Students’ Research: Tradition Ahead of Its Time

This view point describes the experience of introducing research at an undergraduate level during clinical rotation in psychiatry. Objective of this initiative was to encourage critical thinking, self directed learning and sensitization to mental health issues. This contributed to student learning besides galvanizing their interest in the subject. The opinion piece aims to expose various issues to students’ research in the context of medical education in Pakistan

Schizophrenia: a concept

Much of the current research-work into biological basis of mental disorders is predicted on implicit concept of disease that is less critical and sophisticated as it should be. It is remarkable, how the fundamental conceptual frame work of schizophrenia, as proposed by Professor Emil Kraepelin has stayed the same, since its inception almost 100-years ago. This review explores these issues besides highlighting alternative disease classification that suits behavioural neuroscience research

Performance Enhancement of Multiuser Time Reversal UWB Communication System

UWB communication is a recent research area for indoor propagation channels. Time Reversal (TR) communication in UWB has shown promising results for improving the system performance. In multiuser environment, the system performance is significantly degraded due to the interference among different users. TR reduces the interference caused by multiusers due to its spatial focusing property. The performance of a multiuser TR communication system is further improved if the TR filter is modified. In this paper, multiuser TR in UWB communication is investigated using simple TR filter and a modified TR filter with circular shift operation. The concept of circular shift in TR is analytically studied. Thereafter, the channel impulse responses (CIR) of a typical indoor laboratory environment are measured. The measured CIRs are used to analyze the received signal peak power and signal to interference ratio (SIR) with and without performing the circular shift operation in a multiuser environment

The balance-of-payments problem and resource allocation in Pakistan: a linear programming approach

The purpose of this study is to examine Pakistan's foreign-trade problems and policies in the context of the wider question of a rational allocation of domestic resources. It will be argued that measures taken in Pakistan to regulate the flow of imports and exports have led to a pattern of resource allocation which may aggravate the balance-of-payments problem. The difficulty is mainly attributable to the fact that foreign economic policies and policy measures taken to regulate the domestic economy have often been at cross-purposes. For instance, whereas the domestic .investment policy has aimed at promoting the most economical use of scarce investment resources, the licensing system has provided strong incentive for a wasteful use of these resources by encouraging import substitution even where the country may have a long-run comparative disadvantage. While domestic policy has aimed at raising the marginal rate of savings, the policy of protecting consumption goods, particularly the nonessential ones, has tended to liberalize consumption

Ian Livingstone (Ed.). Development Economics and Policy: Readings. London: George Allen & Unwin. 1981. x + 353 pp.Hardback £ 17.50 and Paper• back £ 7.95.

The editor of a 'book of readings' has generally his back to the wall before the onslaught of prospective critics clamouring "why one more". True, the marginal net private benefit to the editor from such publications can always be shown to be positive, or at least strictly non-negative, by reference to the notorious publish-or-perish syndrome. However, the need for a convincing demonstration of the positively of the expected marginal net social benefit from such books drags the reluctant editor gladiator into the arena. In many cases the spectacle is a pathetic one: the editor endlessly and vainly differentiating his goods from those of others even if that involves a comparison of the 'bads', indulging in omniscient subjectivism: "this is what / consider to be the best collection" (never mind if it is the nth-best), or patronizing those who have been forced by time, circumstance or public apathy into anonymity: "such articles were not easily accessible." If all fails, and the editor also happens to be teaching a course in development economics, then even if the social profitability of such a collection falls far short of its private profitability, the situation can still be redeemed by the deus ex machina of the cause of pedagogy needing the helping hand of yet another book of readings