Wolaita Sodo University

Sediment yield poses significant challenges to agricultural productivity, water availability, and watershed sustainability in the Ethiopian highlands. However, spatially explicit assessments of how alternative land management trajectories influence sediment dynamics at the sub watershed scale remain limited. This study provides the integrated evaluation of sediment yield responses to four contrasting land management scenarios including baseline, agricultural expansion, urbanization and reforestation in the Gateno watershed Tekeze River Basin Ethiopia using the InVEST sediment delivery ratio model coupled with RUSLE and GIS techniques. Spatial analysis revealed significant variability in sediment yield across scenarios. Under the baseline scenarios 91.6

This research aimed to investigate livestock owners' willingness to pay (WTP) for a hypothetical livestock vaccination program in southern Ethiopia. We used both primary and secondary data. The former data were collected from 377 livestock farmers. We used descriptive statistics and a seemingly unrelated bivariate probit model to analyze the data. The double-bounded contingent valuation format was used within a seemingly unrelated bivariate probit model to identify factors influencing WTP for livestock vaccination. It was found that the average WTP for sheep and goat vaccination was 0.38 USD (United States of America dollar) yearly, while for cattle and oxen vaccination, it was 0.64. Factors such as the household head's education, sex, and age; annual income; total livestock holdings; and farm size affected farmers' WTP for sheep and goat vaccination in both initial and follow-up scenarios. Market access, farm experience, and access to credit also influenced WTP for cattle and oxen vaccination across both bid values. We suggest that improving socioeconomic factors, such as household well-being and access to credit services, is vital because these elements directly influence a household's capacity to invest in livestock health and productivity. Establishing clear vaccination rates, with vaccine costs aligned to the average household income, is recommended.

Civet coffee is a premium specialty coffee known for its unique flavor, traditionally produced via spontaneous fermentation in the digestive system of civet cats (Paradoxurus hermaphrodites). This study aimed to replicate and optimize the fermentation process in vitro using eight bacterial strains isolated from civet gut, identified as Bacillus, Enterobacter, and Acinetobacter via 16 S rRNA sequencing. Fermentation conditions were optimized using Response Surface Methodology (RSM) with a Box-Behnken Design, assessing the effects of temperature (25–35 °C), time (24–48 h), and inoculum concentration (5–15

The green synthesis of zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnO-NPs) using plant extracts is an eco-friendly and economical process compared with existing methods. The present investigation utilized the leaf and seed extracts of Croton macrostachyus Hochst. ex Delile to biosynthesize ZnO-NPs using a green technique with zinc acetate as the precursor at 80 °C for 60 minutes. XRD analysis proved the hexagonal structure of the Wurtzite ZnO-NPs, with average crystallite dimensions of approximately 40 nm. The estimated band gaps using UV-Visible spectroscopy were in the range of 3.17-3.19 eV, and FTIR, SEM, XPS, and EDS studies proved the functional groups and element contents of ZnO-NPs, in which trace levels of Ca and Mg were present in the extracts. The ZnO-NPs derived from the green synthesis method displayed high antibacterial efficacy against Gram-positive Staphylococcus aureus and Gram-negative Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Klebsiella pneumoniae, which surpassed the antibacterial efficacy of the crude extracts. The green synthesis of ZnO NPs using Croton macrostachyus extracts thus presents promising results in relation to their possible antibacterial applications in the biomedical field and green nanotechnology.

Rehabilitation robots are machines that allow patients to perform practice movements and ought to be sufficiently compliant for safe human interaction. Most robots today use hydraulic systems and continually rotating servo motors, making them less suitable for rehabilitation. The Pneumatic Muscle Manipulators (PAMs), however, offer an intriguing substitute for electric actuators due to their inherent compliance, but their nonlinear properties among force, displacement, and pressure make precise position control impossible in the classical controllers that neglect the significant phenomena of nonlinearities and handle the unmodeled dynamics of a pneumatic artificial muscle (PAM) manipulator. Hence, this paper presents adaptive fuzzy PID control for two-degree-of-freedom (2-DOF) PAM manipulators for leg rehabilitation to alleviate this problem. A 2-DOF robotic manipulator is designed to freely rehabilitate the upper and lower leg arms. MATLAB/Simulink software was used to perform the simulation. The results demonstrate that the fuzzy PID controller exhibits excellent transient performance, effectively handles nonlinearities, and efficiently rejects disturbances and parameter variations.