Revisiting community engagement in higher education in South Africa from a vantage point of the notion of third mission

Globally, there is increasing realisation that the idea of universities as ivory towers detached from the societies and environments within which they exist and operate, is untenable in the twenty-first century. Instead, there are reasonable expectations that universities should contribute to the realisation of the Millennium Development Goals, promote human welfare, and generally make the world a better place. The notion of third mission provides a cogent philosophy and a pragmatic framework for universities to work towards fulfilling these expectations. The article unpacks and analyses the notion of third mission of universities. It also discusses probable reasons why, despite the notion gaining momentum and being accepted globally, it has not gained much traction in South Africa where the focus is on community engagement which is but one of the myriads of activities that falls with the gamut of the notion of third mission. It contends that universities in South Africa have not made significant impacts with their community engagement activities because of the limited scope and scale of implementation, among others. The article concludes by demonstrating that universities and the broader society in South Africa have more to gain if the universities were to consider institutionalising, planning and effectively implementing third mission programmes

Extremal Black Attractors in 8D Maximal Supergravity

Motivated by the new higher D-supergravity solutions on intersecting attractors obtained by Ferrara et al. in [Phys.Rev.D79:065031-2009], we focus in this paper on 8D maximal supergravity with moduli space [SL(3,R)/SO(3)]x[SL(2,R)/SO(2)] and study explicitly the attractor mechanism for various configurations of extremal black p- branes (anti-branes) with the typical near horizon geometries AdS_{p+2}xS^{m}xT^{6-p-m} and p=0,1,2,3,4; 2<=m<=6. Interpretations in terms of wrapped M2 and M5 branes of the 11D M-theory on 3-torus are also given. Keywords: 8D supergravity, black p-branes, attractor mechanism, M-theory.Comment: 37 page

Reprogramming of lysosomal gene expression by interleukin-4 and Stat6.

BACKGROUND: Lysosomes play important roles in multiple aspects of physiology, but the problem of how the transcription of lysosomal genes is coordinated remains incompletely understood. The goal of this study was to illuminate the physiological contexts in which lysosomal genes are coordinately regulated and to identify transcription factors involved in this control. RESULTS: As transcription factors and their target genes are often co-regulated, we performed meta-analyses of array-based expression data to identify regulators whose mRNA profiles are highly correlated with those of a core set of lysosomal genes. Among the ~50 transcription factors that rank highest by this measure, 65% are involved in differentiation or development, and 22% have been implicated in interferon signaling. The most strongly correlated candidate was Stat6, a factor commonly activated by interleukin-4 (IL-4) or IL-13. Publicly available chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) data from alternatively activated mouse macrophages show that lysosomal genes are overrepresented among Stat6-bound targets. Quantification of RNA from wild-type and Stat6-deficient cells indicates that Stat6 promotes the expression of over 100 lysosomal genes, including hydrolases, subunits of the vacuolar H⁺ ATPase and trafficking factors. While IL-4 inhibits and activates different sets of lysosomal genes, Stat6 mediates only the activating effects of IL-4, by promoting increased expression and by neutralizing undefined inhibitory signals induced by IL-4. CONCLUSIONS: The current data establish Stat6 as a broadly acting regulator of lysosomal gene expression in mouse macrophages. Other regulators whose expression correlates with lysosomal genes suggest that lysosome function is frequently re-programmed during differentiation, development and interferon signaling

The State's Losses at State-owned Enterprises in Persfektif Corruption

State-Owned Enterprises administered by the professional who works with rule and regulation. Steps in the form of profit in money terms, it is not independent of the existence of the risk in the form of the possibility of losses. In carrying out the actions of The State-Owned Enterprises have always been faced with the possibility of obtaining profits or suffer losses. Therefore, the losses that occur in professional decision making should not be casually (not necessarily should) be considered as a deliberate act which is equivalent to committing financial fraudProblem management to State-Owned Enterprises and refines that may give rise to uncertainties in law enforcement corruption, losses arising on a transaction conducted by the perpetrators of State-Owned Enterprises was acts that inflict such losses can be seen as a disadvantage the SOES can be raises the loss of State-Owned Enterprises, considering it as a business entity is seeking a profit, which in its management could be profit or loss depends on how could market mechanism

In-Situ Continuous Production of Hydrogen Gas from Molasses Using Mutated Enterobacter aerogenes ADH43 for Fuel Cell Application

