The aim of this study is to determine and compare the maximal voluntary peak torques (PT) of the hamstring and quadriceps muscles and the hamstring/quadriceps (H/Q) torque ratio between elite junior triathletes and cyclists. Seven triathletes (16.88±0.64yr) and eight cyclists (17.38±0.52yr), including the Turkish Junior National Team and the champion of Turkey, were tested using an isokinetic dynamometer at angular velocities of 600.s-1 and 2400.s-1. No significant PT and H/Q muscles ratios were noted at the right hamstring and quadriceps muscles at 600.s-1 and 2400.s-1. The mean of the left hamstring PT results of cyclists (111.86±15.55Nm) was much greater than that of triathletes (85.43±10.78Nm) at 600.s-1. However, the cyclists (159.14±38.65Nm) demonstrated higher differences compared to the triathletes (121.29±12.02Nm) at PT of the left quadriceps at 2400.s-1. The mean H/Q muscle ratios of cyclists (57.24±9.74%) was much more than that of triathletes (46.40±6.24%) at 600.s-1. Significant differences exist among the H/Q ratio and PT of the left hamstring at 600.s-1, in addition to the PT of the left quadriceps at 2400.s-1, between cyclists and triathletes. Left limb of triathletes’ isokinetic strength is lower than left and right limbs of cyclists and right limb of triathletes’ isokinetic strength. \nKey words: knee flexion and extension, peak torque, hamstring: quadriceps ratio.
The methanol extracts of the two parasitic plants Plicosepalus acacia and Phragmanthera austro arabica (Family Loranthaceae) were examined for their hepatoprotective activity against paracetamol induced liver damage in rats and their activities were compared to silymarin. Rats were assigned to vehicle, the two extracts and paracetamol control groups, in addition to the silymarin and the two extracts treated groups. Paracetamol administration induced disturbances in hepatospecific serum markers and development of oxidative stress. These deleterious effects associated with paracetamol administration were effectively ameliorated by pre treatment with either silymarin or both extracts for seven days in comparison with the paracetamol control group, with no significant difference between the silymarin treated group and the two extracts treated groups. Additionally our histo-pathological studies for the score of necrosis and inflammatory infiltration confirm these results. Animals showed no symptoms associated with toxicity after administration of both extracts orally as a single dose for seven days at concentrations of 100, 200, 300, and 500 mg/ kg. The median lethal dose (LD50) was determined to be higher than highest dose tested in both samples. \nSo, we concluded that both extracts exert hepatoprotection against paracetamol-induced toxicity by their ability to ameliorate the severity of oxidative stress.
This study describes the development of on-line process monitoring system in drilling process on Vertical Machining Centre (VMC). In this work, standard data acquisition software LabVIEW (Laboratory Virtual Instrumentation Engineering Workbench) in the application of Virtual Instrumentation (VI) has been applied to predict the drill wear states of High Speed Steel (HSS) drill bit for drilling on a mild steel work piece. Drill wear state prediction allows the determination of the hole quality as well as tool replacement at proper time, during the drilling process in machining. The effective drill wear model has been established to predict the drill wear states based on the relationship between the spindle motor cutting current signals and the various cutting parameters (cutting speed, feed, drill diameter), using LabVIEW. The established on-line process monitoring system has been used for the continuous monitoring of the cutting tool status, and to exhibit the drill wear states as a percentage of the maximum permissible wear. Meanwhile, it facilitates defective tool replacement at the proper time in an automated manufacturing environment.
