Concrete structures are exposed to aggressive environmental conditions that lead to corrosion of the embedded reinforcement and pre-stressing steel. Consequently, the safety of concrete structures may be compromised, and this requires a significant budgets to repair and maintain critical infrastructure. Prediction of structural safety can lead to significant reductions in maintenance costs by maximizing the impact of investments. The aim of this paper is to establish a framework to assess the reliability of existing post-tensioned concrete bridges. A time-dependent reliability analysis of an existing post-tensioned involving the assessment of Ynys-y-Gwas bridge has been presented in this study. The main cause of failure of this bridge was c

Objectives: This study aimed to evaluate and compare the effect of plasma treatment versus conventional treatment on the micro shear bond strength (μSBS), surface roughness, and wettability of three different CAD/CAM materials. Materials and methods: Sixty cylindrical specimens (5 mm diameter ×3 mm height) were prepared from three different CAD/CAM materials: Group A: Zirconia, Group B: Lithium disilicate, and Group C: Resin nano-ceramic. Each group was subdivided into two subgroups according to surface treatment used: Subgroup I: Conventional treatment, zirconia was sandblasted with Al2O3, while lithium disilicate and resin nano-ceramic were etched with hydrofluoric acid. Subgroup II: Plasma treatment, the surface of each material was tr

Rapid, reproducible and accurate method has been developed for the assay for of mebendazol (MBZ) residual assay. The method is based on alkaline hydrolysis of MBZ with sodium hydroxide then oxidation with N-bromosuccinimide (NBS) followed by coupling with 4-Bromoaniline (4-BA) to yield a highly colored product absorbed at maximum 434 nm. Regression analysis of linearity range was found (0.6-2.8) µg.ml-1.  The optimum conditions that affect the oxidation were studied. The developed method was found to be precise with mean value of relative standard deviation (1.153- 1.303) and accurate with relative error (-0.5940-1.7821) .The calculated molar absorptivity and sandal sensitivity values of (29825 L.mol-1.cm-1), 0.0099 µg.cm-2 respe

    The present study aimed to the isolation and identification of Penicillium chrysogenum from subclinical bovine mastitis as well as the evaluation of their potential to produce the main virulence factors by assessing proteinase production, urease production, growth rate at 37 ̊C, and hemolytic activity on Blood agar. One hundred milk samples were assembled from the White Gold village and surrounded outlying farms of Abu-Ghraib, Baghdad province, during the period from November 2018 to March 2019. Each milk sample was tested for California Mastitis (CMT). The results indicated that 85% of the samples gave positive (+ve) results for CMT. Sixty six mycotic isolates were detected, including 31 isolates of Peni

     In this work, vanadium pentoxide (V2O5) thin films were prepared using rf magnetron sputtering on silicon wafer and glass substrates from V2O5 target at 200 °C substrate temperature, followed by annealing at 400 and 500 °C in air for 2 h. The prepared thin films were examined by X-ray diffraction (XRD), forier transform infra-red spectroscopy (FTIR), UV-visible absorbance, and direct current coductivity to study the effects of annealing temperature on their structural and optical properties. The XRD analysis exhibited that the annealing promoted the highly crystallized V2O5 phase that is highly orientated along the c direction. The crystalline size increased from 22.5 nm to 35.4 nm with increasing the annealing

This work used the deposition method to synthesize nickel oxide nanoparticles. The materials mainly used in this study were nickel sulfate hexahydrate (as a precursor) and NaOH (as a precipitant). The properties of the nanopowder were characterized by XRD, FE-SEM, EDX, and VSM. The obtained results confirmed the presence of nickel oxide nanoparticles with a face-centered cubic (FCC) structure with a lattice constant (a=4.17834 Å). Scherer and Williamson-Hall equations were used to calculate the crystallite size of about (30.5-35.5) nm. The FE-SEM images showed that the particle shape had a ball-like appearance with a uniform and homogeneous distribution and confirmed that the particles were within the nanoscale. The presence of oxygen a

In this study, poly4-(nicotinamido)-4-oxo-2-butenoic acid (PNOE) was prepared by the electro polymerization of 4-(nicotinamido)-4-oxo-2-butenoic acid (NOE) monomer on a 316 stainless steel (St.St) which acts as an anticorrosion coating.  Fourier transforms infrared (FTIR), atomic force microscopy (AFM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and cyclic voltammetry were used to diagnose the structure and the properties of the prepared polymer layer. The corrosion behavior of the uncoated and coated 316  St.St were evaluated by using an electro chemical polarization technique in 0.2 M hydrochloric acid  solution as a corrosive medium at a temperature range of 293 to 323 K. Nano materials, such as nano ZnO and graphene were adde

