Exploring the opportunities and perceived success of internationalization strategies in Malaysian SME’s

There is a complete transforming process all around the global economy. Technological displacement is displacing all the business activities into information oriented or information based activities. Internationalization has the great contribution in the fundamental changes which took place all over the world. In fact due to internationalization a revolution has been introduce globally. Due to the web there is availability of extended opportunities for Malaysian customer and small & medium enterprises (SME‟s). There is a need of an orderly frame work, due to limited research on the role of internet in international marketing. In order to have the better understanding to the role of internet in international marketing strategy, it is needed to examine the purpose for which SME‟s use the internet in the international marketing context(Shanker & Meyer, 2009). This paper will be providing a significant contribution in the development of internationalization process among Malaysian SME's. This paper will also help Malaysian SME's to improve their internationalization strategies in contrast with the electronic commerce

Allelopathic potential of Anagalis arvensis L.

Anagalis arvensis L. (Primulaceae) is a common cultivating weed, forming dense populations of undergrowth in warm and temperate regions of Pakistan. Allelopathic studies with aqueous extracts from whole plant including leaves, flowers, shoot and roots; litter and mulch in various experiments invariably reduced the germination, plumule growth, radical growth, number of seminal roots, cell size, and fresh and dry weights of two wheat varieties namely, Ghaznavi and Uqab, which were used as the test species. Phytotoxicity of extracts depended on the amount and soaking duration. Generally, the extracts obtained after 48 h soaking and the hot water extracts were more inhibitory. Addition of litter and mulch also proved inhibitory in the experiments. Our work suggested that A. arvensis had strong allelopathic potential but must further be tested for its weedicidal and insecticidal activities. From the practical view point, the identification of weeds with potential pool of allelochemicals, screening and identification of the toxic principle, assessment of their adverse effects on germination of crops during early growth stages and finally on the commercial yield is highly recommended.Keywords: Anagalis arvensis L. (Primulaceae), allelopathic, extracts, wee

In-Vehicle Safety Features and Their Impacts on Fatal Crashes

One of the most important safety metrics in transportation engineering is fatal crashes, and a major effect to improve safety is to reduce fatal crashes. Therefore, safety features are continuously tested and equipped in vehicles to reduce fatal crashes and provide safety to road users. This study was initiated to explore the relationship between two in-vehicle safety features and their impact on fatal crashes. These two in-vehicle safety features are the Lane Keep Assist System (LKAS) and the Forward Collision Warning System (FCWS). This thesis analyzed nine different General Motors (GM) vehicles’ make, model, and year to test which in-vehicle safety feature reduced fatal crashes. To test the LKAS safety feature, run-off-road fatal crashes were analyzed using the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) data for the Chevrolet Silverado, the Chevrolet Equinox, the GMC Yukon, the GMC Sierra, and the Cadillac Escalade model vehicles. To test the FCWS safety feature, rear-end fatal crashes were analyzed using FARS data for the Chevrolet Equinox, the Chevrolet Traverse, the Buick Enclave, the GMC Acadia, and the GMC Terrain. The odds ratios for the LKAS safety feature for the Chevrolet Silverado, the Chevrolet Equinox, the GMC Sierra, the GMC Yukon, and the Cadillac Escalade model vehicles were 0.704, 0.615, 0.601, 0.446, and 1.149, respectively. The odds ratio showed, when examining the LKAS safety feature for the Chevrolet Silverado, the Chevrolet Equinox, the GMC Yukon, the GMC Sierra, and the Cadillac Escalade model vehicles, that four of the five vehicle models examined resulted in reductions in run-off-road fatal crashes; the GMC Yukon was not statistically significant in reducing this type of crashes. Additionally, the odds ratios for the FCWS safety feature for the Chevrolet Equinox, the GMC Terrain, the Chevrolet Traverse, the GMC Acadia, and the Buick Enclave model vehicles were 0.814, 0.199, 0.873, 0.638, and 0.143, respectively. The odds ratio showed, when examining the FCWS safety feature for the Chevrolet Equinox, the Chevrolet Traverse, the Buick Enclave, the GMC Acadia, and the GMC Terrain model vehicles, that four of the five vehicles examined resulted in a reduction in rear-end crashes; the Chevrolet Equinox, the Chevrolet Traverse, and the GMC Acadia were not statistically significant in reducing run-off-road fatal crashes. In addition, the GMC Terrain results were undefined. Key Words: Lane Keep Assist System (LKAS), Forward Collision Warning (FCWS), fatal crashes, and General Motors (GM

