Background: Neural tube defects (NTDs) are said to be inherited in a multifactorial fashion, i.e. genetic-environmental interaction. Maternal nutritional deficiencies had long been reported to cause NTDs, especially folate deficiency during early pregnancy. More attention had been paid to the exact mechanism by which this deficiency state causes these defects in the developing embryo. The most significant of all researches was that connecting reduced folate and increased homocysteine level in maternal serum on one hand and the risk of developing a NTD baby on the other hand. Objectives : to determine the significance of homocysteine level in Iraqi mothers who gave birth to babies with NTDs as compared to normal controls. Patients, Materials and Methods: Fifty Iraqi women having babies born with NTDS, referred to the genetic clinic in Baghdad Teaching Hospital, were included in this study (the study group) as well as 37 healthy women having normal children (the control group). This study was conducted from November, 2002 till October, 2003. Analysis of total serum homocysteine level for all women was done using a computerized HPLC system. Results : the age of women in both groups was comparable (mean+SD in the study group was 26.2+5.14 years vs. 26.3+4.57 years in the controls). Among the study group, 4 (8%) had normal tHcy level; 44 (88%) had mildly elevated level, and only 2 (4%) had moderately elevated tHcy level, while all (100%) women in the control group had their tHcy level within normal level. This difference was statistically highly significant (p<0.001). Conclusions : Women become at an increased risk of delivering a baby with NTD when having an elevated tHcy level in their sera, and that tHcy level is an important marker in maternal serum that is associated significantly with pregnancy outcome.
Background: Periodontal diseases are initiated by microbial plaque, which accumulates in the sulcular region and induces an inflammatory response. The Receptor activator of nuclear factor-kappa B ligand / osteoprotegerin (RANKL/OPG) axis is involved in the regulation of bone metabolism in periodontitis, in which an increase in receptor activator of nuclear factor-kappa B ligand or a decrease in osteoprotegerin can tip the balance in favor of osteoclastogenesis and the resorption of alveolar bone that is the hallmark of periodontitis. This study was performed to investigate the role of salivary levels of RANKL and OPG in pathogenesis of chronic periodontitis. Subjects and Methods: Fifty five subjects with chronic periodontitis with ages rang
... Show MoreIn this paper three techniques for image compression are implemented. The proposed techniques consist of three dimension (3-D) two level discrete wavelet transform (DWT), 3-D two level discrete multi-wavelet transform (DMWT) and 3-D two level hybrid (wavelet-multiwavelet transform) technique. Daubechies and Haar are used in discrete wavelet transform and Critically Sampled preprocessing is used in discrete multi-wavelet transform. The aim is to maintain to increase the compression ratio (CR) with respect to increase the level of the transformation in case of 3-D transformation, so, the compression ratio is measured for each level. To get a good compression, the image data properties, were measured, such as, image entropy (He), percent r
... Show MoreIn this paper three techniques for image compression are implemented. The proposed techniques consist of three dimension (3-D) two level discrete wavelet transform (DWT), 3-D two level discrete multi-wavelet transform (DMWT) and 3-D two level hybrid (wavelet-multiwavelet transform) technique. Daubechies and Haar are used in discrete wavelet transform and Critically Sampled preprocessing is used in discrete multi-wavelet transform. The aim is to maintain to increase the compression ratio (CR) with respect to increase the level of the transformation in case of 3-D transformation, so, the compression ratio is measured for each level. To get a good compression, the image data properties, were measured, such as, image entropy (He), percent root-
... Show MoreThe determination hardness in water raised to rivers caused several problem in the validity of the water used depends on where determination ions concentration calcium and magnesium in salts carbonate and sulfate , this possibility of separation between of these ions and the resulting impact on concentration and determination the degree of hardness water and appreciation between the insolvent water quality . It study the effect of the impact of concentration magnesium ion in determination the quality of the water has turned out to be Mg concentration more than 60% of the total content of hardness is borderline in hardness effect the determination. Adopted in this research determination the ions in two method titration by EDTA solution and
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The study aims to identify the extent to which the applied colleges at the University of Technology and Applied Sciences meet the comprehensive quality standards in light of the national education strategy for the 2040 Vision in the Sultanate of Oman. To do this, the researchers used the descriptive approach. They used a questionnaire as a tool for data collection that was applied to (237) administrators, academics, and support functions. The study found that the extent to which the applied colleges at the University of Technology and Applied Sciences meet the comprehensive quality standards in the light of the National Education Strategy 2040 in the Sultanate of Oman recorded a high range. The study als
... Show Morecapable of the measuring with a high degree of precision in a single instrument. Total stations device are used for station setting up, setting-outmany points from one station. Their major purpose of this work is to take advantage of total station for setting up building and to establish 3D representation using AutoCAD program. The area of the study was Civil Engineering Department at Baghdad University campus AL Jadiriyah. The completion of the work is done in two stages; 1. The field work: In this stage, the Total Station Nikon Nivo-5C was selected for the current study. This device was measured horizontal and vertical distance, elevations, and coordinates from a single set up. This data directly stored on memory. 2. The office work: In t
... Show MoreThis work is concerned with the design and performance evaluation of a shell and double concentric tubes heat exchanger using Solid Works and ANSY (Computational Fluid Dynamics).
Computational fluid dynamics technique which is a computer-based analysis is used to simulate the heat exchanger involving fluid flow, heat transfer. CFD resolve the entire heat exchanger in discrete elements to find: (1) the temperature gradients, (2) pressure distribution, and (3) velocity vectors. The RNG k-ε model of turbulence is used to determining the accurate results from CFD.
The heat exchanger design for this work consisted of a shell and eight double concentric tubes. The number of inlets are three and that of o
... Show MoreUtilizing phase change materials in thermal energy storage systems is commonly considered as an alternative solution for the effective use of energy. This study presents numerical simulations of the charging process for a multitube latent heat thermal energy storage system. A thermal energy storage model, consisting of five tubes of heat transfer fluids, was investigated using Rubitherm phase change material (RT35) as the. The locations of the tubes were optimized by applying the Taguchi method. The thermal behavior of the unit was evaluated by considering the liquid fraction graphs, streamlines, and isotherm contours. The numerical model was first verified compared with existed experimental data from the literature. The outcomes re
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