Heavy metal (HM) pollution has long been a significant source of environmental deterioration and a problem for the safety of food. Iraqis prefer rice over any other food, and since heavy metals have a direct impact on health, their traces in rice have drawn particular attention. Before cooking rice, it is usual in Iraq to wash and soak it. Some 55 varieties of imported and local rice were sampled from Erbil city markets in 2022 with the aim of determining the concentration of As, Cd, Cr, Ni and Pb before and after soaking. Standard procedure of acid digestions was applied on the raw and soaked samples. The solutions were analyzed using ICPE-9820 Shimadzu. The mean concentrations of As, Cd, Cr, Ni and Pb (in mg/kg) in the rice samples before soaking was 0.655, 0.170, 0.160, 0.387, 0.489, respectively and after soaking 0.421, 0.109, 0.115, 0.124 and 0.336, respectively. The concentration of As and Pb was found to be beyond the optimum level of 0.2 mg/kg codex standards for rice; whereas Cd and Cr were within the proposed level of codex standards. Moreover, local rice showed higher concentration of (Cd and Cr), whereas (AS and Pb) concentration in imported rice was higher. Further, results validated that rice soaking can decrease levels of As, Cd, Cr, Ni and Pb (32.5%, 40.2%, 27.9%, 61.6% and 31.3%, respectively). These findings suggest that soaking as a kitchen practice has efficiency to evaporate metals and has a great influence on the reduction of toxic heavy metals and thus reduces exposure to toxic metals in rice
Population density represents an important indicator for determining the growth of the size of urban areas. Population density has a direct impact on the quality of life, and its excessive rise may lead to the deterioration of basic service facilities. The problem of the research is that the increase in the total population densities of the residential neighborhood may reflect negatively on the nature of the services provided to the residents in these shops, and thus the failure to achieve sustainability in the residential locality. The research assumes that the increase in population densities negatively affects the achievement of sustainability in the residential neighborhood.
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Abstract: Urinary Tract Infections (UTIs) are the most common bacterial infection in humans and a major cause of morbidity and they are the most common cause of hospital visits worldwide. Proper knowledge in identifying factors associated with urinary tract infection may allow the intervention to easily control of the disease in a timely manner. Therefore, the purpose of the study is determining the prevalence of UTI, diagnosis of causative bacterial agents and identifying the factors associated to the urinary tract infection among patients attending Medical City Hospital in Baghdad, Iraq. A total of 237, morning mid-stream urine samples were collected aseptically and the samples were diagnosed according to the standard methods. I
... Show Moreالاحداث السياسية في العراق بعد 2003 وأثر الانتماء والوعي في التشكيل العراقي المعاصر
The implementation of decentralization in Iraq was asymmetrical, leading to different forms and paces of implementation. Comparing four cases of Basra, Kirkuk, Nineveh, and Sulaymaniyah indicate that these cases differ in their political stability and autonomy in a way that led to a different forms of decentralization. This paper argues that the higher the level of political autonomy from the federal government, the more efficient the governance model, and the more efficient the governance model, the more legitimate the system (trust), and the more legitimate a system, the more accountable elected officials. Therefore, it recommends reforming the institutional setup of decentralization by having districts, instead of provinces, as the bu
... Show MoreThe climate is one of the natural factors affecting agriculture, and the success of the cultivation of any agricultural crop depends on the nature of the prevailing climate in the area of its cultivation. If the main elements of climate: temperature, rain and humidity, affect the various agricultural activities that can be practiced, and the stages of growth of agricultural crops and also determine the areas of spread. When the climatic requirements of any crop are well available, its cultivation is successful and comfortable. The research starts from the problem of spatial variation of date production spatially in the study area and the reason for choosing dates because of its economic importance, so the research will be based on
... Show MoreThis research develops a new method based on spectral indices and random forest classifier to detect paddy rice areas and then assess their distributions regarding to urban areas. The classification will be conducted on Landsat OLI images and Landsat OLI/Sentinel 1 SAR data. Consequently, developing a new spectral index by analyzing the relative importance of Landsat bands will be calculated by the random forest. The new spectral index has improved depending on the most three important bands, then two additional indices including the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), and standardized difference built-up index (NDBI) have been used to extract paddy rice fields from the data. Several experiments being
... Show MoreIndustry represents a cornerstone of the process of economic development and a measure of progress and contribute to increased prosperity and high standard of living.
The researcher analyzed the productivity indicators in industrial facilities large and small at several time periods ranging from 1970 to 2009, according to the economic situation that prevailed in each period.
Different impact of periods under discussion, it made Iraq the cash surpluses during the period 70-1980 then the effects of the war after 1980 and the economic blockade since 1990, and the subsequent events of the year
... Show MoreImproving the environment is a mission that should be conducted by three associates; public authorities, environmentalists and the community. The ignorance of environmental education in Iraq has resulted to an almost environmentally illiterate community, demanding well planned programs to raise their environmental; awareness and education. On the other hand, the decision makers should be well informed about the citizens' environmental preferences to be able to set their priorities for the civil services. Merging the Iraqi citizens in listing their environmental priorities is one of many other approaches for "Environment Education" programs. Globally, such methods have proven to be effective and resulted to widespread understandin
... Show MoreAgricultural loans play an important role in the growth and stimulation of agricultural investment opportunities in Iraq, as well as the sustainability and development of existing agricultural projects. The agricultural sector is characterized by the specific conditions of seasonal production and fluctuations in production conditions, which makes the situation of uncertainty more acute in this sector, the need for any agricultural project for financing is urgent and continuous if it wants to continue production and development at all stages. The study proved the impact of agricultural loans in increasing investment and agricultural production at specific times, However, the fluctuation of funding
... Show MoreIn this work, chemical and thermal treatment were used to enhance silica extract on the purity of rice husk and to reduce the impurities associated with the extraction of silica. The thermal degradation of rice husk was studied. The characteristics and thermal degradation behavior of rice husk which investigated using thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA). Hydrochloric acid was used to soak the rice husk and the study of leaching influence is followed by XRF tests for samples before and after the combustion process. Acid treatment and combustion method seem to have a clear effect on silica purity. The pyrolysis processes were carried out at Laboratory temperature up to 650 oC in the presence of nitrogen gas flowing at 150 ml/min. The effect o
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