Abstract\nThe value of education in the global era has evidently influenced the nature as well as awareness of the importance of education for all as the opportunity to pursue higher education is wide open not only for school leavers but also for those who are currently working and would like to upgrade themselves. The options for pursuing higher education is no longer bound to renown institutions in the West but have been extended within the local context and in developing countries. If the West used to be prominently known to offer advanced as well as varied opportunities for higher education, now other countries have also begun to be recognized by the international community as alternative educational hubs that offer a wide range of quality higher education for the international applicants. In order to ensure a quality higher education is offered, this article focuses on the perception of 355 international students’ towards the services provided by the support staff in one of the public universities in Malaysia. A set of questionnaire which was translated and adapted from Hamidah et al. (2004) was used as the survey instrument and analyzed descriptively using the Statistical Package for Social Science, version 16 for percentages and mean scores. Overall results of the study show that the satisfaction level of the international students’ towards the services of the support staff at the university is at a moderate level.\nKeywords: support staff, service, higher learning, institution, perception
Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) is a promising approach used to reduce the time and cost of business solutions in enterprises. It provides enterprises with agility to respond to its changing requirements dynamically. Therefore great efforts needed to move agencies and enterprises into systems such as C4I systems those are supported by SOAs. For this reason, numerous Enterprise Architecture Frameworks (EAFs) has been developed by the architects to enhance the information system development process, System of Systems (SOS) architecture modeling, and seeking for the one that can harness the state-of-the-art of the SOAs. The main objective of this paper is to explore the SOA support in various known Architecture Frameworks (AFs) of Department of Defense (DoD) such as United States Department of Defense Architecture Framework (DDAF), British Ministry of Defense Architecture Framework (MoDAF), Department of National Defense and the Canadian Forces Architectural Framework (DNDAF), and NATO Architecture Framework (NAF). Further, this paper describes a comparison among different AFs based on SOA. This analysis will help architects, designers and developers to select a best architecture framework for building SOA based C4I solutions.
Design : Experiment was conducted to fifty five male Orycytolagus cuniculus rabbits subdivided into four groups. Control : animals received neither ionizing radiation nor radio protector. G1 : animals injected by 1 mCi of 99mTC with the legend Methoxy-Iso-Butyl-Isonitrile (MIBI) with no radio protection application. G2 : animals received a radio protective combination of vitamin E and selenium with no irradiation. G3 : animals received the ionizing radiation after prior protection with vitamin E and selenium combination. Vitamin E (α-tocopherol ) administered as 40 mg/kg body weight three times per week while Seleium was administered as 30 mg/day. This combination was administered for three weeks before irradiation. Whole blood methemoglobin reductase enzyme activity, different hemoglobin derivatives concentrations as well as antioxidants activity were measured to all animals. Results : outcome of this study showed minimum activity of methemoglobin reductase enzyme in animals irradiated with no prior protection application. The highest level of reductase activity was recorded in animals received prior protection with the combination before irradiation. Antioxidants activities and methemoglobin concentration approximately reach the normal levels after have been elevated in animals irradiated with ionizing radiation after administration of the combination. Conclusion : application of vitamin E and selenium application enhanced the methemoglobin reductase enzyme activity by scavengering the free radicals formed by the ionizing effects of radiation and improving the rate by methemoglobin is reduced to ferrous iron hemoglobin.
Visual fatigue is a clear obstacle to be removed in order to progressive advances of display industry. This study focuses on clarifying the relationship between visual fatigue and EEG signal. This study has following advantages compared with previous related works. Firstly, we define a new visual fatigue index by combining two power values in the alpha and the beta frequencies of EEG. Secondly, we experimentally elucidate a significant brain area in terms of discriminating visual fatigue. Thirdly, we found the consistency of occipital signals through analyzing coherencies among three electrodes on occipital region. In experimental results, we actually confirmed that visual fatigue was increased in accordance with increment of watching time of visual stimuli. We also investigated that the most significant electrode areas were on the occipital region in terms of visual fatigue.
Non Destructive Evaluation (NDE) is a technique for damage assessment and quality control, to detect the defects without affecting the internal structure. This paper proposes a system for identifying weld defects, such as Lack of Penetration, Cluster Porosity, Slag inclusion, Burn-Through and Oxide Inclusion in radiographic images. The abstruse image is made operable by image enhancement and noise removal techniques. A novel idea for segmentation using optimized Hough transform which reduce the number of computations required, by designing constraints on and values in parametric space is being proposed in this paper. The qualities of features extracted determine the successfulness of pattern recognition, particularly when the nature of image is obscure and occluded. In this paper Zernike moments, standard deviation and mean of the second derivative of horizontal projection profile are used for extracting features where Zernike moments maps the image to a complex Zernike polynomial, thereby representing the properties of the image without redundancy. In the proposed work, features are being trained using Learning Vector Quantization for weld defect recognition, where five different classes are being trained and the output of the experiments for various test images shows that the proposed system provides very high accuracy in detecting weld defects.
The objective of this paper is to solve the problems of feeder reconfiguration, the optimal capacitor placement and the problem of combination of the both. Distribution systems are normally operated as radial network. However configuration is changed during its operation. Network reconfiguration in distribution system is done by changing the status of sectionalizing switches which is used for loss reduction. Optimal reactive –power compensation in a radial distribution system requires the determination of the best set of locations for installing capacitors of minimum sizes. This paper proposes an algorithm that handles the problem of feeder reconfiguration and the sizing of new shunt capacitors for loss minimisation.
