Primitive Methods Research Articles

Feasibility of Staged Bilateral Radiofrequency Ventral Intermediate Nucleus Thalamotomy for Bilateral Essential Tremor

Patients with bilateral and/or midline/axial tremor have significant diminution in quality of life (QOL). Various studies report high complication rates with bilateral thalamotomy. However, use of primitive methods in these studies confers questionable validity. We conducted a retrospective observational cohort study in patients with medication-refractory bilateral essential tremor treated with staged bilateral radiofrequency ventral intermediate nucleus thalamotomy to subjectively examine the impact of any adverse effects on QOL and patient satisfaction. Eight patients who had undergone staged bilateral radiofrequency ventral intermediate nucleus thalamotomy were included and completed a customized questionnaire. Patients returned the completed questionnaire by mail for statistical analysis. All 8 patients had improved QOL. Seven patients were satisfied with the received treatment, although residual neck and hand tremor remained in 5 and 4 patients, respectively. None of the patients reported worsening of symptoms or severe disability in any area. Adverse effects included speech difficulty, difficulty in concentration, memory loss, and calculation difficulty. All 8 patients were self-reliant in doing everyday tasks that were not possible before the treatment suggesting the nondisabling nature of the adverse effects that occurred. Adverse effects that are nondisabling and hence acceptable to the patient can be considered acceptable adverse effects. Staged bilateral radiofrequency ventral intermediate nucleus thalamotomy definitely improves QOL in patients with medication-refractory bilateral essential tremor despite occurrence of acceptable adverse effects.

Peculiarities of Exhibiting Hot Manufacturing Miniatures in Museums

The article is dedicated to the creation of scientifically grounded miniatures of hot handicrafts and their role in historical and natural museum expositions. As a basis for creating miniatures, developed principles are used.While staying in museum, exposition and visitor have a kind of communication. Culturological text encoded in the revealed monument of ancient culture remains incomprehensible for a visitor and a tourist without recoding it. To cope with this situation, it is necessary to carry out a series of activities that result in the reproduction, museumization of the monument or its miniature creation. As a result, culturological text and audience engage in a dialogue.Foremost, museum communication depends on the attractiveness of the exhibit itself. Naturally, scansen has the highest attraction. However, not all monuments of ancient culture and archeology can by moved to scansens. Not all excavated sights are preserved so that they can be restored in scansens. For this purpose, miniatures are used.Creation of miniatures of archaeological sites for museum exhibitions until now largely remains a matter for the museum.Only the most significant archaeological monuments should be objects for miniature creating. For miniatures, places of outstanding battles, certain objects, associated with manufacturing processes, such as pottery kilns, bugles, blast furnaces, etc. could be used.The monuments should be either fully-investigated or majorly-investigated. Additionally, separate objects on the monuments can be also objects of miniature creation (building, kiln, metallurgic furnace, bugle).Choosing scale of miniature will depend on the capabilities of the museum itself, the area that can be allocated to the miniature.The topographic map of the miniature should serve as a landscape base.The scientific basis of the miniature is the result of archaeological research.The basis of individual objects location on the miniature is the general layout for monument excavation.Using these principles will help to create miniatures of hot handicraft production. Pottery is the oldest known hot handicraft. It has quickly spread throughout Eurasia. To illustrate the first primitive methods of burning out, improvised furnace could be used.They are the so-called ash collectors of white culture. They are round structures outwardly similar to burial mounds. Burning out was carried out on a large fire covered with the turf to maintain constant temperature. The second type of kilns is the so-called single-stage pottery kilns. The third type is multistage kilns. Anothertype of kilns is a transitional variant, recently investigated by Ukrainian archaeologists. The floor of the burning chamber is created of potter’s wheels, which, together with the dishes, are placed on the airways.Another hot handicraft was metal industry. The first metallurgical tools consisted of two crucibles and four nozzles. The crucible with a charge was covered with a second crucible and was placed on a pile of charcoal. Then the coal was burned down and four metallurgists with nozzles came to the crucible with long wooden tubes blowing. Afterwards, the lungs of metallurgists were replaced by miches.During the late bronze period, the metal melting was performed in round kilns, dipped into two thirds below ground. At the tangent line, nozzles were placed. The metal melting was performed in melting pots. The abovementioned kiln types were used in other industries as well. For example, for lime burning in glass and other industries.Similar miniatures will be a major addition to the material evidence of hot handicrafts both for designated museums (for example, metallurgy or pottery museums), as well for general, historical and local natural museums.Article received 22.03.2018

