Business Blockchain Suitability Determinants: Decision-Making through an Intuitionistic Fuzzy Method

Blockchain is one of the innovative and disruptive technologies that has a wide range of applications in multiple industries beyond cryptocurrency.The widespread adoption of blockchain technology in various industries has shown its potential to solve challenging business problems,as well as the possibility to create new business models which can increase a firm’s competitiveness.Due to the novelty of the technology,whereby many companies are still exploring potential use cases,and considering the complexity of blockchain technology,which may require huge changes to a company’s existing systems and processes,it is important for companies to carefully evaluate suitable use cases and determine if blockchain technology is the best solution for their specific needs.This research aims to provide an evaluation framework that determines the important dimensions of blockchain suitability assessment by identifying the key determinants of suitable use cases in a business context.In this paper,a novel approach that utilizes both qualitative(Delphi method)and quantitative(fuzzy set theory)methods has been proposed to objectively account for the uncertainty associated with data collection and the vagueness of subjective judgments.This work started by scanning available literature to identify major suitability dimensions and collected a range of criteria,indicators,and factors that had been previously identified for related purposes.Expert opinions were then gathered using a questionnaire to rank the importance and relevance of these elements to suitability decisions.Subsequently,the data were analyzed and we proceeded to integrate multi-criteria group decision-making(MCGDM)and intuitionistic fuzzy set(IFS)theory.The findings demonstrated a high level of agreement among experts,with the model being extremely sensitive to variances in expert assessments.Furthermore,the results helped to refine and select the most relevant suitability determinants under three important dimensions:functional suitability of the use case,organizational applicability,and ecosystem readiness.

Performance Assessment of a Real PV System Connected to a Low-Voltage Grid

The generation of photovoltaic(PV)solar energy is increasing continuously because it is renewable,unlimited,and clean energy.In the past,generation systems depended on non-renewable sources such as oil,coal,and gas.Therefore,this paper assesses the performance of a 51 kW PV solar power plant connected to a low-voltage grid to feed an administrative building in the 6th of October City,Egypt.The performance analysis of the considered grid-connected PV system is carried out using power system simulator for Engineering(PSS/E)software.Where the PSS/E program,monitors and uses the power analyzer that displays the parameters and measures some parameters such as current,voltage,total power,power factor,frequency,and current and voltage harmonics,the used inverter from the type of grid inverter for the considered system.The results conclude that when the maximum solar radiation is reached,the maximum current can be obtained from the solar panels,thus obtaining the maximum power and power factor.Decreasing total voltage harmonic distortion,a current harmonic distortion within permissible limits using active harmonic distortion because this type is fast in processing up to 300 microseconds.The connection between solar stations and the national grid makes the system more efficient.

Galectins dysregulation: A way for cancer cells to invade and pervade

Galectins are sticky molecules that bind toβ-galactoside.Their interactions render them essential players in many cellular processes.The imbalance of galectin expression was reported in many diseases.In cancer,galectins interact with the extracellular matrix,evade the immune system,and potentially have broad interactions with blood components.In the last ten years,since 2010,we did focus on galectin research in different cancer types.Ourfindings showed an interaction between cancer cells and erythrocytes via galectin-4.Moreover,we found that upregulation of galectins was associated with lymph node metastasis in ovarian cancers.Hence,with this,we shortly review some important aspects of galectins and their potential importance in more profound understanding of cancer progression and thefield of cancer biomarkers.

Numerical Analysis of Laterally Loaded Long Piles in Cohesionless Soil

The capability of piles to withstand horizontal loads is a major design issue.The current research work aims to investigate numerically the responses of laterally loaded piles at working load employing the concept of a beam-on-Winkler-foundation model.The governing differential equation for a laterally loaded pile on elastic subgrade is derived.Based on LegendreGalerkin method and Runge-Kutta formulas of order four and five,the flexural equation of long piles embedded in homogeneous sandy soils with modulus of subgrade reaction linearly variable with depth is solved for both free-and fixed-headed piles.Mathematica,as one of the world’s leading computational software,was employed for the implementation of solutions.The proposed numerical techniques provide the responses for the entire pile length under the applied lateral load.The utilized numerical approaches are validated against experimental and analytical results of previously published works showing a more accurate estimation of the response of laterally loaded piles.Therefore,the proposed approaches can maintain both mathematical simplicity and comparable accuracy with the experimental results.

