Systematics study through scanning electron microscopy; a tool for the authentication of herbal drug Mentha suaveolens Ehrh

In all over the world, herbal drugs are usually adulterated with similar species or varieties due to incorrect identification. Most of herbal products devoid purity and quality, therefore an attempt was carried out to identify plant species and authenticate its herbal drug products from Mentha suaveolens. Microscopy tools provide an excellent platform to identify plants at species level. In this study, microscopic and pharmacokinetic parameters of M. suaveolens were observed. Plant species were collected from high diverse areas of Northern Pakistan. Macro and micro‐morphology including palynology and anatomical features were analyzed to study M. suaveolens. Species characteristics were studied, while implementing microscopic techniques for the delimitation and identification of the species. Traditionally Mentha species are used to cure several diseases that is, digestive disorders, respiratory disorders. Micromorphology (stem, leaves, flowers structure, length etc.), palynology (shape, size of pollen etc.), and anatomical characters (types of stomata, epidermal cell shape, and trichomes) were studied. Micromorphology and anatomical characters were of great interest and significance to discuss the taxonomy of the species. Taxonomic characters were studied to characterize and authenticate the species. The aim of the present study is to observe in detail the taxonomic identification of the species in term of morphology, palynology, and foliar epidermal anatomy for the correct identification along with their medicinal uses in the area.     

Your comments matter: incorporating viewers’ comments for ranking online video content using bibliometrics

ABSTRACT

The quality of user-generated content over World Wide Web media is a matter of serious concern for both creators and users. To measure the quality of content, webometric techniques are commonly used. In recent times, bibliometric techniques have been introduced to good effect for evaluation of the quality of user-generated content, which were originally used for scholarly data. However, the application of bibliometric techniques to evaluate the quality of YouTube content is limited to h-index and g-index considering only views. This paper advocates for and demonstrates the adaptation of existing Bibliometric indices including h-index, g-index and M-index exploiting both views and comments and proposes three indices h_vc, g_vc and m_vc for YouTube video channel ranking. The empirical results prove that the proposed indices using views along with the comments outperform the existing approaches on a real-world dataset of YouTube.     

Exponentially Weighted Moving Average Chart and Two‐Component Measurement Error

The two‐component measurement error (TCME) model effectively quantifies both the additive and multiplicative errors in analytical measurements. The performance of control charts in presence of TCME model has been investigated by researchers in recent past, but these studies are based on only considering fixed levels for the two‐component model parameters. In this study, we investigated the exponentially weighted moving average chart's performance in presence of TCME for varying levels of two‐component model parameters. A cost function analysis is also presented to determine the optimal number of multiple measurements and the sample size for reducing the effect of TCME. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On the Efficiency of Runs Rules Schemes for Process Monitoring

There are two main types of variations, namely, common and special causes leading to in‐control and out‐of‐control states, respectively. Control charts are popular tools used to differentiate between these two states of a process. Implementation of runs rules schemes with control charts is an attractive approach for process monitoring. This study is designed to describe the methodology of runs rules schemes and discuss their implementation for different types of control charts. We have considered memory‐less charts, namely, , S, and R charts for our study purposes. It is examined that the efficiency gain depends on the number of decision points utilized to implement a given rule. Moreover, superiority of runs rules schemes may vary for different types of location and dispersion charts. An application example using a dataset is also included in the study for practical considerations. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Topological evolution of laminar juncture flows under different critical parameters

Horseshoe vortex topological structure has been studied extensively in the past, traditional “saddle of separation” and new “attachment saddle point” topologies found in literature both have theoretical basis and experimental and computational evidences for support. The laminar incompressible juncture flows at low Reynolds numbers especially are observed to have new topology. Studies concerning the existence of the new topology though found in literature, the topological evolution and its dependency on various critical flow parameters require further investigation. A Particle Image Velocimetry based analysis is carried out to observe the effect of aspect ratio, δ*/D and shape of the obstacle on laminar horseshoe vortex topology for small obstacles. Rise in aspect ratio evolves the topology from the traditional to new for all the cases observed. The circular cross section obstacles are found more apt to having the new topology compared to square cross sections. It is noted that the sweeping effect of the fluid above the vortex system in which horseshoe vortex is immersed plays a critical role in this evolution. Topological evolution is observed not only in the most upstream singular point region of horseshoe vortex system but also in the corner region. The corner vortex topology evolves from the traditional type to new one before the topological evolution of the most upstream singular point, resulting in a new topological pattern of the laminar juncture flows “separation-attachment combination”. The study may help extend the understanding of the three-dimensional boundary layer separation phenomenon.     

On the Performance of Phase I Dispersion Control Charts for Process Monitoring

Control charts are usually implemented in two phases: the retrospective phase (phase I) and the monitoring phase (phase II). The performance of any phase II control chart structure depends on the preciseness of the control limits obtained from the phase I analysis. In statistical process control, the performance of phase I dispersion charts has mainly been investigated for normal or contaminated normal distributions of the quality characteristic of interest. Little work has been carried out to investigate the performance of a wide range of possible phase I dispersion charts for processes following non‐normal distributions. The current study deals with the proper choice of a control chart for the evaluation of process dispersion in phase I. We have analyzed the performance of a wide range of dispersion control charts, including two distribution‐free structures. The performance of the control charts is evaluated in terms of probability to signal, under normal and non‐normal process setups. These results will be useful for quality control practitioners in their selection of a phase I control chart. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.