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.
ABSTRUCT
This research aims at examining the expected gap between the fact of planning and controlling process of production at the State Company for Electric Industries and implementation of material requirements planning system in fuzzy environment. Developing solutions to bridge the gap is required to provide specific mechanisms subject to the logic of fuzzy rules that will keep pace with demand for increased accuracy and reduced waiting times depending on demand forecast, investment in inventory to reduce costs to a minimum.
The proposed solutions for overcoming the research problem has required some questions reflecting the problem with its multiple dimensions, which ar
... Show MoreBackground: Pulpotomy is an accepted treatment for the management of cariously exposed pulps in symptom free primary molars to achieve one of the most important goals for Pedodontists, which is the retention of the pulpally involved deciduous teeth healthy until the time of normal exfoliation. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relative success of pulpotec, formocresol and Mineral Trioxide Aggregate (MTA) in cariously exposed primary molar teeth, using clinical and radiographical examinations. Materials and methods: Thirty nine children with 45 primary molars requiring pulpotomy were selected in this study, 15 teeth treated by each type of pulpotomy medicament. Clinical and radiographical follow up for the patients was performed
... Show MoreBackground: Oral squamous cell carcinoma is the most prevalent malignant neoplasm of the oral cavity which results from accumulated genetic and epigenetic alterations. It is not always inexorable and may be reversible if early intervention in the process can occur to prevent further genetic mutation and disease progression. The FHIT gene is a tumor suppressor gene located in FRA3B region which is the most active common fragile site, where DNA damage leading to aberrant transcripts and translocations frequently occur. The WWOX is a tumor suppressor gene that plays a central role in tumor suppression through transcriptional repression and apoptosis, with its apoptotic function the more prominent of the two. This study aimed to evaluate and co
... Show MoreAn essential issue in obstetrics is the prevalence of maternal and fetal complications in pregnant women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). The purpose of the present study was to investigate the prevalence of pregnancy complications among various phenotypes of pregnant women with PCOS.
Software-defined networks (SDN) have a centralized control architecture that makes them a tempting target for cyber attackers. One of the major threats is distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. It aims to exhaust network resources to make its services unavailable to legitimate users. DDoS attack detection based on machine learning algorithms is considered one of the most used techniques in SDN security. In this paper, four machine learning techniques (Random Forest, K-nearest neighbors, Naive Bayes, and Logistic Regression) have been tested to detect DDoS attacks. Also, a mitigation technique has been used to eliminate the attack effect on SDN. RF and KNN were selected because of their high accuracy results. Three types of ne
... Show MoreThin films of CuPc of various thicknesses (150,300 and 450) nm have been deposited using pulsed laser deposition technique at room temperature. The study showed that the spectra of the optical absorption of the thin films of the CuPc are two bands of absorption one in the visible region at about 635 nm, referred to as Q-band, and the second in ultra-violet region where B-band is located at 330 nm. CuPc thin films were found to have direct band gap with values around (1.81 and 3.14 (eV respectively. The vibrational studies were carried out using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). Finally, From open and closed aperture Z-scan data non-linear absorption coefficient and non-linear refractive index have been calculated res
... 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
... Show MoreAt 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