Development of Nitrogen and Solid Removal for a Sustainable Treatment of Aquaculture Industry

国立大学法人長岡技術科学大学博士（工学）Articledoctoral thesi

Controlling shareholders, audit committee effectiveness, and earnings quality: the case of Thailand

This study examines the associations of controlling shareholders and audit committee effectiveness with earnings quality. A sample of non-financial Thai listed firms is used in the study because Thailand provides a useful setting for the study of ownership concentration. A unique data set on the voting rights of controlling shareholders and audit committee characteristics is used to test the hypotheses of whether controlling shareholders and audit committees with strong governance characteristics affect the quality of earnings. Earnings quality is measured using (1) Basu's (1997) asymmetric timeliness measure of accounting conservatism, and (2) absolute abnormal accruals estimated from the Dechow and Dichev (2002) and the Jones (1991) models and its variations. Audit committee effectiveness is measured using a composite index comprising four audit committee characteristics. The empirical results show that firms with a controlling shareholder, on average, are associated with both lower accounting conservatism (lower earnings quality) and lower absolute abnormal accruals (higher earnings quality) than firms with no controlling shareholder. Further analysis shows that family- and the government-controlled firms and firms whose controlling shareholders have voting rights below 75%, in particular, are associated with lower accounting conservatism and absolute abnormal accruals. Although the results imply both lower and higher earnings quality for firms with a controlling shareholder compared to firms with no controlling shareholder, the lower (higher) absolute abnormal accruals (earnings quality) simply reflects less conservative accounting practice by firms with a controlling shareholder. The results provide no evidence that audit committees with strong governance characteristics are associated with earnings quality

Factors affecting engagement with informal science learning in Thailand: A regional perspective

