An Energy Aware and Secure MAC Protocol for Tackling Denial of Sleep Attacks in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks which form part of the core for the Internet of Things consist of resource constrained sensors that are usually powered by batteries. Therefore, careful energy awareness is essential when working with these devices. Indeed,the introduction of security techniques such as authentication and encryption, to ensure confidentiality and integrity of data, can place higher energy load on the sensors. However, the absence of security protection c ould give room for energy drain attacks such as denial of sleep attacks which have a higher negative impact on the life span ( of the sensors than the presence of security features. This thesis, therefore, focuses on tackling denial of sleep attacks from two perspectives A security perspective and an energy efficiency perspective. The security perspective involves evaluating and ranking a number of security based techniques to curbing denial of sleep attacks. The energy efficiency perspective, on the other hand, involves exploring duty cycling and simulating three Media Access Control ( protocols Sensor MAC, Timeout MAC andTunableMAC under different network sizes and measuring different parameters such as the Received Signal Strength RSSI) and Link Quality Indicator ( Transmit power, throughput and energy efficiency Duty cycling happens to be one of the major techniques for conserving energy in wireless sensor networks and this research aims to answer questions with regards to the effect of duty cycles on the energy efficiency as well as the throughput of three duty cycle protocols Sensor MAC ( Timeout MAC ( and TunableMAC in addition to creating a novel MAC protocol that is also more resilient to denial of sleep a ttacks than existing protocols. The main contributions to knowledge from this thesis are the developed framework used for evaluation of existing denial of sleep attack solutions and the algorithms which fuel the other contribution to knowledge a newly developed protocol tested on the Castalia Simulator on the OMNET++ platform. The new protocol has been compared with existing protocols and has been found to have significant improvement in energy efficiency and also better resilience to denial of sleep at tacks Part of this research has been published Two conference publications in IEEE Explore and one workshop paper

A COMPARATIVE EXAMINATION OF ISSUES OF RELIGION AND CULTURE IN AFRICA

This paper examined the contentious issues in the relationship between religion and culture. This relationship appeared to have been cordial and crucial for the corporate existence and development of the society. Although religion and culture are closely knit, there are issues of contention between them. However, these are two concepts or phenomena that exist together for the good of the society. In discovering the issues, the researcher adopted the literary method of study and examined the subject from that perspective. This paper revealed that there is culture in religion as there is religion in culture. These two elements of society (religion and culture) play different roles to keep the society functional. Notably too, religion give meaning to culture. However, the major findings suggest the checking of the excesses of culture over religion to help develop a peaceful and socially conducive atmosphere for the people. This paper further recommended that religion should be given opportunity to shape and reform culture for the benefit of man

Documentation of Orature

Syllabus for workshop, CoLang 2016Orature is an amalgamation of two words: oral and literature. It depicts the creative impulse of the society it evolves from. This artistic expression includes proverbs, riddles, extemporized poems/songs, folktales, childlore, etc. The general observation is that attention has been given to aspects of Orature by adults almost to the exclusion of children’s artistic expression. There is no doubt that some aspects of our collective Orature has been put in print. However, much more is yet to be documented. It is also often not considered that both adults and children draw their experiences from the same setting, they employ the same language and discuss the same socio-cultural issues; they express the same hopes and aspirations. In fact adults very quickly forget that they were once children as they quite often look down on childhood tradition. On the other hand, how quickly their faces radiate with nostalgic laughter/smile as they recall some of the childhood games they played. For a holistic documentation therefore, it is necessary that the artistic creation of adults together with those of children should be collected, collated, analysed and properly documented either for revitalization or for archiving.2015 NSF/BCS 1500841: CoLang 2016: Institute on Collaborative Language Research – ALASK

Conflict Management. The Contribution of the Christian Church

It is true now that man lives in a world of conflict. Conflict is an ever-present process in human relations. Conflict situations indeed appear frequently in daily, public and private life. Conflict may occur within and among families, groups, communities or nations; and they may be fuelled by ethnic, racial, religious, or economic differences, or may arise from differences in ideologies, values and beliefs. Conflict may be on a small or large scale. Conflict charge the people with tensions, threats, fears, anxieties and uncertainties. What makes a society ideal is the extent to which the conflicting interests and needs in a society are constructively managed so that violence does not threaten its continued existence. Since it is obvious that conflicts in any given society is inevitable, management and resolution of conflict is the very essence of talking about conflict. This is what this work is set to achieve and to offer suggestions on how to manage and resolve conflict thereby reducing its negative and destructive effects. This work showed the church has the potential to contribute to the management and resolution of conflicts in Nigeria

Life-form and Density of Valuable Non-timber Plants in Ukpom Community Forest, Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria

