Teaching strategy for Arabic language teaching of 11 to 16-year-olds at Al- Iman School located in North West London, England, UK

The purpose of this research is to explain how and why there is no suitable standard programme to fulfill the comprehensive needs of migrant Iraqi and second generation British-Iraqi 11-16-year olds wishing to learn Arabic in community based, supplementary Saturday schools in London. The ultimate aims of this study are to produce a remodeled curriculum, based on modern standard Arabic (MSA) teaching texts, for the purpose of raising the success rate of passes in Arabic GCSE exams for what is considered to be low achievers. The remodeled curriculum will achieve this through engendering pride and passion in both teachers and pupils for the cultural heritage and Islamic identity associated with learning Arabic. I chose Al-Iman Saturday School in North West London (a member of the National Resource Centre for Supplementary Education (NRCSE); as a typical community Saturday school, a registered charity, still using substantially outmoded syllabi, a narrow curriculum and teaching practices that are not consonant with Iraqi children’s aspirations and mixed-cultural sensibilities. With the exception of the final GCSE year group, who are taught the Edexcel Arabic curriculum, all other age groups are taught Arabic using textbooks introduced directly from Iraq. The school does not rely on a nationally recognised curriculum nor on standardised Arabic texts with which to teach 11-16-year-old students. For the purposes of Al-Iman school, the research undertaken was mainly qualitative as opposed to quantitative. From this research, a new methodology was designed for classroom teachers based on examining the current weaknesses and strengths of teaching practices through interviews, classroom observation and questionnaires of a sample of 13 teachers at the Al-Iman school. Most of the student population at Al-Iman school are second generation Iraqi native speakers born and raised in the UK. For the purposes of this study, Arabic Learners are defined as students with limited Arabic speaking ability

Potential for cogeneration of heat and electricity in California industry, phase 2

The nontechnical issues of industrial cogeneration for 12 California firms were analyzed under three categories of institutional settings: (1) industrial ownership without firm sales of power; (2) industrial ownership with firm sales of power; and (3) utility or third party ownership. Institutional issues were analyzed from the independent viewpoints of the primary parties of interest: the industrial firms, the electric utilities and the California Public utilities Commission. Air quality regulations and the agencies responsible for their promulgation were examined, and a life cycle costing model was used to evaluate the economic merits of representative conceptual cogeneration systems at these sites. Specific recommendations were made for mitigating measures and regulatory action relevant to industrial cogeneration in California

Association of 25-hydroxy vitamin D with asthma and its severity in children: A case-control study

Background: Universally, asthma has high prevalence rates and this has led numerous studies done into its causes. Despite extensive study on asthma the association between 25-Hydroxy Vitamin D (25(OH) vit. D) and asthma remains uncertain. In this study, the associations of 25(OH) vit. D levels with asthma and with the severity of asthma were evaluated. Methods: This was a case-control study performed in 2015 in the city of Isfahan. In this study 520 children were studied. Children with asthma were classified as cases and children who were referred for reasons other than respiratory problems and asthma were considered as controls. Serum 25 (OH) vit. D levels were then examined and compared between the two groups. Differences among groups were stated to be statistically significant when P-values < 0.05. Results: There were 260 asthmatic children and 260 controls in the present study. The mean 25 (OH) vit. D levels in the case group was 25.5 ± 16.62 and 16.76 ± 31.40 the control group and this difference was statistically significant (P < 0.05). 25(OH) vit. D levels were found to be 28.05 ± 16.98 in non-severe asthma and 21.41 ± 15.20 in severe asthma. Consequently 25(OH) vit. D level had inverse relationship with asthma severity (P = 0.002). Conclusions: As the results of this study showed, the lower level of 25(OH) vit. D correlated with the higher severity of asthma manifestations. Therefore, it is recommended that 25(OH) vit. D levels get routinely checked especially in severe asthma cases and if the deficiency presents, appropriate therapeutic measures be used to reduce the asthma severity. © 2020 The Author(s)

Hyperhomocysteinemia and increased risk of coronary artery disease in Iranian patients with diabetes mellitus type II: a cross-sectional study

