Could informality be the solution? An instrumental variable approach on the informality of M/SE in Egypt

The expansion of the informal sector constitutes one of the major issues in Egypt. Yet, micro and small enterprises (M/SEs) proved their important role on the social and economic level, but most of them are running on an informal basis. That's why this paper tries to estimate the impact of informality on the performance of M/SEs. Relying on an instrumental variable approach, the results showed that the higher is the probability of operating in the formal sector, the higher is the productivity of the firm. This effect is subject to the realization of a specific channel, which accounts for the characteristics of the firm, the entrepreneur and all the constraints faced by the firm. These findings highlight the importance of formalization policies to reduce the expansion of the informal sector

It's the Human that Matters: Accurate User Orientation Estimation for Mobile Computing Applications

Ubiquity of Internet-connected and sensor-equipped portable devices sparked a new set of mobile computing applications that leverage the proliferating sensing capabilities of smart-phones. For many of these applications, accurate estimation of the user heading, as compared to the phone heading, is of paramount importance. This is of special importance for many crowd-sensing applications, where the phone can be carried in arbitrary positions and orientations relative to the user body. Current state-of-the-art focus mainly on estimating the phone orientation, require the phone to be placed in a particular position, require user intervention, and/or do not work accurately indoors; which limits their ubiquitous usability in different applications. In this paper we present Humaine, a novel system to reliably and accurately estimate the user orientation relative to the Earth coordinate system. Humaine requires no prior-configuration nor user intervention and works accurately indoors and outdoors for arbitrary cell phone positions and orientations relative to the user body. The system applies statistical analysis techniques to the inertial sensors widely available on today's cell phones to estimate both the phone and user orientation. Implementation of the system on different Android devices with 170 experiments performed at different indoor and outdoor testbeds shows that Humaine significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art in diverse scenarios, achieving a median accuracy of $15^\circ$ averaged over a wide variety of phone positions. This is $558\%$ better than the-state-of-the-art. The accuracy is bounded by the error in the inertial sensors readings and can be enhanced with more accurate sensors and sensor fusion.Comment: Accepted for publication in the 11th International Conference on Mobile and Ubiquitous Systems: Computing, Networking and Services (Mobiquitous 2014

Cairo: Mapping the neoliberal city in literature A study of: The heron, being Abbas el Abd and Utopia

While many scholars have explained neoliberalism and its impact on the economic, political and social spheres, writers have successfully grasped the everyday realities created by the implementation of the neoliberal policies. In my thesis, I am going to use literary maps to analyze three novels written by Egyptian writers at different stages of the neoliberal project. The novels are: Malik al-haÌ\u27zin (1983) (The Heron, 2005) by Ibrahim Aslan, An takun \u27Abbas al-Abd (2003) (Being Abbas El Abd, 2009) by Ahmed Alaidiy and Yutubiya (2008) (Utopia, 2011) by Ahmed Khaled Towfik. Mapping the three novels demonstrate the changes that the city of Cairo and its inhabitants have undergone in the neoliberal era

Cross Cultural Adaptation and Validation of a Self-Reporting Tool to Assess Health-Related Quality of Life for Egyptians with Extremity Bone Sarcomas in Childhood or Adolescence

Validated self-reporting tools are required to evaluate the functional outcome and health-related quality of life (HRQOL) for Egyptians who had extremity bone sarcomas in their childhood or adolescence. Thus, we pursued cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the pediatric Toronto Extremity Salvage Score (pTESS) and Toronto Extremity Salvage Score (TESS) to assess the physical function of children and adult survivors following surgeries of extremity bone sarcomas. Modified versions of pTESS and TESS, which contain additional mental domains, were developed to allow the evaluation of HRQOL using a specific instrument for childhood bone cancer. The internal consistency of the original pTESS and TESS as well as their modified versions was assessed with Cronbach\u27s alpha. The intraclass coefficients (ICC) were calculated for test-retest reliability, and the correlations between scores of the generic Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory (PEDSQL 4.0) and each of the pTESS and TESS scores were used to confirm convergent validity. Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) was only feasible for pTESS-leg; therefore, the construct validity of the remaining versions was assessed by calculating the average inter-item correlation coefficients. The pTESS/TESS scores were also compared based on various patients’ characteristics. In a total sample of 233 included participants, 134 responded to pTESS leg, 53 to TESS-leg, 36 to pTESS-arm, and only 10 to TESS-arm. All versions of pTESS and TESS showed excellent internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha \u3e 0.9), good test-retest reliability (ICC \u3e0.8), moderate to strong correlations with PEDSQL, and acceptable average inter-item correlation coefficients (≥0.3). Based on the scree plot, 3 factors were extracted for pTESS-leg in which all mental items were loaded on a separate factor with acceptable factor loadings (\u3e0.4). Using the original versions of pTESS/TESS-leg only, adults showed significantly higher scores than younger participants. In the large group representing limb salvage surgery in lower extremities, those who were still receiving chemotherapy, had done primary surgery within only one year, or had tumors located in the tibia showed significantly inferior pTESS/TESS scores. In conclusion, the culturally adapted pTESS and TESS are shown to be valid and reliable self-reporting tools for assessing the functional outcome in Egyptians affected with extremity bone sarcomas. The added mental domains enabled the assessment of the overall health status of this particular population. Future studies should evaluate the ability of pTESS and TESS to track progress over time and include more participants, especially those with upper extremity tumors

