Heavy Metals Concentration in Urban Soils of Fallujah City, Iraq

Twenty samples were collected from the urban soils in Fallujah City in order to determine concentrations, spatial distribution and contamination assessment of heavy metals such as Cu, Zn, Ni, Pb, Ni, Fe, Mn, Cd, Co and Cr. The  mean concentrations are as follows : 235.77?g/g for Fe, 24.09?g/g for Mn, 11.59?g/g for Cr, 8.96?g/g for Ni, 5.50?g/g for Zn, 3.82?g/g for Pb, 3.43?g/g for Co , 2.01?g/g for Cu and 0.64?g/g for Cd. To assess metal contamination in urban soils, soil quality guidelines were applied. The mean concentration of Cu, Zn, Ni, Pb, Ni, Fe, Mn, Co and Cr did not exceed and Cd exceeded the USEPA guideline. A similar spatial distribution patterns between the heavy metals were found indicating that these metals were from the same sources. The metal contamination in the soils was also evaluated by appling enrichment factor (EF), pollution load index (PLI), integrated pollution load index (IPLI) and geoaccumulation index (Igeo). Based on enrichment factor (EF) , the urban soils in Fallujah city are extremely high enriched with Cd and Co, very high enriched with Ni and Cr and Pb, Cu and Zn exhibit significant enrichment. to IPLI values, urban soils in Fallujah are lowly polluted with heavy metals. According to Igeo, the urban soils in Fallujah City are uncontaminated to slightly contaminated by Cd. The sources of Cd in soil may be from industrial and anthropogenic activities. Keywords: Urban soils, Heavy metals, Fallujah city

Banana Peel as Removal Agent for Sulfide from Sulfur Springs Water

Banana peel which consider as fruit waste has been tested  for the removal of total sulfide from spring water in Heet area, Iraq. The chemical composition of peels was investigated. The results  show that the composition consists of  Sodium ,Potassium, Calcium ,Manganese and Phosphate and concentrations of these contents were 18.2mg/g, 62mg/g,15.4mg/g ,48mg/g and 0.37 mg/g , respectively. The alkalinity of peels was 5.2 mg/g and the moisture content was 5.8 % . The treatment efficiency was studied as a function of the retention time and  concentration of sulfide ion .The maximum sorption for sulfide was found to be 97% and it was nearly effective as activated carbon. As a result of the removal process , the concentrations of  some common anions ,cations and heavy metals (Mg+2,Ca+2,Na+,So4-2,cl-Po4-2, Cr, Fe, Ni, Cu and Zn) decreased ,the concentrations of K+ and Mn increased . Increasing of concentrations of K+ and Mn is attributed to their high content in the banana peels. A slight increase in pH of the treated water (6.5 – 7.5). This study revealed that  the treatment of water using the banana peel is most effective for removal of hydrogen sulfide from sulfur  spring water. Keywords: Sulfide removal, banana peel, sorbent, peel mineral content ,sulfur, spring wate

An efficient sensor based on anodic activation of graphene oxide for sensitive and selective determination of dopamine in blood serum

A native graphene oxide (NGO) prepared by Hummers modified method was used as the template materials for the fabrication of electrochemically oxidative graphene oxide (OGO) onto a glassy carbon electrode (GCE). The fabrication of OGO-GCE persuaded via anodic reversible potentiodynamic of NGO base surface materials that increases the concentration of oxygen functionalities. The development of a new aldehyde/alcoholic functional group on OGO-GCE characterized by XPS analysis is a marked signal for oxygen richness surface which provoked on the cost of sp2 hybridized function. The EIS data underline that OGO-GCE promote the electron transfer kinetics much more than NGO-GCE by 9 times as estimated by the rate constant calculation. The XPS and EIS data highlight the influence of anodic treatment on increasing the interlayer spacing distance between the resultant OGO. Differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) results were evident for a promising efficiency of OGO-GCE on the simultaneous determination of dopamine (DA), ascorbic acid (AA) and uric acid (UA). In addition, the selectivity of the proposed sensor for DA quantification in the presence of high concentrations of AA and UA was achieved successfully with a detection limit (DL3s) approach to 12 nM. The analytical performance of OGO-GCE on serum blood revealed its potential application for trace DA quantification

Replantation of Nine Fingers in a Patient: A case report

Amputation of multiple fingers of both hands is a rare and serious injury. We report a case of a 41-year-old male patient who presented to Khoula Hospital, Muscat, Oman, in 2015 with the amputation of nine fingers due to a workplace injury. With two teams working in tandem, all the amputated fingers were re-attached. A total of seven fingers survived and the patient regained reasonable functionality of his hands. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first case of several finger amputations in Oman.Keywords: Fingers; Traumatic Amputation; Crush Injuries; Replantation; Case Report; Oman

Assessment of Heavy Metals Pollution In Euphrates River Water, Amiriyah Fallujah, Iraq.

