A constrained maximum available frequency slots on path based online routing and spectrum allocation for dynamic traffic in elastic optical networks

Elastic optical networking is a potential candidate to support dynamic traffic with heterogeneous data rates and variable bandwidth requirements with the support of the optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing technology (OOFDM). During the dynamic network operation, lightpath arrives and departs frequently and the network status updates accordingly. Fixed routing and alternate routing algorithms do not tune according to the current network status which are computed offline. Therefore, offline algorithms greedily use resources with an objective to compute shortest possible paths and results in high blocking probability during dynamic network operation. In this paper, adaptive routing algorithms are proposed for shortest path routing as well as alternate path routing which make routing decision based on the maximum idle frequency slots (FS) available on different paths. The proposed algorithms select an underutilized path between different choices with maximum idle FS and efficiently avoids utilizing a congested path. The proposed routing algorithms are compared with offline routing algorithms as well as an existing adaptive routing algorithm in different network scenarios. It has been shown that the proposed algorithms efficiently improve network performance in terms of FS utilization and blocking probability during dynamic network operation

The Impact on Financial Inclusion in The Era of Covid-19: A Case of Developing Countries

The world still has a large unbanked population, which regularly contributes to unbanked transactions. The problem is a lack of trust, financial insecurity, and knowledge about the products and services of financial inclusion. Financial inclusion provides timely and cost-effective access to financial products and services like loans and credit facilities to low-income vulnerable groups. COVID-19 has badly affected all the world's economies and caused them to suffer a great recession, which makes it essential to include the unbanked population in the net of financial inclusion. This study aims to measure the impact of COVID-19 on financial inclusion in developing countries by taking data from 2017 to 2020. The results concluded that increased fintech technology, such as mobile money services during COVID-19, increased financial technology. People started using mobile accounts during COVID-19 to avoid the risk of getting infected by this novel virus

Surgical Outcome of Endoscopic Third Ventriculostomy in Patients Having High ETV Success Score: One-Year Experience at a Tertiary Care Hospital

Background & Objective:  Endoscopic third Ventriculostomy (ETV) is an accepted alternative to VP shunt in patients with obstructive hydrocephalus. We will share our experience and outcome. Materials & Methods:  Thirty consecutive ETV cases performed by a single surgeon during 1 year in patients with an ETV success score of 60 or higher were included in this study. Patients’ demographics, outcomes, and complications are reported. Results:  (60%) were male and 12 (40%) were female. The mean age in our study was 6.1 years ± 9 (mean ± SD). Posterior fossa tumor was the most common etiology in our series (46.6%) followed by aqueductal stenosis (23.3%). Eighty percent of our patients did not experience an ETV failure. The complication rate was 20%. Inadequate ventriculostomy in 6.6% of the patients was the commonest complication. Conclusion:  ETV is safe and effective in patients with high ETV success scores

Outcome of Minimally Invasive Percutaneous Plate Osteosynthesis Technique for Management of Extra Articular Distal Tibial Fractures

Objective: To assess the outcome of the minimally invasive percutaneous plate osteosynthesis (MIPPO) method applied for the management of extra-articular distal tibial fractures.Materials and Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted at the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Benazir Bhutto Hospital, Rawalpindi, Pakistan. Total 57 patients have included extra-articular type A distal tibial fracture, duration of injury <1 week, and competent neurological and vascular status of the fractured site. All the patients were treated with MIPPO Technique by using the distal tibial medial locking plate and the outcome of all patients was assessed radiologically in terms of union and functionally by using the Ovadia-Beals clinical scoring system. Data were analysed by using SPSS v. 21. Results: As per sample size calculation, 57 patients were included with a mean age of 37.19 ± 9.22 years. There were 45 (78.94%) male patients and 12 (21.05%) female patients. According to AO classification; the most common type was 43A1 with 31 patients (54.38%) whereas 18 (31.57%) were in Type 43A2 and 8 (14.03%) in Type 43A3. In our study, fracture union was achieved in a mean duration of 19.6 ± 3.45 weeks. When the functional outcome was analyzed, 41 (71.92%) patients had excellent outcome, 8 (14.03%) had good results, 5 (8.77%) had fair and 3 (5.26%) had poor outcome based on the subjective result and 44 (77.19%) patients had excellent, 7 (12.28%) had good, 3 (5.26%) had fair and 3 (5.26%) had poor result based on an objective result of Ovadia-Beals clinical scoring system. Conclusion: Thus MIPPO can be highly successful in achieving good to excellent outcomes in the maximum number of patients presented with a distal tibia fracture. So in the future, we can rely on this technique for such types of fractures. &nbsp