A Kernelized Unified Framework for Domain Adaptation

The performance of the supervised learning algorithms such as k-nearest neighbor (k-NN) depends on the labeled data. For some applications (Target Domain), obtaining such labeled data is very expensive and labor-intensive. In a real-world scenario, the possibility of some other related application (Source Domain) is always accompanied by sufficiently labeled data. However, there is a distribution discrepancy between the source domain and the target domain application data as the background of collecting both the domains data is different. Therefore, source domain application with sufficient labeled data cannot be directly utilized for training the target domain classifier. Domain Adaptation (DA) or Transfer learning (TL) provides a way to transfer knowledge from source domain application to target domain application. Existing DA methods may not perform well when there is a much discrepancy between the source and the target domain data, and the data is non-linear separable. Therefore, in this paper, we provide a Kernelized Unified Framework for Domain Adaptation (KUFDA) that minimizes the discrepancy between both the domains on linear or non-linear data-sets and aligns them both geometrically and statistically. The substantial experiments verify that the proposed framework outperforms state-of-the-art Domain Adaptation and the primitive methods (Non- Domain Adaptation) on real-world Office-Caltech and PIE Face data-sets. Our proposed approach (KUFDA) achieved mean accuracies of 86.83% and 74.42% for all possible tasks of Office-Caltech with VGG-Net features and PIE Face data-sets.

What the Old Microbiologists Knew...

Abstract Amazing is the fact that although the organisms have been known since the end of the seventeenth century, effective study of this group of organisms started after about 160 years, in the last two decades of the nineteenth century. The origins of science about bacteria were very difficult, there were many unknowns and conflict information. The research results provided by various scientists created complete chaos. From today’s perspective, it is difficult to imagine how it was possible, do research in such conditions, and obtain reliable results? Yet despite these difficulties, knowledge of our predecessors was neither so small nor so doubtful as might be supposed. On the contrary, it was surprisingly big and wide. What our predecessors knew about bacteria and especially their importance in nature? They knew that bacteria live everywhere, knew about their unlimited spread in the biosphere. The role of microorganisms in the mineralization of organic matter was known, as well as the circulation of matter in nature and role of bacteria in cycles of nutrient elements, and the solar energy as the driving force behind these changes. Today - although we understand these mechanisms much more accurately, we know a lot details and individual changes - but the basic outline of the functioning of the biosphere, valid until today created our predecessors. A look back at the beginning of the microbiology teaches us, how much can be achieved with seemingly primitive methods, if accompanied by a passion for research and imagination.

A VSEPR-inspired force field for determining molecular properties of PF5

ABSTRACTValence Shell Electron Pair Repulsion (VSEPR) theory, commonly taught in introductory chemistry courses, provides a basis for understanding the molecular structures of molecules of the type XY, where X is a central atom surrounded by m Y ligands. While VSEPR is generally thought of only as a qualitative theory, Bartell and coworkers constructed a semi-quantitative model potential to address the physical underpinnings of VSEPR by introducing a points-on-a-sphere (POS) potential such that all X-Y bonds are of fixed length and all atoms Y repel each other. More than forty years ago, this simple model was shown to be effective in reproducing relative quadratic and cubic bending force constants for a variety of binary XY compounds when compared to values computed with semi-empirical and fairly primitive methods. The work presented here endeavours to go beyond the model used in the early investigations by Bartell and coworkers. Specifically, stretching force constants are clearly omitted from any POS model with a fixed radius, and are (primitively) included here by treating all X-Y bonds as simple (and equivalent) Morse oscillators. With the additional degrees of freedom in the parametrization that come from the Morse potential, the resulting model was investigated. The degree to which this simple mechanical model can reproduce quadratic and cubic force fields for PF is studied here, as well as how it works for a more difficult problem – the energetics and transition state properties for the intermediate in the (Berry) pseudorotation process that interchanges axial and equatorial fluorines in this prototype molecule. The five parameter Morse-POS model is shown to be do quite well in describing the quadratic and cubic force fields, as well as the pseudorotation process, a fairly impressive feat given the naivete of the model.

