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We continue the ongoing dialogue in AMLE on business school hubs and addresses from Rogmans (2019, this issue) by evaluating the applicability of Dunning’s OLI advantages—Ownership (O), Location (L...

This study aims to examine the impact of financial inclusion on the financial performance of Jordanian banks listed in the Amman Stock Exchange. The study empirically tested the impact of five main indicators of financial inclusion on bank performance. Using a simple regression analysis, findings of the study showed statistically significant impact of two indicators of financial inclusion (i.e., financial access and enterprise financing) and bank financial performance (i.e., bank profitability) of Jordanian banks. The study recommends Jordanian financial institutions to move toward increasing innovative access to financial services as well as enhancing IT infrastructure and the development of financial services to raise the level of digital banking services which is currently considered relatively low when compared to other middle-income countries.

Funding of higher education institutions is a major growing expense for the Oman government (13–14% of the total spending in 2016) and is at par with that of other governments (e.g., 11% in the UK and 15.5% in the US). However, there has been little investigation into the funding of quality higher education in Oman. The present research project aims to explore the sources of funding at Oman universities after it opened the private education sector in 1996. The research methodology includes conducting interviews with leaders in higher education to explore different types of funding (e.g., gifts, tuition fees, government support). This will enhance our understanding, as well as that of decision-makers, regarding universities' funding sources and of the higher education landscape.

© 1982-2012 IEEE. Back propagation (BP) based on stochastic gradient descent is the prevailing method to train multilayer neural networks (MNNs) with hidden layers. However, the existence of the physical separation between memory arrays and arithmetic module makes it inefficient and ineffective to implement BP in conventional digital hardware. Although CMOS may alleviate some problems of the hardware implementation of MNNs, synapses based on CMOS cost too much power and areas in very large scale integrated circuits. As a novel device, memristor shows promises to overcome this shortcoming due to its ability to closely integrate processing and memory. This paper proposes a novel circuit for implementing a synapse based on a memristor and two MOSFET tansistors (p-type and n-type). Compared with a CMOS-only circuit, the proposed one reduced the area consumption by 92%-98%. In addition, we develop a fuzzy method for the adjustment of the learning rates of MNNs, which increases the learning accuracy by 2%-3% compared with a constant learning rate. Meanwhile, the fuzzy adjustment method is robust and insensitive to parameter changes due to the approximate reasoning. Furthermore, the proposed methods can be extended to memristor-based multilayer convolutional neural network for complex tasks. The novel architecture behaves in a human-liking thinking process.

Abstract The present experimental investigation describes the impact of surfactants (such as Benzalkonium chloride (BAC), Cetrimonium chloride (CTAC), Ammonium lauryl sulphate (ALS), PLS (Pottasium lauryl sulphate), Brij 700, and Span 80), sonication time (30–240 min.), and temperature (55 °C ~ 80 °C), on the stability and viscosity of hybrid nanoparticle (CeO2 + MWCNT) for different base fluids (water, silicone oil, EG, and therminol VP-I). The results of Zeta potential analysis indicated that BAC surfactant shows the best impact on hybrid nanofluid stability (HNF). The observed optimum sonication time is 60, 120, 90, and 120 min, respectively, for silicon oil, EG, water, and therminol VP-I for which HNF yields maximum zeta potential value. With the increment in operating temperature range, the stability of prepared HNF using different base fluids and adding six different surfactants has decreased. Furthermore, it is found that with the increase in sonication time, the viscosity of HNF firstly decreases up to an optimum time, after which it increases gradually. The rheological behavior of working HNF for various practical applications of the current suspensions is also reported. From 3S analysis such as sonication, surfactant, and stability, De-Ionized (DI) Water is advisable to be used as a base fluid for the particle combination of CeO2 + MWCNT with 80:20 mixture ratio as it provides long-term stability and marginal viscosity enhancement. Finally, results show that the CeO2 + MWCNT (80,20)/ DI water nano colloidal behaves as a Non-Newtonian fluid as there is no linear agreement found between shear stress and shear rate.

The Corona Virus Disease-19 (COVID-19) pandemic disrupted medical education across the world. Online teaching has grown rapidly under lockdown. Yet the online approach for assessment presents a number of challenges, particularly when evaluating clinical competencies. The aim of this study was to investigate the feasibility, acceptability, reliability and validity of an online Virtual Clinical Encounter Examination (VICEE) to assess non-psychomotor competencies (non-procedure or manual skills) of medical students.Sixty-one final year medical students took the VICEE as part of the final summative examination. A panel of faculty experts developed the exam cases and competencies. They administered the test online via real-time interaction with artificial intelligence (AI) based virtual patients, along with faculty and IT support.Student and faculty surveys demonstrated satisfaction with the experience. Confirmatory factor analysis supported convergent validity of VICEE with Direct Observation Clinical Encounter Examination (DOCEE), a previously validated clinical examination. The observed sensitivity was 81.8%, specificity 64.1% and likelihood ratio 12.6, supporting the ability of VICEE to diagnose 'clinical incompetence' among students.Our results suggest that online AI-based virtual patient high fidelity simulation may be used as an alternative tool to assess some aspects of non-psychometric competencies.