This study evaluated the toxicity of ciprofloxacin to spleen and liver when used for the treatment of mice infected with S. typhi for seven days. The dose concentration used in these experiments was 100mg/kg. Mice were divided into two groups . The first group (negative control) was not given ciprofloxacin, but rather a sterile phosphate buffer solution (PBS) as an alternative. Ciprofloxacin was administered to the second group. After seven days , the animals were sacrificed and organs (liver and spleen) were collected . The histopathological examination showed normal hepatocytes in the liver  and normal structure of  spleen cells in animals of control group . However, the treated group showed dilated and congested blo

In this paper, the productions of gallium oxide (Ga₂O₃) nanoparticles were achieved via using the Nd: YAG laser deposition method with a fundamental wavelength (1064 nm). These nanoparticles were characterized by using different methods such as X-ray diffractometer (XRD), atomic force microscopy (AFM) and Ultraviolet–visible (UV–vis) spectroscopy. To examine the effects of laser energy on the properties of nanoparticles, the experimental results and theoretical considerations were prepared by the effective method of pulse laser deposition. The synthesis of Ga₂O₃NPs) was achieved with different ranges of energies (500 to 900 mJ). Average crystallite sizes of the synthesized nanopar

In this work, the nuclear density distributions, size radii and elastic electron scattering form factors are calculated for proton-rich 8B, 17F, 17Ne, 23Al and 27P nuclei using the radial wave functions of Woods-Saxon potential. The parameters of such potential for nuclei under study are generated so as to reproduce the experimentally available size radii and binding energies of the last nucleons on the Fermi surface.

Implementing smart community engagement should consider careful planning and collaboration with numerous stakeholders, including the community. The technology and program must be designed to frame its purpose and should link back to specific goals of implementing smart community engagement. Digital services do not guarantee a smart engagement between the community and the local government. This is the case for the Kubang Pasu local government where several online services have been provided in their attempt to implement the smart community concept. However, understanding on the preferences of features and requirements of existing web-based systems and the impact of these systems is lacking. Therefore, a perception study needs to be condu

Ketoprofen is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAID) drug with analgesic, anti-inflammatory, and antipyretic effects. It is widely used in the treatment of inflammation and pain associated with rheumatic disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, and in soft tissue injury. The purpose of this study was to prepare an  oral disintegrating tablets of ketoprofen by simple method. The tablets were prepared by direct compression method and different ratios of various subliming agents or superdisintegrants were incorporated. Then these tablets were evaluated for hardness, friability, weight variation, water absorption ratio, disintegrating time and dissolution time. The results showed that Formula F11 batch had short disint

Background: Squamous cell carcinoma is a disease of elderly peopleand it is uncommon in people with less than 40 years old; however many literatures revealed that tumor developing in patients younger than forty years appears more aggressive at the time of diagnosis. The purpose of the present study was to focus on the clincopathological features of the oral SCC in different age groups. Material and methods: In this study thirty five cases of paraffin embedded tissue blocks of oral squamous cell carcinoma were studied. The age range was from 16 to 80 years. The clinicopathological data were recorded for evaluating the tumor characters according to age of patients. Results : The age was not significantly correlated to the clinicopathological

The expansion in water projects implementations in Turkey and Syria becomes of great concern to the workers in the field of water resources management in Iraq. Such expansion with the absence of bi-lateral agreement between the three riparian countries of Tigris and Euphrates Rivers; Turkey, Syria and Iraq, is expected to lead to a substantially reduction of water inflow to the territories of Iraq. Accordingly, this study consists of two parts: first part is aiming to study the changes of the water inflow to the territory of Iraq, at Turkey and Syria borders, from 1953 to 2009; the results indicated that the annual mean inflow in Tigris River was decreased from 677 m³/sec to 526 m³/sec, after operating Turkey reserv

    Let R be a commutative ring with identity, and M be a left untial module. In this paper we introduce and study the concept w-closed submodules, that is stronger form of the concept of closed submodules, where asubmodule K of a module M is called w-closed in M, "if it has no proper weak essential extension in M", that is if there exists a submodule L of M with K is weak essential submodule of L then K=L. Some basic properties, examples of w-closed submodules are investigated, and some relationships between w-closed submodules and other related modules are studied. Furthermore, modules with chain condition on w-closed submodules are studied.   

