Proceedings of the Eighth Saudi Students Conference in the UK

The following sections are included:

• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction

This is a conceptual paper that tries to highlight, articulate and think about the relationship of public relations (PR) with culture, and examines how Saudi Arabian traditional cultural practices, such as wasta and karam, influence how PR functions in this area. While PR in the Middle East is currently still developing, its present state is affected by confusion as to what PR means and what it should do in a company. Researchers have examined what determines the state of PR in this area by examining the economic development of the countries and the relationship between PR practitioners and journalists. Existing research has, however, chosen to look at Arab PR through a Western lens, which means they have examined the state of PR in this area by Western standards of PR and have not taken into consideration Arab culture. The paper will examine how the elements and cultural differences complicate the understanding of PR practice in Saudi Arabia and therefore what questions need to be asked to be able to clarify these things at a theoretical level, but also to be able to look at the practice in analytical terms.

The present study examines the development of paganism in Najran, south-western Saudi Arabia, during the sixth and seventh centuries CE. Christianity, Judaism, paganism and Islam later formed a religious pluralism that was able to live peacefully most of the time. Pagans formed the majority of this society and they undertook the political leadership and military defence of their country. The first part of this study is on the general aspects of religious life, including the arrival of religion and the most sacred houses of worship. It then highlights the most important rituals of worship such as pilgrimage, prayer and the concept of Allah. The third part discusses the relationship of the Najranite pagans either with other pagan groups or with those of other religion. The study concludes that the pagans of Najran had peaceful relations with other religions, and were able to establish a multi-religion society that would live together in peace and tolerance.

This paper focuses on information ethics in Saudi Arabia's embrace of e-government by referencing the Deputy Government of Riyadh Region for Regional Municipalities (GMRA) and concentrating on agency employees' perceptions. It found out that the agency did not adopt a specific framework for information ethics in e-government. Nevertheless, it adopted a code of ethics, which are drawn from the moral codes afforded by the Islamic religion. The technology acceptance model (TAM) is presented to develop a framework of information ethics in e-government, with the model specifically emphasising trust and perceived risks as important factors. The paper employs a qualitative method that adopts an interpretive approach. It uses survey and a focus group discussion for primary research, while books and online resources are used for secondary research. Recommendations include establishing an objective for installing information ethics, conducting training programmes and orienting employees to information ethics, its importance and the ethical standard they should follow.

This research focus of this paper is entrepreneurial growth in Saudi Arabia in relation to existing small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and how exploration of financial support systems (FSS) and exploiting finance leads to this growth. Entrepreneurs are able to grow their SMEs by accessing finance from FSS and that finance availability offers a noticeable influence on entrepreneurial characteristics. Where FSSs are used to grow SMEs, people in business and other areas work towards increased roles in entrepreneurship as they see FSSs as assisting businesses growth. A second set of logics is that growth of SMEs and entrepreneurship happens because entrepreneurs are able to explore FSS and exploit finance. Entrepreneurs are able to accomplish growth because some characteristics motivate such accomplishment.

Significant attempts have been made by national governments in recent years to provide services and information on the Internet using information and communication technology. However, the accomplishment of these efforts strongly depends on how the targeted users, such as citizens, relay, use and adopt them. As a consequence, a common need to understand the adoption and diffusion of electronic government, or e-government, has emerged in both developed and developing countries. Several impediments may prevent citizens from adopting e-government services, however, and trust is one of the major barriers. Therefore, this study aims to understand the influence of citizens' trust on the adoption of e-government services in the example of Saudi Arabia. From the data analysis, the exogenous variables of trust in Internet, government ability, government benevolence and integrity, and social influence were found to significantly affect citizens' trust in e-government services, whilst citizens' trust propensity was found to more usefully predict citizens' behavioural intention to use e-government services.

My paper aims at presenting the cross-cultural encounters between my educational and intellectual background as an international Ph.D. researcher and the epistemological stances underpinning my Western-based methodology. In my reflexive ethnographic study of a global non-governmental organisation, I developed a dual act of reflexivity, one on constructing the data and the other on developing my methodological perspectives and skills. I draw this approach from Alvesson's (2010) proposal for a methodological awareness through ‘an epistemological-theoretical-methodological context’ in order to make stronger knowledge claims.

In response to the recent housing finance shortage in Saudi Arabia, many solutions have been suggested. Levying taxes on the ownership of undeveloped and extensive lands is one of them. This is because the increase in land prices in recent years has affected the total housing cost, which in turn has impacted on the process of obtaining housing finance. The current picture of lending shows that lenders, including banks, do not lend enough money to enable the borrower to buy a home, given the high cost of housing. As a result, people have avoided borrowing. Therefore, the main purpose of the suggestion to levy taxes on land is to reduce land prices (by encouraging landowners to sell), which will lead to reduced housing costs, so that the latter will be proportional to the loans provided by banks. Thus borrowers will be able to afford to buy houses, and housing finance will be stimulated. However, approval of this suggestion has faced some legal obstacles. They consist of two questions: are constitutional limitations accommodated in this suggestion, and does a tax levy comply with Islamic law, which is considered the main source of the Saudi legal system? The paper found that the suggestion needs to be adjusted to comply with constitutional limitations. Also, it found that the second question has been answered by the Council of Senior Ulama (CSU), which expressly stated that imposing tax does not comply with Islamic law. Therefore, a moderated suggestion is offered by this paper: instead of levying taxes, impose zakat, or zakah, which is an Islamic instrument. The paper found that zakat will play the same role as taxation and is accepted by both believers and Muslim scholars. However, zakat cannot be applied in the case of lands owned by non-Muslims, who are not subject to this instrument. This issue has been addressed by the following proposal: impose taxes on lands owned by non-Muslims and zakat on lands owned by Muslims.

Although many studies have indicated that an enormous number of organisational change initiatives fail due to several reasons, in the forefront of them is resistance to organisational change (ROC). However, study of this phenomenon has not received adequate attention from researchers. Therefore, this paper examines the impact of leader-member exchange (LMX) on ROC in Saudi Arabian organisations that are being privatised. Based on data collected from 406 managers and employees in three Saudi organisations, the results of statistical data analysis showed that LMX was correlated negatively to the components of resistance, namely affective, behavioural and cognitive. Moreover, the results revealed that participants' age, qualification and job were negatively related to ROC, while there was a non-significant relationship between organisational tenure and resistance.