Frequency and Antimicrobial Susceptibility Pattern of Gram-Negative Bacilli Isolated From Urine Specimens at a Tertiary Care Setting

OBJECTIVES: To find out the frequency and pattern of conventional antibiotic susceptibility of gram-negative bacilli cultured from urine specimens of patients at a tertiary care setting. METHODOLOGY: This study was conducted at the Microbiology Department of Combined Military Hospital Multan from June 2016 to May 2017. The data in this retrospective descriptive study was collected from urine culture records of the Microbiology Department, CMH Multan. Only those urine specimens who revealed positive gram-negative bacilli cultures were included in the study. Drug susceptibility patterns of these isolates were recorded against routinely used antibiotics (e.g. Nitrofurantoin, Imipenem, Sulbactum-cefoperazone, Gentamicin and Ciprofloxacin) and evaluated accordingly. RESULTS: A total of 1703 urine specimens were submitted for culture and antibiotics susceptibility testing during the period of study. A total of 128 specimens showed growth of gram-negative rods. Imipenem (95% sensitivity), Sulbactam- Cefoperazone (88% sensitivity) and Nitrofurantoin (87% sensitivity) were highly effective antibiotics against the cultured gram-negative bacilli in the study. CONCLUSION: This study showed that E. coli is the commonest cause of urinary tract infection (UTIs), followed by Klebsiella and Enterobacter species among gram-negative bacilli in our set up. In-vitro efficacy of Imipenem, Sulbactam- Cefoperazone and Nitrofurantoin was found to be the highest against these gram-negative bacilli as compared to other antimicrobials. On the contrary, in-vitro efficacy of ciprofloxacin and gentamycin was found to be extremely low

Accommodation effects on peripheral ocular biometry

The effect of near work on the biometric properties of the eye, including the eye’s length and the thickness of the posterior vascular layer were investigated. Short-sighted eyes had greater increases in length and greater thinning of the vascular layer when focused on close objects than did normally-sighted eyes. These changes occurred across the horizontal meridian of the eye and were greatest at the posterior pole. These ocular effects of focusing may partly explain the influence of close work on development of short-sightedness

Determinants of Vaccine Hesitancy and Refusal in Children of District Swabi Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

OBJECTIVES: The objective of the study was to evaluate factors associated with vaccine hesitancy and refusal at District Swabi, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. METHODOLOGY: This cross-sectional study was conducted at a teaching hospital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa District Swabi over a period of four months. Children between the ages of 9 months to 10 years from the local population admitted to the children ward/daycare centre were included in the study. Parents were inquired about vaccination status and in case of no vaccination or partial vaccination; then the reason was inquired after proper informed consent. Data were collected by using a structured proforma and analyzed using SPSS-24. RESULTS: A total of 828 children were included in this study. Out of these 492 (59.4%) were male and 336 (40.6%) were females. Of the total 828 children, 753 (90.9%) were vaccinated up to date, 48 (5.8%) were not vaccinated and 27 (3.3%) were partially vaccinated. Under vaccinated were 75 patients, 52% were left out due to misconception/beliefs, 6% patients were having issues due to living far away, 2.7% patients could not be vaccinated due to presence of other diseases and 37.3% due to lack of knowledge regarding vaccination. A significant correlation was found between the vaccination status of children and aforementioned reasons (p-value ≤0.001). CONCLUSION: The most common cause of not vaccinating children with polio vaccines was misconceptions/beliefs and lack of knowledge of the parents

