1. |
- Almalki, Yassir Edrees, et al.
(author)
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Robust Gaussian and Nonlinear Hybrid Invariant Clustered Features Aided Approach for Speeded Brain Tumor Diagnosis
- 2022
-
In: Life. - : MDPI. - 2075-1729. ; 12:7
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Brain tumors reduce life expectancy due to the lack of a cure. Moreover, their diagnosis involves complex and costly procedures such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and lengthy, careful examination to determine their severity. However, the timely diagnosis of brain tumors in their early stages may save a patient’s life. Therefore, this work utilizes MRI with a machine learning approach to diagnose brain tumor severity (glioma, meningioma, no tumor, and pituitary) in a timely manner. MRI Gaussian and nonlinear scale features are extracted due to their robustness over rotation, scaling, and noise issues, which are common in image processing features such as texture, local binary patterns, histograms of oriented gradient, etc. For the features, each MRI is broken down into multiple small 8 × 8-pixel MR images to capture small details. To counter memory issues, the strongest features based on variance are selected and segmented into 400 Gaussian and 400 nonlinear scale features, and these features are hybridized against each MRI. Finally, classical machine learning classifiers are utilized to check the performance of the proposed hybrid feature vector. An available online brain MRI image dataset is utilized to validate the proposed approach. The results show that the support vector machine-trained model has the highest classification accuracy of 95.33%, with a low computational time. The results are also compared with the recent literature, which shows that the proposed model can be helpful for clinicians/doctors for the early diagnosis of brain tumors.
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2. |
- Asaf, Sajjad, et al.
(author)
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The complete chloroplast genome of wild rice (Oryza minuta) and its comparison to related species
- 2017
-
In: Frontiers in Plant Science. - : Frontiers Media S.A.. - 1664-462X. ; 8
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Oryza minuta, a tetraploid wild relative of cultivated rice (family Poaceae), possesses a BBCC genome and contains genes that confer resistance to bacterial blight (BB) and white-backed (WBPH) and brown (BPH) plant hoppers. Based on the importance of this wild species, this study aimed to understand the phylogenetic relationships of O. minuta with other Oryza species through an in-depth analysis of the composition and diversity of the chloroplast (cp) genome. The analysis revealed a cp genome size of 135,094 bp with a typical quadripartite structure and consisting of a pair of inverted repeats separated by small and large single copies, 139 representative genes, and 419 randomly distributed microsatellites. The genomic organization, gene order, GC content and codon usage are similar to those of typical angiosperm cp genomes. Approximately 30 forward, 28 tandem and 20 palindromic repeats were detected in the O. minuta cp genome. Comparison of the complete O. minuta cp genome with another eleven Oryza species showed a high degree of sequence similarity and relatively high divergence of intergenic spacers. Phylogenetic analyses were conducted based on the complete genome sequence, 65 shared genes and matK gene showed same topologies and O. minuta forms a single clade with parental O. punctata. Thus, the complete O. minuta cp genome provides interesting insights and valuable information that can be used to identify related species and reconstruct its phylogeny.
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3. |
- Batool, Javaria, et al.
(author)
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Oxygen-vacancy-induced magnetism in anti-perovskite topological Dirac semimetal Ba3SnO
- 2021
-
In: Physical Chemistry, Chemical Physics - PCCP. - : Royal Society of Chemistry. - 1463-9076 .- 1463-9084. ; 23:43, s. 24878-24891
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The thermodynamic, structural, magnetic and electronic properties of the pristine and intrinsic vacancy-defect-containing topological Dirac semimetal Ba3SnO are studied using first-principles density functional theory calculations. The thermodynamic stability of Ba3SnO has been evaluated with reference to its competing binary phases Ba2Sn, BaSn and BaO. Subsequently, valid limits of the atomic chemical potentials derived from the thermodynamic stability were used for assessing the formation of Ba, Sn and O vacancy defects in Ba3SnO under different synthesis environments. Based on the calculated defect-formation energies, we find that the charge-neutral oxygen vacancies are the most favourable type of vacancy defect under most chemical environments. The calculated electronic properties of pristine Ba3SnO show that inclusion of spin–orbit coupling in exchange–correlation potentials computed using generalized gradient approximation yields a semimetallic band structure exhibiting twin Dirac cones along the Γ–X path of the Brillouin zone. The effect of spin–polarization and spin–orbit coupling on the physical properties of intrinsic vacancy defects containing Ba3SnO has been examined in detail. Using Bader charges, electron localization function (ELF), electronic density of states (DOS) and spin density, we show that the isolated oxygen vacancy is a magnetic defect in anti-perovskite Ba3SnO. Our results show that the origin of magnetism in Ba3SnO is the accumulation of unpaired charges at the oxygen vacancy sites, which couple strongly with the 5d states of the Ba atom. Owing to the metastability observed in earlier theoretically predicted magnetic topological semimetals, the present study reveals the important role of intrinsic vacancy defects in giving rise to magnetism and also provides opportunities for engineering the electronic structure of a Dirac semimetal.
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4. |
- Kamran, Muhammad, et al.
(author)
-
Hydroquinone; a novel bioactive compound from plant-derived smoke can cue seed germination of lettuce
- 2017
-
In: Frontiers in Chemistry. - : Frontiers Media S.A.. - 2296-2646. ; 5
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Plant-derived smoke has been known to play an important role in distribution and growth of vegetation. Using a proficiently designed furnace, we extracted smoke from the leaves of four plant viz. Helianthus annuus,Aloe vera,Ginkgo biloba, and Cymbopogon jwarancusa. Smoke dilutions obtained from these plants were obtained in different concentrations to identify potential lettuce growth promoting smoke solution. Results revealed that smoke obtained from G. biloba significantly enhanced the lettuce seed germination. This solution was then partitioned into ethyl acetate, dichloromethane, n-hexane, chloroform and ether fractions. Ethyl acetate fraction was found to be potent to enhance seed germination. This fraction was subjected to column chromatography and spectroscopic techniques to obtain compound 1. This compound was identified as hydroquinone using 1D and 2D NMR techniques. At low concentrations (5, 10, and 20 ppm), compound 1 enhanced the lettuce seed germination; however, higher concentrations inhibited its growth as compared to control.
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5. |
- Muzaffar, Nimra, et al.
(author)
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Designing of VCuS@MXene nanocomposite electrode for energy storage device and electrochemical glucose sensor
- 2024
-
In: Journal of materials science. Materials in electronics. - : Springer Nature. - 0957-4522 .- 1573-482X. ; 35:9
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- MXene, a two-dimensional (2D) material composed of transition metal carbides (TMCs) and nitrides, have fascinated substantial scientific interest. This increased interest results from their exceptional properties, which include extraordinary conductivity, transparency, outstanding absorbing capacity, and significant charge storage capacities. In this work, the MXene-doped vanadium copper sulfide (VCuS) was synthesized through the hydrothermal method. In three electrode measurement system, the VCuS/MXene composite electrode showed exhibited a specific capacity (Qs) of 1620 Cg−1. As application point of view, the hybrid device is designed and measured the electrochemical properties. The hybrid device showed the remarkable Qs of 1528 C.g−1, power density (Pd) of 2347 Wkg−1 and an energy density (Ed) of 34.99 Whkg−1. Further, the VCuS/MXene//AC device is measured up to 6000 cycles to check the stability and durability. The device showed the capacity retention (CR) of 88.5% and a high Coulombic efficiency of 82.6%. Additionally, the VCuS/MXene electrode material is utilized as an electrochemical glucose sensor for the precise detection of H2O2 down to a minimal concentration of H2O2/mm, exhibiting exceptional precision. The use of multifunctional VCuS/MXene nanocomposite electrode material presents novel possibilities for the construction of hybrid energy harvesting systems.
