Application of Apium Graveolens in treatment of hypertension

Apium graveolence has an small brown olyptical seed with pharmacological activity. To evaluate it's application in treatment of hypertension, 37 hypertensive patients (20 female, 17 male) with the age range of 45-65 were given 6 grams of powder of Apium graveolence seed and then the blood pressures before and after the remedy were compared. Before treatment, the mean systolic blood pressure was 171.35 mlHg and the mean diastolic blood pressure was 94 mlHg. After they became 154.3 mlHg and 89.6 mlHg respectively. The difference of blood pressure before and after treatment was statistically significant (P<0.05), so we concluded that Apium graveolence seed can be used as is a safe and effective treatment for high blood pressure. Further controlled studies should be done to compare it with available anti-hypertensive drugs

Detection of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis in Cow Milk Using Culture and PCR methods

Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) is the cause of John’s disease also calledparatuberculosis. This is economically one of the important infectious diseases in cattle and ruminanthusbandry. This disease is manifested as granulomatosis entrocolitis, lymphadenitis and inflammation locallymphatic vessels. The typical sign of this disease is progressive loss of weight. Considering the importanceof detection of this disease in this study, two methods, culture and PCR, were used for the identification ofthis microorganism. In this study 100 milk samples from apparently healthy cows and 100 milk samplesfrom cows that have been suspicious of John’s disease were taken from in Sarab, East Azarbaijan, Iran.Direct microscope observation after ziehl-neelsen staining was done. Then, bacterial culture on specificmedium was carried out, and finally, identification of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis wasexamined using PCR and specific primers. Using direct observation, culture and PCR analyses showed thatfrom 100 healthy cow milk samples, 8, 9 and 12 samples were positive MAP for each method respectively.The results of direct observation, culture and PCR analysis on affected cows were 15, 40 and 44, respectively. The results of this study showed that culture and PCR analyses methods are important in the identification of the causes of this disease. Therefore, considering the frequency of the disease in the studied region, either of those methods can be used in the microorganism identification

Constipation-related symptoms and bowel program concerning individuals with spinal cord injury.

PURPOSE: To determine the prevalence of constipation-related symptoms in individuals with chronic spinal cord injury (SCI), to describe the bowel program as reported by patients and including use of bowel medications and evacuation techniques, and to examine the clinical, functional and pharmacological risks of difficulty with evacuation. PATIENTS AND METHODS: This is a cross-sectional study of all in-patients at least 3 months beyond acute injury, on the West Roxbury/Brockton VAMC SCI Service, during a 10 month period (n = 197). Clinical, functional, and medication data were abstracted from medical and nursing records. Individual interviews were conducted with all available participants (n = 161, 82%) regarding bowel-related symptoms and treatment over the previous 1 month period. The study definition of difficulty with evacuation was spending more than 1 h per episode of bowel evacuation. RESULTS: Forty-one percent of the 161 interview responders spent more than 1 h on bowel evacuation, 50% reported abdominal distension and 38% reported abdominal pain, 27% reported headaches or sweats relieved by having a bowel movement, and 33% reported fecal incontinence at least once a month. The bisacodyl suppository was the most commonly used laxative agent, while docusate was the most popular oral agent. Subjects with difficulty with evacuation (n = 66) were compared with those who spent less than 1 h on evacuation (n = 95). Factors associated with difficulty with evacuation were tetraplegia, Frankel grade A/B, laxative use, polypharmacy, previous urinary outlet surgery, and symptoms of abdominal pain and distension. CONCLUSION: Constipation-related symptoms are highly prevalent in individuals with spinal cord injury, despite considerable laxative use. Our findings suggest that difficulty with evacuation can be predicted on the basis of a patient\u27s clinical profile

Assessing the potential of virtual reality for improving ESA’s space operations

Virtual reality (VR) provides an immersive virtual environment to users. VR users can enter and interact with VR environments in a natural way similar to interacting with the real world. VR offers promising features that could have the capability to improve present and future space operations in various areas. For exploiting the benefits offered by VR, the efficient integration of VR with operations data systems is crucial. In this paper, results of a study on the potential of improving ESA’s operations with the help of VR are presented. Results include conceptual use case and technology analyses as well as practical results from the implementation of a proof-of-concept (PoC) prototype

The Incremental Planning System GSOC's Next Generation Mission Planning Framework

The paper at hand presents the new generic framework for automated planning and scheduling in future mission planning systems developed at GSOC (German Space Operations Center). It evolved from the experiences made in past and current projects and the evaluation of internal and external requirements for upcoming projects. In customary systems such as the one used within GSOC’s TerraSAR-X/TanDEM-X mission, succeeding planning runs to combine all collected input to a consistent, conflict-free command timeline take place at fix, dedicated points in time, e.g. twice a day. In contrast and as a main difference, with the new system each new input is processed immediately and so a consistent up-to-date timeline is maintained at all times. We show that this approach provides a set of important advantages and new possibilities for spacecraft commanding and user satisfaction. For example, uplink schedules can be flexibly modified due to short-term notifications, or up-to-date, extensive information about the planning state is always available, which means that conflicts can be seen before finally submitting a new request and, if applicable, can be resolved by selecting a suggested solution scenario. The presented system constitutes a generic tool suite which is scalable in performance critical areas, which is configurable to various mission scenarios and which defines a dedicated set of interfaces, specifying the functionality that remains to be implemented by each individual project. The declared goal is that all upcoming GSOC missions will benefit from using the Incremental Planning framework in terms of cost reduction, implementation duration and system robustness