Background: Ulcerative colitis (UC) is an inflammatory bowel disease restricted to the large intestine, characterized by superficial ulceration. It is a progressive and chronic disease requiring long-term treatment. Although its etiology remains unknown, it is suggested that environmental factors influence genetically susceptible individuals, leading to the onset of the disease. (C-X-C) ligand 9 is a chemokine that belongs to the CXC chemokine family, it plays a role in the differentiation of immune cells such as cytotoxic lymphocytes, natural killer T cells, and macrophages. Its interaction with its corresponding receptor CXCR3 which is expressed by a variety of cells such as effector T cells, CD8+ cytotoxic T cells, and macrophage

Concrete filled steel tube (CFST) columns are being popular in civil engineering due to their superior structural characteristics. This paper investigates enhancement in axial behavior of CFST columns by adding steel fibers to plain concrete that infill steel tubes. Four specimens were prepared: two square columns (100*100 mm) and two circular columns (100 mm in diameter). All columns were 60 cm in length. Plain concrete mix and concrete reinforced with steel fibers were used to infill steel tube columns. Ultimate axial load capacity, ductility and failure mode are discussed in this study. The results showed that the ultimate axial load capacity of CFST columns reinforced with steel fibers increased by 28% and 20 % for circular and square c

 Inflammatory bowel disease includes both Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, is a chronic, progressive relapsing disease of gastrointestinal tract that require long-term treatment or maintenance therapy. Taking patient’s beliefs about the prescribed medication in consideration had been shown to be an important factor that affects compliance of the patient in whom having positive beliefs is a prerequisite for better compliance. The aim of the current study was to investigate and assess beliefs about medicines among a sample of Iraqi patients with inflammatory bowel disease and to determine possible association between these beliefs and some patient-specific factors.

This study is a cross-sectional study carried out o

The present study experimentally and numerically investigated the impact behavior of composite reinforced concrete (RC) beams with the pultruded I-GFRP and I-steel beams. Eight specimens of two groups were cast in different configurations. The first group consisted of four specimens and was tested under static load to provide reference results for the second group. The four specimens in the second group were tested first under impact loading and then static loading to determine the residual static strengths of the impacted specimens. The test variables considered the type of encased I-section (steel and GFRP), presence of shear connectors, and drop height during impact tests. A mass of 42.5 kg was dropped on the top surface at the m

Detection of early clinical keratoconus (KCN) is a challenging task, even for expert clinicians. In this study, we propose a deep learning (DL) model to address this challenge. We first used Xception and InceptionResNetV2 DL architectures to extract features from three different corneal maps collected from 1371 eyes examined in an eye clinic in Egypt. We then fused features using Xception and InceptionResNetV2 to detect subclinical forms of KCN more accurately and robustly. We obtained an area under the receiver operating characteristic curves (AUC) of 0.99 and an accuracy range of 97–100% to distinguish normal eyes from eyes with subclinical and established KCN. We further validated the model based on an independent dataset with

BACKGROUND: Burkholderia cepacia adhesion and biofilm formation onto abiotic surfaces is an important feature of clinically relevant isolates. The in vitro biofilm formation of B. cepacia onto coated indwelling urinary catheters (IDCs) with moxifloxacin has not been previously investigated. OBJECTIVES: To examine the ability of B. cepacia to form biofilms on IDCs and the effect of coating IDCs with moxifloxacin on biofilm formation by B. cepacia in vitro. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The adhesion of B. cepacia to coated and uncoated IDCs with moxifloxacin was evaluated. Pieces of IDCs were coated with moxifloxacin (adsorption method). The spectrophotometric method was used to check moxifloxacin leaching into tubes. Coated and uncoated tubes were i

Malaysia's growing population and industrialisation have increased solid waste accumulation in landfills, leading to a rise in leachate production. Leachate, a highly contaminated liquid from landfills, poses environmental risks and affects water quality. Conventional leachate treatments are costly and time-consuming due to the need for additional chemicals. Therefore, the Electrocoagulation process could be used as an alternative method. Electrocoagulation is an electrochemical method of treating water by eliminating impurities by applying an electric current. In the present study, the optimisation of contaminant removal was investigated using Response Surface Methodology. Three parameters were considered for optimisation: the curr

􀀑􀀃Pure Cu (CZTSe) and Ag dopant CZTSe (CAZTSe) thin films with Ag content of 0.1 and 0.2 were fabricated on coring glass substrate at R.T with thickness of 800nm by thermal evaporation method. Comparison between the optical characteristics of pure Cu and Ag alloying thin films was done by measuring and analyzing the absorbance and transmittance spectra in the range of (400-1100)nm. Also, the effect of annealing temperature at 373K and 473K on these characteristics was studied. The results indicated that all films had high absorbance and low transmittance in visible region, and the direct bang gap of films decreases with increasing Ag content and annealing temperature. Optical parameters like extinction coefficientrefractive index, and

Cryptosporidiosis is mainly cause a persistent diarrhea in immune compromised patients, BALB/c mice have been suppressed by dexamethasone, tissue Th1, Th2 and Th17 cytokines concentrations in the ileum were significantly diminished in both infected and immunosuppressed mice. Level of IFN-g, TNF-a, IL-12, IL-6, IL-17A was increased in level, IL-4 didn’t increases, in both ileal and spleen tissue. Levels of above cytokines were examined in spleen in order to follow the proliferation of CD4+ T-cell during C. parvum infection.