10 research outputs found
Evaluation of Different Wastewater Treatment Processes and Development of a Modified Attached Growth Bioreactor as a Decentralized Approach for Small Communities
No full textThis study was undertaken to evaluate the potential future use of three biological processes in order to designate the most desired solution for on-site treatment of wastewater from residential complexes, that is, conventional activated sludge process (CASP), moving-bed biofilm reactor (MBBR), and packed-bed biofilm reactor (PBBR). Hydraulic retention time (HRT) of 6, 3, and 2 h can be achieved in CASP, MBBR, and PBBR, respectively. The PBBR dealt with a particular arrangement to prevent the restriction of oxygen transfer efficiency into the thick biofilms. The laboratory scale result revealed that the overall reduction of 87% COD, 92% BOD5, 82% TSS, 79% NH3-N, 43% PO4-P, 95% MPN, and 97% TVC at a HRT of 2 h was achieved in PBBR. The microflora present in the system was also estimated through the isolation, identification, and immobilization of the microorganisms with an index of COD elimination. The number of bacterial species examined on the nutrient agar medium was 22 and five bacterial species were documented to degrade the organic pollutants by reducing COD by more than 43%. This study illustrated that the present PBBR with a specific modified internal arrangement could be an ideal practice for promoting sustainable decentralization and therefore providing a low wastage sludge biomass concentration
The zoonotic potential of avian influenza viruses isolated from wild waterfowl in Zambia
No full textWhilst remarkable progress in elucidating the mechanisms governing interspecies transmission and pathogenicity of highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses (AIVs) has been made, similar studies focusing on low-pathogenic AIVs isolated from the wild waterfowl reservoir are limited. We previously reported that two AIV strains (subtypes H6N2 and H3N8) isolated from wild waterfowl in Zambia harbored some amino acid residues preferentially associated with human influenza virus proteins (so-called human signatures) and replicated better in the lungs of infected mice and caused more morbidity than a strain lacking such residues. To further substantiate these observations, we infected chickens and mice intranasally with AIV strains of various subtypes (H3N6, H3N8, H4N6, H6N2, H9N1 and H11N9) isolated from wild waterfowl in Zambia. Although some strains induced seroconversion, all of the tested strains replicated poorly and were nonpathogenic for chickens. In contrast, most of the strains having human signatures replicated well in the lungs of mice, and one of these strains caused severe illness in mice and induced lung injury that was characterized by a severe accumulation of polymorphonuclear leukocytes. These results suggest that some strains tested in this study may have the potential to infect mammalian hosts directly without adaptation, which might possibly be associated with the possession of human signature residues. Close monitoring and evaluation of host-associated signatures may help to elucidate the prevalence and emergence of AIVs with potential for causing zoonotic infections
Reading Yakhine Min-thami Eigyin as a Fifteenth-century Historical Document
No full textAlthough this paper was written for the Yangon Universities Historical Research Centre conference (14-21 December 2001), the author was ultimately unable to atten
<i>Third World Express</i> : trains and “revolution” in Southern African poetry
No full textThis article examines political dimensions of the train metaphor in selected Southern African poems, some of them in English translation. Exploring work by Mongane Serote, B.W. Vilakazi, Demetrius Segooa, Phedi Tlhobolo, Thami Mseleku, Jeremy Cronin, Alan Lennox-Short, Anthony Farmer, Freedom T.V. Nyamubaya, Abduraghiem Johnstone and Mondli Gwala, the argument shows some of the ways in which the technological character of trains and railways is made to carry a message of political insurrection and revolution. The author shows that the political potential of the railway metaphor builds on the general response to railways evident in poems indebted to traditional African praise poetry. The article also demonstrates that political contention within different strands of the Southern African liberation movement could also find expression using the railway metaphor
The history and politics of liberation archives at Fort Hare
No full textIncludes bibliographical references.This thesis, the first of its kind on liberation historiography, seeks to put the liberation movements archives housed at the University of Fort Hare in context. The thesis focuses mainly on the 1990s, when the repatriation of struggle material by Fort Hare working hand in glove with the liberation movements, mainly the African National Congress ANC), the Pan Africanist Congress(PAC) and the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), was at its height
The zoonotic potential of avian influenza viruses isolated from wild waterfowl in Zambia
No full textCo-phasing the Planet Formation Imager
No full textThis is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from SPIE via the DOI in this record.The Planet Formation Imager (PFI) is a project for a very large optical interferometer intended to obtain images of the planet formation process at scales as small as the Hill sphere of giant exoplanets. Its main science instruments will work in the thermal infrared but it will be cophased in the near infrared, where it requires also some capacity for scientific imaging. PFI imaging and resolution specifications imply an array of 12 to 20 apertures and baselines up to a few kilometers cophased at near infrared coherent magnitudes as large as 10. This paper discusses various cophasing architectures and the corresponding minimum diameter of individual apertures, which is the dominant element of PFI cost estimates. From a global analysis of the possible combinations of pairwise fringe sensors, we show that conventional approaches used in current interferometers imply the use of prohibitively large telescopes and we indicate the innovative strategies that would allow building PFI with affordable apertures smaller than 2 m in diameter. The approach with the best potential appears to be Hierarchical Fringe Tracking based on "two beams spatial filters" that cophase pairs of neighboring telescopes with all the efficiency of a two telescopes fringe tracker and transmit most of the flux as if it was produced by an unique single mode aperture to cophase pairs of pairs and then pairs of groups of apertures. We consider also the adaptation to PFI of more conventional approaches such as a combination of GRAVITY like fringe trackers or single or multiple chains of 2T fringe trackers
