Short communication: Application of machine-vision to assess weight of fish (Case study: Oncorhynchus mykiss)

Computer Vision (CV) is a relatively young discipline which has been widely used to automate quality evaluation. CV inspection of fish and fish products can provide efficient, consistent and cost effective alternative, so efforts focused on speed and accuracy of machine vision as a substitute for human inspection of foods. Machine vision is explained as the construction of explicit informative and meaningful descriptions of a physical object via image analysis. Actually it encloses the capturing, processing and analysis of two-dimensional images, and by modeling human vision electronically perceives and understands images. ... This study tries to evaluate the relationship between weight of fish and visual features derived from image processing and present best fit relationship between weight and visual features

Adherence to Mediterranean dietary pattern and the risk of gestational diabetes mellitus:a systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies

Background and aim: Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is one of the most prevalent disorders occurring during pregnancy, which confers significant risk of short and long-term adverse outcomes in both mothers and offspring. Recently, more attention has been paid to the association of pre-pregnancy and early pregnancy healthy dietary patterns, such as Mediterranean dietary pattern with GDM. However, there is a lack of systematic review and meta-analysis summarizing findings in this regard. Hence, we sought to assess the association of MedDiet and GDM in observational studies by performing a systematic review and meta-analysis. Methods: A comprehensive systematic literature search of observational studies was conducted via PubMed, Scopus, and Google Scholar, up to August 2023. Studies were included in our review if they evaluated the association of MedDiet and GDM, following an observational study design. Results: Ten studies were included in this study. Combining effect sizes, we found that adherence to MedDiet was inversely associated with GDM risk (OR = 0.64; CI: 0.52–0.78); implying that higher adherence to the MedDiet could reduce the risk of GDM by about 36%. Stratification by the geographic area, Mediterranean countries, time of dietary assessment and study design, showed a consistent significant association between MedDiet and GDM. Conclusion: We conclude that adhering to diets resembling MedDiet, before or in early pregnancy, could be associated with lower risks or odds of GDM

A Survey on the Effects of Gold-Nanoparticles in Allergic Asthma

Background and Aim: Asthma is an inflammatory airway disease and allergies are the most important cause of asthma. Different types of drugs have been developed to control asthma, and the use of carrier systems to transfer drugs to the airways is an effective method. Gold nanoparticles (AuNP) is a subject of substantial research that can be easily synthesized and, in this study, the effect of gold nanoparticles on allergic asthma was evaluated. Methods: There are 4 groups of mice, including: the control group, the control group receiving AuNPs, the asthmatic group, and the asthmatic group receiving AuNPs. An animal model of asthma was produced using ovalbumin (OVA). The negative control group was sensitized and challenged with PBS. Broncho-alveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and lung tissue were collected, then quantitative real-time PCR for the four target genes (IL-4, IL-5, IL-13, and MUC5ac) and histopathological study of lung tissue was done. Results: In the OVA group, the mRNA expression of targeted genes had no significant differences (P>0.05). Mucus hypersecretion, goblet cell hyperplasia, peribronchial and perivascular inflammation had no significant difference between AuNPs receiving groups with non-treated groups (P>0.05). Conclusion: In this study, it was observed that AuNP did not affect asthma and control mice. These nanoparticles did not elicit any immune or allergic responses and can be easily used for therapeutic or diagnostic purposes. *Corresponding Authors: Alireza Taheri; Email: [email protected]; Seyyed Shamsadin Athari, Email: [email protected] Please cite this article as: Mehrabi Nasab D, Taheri A, Jafari B, Athari SS. A Survey on the Effects of Gold-Nanoparticles in Allergic Asthma. Arch Med Lab Sci. 2021;7:1-5 (e21). https://doi.org/10.22037/amls.v6.3276

A Scientometric Methodology Based on Co-Word Analysis in Gas Turbine Maintenance

Evaluation of scientific journals has a profound effect on the future of scientific research so that different institutes and countries can set appropriate goals and invest with less risk in various scientific fields. Accordingly, this article presents a new method based on a combination of co-word analysis and social network analysis to extract the hotspot topics. Using HistCite, NodeXL, and VOSviewer, then combining their results, the desired analysis is conducted for six time periods. Based on the bibliographic parameters in HistCite and by defining an index, the first five periods are selected such that both quantity and quality of articles in each period are maximum compared to other years, while the sixth time period contains the latest research. For each of the six periods, the co-word networks as created in VOSviewer are analyzed. Next, based on a combination of network centralities developed in NodeXL, the hotspot keywords are specified which are then validated and aggregated using the bibliographic parameters in HistCite. The results reveal five important time periods in gas turbine maintenance. The hotspot keywords obtained for the last period show that in recent years, some topics including gas turbine fault prognosis, neural network-based approaches, big data analysis, sensor fault diagnosis, blade availability, economic analysis and useful life estimation are prominent subjects in gas turbine maintenance

