Predicting Financial Failure : An Empirical Investigation on Jordanian Industrial and Service Companies

From year to year, strong attention has been paid to the study of the problems of predicting firms’ bankruptcy. Bankruptcy prediction is an essential issue in finance especially in emerging economics. Predicting future financial situations of individual corporate entities is even more significant. Regression analysis is used to develop a prediction model on 22 bankrupt and non-bankrupt Jordanian public listed companies for the period 2000 until 2003. The results show that working capital to total assets, current asset to current liabilities, market value of equity to book value of debt, retained earnings to total asset, and sales to total asset are significant and good indicators of the probability of bankruptcy in Jordan

Sulfide stress cracking resistance of API-X100 high strength low alloy steel in H2S environments

Sulfide Stress Cracking (SSC) resistance of the newly developed API-X100 High Strength Low Alloy (HSLA) steel was investigated in the NACE TM0177 "A" solution. The NACE TM0177 "A" solution is a hydrogen sulfide (H2S) saturated solution containing 5.0 wt.% sodium chloride (NaC1) and 0.5 wt.% acetic acid (CH3COOH). The aim of this thesis was to study the effect of microstructure, non-metallic inclusions and alloying elements of the X100 on H2S corrosion and SSC susceptibility. The study was conducted by means of electrochemical polarization techniques and constant load (proof ring) testing. Microstructural analysis and electrochemical polarization results for X100were compared with those for X80, an older generation HSLA steel. Uniaxial constant load SSC testing was conducted using X100 samples and the results were compared with those reported for older generation HSLA steels. Addition of H2S to the NACE TM0177 "A" solution increased the corrosion rate of X100from 51.6 to 96.7 mpy. The effect of H2S on the corrosion rate was similar for X80. The corrosion rate for X80 increased from 45.2 to 80.2 mpy when H2S was added to the test solution. Addition of H2S enhanced the anodic kinetics by forming a catalyst (FeHSads) on the metal surface and as a result, shifted the anodic polarization curve to more current densities. Moreover, the cathodic half cell potential increased due to the decrease in pH, from 2.9 to 2.7, which shifted the cathodic polarization curve to more current densities. The increase in both the anodic and cathodic currents, after H2S addition, caused the rise in the corrosion current density. In H2S saturated NACE TM-0177 "A" solution, the X100 steel corrosion rate was higher than the X80 steel by 20%. Longer phase boundaries and larger nonmetallic inclusions in the X100 microstructure generated more areas with dissimilar corrosion potentials and therefore, a stronger driving force for corrosion. Higher density of second phase regions and larger nonmetallic inclusions acted as an increased cathode area on the X100 surface which increased the cathodic current density and consequently, increased the corrosion current density. Proof ring tests on the X100 gave a threshold stress value, C5th, of 46% YS, 343.1 MPa(49.7 ksi). The main failure was caused by SSC cracking. SSC nucleated at corrosion pits on the metal surface and microcracks in the metal body and propagated perpendicular to the applied stress. Hydrogen Induced Cracking (HIC) was observed in the X100. HIC cracks nucleated at banded martensite-ferrite interfaces and propagated along the rolling direction parallel to the applied tensile stress through the softer ferrite phase. When compared to older HSLA grades, the X100 tested in this study had a high SSC susceptibility and therefore, is not be recommended for H2S service applications. The high X100 SSC susceptibility was caused by the material high corrosion rates in H2Smedia which formed corrosion pits that acted as crack initiation sites on the metal surface and provided more hydrogen that migrated into the steel. In addition, the X100 inhomogeneous microstructure provided a high density of hydrogen traps in front of the main crack tip which promoted SSC microcrack formation inside the metal. Microcracks in the metal body connected with the main crack tip that originated from corrosion pits which assisted SSC propagation.Applied Science, Faculty ofMaterials Engineering, Department ofGraduat

Saudi Undergraduate Nursing Students’ Experiences of Caring for Patients with Cancer: A Hermeneutic Inquiry

