Earning Management and Dividend Policy: Empirical evidence from Pakistani listed companies

The study is an effort to find out the impact of earning management on dividend policy in Pakistan. A set of listed companies from Karachi stock exchange (KSE) 100 indexes have been investigated to analyze the relationship from the year 2005 to 2009 in Pakistan. Dividend policy has been measured by dividend payout whereas earning management has been quantified by discretionary accruals and discretionary accrual is used as a proxy to determine earning management. Modified cross sectional model (1995) has been used to measure discretionary accruals. Regression analysis shows that earning management has impact on dividend policy that rejects our null hypothesis. But coefficient shows that the relationship is so weak that is near to no relationship. Reason behind this no impact is economic decline period, because earning management changes every year. In the decline period our earning management was increase and the companies starts downsizing divided payment. Key words: Dividend Policy, Earning Management, Karachi Stock Exchange

Optimization of accurate estimation of single diode solar photovoltaic parameters and extraction of maximum power point under different conditions

Introduction. With the snowballing requirement of renewable resources of energy, solar energy has been an area of key concern to the increasing demand for electricity. Solar photovoltaic has gotten a considerable amount of consideration from researchers in recent years. Purpose. For generating nearly realistic curves for the solar cell model it is needed to estimate unknown parameters with utmost precision. The five unknown parameters include diode-ideality factor, shunt-resistance, photon-current, diode dark saturation current, and series-resistance. Novelty. The proposed research method hybridizes flower pollination algorithm with least square method to better estimate the unknown parameters, and produce more realistic curves. Methodology. The proposed method shows many promising results that are more realistic in nature, as compared to other methods. Shunt-resistance and series-resistance are considered and diode constant is not neglected in this approach that previously has been in practice. The values of series-resistance and diode-ideality factor are found using flower pollination algorithm while shunt-resistance, diode dark saturation current and photon-current are found through least square method. Results. The combination of these techniques has achieved better results compared to other techniques. The simulation studies are carried on MATLAB/Simulink.Вступ. З огляду на величезну потребу у відновлюваних енергетичних ресурсах, сонячна енергія стала ключовою сферою розв’язання проблеми зростання попиту на електроенергію. За останні роки сонячна фотоелектрична техніка отримала значну увагу з боку дослідників. Мета. Для створення майже реалістичних кривих для моделі сонячних батарей необхідно оцінити невідомі параметри з максимальною точністю. П'ять невідомих параметрів включають коефіцієнт ідеальності діодів, опір шунту, фотонний струм, струм темного насичення діодів і послідовний опір. Новизна. Запропонований метод дослідження поєднує алгоритм запилення квітів із методом найменших квадратів для кращої оцінки невідомих параметрів та отримання більш реалістичних кривих. Методологія. Запропонований метод демонструє багато перспективних результатів, які є більш реалістичними за своєю природою, порівняно з іншими методами. Розглянуто опір шунта і послідовний опір, і в цьому підході, який раніше застосовувався на практиці, не нехтують постійною діода. Значення послідовного опору та коефіцієнта ідеальності діодів визначаються за допомогою алгоритму запилення квіток, тоді як опір шунту, струм темного насичення діодів і фотонний струм - методом найменших квадратів. Результати. Поєднання цих методів забезпечило кращі результати у порівнянні з іншими методами. Моделювання проводиться на MATLAB/Simulink

Preface

In recent years the involvement of Information Technology in business, governments, and education has increased dramatically. More and more research works have been conducted in different areas of Information Technology such as Artificial Intelligence, Database Managements, Algorithms, Web Technologies, Computer Graphics, Networks, etc. In recognizing the importance and major advances, Information Technology has been chosen to be the theme of this special issue of the Information Science Journal

EFEKTIFITAS PENGGUNAAN APLIKASI LINGODEER PADA PENINGKATAN KEMAMPUAN KOSAKATA SISWA KELAS DELAPAN SMP ISLAM MALANG

Di era globalisasi, teknologi memiliki peran penting dalam setiap sektor kehidupan manusia, termasuk dalam dunia pendidikan sehingga pembelajaran berbasis elektronik tidak asing lagi bagi siswa. Dari perkembangan zaman ini, guru harus mengikuti arus zaman yang semakin modern ini, yang harus beralih dari pembelajaran konvensional ke pembelajaran berbasis elektronik. Maka dalam penelitian ini peneliti mengimplementasikan sebuah aplikasi yang sangat ramah terhadap siswa yaitu aplikasi Lingodeer. Aplikasi ini diterapkan untuk melatih bahasa Inggris siswa, lebih khusus untuk menambah kosakata bahasa Inggris siswa, karena jika kita ingin mempelajari bahasa baru yang harus dipelajari terlebih dahulu adalah kosakata bahasa tersebut.                Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui peningkatan kosakata siswa. Dengan menggunakan aplikasi Lingodeer pada siswa kelas VIII SMP Islam Malang. Penelitian ini menggunakan desain pre-experimental design dengan one group pre-test and post-test.  Populasi dalam penelitian ini adalah siswa SMP Islam yang berjumlah 29 siswa. Sampel penelitian ini adalah kelas VIII yang terdiri dari 20 siswa. Peneliti ini menggunakan pilihan ganda sebagai instrumen penelitian. Berdasarkan temuan penelitian, hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa penggunaan aplikasi Lingodeer efektif dalam meningkatkan kosakata siswa. Hal ini dibuktikan dengan rata-rata skor post t-test. Rata-rata skor sebelum dan sesudah perlakuan (63,700) > (70,75) dengan nilai t-test lebih besar dari t-tabel 3,870 > 2,101. Peneliti berasumsi bahwa menggunakan aplikasi Lingodeer dapat meningkatkan kosakata siswa dan dapat menjadi teknik yang baik dalam mengajar kosakata