Abstract There is currently minimal understanding as to how informal science learning affects young people’s scientific performance, attitudes and experiences at a regional level in Thailand. This thesis is the first to investigate this topic by examining the factors affecting engagement in science learning in regional informal settings. It focuses on ‘underserved’ students from remote schools with poor access to science learning in informal settings and educational support. This research aims to examine the impact of the activities offered by the Science Caravan, a travelling informal science learning activity, on young people in four regions of Thailand and to explore their informal science learning experiences, through five research questions; (1) What settings or resources are available to young people for informal science learning at the regional level?; (2) What are the main factors affecting the experiences of Thai young people in informal science learning?; (3) How do informal science learning activities meet the needs of different learners?; (4) What learning and other outcomes do young people obtain from participating in regional informal science activities?; and (5) How can this learning be applied to other informal science communication projects at the regional level?The research draws on a number of key theoretical models, including cognitive and social constructivism, which is used to examine how participants obtained and constructed their knowledge via engagement with informal science activities (Berkeley Graduate Division, 2017; Van Der Veer, 2007). Falk and Dierking’s (2000) contextual learning model is utilised to investigate personal, physical and social factors affecting the informal science learning experiences of young people. Finally, the Generic Learning Outcomes (GLOs) are used to examine the outcomes of learning achieved from engagement with informal science activities comprised within the Science Caravan (Art Council England, 2017). Mixed methods were used in this research, which employed triangulation to achieve convergence of results from two different methods (Greene, Caracelli, and Graham, 1989; Bryman, 2006 cited by Creswell and Plano Clark, 2011). Pre and post engagement questionnaires were designed to collect quantitative data from 1,400 participants across four different regions (350 participants for each region). Semi-structured interviews were employed for in-depth exploration of the experiences of 40 young people (10 participants for each region), 20 teachers (five teachers for each regions) and 22 National Science Museum, Thailand staff (two directors and 20 science communicators). The Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to identify the changes in attitudes towards science and scientific knowledge from pre- and post-caravan responses taken from the same individual. The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to investigate independent data comprising more than two independent groups, and the Mann-Whitney U test when two independent variables were being explored (Field, 2009). For qualitative data analysis, inductive thematic analysis (TA) was used to capture any themes within the interview results (Braun and Clarke, 2013). This research identifies a number of key settings and resources which are available to young people regionally, including the public library, the school library, internet resources, as well as local national parks, zoos, science museums and discovery centres. The location of the informal learning setting, its accessibility and usefulness are significant factors that influence in the uptake of informal learning by local young people. Beyond these resources, factors effecting young peoples’ engagement with informal science learning include schools, teachers, family, friends, the government and other organisations (e.g. local university and local community institutes), with schools and teachers being the most significant factors in promoting informal science learning for young people based in different regions of Thailand. The results suggest that young people learn from informal science activities both as individual learners and via social interaction. The results show that participants obtained and constructed their scientific knowledge and understanding by watching and observing activities, performing experiments, repeating activities and using experiences to solve science problems. Additionally, they also observed, discussed and shared information with others. Over 50% of participants has post-test knowledge scores which were higher than their pre-test scores, with participants in the Northeast showing the greatest improvement in terms of their post-test scores. There were minimal differences by region, age and gender in terms of which types of science activities were most popular with participants. The results also present evidence of changing attitudes towards science and technology, amongst young people following engagement with the informal science activities, including a growing awareness of the relevance of science and technology to life, as well as the complexity of science and its role within society. In examining the learning outcomes from engaging, most participants showed high levels of agreement that the learning outcomes had been met, wanted to be involved in the activities and were following instructions. Over 80% of all of participants indicated attaining new scientific knowledge, promoting development of social skills, increasing self-confidence in presenting ideas in front of others, enjoying science activities, using knowledge from the science caravan to support learning in school, and sharing information to encourage science awareness to others after engagement with the Science Caravan. Older participants aged 13-15 and females were more likely to want to be involved in science activities, to read instructions, and to anticipate using their learning at school. Additionally, local teachers obtained new scientific knowledge and gained new ideas for teaching science. Finally, three significant factors were identified in response to the five research questions; contexts of informal learning, knowledge construction and learning outcome. This research proposes a model based on these three contexts which can be used to investigate other contexts, other informal learning settings and different participants to expand knowledge and understanding in this area. This study of contextual learning, knowledge construction processes and outcomes from engagement with the Science Caravan can lead to further development of the Science Caravan, and this knowledge can also be applied to investigate other regional informal learning projects that may be occurring internationally

Neurolinguistic Studies on the Linguistic Expression of Time Reference in Thai

While it is easy for healthy speakers to talk about and to understand sentences about events happening in different time frames: past, present or future, it is often hard for people with aphasia (language impairment after brain damage). My thesis investigates this communicative problem in Thai, a language that, unlike English, does not use verb tense to refer to different time frames, but instead refers to different time frames by the use of free-standing words (i.e., aspectual markers). Offline and online methodologies were used to tackle the issues of agrammatism and time reference. The study will help us understand aphasic speakers’ problems when talking about time and thereby provide more effective treatment to facilitate recovery of this important ability

The Investigation of Chinese teaching in Panghudsahasart School Of Thailand

本文以泰国PanghudsahasartSchool为研究对象，对该校汉语课程基本情况、学生的汉语学习、汉语教师及汉语教材等各方面进行全面的研究。笔者通过在学校期间的实地观察和体会，结合使用问卷调查法对该校280名学生进行调查，使用访谈法对该校2位汉语教师进行访谈，最后使用定量统计与分析方法展示出该校汉语教学全面的现状。 论文的具体内容如下：第一章是绪论，内容包括研究背景、研究意义与目的、研究说明以及相关研究成果综述；第二章是学校的汉语教学情况，内容包括学校基本情况、教育历史与教学特点、汉语课程现状；第三章是针对学生的调查，内容包括调查说明、调查结果数据统计及分析；第四章是汉语教师访谈，内容...The purpose of this research is to study about how to learn and how to teach Chinese language of Panghudsahasart School in Thailand. The research methodology is Chinese course investigated; Students, Teachers, material and etc. By the way researcher will collect the data by answering questionnaire from 280 students and interview 2 teachers. And finally the result describe by Quantitative Statistic...学位：教育学硕士院系专业：海外教育学院_汉语国际教育硕士学号：2652014115453

