Impact of stressors on the performance of employees

It is important to recognize workplace stress because workplace stressors badly affect people’s mental as well as physiological health. Some of the reasons of stress at workplace could be the inability to meet out the demands of the job, relationship with colleagues and to control subordinate staff. After starting one’s career the key stressors are related to work, environment and people. Stress is the reaction of body due to interaction with any stimulus in the environment. This study focuses on how workplace stressors effect the motivation of an employee and what it outcomes in term of employee performance. In this study, there are several variables relating to employee performance, motivation and job stresses, whose types of measurement are interval and simultaneously investigated the several variables through structural equation modeling (SEM). The result shows that role conflict, role ambiguity and performance pressure has positively effect the employee motivation and it leads to positively affect employee performance. This study indicates and highlights the intensity of those factors that are involved to create a stress environment in the organization. So this study is policy oriented to maintain a required level of stress in the organization.Stress Management, Motivation, Employee Performance

Reflection of Regulatory Announcement in Equity Market: Fresh Insight from Oil & Gas Sector of Pakistan

This study is based on the problem that how regulations made by oil and gas regulatory authority influences the companies in oil and gas sector of Pakistan. We identify 13 regulatory changes in oil and sector of Pakistan which broadly includes the announcement related to the formulation, functions and responsibilities of oil and gas authority, deregulation and changes in the prices of oil and gas products, interference of apex court into the oil and gas sector and privatization of oil refineries in emerging market of Pakistan. Well-liked event study methodology is used to uncover the impact of regulation announcement on equity prices in Pakistan. Beside this, we also capture the effect of regulation announcement on the firm performance by introducing the dummy variable in ordinary least framework. In line with the financial and econometric theory criteria, we use the sales growth, leverage, liquidity and tangibility as control variables. Study reveal that regulatory announcements have statistically significant aggregate effect on the oil and gas sector of Pakistan stock exchange. We recommend to the policy makers, managers and regulators that the stock prices of oil and gas companies are more sensitive toward the regulatory announcements related to interference of Supreme Court and regulations concerning to the formulation, functions and responsibilities of oil and gas regulatory authority in Pakistan

Still birth classification: Application of relevant condition at death (ReCoDe) classification system in a tertiary care hospital of Pakistan

Objectives: To determine the cause of stillbirth after application of relevant condition at death (ReCoDe) classification system. Methods: This was a retrospective cross sectional study of 207 women diagnosed with stillbirth after 24 completed weeks of pregnancy at the Aga Khan University Hospital (AKUH), Karachi between 1st January 2015 and 31st December 2019. The primary objective was to find the cause of stillbirth according to the new classification of relevant condition at death (ReCoDe). Results: There were a total of 32413 live births and 207 stillbirths during the study period thus stillbirth rate of 6 per 1000 live births. In this study, 80% of women were in the age group of 20-35 years, 16% had advanced maternal age while 3.8% of women accounted for less than 20 years. Among the maternal factors; 54.5% cases were booked and the remaining were were un-booked cases. Pre-eclampsia was the most common associated maternal condition (14.9%).Fetal cause accounted for 34.7% of stillbirths and the fetal growth restriction (FGR) was the most common; 23.6%. After application of ReCoDe classification, in 81% of stillbirth cases associated condition were found and only 18.8% of cases were categorized unexplained. Conclusion: Application of ReCoDe classification is easy to understand and applicable, especially in low resource settings with associated causes identified in vast majority of cases

Antioxidant activity and phenolic profile of four Saudi Arabia date palms (Phoenix dactylifera L.) varieties

