Journal of Engineering

Nigeria's limited freshwater resources are at risk due to the discharge of wastewater from
water-intensive industries, such as food processing, that does not comply with the
regulations of the National Environmental Standards and Regulation Enforcement Agency
(NESREA). This could significantly harm both the ecosystem and human health. This study
aims to assess the physicochemical and biological properties of wastewater discharged from
selected bakeries in Benin City, Nigeria, to determine compliance with NESREA standards
and highlight potential environmental risks. Wastewater samples were randomly collected
from five bakeries in Benin City and examined for their physicochemical and biological
features. The findings indicated that, except for potential of Hydrogen (pH), total dissolved
solids (TDS), chemical oxygen demand (COD), chloride (Cl⁻), Ammonium Nitrogen (NH₄N),
and lead (Pb), all other parameters were within NESREA's permitted limits for food industry
effluent discharge. The average pH value (5.9) was below the permitted range, but the
average TDS (4754.2 mg/l), COD (1058.34 mg/l), NH₄N (3.068 mg/l), Cl (2984.86 mg/l),
along with Pb (0.0724 mg/l) values are substantially over NESREA standards. These results
show non-compliance with NESREA rules, stressing the necessity for regulatory entities to
monitor the quality of bakery wastewater in the research region to guarantee high-quality
effluent discharge.

Weirs are hydraulic structures built across open channels to measure the flow and raise
the water level. A sharp-crested weir is one type of weir of different configurations. Local
scour at the downstream of hydraulic structures is a problem that affects their safety and
stability. The credibility of the estimation of maximum scour depth is debated in many
published studies. In this study, an experimental work was conducted to investigate the
impact of flow rates on maximum scour depth downstream of a sharp-crested weir. The weir
model was calibrated before it was used in the discharge measurement. The value of the weir
coefficient of discharge was found to be 0.633. The experiments were conducted on a
plexiglass model of a sharp crested weir, which was tightly fixed at the middle of a
laboratory flume. The weir had a crest height of 15 cm above the flume bed. In the
experiments, a non-uniform sediment was used with a median diameter (d50) of 0.72 mm; it
was placed downstream of the weir within the working section at a depth of 6.5 cm. The
scour depths at an interval of 4 cm were measured by a point gauge. The measurement
covered the resulting scour hole. The maximum recorded scour depth of 6.2 cm was
observed approximately at the center of the flume width, with a Froude number of 0.0313.
The measured maximum scour depths were found to agree with those published by other
studies.

This research aims to co-register UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) photogrammetry and
Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) for volumetric measurements of irregularly shaped
material stacks available at construction sites in Iraq. The research investigates the potential
of combining these techniques in comparison to standalone and traditional techniques to
improve volume quantification and time consumption. An area containing a stockpile of bulk
materials and building remnants was selected. A low-cost drone was used for data
acquisition, whereas Structure from Motion (SFM) and Multi View Stereo (MVS) algorithms
were used for processing and analysing the photogrammetric data. In contrast, Stonex X300
TLS device was used for laser data collection, while 3D Re-constructor software was used for
data processing and analysis. The resulting volume from utilizing individual techniques came
out as follows: 2692 m3 from UAV photogrammetry with an accuracy of ±6 mm, 2730.99 m3
from integrating photogrammetry and TLS with an accuracy of ±35 cm, while the
conventional approach delivers 3048 m3 with an accuracy of ±1.1 cm. The data integration
(fusion) approach shows a high error level due to data registration obstacles, which can be
overcome if the target-based registration approach is applied to increase the accuracy level
to several millimeters. In this research, the results indicate the significant effectiveness of
low-cost drones to deliver accurate volume measurements in photogrammetry, which
outperform the conventional techniques for estimation, management, and precise volume
calculation of the stocks and materials in construction projects. This was approved in the
perspective of time, data intensity, cost effectiveness, and labor intensity following data
analysis

Environmental quality for a healthy life is a major focus of scientific studies on human life
and health. Rapid economic growth and urbanization have exposed major cities such as
Baghdad to the risk of environmental problems, including desertification, air and water
pollution, and high greenhouse gas emissions. These risks can be studied and assessed using
Geographic Information Systems (GIS), which provide a comprehensive understanding of
environmental issues and evidence-based remedies. Focusing on water and air pollution,
this study will examine and assess environmental risks in Baghdad. The study identified
areas with high concentrations of PM10, NO2, and SO2 through analyzing GIS maps. These
areas are located in densely populated and traffic-intensive areas and are severely affected
by pollution around major roads and industrial areas. Wind conditions and climate change
also cause seasonal fluctuations in pollution levels. Although the Tigris and Euphrates rivers
have suitable pH and nitrate levels, they contain significantly higher amounts of dissolved
solids and phosphates, which may result from industrial and agricultural pollution. Land
cover transformation results show an increase in the percentage of built-up area from 25%
in 2016 to 45% in 2024, with a decrease in green areas from 40% to 30%. The average
annual temperature increased from 21.5°C to 23.2°C, while rainfall decreased from 135 mm
to 115 mm. PM₁₀ concentrations increased from 85 µg/m³ in 2018 to 110 µg/m³ in 2023,
indicating a worsening of air pollution. The hotspot map shows higher concentrations near
industrial areas and the Karkh–Doura corridor.

