99 research outputs found
First Detection of Nosema ceranae, a Microsporidian Protozoa of European Honeybees (Apis mellifera) In Iran
Get PDFBackground: Nosemosis of European honey bee (Apis mellifera) is present in bee colonies worldwide. Until recently, Nosema apis had been regarded as the causative agent of the disease, that causes heavy economic losses in apicultures. Nosema ceranae is an emerging microsporidian parasite of European honeybees, A. mellifera, but its distribution is not well known. Previously, nosemosis in honeybees in Iran was attributed exclusively to N. apis.Methods: Six Nosema positive samples (determined from light microscopy of spores) of adult worker bees from one province of Iran (Savadkouh- Mazandaran, northern Iran) were tested to determine Nosema species using previously- developed PCR primers of the 16 S rRNA gene. As it is difficult to distinguish N. ceranae and N. apis morphologically, a PCR assay based on 16 S ribosomal RNA has been used to differentiate N. apis and N. ceranae.Results: Only N. ceranae was found in all samples, indicating that this species present in Iran apiaries.Conclusion: This is the first report of N. ceranae in colonies of A. mellifera in Iran. It seems that intensive surveys are needed to determine the distribution and prevalence of N. ceranae in different regions of Iran
Segmentation of corpus callosum using diffusion tensor imaging: validation in patients with glioblastoma
Get PDFAbstract
Background
This paper presents a three-dimensional (3D) method for segmenting corpus callosum in normal subjects and brain cancer patients with glioblastoma.
Methods
Nineteen patients with histologically confirmed treatment naïve glioblastoma and eleven normal control subjects underwent DTI on a 3T scanner. Based on the information inherent in diffusion tensors, a similarity measure was proposed and used in the proposed algorithm. In this algorithm, diffusion pattern of corpus callosum was used as prior information. Subsequently, corpus callosum was automatically divided into Witelson subdivisions. We simulated the potential rotation of corpus callosum under tumor pressure and studied the reproducibility of the proposed segmentation method in such cases.
Results
Dice coefficients, estimated to compare automatic and manual segmentation results for Witelson subdivisions, ranged from 94% to 98% for control subjects and from 81% to 95% for tumor patients, illustrating closeness of automatic and manual segmentations. Studying the effect of corpus callosum rotation by different Euler angles showed that although segmentation results were more sensitive to azimuth and elevation than skew, rotations caused by brain tumors do not have major effects on the segmentation results.
Conclusions
The proposed method and similarity measure segment corpus callosum by propagating a hyper-surface inside the structure (resulting in high sensitivity), without penetrating into neighboring fiber bundles (resulting in high specificity)
The relationship between complement factor C3, APOE ε4, amyloid and tau in Alzheimer’s disease
Get PDFIdentification and characterization of pathogenic viruses in aquatic animal using advanced techniques in order to develop rapid diagnostic kit (shrimp viral disease kit as well as TSV, HPV and MBV )
Get PDFShrimp production increasing rapidly in the world and in2013 the production reaches 4.2 MT. In Iran the shrimp production is under development and estimated in 1393, 20 thousand tons produced. In this regards the important subject is health and disease in shrimp farm. The white spot syndrome virus for second time appears in chabahar and damage many farms. Because the aquaculture activity expand in the world in national, regional and international scale, many emerge disease are endanger. In this regard the viral disease is very important and not only decrease the production but also has a side effect in business and national economy. For control and prevention the viral disease, the accurate methods such as PCR kit were developed. In this project the PCR methods with sensitivity, specificity and efficacy was designed and used for detection viral disease. Many viruses have several serotypes and in different area maybe new serotype induce the disease. For this reason, the specific kit will be design. Three viruses consist of MBV, TSV and IHHNV are very pathogenic in shrimp farm and need the specific PCR kit for detection them. In this project the MBV virus was identified and designs a new primer with Oligo software and the primer amplified a part of DNA with 185 bp in the gel. The specificity and sensitivity of primer were checked by IQ2000 Kit and the primer used for detection unknown samples
A systematic review of randomised controlled trials assessing effectiveness of prosthetic and orthotic interventions.