The aim of this article is to understand and identify the relationship between organizational culture and its indicators and psychological empowerment. To this aim, the research method was applied and Survey –Correlation respectively. Also samples were 211 people chosen based on simple random sampling. Data collecting instruments include two questionnaires, one referring to psychological empowerment and the other organizational culture. The reliability of questionnaires were examined by Cronbach method and confirmed with 0.854 and 0.876 respectively and their validities were confirmed by content method. To analyze the data, we used Spearman correlation coefficient and Wilcoxon and Square tests. Research findings demonstrated that there is a direct and meaningful relationship between indicators of organizational culture, like conquering organizational characteristics, kind of organizational leadership, employees’ management, coherence of organization, strategic emphasis and accomplishment factors and psychological empowerment in employees.
Corporate governance has changed into a very crucial investment decision making element for investors.The amount of investors\' investment increases as much as the observing of corporate governance principles increase.Thus, companies\' ranking regarding corporate governance canpresent valuable information for users. Corporate governance criterion is a criterion through which the amount of observingthe principles of corporate governance by the companies is shown. The existence of this criterion besides company rankingscan be effective for investors, auditors and the public to judgeabout these companies. So in this paper we will try to propose our new criterion entitled: \"Fuzzy corporate governance criterion\" and its fundamental concepts based on fuzzy logical theory.The methodology based on fuzzy logical theory has improved and developed inexact and vague estimates of traditionalassessment methods. This methodology has presented a newtype of corporate governance (CG) criterion called Fuzzy corporate governance (FCG).Transparency and disclosure, ownership structure, board of directors\' structure and owners\' equity are among key variables in corporate governance which have been unified in fuzzymodel in this research to gain an acceptable criterion for assessing corporate governance\n\nKeywords: corporate governance, fuzzy logic, transparency and disclosure, board of directors
The objective of this study was to investigate the role of management in developing entrepreneurship and its effect on productivity of human resources from the view of staffs of housing and urbanization organization of Fars province. To do this, four main indices of manager performance was considered for entrepreneurship including goal setting as clarified, job promotion, creating friendly work space and supporting innovation as independent variables and productivity evaluation as dependent variable was raised. The data were collected as library and field and in collecting field data, questionnaire was used. The results of the current study showed that suitable performance of management in preparation to develop effective entrepreneurship on productivity with the mentioned indices.
Due to the dynamic non-linearity of globalization and democratization, prediction error may be determined by unforeseeable interference. Therefore, this study built a Markov-Switching Vector Error Correction Model (MS-VECM) capable of capturing the properties of structural change with regime, as well as describing non-linear characteristics between globalization and democratization in two different regimes by using the Gibbs sampling method to obtain samples and estimate the regime-dependent parameters. \nWe find both globalization and democratization are strongly exogenous in both regimes. The negative relationship between the global trade and the democratization has frequently been in an unstable regime. However, positive influence between globalization and democratization has been fleeting, with only brief periods of mutual benefit and nurturing in a stable regime.\nKeywords: Globalization; Democracy; MS-VECM; Regime\nJEL Classification: F20; F40
Biometric verification systems with fusion of several biometric sources have been proved to be outstanding over single biometric system. However, this is only true when each of the biometric sources is in noise free conditions. In order to overcome this limitation, this study proposes a quality based fusion scheme by designing a fuzzy inference system (FIS). The optimum weight for fusion system is inferred by FIS according to the quality of current biometric traits. For this purpose, a fusion system which combines two modalities i.e. speech and lip traits is experimented. For speech signal, Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficient (MFCC) is used as features while region of interest (ROI) of lip image is employed as lip features. Support vector machine (SVM) is then executed as classifier to the verification system. For validation, common fusion schemes i.e. maximum rule, sum rule, weighted sum rule are compared to the proposed quality based fusion scheme. The system performances are calculated using the equal error rate (EER) percentage. From the experimental results, as an example at 35dB SNR of speech and 0.8 quality density of lip, the EER percentage for quality based fusion achieves 1.2106% compared to 31.1364%, 4.0112%, 14.9023%, 4.9973% and 37.2157% of EER performances by maximum rule, simple sum rule, weighted sum rule, speech only and lip only systems, respectively. This reveals that, the proposed fusion scheme based on fuzzy logic is imperative in order to maintain the performance of fusion system especially when one of the biometric sources is corrupted. This is due to its capability to infer the correct fusion weight according to current data quality.
