bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Non-invasive Hemodynamic Monitoring of Fluid Resuscitation in Cirrhotic Patients with Acute Kidney Injury
Authors: El Hadidy Samir , Albadry Ahmed , Radwan Waheed , Metwaly Amna , Farouk Khaled
Published: July 2020

BACKGROUND: Fluid management of patients with liver cirrhosis and acute kidney injury (AKI) is a complex problem requiring accurate assessment of the intravascular volume status and the cause of the AKI. Echocardiography used in various hemodynamic monitoring as a quick, easy, bedside, and non-invasive tool with great sensitivity.
AIM: This study aims to evaluate echocardiography as a non-invasive hemodynamic monitoring tool for the assessment of volume status and cardiac function before and after volume expansion in patients with liver cirrhosis presented by AKI.
PATIENTS AND METHODS: This study included 120 patients with liver cirrhosis and AKI. All patients were subjected to clinical evaluation, laboratory assessment of kidney and liver functions, and echocardiographic assessment of inferior vena cava (IVC) collapsibility index, left ventricular outflow tract velocity time integral (LVOT VTI) variability index, and cardiac output (CO).
RESULTS: Comparison between responders and non-responders to volume resuscitation regarding the echocardiographic data showed that responders had significantly higher IVC collapsibility index, LVOT VTI variability index, and % of CO increase. IVC collapsibility index and LVOT VTI variability index showed good predictive value of fluid responsiveness.
CONCLUSIONS: The use of echocardiography is a good tool for hemodynamic monitoring of fluid resuscitation in cirrhotic patients with AKI. The use of echocardiography has limited the use of central venous line only to patients with hemodynamic instability requiring vasoactive support.
Energy humanities , une pensée écologique au miroir des industries carbonées
Authors: Duperrex Matthieu
Published: July 2020

Cet article propose une vue synthétique sur les energy humanities , champ disciplinaire récent et nord-américain pour l’essentiel, qui documente l’extraction et la consommation des ressources énergétiques fossiles et produit sur cette base une analyse critique de la modernité occidentale.
Patient-Reported Outcomes of Shoulder Surgery in a Community Orthopedic Practice: A 5-Year Quality Improvement Project Using the QuickDASH Questionnaire
Authors: Shubert Daniel J. , Shubert Sarah B.
Published: July 2020

There has been a shift in US health care to a system that emphasizes value. Patient-reported outcomes have become a critical component of that valuation. A 5-year quality improvement project at the community private practice level was undertaken to assess the authors' delivery of care and practice processes for shoulder surgery as compared with established standards. QuickDASH questionnaires were collected from 1304 consecutive shoulder surgery patients, and data were collected at 4 time points. Mean QuickDASH scores for each procedure and scores assessing biceps tenodesis, distal clavicle excision, workers' compensation status, and sex were analyzed for statistical significance. Rotator cuff repair patients who also underwent biceps tenodesis had statistically significant worse function preoperatively and at 3 and 6 months postoperatively but not at 1 year postoperatively (
P
<.05). Rotator cuff repair patients undergoing concomitant distal clavicle excision had statistically significantly higher pre-operative scores (
P
<.01). Male shoulder arthroplasty patients had statistically significant higher preoperative scores (
P
<.02). Non–workers' compensation patients had statistically significant higher scores at 1 year (
P
<.05), whereas workers' compensation patients were statistically significantly younger (
P
<.01). Maximum changes in scores that met minimal clinically important differences occurred between surgery and 6 months postoperatively in all procedures. Quality outcome studies can be performed in private practice by a single surgeon and yield helpful results that lead to quality improvement through practice and delivery of care processes. [
Orthopedics
. 2020;43(5):e383–e388.]
Intramedullary Nail Fixation for the Treatment of Pathologic Humeral Shaft Fractures
Authors: Colello Michael J. , Hunter Michael D. , Tanner Stephanie L. , Porter Scott E.
Published: July 2020

The goal of this study was to report the clinical outcomes of pathologic humeral shaft fractures treated with reamed or unreamed intramedullary nail fixation in an era of longer patient survival. A retrospective review was conducted of all patients who underwent intramedullary nail fixation performed by a single surgeon for pathologic humeral shaft fractures at a Level I trauma center from 2009 to 2017. Of the 25 patients who were identified, 9 were excluded. Groups were categorized according to whether they underwent reamed or unreamed fixation, and they were evaluated for evidence of union, complications, and reoperation. Of the patients, 11 underwent an unreamed procedure and 5 underwent a reamed procedure. Mean length of follow-up was 51.5 weeks. Of the patients who participated, 12 (75%) showed evidence of union and 2 patients (12.5%) showed evidence of nonunion, with no statistical difference between the groups. Five patients (31.3%) had complications. One nonunion occurred in the reamed group and did not require reoperation. In the unreamed group, complications consisted of 1 delayed union, 1 nonunion treated with revision intramedullary nail fixation, and 2 cases of disease progression that required reoperation. Intramedullary nail fixation of pathologic humeral shaft fractures achieves rates of union parallel to those seen with fixation in a healthy population. The length of follow-up in the current study was longer than the life expectancy reported by previous authors, which can be attributed to improvements in the treatment of cancer. The current authors argue that unreamed fixation is the optimal technique because it yields similar outcomes to a reamed approach and is faster and potentially safer. [Orthopedics. 2020;43(5):e389–e398.]
EVALUATION OF SELECTED DYNAMIC MODELS IN COMPARISON WITH HOT BOX TEST RESULTS FOR MEASUREMENT OF BUILDING ENVELOPE THERMAL PROPERTIES
Authors: Lu Xinrui , Memari Ali M.
Published: July 2020

