One of the most complicated and challenging issues in today & apos; s financial managers is the relationship between the components of capital structure in terms of bonds and shares used for financing and share price of their company, and its effects on the macroeconomic variables. This research aims to study the relationship between the capital structure and performance of the production market in some firms listed on Tehran Stock Exchange (TSE). In this research, the index of capital structure is debt ratio and that of production market performance is sales growth and return of assets (ROA). The statistical sample of this research includes 128 companies, which have been active in 11 various industries and listed on TSE over the period 2005-2010. The statistical techniques used to test the hypotheses of this research include correlation coefficient and pooled least squares regression (panel data). Based on the results of our survey, there is a strong and significant relationship between debt ratio and return on assets among the companies listed on TSE and most industries especially based metals at the confidence level of 95%. In contrast, there is no strong and significant relationship between debt ratio and sales growth in the above-mentioned companies and in most industries.

In this survey, we have investigated whether an easy and comprehensive information technology (IT) infrastructure could contribute on auditing system in Iranian business society. The survey designs and distributes a questionnaire based on technology adoption method (TAM) among employees of bank Melli Iran who participated in our survey in Likert scale and using t-student and Kruskal-Wallis test examined different hypotheses. The results of our survey have indicated that there was a relationship between a good perception in usefulness of IT implementation and accepting recent advances of IT and auditors with good perception on IT are able to take advantage of recent advances of IT in their auditing skills. In addition, our survey has concluded that ease of IT implementation could create motivation among auditors to automate their traditional skills. While educational background played an important role on our survey, age and job experience did not have any impact on our survey.

This paper presents the engineering basis for a document, Residential Design and Construction Guidelines (hereafter, Guidelines). The Guidelines is developed by the engineers of Build Change and its partners based on their technical reconnaissance after the 2013 earthquake in Bohol on October 15, 2013, and Typhoon Haiyan on November 8, 2013. The Guidelines are centered on the observations of typical residential construction and damage in these areas and the requirements of the 2010 National Structural Code of the Philippines. The Guidelines provide illustrated and simple instructions on residential construction, making them accessible to homeowners and local builders. The Guidelines are designed for disaster-resistant, permanent low-rise housing construction, endorsed by the Department of Public Works and Highways of the Philippines (in March 2016). Increasing understanding and application of the Guidelines in residential construction in earthquake- and typhoon-prone areas will increase the structural safety of houses and the country's resiliency.

Indian retail industry held the second rank in A.T. Kearney's Global retail development index in 2021 and ranked 16th FDI confidence index. The retail industry provides ample job opportunities and contributes to the economic progress of the nation. After the advent of new innovation there are new technologies which have emerged in business and it also substantially changed consumer behavior. Digital communication allows the user to transfer data from one end to another using digital technologies like e-mail, phone calls, video conferencing, and several instant message applications. Digital communication allows retailers to send personalized business information to their loyal customers and the customers respond to those messages, which in turn generate business for unorganized retailers. Digital communication not only improves the business of unorganized retailers but also the business image, Geographical spread, profitability, new customer acquisition, customer retention, and the like. Digital communication will transform the traditional unorganized retailer into an offline-to-online commerce model. Based on theoretical review this study identified constructs and proposed major determinants which influence technology adoption and its continuance among the unorganized retailers. This study assesses the digital communication technology usage in supply chain management among unorganized retailers with the constructs like experience, effortlessness, efficiency, enrichment, trust, security, digital infrastructure, satisfaction, and continuous intention to use. The results show that digital communication technology's effort, experience, and efficiency influence satisfaction. However, enrichment failed to influence satisfaction. Further, the results show that satisfaction and security influence continuous intention to use. However, trust and digital infrastructure failed to influence. Therefore, digital communication technology usage in supply chain management among unorganized retailers is substantially influenced by constructs like effort, experience, efficiency, satisfaction, and security.

Nowadays, one of the challenges in the organizations according to budget limitations in the com-panies, is how to prioritize their project portfolios in the events of their strategies. In other words, organizations are seeking to allocate resources in order to gain the maximum profit ac-cording to budget limitations. In this article, a hybrid decision making method is used to priori-tize construction project portfolio by considering sustainability criteria. First, Lexicographic method is applied to weight the sustainability criteria. Then, by considering the weights derived from the Lexicographic and sustainability criteria, projects are prioritized based on VIKOR method. The proposed method of this study is applied for a case study of projects in the refinery scope.

During a pandemic like COVID-19, the country adopted a lockdown to minizine the spread of the pandemic which disrupted the global supply chain and supply chain resilience failed to minimize disruption. In this regard, this study aims to explore the resilience system among countries during a global disruption and the impact of supply chain disruption on supply chain resilience through misinformation/fake news, panic buying behavior, and inflation factors. For this purpose, the analytical study has been selected to predict the impact of supply chain disruption on supply chain resilience through misinformation/fake news, panic buying behavior, and inflation and propose a solution accordingly. The data from 89 countries are collected on various factors for the year 2020 and mediating analysis is selected to test the hypothesis through regression and correlation. They illustrate that there is a 46% correlation and 21% dependency between supply chain disruption and supply chain resilience through misinformation/fake news, panic buying behavior, supply chain disruption & inflation. The criterion validity of convergence validity and Cronbach of homogeneity test are applied. It has been found that panic buying behavior & supply chain disruption has a 71% strong correlation as compared to other factors and the reliability is 69% which is highly reliable and acceptable. In the end, it is concluded that strong coordination among countries will minimize global supply chain disruption through supply chain resilience for continuing supply chain activities and supply chain organizations & mass media organizations coordination with each other for minimizing misinformation/fake news, panic buying behavior supply chain disruption, and inflation factors to improve supply chain resilience by using artificial intelligence technology.

