Utilitarianism and liberal religious approach and Islamic corporations: distortion vs. protection of classical Islamic law

Utilitarianism and liberal religious approaches constitute two important results of Muhammed Abdou\u27s project for modernizing Islamic law. Utilitarianism religious approach has dominated the Islamic legal field since the 19th century, the era of nationalist awakenings when Al-sanhurÄ« introduced his project on modernizing Islamic law. It requires cutting and pasting the supporting opinions to any argument from different Islamic schools of law. Liberal religious approach started gaining importance lately by modern Islamic scholars as a result of the increasing modern problems that were never discussed by classical Islamic scholars. It requires the reinterpretation of the main sources of Islamic law. The comparison between both approaches is important in revealing their effect on the content and organization classical Islamic law. The case of corporations constitutes the common discussed issue by both approaches. Modern Islamic scholars disagree on the adopted approach that reveals whether Islamic law recognizes corporations as legal persons or it does not. On one hand, Zahraa provides the jurisprudential bases for SanhurÄ«\u27s argument on the legal personality concept in Islamic law. He contends that Islamic law recognizes legal personality. Zahraa faced the problems of the lack of any classical discussions concerning legal personality and the lack of the legal personality terminology. Therefore, he adopted the selective approach on two different levels. On the first level, Zahraa selected the Islamic schools that declare the presumed legal status of the fetus and the missing persons in which the concepts of \u27ahliyyat al-wujÅ«b and dhimma are inherent. On the second level, he selected both concepts and applied them on Islamic entities. On the other hand, Kuran is the only modern scholar who adopted liberal approach in case of corporations. He contends that classical Islamic law does not recognize corporations as legal persons. Kuran reinterpreted Islam\u27s call for community building stated in the Qur\u27Ä n. This call is meant to replace the pre-Islam tribal system. Kuran contends that this call implicitly prevented the formation and the development of groups that enjoy personhood since they may affect Muslims\u27 solidarity in the Islamic East. He supported his argument when he introduced the establishment of corporations in the Christian west where the call for community building did not exist. This explains why the historical development of entities in the Islamic East does not show any incorporated form of entities a few years after the advent of Islam. This is specifically applied to the waqf. However, a millennium later, although the effect of this call diminished, other reasons contributed to the stagnation of Middle Eastern organization. The comparison between both approaches is important in revealing their effect on the content and structure of classical Islamic law. This comparison concluded in that although Zahraa perceives a distorting method to the classical Islamic writings to prove that Islamic law recognizes legal status of Islamic entities, Kuran perceives a protecting method to the classical Islamic writings to prove that Islamic law does not recognize corporations as legal persons

Developing advanced mathematical models for detecting abnormalities in 2D/3D medical structures.

