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Fulltext Effect of porosity on compressive strength of resin modified glass ionomer luting cements

Al-Kadhim, A.H.A., Abdullah H.

International Medical Journal Malaysia, 2018;17(2):33-40.
MyJurnal

Introduction: The purpose of this study was to decide on the relation between types of mixing and the porosity of diameter (1-100) µm and compressive strength of RMGIC. Methods: Fifteen specimens 6mm height and 4mm in diameter were prepared for each type of luting cement and were stored in distilled water at 37° C for 24 hours. The compressive strength was determined. The fractured surfaces of 10 randomly selected specimens of each cement type were analyzed using SEM at 250 times magnification, and five photomicrographs were taken at five random places. All the photomicrographs were analyzed using image analyzer software to determine the amount and size of porosity present. Results: There was no significant difference in compressive strength between different mixing methods, but it had a significant impact by increasing the percentage of porosity of diameter (1-100) µm in diameter of RMGIC. There was no linear relationship between compressive strength and porosity (1-100) µm in diameter for both types of luting cements (P>0.05). Conclusion: No significant differences in compressive strength were found using different mixing methods. The size and number of porosity in the specimens of encapsulated cements were greater than those of hand-mixed cements. The porosity (1-100) µm in diameter and the compressive strength bore no linear relationship to each other.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Thermodynamic heuristics with case-based reasoning: combined insights for RNA pseudoknot secondary structure

Al-Khatib RM, Rashid NA, Abdullah R

J Biomol Struct Dyn, 2011 Aug;29(1):1-26.
PMID: 21696223

The secondary structure of RNA pseudoknots has been extensively inferred and scrutinized by computational approaches. Experimental methods for determining RNA structure are time consuming and tedious; therefore, predictive computational approaches are required. Predicting the most accurate and energy-stable pseudoknot RNA secondary structure has been proven to be an NP-hard problem. In this paper, a new RNA folding approach, termed MSeeker, is presented; it includes KnotSeeker (a heuristic method) and Mfold (a thermodynamic algorithm). The global optimization of this thermodynamic heuristic approach was further enhanced by using a case-based reasoning technique as a local optimization method. MSeeker is a proposed algorithm for predicting RNA pseudoknot structure from individual sequences, especially long ones. This research demonstrates that MSeeker improves the sensitivity and specificity of existing RNA pseudoknot structure predictions. The performance and structural results from this proposed method were evaluated against seven other state-of-the-art pseudoknot prediction methods. The MSeeker method had better sensitivity than the DotKnot, FlexStem, HotKnots, pknotsRG, ILM, NUPACK and pknotsRE methods, with 79% of the predicted pseudoknot base-pairs being correct.

Matched MeSH terms: Software*
Isolated hypertriglyceridemia: an insulin-resistant state with or without low HDL cholesterol

Al-Mahmood A, Ismail A, Rashid F, Mohamed W

J Atheroscler Thromb, 2006 Jun;13(3):143-8.
PMID: 16835469

There are numerous reports on insulin resistance in subjects with hypertriglyceridemia but most of the studies involved obese or diabetic subjects. We were interested to study such events but in a population free from other confounders influencing insulin sensitivity (i.e., obesity, glucose intolerance and hypertension). From the population of a cross-sectional study we obtained 12 subjects with isolated hypertriglyceridemia and compared their insulin sensitivity with that of normolipidemic subjects in that study. Insulin sensitivity and secretory status were computed using homeostasis model assessment (HOMA) software. The insulin sensitivity of hypertriglyceridemic subjects was found to be lower than in normolipidemic subjects. For the hypertriglyceridemic subjects, insulin sensitivity (HOMA%S) was 60.07% (values adjusted for age, BMI, waist circumference, and cholesterol levels), which was substantially lower than that of normolipidemic subjects (150.03%; p<0.001). The insulin secretory status (HOMA%B) of the two groups was 248.17% and 124.63%, respectively, and significantly different (p<0.001). Relative insulin resistance, HOMA-IR, of the two groups was 4.90 and 1.54, respectively. We therefore concluded that in comparison with normolipidemic subjects, the insulin sensitivity of otherwise healthy non-obese hypertriglyceridemic subjects was lower, and that B cells had to work harder to compensate for the lowered insulin sensitivity.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Insulin sensitivity and secretory status of a healthy malay population