Antioxidants as free radical scavengers can combat the oxidative stress that occurs in the body to prevent chronic diseases. Therefore, antioxidant rich foods have a high demand among the healthcare consumers to maintain healthy lifestyle. One of the most potential fruit that are expected to contain high antioxidant compound is Phoenix dactylifera that have a lot of varieties. This study was intended to investigate the total phenolic content, antioxidant activity and phenolic profiles of four varieties of P. dactylifera (Khudori, Sabaka, Nabtat Ali and Soukari). The fleshes of the fruit were extracted using ethanol as the solvent using soxhlet. Total phenolic content (TPC) was measured by using Folin-Ciocalteu calorimetric method and the antioxidant activity was determined by using the 2,2,diphenyl-2-picryl-hydrazyl (DPPH) method. Some phenolic acid and flavonoids profiles of the fruit (gallic acid, p-coumaric acid, ferulic acid and quercetin) were analyzed by using High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). TPC of the fruit was in the range of 5.8 to 3.8 mg gallic acid equivalents (GAE) per 1 g of fruit with Soukari have the highest value. As for the antioxidant activity, Soukari need the lowest concentration (27.41 ± 1.68 mg/ml) to achieve half inhibition concentration (IC50 ) whereas Khudori need the highest concentration among the four. The HPLC result shows significantly higher amount of gallic acid (15.35 to 8.56 mg/g), and very small amount of ferulic acid (0.19 to 0.006 mg/g) where Soukari have the highest value for all of the compounds. This study demonstrates Soukari variety might possessed the highest antioxidant capacities among the four. Further study by using advanced and green extraction method need to be carried out to comprehend and confirm the potential of this fruit to be developed as nutraceutical and functional food. Keywords: Pheonix dactylifera, Antioxidant, Phenolic profile, HPLC

Impact of stressors on the performance of employees

It is important to recognize workplace stress because workplace stressors badly affect people’s mental as well as physiological health. Some of the reasons of stress at workplace could be the inability to meet out the demands of the job, relationship with colleagues and to control subordinate staff. After starting one’s career the key stressors are related to work, environment and people. Stress is the reaction of body due to interaction with any stimulus in the environment. This study focuses on how workplace stressors effect the motivation of an employee and what it outcomes in term of employee performance. In this study, there are several variables relating to employee performance, motivation and job stresses, whose types of measurement are interval and simultaneously investigated the several variables through structural equation modeling (SEM). The result shows that role conflict, role ambiguity and performance pressure has positively effect the employee motivation and it leads to positively affect employee performance. This study indicates and highlights the intensity of those factors that are involved to create a stress environment in the organization. So this study is policy oriented to maintain a required level of stress in the organization

Improved Road Segment-Based Geographical Routing Protocol for Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks

This research was funded by Bahria University, Islamabad Campus.Qureshi, KN.; Ul Islam, F.; Kaiwartya, O.; Kumar, A.; Lloret, J. (2020). Improved Road Segment-Based Geographical Routing Protocol for Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks. Electronics. 9(8):1-20. https://doi.org/10.3390/electronics9081248S1209

Stereospermum fimbriatum as a potential source of phytochemicals: a review of stereospermum genus

Stereospermum fimbriatum is one of the medicinal plants that has been claimed to be used traditionally to treat several illnesses such as stomachache, ear-ache, skin irritation and postpartum illness. The genus of this plant is known to pos-sess medicinal properties in every part of the plant. Therapeutic potential of S. fim-briatum is anticipated based on numerous previous studies that documented variety of phytochemical contents and bioactivity of the genus. The most reported bioactiv-ities of its genus are antimicrobial, antioxidant, anti-diabetic, anti-inflammatory, anti-diarrheal and analgesic activities. S. fimbriatum is a rare species that has not been discovered yet. Thus, this review aims at highlighting the potentials of S. fim-briatum by collecting available data on the bioactivities of its genus and set the di-rections for future research on this plant

Mimosa pudica L.: a comparative study via in vitro analysis and GC Q-TOF MS profiling on conventional and supercritical fluid extraction using food grade ethanol

The present study compared conventional (maceration) extraction (EtOHconv) and supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) methods as a mean of comparing conventional and green process for a weed namely Mimosa pudica L. to obtain a safe antidiabetic natural agent. In vitro analysis comprised of two different assays, antioxidant assay (determination of total phenolic content, total flavonoid content, and 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl assay) and antidiabetic assay (inhibition of αamylase and α-glucosidase). GC Q-TOF MS profiling for both extracts was done after derivetisation to confirm the presence of bioactive compounds. SFE was performed at 40 MPa pressure, 60 °C temperature and 5 mL/min CO2 flow rate using 30 % ethanol (co-solvent) for 2 h. EtOHconv prepared using 95 % ethanol through conventional method (maceration) showed a good in vitro antioxidant potential and digestive enzymes inhibitory effect compared to supercritical fluid extract. α-amylase and α-glucosidase inhibitory activities for EtOHconv at 1 mg/mL were 30.08 % (±5.23) and 38.29 % (±2.52), whereas for standard acarbose it was 28.24 % (±13.66) and 36.93 % (±2.70), respectively. Supercritical fluid extract showed less potent in vitro antioxidant and digestive enzymes inhibitory effects (15.67±4.03- α-amylase, 28.36±2.01- α-glucosidase). GC Q-TOF MS analysis was done to confirm the presence of bioactive compounds in both the extracts. Although EtOHconv showed better results, SFE was found to contain more bioactive compounds associated with various pharmacological effects especially antioxidative as per GC Q-TOF MS results. SFE being a clean and green technology could be employed in future with more focus on method development and optimization to reproduce better and safe bioactive products from the neglected weed M. pudica