Detecting abnormalities in two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) medical structures is among the most interesting and challenging research areas in the medical imaging field. Obtaining the desired accurate automated quantification of abnormalities in medical structures is still very challenging. This is due to a large and constantly growing number of different objects of interest and associated abnormalities, large variations of their appearances and shapes in images, different medical imaging modalities, and associated changes of signal homogeneity and noise for each object. The main objective of this dissertation is to address these problems and to provide proper mathematical models and techniques that are capable of analyzing low and high resolution medical data and providing an accurate, automated analysis of the abnormalities in medical structures in terms of their area/volume, shape, and associated abnormal functionality. This dissertation presents different preliminary mathematical models and techniques that are applied in three case studies: (i) detecting abnormal tissue in the left ventricle (LV) wall of the heart from delayed contrast-enhanced cardiac magnetic resonance images (MRI), (ii) detecting local cardiac diseases based on estimating the functional strain metric from cardiac cine MRI, and (iii) identifying the abnormalities in the corpus callosum (CC) brain structure—the largest fiber bundle that connects the two hemispheres in the brain—for subjects that suffer from developmental brain disorders. For detecting the abnormal tissue in the heart, a graph-cut mathematical optimization model with a cost function that accounts for the object’s visual appearance and shape is used to segment the the inner cavity. The model is further integrated with a geometric model (i.e., a fast marching level set model) to segment the outer border of the myocardial wall (the LV). Then the abnormal tissue in the myocardium wall (also called dead tissue, pathological tissue, or infarct area) is identified based on a joint Markov-Gibbs random field (MGRF) model of the image and its region (segmentation) map that accounts for the pixel intensities and the spatial interactions between the pixels. Experiments with real in-vivo data and comparative results with ground truth (identified by a radiologist) and other approaches showed that the proposed framework can accurately detect the pathological tissue and can provide useful metrics for radiologists and clinicians. To estimate the strain from cardiac cine MRI, a novel method based on tracking the LV wall geometry is proposed. To achieve this goal, a partial differential equation (PDE) method is applied to track the LV wall points by solving the Laplace equation between the LV contours of each two successive image frames over the cardiac cycle. The main advantage of the proposed tracking method over traditional texture-based methods is its ability to track the movement and rotation of the LV wall based on tracking the geometric features of the inner, mid-, and outer walls of the LV. This overcomes noise sources that come from scanner and heart motion. To identify the abnormalities in the CC from brain MRI, the CCs are aligned using a rigid registration model and are segmented using a shape-appearance model. Then, they are mapped to a simple unified space for analysis. This work introduces a novel cylindrical mapping model, which is conformal (i.e., one to one transformation and bijective), that enables accurate 3D shape analysis of the CC in the cylindrical domain. The framework can detect abnormalities in all divisions of the CC (i.e., splenium, rostrum, genu and body). In addition, it offers a whole 3D analysis of the CC abnormalities instead of only area-based analysis as done by previous groups. The initial classification results based on the centerline length and CC thickness suggest that the proposed CC shape analysis is a promising supplement to the current techniques for diagnosing dyslexia. The proposed techniques in this dissertation have been successfully tested on complex synthetic and MR images and can be used to advantage in many of today’s clinical applications of computer-assisted medical diagnostics and intervention

A Hybrid Model to Extend Vehicular Intercommunication V2V through D2D Architecture

In the recent years, many solutions for Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) communication were proposed to overcome failure problems (also known as dead ends). This paper proposes a novel framework for V2V failure recovery using Device-to-Device (D2D) communications. Based on the unified Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) architecture, LTE-based D2D mechanisms can improve V2V dead ends failure recovery delays. This new paradigm of hybrid V2V-D2D communications overcomes the limitations of traditional V2V routing techniques. According to NS2 simulation results, the proposed hybrid model decreases the end to end delay (E2E) of messages delivery. A complete comparison of different D2D use cases (best & worst scenarios) is presented to show the enhancements brought by our solution compared to traditional V2V techniques.Comment: 6 page

Scalable and Cost Efficient Algorithms for Virtual CDN Migration

Virtual Content Delivery Network (vCDN) migration is necessary to optimize the use of resources and improve the performance of the overall SDN/NFV-based CDN function in terms of network operator cost reduction and high streaming quality. It requires intelligent and enticed joint SDN/NFV migration algorithms due to the evident huge amount of traffic to be delivered to end customers of the network. In this paper, two approaches for finding the optimal and near optimal path placement(s) and vCDN migration(s) are proposed (OPAC and HPAC). Moreover, several scenarios are considered to quantify the OPAC and HPAC behaviors and to compare their efficiency in terms of migration cost, migration time, vCDN replication number, and other cost factors. Then, they are implemented and evaluated under different network scales. Finally, the proposed algorithms are integrated in an SDN/NFV framework. Index Terms: vCDN; SDN/NFV Optimization; Migration Algorithms; Scalability Algorithms.Comment: 9 pages, 11 figures, 4 tableaux, conference Local Computer Networks (LCN), class