Electromigration- and Parasitic-Aware ILP-Based Analog Router

Interconnect and via failures due to the electromigration (EM) effect have become increasingly challenging in the advanced technology as a result of shrinking feature size. The parasitic effect, which has to be normally represented as analog and radio frequency (RF) circuit constraints for effective suppression in practice, has also made the modern physical design more intractable. In this paper, we present a new integer-linear-programming-based EM-aware and sensitivity-aware analog/RF router, which can effectively address the EM constraints as well as interconnect parasitics and matching constraints along the routing paths. Interconnect parasitics can be evaluated in the sensitivity analysis so that an appropriate width can be adopted for each subnet in order to gain better circuit performance. Any mismatch can be also minimized between ideally matching nets whenever the primitive methods fail to find exactly matched routes for these sensitive nets. By using our proposed routing methodology, the EM constraints are taken into account to guarantee a final EM-compliant routing solution. The experimental results show that our proposed method is able to produce better circuit performance compared to the previous works while EM can be seriously addressed for analog/RF circuits.

Metal concentrations in pregnant women and neonates from informal electronic waste recycling.

Electronic waste (e-waste) is the fastest growing solid waste stream worldwide and mostly ends up in developing countries where residents use primitive methods for recycling. The most infamous e-waste recycling town, Guiyu in Southeast China, has been recycling since the mid-1990s. E-waste contains several harmful chemicals, including lead (Pb), cadmium (Cd), chromium (Cr), and manganese (Mn). In 2011–12, the e-waste Recycling Exposures and Community Health (e-REACH) Study enrolled 634 pregnant women living in Guiyu and Haojiang, a control site, both in Shantou, China. The women completed a questionnaire and gave maternal blood, cord blood, and maternal urine, which were analyzed for Pb, Cd, Cr, and Mn. Maternal blood Pb, Cd, and Cr concentrations were significantly higher in Guiyu compared to Haojiang. In Guiyu, the geometric mean of Pb concentration in maternal blood was 6.66 μg/dL (range: 1.87 – 27.09 μg/dL) and was 1.74-fold greater than in Haojiang (95% CI: 1.60, 1.89). In cord blood, Pb concentration was 1.53-fold higher in Guiyu (95% CI: 1.38, 1.68). In maternal urine, Cd (ratio: 2.15, 95% CI: 1.72, 2.69) and Mn (ratio: 2.60, 95% CI: 2.04, 3.31) concentrations were significantly higher in Guiyu in comparison to Haojiang. In conclusion, pregnant women in Guiyu were at risk for increased exposure to heavy metals.

The Exhibiting Peculiarities of Hot Manufacturing Models in Museums

The article is dedicated to the creation of scientifically grounded miniatures of hot handicrafts and their role in historical and natural museum expositions. As a basis for creating miniatures, developed principles are used.While staying in museum, exposition and visitor have a kind of communication. Culturological text encoded in the revealed monument of ancient culture remains incomprehensible for a visitor and a tourist without recoding it. To cope with this situation, it is necessary to carry out a series of activities that result in the reproduction, museumization of the monument or its miniature creation. As a result, culturological text and audience engage in a dialogue.Foremost, museum communication depends on the attractiveness of the exhibit itself. Naturally, scansen has the highest attraction. However, not all monuments of ancient culture and archeology can by moved to scansens. Not all excavated sights are preserved so that they can be restored in scansens. For this purpose, miniatures are used.Creation of miniatures of archaeological sites for museum exhibitions until now largely remains a matter for the museum.Only the most significant archaeological monuments should be objects for miniature creating. For miniatures, places of outstanding battles, certain objects, associated with manufacturing processes, such as pottery kilns, bugles, blast furnaces, etc. could be used.The monuments should be either fully-investigated or majorly-investigated. Additionally, separate objects on the monuments can be also objects of miniature creation (building, kiln, metallurgic furnace, bugle).Choosing scale of miniature will depend on the capabilities of the museum itself, the area that can be allocated to the miniature.The topographic map of the miniature should serve as a landscape base.The scientific basis of the miniature is the result of archaeological research.The basis of individual objects location on the miniature is the general layout for monument excavation.Using these principles will help to create miniatures of hot handicraft production. Pottery is the oldest known hot handicraft. It has quickly spread throughout Eurasia. To illustrate the first primitive methods of burning out, improvised furnace could be used.They are the so-called ash collectors of white culture. They are round structures outwardly similar to burial mounds. Burning out was carried out on a large fire covered with the turf to maintain constant temperature. The second type of kilns is the so-called single-stage pottery kilns. The third type is multistage kilns. Anothertype of kilns is a transitional variant, recently investigated by Ukrainian archaeologists. The floor of the burning chamber is created of potter’s wheels, which, together with the dishes, are placed on the airways.Another hot handicraft was metal industry. The first metallurgical tools consisted of two crucibles and four nozzles. The crucible with a charge was covered with a second crucible and was placed on a pile of charcoal. Then the coal was burned down and four metallurgists with nozzles came to the crucible with long wooden tubes blowing. Afterwards, the lungs of metallurgists were replaced by miches.During the late bronze period, the metal melting was performed in round kilns, dipped into two thirds below ground. At the tangent line, nozzles were placed. The metal melting was performed in melting pots. The abovementioned kiln types were used in other industries as well. For example, for lime burning in glass and other industries.Similar miniatures will be a major addition to the material evidence of hot handicrafts both for designated museums (for example, metallurgy or pottery museums), as well for general, historical and local natural museums.Article received 22.03.2018

