Sex workers in Nairobi: Services users at BHESP

This baseline pilot study was the joint work of the University of Leicester and Bar Hostess Empowerment and Support Programme. Bar Hostess Empowerment Support Programme (BHESP) is an organisation for and by sex workers (known as bar hostesses) in Nairobi, Kenya. The project consisted of experts in public health, human rights interventions and the sociology of sex work, who came together to develop and administer a unique research activity. The study further provided BHESP with baseline information on the various services provided and the gaps at the clinic, as well as barriers that young female sex workers face in returning to formal education, and /or pursuing their careers

The Most Common Characteristics of Fragile Video Watermarking: A Review

The progress of network and multimedia technologies has been phenomenal during the previous two decades. Unauthorized users will be able to copy, retransmit, modify reproduction, and upload the contents more easily as a result of this innovation. Malicious attackers are quite concerned about the development and widespread use of digital video. Digital watermarking technology gives solutions to the aforementioned problems. Watermarking methods can alleviate these issues by embedding a secret watermark in the original host data, allowing the genuine user or file owner to identify any manipulation. In this study, lots of papers have been analyzed and studied carefully, in the period 2011–2022. The historical basis of the subject should not be forgotten so studying old research will give a clear idea of the topic. To aid future researchers in this subject, we give a review of fragile watermarking approaches and some related papers presented in recent years. This paper presents a comparison of many relevant works in this field based on some of the outcomes and improvements gained in these studies, which focuses on the common characteristics that increase the effect of watermarking techniques such as invisibility, tamper detection, recovery, and security &nbsp

A retrospective study on frequency of canine tumors at the Veterinary Teaching Hospital in Rabat (Morocco)

This work is a contribution to the study of tumors in dogs at the Veterinary Teaching Hospital of the Hassan II Agronomic and Veterinary Medicine Institute in Rabat, Morocco. The study aimed to present a summary of the relative frequency of tumors in dogs, their preferred localization and the influence of age, sex and breed. During the study period from 2004 to 2017, a total of 3099 records were consulted, among them 166 cases of tumors in dogs were diagnosed in both sexes, male and female, whose ages were between 3 months to 15 years. Tumors in dogs have a frequency of approximately 5.4% over the entire canine disease diagnosed at the Veterinary Teaching Hospital. The average age group of onset of these tumors are middle-aged dogs of 7-12 years (65.7%). The German shepherd (30.7%), Poodle (22.9%), Labrador (10.2%), Rottweiler (5.4%) and Pekinese (3.6%) would be more prone to tumors. The most common tumors originated from the mammary gland (46.4%) and the skin and subcutis (25.9%). To our knowledge, there was no study like this one considering canine tumors in Morocco. Therefore, this study provides an important preliminary step to characterize and understand the occurrence of canine tumors in Rabat region. Keywords: Tumor, dog, frequency, sex, age, breed, Morocc

Morphological, Molecular and Pollen Grain Investigations of Salix Species in Egypt

جنس الصفصاف هو من العائلة الصفصافية منتشر في نصف الكرة الشمالي علي مستوي العالم. ممثل في مصر بنوعان (الصفصاف العريض والصفصاف الرفيع). حتى الان لا يزال تصنيف الصفصاف به مشاكل ولذلك هدف الدراسة هو تصنيف الأنواع المصرية من هذا الجنس. قمنا بجمعها خلال الرحلات الميدانية لمعظم البيئات المصرية. خضعت العينات الخضراء والمجففة لمراجعة تصنيفية على أساس السمات المورفولوجية، مسح مجهر الكتروني لحبوب اللقاح وتحليل الايزوزيم باستخدام انزيمات الاستيراز    والبيروكسيديز والتنوع الجيني باستخدام الحمض النووي المتعدد الاشكال العشوائي. سجلنا وجود كلا الجنسين من الصفصاف الرفيع ولكن لم يكن هناك سوي أشجار ذكور من الصفصاف العريض. كشفت حبوب اللقاح عن وجود اختلافات كثيرة بينها. أيضا تطبيق تحليل الايزوزيم يعطي تشير 12 bands الي الجنس بالإضافة الي ذلك استعادت عشرة بادئات  RAPDمجموع 227 نطاقات مكبرة (77 للإناث و 74 للذكور في الصفصاف الرفيع و 76 للذكور في الصفصاف العريض).Genus Salix is among family Salicaceae, distributing in the northern hemisphere. It is represented in Egypt by two species (Salix mucronata and Salix tetrasperma). The classification of Salix at the generic and infra-generic levels is still outstanding. We have agreed to list the Egyptian species of this genus. We collected them during field trips to most Egyptian habitats; fresh and herbarium specimens were subjected to taxonomic revision based on morphological characters; scanning electron microscope (SEM) for pollen grains; isozyme analysis using esterase and peroxidase enzymes and genetic diversity using random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD). We recorded that both sexes of S. mucronata existed but there were only male trees from S. tetrasperma. SEM of pollen grain revealed that there were many differences between them. Also, the application of isozyme analysis giving 12 sex indicating bands. In addition, ten RAPD primers retrieved a total of 227 amplified bands (77 for female S. mucronata, 74 for male S. mucronata and 76 for male S. tetrasperma)