Al-Mahmood AK, Ismail AA, Rashid FA, Wan Bebakar WM

Malays J Med Sci, 2006 Jul;13(2):37-44.
PMID: 22589603 MyJurnal

Insulin insensitivity is a common finding in several metabolic disorders including glucose intolerance, dyslipidemia, hyperuricemia and hypertension. Most of the previous studies on insulin sensitivity were performed on diabetic or obese population. So our knowledge about insulin sensitivity of healthy population remains limited. Rising prevalence of obesity, diabetes and metabolic syndrome is a serious issue in Malaysia and some other rapidly developing countries. So it is important to look at the insulin sensitivity status of healthy Malaysian subjects and to compare it in future with those of diabetic, obese or metabolic syndrome patients. In this study we sampled subjects who were independent of confounding factors such as obesity (including abdominal obesity), hypertension and glucose intolerance (diabetes, IGT or IFG) which may influence insulin sensitivity. Fasting plasma glucose, fasting insulin and lipid profile were determined. Insulin sensitivity and secretory status were calculated using the homeostasis model assessment (HOMA) software (HOMA%S, HOMA%B and HOMA-IR). The insulin sensitivity (HOMA%S) of healthy Malay subjects aged between 30-60 years was 155.17%, HOMA-IR was 1.05 and HOMA%B was 116.65% (values adjusted for age, sex, BMI and waist circumference). It was seen that non-obese Malaysians can prevent age related lowering of insulin sensitivity if they can retain their BMI within limit.
Study site: 7 schools and 2 public offices in Kota Bharu, Kelantan, Malaysia

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Highly deleterious variations in COX1, CYTB, SCG5, FK2, PRL and PGF genes are the potential adaptation of the immigrated African ostrich population

Al-Shuhaib MBS, Al-Kafajy FR, Badi MA, AbdulAzeez S, Marimuthu K, Al-Juhaishi HAI, et al.

Comput Biol Med, 2018 09 01;100:17-26.
PMID: 29960146 DOI: 10.1016/j.compbiomed.2018.06.019

Because of variable inconvenient living conditions in some places around the world, it is difficult to collect reliable physiological data for ostriches. Therefore, this study aims to provide a comprehensive in silico insight for the nature of polymorphism of important genetic loci that are related to physiological and reproductive traits. Sixty-nine mature ostriches ranging over half of Iraq were screened. Six exonic genetic loci, including cytochrome c oxidase I (COX1), cytochrome b (CYTB), secretogranin V (SCG5), feather keratin 2-like (FK2), prolactin (PRL) and placenta growth factor (PGF) were genotyped by PCR-single stranded conformation polymorphism (SSCP). Thirty-six novel SNPs, including seventeen nonsynonymous (ns) SNPs, were observed. Several computational software programs were utilized to assess the extent of the nsSNPs on their corresponding proteins structure, function and stability. The results showed several deleterious functional and stability changes in almost all the proteins studied. The total severity of each missense mutation was evaluated and compared with other nsSNPs accumulatively. It is evident from the extensive cumulative in silico computation that both p.E34D and p.E60K in PGF have the highest deleterious effect. The cumulative predictions from the present study are an impressive guide for the genotypes of African ostriches, which bypassed the expensive protocols for wet laboratory screening, to identify the effects of variants. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first investigation of its kind on the analyses and prediction outcome of missense mutations in African ostrich populations. The highly deleterious nsSNPs in the placenta growth factor are possible adaptive mutations which might be associated with adaptation in extreme and new environments. The flow and protocol of the computational predictions can be extended for various wild animals to identify the molecular nature of adaptations.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Multiple adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system with automatic features extraction algorithm for cervical cancer recognition

Al-batah MS, Isa NA, Klaib MF, Al-Betar MA

Comput Math Methods Med, 2014;2014:181245.
PMID: 24707316 DOI: 10.1155/2014/181245

