Archives-J 

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of financial determinants on firm growth. The impact of financial determinants: profitability, leverage, innovation and leverage on firm growth are studied. Firm size and firm age are also included to investigate how such variables effect firm growth. Data was collected for a sample of 373 non-financial companies listed at Karachi Stock Exchange for a period of six years from 2006 to 2011. Fixed effect model for panel data was applied for analysis and results. The results of this research show that financial determinants of profitability, leverage and innovation have a positive and significant impact on firm growth in Pakistani context. Firm size also have a significant positive effect. However, there is negative relationship of firm age on firm growth. Liquidity has a positive relationship with growth, yet its impact was non-significant. More comprehensive, detailed and extended analysis in future studies will definitely be helpful in gaining a profound understanding of different aspects of the growth of the firms, and hence in formulating better policies for economic development at micro and macro level.

Copper fungicides are extensively used to control leaf necrosis and tuber rot produced by fungi in tiger nut farms. However, information on the levels of copper due to application of copper fungicides are scarce. The levels of water soluble copper of the top soils from eleven preselected tiger nut growing towns from three different districts in the Central Region of Ghana were analysed using atomic absorption spectrometer after the extraction processes. A total of two hundred and twenty top soil samples were taken randomly at a depth of approximately 20cm.Copper fungicides were applied in ten of the farms and the eleventh farm which served as a control had no copper fungicide application. Some physical and chemical properties of the soils were determined. Levels of water-soluble copper in the soils ranged from 0.07 to 0.36 mg kg-1 with a mean concentration of 0.229 mg kg-1. Application of copper fungicides increased water soluble copper levels in the top soils between 257 to 514% in the tiger nut farms analysed. The correlation was done to determine the factors responsible for the differences in the absorption levels of water-soluble copper. Water soluble copper correlated negatively but significantly (P<0.5) with sand, while negative correlation but insignificantly (P>0.5) with silt, organic carbon, cation exchange capacity nitrogen and available phosphorus. An insignificant (P>0.05) but positive correlation existed between water soluble copper level and moisture, acidity, pH and soil clay.

Heavy organic deposition in the production and processing of crude oil has been a problem in the oil and gas sector. Although, some efforts have been made to minimise it such as changes in composition, pressure and/or temperature; this study attempts to address the Nigerian situation. The article investigated the onset of heavy organic precipitation by transmitting microscopy study of the precipitant volumes reported for single nC5; nC6; nC7 and nC8 alkane precipitants as 5.02ml, 5.05ml, 6.00ml and 7.10ml respectively to start precipitation in 1:1 (v/v) precipitant: toluene solution to 2±0.5g crude oil. Their varied binary mixtures nC5:nC6; nC5: nC7; nC5: nC8; nC6: nC7; nC7: nC8 showed onset of HO precipitation with ratios of 7:3, 1:1, 4:1, 3:2 and 9:1 respectively with no onset volume detected for nC6: nC8 within the ratio range being investigated. Hence, the outcome of these results of the precipitant volumes at onset of HO precipitation for single n-alkanes and volume ratios of binary mixture n-alkane solvents should not be altered or exceeded during injection of fluids for enhanced oil recovery or as diluents into Afiesere heavy crude oil to improve flow properties.

This paper describes a research methodology which was developed to study the implementation of Hospital Autonomy Reforms in Pakistan. The research attempted to answer two questions: what happened? And why did it happen? (with regards to the implementation process of hospital autonomy reforms). The environment for this study was very political and characterized by high power distance and low rule of law. Moreover it had an aura of formality and reservation. Few respondents were willing to share information due to their status and busyness. The researcher had to develop a strategy to be flexible and innocuous to be able to accumulate relevant information. Moreover, respondents would rarely honor any official request for information about the process, so the researcher had to use personal connections to gain entry into the environment and to extract data. Main stakeholders were donors, politicians, bureaucrats and doctors. Long unstructured interviews were conducted with them. For the second question, the technique of sense making was used to find out why reform adopted the specific strategy that it took. Use of contextual historical back ground data was made in this regards.

With the huge upsurge of information in day-to-day’s life, it has become difficult to assemble relevant information in nick of time. But people, always are in dearth of time, they need everything quick. Hence clustering was introduced to gather the relevant information in a cluster. There are several algorithms for clustering information out of which in this paper, we accomplish K-means and K-Medoids clustering algorithm and a comparison is carried out to find which algorithm is best for clustering. On the best clusters formed, document summarization is executed based on sentence weight to focus on key point of the whole document, which makes it easier for people to ascertain the information they want and thus read only those documents which is relevant in their point of view.

We are very happy to announce that from 28th June 2019, Dr. Kumaraswamy, Gandla has joined the team of Elixir Editorial Advisory Board. He/She will carry a special responsibility for dealing with manuscripts based on Pharmaceutical Analysis. Dr. Kumaraswamy, Gandla is working as Professor of Pharmaceutical Analysis in Care College of Pharmacy, Warangal (Telangana). The appointment of Dr. Kumaraswamy, Gandla as member Editorial Advisory Board strengthens the links and will make it easier for prospective authors to establish contact with the journal.

We are very happy to announce that from 23rd January 2021, Dr.M.K.Subramanian has joined the team of Elixir Editorial Advisory Board. He will carry a special responsibility for dealing with manuscripts based on Physics. Dr.M.K.Subramanian is working as Associate Professor & Head, PG and Research Department of Physics, Thiruvalluvar Government Arts College, Rasipuram, TamilNadu, India. The appointment of Dr.M.K.Subramanian as member Editorial Advisory Board strengthens the links and will make it easier for prospective authors to establish contact with the journal.

This project investigate the ability of banana musa L peel for adsorption of lead and copper ions from refinery petroleum wastewater. The main functional groups in banana peel were identified by FTIR, Elements composition of used medium has been characterized by Inductively Coupled Plasma (ICP). Lead and copper were determined in refinery petroleum wastewater and their standard solutions before and after passing on banana peel medium by using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry technique (AAS). The adsorption isotherm fitted by Freundlich model at 38 oC and pH=5.5. The FTIR spectrum revealed that the main functional groups in banana peel are OH, C-H stretching, carboxylic acids and amino groups. Elements composition of banana peel medium was found to be Fe, Cu, K, Li, Mg, Mn, Mo, Na, Ni, P, Pd, Sr, Ti, V and Zn. The banana peel showed high ability to uptake lead and copper ions from refinery petroleum wastewater and their standard solutions. The R2 of leaner shape of adsorption isotherm for lead and copper ions was found to be 0.999 and 1 respectively. The concentration of lead and copper ions in refinery wastewater was reduced from 0.091, 0.060 ppm to 0.027 , 0.013 ppm respectively, after being passed through banana peel medium.

Hybrid composites developed by combining natural fibers/natural fiber and natural fibers/synthetic fibers with epoxy, polyester, phenolic, poly vinyl ester, etc., resins are well established. In this present study, hybrid composites were prepared with banana fiber, sisal fiber and with bamboo charcoal by hand layup method according to ASTM standards. The various weight percentages of fibers in the resin and bamboo charcoal were used to gain insights into the effect of fiber content and charcoal filler on the mechanical properties (Impact, Tensile and Flexural). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to examine the morphology of these materials.

An attempt was made to investigate the effect of copper on germination, protein content and peroxidase activity in Phaseolus vulgaris. Increasing copper concentration does not show significant effect on seed germination. An increase in total protein concentration was found with increase in copper concentration however the increase was more prominent in shoots. Peroxidase was found to enhance in shoots whereas in roots the activity increases upto 50µM after which the activity was found to decrease.