Accessibility analysis of higher education institution websites of Portugal

The higher education institutions across the globe are steadily increasing their usage of the web platforms to disseminate information to its stakeholders. In this background, it becomes important to make these resources inclusive. An inclusive website of a higher education institution will facilitate seamless access to its resources for Persons with Disabilities (PwDs). This paper presents an accessibility analysis of 59 higher education websites of Portugal. Both Polytechnic (19) and University (40) websites were incorporated into the study.The accessibility analysis is carried out with three major tools: AChecker, WAVE, and aXe. With respect to the AChecker tool, the average of known problems was observed almost doubled in Universities than Polytechnic Institution websites of Portugal under all levels of conformance. With respect to WAVE tool, we found that the average of alerts, structural elements, and HTML5 & ARIA in terms of web accessibility status of websites of Polytechnic Institutes are less than the Universities, but contrast errors are found with more frequency in Polytechnic Institutes than in universities, and the average of errors and features are almost the same in both of the cases. Also, we found that the average number of violations and needs of review guidelines as per aXe tool are 50.84 and 21.47 in Polytechnic Institutes? websites and 30.75 and 27.83 in Universities websites belonging to Portugal, respectively. Based on scores obtained by these accessibility analysis tools, the outliers of accessibility violations are calculated with respect to websites of Polytechnic Institutes and Universities of Portugal. Moreover, we also suggested and discussed the important clues to solve the accessibility violations of websites along with their issue descriptions among the selected websites in this study. Hence, this analysis report provides the feedback to website administrator and web developers to improve the accessibility evaluation status of these websites.5311-8814-F0ED | Sara Maria da Cruz Maia de Oliveira PaivaN/

Flood vulnerability and resilience: Exploring the factors that influence flooding in Sarawak

Flooding is the most common natural disaster in Malaysia, resulting in chaos and disruptions to social and economic activities, damage to roads and railway tracks, vehicles, affecting the level of properties, loss of life, and rise in vulnerability. In addition to natural causes, floods are mainly attributed to continuous heavy rainfall, rapid development, unplanned urbanization, poor drainage system, and environmental degradation. This annual occurrence of floods has given a big impact on the lives of humans and other living beings. Due to the negative impact of floods, we need to pay serious attention and take alternative ways to reduce this disaster. This study aimed to investigate the vulnerability factors and understand the concept of vulnerability and resilience to manage floods in Sarawak. The researcher primarily focused on reviewing the printed and documented material of disasters in order to find the vulnerability factors. Based on the findings, it can be concluded that nature, human, and governance factors, contributed mostly to floods. The present study shows that vulnerability reduction along with emergency preparedness can reduce flood damages and fatalities. The innovative technologies must have to be considered to reduce vulnerability and build resilience for sustainable disaster risk reduction

Nozzle Wear and Pressure Rise in Heating Volume of Self-blast Type Ultra-high Pressure Nitrogen Arc

This paper reports on experiments with ultra-high pressure nitrogen arcs in a self-blast type switch design. The effect of filling pressure on nozzle mass loss and pressure-rise in the heating volume were investigated. An arc current peak of 130 A at 190 Hz and a fixed inter-electrode gap of 50 mm were used throughout the experiment. The arc burns inside a polytetrafluoroethylene nozzle with a gas outflow vent in the middle. Nitrogen filling pressure of 1 bar, 20 bar, and 40 bar was tested, which also covers the supercritical region. Moreover, to study the effect of vent size on blow pressure near current zero, three different vent dimensions were investigated. By increasing the filling pressure, the energy deposited in the arc increases as a result of increased arcing voltage. It was observed that the pressure-rise in the heating volume is linked to the filling pressure, while the vent size plays a crucial role in the blow pressure near current zero. The nozzle mass loss per unit energy deposited in the arc is found to be independent of the filling pressure

Sedative and Anticonvulsant Activities of the Ethanol Root Extract of Flemingia chappar Benth

Purpose: To investigate the sedative, hypnotic and anticonvulsant activities of the ethanol extract of the roots of the Flemingia chappar (ERFC) on the central nervous system (CNS) of mice.Methods: The ethanol extract of the roots of F. chappar in doses of 200, 400 and 600 mg/kg, p.o., was studied in mice for its sedative effect by evaluating its locomotor activity; its hypnotic effect was assessed by measuring pentobarbital–induced sleeping time, while anticonvulsant effect was determined by evaluating its activity on maximal electroshock–induced and pentylenetetrazole-induced seizures. The latency of tonic convulsions and number of animals protected from tonic convulsions were noted.Results: ERFC (200 - 600 mg/kg) significantly (p < 0.05) decreased locomotor activity. ERFC also produced dose-dependent prolongation of pentobarbitone sleeping time. In addition, ERFC (400 and 600 mg/kg) significantly (p < 0.05) reduced the duration of seizure induced by maximal electroshock (MES), The same dose also protected from pentylenetetrazol-induced tonic seizures and significantly (p < 0.05) delayed the onset of tonic seizures.Conclusion: The results indicate that the ethanol root extract of F. chappar has sedative and anticonvulsant activities, thus justifying its use in traditional medicine for epilepsyKeywords: Flemingia chappar, Anticonvulsant activity, Pentylenetetrazole , Electroshock seizure, CNS depressant

Genetic divergence assessment in Kale (Brassica oleracea L var. acephala (DC.) Alef.) by using the multivariate analysis

A total of 87 genotypes collected from different geographical areas of Kashmir valley evaluated at one site to determinate genetic variability. Considerable diversity was found in different traits of horticultural importance. High coefficient of variation and wide range and mean differences of studied traits indicated the existence of wide genetic variability. Three principal component having eigen value more than one and cumulatively accounted for 84.85 percent of total variability of evaluated horticultural traits. The leaf weight, leaf length, leaf width, leaf yield / plant and yield (q/ha) were major contributing traits towards the first principal component. Similarly number of number of leaves/plant was impotent contributed traits toward principal component -II, whereas plant height was main contributing traits to principal component -III. The maximum inter cluster D2 value (731.04) was observed between cluster IV and cluster -I and followed by between cluster -V and cluster- I (677.29) and between cluster II and I (430.13).It indicated that genotypes belongings with these groups were genetically most divergent and may be use for hybridization to get better segregants

Carcinome spinocellulaire de la levre inferieure: Sur cicatrice de lupus erythemateux chronique

Epidermoïd carcinoma is the most common malignant tumor of the lips.They often develop on precancerous lesions. Leukoplasia is the most frequent precancerous lesion. We report a case of a 35 years old man, who suffered from discoid lupus erythematous since 20 years; and wasn't treatedfrom. He consulted for a squamous ulceration of the under lip, developed from one year. The biopsy concluded to an epidermoïd carcinoma.He was treated with surgical excision with reconstruction and homolateral triangular recovery.Keywords: Squamous cell carcinoma, epidermoïd carcinoma, discoid lupus erythematosus, precancerous lesion

Effect of CuO Doped Polyvinyl Alcohol on the Structural and Optical Properties of PVA Films

The effect of copper oxide doped in PVA on the structural and optical properties of composite films is studied experimentally. Samples are PVA films of 20±1 µm thickness doped with different studied using X – ray diffraction. Using the transmittance of samples, the effect of doped and their concentration on optical parameters of PVA films include absorption and others parameters. Results show the band gap energy of samples is decreased. Keywords : PVA films, doping, optical properties