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6. |
- Ahmed, Waqas, et al.
(author)
-
Influence of load-shedding and night on SiR insulator environmental aging under AC test voltages
- 2021
-
In: SN Applied Sciences. - : Springer. - 2523-3963 .- 2523-3971. ; 3:2
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Insulators play a critical role in healthy transmission under the influence of operational stresses (OSs). OSs include environmental stresses (ultraviolet-radiations, seasonal heat and humidity variations, and pollution (inert and active), etc.) and electrical stresses (electric field distribution, corona, etc.). OSs can deteriorate insulators, jeopardizing the healthy transmission. In this experimental study, four silicon rubber (SiR) insulators with different concentrations of micro and nano-silica fillers are tested in a specially designed and fabricated compact environmental chamber for 1920 h under OSs, un-scheduled load shedding, and night factors for more realistic field insulators deterioration characteristics. Insulators' potential distribution, electrical field distribution, hydrophobicity, and leakage current characteristics are considered. Experimental results reveal OSs affected insulators' leakage current profile due to hydrophobicity loss and electric field distribution variations. Moreover, SiR insulators under OSs regained insulation characteristics due to heavier inner molecule replacement to the dissipated and degraded outer lower weight insulating molecules. This property provides a reusability opportunity for SiR insulators in power system networks, unlike traditional insulators.
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7. |
- Alay-e-Abbas, Syed Muhammad, 1983-, et al.
(author)
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Structure inversion asymmetry enhanced electronic structure and electrical transport in 2D A3SnO (A = Ca, Sr, and Ba) anti-perovskite monolayers
- 2023
-
In: Nano Reseach. - : Springer Nature. - 1998-0124 .- 1998-0000. ; 16:1, s. 1779-1791
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Anti-perovskites A3SnO (A = Ca, Sr, and Ba) are an important class of materials due to the emergence of Dirac cones and tiny mass gaps in their band structures originating from an intricate interplay of crystal symmetry, spin-orbit coupling, and band overlap. This provides an exciting playground for modulating their electronic properties in the two-dimensional (2D) limit. Herein, we employ first-principles density functional theory (DFT) calculations by combining dispersion-corrected SCAN + rVV10 and mBJ functionals for a comprehensive side-by-side comparison of the structural, thermodynamic, dynamical, mechanical, electronic, and thermoelectric properties of bulk and monolayer (one unit cell thick) A3SnO anti-perovskites. Our results show that 2D monolayers derived from bulk A3SnO anti-perovskites are structurally and energetically stable. Moreover, Rashba-type splitting in the electronic structure of Ca3SnO and Sr3SnO monolayers is observed owing to strong spin-orbit coupling and inversion asymmetry. On the other hand, monolayer Ba3SnO exhibits Dirac cone at the high-symmetry Γ point due to the domination of band overlap. Based on the predicted electronic transport properties, it is shown that inversion asymmetry plays an essential character such that the monolayers Ca3SnO and Sr3SnO outperform thermoelectric performance of their bulk counterparts.
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8. |
- Ali, Muhammad Umair, et al.
(author)
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Enhancing Photovoltaic Reliability : A Global and Local Feature Selection Approach with Improved Harris Hawks Optimization for Efficient Hotspot Detection Using Infrared Imaging
- 2024
-
In: International Journal of Energy Research. - : John Wiley & Sons. - 0363-907X .- 1099-114X.
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The photovoltaic (PV) systems' inherent ability to transform solar light directly into electrical energy has contributed to their increasing popularity. However, malfunctions can reduce system dependability. Therefore, rapid hotspot identification is critical for efficient, dependable, and risk-free PV operation. This work presents a method for determining the most optimal hybrid features using the infrared (IR) images of PV panels for hotspot and fault detection. The information at the global (texture, HoG, and color histograms) and local (local binary pattern, SURF, and KAZE) levels were extracted from the IR images of PV panels using a uniform window size of 8 x 8. A binary improved Harris hawks optimization (b-IHHO) optimal feature selection strategy was used to get the optimal feature subset for model training using PV IR images. The IR images of PV were acquired to test the presented framework. The findings suggested that the proposed framework can classify the IR images of solar panels with an accuracy of 98.41% with lesser feature vector size into three classes (normal, hotspot, and defective). Furthermore, the findings were also compared with the latest literature. The presented technique plays a vital role in carbon-free cities and is simple to adopt for PV system inspection.
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9. |
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10. |
- Danish, Muhammad, et al.
(author)
-
An efficient catalytic degradation of trichloroethene in a percarbonate system catalyzed by ultra-fine heterogeneous zeolite supported zero valent iron-nickel bimetallic composite
- 2017
-
In: Applied Catalysis A. - : Elsevier. - 0926-860X .- 1873-3875. ; 531, s. 177-186
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Zeolite supported nano iron-nickel bimetallic composite (Z-nZVI-Ni) was prepared using a liquid-phase reduction process. The corresponding surface morphologies and physico-chemical properties of the Z-nZVI-Ni composite were determined using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Energy dispersive X-ray spectra (EDS), Brunauer Emmett Teller (BET) adsorption, wide angle X-ray diffractometry (WA-XRD), and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). The results indicated high dispersion of iron and nickel nano particles on the zeolite sheet with an enhanced surface area. Complete destruction of trichloroethene (TCE) and efficient removal of total organic carbon (TOC) were observed by using Z-nZVI-Ni as a heterogeneous catalyst for a Fenton-like oxidation process employing sodium percarbonate (SPC) as an oxidant. The electron spin resonance (ESR) of Z-nZVI-Ni verified the generation and intensity of hydroxyl radicals (OH center dot). The quantification of OH center dot elucidated by using p-chlorobenzoic acid, a probe indicator, confirmed the higher intensity of OH center dot. The transformation products were identified using GC-MS. The slow iron and nickel leaching offered higher stability and better catalytic activity of Z-nZVI-Ni, demonstrating its prospective long term applications in groundwater for TCE degradation. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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11. |
- Ghumman, Iss, et al.
(author)
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Computational Fluid Mechanics Model for Numerical Investigation of Frictional Tribo-pair during Mixed Lubrication
- 2022
-
In: Proceedings of 2022 19th International Bhurban Conference on Applied Sciences and Technology, IBCAST 2022. - : Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.. - 9781665460514 ; , s. 815-820
-
Conference paper (peer-reviewed)abstract
- All the machines are constructed through mechanical links and pairs. One of the crucial pairs is the sliding pair; due to their nature and general use, they are often subjected to a higher degree of dynamics and external forces leading to high frictional force. To reduce wear from friction formerly thick film of commercial oil is used. However, viscosity-based higher thickness yields higher energy losses, and nano-lubricants are popular in reducing friction while keeping film thickness and improving wear resistance. This paper develops a numerical model for sliding pairs that predicts the load carried by components under different lubrication regimes. The aim is to simulate hydrodynamic and mixed lubrication regimes for different loading conditions. A detailed multiphysics model of tribo-pair was modeled, including lubricant rheology, surface topology, oil film squeeze, and film temperature through the moving mesh. The fluid domain has been meshed with Arbitrary Lagrangian and Eulerian techniques. Energy loss due to viscous friction and boundary friction were determined by solving Naiver- Stokes equations in the moving mesh deformable geometry domain. The numerical model was compared with the available literature, and the results are presented. This numerical simulation remained valid and provides the fundamental understanding of oil film thickness and load-carrying capacity of sliding tribo-pair in the presence of nano-lubricants. The developed model is a useful methodology for studying lubricant oil enriched with nanoparticles.
