Automatic license plate recognition (ALPR) used for many applications especially in security applications, including border control. However, more accurate and language-independent techniques are still needed. This work provides a new approach to identifying Arabic license plates in different formats, colors, and even including English characters. Numbers, characters, and layouts with either 1-line or 2-line layouts are presented. For the test, we intend to use Iraqi license plates as there is a wide range of license plate styles written in Arabic, Kurdish, and English/Arabic languages, each different in style and color. This variety makes it difficult for recent traditional license plate recognition systems and algorithms to recogn

Conventional hardening, sometimes, is not economically viable due to consuming additional costs and energy. This makes applying selective hardening on specific regions an attractive alternative for members subjected to local friction and wear. This work is devoted for applying cold working hardening on discrete values on regions of aluminum 6061-O alloy using nanosecond fiber laser of 100 W average power and pulse duration of 81 ns. An exaggerated plasma pressure resulted from ablation a thin coat layer on the metal surface was built in order to cause cold plastic deformation and increase the surface hardness of the alloy. The power density (Pd) and pulse overlap percentage (OV) were employed as working parameters. Due to the sensit

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

Lactiplantibacillus plantarum‎, one of lactic acid bacteria (LAB), is found in various foods, ‎‎including dairy products, meat, and vegetables, and most of these bacteria offer beneficial ‎‎effects to humans and animals as potential probiotics with broad-spectrum antimicrobial ‎‎activities. The aim of this study was evaluating the antibacterial efficacy of L. ‎plantarum‎ ‎against ‎some foodborne bacteria isolated from dairy products. This research involved 34 dairy ‎products, ‎including local and imported milk, cheese, and yogurt sold locally in Baghdad ‎province, Iraq, during May ‎‎2022. For the isolation of L. ‎plantarum‎, a special medium called ‎MRS (de Man Rogosa and ‎Sharpe) was applied. Colonie

This research utilized natural asphalt (NA) deposits from sulfur springs in western Iraq. Laboratory tests were conducted to evaluate the performance of an asphalt mixture incorporating NA and verify its suitability for local pavement applications. To achieve this, a combination of two types of NA, namely soft SNA and hard HNA, was blended to create a binder known as Type HSNA. The resulting HSNA exhibited a penetration grade that adhered to Iraqi specifications. Various percentages of NA (20%, 40%, 60%, and 80%) were added to petroleum asphalt. The findings revealed enhanced physical properties of HSNA, which also satisfied the requirements outlined in the Iraqi specifications for asphalt cement. Consequently, HSNA can serve as an