In Australia, most of the existing buildings were designed before the release of the Australian standard for earthquake actions in 2007. Therefore, many existing buildings in Australia lack adequate seismic design, and their seismic performance must be assessed. The recent earthquake that struck Mansfield, Victoria near Melbourne elevated the need to produce fragility curves for existing reinforced concrete (RC) buildings in Australia. Fragility curves are frequently utilized to assess buildings’ seismic performance and it is defined as the demand probability surpassing capacity at a given intensity level. Numerous factors can influence the results of the fragility assessment of RC buildings. Among the most important factors that can affect the performance-based seismic assessment of buildings are the building height and the characteristics of the earthquake. Despite this, very few studies accounted for the earthquake characteristics and the influence of height on the vulnerability of buildings in Australia. Consequently, the combined effect of building height and the characteristics of the earthquake were investigated in this study. This was achieved through numerical modeling and time-history analyses of three typical two-, four-, and nine-story RC frame buildings in Australia. Moreover, these buildings were subjected to three different types of ground motions which were: short- and long-duration, and near-fault earthquakes. Fragility analysis was then conducted for the three buildings under all the selected earthquake suites. It was noted from the median values of the fragility curves that the four-story and the nine-story RC buildings were 17% and 18% more susceptible to damage in comparison with the two-story building under short-duration earthquakes. Moreover, it was also noted that the median value of the vulnerability increased by 33%, 40%, and 50% for the two-, four-, and nine-story buildings, sequentially, when subjected to near-fault compared to short-duration earthquakes.
This study was carried out to determine the heavy metal accumulation of Juncus rigidus Desfontaines, 1798 from three different regions of the Basrah Province in Southern of Iraq. Specifically, the concentrations of lead, nickel, and cadmium were determined in the roots, culms and leaves of the plant. The results indicated that the highest accumulation of the heavy metal was recorded in lead (Pb) 12.50± 3.58 mg kg-1and then in nickel (< 0.30). The lowest value was recorded for cadmium (< 0.05). As well, lead concentrations in J. rigidus varied in different locations and parts of the plant from undetectable in control to 12.66, 19.33, and 9.80 mg kg-1 in leaves, culm, and roots respective
... Show MoreEMS in accordance with ISO 14001: 2015 is considered an entry point to reduce environmental impacts, especially the effects resulting from the oil industry, which is the main source of environmental pollution and waste of natural resources, since the second revision of the standard took place in September 2015. The problem of the research was manifested in the weakness in understanding the correct guidelines that must be followed in order to obtain and maintain the standard. The purpose of this research was to give a general picture of what is behind ISO14001:2015 and how it is possible to create a comprehensive base for understanding its application by seeking the gap between the actually achieved reality, standards requirements
... Show MoreThe research seeks to achieve its goal of demonstrating the impact of applying banking governance variables on the financial performance of Islamic banks, and the independent research variables are represented by (X) by (the number of independent members in the board (X1), the number of directors in the board (X2), the number of committees emanating from the board ( X3), the percentage of shares owned by major shareholders in the board (X4), the number of members of the Sharia supervisory board (X5)), and the dependent variable (Y) is represented by (rate of return on assets (Y1), rate of return on equity (Y2)).
The research sample included (4) Islamic banks, namely (Iraqi Islamic Bank, National Islamic Bank, Jihan Islamic Bank,
... Show MoreThe present paper deals with experimental investigation of the performance of air cooled split air conditioner, with evaporative water mist pre cooling to increase the cooling capacity and reduce the consumption power under hot and dry climate. This investigation considers how the performance can be enhanced by using water mist to pre-cool ambient air entering the condensers by adiabatic cooling process which depends on the ambient air wet bulb temperature; as well the condensing temperature and condensing pressure will be decreased accordingly. So the cooling capacity would be increased and consumption power would be decreased, consequently the energy ratio, EER would be improved. The performance of air cooled air conditioner with water
... Show MoreIn this work, the linear properties of Vitamin D3-5000IU soft gel were investigated by measuring its absorption and fluorescence spectra. It was observed that there was a shift towards longer wavelength within limits (75 nm), with quantitative efficiency equal to (33.58%). The values of absorbance were used to calculate the extinction coefficient, optical refractive index, optical conductivity and optical dielectric constant values.
The non-linear properties of Vitamin D3-5000IU soft gel was also studied using the Z-Scan technique by using Neodymium-doped Yttrium Garnet (Nd: YAG) continuous laser (CW) emitting in &n
... Show MoreA progressive increase in the desire for environmentally friendly lubricants by users and strict government regulations for the use of these lubricants has provided an opportunity to use plant oils as biodegradable lubricants, therefore vegetable oils have been investigated to replace oil lubricants because of their maintaining the conditions of nature (environment) properties. In this paper, the influences of the blending ratio of mustard seeds oil with commercial mineral oil (SAE40) on the tribological characteristics were investigated and compared with mineral oil using the four-ball tribotester. Mustard seeds oil was blended with mineral oil at a volumetric ratio ranging from 22.5 to 90%. All experimental works were
... Show MoreThis paper suggesting a new modern method to evaluate the performance of hotel industry at Jordan instead of the classical method used by the industry and that is Bench Marking , this method can be done by comparing the performance of hotel industry at two serial years which helps in calculating a standard performance .
The industry can use this standard to identify the variance, which make the evaluation of performance easier and support the efforts to develop the hotel industry at all levels and enable to give high quality services to customers.
The study believed that this situation would not be achieved unless the hotel industry will app
... Show MoreResearching performance audits according to the dimensions of financial sustainability in light of the scarcity of resources and economic and social transformations in the business environment is of utmost importance in the non-profit non-governmental organizations in achieving the goals and correct the path and address deviations, and help them in improving the outputs of processes and associated procedures and capacity The research was based on the hypothesis that the existence of a performance audit program in accordance with the dimensions of financial sustainability leads to the measurement of the commitment of the Olympic Committee. National Iraqi indicators of financial sustainability of the dimension of revenue in order to improv
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