Physico-Chemical Properties Of Sponge Cake Made From Wheat Flour Incorporated With Mango (Mangifera Indica Var. Chokanan) Pulp And Peel Flour

The objective of this research was to determine the physico-chemical, nutritional and organoleptic attributes of sponge cake by partial substitution of wheat flour with mango pulp and peel flour (MPuF and MPeF, respectively) at different levels (control, 5, 10, 20 and 30%). In the present study, the chemical composition, antioxidants and functional properties of MPuF and MPeF were evaluated. Compared to the commercial wheat flour (WF), the MPuF and MPeF were significantly (p<0.05) low in moisture and protein, but high in crude fibre and ash content. The MPuF and MPeF showed a balance in soluble and insoluble dietary fibre (SDF and IDF) proportions, ranging from 29 to 35% and 65 to 70% of total dietary fibre (TDF) content, respectively

NEGOTIATING COLONIAL IDENTITIES: MALAYA IN THE BRITISH EMPIRE EXHIBITION, 1924-1925

Master'sMASTER OF ART

A Parametric Study of Piled Raft Foundation in Clay Subjected to Concentrated Loading

The use of piled raft foundation in building and infrastructure constructions is increasingly popular because of its effectiveness in reducing overall and differential settlements. Parameters influencing the performance of the piled raft foundation need to be comprehended in order to optimize the design of the piled raft system. Most of the current available literature focused on the piled raft foundation subjected to a uniform distributed load in sandy material.&nbsp; This parametric study aims to provide insights into the performance of the piled raft foundations subjected to concentrated loading in clay. A series of 2D finite element analyses were performed to investigate the influencing parameters affecting the load distribution and settlement behaviour of the piled raft. The results suggested that increases in both pile length and raft thickness, as well as a decrease in pile spacing would reduce the differential settlement of the piled raft. Comparatively, raft thickness was the most significant controlling parameter affecting the differential settlement. The study also revealed the importance of placing the pile nearer to the location of concentrated load as it would yield a more uniform load distribution, and hence a lower differential settlement

Effects of Crumb Rubber on the Shear Strength of Sand: An Experimental Study

The application of waste rubber tires for ground improvement helps to improve the environment by recycling and reusing it as admixtures. This research aims to investigate the shear strength parameters of rubber-sand mixtures. By using crumb rubber with a constant size (425μm), the sand is replaced by different percentages (0, 2.5, 5.0, 7.5, and 10%) of crumb rubber by weight. A direct shear box test is used to determine the shear strength parameters of rubber-sand mixtures with two different controlled densities. The samples were loaded with normal stresses of 20, 40 and 80kPa and were sheared at a rate of 1mm/min. Although, this experiment discovered that crumb rubbers improve the shear strength parameters in loose sand, however, a reduction in shear strength parameters was found in dense sand. Moreover, it was observed that the inclusion of crumb rubbers into sand greatly improve the strain energy of both loose and dense sand. Likewise, rubber has a low unit weight which makes it suitable for lightweight backfill materials. The surface properties of rubber should be further studied to understand the contribution of shear strength in the rubber-sand mixture

Permutation entropy analysis of the output of a laser diode under stimulated Brillouin scattering optical feedback

The chaotic output emitted by a diode laser with optical feedback has fascinated the community for decades. The external cavity delay time imparts a weak level of periodicity to the laser output (the so-called "time delay signature", TDS) that is a drawback for applications that require random optical signals. A lot of efforts have focused in suppressing the TDS either by post-processing the signal or by using alternative ways to generate random optical signals. Here, we compare the signals generated by two optical feedback setups: in the first one, the stimulated Brillouin backscattered light from a standard optical fibre is re-injected into the laser (stimulated Brillouin scattering optical feedback, SBSOF); in the second one, the light transmitted through the fibre is re-injected into the laser (conventional optical feedback, COF). We analyse the permutation entropy, a well-known measure of complexity that captures order relations between values of a time series. We find that, on average, the signal generated by the SBSOF setup has slightly lower PE than the one generated by the COF setup, except when the sampling time of the intensity signal is an exact multiple of the delay; in that case, due to TDS, the entropy of the COF signal is lower than that of the SBSOF signal. We interpret the lower entropy value of the SBSOF signal as due to oscillations at the Brillouin frequency shift. Taken together, our results show that TDS suppression can have an undesirable side effect: a decrease of the entropy of the signal.ECOS-Nord programme (N° M19P03); Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (465594); Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (Generalitat de Catalunya); Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades (PGC2018-099443-B-I00)Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

The different molecular forms of urine neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin present in dogs with urinary diseases

Neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) is a useful biomarker for the early prediction of renal diseases. NGAL may exist as monomer, dimer and/or NGAL/MMP-9 complex forms in humans. In this study, the existence of various forms of NGAL in urine (uNGAL) was determined and whether these forms are related to the different urinary diseases found in dogs is further discussed

Panax notoginseng Attenuates Bleomycin-Induced Pulmonary Fibrosis in Mice

Panax notoginseng (PN) is a traditional Chinese herb experimentally proven to have anti-inflammatory effects, and it is used clinically for the treatment of atherosclerosis, cerebral infarction, and cerebral ischemia. This study aimed to determine the anti-inflammatory effects of PN against bleomycin-induced pulmonary fibrosis in mice. First, in an in vitro study, culture media containing lipopolysaccharide (LPS) was used to stimulate macrophage cells (RAW 264.7 cell line). TNF-α and IL-6 levels were then determined before and after treatment with PN extract. In an animal model (C57BL/6 mice), a single dose of PN (0.5 mg/kg) was administered orally on Day 2 or Day 7 postbleomycin treatment. The results showed that TNF-α and IL-6 levels increased in the culture media of LPS-stimulated macrophage cells, and this effect was significantly inhibited in a concentration-dependent manner by PN extract. Histopathologic examination revealed that PN administered on Day 7 postbleomycin treatment significantly decreased inflammatory cell infiltrates, fibrosis scores, and TNF-α, TGF-β, IL-1β, and IL-6 levels in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid when compared with PN given on Day 2 postbleomycin treatment. These results suggest that PN administered in the early fibrotic stage can attenuate pulmonary fibrosis in an animal model of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis

QoS multicast tree construction in IP/DWDM optical internet by bio-inspired algorithms

Copyright @ Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.In this paper, two bio-inspired Quality of Service (QoS) multicast algorithms are proposed in IP over dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) optical Internet. Given a QoS multicast request and the delay interval required by the application, both algorithms are able to find a flexible QoS-based cost suboptimal routing tree. They first construct the multicast trees based on ant colony optimization and artificial immune algorithm, respectively. Then a dedicated wavelength assignment algorithm is proposed to assign wavelengths to the trees aiming to minimize the delay of the wavelength conversion. In both algorithms, multicast routing and wavelength assignment are integrated into a single process. Therefore, they can find the multicast trees on which the least wavelength conversion delay is achieved. Load balance is also considered in both algorithms. Simulation results show that these two bio-inspired algorithms can construct high performance QoS routing trees for multicast applications in IP/DWDM optical Internet.This work was supported in part ny the Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) of UK under Grant EP/E060722/1, the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant no. 60673159 and 70671020, the National High-Tech Reasearch and Development Plan of China under Grant no. 2007AA041201, and the Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education under Grant no. 20070145017