Abstract Introduction and background: Cancer is a major health issue worldwide. While advances in cancer care are leading to improved survival, health care for this group requires a skilled and well-prepared nursing workforce. As with all developed nations, having such nursing workforce is a critical component of providing quality cancer services in Saudi Arabia. Attracting new nursing graduates to cancer specific clinical areas as their place of work can be a challenge. The experience of students during their academic studies, including clinical placements, could play a significant role in facilitating an interest to work in the cancer field. Statement of the research study problem and aim: As an academic nurse and clinical facilitator of a Bachelor of Nursing program in Saudi Arabia, I noted that students were reluctant to be allocated to cancer units or assigned to care for cancer patients in medical-surgical wards. There are few studies that explored the experiences of nursing students when undertaking clinical placement in the cancer ward, and no published studies that have explored the experiences of Saudi undergraduate nursing students. This study, therefore, aimed to gain an in-depth understanding of the Saudi undergraduate nursing students’ experiences of caring for cancer patients. This may inform approaches to increase the number of Saudi nursing graduates in the oncology field. v Methodology: Hermeneutic inquiry, an interpretive qualitative methodological approach, was chosen to explore and capture the students’ experiences. Examining the perspectives of those students who had cared for patients with cancer seeking to capture their reflections on their experiences. The study was conducted in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), the home country of the researcher. The settings were two tertiary teaching hospitals in the capital city, Riyadh. Thirty-six students, who were on their final year clinical placement (internship) of the nursing degree, were recruited using purposive sampling. Semi-structured individual interviews were conducted with the participants in their native Arabic language which focused on their experience of providing cancer care. The interviews were audio recorded, transcribed and then translated into English. Data analysis were undertaken through thematic analysis. Findings: Three major themes were identified; transition from feeling unable to being able to care, learning to build therapeutic relationships, and gaps in preparation to care. The analysis of the interviews identified the interns perceived caring for cancer patients as different to other patient groups. The extent to which cultural beliefs regarding cancer influenced this was not clear. Students described being overwhelmed by the sense of not knowing how to provide the care, and feeling fearful of causing distress to the patients. They experienced challenges in not knowing or being confident in how to communicate with cancer patients, how to provide psychological care, and how to care for children with cancer, or individual’s in the palliative care phase of their illness. Aspects of care such as caring for newly diagnosed cancer patients, patients in pain and witnessing the patients’ death were also identified as impacting the interns. vi Of note, the interns’ sense of not knowing, and receiving support from their clinical preceptors became a motivation to acquire the knowledge and practical skills to care for cancer patients. As they developed knowledge and skills throughout their experiences, they became less fearful and more confident to care and interact with the patients. Leaning how to build therapeutic relationships, to communicate effectively, and to gain the patients’ trust and acceptance were the major factors contributing to their increased confidence. The third theme of the study identified the gaps in the interns’ preparation about how to respond to and manage challenging situations that may occur when caring for cancer patients. The interns reflected on the academic preparation that would have better prepared them for caring for cancer patients and to manage their relationships with them. Conclusion: This study highlighted how this group of nursing students in Saudi Arabia used their fear and concern as motivation to learn and develop their skills to effectively care for cancer patients. This reinforces that clinical experience in the cancer setting is an important component of undergraduate nursing students. Opportunities to better prepare students in the area of both clinical knowledge and communication would potentially decrease some of the initial fear and concerns the interns experienced. As cancer will continue to be major health condition for Saudi Arabia in the future, a better understanding of the perspectives and attitudes for the boarder society of cancer and how this may impact health professionals is needed

Green Platinum Nanoparticles Interaction With HEK293 Cells: Cellular Toxicity, Apoptosis, and Genetic Damage

Metal nanoparticles are widely used in industry, agriculture, textiles, drugs, and so on. The adverse effect of green platinum nanoparticles on human embryonic kidney (HEK293) cells is not well established. In the current study, green platinum nanoparticles were synthesized using leaf extract of Azadirachta indica L. Green platinum nanoparticles were characterized by dynamic light scattering and transmission electron microscope. The cytotoxicity of green platinum nanoparticle was observed in HEK293 cells by applying 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-5-(3-carboxymethoxyphenyl)-2-(4-sulfophenyl)-2H-tetrazolium (MTS) and Neutral red uptake (NRU) assays. Cell viability of the cells was decreased in a concentration and duration-dependent manner. Generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in HEK293 cells due to green platinum nanoparticles was examined using fluorescent dye 2,7-dichlorofluorescein diacetate (DCFDA), and ROS was increased according to exposure pattern. The cytotoxicity of HEK293 cells was correlated with increased caspase 3, depolarization of mitochondrial membrane potential, and DNA fragmentation. The abovementioned finding confirmed that mitochondria play an important role in genotoxicity and cytotoxicity induced by nanoparticles in HEK293 cells. Further, we determined other oxidative stress biomarkers, lipid peroxide (LPO) and glutathione (GSH); LPO was increased and GSH was decreased in HEK293 cells. It is also important to indicate that HEK293 cells appear to be more susceptible to green platinum nanoparticles exposure after 24 hours. This result provides a dose- and time-dependent apoptosis and genotoxicity of green nanoparticles on HEK293 cells

Analysis of Popular Social Media Topics Regarding Plastic Pollution

Plastic pollution is one of the most significant environmental issues in the world. The rapid increase of the cumulative amount of plastic waste has caused alarm, and the public have called for actions to mitigate its impacts on the environment. Numerous governments and social activists from various non-profit organisations have set up policies and actively promoted awareness and have engaged the public in discussions on this issue. Nevertheless, social responsibility is the key to a sustainable environment, and individuals are accountable for performing their civic duty and commit to behavioural changes that can reduce the use of plastics. This paper explores a set of topic modelling techniques to assist policymakers and environment communities in understanding public opinions about the issues related to plastic pollution by analysing social media data. We report on an experiment in which a total of 274,404 tweets were collected from Twitter that are related to plastic pollution, and five topic modelling techniques, including (a) Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA), (b) Hierarchical Dirichlet Process (HDP), (c) Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI), (d) Non-Negative Matrix Factorisation (NMF), and (e) extension of LDA—Structural Topic Model (STM), were applied to the data to identify popular topics of online conversations, considering topic coherence, topic prevalence, and topic correlation. Our experimental results show that some of these topic modelling techniques are effective in detecting and identifying important topics surrounding plastic pollution, and potentially different techniques can be combined to develop an efficient system for mining important environment-related topics from social media data on a large scale