Geochemical anomalies of trace elements in unremediated soils of Mt. Karczówka, a historic lead mining area in the city of Kielce, Poland

Concentrations of selected trace elements (Ag, As, Ba, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb, Zn) and rare earth elements were determined in 61 samples of surface soils collected from Mt. Karczówka, a historic Pb ore mining area located in the city of Kielce, south-central Poland. Some of these samples were subjected to XRD analyses and Pb stable isotope measurements. The mineral and chemical composition of rock samples were also examined. Mining activity in the study area was conducted mostly during 15th–17th centuries using technologically primitive methods, and was finally ceased in the first half of the 19th century. More than three thousand old shafts, pits and adits occur in the study area and its vicinity. The soils of the study area have not been remediated since the end of the mining operations. The trace elements of the examined surface soils are heterogeneously distributed with lead concentrations in the range of 41–9114 mg/kg and Pb isotopic signatures similar to those of local galena. The results of trace element measurements allowed us to discriminate geochemical anomalies from background levels and to link mineralogy of the host rocks to the origin of anomalous element concentrations. This study shows that elevated levels of elements of geogenic origin have remained in surface soil for two centuries after cessation of mining operations.

Trunk rotation due to persistence of primitive reflexes in early school-age children.

The angle of trunk rotation (ATR) is a measurement that allows an objective assessment of a growing child's spine. Early detection of trunk rotation prevents the progression of scoliosis. One of the factors that predispose children to the formation of faulty posture may be primitive reflexes, which should be integrated in the central nervous system (CNS) by the age of one year. If retained, primitive reflexes affect children's physical development as well as their development at school. The aim of the study was to determine the prevalence of trunk asymmetry and the persistence of primitive reflexes and their inter-relationships in early school-age children. In this population-based survey, 61 children, average age 6.3 years (SD ±1.43), were examined. The ATR was examined using a scoliometer. The degree of integration of reflexes was assessed using tests developed by S. Goddard to assess the asymmetrical tonic neck reflex (ATNR), symmetrical tonic neck reflex (STNR), and spinal Galant reflex (SGR) on a 0-4 scale. Spearman's rank correlation coefficient and the χ2 test were used in the statistical analysis. In almost half of the children body rotation was observed, in most cases toward the right (p = 0.012). This asymmetry was positively correlated with non-integrated Galant reflex on the same side (r = 0.335, p = 0.050). The presence of trunk rotation is associated with sex: There was higher frequency of asymmetry among the girls than among the boys. In the evaluation of scoliosis, it could be useful to examine primitive reflexes as a possible reason for trunk rotation. In the treatment of scoliosis, primitive reflex integration methods should be used in some cases.

Identifying irregularities in security event logs through an object-based Chi-squared test of independence

A novel technique for identifying irregular event log entries is presented in this paper along with the implementation in a Microsoft Windows-based environment. The motivation behind this research is to identify irregular activity in a system whilst minimising any requirement on expert knowledge, in addition to saving investigative time and computing resources. As the developed solution utilises the standard Microsoft format for event logs, it can work with both live systems, as well as events extracted and stored for off-site analysis. The solution consists of two major steps: first, convert the event logs into objects-based model and second, perform statistical analysis using the Chi-squared (χ2) test of independence and classify mean χ2 values into discrete categories using Jenks natural breaks method. The event logs entries, which failed the test of dependence are considered as irregular events. It is also shown that the proposed solution poses an advantage over primitive frequency analysis methods as it uses object relationships among event log entries to determine irregularities for locating anomalous activities. Empirical analysis of the solution is performed using event logs data from 20 machines and shows promising results by correctly identifying irregular events. Further experimental analysis involving the insertion of synthetic irregular events results in an average accuracy of 85%.