Classification of Electroencephalogram Signals Using LSTM and SVM Based on Fast Walsh-Hadamard Transform

Classification of electroencephalogram(EEG)signals for humans can be achieved via artificial intelligence(AI)techniques.Especially,the EEG signals associated with seizure epilepsy can be detected to distinguish between epileptic and non-epileptic regions.From this perspective,an automated AI technique with a digital processing method can be used to improve these signals.This paper proposes two classifiers:long short-term memory(LSTM)and support vector machine(SVM)for the classification of seizure and non-seizure EEG signals.These classifiers are applied to a public dataset,namely the University of Bonn,which consists of 2 classes–seizure and non-seizure.In addition,a fast Walsh-Hadamard Transform(FWHT)technique is implemented to analyze the EEG signals within the recurrence space of the brain.Thus,Hadamard coefficients of the EEG signals are obtained via the FWHT.Moreover,the FWHT is contributed to generate an efficient derivation of seizure EEG recordings from non-seizure EEG recordings.Also,a k-fold cross-validation technique is applied to validate the performance of the proposed classifiers.The LSTM classifier provides the best performance,with a testing accuracy of 99.00%.The training and testing loss rates for the LSTM are 0.0029 and 0.0602,respectively,while the weighted average precision,recall,and F1-score for the LSTM are 99.00%.The results of the SVM classifier in terms of accuracy,sensitivity,and specificity reached 91%,93.52%,and 91.3%,respectively.The computational time consumed for the training of the LSTM and SVM is 2000 and 2500 s,respectively.The results show that the LSTM classifier provides better performance than SVM in the classification of EEG signals.Eventually,the proposed classifiers provide high classification accuracy compared to previously published classifiers.

A Quantum Algorithm for Evaluating the Hamming Distance

We present a novel quantum algorithm to evaluate the hamming distance between two unknown oracles via measuring the degree of entanglement between two ancillary qubits.In particular,we use the power of the entanglement degree based quantum computing model that preserves at most the locality of interactions within the quantum model structure.This model uses one of two techniques to retrieve the solution of a quantum computing problem at hand.In the first technique,the solution of the problem is obtained based on whether there is an entanglement between the two ancillary qubits or not.In the second,the solution of the quantum computing problem is obtained as a function in the concurrence value,and the number of states that can be generated from the Boolean variables.The proposed algorithm receives two oracles,each oracle represents an unknown Boolean function,then it measures the hamming distance between these two oracles.The hamming distance is evaluated based on the second technique.It is shown that the proposed algorithm provides exponential speedup compared with the classical counterpart for Boolean functions that have large numbers of Boolean variables.The proposed algorithm is explained via a case study.Finally,employing recently developed experimental techniques,the proposed algorithm has been verified using IBM’s quantum computer simulator.

Antimicrobial activities of three seaweeds extract against some human viral and bacterial pathogens

Microbial infections cause complicated health influences along with bad economic impacts.In the present investigation,three dominant seaweeds namely,Amphiroa anceps,Corallina officinalis and Sargassum filipendula were collected from different Egyptian sites at the Red Sea and Mediterranean Sea during autumn 2019.Organic extracts of the three algae were screened for their antibacterial activity against three pathogenic bacteria Salmonella typhiimurium,Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli,in addition to in vitro antiviral activity against Rotavirus(RV),and Coxsackie virus B3(CVB3)that cause severe diseases in human.Organic extract of A.anceps,C.officinalis and S.filipendula inhibit E.coli cells by 57.1%,85.7%,and 91.4%,respectively.The highest level of concentration of the C.officinalis extract(100μg/mL)inhibits 100%of Staphylococcus aureus cells followed by S.filipendula and A.anceps extract which inhibit 82.5%and 75%of S.aureus.Similarly,the highest concentration of C.officinalis extract inhibits S.typhiimurium by 80%.The extract of A.anceps exhibited a high antiviral effect against RV infection with TI=22 and virus titers lessened by 2.75 log TCID_(50) followed by extractions of C.officinalis with TI=18.3 and virus titers reduced by 2.5 log TCID_(50).Against CVB3 infection,the extract of A.anceps causes the highest antiviral activity with TI=15 and reduce the viral titers by 2.5 log TCID_(50),followed by extractions of C.officinalis with TI=8.8 and inhibition of virus titers by 1.75 log TCID_(50).Extract of S.filipendula displayed the lowest antiviral effects against RV and CVB3 infection with TI=2.4 and 1.4,respectively.The obtained results clarified that the extract of three marine seaweeds maintains a potent antimicrobial activity,making them a future promising source of new antimicrobial drugs.

