Communication for development. Towards effective communication

The purpose of this study is to understand and identify the success factors of Communication for Development endeavors. By understanding the past efforts and studying the current methodologies used in the different phases of campaigns this study aims to conceptualize the most effective ways to generate Communication for Development products. Through the examination of foreign and local case studies in this research paper, it is anticipated to have a clear conceptualization of what makes some development campaigns succeed, in terms of message design and outreach rather than others. Meanwhile, through the expert interviews, this study aims to understand the process that marketing professionals take in order to design messages for Communication for Development. Finally, this paper strives to have a better understanding of how marketing professionals plan, design, execute and evaluate Communication for Development campaigns

Services for the mentally handicapped children and adults: Their development and current provisions in England, Germany and Saudi Arabia

The research traces the development of medical, educational and social services provided for the mentally handicapped children and adults in England, Germany and Saudi Arabia, and describes the current situation regarding such services in the three countries. The work considers the different social aspects of mental handicap, such as attitudes towards the mentally handicapped, and problems facing families with mentally handicapped children. It also outlines the different methods of educating and training people with mental handicap, and the development of normalisation concept. The work describes a case study of a special private centre for the mentally handicapped children in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and highlights the development of this project in the context of the special cultural and social circumstances in Jeddah. The writer concludes that a great deal of progress has been recently made, especially in the second half of this century, in the field of providing different aspects of services to the mentally handicapped. However, the study confirms that there is still a significant amount of work to be done both by public and private sectors, in order to meet the special needs of the mentally handicapped people, and to achieve their integration into community life

SOLID LIPID NANOPARTICLES (SLNs) AS NANO DRUG DELIVERY CARRIERS: PREPARATION, CHARACTERIZATION AND APPLICATION

Over the last few years, there has been a significant consideration of solid lipid nanoparticles (SLNs) as an alternative method to other colloidal dispersion methods for drug delivery. Special consideration has been given to the use of SLNs as a drug carrier in recent years. SLNs are aqueous dispersions in which the colloidal particles consist of solid lipids that are biodegradable. As a result of their physical stability, the protection of the entrapped drug from decomposition, the provision of controlled drug release, and the exceptional acceptability, SLNs have several advantages over other drug carriers. This article focuses on the techniques of SLNs preparation and characterization, the effect of formulation variables on SLNs properties, the routes of administration, and the pharmaceutical applications. The data used for this review was collected by searching on Google Scholar and PubMed using the following keywords during the period from 2010 to date

The Role of Information Systems Strategy in Driving Successful Digitalization: an IoT perspective

The Internet of things (IoT) has become one of the most significant topics in information systems (IS) industry yet; it still faces certain complications in its implementation process. The estimation of unsuccessful implementations are up to 60% Cisco (2017). Unsuccessful implementation could be due to many issues such as human resources, collaboration between information technology function (IT) and other business functions, cultural issues within organizations, etc... However, these issues are overcome with an appropriate IS strategy Arora et al. (2017). Although efforts were exerted to understand the factors of successful adoption of IoT, less efforts have been directed towards understanding these factors from an information systems strategy point of view. This study aims to identify the most important driving factors in an information systems strategy leading to successful implementation of IoT. A preliminary framework presenting the 10 IS driving factors leading to successful implementation of IoT is deduced from the literature. The developed framework is tested in two case studies within leading real estate developers who have successfully implemented IoT in various functions. Face to face semi structured interviews were administered and the results revealed that six main factors and nine sub factors were required to guide the IS strategy to successful adoption of IoT projects within an organizational context

THE EMPIRICAL STUDY OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EXCHANGE RATE FLUCTUATIONS AND ECONOMIC GROWTH

Abstract. The study of causes and factors of growth has always been of particular interest to economistsand several growth models have been designed for it. In theoretical and empirical models, several explanatory variables explain the economic growth. The purpose of many of the empirical studies on economic growth is to determine the importance of the effect of one or a set of explanatory variables on economic growth. On the one hand, exchange rate fluctuations and changes in the value of the national currency against foreign currency are so important that international monetary and financial institutions, especially the IMF, emphasize the need to pay attention to this variable and always recommend interference in the foreign exchange market to reduce fluctuations. Therefore, the present study tries to examine the relationship between exchange rate and its fluctuations, foreign direct investment,exports and imports with economic growth. The implementation of this study as a case study will be at the level of the Iranian economy, and therefore the available data from 2006 to 2015 comprises its community and its statistical sample. Multivariate linear regression model has been used to test the hypotheses in this study. The results of the study indicate that: (1) exchange rate fluctuations have an adverse effect on economic growth; (2) direct foreign investment has a direct effect on economic growth; (3) foreign exchange does not affect economic growth; (4) exports has a direct impact on economic growth; and (5) imports do not affect economic growth.Keywords: exchange rate fluctuations, foreign direct investment, foreign exchange rate, exports, imports,economic growth

The 3XMM/SDSS Stripe 82 Galaxy Cluster Survey II. X-ray and optical properties of the cluster sample

We present X-ray and optical properties of the optically confirmed galaxy cluster sample from the 3XMM/SDSS Stripe 82 cluster survey. The sample includes 54 galaxy clusters in the redshift range of 0.05-1.2, with a median redshift of 0.36. We first present the X-ray temperature and luminosity measurements that are used to investigate the X-ray luminosity-temperature relation. The slope and intercept of the relation are consistent with those published in the literature. Then, we investigate the optical properties of the cluster galaxies including their morphological analysis and the galaxy luminosity functions. The morphological content of cluster galaxies is investigated as a function of cluster mass and distance from the cluster center. No strong variation of the fraction of early and late type galaxies with cluster mass is observed. The fraction of early type galaxies as a function of cluster radius varies as expected. The individual galaxy luminosity functions (GLFs) of red sequence galaxies were studied in the five ugriz bands for 48 clusters. The GLFs were then stacked in three mass bins and two redshift bins. Twenty clusters of the present sample are studied for the first time in X-rays, and all are studied for the first time in the optical range. Altogether, our sample appears to have X-ray and optical properties typical of average cluster properties.Comment: accepted for publications in MNRA