Search Results (265)

Enhancing the real-world performance of sustainably designed and certified green buildings remains a significant challenge, particularly in hot climates where efforts to improve thermal comfort often conflict with energy efficiency goals. In the United Arab Emirates (UAE), even newly constructed facilities with green building certifications present opportunities for retrofitting and performance optimization. This study investigates the energy and thermal comfort performance of a LEED Gold-certified, mixed-use university campus in Dubai through a calibrated digital twin developed using IES thermal modelling software. The analysis evaluated existing sustainable design strategies alongside three retrofit energy conservation measures (ECMs): (1) improved building envelope U-values, (2) installation of additional daylight sensors, and (3) optimization of fan coil unit efficiency. Simulation results demonstrated that the three ECMs collectively achieved a total reduction of 15% in annual energy consumption. Thermal comfort was assessed using operative temperature distributions, Predicted Mean Vote (PMV), and Predicted Percentage of Dissatisfaction (PPD) metrics. While fan coil optimization yielded the highest energy savings, it led to less favorable comfort outcomes. In contrast, enhancing envelope U-values maintained indoor conditions consistently within ASHRAE-recommended comfort zones. To further support energy reduction and progress toward Net Zero targets, the study also evaluated the integration of a 228.87 kW rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) system, which offset 8.09% of the campus’s annual energy demand. By applying data-driven thermal modelling to assess retrofit impacts on both energy performance and occupant comfort in a certified green building, this study addresses a critical gap in the literature and offers a replicable framework for advancing building performance in hot climate regions. Full article

The Tunisian uprisings projected an elusive surrealistic scene that was an aberration in a part of the world where Islamic ideology had been considered the only rallying force and a midwife for regime change. However, this sense of exceptionalism was short-lived, as the religiously zealous Islamist expats and their militant executive wings infiltrated the power vacuum to resume their suspended Islamization project of the 1980s. Brandishing electoral “legitimacy”, they attempted to reframe the bourgeoning indigenous democratization project, rooted in an evolving Tunisian intellectual and cultural heritage, along the neocolonial ideological underpinnings of the “Arab Spring” metanarrative, which proffers the thesis that democracy can be promoted in the Muslim world through so-called “Moderate Muslims”. This paper challenges this dominant narrative by offering a counter-narrative about the political transition in Tunisia. It takes stock of the multidisciplinary conceptual and analytical frameworks elaborated upon in postcolonial theory, social movement theory, cognitive neuroscience theories, and digital communication theories. It draws heavily on socio-narrative translation theory. The corpus analyzed in this work consists of disparate yet corroborating narratives cutting across modes, genres, and cultural and linguistic boundaries, and is grounded in insider participant observation. This work opens an alternative inquiry into how the processes of cross-cultural knowledge production and the power dynamics they sustain have helped shape the course of the transition since 2011. Full article

This paper explores suicidality and suicide research from an autoethnographic analysis framed through grief concepts. Self-identifying as a Muslim in the United States, the author explains how lived experiences being racialized through Islamophobia, identifying as a genderfluid non-binary woman, being socially biracial, holding a postpartum bipolar diagnosis, and being connected to a diaspora, are critical elements to develop a deeper sociocultural understanding of suicide. Grief concepts that are used to analyze these themes include disenfranchised grief, ambiguous loss, anticipatory grief, and secondary loss. While these grief concepts are understood as part of the author’s embodied lived experience as an individual, there is also a collective grief that is explored through the author’s bilingual experience with Arabic as it relates to the topics of suicide and genocide occurring in the Arabic-speaking diaspora located in Gaza, Palestine. A conceptual framework is offered to make sense of the author’s lived experience by both incorporating and challenging existing academic perspectives on suicide and research. The emic, or insider, perspective is contextualized such that it may hold implications beyond the individual author, such as for U.S. Muslims and other hard-to-reach populations. A positionality statement demonstrates the author’s reflexivity of being an insider ‘participant’–researcher in conducting transformative research approaches with the U.S. Muslim community. Further directions are shared for scholars with lived experience who may seek to utilize comparable individual or collaborative autoethnographic approaches with such majority-world communities. Full article

