umer farooq

Several main energy conversion technologies need the improvement of extremely active, enduring, and economical catalysts for the cathodic oxygen reduction process. Some power conversion techniques including fuel cells and metal air batteries are efficient for the oxygen reduction process. The current improvements in platinum-based materials and platinum-free materials for fuel cell ORR catalysis are studied. Six primary types of contemporary ORR electrocatalysts are elaborated. Moreover, the efficiency of the resulting catalysts in respect of mass activity, kinetic current density, power density, and their inclusion into fuel cell processes, are also investigated. The benefits, drawbacks, performance of catalysts, and the need of rational design methods at the fuel-cell level are emphasized. Furthermore, the core issues, constraints, and possibilities are reviewed for developing inexpensive, more functional active, and stable electrocatalysts in the future.

Studies were conducted to ascertain the phytotoxic action of aqueous extracts and rhizospheric soils of wasteland weeds such as Parthenium hysterophorus L., Withania somnifera L., Lantana camara L., and Achyranthes aspera L. against four summer crops viz., Gossypium hirsutum L., Helianthus annuus L., Oryza sativa L. and Zea mays L. Experiment was carried out in Agronomy Laboratory, College of Agriculture, University of Sargodha, Punjab-Pakistan. In first experiment, the 5% (w/v) aqueous extract prepared from whole plant of each weed was applied to germinating crop seeds sown in petri plates. In the second experiment soils collected from rhizosphere of these weeds were filled in plastic pots and used as germination medium for seeds of these crops. A constant temperature of 30oC was maintained in germinator throughout the germination period of 12 days. In first experiment, significantly lower germination percentages (31.7 and 38.3%) and germination indices (4.4 and 6.4) of crops were noted with application of A. aspera and P. hysterophorus extracts, respectively. All weed extracts except L. camara caused significant reduction in shoot length, root length, seedling length and seedling biomass of crops. Root growth of the crop seedlings was influenced more than their shoot growth. In second experiment, germination percentage, shoot dry weight, seedling biomass and seedling vigor index of crops were significantly inhibited by rhizospheric soil of all weeds. Among crops, H. annuus was more susceptible to the deleterious effect of the aqueous extracts as well as rhizospheric soils of weeds. It can be concluded that wasteland weeds especially P. hysterophorus and A. aspera imparted more negative impact on the germination and seedling growth of test crops. Therefore, crop fields and their surroundings should be kept free from these weeds by clean cultivation.

Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing technologies have connected the infrastructure of the city to make the context-aware and more intelligent city for utility its major resources. These technologies have much potential to solve thechallenges of urban areas around the globe to facilitate the citizens. A framework model that enables the integration of sensor’s data and analysis of the data in the context of smart parking is proposed. These technologies use sensors anddevices deployed around the city parking areas sending real time data through the edge computers to the main cloud servers. Mobil-Apps are developed that used real time data, set from servers of the parking facilities in the city. Fuzzification is shown to be a capable mathematical approach for modeling city parking issues. To solve the city parking problems in cities a detailed analysis of fuzzy logic proposed systems is developed. This paper presents the resultsachieved using Mamdani Fuzzy Inference System to model complex smart parking system. These results are verified using MATLAB simulation.

Family system has been found to affect the satisfaction level among the family members. The objective of our study was to determine the satisfaction level and its predictors among joint and nuclear family systems in District Abbottabad, Pakistan.

We conducted a population-based cross-sectional study in all 52 :union: Councils (UCs) of District Abbottabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pakistan from March 2015 to August 2015. Multistage cluster sampling technique was used to select 2063 participants from both nuclear and joint family houses. Proportionate sampling was done for selecting mohalla from each UCs, and then subsequently households from respective mohalla’s. Simple random sampling was done for selecting the 18 years and above-aged participant for the study. A structured demographic questionnaire was used to collect information from study participants. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis was done to find out the predictors of satisfaction level among joint and nuclear family systems using SPSS version 20 A p-value of <0.05 was considered as significant.

Level of satisfaction was found to be higher among people living in the joint family system i.e., 87.5 % v/s 81 % (<0.001) compared to the nuclear family system. Multivariate regression analysis of nuclear family system showed that people having higher education level and higher socioeconomic status (SES) were more satisfied as compared to no education & low SES respectively. While, in the joint family system, only high SES was a significant predictor of satisfaction in the joint family system as compared to low SES.  

Our study reported a high level of satisfaction among joint and nuclear family systems in Pakistan. High education level and high SES were identified as important predictors of satisfaction among both systems.

Successful disease management requires a rapid and sensitive diagnosis method that can recognize early infection even before the manifestation of its clinical signs. The only available field diagnostic tests for foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) are lateral flow devices, commonly known as chromatographic strips. Low sensitivity and inability to detect FMD virus (FMDV) at the serotype level are limitations of lateral flow devices. Therefore, a reverse transcriptase loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) was standardized using universal and sero-type specific genes in a single tube. This test does not require sophisticated equipment and can detect FMDV at serotype level in about 60 min. In addition, the sensitivity and specificity of this test is comparable to conventional reverse transcriptase PCR and real time PCR (rRT-PCR).