Water Hardness Removal by Electrochemical Precipitation in a Continuous Flow Condition Using Conductive Concrete as Cathode

This study focuses on the electrochemical precipitation (EP) process to reduce excess water hardness from the Lower Rio Grande Valley (LRGV) tap water using electrically conductive concrete as cathode in a continuous flow condition. LRGV tap water is extremely hard with hardness more than 350 mg/L as CaCO3. Humans can pleasantly consume water with hardness less than 150 mg/l as CaCO3 according to World Health Organization (WHO). Hard water is also known to cause mechanical problems to boilers and heat exchangers. In this process, electricity is passed through electrodes submerged in electrolyte, which causes an alkaline environment around the cathode and precipitate water hardness. Conventional studies on electrochemical hardness removal have used sacrificial metal cathodes which makes the treatment very expensive and unsustainable. However, electrically conductive concrete cathode in this study is made with conductive graphite flakes thus making the system more durable and sustainable. In this study, data will be collected with changes in Current density, flow rate/hydraulic retention time, the total reaction time to analyze their impact on water hardness concentration in tap water. Preliminary research findings showed that an increase in applied current density, reaction time, and a decrease in flow rate achieved greater water hardness removal. If successfully developed, proposed technology will enable municipalities and industries to significantly reduce water hardness on site

Relationship Quality: Its Antecedents and Consequence in the Context of Retailer-Supplier Relationship in Bangladesh

Relationship quality plays a very important role in shaping business relationships. Therefore it has become imperative to develop research models to explain relationship quality. This study investigated the influence of antecedent factors such as participation in decision making, communication, termination cost, switching cost and operational cost on retailers’ relationship quality in the context of retailers’ relationships with their suppliers in Bangladesh’s retail industry. This study also investigated the relationship between retailers’ relationship quality and its impact on loyalty towards the suppliers. This study further identified the moderating role of relationship duration on the relationship between relationship quality and loyalty. Data for this study was collected using mail survey from 121 independent retailers in all over the geographic territory of Bangladesh. The study establishes that three antecedent factors namely termination cost, switching cost and operational cost (by order of importance) to have significant relationship with retailers’ relationship quality. Consequently, the study also indicated that retailers’ relationship quality significantly influences their loyalty toward their suppliers. Nevertheless, duration of relationship was able to significantly moderate the relationship between retailers’ relationship quality and their loyalty toward their suppliers

Ruminant Nutrition and Production in the Tropics and Subtropics

Livestock Production/Industries,

Importance of measuring relationship quality in the retail industry: an asian perspective

This article was published in ELK ASIA PACIFIC JOURNAL OF MARKETING AND RETAIL MANAGEMENT [© 2012 ELK's International Journal of Marketing] and the definite version is available at : http://www.elkjournals.com/MasterAdmin/UploadFolder/4-IMPORTANCE-OF-MEASURING-RELATIONSHIP/4-IMPORTANCE-OF-MEASURING-RELATIONSHIP.pdf The article website is at: http://www.elkjournals.com/In this article the author has identified the necessity and importance of developing a new relationship quality measurement scale (RELQUAL) to assess the degree of relationship quality between the retailers and their suppliers from an Asian perspective. Relationship quality is presented as a higher order concept. Findings reveal that the quality of relationship in the retail industry needs to be measured because of its high theoretical as well as practical implications.Publishe

An Investigation into the Errors Committed by First Year Undergraduates in the Department of English at Jahangirnagar University

English has currently been spoken all over the world which substantially influences its development In Bangladesh English is taught at all levels of education Moreover it has become a notion that if a person does have a good command of English that person is going to get a very good job To learn English a learner has to go under a complex process of committing errors This paper is meant to present how the English variety in Bangladesh has been phonologically and grammatically written and spoken full of errors This paper reviews errors on grammatical lexical and phonological aspects of written and spoken English with theoretical background and procedure of error analysis It empirically through qualitative and quantitative method finds out the errors in pronunciation grammar articles auxiliaries and prepositions and also reflects the possible reasons behind the errors in written and spoken English Finally it provides some recommendations for effective remedial measures and feedback techniques for developing spoken English in the light of the theoretical and empirical findings of the researc

Impact of Public and Private Investment on GDP Growth in Bangladesh: Crowding-in or Out?