The United Arab Emirates has become increasingly concerned about carbon dioxide emissions due to their impact on climate change and the environment, as it is one of the top ten world oil producers. This reflects its recognition of the need for sustainable development. Therefore, this research aims to study the dynamic impact of economic growth, urbanization, energy consumption, and economic openness on CO₂ emissions, during the period 1975–2022. To capture these effects, a novel dynamic ARDL is employed to separate the impact of each variable separately. The results indicate that the effect of GDP per capita on carbon emissions is negative, as a 1% increase in economic growth leads to a decrease in carbon dioxide emissions by 0.6%. Moreover, the findings confirm that the UAE economy does not apply to the Kuznets curve in developing countries. Furthermore, the impact of energy consumption, urbanization, and trade openness is positive on CO₂ emissions, as a 1% increase in each raises CO₂ by 0.17%, 11.6%, and 1.2%, respectively. These findings are important for decision makers in the environmental field to make decisions to reduce carbon emissions by altering the impact of economic variables and spread awareness towards reducing carbon emissions. Full article

This article analyses the spread of unbelief among conservative Egyptian and Syrian Muslims in the post-Arab Spring period. In this period, social media gave an unprecedented visibility to transgressive expressions of fiducial doubt, creating the impression of a ‘wave of atheism’ within the conservative milieu. Based on original sources and interviews, the article argues that what the participants called ‘atheism’ (ilḥād) must not be read from the perspective of preconceived notions of atheism, but examined inductively as an emergent phenomenon of nonreligion in a specific social context, the conservative Muslim and Islamist milieu. Its appearance can be traced to a multifaceted overlay of different developments and factors, including cultural and media globalisation, the unsettling social effects of the Arab Spring, and the severe doubts and disappointments suffered by sympathisers of political Islam in the post-2013 period. It is conceivable that a significant number of people defected from conservative Islam to other shapes of religion and nonreligion, but their personal trajectories await further research. More manifestly, the crisis provided an opportunity for a new generation of conservative religious guides and thinkers who have been leading an updating of religious socialisation and propagation methods among conservative Muslims. Full article

For various religious and political reasons, the idea of divine sovereignty (ḥākimiyya) has found support in many Islamic movements and discourses between the 1940s and the 1980s throughout the Muslim world. Nonetheless, in the 1990s, the consolidation of contemporary nation-states, the appeal of liberal democracy, and human rights in the Muslim world, along with the failure of Islamism, paved the way for a turn towards popular sovereignty in Islamic political thought. The emergence of a post-Islamist age in the Arab world and Iran, especially in the aftermath of the Arab Spring (2011), has changed the perspectives of many Islamic intellectuals and jurists, who now place a higher emphasis on popular sovereignty, depoliticizing divine sovereignty. This article offers an intellectual history of the shift from divine to popular sovereignty in modern Islamic political ethics, as well as a discussion of the factors that led to this change. Few critical voices on sovereignty highlight the ethical aspects of sharia’s governance and challenge the popular sovereignty narrative as authoritarian. Full article

Background/Objectives: While drug dosage calculation is vital in nursing, research indicates nursing students often struggle with necessary mathematics competencies, a gap not previously explored in the Arab world. This study assessed the basic mathematical skills of baccalaureate nursing students in a branch of a Saudi Arabian public university and compared the findings with studies conducted in other countries, which have consistently reported better performance. By highlighting these disparities, this study underscored the need for global educational reforms to ensure safe nursing practices. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study. Three hundred and thirty students were invited; consenting students completed a mathematics experts-validated 45-question test covering four key areas: numbers and operations, data interpretation, measurement, and algebraic applications. Descriptive and inferential statistics were applied. The Mann–Whitney U test was used to detect differences in scores based on gender. An independent-samples Kruskal–Wallis test was conducted to compare the three student groups simultaneously. As this test was statistically significant, post hoc pairwise comparisons were performed to assess differences in scores between the first and second, first and third, and second and third levels of study. Results: A response rate of 40.6% was achieved. Scores ranged from 3 to 58 (median: 18, 27%), with only 2% passing (≥60%). Significant differences in scores were found between genders (p = 0.037) and across study levels (p = 0.002). Overall, 25 (56%) items were difficult, while 20 (44%) were moderately difficult. Conclusions: The low median score underscored a critical need for interventions to improve mathematical competencies in nursing students, affecting medication safety in healthcare systems. Full article

