Survey and Analysis of Safety Components and Costs in Construction Projects in Egypt

The difficulty of determining the factors that achieve safety on Egyptian construction sites as a result of multiple and different criteria and different relative weights of the criteria represents a challenge to achieve safety and a secure environment on construction sites. This issue has been of interest for many decades and continues to be a topic of discussion today because of construction project management is rapidly modernizing. The paper aims to identify the safety standards most commonly used on construction sites, and determine their relative weights as seen by the target audience and also estimate the cost of safety measures used in construction projects. The questionnaire was designed and implemented to collect realistic information covering relevant parties and distributed it to 82 target audiences from different categories, including consultants, site engineers, and site managers. It included 4 specific answers (Very important, Important, Little important, and Unimportant) and consists of 9 Main -criteria and 76 sub- criteria as the most important criteria. The most important Main - criteria are “Preparation of OHS plan , Work protective equipment (APE) , Personal protective equipment (PPE) , Signs required, Others related to Construction Safety risk control . This study concerns with providing construction managers and professionals with recommendations to achieve the highest safety standards in Egyptian construction sites and developing countrie

Block-separable linking constraints in augmented Lagrangian coordination

Augmented Lagrangian coordination (ALC) is a provably convergent coordination method for multidisciplinary design optimization (MDO) that is able to treat both linking variables and linking functions (i.e. system-wide objectives and constraints). Contrary to quasi-separable problems with only linking variables, the presence of linking functions may hinder the parallel solution of subproblems and the use of the efficient alternating directions method of multipliers. We show that this unfortunate situation is not the case for MDO problems with block-separable linking constraints. We derive a centralized formulation of ALC for block-separable constraints, which does allow parallel solution of subproblems. Similarly, we derive a distributed coordination variant for which subproblems cannot be solved in parallel, but that still enables the use of the alternating direction method of multipliers. The approach can also be used for other existing MDO coordination strategies such that they can include block-separable linking constraints

Extension of Analytical Target Cascading Using Augmented Lagrangian Coordination for Multidisciplinary Design Optimization

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/77083/1/AIAA-2008-5843-768.pd

FLOATING RANITIDINE MICROPARTICULATES: DEVELOPMENT AND IN VITRO EVALUATION

Objective: Rapid and inconsistent gastrointestinal tract (GIT) transit could result in reduced drug efficiency and the need for frequent dose administration, which usually result in patients' incompliance. Ranitidine hydrochloride (RH), as a model drug is freely soluble, moisture sensitive drug with a short biological half-life (~2.5-3 h) and narrow absorption window in the initial part of the small intestine. The present study aimed to develop ranitidine floating multi-particulates (RFM) using melt granulation technique and investigation of the effect of lipids and additives on the physicochemical properties. Methods: RFM were prepared using Compritol® 888 ATO, glyceryl behenate, Cutina® HR, Cutina® GMS, hydrogenated castor oil, glyceryl monostearate, and beeswax as lipids and ethyl cellulose, Povidone® K 90 and Aerosil® 200 as release modifiers. The effect of the preparation method and additives, as well as storage for 6 mo at 40 °C, on floating and release characteristics were evaluated. Results: Size distribution indicated that the prepared formulations exhibited reasonably small floating micro particulates; more than 90% of the prepared microparticles were less than 710 µm. Hausner ratios and Carr's compressibility indices ranged from 1.17 to 1.29% and 14.54 to 22.4 %, respectively, and the angle of repose values was ≤40 °, indicating good flow properties. RFM containing Compritol® showed a relatively higher release properties compared to hydrogenated castor oil. Increasing the proportion of the fatty component was accompanied by retardation in RH release. The tested additives (PVP, ethyl cellulose, Aerosil®) resulted in different degrees of retardation of drug release. The percent-floating of RFM was almost 100% in all formulations with the exception of formulations prepared using glyceryl monostearate. FT-IR and DSC studies indicated the compatibility of the excipients with RH. Stability results revealed an insignificant change in RFM properties over 6 mo. Conclusion: The prepared microparticles exhibited optimum particle size, good compressibility, and flow properties. RFM containing Compritol® showed a relatively higher release properties compared to hydrogenated castor oil. Increasing the proportion of the fatty component was accompanied by retardation in RH release. The percent-floating of RFM was almost 100% in most formulations. FT-IR and DSC indicated good compatibility of the excipients with RH and insignificant change in RFM properties over 6 mo's storage

Coordination Specification for Distributed Optimal System Design Using the Chi Language

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/76202/1/AIAA-2002-5410-847.pd

Coordination Specification of the Analytical Target Cascading Process using the Chi Language

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/76587/1/AIAA-2002-5637-610.pd

Epitaxial growth of ultrathin palladium films on Re{0001}

Ultrathin bimetallic layers create unusual magnetic and surface chemical effects through the modification of electronic structure brought on by low dimensionality, polymorphism, reduced screening, and epitaxial strain. Previous studies have related valence and core-level shifts to surface reactivity through the d-band model of Hammer and Nørskov, and in heteroepitaxial films this band position is determined by competing effects of coordination, strain, and hybridization of substrate and overlayer states. In this study we employ the epitaxially matched Pd on Re{0001} system to grow films with no lateral strain. We use a recent advancement in low-energy electron diffraction to expand the data range sufficiently for a reliable determination of the growth sequence and out-of-plane surface relaxation as a function of film thickness. The results are supported by scanning tunneling microscopy and X-ray photoemission spectroscopy, which show that the growth is layer-by-layer with significant core-level shifts due to changes in film structure, morphology, and bonding