cometadata/datacite-titles-descriptions-related-identifiers huggingface dataset:
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.844
title: Natural fiber - castor oil polyurethane sandwich composites

description: The preparation of natural fabric/castor oil polyurethane sandwich composites and laminated sheet was investigated aiming for synthetic fabric replacement. The natural fabric gave the reinforcement of sandwich composites which the castor oil polyurethane was required as an adhesive. In this work, the natural fiber/castor oil polyurethane sandwich composites were prepared by hand-lay up technique of various combination of hemp and cellulose layers. Mechanical properties, flexural strength of biocomposites under sea-water effect and the dynamic mechanical analysis were investigated. From the immersion of sandwich composites and laminate sheets in seawater, it was found that the biocomposites reinforced with 100 wt% cellulose fabric had maximum absorption while the natural fabric and the synthetic fabric at 50/50 wt% reinforced composite had minimum absorption. Comparison with the nontreatement biocomposites, the treated hemp by 5 %wt NaOH reinforced composite showed the decreasing percentage absorption while the mechanical properties increased. From the dynamic mechanical analysis, the storage modulus and loss modulus of the treated hemp fabric composite laminate sheet increased. Glass transition temperature was also increased from 49.7 °C to 57.2 °C.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.845
title: Efficacy of group motivational interviewing plus brief cognitive behavior therapy (GMI-BCBT) for replapse within amphetamine users with co-occuring psychological problems at Southern Psychiatric Hospital in Thailand

description: Amphetamine abuse is a crucial global health problem. Methamphetamine addiction leads to mental illness and recurring psychological problems. To date, research on combined therapy for group motivation interview and brief cognitive behavior therapy to treat drug addiction problems yielded inconclusive results. The aim of this study is to evaluate the efficacy of a combined Group Motivational Interviewing and Brief Cognitive Behavior Therapy (GMI-BCBT) plus usual care in reducing amphetamine dependency in drug abused patients with recurring psychological problems. A quasi-experimental study design is used, with 200 patients from two psychiatric hospitals forming two groups of participants. The patients reported amphetamine use at least once in the past month prior to this study. They were all assessed at baseline and with three follow-up sessions. Patients in one psychiatric hospital were assigned to usual care and assessment-only study group (n=100); and patients at the other psychiatric hospital were assigned to a 4 sessions of GMI-BCBT intervention plus usual care (n=100). Results showed that 59.5% of samples suffered from major depressive. The intervention group had significantly more survival rate from urine positive within 3 months (P value &lt; 0.001). Both groups had similar in pattern of drug use in quantity and frequency. Their mean scores within group on Thai HADS were also significantly reduced at baseline and 3 and 7 months post intervention (P value &lt; 0.001). These results suggest that the combined therapy of GMI-BCBT plus usual care positively reduce the rate of amphetamine use for the out-patients at psychiatric hospital.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.846
title: Accelerated weathering effects on mechanical properties and morphology of Vetiver Grass fiber/polyamide-6 composites

description: This research evaluates the use of natural fiber in polyamide-6 composites aiming to synthetic fiber replacement. The application of natural fiber as reinforcement in composite materials requires a strong adhesion between fiber and the synthetic matrix. In this work, the surface treatments were mercerization and applying the silane coupling agent. The Vetiver grass fiber reinforced polyamide-6 composites at various contents of Vetiver grass fiber (15 and 30%) were prepared by using twin screw extruders. The mechanical properties, morphology and long term stability of Vetiver grass fiber reinforced polyamide-6 were investigated and compared with talc filled and glass fiber reinforced composites. Polyamide-6 composites reinforced with grass fiber treated with silane coupling agent had improved properties compared with grass fiber treated by mercerization. The comparison of tensile properties of the treated grass fiber reinforced polyamide-6 composites with unfilled composite showed that the mercerization and silane coupling agent of treated grass fiber gave a significant increase in tensile strength. The results also showed that the mercerization and silane coupling agent could significantly improved the flexural strength and modulus of grass fiber reinforced composites. After accelerated weathering, grass fiber reinforced polyamide-6 composites retained a higher fraction of the original mechanical properties than unfilled, talc filled and glass fiber reinforced composites.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.847
title: Trade-based analysis of momentum : evidence from Thailand

description: This study uses the unique transaction data for Thailand SET50 stocks and other high turnover stocks in the period 1999 to 2008 to examine the behavior of each investor type based on Jegadeesh and Titman’s (1993) momentum strategy. There are three key findings: (1) each investor type trades differently, (2) the presence of foreign investors in the market affects how domestic investors trade, (3) the difference in trading behavior of each investor type cannot be explained by difference in trade size. Specifically, retail-trades exhibit a clear evidence of initial underreaction and delayed reaction to past return. For example, there is an initial retail buying pressure among losers which abruptly changes into selling pressure after the news arrives. Mutual fund and foreign-trades, however, show no evidence of underreaction. Though, mutual fund-trades demonstrate a little delayed reaction. In conclusion, the results further validate the points that different groups of investors behave dissimilarly and that retail investors are suffered from behavioral biases.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.848
title: Biological activities of Thanaka Hesperethusa crenulata stem bark

