Alleviation of cadmium toxicity and growth enhancement of helianthusannuus and triticum aestivum seedlings through bacterial inoculation

Two Cd-resistant bacterial growth strains MA-9 (Aeromonas) and MA19 (affinities uncertain), which were isolated from ICI effluents, were used to inoculate seeds ifTriticum aestivum (wheat) and Helianthus annuus (sunflower). Both inoculated and non-inoculated seeds were germinated and grown under different concentrations (0, 1, 2 and 3 mM) of CdCl2 for 10 days. Under Cd-stress conditions, bacteria-inoculated plants had better germination and growth than non-inoculated treatments. Bacterial growth enhancement if seedlings was associated with reduced Cd uptake

Cluster-based group mobility support for smart IoT

IPv6 over Low Power Wireless Personal Area Network (6LoWPAN) connects the highly constrained sensor nodes with the internet using the IPv6 protocol. 6LoWPAN has improved the scalability of the Internet of Things (IoTs) infrastructure and allows mobile nodes to send packets over the IEEE 802.15. 4 wireless network. Several mobility managements schemes have been suggested for handling the registration and handover procedures in 6LoWPAN. However, these schemes have performance constraints, such as increased transmission cost, signalling overhead, registration, and handover latency. To address these issues, we propose a novel cluster-based group mobility scheme (CGM6) for 6LoWPAN. To reduce the signalling cost in the CGM6 scheme, we propose to combine the functions of the Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (AAA) server and Local Mobility Anchor (LMA) in AMAG6 (AAA+ MAG for 6LoWPAN). AMAG6 acts as a cluster head and exchange its information directly with its neighbouring AMAG6 during the mobility. Furthermore, AMAG6 is responsible for the binding and authentication process. To reduce the transmission cost, we also propose enhancements in registration and Handover procedures. The performance of CGM6 is evaluated through extensive simulations. The simulation results show that CGM6 has reduced the handoff latency by 32%, registration delay by 11% and transmission cost by 37% compared to the state-of-the-art mobility management schemes

Generalization of Individual Differences in Second Language Learning

This commentary is based on the analyses of the participants’ responses provided in written form while filling the questionnaires. The purpose of the study was to identify and analyze factors in individuals’ experiences about second language acquisition.  The study was conducted through a research questionnaire. The questions were designed for particular outcomes needed for the research. The research was to find motivational, social, and demographic factors in learning second language. The research participants were the successful users of second language. The paper also discussed the different influences from society, and profession which are a support to learn second language or sometimes these influences work as hindrance. Questionnaire also dealt with the usefulness of language books and effectiveness of language teachers. The project involves 4 participants who filled in the answers. 50% of them have provided very short answers but the ideas are understandable and interpretable, the rest gave detailed responses which remained more supportive for the analyses. Over all it was to obtain a general view about the above mentioned influential factors which may result positive or negative during the process of second language acquisition.

A Study of Factors Effecting Academic Achievement of Prospective Teachers

Abstract The (Gaziel, 1996

Pre-Primary Students’ insights Regarding School, Teacher and their Education/Studies

Perceptions are the depiction of personal experiences and significant to explore. The insights of children regarding school, teacher and education required a keen investigation to improve the teaching learning process for early aged children. The study aimed to explore the hidden concepts of early aged children and to find out the reason behind their specific impression. A qualitative phenomenological inquiry was planned and semi structured interview protocol was used to collect data. Formal consent of parents and school administered was taken before recording interviews of individual children aged 4-7 who were purposefully selected. Thematic analysis was done to extract the meaning of the data and it was found that children have contrasting insight about all three phenomena i.e. school, teacher and education.  The negative insight of school and teachers could affect the learning of the students and discourage them to feel good at school therefore it is suggested that insights of students should be unveiled and modified if found negative

A Secure and Efficient Cluster-Based Authentication Scheme for Internet of Things (IoTs)

IPv6 over Low Power Wireless Personal Area Network 6LoWPAN) provides IP connectivity to the highly constrained nodes in the Internet of Things (IoTs). 6LoWPAN allows nodes with limited battery power and storage capacity to carry IPv6 datagrams over the lossy and error-prone radio links offered by the IEEE 802.15.4 standard, thus acting as an adoption layer between the IPv6 protocol and IEEE 802.15.4 network. The data link layer of IEEE 802.15.4 in 6LoWPAN is based on AES (Advanced Encryption Standard), but the 6LoWPAN standard lacks and has omitted the security and privacy requirements at higher layers. The sensor nodes in 6LoWPAN can join the network without requiring the authentication procedure. Therefore, from security perspectives, 6LoWPAN is vulnerable to many attacks such as replay attack, Man-in-the-Middle attack, Impersonation attack, and Modification attack. This paper proposes a secure and efficient cluster-based authentication scheme (CBAS) for highly constrained sensor nodes in 6LoWPAN. In this approach, sensor nodes are organized into a cluster and communicate with the central network through a dedicated sensor node. The main objective of CBAS is to provide efficient and authentic communication among the 6LoWPAN nodes. To ensure the low signalling overhead during the registration, authentication, and handover procedures, we also introduce lightweight and efficient registration, de-registration, initial authentication, and handover procedures, when a sensor node or group of sensor nodes join or leave a cluster. Our security analysis shows that the proposed CBAS approach protects against various security attacks, including Identity Confidentiality attack, Modification attack, Replay attack, Man-in-the-middle attack, and Impersonation attack. Our simulation experiments show that CBAS has reduced the registration delay by 11%, handoff authentication delay by 32%, and signalling coby 37% compared to the SGMS (Secure Group Mobility Scheme) and LAMS (Light-Wight Authentication & Mobility Scheme)

