Metallo-β-lactamase and AmpC genes in Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates from abattoir and poultry origin in Nigeria

Background Gram-negative bacteria (GNB) including Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Klebsiella pneumoniae represent the most relevant reservoir of resistance genes such as metallo-β-lactamase (MBL) and AmpC genes that give them the undue advantage to resist antimicrobial onslaught. This study aimed to investigate the occurrence of MBL (blaIMP-1, blaIMP-2, blaVIM-1, blaVIM-2) and AmpC (blaFOX, blaDHA, blaCMY, blaACC) resistance genes in aforementioned GNB collected from abattoir and poultry sources in Nigeria. Results In total, 370 isolates were collected from abattoir tables (n = 130), anal region of cows (n = 120), and the cloacae of poultry birds (n = 120). The test isolates showed high rate of resistance to cephalosporins and carbapenems. The MBLs were phenotypically detected in 22 E. coli, 22 P. aeruginosa, and 18 K. pneumoniae isolates using combined disc test (CDT). However, only 11 E. coli, 24 P. aeruginosa, and 18 Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates were phenotypically confirmed to be AmpC producers using cefoxitin-cloxacillin double disk synergy test (CC-DDST). MBL encoding genes (particularly the blaIMP-1 genes and blaIMP-2 genes) were detected by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in 12 (54.6%) E. coli, 15 (83.3%) K. pneumoniae, and 16 (72.7%) P. aeruginosa isolates. AmpC genes (particularly the blaCMY genes and blaFOX genes) were found in a total of 5 (29.4%) E. coli isolates, 5 (27.8%) isolates of K. pneumoniae, and 10 (41.7%) isolates of P. aeruginosa. Conclusions Our study showed the circulation of MBL and AmpC genes in GNB from abattoir and poultry origin in Nigeria. Adoption of regular control policies is necessary to reduce the spread of these species as soon as possible, especially in poultry and slaughterhouses.

Challenges and Prospects of Entrepreneurship in Bhutan from the Lens of Business Educators

Entrepreneurship plays an important role in generating employment opportunities, enhancing public income and promoting societal change, particularly in a budding economy like Bhutan. Given its importance to the country, this paper investigates the challenges faced by aspiring entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial ventures, and their future prospects in Bhutan. The paper adopts qualitative research methodology to study the perspective of business educators through a semi-structured interview with fifteen participants from Gedu College of Business Studies located at Gedu, Bhutan. The study reveals that, due to a range of challenges the aspiring entrepreneurs and the entrepreneurial ventures face today, the Bhutanese entrepreneurs have a long way to go before they can effectively drive changes in the economy. However, the findings suggest that there is a good prospect for the entrepreneurial ventures in the country, and the ventures will have an undue advantage if it can leverage on the technological support from other countries. To ease the way for entrepreneurs in the country, the study finds it important to encourage the consumption of indigenous products by discouraging the import of the goods and services that can be produced within the country, regulate the price of the home made product, explore market and marketing facilities beyond the country to encourage large scale production, initiate discussion about entrepreneurship and the associated benefits at school levels and also take adequate infrastructural facilities (water, electricity and transportation network) across all parts of the country.

Trading In Influence Dalam Perspektif Fikih Korupsi

<p><strong></strong>Corruption is a deep-rooted phenomenon existing in inumerable forms that occurs in almost all countries. Of the inumerable forms of corruption, trading in influence (TI) is considered soft corruption as it is not directly inflict losses on the state. However, through misuse influence a person has, he can obtain undue advantage. This article seeks to describe critically about the practice of trading in influence from the perspective of fiqh corruption. The type of method used in this study was a qualitative method. Descriptive-analitycal method was used to accurately describe and systematically analyze the facts found. This research found that fromthe perspective of Islamic criminal law, TI is considered khiyanah or <em>ghulul</em> (betrayal) and <em>risywah</em> (bribes), while the sentence is left to the policy of a judge or ruler (<em>ta'zir</em>), no matter whether the perpetrators are the government or private parties.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>Abstrak</strong></p><p>Korupsi merupakan fenomena yang terjadi hampir merata di berbagai negara. Dari berbagai macam varian korupsi yang ada, <em>trading in influence</em> (TI) termasuk kriteria korupsi yang <em>soft</em>, artinya, negara tidak secara langsung dirugikan, namun melalui pengaruh yang diperdagangkan, seseorang bisa memperoleh keuntungan yang tidak semestinya (<em>undue advantage</em>) lewat kebijakan yang bersifat memihak. Artikel ini berupaya mendeskripsikan secara kritis tentang praktek TI dalam perspektif fikih korupsi. Jenis metode yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah metode kualitatif. Sementara dalam menganalisis, peneliti menggunakan metode deskriptif-analitis, guna menggambarkan serta menganalisis secara sistematis fakta yang ditemukan secara akurat dan cermat. Penelitian ini menemukan bahwa dalam perspektif hukum pidana Islam, TI dapat digolongkan dalam kategori <em>khiyanah</em> atau <em>ghulul</em> (pengkhianatan) dan <em>risywah</em> (suap), sementara hukumannya diserahkan pada kebijakan hakim atau penguasa (<em>ta’zir</em>), baik pelakunya penyelenggara negara maupun pihak swasta.</p>

