studied were alkaline. The control site has a value of 7.16. The conductivity values range from 4.2 x 10-2 to 4.0x105μScm-1 . The highest conductivity value was recorded in site B, while site D had the least value. Moisture content in the 10 dumpsites studied ranged from 17.87 to 82.49%. Organic matter contents in the dumpsites ranged from 3.20 to 5.30% and are higher than values obtained for uncontaminated/control site. These higher values may be due to the aging of the dumpsites. The cation exchange capacity values ranged from 132.83(R) to 469.5(G)CmolKg-1. These values are reasonably high due to the relatively higher conductivity values obtained in the dumpsites and this may also affect the bioavailability of the heavy metals in plants. Correlation analysis revealed that pH, electrical conductivity and moisture content were negatively correlated.Keywords: Bioavailability, dumpsite, heavy metal, physico-chemical parameter, Zari

Studies on the Effects of Ammonium Phosphates on the Flammability Properties of Poly(Vinyl Alcohol) Films

Poly(vinyl alcohol) was solvent-cast from aqueous solution of n-hexane into 125 μm films. Three ammonium phosphates, (NH4)3PO4, NH4H2PO4 and (NH4)2HPO4, were then added to produce eight sample films. Burning time, flame spread, limiting oxygen index, ignition time, and afterglow time of the samples were evaluated to determine the flame retardant efficiency of the three fillers. From the results, burning time, flame spread, after-glow time, and ignition response indices of the filled samples were found to be lower than the control sample. However, limiting oxygen index of the filled samples was found to be higher than that of the control sample. The efficiency of the fillers in fireproofing the poly(vinyl alcohol) film was found to follow the order (NH4)3PO4 > NH4H2PO4 > (NH4)2HPO4. Additive effect was observed when the fillers are added in pairs with the fireproofing efficiency following the order (NH4)3PO4 + NH4H2PO4 > (NH4)3PO4 + (NH4)2HPO4 > (NH4)2HPO4 + NH4H2PO4. Antagonism in fireproofing efficiency was observed when all the three fillers were present in the poly(vinyl alcohol) film. The fireproofing efficiency of the ammonium salts is attributed to the quantity and the ease with which ammonia (NH3) gas is released when the filled poly(vinyl alcohol) films were heated

Vulnerability prediction for secure healthcare supply chain service delivery

Healthcare organisations are constantly facing sophisticated cyberattacks due to the sensitivity and criticality of patient health care information and wide connectivity of medical devices. Such attacks can pose potential disruptions to critical services delivery. There are number of existing works that focus on using Machine Learning(ML) models for pre-dicting vulnerability and exploitation but most of these works focused on parameterized values to predict severity and exploitability. This paper proposes a novel method that uses ontology axioms to define essential concepts related to the overall healthcare ecosystem and to ensure semantic consistency checking among such concepts. The application of on-tology enables the formal specification and description of healthcare ecosystem and the key elements used in vulnerabil-ity assessment as a set of concepts. Such specification also strengthens the relationships that exist between healthcare-based and vulnerability assessment concepts, in addition to semantic definition and reasoning of the concepts. Our work also makes use of Machine Learning techniques to predict possible security vulnerabilities in health care supply chain services. The paper demonstrates the applicability of our work by using vulnerability datasets to predict the exploitation. The results show that the conceptualization of healthcare sector cybersecurity using an ontological approach provides mechanisms to better understand the correlation between the healthcare sector and the security domain, while the ML algorithms increase the accuracy of the vulnerability exploitability prediction. Our result shows that using Linear Regres-sion, Decision Tree and Random Forest provided a reasonable result for predicting vulnerability exploitability

Contamination of herbal medicinal products marketed in Kaduna Metropolis with selected pathogenic bacteria.

