Mesoporous TiO₂ electrodes with different thickness for dye sensitized solar cell application

Mesoporous TiO2 films with different thicknesses were prepared for dye sensitized solar cell application using dip coating method. The crystal structure and morphology of the films were studied by scanning electron microscope and X-ray diffraction. The optical properties of the films were investigated through UV–Vis absorption. With increasing film thickness from 3.1 to 13.9 μm, the efficiency increases from 0.81 to 3.09 %

Determinants of Undernutrition among Children under Age 5 in the Puntland State of Somalia

The purpose of this study was to investigate the determinants of nutritional status among children under age 5 (0-59 months) in Puntland. Undernutrition is a global challenge, it does not only adversely affect short‐ and long‐term health and economic well‐being of children but it is also a leading contributor to death and disability globally. Undernutrition short-term effects include mortality and morbidity where long-term effects are that the children do not reach their full developmental potential and would have poor cognitive performance, which in turn has consequences on the country’s economic productivity. Nutritional status of the Somali children in Puntland is relatively poor due to many reasons such as low economic conditions of Somali households, lack of food security and severe drought that has affected the country in recent years and among other factors. This study used data from the Puntland Health and Demographic Survey 2020 which was conducted by the Department of Statistics at Puntland Ministry of Planning, Economic Development, and International Cooperation with technical support from UNFPA Somalia. The analysis used stunting, wasting, and underweight as dependent variables, while the independent variables were children, maternal, and household characteristics. Bivariate and multivariate Logistic regression models were performed to analyze the determinants of nutritional status among the children. The study showed a significant association between children’s nutritional status and most of the explanatory variables under study. Place of residence, gender of household head, wealth index, source of drinking water, source of energy for cooking, toilet facility, mother’s age, marital status, education, breastfeeding, ANC visits, BMI, work status, child’s sex, child’s age, birth order and size at birth have significant associations with children’s nutrition status. The study found that most variables in child, maternal, and household characteristics were significantly associated with stunting and wasting among children under age five.  Based on these findings, the research recommends that a multi-sectoral approach is needed to address undernutrition in Puntland state. Combined nutrition programmes from different sectors in line with National Development Plans (NDP) need to be designed to address the underlying causes of acute and chronic malnutrition

A facile low temperature route to deposit a TiO<inf>2</inf> scattering layer for efficient dye-sensitized solar cells

Hydrolysis of TiCl4 at low temperature formed an efficient scattering layer in dye-sensitized solar cell architecture, which leads to an improvement in the light harvesting and a remarkable reduction of electronic disorder of mesoporous-TiO2.Nava Technology Limited, Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council, Nyak Technology Limited, Engineering and Physical Sciences Research CouncilThis is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Royal Society of Chemistry via http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/C6RA13273

Seroepidemiological Study of Human Hydatidosis in Meshkinshahr District, Ardabil Province, Iran

Background: The aim of this study was to conduct a sero-epidemiological survey in Meshkinshahr, Arda­bil Province, northwestern Iran to detect the rate of hydatidosis in the city and nearby villages. Literature shows that no such study has been conducted so far.Methods: Overall, 670 serum samples were collected from 194 males and 476 females from patients re­ferred to different health centers of the region. All patients filled out a questionnaire and an informed con­sent. Sera were analyzed using indirect-ELISA test. Ten μg /ml antigens (Antigen B derived from hydatid cyst fluid), serum dilutions of 1:500 and conjugate anti-human coombs with 1:10000 dilutions were util­ized to perform the test. Data analysis was conducted using SPSS software ver. 11.5. Results: The seroprevalence of human hydatidosis was 1.79% by ELISA test in the region. This rate for fe­males was 1.68% and males 2.6%, respectively. There was no significant difference as regards all fac­tors studied and the seropositivity. According to job, farmers and ranchmen had the highest rate of infec­tion as 3.17%. The sero-prevalence of infection was 2.6%% in illiterate people which showed the highest rate. As regards residency, urban life showed no significant difference with rural life (1.1% vs. 2.58%). Age group of 69-90 yr old, with 4.62% as prevalence had the highest rate of positivity.Conclusion: Obtained sero-prevalence of hydatidosis shows more or less a resemblance to other cities of Iran, although due to the specific condition of the city we expected more rate of sero-positivity

Intraoperative Liver Surface Completion with Graph Convolutional VAE

In this work we propose a method based on geometric deep learning to predict the complete surface of the liver, given a partial point cloud of the organ obtained during the surgical laparoscopic procedure. We introduce a new data augmentation technique that randomly perturbs shapes in their frequency domain to compensate the limited size of our dataset. The core of our method is a variational autoencoder (VAE) that is trained to learn a latent space for complete shapes of the liver. At inference time, the generative part of the model is embedded in an optimisation procedure where the latent representation is iteratively updated to generate a model that matches the intraoperative partial point cloud. The effect of this optimisation is a progressive non-rigid deformation of the initially generated shape. Our method is qualitatively evaluated on real data and quantitatively evaluated on synthetic data. We compared with a state-of-the-art rigid registration algorithm, that our method outperformed in visible areas

