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In Vitro Evaluation of Ultrasound Effectiveness in Controlling Doxorubicin Release from Albumin-Conjugated Liposomes
No full textFunctionalized liposomes are among the most promising antineoplastic agents delivery vehicles. Contemporaneous to their accretion at the tumor site, they need to be potentiated to release their cargo using a suitable triggering modality. In this work, targeted DOX-loaded stealth liposomes were synthesized and functionalized with Human Serum Albumin (HSA) to target the overexpressed HSA receptors (HSA-Rs). The effects of low-frequency ultrasound (LFUS) in inducing DOX release from the synthesized liposomes were investigated in vitro. DOX release increased with the increasing power density of the ultrasound. HSA conjugation to the liposomes increased their sensitivity to LFUS. Furthermore, HSA conjugation also enhanced the liposome’s cytotoxic activity and uptake by the cancer cells overexpressing HSA-Rs. This cytotoxic activity and cellular uptake were further enhanced by triggering drug release from those targeted liposomes using LFUS. Combining HSA-targeted liposomes with LFUS is a promising approach in drug delivery.American University of SharjahAlJalila FoundationAl Qasimi FoundationPatient’s Friends CommitteeBiosciences and Bioengineering Research Institute, GCCTakamulTechnology Innovation Pioneer-Healthcare (TIP) ProgramSheikh Hamdan Award for Medical SciencesFriends of Cancer Patients (FoCP)Dana Gas Endowed Chair for Chemical Engineerin
Microwave Imaging for Early Breast Cancer Detection: Current State, Challenges, and Future Directions
No full textBreast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer type and is the leading cause of cancer-related death among females worldwide. Breast screening and early detection are currently the most successful approaches for the management and treatment of this disease. Several imaging modalities are currently utilized for detecting breast cancer, of which microwave imaging (MWI) is gaining quite a lot of attention as a promising diagnostic tool for early breast cancer detection. MWI is a noninvasive, relatively inexpensive, fast, convenient, and safe screening tool. The purpose of this paper is to provide an up-to-date survey of the principles, developments, and current research status of MWI for breast cancer detection. This paper is structured into two sections; the first is an overview of current MWI techniques used for detecting breast cancer, followed by an explanation of the working principle behind MWI and its various types, namely, microwave tomography and radar-based imaging. In the second section, a review of the initial experiments along with more recent studies on the use of MWI for breast cancer detection is presented. Furthermore, the paper summarizes the challenges facing MWI as a breast cancer detection tool and provides future research directions. On the whole, MWI has proven its potential as a screening tool for breast cancer detection, both as a standalone or complementary technique. However, there are a few challenges that need to be addressed to unlock the full potential of this imaging modality and translate it to clinical settings.American University of Sharja
INScription: Department of International Studies (INS) Issue #6 (March 31, 2022, Issue 6)
No full textCollege of Arts and SciencesDepartment of International Studie
Enhancement of the corrosion resistance of mild steel with femtosecond laser- nanostructuring and CrCoNi medium entropy alloy coating
No full textIn this work, the corrosion resistance of mild steel surface nanostructured with a femtosecond laser and coated with high corrosion resistant CrCoNi (CCN) medium entropy alloy through magnetron sputtering is studied. Substantial improvement in corrosion protection was achieved by applying a combination of high-power femtosecond laser surface nano-structuring at ambient conditions and thin-film coating with (CCN) medium entropy alloy. XRD analysis revealed that femtosecond laser structuring increases the susceptibility of the surfaces to Fe₂O₃ nucleation through oxidation. The surface wettability measurements and electrochemical polarization tests revealed that the combined approach of femtosecond laser structuring and magnetron sputter coating is the best for desired high corrosion resistance. Through this novel method, the resulting corrosion resistance of mild steel was improved by more than one-fold. The results are explained considering the detailed microstructural analysis. The presented findings open new possibilities for corrosion prevention using a combination of new powerful technologies that yield to unprecedented corrosion-inhibition efficacy.American University of Sharja
Predicting the Heats of Fusion of Ionic Liquids via Group Contribution Modeling and Machine Learning
No full textA Master of Science thesis in Chemical Engineering by Samira Jihad Zeinab entitled, “Predicting the Heats of Fusion of Ionic Liquids via Group Contribution Modeling and Machine Learning”, submitted in April 2022. Thesis advisor is Dr. Paul Nancarrow and thesis co-advisor is Dr. Nabil Abdel Jabbar. Soft copy is available (Thesis, Completion Certificate, Approval Signatures, and AUS Archives Consent Form).Energy security, environmental pollution, and global warming have become major concerns due to significant population and economic growth. The transition from fossil fuels, which can be used to generate power constantly, to intermittent renewable energy sources, such as solar or wind, requires the development of effective energy storage methods. Phase change materials (PCMs), a type of thermal energy storage technology that can absorb, store, and release thermal energy based on the temperature of the environment, hold significant potential in the energy storage mix. However, many such materials suffer from major drawbacks such as wide melting point ranges, supercooling, phase separation, evaporation, thermal degradation, or corrosion. Ionic liquids (ILs) have been considered as a promising substitute for standard PCMs in recent years, due to their non-volatility and thermal stability. While ILs are often described as designer materials, this potential must be utilized by developing structure-property models for the prediction of their key physiochemical properties. Heat of fusion is one of the most important material properties for PCM applications. In this work, the group contribution modelling (GCM) approach has been used as the basis for the development of a new IL heat of fusion predictive model. A database of IL heat of fusion data was compiled from a variety of literature sources