Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease of airways mediated by T-helper 2 (Th2) cells involving complex signaling pathways. Although resveratrol has previously been shown to attenuate allergic asthma, the role of miRNA in this process has not been studied. We investigated the effect of resveratrol on ovalbumin-induced experimental allergic asthma in mice. To that end, BALB/c mice were immunized with ovalbumin (OVA) intraperitoneally followed by oral gavage of vehicle (OVA-veh) or resveratrol (100 mg/kg body) (OVA-res). On day 7, the experimental groups received intranasal challenge of OVA followed by 7 days of additional oral gavage of vehicle or resveratrol. At day 15, all mice were euthanized and bronchioalveolar fluid (BALF), se

Burdock ( Arctium lappa), is among the most popular plants in traditional medicine and it is associated with several biological effects. Literature survey revealed the presence of phenylpropanoid compounds .The most widespread are hydroxycinnamic acids ( mainly caffeic acid and chlorogenic acid) and lignans (mainly arctiin and arctigenin). This work will confirm the presence of these compounds in Arctium lappa, cultivated in Iraq, in both root and leaf samples.  The dried plant samples were extracted by soxhlet with 80% methanol then separated the main constituents by thin layer chromatography (TLC) and high performance liquid  chromatography (HPLC). Identification of the isolated compounds wa

Abstract: Recently, there is increasing interest in using mode-division multipelexing (MDM) technique  to enhace  data rate transmission over multimode fibers.  In this technique, each fiber mode is treated as a separate optical carrier to transfer its own data.  This paper presents a broadband, compact, and low loss three-mode (de)multiplexer designed for C+L band using subwavelength grating (SWG) technology and built-in silicon-on-insulator SOI platform. SWG offers refractive index engineering for wider operating bandwidth and compact devices compared to conventional ones. The designed (de)multiplex deals with three modes (TE0, TE1, and TE2) and has a loss > -1 dB and crosstalk < −15 dB, and its operation c

Background: Polymorphisms in the TNF-α gene affect the development and progression of rheumatoid arthritis. Objective: To investigate the associations between (-806 T/C) and (-857 T/C) SNPs with rheumatoid arthritis severity and susceptibility in a sample of Iraqi patients. Methods: A case-control study was conducted in Baghdad, Iraq. Twenty healthy controls and 63 patients confirmed to be newly diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis were included. Those are divided into two groups (patients and controls), and the patients were further subdivided into severe and mild-moderate groups. Samples from those participants were analyzed for clinical and inflammatory parameter measurements. Genotyping by the Sanger method was performed to stu

Taguchi experimental design (TED) is applied to find the optimum effectiveness of aqueous Red Pomegranate Peel (RPP) extract as a green inhibitor for the corrosion of mild steel in 2M H₃PO₄ solution. The Taguchi methodology has been used to study the effects of changing, temperature, RPP concentration and contact period, at three levels. Weight-loss measurements were designed by construction a L₉ orthogonal arrangement of experiments.   Results of the efficiencies of inhibition were embraced for the signal to noise proportion & investigation of variance (ANOVA).  The results were further processed with a MINITAB-17 software package to find the optimal condition

Urinary tract infection (UTI) is a considerable problem aecting the health of people each year. It is caused by various Gram-positive (G+ve) and Gram-negative (G-ve) pathogens. It is an important illness in the world aecting all age groups across their life span. Objectives: To identify the most common aerobic bacteria that cause UTIs and their antibiotic susceptibility and antimicrobial activity of plant extracts of the males' patients. Materials and methods: The study involved 35 midstream urine samples from the male students (University of Baghdad, Baghdad, Iraq) with suspicious symptoms of UTI, during the period from January-March 2018. Each urine sample was cultured rst on Mannitol Salt Agar and MacConkey agar plates to dierentiate

Green synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) using different plant parts has shown a great potential in medicinal and industrial applications. In this study, AgNPs were in vitro green synthesized using A. graecorum, and its antifungal and antitumoractivities were investigated. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) image result indicated spherical shape of AgNPs with a size range of 22-36 nm indicated by using Image J program. The functional groups indicated by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) represented the groups involved in the reduction of silver ion into nanoparticles. Alhagi graecorum AgNPs inhibited MCF-7 breast cancer cell line growth in increased concentration depend manner, significant differences shown at