Countries employ various strategies to strengthen their soft power through education, public campaigns, mandatory service, and community involvement, essential for building a well-informed, prepared, and resilient citizenry. In Indonesia, the Civic Awareness for State Defence (CASD) program is designed to instil state defence awareness among citizens. This study introduces the Indonesia State Defence Index (SDI), a novel metric grounded in theoretical constructs such as national identity, nationalism, patriotism, and national pride. Differentiating from previous indices, our SDI employs advanced methodologies including Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) to enhance measurement accuracy. Unlike earlier approaches that used traditional aggregation methods, our use of PCA ensures the reduction of dimensions for each state defence indicator, thereby guaranteeing that only the intended dimensions are measured. Utilising data from the State Defence Survey conducted by the Indonesian Ministry of Defence from 1 March to 26 June 2024, we aim to measure and benchmark SDI values across Indonesian regions, thereby elucidating the civic awareness profile in the context of state defence. The refined SDI provides critical insights for policymakers, highlighting regions that require focused interventions to bolster state defence preparedness.
This study investigates the impact of tourism and institutional quality on environmental preservation, utilizing principal component analysis to generate three composite indices of environmental sustainability for 134 countries from 2002 to 2020. The results reveal that environmental sustainability indices have generally improved in lower- and middle-income nations but have declined in certain high-income countries. The findings also underscore the critical role of institutional quality—particularly regulatory standards, government effectiveness, anti-corruption efforts, and adherence to legal frameworks—in promoting environmental sustainability. However, the study shows that both domestic and international tourism expenditures can have adverse effects on environmental sustainability. Notably, these negative effects are exacerbated in countries with well-developed institutions, which is an unexpected outcome. This highlights the need for careful, thoughtful policymaking to ensure that the tourism sector supports sustainable development, rather than undermining environmental objectives.
The female labor force participation holds significant implications for various aspects of society, the economy, and individual lives. Understanding its significance involves recognizing the multifaceted impact of women’s participation in the workforce. In this context, the current study investigates the factors influencing the female labor force participation rate in Saudi Arabia while using a set of independent variables such as GDP growth, employment-to-population ratio, inflation, urban population growth, tertiary school enrollment, labor force with advanced education, fertility rate, and age dependency ratio, covering a period from 2000 to 2022. The results reveal that the employment-to-population ratio, inflation rate, urbanization, and age dependency ratio have positive and statistically significant impacts on the female labor force participation rate. This research offers valuable insights for formulating policies to foster female empowerment and overcome the obstacles that hinder their economic participation.
Focused Assessment with Sonography for Trauma (FAST) has been widely used and studied in blunt and penetrating trauma for the past 3 decades. Prior to FAST, invasive procedures such as diagnostic peritoneal lavage and exploratory laparotomy were commonly used to diagnose intra-abdominal injuries. Today, the FAST examination has evolved into a more comprehensive study of the abdomen, heart, thorax, inferior vena cava, among others, with many variations in technique, protocols and interpretation. Trauma management strategies such as laparotomy, endoscopy, computed tomography angiography, angiographic intervention, serial imaging and clinical observation have also changed over the years. This technique, at times, has managed to replace computed tomography and peritoneal lavage diagnosis, without producing delays in the surgical procedure. As such, the relationship between the patient’s clinical information and the results of the exam should be guided to guide therapeutic approaches in difficult to access settings such as intensive care units in war zones, rural or remote locations where other imaging methods are not available. This review will discuss the evolution of the FAST exam to its current status and evaluate its evolving role in the acute management of the trauma patient.
This paper presents a coupling of the Monte Carlo method with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to analyze the flow channel design of an irradiated target through numerical simulations. A novel series flow channel configuration is proposed, which effectively facilitates the removal of heat generated by high-power irradiation from the target without necessitating an increase in the cooling water flow rate. The research assesses the performance of both parallel and serial cooling channels within the target, revealing that, when subjected to equivalent cooling water flow rates, the maximum temperature observed in the target employing the serial channel configuration is lower. This reduction in temperature is ascribed to the accelerated flow of cooling water within the serial channel, which subsequently elevates both the Reynolds number and the Nusselt number, leading to enhanced heat transfer efficiency. Furthermore, the maximum temperature is observed to occur further downstream, thereby circumventing areas of peak heat generation. This phenomenon arises because the cooling water traverses the target plates with the highest internal heat generation at a lower temperature when the flow channels are arranged in series, optimizing the cooling effect on these targets. However, it is crucial to note that the pressure loss associated with the serial structure is two orders of magnitude greater than that of the parallel structure, necessitating increased pump power and imposing stricter requirements on the target container and cooling water pipeline. These findings can serve as a reference for the design of the cooling channels in the target station system, particularly in light of the anticipated increase in beam power during the second phase of the China Spallation Neutron Source (CSNS Ⅱ).
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