The study aimed to evaluate the bacterial contamination of powdered herbal medicinal preparations sourced from identified herbal retail outlets in different parts of Kaduna metropolis. The assessments of the contamination of the herbal products were carried out using standard procedures: total aerobic bacterial plate count, measurement of some physical parameters, isolation and characterization of selected bacterial pathogens etc. The results showed that out of a total of 150, 70 (46.67%) herbal remedies were contaminated with Salmonella typhi, twenty nine (19.33%) with Shigella spp. Eighty eight (58.67%) and 98 (65.33%) were contaminated with Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, respectively. The total aerobic plate count results showed that the highest average count of > 5×107cfu/g was found in 89 (59.33%) of the preparations, while average plate count of ≤5×107cfu/g was found in 42 (28%) and no bacterial count was obtained in 19 (12.67%) of the preparations. Correlation was positive (P = 0.01; r = +0.109) between the physical parameters tested and the bacterial load. Antibacterial activities result of some common antibiotics showed that all the antibiotics had activities on the test bacterial isolates at various minimum inhibitory concentrations. Most traditionally prepared herbal medications in Kaduna state are likely to be contaminated with a wide variety of potentially pathogenic bacteria. The quality assurance of these products should be thoroughly enforced and monitored in the production and distribution of herbal preparations.Key words: Herbal preparations, Kaduna metropolis, bacterial contamination, antibacterial assessment

Preparation and Application of Polyvinyl Alcohol Based UV Curable Flexographic Printing Ink

Polyvinyl alcohol was utilized as a single sole binder in the formulation of water based UV curable flexographic printing inks. Six different formulation composition containing 2%, 3%, 4%, 5%, 8% and 10% polyvinyl alcohol were prepared using 1-(4-nitrophenyl)azo-2-naphthol as pigment and potassium dichromate as a cross linking agent. The formulations prepared were characterized for viscosity and FT-IR before being printed on different substrates. The integrity and pigment particle distribution of the ink film formed were assessed by optical microscopy, the print quality and fastness properties were found to meet most requirements in colour printing chemistry and technology applications

Effects of land use on the distribution of three species of armadillos in the Argentinean pampas

We evaluated the effects of land use on the distribution of 3 sympatric species of armadillos, Chaetophractus villosus, C. vellerosus, and Dasypus hybridus, on 34 farms in the eastern Pampas. We characterized 4 soil and vegetation variables around each burrow located during surveys of these farms, and related burrow abundance to 10 variables used to characterize each farm. C. vellerosus was the most specialized, using primarily native woodlands and areas with calcareous soil. D. hybridus was associated with natural grasslands and avoided cultivated pastures, and was negatively related to the number of dogs that lived on the farms. C. villosus, the most abundant species, was found in all 4 types of habitats, but its distribution depended on the intensity of hunting on each farm.Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Muse

Effects of land use on the distribution of three species of armadillos in the Argentinean pampas

We evaluated the effects of land use on the distribution of 3 sympatric species of armadillos, Chaetophractus villosus, C. vellerosus, and Dasypus hybridus, on 34 farms in the eastern Pampas. We characterized 4 soil and vegetation variables around each burrow located during surveys of these farms, and related burrow abundance to 10 variables used to characterize each farm. C. vellerosus was the most specialized, using primarily native woodlands and areas with calcareous soil. D. hybridus was associated with natural grasslands and avoided cultivated pastures, and was negatively related to the number of dogs that lived on the farms. C. villosus, the most abundant species, was found in all 4 types of habitats, but its distribution depended on the intensity of hunting on each farm.Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Muse

Contribution a l’étude physicochimique de l’écosystème lacustre Dayet Aoua au Maroc

L’étude consiste à la détermination de la qualité physicochimique des eaux du lac Dayet Aoua situé dans le Moyen Atlas au Maroc juste après son dernier desséchement survenu en été 2002. Les résultats d’analyse obtenus au cours de la période d’étude comprise entre février et juillet 2005, montrent que les eaux du lac sont bicarbonatées calciques et magnésiennes, dures à très dures. La dureté dépend essentiellement des ions magnésium. Les analyses des formes azotées et des orthophosphates des eaux du lac donnent des valeurs très faibles, et ne décèlent aucune sorte de pollution de type organique pouvant engendrer son eutrophisation, ce qui permet de le classeractuellement parmi les lacs oligotrophes.Mots-clés : lac, physico-chimie, pollution organique, oligotrophe