This study develops a theoretical framework to examine the role of service performances, customer satisfaction and switching barriers in the cell phone industry and examine consumer‘s switching intention to it. The subjects were 392 consumers of cell phone in Tehran area. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with Lisrel software was tested for the data analysis. The results of the structural analysis indicated that core service significantly affected on customer satisfaction and satisfaction completely mediated the effects of service performances on switching intention.\nIn addition, findings from the tests for metric invariances indicated that components of switching barriers (switching costs and lack of alternatives’ attractiveness) moderated the relationships between satisfaction and switching intention. The results show that the role of customer satisfaction derived from core service or service encounter performances in decreasing switching intention is stronger when customers perceive switching costs and lack of attractive alternatives. Based on study findings theoretical and practical implications are identified and discussed.
The unified power flow controller is the most versatile and complex power electronic equipment that has emerged as the indispensable equipment for the control and optimization of power flow in electrical power transmission system. In this thesis the control of real and reactive power flow through a transmission line with the use of UPFC at the sending end is investigated. Computer simulation using MATLAB Simulink is done and the behavior of the UPFC is studied. In the UPFC based control of transmission line parameter control systems, it is observed that whenever the SSSC sources some real power into the transmission line it is manifested as a voltage drop across the DC link. The fall of the DC link voltage is an indication of real power demand from the receiving end. PID Controllers are used in this work in the control of DC voltage, AC voltage and power transfer.
Purpose– Developing people as part of an overall human resource strategy could be a key factor in today’s competitive workplace. The purpose of this paper is to identify the relationship between organizational and individual factors with effective implementation of learning and development (L&D) initiatives. \nDesign/methodology/approach– In a case study of human resources in the ABC bank in Malaysia, the practice of effective L&D implementation for workplace has been analysed. The authors examined five organizational and three individual factors with effective implemention of L&D initiatives. Data were collected through survey with 103 \nparticipants from ABC Bank in Johor Bahru. \nFindings– Data analysis revealed that three organizational factors (outsourcing, top management support, and external consultants) and two individual factors (learning skills and peer support) correlated significantly with effective implimentation of L&D inintiatives. Moreover, using multiple linear regression indicated that peer support is the strongest factor for effective implementation of L&D initiatives. However, the role of learning skills and outsourcing of studies – appeared to have the smallest effect on implementation of L&D initiatives.\n Research limitations/implications– Furthermore, the researcher only focused on five organizational and three individual factors that may not be applicable to all companies or individuals. \nPractical implications– The results can be used for HR specialist regarding importance of L&D determinants which may influence implementation of effective L&D initiatives in ensuring continuous development among employees. Furthermore, it gives the organizations extra advantages in developing their human capital and thus would influence the company’s profits and losses. \nOriginality/value– Although there has been an abundance of literature on learning, there is a dearth of emprical studies in this field. The case study explores the best practices in L&D and promotes change that lead to new innovation and discovery. \nKeywords: Effective implementation, Learning and Development Initiatives, Individual factors, organizational factors
Knowledge management has changed the paradigm of most organisations by turning the organisational climate where knowledge is discovered, captured, shared, and applied in maximizing organisational goals. This article considers the individual determinants that influence knowledge sharing practices and built on the view of academics in a higher education setting. It hypothesizes that trust, altruism, self-efficacy, and mutual reciprocity may influence individuals’ knowledge sharing. Self-efficacy and altruism are derived by the Social Cognitive Theory, while mutual reciprocity and trust are derived from the Social Exchange Theory. A quantitative approach was adopted using questionnaires distributed to one hundred and thirty seven administrators at one Malaysian public university. Multivariate analysis revealed that trust, altruism, and mutual reciprocity have a positive influence on knowledge sharing. However, the influence of self-efficacy was not supported.
This paper presents some results of research carried out in 2011. The research was focused on the relationship of small organizations to crisis prevention. The aim was to determine the extent to which small organizations prepare for crises. The factor analysis identified two crisis prevention strategies. One strategy is focused on creating and updating a crisis plan and crisis team. The other is based on appropriate behaviour to employees and surroundings so that the organization builds up their loyalty. Preparation for crises is most complicated by the financing gap which could be expected in small organizations and managers also declared they were too busy to deal with crisis prevention. Based on the statistically processed data obtained from empirical research the authors came to the conclusion that, although many small organizations know their weaknesses and external threats and try to take precautionary measures, the preparation for a potential crisis still does not become a normal part of managerial work and it is not appreciated as a feature of competitiveness. Statistical tools of correlation analysis and factor analysis were used in the research.
