Abstract: This study was conducted to examine the possible role of serum Gamma-glutamyltransferase (GGT) and Lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) in the prediction of severity of preeclampsia. The study group comprised of 40 preeclamptic cases (22 with mild and 18 with severe) and 40 healthy normotensive pregnant controls. Serum samples of all the cases were assayed for GGT and LDH. Demographic, hemodynamic and laboratory data as well as serum GGT and LDH levels were compared among the three groups.
The results indicated that severe preeclamptic cases had significantly increased levels of serum GGT and LDH. The symptoms in severe preeclamptic women were significantly increased in patients with GGT > 70 IU/L and LDH >800 IU/L. Elevated levels of serum GGT and LDH can be used as biochemical markers which reflects the severity of preeclampsia and useful for the management of preeclampsia to decrease maternal and fetal morbidity and mortality.
Abstract: Environmental and toxicological characteristics of formulated pesticides may substantially differ from those of their active ingredients or other components alone. This phenomenon is demonstrated in the case of the herbicide active ingredient glyphosate. Due to its extensive application, this active ingredient was found in surface and ground water samples collected in Békés County, Hungary, in the concentration range of 0.54–0.98 ng/ml. The occurrence of glyphosate appeared to be somewhat higher at areas under intensive agriculture, industrial activities and public road services, but the compound was detected at areas under organic (ecological) farming or natural grasslands, indicating environmental mobility. Increased toxicity of the formulated herbicide product Roundup compared to that of glyphosate was observed on the indicator aquatic organism Daphnia magna Straus. Acute LC50 values of Roundup and its formulating adjuvant polyethoxylated tallowamine (POEA) exceeded 20 and 3.1 mg/ml, respectively, while that of glyphosate (as isopropyl salt) was found to be substantially lower (690-900 mg/ml) showing good agreement with literature data. Cytotoxicity of Roundup, POEA and glyphosate has been determined on the neuroectodermal cell line, NE-4C measured both by cell viability test and holographic microscopy. Acute toxicity (LC50) of Roundup, POEA and glyphosate on NE-4C cells was found to be 0.013±0.002%, 0.017±0.009% and 6.46±2.25%, respectively (in equivalents of diluted Roundup solution), corresponding to 0.022±0.003 and 53.1±18.5 mg/ml for POEA and glyphosate, respectively, indicating no statistical difference between Roundup and POEA and 2.5 orders of magnitude difference between these and glyphosate. The same order of cellular toxicity seen in average cell area has been indicated under quantitative cell visualization. The results indicate that toxicity of the formulated herbicide is caused by the formulating agent, but in some parameters toxicological synergy occurs between POEA and glyphosate.
Abstract: Each year nearly nine hundred persons die in head injuries and over fifty thousand persons are severely injured due to non wearing of helmets. In motor cycle accidents, the human head is exposed to heavy impact loading against natural protection. In this work, an attempt has been made for analyzing the helmet with all the standard data. The simulation software ‘ANSYS’ is used to analyze the helmet with different conditions such as bottom fixed-load on top surface, bottom fixed -load on top line, side fixed –load on opposite surface, side fixed-load on opposite line and dynamic analysis. The maximum force of 19.5 kN is applied on the helmet to study the model in static and dynamic conditions. The simulation has been carried out for the static condition for the parameters like total deformation, strain energy, von-Mises stress for different cases. The dynamic analysis has been performed for the parameter like total deformation and equivalent elastic strain. The result shows that these values are concentrated in the retention portion of the helmet. These results have been compared with the standard experimental data proposed by the BIS and well within the acceptable limit.
Abstract: TELUM software is a land use model designed specifically to help metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) prepare their transportation improvement programs and fulfill their numerous planning responsibilities. In this context obtaining, preparing, and validating socioeconomic forecasts are becoming fundamental tasks for an MPO in order to ensure that consistent population and employment data are provided to travel demand models. Chittenden County Metropolitan Planning Organization of Vermont State was used as a case study to test the applicability of TELUM land use model. The technical insights and lessons learned from the land use model application have transferable value for all MPOs faced with land use forecasting development and transportation modeling.
Abstract: Control flow graphs are a well-known representation of
the sequential control flow structure of programs with a multitude
of applications. Not only single functions but also sets of functions
or complete programs can be modeled by control flow graphs. In
this case the size of the graphs can grow considerably and thus
makes it difficult for software engineers to analyze the control flow.
Graph reductions are helpful in this situation. In this paper we define
reductions to subsets of nodes. Since executions of programs are
represented by paths through the control flow graphs, paths should
be preserved. Furthermore, the composition of reductions makes a
stepwise analysis approach possible.
