Relationship between the diversity of soil microbial communities and their resistance to different stressors

Straalen, N.M. van [Promotor]Röling, W.F.M. [Copromotor]Niklinska, M. [Copromotor

PP-020 A comparative study of therapeutic effects of Zataria Multiflora vaginal cream and metronidazole vaginal gel on bacterial vaginosis

Núm. de Catàleg de Patrimoni: 744 (Casa de la Ciutat)Llobet, Pere;Clamell Ibáñez, AlíciaPla en detall d'una de les ornamentacions en relleu de l'enteixinat del sostre de l'antiga sala de les eleccions, a la part gòtica de l'Ajuntament de Barcelona, en el moment de la seva restauració. Aquest adornament té forma de l'escut de Barcelon

A framework to select commercial bank partner using fuzzy BSC-DEA method

One of the primary concerns of many corporate organizations is to assess the weakness and strength of their future partners in an attempt to reduce all potential risks involved with them. In this paper, we present a BSC-DEA based model to indentify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of a firm. The proposed model of this paper assumes there are various uncertainties associated with all input/output parameters and uses fuzzy numbers to handle the uncertainties. We also consider a real-world case study of banking industry where four major banks are possible candidates of a partnership and implement the proposed model of this paper for this case study. The results of this study reveal some of the issues such as weakness of electronic banking, services and resource allocation as part of their infrastructure problems

Effects of Zataria Multi-Flora, Shirazi thyme, on the Severity of Premenstrual Syndrome

Background: Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS) is a common problem in women. Zataria multiflora Boiss is a valuable plant. This herbal plant has been used in different conditions. Objectives: The study was performed to investigate the effects of Zataria multiflora Boiss to control PMS symptoms. Materials and Methods: This study was a double-blinded, prospective randomized trial. The study population was the college students living in the dormitories of Isfahan University. Eighty-eight eligible students were randomly divided to intervention and control groups. Students completed the prospective record of the impact and severity of menstrual symptoms (PRISM) calendar including 30 PMS symptoms for four menstrual cycles (two cycles before, and two after the intervention). The intervention group received pearls containing 20 mg of Zataria multi-flora essence (four pearls each day) for two menstrual cycles, seven days before menstruation. The mean difference of PMS severity score between groups was analyzed with Mann-Whitney U test. The difference in frequency score of symptoms was analyzed using repeated-measure analysis of variance. Results: Thirty-eight students in intervention and 37 students in placebo group completed the study. The groups had no significant difference regarding the severity of PMS. Both groups showed a significant improvement in PMS severity score after the intervention. The repeated-measure analysis of variance showed that the frequency of symptoms decreased significantly in the cycles, but it was not different in intervention and placebo groups. Conclusions: Our findings did not support the use of Zataria multiflora Boiss in premenstrual syndrome

An Item Analysis of Written Multiple-Choice Questions: Kashan University of Medical Sciences

Background: Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) are one of the most common types of exams used in evaluation of students in any educational setting. The question items making up these exams need to be examined if they are to meaningfully contribute to the student scores. Such characteristics are amenable to examination by item analysis. Objectives: The purpose of this research was to examine the quality of MCQs used in Nursing and Midwifery Faculty and to compare the results with the other faculties in Kashan University of Medical Science in the academic year 2008-2009. Materials and Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 101 multiple-choice exams were randomly chosen for the study, and 37 exams were selected from the faculty of nursing and midwifery. The difficulty, discrimination indices and Cronbach’s Alpha were calculated for every exam and then mean values for each index were calculated by LERTAL 5.0 software purchased from Assessment Systems Corporation of the United States. Results: A total of 7062 MCQs in the university and 1793 items in the faculty of nursing and midwifery presented to the students by different instructors were analyzed. The average of difficulty index of the faculty of nursing was 0.5. The discrimination index was 0.36, and the average of Alpha-Cronbach was 0.82 in the faculty of nursing. All the values were significantly better in the faculty of nursing and midwifery compared to the rest of the university. Conclusions: The difficulty index, the discrimination index and the Alpha-Cronbach values in the faculty of nursing were within the acceptable range recommended by experts in the field of educational measurement. However, some of the tests had values less than the recommended

