Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Thermodynamics studies on the adsorption of phenol from aqueous solution by coffee husk activated carbon

Activated carbons (ACs) obtained from coffee husk by KOH activation at 650 (ACK-650) and 750oC (ACK-750), were used as an adsorbent for the adsorption of phenol from aqueous solution. The ACs was characterized by SEM, EDX, BET, and Boehm titration techniques. The experimental equilibrium data of phenol adsorption was analyzed by eight isotherm models, which are four two-parameter equations (Langmuir, Freundlich, Elovich, and Temkin) and four three-parameter equations (Redlich-Peterson, Sips, Radke-Prausnitz, and Toth). The results reveal that in general, three-parameter isotherms can provide better prediction than two-parameter isotherms. The best fit for ACK-650 sample is Sips isotherm, while for ACK-750 sample is Redlich–Peterson isotherm. Isosteric heat and thermodynamic parameters ΔGo, ΔHo, and ΔSo of the adsorption were determined, and the results showed that the adsorption of phenol was exothermic and physical in nature. A scale-up of a batch system is designed for 2 to 10 L phenol with an initial concentration of 100 mg L-1.
Photocatalytic degradation of two different types of dyes by synthesized La/Bi2WO6

A lanthanum doped Bi2WO6 composite (La/Bi2WO6) was prepared using a simple hydrothermal method. The synthesized samples were well characterized using XRD, SEM, TEM, UV-vis DRS, XPS, and BET analysis methods. The photocatalytic activities of La/Bi2WO6 on reactive brilliant red X-3B (X-3B) and rhodamine B (RhB), under simulated solar irradiation, were systematically investigated. As a result, the doped Bi2WO6 samples possessed a higher specific surface area than pure Bi2WO6, but still retained the crystalline phases, morphology and visible light absorption properties of pure Bi2WO6. The initial concentrations of dyes, the dosage of catalyst and H2O2 all displayed the same effects on the degradation of the two dyes. However, pH showed different effects on X-3B and RhB because X-3B is an anionic dye while RhB is a cationic dye. Moreover, among all the inorganic ions studied (Na+, K+, Ca2+, Mg2+, NO3−, HCO3−, Cl−, SO42−), the addition of Cl− significantly affected the adsorption and degradation of the two dyes; Cl− inhibited the total removal efficiency of X-3B, but enhanced the removal efficiency of RhB. The effects of inorganic cations were attributed to the effect of Cl− because the four metal ions were used as their chloride salts.
Introducing platform ecosystem resilience: leveraging mobility platforms and their ecosystems for the new normal during COVID-19

ABSTRACT COVID-19 has created many constraint-related challenges for humans in general and organisations in particular. Specifically, businesses that require physical contact, such as mobility providers, have been severely impacted by the crisis. This paper reveals how mobility platforms and their ecosystem of actors have adapted faster than their non-platform competitors to become resilient. Whereas current research on resilience explicitly deals with the concept of organisational resilience, community resilience, or IT resilience, socio-technical characteristics of digital platforms have not been investigated. We build on a case survey approach, including heterogeneous qualitative evidence of 266 actions of 171 analysed mobility platforms. The results show five archetypes of how mobility platforms leverage their platform-based nature and the ecosystem to build resilience. Based on this, we develop the concept of platform ecosystem resilience as leveraging socio-technical factors of digital platforms and ecosystems frugally to design, deploy and use situation-specific responses to prepare for, endure and adapt by capturing new opportunities and engaging in transformative activities to cope with exogenous shocks and become resilient for future disruptions. Our results emphasise the importance of platform ecosystems for practitioners and policy planners to develop the “new normal” rather than resuming existing practices.
Coastal upwelling and seasonal variation in phytoplankton biomass in the Pemba Channel

This study was conducted in the Pemba Channel off Tanga Region in northern Tanzania to investigate physical and chemical factors that drive changes in phytoplankton biomass. Three transects off Mwaboza, Vyeru and Sahare were selected. For each transect, ten stations were sampled. Phytoplankton biomass was determined as chlorophyll-a (Chl-a) concentration. Similarly, physico-chemical variables (temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, pH and nutrients) were determined. It was observed that the Chl-a concentration was significantly higher during the northeast monsoon (median 1.44 mg m-3) as compared to the southeast monsoon (median 1.19 mg m-3; W = 2216, p = 0.029). The higher productivity during the northeast monsoon is attributed to the presence of high-nutrient water caused by coastal upwelling. It is concluded that indication of upwelling, observed through relatively low temperatures during the northeast monsoon season, could be responsible for bringing nutrient-rich waters to the surface, which in turn stimulated the increase in Chl-a concentration.
Fostering Independence While Teaching Students With or at Risk for Reading Disabilities

