Assessing Site Selection of College Student Housing : Commuting Efficiency across Time

Universities around the world are promoting walking for their students because it provides many health and environmental benefits at the personal as well as the community level. This paper aims to help universities, city planners and housing investors in the process of efficient site selection for future student housing projects, by analyzing off-campus students’ commuting habits and travel time preferences to and from the university campuses. An online survey is operated to collect responses of students (n= 527) from two Jordanian universities located within the city of Irbid (N-Jordan). Results indicate that the mean value for students’ longest preferred one-way walking duration is 17.04± 8.25 minutes for the whole sample. A statistically significant negative correlation is found between students’ longest preferred one-way walking duration and age. The percentage of students who would accept this duration was represented in a formula in order to calculate the accumulated walking potential of varied sites around university campuses. The paper presented a local scenario using GIS mapping where this process was implemented to evaluate prospect vacant sites' walking potential around Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan

Assessment of Sentinel-2 and Landsat-8 OLI for Small-Scale Inland Water Quality Modeling and Monitoring Based on Handheld Hyperspectral Ground Truthing

This study investigates the best available methods for remote monitoring inland small-scale waterbodies, using remote sensing data from both Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 satellites, utilizing a handheld hyperspectral device for ground truthing. Monitoring was conducted to evaluate water quality indicators: chlorophyll-a (Chl-a), colored dissolved organic matter (CDOM), and turbidity. Ground truthing was performed to select the most suitable atmospheric correction technique (ACT). Several ACT have been tested: dark spectrum fitting (DSF), dark object subtraction (DOS), atmospheric and topographic correction (ATCOR), and exponential extrapolation (EXP). Classical sampling was conducted first; then, the resulting concentrations were compared to those obtained using remote sensing analysis by the above-mentioned ACT. This research revealed that DOS and DSF achieved the best performance (an advantage ranging between 29% and 47%). Further, we demonstrated the appropriateness of the use of Sentinel-2 red and vegetation red edge reciprocal bands (1/(B4 X B6)) for estimating Chl-a (R2 = 0.82, RMSE = 14.52mg/m3). As for Landsat-8, red to near-infrared ratio (B4/B5) produced the best performing model (R2 = 0.71, RMSE = 39.88 mg/m3), but it did not perform as well as Sentinel-2. Regarding turbidity, the best model (with (R2 =0.85, RMSE = 0.87 NTU) obtained by Sentinel-2 utilized a single band (B4), while the best model (with R2 = 0.64, RMSE = 0.90 NTU) using Landsat-8 was performed by applying two bands (B1/B3). Mapping the water quality parameters using the best performance biooptical model showed the significant effect of the adjacent land on the boundary pixels compared to pixels of deeper water

Evaluation of the gulf of aqaba coastal water, Jordan

© 2020 by the authors. (1) Background: The Gulf of Aqaba (GoA) supports unique and diverse marine ecosystems. It is one of the highest anthropogenically impacted coasts in the Middle East region, where rapid human activities are likely to degrade these naturally diverse but stressed ecosystems. (2) Methods: Various water quality parameters were measured to assess the current status and conditions of GoA seawater including pH, total dissolved solids (TDS), total alkalinity (TA), Cl-, NO3-, SO42-, PO43-, NH4+, Ca2+, Mg2+, Na+, K+, Sr, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Pb, and Zn. (3) Results: The pH values indicated basic coastal waters. The elevated levels of TDS with an average of about 42 g/L indicated highly saline conditions. Relatively low levels of inorganic nutrients were observed consistent with the prevalence of oligotrophic conditions in GoA seawater. The concentrations of Ca2+, Mg2+, Na+, K+, Sr, Cl-, and SO42- in surface layer varied spatially from about 423-487, 2246-2356, 9542-12,647, 513-713, 9.2-10.4, 22,173-25,992, and 317-407 mg/L, respectively. The average levels of Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Pb and Zn ranged from 0.51, 0.38, 1.44, 1.29, 0.88, 0.38, and 6.05 μg/L, respectively. (4) Conclusions: The prevailing saline conditions of high temperatures, high evaporation rates, the water stratification and intense dust storms are major contributing factors to the observed seawater chemistry. The surface distribution of water quality variables showed spatial variations with no specific patterns, except for metal contents which exhibited southward increasing trends, closed to the industrial complex. The vast majority of these quality parameters showed relatively higher values compared to those of other regions

Clinical and Demographic Characteristics of Hospitalized Pediatric Measles Cases; The 2023 Outbreak in Northern Jordan

