This study aims to determine the reasons for the increase in the frequency of sand and dust storms in the Middle East and to identify their sources and mitigate them. A set of climatic data from 60 years (1960–2022) was analyzed. Sand storms in Iraq are a silty sand mature arkose composed of 72.7% sand, 25.1% silt, and 2.19% clay; the clay fraction in dust storms constitutes 70%, with a small amount of silt (20.6%) and sand (9.4%). Dust and sand storms (%) are composed of quartz (49.2, 67.1), feldspar (4.9, 20.9), calcite (38, 5), gypsum (4.8, 0.4), dolomite (0.8, 1.0), and heavy minerals (3.2, 6.6). Increasing temperatures in Iraq, by an average of 2 °C for sixty years, have contributed to an increase in the number of dust storms from 75 to 200 times annually. North African storms affect the Middle East, with a monthly average exceeding 300 g/m3 in peak dust seasons. To reduce the negative impacts on public health, property, and infrastructure, the study suggests solutions to mitigate them, including reducing carbon dioxide gas emissions to prevent the expansion of drought and the afforestation of the desert with plants adapted to drought using advanced techniques and avoiding land overuse.
The dynamic development of computer and software technology in recent years was accompanied by the expansion and widespread implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) based methods in many aspects of human life. A prominent field where rapid progress was observed are high‐throughput methods in biology that generate big amounts of data that need to be processed and analyzed. Therefore, AI methods are more and more applied in the biomedical field, among others for RNA‐protein binding sites prediction, DNA sequence function prediction, protein‐protein interaction prediction, or biomedical image classification. Stem cells are widely used in biomedical research, e.g., leukemia or other disease studies. Our proposed approach of
... Show MoreCarbon dioxide geo-sequestration (CGS) into sediments in the form of (gas) hydrates is one proposed method for reducing anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere and, thus reducing global warming and climate change. However, there is a serious lack of understanding of how such CO2 hydrate forms and exists in sediments. We thus imaged CO2 hydrate distribution in sandstone, and investigated the hydrate morphology and cluster characteristics via x-ray micro-computed tomography in 3D in-situ. A substantial amount of gas hydrate (∼17% saturation) was observed, and the stochastically distributed hydrate clusters followed power-law relations with respect to their size distributions and surface area-volume relationships. The layer-
... Show MoreThis study investigated the bioethanol production from green algae Chlorella vulgaris depending on its carbohydrate-enriched biomass. Four different phosphorous concentrations were employed to stimulate bioethanol production from Chlorella vulgaris. The impact of various phosphorous values on Chlorella vulgaris growth rate as well as primary product (carbohydrate) were evaluated. High performance liquid chromatography was utilized in this work. The stationary phase was identified as day 14, 12, 10 and 6 in treatments 6, 4, 2 and g/L, respectively. The findings suggest that the treatment without phosphorous addition had the highest record of carbohydrate content (22.64% dry weight) as well as the highest bioethanol yield (20.66% dry weight).
... Show MoreA novel demountable shear connector for precast steel-concrete composite bridges is presented. The connector uses high-strength steel bolts, which are fastened to the top flange of the steel beam with the aid of a special locking nut configuration that prevents bolts from slipping within their holes. Moreover, the connector promotes accelerated construction and overcomes the typical construction tolerance issues of precast structures. Most importantly, the connector allows bridge disassembly. Therefore, it can address different bridge deterioration scenarios with minimum disturbance to traffic flow including the following: (1) precast deck panels can be rapidly uplifted and replaced; (2) connectors can be rapidly removed and replaced; and (
... Show MoreThe performance analyses of 15 kWp (kW peak) Grid -Tied solar PV system (that considered first of its type) implemented at the Training and Energy Research Center Subsidiary of Iraqi Ministry of Electricity in Baghdad city has been achieved. The system consists of 72 modules arranged in 6 strings were each string contains 12 modules connected in series to increase the voltage output while these strings connected in parallel to increase the current output. According to the observed duration, the reference daily yields, array daily yields and final daily yields of this system were (5.9, 4.56, 4.4) kWh/kWp/day respectively. The energy yield was 1585 kWh/kWp/year while the annual total solar irradiation received by solar array system was 198
... Show MoreAbstract
The problem of missing data represents a major obstacle before researchers in the process of data analysis in different fields since , this problem is a recurrent one in all fields of study including social , medical , astronomical and clinical experiments .
The presence of such a problem within the data to be studied may influence negatively on the analysis and it may lead to misleading conclusions , together with the fact that these conclusions that result from a great bias caused by that problem in spite of the efficiency of wavelet methods but they are also affected by the missing of data , in addition to the impact of the problem of miss of accuracy estimation
... Show MoreA fixed firefighting system is a key component of fire safeguarding and reducing fire danger. It is installed as a permanent component in a structure to protect the entire or a portion of the building and its contents. The study aims to review the previous studies that deal with the evaluation of fire safety measures and their use in resolving problems associated with fire threats in buildings. For this reason, a number of previous studies in this field were reviewed compared with the NFPA code. The findings revealed that regulatory developments over the last several decades had created an atmosphere conducive to innovation. This has resulted in a growth in the number of fixed firefighting system types now obtainable. Th
... Show MoreIn this study, a 3 mm thickness 7075-T6 aluminium alloy sheet was used in the friction stir welding process. Using the design of experiment to reduce the number of experiments and to obtain the optimum friction stir welding parameters by utilizing Taguchi technique based on the ultimate tensile test results. Orthogonal array of L9 (33) was used based on three numbers of the parameters and three levels for each parameter, where shoulder-workpiece interference depth (0.20, 0.25, and 0.3) mm, pin geometry (cylindrical thread flat end, cylindrical thread with 3 flat round end, cylindrical thread round end), and thread pitch (0.8, 1, and 1.2) mm) this technique executed by Minitab 17 software. The results showed th
... Show MoreABSTRACT : Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is one of the most common inflammatory neurodegenerative diseases linked with dementia, it is characterized by the deposition of amyloid beta-peptide (Ab) in the brain. The present study aims to innovate a biochemical relationship between AD and interleukin 38 (IL-38) as an anti-inflammatory cytokine, expose novel mechanisms and concepts regarding other biochemical parameters studied previously or recently in AD patients and also examine the biochemical action of memantine (10 mg daily) on AD patients. Sixty (60) diagnosed AD patients participated in the present study and classified into four (4) groups: G3 were composed of (15) newly diagnosed males (52-78) years / without treatment, G4 composed of (15
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