Water hyacinth cover and hydrological pattern of Kainji Lake

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Formulation and Environmental Impact Evaluation of Walnut and Soya Bean Oil Based Drilling Fluid

One of the oil and gas hazard that associated with drilling operation is oil based drilling fluid and its associated cutting disposition. It is highly imperative for policy maker to propagate the use of environmental friendly oil based mud for drilling operation. This paper formulated environmentally friendly oil based mud (using walnut and soya bean plant oil) that can carry out the same function as convectional oil based drilling fluid and equally meeting up with the HSE (Health, safety and environment) standard. Mud laboratory tests were carried out at standard condition on plant oil samples so as to ascertain the rheological properties of the drilling fluid formulations. The synthetic oil based was obtained from drilling company in Nigeria and was used as control experiment. At the end of the experiment, the properties of the walnut and soya beans based mud wascompared with industry oil based mud (synthetic oil based mud). All the results were shown to be similar to that of commercial synthetic oil based drilling mud which was gotten from the industry.From the results it can be seen that walnut and soya beans based mud actually gives a less toxic,better rheological properties, requires less waste disposal costs, hence making them more economically and technically viable for oil and gas drilling operation

Science and Technology Teacher’S Level of Awareness of Nigeria’S ICT Initiatives for Teaching

The study looked at the list of Nigeria’s ICT initiatives and attempted to find out whether science and technology teachers (STTs) are aware of the existence of these initiatives that are available in Nigeria for teaching and research. It further looked into the constraints and hindrances to STTs’ awareness of the ICT initiatives. One research instrument was used in the study. A questionnaire was administered on STTs. STTs’ questionnaire was structured along the line of teaching and research. It featured questions on respondent’s personal data, establishment information and respondents’ awareness of Nigeria’s ICT initiatives. Some of the major findings were that none of Nigeria’s ICT initiatives within the last twelve years (2000 – 2011) was specifically or exclusively designed or implemented for STTs. The results of the mean response analysis, analysis of variance (ANOVA) and frequency of responses indicated that there was significant difference in STTs’ opinions pertaining to eight of Nigeria’s ICT initiatives regarding their awareness of the initiatives. The implications of these findings for science and technology programmes and STTs were indicated. It is therefore suggested that Nigeria’s ICT initiatives awareness campaign should be mounted for STTs and the challenges identified in the study should be address urgently. Keywords: ICT Initiatives, Science and Technology Teachers, Awareness

Investment in Education for The Nigerian Economic Development

This study examines investment in education for economic development of Nigeria. Education has been recognized globally as a veritable and strategic venture pivotal to economic transformation of any nation. The study made use of secondary data sourced from Ministry of Education, National Universities Commission (NUC) and Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFUND) and an Ordinary Least Square (OLS) regression method was used to analyze the data obtained to show the relationship between enrolments and funding. The result shows that the education sector contribute significantly to economic development as measured by the Gross Domestic Product although the sector is still underfunded most especially the basic and senior secondary levels in view of geometric increase in yearly enrollments and poor infrastructural facilities. The study recommends that the government at all levels should invest more in education and also collaborate with private sector through Private Public Partnership (PPP) initiative to accumulate the much needed funding that will pave way for technological development. It will also guide against brain-drains and significantly alleviate overdependence on aids from the developed nations and educational organizations

Investigating the Possible Threats from Vegetal Cover Removal and Open Dumpsite to Groundwater Quality

This study investigated the possible groundwater quality threats from excessive removal of vegetation due to urban growth in an open dumpsite in Waterloo, Brong Ahafo Region, Ghana. 15 water samples were collected from five (5) functional Hand-dug wells at increasing distance from the dumpsite. The samples were assessed for some physico-chemical parameters. Descriptive statistics were applied to investigate the quality of groundwater samples from the Hand-dug wells. The groundwater was slightly acidic. Total Suspended Solids (TSS) and Total Coliform count were high for the groundwater samples but total dissolved solids (TDS) were within the permissible limits of Ghana Ministry of Water Resources (GMWR) and WHO. Analysed parameters such as Ca2+, Na+, Cl- and Cu conformed to the prescribed limits of GMWR and WHO for drinking water while Pb was above the permissible limits of both.  Fe2+ conformed to the limit by GMWR but was above WHO. Cd was above the permissible limit of GMWR but fell within that of WHO. Urban growth effects investigated through the use of Landsat images of 1986, 2000, 2006 and 2011 with the aid of ArcGIS 10.5 and ENVI 4.7 revealed that the study area, within these years, drastically reduced in forest cover due to the increase in built-up and has the tendency to cause contamination to groundwater in the area

