Aim To develop a low-density polyethylene–hydroxyapatite (HA-PE) composite with properties tailored to function as a potential root canal filling material. Methodology Hydroxyapatite and polyethylene mixed with strontium oxide as a radiopacifier were extruded from a single screw extruder fitted with an appropriate die to form fibres. The composition of the composite was optimized with clinical handling and placement in the canal being the prime consideration. The fibres were characterized using infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and their thermal properties determined using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The tensile strength and elastic modulus of the composite fibres and gutta-percha were compared, dry and after 1 month storage in simulated body fluid (SBF), using a universal testing machine. The radiopacity of the fibres was determined using digital radiography. The interaction of the composites with eugenol was evaluated and compared with gutta-percha. Data of the tensile test were submitted to two-way anova and Bonferroni tests (P < 0.05). Results The endothermic peaks obtained from the DSC studies showed that the melting point of the HA/PE composites ranged between 110.5 and 111.2 °C, whereas gutta-percha exhibited a melting point at 52 °C. The tensile strength and elastic modulus of the silanated HA/PE composites were significantly higher than those of gutta-percha (P < 0.0001) under dry conditions and 1 month storage in SBF. The gutta-percha in eugenol showed a significant increase in the polymer molar mass, whereas the silanated HA/PE composites were unchanged. Radiological evaluations demonstrated that silanated HA/PE fibres were sufficiently radiopaque. Conclusion Promising materials for endodontic applications have been developed, offering relevant benefits over the traditional materials in terms of mechanical and chemical properties
Background: Varicose vein (VV) is a common problem that mostly occurs in legs. This medical condition can influence the quality of life and working condition of nurses. Aim of the study: To estimate the prevalence of lower limbs varicosity and its associated risk factors among nurses. Methods: This a cross-sectional descriptive study was carried out among 100 nurses working Baghdad Teaching Hospital, Surgical Specialties Hospital, and Al- Kidney Teaching Hospital, Baghdad, Iraq from January 1st to May 10th, 2022. The participants were recruited in the study using systematic random sampling. The Occupational Sitting and Physical Activity and Aberdeen Varicose Vein Questionnaires were used for data gathering. Results: The prevalence o
... Show MoreWireless sensor networks (WSNs) are emerging in various application like military, area monitoring, health monitoring, industry monitoring and many more. The challenges of the successful WSN application are the energy consumption problem. since the small, portable batteries integrated into the sensor chips cannot be re-charged easily from an economical point of view. This work focusses on prolonging the network lifetime of WSNs by reducing and balancing energy consumption during routing process from hop number point of view. In this paper, performance simulation was done between two types of protocols LEACH that uses single hop path and MODLEACH that uses multi hop path by using Intel Care i3 CPU (2.13GHz) laptop with MATLAB (R2014a). Th
... Show MoreThis research develops a new method based on spectral indices and random forest classifier to detect paddy rice areas and then assess their distributions regarding to urban areas. The classification will be conducted on Landsat OLI images and Landsat OLI/Sentinel 1 SAR data. Consequently, developing a new spectral index by analyzing the relative importance of Landsat bands will be calculated by the random forest. The new spectral index has improved depending on the most three important bands, then two additional indices including the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), and standardized difference built-up index (NDBI) have been used to extract paddy rice fields from the data. Several experiments being
... Show MoreIn this research the results of applying Artificial Neural Networks with modified activation function to perform the online and offline identification of four Degrees of Freedom (4-DOF) Selective Compliance Assembly Robot Arm (SCARA) manipulator robot will be described. The proposed model of identification strategy consists of a feed-forward neural network with a modified activation function that operates in parallel with the SCARA robot model. Feed-Forward Neural Networks (FFNN) which have been trained online and offline have been used, without requiring any previous knowledge about the system to be identified. The activation function that is used in the hidden layer in FFNN is a modified version of the wavelet function. This approach ha
... Show MoreThe tests that measure special strength defined by speed contributes a great deal in evaluating the players' weaknesses and strengths so as to aid coaches judge their players according to scientific and objective measurements. The problem of the study lies in answering the following question : is there a test that measures legs' vertical strength defined by speed especially for youth basketball players? The aim of the research was to construct and standardize a test for measuring legs' vertical strength defined by speed in youth basketball. The subjects of the study were 74 youth basketball players from Baghdad. The researchers concluded that the test measures leg's vertical strength defined by speed for youth basketball players as well as
... Show MoreThe Electric Discharge (EDM) method is a novel thermoelectric manufacturing technique in which materials are removed by a controlled spark erosion process between two electrodes immersed in a dielectric medium. Because of the difficulties of EDM, determining the optimum cutting parameters to improve cutting performance is extremely tough. As a result, optimizing operating parameters is a critical processing step, particularly for non-traditional machining process like EDM. Adequate selection of processing parameters for the EDM process does not provide ideal conditions, due to the unpredictable processing time required for a given function. Models of Multiple Regression and Genetic Algorithm are considered as effective methods for determ
... Show MoreGenome sequencing has significantly improved the understanding of HIV and AIDS through accurate data on viral transmission, evolution and anti-therapeutic processes. Deep learning algorithms, like the Fined-Tuned Gradient Descent Fused Multi-Kernal Convolutional Neural Network (FGD-MCNN), can predict strain behaviour and evaluate complex patterns. Using genotypic-phenotypic data obtained from the Stanford University HIV Drug Resistance Database, the FGD-MCNN created three files covering various antiretroviral medications for HIV predictions and drug resistance. These files include PIs, NRTIs and NNRTIs. FGD-MCNNs classify genetic sequences as vulnerable or resistant to antiretroviral drugs by analyzing chromosomal information and id
... Show MoreThis study aims to analyze the spatial distribution of the epidemic spread and the role of the physical, social, and economic characteristics in this spreading. A geographically weighted regression (GWR) model was built within a GIS environment using infection data monitored by the Iraqi Ministry of Health records for 10 months from March to December 2020. The factors adopted in this model are the size of urban interaction areas and human gatherings, movement level and accessibility, and the volume of public services and facilities that attract people. The results show that it would be possible to deal with each administrative unit in proportion to its circumstances in light of the factors that appe