Maize and sorghum nutrient response functions for Ethiopia

Maize (Zea mays L.) and sorghum (Sorghum bicolor L. Moench) are important intermediate and low elevation crops in Ethiopia but yields are low. The information for determination of nutrient rate...     

Innovative polyelectrolytes/poly(ionic liquid)s for energy and the environment

This paper presents the work carried out within the European project RENAISSANCE‐ITN, which was dedicated to the development of innovative polyelectrolytes for energy and environmental applications. Within the project different types of innovative polyelectrolytes were synthesized such as poly(ionic liquid)s coming from renewable or natural ions, thiazolium cations, catechol functionalities or from a new generation of cheap deep eutectic monomers. Further, macromolecular architectures such as new poly(ionic liquid) block copolymers and new (semi)conducting polymer/polyelectrolyte complexes were also developed. As the final goal, the application of these innovative polymers in energy and the environment was investigated. Important advances in energy storage technologies included the development of new carbonaceous materials, new lignin/conducting polymer biopolymer electrodes, new iongels and single‐ion conducting polymer electrolytes for supercapacitors and batteries and new poly(ionic liquid) binders for batteries. On the other hand, the use of innovative polyelectrolytes in sustainable environmental technologies led to the development of new liquid and dry water, new materials for water cleaning technologies such as flocculants, oil absorbers, new recyclable organocatalyst platforms and new multifunctional polymer coatings with antifouling and antimicrobial properties. All in all this paper demonstrates the potential of poly(ionic liquid)s for high‐value applications in energy and enviromental areas. © 2017 Society of Chemical Industry     

Early width estimation of fragmented JPEG with corrupted header

In transformed and compressed domain fragmented files are very difficult to recover using conventional file recovery software. JPEG images are forensically important file format due to its popularity in a wide area of applications. In JPEG compression the header keeps important parameters that are required to decode the image back to pixel domain. In this paper the detection of width and height of an image from the JPEG stream is improved with less assumptions than previous papers. In the old approaches it was assumed that information about the image like Huffman table, Reset (RST) value and Quantization table were readily available for the techniques to work. However, in this paper the width is extracted from the quantized AC values that reduce the assumptions to just Huffman table.     

Enhanced thermoelectric performance of poly(3,4‐ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(4‐styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) with long‐term humidity stability via sequential treatment with trifluoroacetic acid

This paper reports a range of effective sequential chemical processes to enhance the thermoelectric performance of conducting poly(3,4‐ethylenedioxythiophene) films doped with poly(styrene sulfonate) anions (PEDOT:PSS). The electrical conductivity of the PEDOT:PSS films was significantly increased from 0.33 to 3748 S cm^?1 after a series of sequential treatments with trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) while the Seebeck coefficient and thermal conductivity were slightly reduced from 17.5 ± 1.2 to 16.0 ± 1.1 μV K^?1 and 0.537 to 0.415 W m^–1 K^?1 for the pristine film and treated film, respectively, leading to a significant improvement in power factor up to 97.1 ± 5.4 μW m^–1 K^?2. More importantly, around 80% of the electrical conductivity and Seebeck coefficient was retained after 20 days for these TFA‐treated PEDOT:PSS films, revealing the potential for real thermoelectric applications. © 2019 Society of Chemical Industry     

Vulnerability of smallholder rural households to food insecurity in Eastern Ethiopia

Although several empirical methodologies as to how best assess vulnerability to food insecurity have been proposed in the literature, none of these has evolved into a unanimously accepted approach. This article contributes to this literature by adapting the Vulnerability as Expected Poverty approach from poverty analysis methodology with the aim of scrutinizing factors determining household level vulnerability to food insecurity based on cross-section data collected from 277 randomly selected households in eastern Ethiopia. Vulnerability to food insecurity was strongly associated with several factors which included family size, size of cultivated landholding, soil fertility status of plots, access to irrigation, number of extension visits, use of fertilizer and improved seed. The probability that any given household??s food consumption expenditure would fall below a specified cut-off level has also been computed and vulnerable households identified. The total number of vulnerable households (111) was found to be greater than those who are currently food insecure (103). This implies that design and implementation of food security policies and strategies need to focus not only on those who are observed to be currently food insecure, but also on setting up social protection mechanisms to help prevent households from falling more deeply into food insecurity in the future.     

Monetary Practices of Traditional Rural Communities in Ethiopia: Implications for New Financial Technology Design

With the development of ubiquitous technologies that support the digitization of money, research is needed on how individuals’ private life practices are affected by new technological financial systems and how cash-based practices can inform their design. In this article, we report the cash-based monetary practices of one Ethiopian rural community and identify their implications for the design of new financial technology. Particularly, we focus on addressing the question, What characteristic features should go into the design of mobile money application(s) to embody a rural Ethiopian community’s money practices in social (marriage and death) and religious contexts? Primary data on everyday practices of the community were collected. Analysis of our data reveals that new financial technology design should support lived experiences such as embedded social meaning, segregated and aggregate money control, restricted money use, identity extension and hiding, refusal and acceptance of donations, disclosed and secret money practices, and assigning aesthetics to money. The article concludes by discussing possible ways of mapping these concepts into financial system design, thus contributing toward the development of cashless transactions and a cashless society.     

Genetic diversity and correlation of bean caffeine content with cup quality and green bean physical characteristics in coffee (Coffea arabica L.)

BACKGROUND: Although people began to consume coffee for its stimulating effect, the demand for decaffeinated coffee is increasing and now accounts for 10% of the total amount of coffee consumed in the world. Forty‐two arabica coffee genotypes originating from Ethiopia were tested to assess caffeine content variability among them, and the correlation of caffeine content with cup quality and green bean physical characteristics. RESULTS: Green bean caffeine content was measured using high‐performance liquid chromatography, while cup quality was determined by professional coffee tasters. Caffeine content ranged from 9.1 to 13.2 g kg^?1 on dry mass basis (d.m.b.). Six genotypes—AD0291, AD0591, AD2491, AD2691, AD2791 and AD2891—had a caffeine content of less than 10.0 g kg^?1. Caffeine content showed negative and statistically significant correlations with cup quality attributes. Correlations between caffeine content and green bean physical characteristics were non‐significant. CONCLUSIONS: Simultaneous selection for low caffeine content and good cup quality is possible. Some accessions had low caffeine content, and may serve as a source of desirable genes for variety development of types with relatively low caffeine content. Copyright © 2008 Society of Chemical Industry