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12. |
- Goyal, Nitin, et al.
(author)
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Medical Management vs Mechanical Thrombectomy for Mild Strokes: An International Multicenter Study and Systematic Review and Meta-analysis
- 2020
-
In: JAMA Neurology. - : American Medical Association (AMA). - 2168-6149. ; 77:1, s. 16-24
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- © 2019 American Medical Association. All rights reserved. Importance: The benefit of mechanical thrombectomy (MT) in patients with stroke presenting with mild deficits (National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale [NIHSS] score <6) owing to emergency large-vessel occlusion (ELVO) remains uncertain. Objective: To assess the outcomes of patients with mild-deficits ELVO (mELVO) treated with MT vs best medical management (bMM). Data Sources: We retrospectively pooled patients with mELVO during a 5-year period from 16 centers. A meta-analysis of studies reporting efficacy and safety outcomes with MT or bMM among patients with mELVO was also conducted. Data were analyzed between 2013 and 2017. Study Selection: We identified studies that enrolled patients with stroke (within 24 hours of symptom onset) with mELVO treated with MT or bMM. Main Outcomes and Measures: Efficacy outcomes included 3-month favorable functional outcome and 3-month functional independence that were defined as modified Rankin Scale scores of 0 to 1 and 0 to 2, respectively. Safety outcomes included 3-month mortality and symptomatic and asymptomatic intracranial hemorrhage (ICH). Results: We evaluated a total of 251 patients with mELVO who were treated with MT (n = 138; 65 women; mean age, 65.2 years; median NIHSS score, 4; interquartile range [IQR], 3-5) or bMM (n = 113; 51 women; mean age, 64.8; median NIHSS score, 3; interquartile range [IQR], 2-4). The rate of asymptomatic ICH was lower in bMM (4.6% vs 17.5%; P =.002), while the rate of 3-month FI (after imputation of missing follow-up evaluations) was lower in MT (77.4% vs 88.5%; P =.02). The 2 groups did not differ in any other efficacy or safety outcomes. In multivariable analyses, MT was associated with higher odds of asymptomatic ICH (odds ratio [OR], 11.07; 95% CI, 1.31-93.53; P =.03). In the meta-analysis of 4 studies (843 patients), MT was associated with higher odds of symptomatic ICH in unadjusted analyses (OR, 5.52; 95% CI, 1.91-15.49; P =.002; I2 = 0%). This association did not retain its significance in adjusted analyses including 2 studies (OR, 2.06; 95% CI, 0.49-8.63; P =.32; I2 = 0%). The meta-analysis did not document any other independent associations between treatment groups and safety or efficacy outcomes. Conclusions and Relevance: Our multicenter study coupled with the meta-analysis suggests similar outcomes of MT and bMM in patients with stroke with mELVO, but no conclusions about treatment effect can be made. The clinical equipoise can further be resolved by a randomized clinical trial.
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13. |
- Nizami, Abdul-Sattar, et al.
(author)
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Energy, economic and environmental savings by waste recycling : A case study of Madinah City
- 2017
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In: PROCEEDINGS OF THE 9TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON APPLIED ENERGY. - : Elsevier. ; 142, s. 910-915
-
Conference paper (peer-reviewed)abstract
- In the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), millions of worshippers come from across the globe to perform religious rituals of Pilgrimage (Hajj) and Umrah. Madinah-tul-Munawara is one of the holiest city, where pilgrims come after performing rituals in Makkah. In this city, most of the collected municipal solid waste (MSW) is disposed of in the landfills after a partial recycling of paper, cardboard, and metals (similar to 10-20% of total MSW). The Saudi's government has recently launched a new policy of Vision 2030, which outlined the safeguard of local environment through increased efficiency of waste recycling and management, pollution prevention strategies and generating renewable energy from indigenous sources, including the waste. Currently, the recycling practices in KSA are mainly regulated by an informal sector through waste pickers or waste scavengers. This has led to the need of recycling schemes, especially in the holiest cities of Makkah and Madinah through a public-private partnership (PPP). Huge amounts of energy can be conserved, that would otherwise be spent on raw material extraction, transportation, and manufacturing of materials, through recycling into the same materials. Around 10,009 TJ of energy can be saved through recycling of 24.21% of MSW in Madinah city, including glass, metals, aluminum, cardboard, and paper. It is estimated that around 10,200 tons of methane (CH4) emissions and 254,600 Mt center dot CO2 eq. of global warming potential (GWP) can also be saved. In addition, carbon credit revenue of US $5.92 million, and landfill diversion worth of US $32.78 million can be achieved with a net revenue of US $49.01 million every year only by recycling 24.21% of MSW in Madinah city. The waste recycling doesn't require high technical skills and labor, and complicated technologies for large-scale implementation, and therefore, can be implemented easily in the holiest cities of Makkah and Madinah to achieve multiple economic and environmental benefits. (C) 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.
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14. |
- Nizami, Abdul-Sattar, et al.
(author)
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Waste biorefineries : enabling circular economies in developing countries
- 2017
-
In: Bioresource Technology. - : Elsevier. - 0960-8524 .- 1873-2976. ; 241, s. 1101-1117
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This paper aims to examine the potential of waste biorefineries in developing countries as a solution to current waste disposal problems and as facilities to produce fuels, power, heat, and value-added products. The waste in developing countries represents a significant source of biomass, recycled materials, chemicals, energy, and revenue if wisely managed and used as a potential feedstock in various biorefinery technologies such as fermentation, anaerobic digestion (AD), pyrolysis, incineration, and gasification. However, the selection or integration of biorefinery technologies in any developing country should be based on its waste characterization. Waste biorefineries if developed in developing countries could provide energy generation, land savings, new businesses and consequent job creation, savings of landfills costs, GHG emissions reduction, and savings of natural resources of land, soil, and groundwater. The challenges in route to successful implementation of biorefinery concept in the developing countries are also presented using life cycle assessment (LCA) studies. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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15. |
- Sahil, Mehran, et al.
(author)
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Seismic performance evaluation of exterior reinforced concrete beam-column connections retrofitted with economical perforated steel haunches
- 2024
-
In: Results in Engineering (RINENG). - : Elsevier. - 2590-1230. ; 22
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The exterior beam-column joint (BCJ) within reinforced concrete (RC) frame structures is acknowledged as a vulnerable component prone to seismic failure. This article proposes a practical and economical strengthening method for exterior BCJs using a perforated steel haunch system. This method is designed to mitigate damage in BCJs and improve the seismic performance of the structure. Employing finite element modeling (FEM) techniques, the study evaluates the impact of perforated steel haunches on the BCJs’ behavior and performance. The investigation involves creating nine distinct models, each representing a BCJ with a steel haunch system. These models include a control model without any perforations and eight variations with different levels of perforation (ranging from 10% to 50%) within the steel haunch system. Furthermore, the study analyzes the influence of perforation shapes on the connections’ performance, considering square, circular, hexagonal, and triangular shapes. The results reveal that utilizing a steel haunch without perforations significantly increases the load-carrying capacity of a BCJ by about 89%. Additionally, circular or square-shaped perforations, up to 30–35% within the steel haunch, effectively prevent the joints’ failure and promote the ductile behavior. These findings hold the potential to advance the design methodology for RC joints subjected to seismic loads, thereby enhancing the structural resilience in earthquake-prone regions.
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16. |
- Saif-Ul-Allah, Muhammad Waqas, et al.
