A new approach for describing instantaneous line congruence

summary:Based on the E. Study’s map, a new approach describing instantaneous line congruence during the motion of the Darboux frame on a regular non-spherical and non-developable surface, whose parametric curves are lines of curvature, is proposed. Afterward, the pitch of general line congruence is developed and used for deriving necessary and sufficient condition for instantaneous line congruence to be normal. In terms of this, the derived line congruences and their differential geometric invariants were examined

Role of quercetin and arginine in ameliorating nano zinc oxide-induced nephrotoxicity in rats

BACKGROUND: Nanoparticles are small-scale substances (<100 nm) with unique properties. Therefore, nanoparticles pose complex health risk implications. The objective of this study was to detect whether treatment with quercetin (Qur) and/or arginine (Arg) ameliorated nephrotoxicity induced by two different doses of nano zinc oxide (n-ZnO) particles. METHOD: ZnO nanoparticles were administered orally in two doses (either 600 mg or 1 g/Kg body weight/day for 5 conscutive days) to Wister albino rats. In order to detect the protective effects of the studied antioxidants against n-ZnO induced nepherotoxicity, different biochemical parameters were investigated. Moreover, histopathological examination of kidney tissue was performed. RESULTS: Nano zinc oxide-induced nephrotoxicity was confirmed by the elevation in serum inflammatory markers including: tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), interleukin-6 (IL-6); and C-reactive protein (CRP). Moreover, immunoglobulin (IGg), vascular endothelium growth factor (VEGF), and nitric oxide (NO) were significantly increased in rat serum. Serum urea and creatinine levels were also significantly increased in rats intoxicated with n-ZnO particles compared with the control group. Additionally, a significant decrease in the non-enzymatic antioxidant reduced glutathione (GSH) was shown in kidney tissues and serum glucose levels were increased. These biochemical findings were supported by a histopathological examination of kidney tissues, which showed that in the animals that received a high dose of n-ZnO, numerous kidney glomeruli underwent atrophy and fragmentation. Moreover, the renal tubules showed epithelial desquamation, degeneration and necrosis. Some renal tubules showed casts in their lumina. Severe congestion was also observed in renal interstitium. These effects were dose dependent. Cotreatment of rats with Qur and/or Arg along with n-ZnO significantly improved most of the deviated tested parameters. CONCLUSIONS: The data show that Qur has a beneficial effect against n-ZnO oxidative stress and related vascular complications. Also, its combination with Arg proved to be even more effective in ameliorating nano zinc oxide nephrotoxicity

Effect of pretreatment on the proximate composition, physicochemical characteristics and stability of <em>Moringa peregrina</em> oil

The present research work was intended to study the influence of roasting and germination of the kernel seeds of Sudanese Moringa peregrina on the physicochemical characteristics and the oxidative stability of the extracted oil. Roasting was carried out at 180 ˚C for 25 minutes, whereas germination was done at ambient conditions in a wet jute bag for 5–7 days. The oil was extracted using n-hexane in a Soxhlet extraction apparatus. The results show that the oil contains α-tocopherols (152mg/kg) and oleic acid (above 70%) as the major tocols and fatty acids, respectively. Germination reduced the peroxide value and increased the acid value in a significant way (p < 0.05) whereas the opposite trend was noticed in the case of roasting. It is crucial to note that, with the exception of the acid value of the germinated sample, peroxide and acid values remained below one meq O2/Kg of oil and one mg KOH/g of oil, respectively. The oxidative stability of the oil from the roasted sample was increased almost by 80% compared to the raw one. Roasting of the kernels prior to oil extraction is imperative for improving its oxidation resistance and the physicochemical characteristics

Effects of parsley supplementation on the seminal quality, blood lipid profile and oxidant status of young and old male rabbits

