104 research outputs found
Improved Photocatalytic Performance via Air-Plasma Modification of Titanium Dioxide: Insights from Experimental and Simulation Investigation
Commercial titanium dioxide is successfully plasma-treated under ambient
conditions for different time periods, leading to reduced crystallite size and
the creation of oxygen vacancies. Density functional theory-based calculations
reveal the emergence of additional localized states close to the conduction
band, primarily associated with under-coordinated titanium atoms in
non-stoichiometric titanium-oxide systems. The plasma-treated samples exhibit
improved photocatalytic performance in the degradation of methylene blue
compared to untreated samples. Moreover, the 4-hour plasma-treated
photocatalyst demonstrates commendable stability and reusability. This work
highlights the potential of cost-effective plasma treatment as a simple
modification technique to significantly enhance the photocatalytic capabilities
of titanium dioxide.Comment: Manuscript and Supplementary material include
Impact of Emotional Intelligence on Diversity Management in Nigeria Breweries in Oyo State, Nigeria
Cases of ethnic bias and other forms of discrimination still take places in organizations during hiring, promotion and other employer-employee relation practices. Hence, managements are faced with the big challenge of managing its diverse workforce and emotional intelligence of their employees. This study investigated the impact of emotional intelligence on diversity management in Nigeria Breweries Oyo State. A total of 100 staff in Nigeria Breweries Oyo State in which 55 (55.0%) were male while 45 (45.0%) were female. The study was a survey which employed Descriptive research design and questionnaire was used to obtain the relevant data. The collected data were analyzed using Pearson rho Correlation and Regression Analysis with the application of statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) version 21.0. The results showed that that there is joint significant relationship between emotional intelligence on diversity management It was recommended that emotional intelligence concept would integrate the development programs and job-related training provided to employees to improve their skills, providing a foundation for practicable knowledge
Influence of Spirituality and Modesty on Acceptance of Self-Sampling for Cervical Cancer Screening.
INTRODUCTION: Whereas systematic screening programs have reduced the incidence of cervical cancer in developed countries, the incidence remains high in developing countries. Among several barriers to uptake of cervical cancer screening, the roles of religious and cultural factors such as modesty have been poorly studied. Knowledge about these factors is important because of the potential to overcome them using strategies such as self-collection of cervico-vaginal samples. In this study we evaluate the influence of spirituality and modesty on the acceptance of self-sampling for cervical cancer screening. METHODOLOGY: We enrolled 600 participants in Nigeria between August and October 2014 and collected information on spirituality and modesty using two scales. We used principal component analysis to extract scores for spirituality and modesty and logistic regression models to evaluate the association between spirituality, modesty and preference for self-sampling. All analyses were performed using STATA 12 (Stata Corporation, College Station, Texas, USA). RESULTS: Some 581 (97%) women had complete data for analysis. Most (69%) were married, 50% were Christian and 44% were from the south western part of Nigeria. Overall, 19% (110/581) of the women preferred self-sampling to being sampled by a health care provider. Adjusting for age and socioeconomic status, spirituality, religious affiliation and geographic location were significantly associated with preference for self-sampling, while modesty was not significantly associated. The multivariable OR (95% CI, p-value) for association with self-sampling were 0.88 (0.78-0.99, 0.03) for spirituality, 1.69 (1.09-2.64, 0.02) for religious affiliation and 0.96 (0.86-1.08, 0.51) for modesty. CONCLUSION: Our results show the importance of taking cultural and religious beliefs and practices into consideration in planning health interventions like cervical cancer screening. To succeed, public health interventions and the education to promote it must be related to the target population and its preferences
The Social and Political Dimensions of the Ebola Response: Global Inequality, Climate Change, and Infectious Disease
The 2014 Ebola crisis has highlighted public-health vulnerabilities in Liberia, Sierra
Leone, and Guinea – countries ravaged by extreme poverty, deforestation and
mining-related disruption of livelihoods and ecosystems, and bloody civil wars in
the cases of Liberia and Sierra Leone. Ebola’s emergence and impact are grounded
in the legacy of colonialism and its creation of enduring inequalities within African
nations and globally, via neoliberalism and the Washington Consensus. Recent
experiences with new and emerging diseases such as SARS and various strains of
HN influenzas have demonstrated the effectiveness of a coordinated local and
global public health and education-oriented response to contain epidemics. To what
extent is international assistance to fight Ebola strengthening local public health and
medical capacity in a sustainable way, so that other emerging disease threats, which
are accelerating with climate change, may be met successfully? This chapter
considers the wide-ranging socio-political, medical, legal and environmental factors
that have contributed to the rapid spread of Ebola, with particular emphasis on the
politics of the global and public health response and the role of gender, social
inequality, colonialism and racism as they relate to the mobilization and
establishment of the public health infrastructure required to combat Ebola and other
emerging diseases in times of climate change
Characterisation of the opposing effects of G6PD deficiency on cerebral malaria and severe malarial anaemia.
Glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD) deficiency is believed to confer protection against Plasmodium falciparum malaria, but the precise nature of the protective effecthas proved difficult to define as G6PD deficiency has multiple allelic variants with different effects in males and females, and it has heterogeneous effects on the clinical outcome of P. falciparum infection. Here we report an analysis of multiple allelic forms of G6PD deficiency in a large multi-centre case-control study of severe malaria, using the WHO classification of G6PD mutations to estimate each individual's level of enzyme activity from their genotype. Aggregated across all genotypes, we find that increasing levels of G6PD deficiency are associated with decreasing risk of cerebral malaria, but with increased risk of severe malarial anaemia. Models of balancing selection based on these findings indicate that an evolutionary trade-off between different clinical outcomes of P. falciparum infection could have been a major cause of the high levels of G6PD polymorphism seen in human populations
The future of African nowcasting
Nowcasting (weather forecasting predictions from zero to several hours) has enormous value and potential in Africa, where populations and economic activity are highly vulnerable to rapidly changing weather conditions. Timely issuing of warnings, a few hours before an event, can enable the public and decision-makers to take action. Rainfall radar estimates are not widely available in Africa, nor likely to be in the coming years, and numerical weather prediction (NWP) currently has low skill over the African continent. Therefore, for the delivery of nowcasting in Africa, satellite products are the best practical option and needed urgently (Roberts et al., 2021). Fifteen minute (or faster) updates of MSG (Meteosat Second Generation) images and NWC-SAF (Nowcasting Satellite Applications Facility) products are crucial for nowcasting to warn users (e.g. fisherfolk on Lake Victoria, flooding in urban areas, etc.) on pending severe storms. The possibility to have such products every 10 minutes, as well as data from the forthcoming MTG (Meteosat Third Generation) lightning imager, would be highly beneficial to all African countries, saving lives and livelihoods where high population growth and the most extreme impacts of climate change combine
- …