Problem statement: Rural entrepreneurship can be considered as one of the solutions to reduce poverty, migration and develop employment in rural environments. In this paper, the necessity of sustainable entrepreneurship, the effective factors and the barriers to entrepreneurship in rural area will be described. In this regard, a model has been considered to create a sustainable rural entrepreneurship area by establishing a logical connection between the effective factors in entrepreneurship. Some of the most important challenges that can be pointed out are: lack of access to capital and facilities, problems in supplying goods and services, emphasis on an industry or particular business, low possibility risk in villages and lack of supporting organizations.\nObjective: Review and analysis of rural entrepreneurship in order to achieve sustainability.\nMethod: This research in implementation process is qualitative and in objective is descriptive and then analytic.\nResults: The results indicate that comprehensive development can never be obtained without rural development, and in order to achieve this goal the best investment is creating a context for sustainable entrepreneurship and its promotion in rural area since the entrepreneurship has this ability to identify resources, opportunities and problems available in the context while devising new solutions to move toward developing of different aspects of village and environment. \nKey words: Entrepreneurship, sustainable entrepreneurship, rural development, rural areas.
The objective of this article is to propose a new approach for ranking research and development (R&D) projects. More recently, some researchers have proposed data envelopment analysis (DEA) as a tool for evaluating R&D projects. In order to eliminate the inconsistency caused by using different frontier facets to calculate efficiency, common set of weights DEA models have been developed, under which a group of DMUs can be ranked based on common base. Our approach integrates the balanced scorecard (BSC) and common weights in DEA and develops a new model for project evaluation.
Water sorptivity of fly ash based geopolymer pastes and mortars have been experimentally determined. Geopolymer specimens were prepared by activating fly ash with a mixture of sodium hydroxide and sodium silicate containing Na2O in the range of 5% to 8% by weight of fly ash. Compressive strengths of up to 35 MPa and 40 MPa respectively for paste and mortars have been recorded, which increased with Na2O content. Specimens manufactured with higher Na2O content exhibited better microstructure and lesser sorptivity due to better dissolution of fly ash. Sorptivity values of geopolymer specimens ranged between 12.89x10-4 to 5.19 x10-4 g/mm2/min0.5 for pastes and between 3x10-4 to 6.89x10-4 g/mm2/min0.5 for mortars. Sorptivity and compressive strength of the specimens have been related and it has been observed that specimens with lower sorptivity show higher compressive strengths. Results of the present study are expected to help in deciding the appropriate Na2O content for manufacturing fly ash geopolymers of better microstructure with lesser sorptivity and high strength.
The current study aims to forecasting earnings per share, as one of the information which has a key role in drawing the company\'s future prospects for investors; also it is investigated the effect of different features of these issues on the cost of capital of companies listed in Tehran Stock Exchange. Sample consisted of 102 companies listed in Tehran Stock Exchange during 2006-2010. Results of regression tests showed that there is a significant relationship between bad news and information content of earnings management forecasts, with the company\'s cost of capital. In fact, bad news in relation to forecast earnings per share reflects that the manager is pessimistic about the company’s future outlook. Disclosing of this pessimism can be adverse consequences for the company and specifically on the cost of financing. This while on the horizon and revised forecasts profit do not obtain any significant results. In this regard, it seems that the revised earnings forecasts and forecast horizon, is not considered relevant information for investors.
The deregulation of electricity market is resulted in increasingly complex and overloaded power transmission networks with increasing demand of long distance power transmission and improved stability. The emergence of Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS) controllers has significantly resolved these issues eliminating the only choice of PSS. In this paper, nonlinear dynamic model of multi-machine system installed with Static Synchronous Series Compensator (SSSC) is developed. Modeling and controls of SSSC are discussed and its AC network interface, suitable for transient stability program is proposed. The main objective of this work is to develop an adaptive NeuroFuzzy supplementary damping control system, based on continuous wavelet transform, for SSSC, by incorporating wavelets in the conventional structure of Takagi-Sugeno-Kang (TSK). The fuzzy membership functions and control rules are adapted online using gradient descent based back-propagation learning algorithm. The robustness of the proposed control system is validated for various system contingencies and operating conditions for local and inter-area modes of oscillations. Nonlinear time domain simulations reveal that the proposed control system has optimal results in terms of overshoot, settling time and control effort. Finally, the superiority of proposed control system is validated by using different performance indices.
