ABSTRACTSaudi Arabia is the largest country in the Middle East with huge solar energy resources but has achieved minimal adoption of photovoltaic energy systems (PV). This study investigates the ...potential of PV systems to address pressing challenges, including water scarcity and agricultural unemployment. This study addresses the deployment of PV in contemporary agriculture such as aquaponics and hydroponics to promote sustainable water, energy, and agricultural practices. Scrutinising national goals for PV energy against ground realities. The buyback tariff, interest rates of loans, and potential future power price increases are simulated to find suitable rates to encourage PV adoption. The current government grid purchase price is 1.87 cents USD/kWh, while the national grid selling price is 4.8 cents USD/kWh. Small-scale PV plants offer local investors passive income streams if financial institutes can offer these projects at lower interest rates. Investigating the country’s educational sector reveals the need for an overhaul in technical education for solar energy systems. The simulation shows that PV use in agriculture is economically feasible for large loads even with buyback rates as low as 1.87 cents USD/kWh. This research contributes by emphasising local involvement and proposing financial mechanisms, government reforms, and sustainable agricultural development in the region.
The brain is a vital organ, susceptible to alterations under genetic influences and environmental experiences. Social isolation (SI) acts as a stressor which results in alterations in reactivity to ...stress, social behavior, function of neurochemical and neuroendocrine system, physiological, anatomical and behavioral changes in both animal and humans. During early stages of life, acute or chronic SIS has been proposed to show signs and symptoms of psychiatric and neurological disorders such as anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, epilepsy and memory loss. Exposure to social isolation stress induces a variety of endocrinological changes including the activation of hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis, culminating in the release of glucocorticoids (GCs), release of catecholamines, activation of the sympatho-adrenomedullary system, release of Oxytocin and vasopressin. In several regions of the central nervous system (CNS), SIS alters the level of neurotransmitter such as dopamine, serotonin, gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA), glutamate, nitrergic system and adrenaline as well as leads to alteration in receptor sensitivity of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) and opioid system. A change in the function of oxidative and nitrosative stress (O&NS) mediated mitochondrial dysfunction, inflammatory factors, neurotrophins and neurotrophicfactors (NTFs), early growth response transcription factor genes (Egr) and C-Fos expression are also involved as a pathophysiological consequences of SIS which induce neurological and psychiatric disorders.
Due to urbanization and industrialization, there has been an increase in solid waste generation and has become a global concern and leakage of leachate from landfills contaminate the soil and ...groundwater and hence can have a severe impact on human health. The present study aimed to determine the composition of toxic metals (Cr, Mn, Cu, As) and heavy metals (Cd, Ba, Hg, Pb) in soil and water by an inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometer (ICP-OES). To ensure accuracy during the analysis of Cr, Mn, Cu, As, Cd, Ba, Hg, and Pb in real samples, certified reference material (CRM, SRM 2709a) of San Joaquin soil and water (SRM 1640a) were analyzed and results were presented in terms of % recovery studies. The mean concentration of all the metals in soil and water did not exceed the limit set by the European Community (EU), WHO, and US EPA except Cu where the permissible limit defined by the EU is 50-140 mg/kg in soil. The soil is uncontaminated to moderately contaminated with respect to all metals except the Cu and Pb. Among the average daily dose (ADD) of soil, ADD
and ADD
for children had the maximum dose for all metals than adults while ADD
was higher in adults. Hazard quotient (HQ) trend in both adults and children was found in order HQ
> HQ
> HQ
of soil for all metals except Ba which followed HQ
> HQ
> HQ
. Hazard index (HI) values of soil for Cr and Pb in children were 7 and 7.5 times higher than adults respectively. Lifetime cancer risk (LCR) value for Cr by different exposure pathways of soil was 5.361 × 10
for children which are at the lower borderline of risk for cancer.
The proliferation of inter-connected devices in critical industries, such as healthcare and power grid, is changing the perception of what constitutes critical infrastructure. The rising ...interconnectedness of new critical industries is driven by the growing demand for seamless access to information as the world becomes more mobile and connected and as the Internet of Things (IoT) grows. Critical industries are essential to the foundation of today's society, and interruption of service in any of these sectors can reverberate through other sectors and even around the globe. In today's hyper-connected world, the critical infrastructure is more vulnerable than ever to cyber threats, whether state sponsored, criminal groups or individuals. As the number of interconnected devices increases, the number of potential access points for hackers to disrupt critical infrastructure grows. This new attack surface emerges from fundamental changes in the critical infrastructure of organizations technology systems. This paper aims to improve understanding the challenges to secure future digital infrastructure while it is still evolving. After introducing the infrastructure generating big data, the functionality-based fog architecture is defined. In addition, a comprehensive review of security requirements in fog-enabled IoT systems is presented. Then, an in-depth analysis of the fog computing security challenges and big data privacy and trust concerns in relation to fog-enabled IoT are given. We also discuss blockchain as a key enabler to address many security related issues in IoT and consider closely the complementary interrelationships between blockchain and fog computing. In this context, this work formalizes the task of securing big data and its scope, provides a taxonomy to categories threats to fog-based IoT systems, presents a comprehensive comparison of state-of-the-art contributions in the field according to their security service and recommends promising research directions for future investigations.
