Background: Legionella pneumophila (L. pneumophila) is gram-negative bacterium, which causes Legionnaires’ disease as well as Pontiac fever. Objective: To determine the frequency of Legionella pneumophila in pneumonic patients, to determine the clinical utility of diagnosing Legionella pneumonia by urinary antigen testing (LPUAT) in terms of sensitivity and specificity, to compares the results obtained from patients by urinary antigen test with q Real Time PCR (RT PCR) using serum samples and to determine the frequency of serogroup 1 and other serogroups of L. pneumophila. Methods: A total of 100 pneumonic patients (community acquired pneumonia) were enrolled in this study during a period between October 2016 to April 2017; 92 samples were collected from patients attended and admitted to Al-Imamein Al-Kadhimein Medical City and 8 samples from those in the (Center of Kidney Diseases and Transplantation) in the Medical City of Baghdad. All patients were under therapy with antibiotics. Serum and urine specimens were obtained from all patients; urine samples were processed for urinary antigen test (rapid test). Serum samples were collected and submitted to DNA extraction for detection of L. pneumophila mip gene by q RT PCR assay. Results: The percentage of L. pneumophila in two hospitals in Bagdad was 30%. Of these 26% was serogroup 1 detected by urinary antigen testing (UAT). In the other hand, 23% of samples were positive by q RT PCR based mip gene, of these 19 % were serogroup 1 and 4% were another serogroup. The sensitivity of UAT is high (P value < 0.001), which means statistically highly significance than q RT PCR. Conclusion: LPUAT is a rapid tool for early diagnosis of Legionella infection, which highlights the need of using this test in hospitals and health institutions and there is a high prevalence of L. pneumophila in Iraq that refer to the necessity of considering this microorganism point of view in future studies for detection and treatment in pneumonic patients. Keywords: L. pneumophila, mip gene, quantitative real time PCR, urinary antigen. Citation: Gauad SA, Abdulrahman TR, Muhamad AK, Jawad AA, Hassan JS. Clinical utility of urinary antigen test and molecular method for detection of Legionella pneumophila. Iraqi JMS. 2018; 16(2): 207-215. doi: 10.22578/IJMS.16.2.13
The rapid rise in the use of artificially generated faces has significantly increased the risk of identity theft in biometric authentication systems. Modern facial recognition technologies are now vulnerable to sophisticated attacks using printed images, replayed videos, and highly realistic 3D masks. This creates an urgent need for advanced, reliable, and mobile-compatible fake face detection systems. Research indicates that while deep learning models have demonstrated strong performance in detecting artificially generated faces, deploying these models on consumer mobile devices remains challenging due to limitations in computing power, memory, privacy, and processing speed. This paper highlights several key challenges: (1) optimiz
... Show MoreIndividuals across different industries, including but not limited to agriculture, drones, pharmaceuticals and manufacturing, are increasingly using thermal cameras to achieve various safety and security goals. This widespread adoption is made possible by advancements in thermal imaging sensor technology. The current literature provides an in-depth exploration of thermography camera applications for detecting faults in sectors such as fire protection, manufacturing, aerospace, automotive, non-destructive testing and structural material industries. The current discussion builds on previous studies, emphasising the effectiveness of thermography cameras in distinguishing undetectable defects by the human eye. Various methods for defect
... Show MorePavement crack and pothole identification are important tasks in transportation maintenance and road safety. This study offers a novel technique for automatic asphalt pavement crack and pothole detection which is based on image processing. Different types of cracks (transverse, longitudinal, alligator-type, and potholes) can be identified with such techniques. The goal of this research is to evaluate road surface damage by extracting cracks and potholes, categorizing them from images and videos, and comparing the manual and the automated methods. The proposed method was tested on 50 images. The results obtained from image processing showed that the proposed method can detect cracks and potholes and identify their severity levels wit
... Show MoreThis study is dedicated to solving multicollinearity problem for the general linear model by using Ridge regression method. The basic formulation of this method and suggested forms for Ridge parameter is applied to the Gross Domestic Product data in Iraq. This data has normal distribution. The best linear regression model is obtained after solving multicollinearity problem with the suggesting of 10 k value.
In this paper Heun method has been used to find numerical solution for first order nonlinear functional differential equation. Moreover, this method has been modified in order to treat system of nonlinear functional differential equations .two numerical examples are given for conciliated the results of this method.
In this study, plain concrete simply supported beams subjected to two points loading were analyzed for the flexure. The numerical model of the beam was constructed in the meso-scale representation of concrete as a two phasic material (aggregate, and mortar). The fracture process of the concrete beams under loading was investigated in the laboratory as well as by the numerical models. The Extended Finite Element Method (XFEM) was employed for the treatment of the discontinuities that appeared during the fracture process in concrete. Finite element method with the feature standard/explicitlywas utilized for the numerical analysis. Aggregate particles were assumedof elliptic shape. Other properties such as grading and sizes of the aggr
... Show MoreAbstract :- In this paper, silver nanoparticles had been prepared by chemical reduction method. Many tests had been done to it such as UV-Visible spectrophotometer, XRD, AFM&SEM test. finally an attempt had been done to get the optimum condition to control the grain size of silver Nanoparticles by variation the heating period and other parameters which has an effect in silver Nanoparticles synthesis process. in this method we can get a silver nanoparticles in the size range from 52 to 97 nm.
Construction projects have become a changing dramatically in recent decades and that the goal of the beneficiaries of the implementation of structural project is to complete the work with less time and within the cost of the specific and the best possible quality may sometimes happen that highlights the importance of time on the rest of the items at the implementation of projects for various reasons, including the need to use the project as soon as possible possible change rapidly to customer's requests, but the high cost of the project represents the biggest obstacle for entrepreneurs with its effects on the quality and the time workers, and is a measure of those elements in monetary terms is the key to integration between them, so the
... Show MoreIn this paper the method of singular value decomposition is used to estimate the ridge parameter of ridge regression estimator which is an alternative to ordinary least squares estimator when the general linear regression model suffer from near multicollinearity.