(author)
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Computationally Inexpensive 1D-CNN for the Prediction of Noisy Data of NOx Emissions From 500 MW Coal-Fired Power Plant
- 2022
-
In: Frontiers in Energy Research. - : FRONTIERS MEDIA SA. - 2296-598X. ; 10
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Coal-fired power plants have been used to meet the energy requirements in countries where coal reserves are abundant and are the key source of NOx emissions. Owing to the serious environmental and health concerns associated with NOx emissions, much work has been carried out to reduce NOx emissions. Sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI) techniques have been employed during the past few decades, such as least-squares support vector machine (LSSVM), artificial neural networks (ANN), long short-term memory (LSTM), and gated recurrent unit (GRU), to develop the NOx prediction model. Several studies have investigated deep neural networks (DNN) models for accurate NOx emission prediction. However, there is a need to investigate a DNN-based NOx prediction model that is accurate and computationally inexpensive. Recently, a new AI technique, convolutional neural network (CNN), has been introduced and proven superior for image class prediction accuracy. According to the best of the author's knowledge, not much work has been done on the utilization of CNN on NOx emissions from coal-fired power plants. Therefore, this study investigated the prediction performance and computational time of one-dimensional CNN (1D-CNN) on NOx emissions data from a 500 MW coal-fired power plant. The variations of hyperparameters of LSTM, GRU, and 1D-CNN were investigated, and the performance metrics such as RMSE and computational time were recorded to obtain optimal hyperparameters. The obtained optimal values of hyperparameters of LSTM, GRU, and 1D-CNN were then employed for models' development, and consequently, the models were tested on test data. The 1D-CNN NOx emission model improved the training efficiency in terms of RMSE by 70.6% and 60.1% compared to LSTM and GRU, respectively. Furthermore, the testing efficiency for 1D-CNN improved by 10.2% and 15.7% compared to LSTM and GRU, respectively. Moreover, 1D-CNN (26 s) reduced the training time by 83.8% and 50% compared to LSTM (160 s) and GRU (52 s), respectively. Results reveal that 1D-CNN is more accurate, more stable, and computationally inexpensive compared to LSTM and GRU on NOx emission data from the 500 MW power plant.
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17. |
- Tofique, Muhammad Waqas, 1986-, et al.
(author)
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ECCl/EBSD and TEM analysis of plastic fatigue damage accumulation responsible for fatigue crack initiation and propagation in VHCF of duplex stainless steels
- 2017
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In: International Journal of Fatigue. - London : Elsevier. - 0142-1123 .- 1879-3452. ; 100, s. 251-262
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Fatigue test data of duplex stainless steel grades, LDX 2101 and 2304 SRG, in the Very High Cycle Fatigue (VHCF) regime is presented. Fatigue testing was conducted using ultrasonic fatigue test equipment operating at 20 kHz under fully reversed tension-compression load condition. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) analysis of the fracture surfaces and external surfaces of failed specimens was conducted. Electron Channelling Contrast Imaging (ECCI) and Electron Back Scattered Diffraction (EBSD) studies of the axially cut surface of the failed specimens was done to analyse the accumulation of plastic fatigue damage and fatigue crack growth in the grains adjacent to the external surface and crack initiation site. Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) analysis of thin foils cut from failed specimens of LDX 2101 was carried out to examine the effect of fatigue loading on dislocation structure. SEM studies of the Crystallographic Growth Region (CGR) showed features like grain boundaries and fatigue striations on the fracture surfaces. SEM analysis of the external surfaces of fatigue loaded specimens showed inhomogeneous accumulation of plastic fatigue damage. ECCl/EBSD analysis showed Persistent Slip Bands (PSBs) in ferrite grains in LDX 2101 grade but no PSBs were observed in any grains of 2304 SRG specimens. The barrier effect of grain and phase boundaries on short fatigue crack propagation was observed. TEM analysis of thin foils cut from the failed specimens of LDX 2101 showed stacking faults in austenite grains and they were seen to stop at the grain and phase boundaries. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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18. |
- Waqas, Muhammad, 1983, et al.
(author)
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Assessment of the Food-Swallowing Process Using Bolus Visualisation and Manometry Simultaneously in a Device that Models Human Swallowing
- 2019
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In: Dysphagia. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0179-051X .- 1432-0460. ; 34:6, s. 821-833
-
Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The characteristics of the flows of boluses with different consistencies, i.e. different rheological properties, through the pharynx have not been fully elucidated. The results obtained using a novel in vitro device, the Gothenburg Throat, which allows simultaneous bolus flow visualisation and manometry assessments in the pharynx geometry, are presented, to explain the dependence of bolus flow on bolus consistency. Four different bolus consistencies of a commercial food thickener, 0.5, 1, 1.5 and 2 Pa s (at a shear rate of 50 s −1 )—corresponding to a range from low honey-thick to pudding-thick consistencies on the National Dysphagia Diet (NDD) scale—were examined in the in vitro pharynx. The bolus velocities recorded in the simulator pharynx were in the range of 0.046–0.48 m/s, which is within the range reported in clinical studies. The corresponding wall shear rates associated with these velocities ranged from 13 s −1 (pudding consistency) to 209 s −1 (honey-thick consistency). The results of the in vitro manometry tests using different consistencies and bolus volumes were rather similar to those obtained in clinical studies. The in vitro device used in this study appears to be a valuable tool for pre-clinical analyses of thickened fluids. Furthermore, the results show that it is desirable to consider a broad range of shear rates when assessing the suitability of a certain consistency for swallowing.
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19. |
- Waqas, Muhammad, 1983, et al.
(author)
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In vitro models for simulating swallowing
- 2017
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In: Medical radiology. - Cham : Springer International Publishing. - 9783319685717 ; , s. 549-562, s. 549-562
-
Book chapter (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This chapter gives an overview of the in vitro models that are currently used for studying swallowing. The focus is on the construction, geometry, and performance of mechanical models. Swallowing simulations and mathematical modeling are also considered. The in vitro models that are concerned with the oral, pharyngeal, and esophageal phases of swallowing linked to bolus properties are discussed. The pharyngeal phase is given special consideration, as it is involved in both food transport to the stomach and air transport to the lungs, and therefore constitutes the most critical phase of swallowing.
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20. |
- Waqas, Muhammad, 1983, et al.
(author)
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Shear and extensional rheology of commercial thickeners used for dysphagia management
- 2017
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In: Journal of Texture Studies. - : Wiley. - 1745-4603 .- 0022-4901. ; 48:6, s. 507-517
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- People who suffer from swallowing disorders, commonly referred to as dysphagia, are often restricted to a texture-modified diet. In such a diet, the texture of the fluid is modified mainly by the addition of gum or starch-based thickeners. For optimal modification of the texture, tunable rheological parameters are shear viscosity, yield stress, and elasticity. In this work, the flow properties of commercial thickeners obtained from major commercial suppliers were measured both in shear and extensional flow using a laboratory viscometer and a newly developed tube viscometry technique, termed Pulsed Ultrasound Velocimetry plus Pressure Drop (PUV + PD). The two methods gave similar results, demonstrating that the PUV + PD technique can be applied to study flow during the swallowing process in geometry similar to that of the swallowing tract. The thickeners were characterized in relation to extensional viscosity using the Hyperbolic Contraction Flow method, with microscopy used as a complementary method for visualization of the fluid structure. The gum-based thickeners had significantly higher extensional viscosities than the starch-based thickeners. The rheological behavior was manifested in the microstructure as a hydrocolloid network with dimensions in the nanometer range for the gum-based thickeners. The starch-based thickeners displayed a granular structure in the micrometer range. In addition, the commercial thickeners were compared to model fluids (Boger, Newtonian, and Shear-thinning) set to equal shear viscosity at 50/s and it was demonstrated that their rheological behavior could be tuned between highly elastic, extension-thickening to Newtonian.Practical applicationsThickeners available for dysphagia management were characterized for extensional viscosity to improve the understanding of these thickeners in large scale deformation. Extensional deformation behavior was further explained by using microcopy as corresponding technique for better understanding of structure/rheology relationship. Moreover, the major challenge in capturing human swallowing process is the short transit times of the bolus flow (
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21. |
- Waqas, Muhammad, 1983, et al.
