Научный архив: статьи

English is the dominant medium of instruction for numerous university programmes across the Arab Gulf. While a growing body of research examines learners’ attitudes towards English Medium Instruction (EMI), issues of language preference/use have received far less attention. The research reported here sought to redress this imbalance by examining the domain-based language preferences, use, and beliefs of English majors at Oman’s national university. A mixed methods approach was employed involving the administration of a 35-item questionnaire to 120 English majors and one-on-one semi-structured interviews with 13 participants. Descriptive analysis, Pearson’s chi-squared test, and Cramer’s V test were used to examine questionnaire data, while interview transcripts were analysed thematically before data triangulation was performed. Findings indicate respondents preferred and used English for academics and intended careers, Arabic for familial interactions, and both English and Arabic or English by itself to talk about feelings and beliefs. English and Arabic were almost equally preferred for identity representation, with a significant minority of respondents expressing a desire to study their majors in Arabic. Although gender and English proficiency were not found to be related to beliefs about language importance, Arabic proficiency had a moderate, statistically significant association. Arab students employing English to express cultural beliefs and identities has not been widely reported in the existing literature. Results suggest that, despite evidence of emerging bilingualism in some domains, reform to tertiary-level language of instruction policies and planning in the region and similar contexts worldwide, including by offering Arabic Medium Instruction options, may be necessary to ensure effective education provision.

On October 18, 2024 the XIII International Scientific and Practical Conference “Law in the Digital Age” was held at the Faculty of Law of the Higher School of Economics (HSE). This year it was devoted to the topic of artificial intelligence (AI) and law. It was considered from the standpoint of both private and public law. The conference covered the issues of the civil law regime of artificial intelligence technologies and objects created with its use, artificial intelligence and intellectual property law, as well as the topic of generative content and protection of the interests of copyright holders. The topic of regulation and self-regulation of artificial intelligence, including artificial intelligence in Legal Tech, is highlighted. Introduction of Artificial Intelligence Technologies in Labor Relations: Successes, Failures, Prospects Criminal Law Protection of Digital Economy and Finance Entities Using Elements of Artificial Intelligence. Thus, the conference attempted a comprehensive discussion of the role of law in the development of AI technologies. This approach made it possible to show the relationship between the methods of legal regulation in this area, their interaction to create conditions for the development of AI technologies. The conference raised both practical and theoretical issues of the development of law in the new conditions, as well as the problems of the development of legal education.

The article explores the impact of AI on legal systems globally. It highlights how technology, particularly AI, disrupts social order and power dynamics, necessitating legal adaptations. The document categorizes global AI regulatory responses into four types: no response, reliance on existing tech regulations, fragmented solutions, and unified approaches. The European Union (EU) has adopted a unified approach with the Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA), aiming to harmonize AI rules, address risks, and stimulate AI development. The United States employs a piecemeal approach with the National Artificial Intelligence Act of 2020 and various state laws and executive orders. Australia lacks specific AI legislation, but it has an AI Action Plan focusing on economic benefits and talent development. South Africa’s National AI Policy Framework emphasizes economic transformation and social equity. The African Union’s Continental AI Strategy aims for socio-economic transformation while addressing AI risks. Canada has a Voluntary Code of Conduct and a proposed Artificial Intelligence and Data Act (AIDA). The document critiques current AI regulations for incomplete definitions and a lack of focus on the broader societal purpose of AI. It stresses the need for regulations to consider ethical dimensions and societal impacts. The document concludes that AI regulation must balance innovation with social order, human dignity, and safety, emphasizing the urgent need to address AI’s energy and water consumption to prevent potential global instability.

The authors consider animation and game tourism as one of the important areas of tourism. During the study, it was found out that animation and gaming activities are actively used in modern tourism. By improving the quality of tourist services and expanding the number of services (including animation and game tourism), the tourism services sector is actively developing and its income is growing.

The requirements for reliability and durability are increasing every year for the critical elements of bridge structures, as there is a steady increase in the number of vehicles and volumes of cargo movement. Such structural elements include bearing parts of spans of bridges, which perceive loads from the mass of spans, transport cargo and compensate for deformations from thermal expansion and contraction. Antifriction polymeric materials are used in all newly developed designs of bearing parts. The reliability and durability of bridges as a whole depend on the physical, mechanical and operational properties of such materials. The change in the length of spans due to temperature fluctuations is carried out due to sliding along the polymer layers. The article presents a critical analysis of the polymer and metal-polymer materials used as sliding supports. A review and analysis of standardized anti-friction materials for possible use as sliding layers in the bearing parts of bridges have been carried out. The most promising fluoroplastic composite materials capable of operating without lubricant are presented. An analysis of metal-fluoroplastic sheet materials was made, new metal composites were proposed, in which various mesh materials with a high polymer content in the working layer are used as an anti-friction layer. Such materials can be used as guides for the moving bearing parts of the bridge without the use of lubricants. It is shown that the use of the described modern wear-resistant anti-friction materials will significantly increase the bearing capacity and service life of sliding bearings.

