Reforms in the Basic Educational Compulsory System: A Reading of Primary School Arabic Curricula in Egypt

The second of two issues, this volume covers aspects of Egyptian society. Contributors include: Donald Cole, Soraya Altorki, Asef Bayat, Eric Denis, Enid Hill, Ziad Bahaeddin, Malak Rouchdy, Linda Herrera, Jim Napoli, Hussein Amin, Mahmoud al-Lozy, Cynthia Nelson, and Shahnaz Rouse.https://fount.aucegypt.edu/faculty_book_chapters/1988/thumbnail.jp

A FOLLOWER - CENTRIC MODEL: PREDICTORS OF JOB SATISFACTION AND PERCEPTION OF LEADER EFFECTIVENESS IN LEBANESE REGISTERED NURSES

Leaders and their followers share the work environment; they live the same challenges, and face the same problems (Baker, 2007; Uhl-Bien et al., 2014). However, in nursing little is known about the effect of the quality of the manager – follower relationship and work engagement in formulating a follower’s perception of leadership and its impact on job satisfaction. In a country such as Lebanon that has the eighth lowest nurse density in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) and suffers from excessive nurse migration and low nurse satisfaction and retention rates (El-Jardali, Dimassi, Dumit, Jamal, & Mouro, 2009) understanding the factors influencing nurse satisfaction becomes a priority. It is also important for clinical nurse leaders to be associated with engaged and committed followers in order to achieve positive outcomes. Followers are direct care nurses who practice in acute care in the capacity of registered nurses and under the first level supervision of a nurse manager. Effective and engaged followers are those who show intelligence, commitment, integrity, independence, and courage (Kelley, 1988). The relationship between the leader and followers is not unidimensional, but it is rather an interdependent relationship. Followers expect their leaders to be reachable, honest, empathic, visionary, and to be involved in employee development (Sherman, 2012). Follower-centric relational predictors that impact nurses’ job satisfaction in acute care was the focus of this study. Using a predictive correlation design, this study examined the association between the registered nurses’ (RNs’) (a) quality of relationship with the nurse manager and (b) work engagement and how these variables impact the registered nurses’ (followers) perception of leadership effectiveness and job satisfaction. Findings of the study supported that better work engagement and positive follower-nurse manager relationship will impact an enhanced perception of leader effectiveness and increase RNs job satisfaction

SmartWheels: Detecting urban features for wheelchair users’ navigation

People with mobility impairments have heterogeneous needs and abilities while moving in an urban environment and hence they require personalized navigation instructions. Providing these instructions requires the knowledge of urban features like curb ramps, steps or other obstacles along the way. Since these urban features are not available from maps and change in time, crowdsourcing this information from end-users is a scalable and promising solution. However, it is inconvenient for wheelchair users to input data while on the move. Hence, an automatic crowdsourcing mechanism is needed. In this contribution we present SmartWheels, a solution to detect urban features by analyzing inertial sensors data produced by wheelchair movements. Activity recognition techniques are used to process the sensors data stream. SmartWheels is evaluated on data collected from 17 real wheelchair users navigating in a controlled environment (10 users) and in-the-wild (7 users). Experimental results show that SmartWheels is a viable solution to detect urban features, in particular by applying specific strategies based on the confidence assigned to predictions by the classifier

A new stilbene from Agonis flexuosa leaves and verification of its histamine release inhibitory activity using in silico and in vitro studies

This study aimed to explore the phytoconstituents of Agonis flexuosa, F. Myrtaceae and its biological activity. A thorough phytochemical investigation of its leaves led to the isolation of one new stilbene glycoside; (Z)-2,3-dihydroxystilbene-5-O-β-D-glucoside (1), and fifteen known compounds identified as two stilbenes: (Z)-pinosylvin mono methyl ether (2) and (Z)-pinosylvin-3-O-β-D-glucoside (3); six flavanones: (2S)-pinostrobin (4), (2S)-strobopinin (5), (2S)-cryptostobin (6), (2S)-pinocembrin (7), (2S)-dimethylpinocembrin (8) and (2S)-dimethylstrobopinin (9); four flavonoids: quercetin (10), kaempferol-7-O-β-D-glucoside (11), quercetin-3-O-α-D-rhamnoside (12) and quercetin-3-O-β-D-glucoside (13), α-terpineol (14), β-sitosterol (15) and gallic acid (16). The structures of the isolated metabolites were elucidated based upon the interpretation of their 1D and 2D NMR (One Dimensional and Two-Dimensional Nuclear Magnetic Resonance), HR-ESI-MS (High Resolution Electrospray Ionization Mass Spectrometry) and optical rotation. All the isolated compounds were evaluated for their antimicrobial activities. Only compound (6) showed a selective activity against P. aeruginosa with IC50 value of 4.88 µM. In silico virtual screening was done for the isolated compounds on Human histamine H1 receptor (3RZE) downloaded from protein data bank. All the compounds showed certain degree of binding to the protein displaying free binding energies ranging between -11 to -31 kcal/mol. (Z)-2,3-Dihydroxystilbene-5-O-β-D-glucoside (1) showed notable fitting to the active site as evidenced by its free binding energy (∆G) which is computed as -25.09 kcal/mol comparable to diclofenac that displayed (∆G) of -15.00 kcal/mol. In vitro assessment of histamine release inhibitory activity was performed using U937 human monocytes. Compound (1) showed a substantial inhibition to histamine release displaying IC50 value of 0.16 μM

