Abstract Candida albicans is a commensal fungal pathogen that grows in yeast and hyphal forms in the human gut. C. albicans causes mucosal and cutaneous diseases that can result in significant mortality following systematic infections and it also exhibits drug resistance. Zebrafish have been an excellent model to investigate C. albicans infections because of their transparency and the availability of many transgenic lines. However, there is a limitation in using zebrafish as a model because the fish embryos cannot survive at 37°C therefore it is not suitable for studying Candida infections at physiological relevant human body temperature. In this thesis, the normal embryonic development of Arabian killifish (A. dispar) is investigated, revealing that embryogenesis was divided into 32 stages based on diagnostic patterns of development. A. dispar can also found to tolerate a wide range of temperatures and salinities. This suggests that A. dispar could be developed as a novel model to investigate host-pathogen interactions. The tolerance of A. dispar to high temperatures may in part be attributable to brown pigment cells with a highly fluorescent character that may have developed to allow the fish to adapt to live within extreme environmental conditions with strong sunlight and a wide range of temperatures (Chapter 3). In terms of Candida infections, this study examined A. dispar as a model to test C. albicans pathogenicity. The survival of A. dispar embryos following Candida infection showed a dose dependent relationship. We also found that A. dispar can survive longer than zebrafish after infection. Furthermore, C. albicans cells were observed to undergo a transition from yeast to hyphae at 37°C. An investigation of the ability of mutant strains of C. albicans with defects in cell wall mannosylation revealed a significant impact on virulence, host mortality, and the fishes’ immune response. The present study found that although the deletion of O- and N-mannan from the cell wall of C. albicans, affected fungal burden (attenuation), and the survival of the infected embryos per se was significantly decreased in the infections of the mutant strains compared to the WT. This data confirms the importance of the mannosylation state of the cell wall in triggering an immune recognition event (Chapter 4). A. dispar is also shown to be suitable for studying the effectiveness of 3 | P a g e antifungals. Fluconazole treatment of infected embryos and eggs promoted greater rates of survival at high doses, alongside a significant reduction of C. albicans CFUs (Chapter 4). When looking at the Candida-host interaction, we directly observed phagocytosed yeast cells within macrophages. Various detection methods were used to follow macrophages and neutrophils including Western blotting, immunostaining and histological staining (Sudan black and FITC-tyramide) allowing the monitoring of the time course of the immune cells. A biphasic response of macrophages was detected by L-plastin Western blotting, suggesting activation of two different type of macrophage: activated macrophage (M1) and alternative macrophage (M2). We also assayed reactive oxygen species (ROS) within infected embryos using a fluorescent probe (H2DCFDA), revealing the accumulation of the fluorescent probe at the sites of infection. Quantitative and qualitative analyses of the oxidative and immune response using the H2DCFDA and qPCR were also accomplished within A. dispar embryos after infection with both the WT and mutant strains of Candida albicans (WT, pmr1∆, mnt1-mnt2∆, and och1∆). The results confirmed that the mutant strains did not activate a host oxidative stress response nor immune cell accumulation when compared to WT, suggesting that the immune response is less activated against these mutants. Finally, a new transgenic line of A. dispar fish was developed using Betaactin-DsR-LoxP-GFP. The new transgenic A. dispar is suggested to be an ideal model for real time observation of host-pathogen interactions and for investigation of molecular functions of the immune response. Overall these results improve our understanding of the use of a new transparent fish model to study fungal pathogenesis and demonstrates the potential advantages of using this species in future studies of bacterial, fungal and viral pathogens at a physiologically relevant temperature for human infection. Such a model could lead us to investigate in more depth the key interactions between pathogens and their host and permit the screening and development of new antifungal therapies (that might target the pathogens directly or target the host immune system). View full metadata
Optimum perforation location selection is an important study to improve well production and hence in the reservoir development process, especially for unconventional high-pressure formations such as the formations under study. Reservoir geomechanics is one of the key factors to find optimal perforation location. This study aims to detect optimum perforation location by investigating the changes in geomechanical properties and wellbore stress for high-pressure formations and studying the difference in different stress type behaviors between normal and abnormal formations. The calculations are achieved by building one-dimensional mechanical earth model using the data of four deep abnormal wells located in Southern Iraqi oil fields. The magni