To date, cancer of uterine cervix is still a leading cause of cancer-related deaths in women worldwide. The current methods (i.e., Pap smear and liquid-based cytology (LBC)) to screen for cervical cancer are time-consuming and dependent on the skill of the cytopathologist and thus are rather subjective. Therefore, this paper presents an intelligent computer vision system to assist pathologists in overcoming these problems and, consequently, produce more accurate results. The developed system consists of two stages. In the first stage, the automatic features extraction (AFE) algorithm is performed. In the second stage, a neuro-fuzzy model called multiple adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (MANFIS) is proposed for recognition process. The MANFIS contains a set of ANFIS models which are arranged in parallel combination to produce a model with multi-input-multioutput structure. The system is capable of classifying cervical cell image into three groups, namely, normal, low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (LSIL) and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL). The experimental results prove the capability of the AFE algorithm to be as effective as the manual extraction by human experts, while the proposed MANFIS produces a good classification performance with 94.2% accuracy.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Estimating the refractive index of oxygenated and deoxygenated hemoglobin using genetic algorithm - support vector regression model

Alade IO, Bagudu A, Oyehan TA, Rahman MAA, Saleh TA, Olatunji SO

Comput Methods Programs Biomed, 2018 Sep;163:135-142.
PMID: 30119848 DOI: 10.1016/j.cmpb.2018.05.029

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: The refractive index of hemoglobin plays important role in hematology due to its strong correlation with the pathophysiology of different diseases. Measurement of the real part of the refractive index remains a challenge due to strong absorption of the hemoglobin especially at relevant high physiological concentrations. So far, only a few studies on direct measurement of refractive index have been reported and there are no firm agreements on the reported values of refractive index of hemoglobin due to measurement artifacts. In addition, it is time consuming, laborious and expensive to perform several experiments to obtain the refractive index of hemoglobin. In this work, we proposed a very rapid and accurate computational intelligent approach using Genetic Algorithm/Support Vector Regression models to estimate the real part of the refractive index for oxygenated and deoxygenated hemoglobin samples.
METHODS: These models utilized experimental data of wavelengths and hemoglobin concentrations in building highly accurate Genetic Algorithm/Support Vector Regression model (GA-SVR).
RESULTS: The developed methodology showed high accuracy as indicated by the low root mean square error values of 4.65 × 10-4 and 4.62 × 10-4 for oxygenated and deoxygenated hemoglobin, respectively. In addition, the models exhibited 99.85 and 99.84% correlation coefficients (r) for the oxygenated and deoxygenated hemoglobin, thus, validating the strong agreement between the predicted and the experimental results CONCLUSIONS: Due to the accuracy and relative simplicity of the proposed models, we envisage that these models would serve as important references for future studies on optical properties of blood.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Polarization-Independent Ultra-Wideband Metamaterial Absorber for Solar Harvesting at Infrared Regime

Alam A, Islam SS, Islam MH, Almutairi AF, Islam MT

Materials (Basel), 2020 Jun 04;13(11).
PMID: 32512784 DOI: 10.3390/ma13112560

This paper presents an ultra-wideband metamaterial absorber for solar harvesting in the infrared regime (220-360 THz) of the solar spectrum. The proposed absorber consists of square-shaped copper patches of different sizes imposed on a GaAs (Gallium arsenide) substrate. The design and simulation of the unit cell are performed with finite integration technique (FIT)-based simulation software. Scattering parameters are retrieved during the simulation process. The constructed design offers absorbance above 90% within a 37.89% relative bandwidth and 99.99% absorption over a vast portion of the investigated frequency range. An equivalent circuit model is presented to endorse the validity of the proposed structure. The calculated result strongly agrees with the simulated result. Symmetrical construction of the proposed unit cell reports an angular insensitivity up to a 35° oblique incidence. Post-processed simulation data confirm that the design is polarization-insensitive.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Sagittal Jaw Relationship of Different Types of Cleft and Non-cleft Individuals

Alam MK, Alfawzan AA, Haque S, Mok PL, Marya A, Venugopal A, et al.