(author)
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Simultaneous X-ray Video-Fluoroscopy and Pulsed Ultrasound Velocimetry Analyses of the Pharyngeal Phase of Swallowing of Boluses with Different Rheological Properties
- 2020
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In: Dysphagia. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 0179-051X .- 1432-0460. ; 35:6, s. 898-906
-
Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The Ultrasound Velocity Profiling (UVP) technique allows real-time, non-invasive flow mapping of a fluid along a 1D-measuring line. This study explores the possibility of using the UVP technique and X-ray video-fluoroscopy (XVF) to elucidate the deglutition process with the focus on bolus rheology. By positioning the UVP probe so that the pulsed ultrasonic beam passes behind the air-filled trachea, the bolus flow in the pharynx can be measured. Healthy subjects in a clinical study swallowed fluids with different rheological properties: Newtonian (constant shear viscosity and non-elastic); Boger (constant shear viscosity and elastic); and shear thinning (shear rate-dependent shear viscosity and elastic). The results from both the UVP and XVF reveal higher velocities for the shear thinning fluid, followed by the Boger and the Newtonian fluids, demonstrating that the UVP method has equivalent sensitivities for detecting the velocities of fluids with different rheological properties. The velocity of the contraction wave that clears the pharynx was measured in the UVP and found to be independent of bolus rheology. The results show that UVP not only assesses accurately the fluid velocity in a bolus flow, but it can also monitor the structural changes that take place in response to a bolus flow, with the added advantage of being a completely non-invasive technique that does not require the introduction of contrast media.
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22. |
- Ahmad, Naveed, et al.
(author)
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Relationship between corporate social responsibility at the micro-level and environmental performance : The mediating role of employee pro-environmental behavior and the moderating role of gender
- 2021
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In: Sustainable Production and Consumption. - : Elsevier BV. - 2352-5509. ; 27, s. 1138-1148
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Since Pakistan is vulnerable to changing climatic conditions, the country needs emergency measures at every level to mitigate their effect. Many studies have addressed Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) at the macro or institutional level, but its effect at the micro-level is largely ignored in the contemporary literature. The present study aims at filling this gap by highlighting the role of micro-level CSR on Environmental Performance (ENP) and how it is influenced by employees’ pro-environmental (PEB) behavior and gender. This study has been carried out in the context of deteriorating environmental conditions, scarce CSR activities and a male dominant society. Data were collected through a self-administered questionnaire targeting the manufacturing and the service sectors of Pakistan and analyzed through the structural equation modeling technique, using AMOS and SPSS software. The results of this study confirm that micro-level CSR initiatives directly (β = 0.39⁎⁎) and indirectly (β = 0.031⁎⁎) influence the environmental performance of an organization by means of employees’ PEB. A conditional indirect gender effect on this interaction was also observed, with women (β =0.17⁎⁎) exerting a stronger effect than men (β = 0.031⁎⁎). These findings may be helpful for policymakers involved in environmental management: It is possible to reduce the environmental footprint of Pakistan's organizations by encouraging employee's PEB and particularly by actively involving women which are systematically set apart from decision making in Pakistan.
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23. |
- Ahmed, Shahbaz, et al.
(author)
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Accurate First-Principles Evaluation of Structural, Electronic, Optical and Photocatalytic Properties of BaHfO3 and SrHfO3 Perovskites
- 2022
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In: Journal of Alloys and Compounds. - : Elsevier. - 0925-8388 .- 1873-4669. ; 892
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- A reliable first-principles account of experimentally observed physical properties of perovskite oxides is crucial for realizing their employment in electronic and optical devices. In this context, SCAN meta-GGA functional of DFT offers good approximation for the exchange-correlation energy; facilitating accurate determination of structural and energetic properties. However, SCAN is unable to reproduce electronic and optical properties of wide bad gap materials. In the present study, we report systematic DFT calculations to show that structural, energetic, electronic and optical properties of hafnium based BaHfO3 and SrHfO3 perovskite oxides can be accurately determined through a combine application of SCAN and Tran-Blaha modified Becke-Johnson (TB-mBJ) meta-GGAs. The structural and energetic properties computed using SCAN functional for both BaHfO3 and SrHfO3 are found to be in good agreement with experimental data; achieving a level of accuracy comparable to computationally expansive hybrid DFT calculations. On the other hand, TB-mBJ calculated band gaps computed using the SCAN optimized lattice parameters provide better agreement with experimental data at a low computational cost. The optical properties, band edge potentials and effective masses of the charge carriers in BaHfO3 and SrHfO3 are also computed to examine the combined application of SCAN and TB-mBJ meta-GGAs in predicting the photocatalytic performance of these wide band gap materials. Our results clearly show that the combination of the two meta-GGAs provide a computationally economical route for evaluating the photocatalytic performance of alkaline-earth metal hafnates.
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24. |
- Ahmed, Waqas, et al.
(author)
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A Comparison and Introduction of Novel Solar Panel’s Fault Diagnosis Technique Using Deep-Features Shallow-Classifier through Infrared Thermography
- 2023
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In: Energies. - : MDPI. - 1996-1073. ; 16:3
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Solar photovoltaics (PV) are susceptible to environmental and operational stresses due to their operation in an open atmosphere. Early detection and treatment of stress prevents hotspots and the total failure of solar panels. In response, the literature has proposed several approaches, each with its own limitations, such as high processing system requirements, large amounts of memory, long execution times, fewer types of faults diagnosed, failure to extract relevant features, and so on. Therefore, this research proposes a fast framework with the least memory and computing system requirements for the six different faults of a solar panel. Infrared thermographs from solar panels are fed into intense and architecturally complex deep convolutional networks capable of differentiating one million images into 1000 classes. Features without backpropagation are calculated to reduce execution time. Afterward, deep features are fed to shallow classifiers due to their fast training time. The proposed approach trains the shallow classifier in approximately 13 s with 95.5% testing accuracy. The approach is validated by manually extracting thermograph features and through the transfer of learned deep neural network approaches in terms of accuracy and speed. The proposed method is also compared with other existing methods.
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25. |
- Ahmed, Waqas, et al.
(author)
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Photovoltaic panels classification using isolated and transfer learned deep neural models using infrared thermographic images
- 2021
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In: Sensors. - : MDPI. - 1424-8220. ; 21:16
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Defective PV panels reduce the efficiency of the whole PV string, causing loss of investment by decreasing its efficiency and lifetime. In this study, firstly, an isolated convolution neural model (ICNM) was prepared from scratch to classify the infrared images of PV panels based on their health, i.e., healthy, hotspot, and faulty. The ICNM occupies the least memory, and it also has the simplest architecture, lowest execution time, and an accuracy of 96% compared to transfer learned pre-trained ShuffleNet, GoogleNet, and SqueezeNet models. Afterward, ICNM, based on its advantages, is reused through transfer learning to classify the defects of PV panels into five classes, i.e., bird drop, single, patchwork, horizontally aligned string, and block with 97.62% testing accuracy. This proposed approach can identify and classify the PV panels based on their health and defects faster with high accuracy and occupies the least amount of the system’s memory, resulting in savings in the PV investment.
