Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with polymorphic expression. B cells have an essential contribution in immune system activation via the production of different cytokines and functioning as potent antigen-presenting cells. Therefore, a drug that particularly targets B cells may represent an ideal therapeutic approach for SLE. Rituximab (RTX), an anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody causing transient B-cell depletion, has been used to manage SLE. This study aims to assess Rituximab effects on lupus nephritis (LN) patients when added to conventional immunosuppressants. Twenty four patients, 15-32 years old, with class III/IV/V LN were involved in this study. All were on steroids before lupus nephritis occurrence. They were given rituximab induction therapy and mycophenolate mofetil (MMF) maintenance therapy. RTX was indicated for refractory and relapsing SLE. Several investigations done before and after RTX treatment and in the last follow up (done one year after starting Rituximab). Those included protein in urine, serum creatinine, double stranded DNA, C3, C4, and Estimated Glomerular Filtration Rate (eGFR). Proteinuria decreased significantly after RTX treatment and in the last measurement (P=0.01 and P=0.001, respectively). Serum creatinine significantly decreased only in the last measurement (P=0.02). Double stranded DNA decreased remarkably after treatment (P=0.01) with a further decrease in the last measurement (P=0.006). C3 and C4 increased after treatment but the increase was significant only for C3 (P=0.002) and this increase continues till the last measurement (P=0.0006). Active urine sediments found in fifteen patients and disappeared after RTX treatment. Rituximab can be promising in treating lupus nephritis when used along with traditional immunosuppressants. It can reduce disease activity and improve renal function in such patients.
New metal complexes of the ligands 2-benzamido benzothiazole(B1), and 2-actamido benzothiazole(B2) with metal ions Ni(II),and Co(II) were prepared in alcoholic medium. The prepared complexes were characterized by FT-IR and electronic spectroscopy, Magnetic susceptibility, Flame Atomic Absorption technique as well as elemental analysis and conductivity measurement. From the spectral studies, an octahedral monomer structure proposed for Ni(II) complexes, and a tetrahedral monomer structure for Co(II)complexes.Semi-empirical methods (PM3,and ZINDO/1)were carried out to evaluate the heat formation( ?H?f)binding energy(?Eb) and dipole moment(µ)for all metal complexes. Also vibration frequencies, Electrostatic potential, HOMO and LUMO
... Show MoreThe photo-electrochemical etching (PECE) method has been utilized to create pSi samples on n-type silicon wafers (Si). Using the etching time 12 and 22 min while maintaining the other parameters 10 mA/cm2 current density and HF acid at 75% concentration.. The capacitance and resistance variation were studied as the temperature increased and decreased for prepared samples at frequencies 10 and 20 kHz. Using scanning electron microscopy (SEM), the bore width, depth, and porosity % were validated. The formation of porous silicon was confirmed by x-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns, the crystal size was decreased, and photoluminescence (PL) spectra revealed that the emission peaks were centered at 2q of 28.5619° and 28.7644° for et
... Show MoreIn this work was prepared three different types of modified screen printed carbon electrode (SPCEs) with drops casted method, the used carbone nanomaterials were the MWCNT, functionalized –MWCNT (f-MWCNT) and After several experiments were made to find an appropriate ratio to make good GOT/f-MWCNT nanocomposite, and found the suspension mixture (1:1) from GOT/f-MWCNT (f-MWCNT-GOT). The electrical and physical properties were performed with cyclic voltammeter technique, and studied the maximum current response, the effective surface area, effect of the pH value and the determination of active surface area for MWCNT-SPCE , f-MWCNT-SPCE and f-MWCNT-GOT/SPCE as (0.04 cm2), (0.119 cm2) and (0.115 cm2) respectively, the surface coverage concent
... Show MoreThe present study aims at scrutinizing the impoliteness types, causes, and purposes utilized by Iraqi English language learners when refusing marriage proposals. Thus, it attempts to answer the questions: (1) what are the impoliteness formulas used by the Iraqi learners of English in refusing marriage proposals?, and (2) What are their impoliteness triggers/causes and the purposes? The study is significant in bridging the gap that few linguistic types of research concentrate on studying intentionality and emotions allied with impoliteness. Data were collected from 35 Iraqi learners of English responding to 6 situations of marriage. The data were analyzed using Culpeper’s (2011) formulas of impoliteness and Bousfield’s (2007) imp
... Show MoreThe effect of different antibiotics on growth pigment and plasmid curing of Serratia marcescens were studied, S. marcescens was cultured in media containing(16_500)µg/ml of antibiotics, curing mutants unable to produce prodigiosin and lost one plasmid band were obtained of of ampicillin, amoxillin, antibiotics concentrations (64 500) µg/ml metheprim, ultracloxam, azithromycin, cephalexin and erythromycin treated with (350 500) µg/ml of The mutant cells rose- light color and and refampicin revealed S.marcescens inhibited ciprodar and tetracyclin, lincomycin did not lost the plasmid band chlaforan
In this work, lead oxide nanoparticles were prepared by laser ablation of lead target immersed in deionized water by using pulsed Nd:YAG laser with laser energy 400 mJ/pulse and different laser pulses. The chemical bonding of lead oxide nps was investigated by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR); surface morphology and optical properties were investigated by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) and UV-Visible spectroscopy respectively, and the size effect of lead oxide nanoparticles was studied on its antibacterial action against two types of bacteria Gram-negitive (Escherichia coli) and Gram-positive (Staphylococcusaurus) by diffusion method. The antibacterial property results show that the antibacterial activity of the Lead oxide NPs was
... Show MoreSoftware-defined networking (SDN) is an innovative network paradigm, offering substantial control of network operation through a network’s architecture. SDN is an ideal platform for implementing projects involving distributed applications, security solutions, and decentralized network administration in a multitenant data center environment due to its programmability. As its usage rapidly expands, network security threats are becoming more frequent, leading SDN security to be of significant concern. Machine-learning (ML) techniques for intrusion detection of DDoS attacks in SDN networks utilize standard datasets and fail to cover all classification aspects, resulting in under-coverage of attack diversity. This paper proposes a hybr
... Show MoreIn this study, two active galaxies (NGC4725, NGC4639) have been chosen to study their morphological and photometric properties, by using the IRAF ISOPHOTE ELLIPS task with griz-filters. Observations are obtained from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) which reaches now to the DATA Release (DR14). The data reduction of all images (bias and flat field) has been done by SDSS Pipeline. The surface photometric investigation was performed like the magnitude. Together with isophotal contour maps, surface brightness profiles and a bulge/disk decomposition of the images of the galaxies, although the disk position angle, ellipticity, and inclination of the galaxies have been done. Also, the color of galaxies was studied, where chromatic distribution
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