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Electricity consumers attitudes, knowledge and behaviour towards the use of energy saving bulbs in Warri, Nigeria: Implications for governmental action
Get PDFThis paper studies the electricity consumers attitudes, knowledge and behaviour towards the use of energy saving bulbs in Warri, Nigeria using the survey method. The survey randomly selected 400 respondents for the study, and information on their energy consumption and willingness to use energy saving bulbs were solicited using a well structured questionnaire. Results indicate a large majority (77%) of respondents agree that they do not practice any energy saving behaviour in their homes whilst 23% agreed that they practice energy saving in their homes. With respect to their willingness to use energy saving bulbs, 51% of the respondents are extremely willing to consume the product, and 49% were extremely unwilling to use energy saving bulbs. If energy saving bulbs costs consumers 10% more than candescent bulbs, 91% of respondents indicated they are extremely unwilling to consume it, while 53% were willing to consume same. Thus, it appears that respondents will respond to a price differential between energy saving bulbs and non-energy saving bulbs. The findings of this paper spells out the implications for governmental policy and action
Post-Secondary Schooling Quality and Manufacturing Capacity in Africa
Get PDFQuality investment in post-secondary schooling could facilitate structural transformation of African economies presently dominated by small-scale agricultural activities. To probe the causal relationship between human capital quality and manufacturing capacity, we build a new database of schooling quality. The country-level average test score of students in the GMAT examinations between 1984 and 2006 is used as the main measure of post-secondary schooling quality. Our OLS results suggest a strong and positive relationship between schooling quality and manufacturing capacity. Our results are robust to the addition of a fairly large number of relevant variables, corrections for influential observations and check for self-selection related biases. Furthermore, we use 2SLS technique to correct for possible endogeneity, omitted variable bias and measurement error of the schooling quality indicator. Our instrument passed the tests of exogeneity, although the maximum likelihood technique is used due to weak instrument proble
Comparative effect of quercetin and rutin on α-amylase, α-glucosidase, and some prooxidant-induced lipid peroxidation in rat pancreas
Get PDFStaff PublicationThis study was designed to investigate the effect of quercetin, its glycosylated conjugate rutin and various combinations of the two flavonoids on carbohydrate-hydrolyzing enzymes associated with type 2 diabetes (α-amylase and α-glucosidase) in a bid to understand the possible mechanisms of action by which quercetin and rutin could be used in the prevention/management of the degenerative condition. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of quercetin, rutin, and various combinations of the two flavonoids on α-amylase and α-glucosidase activities and the ability of the flavonoids to inhibit some pro-oxidants-induced lipid peroxidation in rat pancreas. The effect of the flavonoids on α-amylase and α-glucosidase activities as well as pro-oxidant (Fe2+ and SNP)-induced lipid peroxidation in rats’ pancreas homogenates was investigated. Rutin (IC50 = 0.048 μΜ) exhibited a significantly (P < 0.05) higher inhibition of Fe2+-induced lipid peroxidation than quercetin (IC50 = 0.075 μΜ). Furthermore, rutin had a stronger inhibition of α-amylase (IC50 = 0.043 μM) and α-glucosidase (IC50 = 0.037 μM) activities than quercetin [α-amylase (IC50 = 0.061 μM); α-glucosidase (IC50 0.038 μM)]. A combination of 25 % quercetin and 75 % rutin showed the strongest inhibition (P < 0.05) of α-amylase activity (IC50 = 313.87 μg/L) while 100 % quercetin showed the least inhibition of α-amylase (IC50 507.61 μg/L) activity and same trend was followed for α-glucosidase activity. This study revealed that glycosylation increased the inhibitory ability of quercetin on key enzymes linked to type 2 diabetes (α-amylase and α-glucosidase), and combination of quercetin and rutin had higher synergistic inhibitory abilities on the enzymes than the individual flavonoids, suggesting that a combination of food sources rich in these flavonoids could be very effective in the management/prevention of type 2 diabetes
Awareness and Use of Social Bookmarking Services by Final Year Students in a Nigerian Private University
No full textSocial computing is one of the renascent features of the web that has made it highly interactive.
