Archives-December 

We are very happy to announce that from 28th January 2012, Dr.Ahmet Ozan Gezerman has joined the team of Elixir Editorial Advisory Board. He will carry a special responsibility for dealing with manuscripts based on Chemical Engineering. Dr.Ahmet Ozan Gezerman is currently working as Shift Adviser at Toros Tarim Co., Icel. The appointment of Dr. Ahmet Ozan Gezerman as member Editorial Advisory Board strengthens the links and will make it easier for prospective authors to establish contact with the journal. Please send any expressions of interest to chiefeditor@elixirjournal.org. Sincerely Editor-in-Chief

We are very happy to announce that from 30th November 2011, Dr.P.Suresh has joined the team of Elixir Editorial Advisory Board. He will carry a special responsibility for dealing with manuscripts based on Computer Science. Dr.P.Suresh is currently working at Department of Computer Science, Salem Sowdeswari College [Govt. Aided] ,Salem – 636 010, Tamilnadu, India. The appointment of Dr.P.Suresh as member Editorial Advisory Board strengthens the links and will make it easier for prospective authors to establish contact with the journal. Please send any expressions of interest to chiefeditor@elixirjournal.org. Sincerely Editor-in-Chief

Although Ethiopia has large number of chickens, their productivity is marginal and constrained by genetic, environmental and management factors. This paper has tried to review the socio-economic contribution of rural poultry production and its constraints in Ethiopia. Indigenous chickens account for about 98% of the total poultry population. The productive and reproductive performance of the local chickens is very poor with an average egg yield of 30-60 eggs/hen and 6 months age at first lay. To improve the livelihood of rural communities by improving the productivity of poultry, development endeavors and research institution should focus on introducing improved breeds along with full packages and investigating on means of improving the local genotype. Keywords: Chicken, extension, egg, gender

Terminalia spinosa species have very high durability and could survive for long while in use, even in areas prone to attack by termites or fungi. Extractives have been found to have different inhibition rates against fungi. Wood extractives play an important role in the natural durability. The objective of this study was to investigate the durability of Terminalia spinosa when exposed to wood decay fungi. Three brown-rot and three white-rot wood decay fungi were screened for their capacity to degrade T. spinosa .Samples were evaluated for decay by weight loss measurements using a modified E7-93 standard (AWPA) for block test method, growth inhibition by solvent extract of T. spinosa was also tested. Brown rot fungi P. placenta and C. puteana caused the highest weight losses of 16% and 15% on heartwood extracted with dichloromethane and acetone, respectively. P. sanguines a member of white rot fungi was the most aggressive in reducing weight by 24% on toluene/ethanol extracted heartwood. The later was comparable to weight loss of P. patula wood which was used as a positive control. All the test fungi species caused negligible weight loss of less than 2% on un-extracted heartwood of T. spinosa implying that extractives in the heartwood played an important role in preventing fungal infestation and hence damage. Efficacy of extracts increased with increase in concentration.

In order to identify the presence of gastrointestinal parasitic infection, and to determine the impact of some factors such as age, sex, location (rural and urban) and nutritional habits of children and also the occupation of their parents, this cross sectional study was carried out on 132 stool samples of primary school children in Okwelle, Onuimo (rural) and Owerri municipal(urban), Imo State, Nigeria. Using direct wet mount techniques(using physiological saline and lugol’ iodine) to process the samples (faeces), 74(56.1) out of 132 samples collected were found positive for various gastrointestinal parasites with E. histolytica accounting 36.4%, Ascaris lumbricoides10%, Trichuris trichuria and Hookworm7.6%, Gardia intestinalis 4.5% and Strongyloides stercolaris 3.0% respectively. Cases of polyparasitism were also detected but no pupil had more than two parasite species. Infection was higher in male (64.8%) than female (44.1%), people living in the rural areas (58.5%) than those in the urban centers (48.0%), lower age group (76%) than higher age group (45%). It is concluded that sanitary measures and de- worming programs be conducted in primary schools especially those in rural areas to decrease the rate of intestinal parasite infection.

This study was conducted to evaluation of vermicompost and split nitrogen application on yield and some yield components of sesame. Experimental design was in RCBD with two factors and four replications, first factor included vermicompost with three levels (10, 20 and 30 ton/ha) and second factor included Urea with three levels (30, 60 and 90 kg/ha). Urea was used in two installments, one of them was applied at the 6 to 8 leaf and another 20 days after the first installment. According to our result, we suggest using of 20 ton/ha vermicompost for sesame culture, also using of 90kg/ha nitrogen is best treatment. For combination using, it suggest 30ton/ha vermicompost + 60kh/ha nitrogen for Firouzabad region and sesame.

