Background: Scientific education aims to be inclusive and to improve students learning achievements, through appropriate teaching and learning. Problem Based Learning (PBL) system, a student centered method, started in the second half of the previous century and is expanding progressively, organizes learning around problems and students learn about a subject through the experience of solving these problems.Objectives:To assess the opinions of undergraduate medical students regarding learning outcomes of PBL in small group teaching and to explore their views about the role of tutors and methods of evaluation. Type of the study: A cross-sectional study.Methods: This study was conducted in Kerbala Medical Colleges among second year students. A self-administered questionnaire was prepared to evaluate the newly applied teaching system. The study analysis included simple descriptive analysis and determining association through t-test, chi square test and regression analysis and using structural equation models to determine simultaneous association between different students’ demographic characteristics and potential predictors using SPSS-20 and Amos software at a significance level of < 0.05.Results:A total of 131 undergraduate medical students participated in the study with a response rate of 94%. The majority (93%) have indicated that PBL strategy contributed effectively to their knowledge development with a similar majority (92%) considering PBL successful new teaching method. About 86% reported that would choose PBL rather than conventional method and also 86% would advise PBL for others. Similarly, high majority indicated that various PBL activities are essential. Regarding the tutors’ role in PBL, the majority (92%) indicated that this role was positive and fundamental. According to two thirds (68%) of participants PBL application in Kerbala Medical college was very good application while a higher majority described various PBL sessions as successful and positive and fundamental role of tutors was stressed by most students.Conclusions: This study highlighted the benefits of soliciting student impressions of effective small group teaching. The students’ emphasized group atmosphere and facilitation skills of tutor in learning.Key words: Problem Based Learning, Medical Education, Small Group Teaching, Team Based Learning, Kerbala Medical College
Heavy metal consider as major environmental pollutants. Many of industrial wastewater effluents contain a wide range of these heavy metals. The adsorption of Cd2+ and Pb2+ metal ions from aqueous solution by activated carbon was studied. The results showed that maximum adsorption capacity occurred at 486.9×10-3 mg/kg for Pb2+ ion and 548.8×10-3 mg/kg for Cd2+ ion. The adsorption in a mixture of the metal ions had a balancing effect on the adsorption capacity of the activated carbon. The adsorption capacity of each metal ion was affected by the presence of other metal ions rather than its presence individually. The study showed the presence of other heavy metals attribute to the reduction in the activated carbon capacity, and the adsorp
... Show MoreThe presence of antibiotic residues such as ciprofloxacin (CIPR) in an aqueous environment is dangerous when their concentrations exceed the allowable. Therefore, eliminating these residues from the wastewater becomes an essential issue to prevent their harm. In this work, the potential of efficient adsorption of ciprofloxacin antibiotics was studied using eco-friendly ZSM-5 nanocrystals‑carbon composite (NZC). An inexpensive effective natural binder made of the sucrose-citric acid mixture was used for preparing NZC. The characterization methods revealed the successful preparation of NZC with a favorable surface area of 103.739 m2/g, and unique morphology and functional groups. Investigating the ability of NZC for adsorbing CIPR antibioti
... Show MoreThe Corrosion protection effectiveness of Alimina(Al2O3,50nm)and Zinc oxide (ZnO,30nm) nanoparticales were studied on carbon steel and 316 stainless steel alloys in saline water (3.5%NaCl)at four temperatures: (20,30,40,50 OC)using three electrodes potentiostat. An average corrosion protection efficiencies of 65 %and 80% was achieved using Al2O3 NP's on carbon steel and stainless steel samples respectively, and it seems that no effect of rising temperature on the performances of the coated layers. While ZnO NP'S showed protection efficiency around 65% for the two alloys and little effected by temperature rising on the performanes of the coated layers. The morphology of the coated spesiemses was examined by Atomic force microscope.
: Cigarette smoking is a lifestyle behavior that causes significant adverse health effects. Cigarette smoke contains chemicals, many of which are lead to the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS), which can lead to apoptosis and autophagy. To estimate the association of Cigarette smoking with the autophagy and immunity, technology of real time polymerase chain reaction (RTPCR) for gene expression of (LC3A, LC3B, LC3C, myd88) was used. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) technique was utilized to measurement the amount of TNF-α protein. The ratios of LC3A/LC3B and LC3B/LC3C were calculated to estimate the autophagy flux. The results indicate the expression of LC3B, LC3C and Myd88 genes in smokers is increased significantly (p
... Show MoreZinc oxide thin films were deposited by chemical spray pyrolysis onto glass substrates which are held at a temperature of 673 K. Some structural, electrical, optical and gas sensing properties of films were studied. The resistance of ZnO thin film exhibits a change of magnitude as the ambient gas is cycled from air to oxygen and nitrogen dioxide
Abstract: Tin oxide thin films were deposited by direct current (DC) reactive sputtering at gas pressures of 0.015 mbar – 0.15 mbar. The crystalline structure and surface morphology of the prepared SnO2 films were introduced by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). These films showed preferred orientation in the (110) plane. Due to AFM micrographs, the grain size increased non-uniformly as the working gas pressure increased.
Cadmium element is one of the group IIB and classified as heavy metal and effects on human health and environment. The present work concerns with the biosorption of Cd(II) ions from aqueous solution using the outer layer of onions. Adsorption of the used ions was found to be pH dependent and maximum removal of the ions by outer layer of onions and was found to be 99.7%.
In this paper we use Bernstein polynomials for deriving the modified Simpson's 3/8 , and the composite modified Simpson's 3/8 to solve one dimensional linear Volterra integral equations of the second kind , and we find that the solution computed by this procedure is very close to exact solution.