Smart agriculture monitoring system using IoT

Atmospheric changes have been sporadic over the previous decade. Because of this in late period, atmosphere shrewd techniques called as savvy agribusiness is embraced by numerous Indian farmers. Keen farming is a robotized and coordinated data innovation executed with the Internet of Things. IOT is growing quickly and broadly connected in every remote condition. This paper presents an efficient sensor innovation and remote systems coordination of IOT innovation has been contemplated and looked into in light of the real circum-stance of agricultural activities. Real goal is to gather ongoing information of agriculture that gives simple access to the farmer. Our task screens the yield development utilizing advanced means giving the precise esteems of different parameters where upon the development depends. Additionally, it will help the farmer to screen more than one rural field in the meantime. Since, the vast majority of the observ-ing is done remotely, it will help the person to pick up data. Since, observing through our framework requires less labor, individuals with physical handicaps can be utilized for checking fields. Our task, not just tries to relieve the primitive methods identified with farming yet additionally serve the group by opening new roads for work.

Clinical application of "categorization by analogy" in acupuncture for pain syndromes

The"categorization by analogy"is one of the most primitive thinking methods for ancient people to explore the world, which has exerted far-reaching impact on the origin and development of TCM. With examples of Sanjian (LI 3) for neck pain, Chize (LU 5) for low back pain and Chengshan (BL 57) for dysmenorrhea, the clinical application of"categorization by analogy"in acupuncture for pain syndromes was discussed, hoping more acupuncturists will pay attention to the guiding role of"categorization by analogy"in acupuncture clinical treatment.

Evaluation of Occupational Therapy Practices for Artisanal Gold Mining in Bagega Community, Zamfara State, Nigeria

Background: The enormous numbers of people involved in artisanal gold mining (AGM) together with primitive methods being used in processing gold have resulted in health and environmental challenges. Based on this, both the local and international stakeholders in mining and health sectors engaged in therapeutic practice to mitigate the challenges. Methods: Physical observation and soil samples were assessed in order to identify the occupational health hazards associated with AGM while questionnaire was used to evaluate the effectiveness of adopted occupational therapy practices across the study area. Soil sample was randomly collected between the depths of 0-20 cm. Soil digestion was carried out in triplicate and lead concentration was determined using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometer. Results: The result of a cumulative carcinogenic risk lifetime for ingestion, dermal contact and inhalation exposure pathways were given as 1.86×10-1, 8.83×10-4 and 5.45×10-6 respectively. The major occupational health hazards associated with AGM were body weakness, brain damage, gastrointestinal tract, neuropsychiatric, injuries and death of miners while the removed occupational therapy practices adopted were awareness campaign, remediation/chelating treatment, sensitization and use of modern equipment training. Conclusion: The study established that most of the adopted occupational therapy practices were efficient and effective to ensure safe practices of AGM across the study area.