This research is mainly focused on the experimental measurement of R-value by several different models. Building energy consumption accounts for about 40% of the total energy use in the U.S, and therefore accurate energy simulation is desired. The R-value is one of the key parameters that can influence the energy simulation results and therefore is of great importance. The Average Model has long been the most widely accepted method to measure the thermal properties of building components. However, its steady-state assumption and dependence on temperature difference limit its use especially for in-situ measurement. In this study, several dynamic models, including the Pentaur Model and R-C Network Models, are studied with test data obtained from a series of hot box tests performed in the Building Enclosure Testing Laboratory. The results show that the 3R2C model has the best performance and a desirable stability of accuracy with respect to different levels of temperature difference, and therefore is recommended for practical measurement. The results also indicate that unlike the Average Model, the accuracy of dynamic models does not necessarily depend on the level of temperature difference.
COMPARING BUILDING SURFACES’ ORIENTATIONS TO OPTIMIZE SOLAR ENERGY COLLECTION
Authors: Rock Brian A.
Published: July 2020

Net-zero and other high performance green buildings normally do or should include optimized solar energy systems. While detailed computer-based energy simulations of buildings’ energy systems are becoming near-commonplace for many projects, simple, easy-to-use data tables are beneficial earlier in the design process to help guide preliminary decisions in all projects. Practical lookup tables, and then comparison of the data they contain, are also very useful for teaching new concepts, in this case for learning about solar orientations in sunny locations.

Engineers, architects, design-build contractors, students, and other designers of green buildings can benefit through knowing, in advance, how exterior surfaces’ orientations increase or decrease the total annual solar energy arriving upon those surfaces. For example, maximizing the incoming energy on a particular roof is advantageous for gathering solar energy for heat or for conversion of that sunlight to electricity, but various requirements often limit designers’ choices for surfaces’ orientations. This paper presents simple tables that form a tool for making initial decisions on surfaces’ directions and slopes; the user can then study various effects further, such as local factors including cloudiness and shading, with detailed software. The classical solar geometry equations utilized are documented here for repeatability of the research, but are not necessary for use of this paper’s tables. Practical examples are given too to help readers use the tables.
An Analysis of Gender Inequality in Professional Tennis
Authors: Mercer Hannah C. , Edwards Patrick S.
Published: July 2020

This paper examines the gender wage gap in professional sports using a pooled cross-section of professional tennis players across the years 2011-2017. The dependent variable is the prize money earned by the top fifty male and top fifty female ranked tennis players throughout the world. This prize money is measured in 2017 real dollar value. The independent variables include: number of tournaments played, age, rank differentiation, gender, country and WTA/ATP score. Gender inequality is measured by determining the wage gap shown through the mean prize money earned by the professional tennis players from 2011-2017. While prize money for men and women has recently become equal in the Grand Slam tournaments, there is evidence to show that women's prize money is considerably lower in the less-publicized tournaments. Results of the ordinary least squares (OLS) regressions suggest that there is evidence for a gender-related pay disparity in professional tennis due to a number of statistically significant variables including WTA/ATP score (+), age (+), country (+) and the gender (-) and year (+) dummies.
Does Regional Variation in Startup Concentration Predict Employment Growth in Rural Areas of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia?
Authors: Sissoko Yaya , Sloboda Brian W.
Published: July 2020

Measures of entrepreneurship, such as average establishment size and the prevalence of start-ups, correlate strongly with employment growth across and within urban areas. Is it possible for entrepreneurship to occur outside of urban areas and be active in rural areas such as Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia? There are causal links of entrepreneurial finance to industry or city growth but little link of the evidence of entrepreneurship outside of urban areas overall. This chapter examines the regional variation in startup concentration used to predict employment in the rural areas of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia by metropolitan statistical area (MSA)/micropolitan areas for the year 2017. The authors find significant differences in new firm formation rates from industrial regions to technologically progressive regions using the generalized linear models (GLM). Variations in firm birth rates are explained by industrial size, population growth, the number of startups, human capital variables, and establishments.
Strategic Business Enablers and Infrastructure Insights of the Saudi Arabian Tourism Industry
Authors: Bashir Nadeem Ahmed , Balaraman Premkumar , Mukherjee Aroop
Published: July 2020