Design of Variation-Tolerant Circuits for Nanometer CMOS Technology: Circuits and Architecture Co-Design

Aggressive scaling of CMOS technology in sub-90nm nodes has created huge challenges. Variations due to fundamental physical limits, such as random dopants fluctuation (RDF) and line edge roughness (LER) are increasing significantly with technology scaling. In addition, manufacturing tolerances in process technology are not scaling at the same pace as transistor's channel length due to process control limitations (e.g., sub-wavelength lithography). Therefore, within-die process variations worsen with successive technology generations. These variations have a strong impact on the maximum clock frequency and leakage power for any digital circuit, and can also result in functional yield losses in variation-sensitive digital circuits (such as SRAM). Moreover, in nanometer technologies, digital circuits show an increased sensitivity to process variations due to low-voltage operation requirements, which are aggravated by the strong demand for lower power consumption and cost while achieving higher performance and density. It is therefore not surprising that the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) lists variability as one of the most challenging obstacles for IC design in nanometer regime. To facilitate variation-tolerant design, we study the impact of random variations on the delay variability of a logic gate and derive simple and scalable statistical models to evaluate delay variations in the presence of within-die variations. This work provides new design insight and highlights the importance of accounting for the effect of input slew on delay variations, especially at lower supply voltages. The derived models are simple, scalable, bias dependent and only require the knowledge of easily measurable parameters. This makes them useful in early design exploration, circuit/architecture optimization as well as technology prediction (especially in low-power and low-voltage operation). The derived models are verified using Monte Carlo SPICE simulations using industrial 90nm technology. Random variations in nanometer technologies are considered one of the largest design considerations. This is especially true for SRAM, due to the large variations in bitcell characteristics. Typically, SRAM bitcells have the smallest device sizes on a chip. Therefore, they show the largest sensitivity to different sources of variations. With the drastic increase in memory densities, lower supply voltages and higher variations, statistical simulation methodologies become imperative to estimate memory yield and optimize performance and power. In this research, we present a methodology for statistical simulation of SRAM read access yield, which is tightly related to SRAM performance and power consumption. The proposed flow accounts for the impact of bitcell read current variation, sense amplifier offset distribution, timing window variation and leakage variation on functional yield. The methodology overcomes the pessimism existing in conventional worst-case design techniques that are used in SRAM design. The proposed statistical yield estimation methodology allows early yield prediction in the design cycle, which can be used to trade off performance and power requirements for SRAM. The methodology is verified using measured silicon yield data from a 1Mb memory fabricated in an industrial 45nm technology. Embedded SRAM dominates modern SoCs and there is a strong demand for SRAM with lower power consumption while achieving high performance and high density. However, in the presence of large process variations, SRAMs are expected to consume larger power to ensure correct read operation and meet yield targets. We propose a new architecture that significantly reduces array switching power for SRAM. The proposed architecture combines built-in self-test (BIST) and digitally controlled delay elements to reduce the wordline pulse width for memories while ensuring correct read operation; hence, reducing switching power. A new statistical simulation flow was developed to evaluate the power savings for the proposed architecture. Monte Carlo simulations using a 1Mb SRAM macro from an industrial 45nm technology was used to examine the power reduction achieved by the system. The proposed architecture can reduce the array switching power significantly and shows large power saving - especially as the chip level memory density increases. For a 48Mb memory density, a 27% reduction in array switching power can be achieved for a read access yield target of 95%. In addition, the proposed system can provide larger power saving as process variations increase, which makes it a very attractive solution for 45nm and below technologies. In addition to its impact on bitcell read current, the increase of local variations in nanometer technologies strongly affect SRAM cell stability. In this research, we propose a novel single supply voltage read assist technique to improve SRAM static noise margin (SNM). The proposed technique allows precharging different parts of the bitlines to VDD and GND and uses charge sharing to precisely control the bitline voltage, which improves the bitcell stability. In addition to improving SNM, the proposed technique also reduces memory access time. Moreover, it only requires one supply voltage, hence, eliminates the need of large area voltage shifters. The proposed technique has been implemented in the design of a 512kb memory fabricated in 45nm technology. Results show improvements in SNM and read operation window which confirms the effectiveness and robustness of this technique

