Information Literacy Skills of LIS Students in Pakistan: A study of University of Sargodha and University of the Punajab, Lahore

This study aimed to investigate the perceived level of IL skills, strength, weakness, challenges, and levels of IL programs attended by ILS students of two leading library schools of Pakistan. This research used descriptive survey method and distributed questionnaire among 330 participants which returned 232 complete usable responses. This study found that participants of both LIS schools perceived good level of IL skills while the majority of them prefer internet sources as they possess adequate internet surfing skills. In addition to challenges the large number of participants lacks knowledge and skills to use computer and personal computer (M = 2.71, SD = 1.245) and (M = 2.84, SD = 1.439). Whereas, the results of IL program attended depicted that majority of participants obtained low mean of (M = 2.76, SD = .985) to (M = 2.57, SD = .991). This study concludes that students of both IL schools were performing well with regard to their IL skills even though there is a dire need for advance level of IL instructions and embedded IL course integration at all a level of degree programs to equipped students with necessary skills

Examining the contribution of fiscal policy on economic growth: Analytical insights from Pakistan

To better understand the influence of fiscal policy (FP) on economic growth (EG) in Pakistan, this study investigates the importance of the amount of output produced by different factors of production in Pakistan's economy. The annual time series data has been collected from the State Bank of Pakistan and World Bank Data-Base from the years (2001-2020). The Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model is used for empirical research to assess the significant factors of EG, and the Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) unit root test is used to ensure that all of the variables are stationary. Using annual time series data from 2001 to 2020. Based on these findings, this study recommends adopting a proactive fiscal policy framework that incorporates expansionary measures. We argue that this strategy has the capacity to stimulate and maintain Pakistan's economic growth path, thereby fostering a more promising and prosperous future. Moreover, the study found the impact of government expenditures (GE), gross fixed capital creation (GFCC), and direct and indirect taxes on Gross domestic Product (GDP). Additionally, findings showed that government expenditures, gross fixed capital creation, indirect, and direct taxes have a strong effect on economic growth. It is argued that an expansionary fiscal policy in the future could greatly benefit Pakistan's economic growth

The frequency of stroke-acquired pneumonia in patients admitted to ICU with Cerebrovascular accident (CVA)

Introduction: Stroke is themost prevalent disorder. In our country, it can cause significant mortality and morbidity due to its associated complications such asstroke-associated pneumonia (SAP). Stroke can be fatal directly due to affecting the respiratory system andneurological damage. Stroke-acquired pneumonia is defined as any respiratory tract infection acquired within 7 days of stroke. Objective:To find out the actual frequency of stroke-acquired pneumonia in ICU patients. Study Design:Descriptive case series. Setting:Department of Medicine, DHQ Teaching Hospital, Sargodha.Duration:Six months from 15thOctober 2018 to 15thApril 2019.Materials and Methods:In this study, the cases of either gender or aged30 to 70 years suffering from stroke within 12 hours were included. SAP was labelled based onfever, cough,and non-homogenous opacities on chest X-ray. Results:Current study comprises about 160 cases of stroke and out of these 78 were (48.75%) females and 82 (51.25%) were males. The mean duration of stroke was 7.05±2.54 hours and the average age of the subjects was 54.24±7.15 years. They were 30 (18.75%) cases that had a history of smoking, 28 (17.50%) had HTN,and 35 (21.88%) cases that had DM. Stroke-acquired pneumonia (SAP) was seen in 20 (12.50%) of the cases. SAP was seen in 12 (15.38%) female cases as compared to 8 (9.75%) males with p= 0.34. SAP was more seen in cases with DM where this was observed in 7 (20%) of the cases as compared to 13 (10.4%) with no DM with p= 0.15. SAP was seen in 5 (17.85%) cases with HTN and 4 (13.33%) cases with a history of smoking with p valuesof 0.35 and 1.0 respectively. SAP was seen in 15 (14.42%) cases with a duration of stroke of 6-12 hours in contrast to 5 (8.92%) cases with a duration less than this with p= 0.45. Conclusion:SAP is not infrequent and is found in more than 1 out of every 10 cases and the cases of SAP were found more in females and those who have a history of DM, HTN,and a duration of stroke of 6 to 12 hours; though none of this variable was found statistically significant. Keywords:SAP, HTN, DM, Smoking

The frequency of stroke-acquired pneumonia in patients admitted to ICU with Cerebrovascular accident (CVA)