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is currently facing economic and sectoral promotion challenges. A number of market-supporting aspects of government support, the tourism industry, transport and accommodation access, connectivity infrastructure, and financial services have been monitored to ensure progress in transparency. The aim of this chapter is to assess and gain insight into the strategic importance of the tourism ecosystem, infrastructure, and allied services for the sustainability of the business. The chapter also seeks to identify potential areas of the Saudi Arabian tourism industry and benchmarks for world-class tourist destinations and to identify the scope for improvement in the various areas of strategic business enablers.
Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurs in Tourism
Authors: Roy Soumyadeep
Published: July 2020

The point of this chapter is to talk about and feature the significance of enterprise and business visionaries in the travel industry. A writing audit was directed on reasonable issues and down to earth parts of business visionaries and enterprise. This chapter features (1) handy meanings of the terms business visionaries and enterprise; (2) principle highlights of the travel industry business visionaries; and (3) the job of businesspeople in the travel industry exercises and their commitment to the advancement of a travel industry goal. This chapter is explorative in nature, because the discourse is, for the most part, dependent on a writing audit. Hence, more research-based learning and increasingly observational examinations are required in this field.
Rural Entrepreneurship Through Tourism in the Himalayan Region With Special Reference to Arunachal Pradesh, India
Authors: Batabyal Debasish , Padhi Bani Ratna
Published: July 2020

The global economy has been witnessing phenomenal change over a long period. The service sector has been dominating the manufacturing industries. That shows the mammoth contribution of the tourism industry in terms of Rupee value. The report has revealed that in 2016 the sector generated INR14.1 trillion (USD208.9 billion) that represents 9.6% of India's GDP. Tourism industry has been creating around 10% jobs in the country that offered 40.3 million jobs in 2016 which promoted India's ranking in 2nd position across the globe in terms of total employment supported by travel and tourism trade. India's travel and tourism sector has been one of the fastest growing amongst the G20. Therefore, the tourism and hospitality sector may poise as an emerging area for the rural economic development. With its multiplier effects, tourism can energize the rural economy. This chapter has attempted to explore the opportunities and challenges of tourism entrepreneurship in rural India with special reference to Arunachal Pradesh.
Designing an Educational Program for Teachers Based on TPACK Principles and Wikis
Authors: Karipidis Nikolaos , Prentzas Jim
Published: July 2020

In this chapter, an approach to the design of an educational program for teachers is proposed. Three main steps are necessary in the design of such a program. The first step is to determine the goals of the program and connect them with the subsequent teaching goals of teachers. Further on, the knowledge and skills required in order to fulfill the goals set need to be determined. The final step concerns the selection of appropriate pedagogical methods and ICT tools that will assist teachers in their teaching. In the specific program, the goals set are based on Habermas' theory of cognitive interests and Schön's theory of the reflective practitioner. The TPACK model is used to categorize the desired knowledge that teachers will acquire from the program and the knowledge required by the instructor of the program. Wikis are used to support the selected pedagogical methods.
Consensus Building Using Quality Improvement Tools During the Instructional Design Process
Authors: Bridges Julie A. , Kannarkat Mily J. , Hooper Brooke , Derber Catherine J. F. , Britton Bruce , Too Gloria , Moore Andrew , Burgess Jessica , Shomaker Kyrie , Vergano Samantha Schrier
Published: July 2020

This case outlines the process of using quality improvement tools during the instructional systems design process. The clerkship curriculum of the third year of medical school was undergoing a complete reform in terms of time and content. An instructional designer was utilized to complete a needs analysis and participate in the instructional systems design process. A need for a common understanding of the language of medical education and instructional design drove the team to utilize the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) Quality Improvement tools. The reform took 11 months, involved six clerkship directors, multiple administrators, and resulted in consensus among the clerkship directors regarding the knowledge, skills, and attitudes appropriate for a third-year medical student curriculum.
Evaluation of Aerosolized Bronchodilator Protocol in a Large Urban Level II Hospital
Authors: Lamey Thomas W. , Joyner Lisa
Published: July 2020

The purpose of this case study is to provide readers with an authentic experience of working alongside clinical care providers in a hospital environment. This case study walks the reader through the analysis, creation, implementation, and evaluation of a bronchodilator protocol initiative in a respiratory therapy department. Seeing the initiative from foundation to evaluation, the reader will experience the viewpoints, strengths, and weaknesses presented by all team members and stakeholders. By the end of this case study, the reader should be able to describe Kirkpatrick's Model of Evaluation and critique missteps the team took along the way.
An Efficient Approach for Solving Integrated Production and Distribution Planning Problems
Authors: Zeddam Besma , Belkaid Fayçal , Bennekrouf Mohammed
Published: July 2020

