Objectives: Small field of view gamma detection and imaging technologies for monitoring in vivo tracer uptake are rapidly expanding and being introduced for bed-side imaging and image guided surgical procedures. The Hybrid Gamma Camera (HGC) has been developed to enhance the localization of targeted radiopharmaceuticals during surgical procedures; for example in sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsies and for bed-side imaging in procedures such as lacrimal drainage imaging and thyroid scanning. In this study, a prototype anthropomorphic head and neck phantom has been designed, constructed, and evaluated using representative modelled medical scenarios to study the capability of the HGC to detect SLNs and image small organs. Methods: An anthropomorphic head and neck phantom has been designed to mimic the adult head and neck including some internal organs and tissues of interest, such as the thyroid gland and sentinel lymph nodes. The design of the head and neck phantom included an adjustable inner jig holding the simulated SLNs and thyroid gland. The simulated thyroid gland was designed and 3D printed taking into consideration the size and the shape of a healthy adult thyroid gland. The inner sealed space of the thyroid was filled with 15MBq of 99mTc through two upper filling valves. Sealed micro-tubes (0.2ml) have been employed to simulate SLNs containing various 99mTc activity concentrations ranging between 0.1MBq and 1MBq, and can be positioned at any desired place in the head and neck region. An active background was simulated through mixing 10MBq of 99mTc solution with the water used to fill the outer shell of the head and neck phantom. Results: The head and neck phantom was employed to simulate a situation where there are four SLNs distributed at two different vertical levels and at two depths within the neck. Contrast to noise ratio (CNR) calculations were performed for the detected SLNs at an 80mm distance between both pinhole collimators (i.e. 0.5mm and 1.0mm diameters) and the surface of the head and neck phantom with a 100s acquisition time. The recorded CNR values for the simulated SLNs are higher when the HGC was fitted with the 1.0mm diameter pinhole collimator. For instance, the recorded CNR values for the superficially simulated SLN containing 0.1MBq of 99mTc using 0.5mm and 1.0mm diameter pinhole collimators are 6.48 and 16.42, respectively (~87% difference). The anatomical context provided by the hybrid imaging aided the localization process of radioactivity accumulation in simulated SLNs. Gamma and hybrid optical images were acquired using the HGC with both available pinhole collimators for the simulated thyroid gland. The thyroid images produced varied in terms of spatial resolution and detectability. The count profiles through the middle of the simulated thyroid gland images provided by both pinhole collimators were obtained. The HGC could clearly differentiate the individual peaks of both thyroid lobes in the gamma image produced by the 0.5mm pinhole collimator. In contrast, the recorded count profile for the acquired image using the 1.0mm diameter pinhole collimator showed broader peaks for both lobes, reflecting the degradation of the spatial resolution with increasing the diameter of the pinhole collimator. Conclusion: The capability of the HGC has been evaluated utilizing a prototype anthropomorphic head and neck phantom, and the gamma and hybrid images obtained demonstrate that it is ideally suited for intraoperative SLNs detection and small organ imaging. The standardization of test phantoms and protocols for SFOV portable gamma systems will provide an opportunity to collect data across various medical centers and research groups. Moreover, it will provide a technical baseline for researchers and clinical practitioners to consider when assessing their SFOV gamma imaging systems. The anthropomorphic head and neck phantom described is cost effective, reproducible, flexible and anatomically representative.