The Persistence of Minimalism
No full textThe following work develops a new and general theory of minimalism – one addressing both its transhistorical and interdisciplinary dimensions, and capable of accounting for existing minimalism of every epoch and in every medium, while suitably open to embrace minimalist work yet to be created. To offer such a theory it is necessary not only to revisit the histories of minimalist practice and criticism, but also to consider its radical philosophical ground and implications. Hence its principal thesis – that minimalism exemplifies the persistence and facticity of the Real – grapples at once with the ontological heart of minimalist theory, and its practical instantiation through canonical as well as rarely considered examples. Divided into three parts, the first part addresses minimalism as the manifestation of particular aesthetic properties in relation to critical and theoretical trends. Since it becomes apparent that no single descriptive or theoretical account adequately frames minimalism, the discussion turns to the possibility of discovering a philosophical ground equally radical to the minimalist objects it addresses. The Real – an indifferent field of forces from which contingent entities are subtracted from within an irreversible temporal passage – offers precisely this radical continuum. Minimalism, by exposing the continuity between radical poiesis and an essentially quantitative understanding of Being, clarifies the indifferent persistence of the Real in every existential situation. Penetrating to the heart of this proposition, parts two and three respectively address minimalism in terms of its quantitative logic of Being – every exemplary subtraction from which is instantiated a type of existential calculation – and its exemplary aesthetic manifestation in terms of an existential transumption – a constructive poietic displacement by which minimalism renders itself maximally intelligible in terms of its objecthood and persistence. The work concludes with a typology which reorients and confirms the substance of the preceding argumentation
Improving the outcome of psoriatic arthritis
No full textPsoriatic arthritis (PsA) is recognised to have a significant impact on functional impairment, joint damage and quality of life. The aim of this thesis was
to investigate tools for early identification, to develop a clinical target for treatment and to utilise these tools within a clinical trial.
The ClASssification of Psoriatic ARthritis (CASPAR) criteria, previously developed in established PsA, were tested in patients with recent onset inflammatory
arthritis (PsA and controls) to test their discriminative ability in early arthritis. The phenotype of early PsA was investigated further with clinical and ultrasound (US)
assessment. Clinical criteria for minimal disease activity (MDA) were developed using a questionnaire. These were subsequently tested in an observational cohort
and interventional trial dataset. Finally, they are being utilised prospectively in an RCT addressing the benefits of tight control in PsA.
The CASPAR criteria were found to have good sensitivity and specificity for the diagnosis of recent onset PsA. No individual clinical parameters accurately distinguished PsA from other types of inflammatory arthritis, but there was evidence of more oligoarticular disease and enthesitis in PsA compared with rheumatoid arthritis. US imaging showed a small burden of subclinical arthritis and enthesitis
but found good correlation between clinical and imaging assessment of disease activity. Criteria for MDA were developed from expert consensus, covering all aspects of psoriatic disease. They were evaluated against the OMERACT filter and have supporting evidence for their validation in terms of truth, discrimination and feasibility. Early unblinded results from the clinical trial indicated that 53%
achieved MDA at 12 months.
In summary, the CASPAR criteria can be used for early classification of PsA. In addition, a new composite outcome measure has been developed and validated and is now being utilised in a clinical trial
Enhancing the reading conditions in a multilingual grade six class : exploring the possibilities
No full textThe qualitative study described in this research addresses the question of ""how to enhance reading conditions in a grade six class with learners from different language backgrounds, but taught in English as a medium of instruction"". The conceptual framework helps to carve a path through the maze of definitions about reading, independent readers, reading models and Cambourne's reading conditions, which were the focus of the research. The grade six classroom, in which the reading conditions, mainly ""immersion"" and ""engagement"", were to be enhanced, consisted of 42 learners and one teacher. The observation period started in February 2002, but the actual research described in this dissertation lasted two months (August and September 2002), and happened in different phases: the initial phase and the main research period. The latter was made up of the intervention and the final phase. In the initial phase the reading conditions In the classroom layout, the learners' profile, the teaching practices and the attitudes towards reading were explored through observations, field notes and interviews. Other qualitative data was gathered using a reading survey and a cloze procedure test, which were both developed by the researcher. The collected data helped to set up the intervention, in which several challenges had to be faced. During that intervention the physical conditions in the classroom were enhanced to create an encouraging and comfortable space for the learner-reader. A wide variety of interesting and relevant books were brought in the classroom in order to make it a literacy rich environment. At the same time, organising activities based on prediction and sequencing studied the learners' meaning making process. These activities were created to stimulate the learners' engagement in reading. In the final phase possible changes in reading engagement and attitudes were registered through the same cloze procedure test and a second reading survey. Significant results of the research showed that reading became a social experience, an interaction between learners and teacher, in an environment where learners read for pleasure. Even though the intervention took place over a short period of two weeks, the results indicate that there are ways in which teachers can enhance reading conditions and a stimulating environment can be created to engage learners in reading
