Security oriented e-infrastructures supporting neurological research and clinical trials

The neurological and wider clinical domains stand to gain greatly from the vision of the grid in providing seamless yet secure access to distributed, heterogeneous computational resources and data sets. Whilst a wealth of clinical data exists within local, regional and national healthcare boundaries, access to and usage of these data sets demands that fine grained security is supported and subsequently enforced. This paper explores the security challenges of the e-health domain, focusing in particular on authorization. The context of these explorations is the MRC funded VOTES (Virtual Organisations for Trials and Epidemiological Studies) and the JISC funded GLASS (Glasgow early adoption of Shibboleth project) which are developing Grid infrastructures for clinical trials with case studies in the brain trauma domain

Aniline effect on concrete steel rebar degradation in saline and sulfate media

Electrochemical potential monitoring experiments were performed on mild steel rebars embedded in concrete admixed with aniline inhibitor and fixed amount of sodium chloride salt partially immersed in sulfuric acid and sodium chloride solution. The open circuit potential corrosion monitoring technique was employed and the potential readings were taken in accordance with ASTM C 876. Repressive attribute and consistency of the inhibitor was then estimated by the Weibull probability density distribution as an extreme value statistical modeling approach to study performance effectiveness and to predict the most efficient inhibitor concentration in each media. Aniline effect on the compressive strengths of the reinforced concrete samples was also investigated and reported. Varying concentrations of the inhibitor were used and its performance improved as concentration changed in NaCl medium, while no particular order of performance was noted in sulfuric medium. In the statistically analyzed experimental results for each of the inhibitor concentrations employed, 0.34 and 0.41 M aniline admixed samples were identified as exhibiting the best inhibiting quality in sodium chloride while 0.14 M aniline was predicted as showing the lowest probability of corrosion risk in sulfuric acid medium. The overall effective inhibitive performance in sulfuric acid was less when compared to the sodium chloride medium. Concrete sample admixed with 0.41 M aniline had the highest improvement in compressive strength in both media

Dividend Policy and Firm Performance:a Study of Listed Firms in Nigeria

This study basically investigates the relationship between the financial performance and dividend payout among listed firms’ in Nigeria. It also looks at the relationship between ownership structure, size of firms and the dividend payouts. The annual reports for the period 2006-2010 were utilized as the main source of data collection for the 50 sampled firms. The regression analysis method was employed as a statistical technique for analysing the data collected. We find that there is a significant positive association between the performance of firms and the dividend payout of the sampled firms in Nigeria. The study also revealed that ownership structure and firm’s size has a significant impact of the dividend payout of firms to

Kinematics of Lower Limb Segments during Cycling Session

This paper presents the kinematics of the leg-bicycle five-bar linkage system mechanism including foot segment. Kinematics is very important in the analysis of rigid bodies system whenever theoretical analysis is being sought especially in bicycle-leg linkage mechanism. A lot of experimental works has already been carried out on lower limbs segments biomechanics during cycling which involved the use of positions of the lower limb segments, but there has not been a complete theoretical analysis of the lower limb segments positions in the literature. Therefore, there is need for a complete kinematics of the bicycle-leg linkage mechanism which includes the position analysis of the lower limb segments. The position, velocity, and acceleration equations were derived and the profiles of the thigh, shank and foot segments were plotted against crank angles. It was found that the profiles obtained are reasonable and agrees with experiments. Keywords: Cycling; Five-bar linkage; Kinematics Analysis; Lower Limb Segments

Phytochemical and Antimicrobial Properties of Mangifera indica Leaf Extracts

There have been reports of increasing development of drug resistance among human pathogens as well as undesirable side effects of certain antimicrobial agents.It is therefore necessary to search for new agents that are better, cheaper and without side effects for treating infectious diseases especially in developing countries. In this study, phytochemical composition and antimicrobial activities of aqueous and ethanolic extracts of leaves of Mangifera indica were investigated. Standard methods were employed to screen for the phytochemicals. Agar well diffusion method was used to determine the antimicrobial effects of aqueous and ethanolic extracts of M. indica leaves against seven different clinical isolates namely:Stapylococcus aureus, Micrococcus virians, M. leteus, Escherichia coli, Klebsellia pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and a fungus, Candida albicans. Phytochemical screening showed the presence of active pharmacological components such as tannins, saponins, cardiac glycoside, flavonoid and alkaloids. Aqueous extract demonstrated a higher activity than the ethanolic extract. S. aureus showed highest sensitivity to the aqueous extracts with MIC 31.25mg/mL. Least sensitivity was observed in K. pneumoniae and Candida albicans with MIC 125mg/mL each in the two extracts.M. indica exhibited significant antimicrobial activity comparable to gentamicin which is used as control in this study

Phytochemical and Antimicrobial Properties ofnMangifera indica Leaf Extracts

There have been reports of increasing development of drug resistance among human pathogens as well as undesirable side effects of certain antimicrobial agents.It is therefore necessary to search for new agents that are better, cheaper and without side effects for treating infectious diseases especially in developing countries. In this study, phytochemical composition and antimicrobial activities of aqueous and ethanolic extracts of leaves of Mangifera indica were investigated. Standard methods were employed to screen for the phytochemicals. Agar well diffusion method was used to determine the antimicrobial effects of aqueous and ethanolic extracts of M. indica leaves against seven different clinical isolates namely:Stapylococcus aureus, Micrococcus virians, M. leteus, Escherichia coli, Klebsellia pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and a fungus, Candida albicans. Phytochemical screening showed the presence of active pharmacological components such as tannins, saponins, cardiac glycoside, flavonoid and alkaloids. Aqueous extract demonstrated a higher activity than the ethanolic extract. S. aureus showed highest sensitivity to the aqueous extracts with MIC 31.25mg/mL. Least sensitivity was observed in K. pneumoniae and Candida albicans with MIC 125mg/mL each in the two extracts.M. indica exhibited significant antimicrobial activity comparable to gentamicin which is used as control in this study

Time-resolved energy transfer from single chloride terminated nanocrystals to graphene

We examine the time-resolved resonance energy transfer of excitons from single n-butyl amine-bound, chloride-terminated nanocrystals to two-dimensional graphene through time-correlated single photon counting. The radiative biexponential lifetime kinetics and blinking statistics of the individual surface-modified nanocrystal elucidate the non-radiative decay channels. Blinking modification as well as a 4 times reduction in spontaneous emission were observed with the short chloride and n-butylamine ligands, probing the energy transfer pathways for the development of graphene-nanocrystal nanophotonic devices

Rollover Stability Models for Three-Wheeled Vehicle Design

The current commercial  three-wheeled vehicles (TWVs) in the market are rollover unstable, with adverse effects on life and property.  This places limitation on their speed and usage, even though they are fuel efficient, cheap and generate about 33% of green gases per rider when compared with four-wheeled vehicles.This work derived mathematical models for the analysis of the stability of the three-wheeled vehicle (TWV). Based on these models, the test method for rollover stability was adopted. Rollover test was carried out on a TWV on Nigerian road. The results showed that the vehicle is unstable with respect to rollover stability. The test procedure if adopted and legislated upon, would significantly enhance safety of life and property of the population. Moreover, the speed and usage of the vehicle for both private and commercial purposes will be enhanced