Front Pediatr, 2021;9:651951.
PMID: 34026687 DOI: 10.3389/fped.2021.651951

To investigate whether the craniofacial sagittal jaw relationship in patients with non-syndromic cleft differed from non-cleft (NC) individuals by artificial intelligence (A.I.)-driven lateral cephalometric (Late. Ceph.) analysis. The study group comprised 123 subjects with different types of clefts including 29 = BCLP (bilateral cleft lip and palate), 41 = UCLP (unilateral cleft lip and palate), 9 = UCLA (unilateral cleft lip and alveolus), 13 = UCL (unilateral cleft lip) and NC = 31. The mean age was 14.77 years. SNA, SNB, ANB angle and Wits appraisal was measured in lateral cephalogram using a new innovative A.I driven Webceph software. Two-way ANOVA and multiple-comparison statistics tests were applied to see the differences between gender and among different types of clefts vs. NC individuals. A significant decrease (p < 0.005) in SNA, ANB, Wits appraisal was observed in different types of clefts vs. NC individuals. SNB (p > 0.005) showed insignificant variables in relation to type of clefts. No significant difference was also found in terms of gender in relation to any type of clefts and NC group. The present study advocates a decrease in sagittal development (SNA, ANB and Wits appraisal) in different types of cleft compared to NC individuals.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Meeting the security requirements of electronic medical records in the ERA of high-speed computing

Alanazi HO, Zaidan AA, Zaidan BB, Kiah ML, Al-Bakri SH

J Med Syst, 2015 Jan;39(1):165.
PMID: 25481568 DOI: 10.1007/s10916-014-0165-3

This study has two objectives. First, it aims to develop a system with a highly secured approach to transmitting electronic medical records (EMRs), and second, it aims to identify entities that transmit private patient information without permission. The NTRU and the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) cryptosystems are secured encryption methods. The AES is a tested technology that has already been utilized in several systems to secure sensitive data. The United States government has been using AES since June 2003 to protect sensitive and essential information. Meanwhile, NTRU protects sensitive data against attacks through the use of quantum computers, which can break the RSA cryptosystem and elliptic curve cryptography algorithms. A hybrid of AES and NTRU is developed in this work to improve EMR security. The proposed hybrid cryptography technique is implemented to secure the data transmission process of EMRs. The proposed security solution can provide protection for over 40 years and is resistant to quantum computers. Moreover, the technique provides the necessary evidence required by law to identify disclosure or misuse of patient records. The proposed solution can effectively secure EMR transmission and protect patient rights. It also identifies the source responsible for disclosing confidential patient records. The proposed hybrid technique for securing data managed by institutional websites must be improved in the future.

Matched MeSH terms: Software Design*
Skin dose measurements using radiochromic films, TLDS and ionisation chamber and comparison with Monte Carlo simulation

Alashrah S, Kandaiya S, Maalej N, El-Taher A

Radiat Prot Dosimetry, 2014 Dec;162(3):338-44.
PMID: 24300340 DOI: 10.1093/rpd/nct315

Estimation of the surface dose is very important for patients undergoing radiation therapy. The purpose of this study is to investigate the dose at the surface of a water phantom at a depth of 0.007 cm as recommended by the International Commission on Radiological Protection and International Commission on Radiation Units and Measurement with radiochromic films (RFs), thermoluminescent dosemeters and an ionisation chamber in a 6-MV photon beam. The results were compared with the theoretical calculation using Monte Carlo (MC) simulation software (MCNP5, BEAMnrc and DOSXYZnrc). The RF was calibrated by placing the films at a depth of maximum dose (d(max)) in a solid water phantom and exposing it to doses from 0 to 500 cGy. The films were scanned using a transmission high-resolution HP scanner. The optical density of the film was obtained from the red component of the RGB images using ImageJ software. The per cent surface dose (PSD) and percentage depth dose (PDD) curve were obtained by placing film pieces at the surface and at different depths in the solid water phantom. TLDs were placed at a depth of 10 cm in a solid water phantom for calibration. Then the TLDs were placed at different depths in the water phantom and were exposed to obtain the PDD. The obtained PSD and PDD values were compared with those obtained using a cylindrical ionisation chamber. The PSD was also determined using Monte Carlo simulation of a LINAC 6-MV photon beam. The extrapolation method was used to determine the PSD for all measurements. The PSD was 15.0±3.6% for RF. The TLD measurement of the PSD was 16.0±5.0%. The (0.6 cm(3)) cylindrical ionisation chamber measurement of the PSD was 50.0±3.0%. The theoretical calculation using MCNP5 and DOSXYZnrc yielded a PSD of 15.0±2.0% and 15.7±2.2%. In this study, good agreement between PSD measurements was observed using RF and TLDs with the Monte Carlo calculation. However, the cylindrical chamber measurement yielded an overestimate of the PSD. This is probably due to the ionisation chamber calibration factor that is only valid in charged particle equilibrium condition, which is not achieved at the surface in the build-up region.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
The thermoluminescence characteristics and the glow curves of Thulium doped silica fiber exposed to 10MV photon and 21MeV electron radiation

Alawiah A, Alina MS, Bauk S, Abdul-Rashid HA, Gieszczyk W, Noramaliza MN, et al.