description: In this work, the stem bark powder of Hesperethusa crenulata or Thanaka was extracted with organic solvents and water, and investigated the biological activities including antioxidant, anti-tyrosinase, UV screening, antibacterial and anti-inflammatory. Safety of the extracts and original powder were also done by cytotoxic and genotoxic assay. The hexane, dichloromethane, ethyl acetate, methanol, 85% (v/v) ethanol and water extracts of the bark showed some variation between them in terms of their potency of those biological activities. All six solvent extracts and the original crude bark powder showed non-genotoxicity in the assay carried out here. Nevertheless, the methanol, 85% (v/v) ethanol and water extracts of the bark all exhibited a very low cytotoxicity. Moreover, vanillin and acrylate derivative, were obtained from thanaka stem bark.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.849
title: The effect of mesenchymal stem cells combined with polycaprolactone/hydroxyapatite composite scaffold on the healing of ulnar defect in dogs

description: Bone tissue engineering strategy using biodegradable scaffolds combined with mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) has emerged as a promising alternative treatment for extensive bone defects. The present in vitro study aimed to investigate the interaction between canine MSCs and polycaprolactone/hydroxyapatite (PCL/HA) scaffolds followed by an in vivo evaluation of the efficacy of PCL/HA and MSC loaded PCL/HA scaffolds on the healing of canine ulnar defect in dogs. Viability assay showed that the majority of cells remained viable on day 1 after seeding. An increase in DAPI-stained nuclei density together with a significant increases in total protein concentration (p&lt;0.05) was observed between day 1 and 5 and day 3 and 5 after seeding all of which indicated that cells were capable of proliferation over time. Finally, osteogenic differentiation potential of the seeded cells was confirmed by Alizarin staining on day 14 of induction. Despite the promising in vitro results, neither new bone nor callus formation was observed in defects treated with PCL/HA alone or MSC-loaded PCL/HA scaffold. Defects in both groups were filled with fibrovascular tissue and remnants of the scaffold. Surprisingly, numerous of multinucleate giant cells were also found within defect sites which strongly indicated chronic inflammation.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.850
title: The therapeutic effects of white kwao krua pueraria mirifica airy shaw and suvatabandhu on ovariectomy - induced osteoporotic rats

description: Pueraria mirifica (PM) is a Thai herb which contains high amount of phytoestrogens. It was reported to prevent bone loss in gonadectomized rats. Thus, this study aimed to investigate the therapeutic effects of PM on bone loss in ovariectomized rats. Six months old female rats were divided into 2 groups; sham operation (SH group, n=13) and ovariectomy (OVX group, n=45). After operation, they were kept for 90 days to induce bone loss. Blood samples were collected every 30 days for serum alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and tartrate resistant acid phosphatase 5b (TRAP 5b) assays. On day 90, 5 rats in each group (OVX90 and SH90 groups) were randomly selected and euthanized. Bone was collected and measured for bone mineral density (BMD), bone mineral content (BMC) and %trabecular bone area (%BA). The remaining SH rats (n=8) were gavaged daily with distilled water for 90 days. The remaining OVX rats were subdivided into 5 groups (n=8/group) and gavaged daily with 0, 10, 100 and 1,000 mg/ kg BW/ day of PM (PM0, PM10, PM100 and PM1000 groups, respectively) and 0.1 mg/ kg BW/ day of 17-α ethinylestradiol (EE group) for 90 days. Blood samples were collected every 30 days for serum ALP and TRAP 5b assays. After 90 days of treatment, rats were euthanized and collected bone for BMD, BMC and %BA determinations. The results showed that BMD, BMC and %BA were significantly lower in the OVX90 rats than the SH90 rats (p&lt;0.01), serum ALP levels were higher (p&lt;0.05) throughout the 90 days of bone loss induction period, while the serum TRAP 5b levels was significantly higher only on D30 (p&lt;0.05). After 90 days of the PM or EE treatment, BMD, BMC and %BA of rats were significantly higher than those of the PM0 group (p&lt;0.05). Although serum ALP levels of PM or EE treated groups were not different from those of the PM 0 group, serum TRAP 5b levels were significantly lower (p&lt;0.01), but not depended on doses. Treatment of EE had no effects on serum ALP and TRAP 5b levels, compared to the PM0 group. These results indicate that PM consumption tends to restore the established osteoporosis in OVX rats by reducing bone loss. However, the mechanism of the effects of PM is different from those of synthetic estrogens.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.851
title: Shrinkability and thermal property of natural rubber/low density polyethylene blown film

