Hidden Costs of Control: Consequences of Over Application of Rigid Control

Control is an integral part of every organization. Without proper application of control an organization can’t reach to its goals. But over application of control can cause cost to organization. Impact of rigid control can vary from organization to organization. Excess use of control has adverse effect on customer satisfaction, employee productivity, employee morale & motivation etc. All of these can cause costs to organization; but these costs can’t be measured explicitly. In this paper we have tried to describe dysfunctional sides of control. We have presented some empirical evidences against rigid control that may generate hidden costs of control. Based on the findings of this paper we have provided some recommendations which will help people to understand necessity of keeping proper balance regarding application of control. Keywords: Integral, dysfunctional, hidden costs of control, empirical, explici

THE SCENARIOS OF COVID-19 PANDEMIC IN BANGLADESH: ANALYSIS OF DATA IN JULY ANDAUGUST’2020

The outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic quickly surges throughout the world including Bangladesh from the beginning of 2020. To challenge the present detrimental situations, many countries are approving several preventive measures, e.g., international travel bans, isolated office activities, country lockdown, and most importantly social distancing, even though some medications are prescribed in some extent. The government of Bangladesh also took various preventive measures to limit the thunder of corona virus disease 20019 (COVID-19) pandemic. But, the actions are not adequate to face the challenges of COVID-19 in Bangladesh, particularly in the capital city Dhaka, remarkably because of the lower-middle-income economy with one of the world’s densest populations. In Dhaka city, based on the present populations, social distancing is difficult, and with the nominal resources it would be extremely challenging to implement the mitigation measures of COVID-19. Mobile sanitization facilities, temporary quarantine sites and healthcare facilities could help to improve the pandemic effect. A rapid, caring, and empathic collaboration between the government, citizens, and health experts, along with international assistance, can enable the country to minimize the impact of the pandemic. In this review, we summarize the occurrence (RT-PCR based test) and present scenarios of COVID-19 outbreak in Bangladesh, particularly in the Dhaka city analyzing available data in July and August’2020

Pose Estimation of Underwater Robots Using Triaxial MI Antenna and Particle Filter

Localization is a key ability for robot navigation and collision avoidance.  The advent of GPS has led to enormous improvements in terrestrial navigation. However, localization using Electromagnetic (EM) techniques is challenging underwater.  The well-established, EM-based global position system (GPS) is infeasible underwater since EM signals rapidly attenuate underwater. This limits the achievable communication range to within a few centimeters of the surface. Instead of EM techniques, most underwater communication is performed using acoustic techniques. Although acoustic communication underwater is common, it suffers from multipath fading due to reflections with the sea surface and sea floor, and with nearby obstacles. Other, methods such as using LIDAR and vision sensors give good localization of AUVs (Autonomous Underwater Vehicle) in clear water, but perform poorly due to poor weather conditions and little to no visibility in poor lighting conditions. Magnetic induction (MI) communication has become an attractive communication method as it does not require line of sight. Two triaxial nodes, known as the anchor (transmitter) node and the sensor (receiver) node are used for MI localization tests underwater. This is performed by measuring the voltages in the receiving coils by sequentially exciting the transmitter coils. The recorded magnetic field strengths along with the data from a set of other sensors are applied to a particle filter to generate an estimate of the location of the transmitting antenna with respect to the receiving one. This approach is supported by simulations and validated through experiments in air and underwater. Accurate position information is essential for exploration tasks and localization of AUVs underwater. The deliverables from this thesis are programming code in Mathematica and {\sc Matlab} for (1) calculating the nine voltages at the receiver coils given the position and orientation of the transmitter, (2) calculating the position and orientation of the receiver given the nine voltages at the transmitter, and (3) particle filter code for tracking a robot.Electrical and Computer Engineering, Department o

Classification of Indoor Human Fall Events Using Deep Learning

Human fall identification can play a significant role in generating sensor based alarm systems, assisting physical therapists not only to reduce after fall effects but also to save human lives. Usually, elderly people suffer from various kinds of diseases and fall action is a very frequently occurring circumstance at this time for them. In this regard, this paper represents an architecture to classify fall events from others indoor natural activities of human beings. Video frame generator is applied to extract frame from video clips. Initially, a two dimensional convolutional neural network (2DCNN) model is proposed to extract features from video frames. Afterward, gated recurrent unit (GRU) network finds the temporal dependency of human movement. Binary cross-entropy loss function is calculated to update the attributes of the network like weights, learning rate to minimize the losses. Finally, sigmoid classifier is used for binary classification to detect human fall events. Experimental result shows that the proposed model obtains an accuracy of 99%, which outperforms other state-of-the-art models