The increasing customer expectations for customized products of high quality in short delays and the worldwide competition in terms of quality and costs have pushed industries to implement new strategies to manage their supply chain decisions. In this context, the integrated planning is becoming the most dominant over the operational research field because of its efficiency and its ability to cover the different aspects of the problem. Production routing problem is one of the problems of the integrated planning that is of interest in optimizing simultaneously production, inventory, and distribution planning. This paper has the purpose of developing two mono-objective models for the production-routing problem; one of them minimizes the total costs, while the other one minimizes the energy consumed by the production system. Finally, a bi-objective model is proposed to combine the two objectives mentioned previously using the LP-metric method in the context of a sustainable supply chain. Experimental results are also presented and discussed through the different scenarios.
Simulated Performance of SCTP and TFRC Over MANETs
Authors: Wheeb Ali H. , Kanellopoulos Dimitris N.
Published: July 2020

Mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) are composed of mobile nodes communicating through wireless medium, without any fixed centralized infrastructure. Providing quality of service (QoS) support to multimedia streaming applications over MANETs is vital. This paper focuses on QoS support, provided by the stream control transmission protocol (SCTP) and the TCP-friendly rate control (TFRC) protocol to multimedia streaming applications over MANETs. In this study, three QoS parameters were considered jointly: (1) packet delivery ratio (PDR), (2) end-to-end delay, (3) and throughput. Specifically, the authors analyzed and compared the simulated performance of the SCTP and TFRC transport protocols for delivering multimedia streaming over MANETs. Two simulation scenarios were conducted to study the impact of traffic load and node speed (mobility) to their performance. Based on the simulation results, the authors found that the PDR and the end-to-end delay of TFRC are slightly better than those of SCTP in both scenarios. Additionally, the performance of SCTP is significantly better than TFRC in terms of throughput.
An Efficient Trust-Based Routing Model for Clustered-Based Hetrogeneous Wireless Sensor Network
Authors: Thaniyath Gousia
Published: July 2020

Wireless sensor networks (WSN) play a very important role in providing real-time data access for big data and IoT application. The open deployment, energy constraint, and lack of centralized administration makes WSN very vulnerable to various kinds of malicious attacks. In WSN, identifying malicious sensor device and eliminating their sensed information play very important roles for mission critical applications. Standard cryptography and authentication schemes cannot be directly used in WSN because of the resource constraint nature of sensor devices. Thus, energy efficient and low latency methodology is required for minimizing the impact of malicious sensor devices. This paper presents a secure and load balanced routing (SLBR) scheme for heterogeneous clustered-based WSN. SLBR present better trust-based security metric that overcomes the problem when sensor keep oscillating for good to bad state and vice versa, and also balance load among CH. Thus, they aid in achieving better security, packet transmission, and energy efficiency performance. Experiments are conducted to evaluate the performance of proposed SLBR model over existing trust-based routing model, namely exponential cat swarm optimization (ECSO). The result attained shows SLBR models attain better performance than ECSO in terms of energy efficiency (i.e., network lifetime considering first sensor device death and total sensor device death), communication overhead, throughput, packet processing latency, malicious sensor device misclassification rate, and identification.
A Restrictive Humanitarian Policy and the Wellbeing of the Disabled in Disasters in Kisumu County
Authors: Masakhwe Phitalis Were , Onkware Kennedy , Kilonzo Susan
Published: July 2020

This paper explores how PWD's well-being is realized in disaster situations in Kisumu County of Kenya. There is a significant population of 15,760 persons with disability across Kisumu County. Their well-being is protected by the international humanitarian policy. At the national level, the well-being of persons with disability is taken care of in the Disability Act 2003 and the National Disability Policy. Despite existence of a humanitarian policy framework, the well-being of the disabled is compromised in disaster situations within Kisumu County. The humanitarian policy framework limits humanitarian action to response, which compromises the well-being of PWD. The study employed semi-structured questionnaire instruments to gather information on humanitarian policies applicable to PWD in disaster context. From the key findings, the study concludes that the international humanitarian policies as well as national humanitarian policies are restrictive in nature. The policy lacks enforcement and implementation mechanisms to support the wellbeing of persons with disability in disasters.
Using AHP to Identify the Priority Equipment for Maintenance Actions
Authors: Bouchaala Abdelghani Mohammed , Noureddine Rachid
Published: July 2020

The prioritization of equipment is among the decisions of great interest in maintenance management, given the effects it reflects on numerous sub-functions and the dependence it implies on various factors. The mastery of the techniques in this context is gaining an increasing importance, especially in heavy industries operating multiple production lines. According to the literature, the Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) method is among the most common techniques to resolve this problem, despite the concerns it involves. Knowing that, this technique supports two synthesis modes: distributive and ideal, and a confusing conflict is noticed; although the second mode seems theoretically more adapted to this problem, the first dominates in the practical aspect. In response to this conflict, the objective of this work is to demonstrate that the ideal synthesis mode is more suitable, through a comparative approach within this context. An improved AHP-approach is implicitly proposed within the study.
Fuzzy Interval Number K-Means Clustering for Region Division of Pork Market
Authors: Meng Xiangyan , Liu Muyan , Qiao Ailing , Zhou Huiqiu , Wu Jingyi , Xu Fei , Wu Qiufeng
Published: July 2020