Microbial,immune and antioxidant responses of Nile tilapia with dietary nano-curcumin supplements under chronic low temperatures

A 56-day feeding period was performed to investigate the possible impacts of dietary nano curcumin(0,50,100,150,and 200 ppm)on the growth,nutrient utilization,non-specific immune parameters,antioxidants in Nile tilapia under chronic low temperature(21.02±0.11◦C).Fishes(n=225;Initial weight=4.39±0.08 g/fish)were randomly stocked at 15 fish/tank for five experimental groups in triplicates.Under low-temperature circumstances,dietary curcumin in nano form showed no notable alteration in growth variable,nutrient efficiency,digestive enzymes efficiency,biometric indices,survival rates,and hematological components.Meanwhile,the serum of fishes with nano curcumin diets under low-temperature stress displayed higher total protein as well as lower glucose,cortisol,and total cholesterol compared with the control group.Moreover,fish fed nano curcumin diets displayed higher lysozyme and bactericidal activities compared to the control group and the best performance was found at dietary nano curcumin level of≥100 ppm.Also,groups fed the basal diet demonstrated the poorest antioxidant capacity,and the best superoxide dismutase(SOD)and glutathione peroxidase(GPx)existed in fish with nano curcumin diets while the best catalase(CAT)efficiency occurred at higher nano curcumin levels≥100 ppm.In addition,higher counts of intestinal microbiota in terms of total bacterial count(TBC),total yeast and molds count(TYMC),and coliform were noticed in fish consumed the basal diet compared to groups fed on nano curcumin diets.In conclusion,incorporating nano curcumin at a level of≥100 mg/kg diet(particularly at 150 mg/kg)improved a non-specific immune response,antioxidant,and healthier gastrointestinal microbiota in Nile tilapia under chronic low-temperature stress.

Evaluation of the nutritional value of Artemia nauplii for European seabass(Dicentrarchus labrax L.)larvae

Adapted European seabass(Dicentrarchus labrax L.)larvae at 25 days post-hatching(dph)with a primary weight and length of 23 mg and 9.92 mm,start the weaning up to 46 dph using the weaning micro-diet(54%crude protein from fish meal,powder milk,and poultry egg)concurrently with Artemia enriched with fortification emulsions(0.6 g/L)of DHA selco®as a control group(DHAS)or Fish oil+20%Vitamin C(FOVC),or Fish oil+20%Vitamin E(FOVE),or Fish oil+10%Vit.C+10%Vit.E(FOCE),or Fish oil only(FO).At 46 dph,groups of larvae fed enriched Artemia with DHAS and FOVE exhibited the highest final body weight,weight gain,average daily gain,specific growth rate,feed intake,protein efficiency ratio,and survival%as well as the lowest feed conversion ratio.Meanwhile,larvae in FOVC displayed the lowest final body weight,total length,weight gain,average daily gain,specific growth rate,feed intake,protein efficiency ratio,and survival%as well as the highest feed conversion ratio.Gastrointestinal histological assessment exhibited no pathological alteration as well as an improvement in the structure with DHAS,FOVE,FOVC,and FOCE co-additives compared to FO.Glutathione peroxidase enzyme(GPx)recorded the highest rates(P<0.05)in groups fed Artemia supplemented with DHAS and FOVE followed by FOCE and FOVC.While the lowest record for GPx activity was noted in the FO group.In conclusion,Using augmented Artemia nauplii with fish oil+vitamin E in single or in companion with vitamin C as cheap antioxidants support D.labrax larval growth,survival,and antioxidant efficacy during the critical weaning period.