Determination of macro and micronutrients levels in organic manure soils and irrigation water

The organic fertilization is cornerstone to raise production value of agricultural land and reduce environmental pollution resulting from the excessive use of chemical fertilizers. Therefore, recycling is important factor that lead to the provision of large quantities of organic fertilizers that meet the needs of agricultural land, especially sandy soils that are poor in organic matter. The study includes estimating the concentration of selected chemical elements and heavy metals in agricultural soils fertilized with organic matter and recycled irrigation water in some areas of the Wadi-Al shati including (Ashkeda , Qyra, Dabdab, Qaqum , Tamazawa , Aqar , and Mahruqa ), where the soil physical and chemical properties are analyzed here. The results showed that the studied soils consistency range from sandy to loamy sand, which has an important role in determining the ability of the soil to retain nutrients. Organic matter played a role in increasing the productivity of sandy soils by 0.63% and improved the cation exchange capacity to reach 39.36 million equivalent / 100 g soil in sandy soils textures. Also, the study showed that the clay minerals and organic matter and pH are the most important factors that influence the content of the soil of heavy elements in addition to the clay minerals which originated the soil. The results showed that irrigation water has direct effect on the properties of physico-chemical properties of soil where accumulation of salts like sulfates of calcium,  magnesium and sodium chloride , calcium, Bicarbonate calcium in the soil. Results showed that the concentration of the elements manganese, chromium, and cadmium in irrigation water was higher than the maximum limits by the FAO standard. Also, the results show that levels of zinc, nickel and iron were within the allowable limit, and the elemental lead and copper are below detection limits. Keywords: Fertilization, Environmental pollution, Recycling, Nutrients, Production value, Physico-chemical properties

Determination of Macro and Micronutrients Levels in Organic Manure Soils and Irrigation Water

The organic fertilization is cornerstone to raise production value of agricultural land and reduce environmental pollution resulting from the excessive use of chemical fertilizers. Therefore, recycling is important factor that lead to the provision of large quantities of organic fertilizers that meet the needs of agricultural land, especially sandy soils that are poor in organic matter. The study includes estimating the concentration of selected chemical elements and heavy metals in agricultural soils fertilized with organic matter and recycled irrigation water in some areas of the Wadi-Al shati including (Ashkeda , Qyra , Dabdab , Qaqum , Tamazawa , Aqar , and Mahruqa ), where the soil physical and chemical properties are analyzed here.The results showed that the studied soils consistency range from sandy to loamy sand, which has an important role in determining the ability of the soil to retain nutrients. Organic matter played a role in increasing the productivity of sandy soils by 0.63% and improved the cation exchange capacity to reach 39.36 million equivalent / 100 g soil in sandy soils textures. Also, the study showed that the clay minerals and organic matter and pH are the most important factors that influence the content of the soil of heavy elements in addition to the clay minerals which originated the soil.The results showed that irrigation water has direct effect on the properties of physico-chemical properties of soil where accumulation of salts like sulfates of calcium,  magnesium and sodium chloride , calcium, Bicarbonate calcium in the soil. Results showed that the concentration of the elements manganese, chromium, and cadmium in irrigation water was higher than the maximum limits by the FAO standard. Also, the results show that levels of zinc, nickel and iron were within the allowable limit, and the elemental lead and copper are below detection limits. Keywords: Fertilization, Environmental pollution, Recycling, Nutrients, Production value, Physico-chemical properties

Hoarding versus circulation of wealth from the perspective of Maqasid Al-Shari'ah

Purpose - The purpose of the paper is to explore the issue of hoarding and dishoarding in modern context, especially as it relates to circulation of wealth, an important economic objective from Islamic viewpoint. Design/Methodology/Approach - This paper presents a survey of scholarly positions on the issue of hoarding and circulation of wealth from Islamic perspectives and analyzes how these positions affect the shaping of financial and economic dimensions of life in our contemporary time. The paper draws on the primary sources, the Qur’an and hadith, and examines the positions of the classical and contemporary scholars, especially in the context of the growing interest in finance, financial system and economy from Islamic perspective. Findings - The paper identifies the fact that the notion of hoarding (kanz) needs significantly revised understanding as money as a concept and tool has evolved substantively in modern times. It also examines variant positions regarding the concept of hoarding and finds more merit in favor of the position that paying zakat is not enough to be exempted from the Qur'anic implications about hoarding. It also identifies and examines securitisation, such as sukuk, as an important tools for better circulation of wealth. Research Limitations/Implications - With the advent of Islamic finance in modern times, sukuk has emerged as one of the most popular capital market instruments. Such instruments can be more relevant for development and shared prosperity, where the notion of hoarding (kanz) is properly understood and the gravity of entrenched propensity to hoarding (kanz) is recognised. Practical Implications - Capital market and its instruments, such as sukuk, can be very useful tool for prevention of hoarding and facilitating circulation of wealth. However, greater awareness about the ways and means by which hoarding exists widely in modern times is essential to enable Islamic finance to serve the people and the humanity from Islamic viewpoint. Originality/Value - Hoarding and dishoarding are not widely explored topic in contemporary literature on Islamic economics and finance. This paper makes a valuable contribution in its attempt to bring the problem of hoarding and the challenge toward greater circulation of wealth to highlight

