The research aims to measure the economic efficiency and technological change and the total productivity of resources using the parameter and non-parameter methods, for agricultural companies registered in the Iraqi stock exchange, the number of 6 companies for the period from 2005 to 2017 based on the hypothesis that the agricultural companies do not achieve economic efficiency and does not control the management of its operations, and It may be technically efficient but the size of its operations is not optimal. From non-parametric methods, the data envelope analysis method was used. Using the DEAP program, the Middle East Company achieved the highest average technical and cost efficiency of 0.62 and 0.58, respectively. The Iraqi seed production company achieved the highest average efficiency of 0.66. Using Al- Malmquist Index, the National Company for Agricultural Production achieved the highest rate of change in the total productivity of resources and the highest change in the technical efficiency respectively 1.97 and 2.28, while the Modern company for agricultural production obtained the highest technological change averaging 1.14. A stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) technique was used; logarithmic TL function was estimated using FRONT software. The maximum likelihood method (ML) shows that the capital was increased by 1%, the value of production of companies will increase by 0.22% because it helps to take advantage of the advanced technology that these companies are supposed to work to localize and support the agricultural sector. The cross-elasticity between labor and capital was 0.67 which indicates the nature of the substitution relationship between the two items, because using the technology reduces the workers. The value of sigma-squared was 0.21.
Understanding, promoting, and teaching media literacy is an important societal challenge. STEM educators are increasingly looking to incorporate 21st century skills such as media literacy into core subject education. In this paper we investigate how undergraduate Computer Science (CS) students can learn media literacy as a by-product of collaborative video tutorial production. The paper presents a study of 34 third-year CS undergraduates who, as part of their learning, were each asked to produce three video tutorials on Raspberry Pi programming, using a collaborative video production tool for mobile phones (Bootlegger). We provide results of both quantitative and qualitative analysis of the production process and resulting video tutorials,
... Show MoreThis paper presents an improved technique on Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) algorithm. The procedure is applied on Single Machine with Infinite Bus (SMIB) system with power system stabilizer (PSS) at three different loading regimes. The simulations are made by using MATLAB software. The results show that by using Improved Ant Colony Optimization (IACO) the system will give better performance with less number of iterations as it compared with a previous modification on ACO. In addition, the probability of selecting the arc depends on the best ant performance and the evaporation rate.
This study involves the design of 24 mixtures of fiber reinforced magnetic reactive powder concrete containing nano silica. Tap water was used for 12 of these mixtures, while magnetic water was used for the others. The nano silica (NS) with ratios (1, 1.5, 2, 2.5 and 3) % by weight of cement, were used for all the mixtures. The results have shown that the mixture containing 2.5% NS gives the highest compressive strength at age 7 days. Many different other tests were carried out, the results have shown that the carbon fiber reinforced magnetic reactive powder concrete containing 2.5% NS (CFRMRPCCNS) had higher compressive strength, modulus of rupture, splitting tension, str
... Show MoreABSTRACT: Ultimate bearing capacity of soft ground reinforced with stone column was recently predicted using various artificial intelligence technologies such as artificial neural network because of all the advantages that they can offer in minimizing time, effort and cost. As well as, most of applied theories or predicted formulas deduced analytically from previous studies were feasible only for a particular testing environment and do not match other field or laboratory datasets. However, the performance of such techniques depends largely on input parameters that really affect the target output and missing of any parameter can lead to inaccurate results and give a false indicator. In the current study, data were collected from previous rel
... Show MoreThis work intends to illustrate the methods of using the authentic literary text in the process of spreading Italian, especially in Baghdad where there is a strong propensity to learn the Italian language. The concept of the language that arises from literature is an idea closely linked to the mentality of the Arab learner towards Italian culture: an idea also created by the first Arabisations of literary texts in the early years of the previous century. The research was carried out in Baghdad by two researchers, an Italianist from Baghdad and an Italian mother language linguist, with the aim of bringing together the two sectors in favor of the diffusion of the Italian language. The study also aims to clarify the models from Italian l
... Show MoreThe development of economic and environmentally friendly extractants to recover cobalt metal is required due to the increasing demand for this metal. In this study, solvent extraction of Co(II) from aqueous solution using a mixture of N,N0-carbonyl difatty amides (CDFAs) synthesised from palm oil as the extractant was carried out. The effects of various parameters such as acid, contact time, extractant concentration, metal ion concentration and stripping agent and the separation of Co(II) from other metal ions such as Fe(II), Ni(II), Zn(III) and Cd(II) were investigated. It was found that the extraction of Co(II) into the organic phase involved the formation of 1:1 complexes. Co(II) was successfully separated from commonly associated metal
... Show MoreConstruction of artificial higher order protein complexes allows sampling of structural architectures and functional features not accessible by classical monomeric proteins. Here, we combine in silico modelling with expanded genetic code facilitated strain promoted azide-alkyne cycloaddition to construct artificial complexes that are structurally integrated protein dimers and demonstrate functional synergy. Using fluorescent proteins sfGFP and Venus as models, homodimers and heterodimers are constructed that switched ON once assembled and display enhanced spectral properties. Symmetrical crosslinks are found to be important for functional enhancement. The determined molecular structure of one artific
Endophytic fungi live inside plants or any part of them without creating any visible pathogenic signs. Endophytic fungi are found within medicinal plants and have shown strong biologic activity, such as anticancer and antioxidant activities, as well as producing extracellular enzymes. In this study, different fungal strains were isolated from the leaves of the medicinal plant Ziziphus spina, including Aspergillus flavus, Aspergillus fumigatus, Aspergillus niger, Cladosporium sp., Rhizopus sp., and Mucor sp. Extracellular enzymes have been quantified using agar plate-based methods in which fungi were grown in specified growth media to detect the enzymes produced. The results showed that A. niger has the highest ability to produce amy
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