Being-with GalleryGardi: A meshwork learning in galleries and museums

This study investigates a transnational walking art practice known as GalleryGardi applied in local engagements, an event of being-with entanglements of body-object-space in meshwork connections. This inquiry is focused on how embodied knowledge forms within this pedagogical event that takes place in the context of galleries and museums. Through embodied experimentation, a corresponding relation is formed among body-object-space as an event of being-with, opening a creative space to embrace the unknown, the unpredictable, and the might-be-possible—both ontologically and epistemologically—in our dynamic socio-material encounters. The meshwork thinking in this study allows for the entanglement of theory-methodology-practice in a way that no single thread of the study is given precedence over another; threads (textual and visual) are knotted together to create a comprehensive expression referred to as GalleryGardi, constituting an event of being-with. Adopting meshwork thinking, the methodological movements of this study intersect with an arts-based research approach to community-based participatory practice, informed by walking and visual ethnographies. This dissertation addresses the significance of affective moments in walking, embodied experiences, co-conservations, being a community, vernacularity, and attentionally of body-object-space correspondence through a co-creative doing-making-meaning. Inspired by eight weeks of walking in Montreal's art museums and galleries, this thesis is structured as a series of threads of inquiry, each of which serves as movements of our walks, encounters, and moments of exploration and intuition. This inquiry reveals GalleryGardi’s potential to be adopted as a transnational art practice and of its capacity for being-with those who collaborate and correspond, in which ethics of care are activated, not only for ourselves, but for others in proximity. Such practice allows us to attune to the relationality of our bodies with artworks and space of galleries and museums toward a human-non-human entanglement. The transnational movement of this artful practice from its origin in Tehran, Iran to Montreal’s art scenes opens possibilities for investigating the pedagogical and educational capacities of the public space of museums and galleries in an alternate way, grounded in trans- practices: that is, respectful of diversity in language, race, gender, and ethnic backgrounds

Awareness and Attitude Towards Opioid and Stimulant Use and Lifetime Prevalence of the Drugs: A Study in 5 Large Cities of Iran

Background: Providing population-based data on awareness, attitude and practice of drug and stimulant use has policy implications. A national study was conducted among Iranian general population to explore life time prevalence, awareness and attitudes toward opioids and stimulant use.Methods:We recruited subjects from 5 provinces with heterogenic pattern of drug use. Participants were selected using stratified multistage cluster sampling. Data were collected using a validated self-administered questionnaire. Logistic regression model was applied to identify the variables that are associated with drug and stimulant use. Results:In total 2065 respondents including 1155 men (33.96 ± 10.40 years old) and 910 women (35.45 ± 12.21 years old) were recruited. Two-third of respondents had good awareness about adverse effects of opioid use. Corresponding figure in terms of stimulants was 81.4%. Almost 95% of participants reported a negative attitude towards either opioid or stimulant use. The lifetime prevalence of opioid use and stimulant use were 12.9% (men: 21.5%, women: 4.0%) and 7.3% (men: 9.6%, women: 4.9%), respectively. Gender (adjusted odds ratio [AOR]M/W =6.92; 95% CI: 2.92, 16.42), education (AORundergraduate/diploma or less = 0.49; 95% CI: 0.26, 0.90), and marital status (AORothers/single = 2.13; 95% CI: 1.36, 3.33) were significantly related with opioid use. With respect to stimulant use, age was negatively associated with the outcome (AOR60+/20-29 years = 0.08: 95% CI; 0.01, 0.98) and men were 2 times more likely than women to use stimulants (ORM/W=2.15: 95% CI: 0.83, 5.56). In addition, marital status (AOROthers/singles = 3.45; 95% CI: 1.09, 10.93), and awareness (AORWeak and moderate/good = 0.40; 95% CI: 0.25, 0.61) were independently correlated with stimulants use. Conclusion: While the attitude of Iranian adults toward opioid and stimulant use was negative, their awareness was not that adequate to prevent the drug use. Men and those with lower socio-economic status (SES) should be the focus of health promotion programs regarding opioid use. However, regarding stimulants use, promotion programs should target younger age groups and those with higher SES status

Predominance of Trichophyton tonsurans causing tinea capitis: A 12-year retrospective study in the north of Iran

