Osteoarthritis is the most prevalent arthritic disease and a leading cause of disability. The pathogenesis of osteoarthritis involves multiple etiologies, including variable degree of synovial inflammation. Metformin and pioglitazone could potentially reduce the levels and activity of inflammatory mediators. This may consider as a new therapeutic approach added to the current used drugs in an attempt to decrease the pain, inflammation, and improve daily activity and quality of life in patients with knee osteoarthritis.

This study designed to evaluate the clinical utility of using metformin or pioglitazone as anti-inflammatory agents in combination with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAID) of selective type of cyclooxygen

Cost estimation is considered one of the important tasks in the construction projects management. The precise estimation of the construction cost affect on the success and quality of a construction project. Elemental estimation is considered a very important stage to the project team because it represents one of the key project elements. It helps in formulating the basis to strategies and execution plans for construction and engineering.  Elemental estimation, which in the early stage, estimates the construction costs depending on  . minimum details of the project so that it gives an indication for the initial design stage of a project. This paper studies the factors that affect the elemental cost estimation as well as the rela

The current research aims to reveal the level of satisfaction of the mentors with the evaluation of their performance according to gender (male - female) and to formulate the predictive equation for the level of performance (dependent variable) from knowing the level of satisfaction with the evaluation (independent variable). (16 paragraphs) contains alternatives to the answer that measures the level of satisfaction (weak, medium, and high) (1,2,3), that is, with a hypothetical average of (32). It consisted of 100 educational counselors consisting of 45 males and 55 females, the results of the research concluded that the level of satisfaction with performance is below the mean when compared with the hypothetical average of the scale of s

In this study, simply supported reinforced concrete (RC) beams were analyzed using the Extended Finite Element Method (XFEM). This is a powerful method that is used for the treatment of discontinuities resulting from the fracture process and crack propagation in concrete. The mesoscale is used in modeling concrete as a two-phasic material of coarse aggregate and cement mortar. Air voids in the cement paste will also be modeled. The coarse aggregate used in the casting of these beams is a rounded aggregate consisting of different maximum sizes. The maximum size is 25 mm in the first model, and in the second model, the maximum size is 20 mm. The compressive strength used in these beams is equal to 26 MPa.

The subje

One hundred twelve urine samples were collected from Baghdad hospitals and examined by different identification techniques. Seventy isolates (62.5%) were diagnosed as Escherichia coli after microscopic and cultural identifications. The result of PCR product electrophoresis on the isolates showed that thirteen isolates (18.57%) have Pap E gene which are uropathogenic E. coli. Antibiotic susceptibility test was done, and four high resistant strains were mixed with aqueous extract of Quercus infectoria plant in 96 well ELISA plate and incubated for different times. After 0, 6, and 12 hr. of incubation, the effect of the plant extract on the bacterial growth was determined by ELISA reader, and the effect on the expression of P

Tin oxide films (SnO2) of thickness (1 ?m) are prepared on glass substrate by post oxidation of metal films technique. Films were irradiated with Nd:YAG double frequency laser of wavelength (532 nm) pulses of three energies (100, 500, 1000) mJ. The optical absorption, transmission, reflectance, refractive index and optical conductivity of these films are investigated in the UV-Vis region (200-900) nm. It was found that the average transmittance of the films is around (80%) at wavelength (550 nm) and showed high transmission (? 90 %) in the visible and near infrared region. The absorption edge shifts towards higher energies, which is due to the Moss-Burstien effect and it lies at (4 eV). The optical band gap increased with increasing of ene

Background: Stress urinary incontinence is a frequent urological disease in women; it has a great influence on an individual’s wellbeing and places a significant economic strain on any health service. The placement of urodynamic diagnostic tests in the evaluation route is an important clinical research concern in this field.

Objective: to find out whether the duration of stress urinary incontinence is associated with the finding of bladder outlet obstruction in urodynamic study or not.

Subjects and Methods: A descriptive study. With enrolled female patients had symptomatic Stress urinary incontinence as their primary complain. All the included patients w

The experiment was carried out the study of effect of seed peels of Nigella sativa and Brassica nigra by 5, 10 mg/ kg soil that added them to soil alone and 5, 10 mg/kg soil together on the growth of Cicer arietinum plants. The results showed the increased significantly germination accelerator, plant height, leaves number, branches number, flowers number, legumes number, seed dry mater, carbohydrate and protein percentage in seeds.

This paper presents an experimental and numerical study which was carried out to examine the influence of the size and the layout of the web openings on the load carrying capacity and the serviceability of reinforced concrete deep beams. Five full-scale simply supported reinforced concrete deep beams with two large web openings created in shear regions were tested up to failure. The shear span to overall depth ratio was (1.1). Square openings were located symmetrically relative to the midspan section either at the midpoint or at the interior boundaries of the shear span. Two different side dimensions for the square openings were considered, mainly, (200) mm and (230) mm. The strength results proved that the shear capacity of the dee