Augmented Reality in Smart Cities: A Multimedia Approach

Intro: This paper presents an advance overview of utilizing Augmented Reality (AR) in smart cities. Although, Smart cities contain six major aspects (mobility, economy, government, environment, living, and people), this paper focuses on three of them that have more potentiality in using virtual assistant (mobility, environment, and living). Methodology: Presenting a state-of-the-art review studies undertake between 2013 and 2017, which is driven from highlighted libraries is the aim of this research. After exact examine, 15 emphasized studies are chosen to divide the main aspects while 120 selective articles are supporting them. These categorizes have been critically compared with an aim, method and chronological perspectives. Results: First of All, Environmental issues (Museums industry) attract the most attention of researchers while the living issues (maintenance) have lower significant compare t latter and mobility (indoor-outdoor navigation) attract the least. Moreover, a close connection between academic and industry fields is going to be created. Conclusions: it has been concluded that, because of economic advantages, utilizing AR technology has improved in the tourism and maintenance. Moreover, until now, most of studies try to prove their concept rather than illustrate well stablished analytic approach. Because of hardware and software improvement, it is essential for the future studies to evaluate their hypothesis in a real urban context

GC/MS analysis of the essential oils of Cupressus arizonica Greene, Juniperus communis L. and Mentha longifolia L.

ABSTRACT. The chemical composition of the essential oils obtained by hydrodistillation from Cupressus arizonica Greene, Juniperus communis L. and Mentha longifolia L. were determined by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS) analysis. The chemical composition of the essential oils were identified by GC/MS. Eicosane (27.4%), umbellulone (13%) and α-pinene (10.51%) were the major components of C. arizonica oil; sabinene (32%), limonene (26%) and bornyl acetate (7.4%) were the major components of J. communis oil and pulegone (26%), L-menthone (13.4%) and cis-para-menthan-3,8-diol (10.2%) were the major components of M. longifolia oil. The percentage of monoterpenes in the three essential oils was compared. The percentage of monoterpenes in C.arizonica is about 5.2%, J. communis 46%, and M. longifolia is 50.1%. The percentage of terpenes in C. Arizonica (16.3%), J. communis (5.2%) and M. longifolia (9.3%) were reported. But the percentage of cyclic monoterpenes in C. arizonica is about 6%, J. communis 26.1%, and M. longifolia is 3%. Monoterpenes are the most components that make up essential oils.               KEY WORDS: Cupressus arizonica, Juniperus communis, Mentha longifolia, Essential oil, Chemical composition Bull. Chem. Soc. Ethiop. 2019, 33(3), 389-400.DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.4314/bcse.v33i3.

Critical Pedagogy in Architectural Design Course (case study: postgraduate design course (1) of Islamic Azad university of Gorgan)

Background and Objective:Creating a learning environment rich in social relationships in which peer interaction and collective learning can be developed is the core of the studio-based education for teaching architectural design. The social dimensions of the studio and the opportunities it provides for collaboration and participation serve as a stimulus for learning, and it is the culture of the studio that means sustainability to students. One of the interactive teaching methods that seems to be in line with the multiplicity of today's world and the different nature of architecture and the workshop education system is the critical pedagogy method invented by the Brazilian thinker Paolo Freire. Freire considers the main purpose of education to be the development of creative and critical human beings who look critically at all the thoughts, ideas and values ​​in society, as well as the actions of individuals and the way they deal with various events and happenings to find their roots. Freire's model in critical education mostly includes critical dialogue in which students (whole class) present their views and review evaluations and critiques. Participate in evaluating the thoughts of others and together with them, by combining views and examining arguments, take a more accurate and comprehensive approach to the issue and discover effective solutions. Therefore, it can be inferred that the critical education methodwith its special characteristics has the potential to improve the quality of architectural design classes. The aim of this study is to illustrate the procedure of applying critical pedagogy in Iran higher education context –architecture discipline- to identify challenges and improve the method in the selected environment. Methods:The qualitative method (interpretation) was selected as research method and content analysis was performed on the collected data. 24 postgraduate architecture students were selected as the sample, and by using a bipartite subject, comparison between two methods (traditional and critical) become possible. To verify and extend the model, the experiment was repeated next year with 22 different students. Findings: The results indicated that the effects of critical pedagogy have been perceived by students in eight categories: (1) improving intrinsic motivation (2) improving social skills, oral skills and self-confidence, (3) improving the speed and quality of development process of architectural ideas, (4) creating diversity and cheerfulness, (5) reducing stress and anxiety, (6) waste of time and vain discussions, (7) educational marginalization, and (8) self-censorship. The first 5 categories are positive feedbacks and the other three are negative feedbacks considered as challenges of applying critical pedagogy. At the end, some strategies are purposed to overcome these challenges and improve the quality of the classes. Conclusion:Some solutions to overcome the challenges are suggested including: students choosing an external reality topic, phasing group corrections, continuing the method to institutionalize it, changing students' view of the teacher as the source of information or the professor as a superior and miraculous person and change the view and reduce students' distrust of themselves. Characteristics for the critical teacher are also mentioned, such as humility, humor, high capacity of the teacher against laughter and jokes, great patience of the teacher in the face of useless discussions, and familiarity of the critical teacher with theories of psychology and psychoanalysis.   ===================================================================================== COPYRIGHTS  ©2019 The author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, as long as the original authors and source are cited. No permission is required from the authors or the publishers.  ====================================================================================

