Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is an autoimmune disease with polymorphic expression. B cells have an essential contribution in immune system activation via the production of different cytokines and functioning as potent antigen-presenting cells. Therefore, a drug that particularly targets B cells may represent an ideal therapeutic approach for SLE. Rituximab (RTX), an anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody causing transient B-cell depletion, has been used to manage SLE. This study aims to assess Rituximab effects on lupus nephritis (LN) patients when added to conventional immunosuppressants. Twenty four patients, 15-32 years old, with class III/IV/V LN were involved in this study. All were on steroids before lupus nephritis occurrence. They were given rituximab induction therapy and mycophenolate mofetil (MMF) maintenance therapy. RTX was indicated for refractory and relapsing SLE. Several investigations done before and after RTX treatment and in the last follow up (done one year after starting Rituximab). Those included protein in urine, serum creatinine, double stranded DNA, C3, C4, and Estimated Glomerular Filtration Rate (eGFR). Proteinuria decreased significantly after RTX treatment and in the last measurement (P=0.01 and P=0.001, respectively). Serum creatinine significantly decreased only in the last measurement (P=0.02). Double stranded DNA decreased remarkably after treatment (P=0.01) with a further decrease in the last measurement (P=0.006). C3 and C4 increased after treatment but the increase was significant only for C3 (P=0.002) and this increase continues till the last measurement (P=0.0006). Active urine sediments found in fifteen patients and disappeared after RTX treatment. Rituximab can be promising in treating lupus nephritis when used along with traditional immunosuppressants. It can reduce disease activity and improve renal function in such patients.
Wireless Multimedia Sensor Networks (WMSNs) are a type of sensor network that contains sensor nodes equipped with cameras, microphones; therefore the WMSNS are able to produce multimedia data such as video and audio streams, still images, and scalar data from the surrounding environment. Most multimedia applications typically produce huge volumes of data, this leads to congestion. To address this challenge, This paper proposes Modify Spike Neural Network control for Traffic Load Parameter with Exponential Weight of Priority Based Rate Control algorithm (MSNTLP with EWBPRC). The Modify Spike Neural Network controller (MSNC) can calculate the appropriate traffi
... Show MoreAn experimental study was carried out for an evaporative cooling system in order to investigate the effect of using an aluminum pad coated with fabric polyester. In the present work, it was considered to use a new different type of cooling medium and test its performance during the change in the wet-bulb temperature and dry-bulb temperature of the supply air outside of the pad, the relative humidity of the supply air, the amount of air supplied (300-600) CFM and also the change of the amount of circulated water (1.75, 2.5, 4.5) liter per minute. A decrease in the WBT of the air was obtained, whereas the WBT of the air entering the pad was 26.5 . In contrast, the WBT of the outside air had reached 23 even though eva
... Show MoreAbstract- Asymptomatic or clinically silent kidney stones are possibly serious because, in their expected passage, they may cause infection, obstruction and renal impairment. The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of silent kidney stones in a sample of Baghdad population and consider how this value could affect the justification for a screening system. To our best knowledge, this is the first study of its kind conducted in Iraq. We investigated 714 consecutive patients who sustained an abdominal ultrasound at our hospital with further kidney screening. All these patients did not have clinical signs and symptoms of nephrolithiasis. Age, sex, the indication for ultrasound, the size, side, and the number of the disco
... Show MoreThe blade pitch angle (BPA) in wind turbine (WT) is controlled to maximize output power generation above the rated wind speed (WS). In this paper, four types of controllers are suggested and compared for BPA controller in WT: PID controller (PIDC), type-1 fuzzy logic controller (T1-FLC), type-2 fuzzy logic controller (T2-FLC), and hybrid fuzzy-PID controller (FPIDC). The Mamdani and Sugeno fuzzy inference systems (FIS) have been compared to find the best inference system used in FLC. Genetic algorithm (GA) and Particle swarm optimization algorithm (PSO) are used to find the optimal tuning of the PID parameter. The results of500-kw horizontal-axis wind turbine show that PIDC based on PSO can reduced 2.81% in summation error of power
... Show MoreA recent study compared experimentally the hydraulic and thermal activity of twisted tape inserts for two types, metal foam twisted tape (MFTT) and traditional twisted tape (TTT), in a double pipe heat exchanger. The investigation goal of the innovatively designed MFTT is to enhance the heat transfer process, which provides a higher thermal enhancement factor over those of TTT under the same conditions. Heat transfer activity in terms of Nusselt number (
Water supply networks are marred by serious risks of imperceptible pipeline leakage, posing sustainability and performance threats. This article highlights the use of vibratory signal features to get around the drawbacks of traditional methods in a highly detailed framework for leak detection based on CatBoost. demonstrated excellent diagnostic performance and carried out a thorough test performance evaluation on five leakage configurations . The expected system achieved an accuracy of 98.1% (variance (well within x/3% of expected):, beating traditional competitors such as Random Forest (97.3%) and Support Vector Machine (93.8%). For example, the area under the receiver-operating characteristic curve was 0.995, in
... Show MoreSummary
The subject ( meaning of added verbs) is one of the main subjects
which study in morphology since in Arabic language. It is include the meaning
of each format, and the increased meaning occurred by this increment in the
verbs.
The (strain) is one of very important meaning in this subject, it takes a
wide area of morphology studies, and interesting of scientists and
researchists.
There are two famous formats for this meaning; (infa la انفع
ل ), and (ifta
la افتع
ل ). Also There are another formats for the same meaning, but less than
the first two in use, they are; (taf ala تفعّ
ل ), (tafa ala تفاع
ل ), (taf lala ) ,(تفعل
ل
ifanlala افعنلل ), (ifanla .(
Background : Xanthomatosis is a disease in which large tendon tumors can occur, especially in the Achilles tendon. This disease is a rare interesting orthopaedic condition. Case Report:A case of a twenty eight year old girl patient with giant bilateral Achilles tendon xanthomas in which both tumors were resected. There was no ulceration on the both sides. The patient was treated by total resection of the lesion and reconstruction using tendon transfer of the Peroneus brevis and Flexor hallusis longus. Postoperative treatment consisted of six weeks lower leg cast immobilization followed by partial weight bearing. After 4 months the patient was able to walk pain free without any difficulties. It has been suggested that total resection with au
... Show MoreThe Quiet American could be considered as one of Graham Greene’s most distinguished books; it is an epochal novel written during the phase of the cold war between the United States and the Soviet Union. The novel deals with the interference of the United States in Vietnam ten years before Vietnam’s war. The role the Americans played in arousing an inner political crisis in the country previous to her military invention. The book reflects that this action was not out of American government concern about Vietnamese people themselves but merely a political foreign affair. They wanted to stop communism from spreading widely and reducing its role in the East. This paper attempts to analyse the novel concentrating on the message Greene intend
... Show MoreTwo- dimensional numerical simulations are carried out to study the elements of observing a Dirac point source and a Dirac binary system. The essential features of this simulation are demonstrated in terms of the point spread function and the modulation transfer function. Two mathematical equations have been extracted to present, firstly the relationship between the radius of optical telescope and the distance between the central frequency and cut-off frequency of the optical telescope, secondly the relationship between the radius of the optical telescope and the average frequency components of the modulation transfer function.