Background: The gene responsible for encoding the protein of cytotoxic T lymphocyte-associated antigen-4 (CTLA-4) has been found to be associated with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in different ethnic populations. But the association of +49A/G CTLA-4 polymorphism with susceptibility of RA among Iraqi Arab populations has not yet been determined. Methods: One hundred and seventy-eight patients were examined, 67 of them were males (mean age 54.71 ± 10.4 years), while 167 were examined for the control group, of whom 64 were males and the rest were females. CTLA-4 DNA genotyping was carried on to determine the +49 A/G (rs231775) polymorphism using a polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP). Enzyme-linked immuno

The process of transformation from the central economy to a free economy requires restructuring the economy according to a new economic philosophy that relies on activating the role of private economic activity in which private and medium-sized institutions occupy an essential axis for their active role in the economies of all countries, especially those countries that have directed towards the market mechanism and sector leadership. The special process of economic development and the role that commercial banks can play in advancing the financing of these projects by establishing specialized business incubators for financing.

What encouraged countries to pay attention to these institutions is the ease of

The paper deals with claims in construction projects in Iraq and studies their types, causes, impacts, resolution methods and then proposes a management system to control the impacts of claims. Two parts have been done to achieve the research objective (theoretical part and practical part). The findings showed that the main types of the claims are extra work claims, different site condition claims, delay claims and the main causes of the claims are variation of the orders, design errors and omission, delay in payments by owner, variation in quantities and scheduling errors. The claims have bad impacts on the cost by increasing (10% to 25%) and also on the duration of the project by increasing from (25% to 50%).The negotiation is the main

......

The Iraqi government seeks to overcome the financial crisis by investing and privatizing some projects to achieve sustainable growth. Most of the investment projects in Iraq suffer from many constraints that greatly impact the success of these projects. A survey of the opinions of a group of experts was conducted to identify the most important constraints facing the investment process in Iraq. Then the experts' answers were arranged in a closed questionnaire and distributed to the research sample for which the statistical analysis was conducted. Through it, the most important (17) factors that had the greatest impact on the failure of investment projects in Iraq were reached. One of the main constraints was

Background: The aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) is a ligand-activated transcription factor historically recognized for its role in the regulation of toxicity mediated by environmental chemicals. Recent research points to AhR's critical participation in male reproductive physiology, particularly in spermatogenesis, hormone signaling, and the maintenance of sperm quality. Both endogenous ligands (e.g., dietary and gut microbiota-derived metabolites) and exogenous pollutants (e.g., dioxins and benzo-α-pyrene) influence AhR-mediated pathways, making it a key link between environmental exposures and male fertility. Results: This review highlights AhR's influence on the male reproductive system, emphasizing the role of endogenous AhR ligands an

Background: Antibiotic resistance is a problem leading to difficulty in treating microbial infections thatmay occur due to many causes. For the important pharmacist role as a reference for the information and theability to access to medications, they are vital members in lowering the development of antibiotic resistance,and also they support the proper use and control of antibioticsmisuse. Our goal is comparing the knowledge,attitude, practice of undergraduate and postgraduate pharmacy students and their perceptions about thecausing factors of antibiotic resistance in Iraq.Method: A cross sectional study was conducted involving the final year bachelor and postgraduate (masterand Philosophical doctor) students from different private

Introduction:

        Many business owners suffer major financial problems during periods of financial stagnation, the decline of markets and businesses, or under the impact of financial shocks for certain reasons that result in large debts and the consequent financial and legal obligations. This is the beginning of a long and endless path of suffering and the search for a safe exit. It is even worse for financial institutions to facilitate financial solutions that rely on lending as a solution to their financial problem. Debt and its consequences increase, and the problem deepens and becomes complicated until things become entangled and the escape or declaration of bank

Data hiding is the process of encoding extra information in an image by making small modification to its pixels. To be practical, the hidden data must be perceptually invisible yet robust to common signal processing operations. This paper introduces a scheme for hiding a signature image that could be as much as 25% of the host image data and hence could be used both in digital watermarking as well as image/data hiding. The proposed algorithm uses orthogonal discrete wavelet transforms with two zero moments and with improved time localization called discrete slantlet transform for both host and signature image. A scaling factor ? in frequency domain control the quality of the watermarked images. Experimental results of signature image