Abstract: Structural lightweight concrete is used primarily to reduce the dead-load weight in concrete members such as floors in high-rise buildings and bridge decks. With given materials, it is generally desired to have the highest possible strength/unit weight ratio with the lowest cost of concrete. The work presented herein is part of an ongoing research project that investigates the properties of concrete mixes containing locally available Scoria lightweight aggregates and mineral admixtures. Properties considered included: workability, unit weight, compressive strength, and splitting tensile strength. Test results indicated that developing structural lightweight concretes (SLWC) using locally available Scoria lightweight aggregates and specific blends of silica fume and fly ash seems to be feasible. The stress-strain diagrams plotted for the structural LWC mixes developed in this investigation were comparable to a typical stress-strain diagram for normal weight concrete with relatively larger strain capacity at failure in case of LWC.
Abstract: Vibration analysis of screw compressors is one of the most challenging cases in preventive maintenance. This kind of equipment considered as vibration bad actor facilities in industrial plants. On line condition monitoring systems developed too much in recent years. The high frequency vibration of ball bearings, gears, male and female caused complex fast Fourier transform (FFT) and time wave form (TWF) in screw compressors. The male and female randomly are sent to balance shop for balancing operation. This kind of operation usually caused some bending in rotors during the process that could cause further machining in such equipment. This kind of machining operation increased the vibration analysis complexity beside some process characteristic abnormality like inlet and out let pressure and temperature. In this paper mechanical principal and different type of screw compressors explained. Besides, some new condition monitoring systems and techniques for screw compressors discussed. Finally, one of the common behavior of oil injected twin rotary screw compressors called hydraulic unbalance that usually occurred after machining operation of male or female and have some specific characteristics in FFT and TWF discussed in details through a case history related to Iran oil industries.
Abstract: PPARs function as regulators of lipid and lipoprotein metabolism. The aim of the study was to compare the lipid profile between two phases of fasting and to examine the frequency and relationship of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor, PPARα gene polymorphisms to lipid profile in fasting respondents. We conducted a case-control study protocol, which included 21 healthy volunteers without gender discrimination at the age of 18 years old. 3 ml of blood sample was drawn before the fasting phase and during the fasting phase (in Ramadhan month). 1ml of serum for the lipid profile was analyzed by using the automated chemistry analyser (Olympus, AU 400) and the data were analysed using the Paired T-Test (SPSS ver.20). DNA was extracted and PCR was conducted utilising 6 sets of primer. Primers were designed within 6 exons of interest in PPARα gene. Genetic and metabolic characteristics of fasting respondents and controls were estimated and compared. Fasting respondents were significantly have lowered the LDL levels (p=0.03). There were no polymorphisms detected except in exon 1 with 5% of this population study respectively. The polymorphisms in exon 1 of the PPARα gene were found in low frequency. Regarding the 1375G/T and 1386G/T polymorphisms in the exon 1 of the PPARα gene, the T-allele in fasting phase had no association with the decreased LDL levels (Fisher Exact Test). However this association is more promising when the sample size is larger in order to elucidate the precise impact of the polymorphisms on lipid profile in the population. In conclusion, the PPARα gene polymorphisms do not appear to affect the LDL of fasting respondents.
Abstract: In the present time, energy crises is considered a severe problem across the world. For the protection of global environment and maintain ecological balance, energy saving is considered one of the most vital issues from the view point of fuel consumption. As the industrial sectors everywhere continue efforts to improve their energy efficiency, recovering waste heat losses provides an attractive opportunity for an emission free and less costly energy resource. In the other hand the using of solar energy has become more insistent particularly after the high gross of prices and running off the conventional energy sources. Therefore, it is essential that we should endeavor for waste heat recovery as well as solar energy by making significant and concrete efforts. For these reasons this investigation is carried out to study and analyze the performance of a power plant working by a combined cycle in which heat recovery system generator (HRSG) gets its energy from the waste heat of a gas turbine unit. Evaluation of the performance of the plant is based on different thermal efficiencies of the main components in addition to the second law analysis considering the exergy destructions for the whole components. The contribution factors including the solar as well as the wasted energy are considered in the calculations. The final results have shown that there is significant exergy destruction in solar concentrator and the combustion chamber of the gas turbine unit. Other components such as compressor, gas turbine, steam turbine and heat exchangers having insignificant exergy destruction. Also, solar energy can contribute by about 27% of the input energy to the plant while the energy lost with exhaust gases can contribute by about 64% at maximum cases.