One of such social tools in the web is the social bookmarking services. It has been reported that
social bookmarking services may be the least known social media network by students. Given
that social media has been predicted to revolutionize learning it is therefore imperative to study
the awareness and use of social media tools like social bookmarking services by undergraduate
students. The survey research design was employed and questionnaire used to collect data. Using
the SPSS statistical tool, the data were analysed and the result presented in simple percentages. It
was found that the students are largely (60.9%) not aware of social bookmarking services. Their
familiarity with and usage of the services were very low as very little proportions of the
respondents can either “use”, “are using” or “have used” some of the social bookmarking
services. With 28%, meeting people with similar research interest is the most beneficial feature of social
bookmarking services to the students. But overall, the students (52.2%) agree that social
bookmarking services are useful for their academic work
Librarian without Building in an E-Learning Environment: Needed Skills, Challenges, and Solutions
Get PDFThis chapter discusses e-learning, its advantages and challenges, the concept of a librarian without a building, and the characteristics and skills of a librarian without a building in an e-learning environment. The chapter empirically looks at the need for an e-librarian in an e-learning environment, the needed skills for such a librarian, and their challenges. Possible solutions to identify challenges are also discussed. The survey method was used for the study; the questionnaire was designed and administered to 138 librarians from Academic libraries in the six geo-political zones of Nigeria. 127 questionnaires were returned and used for analysis. The study reveals that there is a great need for e-librarians in e-learning environments, and that the librarians must possess such skills as high computer literacy, ability to learn fast, teach, and evaluate others. It was also discovered that e-librarians are faced with technical, administrative, financial, and capacity building challenges. Based on these, the authors recommend that e-librarians should be supported at all levels; they should be ready to develop themselves, strive at all cost to acquire more knowledge and skills in order to stand the changing nature of their job. It is also recommended that government agencies that accredit programmes at tertiary institutions should make sure that any institution that offers e-learning must also have a well organized e-library, and a well trained e-librarian must man the library. The study concludes that e-library and e-librarian without building must be recognized and empowered as part of the e-teaching and learning processe
DEVELOPMENT AND CHARACTERIZATION OF MODELING DEFORMATION OF AL-CU ALLOY
Get PDFThis research is aimed at determining the effect of thermo-mechanical ageing experimentally and numerically on the Mechanical Properties of Al-Cu Alloy by formulating a model (constitutive) to determine the nodal value of certain parameters and to simulate the obtain results using Matlab (fematiso).The development and morphology of Al-9.37Cu alloy was characterized through metallographic
examination and failure rate. The alloy was obtained by employing Die -Casting Technique
before being subjected to series of mechanical and materials tests. The result showed that the
strength of Al9.37Cu was greatly enhanced when the alloy was under different percent of
deformations between 5-15%. Constitutive model was adopted to determine the isotropic
material property in which the plane stress and plain strain conditions were considered as
boundary conditions. Consequently, the effect of temperature was able to influence the strain rate
in which the fracture strain determined the failure rate of the Al-Cu alloy.Self-sponsore
A novel hybrid artificial intelligence technique for colpitts oscillator design
Get PDFIn the design of the common base Colpitts oscillator, the resistance values of Thevenin’s resistors
significantly influenced the transient time and steady state response of the resulting circuit. Various
traditional approaches such as intuitive reasoning, mathematical calculation, and simulation-based
techniques have been proposed in the literature for this purpose. Some of the aforementioned
techniques involve rigorous mathematics, intuition, and experimentation in determining
appropriate component values for optimal performance, stable steady state performance, and short
transient response time from the resulting oscillator. In this paper, a new method of designing
Colpitts oscillator using hybrid artificial intelligence comprising evolutionary-based Genetic
Algorithm (GA) and artificial neural network (ANN) has been proposed. GA has been used in
selecting various optimum resistance values of Thevenin’s resistors for maximizing long-term
stability of the output waveform thus ensuring stable steady response of the designed circuit. ANN
has been utilized in learning the nonlinear relationship between Thevenin’s resistors and transient
time response of the Colpitts oscillator. Upon ANN convergence, optimum resistance values of
obtained from GA process are fed into the trained ANN in predicting transient response time of
each circuit. Optimized values with the shortest transient response time are finally selected for the
Colpitts oscillator. The designed circuit successfully achieved optimization between its transient
time response and steady state response. Hence, successfully reducing computation associated with
existing traditional techniques in designing similar optimum Colpitts oscillator and achieving
stable steady state output. Furthermore, this work has also demonstrated that ANN is capable of
predicting the transient time of circuit with reasonable accuracy
Understanding the Phylogenetics and Evolution of Genus Schistosoma- Africa and Asia Stand Point.