Hyperhomocysteinemia in patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) has been proposed as a new risk factor for coronary artery disease (CAD). Due to the prevalence of DM and CAD in the Iranian population and the relatively high economic burden, research on these new risk factors sounds necessary. This study investigated the relationship between hyperhomocysteinemia and coronary heart disease in patients with type 2 diabetes. This study was a hospital-based cross-sectional study performed on 100 diabetic patients with indications of coronary artery angiography. After the measurement of serum HbA1c and homocysteine, the patients went through coronary angiography and, based on the results, were divided into two groups of normal and obstructed coronary arteries. Serum homocysteine and other related risk factors were further compared between the two groups. The mean serum homocysteine of patients was 13.18 ± 3.64 μmol/L in general and 15.02 ± 3.7 μmol/L in those with coronary artery obstruction. With hyperhomocysteinemia defined as serum homocysteine of � 14 μmol/L, 48 of diabetic patients had hyperhomocysteinemia, of which 83 had coronary artery obstruction. The relationship between serum homocysteine and coronary artery obstruction was significant (P < 0.001). The serum homocysteine was the highest in patients with three-vessel involvement (15.39 ± 3.5 μmol/L), which was significantly higher than those with normal coronary arteries (P < 0.001). The mean serum homocysteine of diabetic patients (type II) with coronary artery disease was significantly higher than those with normal coronary arteries. It was also significantly higher in patients with three-vessel involvement than those with no vessel involvement. © 2019, Springer-Verlag London Ltd., part of Springer Nature

Antimicrobial peptides of the vaginal innate immunity and their role in the fight against sexually transmitted diseases

Some antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are produced in the vaginal innate immune system and play an important role in protecting this organ against pathogenic agents. Moreover, sexually transmitted diseases have become a major problem in human societies and are rapidly spreading. The emergence of antibiotic-resistant microbes (superbugs) can pose a major threat to human societies and cause rapid spread of these diseases. Finding new antimicrobial compounds to fight superbugs is therefore essential. It has been shown that AMPs have good potential to become new antibiotics. The most important AMPs in the vaginal innate immune system are defensins, secretory leucocyte protease inhibitors, calprotectin, lysozyme, lactoferrin and elafin, which play an important role in host defence against sexually transmitted infections, modulation of immune responses and anticancer activities. Some AMPs, such as LL-37, magainin 2 and nisin, show both spermicidal and antimicrobial effects in the vagina. In this summary, we will discuss vaginal AMPs and continue to address some of the challenges of using peptides to control pathogens that are effective in sexually transmitted diseases. © 2019 The Author(s

Polyhydroxybutyrate accumulation by a Serratia sp

A strain of Serratia sp. showed intracellular electron-transparent inclusion bodies when incubated in the presence of citrate and glycerol 2-phosphate without nitrogen source following pregrowth under carbon-limitation in continuous culture. About 1.3 mmol citrate were consumed per 450 mg\ud biomass, giving a calculated yield of maximally 55% of stored material per g of biomass dry wt. The inclusion bodies were stained with Sudan Black and Nile Red (NR), suggesting a lipid material, which was confirmed as polyhydroxybutyrate (PHB) by analysis of molecular fragments by GC and by FTIR spectroscopy of isolated bio-PHB in comparison with reference material. Multi-parameter flow cytometry in conjunction with NR fluorescence, and electron microscopy, showed that not all cells contained heavy PHB bodies, suggesting the potential for increasing\ud the overall yield. The economic attractiveness is\ud enhanced by the co-production of nanoscale hydroxyapatite\ud (HA), a possible high-value precursor for bone replacement materials

The Omega deformed B-model for rigid N=2 theories

We give an interpretation of the Omega deformed B-model that leads naturally to the generalized holomorphic anomaly equations. Direct integration of the latter calculates topological amplitudes of four dimensional rigid N=2 theories explicitly in general Omega-backgrounds in terms of modular forms. These amplitudes encode the refined BPS spectrum as well as new gravitational couplings in the effective action of N=2 supersymmetric theories. The rigid N=2 field theories we focus on are the conformal rank one N=2 Seiberg-Witten theories. The failure of holomorphicity is milder in the conformal cases, but fixing the holomorphic ambiguity is only possible upon mass deformation. Our formalism applies irrespectively of whether a Lagrangian formulation exists. In the class of rigid N=2 theories arising from compactifications on local Calabi-Yau manifolds, we consider the theory of local P2. We calculate motivic Donaldson-Thomas invariants for this geometry and make predictions for generalized Gromov-Witten invariants at the orbifold point.Comment: 73 pages, no figures, references added and typos correcte