Hadronic vacuum polarization contribution to the anomalous magnetic moments of leptons from first principles

We compute the leading, strong-interaction contribution to the anomalous magnetic moment of the electron, muon and tau using lattice quantum chromodynamics (QCD) simulations. Calculations include the effects of $u$, $d$, $s$ and $c$ quarks and are performed directly at the physical values of the quark masses and in volumes of linear extent larger than $6\,\mathrm{fm}$. All connected and disconnected Wick contractions are calculated. Continuum limits are carried out using six lattice spacings. We obtain $a_e^\mathrm{LO-HVP}=189.3(2.6)(5.6)\times 10^{-14}$, $a_\mu^\mathrm{LO-HVP}=711.1(7.5)(17.4)\times 10^{-10}$ and $a_\tau^\mathrm{LO-HVP}=341.0(0.8)(3.2)\times 10^{-8}$, where the first error is statistical and the second is systematic.Comment: 17 pages, 8 figures (in 13 PDF files), RevTeX 4.1. Minor changes to results and to text. References updated. Matches version published in Physical Review Letter

Effects of acoustic actuation frequency and nozzle geometry on heat transfer and flow characteristics of an impinging confined water jet

Paper presented at the 9th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Malta, 16-18 July, 2012.An experimental study is performed to investigate the effects of acoustic actuation on heat transfer and flow characteristics of an impinging confined water jet. The water, collected in a reservoir, is accelerated by means of free fall and impinged on a smooth plate at which constant heat flux is applied. Two different nozzle geometries were investigated: sudden and smooth contracting nozzle. The flow is actuated with a loudspeaker at different Strouhal numbers in the range of 0~1, where nozzle-to-plate spacing of 6 nozzle diameters are tested while Reynolds number is kept constant at 10000 to study the effects of other parameters.. Flow visualization, turbulence, and surface heat transfer measurements are performed in the scope of this work. A sharp, continuous and significant roll-up evidence is seen in the smooth contracting nozzle, with the actuation frequency of St=0.175, at the axial location of about z/D~2 where the acoustic actuation has caused a decrease in heat transfer. It is observed that turbulence measurements with hot film anemometry are also in consistency with the surface heat transfer measurements. Acoustic actuation is found to be ineffective both in generating new flow structures or enhancing heat transfer in the sudden contracting nozzle.dc201

Large and non-linear permeability amplification with polymeric additives in hydrogel membranes

Hydrogels which are hydrophilic and porous materials have recently emerged as promising systems for filtration applications. In our study, we prepare hydrogel membranes by the photopolymerization of a mixture of poly (ethylene glycol) diacrylate (PEGDA) and large poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) chains of 300 000 g.mol-1 in the presence of a photoinitiator. We find that this addition of free PEG chains induces a large and non-linear increase of the water permeability. Indeed, by changing the content of PEG chains added, we obtain variations of the hydrogel water permeability over two orders of magnitude. The highest water permeability values are obtained for the membranes when the PEG concentration is equal to its critical overlap concentration C*. Moreover, we find that the flow rate of water through the membranes varies non-linearly with the pressure. We relate this result to the deformability of the membranes as the applied pressure leads to a compression of the pores. This study provides new perspectives for the design of flexible hydrogel membranes with controlled permeability and their application in water treatment and bioseparation

Sieving and clogging in PEG-PEGDA hydrogel membranes

Hydrogels are promising systems for separation applications due to their structural characteristics (i.e. hydrophilicity and porosity). In our study, we investigate the permeation of suspensions of rigid latex particles of different sizes through free-standing hydrogel membranes prepared by photopolymerization of a mixture of poly (ethylene glycol) diacrylate (PEGDA) and large poly (ethylene glycol) (PEG) chains of 300 000 g.mol-1 in the presence of a photoinitiator. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) and cryoscanning electron microscopy (cryoSEM) were employed to characterize the structure of the hydrogel membranes. We find that the 20 nm particle permeation depends on both the PEGDA/PEG composition and the pressure applied during filtration. In contrast, we do not measure a significant permeation of the 100 nm and 1 $\mu$m particles, despite the presence of large cavities of 1 $\mu$m evidenced by cryoSEM images. We suggest that the PEG chains induce local nanoscale defects in the cross-linking of PEGDA-rich walls separating the micron size cavities, that control the permeation of particles and water. Moreover, we discuss the decline of the permeation flux observed in the presence of latex particles, compared to that of pure water. We suggest that a thin layer of particles forms on the surface of the hydrogels