The Effect of Blockchain on Customer-To-Customer Electronic Commerce

The popularity of the Internet and e-business has led more people to online shopping, especially customer-to-customer (C2C) electronic commerce (e-commerce). However, C2C e-commerce faces challenges such as security, product and vendor trust, and more. One of the most important solutions to such problems is the use of decentralized and distributed technologies such as blockchain, which play an important role in identifying, verifying, and validating data, developing information security, and creating transparency and trust in a business. Therefore, this study uses a qualitative method to investigate the effect of blockchain on C2C e-commerce. After conducting the conceptual study, the experiences of experts in this field were used through semi-structured interviews. The data from the interviews were then coded and analyzed. Finally, 12 conceptual codes were extracted. Due to the high frequency of the transparency code, other concepts were studied around this axis and based on it. According to the results, strategies such as transparency, trust, and legal barriers were more important in using blockchain in C2C e-commerce, respectively

Prevalence of age related macular degeneration among elderly smokers results from AHAP study

Background: Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of visual impairment and blindness in elderly population in the developing countries. Previous epidemiological studies revealed various potential modifiable risk factors for this disease. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the prevalence of AMD among elderly living in Babol, North of Iran.  Methods:  The study population of this cross-sectional study came from  the Amirkola Health and Ageing Project (AHAP), the first comprehensive cohort study of the health of people aged 60 years and over in Amirkola, North of Iran. The prevalence of AMD was estimated and its risk was determined using logistic regression analysis (LRA) with regard to variables such as smoking, hyperlipidemia, hypertension and diabetes. Results: Five hundred and five participants with mean age of 71.55±5.9 (ranged 60-89) years entered the study. The prevalence of AMD was 17.6%. There was a significant association between AMD and smoking (P<0.001) but no association was seen with AMD and age, level of education, history of hyperlipidemia, hypertension and diabetes. Multiple LRAs revealed that smoking increased AMD by odds ratio of 5.03 (95% confidence interval 2.47-10.23 p<0.001) as compared to nonsmokers Conclusion: According to our findings, the prevalence of AMD was relatively high and smoking increased the risk of AMD in the elderly population

The Forward Physics Facility at the High-Luminosity LHC

International audienceHigh energy collisions at the High-Luminosity Large Hadron Collider (LHC) produce a large number of particles along the beam collision axis, outside of the acceptance of existing LHC experiments. The proposed Forward Physics Facility (FPF), to be located several hundred meters from the ATLAS interaction point and shielded by concrete and rock, will host a suite of experiments to probe Standard Model (SM) processes and search for physics beyond the Standard Model (BSM). In this report, we review the status of the civil engineering plans and the experiments to explore the diverse physics signals that can be uniquely probed in the forward region. FPF experiments will be sensitive to a broad range of BSM physics through searches for new particle scattering or decay signatures and deviations from SM expectations in high statistics analyses with TeV neutrinos in this low-background environment. High statistics neutrino detection will also provide valuable data for fundamental topics in perturbative and non-perturbative QCD and in weak interactions. Experiments at the FPF will enable synergies between forward particle production at the LHC and astroparticle physics to be exploited. We report here on these physics topics, on infrastructure, detector, and simulation studies, and on future directions to realize the FPF's physics potential