Trans-Sense: Real Time Transportation Schedule Estimation Using Smart Phones

Developing countries suffer from traffic congestion, poorly planned road/rail networks, and lack of access to public transportation facilities. This context results in an increase in fuel consumption, pollution level, monetary losses, massive delays, and less productivity. On the other hand, it has a negative impact on the commuters feelings and moods. Availability of real-time transit information - by providing public transportation vehicles locations using GPS devices - helps in estimating a passenger's waiting time and addressing the above issues. However, such solution is expensive for developing countries. This paper aims at designing and implementing a crowd-sourced mobile phones-based solution to estimate the expected waiting time of a passenger in public transit systems, the prediction of the remaining time to get on/off a vehicle, and to construct a real time public transit schedule. Trans-Sense has been evaluated using real data collected for over 800 hours, on a daily basis, by different Android phones, and using different light rail transit lines at different time spans. The results show that Trans-Sense can achieve an average recall and precision of 95.35% and 90.1%, respectively, in discriminating lightrail stations. Moreover, the empirical distributions governing the different time delays affecting a passenger's total trip time enable predicting the right time of arrival of a passenger to her destination with an accuracy of 91.81%.In addition, the system estimates the stations dimensions with an accuracy of 95.71%.Comment: 8 pages, 11 figures

Consequences to the Stock Market Caused by Currency Fluctuations: Jordanian Evidence

Purpose: The aim of this study is to examine the fluctuations in currency exchange in the stock market, as it relates to the Jordanian market.   Theoretical framework:  The study's main goal is to identify how Jordanian SMR changes in currency exchange are influenced. Thus, the rational expectations theory has been used in this study. This theory illustrates three key aspects that influence the decision to participate in the stock market, including the availability of information, prior experience, and human reason.   Design/ methodology/approach: The study incorporates the quantitative design, in which, information was extracted from secondary sources i.e. Investing.com. The information has been compiled considering the exchange rates, stock market returns, and cotton prices, beginning in 2015 and ending in 2020. The analysis has been conducted with Granger Causality test, VAR, and ADF.   Findings: The results of this study concludes that fluctuations of exchange rates do not impact changes in cotton prices and the returns of the Jordanian stock exchange.   Research, Practical & Social implications: The study is limited to Jordan, as only Jordan’s cotton price and stock market return data have been gathered. In addition, the time period of consideration of data is confined from 2015 to 2019, limiting the study’s scope.    Originality/Value: The study uses sensitivity analysis to investigate the robustness of the impacts of fluctuations in currency exchange in the stock market, as it relates to the Jordanian market

BlockCampus: A Blockchain-Based DApp for enhancing Student Engagement and Reward Mechanisms in an Academic Community for E-JUST University

In today's digital age, online communities have become an integral part of our lives, fostering collaboration, knowledge sharing, and community engagement. Higher education institutions, in particular, can greatly benefit from dedicated platforms that facilitate academic discussions and provide incentives for active participation. This research paper presents a comprehensive study and implementation of a decentralized application (DApp) leveraging the blockchain technology to address these needs specifically for E-JUST (Egypt-Japan University of Science and Technology) students and academic staff

Recurrent Hepatocellular Carcinoma in Patient with Crohn\u27s Disease: Incidental or Expected Outcome of Azathioprine?

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) usually occurs in patients with underlying risk factors such as liver cirrhosis and chronic hepatitis B. Although patients with Crohn’s disease (CD) are at an increased risk to develop malignancies such as colon cancer, the incidence of HCC in this population is extremely rare. We report a case of 62-year-old male with long history of CD treated with azathioprine (AZA) and aminosalicylic acid (ASA) who was incidentally diagnosed with HCC, for which left hepatectomy was done. Four years later during routine follow-up, patient had another hepatic lesion and underwent resection of the mass. The mechanism of occurrence of HCC in patient with CD is still controversial and may include immune mediated changes and medication related complications. AZA was reported in all case reports of CD that developed HCC.Through this report we hope to explore the complex pathophysiological mechanisms contributing to the development of HCC in the Crohn’s disease patient population