Bodacious-instance coverage mechanism for wireless sensor network

Copyright © 2020 Shahzad Ashraf et al. Due to unavoidable environmental factors, wireless sensor networks are facing numerous tribulations regarding network coverage. These arose due to the uncouth deployment of the sensor nodes in the wireless coverage area that ultimately degrades the performance and confines the coverage range. In order to enhance the network coverage range, an instance (node) redeployment-based Bodacious-instance Coverage Mechanism (BiCM) is proposed. The proposed mechanism creates new instance positions in the coverage area. It operates in two stages; in the first stage, it locates the intended instance position through the Dissimilitude Enhancement Scheme (DES) and moves the instance to a new position, while the second stage is called the depuration, when the moving distance between the initial and intended instance positions is sagaciously reduced. Further, the variations of various parameters of BiCM such as loudness, pulse emission rate, maximum frequency, grid points, and sensing radius have been explored, and the optimized parameters are identified. The performance metric has been meticulously analyzed through simulation results and is compared with the state-of-the-art Fruit Fly Optimization Algorithm (FOA) and, one step above, the tuned BiCM algorithm in terms of mean coverage rate, computation time, and standard deviation. The coverage range curve for various numbers of iterations and sensor nodes is also presented for the tuned Bodacious-instance Coverage Mechanism (tuned BiCM), BiCM, and FOA. The performance metrics generated by the simulation have vouched for the effectiveness of tuned BiCM as it achieved more coverage range than BiCM and FOA

Facial expression recognition using lightweight deep learning modeling

Facial expression is a type of communication and is useful in many areas of computer vision, including intelligent visual surveillance, human-robot interaction and human behavior analysis. A deep learning approach is presented to classify happy, sad, angry, fearful, contemptuous, surprised and disgusted expressions. Accurate detection and classification of human facial expression is a critical task in image processing due to the inconsistencies amid the complexity, including change in illumination, occlusion, noise and the over-fitting problem. A stacked sparse auto-encoder for facial expression recognition (SSAE-FER) is used for unsupervised pre-training and supervised fine-tuning. SSAE-FER automatically extracts features from input images, and the softmax classifier is used to classify the expressions. Our method achieved an accuracy of 92.50% on the JAFFE dataset and 99.30% on the CK+ dataset. SSAE-FER performs well compared to the other comparative methods in the same domain

S. Cheema et al .

Objectives Oral health is a crucial determinant of quality of life. We aimed to determine oral health condition and factors associated with poor oral status in the adult national population of Qatar. Methods We used data from the World Health Organization supported STEPS (STEPwise approach to Surveillance) Survey conducted by the Supreme Council of Health, Qatar in 2012. A total of 2,496 Qataris (1,053 men, 1,443 women) answered the national survey. The Rao-Scott Chi-Square test was used to analyze oral health characteristics and multinomial logistic regression to assess risk factors. Results The self-perceived oral status of approximately 40 percent of respondents was either "average" or "poor" rather than "good." Poor oral status was more often reported by women (OR = 1.93; 95%CI = 1.30-2.80), by older (OR = 3.38; 95%CI = 1.59-7.19) and less educated respondents (OR = 3.58; 95%CI = 2.15-5.96). Other risk groups included people with diabetes (OR = 1.87; 95%CI = 1.24-2.81), smokeless tobacco users (OR = 3.90; 95%CI = 1.75-8.68), or ever tobacco users (OR = 1.66; 95%CI = 1.03-2.67). Oral health status appeared to be independent of diet, BMI status, and history of hypertension. Difficulties and behaviors related to oral health were more frequently reported by women than by men. These included pain (P < 0.001), difficulty chewing (P < 0.001), and discomfort over appearance of teeth (P < 0.001). Participants used toothbrushes, toothpicks, dental floss, and miswak to maintain oral hygiene. Conclusion Our results provide evidence that oral health remains a public health concern in Qatar

The environmental profile of a community’s health: a cross-sectional study on tobacco marketing in 16 countries.

OBJECTIVE: To examine and compare tobacco marketing in 16 countries while the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control requires parties to implement a comprehensive ban on such marketing. METHODS: Between 2009 and 2012, a kilometre-long walk was completed by trained investigators in 462 communities across 16 countries to collect data on tobacco marketing. We interviewed community members about their exposure to traditional and non-traditional marketing in the previous six months. To examine differences in marketing between urban and rural communities and between high-, middle- and low-income countries, we used multilevel regression models controlling for potential confounders. FINDINGS: Compared with high-income countries, the number of tobacco advertisements observed was 81 times higher in low-income countries (incidence rate ratio, IRR: 80.98; 95% confidence interval, CI: 4.15-1578.42) and the number of tobacco outlets was 2.5 times higher in both low- and lower-middle-income countries (IRR: 2.58; 95% CI: 1.17-5.67 and IRR: 2.52; CI: 1.23-5.17, respectively). Of the 11,842 interviewees, 1184 (10%) reported seeing at least five types of tobacco marketing. Self-reported exposure to at least one type of traditional marketing was 10 times higher in low-income countries than in high-income countries (odds ratio, OR: 9.77; 95% CI: 1.24-76.77). For almost all measures, marketing exposure was significantly lower in the rural communities than in the urban communities. CONCLUSION: Despite global legislation to limit tobacco marketing, it appears ubiquitous. The frequency and type of tobacco marketing varies on the national level by income group and by community type, appearing to be greatest in low-income countries and urban communities