Discourses around Nubians: A critical discourse analysis of Egyptian social studies and history textbooks

In an attempt to understand the Egyptian state\u27s approach in handling diversity and inclusion in education and offer insights on possible improvements of the current social studies and history textbooks, the study explores the said and the unsaid about Nubian histories, culture, and struggles. The study deals with the representation of Nubians in two periods, the ancient dynastic period and the contemporary period. In the study, I started by a review of literature that helps in situating the analysis into historical, socio-cultural, and political contexts that are an integral part of conducting a Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA). I followed this by a spatial quantitative analysis to contextualize the representation of Ancient Nubians vis-a-vis other Ancient civilizations represented in the textbooks. Then I moved to an in-depth qualitative analysis to understand how power dynamics might shape discourses about Nubians in Egyptian education. In the study I employed Fairclough\u27s (2003) CDA tools to get insights into the discourses around Nubians in selected Egyptian social studies, history, and geography textbooks for the school year 2015/2016, coupled with van Leeuwen\u27s (2008) tools for analyzing legitimation in discourse and analyzing visual images. The study results show that the representation of Nubians, especially, in discussing the ancient Nubians in textbooks almost always appears within the discourses of power over Nubians. The dominant discourses include the discourse of superiority and othering, while legitimating power over Nubians for economic and security reasons. On the other hand, the discourses around contemporary Nubians are more inclusive and can be considered as attempts to positively represent Nubians through mentioning their culture, histories, and displacement problem ; however these attempts are rather superficial and do not capture the complexity of the Nubian case

Optimization of Chiral Separation of Nadolol by Simulated Moving Bed Technology

Simulated Moving Bed (SMB) technology has gained increasing attention as one of the most powerful techniques for chromatographic separations due to its cost-effectiveness and efficiency. Application of SMB technology is especially important in the pharmaceutical industry for production of enantiopure drugs, as required under strict FDA regulations, to avoid possible adverse effects of racemic drugs. In this study, the performance of the SMB process in separation of racemic nadolol on a perphenyl carbamoylated beta cyclodextrin (β-CD) stationary phase was investigated. The equilibrium dispersive model coupled with bi-Langmuir adsorption isotherm and lumped kinetic approximation, constitute the mathematical model used to simulate the dynamic behavior of SMB. Multi-objective optimization was carried out using a robust state-of-the-art optimization technique, non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA). Two optimization problems were solved to simultaneously maximize productivity and purity of the product and minimize consumption of desorbent. The generated Pareto optimal solutions showed that selection of operating conditions can significantly affects the performance of SMB to meet the desired objectives

Theranostic Gelatin Nanoparticles for Antigen Delivery and Combined Strategies for Transcutaneous Application

Transcutaneous application of vaccines is a promising strategy to enhance the effectiveness of vaccination using a reachable route of administration. Additionally, replacing the conventional needles with skin mechanical penetration techniques as microneedles or skin laser microporation will offer great advantages. This transcutaneous delivery techniques are pain-free and will help to avoid the hazards of needles. For the delivery of antigens, nanocarriers are so promising to enhance and modulate their immune response. The nanocarriers offer merits such as antigen protection from degradation, and controlling the release rate of the antigen. Additionally, due to the particulate nature of the nanocarriers, they can potentially display the antigen in a way that better mimics pathogens. For this aim, ovalbumin as a model antigen has been delivered using functionalized theranostic gelatin nanoparticles to bone marrow-derived dendritic cells (BMDCs). The nanoparticles were rendered fluorescent by using a novel imaging agent (gold and silver alloy nanoclusters) that emits near-infra red light. This was beneficial to study the nanoparticles uptake by BMDCs and also to image the nanoparticles within the skin tissue. Finally, the developed theranostic nanocarriers induced the maturation of the BMDCs and enhanced the proliferation of both helper T cells (CD4+) and cytotoxic T cells (CD8+). This indicates the potential efficacy of the delivery system for vaccination either against allergy or viruses and tumors