The Gradual Release of Responsibility (GRR) model for instructional delivery is well supported by research evidence and is often identified as a critical element of instruction for students with learning difficulties. However, there are challenges associated with effectively releasing responsibility to students. This may be especially true during instruction for primary-grade students with or at risk for learning disabilities. In general, educators want to provide a high level of support to young, struggling students in order to ensure that they feel successful and bolster their confidence. However, too much support means that students are not provided with opportunities for independent practice or independent mastery of content being taught. This article describes the GRR model of instruction and provides specific guidance and resources to support special education teachers in implementing the GRR model during small-group reading instruction in primary-grade classrooms, with a particular emphasis on facilitating group and independent practice.
In Vivo Kinematic Analysis of Bicruciate-Retaining Total Knee Arthroplasty Focused on Function of the ACL

uncertain. In this study, we performed an in vivo kinematic analysis of squat motion on level ground and on a downward slope in patients treated with BCR-TKA to examine the value of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) preservation.Methods: The subjects were ten valgus knees that underwent TKA (BCR: 5 knees, CR: 5 knees) at our hospital. We evaluated in vivo kinematics of the knee using fluoroscopy and investigated the femoral component translation relative to the tibial component from extension to maximum flexion, and the rotation angle between the components under the two conditions. Statistical analysis was conducted by Mann-Whitney U test to compare the rotational angle, the location of lateral and medial contact points per flexion angle. Differences in these parameters between the BCR and CR groups across the flexion angles were compared by repeated measures ANOVA. Results: Rotation of the femoral component to the tibial component occurred gradually as flexion continued. On level ground, lateral rotation at 0° to 120° flexion was 14.5±1.95° in the BCR group and 7.9±0.47° in the CR group. Medial translation was 4.1±1.73mm in the BCR group and 2.5±1.64mm in the CR group, and lateral translation was 13.2±1.6mm in the BCR group and 7.1±1.74mm in the CR group. On a forward slope, lateral rotation was 12.7±1.45° in the BCR group and 7.57±0.47° in the CR group. Medial translation was 5.87±1.78mm in the BCR and 2.9±0.81mm in the CR, and lateral translation was 13.6±1.84mm in the BCR and 7.4±0.96mm in the CR.Conclusion: An in vivo kinetics analysis of deep flexion motion was conducted on level ground and on a forward slope to stress the ACL. Under both conditions, kinetics close to screw home movement were found in the BCR group and rotation was significantly larger than that in the CR group. The medial contact point between components was located significantly more anterior in the BCR group. In conclusion, BCR-TKA was found to have in vivo kinetics close to those of a normal knee, in comparison with CR-TKA.
From pandemic to systemic risk: contagion in the U.S. tourism sector

ABSTRACT This paper investigates the interconnectedness among 95 tourism firms in the U.S. over the 2018–2020 period with a focus on the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. The results using tail risk spillover analysis show that the level of risk contagion significantly increased during the Covid-19 pandemic. Small tourism firms become more systemically important during the Covid-19 pandemic while the level of bad risk contagion has a negative impact on the stock performance of US tourism firms.
A high-throughput study of oxynitride, oxyfluoride and nitrofluoride perovskites

Perovskite solar devices are nowadays the fastest advancing photovoltaic technology. Their large-scale application is however restrained by instability and toxicity issues. Alloying is a promising way to stabilize perovskites, optimizing at the same time their absorption and charge-transport properties. We perform an extensive computational study of the thermodynamic stability and electronic properties of oxynitride, oxyfluoride and nitrofluoride perovskites. We consider quaternary stoichiometries of the type ABX2Y, where A and B are any elements of the periodic table and X and Y are nitrogen, oxygen, or fluorine. As a starting point we explore the composition space using a simple five-atom perovskite unit cell. We then filter the candidate compositions according to their distance to the convex hull of thermodynamic stability. For the most stable systems, we then investigate other prototype structures, including more complex perovskite phases that allow for octahedral distortions, and a few non-perovskite geometries. Furthermore, for some paradigmatic cases, we study the effect of disorder by exhaustive enumeration of all possible disordered stoichiometric phases with up to 20 atoms in the unit cell. Our calculations are in very good agreement with data for experimentally known mixed anionic compounds, and predict a series of novel stable (perovskite and non-perovskite) oxynitride and oxyfluoride phases, including some with unexpected chemical composition, and one single nitrofluoride compound. Finally, we calculate and discuss the electronic properties of these compounds and their potential for application as photovoltaic absorbers.
Comparative Proteomics of Schistosoma Japonicum Developed From Different Oncomelania Snails Permissive Areas