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26. |
- Ahmed, Waqas, et al.
(author)
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Techno-economic analysis for the role of single end energy user in mitigating GHG emission
- 2021
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In: Energy, Sustainability and Society. - : BioMed Central (BMC). - 2192-0567. ; 11:1
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: Households, as end energy users, consume grid electricity to meet their energy demands. However, grids across the globe for energy production are majorly based on fossil fuel technology and make the highest contributions to global warming and climate change due to greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions. This generic study aims to investigate the minute role of a single-end energy consumer in GHG mitigation by switching to a rooftop PV system to meet his energy demands and trading surplus energy to the grid through its techno-economic analysis.Method: For the study impact, NASA Meteorological Data are used to select an ideal single energy user equipped with a 10-kW PV system based on annual average daily solar radiation and ambient temperature through MATLAB/Simulink, for 11 populous cities in Pakistan. Helioscope software is used to select tilt and azimuthal angles to maximize the solar radiation intercept. Afterward, RETScreen software is used for cost, financial and GHG analysis.Result and conclusion: A single end energy user equipped with a 10-kW PV system switched to a green energy source from a fossil fuel-based grid has the potential to avoid the burning of 3570.6 L of gasoline by producing 16,832 kWh of green energy per annum, while financially recovering the 10-kW PV system’s 7337$ grid-tied investment in 5 years (equity) and in 9 years (equity) in a 9077$ stand-alone system over its 25-year life. This approach provides relief to end energy users from high priced grid electricity through environmental friendliness by mitigating 8.3 tons of CO2 equivalent emissions per annum from energy production, while providing relief to the main grid by grid stabilization through peak shaving, in the broad sense.
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27. |
- Ahmed, Waqas, et al.
(author)
-
Visual Vocabulary Based Photovoltaic Health Monitoring System Using Infrared Thermography
- 2022
-
In: IEEE Access. - : IEEE. - 2169-3536. ; 10, s. 14409-14417
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Photovoltaic (PV) systems have gained global acceptance in terms of green, replenishable energy resources to meet energy demand with no emissions. However, PV systems are susceptible to operational and environmental stresses. Moreover, PV panels monitoring is necessary to keep their performance and efficiency intact due to their lack of supervisory control. Therefore, this study monitors PV panels based on health into three sub-classes: healthy, hotspot, and faulty through infrared thermography. First, Thermographs key points are selected using an 8× 8 uniform pixel grid, and speed-up robust features (SURF) are extracted from grid intersection points. Afterward, due to its simplicity, the k-mean clustering algorithm creates single-level clusters based on actual observations similarities and similar observations closeness within-cluster and dissimilarity to other clusters observations are used to transform features into visual words. Finally, shallow classifiers are utilized because of low training time and high prediction speed. After extensive testing and compressive analysis, the proposed approach was found economical, fast, and showed high testing accuracy of 97% through a multi-class shallow classifier (support vector machine) with low computational complexity and less storage size. Thus, this approach can monitor megawatt PV systems with high accuracy and keep performance and emissions mitigation potential high while lowering payback time.
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28. |
- Amin, Fayiz, et al.
(author)
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Influence of arch action on load-carrying capacity of double-sized industrial precast slabs: A combined numerical and experimental study
- 2024
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In: Results in Materials. - : Elsevier. - 2590-048X. ; 23
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The precast industry offers slab panels of different geometries according to the field conditions. These slab panels are popular in temporary constructions and beneficial in sustainability but have some financial limitations and local constraints. For a long time, the construction industry has used the arch action method, which restricts the stresses to the compression zone in concrete members and develops the required load-carrying capacity. For the same motives, industrial buildings have preferred semi-circular precast roofs, but the morphology was not suitable. For the proposed slab in this research, firstly, the typical industrial precast slab panel was doubled in width to minimize the time and efforts required for its casting, curing, and placement. Secondly, that doubled-in-width slab was provided with the arch action to confine the stresses to compression and benefit from the section entirely. Lastly, the top of the slab was kept flat to take advantage of the roof space. All these changes aimed for structural stability, reduced material’s weight, improved load-carrying capacity, appropriate mobilization, and financial viability. A numerical approach and practical testing were adopted using the finite element modeling software, ABAQUS, to analyze load–deflection responses of both slabs through the concrete damage plasticity model. The proposed slab exhibited better performance as its capacity enhanced by about 1.5 times that of a typical slab. Although the volume of the material in the proposed slab increased slightly from 0.040 m3 to 0.045 m3, the reductions in joint filler materials, reinforcements, and efforts required for mixing and lifting machinery compensated for this increase significantly. Hence, the slab can be recommended for the industry to save the costs while taking heavier loads efficiently.
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29. |
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30. |
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31. |
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32. |
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33. |
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34. |
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35. |
- Hakim, M. Waqas, et al.
(author)
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Ni-intercalated Mo2TiC2Tx free-standing MXene for excellent gravimetric capacitance prepared via electrostatic self-assembly
- 2023
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In: Journal of Energy Storage. - : Elsevier. - 2352-152X .- 2352-1538. ; 61
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- MXenes and composite belonging to the family of 2D material offer promising applications in the field of energy storage owing to their unique structure, metallic conductivity, and surface tunability. Herein, we have reported a simple approach for the synthesis of pristine Mo2TIC2Tx and Ni-intercalated Mo2TiC2Tx free-standing film. The prepared films were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), cyclic voltammetry (CV) and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) for the electrochemical measurements. A binder-free, flexible, and chemically stable structure of synthesized Ni-Mo2TiC2Tx films shows a high gravimetric capacitance of 682 F g-1, compared to the pristine Mo2TiC2Tx free-standing film which exhibited a gravimetric capacitance of 310 F g-1 at 5 mV s-1. Synthesized Ni-Mo2TiC2Tx electrode exhibited an energy density of 59.77 W h kg- 1 and power density of 0.4 kW kg- 1 along with long-term cyclic ability and stability of over 5000 cycles which makes it a good candidate material for energy storage devices.
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36. |
- Hallbäck, Nils, et al.
(author)
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Development of a distributed dislocation dipole technique for the analysis of multiple straight, kinked and branched cracks in an elastic half-plane
- 2014
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In: International Journal of Solids and Structures. - : Elsevier. - 0020-7683 .- 1879-2146. ; 51, s. 2878-2892
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- A distributed dislocation dipole technique for the analysis of multiple straight, kinked and branched cracks in an elastic half plane has been developed. The dipole density distribution is represented with a weighted Jacobi polynomial expansion where the weight function captures the asymptotic behaviour at each end of the crack. To allow for opening and sliding at crack kinking and branching the dipole density representation contains conditional extra terms which fulfil the asymptotic behaviour at each endpoint. Several test cases involving straight, kinked and branched cracks have been analysed, and the results suggest that the accuracy of the method is within 1% provided that Jacobi polynomial expansions up to at least the sixth order are used. Adopting even higher order Jacobi polynomials yields improved accuracy. The method is compared to a simplified procedure suggested in the literature where stress singularities associated with corners at kinking or branching are neglected in the representation for the dipole density distribution. The comparison suggests that both procedures work, but that the current procedure is superior, in as much as the same accuracy is reached using substantially lower order polynomial expansions.
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37. |
- Khaliq, Muhammad Waqas, et al.