The Impact of Emotional Intelligence upon the Team Effectiveness

The emotional intelligence is a kind of professional skill which an individual attain during the course of his/her career. The leadership regarding their emotions must be synchronized with their team members. They must be well tempered and must comprehend the whims and wishes of their subordinates. The emotional intelligence only can lead towards the maximum output by exercising the assigned authority. The effectiveness of the team is a multi-dimensional phenomenon which is based upon the qualities of the leadership alone. To some social scientists, this kind of intelligence is intrinsic (by birth), but to others it is acquired. When the leadership exercises his/her authority intelligently, its result is not only team effectiveness rather it is cost effective as well. On the part of the leadership, emotional intelligence is a collective phenomenon, whose cumulative impact on the project regarding the team effectiveness has been discussed in the present wor

Sustainable and Resilient Smart Water Grids: A Solution for Developing Countries

According to a United Nations report, the world population will increase from 7 billion to 9 billion by 2050. Further, the water stress level is more than 70% in 22 countries while in another 31 countries it is between 25% and 70%. More than 2 billion people live in these 53 countries which are all underdeveloped. Water use has increased by 1% per year since the 1980s, so global demand is expected to rise by 30% by 2050. Thus, efficient water grid management is imperative to ensure there is sufficient water for the future. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can be used to create smart water grids to optimize water distribution, reduce waste and leakage, and resolve quality and overuse issues. In this work, a low cost, real-time, reliable and sustainable IoT based solution called SmartTubewell is proposed for smart water grid management. It is composed of two components, a sensor node installed at tube wells and an application layer on Amazon Web Services (AWS) for data analysis, storage and processing. The sensor node is based on a Raspberry Pi with integrated current and voltage sensors and a local database. The sensor data is transmitted to AWS using a cellular (GPRS) network. A comparison between the proposed system and SCADA is presented which shows that SmartTubewell has a much lower cost. A field test with multiple tube wells in Peshawar, Pakistan indicates that this is a suitable solution for developing countries

A Sociological Study about the Adoption of Contraception Methods and Their Effects on the Married Females’ Health in Rural Areas of Tehsil Dera Ghazi Khan-Pakistan

Population is growing rapidly & adoption of FP has been neglected by Govt. of Pakistan due to lack of services, awareness and education, traditional believes, employment & misconception. Mostly people think that the use of contraception methods is against the nature and Islam and is also harmful for health. So present study was designed in rural areas of Tehsil Dera Ghazi Khan in 2013 to investigate the knowledge level, adoption of contraception as well as to perceived positive and negative effects of contraception methods on the health of married females in rural community. 160 rural married females were interviewed to find out their demographic features; utilization of contraception and its side effects on their health in tehsil Dera Ghazi Khan. The data was analyzed by using Uni-variate (frequency distribution and percentage) and Bi-variate analysis (Chi square and Gamma Statistics) was carried out. Predominating age categories were <15 and 16-20 years, 45.6% were illiterate, and 55.6% had good mutual understandings. More than one fifth (26.2%) had 1-2 pregnancies, 59.4% had sometimes heard about contraceptive methods while 84.4% had favorable attitude towards adoption of contraception methods. Whereas 58.1% had sometimes used contraceptive methods, 31.9% got information about contraceptive methods from relatives. In adoption of different contraception methods during the life span, respondents reported both types i.e. modern injections (60.6%), spermicides (50.6%), and in traditional methods i.e. withdrawal (6.2%); adoption of herbs (5.7%) and 44.4% had faced positive effects while 19.4% faced negative effects whereas 36.2% of the respondents had both type of effects (positive/ negative) on their health after the adoption of FP methods during reproductive span. Bi-variate analysis showed positive relationship between desired of family size and utilization of contraception, Freedom of decision making vs utilization of contraception methods and mutual understanding of spouse vs adoption of contraception method. There was a need to bring positive change in societal attitude for the utilization of family planning. Keywords: FP Methods, Contraception adoption, effects, Religious opinion, Decision making, Rural Females, Socio-economic statu

Proximal Actuation of an Elastically Loaded Scissors Mechanism for the Leg Design of a Quadruped Robot

Spring Loaded Pantographs (SLPs) are frequently used in designing lightweight limbs for multi-legged robots. Quadruped robots that incorporate cable-pulled SLP legs have proven to be agile, robust and capable of conserving energy during their gait cycle. In such designs, the extension of the distal segments via the knee joint is dependent upon the length of the cable. In this article we propose the use of an Elastically Loaded Scissors Mechanism (ELS Mechanism or ELSM), which is a variant of the SLP. Driven by ’pulling’ onto the proximal joint of the scissors as opposed to the distal joint, this proposed leg utilizes the increased mechanical advantage of the scissors mechanism to ’amplify’ input angles to larger output displacement by the knee joint. Analysis and Simulations reveal that the proposed mechanism achieves increased motion speed as compared to the SLP mechanism. This, however, comes at the cost of higher load on the actuator which serves as an engineering trade-off. This is validated by experimentation using motion capture and load motor techniques of the SLP and ELS configurations in a physical quadruped robot