A review on seawater as concrete composites and its effects on the strength and durability

The world is facing a big challenge of balancing a growing population and demand with a natural environment that is increasingly under stress. The rapidly changing environmental conditions especially intensity and frequency of extreme weather it has now become very important to explore in green technology. Effective use of natural resources is pressing concern. Particularly, water resources for drinking are predicted to be in serious shortage in 2050 due to increase in population and rapid urbanization throughout the world. The beginning of the 21st century is straddled with enormous environmental problems of which water shortage is one of the most serious. It is a well-known fact that fresh water resources are continuously declining throughout the world and according to a report by the United Nations, water will be very short in future. It is expected that 5bn people will be short of drinking water in 2050 [1]. In another report published by OECD, it is stated that a number of people living in river basins will be under severe water stress which is expected to be double in 2050 .

IMPROVING EFFICIENCY AND PERFORMANCE OF 5MN HYDRAULIC PRESS THROUGH EFFECTIVE PREVENTIVE MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING AND MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES

The capital cold of this research work is to access the availability of 5 MN hydraulic press and to abate it’s down time in order to ensure maximum plant production capacity rate and to implement an advance and modern preventive maintenance engineering management aliment schedule. This work is agitated out on hydraulic press installed and in working condition in Frontier Ceramics Ltd Peshawar - Pakistan where various undesired and performance gradated breakdowns were centrally focused and analyzed forth with the perilous components of machine, which were beneath breakdown action which were further determined and analyzed though various maintenance techniques. Considering the motives of research, these undesired failures have been scrutinized and reviewed using famous Cause and Effect Analysis with Fish Bone diagram and 5-why techniques and consequently the root cause of these potential failures were investigated. Following these valuable measures the existing machine availability has dramatically enhanced up to a convinced level that will also upturn the required scheduled plant production capacity leading to diminish all the undesired possible maintenance rates and decreases the frequency of machine down time. This in about-face facilitated to advance new-fangled preventive maintenance checklists of determined period for the betterment of machine performance and obviously helpful to avert the possible degrading of machine before it truly transpires. This research work is principally marking at plummeting abandoned spell like sudden failures and to enhance the plant current manufacturing capacities achievement through accretion machine availability, mean time between failures and mean time between failures of critical components of machine that need extensive maintenance techniques and skills. Obviously this work has been accomplished by optimum operation of time necessary for required maintenance, scrutiny regularity as recommended by plant stockholder and of course a considerable opportunity of prior professional practice

Optimizing productivity by eliminating and managing rejection frequency using 5s and kaizens practices: case study

The worldwide demand of ceramic tiles market is projected to spread about 21,000 million square meters by 2020. The rising infrastructure progress activities in emergent countries is expected to motivate the trade growth throughout the estimated period. The industry has fascinated a number of new competitors owing to the fast demand progress, thus executing the business extremely reasonable. The production of ceramic tiles involves two different stages: pre bisque firing kiln processes and post bisque firing kiln processes. Rejection encountered in pre bisque firing kiln processes can be recycled deprived of much damage to the environment however the post bisque firing kiln rejection cannot be reprocessed. On the other hand, greatest amount of thermal energy is consumed in the bisque firing kiln process. This research paper highlights a case study of frontier ceramic ltd to diminish the post bisque firing kiln rejections frequency during the production of ceramic wall tiles. In this perspective, 5S methodology is used to reorganize the workstations and process flow while the application of kaizens philosophy of continuous improvement has directed to 40% decrease in post bisque firing kiln rejection consequently saving energy and damage to environment

Intention to Purchase Halal Cosmetic Products in an Islamic Pakistani Culture

The purpose of this study is to determine the impact of Muslim customers' purchases of halal cosmetic products in Pakistan. Multiple linear regressions were used in this study. The data was collected from 223 Muslims who were all over the age of 18. Product quality, religious belief, halal awareness, personal societal perception, and halal certification were five of the six hypotheses tested. Results were found to have a significant impact on customer intentions to buy halal cosmetic products in Pakistan. According to the findings, customers' intentions to purchase halal cosmetics are influenced by brand perception. According to the findings of this study, halal certification is the most important factor influencing customer intentions to buy halal cosmetics

Evaluation and In Vitro Studies of Folate PEG Biotin and other PEG Agents

Folate is a member of vitamin B family and plays an essential role in cell survival by participating in the biosynthesis of nucleic and amino acids. Receptors folic acid are frequently over expressed on epithelial cancer cells. These receptors are believed to serve as a receptor-mediated transport system of folic acid into cancer cells and cells associated with inflammation. Interesting, most normal cells in the body have lower frequency of these receptors. Based on these attributes, folate based drug delivery, imaging systems, and diagnostic systems are in several stages of development worldwide. In this current project, we have characterized the affinity of the proprietary folate PEG-biotin-fluorescein- (FPBF) conjugate synthesized by Dr. Walter Henne. We have successfully purified and characterized FPBF capture ligand using LC/MS. Further, affinity studies of FPFB towards Streptavidin coated Dynabeads was carried out utilizing fluorescein microscopy. It was demonstrated that the conjugate has site specific interaction toward the Streptavidin coated Dynabeads, a much important characteristic for the effective cancer cell capture. The inexpensive and previously produced folate probe may be substituted for the more costly and cumbersome antibody based ligands, which are typically used for this method of drug delivery system to treat cancer. This method significantly reduces false positive events associated with non-specific binding and capture of non-targeted cells (a problem associated with the aforementioned affinity capture protocols)

PREPARATION, CHARACTERISATION AND COLLOIDAL STABILITY OF CHITOSAN-TRIPOLYPHOSPHATE NANOPARTICLES: OPTIMISATION OF FORMULATION AND PROCESS PARAMETERS

Objective: Chitosan (CS)–tri polyphosphate (TPP)–nano particles (NPs) have been extensively studied during the past few decades due to their well-recognized applicability in various fields. Thus, the present study was aimed to optimise the fabrication conditions for the preparation of CS-TPP-NPs aiming towards smallest possible size, optimal zeta potential and narrow poly dispersity index (PDI), simultaneously.Methods: CS-TPP-NPs were prepared via ionic cross-linking of CS and TPP and were characterized physico-chemically (particle size, zeta potential and PDI) and morphologically. The influence of several formulation conditions (CS concentrations, CS: TPP mass ratio and initial pH of CS solutions) and process parameters (stirring speed, stirring time, ultra-sonication and ultra-centrifugation) on the colloidal characteristics of CS-TPP-NPs were investigated. In addition, the colloidal stability of the prepared NPs was also assessed on storage.Results: Results clearly identified that the formulation and process parameters showed significant impact on the physico-chemical and morphological characteristics of the CS-TPP-NPs. The CS-TPP-NPs prepared under optimum conditions (CS concentration of 0.2 mg/ml, CS: TPP mass ratio of 7:1, initial pH of CS solution of 4.0, stirred at 700 rpm for 10 min and ultra-centrifuged at 25 000 rpm for 30 min) had shown a mean particle size of ~187±21 nm, zeta potential of+37±3.5 mV, PDI of ~0.28±0.0390 as well as the smooth and round shaped morphology.Conclusion: The present study describes the optimal circumstances to fabricate the CS-TPP-NPs with finest physico-chemical characteristics and also explore the prospects of manipulation and optimisation of the NPs for intended applications.Keywords: Chitosan nanoparticles, Ionic cross-linking, Morphology, Ultra-sonication, Ultra-centrifugation, Colloidal stabilit