This article proposes a new clustering algorithm named FINK-means. First, this article converts original data into a fuzzy interval number (FIN). Second, it proves the F that denotes the collection of FINs is a lattice. Finally, it introduces a novel metric distance on the lattice F. The contrast experiments about FINK-means, k-means, and FCM algorithm are carried out on two simulated datasets and four public datasets. The results show that the FINK-means algorithm has better clustering performance on three evaluation indexes including the purity, loss cost, and silhouette coefficient. FINK-means is applied to the task of region division of pork market in China based on the daily data of pork price for different provinces of China from August 9, 2017 to August 9, 2018. The results show that regions of pork market in China was divided into five categories, namely very low, low, medium, high, and very high. Every category has been discussed as well. At last, an additional experiment about region division in Canada was carried out to prove the efficiency of FINK-means further.
Means to Classify the R&D Projects on the Criticality Dimensions
Authors: Ramanathan M.  , Punnniyamoorthy M.  , Balamurugan V.
Published: July 2020

The evaluation of the complexity of research and development (R&D) projects is critical for the successful management of projects. In Defence, R&D projects could be classified as mission mode (MM) projects, technology development (TD) projects, science and technology (S&T) projects, infrastructure facilities (IF) projects, and product support (PS) projects. This study is focused on the assessment of the complexity in the five categories of the R&D projects, and it is based on the survey (with about 179 respondents) undertaken by considering about 40 attributes. The purpose of this exercise is to rank the five types of projects based on their complexity. A series of algorithms such as K-means clustering, analytic hierarchy process, modified TOPSIS method, and Henry Garrett ranking technique were applied to arrive at the results. Thus, a scenario analysis framework in terms of different methods is portrayed to select the appropriate ranking of the critical project.
Adaptive Edge Process Migration for IoT in Heterogeneous Fog and Edge Computing Environments
Authors: Chang Chii , Hadachi Amnir , Srirama Satish Narayana
Published: July 2020

To address the latency issue of the cloud-centric IoT management systems, researchers have introduced fog and edge computing (FEC) architecture, which distributes the computational tasks and decision making from the distant cloud to the edge or near the edge of IoT network. Considering the need for dynamic process migration from the mobile sensors to other resources when the mobile sensors are unable to continue their tasks, the IoT system needs to provide a flexible mechanism that allows the mobile sensors to dynamically migrate their tasks to the other FEC resources at runtime. The paper proposes a resource-aware edge process migration (REM) scheme that is capable of optimising the process migration decision. To realise such a system and to validate the REM scheme, the authors have developed a framework called edge process-enabled internet of thing (EPIoT) host. The framework and the REM scheme are implemented and evaluated. The results have shown that the REM scheme is capable of enhancing the performance of the process migration in heterogeneous FEC environment.
FBPCQS-Fuzzy-Based Peer Coordination Quality Systems for P2P Networks
Authors: Liu Yi , Qafzezi Ermioni , Ampririt Phudit , Ohara Seiji , Barolli Leonard
Published: July 2020

This work presents a distributed event-based awareness approach for P2P groupware systems. The authors present two fuzzy-based systems for improving peer awareness and group synchronization according to four parameters: activity awareness (AA), sustained communication time (SCT), group synchronization (GS), and peer communication cost (PCC). Then, this research uses fuzzy-based model to decide peer coordination quality (PCQ). The authors call the proposed systems: fuzzy-based peer coordination quality (FBPCQ) systems (FBPCQS1 and FBPCQS2). The authors make a comparison study between FBPCQS1 and FBPCQS2. The simulations results conclude that when AA, GS, and SCT are high, the PCQ is high, but with increasing of the PCC, the PCQ is decreased. The proposed systems can choose reliable peers with good peer coordination quality in mobilePeerDroid mobile system. Comparing the complexity, the FBPCQ2 is more complex than FBPCQS1. However, FBPCQS2 considers also the PCC, which makes the system more reliable.
Differing Perceptions of Mobile Devices
Authors: Brown Wiley S. , Palvia Prashant C.
Published: July 2020

Employees are constantly engaging in new technologies that allow them to be more productive. The increased ubiquity of information and communication technologies, in particular the use of mobile devices, has coincidentally increased the amount of time employees spend on work-related tasks each week. This paper attempts to better understand if individuals who are required to use mobile devices and those who voluntarily use them will have differing perceptions on mobile device use, usefulness (of the mobile device), work overload, flexibility in work structure, and work-life conflict. Secondary data from a previous study, surveying 185 working individuals of various demographics, was analyzed. The results suggest many differences in perceptions between the two groups. The findings have practical importance as managers and firms consider providing mobile devices to employees or allowing them to connect their own devices to work related systems.
Financial Asset Management Using Artificial Neural Networks
Authors: Sinaki Roohollah Younes , Sadeghi Azadeh , Lynch Dustin S. , Young II William A. , Weckman Gary R.
Published: July 2020