Translation activities in the Islamic world began during the Umayyad period (41–132 H/661–750 CE) and peaked during the Abbasid era (132–656 H/750–1258 CE), spanning nearly three and a half centuries. Scholars often highlight Caliph al-Ma’mun (d. 218/833) as the most influential patron of these activities. During the reign of Caliph al-Ma’mun, translations into Arabic increased significantly, and texts in fields such as mathematics, medicine, astronomy, and astrology flourished. These activities continued to expand in scope and influence in the following decades. However, existing studies have largely overlooked the translation efforts during the reign of Caliph Mutawakkil ‘Alā’llāh (d. 247/861), despite the significant contributions of figures such as Ḥunayn b. Isḥāq (d. 260/873), Isḥāq b. Ḥunayn (d. 298/910), Ḥubaysh (d. 9th century), Yuḥannā b. Māsawayh (d. 243/857), al-Kindī (d. 256/870), and the Banū Mūsā brothers (d. 9th century). This study examines the individuals engaged in translation activities during al-Mutawakkil’s reign, highlighting their roles within the Abbasid court and intellectual networks. By reassessing the role of al-Mutawakkil’s era in the broader translation movement, this research aims to offer a more nuanced understanding of its significance within the history of science and translation in Islamic civilization. Full article

The Conca d’Oro of Palermo, a plain in NW Sicily of significant historical and agricultural importance, has undergone significant landscape alterations due to agricultural strengthening and urbanization. This paper analyses the evolution of the plant landscape from early human settlements to the present by integrating historical records, cartographic analysis, and floristic surveys. Three key periods of change were identified: Roman-era deforestation for cereal cultivation, the expansion of irrigated agriculture under Arab rule, and the dominance of citrus monoculture in the 19th century. Post-World War II urban expansion led to the loss of agricultural land and natural habitats, particularly wetlands and coastal dunes. Spatial analysis revealed a drastic reduction in semi-natural areas, with agricultural land giving way to urban sprawl. Floristic studies showed the persistence of endemic plant species in fragmented natural habitats alongside the local extinction of wetlands and coastal vegetation. The Oreto River, a river with a basin that extends into the territories of the municipalities of Altofonte, Monreale, and Palermo, remains a critical biodiversity reservoir, and most other natural ecosystems have been degraded. This research provides insights into the long-term interactions between human activities and biodiversity and offers a foundation for sustainable conservation strategies in Mediterranean urban and peri-urban environments. Full article

Named Entity Recognition (NER) is a fundamental task in Natural Language Processing (NLP) that supports applications such as information retrieval, sentiment analysis, and text summarization. While substantial progress has been made in NER for widely studied languages like English, Arabic presents unique challenges due to its morphological richness, orthographic ambiguity, and the frequent occurrence of nested and overlapping entities. This paper introduces a novel Arabic NER framework that addresses these complexities through architectural innovations. The proposed model incorporates a Hybrid Feature Fusion Layer, which integrates external lexical features using a cross-attention mechanism and a Gated Lexical Unit (GLU) to filter noise, while a Compound Span Representation Layer employs Rotary Positional Encoding (RoPE) and Bidirectional GRUs to enhance the detection of complex entity structures. Additionally, an Enhanced Multi-Label Classification Layer improves the disambiguation of overlapping spans and assigns multiple entity types where applicable. The model is evaluated on three benchmark datasets—ANERcorp, ACE 2005, and a custom biomedical dataset—achieving an F1-score of 93.0% on ANERcorp and 89.6% on ACE 2005, significantly outperforming state-of-the-art methods. A case study further highlights the model’s real-world applicability in handling compound and nested entities with high confidence. By establishing a new benchmark for Arabic NER, this work provides a robust foundation for advancing NLP research in morphologically rich languages. Full article

Sign language recognition and translation remain pivotal for facilitating communication among the deaf and hearing communities. However, end-to-end sign language translation (SLT) faces major challenges, including weak temporal correspondence between sign language (SL) video frames and gloss annotations and the complexity of sequence alignment between long SL videos and natural language sentences. In this paper, we propose an Adaptive Transformer (ADTR)-based deep learning framework that enhances SL video processing for robust and efficient SLT. The proposed model incorporates three novel modules: Adaptive Masking (AM), Local Clip Self-Attention (LCSA), and Adaptive Fusion (AF) to optimize feature representation. The AM module dynamically removes redundant video frame representations, improving temporal alignment, while the LCSA module learns hierarchical representations at both local clip and full-video levels using a refined self-attention mechanism. Additionally, the AF module fuses multi-scale temporal and spatial features to enhance model robustness. Unlike conventional SLT models, our framework eliminates the reliance on gloss annotations, enabling direct translation from SL video sequences to spoken language text. The proposed method was evaluated using the ArabSign dataset, demonstrating state-of-the-art performance in translation accuracy, processing efficiency, and real-time applicability. The achieved results confirm that ADTR is a highly effective and scalable deep learning solution for continuous sign language recognition, positioning it as a promising AI-driven approach for real-world assistive applications. Full article