This paper proposes a novel control strategy for a Unified Power Quality Conditioner
(UPQC) to effectively mitigate voltage and current disturbances in three-phase four-wire
(3P-4W) systems. Existing UPQC control approaches often struggle to address unbalanced
load conditions, resulting in significant power quality degradation. This research addresses
this gap by introducing a fast fuzzy logic (FFZ) controller, which, in comparison to traditional
PI controllers, offers enhanced performance in managing DC voltage fluctuations and
generating accurate reference currents for the shunt active filter. The proposed FFZ
controller effectively minimizes the impact of unbalanced loads on DC voltage, reducing
error and improving overall system performance. Simulation results using MATLAB validate
the effectiveness of the FFZ controller in reducing total harmonic distortion (THD) and
improving transient response, demonstrating its superiority over traditional PI control for
unbalanced load scenarios.

Radiation is the emission of energy in the form of particles or photons, and it has two types:
cosmic radiation and terrestrial radiation. Materials that emit radiation as they decay over
time are called naturally occurring radioactive elements. This study, which was conducted
at the Asalah site after removing radioactive contamination, included taking 15 samples
from different locations at the site and conducting radiological tests on them using the HpGe
(high-purity germanium) system available at the laboratory of Iraqi Atomic Energy
Commission- Radiological and Nuclear Applications and Laboratories Directorate From this
study one can see that the average value of specific activity for 226Ra was 15.51 Bq/kg, with
the highest value for As 9, ranging between 22.2±1.9 Bq/kg and the lowest value for As 2,
which was 12±1.4 Bq/kg. The average value (14.56) and the highest value of 228Ac were
25±4.2 Bq/Kg for As 11, while the lowest was 13.5±1.9 Bq/kg for As 12. The average value
of 40K was 317.28 Bq/kg, with the highest value (391.6±30.7) Bq/kg in As11 and the lowest
value (295±22.3) Bq/kg in As5. The average value for the dose rate was 0.14 µSv/h, ranging
from 0.08 µSv/h in As 1 to 0.17 µSv/h. The dose and risk of cancer were elevated using the
RESRAD 7.2 code. The external radiation dose at the site decontamination, according to the
RESRAD calculations, is 2.5×10-7 Sv/year, which is the highest value of any pathway. The
total dose from all pathways decreases to 1.1 × 10−7 ????????/????????????????. After 100 years, it approaches
zero after 1000 years. The total dose determined by RESRAD at the Al-Asalah site is less
than the 1 mSv/year acceptable limit for public radiation exposure as established by the
IAEA's International Basic Safety Standards.

This review offers an overview of key developments that may assist researchers in
improving thermal management strategies for photovoltaic systems across different
environmental conditions. It's worth noting that temperature significantly affects the
efficiency of photovoltaic systems. As operating temperatures rise, energy production
decreases, impacting the system's lifetime. The main focus of this research paper, which
examines recent developments in thermal management technologies for photovoltaic
systems, is the use of fin-based cooling technologies. he efficiency of passive, active, and
hybrid cooling technologies was evaluated, focusing on their ability to dissipate heat and
increase the efficiency of photovoltaic panels by expanding the heat dissipation surface area.
Metal foam fins and heatsinks improve heat transfer. Key findings from numerical
simulations and experimental studies are summarized, including the impact of fin design,
material selection, and environmental factors on cooling performance. For instance,
trapezoidal fins, cylindrical pin fins, and foam-based configurations demonstrate notable
temperature reductions and efficiency improvements in various setups. Additionally, the
research identifies challenges such as optimal fin spacing, material durability, and cost
effectiveness.

This study employs an integrated research model to examine the syntax properties of the
historic urban network in older Baghdad, explaining how spatial configurations affect urban
functions and land use. The relationship between the street network and land use pattern is
again the focus for architects and urban planners trying to revitalize historic urban cores. In
this research, a multi-method approach is used, incorporating GIS, space syntax analysis,
statistical correlations, and site observations, to systematically analyze the syntactic
properties of the street network in Old Rusafa. The examination was conducted within a
400m radius of Old Rusafa's historic urban fabric to analyze the syntactic processes that
govern the city’s functionality and accessibility despite the multiple morphological changes
that have happened in the area. Results show a strong correlation between street network
and land use in Old Rusafa, commercial areas positive (ρ=0.175, p<0.01) and residential
areas negative (ρ=-0.234, p<0.01). High choice values also correlate with commercial activity
(ρ=0.160, p<0.01), so spatial accessibility plays a big role in shaping urban functions and
land use. There is a lot to learn from this in other historical urban situations to compare and
apply urban design principles based on syntactic properties. Comparative research like this
can help architects and urban planners understand the universality of space syntax in urban
design.