Background: Schistosomiasis is an important zoonotic parasitic disease that is widely prevalent in tropical and subtropical countries and regions in the worldwide.Methods: We aimed to analyze the proteomic differences between adult S. japonicum worms in Weishan Lake of Shandong province and the Jiangsu Yangtse river. Isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantification (iTRAQ) assays were used to analyze the differential proteomic profiles between female and male adult worms.Results: A total of 2364 adult S. japonicum proteins were identified, and 1901 proteins were quantified by isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantification (iTRAQ) technology. Our results revealed 68 differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) in female adult worms and 55 DEPs in male adult worms. LC-MS/MS and bioinformatics analysis indicated that these DEPs are enriched in cellular composition, molecular function, biological function and catabolism pathways. Gene Ontology (GO), Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG), and Domain and Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COG) analyses indicated that several groups of DEPs were involved in regulating transport, metabolism, signal transduction, energy production and conversion, defense and biosynthesis in adult S. japonicum worms. Our findings indicated that adult S. japonicum worms derived from O. hupensis that were transferred from permissive to nonpermissive areas exhibited moderate changes at the proteomic level. Moreover, snails transferred to the Weishan Lake did not change their schistosomiasis transmission ability and remained pathogenic in mice. In addition, three upregulated proteins (peptidylprolyl isomerase, heat shock protein 90α and receptor expression-enhancing protein (Q5DBJ1)) and three downregulated proteins (histone H3, histone H4 and receptor expression-enhancing protein (C1L9D7)) were found in both female and male adult worms. Conclusions: Proteomic analysis showed that differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) between adult S. japonicum worms in Weishan Lake of Shandong province and the Jiangsu Yangtse river. The results of this proteomics analysis of adult worms that hatched in two separate intermediate hosts help to improve our understanding of the growth and developmental mechanisms of S. japonicum in different environments. Under the South-to-North Water Diversion Project (SNWDP) framework, long-term surveillance is needed to prevent the diffusion of O. hupensis and to reduce the risk of schistosomiasis transmission.
Care to Wager Again? An Appraisal of Paul Ehrlich's Counterbet Offer to Julian Simon, Part 2: Critical Analysis

Objective. This paper provides the first comprehensive assessment of the outcome of Paul Ehrlich’s and Stephen Schneider’s counteroffer (1995) to economist Julian Simon following Ehrlich’s loss in the famous Ehrlich-Simon wager on economic growth and the price of natural resources (19801990). Our main conclusion in a previous article is that, for indicators that can be measured satisfactorily or can be inferred from proxies, the outcome favors Ehrlich-Schneider in the first decade following their offer. This second article extends the timeline towards the present time period to examine the long-term trends of each indicator and proxy, and assesses the reasons invoked by Simon to refuse the bet. Methods. Literature review, data gathering, and critical assessment of the indicators and proxies suggested or implied by Ehrlich and Schneider. Critical assessment of Simon’s reasons for rejecting the bet. Data gathering for his alternative indicators. Results. For indicators that can be measured directly, the balance of the outcomes favors the Ehrlich-Schneider claims for the initial ten-year period. Extending the timeline and accounting for the measurement limitations or dubious relevance of many of their indicators, however, shifts the balance of the evidence towards Simon’s perspective. Conclusion. The fact that Ehrlich and Schneider’s own choice of indicators yielded mixed results in the long run, coupled with the fact that Simon’s preferred indicators of direct human welfare yielded largely favorable outcomes is, in our opinion, sufficient to claim that Simon’s optimistic perspective was largely validated.
Plagiarism in higher education across nations: a case of language students

PurposeMany scholars have recognized the cultural dependency of the concept of plagiarism and have investigated the influence of cultural attitude on university students' plagiarism; however, since the findings are inconsistent and because plagiarism is a major concern in academic institutions in Asia, we were motivated to examine the understanding and prevalence of plagiarism among Canadian and some Asian language students.Design/methodology/approachTo elicit the data, the questionnaire developed by Maxwell et al. (2008) was adapted for this study. The scale included three sections. In the initial section, the students' background information was inquired. Section two included 10 scenarios, all of which consisted of two levels; understanding and experience. Section three of the scale consisted of five open-ended questions. In fact, the questions intended to complement the survey findings. Finally, in the fourth section, five yes/no questions were asked. Because the respondents could evade answering some open-ended questions, we developed five questions with yes/no answers in order to probe deeper into the participants' answers.FindingsThe results showed significant differences among the participants concerning both understanding and prevalence of plagiarism. Most of the differences were between Canadian and Asian students in that Canadians had a higher level of understanding. They also enjoyed a lower rate of incidence of plagiarism. Nevertheless, further analyses revealed that the students' academic misconduct is probably influenced by other factors including lack of proper education rather than cultural differences.Social implicationsThe findings lead us to argue that cultural differences may not be the main source of the prevalence of plagiarism across nations and that Asian language university students plagiarize mainly due to a lack of understanding of the principles of plagiarism. Therefore, Asian universities should take measures to make sure that they promote language students' understanding regarding the misconduct.Originality/valueApart from a few studies, no other study has scrutinized plagiarism across cultures. As such, our study attempted to shed more light on the student, especially language students' plagiarism across different nations.
IoT Based Electric Vehicle Application Using Boosting Algorithm for Smart Cities