Get PDFBACKGROUND: Assistive products are items which allow older people and people with disabilities to be able to live a healthy, productive and dignified life. It has been estimated that approximately 1.5% of the world's population need a prosthesis or orthosis. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to systematically identify and review the evidence from randomized controlled trials assessing effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of prosthetic and orthotic interventions. METHODS: Literature searches, completed in September 2015, were carried out in fourteen databases between years 1995 and 2015. The search results were independently screened by two reviewers. For the purpose of this manuscript, only randomized controlled trials which examined interventions using orthotic or prosthetic devices were selected for data extraction and synthesis. RESULTS: A total of 342 randomised controlled trials were identified (319 English language and 23 non-English language). Only 4 of these randomised controlled trials examined prosthetic interventions and the rest examined orthotic interventions. These orthotic interventions were categorised based on the medical conditions/injuries of the participants. From these studies, this review focused on the medical condition/injuries with the highest number of randomised controlled trials (osteoarthritis, fracture, stroke, carpal tunnel syndrome, plantar fasciitis, anterior cruciate ligament, diabetic foot, rheumatoid and juvenile idiopathic arthritis, ankle sprain, cerebral palsy, lateral epicondylitis and low back pain). The included articles were assessed for risk of bias using the Cochrane Risk of Bias tool. Details of the clinical population examined, the type of orthotic/prosthetic intervention, the comparator/s and the outcome measures were extracted. Effect sizes and odds ratios were calculated for all outcome measures, where possible. CONCLUSIONS: At present, for prosthetic and orthotic interventions, the scientific literature does not provide sufficient high quality research to allow strong conclusions on their effectiveness and cost-effectiveness
ESTIMATION OF THE LONGITUDINAL AND TRANSVERSE DISPERSION COEFFICIENTS OF SAND SEDIMENTS IN SATURATED STATE
No full textGroundwater resources play an essential role in water supply for drink, griculture, and industry sectors. Nowadays, for various reasons, such as urban and opulation growth, indiscriminate use of fertilizers and chemical poisons, groundwater resources have been populated. Therefore, studying the pollutions and their fate and preventing groundwater resources from the pollutants is necessary. In this research study, a laboratory physical model has been designed and performed in order to obtain enough data of pollution movement in homogeneous porous media. In other words, the main aim of this paper is to track the distribution of a conservative tracer in porous media in a laboratory-scale model to estimate the longitudinal and transverse dispersion coefficients. In this study, non-cohesive sands were used to create the porous media body in the laboratory model, and the grain diameter of the sand was 1-2.5 mm. Salt with concentrations of 5, 7.5, and 10 gr/l was used as a tracer. The porosity of the sand was measured equal to 39\%, and the hydraulic conductivity of that was measured equal to 172.26 cm/hr using the constant load
test. In order to control changes of flow velocity, to minimize test errors, a
constant head of water was created over the entrance of the sand body. The flow
velocity was measured equal to 1.21 mm/sec. An EC-meter apparatus was used to
measure the EC values of the tracer inside model; then, these data were used to
calculate the concentration of tracer in different points over time, during
each test. Then, the values of the concentration were compared with those of
concentration which were obtained from the analytical solution of Fick's second
law. Root Mean Square Error criterion (RMSE) was used to compare the measured
and calculated mentioned data. According to the results, the values of the
longitudinal coefficient tracer for the studied conditions, concentrations of
5, 7.5, and 10 gr/l, obtained 3.36e-6, 3.08e-6, and 3.52e-6 for transverse
coefficients 6.58e-7, 6.49e-7, and 6.79e-7 m2/s, respectively
A neuroimaging model based on MRI, DTI, and spect findings for lateralization of temporal lobe epilepsy
No full textPurpose: Temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is the most widespread type of epilepsy with the most successful resection outcome. Interhemispheric variations detected in the images of T1-weighted and fluid attenuated inversion recovery (FLAIR) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and ictal and interictal single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT), and in the indices of mean diffusivity (MD) and fractional anisotropy (FA) of diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), are within the established markers ofTLE laterality. However, current non-quantitative imaging evaluations may not optimally incorporate the imaging information into the decision-making process prior to resection of mesial temporalstructures. We hypothesize that quantitative TLE lateralization response models of MRI, DTI, and SPECTneuroimaging attributes will optimize the selection ofsurgical candidates and reduce, in some cases, the need for extraoperative electrocorticography (eECoG). Method: Neuroimaging features of 138 retrospective TLE patients with Engel class l surgical outcomes were extracted, including the hippocampal volumes, normalized ictal-interictal SPECT and FLAIR intensities, and mean diffusivity, along with the cingulate and forniceal fractional anisotropy (FA). Using logistic function regression, univariate and multivariate models were developed. Results: The model incorporating all multivariate attributes for138 TLE cases that had at least one imaging attribute and imputing the missing attributes with the mean values of the corresponding attributes measured oncontrol cohort reached the probability of detection and false alarm of 0.83 and 0.17 for all cases, and 0.90 and 0.10 for the patients who underwent eECoG. Conclusion: Increased reliability in lateralizing TLE cases using the proposed response model involving the incorporation of the multivariate attributes reinforces the notion that eECoG in a number ofcases may be circumvented. The proposed response model can be further generalized by integrating attributes of additional neuroclinical, neurophysiological, neuropsychological, and neuroimaging attributes into the presurgical decision making process
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