Renoprotective effect of red grape (Vitis vinifera L.) juice and dark raisins against hypercholesterolaemia-induced tubular renal affection in albino rats

Background: Red grape juice (RGJ) and dark raisins (DR) are rich in polyphenols and antioxidants. This study aimed to assess the efficacy of RGJ and DR in protec- ting the renal tubules against hypercholesteraemic-induced pathological changes.  Materials and methods: Forty albino rats divided into four groups (n = 10) were utilised in this study. They included the control, high cholesterol diet (HCD)-fed, HCD+RGJ-fed, and HCD+DR-fed groups. Body weight gain, food and water in- take, blood and insulin levels, lipid profile and kidney functions were assessed at the start of the experiment and after 12 weeks. The right kidney was dissected out and processed for both light and electron microscopic examination. Desmin and cytokeratin antibodies were utilised as histologic markers to assess the integrity of the proximal (PTs) and distal tubules (DTs) of the kidney.  Results: Administration of HCD resulted in hypercholesterolaemia in rats as evi- denced by the lipid profile. The PTs of hypercholesteraemic rats appeared dilated with hyaline casts and mitochondria in most of the tubular cells were affected. Immunohistochemical assessment revealed affection of both PTs and DTs. Both RGJ and DR, when administered along with the HCD for 12 weeks, improved the lipid profile, kidney functions as well as the histologic and cellular changes-induced by hypercholesterolaemia in the rats. The effect of raisins was superior to RGJ which might be due to its high contents of fibres and proteins.  Conclusions: This study highlighted the importance of supplementation of red grape and raisins in protection against the harmful effects induced by deposition of fat on the renal tubules’ structure and function.

The use of high throughput DNA sequence analysis to assess the endophytic microbiome of date palm roots grown under different levels of salt stress

Date palms are able to grow under diverse abiotic stress conditions including in saline soils, where microbial communities may be help in the plant’s salinity tolerance. These communities able to produce specific growth promoting substances can enhance date palm growth in a saline environment. However, these communities are poorly defined. In the work reported here, the date palm endophytic bacterial and fungal communities were identified using the pyrosequencing method, and the microbial differential abundance in the root upon exposure to salinity stress was estimated. Approximately 150,061 reads were produced from the analysis of six ribosomal DNA libraries, which were prepared from endophytic microorganisms colonizing date palm root tissues. DNA sequence analysis of these libraries predicted the presence of a variety of bacterial and fungal endophytic species, some known and others unknown. The microbial community compositions of 30% and 8% of the bacterial and fungal species, respectively, were significantly (p ≤ 0.05) altered in response to salinity stress. Differential enrichment analysis showed that microbe diversity indicated by the Chao, Shannon and Simpson indices were slightly reduced, however, the overall microbial community structures were not significantly affected as a consequence of salinity. This may reflect a buffering effect by the host plant on the internal environments that these communities are colonizing. Some of the endophytes identified in this study were strains that were previously isolated from saline and marine environments. This suggests possible interactions with the plant that are favorable to salinity tolerance in date palm. [Int Microbiol 19(3):143-155 (2016)]Keywords: Phoenix dactylifera · endophytes · salt stres

Machine learning based IoT Intrusion Detection System:an MQTT case study (MQTT-IoT-IDS2020 Dataset)

The Internet of Things (IoT) is one of the main research fields in the Cybersecurity domain. This is due to (a) the increased dependency on automated device, and (b) the inadequacy of general-purpose Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) to be deployed for special purpose networks usage. Numerous lightweight protocols are being proposed for IoT devices communication usage. One of the distinguishable IoT machine-to-machine communication protocols is Message Queuing Telemetry Transport (MQTT) protocol. However, as per the authors best knowledge, there are no available IDS datasets that include MQTT benign or attack instances and thus, no IDS experimental results available. In this paper, the effectiveness of six Machine Learning (ML) techniques to detect MQTT-based attacks is evaluated. Three abstraction levels of features are assessed, namely, packet-based, unidirectional flow, and bidirectional flow features. An MQTT simulated dataset is generated and used for the training and evaluation processes. The dataset is released with an open access licence to help the research community further analyse the accompanied challenges. The experimental results demonstrated the adequacy of the proposed ML models to suit MQTT-based networks IDS requirements. Moreover, the results emphasise on the importance of using flow-based features to discriminate MQTT-based attacks from benign traffic, while packet-based features are sufficient for traditional networking attacks