Impacts of Lancang -Mekong Cooperation on Chinese Investment in Eastern Economic Corridor

This article investigates the impacts of Chinese investment on Thailand’s Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) under the Thailand 4.0 policy and the effects from the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation (LMC) under China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) from 2012 to 2019. As a major aspect of Chinese foreign policy, LMC, along with the BRI, focuses on building cooperation and economic connectivity with Mekong countries. Thailand has become one of China’s prime targets for foreign direct investment (FDI). Meanwhile, Thailand benefits by linking the EEC with special economic zones in China, supporting the concentration of technology and innovation in correspondence with the “Thailand 4.0” policy in the current 20-year national development plan. Consequently, Thailand is promoting investments by Chinese investors in the EEC. This research employed qualitative and quantitative methods to study a sample of 200 Chinese entrepreneurs in the EEC. The survey found that the number of Chinese investors has increased significantly in the EEC since 2014. In 2019, Chinese investors had the highest FDI in Thailand. However, the majority of these Chinese industries were (and still are) in relatively low-technology fields. Also, the availability of utility infrastructure for factories in the EEC is still comparatively low, and issues around government services and the availability of labor and resources must still be addressed

An investigation of time reference in production and comprehension in Thai speakers with agrammatic aphasia

Background It has been demonstrated that reference to the past is difficult for individuals with agrammatic aphasia, leading to the formulation of the PAst DIscourse LInking Hypothesis (PADILIH). Many of the previous studies have focused on Indo-European languages, in which time reference is expressed through verb inflection. The current study examined the PADILIH in Thai, a language that does not use verb inflection but instead uses aspectual markers to refer to time. Aims We aimed to evaluate the pattern of impairment of time reference in Thai speakers with agrammatic aphasia, by investigating how grammatical reference to past, present, and future was processed. Methods and Procedures A total of 15 Thai agrammatic speakers and 18 Thai non-brain-damaged (NBD) speakers participated in a sentence production task and an auditory sentence-to-picture matching comprehension task, both of which probed past, present, and future time reference. Outcomes and Results While the NBD participants performed close to ceiling in both production and comprehension, the agrammatic speakers showed significantly more difficulty in conditions requiring reference to the future in both modalities. In production, however, the agrammatic speakers replaced the target future time reference construction with negation (a construction that can be used as an alternative means for future reference). When responses using negation were counted as correct, the individuals with agrammatic aphasia showed equal impairment across conditions. Conclusions The results of this study were inconsistent with the PADILIH predictions: Thai agrammatic speakers experienced more vulnerability in reference to the future than the present and the past. This suggested that impairments of time reference may differ depending on the structure of the language. We hypothesized that the problems with producing future time reference in Thai may be influenced by the grammatical status of the future marker. In addition, the use of negation in place of the target word might have been because this negative construction reduces the processing load for Thai agrammatic speakers

Design and experimental investigation of a lemon cutting machine

The aim of this research is to design, develop and test a lemon cutting machine for processing lemon fruits. A prototype is designed and developed to consist of four main parts. Firstly, a power transmission system is designed as a source of power for driving a mechanism to rotate a rotor and blades. Secondly, a suspension system is fabricated with a lockable wheel that is able to fix the machine during the operation process without moving. Thirdly, a feeder system is constructed to include a hole with an incline tray that assists the feeding of lemons into the machine. Finally, a cutting system is manufactured for slicing a lemon into 2 pieces based on shear force. The experimental investigation is performed by a comparative study between the developed machine and the cutting of lemons by manual labour. The results show that the lemon cutting machine can demonstrate the higher performance than that of manual cutting by 3.31 times. In addition, for the lemon cutting process, the machine can produce the high-quality product of 88.79 %. Moreover, the prediction of lemon shear stress provides the accuracy of 96.50 %

