ALBERT

Description: Travelers act as sentinels for the spread of Zika virus. Imported Zika cases and the presence of Zika virus-transmitting mosquitoes have been documented in the Middle East. However, data on travelers’ knowledge, attitude and practices regarding Zika and its prevention measures within the Middle East are scarce. This study aimed to address this issue in a sample of Jordanian and non-Jordanian travelers to U.S. in Jordan. A paper-based questionnaire was distributed to 301 travelers to U.S. in Queen Alia International airport, Amman, Jordan. Only 2.7% of the travelers knew that Zika is associated with birth defects. A total of 10.4% of the participants knew that the bite of infected mosquitoes is a route of Zika transmission. Only 12.6% of respondents correctly identified Zika prevention measures. The level of education and future plans for pregnancy were significantly associated with a high knowledge score (R2 = 0.140, p-value 〈 0.005). Although 76.2% of the travelers perceived Zika as a health threat, only 11.2% believed in the efficacy of the prevention measures. Formulation of educational campaigns within Middle Eastern countries and development of awareness strategies regarding Zika and its prevention within the airports are required. This is particularly essential with the upcoming 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

Description: This article presents certain families of analytic functions regarding q-starlikeness and q-convexity of complex order γ ( γ ∈ C \ 0 ) . This introduced a q-integral operator and certain subclasses of the newly introduced classes are defined by using this q-integral operator. Coefficient bounds for these subclasses are obtained. Furthermore, the ( δ , q )-neighborhood of analytic functions are introduced and the inclusion relations between the ( δ , q )-neighborhood and these subclasses of analytic functions are established. Moreover, the generalized hyper-Bessel function is defined, and application of main results are discussed.

Description: Several emerging nano scale forms of carbon are showing great promise in electrochemical sensing such as graphene and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs). Herein we present an ecofriendly method to fabricate long life and sensitive ion selective sensors based on graphene and MWCNTs nanocomposites with no need for volatile organic solvents. Both sensors were fabricated, for the analysis of carbachol in ophthalmic solutions, plasma and urine where ion- association complex was formed between cationic carbachol and anionic Sodium tetra phenyl borate (NaTBP) in a ratio 1:1. Both sensors were evaluated according to the IUPAC recommendation data, revealing linear response in the concentration range 10−7 M to 10−2 M with near Nernstian slopes 50.80 ± 5 and 58.14 ± 3 mV/decade and correlation coefficients 0.9992 and 0.9998 for graphene and MWCNTs based sensors, respectively. Both sensors were successfully applied as stability indicating method for the analysis of carbachol in presence of its metabolite choline, in ophthalmic preparations, in plasma and urine showing good recovery percentage values. MWCNTs based sensor showed some advantages over graphene sensor regarding lower limit of detection (LOD), longer life time and higher selectivity towards carbachol. Statistical comparison of the proposed sensors with the official method showed no significant difference for accuracy and precision.

Description: Historically, the Nile Delta has played an integral part in Egyptian civilization, as its fertile soils have been cultivated for centuries. The region offers a lush oasis among the expansive arid climate of Northern Africa; however, in recent decades, many anthropogenic changes to the environment have jeopardized Egypt’s agricultural productivity. Political instability and lack of sufficient regulations regarding urban growth and encroachment have put agricultural land in the area at risk. Advanced geospatial techniques were used to assess the rate at which urban areas are increasing within the region. A hybrid classification of Landsat satellite imagery for the eastern sector of the Nile Delta, between the years 1988 and 2017, was conducted to map major land-use and land-cover (LULC) classes. The statistical change analysis revealed that urban areas increased by 222.5% over the study period (29 years). Results indicated that urban areas are encroaching mainly on established agricultural lands within the Nile Delta. Most of the change has occurred within the past nine years, where approximately 235.60 km2 of the cultivated lands were transitioned to urban. Nonetheless, at the eastern delta flank, which is bordered by desert, analysis indicated that agricultural lands have experienced a considerable growth throughout the study period due to a major desert reclamation effort. Areas most at risk from future urban expansion were identified. A simulation of future urban expansion, using a Markov Chain algorithm, indicated that the extent to which urban area is simulated to grow in the region is 16.67% (277.3 km2) and 37.82% (843 km2) by the year 2026, and 2050, respectively. The methods used in this study are useful in assessing the rate of urban encroachment on agricultural lands and can be applied to similar at-risk areas in the regions if appropriate site-specific modifications are considered.

Description: Transformations are taking place within the distribution systems to cope with the congestions and reliability concerns. This paper presents a new technique to efficiently minimize power losses within the distribution system by optimally sizing and placing distributed generators (DGs) while considering network reconfiguration. The proposed technique is a hybridization of two metaheuristic-based algorithms: Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) and Particle Swarm Optimizer (PSO), which solve the network reconfiguration problem by optimally installing different DG types (conventional and renewable-based). Case studies carried out showed the proposed hybrid technique outperformed each algorithm operating individually regarding both voltage profile and reduction in system losses. Case studies are carried to measure and compare the performance of the proposed technique on three different works: IEEE 33-bus, IEEE 69-bus radial distribution system, and an actual 78-bus distribution system located at Cairo, Egypt. The integration of renewable energy with the distribution network, such as photovoltaic (PV) arrays, is recommended since Cairo enjoys an excellent actual record of irradiance according to the PV map of Egypt.

