Background. Alopecia areata (AA) is a common form of noncicatricial hair loss of unknown cause, affecting 0.1-0.2% of the general population. Most evidence supports the hypothesis that it is disease of the hair follicle of autoimmune nature mediated by T-cells, with important cytokine role. Objective of the Study. The objective of this study is to study the association and changes in serum levels of interleukin-15 (IL-15) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) in patients with AA in relation to the type, activity, and disease duration. Patients and Methods. Thirty-eight patients with AA and 22 individuals without the disease as controls were enrolled in this case-controlled study conducted in the Department of Dermatology in the Al-K

During pregnancy, high blood pressure disorder is the most common medical complication in pregnancy. It is the foremost cause of maternal mortality and perinatal diseases. Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) affects the growth of vascular endothelial cells, existence, and multiplying, which are known to be expressed in the human placenta. This study aimed to identify the expression VEGF in the placenta of hypertension and normotensive women. In this study, a cross-sectional study from november 2019 to February 2020. A total of 100 placentae involved 50 hypertensive cases and 50 normotensive groups were assessed. VEGF-A expression in two placentas groups was evaluated by immunohistochemistry techniques. Strong and moderate VEGF

Instruments for the measurements of radon, thoron and its decay
products in air are based mostly on the detection of alpha particles.
The health hazards of radon on general public are well known. In
order to understand the level and distribution of ²²²Rn concentrations
indoor in Al-Fallujah City; new technique was used, this technique
was three radon–thoron mixed field dosimeters is made up of a twin
chamber cylindrical system and three LR-115 type II detectors were
employed. The aim of this work was to measurement radon gas using
SSNTD technique door in in Al-Fallujah City, and estimation of
excess in cancer due to increment in radon gas. Results for samples
which are collected from January to

Over the last few years, there has been a worldwide increase in the use of composite materials for rehabilitation of deficient reinforced concrete structures. One important application of this technology is the use of Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) jacket to provide external confinement of reinforced concrete columns. Square concrete column specimens 100×100×1000 mm with concrete
compressive strength of about 30 and 50 MPa, steel fiber volume fraction 0%, 0.5%, 0.75%, and percentage of longitudinal reinforcement 2.01%, 3.14% and 4.52% were tested until failure in previous research. In this research seven tested columns were repaired and rehabilitated using one layer of CFRP flexible wraps and tested to determine their ultim

The main objective of this study is to introduce a systematic design procedure for short-span segmental beams following a sophisticated ACI 440.2R-17 design procedure. The general aspects of innovative short-span segmental beams are easy to fabricate, economical and rapidly placed in pre-specified positions. Short-span segmental beams fabricated from individual precast plain-concrete blocks and CFRP plates. Recently, experimental tests performed on short-span segmental beams, by the authors, investigated CFRP plate-bonding, CFRP plate cross-sectional area, the thickness of plate-bonding epoxy resin, surface-to-surface condition of concrete blocks, as well as, interface condition of the bonding surface. The experimental program comprises tes

This paper presents theoretical parametric study of the curvature ductility capacity for reinforced concrete column sections. The study considers the behavior of concrete and reinforcing steel under different strain rates. A computer program has been written to compute the curvature ductility taking into account the spalling in concrete cover. Strain rate sensitive constitutive models of steel and concrete were used for predicting the moment-curvature relationship of reinforced concrete columns at different rate of straining. The study parameters are the yield strength of main reinforcement, yield strength of transverse reinforcement, compressive strength of concrete, spacing of ties and the axial load. The results indicated that hi

Experimental research was carried out to investigate the performance of CFRP wrapping jackets used for retrofitting twelve square reinforced concrete (CR) column specimens damaged by exposure to fire flame, at different temperatures of  300, 500 and 700ºC, except for two specimens that were not burned. The specimens were then loaded axially till failure after gradual or sudden cooling. The specimens were divided into two groups containing two main reinforcement ratios, ρ= 0.0314 and ρ= 0.0542. This was followed by the retrofitting procedure that included wrapping all the specimens with two layers of CFRP fabric sheets. The test results of the retrofitted specimens showed that the fire damaged RC

This paper presents a study (experimentally) for strengthening reinforced concrete (RC) beams with Near-Surface-Mounted (NSM) technique. The use of this technique with CFRP strips or rebars is an efficient technology for increasing the strength for flexure and shear or for repairing damaged reinforced concrete (RC) members. The objective of this research is to study, experimentally, RC beams either repaired or strengthened with NSM CFRP strips and follow their flexural behavior and failure modes. NSM-CFRP strips were used to strengthen three RC beam specimens, one of them was initially strengthened and tested up to failure. Four beam specimens have been initially subjected to preloading to 50% and 80% of ultimate load. Two of the sp

In this research, the effect of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) on the alumina/chromia (Al₂O₃/Cr₂O₃) nanocomposites has been investigated. Al₂O₃/Cr₂O₃-MWCNTs nanocomposites with variable contents of Cr₂O₃ and MWCNTs were fabricated using coprecipitation process and followed by spark plasma sintering. XRD analysis revealed a good crystallinity of sintered nanocomposites samples and there was only one phase presence of Al₂O₃-Cr₂O₃ solid solution. Density, Vickers microhardness, fracture toughness and fracture strength have been measured in the sintered samples. The results show tha

Test results of nine reinforced concrete one way slab with and without lacing reinforcement are reported. The tests were designed to study the effect of the lacing reinforcement on the flexural response of one way slabs. The test parameters were considered is the lacing steel ratios of (0, 0.0025, 0.0045, and 0.0065), flexural steel ratios of (0.0025, 0.0045, and 0.0065) and span to the effective depth ratios of (11, 13, and 16). Two specimens had no lacing reinforcement and the remaining seven specimens had the lacing reinforcement. Four point bending test were carried out, one of the specimens was tested under the static load applied gradually up to failure and the other specimens were tested under repeated load (5 cyc