Abstract Asthma is a complex disease defined by chronic airway inflammation and airflow limitation causing variable respiratory symptoms which include shortness of breath (SOB), wheezing, chest tightness and cough. Asthma guidelines advocate adding a second long acting bronchodilator to medium doses of inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) rather using high doses of ICS alone to control moderate to severe persistent asthma. The aim of this study was to evaluate the clinical outcomes of three medication regimens indicated for Iraqi patients suffering from persistent asthma. This study was interventional randomized clinical study conducted on a sample of adult Iraqi asthmatic patients in Baghdad City. The study composed of three visits distributed over eight weeks; baseline visit followed by first follow up and second follow up visits after four and eight weeks respectively. The study enrolled 78 adult patients with moderate to severe persistent asthma as diagnosed by specialist physician according to patient history and baseline pulmonary function test (PFT) and allocated them randomly to three groups (each group included 26 patients) to receive equivalent medium doses of budesonide inhaler in addition to either formoterol inhaler, oral modified release aminophylline tablets or tiotropium inhaler (first, second and third group respectively). Sixty four patients completed this study. The mean ages of patients were above 35 years with slightly more male predominance. The study groups developed significant increase of peak expiratory flow rate (PEFR) and forced vital capacity (FVC) values at the first follow up visit compared to baseline values (p<0.001). Thereafter, the first and third groups achieved significant higher values at the second follow up visit compared to first follow up visit (p<0.001), while second group produced no change. All the groups developed significant improvement of Mini asthma quality of life questionnaire (MiniAQLQ) scores and percentage of symptom free days (SFD) at first follow up visit and continued further significant improvement at the second follow up visit (p<0.001). Generally, between groups comparison according to extent of change of study parameters revealed that third group produced the greatest improvement over the entire study period followed by the first group, whereas the second group was associated with the least extent of improvement. This study concluded that all groups caused significant improvement in study parameters compared to baseline values and also concluded that the third group of inhaled [tiotropium/budesonide] was associated with the highest extent of improvement followed by first group, while the second group was the least.
In current study, the dye from flowers petals of Strelitzia reginae used for the first time to prepare natural photosensitizer for DSSC fabrication. Among five different solvents used to extract the natural dye from S. reginae flowers, the ethanol extract of anthocyanin dye revealed higher absorption spectrum of 0.757a.u. at wavelength of 454nm. A major effect of temperature was studied to increase the extraction yield. The results show that the optimal temperature was 70 °C and there was a sharp decrease of dye concentration from 0.827 at temperature of 70 °C to 0.521 at temperature of 90°C. The extract solution of flowers of S. reginae showed higher concentration in acidic media, especially at pH 4 (0.902). The
... Show MoreProtection of the oil pipelineswhich extracted from the wells was found to shut the well and prevent the leakage of oil when broken using safety valve. This valve is automatically activated by loss of pressure between the well and pipelines, which take the pressure, signal from hydraulic pressure sensor through pressure control valve which has constant or variable value but it is regulated manually. The manual regulatory process requires the presence of monitoring workers continuously near the wells which are always found in remote areas. In this paper, a smart system has been proposed that work with proportional pressure control valve and also electronic pressure sensor through Arduino controller, which is programmed in a way that satisfie
... Show MoreAn experimental study was carried out to improve the surface roughness quality of the stainless steel 420 using magnetic abrasive finishing method (MAF). Four independent operation parameters were studied (working gap, coil current, feed rate, and table stroke), and their effects on the MAF process were introduced. A rotating coil electromagnet was designed and implemented to use with plane surfaces. The magnetic abrasive powder used was formed from 33%Fe and 67% Quartz of (250µm mesh size). The lubricant type SAE 20W was used as a binder for the powder contents. Taguchi method was used for designing the experiments and the optimal values of the selected parameters were found. An empirical equation representing the r
... Show MoreModern automation robotics have replaced many human workers in industrial factories around the globe. The robotic arms are used for several manufacturing applications, and their responses required optimal control. In this paper, a robust approach of optimal position control for a DC motor in the robotic arm system is proposed. The general component of the automation system is first introduced. The mathematical model and the corresponding transfer functions of a DC motor in the robotic arm system are presented. The investigations of using DC motor in the robotic arm system without controller lead to poor system performance. Therefore, the analysis and design of a Proportional plus Integration plus Divertive (PID) controller is illustrated.
... Show MoreThe aim of present work is to improve mechanical and fatigue properties for Aluminum alloy7049 by using Nano composites technique. The ZrO2 with an average grain diameter of 30-40 nm, was selected as Nano particles, to reinforce Aluminum alloy7049 with different percentage as, 2, 4, 6 and 7 %. The Stir casting method was used to fabricate the Nano composites materials due to economical route for improvement and processing of metal matrix composites. The experimental results were shown that the adding of zirconium oxide (ZrO2) as reinforced material leads to improve mechanical properties. The best percentage of improvement of mechanical properties of 7049 AA was with 4% wt. of ZrO2 about (7.76% ) for ultim
... Show MoreAirlift reactors are widely used in the chemical and biochemical applications as effective contactors for mass and heat transfer. The main advantages of airlift contactor compared with simple bubble column are ease of construction, low shear rate, high capacity, good mixing and liquid circulation without mechanical agitators and circulating pumps.
In this work, growth characteristics of Chlorella vulgaris microalgae were studied in an internal loop airlift photobioreactor for biomass production. The bioreactor operated under batch and semi-continuous culture mode using commercially available 20:20:20+TE NPK fertilizer as nutrients. The experiments were conducted to evaluate the growth rate and biomass productivity of
... Show MoreIn this study, condensation polymerization was used to synthesize a number of novel liquid crystal polymers with 1,3,4-oxadiazole rings based on melamine. The new synthesized polymers were characterized by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) and proton nuclear magnetic resonance (1HNMR) spectroscopy. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and optical polarization microscopy (OPM) were used to investigate their liquid crystalline properties. The results demonstrated that throughout a wide temperature range, most of the polymers exhibited columnar (CohX) and nematic (N) liquid crystalline phases.
ABSTRACT
The simulation of groundwater movement has been carried out by using MODFLOW model
in order to show the impact of change of water surface elevation of the Tigris river on layers of
the aquifer system for Nuclear Research Center at Al-Tuwaitha area, in addition to evaluate the
ability of the proposed pumping well to collect groundwater and change the direction of flow at
steady-state. The results of the study indicated that there is a good match between the values of
groundwater levels that calculated in the model and measured in the field, where mean error is
0.09 m.
The study also showed that the increasing of water surface elevation of the