Antibiotic resistance is the major growing threat facing the pharmacological treatment of bacterial infections. Therefore, bioprospecting the medicinal plants could provide potential sources for antimicrobial agents. Mimusops, the biggest and widely distributed plant genus of family Sapotaceae, is used in traditional medicines due to its promising pharmacological activities. This study was conducted to elucidate the antimicrobial effect of three unexplored Mimusops spp. (M. kummel, M. laurifolia and M. zeyheri). Furthermore, the mechanisms underlying such antibacterial activity were studied. The Mimusops leaf extracts revealed significant antibacterial activities against the five tested bacterial strains with a maximum inhibition zone diameter of 22.0 mm against B. subtilis compared with standard antibiotic ciprofloxacin. The minimal inhibitory and bactericidal concentration values against tested Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacterial strains ranged from 3.15-12.5 µg/ml. However, weak antifungal effect was recorded against Candida albicans with MIC value ˃25 µg/ml. The 1, 1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay showed that M. caffra was the best antioxidant (IC50=14.75±0.028 µg/ml), while M. laurifolia was the least one (IC50=34.22±0.014 µg/ml). The phenolics in plant leaves extracts were identified and quantified by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) which revealed the presence of seven phenolic acids and four flavonoids. The abundant phenolic compounds were rutin (5.216±0.067 mg/g dried wt.) and gallic acid (0.296±0.068 mg/g) followed by myricetin (0.317±0.091 mg/g) then kaempferol (0.113±0.049 mg/g) as flavonoids. The antibacterial mechanism of M. laurifolia extract, as a representative species, induces ultrastructural changes in the model bacterium Staphylococcus aureus with cell wall and plasma membrane lysis as revealed by transmission electron microscopy. Overall, Mimusops species (M. laurifolia, M. kummel and M. zeyheri) are promising natural alternative sources for antimicrobial agents.
To investigate the efficacy of polyether‐ether‐ketone (PEEK) wire as a fixed orthodontic retainer, by comparing its performance to other retainer wires and optimizing its adhesion to composite bonding materials.
Retainer wires of 15 mm segments were used, PEEK wires were prepared in cylindrical form with 0.8 mm diameter, and had two surface treatments namely air‐abrasion and conditioning with adhesive system. Three different metallic retainer wires were used for comparison and three tests were performed; two tests measured debonding force and associated wire deflec
The paper investigates the impact of role-playing as a classroom technique on Iraqi EFL students’ speaking skill on Iraqi EFL students at the college level. The students are 40 college language students in University of Baghdad, College of Education Ibn-Rushd randomly chosen. Then, they were divided into two groups, experimental and control groups. Thirty questions were applied to both groups as a pre-test of speaking and the students asked to answer them orally. The experimental group was taught speaking skill of the targeted role-play technique while the control group was taught in traditional method. After 20 lessons of the teaching, the post-test of speaking was conducted in which the students in both groups were asked to answ
... Show MoreOne of the most important problems facing the world today is the energy problem. The solution was in finding renewable energy sources such as solar energy. The solar energy applications in Iraq is facing many problems . One of the most important problems is the accumulation of dust on the solar panels surface which causes decreasing its performance sharply. In the present work, a new technique was presented by using two-axis solar tracking system to reduce the accumulated dust on the solar panel surface and compared it with the fixed solar panels which installed at tilt angles 30° and 45°. The results indicated that the maximum losses of the output power due to accumulation of dust on the fixed solar panels is about 31.4% and 23.1% res
... Show MoreIn this research velocity of moving airplane from its recorded digital sound is introduced. The data of sound file is sliced into several frames using overlapping partitions. Then the array of each frame is transformed from time domain to frequency domain using Fourier Transform (FT). To determine the characteristic frequency of the sound, a moving window mechanics is used, the size of that window is made linearly proportional with the value of the tracked frequency. This proportionality is due to the existing linear relationship between the frequency and its Doppler shift. An algorithm was introduced to select the characteristic frequencies, this algorithm allocates the frequencies which satisfy the Doppler relation, beside that the tra
... Show MoreChaotic features of nuclear energy spectrum in 68Ge nucleus are investigated by nuclear shell model. The energies are calculated through doing shell model calculations employing the OXBASH computer code with effective interaction of F5PVH. The 68Ge nucleus is supposed to have an inert core of 56Ni with 12 nucleons (4 protons and 8 neutrons) move in the f5p-model space ( and ). The nuclear level density of considered classes of states is seen to have a Gaussian form, which is in accord with the prediction of other theoretical studies. The statistical fluctuations of the energy spectrum (the level spacing P(s) and the Dyson-Mehta (or statistics) are well described by the Gaussian orthogonal ens
... Show MoreThat the essential contribution of this research is a description of how complex systems analysis service of the properties of the queue in Baghdad Teaching Hospital using a technique network is techniques method (Q - GERT) an acronym of the words:
Queuing theory _ Graphical Evaluation and Review Technique
Any method of assessment and review chart where you will be see the movement flow of patients within the system and after using this portal will be represented system in the form of planned network probabilistic analysis and knowledge of statistical distributions appropriate for times of arrival and departure were using the program ready (Win QSB) and simulatio
... Show MoreThere are many applied Economic studies that have found positive nexus between financial development and poverty reduction in developing countries. Iraq has witnessed an increasing rate of poverty during the period 1980-2010 due to many internal and external factors such as wars, economic sanctions, inflation, a high rate of unemployment, and political and security instability. Therefore, the investigation about the solutions to reduce poverty becomes very necessary, and enhancing the financial development in Iraq is one of these options. This is due to that the financial development could reduce the poverty rates through two channels: the first is direct via the offering of the loans and other financial facilities to the poor, a
... Show MoreBackground: Breast cancer is the most common
malignancy affecting females worldwide. The association
of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) with this cancer is a longstanding
interest to this field.
Aim: to investigate the presence of EBV in breast tumor
tissue in relation to age.
Patients and Methods: Paraffin-embedded tissue blocks
from 45 female patients with breast tumors (ranged in age
from 28 to 85 years) were retrieved. The cases were
grouped into two categories: group (A): included 30 cases
with breast carcinoma and group (B): included 15 cases
with benign breast diseases as a control group .The
expression of EBV protein was examined
immunohistochemically.
Results: Twelve (40%) of the 30 breast canc
Keloids are prevalent fibro-proliferative tumors, and treating them is still a challenge although intralesional injections of triamcinolone acetonide (TAC) are effective, they have frequently linked adverse effects. Pentoxifylline (PTX) is an anti-fibrotic and anti-inflammatory, and vasodilator. It has not yet been tested for intralesional injection in keloids. The aim of the study is to study the efficacy of intralesional pentoxifylline versus triamcinolone acetonide in keloid scars of 40 patients. In this study, 40 patients with keloid scars regardless of the cause of keloid born, 20 patients have injected with intralesional triamcinolone acetonide, and 20 patients with intralesional pentoxifylline every two weeks until the lesi
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