Several toxigenic cyanobacteria produce the cyanotoxin (microcystin). Being a health and environmental hazard, screening of water sources for the presence of microcystin is increasingly becoming a recommended environmental procedure in many countries of the world. This study was conducted to assess the ability of freshwater cyanobacterial species Westiellopsis prolifica to produce microcystins in Iraqi freshwaters via using molecular and immunological tools. The toxigenicity of W. prolifica was compared via laboratory experiments with other dominant bloom-forming cyanobacteria isolated from the Tigris River: Microcystis aeruginosa, Chroococcus turigidus, Nostoc carneum, and Lyngbya sp. signifi

Acute decompensated heart failure (ADHF) is a leading cause of hospital admission and many factors are known to precipitate decompensation. We aimed to assess the decompensating factors of heart failure and the management of patients admitted to the emergency department (ED). A total of 107 patients were examined, all diagnosed with ADHF in the ED of the Baghdad Teaching Hospital, from June 2017 to December 2017, and presenting with decom¬pensation (pulmonary oedema, peripheral oedema, and fatigue). The mean patient age was 62.5 ± 9.8 years (range: 43–85 years); the majority of them were in their 7th decade (37.4%), and men were slightly more than women. Hy¬pertension was the most commonly associated comorbidity (68.2%), follow

The electric quadrupole moments for some scandium isotopes (41, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47Sc) have been calculated using the shell model in the proton-neutron formalism. Excitations out of major shell model space were taken into account through a microscopic theory which is called core polarization effectives. The set of effective charges adopted in the theoretical calculations emerging about the core polarization effect. NushellX@MSU code was used to calculate one body density matrix (OBDM). The simple harmonic oscillator potential has been used to generate the single particle matrix elements. Our theoretical calculations for the quadrupole moments used the two types of effective interactions to obtain the best interaction compared with the exp

Hydrated lime has been recognized as an effective additive used to improve asphalt concrete properties in pavement applications. However, further work is still needed to quantify the effect of hydrated lime on asphaltic concrete performance under varied weather, temperature, and environmental conditions and in the application of different pavement courses. A research project was conducted using hydrated lime to modify the asphalt concretes used for the applications of wearing (surface), leveling (binder), and base courses. A previous publication reported the experimental study on the resistance to Marshall stability and the volumetric properties, the resilient modulus, and permanent deformation at three different weather temperatures. This

    The electronic properties (such as energy gap HOMO levels. LUMO levels, density of state and density of bonds in addition to spectroscopic properties like IR spectra, Raman spectra, force constant and reduced masses as a function of frequency) of coronene C24 and reduced graphene oxide C24OX , where x=1-5, were studied.. The  methodology employed was  Density Functional Theory (DFT) with Hybrid function B3LYP and 6-311G** basis sets. The energy gap was calculated for C24 to be 3.5 eV and for C24Ox was from 0.89 to 1.6862 eV  for x=1-5 ,respectively.   These energy gaps values are comparable to the measured gap of Graphene (1-2.2 eV). The spectroscopic properties were  compared with experimental measurements, specificall

   The modified Hummers method was applied to prepare graphene oxide (GO) from the graphite powder. Tin oxide nanoparticles with different loading (10-20 wt.%) supported on reduced graphene oxide were synthesized to evaluate the oxidative desulfurization efficiency. The catalyst was synthesized by the incipient wetness impregnation (IWI) technique. Different analysis methods like FT-IR, XRD, FESEM, AFM, and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) were utilized to characterize graphene oxide and catalysts. The XRD analysis showed that the average crystal size of graphene oxide was 6.05 nm. In addition, the FESEM results showed high metal oxide dispersions on the rGO. The EDX analysis shows the weight ratio of Sn is close to its theoretical weight.