Profitability and Working Capital Management Nexus: Evidence from Food & Personal Care Products Sector Firms Listed on Pakistan Stock Exchange

Working capital management (WCM) usually have an essential role to play in a firm’s overall performance, especially those of manufacturing sector. The key aim of the current research work is to find the empirical association amid profitability and working capital management of the Food & Personal Care Product sector Pakistani firms. Eight companies are selected randomly as a sample from the firms listed on Pakistan Stock Exchange. Secondary data for six years, that is, 2010 - 2016 is gathered from the financial reports of these companies and evaluated through Pearson correlation coefficient and regression analysis techniques, using STATA software. The results prove that Return on Assets (ROA) is negatively correlated with Average Collection Period (ACP) and positively correlated with Inventory Turnover in Days (ITID), Average Payment Period (APP), Current Ratio (CR) and Sales Growth (SG). All the relationships are significant except ITID and SG one

IMPACTS OF ATTABAD LAKE (PAKISTAN) AND ITS FUTURE OUTLOOK

Due to geological, hydrological and anthropogenic variations in Northern Areas of Pakistan, the possibility of hazards like earthquake, flash floods, landslide and Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) have increased manifolds. The incident of Attabad landslide on 4th January 2010 blocking the Hunza River and resulting in the formation of huge lake as a sequel to Astore earthquake in 2002 and Kashmir earthquake in 2005 is a testimony to the fact hazards turn into disasters causing loss and damage to lives, properties, assets and environment. There are multiple reasons ranging from global warming, deforestation, unplanned settlements, population growth, aggressive farming and host of other man induced activities which have made the Northern Areas of Pakistan hazards prone and are likely to pose continuous threat if requisite preparation and response options are not considered well in advance. In case of Attabad landslide, viewing from the prism of disaster risk management the response of Gilgit-Baltistan and Federal Governments has though not been up to the mark yet mobilization of resources and opinion to manage the disaster leaves a promising environment of hope and capacity which can be further developed to more resilient respondent provided little extra deliberations are done and attention is paid. The solution to Attabad landslide dam crisis lies in reducing the risk by either draining out the lake completely or making a reliable structure with proper design for flow of the water from the lake

ENHANCEMENT IN OVERALL THERMAL EFFICIENCY OF A GAS TURBINE POWER PLANT USING COMBINED CYCLE SYSTEM

The gas turbines are one of the major resources of power generation in the world and its usage is increasing day by day. Although the gas turbines have several advantages over other systems (such as high power to weigh ratio, high rotational speed or fast activation capabilities) but they still waste the energy in the form of high temperature exhaust gases coming out of the gas turbine which pollute the atmosphere and affect the environment. A waste heat recovery system (WHRS) installed at Gas turbine exhaust helps not only to reduce the exhaust temperature of these gases emitting from the uptake into the atmosphere but also enables to produce useful steam for various processes. The air mass flow rate which enters the compressor has a direct relation with the performance of gas turbine power plant. The volumetric efficiency of the gas turbines decreases with rise in the temperature of the inlet air. The increase in temperature will reduce the density which results in the reduction of gas turbine efficiency. In the present work the steam produced from WHRS has been used in the vapor absorption system of refrigeration. The refrigeration system is utilized to cool the air at the entry of the gas turbine compressor power plant. It was observed in gas turbine power plant that there is a 10% increase in thermal efficiency

Non-contact smart sensing of physical activities during quarantine period using SDR technology

The global pandemic of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is dramatically changing the lives of humans and results in limitation of activities, especially physical activities, which lead to various health issues such as cardiovascular, diabetes, and gout. Physical activities are often viewed as a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it offers enormous health benefits; on the other hand, it can cause irreparable damage to health. Falls during physical activities are a significant cause of fatal and non-fatal injuries. Therefore, continuous monitoring of physical activities is crucial during the quarantine period to detect falls. Even though wearable sensors can detect and recognize human physical activities, in a pandemic crisis, it is not a realistic approach. Smart sensing with the support of smartphones and other wireless devices in a non-contact manner is a promising solution for continuously monitoring physical activities and assisting patients suffering from serious health issues. In this research, a non-contact smart sensing through the walls (TTW) platform is developed to monitor human physical activities during the quarantine period using software-defined radio (SDR) technology. The developed platform is intelligent, flexible, portable, and has multi-functional capabilities. The received orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) signals with fine-grained 64-subcarriers wireless channel state information (WCSI) are exploited for classifying different activities by applying machine learning algorithms. The fall activity is classified separately from standing, walking, running, and bending with an accuracy of 99.7% by using a fine tree algorithm. This preliminary smart sensing opens new research directions to detect COVID-19 symptoms and monitor non-communicable and communicable diseases