The application of Internet of Things (IoT) has been emerging as a new platform in wireless technologies primarily in the field of designing electric vehicles. To overcome all issues in existing vehicles and for protecting the environment, electric vehicles should be introduced by integrating an intellectual device called sensor all over the body of electric vehicle with less cost. Therefore, this article confers the need and importance of introducing electric vehicles with IoT based technology which monitors the battery life of electric vehicles. Since the electric vehicles are implemented with internet, an online monitoring system which is called Things Speak has been used for monitoring all the vehicles in a continuous manner (day-by-day). These online results will then be visualized in MATLAB after an effective boosting algorithm is integrated with objective function. The efficiency of proposed method is tested by visual analysis and performance results prove that the projected method on electric vehicle is improved when using IoT based technology. It is also observed that cost of implementation is lesser and capacity of electric vehicle is increased to about 74.3% after continuous monitoring with sensors.
Inverse desert beetle-like ZIF-8/PAN composite nanofibrous membrane for highly efficient separation of oil-in-water emulsions

Purification of highly emulsified oily wastewater is of significance but challenging due to the critical limitations of low efficiency and serious membrane blocking. Herein, inspired by the desert beetle's capability of water-collection in air, we first constructed an inverse desert beetle-like membrane to achieve oil capture in water, thus improving the separation performances of the surfactant-stabilized oil-in-water emulsion. The as-prepared nanofibrous membrane consists of hydrophobic/oleophilic ZIF-8 bumps and underlying underwater superoleophobic polyacrylonitrile (PAN), and possesses a similar structure to desert beetles but with opposite wettability. In the process of emulsion demulsification, besides the sieving effect of the underlying traditional underwater superoleophobic PAN membrane, the bumpy oleophilic ZIF-8 particles of the composite membrane can capture oil, thus strengthening the demulsification ability of the membrane. Furthermore, the separation efficiency of the inverse desert beetle-like membrane is up to 99.92% for surfactant-stabilized oil-in-water emulsion, which is superior to that of traditional single underwater superoleophobic PAN membranes lacking the hydrophobic bump structure. Moreover, for light oil-in-water emulsion, the permeation flux also increases because the captured tiny oil droplets can aggregate subsequently and grow large enough to detach from the underlying surface which greatly reduces the incidence of filter cake formation and congestion. This inverse desert beetle-like membrane opens up new avenues for designing advanced membranes in the oil/water emulsion separation field.
Determinants of Consumers’ Green Purchase Intension a Study of Pakistani Consumers

The main goal of this article is to find the potential positive relationships among constructs (environmental knowledge, environmental concern, supposed product price, quality of green products and environmental attitude) to illuminate consumer preference about green brands. The study applies five constructs to develop an integrated model to enhance green purchase intentions. In addition, this research employs an empirical study by means of the questionnaire survey method to verify the hypotheses and to explore its managerial implications. The empirical results show that environmental concern, environmental knowledge, and supposed product price & quality of green products has statistically significant and positive influence on environmental attitude and purchase preferences for green products of consumer. Likewise, a purchaser’s environmental attitudes also had statistically notable and substantial influence on consumer green purchase intentions. If consumers' have competitive and high deliberations over the price, quality, environmental concerns, and environmental knowledge of green products, it influencially implies to their purchase intentions. Original Research Article Sherwani et al.; AJEBA, 21(2): 53-68, 2021; Article no.AJEBA. 64755 54
A potential antibiofilm, antimicrobial and anticancer activities of chitosan capped gold nanoparticles prepared by γ–irradiation

ABSTRACT Recently, nanotherapy has been considered a promising and rapidly evolving field to combat cancer. Both gold nanoparticles and chitosan are interesting materials with biological and antitumor properties. The present study aimed to synthesise chitosan/gold nanocomposites (Cs/Au) using gamma irradiation technique and to study their anticancer, antibiofilm and antimicrobial activities. The synthesized Cs/Au nanocomposites were characterized using various analytical tools such as UV-vis, XRD, and TEM. UV-vis absorption spectra exhibited a surface plasmon resonance (SPR) peak at 525 nm that confirming the successful synthesis of colloidal AuNPs. The TEM image demonstrates well-dispersed spherical shaped Au nanoparticles. The cytotoxic activity of Cs/Au nanocomposites was examined against HepG-2 and CACO-2 cell lines in comparison to free chitosan using neutral red assay test. The Cs/Au nanocomposites inhibited the proliferation of cancer cells more than chitosan. Moreover, the prepared Cs/Au nanocomposites showed antibacterial and antibiofilm activities encouraging its potential candidature for biomedical and pharmaceutical purposes.