The article presents a short summary of the part of research outcomes. It represents a kind of \'introduction\' to the issues of crisis management modeling. At the beginning it pays attention to the ideas of theory of chaos that have been applied to crisis management. Furthermore, it dealt with comparison of the basic characteristics of crisis management and standard management and then crisis management and strategic management. The following barriers and limits in creating generally applicable (fits-all) models of crisis management mean a challenge not only for researchers but at the same time they make the creation of crisis management system in practice more difficult.
Abstract \nThe current paper assesses the physical education program (PEP) at secondary schools located within the Selangor State of the Malaysia. Of the 116 schools invited to participate, 38 schools selected to complete the survey (32.8% response rate). The purpose of this study was to assess the (PEP) and to determine implementation levels of the (PEP) in Selangor schools. The 79- item of the checklist survey included topics related to basic school PE teacher profile, sports facilities, safety guidelines and maintenance, school leader, curricular items incorporated into each program, and various areas of (PEP) content. The checklist total score was used as criteria in determining the implementation levels of the (PEP) in these schools. Findings from this study indicated that PEP, on average, in these schools was lowly implemented, and not like as planned by the Ministry of Education. The variation of implementation levels of the PEP in these schools is the most likely contributing to the shortages of sports facilities, lack of opportunities for the children to be active, status of the PE inside schools, and due to the lack of qualified PE teachers in Malaysian schools.
The maximum likelihood, moment and mixture of the estimators are derived\nfor samples from the gamma distribution in the presence of outliers generated from\ngamma distribution. These estimators are compared empirically when all parame-\nters are unknown; their bias and mean squares error are investigated with the help\nof numerical technique. We have shown that these estimators are asymptotically\nunbiased. At the end, we conclude that mixture estimators are better than the\nmaximum likelihood and moment estimators.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, only the Republic of Tajikistan among the Central Asia countries was involved in the civil war. This war took place due to numerous factors including: the ethnic differences, regionalism, formation of political parties and various organizations, and the economic downturn of country during 1992-1997 between the supporting communist forces on the one hand and the opposition Communist forces on the other hand. Among the regional countries, Russia and Uzbekistan played the greatest role in the civil war in order to achieve their goals. With the rise of civil war and the demands of this republic of international organizations for ending this crisis, the UN Security Council with the cooperation of Iran and Russia have paid the most attentions to the Civil War and provided the field for peace negotiations in order to resolve the dispute. Peace negotiations of Tajikistan, which included 9 round of official negotiations and several rounds of consultative negotiation and leaders\' meeting, were began from April 5, 1994 in the city of Moscow. Finally, the General Peace Contract was signed by Imamali Rakhmanov (President) and Seyyed Abdollah Nouri (chairman of the opposition Union) in the same city on June 27, 1997.
When Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in the Soviet Union, the policy of reconstruction and creation of reconstruction space, known as perestroika and glasnost, created a new space in the stagnant society of Soviet and this new space eventually dismantled this empire. Republic of Tajikistan is one of the republics separated from the Soviet Union, and the developments in this republic were started with delay. Political Islam in Tajikistan was one of the reasons which had a large impact on the emergence of war. Two ethnic Uzbeks and Russians nation in this republic, which included more than 30 percent of Tajikistan\'s population and were supported by the Uzbekistan and Russia, were the causes of prolonged civil war, but the main reason for the civil war in Tajikistan was the relative deprivation which has been studied in the form of created virtual identities, economic downturn and corruption, ethnic tensions, regionalism and weak national nationalism, weak governmental organizations, Islamic awakening and competing ideologies.
Abstract \n\nObjectives: This study aim to investigate the relation between health-related physical fitness (HRF), physical activity (PA), and BMI among children in Malaysia. \nDesign: PA was measured and classified into three levels based on the checklist questions. Anthropometric and HRF were measured in a sample of 918 students. BMI was computed and classified into underweight, normal, overweight/obese.\nResults: More boys than girls were underweight and overweight (14.8% vs 12.4%), (28.8% vs 19.4%). Boys perform significantly (P< 0.000) better than girls in all HRF except for the sit-and-reach. All HRF tests were significantly correlated with each other in boys and girls, but BMI was weakly correlated with sit-and-reach in boys, and sit-and-reach and sit-up girls. Boys and girls performances decrease (p for trend < 0.05) in all HRF tests from normal weight to overweight/obese. Overweight/underweight children had poorer performance in HRF than normal weight children. However, performances of overweight and underweight children in high PA level were significantly better in overall HRF tests than their low PA level. \nConclusion: The relations between HRF, BMI, and PA were noticed. The variation of children’s performances in HRF tasks may consider as indicators of potential health risks that overweight and underweight children faced.
