Comparative Evaluation of the Nutritional, Physical and Sensory Properties of Beef, Chicken and Soy Burgers

The sporadic technological advancement witnessed worldwide since the beginning of the twenty first century has encouraged civilization and urbanization culminating into changes in lifestyle from active to sedentary globally. People now prefer instant foods and eating out in different food service units to home cooked meals. Burger is a special delicacy which is seldom prepared at home but commonly purchased from restaurants. The need to encourage human consumption of soybean cannot be over emphasized due to the unrivalled nutritional and health benefits derivable from it especially in combating some communicable diseases, the epidemic of which is becoming alarming globally, hence, harnessing soybean potentials in the production of burger is of pertinent importance. This experimental study was therefore designed to compare the nutritional, physical and sensory properties of soy burger with those of the conventional beef and chicken burgers. Soy cheese was prepared from soybeans using appropriate culinary procedure. Equal portions of minced beef, minced chicken and soy cheese were processed into burgers using basic recipe. Beef, chicken and soy burgers were subjected to proximate, thiamine, riboflavin, cholesterol, colour, texture and sensory evaluation using standard methods. Mean data were compared using Analysis of Variance at p≤0.05. Protein content (Dry Weight Basis) for Beef burger (BB), Chicken Burger (CB) and Soy Burger (SB) were 57.87, 50.36 and 53.89% respectively. In similar sequence fat content were 10.02(BB) 10.15(CB) and 8.58 (SB). SB was significantly higher than the other two samples in crude fibre, riboflavin and niacin while its cholesterol content was negligible. There was no significant difference between SB and CB in lightness and redness while the values for yellowness were 10.60, 25.12 and 18.25 for BB, CB AND SB respectively. In the same vein there was no significant difference in chewiness, cohesiveness and springiness of the three burger samples. For overall acceptability BB was most acceptable followed by SB and then CB. The nutritional, physical and sensory properties of soy burger were comparable to that of beef and chicken burgers, hence, soy burger may compete favourably with the conventional types of burger and is hereby presented as a cholesterol-free alternative with higher health benefits suitable for all even vegans. Household and commercial production and consumption of soy burger is hereby recommended

Evaluation of 0 <_ M <_ earthquake data sets in African – Asian region during 1966–2015

Thisarticleevaluatestheoccurrenceof0 r M r 8 earthquakedata setsfortheperiodof50years(thatis,January1,1966toDecember 31,2015)inAfricanandWesternAsiaregion.Itisboundedby latitude40° S to40° N andlongitude30° W to60° E withthefocal depthof0–700km.Seventyseventhousand,sixhundredand ninety-sixdatapointswerepresentedfortheanalysis.Thedata usedwereextractedfromearthquakecatalogofAdvancedNational Seismicsystemvia http://quake.geo.berkeley.edu/cnss/, anofficial websiteoftheNorthernCaliforniaEarthquakeDataCentre,USA. Eachdatumcomprisedtheearthquakeoccurrencedate,timeofthe earthquakeoccurrence,epicenter’s coordinates,focaldepthand magnitude.TheGutenberg-Richter’s relationshipbeingthelongest observedempiricalrelationshipinseismology,analysisofvariance andtimeserieswereusedtoanalyzetheseismicityofthestudy area.Annualdistributionsofearthquakeoccurrencebasedon magnitudevariationswiththelimit0 r M r 8 werepresented. ThetwoconstantsaandbintheGutenberg-Richter’s equation, magnitudeofcompleteness(MC)adjustedR-Squareand F-valuefor theperiodof1966–1975,1976–1985,1986–1995,1996–2005,2006– 2015,andtheentireperiodofinvestigationrangingfrom1966to 2015weredeterminedsoastoinvestigatethevariationsofthese parametersonearthquakeoccurrenceovertime.Thehistogramsof earthquakeoccurrenceagainstmagnitudeofearthquakesforthe selectedyears(1966–1975,1976–1985,1986–1995,1996–2005, 2006–2015,and1966–2015),andthedecadalfrequencydistribu- tionsofearthquakeoccurrencewerealsoplotted.Thefocaldepth occurrenceforeachmagnitudebins(0–0.9,1–1.9,2–2.9,3–3.9,4– 4.9,5–5.9,6–6.9,7–7.9,8–8.9)weregroupedintoshallow,inter- mediate,anddeepdepthsrangingfrom0to70,71to300,and301 to700kmasbeingusedinseismology.Theneuralnetworkanalysis wasalsoappliedtothemagnitudeoftheearthquake.Thenetwork usesatimeseriesmagnitudedataasinputwiththeoutputbeing themagnitudeofthefollowingday.Ifthenatureoftheearthquakes timeseriesisstochastic,modelingandpredictionispossible.The earthquakedatasetspresentedinthisarticlecanfurtherbeadopted in thestudyofseismicitypattern, b-valueusingseriesofmodels, earthquakepredictionandvariationsofearthquakeparameterson Africanand/orArabianplates.Whenthisapproachisintegrated withothertechnique(s),itcanprovideinsightstostabilityof African lithospehricplatesespeciallythecoastalregionofAfrica