The Chicago Women's Graphics Collective: A Memoir

104 Feminist Studies 44, no. 1. © 2018 by Feminist Studies, Inc. Estelle Carol The Chicago Women’s Graphics Collective: A Memoir In 1973, the Chicago Women’s Graphics Collective worked in an old run-down second-floor office on Belmont Avenue, which we shared with the main offices of the Chicago Women’s Liberation Union (CWLU).1 They call it New Town now, but in 1973, there wasn’t much new about it. We weren’t the only artists in the building though; downstairs was a tattoo parlor. Still, it was better than having the studio located in my apartment on Newport Street, where there were silkscreen tables in the dining room and a bathroom that doubled as a darkroom. My bedroom door opened directly into the dining room and usually reeked of the foul chemicals we used to make the posters. Just one OSHA inspection would have shut us down forever, but it was not until later that we learned about the dangers of long-term exposure. On Newport Street, the apartment was right next to the Ravenswood Branch of the “L,” and it shook like the aftershock of a California earthquake each time a train passed. But we were in the midst of a women’s revolution, and our priorities were clear. 1. The Chicago Women’s Graphics Collective (WGC) was a “workgroup” of the CWLU from the very start. There were about 25 workgroups and other groups within the CWLU. CWLU outreach to recruit new members got a lot of new women into WGC. WGC, Women’s Liberation Rock Band, and Womankind Newspaper were the cultural arms of the CWLU. Cultural outreach to attract new CWLU members and new feminists to the movement in general was critical to the CWLU’s success. In Celebration of Amazons, 194. All posters designed and silkscreened collectively by the Chicago Women’s Liberation Union, www.cwluherstory.org. Courtesy of CWLU Herstory Project. All posters are on silkscreen. Turning Through Time, Workwoven, 195. Sisterhood Is Blooming, Springtime Will Never Be the Same, 190. Chicago Women’s Labor History, 194. International Women’s Day (reprinted from a Cuban poster). ABOVE Healthcare Is for People, Not for Profit, 195. OPPOSITE Abortion Is a Personal Decision, Not a Legal Debate, 190. ABOVE Healthcare Is for People, Not for Profit, 195. OPPOSITE Abortion Is a Personal Decision, Not a Legal Debate, 190. OPPOSITE Chicago Maternity Center, 192. ABOVE Lesbian Pride, 192. Mountain-Moving Day, 192. ABOVE Detail from Mountain-Moving Day, 192. OPPOSITE Women Unite, Take Back the Night, 199. Lipstick and Blood (reprinted from a Cuban design). Women Are Not Chicks, 191. Liberation School for Women, 192. Boycott Red Coach Lettuce, 192. Working Women Unite, 195. International Women’s Day, Many Waves But One Ocean, 192. Estelle Carol 121 If you look at Chicago Women’s Graphics Collective posters, you’ll rarely see a person’s name on them, because we decided early on that art had been done all wrong by men. It was based on egotism and the cult of the individual—the great-men-of-art syndrome. So we decided to throw all that out, and art now had to be a collective experience. So every poster that we created had to be done by committee. Every one. We had a system in which any one of the collective could get an idea or a phrase or an image and decide to do a poster. They would ask two or three other members to be their assistants and to help develop the idea. And then in little teams they would physically create the poster in silk screen. It had to be a collective process. There’s no way that one single woman could really do it because we were using very primitive reproduction methods, and we needed at least three people to run the silk screen. The silk screens were all hand printed. No machines. If a poster was more than one color, it had to be hand printed, one color at a time, so it was very, very labor intensive. And...

Vliv historické těžby železných rud v Podbeskydské pahorkatině a Moravskoslezských Beskydech na současný reliéf

Although relatively extensive extraction of the pelocarbonate iron ore in the Podbeskydská pahorkatina Upland and the Moravskoslezské Beskydy Mts. have terminated until the end of the 19th century, the remnants are rarely preserved in the recent relief as collapsed shafts, mining pits, dumps or their combinations. The adits are occurring infrequently, because the majority of them are completely collapsed or at least the entrance is filled up with rocks. Similarly, the shafts formerly many meters deep, are recently reflected only as shallow concave hollows. Distinct post-mining landforms are still preserved e.g. in Chlebovice, Libotín near Štramberk, Čeladná or Kozlovice villages. The causes of wrong preservation of these forms, which stood at the beginning of the Ostrava industrial agglomeration, are as: (i) mining in the incoherent fine flysch rocks, (ii) primitive mining methods without wooden setts, and (iii) intensive anthropogenic activities after the mining termination in the landscape. Some of the localities with preserved free underground spaces are remnants after the mining of the other or the related materials, or even crevice type caves. Because of the historical importance of the iron ore mining in the wider area, I would recommend consideration of at least some basic protection of preserved landforms. Otherwise, at the present rate of the landscape changes intensity, they would shortly vanish.

تحليل العلاقة بين الاعتمادات المستندية والتجارة الخارجية واثرها على تحقيق التنمية الاقتصادية في العراق

The aim of the research is to clarify the importance of documentary credits in foreign trade and especially their impact on the balance by limiting imports we highlighted the reality of documentary credits in Iraq and the accompanying changes and developments highlighted the indicators of foreign trade and finding solutions for harmonizing the fund Documentary and trade balance in order to achieve long term economic development.
 The local banks are urged to restore the documentary credit system despite the backwardness and primitive methods used. The documentary credits have increased especially in the last years of the study period. 
 The advantages of the documentary credits have not been used to limit these imports and support the economic development process .

