Sustainable Production Through Balancing Trade-Offs Among Three Metrics in Flow Shop Scheduling

In sustainable manufacturing, inconsistencies exist among objectives defined in triple-bottom-lines (TBL) of economy, society, and environment. Analogously, inconsistencies exist in flow shop scheduling among three objectives of minimizing total completion time (TCT), maximum completion time (MCT), and completion time variance (CTV), respectively. For continuous functions, the probability is zero to achieve the objectives at their optimal values, so is it at their worst values. Therefore, with inconsistencies among individual objectives of discrete functions, it is more meaningful and feasible to seek a solution with high probabilities that system performance varies within the control limits. We propose a trade-off balancing scheme for sustainable production in flow shop scheduling as the guidance of decision making. We model trade-offs (TO) as a function of TCT, MCT, and CTV, based on which we achieve stable performance on min(TO). Minimizing trade-offs provides a meaningful compromise among inconsistent objectives, by driving the system performance towards a point with minimum deviations from the ideal but infeasible optima. Statistical process control (SPC) analyses show that trade-off balancing provides a better control over individual objectives in terms of average, standard deviation, Cp and Cpk compared to those of single objective optimizations. Moreover, results of case studies show that trade-off balancing not only provides a stable control over individual objectives, but also leads to the highest probability for outputs within the specification limits. We also propose a flow shop scheduling sustainability index (F S S I). The results show that trade-off balancing provides the most sustainable solutions compared to those of the single objective optimizations

Correction to: A Randomized Clinical Trial of a Modified Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for Children Hospitalized with Cancer (Mindfulness, (2021), 12, 1, (141-151), 10.1007/s12671-020-01506-3)

In the original published version of this article, Dr. Randye J. Semple was captured as corresponding author instead of Dr. Mojtaba Habibi. Dr. Semple took the role of pre-publication correspondent simply because she is more familiar with the journal�s online submission process than Dr. Habibi. Thus, this erratum is presented to fix the error. The original article has been corrected. © 2020, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature

Study of Intraventricular Hemorrhage in VLBW Neonates Admitted in Al-Zahra Hospital, Tabriz, Iran

Introduction and Aim: Intra-ventricular hemorrhage (IVH) is an important predictor of adverse neurodevelopmental outcome. IVH risk factor identification may conduct improvement of quality of care in Neonatal Intensive Care Units. The aim of the current study was to determine possible risk factors associated with IVH in VLBW neonates admitted in our hospital. Patients and Methods: All neonates with birth weight below 1500 gr admitted to NICU. Cranial ultrasonography was done for premature neonates weighed <1000 g in 3 to 5 days and in 1 month again. In premature infants weighed >1000 g, sonography was done in 7 days and 30 days of life respectively. If there is any conditions such as apnea, seizure, significant decrease in level of hemoglobin, increased head circumference, increased oxygen consumption, and other significant changes another sonography was done again. Exclusion criteria were cerebral malformations, metabolic disturbances, chromosomal anomalies, central nervous system infection, and genetic syndromes. Data was analyzed by SPSS ver 16.0 (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL, USA) Results: In this study 64 cases with IVH and 110 without IVH were included. Mean of gestational age was 28.78±2.08. From neonates, 54.6% were boys and 45.4% were girls. Vaginal delivery and cesarean section was done in 56 (32.2%) and 118(67.8%) cases respectively. Mean±SD of pH in cases with IVH and without IVH was 7.19±0.22 and 7.30±0.12 respectively(p=0.001). Mean ±SD of pco2 in cases with IVH and without IVH was 65.15±29.89 and 49.88±40.89 respectively(p=0.001). Mean of 5th min APGAR score in patients required CPR was 7.36±1.57 and in patients without CPR was 8.68±1.25(P=0.001). From cases with IVH, hydrocephaly was detected in 20 cases. From cases without IVH, hydrocephaly was detected in 6 cases. Result of chi-square showed significant correlation between IVH and prematurity( X2=21.94, df=1, P<0.001). From cases with IVH, 18 cases (28.1%) expired. From cases without IVH, 11 cases(10%) expired(X2=9.398, df=1, P=0.002). Results of chi-square test showed that there were a correlation between IVH and PDA, pressure support, surfactant therapy, inotrop drug administration, vaginal delivery, neonatal resuscitation, and antenatal corticosteroid therapy(p<0.05). Hyaline membrane disease, history of preclampsia in mother was significantly higher in cases without IVH(Chi-square, p<0.05). Conclusion: PDA, pressure support, surfactant therapy, inotrop drug administration, vaginal delivery, neonatal resuscitation, and antenatal corticosteroid therapy were significantly higher in cases with IVH. Hyaline membrane disease and preeclampsia in mother was significantly higher in cases without IVH.Keywords: Intraventricular hemorrhage, APGAR, low birth weight, hyaline membrane disease, corticosteroid, surfactant, inotrop, pre-eclampsi