Prevalence of undiagnosed metabolic syndrome using three different definitions and identifying associated risk factors among apparently healthy adults in Karachi, Pakistan:a cross-sectional survey in the year 2022

Objective: To determine the prevalence and associated risk factors of undiagnosed metabolic syndrome (MetS) using three different definitions among apparently healthy adults of Karachi, Pakistan. Methods: This community-based cross-sectional survey was conducted in Karachi, Pakistan, from January 2022 to August 2022. A total of 1065 healthy individuals aged 25–80 years of any gender were consecutively included. MetS was assessed using the National Cholesterol Education Program for Adult Treatment Panel (NCEP-ATP) III guidelines, International Diabetes Federation (IDF), and modified NCEP-ATP III. Results: The prevalence of MetS was highest with the modified NCEP-ATP III definition at 33.9% (95% CI: 31–36), followed by the IDF definition at 32.2% (95% CI: 29–35). In contrast, the prevalence was lower at 22.4% (95% CI: 19–25) when using the NCEP ATP III definition. The risk of MetS significantly increases with higher BMI, as defined by the IDF criteria (adjusted OR [ORadj] 1.13, 95% CI 1.09–2.43), NCEP-ATP III criteria (ORadj 1.15, 95% CI 1.11–1.19), and modified NCEP-ATP III criteria (ORadj 1.16, 95% CI 1.12–1.20). Current smokers had significantly higher odds of MetS according to the IDF (ORadj 2.72, 95% CI 1.84–4.03), NCEP-ATP III (ORadj 3.93, 95% CI 2.55–6.06), and modified NCEP-ATP III (ORadj 0.62, 95% CI 0.43–0.88). Areca nut use was associated with higher odds of MetS according to both IDF (ORadj 1.71, 95% CI 1.19–2.47) and modified NCEP-ATP III criteria (ORadj 1.58, 95% CI 1.10–2.72). Furthermore, low physical activity had significantly higher odds of MetS according to the NCEP-ATP III (ORadj 1.36, 95% CI 1.01–1.84) and modified NCEP-ATP III criteria (ORadj 1.56, 95% CI 1.08–2.26). Conclusion: One-third of the healthy individuals were diagnosed with MetS based on IDF, NCEP-ATP III, and modified NCEP-ATP III criteria. A higher BMI, current smoking, areca nut use, and low physical activity were significant factors

Acaricides resistance in ticks : selection, diagnosis, mechanisms, and mitigation

Ticks are blood-feeding ecto-parasites that have a cosmopolitan distribution in tropical and subtropical regions of the world. Ticks cause economic losses in the form of reduced blood, meat and dairy products, as well as pathogen transmission. Different acaricides such as organochlorines, organophosphates, formamidines (e.g. amitraz), synthetic pyrethroids, macrocyclic lactones, fipronil, and fluazuron are currently used sequentially or simultaneously to control tick infestations. Most acaricide treatments now face increasingly high chances of failure, due to the resistance selection in different tick populations against these drugs. Acaricide resistance in ticks can be developed in different ways, including amino acid substitutions that result in morphological changes in the acaricide target, metabolic detoxification, and reduced acaricide entry through the outer layer of the tick body. The current literature brings a plethora of information regarding the use of different acaricides for tick control, resistance selection, analysis of mutations in target sites, and resistance mitigation. Alternatives such as synergistic use of different acaricides, plant-derived phytochemicals, fungi as biological control agents, and anti-tick vaccines have been recommended to avoid and mitigate acaricide resistance. The purpose of this review was to summarize and discuss different acaricides applied for tick control, their mechanisms of action and resistance selection, genetic polymorphisms in their target molecules, as well as the approaches used for diagnosis and mitigation of acaricide resistance, specifically in Rhipicephalus microplus ticks