Re-Viewing the Mass Communication Education Curriculum. Case for Language/Linguistics, Communication Synergy.

Curriculum review of any academic curriculum is one way of demonstrating the dynamism of such discipline. Mass Communication as a dynamic discipline is one such beneficiary of curriculum review. In line with Iwuchukwu’s (2010) earlier submission that no graduate of any academic level or discipline worth’s more than the curriculum that produces him/her, it was an observed inability of some practicing journalists, especially, those in the print. To handle ethical issues, which was traced to a lacuna in the curriculum that led to the introduction of the course, ethics. This paper seeks to unveil another obvious lapse among mass communication practitioners cutting across, print, broadcast and electronic media. It further highlights that such lapses as incompetence in language use, both at the phonetic, phonological semantic. Syntactic stylistic and even psycholinguistic to be a direct fall out of a perceived lacuna in the present mass communication education curriculum especially in Nigeria. We contend that a review of the present curriculum is glaringly imperative recommending not only the inclusion of more language/linguistic courses but also a stronger synergy between language/linguistics and mass communication. This is our opinion could be boosted with a course "Language and Communication not only though to all mass communication students at all levels, but it being recognized as another Sub-field of specialization by mass communication graduates who wish to further their stadium at the postgraduates levels as in the case in the University of Calabar

Testing and validating the CERES-wheat (Crop Estimation through Resource and Environment Synthesis-wheat) model in diverse environments

CERES-Wheat is a computer simulation model of the growth, development, and yield of spring and winter wheat. It was designed to be used in any location throughout the world where wheat can be grown. The model is written in Fortran 77, operates on a daily time stop, and runs on a range of computer systems from microcomputers to mainframes. Two versions of the model were developed: one, CERES-Wheat, assumes nitrogen to be nonlimiting; in the other, CERES-Wheat-N, the effects of nitrogen deficiency are simulated. The report provides the comparisons of simulations and measurements of about 350 wheat data sets collected from throughout the world

A protocol for a randomised controlled trial of prefabricated versus customised foot orthoses for people with rheumatoid arthritis: the FOCOS RA trial [Foot Orthoses – Customised v Off-the-Shelf in Rheumatoid Arthritis]

Abstract Background Foot pain is common in rheumatoid arthritis and appears to persist despite modern day medical management. Several clinical practice guidelines currently recommend the use of foot orthoses for the treatment of foot pain in people with rheumatoid arthritis. However, an evidence gap currently exists concerning the comparative clinical- and cost-effectiveness of prefabricated and customised foot orthoses in people with early rheumatoid arthritis. Early intervention with orthotics may offer the best opportunity for positive therapeutic outcomes. The primary aim of this study is to evaluate the comparative clinical- and cost-effectiveness of prefabricated versus customised orthoses for reducing foot pain over 12 months. Methods/design This is a multi-centre two-arm parallel randomised controlled trial comparing prefabricated versus customised orthoses in participants with early rheumatoid arthritis (< 2 years disease duration). A total of 160 (a minimum of 80 randomised to each arm) eligible participants will be recruited from United Kingdom National Health Service Rheumatology Outpatient Clinics. The primary outcome will be foot pain measured via the Foot Function Index pain subscale at 12 months. Secondary outcomes will include foot related impairments and disability via the Foot Impact Scale for rheumatoid arthritis, global functional status via the Stanford Health Assessment Questionnaire, foot disease activity via the Rheumatoid Arthritis Foot Disease Activity Index, and health-related quality of life at baseline, 6 and 12 months. Process outcomes will include recruitment/retention rates, data completion rates, intervention adherence rates, and participant intervention and trial participation satisfaction. Cost-utility and cost-effectiveness analyses will be undertaken. Discussion Outcome measures collected at baseline, 6 and 12 months will be used to evaluate the comparative clinical- and cost- effectiveness of customised versus prefabricated orthoses for this treatment of early rheumatoid arthritis foot conditions. This trial will help to guide orthotic prescription recommendations for the management of foot pain for people with early rheumatoid arthritis in future. Trial registration ISRCTN13654421. Registered 09 February 2016

Community based local management of fisheries - a paradigm from Minicoy, Lakshadweep, lndia

Traditional practices related to fishing observed by the fishermen of Minicoy, Lakshadweep with a mew to conserve the resource and avoid conflicts among them are detailed here

