This study explores the factors affecting dentists’ willingness to use social media in their practices, examining how consumer behavior influences their adoption decisions. Despite the growing use of social media across industries, its adoption in dentistry remains relatively underexplored. As investments in digital technologies increase, understanding dentists’ intentions to integrate social media becomes crucial, especially considering the evolving consumer behavior patterns in healthcare. Using the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and factoring in patient pressures, this study analyzes data from 209 respondents through SPSS and Smart PLS 4.0. The results offer valuable insights for dentists, highlighting the benefits of social media integration, and justifying investments in these platforms to align with changing consumer expectations. The study also discusses its limitations and suggests future research directions to further explore social media adoption in dentistry and its potential to drive economic growth within the sector.
Antioxidants are derivatives of vitamin C or beta-carotene that prevent reactions stimulated by oxygen, peroxides, or free radicals, thus reducing the oxidative stress. They have found their way into many uses in treating several human diseases and reducing the risk of developing diseases like cancer. In view of this property, the present study was focussed in identifying several plants possessing antioxidative properties and which were also conserved in the ex-situ park of CSIR – Central Institute of Mining and Fuel Research, Dhanbad, India. Fifteen medicinal plants including herbs, shrubs and grasses are reported in this paper, and a collective insight has been presented about their antioxidant properties and the present state of their pharmacological applications. The specific chemical constituents abundant in the leaves, roots, stems, seeds and fruits of each of these plants have also been dealt with. To report a few antioxidant pharmacological preparations from Ayurvedic literature are Vimang, Maharishi Amrit Kalash (MAK4, MAK5), Maharishi Ayurved (MA631, MA47), MA Raja’s Cup, MA Student Rasayana and MA Ladies Rasayana. This review has been attempted to enhance the importance of the plants which are generally being neglected, so that it can used by the local people in rural areas for their cultivation and it will also pave the pathway for their subsequent future use in medicinal and research industry for drug formulation.
The rapid increase in the aging population has raised significant concerns about the living conditions and well-being of elderly residents in old communities. This study addresses these concerns by proposing a Sustainable Urban Renovation Assessment Model (SURAM) specifically designed to enhance elderly-friendly environments in Chongqing City. The model encompasses multiple dimensions, including the comfort of public facilities, service safety and convenience, medical travel services, infrastructure security, life service convenience, neighbor relations, ambulance aid accessibility, commercial service facilities, privacy protection, elderly care facilities and service supply, and medical and health facilities. By employing factor analysis, the study reduces the dimensionality of the 49 indicator factors, allowing for a more focused and comprehensive evaluation of the effectiveness of aging-friendly renovation efforts. The main factors identified in the proposed model include community infrastructure security, elderly comfort of community public facilities, completeness and convenience of surrounding living services, and security and convenience of elderly care services. The results reveal that the age-appropriate comfort of public facilities plays a significant role in achieving successful aging-appropriate renovation outcomes. The findings demonstrate that by addressing specific needs such as safety, accessibility, and convenience, communities can significantly improve the quality of life for elderly residents. Moreover, the application of SURAM provides actionable insights for policymakers, urban planners, and community stakeholders, guiding them in implementing targeted initiatives for sustainable and inclusive urban development.
Finding the right technique to optimize a complex problem is not an easy task. There are hundreds of methods, especially in the field of metaheuristics suitable for solving NP-hard problems. Most metaheuristic research is characterized by developing a new algorithm for a task, modifying or improving an existing technique. The overall rate of reuse of metaheuristics is small. Many problems in the field of logistics are complex and NP-hard, so metaheuristics can adequately solve them. The purpose of this paper is to promote more frequent reuse of algorithms in the field of logistics. For this, a framework is presented, where tasks are analyzed and categorized in a new way in terms of variables or based on the type of task. A lot of emphasis is placed on whether the nature of a task is discrete or continuous. Metaheuristics are also analyzed from a new approach: the focus of the study is that, based on literature, an algorithm has already effectively solved mostly discrete or continuous problems. An algorithm is not modified and adapted to a problem, but methods that provide a possible good solution for a task type are collected. A kind of reverse optimization is presented, which can help the reuse and industrial application of metaheuristics. The paper also contributes to providing proof of the difficulties in the applicability of metaheuristics. The revealed research difficulties can help improve the quality of the field and, by initiating many additional research questions, it can improve the real application of metaheuristic algorithms to specific problems. The paper helps with decision support in logistics in the selection of applied optimization methods. We tested the effectiveness of the selection method on a specific task, and it was proven that the functional structure can help the decision when choosing the appropriate algorithm.
This article analyzes library promotion in developing the Universitas Sumatera Utara (USU) towards a World Class University (WCU). Indonesia is experiencing educational obstacles in achieving the WCU title. Several factors influence the difficulty of achieving the WCU predicate, but the most dominant is the library’s role in accommodating student literacy skills. As one of the higher education institutions, USU understands the vital role of the library in increasing the intensity of literacy to achieve the WCU predicate. The urgency of this research is to review the promotion of the USU library in achieving the WCU predicate through the library as an instrument. This article uses qualitative research with a case study approach. The data collection techniques used in this article are in-depth interviews, observation, and documentation. Primary data sources in this article are research informants, while secondary data used are books, articles, and reportage. The data collected by the author will then be analyzed using content analysis techniques. The results show that the library has various vital roles in literacy reform so that USU can achieve the WCU title. In this case, the library pursues promotional strategies including 1) Product, 2) Price, 3) Promotion, and 4) Distribution. The whole promotion model contributes to improving campus literacy in achieving WCU goals.
Banana macropropagation in a thermal chamber is an economical technology, effective as a phytosanitary cleaning method, and efficient to enhance seedling production. The objective of this work was to evaluate the effects of corm size (CS) and benzylaminopurine (BAP) on plantain cv. Barraganete seedling proliferation in two propagation environments (PE). The treatments consisted of two levels of BAP (with and without BAP), three CS (2 ± 0.5, 4 ± 0.5 and 6 ± 0.5 kg) and two PE (thermal chamber and raised bed). The variables evaluated were sprouting time (days), multiplication rate (MT) per unit (seedlings per corm) and area (seedlings per m2). Sprouting time was significantly influenced (p < 0.05) by the PE, where the thermal chamber advanced shoot emergence by 12 days, with respect to the raised bed. MT of seedlings per corm and m2, were significantly influenced (p < 0.05) by BAP × AP and TC × AP interactions, where the highest seedling production per corm occurred inside thermal chamber with BAP and 6 ± 0.5 kg corms, while seedling production per m2 was higher with 2 ± 0.5 kg corms under the same thermal chamber conditions and with BAP. The main effects results reported that with BAP there were 30 and 31% increases in MT per corm and per m2, respectively, relative to the treatment without BAP. Within the thermal chamber the MT per corm and per m2 increased by 44% relative to the raised bed. Regarding the effect of CS, larger corms achieved higher individual MT, while smaller corms achieved higher MT per area. The use of a thermal chamber and BAP is recommended for mass production of banana seedlings through macropropagation.
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