This research paper offers an evaluation of the attempt of six Arabic countries towards adopting a single currency and achieving a monetary union. To assess the feasibility of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries to produce a common currency, the research adopts the well-known theory of optimum currency area (OCA) by Mundell (1961). The paper reviews empirical as well as theoretical studies on the GCC states' attempts to form a single currency. Moreover, it discusses a number of criteria suggested in Mundell's theory and how these are applied in the context of the GCC countries. The paper concludes with some recommendations for policy.

Motivated by the knowledge economy, globalisation and innovation, companies seek new ways to enhance knowledge creation and sharing to achieve organisational objectives. In recent years, the notion of communities of practice (CoPs) has burgeoned, with large business organisations increasingly creating and supporting CoPs actively, particularly as a knowledge management initiative. Aspects related to organisational culture, structure and top management directly impact knowledge sharing in CoPs. However, few studies have directly addressed the influence of these factors on CoPs within business organisations. Accordingly, this study aims to contribute to existing knowledge by exploring organisational culture, structure and top management issues that influence CoPs activities in a non-Western country, namely Saudi Arabia.

Business environments are complex and evolve dynamically to react to environmental or contextual changes. Nowadays, many businesses use business processes to describe and automate their operations. However, current business process systems are based on executing statically defined workflows, which do not naturally allow the handling of emergent needs. In this work we are developing mechanisms to allow for a dynamic adaptation of workflows, and consider assurances that the derived workflows still achieve the main aims of the originals. Specifically, these mechanisms are self-adaptive workflows, based on policies, and self-managed adaptations, based on the refinement checking of an underlying formal model. The formal model, developed using the process algebra known as communicating sequential processes (CSP), allows for checking the correctness of desired adaptations at system runtime and when the adaptation is being attempted. In this paper we present the overview of our approach.

This paper investigates the extension of the z-score model in predicting the health of UK companies. It uses multiple discriminant analysis (MDA) and performance ratios to test which ratios were statistically significant in predicting the health of companies between 2000 and 2013. The purpose of this study is to contribute towards Altman's (1968) original z-score model by adding new variables. It was found that cash flow, when combined with the original z-score variable, is highly significant in predicting the health of UK companies. A J-UK model was thus developed to test the health of UK companies. When compared with the z-score model, the predictive power of the model was 82.9%, which is consistent with Taffler's (1982) UK model. Furthermore, to test the predictive power of the model before, during and after the financial crisis of 2007–2008, results showed that the J-UK model had a higher accuracy in predicting the health of UK companies than the z-score UK model.

Executive remuneration has attracted the attention of the general public in recent years. It is an interest driven by the extensive and sustained rise in executive pay experienced in most developed countries. Two questions arise from increased executive pay. First, what are the determinants of executive pay and what is the nature of the relationship between executive pay and firm performance? Second, does rising executive pay reflect top management's contribution to firm performance or it is just following stationary patterns depending on past years? Prior research provides mixed findings, which may be attributed to the overlooked fact of the dynamic nature of the pay-performance association. Using UK data from 2000–2012, and employing mainly the generalised method of moment estimation (SYSTEM-GMM), this study aims to investigate whether chief executive officer (CEO) pay does actually enhance firm performance. I found that past CEO salary has a negative impact on accounting earnings, while CEO bonuses positively determine future earnings. It is also found that long-term compensation is positively associated with market-based performance measures. This supports the agency framework that executive pay can align the interests of managers and shareholders.

In spite of a growing field of research interest in management with regard to religion in the last few decades, there is a dearth of such studies on Islam. The purpose of the present study therefore is twofold. First, to test the Islamic faith-based model developed by Alshehri, Fotaki and Kauser (2013), and second, to develop and validate a scale that measures a Muslim's view of God. To enable this, a sample of 427 responses was collected from people in Saudi Arabia. Notably, the model was empirically valid. Moreover, results showed that the newly constructed Muslim's View of Allah at Work Scale (MVAWS) had adequate psychometric properties in terms of structural validity, internal consistency and correlations, and predicted personal religious practices. To test the validity, conformity factors analysis (CFA) was run. The scale items show a good fit. In this paper we consider the terms ‘Allah’ and ‘God’ to be synonymous and use them interchangeably.

This research paper aims to explore the perceptions of Saudi women about their legal awareness with regards to domestic violence (DV) laws. While there has been an increasing interest in the ‘common place of law’, there is a dearth of research on women's views about their legal consciousness of DV laws, both in Saudi Arabia and internationally. The study aims to bridge this gap and contribute to our understanding of how women's awareness, individually and collectively, of their legal rights enhances the implementation of laws and the elimination of DV in matrimonial homes. Thematic analysis was utilised to highlight recurring themes in the interviews and map major themes in the literature. The findings reveal a lack or minimal awareness of DV laws among Saudi women. This was attributed to simplistic views of DV and the legal treatment adopted by the state, socio-cultural influences and the absence of women's voices in the legal discourse.

This paper is an attempt to improve the understanding of the role played by professionalism in the implementation of a high-performance work system (HPWS). Based on institution theory, this paper seeks to investigate how professional norms (i.e. the competence and political stature of the actors involved) as an institutional factor affects the efficacy of the relationship interaction between human resources (HR) and line managers when implementing HPWS functions. In other words, investigating the extent to which the partnership and co-ordination between HR and line management exists based on their professional norms. Using a case study involving two Saudi banks, and conducting semistructure interview with 54 managers, results indicated that both HR professionals and unit members' political stature and competencies have significant impacts on building trust and reciprocity. Furthermore, line managers' work-type priorities and interests form another vital factor that has an implication for the level of interaction between the two players.