Assisting V2V failure recovery using Device-to-Device Communications

This paper aims to propose a new solution for failure recovery (dead-ends) in Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) communications through LTE-assisted Device-to-Device communications (D2D). Based on the enhanced networking capabilities offered by Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) architecture, our solution can efficiently assist V2V communications in failure recovery situations. We also derive an analytical model to evaluate generic V2V routing recovery failures. Moreover, the proposed hybrid model is simulated and compared to the generic model under different constrains of worst and best cases of D2D discovery and communication. According to our comparison and simulation results, the hybrid model decreases the delay for alarm message propagation to the destination (typically the Traffic Control Center TCC) through the Road Side Unit (RSU)Comment: 3 page

Toward a Robust, Coordinated and Effective System of Technology and Knowledge Transfer in Transportation Research

Technology and know-how transfer encompasses policies, practices and activities needed to facilitate the adoption of products or procedures by a user or group of users. Transfer of know-how produced by research and innovation activities is a means to directly affect improvements to the transportation system, leverage resources and maximize return on valuable research investments. The lack of robust, coordinated systems of technology and knowledge transfer leads to a waste of research dollars, and undermines the enterprise of research and innovation. Mainstreaming of research products and promoting their use is critical. While there is a huge body of literature on technology transfer, in the transportation fileld and in other disciplines, the shift to collaborative governance as a paradigm of leadership create new opportunities for significantly strengthening transfer of technologies and know-how across and within national border

ISLAMIC MICROFINANCE: MOVING BEYOND FINANCIAL INCLUSION

The current situation of high unemployment and the widening whole of the disadvantaged people in Muslims countries have awakened the need for proper access to microfinance. Currently, poor and low income people in Muslim countries have little access to either conventional or Islamic microfinance. This article is an attempt to investigate to what extend Islamic microfinance can best help in alleviating poverty in Muslim communities. The results showed that conventional microfinance concentrates on the lowincome group. However, it excluded the destitute people from microcredit and other related activities such as saving and skills improvement both financially and socially. Furthermore, the result indicates that Islamic microfinance is moving beyond conventional counterpart to provide effective social and financial inclusion simultaneously. This is done through Islamic social tools such as Sadaqah, waqf, and Zakah, which is to be given directly to the extremely poor either in cash or in kind to satisfy their basic needs before granting them microcredit.Thus, these results are a good motivation to those who provide microfinance in these countries to improve the social and financial inclusions of the disadvantaged people. Hence, this can be achieved by adopting Islamic microcredit

Enhancement of data transmission for mobile multi hop relay worldwide interoperability for microwave access network

Mobile Multi-hop Relay (MMR) Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) uses Non-Transparent Relay Station (NT-RS) to extend the Base Station (BS) coverage and improve the channel quality and throughput of the network. Nevertheless, the use of NT-RS in MMR WiMAX network increases the delay of relaying packets across multiple hops. Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) and Automatic Repeat reQuest (ARQ) are used to achieve the data transmission reliability in the wireless systems. However, the setting of ARQ parameters are optimised for single hop network and it does not consider the Quality of Service (QoS) limits required of WiMAX networks. In addition, the TCP is adapted to deal with the congestion in the wired network without considering the QoS requirements. In order to enhance the performance of data transmission over MMR WiMAX networks, resource management, transmission control and error control mechanisms should be optimised for MMR WiMAX network. Therefore, this research proposes resource management schemes to decrease the delay of relaying the packets across multiple hops scenario. Transmission control mechanism is then proposed to optimise the transmission control for MMR WiMAX network. Lastly, ARQ parameters are optimised to enhance the link utilisation in order to achieve the QoS rates required. The proposed algorithms performances are evaluated through simulation work. The proposed resource management schemes reduce the delay of relaying packets across multiple hops by 33% and 40% for the second and third hops respectively. Therefore, the link layer throughput is enhanced by 35% and 53% and TCP throughput by 30% and 40% for the second and third hops correspondingly. The proposed transmission control scheme reduces the timeout occurrences which increase the resource utilisation up to 90% and hence the TCP throughput is enhanced by 26% to 75% for different hops. In conclusion, the optimised ARQ parameters for MMR WiMAX network reduce the TCP packet loss by 8%, 44% and 64% for the first, second and third hops. Hence, the link layer and TCP performances are improved by 10% to 140% for diverse scenarios