Investors typically build portfolios for retirement. Investment portfolios are typically based on four asset classes that are commonly managed by large investment firms. The research presented in this article involves the development of an artificial neural network-based methodology that investors can use to support decisions related to determining how assets are allocated within an investment portfolio. The machine learning-based methodology was applied during a time period that included the stock market crash of 2008. Even though this time period was highly volatile, the methodology produced desirable results. Methodologies such as the one presented in this article should be considered by investors because they have produced promising results, especially within unstable markets.
Crystal Structure and Colorimetric Behavior of Low Melting Point Ternary Alloy
Authors: Issa Tarik T. , Majeed Sadeer M. , Ahmed Duha S.
Published: July 2020

Elements of high purity (99.999) ,were used to prepare the alloy , Bi ,Sn,Zn and Cu .Two types alloy Bi – Sn – Zn and Bi – Sn – Cu were prepared by mechanical alloying technique (MA) .Annealing at 100 °Cfor 8 hours was applied for the resulting alloys . X-ray diffraction and differential scanning colorimetriy were tested for the two types of alloy before and after annealing. The best results was noticed in the ternary alloythat prepared at 4 hours milling time ,and annelid at 100 °C, for 8 hours ,under static air.
Effect of Friction Stir Processing Parameters on the Properties of AA7075-T73/Al2O3 Surface Metal Matrix Composite
Authors: Al-Helli Ali H. , Alhamaoy Ahmed R. , Takhakh Ayad Murad
Published: July 2020

Friction Stir Processing (FSP) technology was wielded to output the Al7075/ Al2O3 surface composite. The effects parameters of processing method on particle distribution have been studied. The microstructure and mechanical characteristics of the samples were examined using the optical microscope, SEM and hardness examination. Acquired consequences, showed that Al2O3 particles were in a good interior distribution inside the basement. This technique produced excellent bonding between the surface composite and the base material. On other hand the surface hardness was increased about 25% as compared with the substrate. In addition, grain matrix refinement and enhanced particle distribution were obtained after each FSP pass. Also the dispersion of Al2O3 particles in the stirred area became more homogeneous and the average hardness improved by increasing the number of passes.
Study the Effect of the Heat Treatment on the Photoelectrochemical Performance of Binary Heterostructured Photoanode Ag2S/ ZnO Nanorod Arrays in Photoelectrochemical Cells
Authors: Al-Zahranil Asla A. , Zainal Zulkarnain , Talib Zainal Abdib , Ngee Lim Hong , Holi Araa Mebdir
Published: July 2020

Heterostructured semiconductors are considered one of the most significant candidates for photoelectrochemical cells (PECs) water splitting because of their visible photovoltaic features. Hence, this study displayed the synthesis of Ag2S NPs/ZnO nanorods arrays (NRAs) as a function of annealing temperature in the range between 100 °C and 500 °C. The heterostructured photoanode was fabricated through two- simple steps synthesis; the first one was hydrothermal method (HT) and the second one successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction (SILAR) method. Structural morphology characteristics, chemical conformation and properties of synthesized nanostructure were studied via different characterization techniques such as field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction spectroscopy (XRD), HR-TEM and EDX, correspondingly. The XRD results showed that the hexagonal phase of ZnO NRAs combined successfully with monoclinicAg2S nanoparticles. The optical properties throughout absorbance spectra disclosed that with increasing the annealing temperature, the absorbance edges shifted toward extended wavelength indicating considerable enhancement in the optical properties upon the heat -treatment. Additionally, Ag2S nanoparticles/ZnO NRAs was employed as a working photoanode in photoelectrochemical cell consists of three-electrodes configuration. The result showed an important improvement in the performance of photoelectrochemical cell. It was observed that Ag2S/ZnO NRAs upon annealing at 400 °C showed an impressive photocurrent density, photoconversion efficiency of 2.73 mA/cm2 and 2.33%, respectively by achieving ~8 times higher compared to ZnO NRAs (0.337 mA/cm2). Such this enhancement was attributed to the morphological structure improvement, crystallinity and optical properties enhancement of the heterostructured photoanode after the conducting annealing process.
Photo Voltaic Properties of Ag2O/ Si Heterojunction Device: Effect of Substrate Conductivity
Authors: Awayiz Muntadher Talib , Salim Evan T.
Published: July 2020

The chemical bath deposition method was employed to prepare Ag2O films at specific preparation conditions. Silicon substrate with different conductivity was used to study their effect on the electrical and photovoltaic properties of the prepared devices. The current-voltage properties reveal that the ideality factor was (2.4 and 3.36) for psi and n-si substrate respectively. The obtained device efficiency is 0.35 while maximum detectivity was 0.3 cm.Hz1/2W-1.
DFT Study of New Donor-π-Acceptor Materials Based on Thieno[2,3-b] Indole Candidate for Organic Solar Cells Application
Authors: Al-Temimei Faeq A. , Alasadi Lubna A. , Alaboodi Azhar S.
Published: July 2020

