Archives-July 2011

The FTIR and FT-Raman spectra of the o-nitrobenzaldehyde oxime (ONBO) have been recorded in the regions 4000-400 and 3500-100 cm^-1 respectively. The spectra were interpreted with the aid of normal coordinate analysis following full structure optimization and force field calculations based on density functional theory (DFT) using standard B3LYP/6-31+G(d,p) and B3LYP/6-31++G(d,p) method and basis set combination. The geometries and normal modes of vibration obtained from the DFT method are in good agreement with the experimental data. The total energy distribution (TED) values obtained reflect the correctness of the vibrational assignments.

With the developing economies like India has opened their flood gates for foreign players as a part of economic reforms many foreign automobile companies like Ford, General Motors, Hyundai, Mercedes-Benz, Peugeot and Volvo etc has entered into Indian market. This has also attracted the giant auto component suppliers throughout the world to come and invest in the Indian automotive industry. As the protection from the government to the small and medium auto component manufacturers has been lifted , the only way they can survive , if they do understand need of market better than their competitors and do adopt better B2B marketing strategies and become marketing oriented rather than production or sales oriented. As it has been found that firms with better marketing orientation has good record of business success. Hence this paper makes an attempt in finding relationship between marketing orientation and performance of small and medium sized auto component manufacturers. It was found that firms with higher level marketing orientation has better profit growth over firms with low level of marketing orientation. The findings are of immense value to marketing practitioners and academicians.

This paper is part of an ongoing research on the development of systemic maintenance management model for Malaysian university buildings. In order to achieve this aim, there is a need to develop a performance model against which services are measure. Measuring performance is a significant part of systemic maintenance management service delivery. Maintenance organization needs to know where they are in order to provide user-driven services and to enhance productivity. Through “hypothetico-deductive” theory, this paper developed a 10 points matrix for the university maintenance organizations for measuring and improving their service delivery. The aim of this paper is to present the validated maintenance management model for Malaysian university maintenance organizations. The model is to guide and facilitate value added service delivery through initiating maintenance according to user value system rather than mainly on the condition of the building

The trend of the integration of trade and investment makes many inconsistent conclusions of the research on the relationship between economic growth and single trade or foreign direct investment. The combinability of industry internationalization patterns, for import, export and FDI of inflow and outflow, as well as their dynamic evolution law determines the nonlinear characteristic of internationalization growth effect. By putting the four internationalization patterns into a uniform production function and using Zhejiang manufacturing industry data of the year from 2002 to 2008, this paper does an empirical research on the non-linear relationship between the growth of Zhejiang manufacturing industry and the three kinds of internationalization patterns, namely, import, FDI and export. It is indicated that there exists a U-shaped relationship between Zhejiang manufacturing industry growth and the dependence of import and FDI, while an inverted U-shaped relationship between Zhejiang manufacturing industry growth and export dependence. In the present Zhejiang manufacturing industry, export can promote the growth of most manufacturing industry. But import and FDI are not conducive to the growth. The future internationalization development should enhance export and FDI level to exceed its critical value. Besides, export of most industry need to prevent the excessive growth and overleap the critical value of growth promotion too early. It’s concluded that now China government must adjust the policy of export, import and FDI and consider the differentiation between different industries.

In this paper the three dimensional wave propagation in a homogenous Isotropic generalized thermo elastic cylindrical panel is investigated in the context of the linear theory of thermo elasticity. The analysis is carried out by introducing three displacement potentials so that the equations of motion are uncoupled and simplified. A modified Bessel function solution with complex arguments is then directly used for the case of complex eigenvalues , To clarify the correctness and effectiveness of the developed method the dispersion curves of different panel parameters are computed and presented for Zinc material with the support of MATLAB.

Heat flow values were obtained from four boreholes located at Agbor, Delta State, Nigeria. The values obtained from the four wells, A, B, C and D was respectively 75, 68, 60 and 56mWm^-2. However, the average value of 64.75mWm^-2 is very close to the estimated value of 65mWm^-2 from the semi-empirical law of heat flow versus lithospheric age. The platinum resistance thermometer and the thermistor were used for the measurement of borehole temperature. From the measured temperature distribution, the temperature gradient was computed. The formation heat flow was obtained by multiplying the gradient by the mean thermal conductivity of the rocks. The interpretation of high and low values of heat flow in wells A and D respectively were explained.  However anomalous high heat flow values have been observed in well A.   The result reveals that a hot plate mobility of heat carrier through some structural boundary and chemical reactions of some organic matters are some specific causes of high heat flow anomaly in the area of the research.

Four stations were recently investigated at Abraka using Vertical Electrical Sounding (VES) for detailed studies for the analysis of the resistivity response of the earth due to buried cables (wires) in the ground. The cable is characterized by specified axial impedance and is assumed to be infinite in length. A configuration of a current point source in an infinite region was considered. The result shows that the metal conductor or cable channels a major portion of the current flow thereby leading to profound departures from the apparent resistivity curves calculated from idealized homogeneous and layered structures. It was observed that it is not advisable to carry out VES survey in an area where there are metallic conditions or pipes since they channel part of the current flow and distort the potential field distribution.

Education in general and language education in particular usually poses great problems to those who don’t have a favourable academic environment. The case of ESL/EFL/ESOL is always a challenging task. English in most Arabic speaking countris serves a very limited purpose. Yet, it is very important for social as well as technological development. Therefore, English language teaching (ELT) in such countries also catches attention of many researchers. ELT generally starts at the school level. Despite good overall planning, purposive curriculum, integrated textbooks, qualified teachers, the achievement is below the expectations. Therefore, diagnostic studies should better be undertaken in different language areas: sound system, vocabulary, meaning, grammar and various skills so that the teacher may know the types of the problems and the corresponding factors. Such attempts are expected to be helpful in possible evolution of some fruitful and compatible strategies in order to yield the maximum academic output.

Major ions as well as pH and conductivity were analysed in about 52 rainwater samples collected daily from the rain station of GhanaAtomic Energy Commission for a period of April, 2009- June, 2010. Results for the major cations analyses indicate a trend of K⁺>Na⁺>Ca²⁺>Mg²⁺ and the major anions show a trend of HCO₃^->Cl^->SO₄^2->NO₃^-.The values of pH range from 4.62-8.64 and conductivity from 5.74-1274µS/cm.Contribution to the acidity of rain in this area is mostly by SO₄^2- instead of NO₃^- due to the reason that the study area lies in the Accra Plains which is a highly industrialized area. Ratios of mean annual concentrations of major ions (Cl^-, K⁺, Mg²⁺, Ca²⁺ and SO₄^2-) to Na⁺ in the rainwater samples were higher in comparison to   sea water. This suggests that there are other sources of these ions apart from the sea. High concentrations of most of the elements were recorded in months with smaller amounts of rainfall and so it was concluded that continuous rainfall may have washed away so many of the elements suspended in the atmosphere.

The study was designed to assess the level of farmers’ participation in organic farming practices in a rural farming community using a sample of 63 randomly selected farmers. The results show that there is a general awareness of climate change among the respondents. In addition, majority of the farmers considered the rise in temperature as the most prominent indicator of climate change in the research area. The major specific change considered to be as a result of climate change was the late on set of rainfall. The farmers moderately participated in organic farming practices but not deliberately to mitigate climate change. It was therefore recommended that extension agents should enlighten farmers on the potentials of organic farming practices in mitigating climate change.