Resilient polymeric materials such as silicone elastomers are currently used for maxillofacial prostheses construction but the strength of these materials and their clinical performance need to be optimized with the addition of reinforcing fillers. This study investigates the effect of zirconia nanopowder addition on tear strength, tensile strength, elongation at break, Shore A hardness, surface roughness and cytotoxicity of VST-50 maxillofacial silicone. Silicone base was mixed with different amounts (1%, 2% and 3%) of zirconia nanopowder using a vacuum mixer. Silicone without filler was used as control for comparison. Scanning Electron Microscopy and Atomic Force Microscopy were utilized to assess the efficiency of high-shear vacuum mixing as filler dispersion method and the surface topography, respectively. Both SEM and AFM images showed that the zirconia nanopowder were distributed fairly well within the polymer. Statistically, highly significant increase in tear strength, tensile strength and hardness with non-significant decrease in elongation at break and non-significant increase in surface roughness were seen with 1% and 2% groups. Whereas with 3% group, there was significant improvement in tear strength, tensile strength and hardness but there was significant undesirable decrease in elongation and increase in roughness. Cytotoxicity test revealed that the addition of zirconia nanopowder was nontoxic to Rat Embryonic Fibroblast (REF) cells and there was non-significant change in the cell viability of all study groups after 24- and 72-hours incubation periods. In conclusion, the addition of 2% by weight nano zirconia to VST-50 maxillofacial silicone could be beneficial in enhancing its performance.
In the current study, CuAl0.7In0.3Te2 thin films with 400 nm thickness were deposited on glass substrates using thermal evaporation technique. The films were annealed at various annealing temperatures of (473,573,673 and 773) K. Furthermore, the films were characterized by X-ray Diffraction spectroscopy (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), and Ultra violet-visible (UV–vis). XRD patterns confirm that the films exhibit chalcopyrite structure and the predominant diffraction peak is oriented at (112). The grain size and surface roughness of the annealed films have been reported. Optical properties for the synthesized films including, absorbance, transmittance, dielectric constant, and refr
... Show MoreSpatial data observed on a group of areal units is common in scientific applications. The usual hierarchical approach for modeling this kind of dataset is to introduce a spatial random effect with an autoregressive prior. However, the usual Markov chain Monte Carlo scheme for this hierarchical framework requires the spatial effects to be sampled from their full conditional posteriors one-by-one resulting in poor mixing. More importantly, it makes the model computationally inefficient for datasets with large number of units. In this article, we propose a Bayesian approach that uses the spectral structure of the adjacency to construct a low-rank expansion for modeling spatial dependence. We propose a pair of computationally efficient estimati
... Show MoreThe main goal of this work is to put a simple model of the spectral energy distribution of binary stars called WW Cha. This model is built up on the extracted data from various telescopes and archives for the target WW Cha stars and then analyzing them using a python environment. The result of the fitting proposes that there are two protoplanetary disks around the WW Cha star, with different physical properties for each disk, such as the size of the inner disk being 10 AU, while the size of the outer disk being 300 AU. The shape of the outer disk is a flaring disk not a flat disk according to the value of the power law for the surface density (1.5). The emission in the disk is caused by small amorphous olivine grains rangin
... Show MoreThe objective of this research was to investigate the effect of replacing fat(shortening) with different percentages of tahena on the quality properties (physiochemical and sensory ) of shortened cake.The percentages of moisture,protein ,fat and ash of cake increased significantly(p<0.05) as the replacement was increased .The highest increase percentages were 10,48,5,and 90 %,respectivly, at 100% replacement .Carbohydrate,however,decreased by 10%at 100% replacement .these findings may indicate improvement of cake nutritional value.Standing height,as an indicator of cake volume, also increased significantly by 4% at the 50% replacement then it decreased by 4% 100% replacement level. Basic formula (control) has signific
... Show MoreInSb alloy was prepared then InSb:Bi films have been prepared successfully by thermal evaporation technique on glass substrate at Ts=423K. The variation of activation energies(Ea1,Ea2)of d.c conductivity with annealing temperature (303, 373, 423, 473, 523 and 573)K were measured, it is found that its values increases with increasing annealing temperature. To show the type of the films, the Hall and thermoelectric power were measured. The activation energy of the thermoelectric power is much smaller than for d.c conductivity and increases with increasing annealing temperature .The mobility and carrier concentration has been measured also.
At atmospheric pressure and at a frequency of 9.1 kHz, a constructed magnetically stabilized tornado gliding arc discharge (MSGAD) system was utilized in this study to generate a non-thermal plasma with an alternating voltage source from 2,4,6,8 to 10 kV. Argon gas was used to generate the arc plasma with an adjustable flow rate using a flow meter regulator to stabilize the gas flow rate to 2 L/min. A gliding plasma discharge is achieved by a magnetic field for the purpose of a planned investigation. The influence of the magnetically stabilized tornado gliding arc discharge parameters such as magnetic field and applied voltage on microscopic tornado plasma parameters was studied. The electron temperature1was measured using a Boltzmann plot
... Show MoreDuring 9–10 September 2011 the ACE, Wind, and SOHO spacecraft measured the complex interaction between an interplanetary coronal mass ejection (ICME) and a corotating interaction region (CIR) associated with the heliospheric sector boundary. Except for a few short periods, the suprathermal electrons are unidirectional, suggesting that the ICME magnetic field has opened through interchange reconnection. Signatures of interaction are distributed throughout the event suggesting that the structures have become entangled or embedded. Since the ICME speed is relatively low, the strong forward shock must be caused by the ICME‐CIR interaction. Other interesting features are the upstream heating flux disc
In the recent years, some of the newly constructed asphalt concrete pavements in Baghdad as well as other cities across Iraq showed premature failures with consequential negative impact on both roadway safety and economy. Frequently, load associated mode of failure (rutting and fatigue) as well as, occasionally, moisture damage in some poorly drained sections are the main failure types found in those newly constructed road.
In this research, hydrated lime was introduced into asphalt concrete mixtures of wearing course in two methods. The first one was the addition of dry lime on dry aggregate and the second one was the addition of dry lime on saturated surface dry aggregate moisturized by 2.0 to 3.0 percent of wa
... Show MoreThe current research aimed to investigate the psychometric characteristics of the Arabic version of the Nomophobia scale for the Omani youth. The scale was administered to a random sample of students from public and private universities and colleges in Oman. The research sample consisted of 2507 students, of whom 868 males and 1639 females. The validity of the measure was first checked by presenting the scale to a group of experts in this field. Then the exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was carried out. The exploratory factor analysis revealed the existence of three main factors: the fear of connectivity loss, the fear of communication loss with others, and the fear of network outages. These factors accounted for 65.6% of the
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