Feeding habits of skipjack tuna, Katsuwonus pelamis associated with flotsam in Minicoy, Lakshadweep

Feeding habits of skipjack tuna associated with flotsam and those from free schools were studied based on data collected from the pole and line fishery from Minicoy during 1999-2001. The flotsam were found in different months but was more frequent during Sept. to Nov. A preponderance of smaller siz-e groups below 40 cm (48%) was seen around flotsam whereas in free schools size groups above 50 cm (65%) dominated. Stomach contents of 828 individuals were analysed. In flotsam associated skipjack, stomachs were found to be either empty or with natural prey. Caridian shrimps were found to be the main food in all size groups/and were actively fed. The average ration per 1000 g body weight ranged between 17.3 and 39.4 ml suggesting that the flotsam have a function related to feeding rather than refuge

Writing as a Therapeutic Agent for Collective Healing in the Poems of Tensin Tsundue

Almost all people experience trauma in their life. Surviving in the era that has witnessed a lot of trauma, a millennium composed of two world wars and cold wars, has made every human being experience chains of trauma. Traumatic problems affect a person mentally and physically. There is a long history of human associating himself through a way or therapy to find himself out of the Post Traumatic Stress Disorders (PTSD). This paper projects the importance of writing that serves as a therapy, with the backdrop of the Tibetan writer Tensin Tsundue. Tibet at present undergoes the tough situations due to the Chinese invasion and Tibetans are mostly away from their homeland and staying as refugees in other countries. Tensin Tsundue is a Tibetan activist and writer, and his works bring out the reality of the Tibetan struggle, where his poems stand as a placard for the readers to identify the lost identity of Tibetans. This paper brings out the importance of writing as a therapy to overcome the traumatic stress, and it analyses how an individual writing brings the impact of collective healing into action

An Economic analysis of the potential for precision farming in UK cereal production

The results from alternative spatial nitrogen application studies are analysed in economic terms and compared to the costs of precision farming hardware, software and other services for cereal crops in the UK. At current prices, the benefits of variable rate application of nitrogen exceed the returns from a uniform application by an average of £22 ha−1 The cost of the precision farming systems range from £5 to £18 ha−1 depending upon the system chosen for an area of 250 ha. The benefits outweigh the associated costs for cereal farms in excess of 80 ha for the lowest price system to 200–300 ha for the more sophisticated systems. The scale of benefits obtained depends upon the magnitude of the response to the treatment and the proportion of the field that will respond. To be cost effective, a farmed area of 250 ha of cereals, where 30% of the area will respond to variable treatment, requires an increase in crop yield in the responsive areas of between 0·25 and 1.00 t ha−1 (at £65 t−1) for the basic and most expensive precision farming systems, respectively

Approaches for Automated Object Recognition and Extraction from Images — a Study

Digital Image Interpretation is one of the most challenging and important tasks in many scientific and engineering applications. The two vital subtasks in image interpretation are recognition and extraction of object(s) of interest (OOI) from an image. When such tasks are manually performed, it calls for human experts, making them more time consuming, less cost effective and highly constrained. These negative factors led to the development of a computer system which performed an automatic analysis of visual information in order to bring in consistency, efficiency and accuracy in image analysis. This paper focuses on the survey of various existing automated approaches for recognition and extraction of OOI from an image in various scientific and engineering applications. In this work a categorization of these approaches is made based on the four principle factors (Input, Object, Feature, Attention) with which each approach is driven. Most of the approaches discussed in this paper are proved to work efficiently in real environments

Trade openness and economic growth in East African Community economies: A panel causality test

Abstract. In spite of financial liberalization that has been discussed and studied over the past decades, the debate for the East African Community (EAC) still remain open on the relationship between trade openness and economic growth that has a link with trade-economic policies. This paper analyzes the relationship by employing the modern methodology of Dumistrescu &amp; Hurlin (2012) Panel Causality test, The Test involved a scope of 46 years from 1970-2016. The empirical finding shows that there is a bidirectional movement (causality) as trade openness increase or relaxed lead to the growth of the economy in the East African Community. The results are supported by the endogenous growth theory that openness increases economic growth. There is a feedback relationship. The main operational implication of these empirical results is that the governments of the East African economies should dismantle barriers to trade to make sure that their intended objective is not ephemeral.Keywords. East African Community, Economic growth, Panel causality test, Trade openness.JEL. C59, F43, O24