description: In this study, the shrink film based on LDPE and NR (reclaimed rubber (RR) and natural rubber (NR) latex) blends was prepared by internal mixer. The effect of NR types and NR contents to shrink film properties were investigated. The results indicated that the RR was not suitable to use for shrink film because RR/LDPE films were rough surface, while the NR/LDPE films were smooth surface. Various properties of NR/LDPE films i.e., physical, crystallinity, morphology, dynamic mechanical, mechanical, thermal properties and shrinkability were also investigated. The results indicated that the increasing NR latex contents did not affect the clarity but affected the color of NR/LDPE films. The crystallization temperature (Tc) of NR/LDPE films was lower than that of neat LDPE, resulting in the increase ability of crystallization of NR/LDPE film. The increase of crystallinity, the increase of shrinkability of NR/LDPE film was obtained. The tensile strength and hardness of NR/LDPE films showed decreased with increasing NR latex contents. However, the impact resistance and tear strength increased with the increase of NR latex content up to 5 phr and then their values decreased beyond this content. These results indicated that the phase separation was occurred between LDPE and NR in the blend. These results could be confirmed by measuring dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM).
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.852
title: Neural network-based teeth recognition system using hybrid features

description: Nowadays, biometric technology is used in various security applications. The efficiency of such applications depends upon a type of biometric information. Nevertheless, some information can be faked by intent surgery or they are unexpectedly reshaped such as face, iris, palmprint and fingerprint. Unlike ordinary features, teeth cannot be easily reshaped. In this thesis, hybrid features and machine learning model for teeth recognition are proposed. Hybrid features of this system are composed of global and local features simultaneously fed into the system. In this thesis, proposed global features composed of singular values from singular value decomposition and color histogram of teeth image are analyzed and give the adequate result whilst the proposed local features are the ratio of the width from upper-front-teeth. These features were fed into the multilayer perceptron network with Levenberg-Marquart backpropagation training algorithm. With these features and model, the proposed method performs better than other existing techniques in terms of accuracy and error.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.853
title: The social performance of microfinance institutions in Bangkok

description: The microfinance sector in Thailand is at a crossroads at the moment. Drowning in a plethora of government subsidized small loan schemes which are provided to uplift the grassroots economy with small loans with minimal interest rates, repayable over sometime to motorbike taxi drivers, taxi drivers and vendors. These popular loan programs make it difficult for community and international microfinance institutions to operate and thus, certify the double bottom line standard. Microfinance’s ability to guarantee financial as well as social benefits to those excluded from traditional banking services This study comparatively analyzes the social performance of two microfinance institutions operating in the urban slum Klong Toey. A comparative analysis allows the organizations staff, management and board members to monitor and discuss the strengths and weaknesses to find innovative methods to improve social performance policies. The hope of this study is that through increased transparency and greater emphasis on social responsibility the Thai microfinance sector can better improve the products and services offered to its clients as well as empower those microfinance serves.
DOI: 10.17632/ms484mrjj5.1
title: soil coring description

description: This dataset contains the detailed soil coring description, total coring depth and peat thickness of 866 soil profiles from the Upper Dee (Scotland). This dataset is linked to the following Biogeosciences publication: "Modelling long-term blanket peatland development in eastern Scotland" (Swinnen et al., 2019)
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.854
title: Determination of N -nitrosamine in cosmetics by headspace solid phase microextraction gas chromatography

description: N-Nitrosamines are carcinogen in testing animals and are prohibited to use in cosmetics as specified in Notification of Ministry of Public Health. This research has developed the method for determination of N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GCMS) using DB-WAX column (30 m long, 0.25 mm I.D., 0.25 μm film) with a temperature program from 60 to 200 °C. Headspace solid-phase microextraction (HS-SPME) was used for extraction and preconcentration of volatile NDMA in aqueous solutions. Factors affecting the extraction efficiency with HS-SPME were studied including type of fiber, concentration of NaCl in solution, pH of solution, extraction temperature and time. The carboxen/polydimethylsiloxane (CAR/PDMS) fiber was found to be suitable for the extraction of NDMA. For 40-mL vial, sample volume of 5–10 mL was used. NaCl concentration of 357 mg/mL was added, while pH of solution showed insignificant effect to extraction efficiency. Extraction temperature of 65 ℃ and extraction time of 10 min were selected. The validation results of the method showed good linearity in 0.1-200 ng/mL range; limit of detection (LOD) of 10 ng/g; limit of quantitation (LOQ) of 50 ng/g; recovery of 84–99 %; and repeatability of 3 % RSD. The developed method could be used to determine NDMA in shampoo.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.855
title: Supplier relationship management for electronics manufacturing service company