Appl Radiat Isot, 2015 Apr;98:80-6.
PMID: 25644081 DOI: 10.1016/j.apradiso.2015.01.016

The thermoluminescence (TL) glow curves and kinetics parameters of Thulium (Tm) doped silica cylindrical fibers (CF) are presented. A linear accelerator (LINAC) was used to deliver high-energy radiation of 21MeV electrons and 10MV photons. The CFs were irradiated in the dose range of 0.2-10Gy. The experimental glow curve data was reconstructed by using WinREMS. The WinGCF software was used for the kinetic parameters evaluation. The TL sensitivity of Tm-doped silica CF is about 2 times higher as compared to pure silica CF. Tm-doped silica CF seems to be more sensitive to 21MeV electrons than to 10MV photons. Surprisingly, no supralinearity was displayed and a sub-linear response of Tm-doped silica CF was observed within the analyzed dose range for both 21MeV electrons and 10MV photons. The Tm-doped silica CF glow curve consists of 5 individual glow peaks. The Ea of peak 4 and peak 5 was highly dependent on dose when irradiated with photons. We also noticed that the electron radiation (21MeV) caused a shift of glow peak by 7-13°C to the higher temperature region compared with photons radiation (10MV). Our Tm-doped fibers seem to give high TL response after 21MeV electrons, which gives around 2 times higher peak integral as compared with 10MV photon radiation. We concluded that peak 4 is the first-order kinetic peak and can be used as the main dosimetric peak of Tm-doped silica CF.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext TranCEP: Predicting the substrate class of transmembrane transport proteins using compositional, evolutionary, and positional information

Alballa M, Aplop F, Butler G

PLoS One, 2020;15(1):e0227683.
PMID: 31935244 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0227683

Transporters mediate the movement of compounds across the membranes that separate the cell from its environment and across the inner membranes surrounding cellular compartments. It is estimated that one third of a proteome consists of membrane proteins, and many of these are transport proteins. Given the increase in the number of genomes being sequenced, there is a need for computational tools that predict the substrates that are transported by the transmembrane transport proteins. In this paper, we present TranCEP, a predictor of the type of substrate transported by a transmembrane transport protein. TranCEP combines the traditional use of the amino acid composition of the protein, with evolutionary information captured in a multiple sequence alignment (MSA), and restriction to important positions of the alignment that play a role in determining the specificity of the protein. Our experimental results show that TranCEP significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art predictors. The results quantify the contribution made by each type of information used.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Directionally-Enhanced Binary Multi-Objective Particle Swarm Optimisation for Load Balancing in Software Defined Networks

Albowarab MH, Zakaria NA, Zainal Abidin Z

Sensors (Basel), 2021 May 12;21(10).
PMID: 34065920 DOI: 10.3390/s21103356

Various aspects of task execution load balancing of Internet of Things (IoTs) networks can be optimised using intelligent algorithms provided by software-defined networking (SDN). These load balancing aspects include makespan, energy consumption, and execution cost. While past studies have evaluated load balancing from one or two aspects, none has explored the possibility of simultaneously optimising all aspects, namely, reliability, energy, cost, and execution time. For the purposes of load balancing, implementing multi-objective optimisation (MOO) based on meta-heuristic searching algorithms requires assurances that the solution space will be thoroughly explored. Optimising load balancing provides not only decision makers with optimised solutions but a rich set of candidate solutions to choose from. Therefore, the purposes of this study were (1) to propose a joint mathematical formulation to solve load balancing challenges in cloud computing and (2) to propose two multi-objective particle swarm optimisation (MP) models; distance angle multi-objective particle swarm optimization (DAMP) and angle multi-objective particle swarm optimization (AMP). Unlike existing models that only use crowding distance as a criterion for solution selection, our MP models probabilistically combine both crowding distance and crowding angle. More specifically, we only selected solutions that had more than a 0.5 probability of higher crowding distance and higher angular distribution. In addition, binary variants of the approaches were generated based on transfer function, and they were denoted by binary DAMP (BDAMP) and binary AMP (BAMP). After using MOO mathematical functions to compare our models, BDAMP and BAMP, with state of the standard models, BMP, BDMP and BPSO, they were tested using the proposed load balancing model. Both tests proved that our DAMP and AMP models were far superior to the state of the art standard models, MP, crowding distance multi-objective particle swarm optimisation (DMP), and PSO. Therefore, this study enables the incorporation of meta-heuristic in the management layer of cloud networks.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Feature Selection Using Information Gain for Improved Structural-Based Alert Correlation