In present search, we report theoretical analysis by using DFT (TD-DFT)-B3LYP with 6-31G (d, p) level on the geometries, optoelectronic and absorption characteristics of novel a series of the donor-π-acceptor dyes. Their π-conjugated bridge is based on the thiophene, benzene, pyridine, and pyrazine, the thieno [2,3-b] indole was used as an electron donor (D) and the acid 2-cyanoacrylic was used as an electron acceptor (A) group. The theoretical information of the electronic structures such as energy levels (HOMO and LUMO) and energy gap of the molecules is based on study the dyes in organic solar cells. Consequently the energy levels, energy gap, photovoltaic properties, quantum chemical and absorption parameters of all the dyes have been computed and reported. The calculations show that the dyes under study can theoretically be good photosensitizers in DSSCs. Also, the results show that the LUMO levels of all dyes design lie over the conduction band (Ecb) of the semiconductors TiO2 (or PC70BM) likewise the HOMO levels lie under the decrease potential vitality of the (electrolytes) comparing to ability of electron transfer from the molecular dye excited state to TiO2 (or PC70BM) and chargeerenewal after photo-oxidation process, separately.
Synthesis of Hg2Sr2-xBaxCa2Cu3O10 Superconductor and Study the Structure and Electrical Properties
Authors: Nawaf Shahir Fleyeh , Ali Shafeek Nihad , Darweesh Mohamed Hasan
Published: July 2020

Compound Hg2Sr2-xBaxCa2Cu3O10 high temperature superconductor looks like (HTSC) has been prepared as a pellet by two step solid state reaction with a certain substitution percentages (0.5, 1,1.5,2) of Ba compensation rate of Sr respectively using appropriate weight of pure material Hg2O3, Sr(NO3)2, Ba(NO3)2, CaCO3, and Cu(NO3)2 proportional to their molecular weight. XRD used for study structure properties, a computer program was used to calculation of spike dimensions the lattice parameters a, b and c shows Tetragonal, Electrical resistivity at x= 1.5 of Ba are obtained when the best value of Tc= 142 K.
Experimental Evaluation of the Static Magnetic Field Effect on White Blood Cells: In Vivo Study
Authors: Mustafa Bestoon Taha , Yaba Sardar P. , Ismail Asaad Hamid
Published: July 2020

In this study, we investigated the effect of the static magnetic field (SMF) on white blood cells (WBCs) for female albino rats using a fabricated exposure system of SMFs. Five main groups of animals exposed to 2.4±0.2 milli-Tesla (mT) for four weeks continuously. Five main groups (each group = 4 subgroups) have exposed to a different time of exposure; 1hr, 2hrs, 4hrs, 6hrs and 8hrs/day, respectively. Collected blood samples examined and compared with control values. The results proved that the time of exposure influences the WBCs significantly. One hour of exposure has increased the WBCs counts tremendously (from 50%-79%) in all weeks. However, the 8hrs of exposure reduced WBCs counts highly (from 71%-51%). The 3 weeks exposure trend was an increase, except the 8hrs/day exposure.
Removal of Organic Contaminants from Textile Wastewater by Adsorption on Natural Biosorbent
Authors: Hussain Zainab , Fadhil Zeyad , Kareem Sameer , Mohammed Salam , Yousif Emad
Published: July 2020

In the present study, removal of safranin dye from water bodies was investigated using natural biosorbent (Thyme leaves (TEL)). The influence of multiple factors such as as contact time (15 – 105 mins), adsorbent dose (25 to 350) mg/l , adsorbate dose (5 to 40)mg\L, and temperature (25 to 55)o C were taken for investigation. The adsorption isotherms were described by utilized Langmuir, Freundlich and Dubnin-Radushkevich models, Freundlich isotherm model found to be best suited with experimental data out of 3 isotherm The adsorption process followed pseudo second order model.
Experimental Study of Strengthening of RC Columns with Steel Fiber Concrete
Authors: Mhuder Wathiq Jassim , Chassib Samir M.
Published: July 2020

This study introduces an experimental program to investigate the performance of concrete wrapping jackets reinforced by steel fibers used for retrofitting of the square and circular RC columns under axial loads. Ten columns divided into two groups; the first group included seven square columns while the second group involved three circular columns. The experimental study included testing the columns with varied parameters such as cross-section shape, type and aspect ratio of steel fibres, jacket thickness, and using several techniques for retrofitting the column such as strengthening by plain and reinforced concrete jackets. The selected parameters affected the compressive behavior of confined columns high strength concrete jackets. The obtained results revealed that all strengthened columns with square cross-section appeared maximum strength greater than a circular one. Using several types of concrete jacketing promotes the load-capacity of the column with a clear improvement in the ductility. Increasing thickness appeared increasing in the load-carrying capacity in comparison with the reference column. Using the straight fibres showed better enhancement in the load capacity than the hooked ones. The main result was the failure mode was different from unstrengthen columns which showed more crushing in the concrete core with an increase in thickness.
Bone Marrow–Derived Dendritic Cell Cultures from RAG−/− Mice Include IFN-γ–Producing NK Cells
Authors: Abdi Kaveh , Thomas L Michael , Laky Karen , Abshari Mehrnoosh , Matzinger Polly , Long Eric O
Published: July 2020

