EXAMINING THE INFLUENCE OF FAIRNESS PERCEPTION ON TAX COMPLIANCE BEHAVIOR OF THE LIBYA INDIVIDUAL TAXPAYERS: THE MODERATING TAX AWARENESS AND TAX COMPLEXITY

Purpose of Study: This study examines the impact of the perceptions of fairness among Libyan taxpayers in the Libyan income tax system, where a multidimensional model of justice was introduced. This extends the definition of justice from one to distributive fairness and procedural fairness, along with tax awareness and tax complexity as moderators’ variables. This study is one of the first studies that test the impact of tax awareness and tax complexity as moderators’ variables on tax compliance behavior in a country. Methodology: Despite the importance of collecting taxes from individual taxpayers, it is a little known about the behavior of tax compliance in general in the Libyan context. This is important for tax authorities to identify behavioral factors that may hinder the successful tax compliance so that remedial action can be taken to improve compliance behavior. It remains currently a severe challenge for the Libyan tax authorities. Results: The results of this research will contribute significantly to the paucity of current literature on the role of tax awareness and tax complexities as moderators’ variables on tax compliance behavior, particularly in developing countries. The serial exploratory search design will be used in this study. The sub-squares analysis will be used to analyze the surveys

Design, characterisation and testing of SU8 polymer based electrothermal microgrippers

Microassembly systems are designed to combine micro-component parts with high accuracy. These micro-components are fabricated using different manufacturing processes in sizes of several micrometers. This technology is essential to produce miniaturised devices and equipment, especially those built from parts requiring different fabrication procedures. The most important task in microassembly systems is the manipulator, which should have the ability to handle and control micro-particles. Different techniques have been developed to carry out this task depending on the application, required accuracy, and cost. In this thesis, the most common methods are identified and briefly presented, and some advantages and disadvantages are outlined. A microgripper is the most important device utilized to handle micro-objects with high accuracy. However, it is a device that can be used only in sequential microassembly techniques. It has the potential to become the most important tool in the field of micro-robotics, research and development, and assembly of parts with custom requirements. Different actuation mechanisms are employed to design microgrippers such as electromagnetic force, electrostatic force, piezoelectric effect, and electrothermal expansions. Also, different materials are used to fabricate these microgrippers, for example metals, silicon, and polymers such as SU-8. To investigate the limitation and disadvantages of the conventional SU-8 electrothermal based microgrippers, different devices designed and fabricated at IMT, Romania, were studied. The results of these tests showed a small end-effector displacement and short cycling on/off (lifetime). In addition, the actuator part of these microgrippers was deformed after each operation, which results in reduced displacement and inconsistent openings at off state every time it was operated in a power ON/OFF cycle. One of these limitations was caused by the existence of conductors in arms of the end-effectors. These conductor designs have two disadvantages: firstly, it raises temperature in the arms and causing an expansion in the opposite direction of the desired displacement. Secondly, since the conductors pass through the hinges, they should be designed wide enough to reduce the conductor resistance as much as possible. Therefore, the wider the hinges are, the higher the in-plane stiffness and the less out of plane deflection. As a result, it increases the reaction force of the arm reducing the effect of deformation. Based on these limitations a new actuatorstructure of L-shape was proposed to reduce the effects of these drawbacks. This actuator has no conductor in the hinges or the arms of the end-effectors which reduce limitation on the hinge width. . In addition, a further development of this actuator was proposed to increase the stiffness of the actuator by doubling its thickness compared with the other parts of the griper. The results of this actuator proved the improvement in performance and reduction of the actuator deformation. This new actuator structure was used to design several different microgrippers with large displacement and suitable for a wide range of applications. Demonstrations of the capabilities of the microgrippers to be used in microassembly are presented. In addition, a novel tri-directional microactuator is proposed in this thesis. This actuator’s end-effector is capable of displacements in three different directions. This actuator was used with the other designs to develop a novel three-arm (three fingers) multidirectional microgripper. To study the microgripper displacement as a function to the heater temperature, the TCR of the conductor layer of each device was measured. Because different configurations of conductor layers were studied, a significant effect of the metal layer structure on TCR was discovered. The TCR value of gold film is reduced significantly by adding the chromium layers below and about it which were used to improve the adhesion between the gold film and the SU layers. In this thesis, a new method based on a robotic system was developed to characterise these microgrippers and to study the steady state, dynamic response, and reliability (lifetime cycling on/off). An electronic interface was developed and integrated to the robotic system to control and drive the microgrippers. This new system was necessary to carry out automated testing of the microgrippers with accurate and reliable results. Four different new groups of microgrippers were designed and studied. The first group was indirectly actuated using an L-Shaped actuator and two different actuator widths. The initial opening was 120 μm for both designs. The maximum displacement was about 140 μm for both designs. However, the actuator in the wider heater width showed more stable behavior during the cycling and the dynamic tests. The second group was based on direct actuation approach using the L-Shaped actuator. There were eight different designs based on this method with different heater conductor shape, actuator width, and arm thickness. The initial opening was 100 μm and there were different displacements for the eight designs. The study of these microgrippers proved that the actuator stiffness has a significant effect on the microgripper displacement. In addition, the shape of the heater conductor has less effect. The largest displacement achieved using this method of design was about 70 μm. The third group was designed for dual mode operation and has three different designs. The initial openings were 90 μm and 250 μm. The displacement was about 170 μm in both modes. The last microgripper design was a tri-arm design for multi-mode operation. The lifetime study of SU8 based microgrippers in this thesis was the first time such an investigation was carried out. The results of IMT designs showed that the larger is the displacement the less stable is the gripper design because of the high rection force acting on the actuators. The L-shape based microgrippers had better performance and they did not break after more than 400 cycles. In addition, the studies of static displacement and dynamic response of different designed microgripper proved that better performance of the proposed actuator can be obtained by using double thickness for the actuator as compared to the arm thickness