description: The purpose of this research is to study the potential root cause of the delays in Failure Analysis process including supplier selection. The extended research on its characteristics will be necessary. The objectives of this research are to minimize and prevent the delay in our internal process to ship part for performing failure analysis at supplier site. This will be focus on of time and quality. Preventive methods will also be created. Supplier relationship management including for supplier assessment by using audit method and create the audit checklist as a guideline for other supplier audit in the same service. For supplier development which focuses on the delivery, FMEA (Failure Mode and Effect Analysis) will be used to assess the risk sensitivity from 44 potential root causes. The assessment of the RPN (Risk Priority Number) using Analysis shows that there are in total of 24 critical potential root causes. The analysis of critical potential root causes is done by using 5 why analysis and creating the preventive actions is. Two mains preventive action would resolve the intensity of these potential root causes to lower the RPN value of the critical potential root causes. The results show that the RPN after applying preventive actions has reduced by 60%. After implementation of time that use for delivery process improve from normal 60% and also meet for customer requirement., There were improvements in the delaying shipment showing a big improvement compared with to the normal process. It is proven that development process has improved the result of the project in terms of time and quality.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.856
title: Techinical and scale efficiency of district hospitals in Nepal : a data envelopment analysis approach

description: The study aimed to measure technical and scale efficiency of district hospitals and to estimate the possible factors affecting on the efficiency of district hospitals in Nepal. Input oriented Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) was employed to measure technical and scale efficiency of 56 district hospitals in the year 2009 and 2010. In the second stage, Tobit regression model was used to determine the factors that affect on efficiency. The DEA analysis revealed that 29 (51.79%) and 30 (53.57%) of the hospitals were run inefficiently in 2009, and 2010 respectively. The average variable returns to scale (VRS) technical efficiency scores were 89% and 90% respectively during two years. Most of the patterns of scale inefficiency were increasing return to scale. The result of Tobit regression revealed that hospitals with higher occupancy rates and higher outpatient per physician perform better than those with lower occupancy rates. The bed physician ratio is positively and nurse physician ratio is negatively significant. Similarly bed occupancy rates, no. of beds, outpatient physician ratio are associated with scale efficiency. Hospitals in mountain region are significantly less scale efficient than others.
DOI: 10.14457/cu.the.2010.857
title: The impact of organic rice contract farming on farmers' livelihood and land tenure in Cambodia : a case study in Kampong Speu province

description: This study examines organic rice contract farming in Cambodia and its impact on farmers‟ livelihood and land tenure. The study‟s objective is to gain a better insight of the terms and conditions of rice contract farming scheme in Cambodia, and determine under what conditions contract farming could bring improvements to farmers‟ livelihoods and strengthen land tenure security. This study contributes new research findings on farmers‟ livelihood and land ownership changes due to organic-rice contract farming with a case study in Kampong Speu province, Cambodia. Rice contract farming is not widespread in Cambodia at present, but is expected to expand significantly in the near future. Contract farming can increase investment into agricultural and infrastructure in rural areas. Contract farming can also enable farmers to access credit, inputs, technical advice and information about market condition and pricing trends. Yet, the disadvantages of contract farming include loss of farmer bargaining power and a potential reduction in profit margins, increased emphasis on improving production quality, land consolidation in favor of participating contract farmers, and less secure livelihoods. In this study, the contract farming arrangements of Angkor Kasekam Rongroeung (AKR) Company is studied. A survey of 16 contract farmers and 20 non-contract farmers in Kampong Speu province has been undertaken to examine the AKR contract farming scheme arrangements and to identify farmer‟s motivations to participate in contract farming and the costs, benefits and changes in the community. AKR rice contract farming improves farmers‟ livelihood because they get a higher income and rice yields. Higher price, good rice seed, and access to market are the main reasons for farmers to participate in AKR contract farming. However, strict requirements, heavy penalties, poor extension services, and lack of information about the contract terms and conditions reduce farmers‟ long-term participation in contract farming. In addition, contract farmers have less bargaining power to negotiate with the company due to the absence of a farmer association. The AKR contract farming does not strengthen farmers‟ land tenure, but deforestation has been widespread in the villages studied due to the expansion of land under (contract) cultivation. Overall, the status of contract farming in Cambodia clearly points to the great potential for its expansion in the future. However, for this to be realized and for the benefits to be shared fairly between companies and the farmers themselves, the study concludes that issues about the role of the government, the regulatory framework, contract enforcement, the land tenure system and the formation of small-scale farmer organizations must all be addressed.