... Show MoreA Genetic Algorithm optimization model is used in this study to find the optimum flow values of the Tigris river branches near Ammara city, which their water is to be used for central marshes restoration after mixing in Maissan River. These tributaries are Al-Areed, AlBittera and Al-Majar Al-Kabeer Rivers. The aim of this model is to enhance the water quality in Maissan River, hence provide acceptable water quality for marsh restoration. The model is applied for different water quality change scenarios ,i.e. , 10%,20% increase in EC,TDS and BOD. The model output are the optimum flow values for the three rivers while, the input data are monthly flows(1994-2011),monthly water requirements and water quality parameters (EC, TDS, BOD, DO and
... Show MoreThis research consists of two parts, the first part concern with analyzing the collected data of BOD and COD values in discharge waste water from Al-Dora refinery during 2010 to find the relationship between these two variables The results indicates that there is a high correlation between BOD and COD when using a natural logarithm model (0.86 ln(COD)) with correlation coefficient of 0.98. This relationship is useful in predicting the BOD value using the COD value. The second part includes analyzing collected data from the same site in order to find a relationsip between BOD and other parameters COD, Phenol(phe), Temperature(T), Oil, Sulphat(SO4),pH and Total dissolved solids( TDS) discharged from the refinery. The results indicated that th
... Show More<span lang="EN-GB">This paper highlights the barriers that have led to a delay in the implementation of E-Health services in Iraq. A new framework is proposed to improve the E-Health sector using a SECI model which describes how explicit and tacit knowledge is generated, transferred, and recreated in organizations through main stages (socialization, externalization, combination and internalization). Class association rules (CARs) is integrated to mine the SECI model by extracting related rules which correspond to the medical advice. The proposed framework (SECICAR) can be done through a web portal to assemble healthcare professionals, patients in one environment. SECICAR will be applied to the hypertension community to show th
... Show MoreIn this paper, the problem of resource allocation at Al-Raji Company for soft drinks and juices was studied. The company produces several types of tasks to produce juices and soft drinks, which need machines to accomplish these tasks, as it has 6 machines that want to allocate to 4 different tasks to accomplish these tasks. The machines assigned to each task are subject to failure, as these machines are repaired to participate again in the production process. From past records of the company, the probability of failure machines at each task was calculated depending on company data information. Also, the time required for each machine to complete each task was recorded. The aim of this paper is to determine the minimum expected ti
... Show MoreIn this paper we estimate the coefficients and scale parameter in linear regression model depending on the residuals are of type 1 of extreme value distribution for the largest values . This can be regard as an improvement for the studies with the smallest values . We study two estimation methods ( OLS & MLE ) where we resort to Newton – Raphson (NR) and Fisher Scoring methods to get MLE estimate because the difficulty of using the usual approach with MLE . The relative efficiency criterion is considered beside to the statistical inference procedures for the extreme value regression model of type 1 for largest values . Confidence interval , hypothesis testing for both scale parameter and regression coefficients
... Show MoreThis study aims to measure and analyze the direct and indirect effects of the financial variables, namely (public spending, public revenues, internal debt, and external debt), on the non-oil productive sectors with and without bank credit as an intermediate variable, using quarterly data for the period (2004Q1–2021Q4), converted using Eviews 12. To measure the objective of the study, the path analysis method was used using IBM SPSS-AMOS. The study concluded that the direct and indirect effects of financial variables have a weak role in directing bank credit towards the productive sectors in Iraq, which amounted to (0.18), as a result of market risks or unstable expectations in the economy. In addition to the weak credit ratings of borr
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This paper discusses the essence of the developmental process in auditing firms and offices at the world today. This process is focused on how to adopt the audit concepts which is based on Information and Communication Technology (ICT), including the Continuous Auditing (CA) in particular. The purpose of this paper is to design a practical model for the adoption of CA and its requirements according to the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM). This model will serve as a road map for manage the change and development in the Iraqi auditing firms and offices. The paper uses the analytical approach in reaching to the target results. We design the logical and systematic relations between the nine variable
... Show MoreStarting from the term (forbidden montage) initiated by the French critic (Andre Bazin) as a method of processing the movies that depend on (mise en scene) achieved by the action of the camera and its ability to photograph and employ the depth of the field, in addition to the possibility of free movement without interruption in the filming environment in order to avoid montage as much as possible (the montage that distorts focus and distracts attention and moves away from realism, which is the most important theoretical pillar of Bazin in photography). The pursuit was behind a cinema that depicts its topics in one integrated snapshot with all its details thus approximating reality without any interference of montage. Our study sta
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