Strength and ductility of bulk nanostructured aluminum processed by mechanical milling

Aluminum\u27s many exceptional properties promote it to be as a strong candidate for several applications in the aerospace, automotive, building and packaging industries to name a few. As a result, strengthening Aluminum has been the interest of many researchers over the time. The most commonly followed approaches are alloying and thermal treatments. However, recently, refining the internal structure of materials until reaching the nano-scale range to improve their mechanical properties has been fostered. Specifically speaking, research adopting this approach on various metals has yielded promising results. One of the techniques used to produce nanostructured Aluminum powders, which is the one employed in this research, is mechanical milling. Aluminum powders were mechanically milled using a high-energy ball mill under argon atmosphere for several milling durations up to 12 hours. The effect of the process control agent used during milling was investigated to determine the suitable amount to be used for best achievable mechanical behavior. Both X-ray diffraction patterns and scanning electron micrographs have revealed the establishment of nanostructured Aluminum by mechanical milling. Bulk samples were synthesized by powder metallurgy. The success of the process of powder consolidation was determined by examining the degree of densification through density measurements. The effect of mechanical milling on the bulk samples has been studied by evaluating the tensile and compressive behaviors of the developed material. The material after milling for 12 hours exhibited a tensile strength that is four folds that of the starting powders. But this elevated strength was at the cost of sacrificing the ductility of the material. Nevertheless, under compressive loading the material behaved in a ductile manner in addition to the improved strength. Peaks for secondary phases have been noticed in the X-ray diffraction patterns for the bulk samples after mechanical milling. The types of these phases remain undetermined, although high suspects of oxides and carbides exist, that might have contributed to the material strengthening. Transmission electron micrographs have ascertained achieving a nanocrystalline structure after milling for 12 hours. The poor ductility of the milled Aluminum acts as a barrier that hinders the utility of the material since almost all the applications require an amount of ductility within certain margins for shaping, manufacturing, and so forth. Hence, post-extrusion annealing was conducted on additional samples in an attempt to improve the ductility. This has been proved quite successful, but still the achieved ductility is nowhere near the range that can help commercialize the newly developed material. It was also remarkable that annealing didn\u27t result in sacrificing the acquired strength; on the contrary, the tensile strength of the material was noticed to have increased. Another approach to compromise the strength and ductility of mechanically milled Aluminum was to mix soft as-received Aluminum powders with the Aluminum powders mechanically milled for 12 hours to produce bi-modally structured Aluminum composite. Two mixing techniques were tried out that are turbula mixer and the high-energy ball mill. Using turbula mixer yielded disappointing results by demonstrating a weak bond between the two constituents. Conversely, using the ball mill for mixing allowed a strong bond to form between the constituents leading to enhancing the ductility of mechanically milled Aluminum for 12 hours without depressing the strength beyond the acceptable range

Negotiated identity of teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL): A sociocultural perspective

Many studies have investigated the sociocultural aspects of professional identities of EFL teachers in different contexts. However, a limited amount of research has been conducted on the negotiation of teachers’ identities particularly in the Arab world and in Egypt. The current study investigates the factors that contribute to forming and negotiating the sociocultural aspects of the professional identity of six experienced and six novice Egyptian teachers of English as a second language (EFL). The study is conducted in two English language programs, one in a private university and the other in a public university context. Interviews and classroom observations were conducted with all twelve teachers. A framework is introduced to conceptualize the negotiation of a professional identity construct that is associated with a number of social and cultural factors, including past teaching and non-teaching professional experiences which influence identity development and shared identity formation. Tajfel’s (1982) theory of social identity was found to reflect a level of the teachers’ professional identities along with the sense of the teachers’ shared identities. Experience, in addition to other external factors such as context, institution and culture, appeared to be one of the variables affecting the negotiation of the sociocultural aspects of teachers’ professional identities both in their self-reported data and classroom practices. The study suggests some pedagogical implications that if emphasized in teacher education programs could assist teachers in negotiating their professional identities in accordance with the surrounding sociocultural factors of different contexts

Les Forêts Aléatoires en Apprentissage Semi-Supervisé (Co-forest) pour la segmentation des images rétiniennes

Nous proposons une approche qui permet la reconnaissance automatique des régions Disques et Cups pour la mesure du rapport CDR (Cup/Disc Ratio) par apprentissage semi-supervisé. Une étude comparative de plusieurs techniques est proposée. Le principe repose sur une croissance de région en classifiant les pixels voisins à partir des pixels d'intérêt de l'image par apprentissage semi-supervisé. Les points d'intérêt sont détectés par l'algorithme Fuzzy C-means (FCM)