An increase in service life of equipment and plants (objects) in electric power systems makes it more appropriate to relate the organization of a system of maintenance service and restoration of wear and tear to their technical condition. This, in turn generates the need to quantitatively estimate the indices of their individual reliability. There can be no data on failures and defects of concrete objects, therefore, in practice we often calculate generalized reliability indices. An intuitive understanding of the varied significance of varieties of attributes is reflected by classifying statistical data for some varieties of attributes. For example, they can be classified according to voltage class, design, service life, etc. At the same time, the question on the appropriateness of the statistical data classification is not considered. Initial assumptions of known methods and criteria of checking if it is expedient to classify the statistical data on failures of the electric power system objects in most cases are unacceptable, since they are not relevant to this data set. We have developed a new method and an algorithm to assess the appropriateness of the statistical data classification. Their novelty lies in the application of a fiducial approach to estimation of critical values of a sample from a set of multivariate statistical data.

The blockage of the propagation path is one of the major challenges preventing the deployment of fifth-generation New Radio systems in the millimeter-wave band. To address this issue, the Integrated Access and Backhaul technology has been proposed as a cost-effective solution for increasing the density of access networks. These systems are designed with the goal of avoiding blockages, leaving the question of providing quality-ofservice guarantees aside. However, the use of multi-hop transmission negatively impacts the end-to-end packet latency. In this work, motivated by the need for latency reduction, we design a new link activation policy for self-backhauled Integrated Access and Backhaul systems operating in half-duplex mode. The proposed approach utilizes dynamic queue prioritization based on the number of packets that can be transmitted within a single time slot, enabling more efficient use of resources. Our numerical results show that the proposed priority-based algorithm performs better than existing link scheduling methods for typical system parameter values.

For one-dimensional inhomogeneous (with respect to the spatial variable) linear parabolic equations, a combined approach is used, dividing the original problem into two subproblems. The first of them is an inhomogeneous one-dimensional Poisson problem with Dirichlet–Robin boundary conditions, the search for a solution of which is based on the Chebyshev collocation method. The method was developed based on previously published algorithms for solving ordinary differential equations, in which the solution is sought in the form of an expansion in Chebyshev polynomials of the 1st kind on Gauss–Lobatto grids, which allows the use of discrete orthogonality of polynomials. This approach turns out to be very economical and stable compared to traditional methods, which often lead to the solution of poorly defined systems of linear algebraic equations. In the described approach, the successful use of integration matrices allows complete elimination of the need to deal with ill-conditioned matrices.

The second, homogeneous problem of thermal conductivity is solved by the method of separation of variables. In this case, finding the expansion coefficients of the desired solution in the complete set of solutions to the corresponding Sturm–Liouville problem is reduced to calculating integrals of known functions. A simple technique for constructing Chebyshev interpolants of integrands allows to calculate the integrals by summing interpolation coefficients.

In this paper, we study a queuing system with a single-capacity storage device and queue updating. An update is understood as the following mechanism: an application that enters the system and finds another application in the drive destroys it, taking its place in the drive. It should be noted that systems with one or another update mechanism have long attracted the attention of researchers, since they have important applied significance. Recently, interest in systems of this kind has grown in connection with the tasks of assessing and managing the age of information. A system with a queue update mechanism similar to the one we are considering has already been studied earlier in the works of other authors. However, in these works we were talking about the simplest version of the system with Poisson flow and exponential maintenance. In this paper, we consider a phase-type flow and maintenance system. As a result of our research, we developed a recurrent matrix algorithm for calculating the stationary distribution of states of a Markov process describing the stochastic behavior of the system in question, and obtained expressions for the main indicators of its performance.

The paper considers a single-line retrial queueing system with an unreliable server. Queuing systems are called unreliable if their servers may fail from time to time and require restoration (repair), only after which they can resume servicing customers. The input of the system is a simple Poisson flow of customers. The service time and uptime of the server are distributed exponentially. An incoming customer try to get service. The server can be free, busy or under repair. The customer is serviced immediately if the server is free. If it is busy or under repair, the customer goes into orbit. And after a random time it tries to get service again. The study is carried out by the method of asymptotically diffusion analysis under the condition of a large delay of requests in orbit. In this work, the transfer coefficient and diffusion coefficient were found and a diffusion approximation was constructed.

Economic landscape of Pakistan is determined by an extremely complex interaction of domestic and global forces; navigating it successfully requires a clear understanding of its character. The paper explores the dynamic relationships between macroeconomic variables and GDP growth in Pakistan using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model and other stability tests using time series data from 1980 to 2022. The analysis includes variables representing GDP per capita, inflation, imports, total debt as a percentage of GDP, total population, and forestry and agricultural output. The correlation matrix shows a positive association between GDP growth rate and GDP per capita, total debt service is inversely correlated with total population, and GDP demonstrates a significant negative correlation. The ARDL results indicate that GDP per capita and the agriculture and forestry sectors are significant drivers of economic growth. Over the period in question, inflation only marginally affected GDP growth showing how important it is to maintain price stability through effective policies. Imports provide short-term benefits by enhancing productivity through capital goods and technology inflows but they may pose long-term challenges due to trade imbalances. The influence of population growth appears to be ambivalent: in the short term it contributes to economic growth by increasing labor supply and consumption; in the long term, however, its effect may become detrimental owing to resource constraints. Public debt shows little influence in the short term but negatively impacts growth over time by increasing the fiscal burden of debt servicing. These findings suggest that to achieve long-term economic stability and growth, the country needs targeted policy interventions that should help it control inflation, manage the debt sustainably, optimize imports, and invest in agriculture, which is an important determinant of GDP growth. Future research should concentrate on sector-specific studies and the effects of political stability on economic growth in order to provide deeper insights contributing to Pakistan’s sustainable economic development.