31 research outputs found

    The Role of New Technology in Inquiry Media Architecture

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    The late twentieth century saw clear sophisticated in information and multimedia technology, which becoming a bigger influential in daily human life and also in the built environment posed by the need and shape, so architecture Included all achievements that were produced by this technology, that’s current research focus, Thus the emergence of the research problem of the "absence of a clear vision about the nature of the relationship formulated by the media as the media surfaces of architecture with the receiver". The goal of research Represent with trying to define what the media and media architecture clarify new relationship with the receiver drafted by the type of sensory and behavioral impact through the formulation of the surfaces of architecture. To achieve the objective search mode method of literature review of previous dealt to define multimedia architecture such as offering in Search explains the meaning of a new type of architecture witnessed by the architectural arena specific dimensions and goals, To move in the private segment to illustrate the specificity and tools design represented-media and smart materials responsive invented and achieved a new version of the architecture is different facads and its impact sensory behavioral traditional and reach conclusions have been put through practical models (international, Arab and) were accomplished

    The corporate reputation of Islamic banks: a measurement scale.

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    During the last few years, the concept of corporate reputation has received considerable attention from marketing academics and practitioners alike. This is not surprising in view of the concept enormous practical implications. Suffice it to say, that the market value of a modern company lies mainly in its intangibles assets. Corporate reputation embodies all of the intangible capital that a company may have. The current study describes an attempt to develop and validate a scale to measure the corporate reputation of Islamic banks. The operational definition of the construct draws mainly on its attitudinal and perceptual nature. To tap into the different dimensions of the target domain, an initial item pool of 42 statements was developed following a comprehensive review of related literature. Successive stages of revision, editing, rewriting and face and content validity reduced the initial item pool to 29 statements. These were put to a convenient sample of 150 bank customers in the Kingdom of Bahrain. The resultant data set was factor analyzed. A Principal Component Analysis extraction method suggested a two factor solution. Between them,the two factors explained 55% of the total variance in the factor model. Items that loaded poorly on any of the two components were eliminated from the analysis. 17 items made up the final version of the scale. The Cronbach alpha coefficients revealed that the two subscales and the overall scale were reliable. The inter-item correlation coefficients, the variance extracted, the factor communalities, and the Cronbach alpha coefficients do all point to the validity of the construct: that all the items in the scale seem to measure an underlying theme, in this case the corporate reputation of Islamic banks

    Greening Big Data Networks: Velocity Impact

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    The authors investigate the impact of big data's velocity on greening IP over WDM networks. They classify the processing velocity of big data into two modes: expedited-data and relaxed-data modes. Expedited-data demands higher amount of computational resources to reduce the execution time compared with the relaxed-data. They developed a mixed integer linear programming model to progressively process big data at strategic locations, dubbed processing nodes (PNs), built into the network along the path from the source to the destination. The extracted information from the raw traffic is smaller in volume compared with the original traffic each time the data is processed, hence, reducing network power consumption. The results showed that up to 60% network power saving is achieved when nearly 100% of the data required relaxed processing. In contrast, only 15% of network power saving is gained when nearly 100% of the data required expedited processing. The authors obtained around 33% power saving in the mixed modes (i.e. when ∌50% of the data is processed in the relaxed mode and 50% of the data is processed in expedited mode), compared with the classical approach where all the processing is achieved inside the centralised data centres only

    mRNA in situ hybridization analysis of MMP-9 in chronic lymphocytic leukemia

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    Background: Several factors render chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) an interesting subject for study by researchers. These include marked progress in understanding the molecular biology of normal and neoplastic lymphocytes and recent advances in molecular genetics techniques. Among molecular markers, matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9), have been widely studied. Objectives: The aim of the study is to evaluate the role of MMP-9 in the pathogenesis of CLL and to assess its prognostic role. Patients and methods: A retrospective cross-sectional study done on 60 patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia compared with 20 controls (anemic patients), all recruited at the Medical City Teaching Hospital laboratories from January 2004 to December 2007. The bone marrow biopsy of each patient was re-examined histologically. MRNA-In situ hybridization was performed to detect MMP-9. Results: The frequency of MMP-9 positivity was 78.3% (47 of 60 cases). A significant inverse correlation was found between increasing MMP-9 scores and lower PCV level. A significantly larger number of patients with high score were associated with advanced modified Rai stage than patients with low score. In addition, there was a significant positive correlation between increasing scores of MMP-9 and advancing clinical stage. Conclusion: MMP-9 positivity was high and the score was significantly associated with advanced clinical stage of the diseas

    Development of an Unmanned Underwater Remotely Operated Crawler (ROC) For Monitoring Application

