The correlation of length and weight of Kutum (Rutilus frisii kutum) in the central south of Caspian Sea with copper and zinc concentration in muscle and liver tissues

Concentration of copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn) in liver and muscle tissues of Kutum (Rutilus frisii kutum) of the Caspian Sea was assessed to study possible correlation of length and weight and the bioaccumulation of these heavy metals in the fish. Concentration of the metals in liver was higher than muscle (Zn: 55.2, Cu: 41.5 kg/g) while the concentrations in the muscle tissue were lower than permissible limits proposed by FAO. Significant correlations were not detected between mean Zn and cu concentration and fish size. Finally, no significant difference was found in the concentration of the heavy metals in male and female fish specimens (P>0.05)

Carvedilol Compared With Metoprolol on Left Ventricular Ejection Fraction After Coronary Artery Bypass Graft

A number of elective coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery patients have impaired underlying left ventricular function (poor ejection fraction). This study was performed to compare the effect of postoperative oral carvedilol versus metoprolol on left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) after CABG compared with metoprolol. In a double-blind clinical trial, 60 patients with coronary artery disease, aged 35 to 65 years, who had an ejection fraction of 15% to 35% were included. Either carvedilol or metoprolol was administered the day after CABG The patients were evaluated by the same cardiologist 14 days before and 2 and 6 months after elective CABG The results demonstrated better improvements in LVEF in the carvedilol group. No difference regarding postoperative arrhythmias or mortality was detected. The results suggest that carvedilol may exert more of an improved myocardial effect than metoprolol for the low ejection fraction patients undergoing CABG in the early postoperative months

Study of one class boundary method classifiers for application in a video-based fall detection system

In this paper, we introduce a video-based robust fall detection system for monitoring an elderly person in a smart room environment. Video features, namely the centroid and orientation of a voxel person, are extracted. The boundary method, which is an example one class classification technique, is then used to determine whether the incoming features lie in the ‘fall region’ of the feature space, and thereby effectively distinguishing a fall from other activities, such as walking, sitting, standing, crouching or lying. Four different types of boundary methods, k-center, k-th nearest neighbor, one class support vector machine and single class minimax probability machine are assessed on representative test datasets. The comparison is made on the following three aspects: 1). True positive rate, false positive rate and geometric means in detection 2). Robustness to noise in the training dataset 3). The computational time for the test phase. From the comparison results, we show that the single class minimax probability machine achieves the best overall performance. By applying one class classification techniques with 3-d features, we can obtain a more efficient fall detection system with acceptable performance, as shown in the experimental part; besides, it can avoid the drawbacks of other traditional fall detection methods

Genetic susceptibility loci for cardiovascular disease and their impact on atherosclerotic plaques

Background: Atherosclerosis is a chronic inflammatory disease in part caused by lipid uptake in the vascular wall, but the exact underlying mechanisms leading to acute myocardial infarction and stroke remain poorly understood. Large consortia identified genetic susceptibility loci that associate with large artery ischemic stroke and coronary artery disease. However, deciphering their underlying mechanisms are challenging. Histological studies identified destabilizing characteristics in human atherosclerotic plaques that associate with clinical outcome. To what extent established susceptibility loci for large artery ischemic stroke and coronary artery disease relate to plaque characteristics is thus far unknown but may point to novel mechanisms. Methods: We studied the associations of 61 established cardiovascular risk loci with 7 histological plaque characteristics assessed in 1443 carotid plaque specimens from the Athero-Express Biobank Study. We also assessed if the genotyped cardiovascular risk loci impact the tissue-specific gene expression in 2 independent biobanks, Biobank of Karolinska Endarterectomy and Stockholm Atherosclerosis Gene Expression. Results: A total of 21 established risk variants (out of 61) nominally associated to a plaque characteristic. One variant (rs12539895, risk allele A) at 7q22 associated to a reduction of intraplaque fat, P=5.09×10−6 after correction for multiple testing. We further characterized this 7q22 Locus and show tissue-specific effects of rs12539895 on HBP1 expression in plaques and COG5 expression in whole blood and provide data from public resources showing an association with decreased LDL (low-density lipoprotein) and increase HDL (high-density lipoprotein) in the blood. Conclusions: Our study supports the view that cardiovascular susceptibility loci may exert their effect by influencing the atherosclerotic plaque characteristics

Analysis of pollution removal from wastewater by Ceratophyllum demersum

Water is one of the most stable and abundant complexes on nature that can be polluted with natural and human factors. Polluted water is harmful to human health and need to purify. One of the economic and rapid methods for elements removal is displacement of metals by biosorption. Two treatments in four replications for the purpose of purifying wastewater by Ceratophyllum demersum were designed. The treatments included raw municipal wastewater (RMW) and treated municipal wastewater (TMW). The experiment was performed at the open air of Khorasgan University area for 18 days without aeration. Result of the COD indicated that the COD of RMW and TMW were decreased from 664 to 152.75 mg/l and 260 to 64.5 mg/l, respectively. Also, this investigation demonstrated that the amount of ammonium in RMW and TMW decreased from135 to 15 meq/l and 90 to 10 meq/l, respectively. The amount of nitrate in RMW and TMW had a similar decreased from 60 to 30 meq/l as well as 4.48 to 0.53 meq/l, respectively and the amount of phosphorous in RMW and TMW declined from 13.68 to 1.15 meq/l and 4.48 to 0.53 meq/l, respectively. It could be concluded from these results that a significant amount of these macro elements were absorbed by C. demersum. The other factor that was measured in this study was the electrical conductivity (EC). Results of this factor indicated that the EC of treated municipal wastewater (from 1.34 to 0.95 ds/m) and the EC of raw municipal wastewater (from 2.68 to 2.12 ds/m) were reduced. The variation for NH4, NO3, COD and EC were < 5%. Therefore it was concluded that C. demersum can be used for refining wastewater