Background and purpose: Among different clinical entities of dermatophytosis, tinea capitis (TC) is considered a major public health challenge in the world, especially in regions with poor health and low income. Therefore, this study aimed to provide a retrospective analysis of the patients suspected of TC who were referred to the medical mycology laboratory of Mazandaran, a northern province of Iran.Materials and Methods: A retrospective analysis was performed on the patients suspected of TC who were referred to the medical mycology laboratory from July 2009 to April 2022. Hair roots and skin scrapings were collected from the participants. The laboratory diagnosis was confirmed by direct microscopic examination and culture. Finally, 921 out of 11095 (8.3%) patients were suspected of TC.Results: Based on the findings, TC was confirmed in 209 out of 921 patients (22.7%). In terms of gender, 209 TC patients (75.1%) were male. Moreover, the male to female ratio of TC patients was 1:3.0. Trichophyton tonsurans (146/174, 83.91%) was the most etiological agent,followed by T. mentagrophytes (13/174, 7.47%), T. violaceum (9/174, 5.17%), Microsporum canis (3/174, 1.71%), T. verrucosum (2/174, 1.15%) and T. rubrum (1/174, 0.57%). Besides, endothrix (77.0%) was the most prevalent type of hair invasion.Conclusion: The results revealed the predominance of T. tonsurans, as a causative agent of TC. Despite the prevalence of TC, the absence of appropriate consideration highlights that it is a neglected complication among children

Review: Characterization and Modeling of the Mechanical Properties of Lithium-Ion Batteries

Li-ion batteries have become a dominant power source in consumer electronics and vehicular applications. The mobile use of batteries subjects them to various mechanical loads. The mechanisms that follow a mechanical deformation and lead to damage and failure in Li-ion batteries have only been studied in recent years. This paper is a comprehensive review of advancements in experimental and computational techniques for characterization of Li-ion batteries under mechanical abuse loading scenarios. A number of recent studies have used experimental methods to characterize deformation and failure of batteries and their components under various tensile and compressive loading conditions. Several authors have used the test data to propose material laws and develop finite element (FE) models. Then the models have been validated against tests at different levels from comparison of shapes to predicting failure and onset of short circuit. In the current review main aspects of each study have been discussed and their approach in mechanical testing, material characterization, FE modeling, and validation is analyzed. The main focus of this review is on mechanical properties at the level of a single battery

Visible-light-induced nitrogen photofixation ability of g-C3N4 nanosheets decorated with MgO nanoparticles

Nitrogen fixation is a natural or artificial process, in which molecular nitrogen is combined with other elements to form more-reactive compounds containing nitrogen elements. In this study, graphitic carbon nitride nanosheets were combined with nanoparticles of MgO to fabricate an efficient binary visible-light-induced photocatalysts (abbreviated as NCN/MgO), and they were applied for the photofixation of nitrogen gas. The synthesized photocatalysts were characterized to investigate the morphology, phase structure, optical, and textural properties. The results displayed that the NCN/MgO (10%) nanocomposite has considerable performance in the nitrogen photofixation reaction compared with the pristine CN and NCN, which is 10.8 and 2.8 times, respectively. The stability of the optimum sample, as a vital characteristic of photocatalyst, was examined in three runs. Also, the effect of MgO loading, calcination temperature, solvent, electron scavenger, pH, and absence of N-2 in solution upon the NH4+ production rate was examined. Finally, an anticipated mechanism was proposed for the meaningful nitrogen photofixation enhancement. (C) 2020 The Korean Society of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

Effect of Pre-Incubation of Cryopreserved Sperm with either Kisspeptin or Glutathione to Mitigate Freeze-Thaw Damage

