Utilizing Steel Slag in the Removal of Suspended Solids from Dewatered Construction Water

Construction dewatering is an operation used to remove shallow groundwater that infiltrates construction sites. After recovering this water from the construction sites, the water is either discharged to the sea, injected in deep groundwater aquifers, or treated and reused in some other applications. However, municipal and industrial application of this water is unfeasible due to its poor quality. Thus, in this study, dewatered construction water is being treated utilizing waste steel slag in order to improve the quality of the water. The pH of the dewatered construction water used for this study was 7.59 and the average diameter of steel slag used was 425 nm. For coagulation, the impact of the mass of steel slag and the contact time on the quality of dewatered construction water were studied. By using 5gm/L of steel slag, more than 85% of the total suspended solids and turbidity were removed within 30 minutes.The authors would like to thank Qatar University for the financial support. In addition, the authors would like to thank Qatar Steel for the supply of the steel slag sample

Rabies encephalitis in children: a resurgence of a fatal anthropozoonosis

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High flow nasal cannula therapy versus continuous positive airway pressure and nasal positive pressure ventilation in infants with severe bronchiolitis: a randomized controlled trial

Introduction: non-invasive ventilation is widely used in the respiratory management of severe bronchiolitis. Methods: a randomized controlled trial was carried out in a tertiary pediatric university hospital´s PICU over 3 years to compare between continuous positive airway pressure/nasal positive pressure ventilation (CPAP/NPPV) and high flow nasal cannula (HFNC) devices for severe bronchiolitis. The trial was recorded in the national library of medicine registry (NCT04650230). Patients aged from 7 days to 6 months, admitted for severe bronchiolitis were enrolled. Eligible patients were randomly chosen to receive either HFNC or CPAP/NPPV. If HFNC failed, the switch to CPAP/NPPV was allowed. Mechanical ventilation was the last resort in case of CPAP/NPPV device failure. The primary outcome was the success of the treatment defined by no need of care escalation. The secondary outcomes were failure predictors, intubation rate, stay length, serious adverse events, and mortality. Results: a total of 268 patients were enrolled. The data of 255 participants were analyzed. The mean age was 51.13 ± 34.43 days. Participants were randomized into two groups; HFNC group (n=130) and CPAP/NPPV group (n=125). The success of the treatment was significantly higher in the CPAP/NPPV group (70.4% [61.6%- 78.2%) comparing to HFNC group (50.7% [41.9%- 59.6%])- (p=0.001). For secondary outcomes, lower baseline pH was the only significant failure predictor in the CPAP/NPPV group (p=0.035). There were no differences in intubation rate or serious adverse events between the groups. Conclusion: high flow nasal cannula was safe and efficient, but CPAP/ NPPV was better in preventing treatment failure. The switch to CPAP/NPPV if HFNC failed, avoided intubation in 54% of the cases

Rabies encephalitis in children: a resurgence of a fatal anthropozoonosis

Rabies is a ubiquitous fatal disease and its large wild life reservoir may precipitate a flare-up whenever stringent control is relaxed. It remains a serious public health challenge in the developing world. It is estimated that up to 40\u201360,000 cases of human rabies occur annually, mostly in rural areas of Africa and Asia, and with a particularly high incidence in young children (under the age of 15 years). Although Tunisia has implemented a national program against rabies since 1982, we are still recording one or two cases every year; in these cases, the victims generally did not consult after a dog bite and did not receive prophylaxis. We report in this article the case of an eleven year old child, who received post exposure prophylaxis and unfortunately developed fatal rabies

Explainable deep learning model for automatic mulberry leaf disease classification