This paper analyses forced labour and human trafficking laws from the UK and the Saudi Arabian perspective. It begins with a discussion of the characteristics of human trafficking and the legal frameworks adopted by transnational and trans-regional bodies to restrict human trafficking. Next, the paper analyses the legal instruments in the UK and Saudi Arabia for the protection of victims of trafficking, and finally it provides a critical commentary on forced labour and the international and national legal instruments for preventing this. This examination of both states' efforts to identify the weaknesses and strengths of each, and in particular to address the weaknesses in the Saudi system as compared to the UK system, is the main purpose of this paper. Saudi Arabia can improve its ranking from Tier 3 to Tier 2 (United States Department of State, 2002) if reforms are introduced in the legislation and enforcement domains. (Tier 1 means ‘countries whose governments fully comply with the TVPA's [Trafficking Victims Protection Act 2000] minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking’; Tier 2 means ‘countries whose governments do not fully comply with the TVPA's minimum standards but are making significant efforts to bring themselves into compliance with those standards’; and Tier 3 means ‘countries whose governments do not fully comply with the TVPA's minimum standards and are not making significant efforts to do so’.) The anti-trafficking laws are also improving in Saudi Arabia, with an emphasis on the role of the law enforcement agencies in preventing the occurrence of trafficking across Saudi borders.

The ability of fuzzy logic systems (FLSs) to abstract and to explain the complex behaviour of systems in linguistic terms has been the driving force behind this research. In this paper, a general presentation about fuzzy sets (FSs) and systems, and a comparison of the ability of both types, type-1 fuzzy logic systems (T1 FLSs) and interval type-2 fuzzy logic systems (IT2 FLSs), when faced with different levels of noise and uncertainty, are investigated. Here also, the design of different types of FLSs is explored and a comparison between two different controllers, type-1 and interval type-2, is carried out by applying them to the truck backer-upper problem. This paper then indicates the effect of different models for uncertainty, providing the starting point for a deeper and more elaborate analysis of the role and modelling of uncertainty in type-2 fuzzy sets and systems.

Software defined networking (SDN) is a promising technology that is expected to dominate the networking market, especially wired networking. This network architecture overcomes many of the shortcomings in traditional transmission control protocol (TCP) networking by decoupling data and control planes and centralising the logic/control in the network. A successful and popular implementation of SDN is the OpenFlow protocol, which has lately been implemented by the largest Internet and networking corporations. To date, however, there is little research related to wireless networks and the integration of the OpenFlow protocol. This paper presents the results of a comprehensive survey of trials to integrate SDN technology with wireless networks. The applications of such integration are highlighted, such as performance, load balancing, and networks in rural areas.

The Resource Description Framework (RDF) is increasingly used for storing large data structures. Such large RDF collections evolve as a consequence of their representation within a changing world. Therefore, this ever-changing data needs to be managed and updated when a change occurs. In order to cope with the evolving nature of the Semantic Web, an effective and efficient technique for detecting changes and updating RDF is required. In this paper, we provide through experiment a detailed analysis of the overall process of RDF change detection techniques, namely explicit change detection, forwardinference change detection, backward-inference change detection and pruning-and-backward- inference change detection.

The seating assignment problem in aeroplanes is a crucial issue for every airline company, especially Saudi Arabian Airlines, whose many problems arranging seats for their customers, most of whom are from Saudi Arabia (Alsharq al-Awsat News, 2007), were evidenced by a recent online survey (Appendix A1). It appears that three main constraints are faced in every flight. First, two people from different genders prefer not to sit next to each other if they do not belong to the same family. Second, families or groups of friends always prefer to sit close to each other. Third, all other sitting preferences are neglected while considering the importance of the two previous constraints.In this paper, we are going to consider several solutions to solve this problem in a way that is acceptable to all, with a comparison between these different solutions achieved to best solve the problem.

Madinah 50 is a digital application designed to be used in local museums in Al Madinah, Saudi Arabia. It has been developed by the researcher using 3D software and a game engine programme to represent the city of Al-Madinah in the period between 1850 and 1950. The paper explains the design process of the implementation and the workflow of the system. The production workflow describes the phases of the content creation based on old images and descriptions, and explains how to convert this to create an interactive 3D virtual space.

Non-uniform memory access (NUMA) architectures are modern shared-memory, multi-core machines offering varying access time and latencies between different memory banks. The organisation of nodes across different regions with nodes in the same regions that share the same memory poses challenges to efficient shared-memory access, thus negatively affecting the scalability of parallel applications. This paper studies the effect of state-of-the-art physical shared-memory NUMA architectures on the performance scalability of parallel applications using a range of programs and various language technologies. In particular, different parallel programs are used with different communication libraries and patterns in two sets of experiments. The first experiment examines the performance of the mainstream, widely used parallel technologies MPI and OpenMP, which utilise message passing and shared-memory communication patterns respectively. In addition, the performance implications of message passing versus shared-memory access on NUMA are compared using a concordance application. The second experiment assesses the performance of two parallel Haskell implementations as examples of a high-level language with automatic memory management.The results revealed that in the case of OpenMP the scalability was good, with threads up to six representing threads allocated in the same NUMA node. Moreover, as the number of threads increased, the performance dramatically decreased, confirming the effect of inefficient memory access. Likewise, MPI demonstrated similar behaviours, with the optimum speedup at six cores. However, unlike OpenMP, performance did not decrease sharply beyond that point, illustrating the benefits of message passing as opposed to shared-memory access. In terms of the standard, shared-memory parallel Haskell implementation, the scalability was limited to between 10 to 25 cores out of 48 across three parallel programs, with high memory management overheads. On the other hand, our parallel Haskell implementation, GUMSMP, which combines both distributed and shared-heap abstractions, scaled consistently with a speedup of up to 24 on 48 cores and overall performance improvement of up to 57%, as compared with the shared-memory implementation.

This paper discusses a new parallel corpus for Arabic and English. The new corpus contains 27.8 million Arabic words and 30.8 million English words and covers various topics including books, businesses, cinema, conferences, economics, legal issues, opinions and politics. The corpus was carefully prepared to examine and correct the entire dataset to ensure noise and mistranslations have been eliminated as much as is technically possible.

We propose a reference model and its computational core to construct learning spaces (LeS) that take into account differences in learning (DiffInL). The computational model is based on (a) semantic Web rule language (SWRL)-enabled ontology Web languages (OWLs) that secure the correct interpretation of the semantics of a learning environment (LE), and (b) a reasoning mechanism that allows a personalised LE. We illustrate the proposal by showing a scenario of inferring learning practices in LeS created for people who exhibit autistic syndrome (autism) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and who are interested in achieving certain learning goals.