A Comparative Study and Analysis of Query in Encrypted Databases

تعد البيانات اليوم هي الموجود الرئيسي للشركات وأعمالها. عادة ما يتم تخزين هذه البيانات في قاعدة البيانات. يجب أن تكون جميع أنظمة قواعد البيانات قادرة على الاستجابة لطلبات الحصول على معلومات من المستخدم وهي استعلامات العمليات. هناك حاجة إلى خوارزميات التشفير التي توفر القدرة على الاستعلام عبر قاعدة البيانات المشفرة وتتيح تحسين تشفير وفك تشفير البيانات. ومع ذلك ، تطبيق خوارزميات التشفير على قاعدة البيانات المشفرة يعتبر التحدي الذي ينشأ هو في  انخفاض اداء النظام الناتج عن نشر خوارزمية التشفير في وقت التشغيل. لذلك ، تعرض هذه الورقة معظم الأعمال الحديثة التي تم إجراؤها على معالجة الاستعلام في  قاعدة البيانات المشفرة وتحليلها لتوضيح تحليل الأداء ، بناءً على مقاييس أداء مختلفة في كل عمل ذي صلةData is the main asset of the modern companies and their businesses. Typically, it is stored in the data-base. Every database system has to be capable of responding to information requests from users, which is queries of the process. Encryption mechanisms are required, which give the capability to the query over the encrypted data-base and permit the optimization of data encryption and decryption. However, applying encryption algorithms on Encrypted database then challenge arises that the efficiency of the system degrades on deploying encryption algorithm on the runtime. Therefore, this paper presents most of the recent works that have been conducted on the query preprocessing of encrypted database and analyzes them to clarify the performance analysis, based on different performance metrics in each related work

Neurons Expressing Pathological Tau Protein Trigger Dramatic Changes in Microglial Morphology and Dynamics

International audienceMicroglial cells, the resident macrophages of the brain, are important players in the pathological process of numerous neurodegenerative disorders, including tauopathies, a heterogeneous class of diseases characterized by intraneuronal Tau aggregates. However, microglia response in Tau pathologies remains poorly understood. Here, we exploit a genetic zebrafish model of tauopathy, combined with live microglia imaging, to investigate the behavior of microglia in vivo in the disease context. Results show that while microglia were almost immobile and displayed long and highly dynamic branches in a wild-type context, in presence of diseased neurons, cells became highly mobile and displayed morphological changes, with highly mobile cell bodies together with fewer and shorter processes. We also imaged, for the first time to our knowledge, the phagocytosis of apoptotic tauopathic neurons by microglia in vivo and observed that microglia engulfed about as twice materials as in controls. Finally, genetic ablation of microglia in zebrafish tauopathy model significantly increased Tau hyperphosphorylation, suggesting that microglia provide neuroprotection to diseased neurons. Our findings demonstrate for the first time the dynamics of microglia in contact with tauopathic neurons in vivo and open perspectives for the real-time study of microglia in many neuronal diseases

PSEUDOMONAS AERUGINOSA SKIN-NASOPHARYNGEAL COLONIZATION IN THE IN-PATIENTS: PREVALENCE, RISK FACTORS AND ANTIBIOTIC RESISTANCE IN TERTIARY HOSPITALS IN SANA'A CITY -YEMEN