In the Netherlands, more than 80% of the highways are surfaced by porous asphalt (PA) mixes. The benefits of using PA mixes include, among others, the reduction of noise and the improvement of skid resistance. However, pavements with PA mixes are known to have a shorter lifetime and higher maintenance costs as compared with traditional dense asphalt mixes. Raveling is one of the most prominent distresses that occur on PA mix pavements. To analyze the raveling distress of a PA mix pavement, the stress and strain fields at the component level are required. Computational models based on finite element methods (FEM), discrete element methods (DEM), or both, can be used to compute local stress and strain fields. However, they require the development of large FEM meshes and large-scale computational facilities. As an alternative, the homogenization technique provides a way to calculate the stress and strain fields at the component level without the need for much computation power. This study aims to propose a new approach to analyze the raveling distress of a PA mix pavement by using the homogenization technique. To demonstrate the application of the proposed approach, a real field-like example was presented. In the real field-like example, the Mori–Tanaka model was used as a homogenization technique. The commonly available pavement analysis tool 3D-MOVE was used to compute the response of the analyzed pavement. In general, it was concluded that the homogenization technique could be a reliable and effective way to analyze the raveling distress of a PA mix pavement.

Abstract This paper explores the viability of using aluminum alloy (AA) plates as an externally bonded reinforcement (EBR) material that could overcome some of the shortcomings of the prevailing steel and FRP materials and provides new advantages. A total of 32 prisms with different concrete strengths have been prepared as single shear test specimens with AA plates bonded to the prisms at different lengths using epoxy adhesive. Single shear tests were conducted on the prism specimens until failure. Load-extension and load-strain values were recorded. Bond stress and bond slip values were calculated. Test results have shown that plain untreated AA surface is susceptible to premature debonding; however treating the AA surface, by roughening it, increases its bond strength and ultimate load capacity considerably. Generally, the ultimate load and maximum bond stress increased with the increase of the bonded length and concrete strength, on the average, for the AA roughened surface compared to the AA plain untreated surface, by up to 457%, 327%, respectively. It is also observed that the modes of failure were influenced by the changes in the bonded length, concrete strength and AA surface treatment.

Recurrent cardiovascular events remain an enigma that accounts for30% of deaths worldwide. While heredity and human genetics variation play a key role, host-environment interactions offer a sound conceptual framework to dissect the molecular basis of recurrent cardiovascular events from genes and proteins to metabolites, thus accounting for environmental contributions as well. We report here a multiomics systems science approach so as to map interindividual variability in susceptibility to recurrent cardiovascular events. First, we performed data and text mining through a mixed-methods content analysis to select genomic variants, 10 single nucleotide polymorphisms, and microRNAs (miR-10a, miR-21, and miR-20a), minimizing bias in candidate marker selection. Next, we validated our

ABSTRACT We report the detection of a bright fast radio burst, FRB 191108, with Apertif on the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope. The interferometer allows us to localize the FRB to a narrow 5 arcsec × 7 arcmin ellipse by employing both multibeam information within the Apertif phased-array feed beam pattern, and across different tied-array beams. The resulting sightline passes close to Local Group galaxy M33, with an impact parameter of only 18 kpc with respect to the core. It also traverses the much larger circumgalactic medium (CGM) of M31, the Andromeda Galaxy. We find that the shared plasma of the Local Group galaxies could contribute ∼10 per cent of its dispersion measure of 588 pc cm−3. FRB 191108 has a Faraday rotation measure (RM) of +474 $\pm \, 3$ rad m−2, which is too large to be explained by either the Milky Way or the intergalactic medium. Based on the more moderate RMs of other extragalactic sources that traverse the halo of M33, we conclude that the dense magnetized plasma resides in the host galaxy. The FRB exhibits frequency structure on two scales, one that is consistent with quenched Galactic scintillation and broader spectral structure with Δν ≈ 40 MHz. If the latter is due to scattering in the shared M33/M31 CGM, our results constrain the Local Group plasma environment. We found no accompanying persistent radio sources in the Apertif imaging survey data.