Alhaj TA, Siraj MM, Zainal A, Elshoush HT, Elhaj F

PLoS One, 2016;11(11):e0166017.
PMID: 27893821 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0166017

Grouping and clustering alerts for intrusion detection based on the similarity of features is referred to as structurally base alert correlation and can discover a list of attack steps. Previous researchers selected different features and data sources manually based on their knowledge and experience, which lead to the less accurate identification of attack steps and inconsistent performance of clustering accuracy. Furthermore, the existing alert correlation systems deal with a huge amount of data that contains null values, incomplete information, and irrelevant features causing the analysis of the alerts to be tedious, time-consuming and error-prone. Therefore, this paper focuses on selecting accurate and significant features of alerts that are appropriate to represent the attack steps, thus, enhancing the structural-based alert correlation model. A two-tier feature selection method is proposed to obtain the significant features. The first tier aims at ranking the subset of features based on high information gain entropy in decreasing order. The‏ second tier extends additional features with a better discriminative ability than the initially ranked features. Performance analysis results show the significance of the selected features in terms of the clustering accuracy using 2000 DARPA intrusion detection scenario-specific dataset.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
A visual probe localization and calibration system for cost-effective computer-aided 3D ultrasound

Ali A, Logeswaran R

Comput Biol Med, 2007 Aug;37(8):1141-7.
PMID: 17126314

The 3D ultrasound systems produce much better reproductions than 2D ultrasound, but their prohibitively high cost deprives many less affluent organization this benefit. This paper proposes using the conventional 2D ultrasound equipment readily available in most hospitals, along with a single conventional digital camera, to construct 3D ultrasound images. The proposed system applies computer vision to extract position information of the ultrasound probe while the scanning takes place. The probe, calibrated in order to calculate the offset of the ultrasound scan from the position of the marker attached to it, is used to scan a number of geometrical objects. Using the proposed system, the 3D volumes of the objects were successfully reconstructed. The system was tested in clinical situations where human body parts were scanned. The results presented, and confirmed by medical staff, are very encouraging for cost-effective implementation of computer-aided 3D ultrasound using a simple setup with 2D ultrasound equipment and a conventional digital camera.

Matched MeSH terms: Software Design
Implementing cost-effective 3-dimensional ultrasound using visual probe localization

Ali A, Logeswaran R

J Digit Imaging, 2007 Dec;20(4):352-66.
PMID: 17372781

This article proposes a set-up for a 3-dimensional ultrasound system using visual probe localization on the conventional 2-dimensional ultrasound machines readily available in most hospitals. A calibrated digital camera is used for probe-tracking (localization) purposes, whereas ultrasound probe calibration is implemented using a purpose-built phantom. The calibration steps and results are detailed here. The overall system is proven effective in clinical trials through scanning of human organs. Results obtained show successful, accurate 3-dimensional representations using this simple cost-effective set-up.