Mulberry leaves feed Bombyx mori silkworms to generate silk thread. Diseases that affect mulberry leaves have reduced crop and silk yields in sericulture, which produces 90% of the world’s raw silk. Manual leaf disease identification is tedious and error-prone. Computer vision can categorize leaf diseases early and overcome the challenges of manual identification. No mulberry leaf deep learning (DL) models have been reported. Therefore, in this study, two types of leaf diseases: leaf rust and leaf spot, with disease-free leaves, were collected from two regions of Bangladesh. Sericulture experts annotated the leaf images. The images were pre-processed, and 6,000 synthetic images were generated using typical image augmentation methods from the original 764 training images. Additional 218 and 109 images were employed for testing and validation respectively. In addition, a unique lightweight parallel depth-wise separable CNN model, PDS-CNN was developed by applying depth-wise separable convolutional layers to reduce parameters, layers, and size while boosting classification performance. Finally, the explainable capability of PDS-CNN is obtained through the use of SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) evaluated by a sericulture specialist. The proposed PDS-CNN outperforms well-known deep transfer learning models, achieving an optimistic accuracy of 95.05 ± 2.86% for three-class classifications and 96.06 ± 3.01% for binary classifications with only 0.53 million parameters, 8 layers, and a size of 6.3 megabytes. Furthermore, when compared with other well-known transfer models, the proposed model identified mulberry leaf diseases with higher accuracy, fewer factors, fewer layers, and lower overall size. The visually expressive SHAP explanation images validate the models’ findings aligning with the predictions made the sericulture specialist. Based on these findings, it is possible to conclude that the explainable AI (XAI)-based PDS-CNN can provide sericulture specialists with an effective tool for accurately categorizing mulberry leaves

Wafer-scale detachable monocrystalline Germanium nanomembranes for the growth of III-V materials and substrate reuse

Germanium (Ge) is increasingly used as a substrate for high-performance optoelectronic, photovoltaic, and electronic devices. These devices are usually grown on thick and rigid Ge substrates manufactured by classical wafering techniques. Nanomembranes (NMs) provide an alternative to this approach while offering wafer-scale lateral dimensions, weight reduction, limitation of waste, and cost effectiveness. Herein, we introduce the Porous germanium Efficient Epitaxial LayEr Release (PEELER) process, which consists of the fabrication of wafer-scale detachable monocrystalline Ge NMs on porous Ge (PGe) and substrate reuse. We demonstrate monocrystalline Ge NMs with surface roughness below 1 nm on top of nanoengineered void layer enabling layer detachment. Furthermore, these Ge NMs exhibit compatibility with the growth of III-V materials. High-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) characterization shows Ge NMs crystallinity and high-resolution X-ray diffraction (HRXRD) reciprocal space mapping endorses high-quality GaAs layers. Finally, we demonstrate the chemical reconditioning process of the Ge substrate, allowing its reuse, to produce multiple free-standing NMs from a single parent wafer. The PEELER process significantly reduces the consumption of Ge during the fabrication process which paves the way for a new generation of low-cost flexible optoelectronics devices.Comment: 17 pages and 6 figures along with 3 figures in supporting informatio

Global respiratory syncytial virus–related infant community deaths

Background Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a leading cause of pediatric death, with >99% of mortality occurring in low- and lower middle-income countries. At least half of RSV-related deaths are estimated to occur in the community, but clinical characteristics of this group of children remain poorly characterized. Methods The RSV Global Online Mortality Database (RSV GOLD), a global registry of under-5 children who have died with RSV-related illness, describes clinical characteristics of children dying of RSV through global data sharing. RSV GOLD acts as a collaborative platform for global deaths, including community mortality studies described in this supplement. We aimed to compare the age distribution of infant deaths <6 months occurring in the community with in-hospital. Results We studied 829 RSV-related deaths <1 year of age from 38 developing countries, including 166 community deaths from 12 countries. There were 629 deaths that occurred <6 months, of which 156 (25%) occurred in the community. Among infants who died before 6 months of age, median age at death in the community (1.5 months; IQR: 0.8−3.3) was lower than in-hospital (2.4 months; IQR: 1.5−4.0; P < .0001). The proportion of neonatal deaths was higher in the community (29%, 46/156) than in-hospital (12%, 57/473, P < 0.0001). Conclusions We observed that children in the community die at a younger age. We expect that maternal vaccination or immunoprophylaxis against RSV will have a larger impact on RSV-related mortality in the community than in-hospital. This case series of RSV-related community deaths, made possible through global data sharing, allowed us to assess the potential impact of future RSV vaccines

Contribution à l'étude des rôles fonctionnels des gènes impliqués dans le syndrome de Kallmann de Morsier

