Background: It's believed that HBD-3 is involved in the tissue remodeling process of articular cartilage. Also, HBD-3 has anti-inflammatory properties. Objectives: The purpose of this study is to assay human beta-defensine-3 (HBD-3) in serum from rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients and investigate its correlation with proinflammatory cytokines. Methods: In this case-control study, fifty-eight RA patients were aged 20–65 years, and 29 age-matched healthy subjects (HS) had no inflammatory rheumatic diseases. The disease activity score-28 joint erythrocyte sedimentation rate (DAS28-ESR) was used to measure RA activity. CRP, ACPA, HBD-3, TNF-α, and IL-1β were assessed using the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay technique (ELISA). Res

Sixteen polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) concentrations were measured in aerosol samples collected for the period from April 2012 to February 2013 at thermal south power station of Baghdad. Fourty one aerosol sample were extracted with (1:1) dichloromethane and methanol using soxhlet for seventeen hour. The extraction solution was analyzed applying GC/MS. The PAH concentrations outside thermal south power station were higher than those inside it, and higher in summer season than in winter. Naphthalene, pyrene, Anthracene, Indeno [1, 2, 3-cd] pyrene and Phenanthrene were the most abundant PAHs detected in all points at the site sampling. The total polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (TPAH) and total suspended particles (TSP) concentrat

This study focuses on evaluating the suitability of three interpolation methods in terms of their accuracy at climate data for some provinces of south of Iraq. Two data sets of maximum and minimum temperature in February 2008 from nine meteorological stations located in the south of Iraq using three interpolation methods. ArcGIS is used to produce the spatially distributed temperature data by using IDW, ordinary kriging, and spline. Four statistical methods are applied to analyze the results obtained from three interpolation methods. These methods are RMSE, RMSE as a percentage of the mean, Model efficiency (E) and Bias, which showed that the ordinary krigingis the best for this data from other methods by the results that have b

This study reported the investigation of the Radio Frequency (RF) signal propagation of Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) coverage in Emmanuel Alayande College of Education (EACOED), Oyo, Oyo State, Nigeria. The study aims at amplifying the quality of service and augment end users' sensitivity of the wireless services operation. The drive test method is adopted with estimation of coverage level and received signal strength. The Network Cell Info Lite application installed in three INFINIX GSM mobile phones was employed to take the measurement of the signal strength received from the transmitting stations of different mobile networks. The results of the study revealed that MTN has the maximum signal strength with a mean value

Ammi species belong to the family Umbellifereae that provide a host of bioactive compounds (mainly coumarins and flavonoids) of important biological activities, like prevention and treatment of heart and vascular disease and some types of cancer. Literature survey revealed that there was no study concerning Ammi flavonoids in Iraq. Ammi majus and Ammi visnaga, which are wildly grown in Iraq, were chosen for this study. This study concerned with extraction, identification, isolation, and purification of some biologically important flavonols quercetin and kaempferol from the fruits of Ammi majus and Ammi visnaga. Extraction of these flavonols was carried out using 85% methanol and 90% e

Some feline intestinal parasites such as Toxocara, Giardia, and Cryptosporidium can spread to humans through feces. Therefore, it is important to prevent exposure of family members by screening cat fecal samples twice per year for potential treatment regimes. This study was initiated to compare and identify gastrointestinal parasites of domestic and stray cats (Felis domesticus) in Baghdad City, Iraq. Parasite eggs and oocysts were identified under light microscopy by applying standard laboratory techniques (flotation and sedimentation). Overall, 59 of 121 (48.7%) fecal samples were positive for intestinal parasites. The rate of infection by Toxoplasma gondii was (3.31%), Isospora spp. (6.61%), Cryptosporidium spp. (31.4%), and Toxocara spp

A field experiment was conducted during the autumn of 2021 at the Agricultural Research Department station / Abu Ghraib to evaluate the soil moisture, water potential distribution, and growth factors of maize crops under alternating and constant partial drip irrigation methods. In the experiment, two irrigation systems were used, surface drip irrigation (DI) and subsurface irrigation (SD); under each irrigation system, five irrigation methods were: conventional irrigation (CI), and 75 and 50% of the amount of water of CI of each of the alternating partial irrigation APRI75 and APRI50 and the constant partial irrigation FPRI75 and FPRI50 respectively. The results showed that the water depth for conventional irrigation (C1) was 658.3