Improving students’ use of argumentation is front and center in the increasing emphasis on scientific practice in K-12 Science and STEM programs. We explore the construct validity of scenario-based assessments of claim-evidence-reasoning (CER) and the structure of the CER construct with respect to a learning progression framework. We also seek to understand how middle school students progress. Establishing the purpose of an argument is a competency that a majority of middle school students meet, whereas quantitative reasoning is the most difficult, and the Rasch model indicates that the competencies form a unidimensional hierarchy of skills. We also find no evidence of differential item functioning between different scenarios, suggesting

This paper presents the Extended State Observer (ESO) based repetitive control (RC) for piezoelectric actuator (PEA) based nano-positioning systems. The system stability is proved using Linear Matrix Inequalities (LMIs), which guarantees the asymptotic stability of the system. The ESObased RC used in this paper has the ability to eliminate periodic disturbances, aperiodic disturbances and model uncertainties. Moreover, ESO can be tuned using only two parameters and the model free approach of ESO-based RC, makes it an ideal solution to overcome the challenges of nano-positioning system control. Different types of periodic and aperiodic disturbances are used in simulation to demonstrate the effectiveness of the algorithm. The comparison studi

This article presents a new cascaded extended state observer (CESO)-based sliding-mode control (SMC) for an underactuated flexible joint robot (FJR). The control of the FJR has many challenges, including coupling, underactuation, nonlinearity, uncertainties and external disturbances, and the noise amplification especially in the high-order systems. The proposed control integrates the CESO and SMC, in which the CESO estimates the states and disturbances, and the SMC provides the system robustness to the uncertainty and disturbance estimation errors. First, a dynamic model of the FJR is derived and converted from an underactuated form to a canonical form via the Olfati transformation and a flatness approach, which reduces the complexity of th

Objectives Bromelain is a potent proteolytic enzyme that has a unique functionality makes it valuable for various therapeutic purposes. This study aimed to develop three novel formulations based on bromelain to be used as chemomechanical caries removal agents. Methods The novel agents were prepared using different concentrations of bromelain (10–40 wt. %), with and without 0.1–0.3 wt. % chloramine T or 0.5–1.5 wt. % chlorhexidine (CHX). Based on the enzymatic activity test, three formulations were selected; 30 % bromelain (F1), 30 % bromelain-0.1 % chloramine (F2) and 30 % bromelain-1.5 % CHX (F3). The assessments included molecular docking, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), viscosity and pH measurements. The efficiency

Aerial Robot Arms (ARAs) enable aerial drones to interact and influence objects in various environments. Traditional ARA controllers need the availability of a high-precision model to avoid high control chattering. Furthermore, in practical applications of aerial object manipulation, the payloads that ARAs can handle vary, depending on the nature of the task. The high uncertainties due to modeling errors and an unknown payload are inversely proportional to the stability of ARAs. To address the issue of stability, a new adaptive robust controller, based on the Radial Basis Function (RBF) neural network, is proposed. A three-tier approach is also followed. Firstly, a detailed new model for the ARA is derived using the Lagrange–d’A

A medical- service platform is a mobile application through which patients are provided with doctor’s diagnoses based on information gleaned from medical images. The content of these diagnostic results must not be illegitimately altered during transmission and must be returned to the correct patient. In this paper, we present a solution to these problems using blind, reversible, and fragile watermarking based on authentication of the host image. In our proposed algorithm, the binary version of the Bose_Chaudhuri_Hocquengham (BCH) code for patient medical report (PMR) and binary patient medical image (PMI) after fuzzy exclusive or (F-XoR) are used to produce the patient's unique mark using secret sharing schema (SSS). The patient’s un

D-mannose sugar was used to prepare [benzoic acid 6-formyl-2, 2-dimethyl-tetrahydrofuro [3, 4-d][1, 3] dioxol-4-yl ester](compound A). The condensation reaction of folic acid with (compound A) resulted in the formation of new ligand [L]. These compounds were characterized by elemental analysis CHN, atomic absorption AA,(FT-IR),(UV-Vis), TLC, ES mass (for electrospray), molar conductance, and melting point. The new tetradentate ligand [L], reacted with two moles of some selected metal ions and two moles of (2-aminophenol),(metal: ligand: 2-aminophenol) at reflux in water medium to give a series of new complexes of the general formula K2 [M2 (L)(HA) 2] where M= Co (II), Ni (II), Cu (II) and Cd (II). These complexes were characterized by eleme