Fungal systematics and evolution : FUSE 6

Fungal Systematics and Evolution (FUSE) is one of the journal series to address the “fusion” between morphological data and molecular phylogenetic data and to describe new fungal taxa and interesting observations. This paper is the 6th contribution in the FUSE series—presenting one new genus, twelve new species, twelve new country records, and three new combinations. The new genus is: Pseudozeugandromyces (Laboulbeniomycetes, Laboulbeniales). The new species are: Albatrellopsis flettioides from Pakistan, Aureoboletus garciae from Mexico, Entomophila canadense from Canada, E. frigidum from Sweden, E. porphyroleucum from Vietnam, Erythrophylloporus flammans from Vietnam, Marasmiellus boreoorientalis from Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East, Marasmiellus longistipes from Pakistan, Pseudozeugandromyces tachypori on Tachyporus pusillus (Coleoptera, Staphylinidae) from Belgium, Robillarda sohagensis from Egypt, Trechispora hondurensis from Honduras, and Tricholoma kenanii from Turkey. The new records are: Arthrorhynchus eucampsipodae on Eucampsipoda africanum (Diptera, Nycteribiidae) from Rwanda and South Africa, and on Nycteribia vexata (Diptera, Nycteribiidae) from Bulgaria; A. nycteribiae on Eucampsipoda africanum from South Africa, on Penicillidia conspicua (Diptera, Nycteribiidae) from Bulgaria (the first undoubtful country record), and on Penicillidia pachymela from Tanzania; Calvatia lilacina from Pakistan; Entoloma shangdongense from Pakistan; Erysiphe quercicola on Ziziphus jujuba (Rosales, Rhamnaceae) and E. urticae on Urtica dioica (Rosales, Urticaceae) from Pakistan; Fanniomyces ceratophorus on Fannia canicularis (Diptera, Faniidae) from the Netherlands; Marasmiellus biformis and M. subnuda from Pakistan; Morchella anatolica from Turkey; Ophiocordyceps ditmarii on Vespula vulgaris (Hymenoptera, Vespidae) from Austria; and Parvacoccum pini on Pinus cembra (Pinales, Pinaceae) from Austria. The new combinations are: Appendiculina gregaria, A. scaptomyzae, and Marasmiellus rodhallii. Analysis of an LSU dataset of Arthrorhynchus including isolates of A. eucampsipodae from Eucampsipoda africanum and Nycteribia spp. hosts, revealed that this taxon is a complex of multiple species segregated by host genus. Analysis of an SSU–LSU dataset of Laboulbeniomycetes sequences revealed support for the recognition of four monophyletic genera within Stigmatomyces sensu lato: Appendiculina, Fanniomyces, Gloeandromyces, and Stigmatomyces sensu stricto. Finally, phylogenetic analyses of Rhytismataceae based on ITS–LSU ribosomal DNA resulted in a close relationship of Parvacoccum pini with Coccomyces strobi.http://www.sydowia.at/index.htmpm2021Medical Virolog

Cheyne-Stokes respiration perception via machine learning algorithms

With the development of science and technology, transparent, non-invasive general computing is gradually applied to disease diagnosis and medical detection. Universal software radio peripherals (USRP) enable non-contact awareness based on radio frequency signals. Cheyne-Stokes respiration has been reported as a common symptom in patients with heart failure. Compared with the disadvantages of traditional detection equipment, a microwave sensing method based on channel state information (CSI) is proposed to qualitatively detect the normal breathing and Cheyne-Stokes breathing of patients with heart failure in a non-contact manner. Firstly, USRP is used to collect subjects’ respiratory signals in real time. Then the CSI waveform is filtered, smoothed and normalized, and the relevant features are defined and extracted from the signal. Finally, the machine learning classification algorithm is used to establish a recognition model to detect the Cheyne-Stokes respiration of patients with heart failure. The results show that the system accuracy of support vector machine (SVM) is 97%, which can assist medical workers to identify Cheyne-Stokes respiration symptoms of patients with heart failure

MHD mixed convection flow for Maxwell Hybrid nanofluid with Soret, Dufour and Morphology effects

We have investigated the two-dimensional mixed convective Maxwell hybrid nanofluid boundary layer mass and heat flows over a linearly stretching porous surface with the applied external magnetic flux. Thermal radiations along with the Dufour and Soret effects are also incorporated. The governing model of partial differential equations (PDE) is altered into ordinary differential equations (ODE) with an appropriate similarity transformation. The finite difference-based numerical method BVP4c is applied to solve the system of nonlinear ODEs. The flow features and the heat transfer characteristics have been illustrated with graphical representations and a numerical table. For varied values of the flow-related variables, organized and graphical data for the Nusselt number and skin friction coefficient are indicated. In most cases, spherical-shaped nanoparticles have a better influence on stream function, velocity and temperature distributions. This behavior is the opposite of the mass concentration profile. It has been observed that stream function decreases as increase the value of the magnetic field but opposite for mass concentration distribution and temperature profile. The temperature gradient is enhanced as a result of stronger convective flow when Soret number Sr values increase, which causes the boundary layer thickness to grow. A comparative study of hybrid nanofluid and nanofluid showed that the hybrid nanofluid has superior shear stress/skin friction and Sherwood number/surface mass flux than nanofluid flow

A Molecular Communication Platform Based on Body Area Nanonetwork

With the development of nanotechnology and biotechnology, the nanomachine can be applied to the interior of the human body. In order to achieve the goal of completing complex tasks, measures to connect multiple nanomachines that can complete more simple tasks are taken. This can expand the ability of a single nanomachine to cooperate and share information to complete more complex tasks—namely, the emergence of the Body Area Network (BAN). In response to the requirements of building a BAN, we must first need to solve the communication problem between two nanomachines. Communication networks based on molecular communication (MC), known as “natural body area networks”, are widely used in biomedical fields. With the considerable development of MC theory, it is urgent to set up an experimental platform to verify and guide theoretical modeling. In this paper, a nanomaterial-based MC platform is designed and built to simulate the cardiovascular system. The platform uses the diffusion of nanoscale pigment particles in water solution in silicone tube to achieve communication process and modulates binary sequence information to messenger molecules by on-off keying (OOK). The platform successfully transmits and receives a 17-bit binary sequence to prove its communication possibilities. To assess the platform capabilities, this paper tests the effects of different solution concentrations, pipeline flow rates, and pressure on platform communications. These factors can be used to expand the modulation schemes that the platform can implement. In future work, some nanomaterials that can be used for molecular communication can be applied to the platform to characterize their channel characteristics