Influence of surface geometry on the culture of human cell lines: a comparative study using flat, round-bottom and v-shaped 96 well plates

© 2017 Shafaie et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.In vitro cell based models have been invaluable tools for studying cell behaviour and for investigating drug disposition, toxicity and potential adverse effects of administered drugs. Within this drug discovery pipeline, the ability to assess and prioritise candidate compounds as soon as possible offers a distinct advantage. However, the ability to apply this approach to a cell culture study is limited by the need to provide an accurate, in vitro-like, microenvironment in conjunction with a low cost and high-throughput screening (HTS) methodology. Although the geometry and/or alignment of cells has been reported to have a profound influence on cell growth and differentiation, only a handful of studies have directly compared the growth of a single cell line on different shaped multiwell plates the most commonly used substrate for HTS, in vitro, studies. Herein, the impact of various surface geometries (flat, round and v-shaped 96 well plates), as well as fixed volume growth media and fixed growth surface area have been investigated on the characteristics of three commonly used human cell lines in biopharmaceutical research and development, namely ARPE-19 (retinal epithelial), A549 (alveolar epithelial) and Malme-3M (dermal fibroblastic) cells. The effect of the surface curvature on cells was characterised using a combination of a metabolic activity assay (CellTiter AQ/MTS), LDH release profiles (CytoTox ONE) and absolute cell counts (Guava ViaCount), respectively. In addition, cell differentiation and expression of specific marker proteins were determined using flow cytometry. These in vitro results confirmed that surface topography had a significant effect (p < 0.05) on cell activity and morphology. However, although specific marker proteins were expressed on day 1 and 5 of the experiment, no significant differences were seen between the different plate geometries (p < 0.05) at the later time point. Accordingly, these results highlight the impact of substrate geometry on the culture of a cell line and the influence it has on the cells' correct growth and differentiation characteristics. As such, these results provide important implications in many aspects of cell biology the development of a HTS, in vitro, cell based systems to further investigate different aspects of toxicity testing and drug delivery.Peer reviewedFinal Published versio

Differential biological behavior of fibroblasts and endothelial cells under aloe vera gel culturing

Aloe vera is used for its large variety of biological activities such as wound healing, anti-fungal, anti-inflammatory, hypoglycemic. immunomodulatory, gastroprotective, and anti-cancer. Although the beneficial effects of Aloe vera on wound healing have been proven. little is known about its effects at the cellular level. In this study, we evaluated the angiogenic and migrative effects of Aloe vera gel on fibroblasts and endothelial cells. Fibroblasts and endothelial cells were cultured in monolayer conditions with low glucose DMEM with 10% serum and 1% penicillin-streptomycin. Fresh and mature leaves of Aloe vera were used for gel preparation. Cell proliferation and morphology were studied by an inverted microscope. The migration of fibroblasts was assessed by scratch assay. MTT assay was performed for cell viability assessment, and real-time RT-PCR was used for evaluation of PECAM-1, integrin alpha 1 and beta 1 transcription. After two days, the protein level of PECAM-1 was detected by flow cytometty. Our results showed that Aloe vera has a higher proliferative effect on fibroblasts in comparison with endothelial cells. Aloe vera also induced the migration of fibroblasts. The viability of both types of cells was similar to control ones. Integrin alpha(1), beta(1) and PECAM-1 gene expression increased significantly (P &lt;0.005) in Aloe vera treated fibroblasts and endothelial cells in comparison with the control groups. However, the expression of these genes was significantly higher in fibroblasts in comparison with endothelial cells. Protein levels of PECAM-1 showed no change in both cell types upon Aloe vera treatment. Aloe vera gel induced angiogenic and cell adhesion properties in fibroblasts more than endothelial cells. Further investigations are needed to show the main role of fibroblasts rather than endothelial cells in wound healing by Aloe vera administration

