This study is to evaluate plasma levels of several cytokines in preeclamptic pregnancies compared to those of healthy pregnancies. Ninety pregnant women with preeclampsia (37 mild & 53 severe) and thirty healthy pregnant women were enrolled in the study. Blood samples were taken and plasma levels of IL-8, IL-10, and IFN-? were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Preeclamptic women and their severe cases but not mild cases had significantly (P<0.05) increased levels of plasma IL-8, and IFN-? as compared with healthy pregnancies. By contrast, plasma levels of IL-10 was significantly (P<0.05) increased in healthy pregnant women as compared to all groups of preeclampsia. Preeclampsia is associated with an imbalance betwe

This study illustrates in vitro effect of cold atmospheric plasma (CAP) on the treatment of Leishmania. In addition, the study evaluated the effect of drug treatment (pentostam) and the combination treatment of pentostan and CAP at different doses and incubation time 24 h in order to assess the most effective treatment. The duration of the cold plasma doses was 1 min, 2 min and 3 min, while the pentostam doses were 2.5 µg/ml and 5 µg/ml. The combinations therapies included combining the three cold plasma doses with the pentostam doses to test 6 combinations of treated in vitro. The maximum growth inhibition was given by combination treated 46% and 44% for donovani and tropica leishamnia respectively; these results give an indi

A simple low-cost approach at various exposure times was utilized to generate cold plasma in the aim to fabricate AuNPs. UV-Visible spectra and X-ray diffraction were used to characterize the nanoparticles (XRD). Surface Plasmon resonance was observed in the synthesized AuNPs at 530, 540, and 533 nm. For all samples, the patterns of XRD show very intensive peaks implying the fcc crystalline structure of AuNPs. The average crystallite size of AuNPs is ranging between 20-30 nm. The observation of morphology by FESEM revealed the spherical formation of AuNPs. Doses of 100 and 200 ppm of AuNPs were adapted to investigate their effect on the blood-mixture with and without a 20-second of cold plasma exposure. The WBC components in the blood

Experimental results on harmonic distortions in 13.56 MHz RF Argon glow discharge using different grounded electrodes areas and electrodes spacing are presented. The experiment is carried out at four pressure values. RF power values used are between 20 and 90 watts. The results indicate significant increase in distortions at two specific values of the cone angle enclosing the two electrodes within its geometrical volume. The computation of the cone head angle gave the symmetry discharge or asymmetry as well as when the angle is small the condition is near symmetry discharge associated with decrease in the nonlinearity.

The main goal of this work is to obtain the plasma electron temperature Te by optical emission spectroscopy of low pressure microwave argon plasma, as a function of working pressure and microwave power. A plasma system was designed and constructed in our laboratory using a magnetron of domestic microwave oven with power 800W without any commercial part. The applied voltage on the magnetron electrical circuit is changed for the purpose of obtaining the variable values of the microwave power. The spectral detection is performed with a spectrometer of wavelength range (200−1000nm). The working pressure and magnetron applied voltage were 0.3-3.0mbar and 180-240V, respectively. Two methods had been applied to estimate the electron temperatu

The calculation of the charge on an isolated dust grain immersed in plasma with different grain sizes is a challenging one, especially under moderately high plasma temperature when secondary electron emission significant. The discrete charging model is used to calculate the charges of dust grain in dusty plasma. In this model, we included the effect of grain size dependence on secondary electron emission. The results show that the secondary electron emission from the glass dust grains due to energetic electron (40eV) can lead to the small grain to be slightly more positive than the large grain. Under these conditions, the smaller and larger grains would be attracted rather than repelled, which possibly lead to enhanced coagulation rates.

A theoretical model is developed to determine time evolution of temperature at the surface of an opaque target placed in air for cases characterized by the formation of laser supported absorption waves (LSAW) plasmas. The model takes into account both plasma dynamics and time variation of incident laser pulse (i.e. pulse shape or profile).Shock tube relations were employed in formulating plasma dynamics over target surface. Gaussian function was chosen in formulating the pulse profile in the present modeling

         The Na-alginate bead is commonly used in biotechnology fields such as adsorption due to ion exchange between Ca and Na with elements. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM-EDX) has proven to be a comparative method in the detections of these adsorbed elements, but the un-flat forming area of beads that can introduce impossible of the detection of element adsorbed. In contrast, X-ray fluorescence (XRF) documents analysis of elements, direct examination, which may analysis the adsorbents of elements. Here, this Study evaluated the possibility by using XRF for the direct analysis for examples of Cd and Ag in a bench stand. This Study compared this to commonly use

An optimization study was conducted to determine the optimal operating pressure for the oil and gas separation vessels in the West Qurna 1 oil field. The ASPEN HYSYS software was employed as an effective tool to analyze the optimal pressure for the second and third-stage separators while maintaining a constant operating pressure for the first stage. The analysis involved 10 cases for each separation stage, revealing that the operating pressure of 3.0 Kg/cm2 and 0.7 Kg/cm2 for the second and third stages, respectively, yielded the optimum oil recovery to the flow tank. These pressure set points were selected based on serval factors including API gravity, oil formation volume factor, and gas-oil ratio from the flow tank.    To impro