with 344 data points and 289 unique ILs after data refinement. Extensive analysis of the structure-property relationships was used to develop several novel structural parameters that were incorporated into the GCM. A range of machine learning algorithms were investigated in combination with the GCM approach, including ridge regression, lasso regression, multi-layer neural networks, and gradient boosting regression, with the latter giving the best performance against the test set. A test set mean absolute error of 5.9 kJ.mol⁻¹ and R² of 0.67 between the predicted and experimental data was obtained, indicating that the model displays reasonable accuracy for the comprehensive range of ILs studied. However, significant discrepancies were found to be widespread in the literature data for IL heat of fusion, limiting the predictive power of the data-driven models and highlighting the need for improvements in measurement protocols.College of EngineeringDepartment of Chemical EngineeringMaster of Science in Chemical Engineering (MSChE
Melting performance of a composite bio-based phase change material: An experimental evaluation of copper foam pore size
No full textThis paper presents an experimental study on the thermal performance of a composite heat sink consisting of a bio-based phase change material and copper foam. The experiments are carried out at three different heat loads (10, 15, and 20 W) using five copper metal foam samples with the same dimensions (10 × 9 × 0.3 cm), porosity (98%), and pore densities of 20, 35, 60, 80, and 95 pores per inch (PPI). The thermal performances are evaluated using the temperature profiles, the time required to reach specific temperatures, and the enhancement ratios of the heat sinks. The results favor the PCM-Copper composite sample with 95 PPI because it took the longest time to achieve a constant temperature when compared to its other pore density counterparts. Also, for the same sample under 20 W power input, the enhancement ratios are 1.29, 1.45, and 1.23 at critical temperatures of 50, 55, and 60 °C, respectively
Healthcare Supply Chain Disruption Risks
No full textA Master of Science thesis in Engineering Systems Management by Fatima Wisam Ahmad entitled, “Healthcare Supply Chain Disruption Risks”, submitted in December 2022. Thesis advisor is Dr. Abdulrahim Shamayleh. Soft copy is available (Thesis, Completion Certificate, Approval Signatures, and AUS Archives Consent Form).The healthcare industry is essential in all countries worldwide; it plays a vital role in the survival and wellbeing of citizens. To receive the best quality of healthcare, healthcare facilities should have efficient strategies for managing the supply chain. Following such strategies will result in reduced costs and improved quality, efficiency, and flexibility. Nevertheless, the recent events of COVID-19 have shown many flaws in the healthcare supply chain risk management strategies. This pandemic has shown that the healthcare supply chain was not prepared for such disruption and that the traditional supply chain risk strategies followed are restrictive in tackling long-term global pandemic disruptions. Thus, this work aims to propose a framework that identifies disruption risks, understands the varied nature of the disruption, its sources, and its significance. Risks are collected from an extensive literature review and semistructured interviews with healthcare supply chain specialists. Then, survey results were analyzed using Bayesian Belief Networks (BBN) to identify interdependency among risks and rank them. This study will provide decision makers an insight into the main risks leading to disruption in the healthcare supply chain field. Moreover, it provides a potential for further exploration by including appropriate mitigation strategies for the proposed framework.College of EngineeringDepartment of Industrial EngineeringMaster of Science in Engineering Systems Management (MSESM
INScription: Department of International Studies (INS) Issue #5 (February 24, 2022, Issue 5)
No full textCollege of Arts and SciencesDepartment of International Studie
Developing Heat Transfer for Laminar Flow of Power-law Fluids in the Entrance Region of a Pipe
No full textA Master of Science thesis in Chemical Engineering by Muhammad Faheem Hassan entitled, “Developing Heat Transfer for Laminar Flow of Power-law Fluids in the Entrance Region of a Pipe”, submitted in June 2022. Thesis advisor is Dr. Rachid Chebbi. Soft copy is available (Thesis, Completion Certificate, Approval Signatures, and AUS Archives Consent Form).The objective of this thesis is to develop a model to solve the combined hydrodynamic-thermal entrance region problem for laminar flow of power-law fluids in a circular pipe under uniform wall heat flux condition. The model is based on the inlet-filled region concept of Ishizawa (1966) and uses a boundary layer integral method to solve for the simultaneously developing velocity and thermal profiles. The developed model for power-law fluids uses the hydrodynamic entrance region model developed by Chebbi (2002) for power-law fluids and extends the heat transfer model presented by Al-Ali (1988), and Al-Ali and Selim (1992) for the Newtonian fluid flow case. The axial location at which the thermal boundary layer thickness reaches the circular pipe radius value represents the end of the thermal inlet region. The local Nusselt number asymptotically approaches the fully developed value. The solution is performed in each of the three zones forming the thermal entrance region: hydrodynamic inlet-thermal inlet, hydrodynamic filled-thermal inlet and hydrodynamic filled-thermally filled regions. The local Nusselt number variations along the axial distance of the pipe for power-law indices n = 0.6, 1 and 1.4 and Prandtl number, Pr = 1, 5, 10 and 15 are presented graphically and in tabulated forms. The dimensionless thermal entrance region length is calculated using a Nusselt number criterion (local Nusselt number equal to 1.05 the asymptotic value). Its values at Pr = 5 and for n = 0.6, 1 and 1.4 are 0.3222, 0.3532 and 0.3831, respectively. The Nusselt number asymptotic values for n = 0.6, 1 and 1.4 are 4.49, 4.36 and 4.30, respectively. The present results are in good agreement with the theoretical results in the literature for n=1 (Newtonian fluid case). To my knowledge, no experimental data, numerical or theoretical results asymptotically matching the fully developed solution, are available for the case of simultaneously developing fluid flow and heat transfer for power-law fluid flow in pipes.College of EngineeringDepartment of Chemical EngineeringMaster of Science in Chemical Engineering (MSChE