Social network sites as educational factors

Background: In this present era, the technology development has established certain type of communication. Nowadays education as the fundamental principle in transferring cognition to the learners has found various methods. Recently the concept that social networks could be effective tool in easing the achievement to the educational goals has been under attention. Therefore, this investigation is trying to find out whether, the social networks could play role on the process of education among students? Materials and Methods: This cross sectional descriptive study was performed on 1000 students from 7 medical universities in 2015. The data collection tool was questionnaire that was approved Cronbach's alpha was 0.85. Meanwhile its validity was confirmed too. The obtained data were analyzed by the descriptive statistic, ANOVA, Turkey and used X2 SPSS-19. Results: In this investigation, 940 subjects were under study. 85 used daily the social network. The highest usage was attributed to the Telegram. 52 preferred image suitable for transferring of information. Even though, 73 believed that these networks have significant effects on coordinating of students with in university charges. Conclusion: Considering the findings of the present study, it is proposed that the universities integrate the social networks in the education programs and recognize it as the awareness factor, therefore benefit it in the educational affairs. © 2016 Alireza Ebrahimpour, Farnaz Rajabali, Fatemeh Yazdanfar, Reza Azarbad, Majid Rezaei Nodeh, Hasan Siamian, Mohammad Vahedi

Functional and compositional responses in soil microbial communities along two metal pollution gradients : does the level of historical pollution affect resistance against secondary stress?

We examined how the exposure to secondary stressors affected the functional and compositional responses of microbial communities along two metal pollution gradients in Polish forests and whether responses were influenced by the level of metal pollution. Basal respiration rate and community composition, as determined by 16S rRNA gene-based denaturing gradient analysis, were studied in laboratory-incubated microcosms, containing soil samples taken from different locations in the field gradients, and subjected to secondary stress factors (arsenic, salt, benzo[a]pyrene or flooding). Soils adapted to higher metal contamination levels were more resistant to arsenic and salt stress compared to less polluted soils, indicating that functional and compositional responses to these stresses were related to the level of historical pollution in the long-term contaminated forest soils. However, community composition and functioning in soils along the two gradients were resistant to benzo[a]pyrene and flooding stress. Changes in respiration were significantly related to changes in community composition. Knowledge on the functional gene capabilities prior to adding the secondary stressor benefitted understanding the functional responses toward additional stressors. Our study highlights that microbial communities selected for metal resistance in the field might also become more resistant against some secondary stress factors; however, the type of stress and the level of historical pollution play a decisive role in community-level responses toward secondary stressors

Energy efficient geographical and power based clustering algorithm for heterogeneous wireless sensor networks

Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) has gained tremendous research attention recently due to their extensive applications. As sensor nodes being battery operated, many researchers have made attempts to prolong the lifespan of the WSN by reducing the-per node energy consumption and efficiently utilizing the sensor nodes. However, in the tradition WSNs, nodes were homogeneous and hence could not take full advantage of the presence of heterogeneity in the network. To solve this problem in this paper, we propose Geographical and power based clustering algorithm (GPCA): a heterogeneous-aware clustering protocol, which has significant impact on the entire energy dissipation of WSNs. In GPCA, a Virtual Header (VH) transfers data to the nearest VH, and the nearest VH forwards the data to sink node. In this way, the energy dissipation of the entire network is reduced because of the transmitting distance between VHs and the sink that is greatly shortened. Also, a large number of nodes are self-organized by a distributed cluster formation technique. Moreover, a randomized technique is used to rotate the local cluster-heads base on power label in order to evenly distribute the energy load among the sensors in the network. GPCA uses geographical position to enable scalability and robustness for dynamic networks. By using simulation, the proposed GPCA scheme shows superior performance over the current energy-efficient schemes in terms of network lifespan, Energy dissipation and number of alive nodes