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    Underwater vehicles are a type of vehicle that a type of vehicles that able to explore the underwater world. Remotely Operated Crawler (ROC) is one of the Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (UUV) that can be categorized in Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) class. The specialty of ROC allows for underwater intervention by staying a direct contact with the seabed. The common issues face for the crawlers are the underwater pressure, maneuverability, power and control. Besides that, the surface of the seabed become one of the problems in that restrict on ROC maneuverability. Designing a ROC that can crawl in any surface conditions is one of the issues emerged in this project. This project is about developing the ROC in order to fulfil a specific mission involving certain tasks. ROC lend themselves to long-term work and offer a very stable platform for manipulating objects and taking measurements better than other ROV. Development the ROC based on wheel mechanism that allows the ROC moves with direct contact with the seabed without any glitch and have an ability to operate in any condition of the underwater environment. The wheel mechanism is adapted based on the tanks which is the chain type wheels. The performance of the ROC will be verified based on experiments conducted on the cluttered condition either on the surface or underwater. The operation of ROC can achieve excellent performance with an unexpected level of environmental condition

    Development and Modelling of Unmaned Underwater Glider using the System Identification Method

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    This paper describes a comparison study for the modelling of the unmanned Underwater Glider (UG) using system identification techniques based on two experimental set up. The experimental data obtained from lab tank test and pool test to infer model using a MATLAB System Identification toolbox. The experimental testing of UG only considered the horizontal movement or called as auto-heading. The modeling obtained will be used to design the suitable controller for heading control. The UG will be tested on an open loop system to obtain measured input-output signals. Input and output signals from the system are recorded and analyzed to infer a model using a System Identification MATLAB toolbox. Two models obtained based on data tabulated and verify using mathematical modelling of UG. The parameter of UG come up from the real model of UG and Solidworks software. The Underwater Lab Tank model has better performance which has faster rise time and settling time than swimming pool model and mathematical model.

    The evolving SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in Africa: Insights from rapidly expanding genomic surveillance

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    INTRODUCTION Investment in Africa over the past year with regard to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) sequencing has led to a massive increase in the number of sequences, which, to date, exceeds 100,000 sequences generated to track the pandemic on the continent. These sequences have profoundly affected how public health officials in Africa have navigated the COVID-19 pandemic. RATIONALE We demonstrate how the first 100,000 SARS-CoV-2 sequences from Africa have helped monitor the epidemic on the continent, how genomic surveillance expanded over the course of the pandemic, and how we adapted our sequencing methods to deal with an evolving virus. Finally, we also examine how viral lineages have spread across the continent in a phylogeographic framework to gain insights into the underlying temporal and spatial transmission dynamics for several variants of concern (VOCs). RESULTS Our results indicate that the number of countries in Africa that can sequence the virus within their own borders is growing and that this is coupled with a shorter turnaround time from the time of sampling to sequence submission. Ongoing evolution necessitated the continual updating of primer sets, and, as a result, eight primer sets were designed in tandem with viral evolution and used to ensure effective sequencing of the virus. The pandemic unfolded through multiple waves of infection that were each driven by distinct genetic lineages, with B.1-like ancestral strains associated with the first pandemic wave of infections in 2020. Successive waves on the continent were fueled by different VOCs, with Alpha and Beta cocirculating in distinct spatial patterns during the second wave and Delta and Omicron affecting the whole continent during the third and fourth waves, respectively. Phylogeographic reconstruction points toward distinct differences in viral importation and exportation patterns associated with the Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Omicron variants and subvariants, when considering both Africa versus the rest of the world and viral dissemination within the continent. Our epidemiological and phylogenetic inferences therefore underscore the heterogeneous nature of the pandemic on the continent and highlight key insights and challenges, for instance, recognizing the limitations of low testing proportions. We also highlight the early warning capacity that genomic surveillance in Africa has had for the rest of the world with the detection of new lineages and variants, the most recent being the characterization of various Omicron subvariants. CONCLUSION Sustained investment for diagnostics and genomic surveillance in Africa is needed as the virus continues to evolve. This is important not only to help combat SARS-CoV-2 on the continent but also because it can be used as a platform to help address the many emerging and reemerging infectious disease threats in Africa. In particular, capacity building for local sequencing within countries or within the continent should be prioritized because this is generally associated with shorter turnaround times, providing the most benefit to local public health authorities tasked with pandemic response and mitigation and allowing for the fastest reaction to localized outbreaks. These investments are crucial for pandemic preparedness and response and will serve the health of the continent well into the 21st century

    Energy balance modelling of high velocity impact effect on composite plate structures