A review on chemistry, source and therapeutic potential of lambertianic acid

Lambertianic acid (LA) is a diterpene bioactive compound mainly purified from different species of Pinus. It is an optical isomer of another natural compound daniellic acid and was firstly purified from Pinus lambertiana. LA can be synthesized in laboratory from podocarpic acid. It has been reported to have potential health benefits in attenuating obesity, allergies and different cancers including breast, liver, lung and prostate cancer. It exhibits anticancer properties through inhibiting cancer cell proliferation and survival, and inducing apoptosis, targeting major signalling components including AKT, AMPK, NFkB, COX-2, STAT3, etc. Most of the studies with LA were done using in vitro models, thus warranting future investigations with animal models to evaluate its pharmacological effects such as antidiabetic, anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective effects as well as to explore the underlying molecular mechanisms and toxicological profile. This review describes the chemistry, source, purification and therapeutic potentials of LA and it can therefore be a suitable guideline for any future study with LA

A Retrospective Evaluation of Self-Reported Adverse Events Following Immunization with Different COVID-19 Vaccines in Türkiye

Background: The Sinovac and BioNTech vaccines were the first to be introduced in Türkiye to fight the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. As these vaccines had shown some side-effects in its clinical trial, we aimed to conduct a survey study to assess the short-term adverse events following immunization (AEFIs) in Türkiye. Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted using social and electronic media platforms by delivering a pre-formed and validated online questionnaire among people who had received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. This survey study focused on mass populations from different regions in Türkiye. A total of 603 responses were collected. Among these, 602 were selected based on complete answers and used for the assessment. The collected data were then analyzed to evaluate the various parameters related to the AEFIs of the respondents. Results: Among the total 602 participants, 20.8% were male, and 78.7% were female, actively answering all of the constructive questions. Most of the respondents were between 18–30 years of age. We found that a total of 23.3% of the total respondents had been infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Our survey revealed that out of 602 volunteers, the rate of experiencing physical discomfort was higher in participants who had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at all three doses than in those who had received the Sinovac vaccine. When all vaccine types were examined, the most common side effect was pain at the injection site, reported by 75.19% participants. When the side effects were compared according to vaccine types, there was a significant difference only in terms of fever. Fever rates in those who had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine (20.96%) were found to be significantly higher than those who had received the Sinovac vaccine (8%). Conclusions: The studied vaccines showed minor side effects and there was no significant difference between the vaccines in terms of other side effects. Moreover, further research is needed to determine the efficacy of the existing vaccines in preventing SARS-CoV-2 infections or after-infection hospitalization

A Retrospective Evaluation of Self-Reported Adverse Events Following Immunization with Different COVID-19 Vaccines in Türkiye

Background: The Sinovac and BioNTech vaccines were the first to be introduced in Türkiye to fight the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. As these vaccines had shown some side-effects in its clinical trial, we aimed to conduct a survey study to assess the short-term adverse events following immunization (AEFIs) in Türkiye. Method: A cross-sectional study was conducted using social and electronic media platforms by delivering a pre-formed and validated online questionnaire among people who had received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. This survey study focused on mass populations from different regions in Türkiye. A total of 603 responses were collected. Among these, 602 were selected based on complete answers and used for the assessment. The collected data were then analyzed to evaluate the various parameters related to the AEFIs of the respondents. Results: Among the total 602 participants, 20.8% were male, and 78.7% were female, actively answering all of the constructive questions. Most of the respondents were between 18–30 years of age. We found that a total of 23.3% of the total respondents had been infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Our survey revealed that out of 602 volunteers, the rate of experiencing physical discomfort was higher in participants who had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at all three doses than in those who had received the Sinovac vaccine. When all vaccine types were examined, the most common side effect was pain at the injection site, reported by 75.19% participants. When the side effects were compared according to vaccine types, there was a significant difference only in terms of fever. Fever rates in those who had received the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine (20.96%) were found to be significantly higher than those who had received the Sinovac vaccine (8%). Conclusions: The studied vaccines showed minor side effects and there was no significant difference between the vaccines in terms of other side effects. Moreover, further research is needed to determine the efficacy of the existing vaccines in preventing SARS-CoV-2 infections or after-infection hospitalization

Germination and growth responses to water stress of three agroforestry tree species from Bangladesh

Globally, tree plantations are considered one of the most effective solutions in tackling the climate crisis, and by incorporating trees, agroforestry plays an essential role in mitigating climate change. However, the productivity and sustainability of this commendable solution are often impeded by the wide range of abiotic stresses, including drought. Species selection is always considered as one of the major challenges in a drought-prone area to ensure maximum productivity and halting tree mortality. In this study, seedling responses such as germination, survival, and growth were examined for Swietenia macrophylla, Acacia nilotica and Pithecellobium dulce in variable soil moisture regimes with 100%, 50% and 25% soil water content (SWC). Despite complete failure of germination at 25% SWC, S. macrophylla showed a significantly higher germination percent at both 100% and 50% SWCs (p < 0.05). Irrespective of species, the 25% SWC showed reductions of germination percent, survivability and total dry biomass in comparison with the higher moisture regimes. The study also showed that P. dulce and A. nilotica seedlings were able to survive and maintain growth at low moisture regimes. The significant interaction effect in most parameters highlighted that both species and moisture regimes played an important role in germination and total biomass production, but this interaction had an insignificant effect on the survivability of all species. The result from this study highlights that species-specific responses to water stress could contribute to the species selection policies in drought-prone areas