Content on the Web is huge and constantly growing, and building taxonomies for such content can help with navigation and organisation, but building taxonomies manually is costly and time-consuming. An alternative is to allow users to construct folksonomies: collective social classifications. Yet, folksonomies are inconsistent and their use for searching and browsing is limited. Approaches have been suggested for acquiring implicit hierarchical structures from folksonomies, however, but these approaches suffer from the ‘popularity-generality’ problem, in that popularity is assumed to be a proxy for generality, i.e. high-level taxonomic terms will occur more often than low-level ones. To tackle this problem, we propose in this paper an improved approach. It is based on the Heymann–Benz algorithm, and works by checking the taxonomic directions against a corpus of text. Our results show that popularity works as a proxy for generality in at most 90.91% of cases, but this can be improved to 95.45% using our approach, which should translate to higherquality tag hierarchy structures.

This paper presents a novel approach of agile methods causing a shift in the software development field. ‘Scrum’, as one of these methods, is an iterative and incremental process of software development usually used as a project management framework. The literature has reviewed some studies and researchers' attempts at integrating security activities with agile software development methods (Martin, 2003), and has motivated the need to integrate security into these methods. This paper describes the integration of a security owner role and UMLsec (an extension by Jürjens [2002] of unified modelling language [UML] that encapsulates security requirements) security requirements techniques within an agile development method. The discussion concentrates on how to apply UMLsec in software projects that are controlled by the scrum management framework.

Multi-label classification is a supervised learning problem that predicts multiple labels simultaneously. One of the key challenges in such tasks is modelling the correlations between multiple labels. In this paper we use a ‘decision tree’ algorithm, which models label dependency locally. The proposed algorithm establishes a hybrid multi-label decision tree (HMLDT) that interpolates between two baseline methods: binary relevance, which assumes all labels independent; and label powerset, which learns the joint label distribution. The key idea is a splitting criterion based on the label covariance matrix. Empirical results on 12 datasets show strong performance of the HMLDT, particularly on datasets with hundreds of labels.

In phrase-based, statistical machine translation systems, variations in grammatical structures between source and target languages can cause large movements of phrases. Modelling such movements is crucial in achieving translations of long reorderings that appear natural in the target language. In this paper, we explore generative and discriminative learning approaches to phrase reordering in Arabic to English. Formulating the reordering problem as a classification problem and using naive Bayes, we achieve an improvement in BLEU score over a lexicalised reordering model for Arabic-English. The model is scalable to large datasets.

In modern warfare combatants can be equipped with computing devices to report on changes in the battlefield situation and make important observations to operational planners and commanders. More often than not, these devices cannot communicate directly to achieve a seamless information exchange, but instead must use intermediate nodes or wait before making a connection, i.e. they are loosely coupled. To provide communication support for all mobile devices by connecting all the loosely coupled scenario elements, it is important to support and develop effective routing algorithms operating in a mobile adhoc network (MANET) environment, which would be naturally appropriate for military purposes. In this work we show that greedy perimeter stateless routing (GPSR) does not perform adequately in military scenarios due to frequent network disconnections, which occur as a consequence of operating in a large, battalion-sized deployment area. Furthermore, we propose a novel optimisation to GPSR algorithms targeted at battalionlevel topologies that includes techniques drawn from delay-tolerant network research to enhance performance by using knowledge derived from the application itself and the topology.

The traditional password has long been the most widely used authentication mechanism in spite of its well-known flaws. In order to address these flaws, researchers have utilised images or drawings as a potential alternative. In this paper, we consider the attributes of several graphic-based techniques. As a result, the study suggests a new data-entry classification within the field of graphical authentication. Several related graphical password schemes that share the characteristic of keypad typing entry are reviewed here. In addition, various illustrative summaries are provided in accordance with the related category, which also shows the fundamental design aspects associated with each category. This work aims to benefit researchers in the field of authentication security with an interest in alternative authentication methods.

Cloud computing system is a modern technology that enables users to share resources in a virtual storage and computing environment. A cloud system provides an environment of a number of virtual machines (VMs), which are used by multiple users, and implemented on a single physical server. However, cloud security is one of the substantial concerns for researchers and users of cloud computing. In order to secure data storage, any malicious behaviour, which could be internal, such as data loss, or external, e.g. attacks, should be promptly discovered and stopped if possible. In this paper, our research approach focuses on identifying malicious behaviour via discovering respective symptoms rather than targeting particular malicious behaviour directly. The reason behind our research approach is that a malicious behaviour can be characterised by a set of symptoms. Finally, this paper provides experiments of monitoring VMs in order to discover symptoms.

A robotic swarm needs to ensure a continuous operation even in the event of the failure of one or more individual robots. Even with a small number of faulty robots, the time to achieve any task will be affected. Failure detection techniques can involve an investigation of similar techniques in insects. The research here involves an enhancement technique that relies on the transferable data from a robot's controller to be diagnosed by other robots within communication range. Therefore, communication plays an important part of the diagnosis procedure. A fault is identified if the transferred data does not match with the data from the other robot. This research explores the performance of the simulation experimental results. It can be shown that failed robots are detected correctly with the proposed technique in a timely manner.

A configuration for a mechanically tuned, suspended-substrate-stripline, low-pass filter is proposed, where the traditional resonating posts are replaced with a combination of a suspended planar circuit and tuning plates. The proposed filter is designed based on the elliptic low-pass prototype filter and the Richardson frequency and element transformation at a cut-off frequency (Fc) equal to 1.78 GHz. The implemented capacitively tuned filter presents a good response at the transmission band, with a high selectivity response at the band-edge frequency. The filter's tuning range is approximately 210 MHz. Moreover, the losses vary from 10.6 to 13.03 dB for a return loss at the frequency range 1.564 to 1.782 GHz, and the insertion loss equals 0.441dB at the cut-off frequency of 1.564 GHz.

This paper explains the setup and instrumentation of full-scale fire experiments for the purpose of fire research and fire-fighting training. The tests were conducted in a single burn room connected to a main entrance by a corridor. Detailed information of the measurements and dimensions of the test facility and equipment used are provided. Additionally, examples of the measurements that could be obtained are demonstrated. The influence of fire-fighting operation techniques on a well-instrumented, fully developed compartment fire is then studied. It was found that the short pulses towards the ceiling had an immediate effect in reducing the temperature of the smoke layer by dropping the temperature elsewhere by up to about 100 °C. Air supply to the fire was restricted by the fire-fighting team entering the compartment through the corridor (the only air supply path), resulting in a rise of the equivalence ratio of the fire and subsequently the fire effluents' yields.

Concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) technology has the potential to replace expensive photovoltaic (PV) material with cheaper optical elements. However, the non-uniformity of incident flux is detrimental to CPV as it tends to cause hot spots and current mismatch leading to reduced electrical efficiency within the system. Using advanced ray-tracing software, this work investigates the optical performance of a high-concentration-ratio (CR) Fresnel lens at various focal lengths and groove facet angles. Also, the effect of using a small, square reflector placed above the receiver as a second optical element (SOE) is investigated. Results show that a combination of introducing a reflector 60 mm above the receiver and increasing the focal length of the Fresnel lens to 500 mm significantly improve the surface illumination uniformity with minimum loss in received power.

Time of flight-secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) is becoming a valuable bioanalysis surface-image tool due to its capabilities of in situ measurements of biomolecules, accompanied by high spatial resolution and high sensitivity. However, matrix ionisation effects lead to difficulties in the quantitative analysis of the analytes of interest. This issue largely arises from the high dependence of the ion signal on the localised chemical environment. The development of massive gas cluster ion beams comprised of argon (Ar_n⁺) or water (H₂O)_n⁺ (n<10,000) has led to less chemical damage accumulation and higher secondary ion yield. In this study, we report the assessment of various primary ion beam types in the ionisation of metabolites in a heterogonous environment; the analysis has been carried out on a mixture of amino acids and amino acids doped in the sugar trehalose. The results show that the ionisation of metabolites using different beams generally follows the gas-phase basicity (GPB) order of the amino acids. The analysis using water cluster beam reduces the matrix effect of the amino acids when mixed with trehalose, producing a secondary ion yield that is less variable between analytes.

Diamond-like carbon (DLC) film is a mixture of various allotropes of carbon; predominately it is comprised of sp³ and sp², with hydrogen stabilising the dangling bonds. The film is a metastable form of amorphous carbon, possessing a range of attractive chemical, mechanical, tribological, optical and electrical properties. The electrical and optical properties of the film are mainly determined by the sp³/sp² ratio and the amount of hydrogen content in the DLC. A number of methods have been employed previously to understand the sp³/sp² ratio and the amount of hydrogen in DLC thin film; for example, Raman analysis of the sp³/sp² ratio and Rutherford backscattering and infrared spectroscopy for the estimation of the hydrogen content. The information regarding the sp³/sp² ratio and the amount of hydrogen is key to the fabrication of reliable electronic devices. The amount of hydrogen present in the thin films can be estimated according to infrared absorption. Thin films are generally deposited onto substrate; this study investigates the suitability of various substrates for a Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) analysis of DLC.

Incorporation of conductive carbon fillers into polymer matrices can improve the electrical, thermal and mechanical properties of the resulting composites. In this work, three different conductive carbon fillers size were used: graphite (microfiller), graphite nano-platelets (GNP) and as-received multiwall carbon nanotubes (A-MWCNTs) as nanofiller. These three fillers were incorporated into polyethylene terephthalate (PET) to prepare four types of PET/carbon micro- and nano-composites. These composites were prepared by meltcompounding using a Haake Minilab extruder equipped with co-rotating twin screws. The extruded samples were compression-moulded to films of 1 mm thickness. The effect of those carbon fillers on the electrical properties of PET was investigated. The PET/AMWCNTs composites exhibited an excellent electrical conductivity with a low percolation threshold (Φ_c ~ 0.33 wt. % of carbon nanotubes [CNTs]) compared to other investigated PET/carbon composites.

A maximum power point tracking (MPPT) controller is necessary for a photovoltaic (PV) power system to improve its energy conversion efficiency. An MPPT can be achieved by regulating the input voltage of the PV system, and one of the power electronics converter's objectives in a PV system is to perform the MPP operation. There are several topologies of DC-to-DC converters, and in this paper a single-ended primary-inductor converter (SEPIC) topology has been implemented and analysed. The complicity in controlling SEPIC has been simplified, and the MPPT controller has been proposed using sliding mode control (SMC). The results show a simple design and a satisfactory operation with a perfect achievability of MPP. The validation of the proposed controller is shown by a MATLAB/Simulink environment.

Spatial modulation (SM) has recently received much attention since it can achieve a spatial multiplexing gain while avoiding the conventional multi-input-multi-output (MIMO) limitations such as inter-channel interference (ICI), inter-antenna synchronisation (IAS) and multiple radio frequency (RF) chains. Space shift keying (SSK) is a special case of SM. In SSK, only the antenna indices are used to convey the information. Therefore, the complexity of the receiver is reduced compared to that of the conventional SM, which reduces the cost of the transceiver. The main contributions in this paper are: first, we propose three different methods in order to analyse the performance of the SSK modulation; second, the numerical calculations are used to validate that all of the three methods lead to the same results; and third, we prove that the simulation results agree with the theoretical analysis. The significant reduction in complexity, without affecting the SM performance gain, suggests SSK as a viable solution for the next generation of wireless communication.

Despite significant advances in stem cell (SC) research, their clinical applications have been delayed owing to a lack of optimal culture condition in vitro. Introducing 3D scaffolds can improve cell-cell and cell-extracellular matrix (ECM) contact and offer in vivosimulated approaches to understanding SC behaviour in vitro. Using quantitative-based gene expression, we show in this paper that SCs in 3D dynamic cultures are characterised by highly expressed, self-renewal genes, compared with those in 2D or 3D static condition. By monitoring the glucose/lactate ratios and ammonia levels, we demonstrate that the lactate accumulates in the 3D static conditions cause metabolic stress, reducing cell viability. In contrast, we show that 3D dynamic cultures deliver enhanced microenvironments with higher cell viability and lower metabolites stress. By Day 18 in our research the cell number exceed 70 × 10³ cells/beads in 3D dynamic culture and the Oct-4 (or Oct-04) expression – a protein used as a marker and regulator of stem cells pluripotency – was also higher. We thus postulate that the reduction of metabolites accumulation introduced by a dynamic fluid flow promoted pluripotency and boosted proliferation.