Abstract: This work evaluates the ability of OBT for detecting parametric faults in continuous-time filters. To this end, we adopt two filters with quite different topologies as cases of study and a previously reported statistical fault model. In addition, we explore the behavior of the test schemes when a particular test condition is changed. The new data reported here, obtained from a fault simulation process, reveal a lower performance of OBT not observed in previous work using single-deviation faults, even under the change in the test condition.
Abstract: Using an enzyme of known specificity the hydrolysis of protein was carried out in a controlled manner. The aim was to obtain oligopeptides being the so-called active peptides or their direct precursors. An original way of expression of the protein hydrolysis kinetics was introduced. Peptide bonds contained in the protein were recognized as a diverse-quality substrate for hydrolysis by the applied protease. This assumption was positively verified taking as an example the hydrolysis of albumin by thermolysin. Peptide linkages for this system should be divided into at least four groups. One of them is a group of bonds non-hydrolyzable by this enzyme. These that are broken are hydrolyzed at a rate that differs even by tens of thousands of times. Designated kinetic constants were k'F = 10991.4 L/g.h, k'M = 14.83L/g.h, k'S about 10-1 L/g.h for fast, medium and slow bonds, respectively. Moreover, a procedure for unfolding of the protein, conducive to the improved susceptibility to enzymatic hydrolysis (approximately three-fold increase in the rate) was proposed.
Abstract: The article focuses on the role of FDI in Georgia’s economic development for the last decade. To attract as much FDI as possible a proper investment climate should be on the place - institutional, policy and regulatory environment. Well developed investment climate is the chance and motivation for both, local economy and foreign companies, to generate maximum income, create new work places and improve the quality of life. FDI trend is one of the best indicators of country’s economic sustainability and its attractiveness. Especially for small and developing countries, the amount of FDI matters, therefore most of such countries are trying to compete with each other through improving their investment climate according to different world famous indexes. As a result of impressive reforms since 2003, Georgian economy was benefited with large invasion of FDI, however the level of per capita GDP is still law in comparison to Eastern European countries and it should be improved. The main idea of the paper is to show a real linkage between FDI and employment ration, on the case of Georgian economy.
Abstract: With short production development times, there is an increased need to demonstrate product reliability relatively quickly with minimal testing. In such cases there may be few if any observed failures. Thus it may be difficult to assess reliability using the traditional reliability test plans that measure only time (or cycles) to failure. For many components, degradation measures will contain important information about performance and reliability. These measures can be used to design a minimal test plan, in terms of number of units placed on test and duration of the test, necessary to demonstrate a reliability goal. In this work we present a case study involving an electronic component subject to degradation. The data, consisting of 42 degradation paths of cycles to failure, are first used to estimate a reliability function. Bootstrapping techniques are then used to perform power studies and develop a minimal reliability test plan for future production of this component.
Abstract: Developments in turbine cooling technology play an important role in increasing the thermal efficiency and the power output of recent gas turbines, in particular the turbojets.
Advanced turbojets operate at high temperatures to improve thermal efficiency and power output. These temperatures are far above the permissible metal temperatures. Therefore, there is a critical need to cool the blades in order to give theirs a maximum life period for safe operation.
The focused objective of this work is to calculate the turbojet performances, as well as the calculation of turbine blades cooling.
The developed application able the calculation of turbojet performances to different altitudes in order to find a point of optimal use making possible to maintain the turbine blades at an acceptable maximum temperature and to limit the local variations in temperatures in order to guarantee their integrity during all the lifespan of the engine.
Abstract: The calcarenites carbonate rocks of the Quaternary ridges, which extend along the northwestern Mediterranean coastal plain of Egypt, represent an excellent model for the transformation of loose sediments to real sedimentary rocks by the different stages of meteoric diagenesis. The depositional and diagenetic fabrics of the rocks, in addition to the strata orientation, highly affect their ultimate compressive strength and other geotechnical properties.
There is a marked increase in the compressive strength (UCS) from the first to the fourth ridge rock samples. The lowest values are related to the loose packing, weakly cemented aragonitic ooid sediments with high porosity, besides the irregularly distributed of cement, which result in decreasing the ability of these rocks to withstand crushing under direct pressure. The high (UCS) values are attributed to the low porosity, the presence of micritic cement, the reduction in grain size and the occurrence of micritization and calcretization processes.
The strata orientation has a notable effect on the measured (UCS). The lowest values have been recorded for the samples cored in the inclined direction; whereas the highest values have been noticed in most samples cored in the vertical and parallel directions to bedding plane. In case of the inclined direction, the bedding planes were oriented close to the plane of maximum shear stress. The lowest and highest anisotropy values have been recorded for the first and the third ridges rock samples, respectively, which may attributed to the relatively homogeneity and well sorted grainstone of the first ridge rock samples, and relatively heterogeneity in grain and pore size distribution and degree of cementation of the third ridge rock samples, besides, the abundance of shell fragments with intraparticle pore spaces, which may produce lines of weakness within the rock.