This research describes a new method for estimating tramadol hydrochloride in
pharmaceutical formulations using Molecularly Imprinted Solid-Phase Extraction (MISPE)
as a sample extraction technique. Acrylamide was used as the functional monomer,
trimethylolpropane Trimethacrylate as the cross-linker, and tramadol hydrochloride as the
template molecule to make Molecularly Imprinted Polymer (MIP). The new
molecularly imprinted polymer was characterized using UV-Vis spectroscopy, Fourier
transform infrared spectroscopy, and a scanning electron microscope. The adsorption
isotherm of the prepared polymer was determined under the optimum conditions using
spectrophotometry at a wavelength of 272 nm. The method\'s linear dynamic range was
found to be 5–140 µg/mL, and the limits of detection (LOD) and quantification (LOQ) were
0.62 and 1.87 µg/mL, respectively. Relative Standard Deviation (RSD%) was less than 2%
five times in intra-day and inter-day. This method was successfully utilized to determine
tramadol hydrochloride in pharmaceutical formulations with recoveries in the 93.04
104.3% range.

Taziz Al-Taziz irrigation pumping station, within Al-Muthanna Governorate, Iraq, was
studied, aiming at investigating the performance of its stilling basin in reducing the energy
of the water out of the discharge pipes outlet. The study relied on the results of the physical
model of the basic design of the stilling basin and the use of ANSYS Fluent 21.0 software to
simulate both the basic design and the as-built stilling basin. The physical model was
constructed and studied by the Center for Studies and Engineering Designs of the Iraqi
Ministry of Water Resources. Simulations showed the variation in velocity within the basic
design of Taziz Al-Taziz pumping station to be 3.98 m/s to 0.209 m/s in the basin, with an
average velocity at the beginning of the canal of 1.4 m/s. For that, as built Taziz Al-Taziz, the
velocity results showed a variation of 3 m/s to 0.209 m/s within the basin with an average
velocity of 1m/s at the beginning of the canal. By converting the physical model's measured
results to a prototype, the average velocity at the beginning of the canal is 1.28 m/s. The
efficiency of the basic design stilling basin is 30.7%, while that for the as-built is 50.5 % and
36.7% for the physical model. This indicates the quality and efficiency of the as-built stilling
basin in dispersing a significant percentage of water energy from the pipes. Moreover, it was
found that no negative pressure is developed within the basins

Clustering high-dimensional data remains challenging because traditional k-means is
sensitive to noise, outliers, and high dimensionality, often leading to unstable performance.
The research presents a robust clustering system which combines the Fully Corrective
Frank-Wolfe (FCFW) algorithm with k-means objective that uses Frobenius norm
regularization. The addition of Frobenius norm regularization in the model produces more
stable clusters while preventing overfitting and promoting cluster compactness. The
proposed method uses probabilistic cluster assignments to enable each data point to join
multiple clusters at different membership levels, thus supporting clusters with overlapping
boundaries. The Kruskal-Wallis test functions as a feature selection method to identify
crucial genes, which then guide the clustering operation toward important features in high
dimensional datasets. The FCFW-regularized k-means outperforms traditional k-means in
all experiments performed on synthetic and real gene expression datasets. On a breast
cancer gene expression dataset (GSE10797), it achieved an Accuracy of 89.39%, compared
to 58% for traditional ????-means. Moreover, it surpassed a recent deep subspace clustering
method (scPEDSSC) in Adjusted Rand Index by 8.3% on the Goolam single-cell dataset
(0.968 vs. 0.885) and 7.2% on the Deng dataset (0.801 vs. 0.729). Overall, the proposed
approach attained the highest ARI and Normalized Mutual Information (NMI) scores across
five benchmark datasets. These results confirm that the FCFW-regularized ????-means yields
more accurate and stable clustering results, demonstrating robust performance on high
dimensional data.

An experimental analysis was conducted to investigate the effect of varying the inlet airflow
rate into the drying chamber on the performance of an indirect solar dryer using a forced
convection system under the climatic conditions of Baghdad, Iraq, at a latitude of 33.3°N. The
dryer performance was tested at three airflow rates (0.0113, 0.0169, and 0.0226) m³/s,
using a conventional flat absorber plate and a perforated plate with circular holes of
diameter 3 mm. Apricots were dried in all experiments conducted in June 2024. The results
showed that the perforated plate significantly enhanced the thermal efficiency of the solar
collector compared with that of the flat plate. The perforated plate improved the heat
exchange by disturbing the thermal boundary layer and improving airflow. The results also
indicated that a low airflow rate (0.0113 m³/s) achieved the best drying efficiency, reducing
the apricot moisture content from 80% to 42% for the perforated plate and 47% for the flat
plate within 8 h, with maximum drying efficiencies of 28.44% and 22.22%, respectively.
Although a higher airflow rate (0.0226 m³/s) improved the thermal efficiency of the
collector, it was less effective for enhancing the drying process. The results of this study
demonstrated that operating an indirect solar dryer with a perforated absorbent plate at a
low airflow rate accelerates the removal of moisture from the product while maintaining its
quality. This makes the system suitable for practical agricultural applications in hot and dry
environments, where drying speed and efficiency are critical for reducing postharvest losses
and increasing product storage life