TESTING FOR MULTIPLE UPPER OUTLIERS IN DISTRIBUTION SAMPLES: A STUDY OF FOREIGN EXCHANGE DATA

In this study, the existences of k-upper outliers are investigated in distribution samples of gamma, Normal and exponential by carrying out a simulation of ten thousand at different values of n using algorithm introduced by Tietjen-Moore, test statistics, and critical values were equally estimated from the algorithm. A Normal Q-Q plot was made which aims at distinguishing a data set that follows a normal distribution and one that deviates from normality. The algorithm was applied to Nigeria-US dollars foreign exchange rate, both on raw and logarithmic transformed data. The simulation study reveals the existence of upper outliers more in Gamma and exponential samples than the Normal sample. Empirical analysis shows that there are upper outliers in the raw data set but no upper outliers are found in the transformed data. The result in this paper would help the researcher in business and economics to take time to explore data before use and properly transform accordingly to avoid error in estimation

Bayesian Models for Zero Truncated Count Data. Asian Journal of Probability and Statistics.

It is important to fit count data with suitable model(s), models such as Poisson Regression, Quassi Poisson, Negative Binomial, to mention but a few have been adopted by researchers to fit zero truncated count data in the past. In recent times, dedicated models for fitting zero truncated count data have been developed, and they are considered sufficient. This study proposed Bayesian multi-level Poisson and Bayesian multi-level Geometric model, Bayesian Monte Carlo Markov Chain Generalized linear Mixed Models (MCMCglmms) of zero truncated Poisson and MCMCglmms Poisson regression model to fit health count data that is truncated at zero. Suitable model selection criteria were used to determine preferred models for fitting zero truncated data. Results obtained showed that Bayesian multi-level Poisson outperformed Bayesian multi-level Poisson Geometric model; also MCMCglmms of zero truncated Poisson outperformed MCMCglmms Poisson

Unlocking Rural and Remote Coverage with Small Cells and Satellite

According to the Global System for Mobile Alliance (GSMA), in 2017, there were around 3.3 billion people connected to the mobile Internet. This represented an upward surge in global coverage compared to previous years. However, more than one billion people are still not covered by mobile broadband networks, representing what is termed “the coverage gap”. Uncovered populations typically live in rural locations with low population densities, low per-capita income levels and weak or non-existent enabling infrastructure, and thus, closing the mobile coverage gap seems to be more of an economic challenge, than a pure technical one. This paper presents an overview of the need for rural and remote coverage, both from an operator and consumer as well as government perspective. It then presents the major challenges, and necessary actions to be taken by industry, Government and other stake-holders to drive rural and remote coverage by significantly lowering the cost of network roll-out and increase incentives for such deployments. The paper therefore, presents a technical and business case for the use of “Small Cells” in conjunction with satellites with a view to opening up huge markets via collaboration between the mobile operators and satellite system owners, while offering significant improvements in the coverage and capacity needs of remote, rural or underserved end-users in a cost-effective and scalable manner. Detailed insights to these two technologies are presented, including the innovations to overcome technical and regulatory challenges. Lastly, some real-life deployments are given and the paper concludes with some recommendations for Government and network operators presente

Digitization of Library Collection in Nigerian University Libraries: University of Ilorin Library Experience

The aim of this paper is to discuss the difficulties that the University of Ilorin library encountered in its digitization project and how these difficulties were handled to ensure a robust digitization outfit. The idea is to alert Nigerian Libraries which are yet to embark on digitization on some of the problems or challenges that they are likely to encounter in planning and implementing a digitization project. Admittedly, some of the problems may be unique to University of Ilorin Library but it can be said with a fair degree of accuracy that some of the problems the University of Ilorin Library encountered are general at the planning and the implementation stages. In this paper, the conception, the planning and the implementation stages of the project will be discussed. Problems will be highlighted and suggestions will be made for an effective and efficient digital service delivery

Determinants of utilisation of traditional birth attendant services by pregnant women in Ogbomoso, Nigeria

Background: This study was designed to assess the determinants of utilization of Traditional Birth Attendants (TBAs) services by pregnant women in different communities in Ogbomoso, Nigeria.Methods: This was a community- based cross-sectional study. Fisher's formula was used to calculate the sample size and a total of 270 eligible pregnant women were enrolled for the study using multistage sampling technique. Data was collected using pretested structured interviewer-administered questionnaire. Data analysis was done using SPSS version 20 and results were presented in frequencies and percentages.Results: Factors found to have a significant influence on the utilization of TBA services in this study include: low educational status (p <0.001), lower socioeconomic status (p <0.001), and compassionate care given by the TBAs (p=0.004). Other factors include service proximity and lower cost of TBA services.Conclusions: The impact of TBAs and their services cannot be overemphasized in the present state of maternal and child health in Nigeria.  Lower educational status among others has been found to be a strong predictor of utilization of TBA services. There is, therefore, the need to improve the educational and socioeconomic status of women in order to allow them to access quality health care services that will safeguard their well-being. Inculcating compassionate care into orthodox healthcare delivery will go a long way to improve patronage and discourage TBA utilization