On the Effects of Saturation Terms on A SEIR Epidemic Model with Infected and Susceptible Compartments

The importance of the saturation term in an SEIR (Susceptible, Exposed, Infected, and Recovered) epidemic model was examined in this article. To estimate the basic reproduction number (R0), examine the stabilities and run numerical simulations on the model, the next generation matrix, the Lyapunov function and Runge-Kutta techniques were used. The numerical simulation results reveal that, the saturation term has a significant influence in the model’s susceptible and infected compartments. However, as demonstrated by the simulation results, saturation term has a greater influence on vulnerable people than on infected people. As a result, greater sensitization programs through seminars, media, and awareness will be more beneficial to the vulnerable class than the afflicted class during disease eradication

Evaluationof0 r M r 8 earthquake datasets in African – Asian regionduring1966–2015

Thisarticleevaluatestheoccurrenceof0 r M r 8 earthquakedata setsfortheperiodof50years(thatis,January1,1966toDecember 31,2015)inAfricanandWesternAsiaregion.Itisboundedby latitude40° S to40° N andlongitude30° W to60° E withthefocal depthof0–700km.Seventyseventhousand,sixhundredand ninety-sixdatapointswerepresentedfortheanalysis.Thedata usedwereextractedfromearthquakecatalogofAdvancedNational Seismicsystemvia http://quake.geo.berkeley.edu/cnss/, anofficial websiteoftheNorthernCaliforniaEarthquakeDataCentre,USA. Eachdatumcomprisedtheearthquakeoccurrencedate,timeofthe earthquakeoccurrence,epicenter’s coordinates,focaldepthand magnitude.TheGutenberg-Richter’s relationshipbeingthelongest observedempiricalrelationshipinseismology,analysisofvariance andtimeserieswereusedtoanalyzetheseismicityofthestudy area.Annualdistributionsofearthquakeoccurrencebasedon magnitudevariationswiththelimit0 r M r 8 werepresented. ThetwoconstantsaandbintheGutenberg-Richter’s equation, magnitudeofcompleteness(MC)adjustedR-Squareand F-valuefor theperiodof1966–1975,1976–1985,1986–1995,1996–2005,2006– 2015,andtheentireperiodofinvestigationrangingfrom1966t

Quantitative datasets reveal marked gender disparities in Earth Sciences faculty rank in Africa

As in most disciplines of science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM), gender disparity is prevalent in the ranking of Earth Sciences faculties at senior and advanced levels. (i.e., Associate and Full Professors). In this study, a robust database was mined, created, and analyzed to assess the faculty compositions of 142 Earth Science departments in 39 countries across Africa. The data were collected from verifiable online resources focusing on ranks and gender ratios within each department. The studied earth science departments cut across universities in northern, southern, central, eastern, and western Africa. Our data revealed that female faculty members are predominantly underrepresented in most of the departments documented and are markedly uncommon in senior positions such as Professors, associate Professors, and senior researchers compared to their male counterparts. On the contrary, female faculty members are predominant in the lower cadres, such as lecturers, teaching, and graduate assistants. The observed male to female ratio is 4:1. At the base of this gender gap is the lower enrolment of female students in Earth Science courses from undergraudate to graduate studies. To achieve gender equality in Earth Science faculty composition in Africa, we recommend increasing female students’ enrollment, mentoring, awareness, timely promotion of accomplished female researchers, and formulation of enabling government policies. More work-related policies that guarantee work-life balance for female earth science academic professionals should be formulated to attract and retain more women into Earth Sciences careers