Abstract- Asymptomatic or clinically silent kidney stones are possibly serious because, in their expected passage, they may cause infection, obstruction and renal impairment. The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of silent kidney stones in a sample of Baghdad population and consider how this value could affect the justification for a screening system. To our best knowledge, this is the first study of its kind conducted in Iraq. We investigated 714 consecutive patients who sustained an abdominal ultrasound at our hospital with further kidney screening. All these patients did not have clinical signs and symptoms of nephrolithiasis. Age, sex, the indication for ultrasound, the size, side, and the number of the discovered stones were recorded. We observed silent kidney stones in 3.4% of patients. Males were stone carriers mostly. Stones were detected more in the left kidney than the right. Distinctly, multiple stones and stones of a large size were minimally seen. We conclude that the prevalence of clinically silent nephrolithiasis of 3.4% does not support a global screening. Yet, this screening may be justified in a limited pattern for those male subjects higher than 50 years, having a positive family history of renal stones, and their socioeconomic status is granted.
Durability of hot mix asphalt (HMA) against moisture damage is mostly related to asphalt-aggregate adhesion. The objective of this work is to find the effect of nanoclay with montmorillonite (MMT) on Marshall properties and moisture susceptibility of asphalt mixture. Two types of asphalt cement, AC(40-50) and AC(60-70) were modified with 2%, 4% and 6% of Iraqi nanoclay with montmorillonite. The Marshall properties, Tensile strength ratio(TSR) and Index of retained strength(ISR) were determined in this work. The total number of specimens was 216 and the optimum asphalt content was 4.91% and 5% for asphalt cement (40-50) and (60-70) respectively. The results showed that the modification of asphalt cement with MMT led to increase Marsh
... Show MoreOndansetron HCl (OND) is a potent antiemetic drug used for control of nausea and vomiting associated with cancer chemotherapy. It exhibits only 60 – 70 % of oral bioavailability due to first pass metabolism and has a relative short half-life of 3-5 hours. Poor bioavailability not only leads to the frequent dosing but also shows very poor patient adherence. Hence, in the present study an approach has been made to develop OND nanoparticles using eudragit® RS100 and eudragit® RL100 polymer to control release of OND for transdermal delivery and to improve patient compliance.
Six formulas of OND nanoparticles were prepared using nanoprecipitation technique. The particles sizes and zeta potential were measured
... Show MoreThe thermal distribution in the diseased tissue treated by different methods faces the problem of an uncontrollable defused heat. In the present article, we use a plasmonic bowtie nanoantenna working in the near infrared region to enhance the temperature confinement in the tissue. The Computer Simulation Technology Studio Suite package version 2019 was used to execute the design of both plasmonic nanoantenna and the tissue. Gold nanostructure and silicon carbide dioxide are the components the plasmonic nanoantenna in the bowtie shape. The results showed that the distance between the tumor tissue and the antenna is important to determine the intensity field where the maximum field is 5.9*107 V/m at a distance of 100 nm. The maximum
... Show MoreA novel encapsulated deep eutectic solvent (DES) was introduced for biodiesel production via a two-step process. The DES was encapsulated in medical capsules and were used to reduce the free fatty acid (FFA) content of acidic crude palm oil (ACPO) to the minimum acceptable level (< 1%). The DES was synthesized from methyltriphenylphosphonium bromide (MTPB) and p-toluenesulfonic acid (PTSA). The effects pertaining to different operating conditions such as capsule dosage, reaction time, molar ratio, and reaction temperature were optimized. The FFA content of ACPO was reduced from existing 9.61% to less than 1% under optimum operating conditions. This indicated that encapsulated MTPB-DES performed high catalytic activity in FFA esterificatio
... Show MoreSuppose that
Solar collectors, in general, are utilized to convert the solar energy into heat energy, where it is employed to generate electricity. The non-concentrating solar collector with a circular shape was adopted in the present study. Ambient air is heated under a translucent roof where buoyant air is drawn from outside periphery towards the collector center (tower base). The present study is aimed to predict and visualize the thermal-hydrodynamic behavior for airflow under inclined roof of the solar air collector, SAC. Three-dimensional of the SAC model using the re-normalization group, RNG, k−ε turbulence viscus model is simulated. The simulation was carried out by using ANSYS-FLUENT 14.5. The simulation
... Show MoreChemotherapy is one of the most efficient methods for treating cancer patients. Chemotherapy aims to eliminate cancer cells as thoroughly as possible. Delivering medications to patients’ bodies through various methods, either oral or intravenous is part of the chemotherapy process. Different cell-kill hypotheses take into account the interactions of the expansion of the tumor volume, external drugs, and the rate of their eradication. For the control of drug usage and tumor volume, a model based smooth super-twisting control (MBSSTC) is proposed in this paper. Firstly, three nonlinear cell-kill mathematical models are considered in this work, including the log-kill, Norton-Simon, and hypotheses subject to parametric uncertainties and exo
... Show More