Does Speech Enhancement of Publicly Available Data Help Build Robust Speech Recognition Systems? (Student Abstract)

Automatic speech recognition(ASR) systems play a key role in many commercial products including voice assistants. Typically, they require large amounts of high quality speech data for training which gives an undue advantage to large organizations which have tons of private data. We investigated if speech data obtained from publicly available sources can be further enhanced to train better speech recognition models. We begin with noisy/contaminated speech data, apply speech enhancement to produce 'cleaned' version and use both the versions to train the ASR model. We have found that using speech enhancement gives 9.5% better word error rate than training on just the original noisy data and 9% better than training on just the ground truth 'clean' data. It's performance is also comparable to the ideal case scenario when trained on noisy and it's ground truth 'clean' version.

5 Market Abuse

This chapter assesses market abuse. Market abuse offences, in all of their possible forms, frustrate the concept of market efficiency by allowing undue advantage to the individuals performing the abusive actions, thus jeopardizing the development of fair and orderly markets. In turn, this is likely to harm confidence by undermining investors' beliefs that the market is fair, leading them to withdraw their investments. In Europe, the first European-wide legislative package was initiated with the adoption of the Market Abuse Directive in 2003 (Directive 2003/6/EC), with the aim of providing a broad framework that would address market manipulation and insider dealing practices in the EU. However, in the aftermath of the Financial Crisis in 2008, a review of the regime was required as a number of deficiencies were found. In 2011 and in order to address these issues, the European Commission adopted the proposal for the Regulation on insider dealing and market manipulation (MAR) as well as the Directive on Criminal Sanctions for Insider Dealing and Market Manipulation (CSMAD).

Inexorable transformation in healthcare-seeking behaviour: a paradigm of choice

Purpose Healthcare is traditionally considered an indispensable service in both personal and social points of views. In this regard, healthcare-seeking behaviour is driven by utilitarian orientation, given its existential value. But this trend is changing, as the propensity to avail (un)necessary healthcare services is burgeoning with changing lifestyle and practices. From the supply point of view, the market appears to be relentless in enforcing propensity to seek healthcare. The service providers, generally, create unnecessary needs and aspirations, taking undue advantage of the prospects’ over-conscious health concerns and overzealous longing for wellness. This study aims to find whether utilitarianism or hedonism is the prominent paradigm of healthcare-seeking behaviour in the onset of changing preferences and lifestyles and supply-driven market forces. Design/methodology/approach The study followed an empirical approach to accomplish the aim of research. Subjects for the study constitute sample respondents in the age of 18-60 years, who were identified on inspection. A structured questionnaire, drawn upon literature, was used to elicit information. Findings The study offered new insight into the basic psychological motive for healthcare-seeking. The results have empirically validated the pre-eminence of a hedonic attribute of consumer behaviour in healthcare-seeking. Practical implications The outcome of the study has implications for healthcare providers to tailor-make their future products and services and for governing bodies to design suitable policy guidelines. Originality/value The study explores the emerging trends in health-seeking behaviour.

The positive benefits from the observation that test duration is mostly uncorrelated with student grades

New and experienced instructors strugglewith setting tests and exams at a suitable level ofdifficulty, with appropriate questions for the allocatedtime. Tests that are too short might be thought of as givingstudents undue advantage. Exams that are too long leavestudents feeling pressured and anxious, and without timefor careful thought to display mastery of the conceptsbeing tested.Unlimited time tests are a way to eliminate the effect ofanxiety. In this paper we start by reviewing existing workon this topic and explain the data collected in our context.We confirm the literature findings that grades are notinflated by longer durations – if anything, we show thereis a slight decrease with longer durations.Practical applications exist for universities that arefacing pressure to shorten exam durations, due toscheduling limitations as class sizes grow. Mainly though,these results will set the mind of new instructors at ease,and validate suspicions of veteran instructors: tests mustbe of short-enough duration to alleviate time-pressure andanxiety. Building in excess time is required to fairly assesslearning outcomes. Students have a higher level ofsatisfaction knowing they can display their capabilityfairly, and this comes without undue advantage.