Description: Solar Photovoltaic (PV) systems have become prominent and have attained the attention of energy engineers, governments and researchers. To achieve the maximum benefit from the PV system in spite of its nonlinear characteristic and environmental conditions, finding a robust maximum power point tracking method is essential. Over two decades, various researchers proposed numerous MPPT methods, but they failed to evaluate their methods on consistency, reliability, and robustness over several numbers of runs. Most of the researchers examined one configuration and they did not to consider the dynamic change in the irradiation conditions. Therefore, in this manuscript, the authors introduced a novel optimization technique Fractional chaotic Flower Pollination Algorithm (FC-FPA), by merging fractional chaos maps with flower pollination algorithm (FPA). The proposed technique, help FPA in extracting the Global Maximum Power Point (GMPP) under different partial shading patterns including with different PV array configurations. The proposed FC-FPA technique is tested and evaluated over 5 different patterns of partial shading conditions. The first three patterns are tested over 4S configuration made with Shell S36 PV module. The other two patterns are applied to the 4S2P configuration of Shell SM55 PV panels. The performance of the proposed variant is investigated by tracking the GMPP for abruptly changing shade pattern. Exclusive statistical analysis is performed over several numbers of runs. Comparison with perturb and observe MPPT technique is established. These results confirm that, the proposed method shows fast convergence, zero oscillation and rapid response for the dynamic change in irradiation with consistent behavior.

Description: Genetic algorithm (GA) is an artificial intelligence search method that uses the process of evolution and natural selection theory and is under the umbrella of evolutionary computing algorithm. It is an efficient tool for solving optimization problems. Integration among (GA) parameters is vital for successful (GA) search. Such parameters include mutation and crossover rates in addition to population that are important issues in (GA). However, each operator of GA has a special and different influence. The impact of these factors is influenced by their probabilities; it is difficult to predefine specific ratios for each parameter, particularly, mutation and crossover operators. This paper reviews various methods for choosing mutation and crossover ratios in GAs. Next, we define new deterministic control approaches for crossover and mutation rates, namely Dynamic Decreasing of high mutation ratio/dynamic increasing of low crossover ratio (DHM/ILC), and Dynamic Increasing of Low Mutation/Dynamic Decreasing of High Crossover (ILM/DHC). The dynamic nature of the proposed methods allows the ratios of both crossover and mutation operators to be changed linearly during the search progress, where (DHM/ILC) starts with 100% ratio for mutations, and 0% for crossovers. Both mutation and crossover ratios start to decrease and increase, respectively. By the end of the search process, the ratios will be 0% for mutations and 100% for crossovers. (ILM/DHC) worked the same but the other way around. The proposed approach was compared with two parameters tuning methods (predefined), namely fifty-fifty crossover/mutation ratios, and the most common approach that uses static ratios such as (0.03) mutation rates and (0.9) crossover rates. The experiments were conducted on ten Traveling Salesman Problems (TSP). The experiments showed the effectiveness of the proposed (DHM/ILC) when dealing with small population size, while the proposed (ILM/DHC) was found to be more effective when using large population size. In fact, both proposed dynamic methods outperformed the predefined methods compared in most cases tested.

Description: In the present research paper, our aim is to introduce a new subfamily of meromorphic p-valent (multivalent) functions. Moreover, we investigate sufficiency criterion for such defined family.

Description: Graph invariants are the properties of graphs that do not change under graph isomorphisms, the independent set decision problem, vertex covering problem, and matching number problem are known to be NP-Hard, and hence it is not believed that there are efficient algorithms for solving them. In this paper, the graph invariants matching number, vertex covering number, and independence number for the zero-divisor graph over the rings Z p k and Z p k q r are determined in terms of the sets S p i and S p i q j respectively. Accordingly, a formula in terms of p , q , k , and r, with n = p k , n = p k q r is provided.

Description: A new cyclic dipeptide, petrocidin A (1), along with three known compounds—2,3dihydroxybenzoic acid (2), 2,3-dihydroxybenzamide (3), and maltol (4)—were isolated from the solid culture of Streptomyces sp. SBT348. The strain Streptomyces sp. SBT348 had been prioritized in a strain collection of 64 sponge-associated actinomycetes based on its distinct metabolomic profile using liquid chromatography/high-resolution mass spectrometry (LC-HRMS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). The absolute configuration of all α-amino acids was determined by HPLC analysis after derivatization with Marfey’s reagent and comparison with commercially available reference amino acids. Structure elucidation was pursued in the presented study by mass spectrometry and NMR spectral data. Petrocidin A (1) and 2,3-dihydroxybenzamide (3) exhibited significant cytotoxicity towards the human promyelocytic HL-60 and the human colon adenocarcinoma HT-29 cell lines. These results demonstrated the potential of sponge-associated actinomycetes for the discovery of novel and pharmacologically active natural products.