[EN] The high unsaturation levels of spermatozoal membrane make it very susceptible to oxidative damage and this problem increases with advancing age. In this study, the aim is to investigate whether parsley seed (PS) has a protective effect on semen quality, serum lipid profile and antioxidative status of old and young bucks. Male rabbits (n= 36) (18 young 9-12 mo old and 18 old 36-42 mo old) were each assigned to 3 dietary treatments (a control and 2 levels of PS: 0.3 and 0.6 kg/100 kg diet) to evaluate the ability of parsley to enhance bucks’ reproductive status. Most of the studied traits were adversely affected by age of rabbit bucks. On the other hand, the inclusion of PS significantly boosted ejaculate volume and improved mass motility concentration and total sperm output. Seminal plasma and blood serum total antioxidant capacity increased, while serum lipid peroxidase decreased with parsley treatments. In conclusion, dietary supplementation of parsley seed alleviates most semen quality parameters and counteracts oxidative stress, especially with the advance of age (seminal plasma and blood serum of total antioxidant capacity and malondialdehyde.El-Gindy, Y.; Zeweil, H. (2017). Effects of parsley supplementation on the seminal quality, blood lipid profile and oxidant status of young and old male rabbits. World Rabbit Science. 25(3):215-223. doi:10.4995/wrs.2017.6532.SWORD215223253Abd El-Baky A.E. 2011. Quercetin protective action on oxidative stress, sorbitol, insulin resistance and ß-cells function in experimental diabetic rats. IJPSR., 2: 11-18.Ahsan S.K., Shah A.H., Tanira M.O.M., Ahmad M.S., Tariq M., Ageel A.M. 1990. Studies on some herbal drugs used against kidney stones in Saudi folk medicine. Fitoterapia, 61: 435-438.Aitken, R. J., & Baker, M. A. (2004). Oxidative stress and male reproductive biology. 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In: De Blas, J.C., Wiseman J., (Ed). The nutrition of rabbit. Ed CABI publishing, UK. pp.241-254.Duncan, D. B. (1955). Multiple Range and Multiple F Tests. Biometrics, 11(1), 1. doi:10.2307/3001478El-Damrawy S.Z., El-Kholy K.H., Eid Y.Z., Nematallh G.M.A. 2008. Age-induced oxidative stress in rabbit bucks: protective effect of melatonin. J. Agric. Sci. Mansoura Univ., 33: 3323-3330.Farah H., Elbadrawy E., Al-Atoom A. 2015. Evaluation of antioxidant and antimicrobial activities of ethanoic extracts of Parsley (Petroselinum erispum) and Coriander (Coriandrum sativum) plants grown in Saudi Arabia. Int. J. Adv. Res., 3: 1244-1255.Kery A., Blazovics A., Fejes S., Nagy E., Lugasi A. L., Kursinszki E., Czinner T., Kristo S., Apati P., Balazs A., Szoke E. 2001. Antioxidant activity of medicinal plants used in phototherapy. Intern. J. Hortic. Sci., 7: 28-35.Khatoon F., Abdullah F.E., Mushtaq M., Balouch S.Z. 2014. Correlation of Fructose with Spermatogenesis. Pinnacle Biochem. 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Human Reproduction, 13(8), 2172-2176. doi:10.1093/humrep/13.8.2172Ozturk Y., Baser C.H.K., Aydin S. 1991. Hepatoprotective antihepatotoxic plants in Turkey. In: Proceedings of the 9th Symposium on Plant Drugs, Eskisehir, Turkey, 40-50.Rajeshwari C.U., Abirami M., Andallu B. 2011a. In vitro and in vivo antioxidant potential of aniseeds (Pimpinella anisum) Asian J. Exp. Biol. Sci., 2: 80-89.SAS, 2004. Institute Inc. SAS On line Doc 9.1.3. Cary, NC: SAS Institute. Inc.Syntin P., Robaire B. 2001. Sperm structural and motility changes during aging in the Brown-Norway rat. J. Androl., 22: 235-244.Tarin J.J., Perez-Albala S., Cano A. 2000. Consequence on off spring of abnormal function in ageing gametes. Human reprod. Updata, 6: 532-549.Wilke, M. S., French, M. A., Goh, Y. K., Ryan, E. A., Jones, P. J., & Clandinin, M. T. (2009). Synthesis of specific fatty acids contributes to VLDL-triacylglycerol composition in humans with and without type 2 diabetes. Diabetologia, 52(8), 1628-1637. doi:10.1007/s00125-009-1405-9WONG, P., & KITTS, D. (2006). Studies on the dual antioxidant and antibacterial properties of parsley (Petroselinum crispum) and cilantro (Coriandrum sativum) extracts. Food Chemistry, 97(3), 505-515. doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2005.05.03

Spatio-temporal patterns of land use/land cover change in the heterogeneous coastal region of Bangladesh between 1990 and 2017