This paper describes a way of controlling the current waveform of a three-phase, gridconnected inverter using different control schemes. A proportional resonance (PR) control strategy gives a smother waveform compared with proportional integrator (PI) control, and this is demonstrated here by modelling a three-phase, grid-connected inverter using a MATLAB/Simulink environment, where PR and PI control strategies are described, applied, observed and compared in regard to their resultant current waveform distortion, advantages and disadvantages.

Ultrasonic sensors utilise ultrasound that propagates at the speed of several kilometres per second in liquids and solids. For this reason, they respond rapidly to changes in the propagation environment – such as average temperature across the complete ultrasonic pathway – which are difficult to achieve using conventional temperature-sensing technologies that only enable point sensing.

Problems with post-stroke shoulder (PSS) are common after stroke. Rehabilitation in this area is complicated and the lack of a framework to guide the scope of physiotherapy practice is recognised. To resolve this issue, this study aims to provide such a suitable framework. The methodology employed by the study was a mixed-method design that included a scoping review of the role of physiotherapy across PSS management, as well as interviews with 15 specialist physiotherapists working in the UK. The scoping review identified 118 papers covering a total of 13 categories. Thematic analysis of interview data enabled these categories to be mapped into a framework with five key domains: prevention, conceptualisation, assessment, management and delivery. Synthesis of the scoping review and interviews were a useful way of mapping the physiotherapy role, and provided the first empirically derived framework that establishes the physiotherapy contribution to the management of PSS. While informing clinical practice and research, the framework may also be helpful to develop practical, and more focused, guidance for physiotherapists, drawn from a complex evidence base for stroke (e.g. across national clinical guidelines).

The purpose of this study is to investigate the perceptions, level of knowledge, attitudes and behaviour of female nursing students at the Technical Institute for Health Training (TIHT) in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, towards using electronic medical records (EMRs). A questionnaire comprised of closed and open questions was distributed to 70 female nursing students of whom 56 (80%) responded. Results showed that while 58.9% of students have heard of EMR, 78.6% of them have not received any formal EMR training. The findings show that there is no significant relation between age and the level of the study, and the knowledge or attitude towards EMR, although there is a significant relationship between age and the readiness to use EMR, with students over 23 years of age being more prepared to use EMR than those who are under 23 years.

Lung cancer is generally considered a worthwhile target disease because of the high rates of its incidence and resultant deaths worldwide. Due to the drawbacks of chemotherapy employed in lung cancer treatment, research has recently focused on exploiting the promise of small interfering ribonucleic acid (siRNA) therapy. However, the main bottleneck in applying siRNA clinically is its effective delivery to the cytosol of the target cell. This work investigates an siRNA delivery system based on cationic liposomes comprising the cationic lipid 3ß-[N-(N',N'- dimethylaminoethane)-carbamoyl] cholesterol (DC-Chol) and the neutral lipid dioleoylphosphatidylethanolamine (DOPE). It shows that the cytotoxicity of the DCChol: DOPE liposomes per se is dependent on applied concentration and the molar ratio of the lipid components, as observed by MTS and LDH assays in A549 (human epithelial lung cancer) cell culture. A high level of siRNA encapsulation by a classical ‘film hydration’ method was achieved at selected conditions, as confirmed by gel electrophoresis, even at relatively low cationic lipid to siRNA charge ratios. In A549 cell culture, siRNA-liposome formulations prepared at different lipid compositions, and at selected lipid-siRNA ratios, showed a reasonable cellular uptake, as observed by flow cytometry. It can be concluded that siRNA lipoplexes nanoparticles could represent a candidate formulation for future siRNA delivery to lung cancer.

The azygos system is highly variable in terms of its anatomical features. Thus, this study aims to observe its anatomical variations and classify them into types. Thirty Thielembalmed cadavers aged 48 to 98 years (18 of which were female and 12 male) were studied. The termination level and diameter of the azygos, hemiazygos, accessory hemiazygos and left superior intercostal vein were investigated. In addition, the termination level of the right superior intercostal vein was observed. The 30 cases were classified into three types: one case as primitive (Type 1); 26 cases as transitional (Type 2); and three cases as unicolumn (Type 3). Type 2 was further subdivided into five groups according to the number of retroaortic communications present. Lymphovenous communications connecting the thoracic duct with the azygos system were found in this study. Identification and understanding these variations are important during radiological investigations and surgical procedures. Abnormalities of this system may mimic aneurysms and tumours.

In this paper I develop a cooperative investment scheme in a multi-period portfolio optimisation. I suggest that agents can invest their joint capital in a common portfolio, and then divide the resulting outcome according to their risk-reward preferences. I prove that with this strategy all agents can achieve lower risk with the same expected profit, or greater expected profit with the same level of risk, compared to an optimal individual investment strategy. I define the strategy for an investor in a case of individual and cooperative investment, where the portfolio contains one risk-free asset and n risky securities in a single period, then I generalise the strategies into one risk-free asset and n risky securities for cooperative investment in a multi-period. I develop a dynamic programming algorithm to find the optimal time-consistent cooperative trading strategy, and construct the corresponding efficient frontier. The results are implemented and illustrated for components of the S&P 100 Index, for which the scenario tree for future returns was constructed using historical data simulation. In addition, I provide an example that is slightly modified from Grechuk and Zabarankin (2015) and seeks to show that if several agents have different risk preferences, they can reduce their investment risk using cooperation. This paper develops a technique for determining the optimal cooperative investment strategy in both one-period and multi-period portfolio optimisation frameworks. The key benefit from cooperation is that investors use different utility functions, and therefore can act as insurers for each other.

An approach to the synthesis of novel sulphonamide-based siderophores using a serinetrimer, as a readily accessible scaffold, is disclosed in this paper. The methodological studies involved have also resulted in the identification of an uncommon example of desmotropy.

DNA methylation is a critical epigenetic modification involved in the saptio-temporal and developmental regulation of the genome. It is thought to provide a degree of plasticity for the genome in response to environmental stresses, whose effects can span generations. Notably, the methylation process has been demonstrated to be highly reactive to a variety of factors, including diet and maternal in-utero stress. DNA methylation has also been shown to be important in the functioning of the brain. The dopamine signalling pathway is tightly regulated by the methylation of the promoter regions of two key factors: tyrosine hydroxylase (a precursor in the synthesis of dopamine) and the dopamine transporter. We have explored the impact of methylation in the brain, using the AS/AGU rat, a rat model of accelerated ageing with a distinct Parkinsonian phenotype, where disruption of the dopamine signalling system is central to the phenotype and which is driven by a stop mutation in a single gene, that for protein kinase C gamma (PKC_γ), in comparison to the parental wild type AS strain. In this model, we have demonstrated differential methylation in specific brain regions that vary with age, coincident with loss of PKC_γ expression, and dopamine signalling disruption in AS/AGU rats.