Bitumen is a hydrocarbon material that accumulates near the earth's surface in the form of asphalt springs or in other forms under the act of hydrostatic pressures of oil reservoirs, it will form bitumen mines after undergoing polymerization process. This mineral (organic) matter is in close relationship to oil reservoirs present in the area, i.e. when oil moves or migrates from one place to another place some part of it will be separated and will remain in the form of streaks, lenses and etc. In this work, the exploration of bitumen resources in Saleh-Abad area, Ilam is carried out using geoelectrical data that were gathered in two-dimensional form, exploration drilling data and also geological data. Today the best method for underground studies and mineral explorations is geophysical studies and drilling exploration wells meanwhile. One of the best data acquisition methods in the Geoelectricity is two-dimensional data acquisition or in other words electrical imaging in two dimensions. Tomography or electrical apparent resistivity tomography is a geophysical technique that investigates underground structures in two or three dimensions. The advantage of ERT method in comparison with other traditional and routine methods is that it investigates the changes of electrical apparent resistivity either laterally (constant spacing traversing or CST) or vertically (vertical electrical sounding, VES) in space. Geophysical data acquisition of the mentioned mine was done using dipole-dipole array in two profiles upon which some points were proposed for exploration drilling. Exploration drilling was done in powder method on the geophysical profiles in six 15-meter bores which proved the high precision of apparent resistivity method for bitumen exploration. Interpretation and modeling of two profiles was carried out using RES2DINV and modeling of drilling Logs was done using LOGPLOT that both had a good conformity with geological data and surface outcrops.

Fiscal policy assumes the life-wire, and most critically, of resource volatilized economies, it is facing specific challenges both in the start run as regards microeconomic stabilization and fiscal planning, and in the long run, as regards intergenerational equity and fiscal sustainability. The paper demonstrated the fiscal policy challenges faced by oil Exporting Countries (OECs) in the past, including volatile revenue structure, weak budget system and sending pattern which often have given rise to high inflationary pressure, poor investment and low growth profile. The aim was to identify the weakness in the fiscal policy of oil-rich economies and make empirical assessment of policy impact on their economic growth. The paper revealed that fiscal policy of OECs had not significantly impacted on their economic growth, with more negative influence generated by crude oil prices, which is indicative of serious fiscal volatility and risk. It also showed that inflation and government spending had increased tremendously in oil exporting countries during upswings in oil surpluses and oil prices, suggesting that fiscal policies of OECs tend to be largely driven by government budgets, with less private sector leadership and developed market economic initiative. There appeared to be lack of evidence that fiscal crude oil surpluses accruing to OECs over the years have impacted significantly on economic growth of OECs, and this is indicative of fiscal policy weakness in translating abundant oil revenue into sustainable economic growth. To make a positive policy outcome for sustainable economic development in oil exporting countries, the budget process must be effectively managed, with the aim to decoupling government spending from volatile oil revenue, and institutionalizing private sector-led growth economy. Keywords: fiscal Policy, Oil-exporting Countries, Inflation, Fiscal risk, Cyclicality, Benchmarking.

Dystopia is a totalitarian or a degraded society. The dystopian society is characterized by human misery and oppression. The people of this society lives in constant fear and unhappiness. Dystopian writings become popular in the twentienth century which witnessed various kinds of deprivation and sufferings. Dystopian narratives traditionally achieve their power by reflecting the dominant cultural anxieties of the era in which they were written. This research paper has taken up The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood to examine the various dystopian aspects presented in it. The Heart Goes Last, written as the US economy slowly recovers from a recession, is a cautionary tale about our desire for security. The various dehumanizing and unpleasant pictures presented by Margaret Atwood is carefully analysed. The grave situation is can happen to any society and it foreshadows the inescapable future to come.

Rapid growth of mobile communication over the past years has tremendously increased the number of users which reduces the capacity of the system due to the increase in the number of interferers. Space Division Multiple Access (SDMA) is one of the promising technologies for future mobile communication. Smart antennas, usually employed at the base station radiate narrow beams to serve different users by using spatial processing. As long as the users are well separated spatially, the same frequency can be reused even when the users are in the same cell. The paper focuses the use of adaptive antenna arrays in CDMA networks to suppress cochannel interference. The training sequence based adaptive algorithms like the LMS, SMI and RLS algorithms are discussed in detail and the effect of number of antenna elements, inter element spacing, effect of number of interferers and the variation in SNR on the training sequence based adaptive algorithms is studied. The beam formation, null steering, maximum side lobe levels and convergence of these algorithms is studied in detail and compared. Keywords- Smart Antenna, LMS Algorithm, SMI Algorithm, RLS Algorithm, Beam Formation, Null Steering.