(author)
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GHz sample excitation at the ALBA-PEEM
- 2023
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In: Ultramicroscopy. - 0304-3991. ; 250
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- We describe a setup that is used for high-frequency electrical sample excitation in a cathode lens electron microscope with the sample stage at high voltage as used in many synchrotron light sources. Electrical signals are transmitted by dedicated high-frequency components to the printed circuit board supporting the sample. Sub-miniature push-on connectors (SMP) are used to realize the connection in the ultra-high vacuum chamber, bypassing the standard feedthrough. A bandwidth up to 4 GHz with -6 dB attenuation was measured at the sample position, which allows to apply sub-nanosecond pulses. We describe different electronic sample excitation schemes and demonstrate a spatial resolution of 56 nm employing the new setup.
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38. |
- Khan, Abdul Ahad, et al.
(author)
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Algal biochar : A natural solution for the removal of Congo red dye from textile wastewater
- 2024
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In: Journal of the Taiwan Institute of Chemical Engineers / Elsevier. - : Elsevier. - 1876-1070 .- 1876-1089.
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- The present study was aimed at synthesizing algae-derived biochar to examine its effectiveness and adsorption capacity to remove Congo red dye. The independent variables such as dye concentration, adsorbent dose, and adsorption time were optimized by using a central composite design (CCD). An adsorption experiment was conducted to evaluate equilibrium using a detailed experimental design and characterized through XRD, TGA, SEM, EDX, and FTIR analysis. This paper also focuses on evaluating non-linear adsorption isotherm and kinetics to describe the adsorption mechanism along with applying an Artificial neural network to validate the removal efficiency. The maximum Congo red removal efficiency (96.14 %) and maximum adsorption capacity of algal biochar (186.94 mg/g) were achieved with the optimized parameters of 1 mg/L of dye concentration, 0.1 g of adsorbent dose, and 240 min of contact time. Adsorption behavior was well described by Langmuir isotherm and Pseudo-nth order. A multilayer perceptron (MLP) MLP 2–5–1 structure best validates the response. Overall, the study sheds light that Algal-derived biochar is a potential material for the elimination of Congo red dye and contributes to achieving sustainable development goals.
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39. |
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40. |
- Khan, Waqas Nawaz, et al.
(author)
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Performance Evaluation of Time-Reversal on Measured 60 GHz Wireless Channels
- 2013
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In: Wireless Personal Communications. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1572-834X .- 0929-6212. ; 71:1, s. 707-717
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Time-reversal (TR) signal processing has the potential to focus the transmitted signal at a desired receive (Rx) location in both space and time. At lower frequency bands, TR in conjunction with array antennas at transmit (Tx) or Rx has been shown to significantly improve its focusing performance relative to the case of single antennas at both link ends. This work for the first time investigates TR processing for multi-antenna systems in the 60 GHz band. We consider both multiple-input-single-output and single-input-multiple-output (SIMO) channels measured in the 60 GHz band in a conference room environment and investigate the effect of array size and its orientation on spatial and temporal compression properties of TR. It is observed that the root mean square (RMS) delay spread can be reduced significantly by the application of TR in the 60 GHz band and that the orientation of the Rx array significantly affects TR performance for SIMO systems.
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41. |
- Mahmood, Rashid, et al.
(author)
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Assessment of antidiabetic potential and phytochemical profiling of Rhazya stricta root extracts
- 2020
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In: BMC Complementary Medicine and Therapies. - : Springer Nature. - 2662-7671. ; 20:1
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: Diabetes mellitus is a chronic disease characterized by hyperglycemia that may occur due to genetic, environmental or lifestyle factors. Natural remedies have been used to treat diabetes since long and many antidiabetic compounds of varied efficacies have been isolated from medicinal plants. Rhazya stricta has been used for decades for the treatment of diabetes mellitus and associated ailments. Considering the folkloric use of R. stricta against diabetes, it was aimed to investigate the effectiveness of its root extracts against diabetes through in vitro assays and in vivo studies using animal model along with phytochemical profiling through GCMS. Methods: Various fractions of Rhazya stricta obtained through column chromatography were evaluated for a variety of assays including a-glucosidase, Dipeptidyl peptidase-IV (DPP-IV), beta-secretase and Glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) secretion studies. For the in vivo studies the alloxan-induced diabetic mice were treated with root extracts and blood glucose levels, HbA1C, and other biochemical markers along with the histological study of the liver were done. The phytochemical identification was performed using an Agilent 7890B GC coupled to a 7010 Triple Quadrupole (MS/MS) system. GraphPad Prism software version 5.01 was used for statistical analysis. Results: Majority of the extract fractions showed excellent results against diabetes by inhibiting enzymes DPP-IV (Up to 61%) and beta-secretase (Up to 83%) with IC50s 979 pg/ml and 169 mu g/ml respectively with increase in the GLP1 secretion. The results of in vivo studies indicated a marked reduction in blood glucose and HbA1c levels along with positive effects on other parameters like lipid profile, liver functions and renal functions of extract-treated mice as compared to control. The histological examination of the liver demonstrated hepatoprotective effects against diabetes led changes and various classes of phytochemicals were also identified through GCMS in different fractions. Conclusion: The results revealed strong antidiabetic activity of R. stricta root with the potential to protect body organs against diabetic changes. Moreover, a variety of phytochemicals has also been identified through GCMS that might be responsible for the antidiabetic potential of Rhazya stricta root.
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42. |
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43. |
- Mustafa, Ghulam M., et al.
(author)
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Study of optoelectronic and transport properties of MgLu2Z4 (Z=S, Se) spinels for optoelectronic and energy harvesting applications
- 2021
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In: Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing. - : Elsevier. - 1369-8001 .- 1873-4081. ; 121
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Intense research has been done to build materials that are potential candidates for energy storage applications. Spinels are of great interest in this respect because they have vast potential to be used in Mg-based batteries. To explore their energy storage as well as transport response, we calculate Mg-based spinels, namely MgLu2Z4 (ZS, Se). The full potential linearized augmented plane wave method has been used to examine their optoelectronic and transport response. An increase in the lattice constant has been observed by replacing S with Se, and our calculated values are in good agreement with those obtained experimentally. The Tran-Blaha modified Becke-Johnson exchange potential (TB-mBJ), has been used to study the optoelectronic and thermoelectric characteristics of the respective spinels. The dependence of these properties on the bandgap has also been observed. Replacing S with Se resulted in the transformation of the electronic bandgap from near-infrared to the visible region (MgLu2S4: 2.60 eV and MgLu2Se4: 2.00 eV). These results showed that these materials have the potential to be used in optoelectronic devices. The optical properties are discussed as a function of energy. Besides, the thermal transports are discussed with the help of Seebeck coefficient and figure of merit as a function of chemical potential and temperature.
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44. |
- Nyström, Magda, 1984, et al.
(author)
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Effects of rheological factors on perceived ease of swallowing
- 2015
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In: Applied Rheology. - 1430-6395 .- 1617-8106. ; 25:6, s. 40-48
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This study is a contribution to the understanding of how rheological properties of a fluid influences swallowing, especially people suffering from swallowing disorders (dysphagia). Our hypothesis was that fluid elasticity contributes to safe and pleasant swallowing. In the present study three food grade model fluids with specific rheological properties were developed and used: a Newtonian fluid with constant shear viscosity, an elastic Boger fluid with constant shear viscosity and a shear-thinning fluid which was elastic and had rate dependent shear viscosity. By comparing the swallowing of these model fluids the specific rheological effects could be distinguished. Sensory analysis of the perceived ease of swallowing was performed by a panel of healthy individuals, and by a group of dysphagic patients. The swallowing of the latter group was also characterized by videoflouroscopy and the transit times in the mouth and pharynx were determined. The hypothesis was confirmed by dysphagic patients who perceived swallowing easier for the elastic model fluids. A sensory panel of healthy individuals could not distinguish differences in swallowing, likely because their swallowing functions well and is an involuntary process. Quantitative videofluoroscopic measurements of swallowing transit times for the dysphagic patients suggested that fluid elasticity contributed to easy and safe swallowing, but the effect was not statistically significant due to the large spread of type of swallowing disorder.