The aim of this study was to assess abused children in Saudi Arabia for possible psychological problems. The sample participants were nine Saudi families that included 29 children and eight caregivers (parent or guardian), and the method involved interviewing both the children (two sessions each) and the caregivers. Also, the children were asked to complete the self-report Spence children's anxiety scale (SCAS), while the parents were asked to complete the child behaviour checklist (CBCL). The results showed that children suffered from different types of anxiety, but the highest one was generalised anxiety disorder. Also, the children had emotional and behavioural problems and the most frequent ones were aggressive behaviours and being anxious/depressed. The conclusion is that abused children in Saudi Arabia had high levels of anxiety and behavioural and emotional problems and that this has implications for their care.

The term ‘descriptive linguistics’, also known as ‘synchronic linguistics’, is defined as the ‘systematic study of the patterns and use of a specific language or dialect, at a particular point in time’ (Crystal, 2008). In this context, this study aims to present a linguistic analysis of the functions and uses of ba in Faifa Dialect (FD) from a descriptive perspective. The ultimate goal is to explore its various functions, the meaning it communicates and the different grammatical structures within which it is used. The study shows that ba as used in FD performs three functions: as a future marker, as a particle in the demonstrative structure and as an emphasis marker.

In road traffic, a great number of travellers share the roads and have to interact with other travellers as well as pedestrians. This interaction can sometimes lead to risky behaviour. Driving anger is one of the major issues in traffic that can cause traffic accidents. The purpose of this study is to seek a solution to this issue in Saudi Arabia by studying and understanding the characteristics of anger that occur due to traffic interactions. The interview method has been used with Saudi drivers to investigate the issue: 20 traffic scenarios were developed from the results and various core appraisal components have been identified to categorise the types of traffic events that trigger anger. Finally, our study shows a strong relationship between aggression and anger in the way drivers respond to other drivers. However, more research is needed to discover coping strategies and other important factors with regard to coping styles.

As the demand for low-energy buildings keeps rising, there is a need to develop highly efficient insulation materials to be applied in building envelopes. Preferably, such materials should have low U-values (overall heat transfer coefficients) to reduce energy consumption through heat loss. One such material is a vacuum insulation panel (VIP). With U-values being several times lower than that of traditional insulation, VIPs offer not only an excellent capacity to reduce building heat losses but also increase living space due to reduced requirements for insulation thickness. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to study the economic feasibility of improving U-values of external walls with traditional and advanced insulation materials. The analysis is based on Level 6 of the Code of Sustainable Homes (CSH), while an external wall (in Nottingham) with a U-value of 0.17 W/m²K was chosen as a case study.

Student counselling in schools is an area that is well established in both developing and developed countries around the world, and has been made available to a wide range of ages (i.e. 5–18 years old) (Harris, 2013). In addition, while the many benefits of student counselling have been widely researched and documented, the problems and obstacles encountered by student counsellors has received less attention. This research aims to combine a brief review of the literature, with the researcher's own 16 years of professional experience of student counselling in Saudi schools, in order to provide a critical account of Saudi student counselling practices. The research shows that cultural, social and financial barriers and challenges may be stopping student counselling practices from developing effectively in Saudi Arabia. It puts forward ways in which student counselling practices might be improved in order to help children and young people in schools across Saudi Arabia.

Project cost estimation is considered an essential part of building practice. It analyses vital elements, which potentially affects the whole project's costs. In Saudi Arabia, the construction sector has established itself as the largest in the Middle East in the modern era, particularly because of the massive demand for residential properties. Consequently, this qualitative study evaluates Saudi construction project estimation trends (tenders) and types from a commercial perspective, in recent periods, using a new methodology, a 2-Path Analysis. This methodology provides both a level of stakeholder satisfaction and an evaluation approach of current contract, notably highlighting potential impacts on present and future construction market developments. Currently, the Saudi building system reveals that a significant upsurge of developments in the construction of residential properties has taken place. However, the Saudi government contract systems need more up-to-date practices, rather than the current traditional contracts, which are public works contracts (PWC), to fulfil the current generation's needs. In addition, this paper also scrutinises the risks and allocations between the owner and the contractor.

This paper presents a review of distance learning (DL) pedagogies and theories to identify the key elements of the DL system. It reveals that, in spite of the differences in approaches to and applications of DL by the different pedagogical models, six dimensions are identified as the core elements. These dimensions are: institutional mission, technology, instructions, evaluation, faculty members and students. The next stage of this paper, a literature review, focuses on reviewing attempts conducted by eight DL accreditation agencies to develop indicators for effective DL. It concludes by proposing 15 indicators of effective DL by which it can be assessed.

Many countries worldwide are facing a significantly high demand for water and power, and Saudi Arabia has one of the highest water consumption rates per capita in the world. Water and power plant (WPP) projects following the independent water and power plant (IWPP) approach have typically involved a plethora of risks, and since about 75% of IWPP projects in Saudi Arabia have failed to meet specified objectives, effective risk management (RM) implementation is key to the success of any public or private project. Practitioners have related their experience about RM in IWPP projects in Saudi Arabia through semi-structured interviews, and these are analysed through the grounded theory approach. The paper concludes with an emergent diagram that illustrates three major phenomena, eight categories and 18 subcategories affecting the implementation of RM in WPP projects in Saudi Arabia.

This paper reports on the findings of the first phase of a larger research project that aims to explore ways of bridging the gap between the needs of the translation market and the curricula of Saudi Arabian university translator training (TT) programmes. Semistructured, oral interviews were used to measure the level of satisfaction among professional translators and translators' employers with existing TT programmes at Saudi universities, and to explore their needs and their perceptions of an effective TT programme. Informed by their feedback, this paper identifies areas for further development and makes recommendations for the review and renewal of Saudi TT programmes.