Jomana W Alsulaiman,1 Khalid A Kheirallah,2 Ahmad Alrawashdeh,3 Ziydoun Abu Sanad,4 Asma’a M Al-Mnayyis,5 Ahmed Yassin,6 Mohammad Issa Rawabdeh,3 Hamed Alzoubi7 1Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine, Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan; 2Department of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Irbid, Jordan; 3Department of Allied Medical Sciences, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Irbid, Jordan; 4Department of Pediatrics, Princess Rahma Pediatric Teaching Hospital, Irbid, Jordan; 5Department of Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan; 6Department of Neurology, Faculty of Medicine, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Irbid, Jordan; 7Department of Pathology and Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, Jordan University of Science and Technology, Irbid, JordanCorrespondence: Khalid A Kheirallah, Department of Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, Jordan University of Science and Technology, P.O. Box 3030, Irbid, 22110, Jordan, Email [email protected]: Measles remains a leading vaccine-preventable cause of childhood morbidity and mortality globally. Despite immunization efforts, outbreaks persist, including a 2023 outbreak in Irbid, Jordan.Objective: To describe the clinical, demographic, and vaccination characteristics of pediatric measles patients hospitalized during the 2023 Irbid outbreak and assess complications and outcomes.Methods: A retrospective observational study included all children (0– 14 years) hospitalized with laboratory-confirmed measles at Princess Rahma Pediatric Hospital, Irbid, from April to December 2023. Data on demographics, vaccination status, symptoms, complications, management, and outcomes were analyzed using descriptive statistics and comparisons between vaccinated/unvaccinated groups.Results: Of 63 hospitalized children, 61.9% were under one year old, and 49.2% were male. Most (63.5%) were unvaccinated; 47.6% of these were ineligible due to age (< 9 months). Among eligible children (≥ 9 months), 27.2% were fully vaccinated, 42.5% under-vaccinated, and 30.3% unvaccinated. Fever (95.2%) and rash (96.8%) were the most common symptoms. Pulmonary complications affected 68.3% (bronchopneumonia: 55.5%; pneumonia: 12.7%). Dehydration (34.9%) and gastrointestinal symptoms (vomiting: 30.1%; diarrhea: 28.5%) were frequent. One unvaccinated 7-month-old infant died from measles-associated pneumonia. Vitamin A was administered to all patients, and 82.5% received empirical antibiotics. The average hospital stay was 4.4 days.Conclusion: The measles outbreak in Northern Jordan predominantly affected unvaccinated children, particularly those under nine months of age. While vaccination reduced the risk of severe complications (eg, pneumonia occurred in 75% of unvaccinated vs 25% of vaccinated cases), breakthrough infections in vaccinated children underscore the need for optimized immunization strategies. Respiratory complications, including pneumonia, were the leading cause of hospitalization and mortality, highlighting the vaccine’s critical role in mitigating disease severity. Strengthening vaccination coverage and revisiting age-specific policies in high-risk regions remain essential to reduce measles-related morbidity and mortality.Keywords: measles, pediatrics, outbreak, vaccination, Jordan, respiratory complication

Predictive decision making under risk and uncertainty: A support vector machines model

In this paper, a decision making model using support vector machine (SVM) approach is presented. Here, human attitude towards risk and uncertainty is identified via optimizing SVM certainty classification model. In particular, individuals are given different pairs of gambles in order to reveal their preference. Unlike traditional methods used to estimate the utility function through direct inquiry of the certainty equivalents, pair-wise comparisons are used here in the training process to predict human preferences and to compute the utility parameters. The presented study is characterized by first, the use of SVM in the field of decision making to classify individuals’ choices, second, it uses such model to search for the optimal utility parameters, third, the model can be used to guide the decision makers towards better decisions. In contrast to existing utility models, the SVM utility approach is characterized by its tolerance to misclassification in the training and testing data sets which makes it cope with the existing violations such as the common consequence, common ratio and violation of betweenness in the utility theory. To demonstrate the merits of the model, different data sets were used from well known literature studies and new conducted surveys that elicit individual preferences. The data is split into training and testing sets. The results demonstrated a notable consistency in the computed utility parameters and remarkable predictions without the need to strict certainty equivalent estimation. The model can be beneficial in predictive decision making under risk and uncertainty

PLANAR CONSTRAINTS FOR AN IMPROVED UAV-IMAGE-BASED DENSE POINT CLOUD GENERATION

In this paper, we proposed a new refinement procedure for the semi-global dense image matching. In order to remove outliers and improve the disparity image derived from the semi-global algorithm, both the local smoothness constraint and point cloud segments are utilized. Compared with current refinement technique, which usually assumes the correspondences between planar surfaces and 2D image segments, our proposed approach can effectively deal with object with both planar and curved surfaces. Meanwhile, since 3D point clouds contain more precise geometric information regarding to the reconstructed objects, the planar surfaces identified in our approach can be more accurate. In order to illustrate the feasibility of our approach, several experimental tests are conducted on both Middlebury test and real UAV-image datasets. The results demonstrate that our approach has a good performance on improving the quality of the derived dense image-based point cloud

Newsvendor revisited: risk premiums of loss aversion

The classical newsvendor model in economics and decision theory treats losses and gains equally likely. However, decision makers are usually loss-averse as probable losses have more impact on humans than probable gains. This study presents a new variant of the newsvendor problem of loss-averse decision makers. The optimal order quantity is found by maximizing the expected utility of bounded functions. The implications of loss aversion on the certainty equivalents and risk premiums were also analyzed. Two case studies of exponential utility and normal demand were considered. A new elegant form of the optimal order quantity is established. The results show that when exponential loss aversion exists, the newsvendor optimal quantity serves as a lower(upper) bound on the optimal quantities. Moreover, high loss aversion entails higher RP. Similar findings hold by increasing the overage/underage costs and the demand standard deviation. Possible future extensions are demonstrated at the end of the paper