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45. |
- Nyström, Magda, et al.
(author)
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Effects of rheological factors on perceived ease of swallowing
- 2015
-
In: Applied Rheology. - 1430-6395 .- 1617-8106. ; 25:6, s. 9-17
-
Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This study is a contribution to the understanding of how rheological properties of a fluid influences swallowing, especially people suffering from swallowing disorders (dysphagia). Our hypothesis was that fluid elasticity contributes to safe and pleasant swallowing. In the present study three food grade model fluids with specific rheological properties were developed and used: a Newtonian fluid with constant shear viscosity, an elastic Boger fluid with constant shear viscosity and a shear-thinning fluid which was elastic and had rate dependent shear viscosity. By comparing the swallowing of these model fluids the specific rheological effects could be distinguished. Sensory analysis of the perceived ease of swallowing was performed by a panel of healthy individuals, and by a group of dysphagic patients. The swallowing of the latter group was also characterized by videoflouroscopy and the transit times in the mouth and pharynx were determined. The hypothesis was confirmed by dysphagic patients who perceived swallowing easier for the elastic model fluids. A sensory panel of healthy individuals could not distinguish differences in swallowing, likely because their swallowing functions well and is an involuntary process. Quantitative videofluoroscopic measurements of swallowing transit times for the dysphagic patients suggested that fluid elasticity contributed to easy and safe swallowing, but the effect was not statistically significant due to the large spread of type of swallowing disorder.
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46. |
- Qazi, Waqas Muhammad, et al.
(author)
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A swallowing model for efficient food product development
- 2016
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In: The Materials Science Graduate Student Days 2016. ; , s. 38-
-
Conference paper (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Dysphagia refers to difficulties in swallowing, caused by conditions ranging from trauma to neurological disorders such as dementia. People suffering from dysphagia cannot adequately transfer food from the mouth to the stomach especially low viscosity, fluid foods. Texture modification is imperative to ensure safe passage of food from mouth into the stomach. Food products with elastic properties, i.e. high extensional viscosity, have been identified as helpful in promoting safe swallowing. However, this hypothesis is difficult to prove by clinical studies due to ethical issues and availability of suitable patients. Moreover, the problems of individual patients vary largely in nature and extent which further complicates the matter as identified in our previous research (1). We are currently constructing an in vitro human swallowing apparatus mimicking swallowing through the pharynx to the esophagus. The apparatus will have the pressure and ultrasound sensors to monitor real time flow properties of the bolus as it travels along the swallowing tract. This will enable us to measure relevant parameters during swallowing such as residence times and bolus velocity along the way. The model can be adjusted to different dysphagic conditions such as abnormal epiglottis closure. The goal of the project is to develop food products for safe swallowing and currently we are determining the rheological properties of commercial dysphagia thickeners, as well as model fluids. Two companies active in dysphagia foods are contributing (Fresenius Kabi and Findus). The shear and extensional properties have been shown to vary significantly, which has been correlated with fluid microstructure.
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47. |
- Qazi, Waqas Muhammad, et al.
(author)
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Rheological modification of fluid foods for patients with dysphagia
- 2016
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In: Annual Transactions of the Nordic Rheology Society. - 9789163791055 ; , s. 75-76
-
Conference paper (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Swallowing disorders, or dysphagia, is a growing problem especially as the population gets older. Fluid thickening is a well-established strategy for treating dysphagia, but the effects of thickening on the physiology of impaired swallowing are not fully understood and the relations to basic rheology are scarce. Commercial thickeners studied showed different behavior in both shear thinning, yield stress and first normal stress difference, and even larger differences in extensional viscosity.
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48. |
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49. |
- Rafiq, Shazia, et al.
(author)
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Comparison of neural mobilization and conservative treatment on pain, range of motion, and disability in cervical radiculopathy : A randomized controlled trial
- 2022
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In: PLOS ONE. - : Public Library of Science (PLoS). - 1932-6203. ; 17:12
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Objective: The objective of the study was to compare the effectiveness of neural mobilization technique with conservative treatment on pain intensity, cervical range of motion, and disability.Methods: It was a randomized clinical trial; data was collected from Mayo Hospital, Lahore. Eighty-eight patients fulfilling the sample selection criteria were randomly assigned into group 1 (neural mobilization) and group 2 (conventional treatment). Pain intensity was measured on a numeric pain rating scale, range of motion with an inclinometer, and functional status with neck disability index (NDI). Data were analyzed using SPSS, repeated measure ANOVA for cervical ranges and the Friedman test for NPRS and NDI were used for within-group analysis. Independent samples t-test for cervical ranges and Mann-Whitney U test for NPRS and NDI were used for between-group comparisons.Results: There was a significant improvement in pain, disability, and cervical range of motion after the treatment in both groups compared to the pre-treatment status (p < 0.001), and when both groups were compared neural mobilization was more effective than conventional treatment in reducing pain and neck disability (p < 0.001), but there was no significant difference present in the mean score of cervical range of motion between both groups. (p>0.05).Conclusions: The present study concluded that both neural mobilization and conservative treatment were effective as an exercise program for patients with cervical radiculopathy, however, neural mobilization was more effective in reducing pain and neck disability in cervical radiculopathy.
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50. |
- Rafiq, Shazia, et al.
(author)
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Effects of neurodynamic mobilization on health-related quality of life and cervical deep flexors endurance in patients of cervical radiculopathy : A randomized trial
- 2022
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In: BioMed Research International. - : Hindawi Publishing Corporation. - 2314-6133 .- 2314-6141. ; 2022
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Purpose: Cervical radiculopathy is disorder of cervical spinal nerve root affecting large number of population. Previously many studies are conducted to design suitable protocol for management of this disorder, but they lack in quality. The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of neural mobilization and cervical isometrics on health-related quality of life and deep flexors endurance in cervical radiculopathy.Methods: A double-blinded randomized clinical trial was conducted at Mayo Hospital, Lahore, Pakistan. Eighty-eight patients within the age range of 35-50 years were included in the study after taking their consent. In the experimental group (n = 44), median nerve mobilization was applied along with cervical isometric exercises. The control group (n = 44) performed cervical isometric exercises alone. Muscle endurance was measured by craniocervical flexion test and quality of life on 36 items short form health survey SF-36 scale. Measurements were taken at baseline, at 2nd week, and at 4th week. For missing data, intention-to-treat analysis was used.Results: Within-group comparison with Friedman test showed a significant difference between pre, mid, and posttreatment scores on craniocervical flexion test and in all domains of SF 36 in both groups. While between-group comparison with Mann-Whitney U test showed all variables were similar at baseline but after 4 weeks there was a statistically significant improvement in craniocervical flexion test scores and all domains of SF 36 in the experimental group. But domain of pain showed mean rank of 49.43 after 4 weeks in the experimental group and 39.57 in the control group with p = 0.065 and d = 0.579, while for all the other 7 domains values were p < .05 and d > 0.25.Conclusion: Neural mobilization combined with cervical isometrics shows significant effects in improving quality of life and deep flexors endurance in patients with cervical radiculopathy than cervical isometrics alone.
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