The study creates a bridge between existing gap by developing an effective attributes of brand and vital component of successful long-term relationships, as well it develops a conceptual model which clarify the bonds between the image and trust of brand and consumer commitment. And also, it prepares some insights regarding how brand attributes and consumers’ commitment can be linked. The data for this study come from top 250 Iranian contractor companies in the oil industry. The research used from measuring model and structural relationships with positivism approach. The study examined the linear effects in the proposed model and concluded that all suggested relationships received acceptable support. The measuring results of models prove that selected items offered good explanation for constructs of models. As shown by the results of measuring concepts and indictors dimensions, there is significant loading for every one of selected item, as well indicating adequate convergent and construct validity.
Abstract\n\nHydrogen (H2) is produced by aqueous-phase reforming of natural gas and biomass-derived oxygenated hydrocarbons at temperatures near 500 k over a catalyst such as Raney -Nickel. In this work preparation of α-Alumina supported nickel-tin catalyst for hydrogen gas production was carried out. This catalyst exhibits higher selectivity for H2 production and lower selectivity for production of alkanes for natural gas reforming .Investigation of catalyst activity in H2 production mentions it,s economic feasibility.Nickel-tin oxides were obtained from the calcinations of basic nickel carbonate and tin oxide mixture with α-Alumina at 600 ˚C in air reduction of the nickel and tin oxides in the follow at hydrogen gas at 450 ˚C guided to the formation of activated nickel –tin catalyst. XRD technique was used for characterizing of formed nickel-tin specimen. XRD spectrums showed reduction of nickel and tin oxides to their active metallic forms.Adition of other promotion reagent , such as Mn and Mg showed that Mg has an excellent promotion effect on catalyst activity. Activity and selectivity of catalyst evaluated by gas chromatography technique measurments.GC Analysis showed that the amount of H2 in reforming product is the main in comparison with CO and CO2 content. The present study aims to find a method through which hydrogen could be produced as a cheap and renewable energy source. The present method attempts to synthesize a modified catalyst of Raney and Nickel using tin and evaluate and compare its efficiency.
Housing affordability problems are emerging. Homeownership status as a measure of housing affordability problem is important to seek in order to fully grasp the level of the challenge. With aims of addressing current homeownership status and examine to what extent is the need to improve housing affordability in Malaysia; a survey of 760 respondents from random sampling is conducted. The surveys are analysed against a ‘structural’ component of the affordability problem after factors and variables taken from literature review. Homeownership status and the level of affordability when the houses were purchased by the owners are assessed, and improvements for housing affordability problem are then discussed. The findings demonstrate that most households own a house. It was also revealed that households paid their deposits with their own savings and bank loans are the main source. Homeowners employed in the public sector bought their house at a lower range as compared to private sector and the house prices are affordable prices for the income range of middle income household’s income. The findings can be simply interpreted that middle income households in Malaysia are fortunate to have a place to live in. Nonetheless without proper monitoring by the government and protection by policies the situation might change drastically for generation to come.
Underwater wireless sensor networks have emerged in recent years as an effective technique for aquatic applications such as underwater surveillance systems. Due to highly resource constrained nature of underwater wireless sensor networks and harsh operation environments, fulfilling the quality of service (QoS) requirements in underwater surveillance systems is a critical problem. In this paper QoS parameter analysis for underwater surveillance system routing protocols is focused. QoS parameters of four routing protocols VBF, HH-VBF, DBR and FDBR in terms of packet delivery ratio, energy efficiency and average end to end delay in two different nodes deployment strategies are analyzed. The main contribution of this paper is that this is the first article that compares routing protocols in randomly deployment strategy and Octahedron placement strategy for an underwater surveillance system. We have used the underwater wireless sensor network simulator Aqua-Sim for simulating routing protocols. The simulation results on prototype data show the effectiveness of the comparisons of the proposed method.