The concentrations of heavy metals (Cd, Cr, Fe, Ni and Pb) in water samples for the Euphrates River in Amiriyah Fallujah, Iraq were evaluated to assess the pollution level. Ten sites were selected along the study area and sampled during December 2013 to March 2014. The decreasing trend of metals were observed in water as  Pb > Fe > Cr > Cd > Ni. The concentration of the studied metals was higher than the recommended guidelines for drinking and aquatic life, indicated that the water is not safe for drinking and aquatic life uses. There were significant differences in the concentrations of heavy metal  during the sampling period. Heavy pollution index (HPI) results showed that the water was seriously polluted  with Cd, Cr and Pb. According to metal index (MI) results, the water is seriously threatened with metal pollution and unsafe for drinking, irrigation and aquatic life uses. Principal components analysis (PCA) suggests that the Cd, Cr and Pb are derived from anthropogenic sources. Keywords: River pollution; Pollution index, Metal Index; Euphrates; Ira

Seismic performance of concrete core walls reinforced with shape memory alloy bars

Reinforced Concrete (RC) core walls are widely used to resist lateral loads because of their high flexural and torsional stiffnesses. Their seismic performance parameters, including residual displacement, floor acceleration, and residual in-plane rotation, were examined by many researchers. However, reports from previous earthquakes have highlighted the difficulties of repairs addressing their residual displacements and/or rotations. This paper addresses this problem by investigating the influence of self-centering superelastic shape memory alloy (SMA) bars on the seismic performance parameters of RC core walls. A case study building is analyzed, considering both steel and SMA reinforcement, for unidirectional and bidirectional seismic excitations. Different mass eccentricities are assumed. SMA RC core walls are found to have significantly reduced floor accelerations, residual displacements, and residual in-plane rotations as compared to steel RC core walls

Seismic Performance of Hybrid Corrosion-Free Self-Centering Concrete Shear Walls

Reinforced concrete (RC) walls are extensively used in high-rise buildings to resist lateral loads, while ensuring an adequate level of ductility. Durability problems, including corrosion of conventional steel reinforcements, necessitate exploring alternative types of reinforcement. The use of glass fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) bars is a potential solution. However, these bars cannot be used in seismic applications because of their brittleness and inability to dissipate seismic energy. Superelastic shape memory alloy (SMA) is a corrosion-free material with high ductility and unique self-centering ability. Its high cost is a major barrier to use in construction projects. The clear advantage of utilizing both SMA and FRP to achieve durable self-centering structures has motivated the development of a composite SMA-FRP bar. This paper investigates the hybrid use of FRP bars and either SMA bars or composite SMA-FRP in concrete shear walls. An extensive parametric study was conducted to study the effect of different design parameters on the lateral performance of hybrid RC walls. The seismic behavior of the hybrid walls was then examined. The hybrid walls not only solved the durability problem but also significantly improved the seismic performance

Comparison of Properties of Various Heat Storage Fluids used with Evacuated Tube of Solar Water Heater

The aim of this work was to capture solar radiation and convert it into solar thermal energy by using a storage material and the heat transfer fluid like oil and water and comparison between them, we used the evacuated tube as a receiver for solar radiation, The results showed that the oil better than water as storage material and the heat transfer fluid and the effective thermal conductivity material and good for power level, rates and durations of charge and discharge cycles

When Users Enjoy Using the System: The Case of AIS

This study utilized an extended model of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT2) to explore the factors influencing the future adoption of accounting information systems (AIS) by Qatari students. A research model was proposed to predict future adoption, partially moderated by voluntary status of using the system. A sample of 237 students was used to probe their perceptions regarding the use of such systems in their future careers. Students were enrolled in an accounting information systems course in Qatar University. Results indicated that perceived facilitating conditions, performance expectancy and enjoyment were significant predictors of AIS. The other factors failed to be significant predictors. The estimated R2 was 48.4%. The moderation effect of voluntariness was also significant in influencing the relationship between enjoyment and future adoption. The moderator yielded a negative beta, which means that it faded the relationship under consideration. Conclusions and future recommendations are reported at the end of the paper

Feature Selection Approach based on Firefly Algorithm and Chi-square

Dimensionality problem is a well-known challenging issue for most classifiers in which datasets have unbalanced number of samples and features. Features may contain unreliable data which may lead the classification process to produce undesirable results. Feature selection approach is considered a solution for this kind of problems. In this paperan enhanced firefly algorithm is proposed to serve as a feature selection solution for reducing dimensionality and picking the most informative features to be used in classification. The main purpose of the proposedmodel is to improve the classification accuracy through using the selected features produced from the model, thus classification errors will decrease. Modeling firefly in this research appears through simulating firefly position by cell chi-square value which is changed after every move, and simulating firefly intensity by calculating a set of different fitness functionsas a weight for each feature. K-nearest neighbor and Discriminant analysis are used as classifiers to test the proposed firefly algorithm in selecting features. Experimental results showed that the proposed enhanced algorithmbased on firefly algorithm with chi-square and different fitness functions can provide better results than others. Results showed that reduction of dataset is useful for gaining higher accuracy in classification