Cyber Framework for Steering and Measurements Collection Over Instrument-Computing Ecosystems

We propose a framework to develop cyber solutions to support the remote steering of science instruments and measurements collection over instrument-computing ecosystems. It is based on provisioning separate data and control connections at the network level, and developing software modules consisting of Python wrappers for instrument commands and Pyro server-client codes that make them available across the ecosystem network. We demonstrate automated measurement transfers and remote steering operations in a microscopy use case for materials research over an ecosystem of Nion microscopes and computing platforms connected over site networks. The proposed framework is currently under further refinement and being adopted to science workflows with automated remote experiments steering for autonomous chemistry laboratories and smart energy grid simulations.Comment: Paper accepted for presentation at IEEE SMARTCOMP 202

The impact of herbal infusion consumption on oxidative stress and cancer: The good, the bad, the misunderstood

© 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. The release of reactive oxygen species (ROS) and oxidative stress is associated with the development of many ailments, including cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and cancer. The causal link between oxidative stress and cancer is well established and antioxidants are suggested as a protective mechanism against cancer development. Recently, an increase in the consumption of antioxidant supplements was observed globally. The main sources of these antioxidants include fruits, vegetables, and beverage. Herbal infusions are highly popular beverages consumed daily for different reasons. Studies showed the potent antioxidant effects of plants used in the preparation of some herbal infusions. Such herbal infusions represent an important source of antioxidants and can be used as a dietary protection against cancer. However, uncontrolled consumption of herbal infusions may cause toxicity and reduced antioxidant activity. In this review, eleven widely consumed herbal infusions were evaluated for their antioxidant capacities, anticancer potential and possible toxicity. These herbal infusions are highly popular and consumed as daily drinks in different countries. Studies discussed in this review will provide a solid ground for researchers to have better understanding of the use of herbal infusions to reduce oxidative stress and as protective supplements against cancer development

Biomarkers Associated with Organ-Specific Involvement in Juvenile Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

Juvenile systemic lupus erythematosus (JSLE) is characterised by onset before 18 years of age and more severe disease phenotype, increased morbidity and mortality compared to adult-onset SLE. Management strategies in JSLE rely heavily on evidence derived from adult-onset SLE studies; therefore, identifying biomarkers associated with the disease pathogenesis and reflecting particularities of JSLE clinical phenotype holds promise for better patient management and improved outcomes. This narrative review summarises the evidence related to various traditional and novel biomarkers that have shown a promising role in identifying and predicting specific organ involvement in JSLE and appraises the evidence regarding their clinical utility, focusing in particular on renal biomarkers, while also emphasising the research into cardiovascular, haematological, neurological, skin and joint disease-related JSLE biomarkers, as well as genetic biomarkers with potential clinical applications

Genome-wide linkage analysis of 972 bipolar pedigrees using single-nucleotide polymorphisms.