The performance of the continuous stirred tank reactor (CSTR) for the in-situ production of hydrogen gas (H2) integrated with a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) was investigated. Facultative anaerobe fermentation of Enterobacter aerogenes ADH-43 was conducted into CSTR 50 rpm of agitation speed , 37 0C of temperature, 6.3 of pH, and 0.15, 0.3, 0.45, 0.60 h-1 of dilution rate. Bio-H2 produced was assesed after inserting it into a fuel cell to generate electricity and measuring voltages. The system was integrated with a ceramic membrane having 0.2 µm pore size for recycling the retentate cell into reactor and separating the permeate supernatant during the fermentation. The obtained H2 was purified from CO2 by absorption in Ca(OH)2 solution prior to feed to PEMFC. The CSTR was initially operated on batch basis to increase the bacterial cell density to ensure the production of sufficient H2 and develop a feeding culture strategy for the continues operation mode. The result showed that the highest H2 production was achieved at continuous system resulted in 0.30 h-1 of optimum dilution rate. The maximum H2 volume of 9.76 l H2/l sugar , the yield of 1.84 mol H2/mol sugar, and the flow rate of 115 ml H2/min were obtained. Furthermore, colony count of 9.81 log cfu/ml, pH of 5.73, maximum electrical current of 0.38 Ampere, electrical power of 2.20 Watt, and electrical voltage of 5.75 volt after given resistance using LED of 25 ohm was also reached

INFLUENCE OF PHENOLIC COMPOUNDS ON ANTIOXIDANT CAPACITY OF LEAVES EXTRACTS OF MORINGA OLEIFERA FROM TAMANRASSET REGION

In the present research the crude extract and all fractions of Moringa oleifra leaves grown in Tamanrasset, were examined for its antioxidant activities by using three different assays such as DPPH scavenging activity, superoxide anion scavenging activity and phosphomolybdenum capacity.The quantitative estimation of total phenolics, flavonoids and tannins content additionally was calculated by spectrophotometric methods.The results showed that the extracts contained total phenolic compound at concentration of 32.985±0.07 to 309.418 ± 0.71 (mg GAE/g EW) and higher total flavonoids contents of 5.192 ± 0.17 to 44.695 ± 0.23 (mg QE/g EW), for total tannins contents of 3.864 ±0.07 to 15.148 ± 0.66 (mg/g). It also this experiment found out that each extract confirmed a good antioxidant. Consequently, it can be concluded that the phenolic compounds content may be answerable for the good activities of Moringa oleifra leaves

Chemical Composition, Bioactive Compounds, and Antioxidant Activity of Two Wild Edible Mushrooms Armillaria mellea and Macrolepiota procera from Two Countries (Morocco and Portugal)

The present study aimed to investigate the chemical composition, bioactive compounds, and antioxidant activity of two wild edible mushrooms, the honey fungus (Armillaria mellea) and the parasol mushroom (Macrolepiota procera), collected from Northern Morocco (MA) and Portugal (PT). Those species were chosen due to their edibility, nutraceutical, and medicinal properties. Bioactive compounds (ascorbic acid, tannin, total phenolic, total flavonoid, beta-carotene, and lycopene) and their antioxidant activity were determined by spectrophotometric methods. Herein, the fruiting body of the samples revealed a significantly higher amount of bioactive compounds, and values varied between the Moroccan and the Portuguese ones. Methanolic extracts shown a strong antioxidant capacity: Using DPPH free radical-scavenging activity radicals (IC50 1.06-1.32 mg/mL); inhibition of beta-carotene bleaching radicals (IC50 0.09-0.53 mg/mL); and, reducing power radicals (IC50 0.52-1.11 mg/mL). The mushroom species with the highest antioxidant capacity was A. mellea from MA. Chemical composition was analyzed by GC-MS and LC-MS methodologies. GC-MS analysis showed that the most abundant biomolecules group was sugar compositions in the four samples (62.90%, 48.93%, 59.00%, and 53.71%) and the main components were galactitol 16.74%, petroselinic acid 19.83%, d-galactose 38.43%, and glycerol 24.43% in A. mellea (MA), A. mellea (PT), M. procera (MA), and M. procera (PT), respectively. LC-MS analysis of individual phenolic compounds revealed that vanillic acid (198.40 +/- 2.82 mu g/g dry weight (dw) and cinnamic acid (155.20 +/- 0.97 mu g/g dw) were the main compounds detected in A. mellea, while protocatechuic acid (92.52 +/- 0.45 and 125.50 +/- 0.89 mu g/g dw) was predominated in M. procera for MA and PT samples, respectively. In general, the results of this comparative study demonstrate that the geographic and climatic conditions of the collection site can influence biomolecule compounds and antioxidant properties of wild mushrooms. This study contributes to the elaboration of nutritional, nutraceutical, and pharmaceutical databases of the worldwide consumed mushrooms

Water resource management for sustainable development

Water resource management is the cornerstone for sustainable development. According to the United Nations world water development report, one-fifth of the world?s population lives in areas characterized by physical water scarcity.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Quantum information processing using Josephson junctions coupled through cavities

Josephson junctions have been shown to be a promising solid-state system for implementation of quantum computation. The significant two-qubit gates are generally realized by the capacitive coupling between the nearest neighbour qubits. We propose an effective Hamiltonian to describe charge qubits coupled through the cavity. We find that nontrivial two-qubit gates may be achieved by this coupling. The ability to interconvert localized charge qubits and flying qubits in the proposed scheme implies that quantum network can be constructed using this large scalable solid-state system.Comment: 5 pages, to appear in Phys Rev A; typos corrected, solutions in last eqs. correcte