Nuclear power plants play a significant role in the contribution of electricity generation on a global scale. Various reactor designs have advantages over others in different aspects. APR-1400 is a ...pressurized water reactor that is deemed safe due to the redundancy and independence of the multiple safety systems. Probabilistic safety assessment (PSA) is well known for its effectiveness in the representation of risk and safety analysis of the systems in a nuclear power plant. It provides different scenarios of system failure and accident progression via fault tree analysis. A loss of feedwater (LOFW) accident may occur due to numerous reasons such as spurious closure of valves, component failure of heaters, pumps, tanks, or a loss of offsite power (LOOP) event. In the present research, a methodology has been developed that aims to investigate different factors contributing to the loss of feedwater. This research also aims to analyze LOFW accidents by developing fault tree models for the main feedwater system of the APR-1400 to identify the basic events, which may lead to a loss of feedwater accidents. The results of the top event probabilities, risk decrease factor (RDF), risk increase factor (RIF), minimal cut sets (MCS), basic event probabilities, and sensitivity analysis were compared with the WASH-1400 database. It has been found that the control valve (V04) and main feedwater isolation valve (V05) have more contribution to the LOFW accident. The common cause failure (CCF) analysis has been carried out, and it was found that the flow toward the check valve and steam generator are most critical for CCF.
This study aims to identify and isolate the secondary metabolites of
using GC-MS, preparative TLC, and LC-MS/MS methods, to evaluate the inhibitory potency on SARS-CoV-2 3 chymotrypsin-like protease ...enzyme, as well as to study the molecular interaction and stability by using docking and molecular dynamics simulations. GC-MS analysis suggested for the isolation of terpenoids compounds as major compounds on methanol extract of pseudostems and rhizomes. Isolation and LC-MS/MS analysis identified 5-hydro-7, 8, 2'-trimethoxyflavanone (
), (
)-hexadecyl-ferulate (
), isocyperol (
),
isobutyl-(2
,4
)-octadecadienamide (
), and nootkatone (
) from the rhizome extract, as well as from the leaves extract with the absence of
. Three known steroid compounds, i.e., spinasterone (
), spinasterol (
), and 24-methylcholesta-7-en-3
-on (
), were further identified from the pseudostem extract. Molecular docking showed that steroids compounds
,
, and
have lower predictive binding energies (MMGBSA) than other metabolites with binding energy of -87.91, -78.11, and -68.80 kcal/mole, respectively. Further characterization on the single isolated compound by NMR showed that
was identified and possessed 75% inhibitory activity on SARS-CoV-2 3CL protease enzyme that was slightly different with the positive control GC376 (77%). MD simulations showed the complex stability with compound
during 100 ns simulation time.
Evaluation of climate-induced crop damages is imperative to formulate innovative technologies and management strategies to reduce the vulnerability of farms and agriculture. Based on a survey of 1232 ...wheat growers from Pakistan, conducted in April and May of 2019, the study estimates the production risk of wheat farms to weather shocks and the effectiveness of physical, non-physical, and innovative management strategies for reducing crop damages. Parametric and non-parametric econometric techniques were applied to approach study objectives. The survey revealed that the adverse effects of extreme weather events on the damages to wheat crop were more significant with the rise of severe weather the closer to harvest time such damages occurred. The results of the propensity score matching (PSM) method found wheat loss when the crop experienced a severe intensity of thunderstorms, windstorms, and hailstorms. The parametric analysis confirmed that with a one-unit increase in the severity of thunderstorms, windstorms, and hailstorms the wheat yield decreased. Surprisingly, even if thunderstorms and hailstorms were rated moderate or low in severity, a significant reduction in wheat yield was found. The Mann-Whitney (MW) test showed that adaptive measures significantly reduced the amount of wheat damage. Particularly, the PSM method confirmed that the adoption of strategies such as watercourse availability, maintenance of watercourse, availability of canal/drain, sowing of stiff-stem wheat variety, plantation of a shelterbelt, and adjustment in irrigation schedule, significantly reduced wheat loss. Furthermore, education, farming experience, family size, cropping area, and access to weather forecast information significantly affected the adaptation of innovative management strategies.