A coherent discrete variable representation method on a sphere.

The coherent discrete variable representation (ZDVR) has been extended for constructing a multidimensional potential-optimized DVR basis on a sphere. In order to deal with the non-constant Jacobian in spherical angles, two direct product primitive basis methods are proposed so that the original ZDVR technique can be properly implemented. The method has been demonstrated by computing the lowest states of a two-dimensional (2D) vibrational model. Results show that the extended ZDVR method gives accurate eigenvalues and exponential convergence with increasing ZDVR basis size.

Agent-based modeling and simulation of earthmoving operations

Abstract Discrete-Event Simulation (DES) models are constructed from sequential duration-based activities. DES is used in modeling several construction operations including earthmoving. Current earthmoving models cannot accommodate equipment units with different specifications performing the same task. In addition, activity durations are calculated based on primitive methods such as interpolating existing durations of similar activities in previous projects. Finally, model elements behave in a predetermined manner, ignoring special operational real-life scenarios that occur due to resource constraints. These limitations often lead to inaccuracies in calculating productivity and equipment utilization. This paper applies Agent-Based Modeling and Simulation (ABMS) as an effective bottom-up tool to modeling earthmoving operations. An Agent-Based (AB) earthmoving model consisting of smart, adaptive agents is developed. Each agent is assigned a state chart and a set of static and dynamic properties (attributes and variables) to direct its interactions with the environment and with other agents. This framework proves how modeling earthmoving from the agent's prospective and basing agents' interactions on their properties allow for modeling equipment units with different specifications performing the same task (e.g. trucks of different capacities), as well as for an accurate representation of activity durations, resource handling and resource constraint scenarios. A Java-based application named Agent-Based Simulator for Earthmoving Operations (ABSEMO) is developed as an implementation of the proposed model. ABSEMO will be helpful to contractors in planning earthmoving operations according to the AB approach. A real-life case study of a riverbed excavation in a dam construction project is simulated using ABSEMO, and the results are compared with those obtained from existing simulation models to verify ABSEMO's logic. A percentage difference of 0.42% from the existing results is obtained, indicating that the model's flow of resources is indeed accurate.

Statistical Optimization of Heavy Metal (Cu2+ and Co2+) Extraction from Printed Circuit Boards and Mobile Batteries Using Chelation Technology

Electronic waste has emerged as one of the fastest growing segments of the solid waste stream in the last two decades because of the greater consumption and obsolescence rates of electronic products. Significant content of metals and polymers present in e-waste may affect the ecosystem and human health if treated inappropriately using primitive recycling methods. Several studies have been reported in the literature for the recovery of metals from e-waste; however, limitations associated with ongoing methods incited this study to move toward modern approaches based on green chemistry principles. The present study is a pioneer effort to employ a novel green technology based on a unique combination of chelation–dechelation concepts to extract metals from printed circuit boards and mobile batteries. The applicability of response surface methodology (RSM) was explored to investigate the mutual interaction effect of process parameters and to provide an improved quality of information. Statistical optimization of the extraction process was performed by coupling of Box–Behnken design and central composite design matrices with RSM. Nearly 85.3% Cu2+ and 86.2% Co2+ recovery was predicted at the center level of design matrices using quadratic regression models for the respective metals. Maximum ±4% deviation was observed between experimental and predicted extraction efficiency. The high values of regression coefficients (R2 = 0.994 for Cu2+ recovery and R2 = 0.998 for Co2+ recovery) indicated that >99% of response variability could be explained by regression models. Relatively lower p-values (<0.0001) and coefficient of variation (<2.8%) indicate the adequacy of the proposed models. The desirability function approach was employed to localize the optimum process parameters, and ramp functions were drawn for the set of optimal points. A well-defined optimal region was identified to maximize the metal extraction with desirability >0.95. Characterization of raw material and residues corroborated the significant extraction of metals. Also, recovered chelating agent was successfully employed in subsequent extraction cycles, which fortifies the concept of a zero-waste technology. The proposed design correlations may prove to be a useful tool in designing pilot and commercial plants for extraction of heavy metals using environmentally friendly chelation technology.