This article aims to provide a critical synthesis of the major trends and approaches to the professional development (PD) of English language academic staff in Saudi Arabian tertiary education. It explains how the context in which teachers' development occurs shapes the way it is conceptualised and realised. Despite the increasing importance and appreciation of PD, the review indicates a minimal research conducted in this area, but one that is dominated by an essentialist view of what PD is all about. The in-service, one-sizefits- all model, which aims to impart knowledge wholesale to academics through training and workshops, maybe the only and/or dominant model available to them. This reflects a narrow understanding of teachers' PD, which is underpinned by the technical-rational views of the academic professionalism. It concludes by presenting a socio-cultural conceptualisation of PD that can promote teachers' continuous learning in the Saudi higher education (HE) context.

Dollie Radford (1858–1920) is a fin de siècle woman poet whose poetry engages with many vital aspects of late-Victorian England, including aestheticism, the New Woman and socialism. Radford is one of the talented women writers who is still insufficiently acknowledged by contemporary studies because of the lack of extant information about her life. LeeAnne Richardson, Ruth Livesey and Emily Harrington are three of only a handful of scholars who have discussed in any detail Radford's role as a poet, socialist and activist who was surrounded by key figures in the history of English literature and culture, such as George Bernard Shaw, William Morris, Amy Levy, Eleanor Marx and Olive Schreiner. In a recent article, Richardson identifies Radford as one of the New Women who ‘moved toward a greater social commitment in which her identity as a woman is a key element of her poetic’ (Richardson, 2012). Building on Richardson's argument, my paper examines Radford's commitment to her gender through her unconventional reflection in her diary and poetry on marriage. Most of the diary entries, letters and the poem I will discuss in this paper are considered for the first time. Thus, my argument adds to the existing body of knowledge a new approach to Radford's life and poetry in relation to aspects concerning the conflict suffered by married women in Victorian England. Also, I aim to raise awareness of Radford's role as a Victorian feminist who sought through her poetry to challenge patriarchal attitudes towards women and to engage with the notion of the New Woman who rejected the traditional domestic role.

Historical Jeddah, one of the most important historic sites in Saudi Arabia, has had a long history since it became the main gateway for the hajjis. The city contains many monuments founded more than 100 years ago, such as the Nasif Historical House, which was built in 1881. However, the historical monuments in Jeddah face a variety of serious issues, including problems of documentation and conservation, and in the last decade several manual measurement techniques have been used to document them. Yet, these techniques take a long time, often lack completeness and may sometimes give unreliable information. In contrast, terrestrial laser scanning and image surveys have already been undertaken across several heritage sites in the UK and elsewhere in Europe as a new method of documentation. This paper focuses on using terrestrial laser scanning and image survey methods to record the Nasif Historical House as an example of historical architectural documentation.

This paper examines sluicing as an elliptical phenomenon in Hijazi Arabic (HA), a variety of Arabic spoken in the western region of Saudi Arabia. This paper argues that sluicing structures are derived from a fully-fledged syntactic structure, which can be best described as being silent. This silence is attributed to the deletion of an inflectional phrase (IP) at phonetic form (PF). Sluicing in HA derives from overt wh-movement to the left periphery, followed by an IP ellipsis, to rescue what seems to be an island violation through extraction. Additionally, this paper argues that resumptive pronouns, when present in islands, do not violate any islands; rather, they suggest an overt wh-movement and, thus, support the structural argument in favour of the PF-deletion approach to sluicing.

The main focus of this paper is the vernacular architecture of the Red Sea Coast, particularly as regards Nasif Historical House, located in the old town of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. It describes the main results of a holistic investigation evaluating the environmental performance of this architecture with specific attention to thermal performance. The qualitative analysis revealed the sensible response to the cultural, social and climatic requirements of the region visible in the different aspects of urban formation, spatial organisation, migratory living patterns and adaptive architectural elements and materials. The thermal performance of Nasif Historical House was investigated through onsite measurement and dynamic thermal simulations, and the findings revealed the interaction between the climatic variables, building fabric and users' behaviour. This paper also identifies the effectiveness of passive design strategies used in the vernacular of the Red Sea coast, and suggests how contemporary architecture may benefit from the application of these environmental strategies.

This study proposes a framework designed to help e-tutors in English distance language learning programmes (DLLPs) in King Abdul-Aziz University, Saudi Arabia, in their role as distance e-tutors, and involves asking both how e-tutors can help distance learners to take control over their learning and how difficult it is to help their learners to develop new learning strategies, or to become autonomous learners. To reply to these questions, along with other research questions, I have decided to adopt three data-collection methods: reflective journals, semi-structure interviews and document analysis. However, this paper will concentrate on the process and analysis of the first method (reflective journals) for two main reasons: this method has never been used with e-tutors in this DLLP; and the researcher is keen to share with other researchers her experience of using this interesting and relatively new method of data collection in Saudi universities.

The aim of the study is to identify appropriate evidence regarding Triple P (‘Positive Parenting Programme’) through a literature search, and to critically appraise the evidence and to find out whether the Triple P programme is effective in reducing behavioural and emotional problems in children. The methodology employed uses a systematic search strategy, with data extracted from the published literature in the electronic research engines and databases (MEDLINE, PubMed, Cochrane Library and PsycINFO). The main focus is on existing reviews, in particular systematic reviews and good quality reviews or studies. Three meta-analyses have been chosen for the critical appraisal that have fulfilled the criteria and met the research terms (Nowak and Heinrichs, 2008; De Graaf et al., 2008; Thomas and Zimmer-Gembeck, 2007).

Cinema tries to depict reality in many of its aspects, such as the projection of racial tension and the extensive usage of racial slurs in everyday dialogue. This paper investigates how Arabic subtitlers deal with racial slurs in English-language films. Drawing on the eclectic methodology put forward by Filmer (2011), the paper depends on critical discourse analysis (Van Dijk, 2001) and politeness theory (Brown and Levinson, 1987), and it follows general principles of descriptive translation studies (Toury, 1995). Comparing different racial slurs with their Arabic subtitles from the two US films Sommersby (1993) and Stop-Loss (2008), the paper describes the context of each racial slur and tries to identify the strategies that subtitlers adopt. The paper concludes that subtitling techniques which Gottlieb (1992) labels as decimation, resignation and deletion are found to be prominent techniques used to translate racial slurs in English-Arabic subtitling.

The following sections is included:

• Appendix: Scientific Society for Saudi Students in the UK Conference Organising Committees