Vibrational analysis of PDC bits in a laboratory compliant drillstring

Excessive vibrations during drilling operations can shorten the life of downhole equipment and instruments. One of the major contributors to drilling vibrations is bit-rock interaction. Therefore, controlling drillstring vibrations increases the range of drilling operating parameters to maintain a safe drilling operation. The goal of the research is to study the effect of drillstring vibration on drill bit dynamics and to estimate the frictional parameters of various bit-rock interaction models using laboratory testing data. In collaboration with Sandia National Laboratory (SNL), drilling tests in a controlled laboratory environment with multiple drillstring configurations mimicking field drillstring vibrations were performed at the Hard Rock Drilling Facility (HRDF). The rigid configuration was used as a base case to compare the effect of drillstring vibration on drill bit dynamics. The various drillstring configurations were investigated using two 3¾ inches of Polycrystalline Diamond Compact (PDC) bits with 4 and 5-blade designs. Drilling tests were conducted at 500 lb axial load increments up to 5500 lb at three constant rotating speeds of 80, 120, and 160 RPM. The results showed that the flywheel configuration provides a stable torque to the bit, while the torsional compliance configuration produced less torque at the same weight on bit (WOB) compared to the rigid configuration for the 4-bladed bit. The axial compliance configuration increases the WOB variation. The combined axial torsional compliance configuration showed increased fluctuation in WOB, rotational speed, and applied torque. Overall, traditional rigid drillstring experiments overestimate drilling vibrations frequencies by an average of 26.3% in the axial direction and 35% in the torsional direction when compared to the combined axial and torsional compliance for both bit designs. The use of the 5-bladed PDC bit in hard rock reduces axial vibrations by 53.7% in the axial direction and 14.2% in the torsional direction. The drilling test data were compared with one coupled axial and torsional bit-rock interaction model, and three uncoupled torsional bit-rock interaction models to perform a sensitivity analysis and determine the frictional constants for the testing data. The sensitivity of models showed difficulties in predicting actual laboratory conditions where such models are highly dependent on the frictional constants which are difficult to obtain for a certain drilling condition

FSViewFusion: Few-Shots View Generation of Novel Objects

Novel view synthesis has observed tremendous developments since the arrival of NeRFs. However, Nerf models overfit on a single scene, lacking generalization to out of distribution objects. Recently, diffusion models have exhibited remarkable performance on introducing generalization in view synthesis. Inspired by these advancements, we explore the capabilities of a pretrained stable diffusion model for view synthesis without explicit 3D priors. Specifically, we base our method on a personalized text to image model, Dreambooth, given its strong ability to adapt to specific novel objects with a few shots. Our research reveals two interesting findings. First, we observe that Dreambooth can learn the high level concept of a view, compared to arguably more complex strategies which involve finetuning diffusions on large amounts of multi-view data. Second, we establish that the concept of a view can be disentangled and transferred to a novel object irrespective of the original object's identify from which the views are learnt. Motivated by this, we introduce a learning strategy, FSViewFusion, which inherits a specific view through only one image sample of a single scene, and transfers the knowledge to a novel object, learnt from few shots, using low rank adapters. Through extensive experiments we demonstrate that our method, albeit simple, is efficient in generating reliable view samples for in the wild images. Code and models will be released

Speech Act Theory and Ethics of Speech Processing as Distinct Stages: the ethics of collecting, contextualizing and the releasing of (speech) data

Using speech act theory from the Philosophy of Language, this paper attempts to develop an ethical framework for the phenomenon of speech processing. We use the concepts of the illocutionary force and the illocutionary content of a speech act to explain the ethics of speech processing. By emphasizing the different stages involved in speech processing, we explore the distinct ethical issues that arise in relation to each stage. Input, processing, and output are the different ethically relevant stages under which a spoken item or a speech navigates within the range of speech-processing modules. Employing the illocutionary force-content distinction, we specify and characterize the input-related ethical issues, the output-related ethical issues, and the processing-related ethical issues involved in speech processing. Together with illocutionary force-content distinction, we employ the data-information distinction to characterize the stage-wise ethical issues in the phenomenon of speech processing as the ethics of collecting (speech) data, the ethics of contextualizing (speech) data/information, and the ethics of releasing the con-textualized information (processed speech). Immediate ethical issues that arise from the range of speech processing modules are distinguished from distant ethical issues. We also indicate the nature of ethical issues that arise from Speaker Independent speech technologies