Voice Activity Detection (VAD) is considered as an important pre-processing step in speech processing systems such as speech enhancement, speech recognition, gender and age identification. VAD helps in reducing the time required to process speech data and to improve final system accuracy by focusing the work on the voiced part of the speech. An automatic technique for VAD using Fuzzy-Neuro technique (FN-AVAD) is presented in this paper. The aim of this work is to alleviate the problem of choosing the best threshold value in traditional VAD methods and achieves automaticity by combining fuzzy clustering and machine learning techniques. Four features are extracted from each speech segment, which are short term energy, zero-crossing rate, autocorrelation, and log energy. A modified version of fuzzy C-Means is then used to cluster speech segments into three clusters; two clusters for voice and one for unvoiced. After that, three feed forward neural networks are trained to adjust their weights, in which each network represents one cluster. To make the final decision regarding the class type of a given speech segment, the membership degrees of this segment in all clusters along with neural networks' decisions are given to a defuzzification step which finally gives the class type of that segment. The proposed FN-AVAD is tested on the public multimodal emotion database, Surrey AudioVisual Expressed Emotion (SAVEE), and the error rate was 2.08%. The achieved results are comparable to the results achieved by the current published works in the literature.
Silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) are of potential interest because of their effective antibacterial and antiviral activities. Capping agents are used for exhibiting a better antibacterial activity than uncapped Ag NPs. There are very few reports that have shown the usage of AgNPs for in-vivo antibacterial therapy. Citrate-capped silver nanoparticles were synthesized chemically by citrate reduction method; the size of Cit-AgNPs was determined by an atomic force microscope (AFM) and was between 15-90 nm. Acinetobacter baumannii (A. baumannii) isolates were the only sensitive species to Cit-AgNPs. MICs and MBC of Cit-AgNPs were determined by using A. baumannii. The results showed an additive effect of Cit-AgNPs. Four mice groups were infected with
... Show MoreSynthesis of new nucleoside analogues of the type : 3¢ , 3¢ - gem – di – C – nitromethly , expected to have useful application in the chemotherapeutic treatment of AIDS , cancer and microbial infections. The synthesis involved the condensation of the appropriate sugar derivative ( i.e . 3¢ , 3¢ – gem – di – C – nitromethly – 1– ribofuranose ) with nitrogen bases , such as , uracil and theophllin following a multi step scheme starting from diacetone golucose (1) (scheme 1) .The prepared compound were identified by spectroscopic methods ; ir , mass , 1H and 13C nmr.
Antibacterial Activity of Bioactive Glass 45S5 and Chitosan Incorporated as Fillers into Gutta Percha, Ahmed I AL-Jobory*, Raghad AL-Hashimi
Human Adenosine deaminase is an essential enzyme for modulating the bioactivity of thyroid hormones, and It is important for the maturation and differentiation of lymphocytes, although its clinical importance in thyroid diseases have yet to be identified. Objective: The aim of the current study is to determine the Adenosine deaminase concentration in healthy controls, and in autoimmune thyroid diseases such as Graves' Disease, and Hashimoto's Thyroiditis. Patients and methods: A total of 183 serum specimens of 103 female patients with autoimmune thyroid diseases and 80 healthy control groups were included in this study and collected from the Baghdad Medical City, Iraq. Quantitative Human Adenosine Deaminase ELISA kits were used to estimate
... Show MoreOne of the major health problems causing defects or damage to one or more of the four heart valves [aortic, mitral, pulmonary, and tricuspid] is valvular heart disease [VHD]; it occurs due to congenital abnormalities or acquired pathology. It is a defect that results in weak heart valves and is therefore unable to function as precise pathways of the blood. The aim of the current study was to evaluate the ferroxidase activity of ceruloplasmin (Cp) and the lipid profile of valvular heart disease patients in sera. Ninety subjects were included in this study and 60 patients with HDV were divided into two subgroups according to the affected valve: 33 patients with aortic valve disease (AV) and 27 patients
Celiac disease (CD) is the most common genetically - based disease in correlation with food intolerance. The aim of this study is to measure the activity of ALT enzyme and purify enzyme from sera women with celiac disease. Alanine aminotransferase (ALT) activity has been assayed in (30) women serum samples with celiac disease, age range between (20-40) year and (30) serum of healthy women as control group, age range between (22-38) year. In the present study, the mean value of ALT activity was significantly higher in patients with celiac disease than healthy group (p<0.01). The ALT enzyme was partial purified from sera women with celiac disease by dialysis, gel filtration using Sephadex G- 50 and ion exchange chr
... Show MoreNew 2-amino thiazole ,oxodiazole, sulphonilamide and diazin derivatives of N-(α-chloro aceto)-3-(tolyl imino)-5-bromo-2-oxo-indole(2) have been synthesized .The preparation process started by the reaction of 5-bromo isatin with P-toluidine in the presence of glacial acetic acid and dimethylformamide(DMF) as a solvent to give 3-(tolyl imino)5-bromo-1H-indole-2-one.(1), Compound (1) with sodium hydride in dimethylformamide(DMF) at 0C0 gave a suspension of the sodium salt of Schiff base derivative and subsequent reaction with monochloroacetylchloride obtained the intermediate compound(2).Compound(2) was reacted with different reagents in four routes.The first route involved direct reaction with substituted 2-aminobenzothiazole u
... Show MoreInflammasome is a multiprotein oligomer complex which is the precursor procaspase-1 and is a component of the innate immune system so that this study aimed to determine the serum levels of interleukin-1? and 18 in patients with T2D and simple obesity in an attempt to clarify the role of inflammasome in these disorders.Twenty five known cases of T2D, twenty four patients with simple obesity and twenty healthy subjects were randomly recruited from AL-Kindy Teaching Hospital in Baghdad to enroll in this study. All the data about the demographic characteristics and anthropometric measurements were determined in all patients, also the C-reactive protein and serum interleukin (IL)-1? and IL-18 levels were obtained from each patient. The results s
... Show MoreThis work aimed to investigate the prevalence of pathogenic fungi and evaluate the antifungal activity of Trichoderma orientale FMR12486 crude extract against pathogenic fungi isolated from patients attending the National Center for Thoracic and Respiratory Diseases (having a history of tuberculosis) and consultant of Dermatology of Baghdad hospital, Iraq. A total of 80 clinical specimens were collected: 20 skin scrapings specimens and 60 sputum specimens. The results of direct examination by KOH 10% and culture showed that 11 (55%) cases from 20 skin specimens were positive for fungal infections, while in the sputum specimens, 28 (47%) cases from 60 were positive. Candida albicans represented the most common fungal infection isolat
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