Mind-body skills groups for posttraumatic stress disorder and depression symptoms in Palestinian children and adolescents in Gaza.

A mind-body skills group program was evaluated to determine its effects on symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression, and on hopelessness in children and adolescents in Gaza. The 10-session mind-body skills groups included meditation, guided imagery, breathing techniques, autogenic training, biofeedback, genograms, and self-expression through words, drawings, and movement. Data were analyzed from 129 children and adolescents meeting criteria for PTSD. Significant improvements in PTSD and depression symptoms and a significant decrease in a sense of hopelessness were observed immediately following participation in the program. At 7-month follow-up, the improvements in the total PTSD and depression scores were largely maintained and the decreased sense of hopelessness was fully maintained despite ongoing violent conflict and economic hardship. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Facile green synthesis, optical and photocatalytic properties of zinc oxide nanosheets via microwave assisted hydrothermal technique

Novel hexagonal two dimensional ZnO nanosheets were successfully and economically synthesized using zinc acetate and urea based on a facile microwave hydrothermal method. The structure, morphology and size of the ZnO nanosheets were investigated by X-ray diffraction (X-ray), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), energy dispersive analysis of x-ray (EDS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), selected area electron diffraction (SAED) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). X-ray analysis showed that the obtained ZnO nanosheets are crystalline corresponding to the pure ZnO phase with an average particle size of 12 nm. Optical properties of ZnO nanosheets were investigated by UV-Vis absorption and photoluminescence (PL) techniques. The band gap energy of ZnO nanosheets was found to be 3.29 eV. The photoluminescence (PL) measurement shows a strong UV emission, blue emission and blue-green emission bands. ZnO nano sheets possess a higher photocatalytic activity leading to the degradation of methylene blue (MB). The ZnO nanosheets are expected to have new opportunities in vast research areas and for application in catalysts and optoelectronic devices.     

Transport Properties of K_xV_2O_5·nH_2O Nanocrystalline Films

Five different compositions of K x V 2 O 5 ·nH 2 O(where x=0.00,0.0017,0.0049,0.0064 and 0.0091 mol) were prepared by the sol-gel process.Electrical conductivity and thermoelectric power were measured parallel to the substrate surface in the temperature range of 300-480 K.The electrical conductivity showed that all samples were semiconductors and that conductivity increased with increasing K content.The conductivity of the present system was primarily determined by hopping carrier mobility.The carrier density was evaluated as well.The conduction was confirmed to obey non-adiabatic small polaron hopping.The thermoelectric power or Seebeck effect,increased with increasing K ions content.The results obtained indicated that an n-type semiconducting behavior within the temperature range was investigated.     

Moisture-Dependent Physical Properties of Kola Nut (Cola nitida) Seed

This study was carried out to determine the effect of moisture content on some physical properties of kola nut seed. Four moisture levels ranging from 47.48 to 61.4 % wet basis (w.b.) was considered. Results showed that there was linear increase in the mean length, width, thickness, geometric mean diameter, surface area, volume, sphericity, aspect ratio, 1,000 nut mass, bulk and true densities, and static coefficient of friction at different surfaces (mild steel and wood) by 3.58, 3.96, 6.29, 4.98, 10.72, 16.87, 1.54, 1.50, 26.23, 11.50, 7.27, and 17.86 to 23.53 %, respectively, with increase in moisture content from 47.48 to 61.4 % (w.b.). Furthermore, the angle of repose increased by 17.45 % while the porosity decreased by 3.85 % with increase in moisture content.     

Effect of a Magnetic Field on a Micropolar Fluid Flow in the Vicinity of an Axisymmetric Stagnation Point on a Circular Cylinder

The effect of a magnetic field on a micropolar fluid flow in the vicinity of an axisymmetric stagnation point on a circular cylinder is studied numerically. The governing conservation equations of continuity, momentum and angular momentum are partial differential equations which are transformed into a system of ordinary differential equations by using the usual similarity transformations. The resulting system of coupled non‐linear ordinary differential equations is solved numerically by using the shooting method. The numerical results indicate the velocity, angular velocity and pressure distributions for different parameters of the problem including Reynolds number, magnetic parameter and dimensionless material properties, etc. In addition, the effect of the pertinent parameters on the local skin friction coefficient and the couple stress are discussed numerically and illustrated graphically.     

Kelvin-helmholtz instability in magnetic fluids with surface adsorption: Linear and nonlinear theory

The linear and nonlinear stability of the Kelvin-Helmholtz problem for magnetic fluids with surface adsorption is studied by employing the multiple scale method. The phenomenon of nonlinear focusing or collapse is considered. It is shown that the evolution of the amplitude is governed by a two-dimensional Schrödinger equation with cubic nonlinearity. This equation gives rise to a self-focusing singularity when the velocity difference is in the subcritical regime. Also from its equation, we obtain the condition for the existence of the modulational instability. The various regions of stability and instability are indicated.     