Introduction: Stroke is themost prevalent disorder. In our country, it can cause significant mortality and morbidity due to its associated complications such asstroke-associated pneumonia (SAP). Stroke can be fatal directly due to affecting the respiratory system andneurological damage. Stroke-acquired pneumonia is defined as any respiratory tract infection acquired within 7 days of stroke. Objective:To find out the actual frequency of stroke-acquired pneumonia in ICU patients. Study Design:Descriptive case series. Setting:Department of Medicine, DHQ Teaching Hospital, Sargodha.Duration:Six months from 15thOctober 2018 to 15thApril 2019.Materials and Methods:In this study, the cases of either gender or aged30 to 70 years suffering from stroke within 12 hours were included. SAP was labelled based onfever, cough,and non-homogenous opacities on chest X-ray. Results:Current study comprises about 160 cases of stroke and out of these 78 were (48.75%) females and 82 (51.25%) were males. The mean duration of stroke was 7.05±2.54 hours and the average age of the subjects was 54.24±7.15 years. They were 30 (18.75%) cases that had a history of smoking, 28 (17.50%) had HTN,and 35 (21.88%) cases that had DM. Stroke-acquired pneumonia (SAP) was seen in 20 (12.50%) of the cases. SAP was seen in 12 (15.38%) female cases as compared to 8 (9.75%) males with p= 0.34. SAP was more seen in cases with DM where this was observed in 7 (20%) of the cases as compared to 13 (10.4%) with no DM with p= 0.15. SAP was seen in 5 (17.85%) cases with HTN and 4 (13.33%) cases with a history of smoking with p valuesof 0.35 and 1.0 respectively. SAP was seen in 15 (14.42%) cases with a duration of stroke of 6-12 hours in contrast to 5 (8.92%) cases with a duration less than this with p= 0.45. Conclusion:SAP is not infrequent and is found in more than 1 out of every 10 cases and the cases of SAP were found more in females and those who have a history of DM, HTN,and a duration of stroke of 6 to 12 hours; though none of this variable was found statistically significant. Keywords:SAP, HTN, DM, Smoking

Image-guided percutaneous radiofrequency ablation for osteoid osteoma: experience from a developing nation

Objective The purpose of this study is to report our experience in using image-guided percutaneous radiofrequency ablation (RFA) for the treatment of osteoid osteoma (OO) and the subsequent duration of pain relief over a period of about six years (May 2013-March 2019; 70 months) at a tertiary-care hospital in a developing nation. Methods A retrospective study was performed at the radiology department of Aga Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan. All patients who had undergone image-guided percutaneous RFA for OO between May 2013-March 2019 were included. All cases had been performed with CT-guidance under general anesthesia, with an additional local anesthesia injection also administered to the patients. A soloist needle had been used for RFA. The primary success rates, complications, symptom-free intervals, and follow-ups were evaluated. Results In total, 15 patients (11 males, 4 females) of a mean age of 13.93 years (range: 5-25 years; median age: 14.5 years) with OO underwent image-guided percutaneous RFA during a period of 70 months. Eleven lesions were located in the femur, three in the tibia, and one in the humerus. The mean nidus size was 8.1 x 5.73 mm [range: (4.9-11.5) x (3.8-9.1) mm]. All patients were successfully treated and experienced resolution of pain in 2.36 months (range: 1-4 months). During the follow-up period (range: 3-40 months; mean: 13.85 months; median: nine months), none of the patients experienced any relapse or persistent symptoms. No major complications were reported. Conclusion Image-guided percutaneous RFA is a minimally invasive and safe treatment option with high efficiency and a high rate of technical success for the treatment of OO. The risk of recurrence is remote with all patients achieving independent recovery

Gas exchange and morpho-physiological response of soybean to straw mulching under drought conditions

A pot experiment was conducted to investigate the morphological, physiological and biochemical straw mulch-induced response of soybean under water-deficit conditions. Soybean (Glycine max L. Merrill) variety “Xidou 7” was treated with varying quantity of wheat straw mulch viz: (control (no straw mulch), 3750, 7500, 11000 and 14750 kg/ha) under water-deficit conditions. The experimental results indicate that the varying quantity of straw mulch significantly improved the plant growth in terms of plant height, leaf area, number of leaves/plant and stem diameter. Mulch treatment also significantly enhanced the photosynthesis (PN), intercellular CO2 concentration (Ci), transpiration rate (E) and stomatal conductance (gs) over the control. The gas exchange parameters were improved depending on the quantity of wheat straw mulch; significantly highPN and E was observed in the treatment where wheat straw was applied at the rate of 11000 kg/ha. Wheat straw mulch treatments led to noticeable reduction in malondialdehyde (MDA) contents, which protected the drought stressed soybean plants from membrane damage. Furthermore, the free proline contents linearly increased with increase in straw mulch quantity. It is evident that wheat straw mulch can considerably modulate growth, photosynthetic and physio-biochemical attributes of soybean under drought. The research will effectively solve seasonal drought problem and can provide technical assistance for sustainable agriculture development.Keywords: Soybean, growth, water-deficit, wheat straw mulchAfrican Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(18), pp. 2360-236

Maximum Power Extraction from a Standalone Photo Voltaic System via Neuro-Adaptive Arbitrary Order Sliding Mode Control Strategy with High Gain Differentiation

In this work, a photovoltaic (PV) system integrated with a non-inverting DC-DC buck-boost converter to extract maximum power under varying environmental conditions such as irradiance and temperature is considered. In order to extract maximum power (via maximum power transfer theorem), a robust nonlinear arbitrary order sliding mode-based control is designed for tracking the desired reference, which is generated via feed forward neural networks (FFNN). The proposed control law utilizes some states of the system, which are estimated via the use of a high gain differentiator and a famous flatness property of nonlinear systems. This synthetic control strategy is named neuroadaptive arbitrary order sliding mode control (NAAOSMC). The overall closed-loop stability is discussed in detail and simulations are carried out in Simulink environment of MATLAB to endorse effectiveness of the developed synthetic control strategy. Finally, comparison of the developed controller with the backstepping controller is done, which ensures the performance in terms of maximum power extraction, steady-state error and more robustness against sudden variations in atmospheric conditions