Ukpom Community Forest in Ikono Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria was assessed for the abundance of plant species producing economically valuable non-timber forest products. Forty-six plant species comprising 16 tree species, 17 shrub species, 8 herb species and 5 climber species were encountered. Apart from Baphia nitida, Pentatethra macrophylla and Brachystegia eurycoma with densities of 6,4 and 3/ha respectively, all the other tree species had a density of 1/ha each. In the shrub category, Lasianthera africana had the highest density of 255/ha and Alchornea cordifolia, the least of 1/ha. Palisota hirsuta had the highest density of 136/ha in the herb life-form, and Urena lobata the least of one/ha. Among the climbers, Ancistrophyllum secundiflorum had the highest density of 51/ha and Plukentia conophora, the least of 1/ha. The implications of the results for sustainable management of the forest are discussed.Key words: Rainforest, Plants, Density, Non-Timber Products, Exploitation

Performance Analysis of Denial-of-Sleep Attack-Prone MAC Protocols in Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks which form part of the core for the Internet of Things consist of resource constrained sensors that are usually powered by batteries. Therefore, careful energy awareness is essential when working with these devices. On the other hand, the presence as well as the absence of security features implemented in resource constrained sensors can have negative effects on their energy consumption. Indeed, the introduction of security techniques such as authentication and encryption, to ensure confidentiality and integrity of data, can place higher energy load on the sensors. However, the absence of security protection could give room for energy-drain attacks such as denial-of-sleep attacks which has a higher negative impact on the life span (availability) of the sensors than the presence of security techniques. This paper focuses on denial-of-sleep attacks by simulating three Media Access Control (MAC) protocols – Sensor-MAC, Timeout-MAC and TunableMAC – under different network sizes. We evaluate, compare, and analyse the received signal strength and the link quality indicators for each of these protocols. The results of our simulation provide insight into how these parameters can be used to detect a denial-of-sleep attack. Finally, we propose a novel architecture for tackling denial-of-sleep attacks by propagating relevant knowledge via intelligent agents

Evaluation of Pharmacodynamic Effects of Ethanolic Extract of the Leaves of Gnetum africanum on Uterine and Ovarian Tissues Morphology of Rats.

Dynamic effect of Ethanolic extract of medicinal plant, Gnetum africanum repeated oral administration on uterine and ovarian tissues histology of rats was investigated. Three tolerated doses of the extract 10, 200 and 700 mg/kg obtained from acute toxicity test were administered orally to three respective groups of female rats daily for 3 days. On the 4th day, rats of all the groups were sacrificed and their uteri and ovaries were carefully isolated and fixed in 10% formal-saline, for 28 days. The fixed tissues were sectioned and histologically processed and examined under light microscope. Photomicrographs of the tissue sections revealed uterine endometrial hyperplasia with formation of several tiny cysts due to glandular dilatation and formation of ovarian fibromas, cytological atypia and stroma. The findings allow the conclusion that excessive oral administration of the medicinal plant, Gnetum africanum, a popular Nigerian medicinal plant, could impact a negative influence on the female reproductive physiology. Keywords: Ethanolic Extract, leaves of Gnetum africanum, Ovarian tissues, Uterus, female rats

Proactive Energy-Efficiency: Evaluation of Duty-Cycled MAC Protocols in Wireless Sensor Networks

Duty cycling happens to be one of the major techniques for conserving energy in wireless sensor networks and this research aims to answer questions with regards to the effect of duty cycles on the energy efficiency as well as the throughput of three duty-cycled protocols – Sensor-MAC (SMAC), Timeout-MAC (TMAC) and TunableMAC. Although other duty-cycled protocols are reviewed, the aforementioned three protocols are observed in OMNET++ simulator via the Castalia framework. Graphical results are produced which show the energy consumption and throughput as the duty cycle is varied and the variations in results for each of the three protocols are analyzed. The results provide insight into how to ensure ‘proactive energy-efficiency’ whereby the impact of denial-of-sleep attacks can be minimized while throughput is maximized

Alternative Sources of Funding University Education in Nigeria

The aim of the study was to determine how parents, lecturers and university students view some alternative sources of funding university education in Nigeria. Two research questions were raised and stratified random sampling technique was used in selecting 677 parents, 679 students and 309 lecturers for the study. Researcher made questionnaire was used for data collection, which were analysed using percentage and analysis of variance. The results showed that they accepted scholarship, scientific break-through, staff exchange programme, checking fraudulent practices, and loans but rejected commercializing accommodation, payment of tuition fees, graduate tax, tax-relief and commercializing activities on campuses as alternative sources of funding university education. It was recommended that the general economy of the society need to be improved if the society may be at ease to assist in funding university education.African Research Review Vol. 2 (3) 2008: pp. 187-19

Bilateral post-traumatic acute extradural hematomas: A report of four cases and review of literature

Bilateral extradural hematomas are rare and follow significant trauma. The mortality is higher than with unilateral single extradural hematomas and postoperative outcome depends on preoperative neurological status.Keywords: Bilateral, extradural, hematoma, outcome, traumaNigerian Journal of Clinical Practice •Jan-Mar 2012 • Vol 15 • Issue