The Growth Differentiation Factor -15 (GDF-15) is a member of the transforming growth factor β superfamily. İt represents an example of the stress response cytokines. It's mostly found in cardiac myocytes, adipocytes, macrophages, endothelial cells, and vascular endothelial cells, whether they're generated normally or not. GDF-15 levels have increased and are associated with cardiovascular risk. Aim of the study: To investigate the correlation between angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors and angiotensin II receptor blockers (ARBs) with the level of plasma GDF-15 in a group of hypertensive patients. Materials and methods: A case-control study involved 90 individuals, 60 hypertensive patients (36 on ACE inhibitors and 24 on ARBs)

This work was conducted to study the extraction of eucalyptus oil from natural plants (Eucalyptus camaldulensis leaves) using water distillation method by Clevenger apparatus. The effects of main operating parameters were studied: time to reach equilibrium, temperature (70 to100°C), solvent to solid ratio (4:1 to 8:1 (v/w)), agitation speed (0 to 900 rpm), and particle size (0.5 to 2.5 cm) of the fresh leaves, to find the best processing conditions for achieving maximum oil yield. The results showed that the agitation speed of 900 rpm, temperature 100° C, with solvent to solid ratio 5:1 (v/w) of particle size 0.5 cm for 160 minute give the highest percentage of oil (46.25 wt.%). The extracted oil was examined by HPLC.

This paper presents a combination of enhancement techniques for fingerprint images affected by different type of noise. These techniques were applied to improve image quality and come up with an acceptable image contrast. The proposed method included five different enhancement techniques: Normalization, Histogram Equalization, Binarization, Skeletonization and Fusion. The Normalization process standardized the pixel intensity which facilitated the processing of subsequent image enhancement stages. Subsequently, the Histogram Equalization technique increased the contrast of the images. Furthermore, the Binarization and Skeletonization techniques were implemented to differentiate between the ridge and valley structures and to obtain one

In this study, we have created a new Arabic dataset annotated according to Ekman’s basic emotions (Anger, Disgust, Fear, Happiness, Sadness and Surprise). This dataset is composed from Facebook posts written in the Iraqi dialect. We evaluated the quality of this dataset using four external judges which resulted in an average inter-annotation agreement of 0.751. Then we explored six different supervised machine learning methods to test the new dataset. We used Weka standard classifiers ZeroR, J48, Naïve Bayes, Multinomial Naïve Bayes for Text, and SMO. We also used a further compression-based classifier called PPM not included in Weka. Our study reveals that the PPM classifier significantly outperforms other classifiers such as SVM and N

TI1e Web service securi ty challenge is to understand  and  assess the risk  involved  in securing  a web-based  service  today, based on our existing security technology, and at the same time tmck emerging standards and  understand  how they will be used  to offset the risk in

new web services. Any  security model must  i llustrate  how data  can

now  through   an  application   and   network   topology  to  meet  the

requirements  defined  by the busi ness  wi thout exposing  the data  to undue  risk.  In this paper  we propose &n

The aim of this paper is to propose an efficient three steps iterative method for finding the zeros of the nonlinear equation f(x)=0 . Starting with a suitably chosen , the method generates a sequence of iterates converging to the root. The convergence analysis is proved to establish its five order of convergence. Several examples are given to illustrate the efficiency of the proposed new method and its comparison with other methods.

  There are many researches deals with constructing an efficient solutions for real problem having Multi - objective confronted with each others. In this paper we construct a decision for Multi – objectives based on building a mathematical model formulating a unique objective function by combining the confronted objectives functions. Also we are presented some theories concerning this problem. Areal application problem has been presented to show the efficiency of the performance of our model and the method. Finally we obtained some results by randomly generating some problems.

  The current  research was ataxonomic  study for the species Pyrus pyraster L.  that belong to the subfamily Pomoideae from the family Rosaceae which growing wildely in Iraqi Kurdistan .The macro and micro morphology and pollen grain were studied .A wide field servay for the districts of Iraqi Kurdistan was done . According to the taxonomic references adetail study for the morphology of the leaves ,color of the corolla,calyx ,  the fruits diameters,  color and shapes,also the seed were studied  From the study of pollen grains it appeared that the pollen grains areTricolporate ,their shape in the Equatorial view was ovoid but in the pollar view they are triangular. The species Pyrus pyraster L.was recor