Background: Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a genetically heterogeneous leukemia characterized by abnormal myeloid blast accumulation, disrupting normal hematopoiesis and leading to rapid progression. Objective: To investigate SNPs within the 3’UTR of the CCAAT/enhancer-binding protein alpha (CEBPA) gene and its association with AML in Iraqi patients. Methods: The study was carried out on 120 AML patients classified into newly diagnosed, induction chemotherapy, and consolidation chemotherapy stages (40 each), and 40 individuals as a control group. Genomic DNA was extracted from AML patients and controls, followed by PCR amplification and Sanger sequencing of the 3’UTR region of the CEBPA gene. The AML patients were characterized
... Show MoreThe present study aimed at identifying the role of supervisory and training practices in the field education program in achieving course objectives from the perspective of the student teachers in the Faculty of Science and Arts in sharourah, and its relationship to some variables (gender, specialization,estimation). To achieve this, the researcher used the descriptive-analytical method, and the study tool was designed, which consists of (24) items distributed on two axes: the objectives of field education and supervisory and training practices.Then, the study tool was applied to the research sample represented in the entire study community, which consists of (65) male and female students in the Faculty of Sciences and Arts in
... Show MoreTotal quality management is considered a modern management concept that achieved success in all fields of various industrial and service sectors in advanced countries . One of these sectors is insurance. This concept aims at improving and developing the performance of insurance service continually . It is the gate that can enable radical change in the organization culture inside the company to transform it from using the traditional management style into using the modern style which achieves high quality standard of insurance service . As a result many insurance companies headed to applying the principles of total quality management in their companies . This study aims at raising the standard of the performance of the Iraqi Insurance Com
... Show MoreThe electrical performance of bottom-gate/top source-drain contact for p-channel organic field-effect transistors (OFETs) using poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) as an active semiconductor layer with two different gate dielectric materials, Polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) and Hafnium oxide (HfO2), is investigated in this work. The output and transfer characteristics were studied for HfO2, PVP and HfO2/PVP as organic gate insulator layer. Both characteristics show a high drain current at the gate dielectric HfO2/PVP equal to -0.0031A and -0.0015A for output and transfer characteristics respectively, this can be attributed to the increasing of the dielectric capacitance. Transcondactance characteristics also studied for the three organic mater
... Show MoreThermal energy storage is an important component in energy units to decrease the gap between energy supply and demand. Free convection and the locations of the tubes carrying the heat-transfer fluid (HTF) have a significant influence on both the energy discharging potential and the buoyancy effect during the solidification mode. In the present study, the impact of the tube position was examined during the discharging process. Liquid-fraction evolution and energy removal rate with thermo-fluid contour profiles were used to examine the performance of the unit. Heat exchanger tubes are proposed with different numbers and positions in the unit for various cases including uniform and non-uniform tubes distribution. The results show that
... Show MoreBackground. The motor response is a fundamental ability that is evident during any physical or motor activity. However, the need for this ability varies from one sport to another and depends on the specific skills required in each sport. Objectives. This study aims to compare the average motor reaction times of the arm and leg among handball, basketball, and volleyball players aged 14 to 16 years. Methods. The sample included 30 players aged 14-16 years from the sports talent care center, evenly distributed on handball, basketball, and volleyball. Standardized tests were used to measure the speed of motor response, including the Batak Micro test for hands, which records the number of responses to light stimuli in 30 seconds, and the Saqer t
... Show MoreThis encapsulates the general relationship between plant and bacteria in the natural and agricultural ecosystem. It is based on the activities of useful bacteria, such as plant growth-promoting bacteria (PGPRs) and nitrogen-fixing bacteria, in promoting plant growth and plant tolerance to stressful situations regarding pollution, salinity, and drought. The article also mentions that the bacteria maintain plant health by secretion of phytohormones, nitrogen fixation, solubilization of phosphate, and production of antibiotics against pathogenic bacteria. The article also mentions the existing applications of the interaction in sustainable agriculture and bioremediation of contaminated soils.
Mobile ad hoc network security is a new area for research that it has been faced many difficulties to implement. These difficulties are due to the absence of central authentication server, the dynamically movement of the nodes (mobility), limited capacity of the wireless medium and the various types of vulnerability attacks. All these factor combine to make mobile ad hoc a great challenge to the researcher. Mobile ad hoc has been used in different applications networks range from military operations and emergency disaster relief to community networking and interaction among meeting attendees or students during a lecture. In these and other ad hoc networking applications, security in the routing protocol is necessary to protect against malic
... Show MoreBinary relations or interactions among bio-entities, such as proteins, set up the essential part of any living biological system. Protein-protein interactions are usually structured in a graph data structure called "protein-protein interaction networks" (PPINs). Analysis of PPINs into complexes tries to lay out the significant knowledge needed to answer many unresolved questions, including how cells are organized and how proteins work. However, complex detection problems fall under the category of non-deterministic polynomial-time hard (NP-Hard) problems due to their computational complexity. To accommodate such combinatorial explosions, evolutionary algorithms (EAs) are proven effective alternatives to heuristics in solvin
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