Investigating factors affecting loyalty to learning through social media

Background and Objectives: Today, with the development of mass communication tools and computers, the penetration and expansion of the Internet in various areas of life is undeniable. One of the most pervasive phenomena that has emerged on the Internet in recent years is the emergence of social media. Social media has affected social and economic life. The spread of social media has attracted the attention of various segments of society, including educational administrators. From the perspective of educational administrators, social media provides unique opportunities for teaching and learning. Social media is a group of Internet-based applications that rely on the basics of Web technology to create and share user-generated content. Social media, in addition to the entertainment aspect, is used to access and disseminate learning information, and their use to achieve educational goals has been studied in detail. One of the applications of social media is learning, in which the learning process takes place through knowledge sharing. With the development of social media, proper and efficient use of it is inevitable. Social media is a good tool for learning. In order to have a better and more advanced society, special attention should be given to the role of learning through social media. One of the issues that promotes the development of learning through social media is the loyalty of users to learning through social media. Therefore, in the present study, the antecedents of learning loyalty through social media have been studied. Methods: The present study is a descriptive study in terms of objective and applied in nature. The data gathering instrument was a questionnaire and the population of this research was the users of the Telegram group of Qom IT Centre. In the current study, convenience sampling was used to collect 364 questionnaires. Data were analyzed using SPSS and LISREL software. Findings: The findings of the study showed that more than 95% of the statistical population were university educated and all the research hypotheses were confirmed. Conclusion: The results of the research show that two indicators for measurement of learning loyalty through social media (behavioral intention to continue using and willingness to recommend to others) are affected by satisfaction, and satisfaction is also affected by self-efficacy of learning and interest to learning through social media. The results also showed that the cognitive disability of the Internet has disadvantages and causes a decrease in self-efficacy and interest in learning through social media. When a person feels the self-efficacy of learning through social media, they find interest and satisfaction in learning through it. Also, the interest in learning through social media leads to the satisfaction of learning through it, and finally, if a person finds satisfaction in learning, they have a behavioral tendency to continue using social media and a tendency to advise others.Through the above, the development of social media as a learning tool is possible, and this brings many benefits, including reducing learning costs, reducing learning time, expanding learning fairly, and improving learning.   ===================================================================================== COPYRIGHTS  ©2020 The author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, as long as the original authors and source are cited. No permission is required from the authors or the publishers.  ====================================================================================

A case-control study of Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diets, colorectal cancer and adenomas among Iranian population

Abstract Background and aims Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most common cancer, worldwide. Recently, much attention has been given to the association between Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) and CRC, however, data on colorectal adenomas (CRAs) as its precursor are scarce. Thus, the purpose of this case-control study was to investigate the association of DASH score with the risk of CRC and CRA in Iranian adults. Method A total of 499 participants, including 129 CRC and 130 CRA cases, along with 240 controls, were asked about their dietary intake via a validated questionnaire. The DASH score was then calculated based on a priori methods and categorized in quartiles. Multivariate logistic regression was performed to assess the association of DASH score and the risk of CRC and CRA. Results After adjusting for confounding variables, adherence to the DASH diet was associated with a reduction in the risk of CRC and CRA, respectively (OR of 4th versus 1st quartile = 0.04, 95% CI: 0.01–0.11, OR = 0.10, 95% CI: 0.04–0.22). Also, subgroup analysis based on gender showed that women and men with a higher DASH score had a significantly lower risk of CRC and CRAs. Conclusion The results of this study demonstrated that adherence to a DASH dietary pattern could reduce the risk of CRC and CRA in men and women. Promoting a DASH eating plan can be helpful in reducing the risk of CRC

Precision molecular threading/dethreading

Abstract: The general principles guiding the design of molecular machines based on interlocked structures are well known. Nonetheless, the identification of suitable molecular components for a precise tuning of the energetic parameters that determine the mechanical link is still challenging. Indeed, what are the reasons of the \u201call-or-nothing\u201d effect, which turns a molecular \u201cspeed-bump\u201d into a stopper in pseudorotaxane-based architectures? Here we investigate the threading and dethreading processes for a representative class of molecular components, based on symmetric dibenzylammonium axles and dibenzo[24]crown-8 ether, with a joint experimental-computational strategy. From the analysis of quantitative data and an atomistic insight, we derive simple rules correlating the kinetic behaviour with the substitution pattern, and provide rational guidelines for the design of modules to be integrated in molecular switches and motors with sophisticated dynamic feature

Mapping 123 million neonatal, infant and child deaths between 2000 and 2017

Since 2000, many countries have achieved considerable success in improving child survival, but localized progress remains unclear. To inform efforts towards United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 3.2—to end preventable child deaths by 2030—we need consistently estimated data at the subnational level regarding child mortality rates and trends. Here we quantified, for the period 2000–2017, the subnational variation in mortality rates and number of deaths of neonates, infants and children under 5 years of age within 99 low- and middle-income countries using a geostatistical survival model. We estimated that 32% of children under 5 in these countries lived in districts that had attained rates of 25 or fewer child deaths per 1,000 live births by 2017, and that 58% of child deaths between 2000 and 2017 in these countries could have been averted in the absence of geographical inequality. This study enables the identification of high-mortality clusters, patterns of progress and geographical inequalities to inform appropriate investments and implementations that will help to improve the health of all populations

Global, regional, and national burden of colorectal cancer and its risk factors, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019

Funding: F Carvalho and E Fernandes acknowledge support from Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, I.P. (FCT), in the scope of the project UIDP/04378/2020 and UIDB/04378/2020 of the Research Unit on Applied Molecular Biosciences UCIBIO and the project LA/P/0140/2020 of the Associate Laboratory Institute for Health and Bioeconomy i4HB; FCT/MCTES through the project UIDB/50006/2020. J Conde acknowledges the European Research Council Starting Grant (ERC-StG-2019-848325). V M Costa acknowledges the grant SFRH/BHD/110001/2015, received by Portuguese national funds through Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), IP, under the Norma Transitória DL57/2016/CP1334/CT0006.proofepub_ahead_of_prin