Matched MeSH terms: Software Design
Fulltext Technique for Early Reliability Prediction of Software Components Using Behaviour Models

Ali A, N A Jawawi D, Adham Isa M, Imran Babar M

PLoS One, 2016 Sep 26;11(9):e0163346.
PMID: 27668748 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0163346

Behaviour models are the most commonly used input for predicting the reliability of a software system at the early design stage. A component behaviour model reveals the structure and behaviour of the component during the execution of system-level functionalities. There are various challenges related to component reliability prediction at the early design stage based on behaviour models. For example, most of the current reliability techniques do not provide fine-grained sequential behaviour models of individual components and fail to consider the loop entry and exit points in the reliability computation. Moreover, some of the current techniques do not tackle the problem of operational data unavailability and the lack of analysis results that can be valuable for software architects at the early design stage. This paper proposes a reliability prediction technique that, pragmatically, synthesizes system behaviour in the form of a state machine, given a set of scenarios and corresponding constraints as input. The state machine is utilized as a base for generating the component-relevant operational data. The state machine is also used as a source for identifying the nodes and edges of a component probabilistic dependency graph (CPDG). Based on the CPDG, a stack-based algorithm is used to compute the reliability. The proposed technique is evaluated by a comparison with existing techniques and the application of sensitivity analysis to a robotic wheelchair system as a case study. The results indicate that the proposed technique is more relevant at the early design stage compared to existing works, and can provide a more realistic and meaningful prediction.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Fulltext Development of a valid and reliable software customization model for SaaS quality through iterative method: perspectives from academia

Ali AQ, Md Sultan AB, Abd Ghani AA, Zulzalil H

PeerJ Comput Sci, 2020;6:e294.
PMID: 33816945 DOI: 10.7717/peerj-cs.294

Despite the benefits of standardization, the customization of Software as a Service (SaaS) application is also essential because of the many unique requirements of customers. This study, therefore, focuses on the development of a valid and reliable software customization model for SaaS quality that consists of (1) generic software customization types and a list of common practices for each customization type in the SaaS multi-tenant context, and (2) key quality attributes of SaaS applications associated with customization. The study was divided into three phases: the conceptualization of the model, analysis of its validity using SaaS academic-derived expertise, and evaluation of its reliability by submitting it to an internal consistency reliability test conducted by software-engineer researchers. The model was initially devised based on six customization approaches, 46 customization practices, and 13 quality attributes in the SaaS multi-tenant context. Subsequently, its content was validated over two rounds of testing after which one approach and 14 practices were removed and 20 practices were reformulated. The internal consistency reliability study was thereafter conducted by 34 software engineer researchers. All constructs of the content-validated model were found to be reliable in this study. The final version of the model consists of 6 constructs and 44 items. These six constructs and their associated items are as follows: (1) Configuration (eight items), (2) Composition (four items), (3) Extension (six items), 4) Integration (eight items), (5) Modification (five items), and (6) SaaS quality (13 items). The results of the study may contribute to enhancing the capability of empirically analyzing the impact of software customization on SaaS quality by benefiting from all resultant constructs and items.

Matched MeSH terms: Software
Development and Standardization of Moringa oleifera Leaves as a Natural Dietary Supplement

Ali MA, Yusof YA, Chin NL, Ibrahim MN, Muneer S

J Diet Suppl, 2019;16(1):66-85.
PMID: 29469600 DOI: 10.1080/19390211.2018.1429517

Moringa oleifera leaves were selected as a model due to their hundreds of health benefits. On the other hand, the powder of these leaves has exhibited poor flowability, low tensile strength, bitter taste, poor dissolution rate, and lack of information regarding dosage. These are the common hurdles and limitations in the adaptation of herbal-based medications. Therefore, a comprehensive study was planned to introduce herbal-based medicines into mainstream medicines by standardization according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and international pharmaceutical standards. A Simplex Lattice Design (SLD) of Design Expert 8.0 software was used to formulate different concentrations of superdisintegrant, binder/diluent, and sweeteners. An Instron Universal Testing machine coupled with a 13 mm stainless cylindrical die was used to manufacture tablets by means of direct compression method at 20 kN applied force. Therefore, selection of excipients was made on the basis of their tensile strength, flowability, and taste-masking properties. Optimum formulation was tested on rabbits for toxicity and growth rate. All formulated tablets were evaluated on standard parameters for orally disintegrating tablets described by the Food and Drug Authority (U.S.). The optimum formulation fulfills all standard parameters such as hardness, disintegration time, friability, and dissolution rate. The present formulation showed no toxicity when tested on rabbits. The present study provides a fundamental understanding of the tableting characteristics of natural medicines. The present study provides information that will help to overcome the challenges.

Matched MeSH terms: Software

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