Dendritic cells (DCs) play a key role in the initiation of an immune response and are known as “professional” APCs because of their ability to activate naive T cells. A widely used method to generate DCs in vitro is to culture bone marrow (BM) cells or blood monocytes in the presence of GM-CSF and IL-4. In this study, we show that a small population of NK cells residing in the BM of RAG−/−, but not RAG−/− γc chain−/− mice, remain in the DC culture and is the source of IFN-γ produced after stimulation with LPS. These cells, which may represent early promoters of LPS-induced responses, have to be taken into account when interpreting experiments using BM-derived DCs.
Effectiveness and applicability of Non-Invasive Ventilation (NIV) in the Emergency Department in acute respiratory failure due to Sars-CoV-2 pneumonia
Authors: Lari Federico , Giostra Fabrizio , Guerrini Stefania
Published: July 2020

Treatment of de novo acute hypoxic respiratory failure is not recommended by current Non-Invasive Ventilation (NIV) guidelines as it does not seem to improve patients outcome. Many cases of acute hypoxic respiratory failure associated with Sars-Cov2 infection (SARI) have been observed during Sars-Cov2 pandemic. So far, data are missing regarding the use of NIV, but a correct identification of subgroups of patients based on different clinical, patho-physiological and radiological features, might be helpful for stratifying patients and choosing the correct respiratory support (invasive versus non-invasive). In case of NIV appliance, risk of environmental virus dispersion is particularly elevated; therefore, extreme attention by operators is required.
CD markers polymorphisms as prognostic biomarkers in hematological malignancies
Authors: Shahrabi Saeid , Ghanavat Majid , Maleki Behzad Masumeh , Purrahman Daryush , Saki Najmaldin
Published: July 2020

The clusters of differentiation (CD) are surface molecules used for immunophenotyping of cells. The expression of CD markers is widely used to classify hematological malignancies, including leukemia and lymphoma. Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are crucial genetic changes that can be associated with abnormal expression and function of CD markers. In this paper, we assess the prognostic effect of CD markers’ SNPs in hematological malignancies. Materials and methods and relevant literature was identified by a PubMed search (2001-2019) of English language papers using the following terms: ‘polymorphism’, ‘CD marker’, ‘leukemia’, ‘lymphoma’, ‘prognosis’, ‘CD marker’, and ‘polymorphism’. Many studies have demonstrated the effects of CD markers’ polymorphisms on risk of hematological malignancies. Also, SNPs of CD markers can be related with clinicopathological features, invasiveness, and response to therapy of these disorders. Considering the importance of SNPs in the expressions of CD markers, these genetic changes could be used as potential prognostic biomarkers in hematological malignancies. It is hoped that the evaluation of SNPs in CD markers will enable early diagnosis, prognosis, and detection of response to treatment. However, better understanding of SNPs in CD markers that are involved in hematological malignancies requires further studies on different populations of the worldwide.
A proposed model for measuring administrative transparency in Saudi universities in light of the Kingdom's 2030 vision
Authors: د. علي بن حسن يعن الله القرني د. علي بن حسن يعن الله القرني
Published: July 2020

the study aimed to build a proposed model for measuring administrative transparency in Saudi universities in the light of the Kingdom's 2030 vision. The researcher has used the descriptive approach (documentary) with its various approaches to build the model; by extrapolating many primary and secondary sources related to administrative transparency and methods of measuring them in universities, then the researcher has used the Delphi method to judge the model from specialized educational leadership experts and practitioners. The process of building the model went through seven stages. The model was built in its initial form in the first three stages, and it consists of 9 standards and 130 indicators. The first model No. (1) in the fourth stage was judged by specialists in educational management, leadership and practitioners of academic leadership in terms of formulation, affiliation and proposals. Based on the opinions of the arbitrators, another model No. (2) was built, consisting of 9 standards and 119 indicators. In the fifth stage, the researcher used the Delphi method to arbitrate it from experts in terms of relevancy and measurability. In the sixth stage, the researcher used the Delphi method to arbitrate the second model again. Form No. (2) was sent again to the experts accompanied by the results of its arbitration in the previous round; as a feedback, by asking experts to review their responses in the previous round in terms of relevancy and measurability. In the seventh and final stage, and based on the results of the third round; indicators were adopted, the degree of their significance and their ability to measure together according to the opinion of experts (70% or more), and the deletion of indicators whose degree of importance or measurability according to expert opinion of (70%). Accordingly, the proposed final model was reached, the findings consist of 9 standards and 104 indicators. Based on the findings, the researcher recommends employing the proposed model for measuring administrative transparency in Saudi universities by the Ministry of Education, governmental and private universities, the National Anti-Corruption Authority, the National Authority for Academic Assessment and Accreditation. The researcher also, recommends that , academic leaders in Saudi universities should benefit from the criteria and indicators the proposed model contained in the self-evaluation for the relevant bodies in which they work, and to provide specialized professional training courses according to the training needs that are demonstrated by applying the proposed model for the level of administrative transparency in the university.