ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Estrogens has traditionally been known as the female hormone, but this idea has been challenged in early 1990’s and an essential physiological role for estrogen in male fertility was identified. Phytoestrogens are naturally occurring non-steroidal plant chemicals that can act like the female hormone estrogen. The herbs ( anise alfalfa and vervain ) chosen in this study contain phytoestrogens. OBJECTIVE: Previous studies demonstrated controversy of the effects of phytoestrogens on the rat testes .Hence, the present investigation was undertaken to investigate the influence of typical dose of herbs containing phytoestrogen on the rat testis. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Twenty-four apparently normal mature male rats were divided into four groups of 6 animals each. The first "control" group received only 4ml of distilled water as a placebo. The second group received 40mg/kg of anise seed; the third group received 53.3 mg/kg of dried herb of vervain and the fourth group received 400 mg /kg of alfalfa seeds. All experimental groups received the doses through orogastric tube daily for fourteen days. Testicular histology was evaluated by light and enzyme histochemistry. Plasma FSH and testosterone concentrations were taken to support our results. RESULTS: Histological examination of anise, alfalfa and vervain – treated groups showed an increase in the height of germinal epithelia. There was marked lipoprotein lipase activity in the whole of the interstitial tissue which is more in amount in experimental groups than that in control group. Acid phosphatase granules were infiltered the seminiferous epithelia mildly in control group , moderately in anise and vervain groups and markedly in alfalfa group. The number of interstitial cells showing marked acid phosphatase activity was higher in all experimental groups than that in control group. Alkaline phosphatase exhibited intense activity in the boundary tissue of the seminiferous tubules in testes of control and experimental groups but it appeared thicker in the latter. CONCLUSION: The low dose and short duration of treatment used in our study made these phytoestrogen – containing herbs to have a stimulatory effect on leydig cell steroidogenesis. This study also demonstrated that aniseed being the most potent of the three herbs followed by alfalfa in stimulating testosterone synthesis. This is possibly attributed to the coumarin constituent of aniseed and alfalfa. KEY WORDS: phytoestrogen-containing herbs, testis, acid phosphatase, alkaline phosphatase, lipoprotein lipase
The proper operation, and control of wastewater treatment plants, is receiving an increasing attention, because of the rising concern about environmental issues. In this research a mathematical model was developed to predict biochemical oxygen demand in the waste water discharged from Abu-Ghraib diary factory in Baghdad using Artificial Neural Network (ANN).In this study the best selection of the input data were selected from the recorded parameters of the wastewater from the factory. The ANN model developed was built up with the following parameters: Chemical oxygen demand, Dissolved oxygen, pH, Total dissolved solids, Total suspended solids, Sulphate, Phosphate, Chloride and Influent flow rate. The results indicated that the constructed A
... Show MoreBackground: Salivary biomarkers, a non-invasive alternative method to serum and tissue based biomarkers and it is consider as an effective modality for early diagnosis. Salivary microRNA 21, a nucleotide biomarker, was reported to increase in patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma. This study was conducted to measure the fold change of microRNA 21 in stimulated saliva and to study its association with smoking and occurrence of oral squamous cell carcinoma. Materials and methods: A 20 patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma who used to be smokers was included in addition to 40 control subjects (20 smokers and 20 non- smokers health looking subjects). Stimulated saliva was collected under standardized condition. Salivary microRNA 21 wa
... Show MoreThe present paper deal with the issue of the beginning of the culturally
renaissance in emirates of Arab Gulf from 1914-1945 between tow world war
has been attracting the attention of academic about the developments in many
fields in the Arab Gulf at this time.
The paper is divided into five sections. First section, deals with the
geographic importance for the Arab Gulf region. Second section, the economic
situations in the region before and after oil. The third section, talk for social
situations, like population, tribe and tribes in society, and immigration. The
fourth section, deals with the factors of rise the culture and political in the Arab
Gulf before discovery of oil period. The five section, the cultu
Use Almtafr axis to study the response component that isolates gave a positive response to the use of standard Almtafr which leads to lower the temperature and the number of cells at a temperature suitable Rifampicin resistant less than that TJ and similarly reflected on the frequency of mutations induced
Our research sheds light on one of the most important aspects of David Grossman's play, "Ricky's Garden, גן ריקי " which is characterized by its realistic portrayal of characters. Grossman gradually moves towards the inner awareness of his characters, expressing their emotions and thoughts through conversations and emotional conflicts, referring to their past and rooted background. Grossman transformed the main subject of his play (psychological depth) into a presentation and arrangement of all the elements of the play in a way that expresses emotional nature more powerfully by each child in the garden. This is reflected in their actions and words, making Grossman's works suitable for study and always of interest to specialized resear
... Show MoreReduce the required time for measuring the permeability of clayey soils by using new manufactured cell
The research aims to design an electronic program that allows users to assess the possibility of different practices for projects management professional according to the PMBOK methodology)) and using the requirements Data mentioned in the "knowledge and experience in project management Evaluation guide" issued by the professional Institute of project management According to the results of this program will be electronic The possible classification of project management in terms of both (proficiency_ perform tasks) as less than the desired level or within or above average in terms of best practices, and finally a number of recommendations to overcome the possible shortcomings. The most important is the need to enrich the service
... Show MoreThe uptake of Cd(II) ions from simulated wastewater onto olive pips was modeled using artificial neural network (ANN) which consisted of three layers. Based on 112 batch experiments, the effect of contact time (10-240 min), initial pH (2-6), initial concentration (25-250 mg/l), biosorbent dosage (0.05-2 g/100 ml), agitation speed (0-250 rpm) and temperature (20-60ºC) were studied. The maximum uptake (=92 %) of Cd(II) was achieved at optimum parameters of 60 min, 6, 50 mg/l, 1 g/100 ml, 250 rpm and 25ºC respectively.
Tangent sigmoid and linear transfer functions of ANN for hidden and output layers respectively with 7 neurons were sufficient to present good predictions for cadmium removal efficiency with coefficient of correlatio
... Show MoreObjectives: The study aims at identifying the nurses’ knowledge about peritoneal dialysis complications, to
construct an education program for nurses in peritoneal dialysis units, to determine the effectiveness of the
education program upon the nurses' knowledge about complications of peritoneal dialysis, and to identify the
relationship between the nurses’ knowledge and their demographic characteristics of level of education and
years of experience.
Methodology: A quasi-experimentai study was carried out at the peritoneal dialysis units of Baghdad teaching
hospitals, from April 2004 to April 2006.
٨ purposive sample of (50) nurse was selected from Baghdad teaching hospitals. These nurses working at the
perit