The Contagious Nature of SARS-CoV-2 Omicron Variant and Vaccine Efficacy

Background: Since the first COVID-19 outbreak, variants of SARS-CoV-2 have continued to dominate the global population. The repeated waves of emerging variants, each replacing the previous one with a greater rate of transmissibility and mutations, are the primary cause of the global pandemic. Public health concerns dramatically rose when a highly mutated variant (VOC) omicron (B.1.1.529) emerged in late 2021. omicron has more than 50 mutations, and over 30 mutations are in their spike protein that contributes to the virologic characteristics of the variant. Omicron is more contagious than previously reported SARS-CoV-2 strains and can re-infect people who have already contracted other SARS-CoV-2 infections. The variant has acquired a unique immune escape mechanism against monoclonal antibodies and vaccines. Currently, no therapeutic drug or vaccine is specifically available to prevent omicron infection and sublineage emergence. Method: The review was designed to search the recent research and literature and compile the most pertinent data on the virologic characteristics of the variant of concern. Result: The study reviewed and discussed the present prevalence, infectivity, dominance, immune evasion, therapeutic options, vaccine efficacy, and the future prospect of the omicron variant. Conclusion: Omicron variant has become a global public health concern due to the emergence of highly mutated sublineages. Developing variant-specific therapeutic drugs or vaccines is desirable to prevent the spread of these contagious variants globally.Keywords: COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, Omicron variant, Vaccine efficacy, Immune evasion

Difficult Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy and Its Conversion to Open Cholecystectomy Using Intra-Operative Scoring System

Objective: To determine the frequency of conversion of laparoscopic cholecystectomy to open cholecystectomy using proposed intra-operative scoring system and to check the validity of the scoring system. Study Design: Descriptive cross-sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: The study was conducted in the Department of Surgery, Federal Government. Polyclinic Hospital (FGPC) Islamabad from 1 February 2019 to 31 July, 2019. Materials and Methods: This study enrolled 197 patients of either gender with age ranging between 20-60 years planned for laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC). All the recruits were assessed intraoperatively using proposed objective intraoperative scoring-system for difficult LC. The conversion rate of LC to open cholecystectomy was recorded in correlation with demographic data and co-morbidities. Data was entered and analyzed using SPSS version 25.0. Results: Out of 197 enrolled patients, 64% were females. The mean age of study population was 42.7 ± 12.1 years. Forty six percent (46%) patients had co-morbidities with fifty-nine (n=59) being diagnosed as hypertensive and thirty-two (n=32) as diabetic. A total of 8.1% (n=16/197) patients underwent conversion to open cholecystectomy. The overall mean objective intra-operative score was 3.6 ± 1.73; which was significantly higher in patients who underwent conversion to open cholecystectomy compared to those who did not undergo conversion (7.19 ± 0.83 vs 3.28 ± 1.39; p-value = 0.001). Conversion rate was significantly more in the patients who were above 40 years, hypertensive, and diabetic. (p<0.05 in all cases). Conclusion: The intra-operative scoring system can be used as a valuable predictor of difficult LC and conversion to open surgery to improve clinical outcome for the patients indicated for LC

Biotechnology: a powerful tool for the removal of cadmium from aquatic systems

The prime objective of the present research work was to evaluate the efficiency of bio-machine for the removal of Cadmium (Cd) from aquatic systems. Aspergillus niger fungus was used as bio-machine to remove Cd from aquatic systems. Twenty three different strains (IIB-1 to IIB-23) were isolated from industrial effluents and the Langmuir and Freundlich models were applied to the best Cadmium removal strain IIB-23 in order to obtain the adsorption parameters. Different parameters such as pH, temperatur e, contact time, initial metal concentratio, and biomass dosage on the biosorption of Cd were studied. The percent removal of Cd initially increased with an increase in pH ranging from 5.5-6.5 and then decreased by increasing pH from 7.0-7.5. An optimized pH used for Cd removal from aquatic systems was found to be 6.5. Additionally, an optimum amount of biomass was 1.33 g for the maximum removal of Cd from the aqueous solutions with initial metal concentration of 75 mg/L. The results obtained thus indicated that Langmuir model is the best suited for the removal of Cd from aquatic systems