Le syndrome de Kallmann de Morsier est une maladie de développement embryonnaire qui associe un hypogonadisme et une anosmie. Chez les patients atteints de ce syndrome, des anomalies génétiques ont été décrites, touchant plusieurs gènes parmi lesquels : KAL1, KAL-2, ProkR2 et Prok2. Les travaux effectués au cours de cette thèse sont une contribution à l étude des rôles fonctionnels de ces gènes. La première partie de ce mémoire est consacrée à l étude de l interaction de l anosmine-1 et le FGFR1 dans les bulbes olfactifs du rat ainsi qu à l étude des rôles fonctionnels des récepteurs aux prokinéticines durant le développement et à l âge adulte chez le poisson zèbre. Ces travaux ont tout d abord montré que l anosmine-1 et le FGFR1 sont co-exprimés dans les bulbes olfactifs du rat au cours de développement et qu ils appartiennent au même complexe protéique. De plus nous avons démontré in vivo que l anosmine-1 module l expression du FGFR1. Ensuite, nous avons cloné les récepteurs de prokinéticines prokr1 et prokr2. Par hybridation in situ nous avons étudié les profils d expression de ces deux gènes durant le développement et l âge adulte et nous avons montré qu ils sont superposables dans toutes les régions ou ils sont localisés. Enfin, nous avons étudié le rôle fonctionnel de prokr2 par injection de morpholinos oligonucléotides antisens au stade une cellule de poisson zèbre et nous avons démontré qu il y a altération de fasciculation des axones olfactifs, une désorganisation et une diminution du nombre des neurones dopaminergiques dans les bulbes olfactifs et dans tout le cerveau ainsi qu un blocage de migration de primordium de la ligne latérale. Ces phénotypes sont semblables à ceux trouvés chez les morphants kal.1a ce qui nous a permis de proposer prokr2 comme co-facteur de l anosmine-1. La deuxième partie de ce mémoire est consacrée à l étude du rôle de prokinéticine type 2 dans la neurogenèse et la régénération chez le poisson zèbre adulte. Pour cela nous avons cloné les prokinéticines type 1 et 2 chez le poisson zèbre et nous avons analysé le profil d expression neuro-anatomique qui comporte toutes les zones de neurogenèse décrites chez le poisson zèbre. Ensuite, nous avons réalisé pour la première fois un nouveau modèle lésionnel au niveau du télencéphale, nous l avons caractérisé et nous avons montré qu il y a cicatrisation par régénération neuronale 5 semaines post lésion. Enfin, nous avons montré, par hybridation in situ et PCR quantitative, qu il y a une expression éctopique de prok2 autour de la lésion qui accompagne le processus de régénération neuronale et qui disparaît quand la cicatrisation est achevée. Nous avons alors suggéré que prok2 pourrait être un des facteurs impliqués dans la neurogenèse et la grande capacité régénératrice du poisson zèbre et pourrait avoir un grand intérêt thérapeutique dans les maladies neurodégénératives.The first part of this manuscript is devoted to studying the interaction of anosmine-1 and FGFR1 in the rat olfactory bulb and the study of functional roles of the prokineticins receptors during development and adult zebrafish. First we have shown that anosmine-1 and FGFR1 are co-expressed in the olfactory bulbs during development and that are in the same protein complex. In addition we have demonstrated in vivo that anosmine-1 modulated the expression of FGFR1in CHO cells. We then cloned the prokr1 and prokr2. By in situ hybridization we have studied their patterns of expression during development and adulthood. Finally, we investigated the functional role of ProkR2 by injecting morpholino antisense oligonucleotides in a 1 cell stage zebrafish and have demonstrated that morphants shown an altered fasciculation of olfactory axons, disruption and decreased numbers of neurons in the olfactory bulb and whole brain and a blocked migrating of PLL. These phenotypes are similar to those found in kal.1a morphants which allowed us to propose ProkR2 as an interactant of anosmine-1. The second part of this manuscript we characterized the zebrafish prok2 gene and showed that its transcription takes place in almost all proliferating areas previously identified in adult zebrafish brain. Moreover, in TC, prok2 transcription was mainly, likely specifically, restricted to neurons. Next, using a new model of TC injury in adult zebrafish, we observed that telencephalon lesion induced a drastic increase in cell proliferation within the injured hemisphere in regions located both adjacent and distal to injury site. Moreover, our data strongly suggest that cell proliferation was followed by the migration of newly generated neurons towards injury site. In addition, we observed a transient over-expression of prok2 transcripts in cells surrounding the lesion during the very first days post-injury, and, a few days later, in broad cell rows extending from TC cortical regions to injury site. However, prok2 over-expression was no longer detected when the regeneration was completed, showing that ectopic prok2 transcription paralleled neuronal regeneration. Taken together, our results suggest that in adult zebrafish brain, Prok2 may be involved in both adult neurogenesis and injury-induced neuronal regeneration and could have a great therapeutic value in neurodegenerative diseases.PARIS-BIUSJ-Physique recherche (751052113) / SudocSudocFranceF