Three-dimensional verification of volumetric measurements and relationships between the condyle and the rest of the mandible; a novel approach

Background: Few studies have investigated the volumetric relationship between the condyles and the mandible bilaterally.Materials and methods: Condylar and mandibular segmentations from a sample of cone-beam computed tomography for 37 individuals were selected. T-test, correlation and linear regression analyses were performed to assess the relationships between the volumes of the condyles and mandible.Results: The volume of the condyles and the mandible was significantly different between genders (p < 0.05). There was a significant but moderate correlation between the volumes of the condyle and the rest of the mandible on the same side (p < 0.01). A regression analysis model demonstrated that condylar volume is related to the volume of the mandible.Conclusions: The relationship between the condylar volume and the rest of the mandible was found to be moderate. The relation between the condylar volume and mandibular volume is described by the regression equations for each side of the jaw. Sexual dimorphism exists in condylar and mandibular volumes

Stress Reactivity, Depressive Symptoms, and Mindfulness: A Gulf Arab Perspective

Explorations of the relationship between stress reactivity and depression are relatively scarce outside of Europe and North America. This research examined the relationship between emotional reactivity to daily life stressors (stress reactivity) and depressive symptoms among citizens of the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Emirati college students ( N = 286, 76% females) completed a culturally grounded measure of daily life stress, along with measures of depression and anxiety symptoms. Stress reactivity was associated with elevated depression and anxiety symptoms. In a second study, we examined the efficacy of a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program within the same population. Emirati College women ( N = 24) were randomly assigned to either an 8-week MBSR program or a waiting list control group (WLC). MBSR participants demonstrated significantly greater reductions in stress reactivity and depressive symptoms compared with the WLC group. These findings extend the stress reactivity literature to an Arabian Gulf nation. Interventions that help young adults better manage responses to daily life stress may play an important role in reducing the prevalence of depressive illness in the region

Circular and linear : a tale of aptamer selection for the activation of SIRT1 to induce death in cancer cells

It is a challenge to select the right target to treat conditions without affecting non-diseased cells. Cancer belongs to the top 10 causes of death in the world and it remains difficult to treat. Amongst cancer emerging targets, silent information regulator 1 (SIRT1) – a histone deacetylase – has shown many roles in cancer, ageing and metabolism. Here we report novel SIRT1 ligands that bind and modulate the activity of SIRT1 within cells and enhance its enzymatic activity. We developed a modified aptamer capable of binding to and forming a complex with SIRT1. Our ligands are aptamers, they can be made of DNA or RNA oligonucleotides, their binding domain can recognise a target with very high affinity and specificity. We used the systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment (SELEX) technique to develop circular and linear aptamers selectively binding to SIRT1. Cellular consequences of the interaction were monitored by fluorescence microscopy, cell viability assay, stability and enzymatic assays. Our results indicate that from our pool of aptamers, circular AC3 penetrates cancerous cells and is recruited to modulate the SIRT1 activity. This modulation of SIRT1 resulted in anticancer activity on different cancer cell lines. Furthermore, this modified aptamer showed no toxicity on one non-cancerous cell line and was stable in human plasma. We have demonstrated that aptamers are efficient tools for localisation of internal cell targets, and in this particular case, anticancer activity through modulation of SIRT1

Personality profiles of cultures: aggregate personality traits

Personality profiles of cultures can be operationalized as the mean trait levels of culture members. College students from 51 cultures rated an individual from their country whom they knew well (N = 12, 156). Aggregate scores on Revised NEO Personality Inventory scales generalized across age and gender groups, approximated the individual-level Five-Factor Model, and correlated with aggregate self-report personality scores and other culture-level variables. Results were not attributable to national differences in economic development or to acquiescence. Geographical differences in scale variances and mean levels were replicated, with Europeans and Americans generally scoring higher in Extraversion than Asians and Africans. Findings support the rough scalar equivalence of NEO-PI-R factors and facets across cultures, and suggest that aggregate personality profiles provide insight into cultural differences

Territoriality and long-distance movements in an anthophorid bee

This project involves the following physical datasheet: 1. male bouts of sitting on the ground 2. male-female interactions 3. male-male interactions 4. proportion of marked male and female remaining on the same site 5. visits of males to flowers 6. visits of males to plants of different size