Self-assembled amyloid fibrils with controllable conformational heterogeneity

Amyloid fibrils are a hallmark of neurodegenerative diseases and exhibit a conformational diversity that governs their pathological functions. Despite recent findings concerning the pathological role of their conformational diversity, the way in which the heterogeneous conformations of amyloid fibrils can be formed has remained elusive. Here, we show that microwave-assisted chemistry affects the self-assembly process of amyloid fibril formation, which results in their conformational heterogeneity. In particular, microwave-assisted chemistry allows for delicate control of the thermodynamics of the self-assembly process, which enabled us to tune the molecular structure of ??-lactoglobulin amyloid fibrils. The heterogeneous conformations of amyloid fibrils, which can be tuned with microwave-assisted chemistry, are attributed to the microwave-driven thermal energy affecting the electrostatic interaction during the self-assembly process. Our study demonstrates how microwave-assisted chemistry can be used to gain insight into the origin of conformational heterogeneity of amyloid fibrils as well as the design principles showing how the molecular structures of amyloid fibrils can be controlledopen0

MIMIM photodetectors using plasmonically enhanced MIM absorbers

Conference name: Proceedings of SPIE, Physics, Simulation, and Photonic Engineering of Photovoltaic Devices VIDate of Conference: 30 January–1 February 2017We demonstrate super absorbing metal-insulator-metal (MIM) stacks and MIMIM photosensitive devices operating at visible and near-infrared (VIS-NIR) spectrum, where absorbing (top) MIM and photocollecting (bottom) MIM can be optimized separately. We investigate different bottom metals in absorbing MIM with nanoparticles realized by dewetting of silver thin film on top. While gold and silver have conventionally been considered the most appropriate plasmonic absorbers, we demonstrate different absorbing metals like aluminum and specifically chromium, with its plasma frequency happening at 850 nm, as more efficient layers for absorption. Absorption in chromium hits 82 percent around 1000 nm. We provide convincing evidences by doing reflection experiment and computational simulations for absorbing MIM part. We also suggest for the first time investigating electric loss tangent of metal or coherently, surface plasmon quality factor of absorbing metals which are reliable tools for engineering different metal layers. They reveal that despite the fact that gold and silver are good plasmonic scatterers in VIS-NIR and reliable absorbers in VIS region, they are not proper choices as absorbers for NIR applications. Once the most optimum absorbing design is pointed out, we integrate it on top of another metal-insulator to form an MIMIM photodetector with tunneling photocurrent path. The final optimized sample consisting of silver - hafnium oxide - chromium - aluminum oxide - silver nanoparticles (from bottom to top) has a dark current of 7nA and a photoresponsivity peak of 0.962 mA/W at 1000 nm and a full width at half maximum of 300 nm, while applied bias is 50 mV and device areas are 300 μm x 600 μm. This photoresponse shows 70 times enhancement compared to former reported spin coated rare nanoparticle MIMIMs

Study of the relationship between information technology and knowledge management in the headquarters of Tehran Social Security Organization

Information technology and knowledge management are two important matters in the modern organizations of this era. The biggest factor in the success of knowledge management in the present era is the potential that information technology creates for it. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to determine the relationship between information technology and knowledge management in the headquarters of the Social Security Organization. The research method was descriptive-correlational and the statistical population was 620 Experts and senior staff of headquarters of the social security organization. Of these, 237 were selected by random sampling method based on Cochrans formula. Collected information through questionnaire were analyzed using SPSS and LISREL softwares. The results indicated a significant relationship between information technology and knowledge management in the headquarters of the Social Security Organization as well as the relationship between information technology and knowledge management components such as (acquisition, creation, storage, distribution, maintenance). According to the Friedman test, knowledge storage was highly related to information technology in the organization under study