Recovery of coal particles from a tailing dam for environmental protection and economical beneficiations

Abstract Considerable amounts of coal particles are accumulated in the tailing dams of washing plants which can make serious environmental problems. Recovery of these particles from tailings has economically and environmentally several advantages. Maintaining natural resources and reducing discharges to the dams are the most important ones. This study was examined the possibility to recover coal particles from a tailing dam with 56.29% ash content by using series of processing techniques. For this purpose, gravity separation (jig, shaking table and spiral) and flotation tests were conducted to upgrade products. Based the optimum value of these processing methods, a flowsheet was designed to increase the rate of recovery for a wide range of coal particles. Results indicated that the designed circuit can recover over 90% of value coal particles and reduce ash content of product to less than 14%. These results can potentially be used for designing an industrial operation as a recycling plant and an appropriate instance for other areas to reduce the environmental issues of coal tailing dams

Attachment and spreading of ARPE-19 cells on different surface topographies and at different growth conditions.

<p>ARPE-19 cultured at 1 x 10⁴ cells per well density on flat, round and v-shaped well plates over 8 days and at fixed growth volume and fixed growth surface. Group A and B represent cells at FV and FSA respectively and images 1, 2 and 3 represent flat, round and v-shaped well plates respectively. Samples were photographed using GX CAM digital camera at X 4 magnification (100 μm = scale bar). Each images is accompanied by analysis of the cells in the dot plot display mode of forward scatter (FCS) versus side scatter (SSC) on a logarithmic scale, and the core population of the cells is surrounded by a gate.</p

Comparing cell activity, LDH release and viability of Malme-3M cells cultured on flat, round and V-shaped well plates at 10⁴ cells/well density over 5 days and at fixed growth volume and fixed growth surface area.

<p>Group A: Mitochondrial activity of Malme-3M cells cultured at 10⁴ cells/well density, A1) cell activity cultured on round and V-shaped well plates and relative to flat at FV; A2) cell activity cultured on round and V-shaped well plates and relative to flat at FSA. Group B: LDH release of Malme-3M cells cultured at 10⁴ cells/well density, B1) LDH release on round and V-shaped plates and relative to flat at FV; B2) LDH release on round and V-shaped plates and relative to flat at FSA. Group C: cell viability/ml of Malme-3M cells cultured at 10⁴ cells/well density l, C1) round and V-shaped cell viability relative to flat well plates at FV; C2) round and V-shaped cell viability relative to flat well plates at FSA. Data are represented as mean + SD of three independent repeats (n = 3). Any significant difference in results is shown as <i>p</i> ≤ 0.05*, <i>p</i> ≤ 0.01**, <i>p</i> ≤ 0.001*** and is relative to flat plates.</p

Attachment and spreading of A549 cells on different surface topographies and at different growth conditions.

<p>A549 cultured at 1 x 10⁴ cells per well density on flat, round and v-shaped well plates over 8 days and at fixed growth volume and fixed growth surface. Group A and B represent cells at FV and FSA respectively and images 1, 2 and 3 represent flat, round and v-shaped well plates respectively. Samples were photographed using GX CAM digital camera at X 4 magnification (100 μm = scale bar). Each images is accompanied by analysis of the cells in the dot plot display mode of forward scatter (FCS) versus side scatter (SSC) on a logarithmic scale, and the core population of the cells is surrounded by a gate.</p