Background: Sperm cryopreservation reduces sperm quality. Kisspeptin (KP) has beneficial effects on sperm functions. This study compares the effect of KP and Glutathione (GSH) on mitigating the detrimental effects of the freeze-thaw cycle on sperm. Methods: An experimental study was conducted in Birjand (Iran) during 2018-2020. Thirty normal swim-up semen samples were treated with Ham’s F10 medium (negative control), 1 mM GSH (positive control), or KP (10 µM) for 30 min before freezing. The motility, acrosome reaction, capacitation, and DNA quality of the frozen-thawed sperms were assessed according to the WHO guidelines. Statistical analysis was performed using paired t test, one-way analysis of variance, and least significant difference.Results: Pre-incubation with KP significantly increased the percentage of sperm motility (34.00±6.7, P=0.003) compared to the control (20.44±7.4) and GSH-treated (31.25±12.2) aliquots. The frequency of non-capacitated spermatozoa was significantly higher in the KP-treated group (98.73%) than in the control (96.46%) and GSH-treated (96.49%) aliquots (P<0.001). The percentage of acrosome-intact spermatozoa in the KP-treated group (77.44%) was significantly higher than the control (74.3%) and GSH-treated (74.54%) groups (P<0.001). The sperm frequency with normal histone in the KP-treated group (51.86%) and with normal protamine (65.39%) was significantly higher than the controls (P=0.001 and P=0.002, respectively). The percentage of TUNEL-positive sperm was significantly lower in the KP-treated group (9.09±2.71) than both GSH-treated (11.22±2.73) and control (11.31±2.2) groups (both P=0.002).Conclusion: Pre-incubation with KP protects sperm motility and DNA integrity from the detrimental effect of the freeze-thaw cycle. KP is suitable as a pre-treatment to control sperm quality during freezing-thawing

Nitrogen photofixation ability of g-C3N4 nanosheets/Bi2MoO6 heterojunction photocatalyst under visible-light illumination

In this study, we combined bismuth molybdate with graphitic carbon nitride nanosheets with different percentages of 10%, 20%, 30%, and 40%, in which noticeable N-2 photoreduction under visible-light illumination was seen for the binary g-C3N4 nanosheets/Bi(2)MoO(6 )photocatalysts, denoted as NCN/BMO. The XPS, HRTEM, TEM, XRD, EDX, UV-vis DRS, N-2 adsorption-desorption, FT-IR, TGA, PL, photocurrent, and EIS instruments were utilized to characterize the fabricated photocatalysts. The results displayed the construction of type-II heterojunction between the NCN and BMO components for the easy charge transfer. Under mild conditions and using ethanol as a hole scavenger, the NCN/BMO (30%) nanocomposite showed the maximum capability for ammonia generation by 3271 mu mol/L g, which is 1.9 and 9.2 times higher than the NCN and BMO components, respectively. The effects of solvent type, pH of solution, and electron scavenger on the rate of NH4 production were also studied and conversed. Finally, the stability of the NCN/BMO (30%) nanocomposite was evaluated for four cycles, in which the results were desirable. (C) 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

FIS1 Overexpression Is Correlated with Tumor Metastasis in Gastric Adenocarcinoma

Background Due to poor prognosis and treatment failure, gastric cancer (GC) is still regarded as one of the deadliest malignancies worldwide, demanding new molecular targets for therapeutic and diagnostic approaches. Therefore, the current study was aimed to investigate the expression levels of FIS1 gene involving in mitochondrial fission as a promising target in gastric tumor progression. Material and Methods A total of eighty clinical tissue samples including 40 gastric primary tumor samples and 40 paired marginal samples were prepared. Total RNA was extracted and reverse transcribed to complementary DNA. Then, FIS1 expression levels were quantified in GC samples compared to normal ones using q-PCR. Furthermore, the correlation between FIS1 expression and clinicopathological features of patients was evaluated. Results The obtained results illustrated that FIS1 is significantly (p = 0.0013) overexpressed in gastric tumors compared to noncancerous marginal tissues; indicating the possible role of FIS1 through gastric tumorigenesis. Further analysis showed that FIS1 upregulation was significantly (p = 0.0419) correlated with metastasis in patients. Also, ROC curve analysis estimated an area under the curve (AUC) value of 0.7209 for FIS1 to discriminate cancer patients from healthy cases. Conclusion Taken together, our findings suggested FIS1 as a promising tumor marker where its overexpression predicts tumor metastasis of gastric cancer.Department of Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases Research Center, University Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, IranThis study was supported by a grant from research deputy of Department of Tuberculosis and Lung Diseases Research Center, University Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran. This center was funder for the current study