Background: Smoking is considering a major risk factor for development and progression of periodontal disease. Investigations regarding the association between smoking and periodontal disease have consistently demonstrated negative periodontal effects and greater probabilities of established periodontal disease among smokers in comparison with non smokers. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of smoking on periodontal health status and on the salivary levels of alkaline phosphatase (ALP), lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and creatine kinase (CK), and to correlate the clinical parameters of periodontal health with the biochemical findings in smokers and non-smokers. Materials and methods: Unstimulated saliva sample was collected

Tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α) antagonists’ therapy are expensive and has a non-responsive rate between 30% to 40% in rheumatoid arthritis patients. Genetic variation plays a vital role in the responsiveness to this type of therapy.The aim of this study is to investigate if the presence of genetic polymorphism in the TNF-α gene promoter region at locations -376 G/A (rs1800750), -806 C/T (rs4248158), and -1031 T/C (rs1799964) affects rheumatoid arthritis patient's tendency to be a non-responder to etanercept.

Eighty RA patients on etanercept (ETN) for at least six months were recruited from the Rheumatology Unit at Baghdad Teaching Hospital. Based on The European League Against Rheumatism response (EULAR) criteria, patient

Some methods recommended abroad to control the oriental hornet, Vespa orientalis L., attacking the honey bee, Apis mellifera L., colonies were tested, with some modifications, for the first time under the Iraqi conditions. One of these methods was carried out by covering the hive entrance with a piece of queen excluder to prevent the hornet from entering the hive. Also, the position of hive stand was reversed to deprive the hornet from using the flight board as a stage for waiting and creeping toward the defending bees. The second method was carried out by fixing a cardboard cone as a bee passage at the hive entrance to hinder the entry of the hornet into the hive. Both of these methods were found to be unsuccessful to

The present study is about tales attributed to certain people and are not traded. Such a study has a great importance for religion scholars and conveyors of hadiths since it is considered as one of the important sources of Islamic legislation that represent the Holy Sunna, and the majority of the recent study is concerned with non-traded tales of religion scholars. The research starts with the definition of such type of tales and then its types, conditions, legality, exceptions, and the benefit from studying such matter. It is mainly concerned with the opinions of the Imami and Hanafi region scholars respectively, and with comparing between the two doctrines i.e. Imami and Hanafi at the end of each

The temperature influence on the fluorescence lifetime, quantum yields and non-radiative rate parameter or coumarin 460 dye dissolved in methanol was investigated in the temperature range (160-300 k). A single photon counting technique was used or measuring the fluorescence decay curves. A noticeable decrease of the fluorescence lifetime with increasing the temperature was observed. The non-radiative activation energy of 10.57 K.J. mole-1 was measured by the help of Arrhenius plot.

This paper considers and proposes new estimators that depend on the sample and on prior information in the case that they either are equally or are not equally important in the model. The prior information is described as linear stochastic restrictions. We study the properties and the performances of these estimators compared to other common estimators using the mean squared error as a criterion for the goodness of fit. A numerical example and a simulation study are proposed to explain the performance of the estimators.

The influence of an aortic aneurysm on blood flow waveforms is well established, but how to exploit this link for diagnostic purposes still remains challenging. This work uses a combination of experimental and computational modelling to study how aneurysms of various size affect the waveforms. Experimental studies are carried out on fusiform-type aneurysm models, and a comparison of results with those from a one-dimensional fluid–structure interaction model shows close agreement. Further mathematical analysis of these results allows the definition of several indicators that characterize the impact of an aneurysm on waveforms. These indicators are then further studied in a computational model of a systemic blood flow network. This demonstr

Objective: to evaluate the results of (Modification of Russe method) in treatment of nonunion fracture scaphoid bone by bone graft with external splintage (plaster of paris cast (pop ).
Methods:Prospective study done on 26 patients (24 male, 2 female), age range between 25-42 years (mean age 34 years), fracture site at middle 1/3 with minimal displacements with no carpal bone or radial bone injury, technique of Matte- Russe method (explore the bone through volar approach using bone graft from iliac crest (cortico-cancellous peg plus cancellus bone) with thumb spica for 90 days with period of follow up 12-18 months.
Results: out of 26 patients treated by this method , 23 patients (88.5%) union was achieved radiologically by the end

The Behavioral Disorders of Primary School pupils the son of Alcohol and Non Alcoholic

Groupwise non-rigid image alignment is a difficult non-linear optimization problem involving many parameters and often large datasets. Previous methods have explored various metrics and optimization strategies. Good results have been previously achieved with simple metrics, requiring complex optimization, often with many unintuitive parameters that require careful tuning for each dataset. In this chapter, the problem is restructured to use a simpler, iterative optimization algorithm, with very few free parameters. The warps are refined using an iterative Levenberg-Marquardt minimization to the mean, based on updating the locations of a small number of points and incorporating a stiffness constraint. This optimization approach is eff