•The study explores response of management in agriculture to extreme weather events.•The PSM method uses to estimate weather-induced wheat yield losses.•The per hectare wheat damages were 43 Maunds, caused by severe storms.•Plantation of shelterbelt & sowing stiff-stem wheat variety reduced the damages.•Use of management strategies reduced wheat losses by 35.6 Maunds per hectare.
This empirical study examines the endogenous relationship between carbon emissions (CO
2
), financial development, renewable energy, globalization, and institutional quality in 64 belt and road ...initiative countries (BRI) using a two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM) approach with panel data over the period 2003 to 2018. Furthermore, this study used (Dumitrescu & Hurlin,
2012
) causality test to estimate the variables’ causal relationship. The results indicate that financial development significantly increases CO
2
emissions and causes environmental degradation in BRI countries. However, renewable energy and globalization mitigate CO
2
emissions and improve the quality of the environment. Institutional quality was positive in correlation with CO
2
emission and indicates bad governance, corruption, weak bureaucracy, and improper implementation of environmental laws cause environmental degradation. Further, the study also reports a bidirectional relationship of financial development, renewable energy, and institutional quality with CO
2
emissions and a unidirectional causality running from globalization to CO
2
emissions in BRI countries. This study offers policymakers insight into restructuring the financial system, energy consumption pattern, and global integration and improving institutions’ quality for a sustainable environment and the economy at the national and regional levels.
While disobeying environmental regulations of Pakistan, several Pb-acid batteries recycling and repairing units discharge their effluents into water canals that irrigate arable fields. Resultantly, ...serious ecological risks, as well as human health hazards through consumption of edible crops grown on such Pb-polluted soils have been reported. In this experiment, we observed associative effects of amending a soil polluted from Pb-acid batteries effluents (SPB) with arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and lignin-derived biochar (LBC) on barley grain safety to human health. The SPB was treated with AMF inoculum (a consortium of four AMF species), lignin (LN), and LBC, as sole treatments and AMF inoculum with LN and LBC. Barley parameters involving Pb distribution in grain and other parts, grain biochemistry, and nutrition were assessed. Likewise, Pb bioavailability in SPB, AMF root colonization, soil enzymes, microbial biomass carbon (MBC), and AMF produced total glomalin related soil protein (TGSP) were also scoped. Additionally, human renal cells (HEK 293) cytotoxicity test was performed by opting barley grain-related Pb concentrations. Results show that LBC + AMF significantly reduced grain Pb concentrations below the critical limit 4.67 mg kg−1 (WHO/FAO standard), AMF colonization, MBC, soil enzymology, and TGSP, compared to control. Likewise, rest barley parameters were also improved in this treatment. Contrary to other treatments, grain produced on LBC + AMF did not result in (a) cell apoptosis, (b) cell distortion and (c) cohesion loss. Immobilization of Pb in SPB was due to the dilution effect of Pb adsorption on LBC, AMF mycelium and TGSP which resulted in a significant drop of grain Pb concentrations below the critical limit and ultimately no harm to HEK 293 cells. Our findings endorse that grain produced at LBC + AMF treatment are safer for human consumption and will not pose health risks. The LBC + AMF application can remediate SPB for safer cereal production.
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•Soil Pb pollution from acid batteries effluent (SPB) poses health risks via food.•Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) + lignin biochar (LBC) reduced bioavailable Pb.•Barley grain Pb concentrations were below critical limit of WHO/FAO with LBC + AMF.•Highest HEK 293 cells' viability exposed to grain Pb concentrations was at LBC + AMF.•LBC + AMF can produce barley on SPB that will have no harmful effect on human health.
Over the last few decades, the available literature on environmental economics hosts numerous environmental issues and underlines their reasons, calling for instant action on carbon dioxide emissions ...(CO2e). In the same context, the recent article develops a new framework that extends the pertinent literature by linking commercial policies, globalization, labor force, GDP growth, fossil fuel, and renewable energy consumption with consumption and production-based CO2e (CCO2e and PCO2e). To this end, the sample of developing economies is utilized from 1991 to 2016. Further, several advanced techniques are applied for robust findings. The findings reveal that the expansionary and contractionary commercial policies significantly affect CCO2e and PCO2e. Likewise, import taxes also have a significant association with CCO2e and PCO2e. Additionally, the results determine that globalization, labor force, GDP growth, fossil fuel, and renewable energy consumption are the essential drivers of environmental pollution. Besides, the panel causality test establishes a one-way causality which runs from commercial policies, import taxes, globalization, labor force, GDP growth, fossil fuel, and renewable energy consumption to CCO2e and PCO2e. Based on the findings, some relevant implications are also suggested.
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