A new sol-gel derived ceramic-carbon composite electrode was fabricated by the use of CuI as modifier. The electrocatalytic activity of the copper iodide modified sol-gel derived ceramic-carbon composite (CIM-SGD-CCC) electrode was examined for the oxidation of hydrazine. Cyclic voltammetry was employed to study the electrochemical and electrocatalytic properties of the modified electrode. Results showed that the CIM-SGD-CCC electrode has very high catalytic activity for electrooxidation of hydrazine. This proves that the copper iodide bears the main role in electro-catalytic oxidation of hydrazine. This modified electrode shows fast amperometric response with the range from 1 ? mol L-1 to 40 ? mol L-1 and the limit of detection (LOD) of 0.524 ? mol L-1 for hydrazine. The relative standard deviation (R.S.D.) was 0.72 % for 5 successive assays. High stability, good reproducibility, rapid response, easy surface regeneration and fabrication are the important characteristics of the proposed electrode.

This survey research paper explores the methods most commonly used in over 190 studies determining life insurance efficiency. The purpose is to provide an overview of life insurance efficiency studies and guidance as to the (dis)advantages of the different techniques used plus their applicability to life insurance. An evaluation of the different approaches is undertaken plus an examination of the numbers and trends of methods and aspects of life insurance efficiency measurement. This paper also discusses the fundamental elements of life insurance efficiency estimation, such as the set-up and form of outputs and inputs. Findings include that the focus of life insurance efficiency studies considering individual nations has changed. Additionally data envelope analysis is the technique used most commonly with stochastic frontier analysis next. Another main result is that output proxies (akin to) premiums and investment income is utilized most. This study allows practitioners to determine the best techniques to employ in life insurance efficiency studies. Moreover an evaluation by regulators of the value and applicability of such studies is facilitated. This article builds upon those previous to enumerate and investigate the approaches most commonly used in over 190 papers determining life insurance efficiency and has described the advantages and disadvantages of these methods. Therefore an assessment of the overall results of efficiency studies is possible. In addition ideas for potential further research are discussed. Consequently this review will be useful to both practitioners and regulators concerned with this area.

In this work, we report on the synthesis of SiO2 hollow spheres using carbon nanospheres as the sacrificial template by hydrothermal method. The synthesized substrates are in a spherical morphology and uniform size distribution. The effects of hydrothermal process, concentration and the reaction temperature were optimized during synthesis of carbon nanospheres. Infrared spectroscopy (IR), and scanning electronic microscopy (SEM) methods were used for identification of the synthesized products. The synthesized SiO2 nanospheres were used as drug carrier to investigate in vitro release behavior of monoterpenic phenol isomers, carvacrol and thymol, in simulated body fluid (SBF). Ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy (UV-vis) method was carried out to determine the amount of the drugs entrapped in the carrier. The results indicated that SiO2 nanospheres have high ability to adsorb the drugs and there is no need for adjusting the pH during the adsorption process. The drug release profile shows a three stages pattern and indicates a delayed release action.

One of the most hazardous phenomena in forests is wildfire or bush fire and early detection of massive damage prevention is vital. Employing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) as a visual and extinguisher tool in order to prevent this tragedy which brings fatal effects on humans and wildlife has high importance. Additionally, using aerial imagery could assist firefighters to recognize fire intensity and localize and route the fire in the forest which shrinks down casualties of firefighters. All these benefits and more is just possible by employing cheap UAVs. The proposed research uses nature-inspired image processing techniques in order to segment and classify fire in color and thermal images. Multiple nature-inspired and traditional computer vision techniques, including Chicken Swarm Algorithm (CSA) intensity adjustment (contrast enhancement), Denoising Convolutional Neural Network (DnCNN), Local Phase Quantization (LPQ) feature extraction, Bees Image Segmentation, Biogeography-Based Optimization (BBO) feature selection, Firefly Algorithm (FA) classification and more are employed to achieve high classification and segmentation accuracy. The system evaluates nine performance metrics including, F-Score, Accuracy, and Jaccard for the segmentation stage and four performance metrics for the classification stage. All experiments are conducted on the two most recent UAV fire datasets of FLAME (2021) and DeepFire (2022). Additionally, fire intensity, fire direction, and fire geometrical calculation are calculated which assists firefighters even more. As smoke shows the location of the fire, a smoke detection workflow is proposed, too. Proposed system Compared with traditional and novel methods for segmentation and classification leading to satisfactory and promising results for almost all metrics. The trained model of this system could be used in most of the current rescue UAVs in real-time applications. For the FLAME dataset (color data), segmentation precision is 95.57 % and classification accuracy is 91.33 %. Also, For the DeepFire dataset segmentation precision is 91.74 % and classification accuracy is 96.88 %.