Although a detailed analysis of land use and land cover (LULC) change is essential in providing a greater understanding of increased human-environment interactions across the coastal region of Bangladesh, substantial challenges still exist for accurately classifying coastal LULC. This is due to the existence of high-level landscape heterogeneity and unavailability of good quality remotely sensed data. This study, the first of a kind, implemented a unique methodological approach to this challenge. Using freely available Landsat imagery, eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost)-based informative feature selection and Random Forest classification is used to elucidate spatio-temporal patterns of LULC across coastal areas over a 28-year period (1990-2017). We show that the XGBoost feature selection approach effectively addresses the issue of high landscape heterogeneity and spectral complexities in the image data, successfully augmenting the RF model performance (providing a mean user's accuracy > 0.82). Multi-temporal LULC maps reveal that Bangladesh's coastal areas experienced a net increase in agricultural land (5.44%), built-up (4.91%) and river (4.52%) areas over the past 28 years. While vegetation cover experienced a net decrease (8.26%), an increasing vegetation trend was observed in the years since 2000, primarily due to the Bangladesh government's afforestation initiatives across the southern coastal belts. These findings provide a comprehensive picture of coastal LULC patterns, which will be useful for policy makers and resource managers to incorporate into coastal land use and environmental management practices. This work also provides useful methodological insights for future research to effectively address the spatial and spectral complexities of remotely sensed data used in classifying the LULC of a heterogeneous landscape

Microstructural characterization of catalysis product of nanocement based materials: A review

Cement as an essential element for cement-based products contributed to negative environmental issues due to its high energy consumption and carbon dioxide emission during its production. These issues create the need to find alternative materials as partial cement replacement where studies on the potential of utilizing silica based materials as partial cement replacement come into picture. This review highlights the effectiveness of microstructural characterization techniques that have been used in the studies that focus on characterization of calcium hydroxide (CH) and calcium silicate hydrate (C-S-H) formation during hydration process of cement-based product incorporating nano reactive silica based materials as partial cement replacement. Understanding the effect of these materials as cement replacement in cement based product focusing on the microstructural development will lead to a higher confidence in the use of industrial waste as a new non-conventional material in construction industry that can catalyse rapid and innovative advances in green technology

Global economic burden of unmet surgical need for appendicitis

Background: There is a substantial gap in provision of adequate surgical care in many low-and middle-income countries. This study aimed to identify the economic burden of unmet surgical need for the common condition of appendicitis. Methods: Data on the incidence of appendicitis from 170 countries and two different approaches were used to estimate numbers of patients who do not receive surgery: as a fixed proportion of the total unmet surgical need per country (approach 1); and based on country income status (approach 2). Indirect costs with current levels of access and local quality, and those if quality were at the standards of high-income countries, were estimated. A human capital approach was applied, focusing on the economic burden resulting from premature death and absenteeism. Results: Excess mortality was 4185 per 100 000 cases of appendicitis using approach 1 and 3448 per 100 000 using approach 2. The economic burden of continuing current levels of access and local quality was US $92 492 million using approach 1 and$73 141 million using approach 2. The economic burden of not providing surgical care to the standards of high-income countries was $95 004 million using approach 1 and$75 666 million using approach 2. The largest share of these costs resulted from premature death (97.7 per cent) and lack of access (97.0 per cent) in contrast to lack of quality. Conclusion: For a comparatively non-complex emergency condition such as appendicitis, increasing access to care should be prioritized. Although improving quality of care should not be neglected, increasing provision of care at current standards could reduce societal costs substantially

Global variation in anastomosis and end colostomy formation following left-sided colorectal resection

Background End colostomy rates following colorectal resection vary across institutions in high-income settings, being influenced by patient, disease, surgeon and system factors. This study aimed to assess global variation in end colostomy rates after left-sided colorectal resection. Methods This study comprised an analysis of GlobalSurg-1 and -2 international, prospective, observational cohort studies (2014, 2016), including consecutive adult patients undergoing elective or emergency left-sided colorectal resection within discrete 2-week windows. Countries were grouped into high-, middle- and low-income tertiles according to the United Nations Human Development Index (HDI). Factors associated with colostomy formation versus primary anastomosis were explored using a multilevel, multivariable logistic regression model. Results In total, 1635 patients from 242 hospitals in 57 countries undergoing left-sided colorectal resection were included: 113 (6·9 per cent) from low-HDI, 254 (15·5 per cent) from middle-HDI and 1268 (77·6 per cent) from high-HDI countries. There was a higher proportion of patients with perforated disease (57·5, 40·9 and 35·4 per cent; P < 0·001) and subsequent use of end colostomy (52·2, 24·8 and 18·9 per cent; P < 0·001) in low- compared with middle- and high-HDI settings. The association with colostomy use in low-HDI settings persisted (odds ratio (OR) 3·20, 95 per cent c.i. 1·35 to 7·57; P = 0·008) after risk adjustment for malignant disease (OR 2·34, 1·65 to 3·32; P < 0·001), emergency surgery (OR 4·08, 2·73 to 6·10; P < 0·001), time to operation at least 48 h (OR 1·99, 1·28 to 3·09; P = 0·002) and disease perforation (OR 4·00, 2·81 to 5·69; P < 0·001). Conclusion Global differences existed in the proportion of patients receiving end stomas after left-sided colorectal resection based on income, which went beyond case mix alone