No full textThe evolutionary spread of schistosomes infection was reportedly prominent more in Africa
and Asia continents. This study therefore examined the evolutionary trend of this parasite
while limiting the investigation to Schistosoma species peculiar to this region of the world.
The evolutionary history of this species group was inferred using DNA sequences from
NCBI Genbank database and Maximum likelihood, Ancestral inference; Neighbor-Joining
method analysis was employed in this study. All members of this species complex were AT
rich, with S. mekongi and S. malayensis having the highest AT nucleotide composition. The
smallest evolutionary divergence was also observed in S. curassoni and S. bovis. The
finding of this study slightly contradict previous report on ancestral prediction of
Schistosomes
Managing a Sustainable Institutional Repository: The Covenant University Experience
Get PDFThe paper examined the ubiquitous nature of digital institutional repositories and their concomitant capabilities. It specifically show-cased the robust process and technical details involved in the development and sustenance of Covenant University Institutional Repository which has consistently ranked number one repository in Nigeria based on webometric rankings. Relying on Strajda Process Management model, Covenant University adopted two open source software- Dspace and E-print based on adjudged robustness of the metadata, relative easy to setup as well as amenable to customization. The paper recommended among others, the sensitization of researchers on the dangers of ceding copyright to Journal publishers as the practice divests them of inherent rights and may preclude deposition of their works on the Institutional repository thereby undermining growth of content and visibility of research outputs. It further recommended backup systems that forestall intrusion and mitigate effect of potential disasters on sustainability of Institutional Repository
Biosorption of Cadmium (II) and Chromium (VI) from Aqueous Solution by Chemically Modified Tithonia Diversyfolia Biomass
Get PDFStaff PublicationThe search for alternative and innovative treatment technologies for the effective removal of heavy metals
from aqueous wastes has been a research of concerted effort due to the inherent limitations exhibited by the
conventional methods such as less efficiency, sensitive operating conditions, energy requirements and generation of
toxic sludge or other waste products. Biosorption, the passive uptake of heavy metals by biomaterials has been
studied recently because of its high efficiency and cost effectiveness. Therefore, the biosorption capacity of Tithonia
diversyfolia biomass chemically modified with sodium hydroxide for the removal of cadmium and chromium ions
from aqueous solution was investigated. The effects of temperature, contact time, initial concentration of metal ions,
adsorbent dosage and pH on the biosorption of Cd2+ and Cr6+ ions were assessed. Thermodynamic parameters such
as free energy change (ΔG), enthalpy change (ΔH) and entropy change (ΔS) during the biosorption were evaluated.
The results showed that the biosorption process of Cd2+ and Cr6+ by chemically modified Tithonia diversyfolia
(CMTD) biomass was feasible and exothermic under the studied conditions. The equilibrium process was well
described by the Langmuir isotherm model, with a maximum biosorption capacity of 46.75mg/g and 48.00mg/g for
Cadmium and Chromium ions, respectively. Kinetic studies indicated that the biosorption of metal ions followed a
pseudo-second order equation