The study investigates into the impact of public and private investment on GDP growth in Bangladesh over the period 1980-2016 within ARDL framework It also enquires into the causal relationship between investment public and private and GDP growth using Block Exogeneity Wald Test The study primarily finds that there exists a significant impact of both public and private investment on GDP growth in the long run In the short run public investment does not affect but private investment has a positive impact on GDP growth The study also uncovers a bidirectional association between public investment and GDP growth whereas unidirectional relationships from private investment to GDP growth and from public investment to private investment Consequently public investment crowds-in private investment Therefore increase in public investment is critical to moving to the next level of the country s growt

Determinants of Living Arrangements, Health Status and Abuse among Elderly Women: A Study of Rural Naogaon District, Bangladesh

In this study, the socio-economic backdrops, living arrangements, health status and abuse of the women aged 60 years and older in the rural Naogaon district of Bangladesh are examined. The data were collected from seven villages by using probability proportional to size (PPS) sampling and the results show that an overwhelming majority of the elderly women in the age group 60-69 years who are widowed, illiterate, have no education and income, economically dependent, living with married children, unhealthy, suffer from arthritis related illness and are taking treatment from village doctors. Furthermore, the study shows that, nearly 35 percent elderly women are abused, mostly mentally abused due to poverty. Logistic regression analysis reveals the determinants of living arrangements, health status and abuse of the elderly women. The findings of the study should get due attention to provide secured later life of the elder especially female elderly in Bangladesh and developing nation as well

A Study of Polycarbonate / Poly (butylene terephthalate) Compounding in a Twin Screw Extruder

In this work, the compounding of polycarbonate (PC) / poly-butylene terephthalate (PBT) blends was studied for the purpose of improving quality of products with reduced wastage and finally to satisfaction of end users. The effect of material rheological characteristics and processing conditions on compounding of PC /PBT was investigated through statistical experiments carried out on a 58 mm twin-screw extruder at SABIC Innovative Plastics Limited (formerly GE Plastics Limited) in Cobourg, Ontario. Melt Volume-Flow Rate (MVR) is the most commonly used property to monitor the quality of products of PC/PBT blends. The MVR was studied with different sampling times and correlations between product properties (melt flow) and processing conditions (screw speed, flow rates) were discussed. The rheological behavior of PC/PBT blends was investigated by dynamic and capillary rheometers. The effects of processing conditions (screw speed, feed rate) on viscosity were measured and it was found that the Cox-Merz rule is not valid for PC/PBT blends. The change of morphology of PC/PBT blends was observed under a scanning electron microscope (SEM) by using different types of samples. Those samples were (i) PC/PBT blends pellets, (ii) PC/PBT blend samples, but collected after completing the rheological tests in the parallel plate rheometer, and (iii) PC/PBT blend samples, but collected after completing the rheological tests in the capillary rheometer. There was evidence that the samples collected after completing the tests in the parallel and capillary rheometer might be degraded due to temperature and time

Asset Pricing Model Suitability: Evidence from USA, UK, and India

This study examines firms from USA, UK, and India and attempts to determine whether a standard or behavioral model is more suitable for the purpose of asset pricing. The standard model used is the Fama and French (1993) three factor model and the behavioral model is constructed based on the model presented in Shefrin and Statman (1995). All factors of the Fama-French model are found significant in UK and India, indicating that it is still effective in the modern world and size and value effect still persist. HML is found insignificant in USA, indicating that value effect may be disappearing in the US market. The intercepts are close to zero, suggesting that the models are well-defined. In all three markets, smaller firms are exposed to higher systematic risk than larger firms on average. In USA and India, value stocks carry more risk than growth stocks. This suggests that smaller and value stocks earn higher return because they carry higher risk. All variables of the behavioral model are also to a great extent found to be significant in USA and UK. This indicates that the behavioral model is also effective. This study also finds that investors seem to judge stocks of well-reputed companies as good stocks to invest in. The stock beta, which was found insignificant in previous studies, is found to be a significant explanator of company reputation. Realized returns estimated by the Fama-French model and expected returns estimated by the behavioral model are compared with one another to detect errors in investment decision-making process. Investors in USA demonstrate accurate and rational judgment, indicating that a standard asset pricing model is more suitable. Investors in UK and India display erroneous judgment and irrationality, making the behavioral model more appropriate. However, this particular behavioral model performs poorly in India, possibly as a result of poor reputation scores obtained from the reputation surveys of Fortune 500 India