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    Purpose: In many military applications, composite materials have been used because of their high velocity impact resistance that helps absorption and dispersion energy. It is therefore used in armour and vehicles, aircraft and spacecraft that are subjected to impact of various shapes and velocities. Design/methodology/approach: In the theoretical part, the absorption energy equation for the sample was established by constructing an energy balance equation consisting of five types of energies, it is the compressive energy in the first region (the impact region), the tensile energy in the first region, the tensile energy in the second region, the energy of the shear plugging and the friction energy. Findings: It was found in the experiments that the tensile stress value increased by increasing the volume fraction of fibres to the polyester, and the value of compressive stress decreased. Also manufactured different types of impact samples with dimensions (20*20 cm2 ) and deferent thickness. The results were an increase in the amount of energy absorbed by increasing the ratio of the fibre to the polyester. It is found that the greatest effect in the equation of energy balance is the shear plugging energy, in which the value of the energy absorbed reached 38% of the total energy. And in the second degree friction energy, in which the value of the energy absorbed reached 27% of the total energy. while the other energies are relatively small but with important values, except for the tensile energy in the second region, the Kevlar-Polyester (40-60)%, so that the increase was more than four times the previous case. Research limitations/implications: Three types of reinforcing fibres were used: Kevlar, Carbon and Glass fibres with a matrix material as polyester. Six samples are made for tensile and compression testing, Kevlar-Polyester (30-70)%, Carbon-Polyester (30-70)%, Glass-Polyester (30-70)%, Kevlar-Polyester (40-60)%, Carbon-Polyester (40-60)% and Glass-Polyester (40-60)%. Practical implications: On the experimental part, experimental work tests were carried out to determine the mechanical properties of the samples such as tensile and compression tests as well as conducting the natural frequency test conducting the impact test by bullet to identify the effects and penetration incidence and compare this with the theoretical results. Originality/value: In this research high velocity impact is used with a bullet it diameter 9 mm, mass of 8 g, and a semi-circular projectile head with a specific velocity ranging from 210-365 m/s. The effect of the impact is studied theoretically and experimentally. The elastic deformation is increased for increasing the ratio of the fiber to the polyester and the depth of penetration is decreasing. The hybrid sample is affected in absorption energy and decreasing the penetration. Finally calculated for penetration behaviour theoretically and experimentally for different composite materials and comparison for the results calculated

    Using spike model to reduce traffic congestion and improve public transportation in Malaysia

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    In this study, passengers’ willingness to pay (WTP) for and willingness to accept (WTA) improved public transportation and shift to public transportation in Malaysia were examined. Specifically, this study aimed to determine the factors or transport attributes that affect passenger WTA and WTP to shift to public transportation. The adopted methodology was based on a contingent valuation (CV) survey, which was conducted on a representative sample of a cross section in residents of Kajang, in Malaysia. This CV primary survey elicited the demand of passengers for improved public transportation. The spike model was adopted to avoid estimation errors caused by a large percentage of respondents who were unwilling to pay and accept at all. The estimation results showed that the best reduction rate for both travel time and cost was 45% among other amounts that range from 15% to 75%. The best parking cost increment was US0.30andtheaverageWTPisUS0.30 and the average WTP is US0.68

    Kinetics, mechanism, isotherm and thermodynamic studies of liquid phase adsorption of Pb 2+

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    The kinetics, mechanism, isotherm and thermodynamics adsorption of Pb2+ onto Wood Activated Carbon Supported Zerovalent Iron (WAC-nZVI) nanocomposite was successfully studied. WAC-nZVI was characterized by a combination of spectroscopic and analytical techniques (BET, PZC, FTIR, SEM and EDX). BET surface area was 101.50 m2/g and BJH Adsorption average pore diameter 116.73 Å. The adsorption of Pb2+ studied in batch process depends on various operational parameters ranging from effect of pH to ionic strength. Kinetics data were best described by pseudo second-order model based on high initial adsorption rate, h2 (166.67 mgg-1min-1) and correlation coefficient (R2 > 0.99). The mechanism was controlled by both external and intraparticle diffusion models confirmed by Bangham and Boyd models. Equilibrium data were fitted to seven isotherm models. The Langmuir monolayer adsorption capacity (77.52 m2/g) surpassed those previously investigated for adsorption of Pb2+ onto nano-adsorbents. Validity of kinetics and isotherm models was studied using three statistical models. Post adsorption characterization by SEM, EDX and FTIR confirmed the presence of Pb2+ on the loaded-WAC-nZVI. Thermodynamic parameters (∆Ho, ∆So, ∆Go) confirmed the feasibility, spontaneity and randomness of the adsorption process. This study revealed that WAC-nZVI is a better adsorbent for treatment of industrial wastes in the presence of other competing ions
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