This article examines the intertextuality and shared origins of two prominent narratives in classical Arabic literature: the story of Solomon’s Copper Carafes and the tale of The City of Brass. Both narratives, which later appeared in combined form in Alf Laylah wa-Laylah (One Thousand and One Nights), are laden with religious and mythological motifs that reflect broader cultural and theological concerns in the medieval Islamic world. This study attempts to answer the following question: “What are the common motives and ideas between the stories of Solomon’s Copper Carafes and The City of Brass in ancient Arabic literature?” By analyzing these stories as they appear in key sources of classical Arabic prose, this study investigates their shared themes and explores their potential common origins predating their Arabic textual forms. This study analyzes selected classical Arabic sources to demonstrate the narrative relationship between The City of Brass and Solomon’s Copper Carafes. It argues that both stories share a common origin predating their Arabic textual transmission. From a literary perspective, the tales of The City of Brass and Solomon’s Copper Carafes are prime examples of Islamic religious fiction, skillfully employing narrative devices to spread Islamic principles and beliefs. The stories are consistent with the core beliefs of Islam since they emphasize austerity, the certainty of death, and the primacy of monotheism. From a religious perspective, the intertwined stories of The City of Copper and Solomon’s Copper Carafes in Alf Laylah wa-Laylah provide a powerful example of how Islamic stories are inherently consistent with Islamic morality and beliefs. Full article

This article examines Tahar Ben Jelloun’s Mes Contes de Perrault (2014) as a multilayered instance of literary appropriation. Ben Jelloun’s stories, which relocate Charles Perrault’s classic French fairytales to the Arab world, represent not only a subversive challenge to French cultural hegemony (as has been argued) but can also be read as a complex engagement with the history of French folktales and their literary adaptations. This study posits that Ben Jelloun’s project restores elements of realism to Perrault’s tales that were lost when the author adapted folk stories for the French court. By reintroducing themes of bodily suffering, desire, and quotidian struggles, Ben Jelloun reconnects these tales with their folk origins. Examining Ben Jelloun’s “appropriation”—his word—in the context of Perrault’s own adaptations, this study offers new insights into the circulation and transformation of folktales across cultures and literary traditions. It contributes to ongoing discussions about literary and cultural appropriation and the place of the fairytale genre in today’s world. Full article

Rapid urbanization in Saudi Arabia, fueled by economic growth and population expansion, has created substantial challenges for urban planning, infrastructure, and environmental sustainability. In response, smart cities have emerged as a transformative solution, integrating technological innovation with sustainable urban development. While the concept of smart cities has gained global traction, its practical application in Saudi Arabia remains in its early stages. This study investigates the potential of smart cities to tackle Saudi Arabia’s urban challenges, aligning with the objectives of Vision 2030. Employing a mixed-methods approach, the research combines a theoretical analysis of global smart city frameworks with applied research, including field observations and policy analysis of Saudi initiatives. It explores the dynamic relationship between technology, governance, and sustainability, providing a comparative perspective that benchmarks Saudi efforts against international best practices. A central contribution of the study is the development of a multi-dimensional framework designed to advance sustainable smart cities in Saudi Arabia. This framework highlights key pillars such as data-driven governance, environmental resilience, social inclusivity, and economic innovation. By contributing to the broader discourse on sustainable urban development, this research positions Saudi Arabia as a potential regional leader in smart city implementation. Ultimately, the study highlights the transformative potential of smart cities to address global urbanization challenges, fostering resilient, equitable, and sustainable urban environments for future generations. Full article

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is a significant public health concern, ranking third in incidence and second in mortality worldwide. Despite rising CRC incidence rates in the Arab world, understanding of trends and patterns in CRC screening research remains limited. This study addresses this gap through a bibliometric analysis of CRC screening research in the Arab world from 2007 to 2023. We conducted an extensive literature search in Web of Science and Scopus databases, analyzing 124 articles using the Bibliometrix Package in R. Our findings revealed a 16.5% annual growth in research output, with significant increases from 2014 onwards. Saudi Arabia led in scientific production, followed by Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, while Qatar had the highest country production when adjusted for population size. Disparities in research output relative to the CRC burden were evident, especially in lower-resource countries. Three regional clusters were identified: Saudi Arabia, with strong collaborations with Canada and Egypt; a second cluster including Lebanon, UAE, Jordan, Qatar, Iraq, and Oman; and a third cluster featuring Morocco, with significant collaboration with France. Thematic analysis showed a focus on CRC screening awareness, barriers, and adherence but a lack of studies on implementation strategies and cost-effectiveness. This analysis highlights significant trends and gaps in CRC screening research in the Arab world, underscoring the need for increased investment in CRC research and screening initiatives to improve outcomes in the region. Full article