Efficient Algorithms for Cache-Throughput Analysis in Cellular-D2D 5G Networks

In this paper, we propose a two-tiered segment-based Device-to-Device (S-D2D) caching approach to decrease the start up and playback delay experienced by Video-on-Demand (VoD) users in a cellular network. In the S-D2D caching approach cache space of each mobile device is divided into two cache-blocks. The first cache-block reserve for caching and delivering the beginning portion of the most popular video les and the second cache-block caches the latter portion of the requested video les ‘fully or partially’ depending on the users’ video watching behaviour and popularity of videos. In this approach before caching, video is divided and grouped in a sequence of fixed-sized fragments called segments. To control the admission to both cache-blocks and improve the system throughput, we further propose and evaluate three cache admission control algorithms. We also propose a video segment access protocol to elaborate on how to cache and share the video segments in a segmentation based D2D caching architecture. We formulate an optimisation problem and the optimal cache probability and beginning-segment size that maximise the cache-throughput probability of beginning-segments. To solve the non-convex cache-throughout maximisation problem, we derive an iterative algorithm, where the optimal solution is derived in each step. We used extensive simulations to evaluate the performance of our proposed S-D2D caching system

IoT-Based COVID-19 Diagnosing and Monitoring Systems: A Survey

To date, the novel Coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) has infected millions and has caused the deaths of thousands of people around the world. At the moment, five antibodies, two from China, two from the U.S., and one from the UK, have already been widely utilized and numerous vaccines are under the trail process. In order to reach herd immunity, around 70% of the population would need to be inoculated. It may take several years to hinder the spread of SARS-CoV-2. Governments and concerned authorities have taken stringent measurements such as enforcing partial, complete, or smart lockdowns, building temporary medical facilities, advocating social distancing, and mandating masks in public as well as setting up awareness campaigns. Furthermore, there have been massive efforts in various research areas and a wide variety of tools, technologies and techniques have been explored and developed to combat the war against this pandemic. Interestingly, machine learning (ML) algorithms and internet of Things (IoTs) technology are the pioneers in this race. Up till now, several real-time and intelligent IoT-based COVID-19 diagnosing, and monitoring systems have been proposed to tackle the pandemic. In this article we have analyzed a wide range of IoTs technologies which can be used in diagnosing and monitoring the infected individuals and hotspot areas. Furthermore, we identify the challenges and also provide our vision about the future research on COVID-19

Efficient algorithms for cache-throughput analysis in cellular-D2D 5G networks

In this paper, we propose a two-Tiered segment-based Device-To-Device (S-D2D) caching approach to decrease the startup and playback delay experienced by Video-on-Demand (VoD) users in a cellular network. In the S-D2D caching approach cache space of each mobile device is divided into two cache-blocks. The first cache-block reserve for caching and delivering the beginning portion of the most popular video files and the second cacheblock caches the latter portion of the requested video files fully or partially depending on the users video watching behaviour and popularity of videos. In this approach before caching, video is divided and grouped in a sequence of fixed-sized fragments called segments. To control the admission to both cacheblocks and improve the system throughput, we further propose and evaluate three cache admission control algorithms. We also propose a video segment access protocol to elaborate on how to cache and share the video segments in a segmentation based D2D caching architecture.We formulate an optimisation problem and find the optimal cache probability and beginning-segment size that maximise the cache-Throughput probability of beginning-segments. To solve the non-convex cache-Throughout maximisation problem, we derive an iterative algorithm, where the optimal solution is derived in each step.We used extensive simulations to evaluate the performance of our proposed S-D2D caching system

Reconfigurable Intelligent Surface-Aided Millimetre Wave Communications Utilizing Two-Phase Minimax Optimal Stochastic Strategy Bandit

Millimetre wave (mm Wave) communications, that is, 30 to 300 GHz, have intermittent short-range transmissions, so the use of reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS) seems to be a promising solution to extend its coverage. However, optimizing phase shifts (PSs) of both mm Wave base station (BS) and RIS to maximize the received spectral efficiency at the intended receiver seems challenging due to massive antenna elements usage. In this paper, an online learning approach is proposed to address this problem, where it is considered a two-phase multi-armed bandit (MAB) game. In the first phase, the PS vector of the mm Wave BS is adjusted, and based on it, the PS vector of the RIS is calibrated in the second phase and vice versa over the time horizon. The minimax optimal stochastic strategy(MOSS) MAB algorithm is utilized to implement the proposed two-phase MAB approach efficiently. Furthermore, to relax the problem of estimating the channel state information(CSI) of both mm Wave BS and RIS, codebook-based PSs are considered. Finally, numerical analysis confirms the superior performance of the proposed scheme against the optimal performance under different scenarios