Objective:  Pseudomonas aeruginosa is one of most important cause of healthcare-associated infections. This active surveillance cross sectional study was aimed to determine the rate of P. aeruginosa colonization among inpatients at three tertiary hospitals in Sana'a city. In addition, to determine risk factors of colonization and the antibiotic susceptibility of the isolated P. aeruginosa.  Methods: The study included 327 inpatients. Skin and nasopharyngeal swabs were collected from all participated patients and data were collected by predesigned questionnaire. Standard methods of isolation and identification were used to isolate bacteria in pure culture then identify. Also, antibiotic sensitivity for isolated P. aeruginosa was determined by the disc diffusion method. 42 patients (12.8%) were colonized with P. aeruginosa on skin and nasopharyngeal. Results: The significant risk factors of colonization were male patients (OR=2.5), older age (OR= 2.2), burn ward (OR=37), long stay in hospital (OR=4) and burn as underlying disease (OR=45). The isolated P. aeruginosa were completely resistant (100%), to Aztroneome, Ceftriaxone, and Ciprofloxacine; and the rates of resistant were ranged between 83.3-85.7% for Amikacin, Ampicillin sulbactam Levofloxacin. Also the rates were 71.4% for Netilmicin and 92.9% for chloramphenicol. Moreover, the rates of resistant were low for Gentamicin (35.7%), Imipenem (11.9%), Pipracillin Tazobactam (11.9%), Ticaracillin calvulanic acid (31%) and Colistin sulphat (14.3%). Conclusion: In conclusion, this study has highlighted the role of hospitalization as a significant risk for P. aeruginosa colonization; concerted and coordinated efforts are required both in the hospital and community to tackle this.  These data emphasize the need to identify hospitalized patients colonized with P. aeruginosa on admission. Prediction rules or rapid diagnostic testing will help clinicians more appropriately choose empiric antibiotic therapy if subsequent infections occurred.                  Peer Review History: Received 25 November 2018;   Revised 15 December; Accepted 28 December, Available online 15 January 2019 Academic Editor:  Dr. Iman Muhammad Higazy, National Research Center, Egypt, [email protected] UJPR follows the most transparent and toughest ‘Advanced OPEN peer review’ system. The identity of the authors and, reviewers will be known to each other. This transparent process will help to eradicate any possible malicious/purposeful interference by any person (publishing staff, reviewer, editor, author, etc) during peer review. As a result of this unique system, all reviewers will get their due recognition and respect, once their names are published in the papers. We expect that, by publishing peer review reports with published papers, will be helpful to many authors for drafting their article according to the specifications. Auhors will remove any error of their article and they will improve their article(s) according to the previous reports displayed with published article(s). The main purpose of it is ‘to improve the quality of a candidate manuscript’. Our reviewers check the ‘strength and weakness of a manuscript honestly’. There will increase in the perfection, and transparency. Received file:        Reviewer's Comments: Average Peer review marks at initial stage: 6.0/10 Average Peer review marks at publication stage: 8.5/10 Reviewer(s) detail: Dr. Omonkhelin J Owolabi, University of Benin, Nigeria, [email protected] Dr. Francis Adou Yapo, Felix Houphouet Boigny, University of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, [email protected] Similar Articles: PREVALENCE OF PSEUDOMONAS AERUGINOSA (P. AERUGINOSA) AND ANTIMICROBIAL SUSCEPTIBILITY PATTERNS AT A PRIVATE HOSPITAL IN SANA'A, YEMEN IN-VITRO ANTIBACTERIAL ACTIVITY OF LACTOBACILLI METABOLITES LOADED HYDROGEL FORMULATIONS AGAINST PSEUDOMONAS AERUGINOS

Transformation Early Childhood Education in Iraq: Challenges, Innovations, and Future Prospects

The article "Transformation Early Childhood Education in Iraq: Challenges, Innovations, and Future Prospects" provides a comprehensive analysis of the current landscape of early childhood education (ECE) in Iraq. Through a systematic literature review methodology, the study identifies and examines the major challenges facing ECE in Iraq, including inadequate funding, shortage of qualified educators, and cultural barriers. Moreover, the research explores innovative approaches and promising initiatives aimed at revitalizing ECE in Iraq, such as community-driven projects, technology-enabled solutions, and government-led reforms. By synthesizing empirical evidence with theoretical frameworks and situating the research within the socio-political context of Iraq, the analysis offers valuable insights for informing evidence-based decision-making and practice in the field of early childhood education. The study concludes with recommendations for future research, emphasizing the need for longitudinal studies, intersectional analyses, and rigorous evaluations to drive meaningful change and foster equitable access to quality ECE for all children in Iraq