Furfural is a toxic aromatic aldehyde that can cause a severe environmental problem especially the wastewater drown from petroleum refinery units. In the present work, a useless by-product from local furniture manufacturing industry; sawdust was used as raw material for the preparation of activated carbon which is chemically activated with phosphoric acid. The effect of adsorption variables which include initial pH of solution (2-9), agitation speed (50-250) rpm, agitation time (15-120) min, initial concentration of furfural (50-250) ppm, and amount of adsorbent material (0.5-2.5) g for the three adsorbents used (prepared activated carbon, commercial activated carbon and raw sawdust) were investigated in a batch process

This paper proposes feedback linearization control (FBLC) based on function approximation technique (FAT) to regulate the vibrational motion of a smart thin plate considering the effect of axial stretching. The FBLC includes designing a nonlinear control law for the stabilization of the target dynamic system while the closed-loop dynamics are linear with ensured stability. The objective of the FAT is to estimate the cubic nonlinear restoring force vector using the linear parameterization of weighting and orthogonal basis function matrices. Orthogonal Chebyshev polynomials are used as strong approximators for adaptive schemes. The proposed control architecture is applied to a thin plate with a large deflection that stimulates the axial loadi

It is shown that if a subset of a topological space (χ, τ) is δ-semi.closed, then it is semi.closed. By use this fact, we introduce the concept regularity of a topological space (χ, τ) via δ-semi.open sets. Many properties and results were investigated and studied. In addition we study some maps that preserve the δ-semi.regularity of spaces.

New 2-Mercaptobenzimidazole derivatives were synthesized. 4,5-disubsitituted 1,2,4-Triazole compounds 1b-2c were synthesized from 2-(benzylthio) benzimidazole compound a, which was then reacted with (NaH) in dioxane at a temperature of (0-5 C°) to produce the salt of compound a. Then the salt was reacted with ethyl chloro acetate to yield Ethyl 2-(benzylthio) benzimidazole acetate compound b. Compound b was converted to triazole derivatives by two pathways. The first pathway was reacting compound b with semicarbazide, thiosemicarbazide and phenylsemicarbazide in DMSO as a solvent to gain compounds 1b-3b, which were then

<p>Vehicular ad-hoc networks (VANET) suffer from dynamic network environment and topological instability that caused by high mobility feature and varying vehicles density. Emerging 5G mobile technologies offer new opportunities to design improved VANET architecture for future intelligent transportation system. However, current software defined networking (SDN) based handover schemes face poor handover performance in VANET environment with notable issues in connection establishment and ongoing communication sessions. These poor connectivity and inflexibility challenges appear at high vehicles speed and high data rate services. Therefore, this paper proposes a flexible handover solution for VANET networks by integrating SDN and

The inelastic C2 form factors and the charge density distribution (CDD) for ^58,60,62Ni and ^64,66,68Zn nuclei has been investigated by employing the Skyrme-Hartree-Fock method with (Sk35-Skzs*) parametrization. The inelastic C2 form factor is calculated by using the shape of Tassie and Bohr-Mottelson models with appropriate proton and neutron effective charges to account for the core-polarization effects contribution. The comparison of the predicted theoretical values was conducted with the available measured data for C2 and CDD form factors and showed very good agreement.

Continuous escalation of the cost of generating energy is preceded by the fact of scary depletion of the energy reserve of the fossil fuels and pollution of the environment as developed and developing countries burn these fuels. To meet the challenge of the impending energy crisis, renewable energy has been growing rapidly in the last decade. Among the renewable energy sources, solar energy is the most extensively available energy, has the least effect on the environment, and is very efficient in terms of energy conversion. Thus, solar energy has become one of the preferred sources of renewable energy. Flat-plate solar collectors are one of the extensively-used and well-known types of solar collectors. However, the effectiveness of the coll

The aim of the present study was to demonstrate the possible role of statins on the inflammatory biomarkers in patients with periodontal disease (PD) This cross-sectional study involved 74 patients with PD and/or dyslipidemia divided into Group A: 34 patients with PD (nonstatins users); Group B: 40 patients with PD (statins users); and Group C: 30 healthy controls. Total cholesterol (TC), triglyceride (TG) and high-density lipoprotein, C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin-6 (IL-6), tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), and malondialdehyde (MDA) were measured . Blood pressure prolife and indices of PD were evaluated in each group. Statistical analysis was conducted by using SPSS version 20.0.

The hydrological process has a dynamic nature characterised by randomness and complex phenomena. The application of machine learning (ML) models in forecasting river flow has grown rapidly. This is owing to their capacity to simulate the complex phenomena associated with hydrological and environmental processes. Four different ML models were developed for river flow forecasting located in semiarid region, Iraq. The effectiveness of data division influence on the ML models process was investigated. Three data division modeling scenarios were inspected including 70%–30%, 80%–20, and 90%–10%. Several statistical indicators are computed to verify the performance of the models. The results revealed the potential of the hybridized s

Mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) are composed of mobile nodes communicating through wireless medium, without any fixed centralized infrastructure. Providing quality of service (QoS) support to multimedia streaming applications over MANETs is vital. This paper focuses on QoS support, provided by the stream control transmission protocol (SCTP) and the TCP-friendly rate control (TFRC) protocol to multimedia streaming applications over MANETs. In this study, three QoS parameters were considered jointly: (1) packet delivery ratio (PDR), (2) end-to-end delay, (3) and throughput. Specifically, the authors analyzed and compared the simulated performance of the SCTP and TFRC transport protocols for delivering multimedia streaming over MANETs.