Extending and Enhancing the Properties of Porous Cordierite Ceramics by Mo6+ ion Incorporation via Facile Combined Synthesis Technique

Molybdenum‐doped cordierite ceramics have been fabricated through facile combined techniques, coprecipitation followed by solid state. XRD results revealed that α‐cordierite phase is predominated with increasing Mo⁶⁺ ion content. The density measurements showed that the bulk density reduced to the minimum value of 0.61 g/cm³, which corresponds to the maximum porosity of about 76.8% at 5% Mo⁶⁺ ion. The dielectric permittivity (ε) of pure cordierite is decreased with increasing Mo⁶⁺ ion content. The minimum dielectric loss of Mo‐doped cordierite at 1 MHz was equal 0.008 with 10% Mo⁶⁺, while at 1 GHz was equal 0.03 with 5% Mo⁶⁺.     

A simulation optimisation tool for planning of low-income housing projects

Construction of low-income housing projects is a recurring process and is associated with uncertainties that arise from the unavailability of resources. This paper presents a case study that discusses how computer simulation and optimisation are used to aid government agencies and/or contractors in planning of such projects. It illustrates the optimisation of project objectives, taking into consideration the interaction amongst involved resources. As such, total duration and the associated total costs, including direct and indirect costs, can be estimated and optimised. One Youth Habitation project that is executed in 6th of October City in Egypt is analysed in a step-by-step procedure to demonstrate the capability of proposed computer simulation and optimisation prototype (named LIHouse{_}Sim) in the modelling construction of low-income housing projects using bearing block walls with hollow core technique. The presented tool proves its practicality to contractors in estimating the time and costs of the recurring process of low-income housing construction, considering complex interdependencies between construction resources and the uncertainties associated with construction activities. The LIHouse{_}Sim prototype is used to perform a wide analysis for the alternative of the effective optimisation criteria in the bearing block walls/hollow core technique and for the genetic algorithm optimisation approach elements.     

On the Performance of FFT/DWT/DCT-based OFDM Systems with Chaotic Interleaving and Channel Estimation Algorithms

The efficiency of data transmission over fading channels in orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) systems depends on the employed interleaving method. In this study, we propose an improved chaotic interleaving scheme which aims to improve the performance of OFDM system under fading channel. In the proposed scheme, the binary data is interleaved with chaotic Baker map prior to the modulation process. In the sequel, significant degree of encryption is being added during data transmission. The performance of the proposed approach is tested on the conventional fast Fourier transform OFDM, discrete wavelet transform OFDM, and discrete cosine transform OFDM with and without chaotic interleaving. Furthermore, an expectation–maximization (EM) algorithm is proposed for improving channel impulse response (CIR) estimation based on a maximum likelihood principle. The proposed scheme makes use of EM algorithm to update the channel estimates until convergence is reached. The simulation results show the efficiency of the proposed algorithms under Rayleigh fading environments where the symbol error rate essentially coincides with that of the perfect channel case after the fifth EM iteration.     

A Dempster–Shafer Based Tit-for-Tat Strategy to Regulate the Cooperation in VANET Using QoS-OLSR Protocol

In this paper, we address the problem of cooperation among vehicles in VANET using QoS-OLSR protocol in the presence of selfish nodes. QoS-OLSR is a proactive protocol that considers the Quality of Service (QoS) of the nodes while electing the cluster-heads and selecting the Multi-Point Relay (MPRs) nodes. Cluster-heads and MPRs might misbehave on the roads by over-speeding or under-speeding. Classical and generous Tit-for-Tats are proposed to analyze the interaction among vehicles. However, both strategies are not able to enforce the cooperation due the fact that they (1) count on individual watchdogs monitoring, (2) rely on the node-to-node cooperation decision, (3) and ignore the high mobility and packet collisions. Therefore, we propose a Dempster–Shafer based Tit-for-Tat strategy that is able to improve the decision and regulate the cooperation in the vehicular network. This is done by (1) launching a cooperative watchdogs monitoring, (2) correlating the observations of the different watchdogs using Dempster–Shafer theory, and (3) propagating the decisions among clusters. Thereafter, we compare the Dempster–Shafer based strategy with several strategies derived from the original Tit-for-Tat. Simulation results prove that the Dempster–Shafer based strategy is able to maintain the survivability of the vehicular network in the presence of high mobility and packet collisions with minimal time and overhead.