Storia del romanzo rosa in Italia

2011 - 2012Molti sono i testi critici che hanno dedicato attenzione a quel particolare settore della letteratura di consumo che va sotto il nome di “rosa”. Troppo spesso bistrattato, il romanzo femminile per eccellenza ha dovuto a lungo combattere un virulento disprezzo sociale che ne ha impedito un’analisi scevra di pregiudizi negativi, basati su una sua presunta appartenenza ad un sottogenere specificamente riguardante donne di scarsa cultura o, al meglio, ingenue. E d’altronde, se un limite va riconosciuto al romanzo rosa, questo sta proprio nell’inflessibile settorialità della fruizione: il rosa, cioè, unito in questo non casualmente alla letteratura per l’infanzia, si definisce non attraverso una vocazione di lettura, ma per mezzo di dati anagrafici come età e sesso. Grande attenzione è stata rivolta alla “nobile schiera” di narratrici femministe ottocentesche che provarono, molto spesso riuscendoci, a tracciare il triste profilo della vita cittadina delle donne, all’indomani dell’Unità d’Italia. Imprescindibile prodromo, questa letteratura educativa, agli esiti dei primi decenni del XX secolo, che vira verso un estetismo a volte fine a sè stesso, e pure comprende una larvata meditazione sulla condizione femminile, a questo punto estesa a tutti i gangli della società italiana. È proprio a questo punto, nel momento in cui il romanzo femminile sembrava aver imboccato una strada senza via d’uscita, costellata di viveur cinici e donne fatali, figurine monodimensionali buone per ogni occasione, che si assiste all’avvento di una giovane scrittrice capace veramente di “scombiccherare” le carte: Liala, appunto...[a cura dell'autore]XI n.s

The Characteristics of Green Calcium Oxide Derived from Aquatic Materials

AbstractThermogravimetric Analysis of three aquatic materials, i.e. cuttlebone, mussel shell and oyster shell, and other physicochemical characteristics were investigated. The highest decomposition rates of aquatic materials under two surrounding gases, i.e. oxygen and nitrogen, exhibited no significant difference for cuttlebone (3.6×10-5-4.8×10-5 mg s-1 mginitial-1 at heating rate 5°C/min and 11.8 ×10-5 -12.5×10-5 mg s-1 mginitial-1 at heating rate 15°C/min) and mussel shell (3.4×10-5- 5.2×10-5 mg s-1 mginitial-1 at heating rate 5°C/min and 11.9×10-5 – 12.4×10-5 mg s-1 mginitial-1 at heating rate 15°C/min), while oyster shell provided the higher decomposition rate under nitrogen surrounding gas (7.6×10-4 mg s-1 mginitial-1 at heat rate 5°C/min and 21.53×10-4 mg s-1 mginitial-1 at heating rate 15°C/min). This is probably because of the difference in their starting crystalline structures, i.e. aragonite (cuttlebone and mussel shell) and calcite (oyster shell). The cubic calcium oxides were prepared by calcination of three aquatic materials under oxygen and nitrogen surrounding gases at 5°C/min ramping to 850°C for 2hours. All resulting calcium oxides obtained from oxygen atmosphere provided only cubic crystalline phases and the adsorption-desorption isotherms (IUPAC Type III), whereas the calcinations under nitrogen surrounding gas gave a presence of calcium hydroxide crystalline or hydroxyl- contaminate existing with cubic calcium oxide that influences on the strength and the number of carbon dioxide adsorption sites. The specific surface area of all resulting calcium oxides ranged from 0.1 – 1.5 m2/g and the average pore diameter was found in the range of 40-60nm. The the number of basic sites belonging to CaO derived from Oyster shell or Cuttlebone were improved while firing under oxygen atmosphere. The suitable firing condition is at the low heating rate to develop porous materials