Abstract: To relieve the burden of reasoning on a point to point basis, in many domains there is a need to reduce large and noisy data sets into trends for qualitative reasoning. In this paper we propose and describe a new architectural design pattern called REDUCER for reducing large and noisy data sets that can be tailored for particular situations. REDUCER consists of 2 consecutive processes: Filter which takes the original data and removes outliers, inconsistencies or noise; and Compression which takes the filtered data and derives trends in the data. In this seminal article we also show how REDUCER has successfully been applied to 3 different case studies.
Abstract: This study investigates the level of existence of organized retail crime in supermarkets of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The store managers, security managers and general employees were asked about the types of retail crimes occur in the stores. Three independent variables were related to the report of organized retail theft. The independent variables are: 1) the supermarket profile (volume, location, standard and type of the store), 2) the social physical environment of the store (maintenance, cleanness and overall organizational cooperation), 3) the security techniques and loss prevention electronics techniques used. The theoretical framework of this study based on the social disorganization theory. This study concluded that the organized retail theft, in specific, organized theft is moderately apparent in Riyadh stores. The general result showed that the environment of the stores has an effect on the prevalence of organized retail theft with relation to the gender of thieves, age groups, working shift, type of stolen items as well as the number of thieves in one case. Among other reasons, some factors of the organized theft are: economic pressure of customers based on the location of the store. The dealing of theft also was investigated to have a clear picture of stores dealing with organized retail theft. The result showed that mostly, thieves sent without any action and sometimes given written warning. Very few cases dealt with by police. There are other factors in the study can be looked up in the text. This study suggests solving the problem of organized theft; first, is "the well distributing of the duties and responsibilities between the employees especially for security purposes". Second "Installation of strong security system" and "Making well-designed store layout". Third is "giving training for general employees" and "to give periodically security skills training of employees". There are other suggestions in the study can be looked up in the text.
Abstract: Vacant City of Cape Town-owned land lying unutilized and -productive could be developed for land uses such as urban agriculture that may improve the livelihoods of low income families. The new City of Cape Town zoning scheme includes an Urban Agriculture zoning for the first time. Unstructured qualitative interviews among town planners revealed their optimism about this inclusion as it will provide low-income residents with opportunities to generate an income. An existing farming community at Philippi, located within the municipal boundary of the city, was approached and empirical data obtained through questionnaires provided proof that urban agriculture could be viable in a coastal metropolitan city such as Cape Town even if farmers only produce for their own households. The lease method proposed for urban agriculture is a usufruct agreement conferring the right to another party, other than the legal owner, to enjoy the use and advantages of the property.
Abstract: An effort for the detection of damages in the
reinforcement bars of reinforced concrete members using PZTs is
presented. The damage can be the result of excessive elongation of
the steel bar due to steel yielding or due to local steel corrosion. In
both cases the damage is simulated by considering reduced diameter
of the rebar along the damaged part of its length. An integration
approach based on both electromechanical admittance methodology
and guided wave propagation technique is used to evaluate the
artificial damage on the examined longitudinal steel bar. Two
actuator PZTs and a sensor PZT are considered to be bonded on the
examined steel bar. The admittance of the Sensor PZT is calculated
using COMSOL 3.4a. Fast Furrier Transformation for a better
evaluation of the results is employed. An effort for the quantification
of the damage detection using the root mean square deviation
(RMSD) between the healthy condition and damage state of the
sensor PZT is attempted. The numerical value of the RSMD yields a
level for the difference between the healthy and the damaged
admittance computation indicating this way the presence of damage
in the structure. Experimental measurements are also presented.
Abstract: Asymmetric incremental sheet forming (AISF) could significantly reduce costs incurred by the fabrication of complex industrial components with a minimal environmental impact. The AISF experiments were carried out on commercially pure titanium (Ti-Gr2), Timetal (15-3-3-3) alloy, and Ti-6Al-4V (Ti-Gr5) alloy. A special testing geometry was used to characterize the titanium alloys properties from the point of view of the forming zone and titanium structure effect. The structure and properties of the materials were assessed by means of metallographic analyses and microhardness measurements.The highest differences in the parameters assessed as a function of the sampling zone were observed in the case of alpha-phase Ti-Gr2at the expense of the most substantial sheet thinning occurrence. A springback causes a smaller stored deformation in Timetal (β alloy) resulting in less pronounced microstructure refinement and microhardness increase. Ti-6Al-4V alloy exhibited early failure due to its poor formability at ambient temperature.