Because of the high costs associated with ascertainment of families, most linkage studies of Bipolar I disorder (BPI) have used relatively small samples. Moreover, the genetic information content reported in most studies has been less than 0.6. Although microsatellite markers spaced every 10 cM typically extract most of the genetic information content for larger multiplex families, they can be less informative for smaller pedigrees especially for affected sib pair kindreds. For these reasons we collaborated to pool family resources and carried out higher density genotyping. Approximately 1100 pedigrees of European ancestry were initially selected for study and were genotyped by the Center for Inherited Disease Research using the Illumina Linkage Panel 12 set of 6090 single-nucleotide polymorphisms. Of the ~1100 families, 972 were informative for further analyses, and mean information content was 0.86 after pruning for linkage disequilibrium. The 972 kindreds include 2284 cases of BPI disorder, 498 individuals with bipolar II disorder (BPII) and 702 subjects with recurrent major depression. Three affection status models (ASMs) were considered: ASM1 (BPI and schizoaffective disorder, BP cases (SABP) only), ASM2 (ASM1 cases plus BPII) and ASM3 (ASM2 cases plus recurrent major depression). Both parametric and non-parametric linkage methods were carried out. The strongest findings occurred at 6q21 (non-parametric pairs LOD 3.4 for rs1046943 at 119 cM) and 9q21 (non-parametric pairs logarithm of odds (LOD) 3.4 for rs722642 at 78 cM) using only BPI and schizoaffective (SA), BP cases. Both results met genome-wide significant criteria, although neither was significant after correction for multiple analyses. We also inspected parametric scores for the larger multiplex families to identify possible rare susceptibility loci. In this analysis, we observed 59 parametric LODs of 2 or greater, many of which are likely to be close to maximum possible scores. Although some linkage findings may be false positives, the results could help prioritize the search for rare variants using whole exome or genome sequencing

Global assessment of biomass suitability for ironmaking — opportunities for co-location of sustainable biomass, iron and steel production and supportive policies

Iron and steel production processes are amongst the biggest industrial contributors to the global carbon emissions, and national as well as international obligations are set to drive their significant emission reductions. One of the possible strategies is to partially substitute fossil fuels used during the iron ore reduction process by sustainably-sourced biomass. The extent of the opportunities for such fuel switching, however, varies for each country. Theoretically, biomass into ironmaking should be only supported for countries which present co-location of sustainably domestically sourced biomass in sufficient quantity, a substantial iron and steel industry and supportive national policies. Using a multi-criteria global suitability assessment approach developed in this research, the status of countries’ steel industry, sustainable biomass resources and supportive policies were examined for top 40 steel production countries via the blast furnace ironmaking route. The results highlight those countries with significant potential to use domestically sourced biomass for such application and advance the efficient use of the limited biomass resources from the global perspective. Specifically countries such as Canada, Sweden, China, USA and France were identified as the most suitable, but other countries present opportunities that could be overcome if the corresponding barriers are identified

Breast feeding in Australia: A comparative study of Aboriginal and non Aboriginal women

The superiority of breast feeding over bottle feeding is universally acknowledged, and its crucial contribution to infant health is accepted by health authorities. Australia in recognition of the importance of breast feeding to infant health, aims to increase the prevalence of breast feeding. Breast feeding provides benefits for all children, however the health advantage that is gained by breast feeding in comparison to artificial feeding is more apparent among disadvantaged groups. Aboriginal Australians are identified as one such disadvantaged group. This study compares the available literature regarding the prevalence of breast feeding in Aboriginal and non Aboriginal women. It is apparent that breast feeding prevalence differs, between population groups within Australia. Aboriginal children are less likely to have been breast fed than non Aboriginal children. The comparison, indicates that there are deficiencies in the research regarding breast feeding prevalence in both population groups. Many factors affect a woman's decision to breast feed, and the duration of her breast feeding. These factors include, socioeconomic status, age, marital status, educational attainment, occupation and smoking status. These factors are clearly associated with breast feeding in non Aboriginal women. For Aboriginal women, the factors influencing breast feeding are more complex. It is recommended therefore, that it is essential for future research to examine the attitudinal and socialdeterminants of infant feeding practices in Aboriginal women. This is necessary, if educational or interventional strategies are to be effective for this population