A phase I study of extended dosing with lomeguatrib with temozolomide in patients with advanced melanoma

Lomeguatrib, an O6-methylguanine-DNA methyltransferase inactivator, was evaluated in an extended dosing regimen with temozolomide, designed according to pharmacodynamic data from previous studies. Patients with unresectable stage 3 or 4 cutaneous or unknown primary melanoma metastases were treated with lomeguatrib 40 mg, b.i.d. for 10 or 14 days and temozolomide 75–100 mg m−2 on days 1–5. Drugs were administered orally with cycles repeated every 28 days, for up to six cycles. A total of 32 patients were recruited to the study. Lomeguatrib for 10 days with temozolomide 75 mg m−2 was established as the optimal extended lomeguatrib dosing schedule, with haematological toxicity being dose limiting. There were two partial responses to treatment giving an overall response rate of 6.25%. Extending lomeguatrib administration beyond that of temozolomide requires a reduced dose of the latter agent. Only limited clinical activity was seen, suggesting no advantage for this regimen over conventional temozolomide administration in the treatment of melanoma

Bio-nanotechnology application in wastewater treatment

The nanoparticles have received high interest in the field of medicine and water purification, however, the nanomaterials produced by chemical and physical methods are considered hazardous, expensive, and leave behind harmful substances to the environment. This chapter aimed to focus on green-synthesized nanoparticles and their medical applications. Moreover, the chapter highlighted the applicability of the metallic nanoparticles (MNPs) in the inactivation of microbial cells due to their high surface and small particle size. Modifying nanomaterials produced by green-methods is safe, inexpensive, and easy. Therefore, the control and modification of nanoparticles and their properties were also discussed

Phosphine Resistance in the Rust Red Flour Beetle, Tribolium castaneum (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae): Inheritance, Gene Interactions and Fitness Costs

The recent emergence of heritable high level resistance to phosphine in stored grain pests is a serious concern among major grain growing countries around the world. Here we describe the genetics of phosphine resistance in the rust red flour beetle Tribolium castaneum (Herbst), a pest of stored grain as well as a genetic model organism. We investigated three field collected strains of T. castaneum viz., susceptible (QTC4), weakly resistant (QTC1012) and strongly resistant (QTC931) to phosphine. The dose-mortality responses of their test- and inter-cross progeny revealed that most resistance was conferred by a single major resistance gene in the weakly (3.2×) resistant strain. This gene was also found in the strongly resistant (431×) strain, together with a second major resistance gene and additional minor factors. The second major gene by itself confers only 12–20× resistance, suggesting that a strong synergistic epistatic interaction between the genes is responsible for the high level of resistance (431×) observed in the strongly resistant strain. Phosphine resistance is not sex linked and is inherited as an incompletely recessive, autosomal trait. The analysis of the phenotypic fitness response of a population derived from a single pair inter-strain cross between the susceptible and strongly resistant strains indicated the changes in the level of response in the strong resistance phenotype; however this effect was not consistent and apparently masked by the genetic background of the weakly resistant strain. The results from this work will inform phosphine resistance management strategies and provide a basis for the identification of the resistance genes

Atomically dispersed nickel-nitrogen-sulfur species anchored on porous carbon nanosheets for efficient water oxidation

Developing low-cost electrocatalysts to replace precious Ir-based materials is key for oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Here, we report atomically dispersed nickel coordinated with nitrogen and sulfur species in porous carbon nanosheets as an electrocatalyst exhibiting excellent activity and durability for OER with a low overpotential of 1.51 V at 10 mA cm(-2) and a small Tafel slope of 45 mV dec(-1) in alkaline media. Such electrocatalyst represents the best among all reported transition metal- and/or heteroatom-doped carbon electrocatalysts and is even superior to benchmark Ir/C. Theoretical and experimental results demonstrate that the well-dispersed molecular S vertical bar NiNx species act as active sites for catalyzing OER. The atomic structure of S vertical bar NiNx centers in the carbon matrix is clearly disclosed by aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy and synchrotron radiation X-ray absorption spectroscopy together with computational simulations. An integrated photoanode of nanocarbon on a Fe2O3 nanosheet array enables highly active solar-driven oxygen production

Modelling reconfigurable manufacturing systems with coloured timed Petri nets

International audienceReconfigurable manufacturing systems (RMSs) have been acknowledged as a promising means of providing manufacturing companies with the required production capacities and capabilities. This is accomplished through reconfiguring system elements over time for a diverse set of individualized products often required in small quantities and with short delivery lead times. Recognizing the importance of dynamic modeling and visualization in decision-making support in RMSs and the limitations of current research, we propose in this work to model RMSs with Petri net (PN) techniques focusing on the process of reconfiguring system elements while considering constraints and system performance. In view of the modeling challenges, including variety handling, production variation accommodation, machine selection, and constraint satisfaction, we develop a new formalism of colored timed PNs. In conjunction with colored tokens and timing in colored and timed PNs, we also define a reconfiguration mechanism to meet modeling challenges. An application case from an electronics company producing mobile phone vibration motors is presented. Also reported are system analysis and application results, which show how the proposed formalism can be used in the reconfiguration decision making process