Nitric Oxide Levels in Patients with Psoriasis Treated with Methotrexate

Psoriasis is a chronic, recurrent, inflammatory, and hyperproliferative disease. Recently there have been studies regarding increases in the levels of NO in inflammatory dermatoses including psoriasis. In this study, 22 patients with psoriasis were scored with PASI (psoriasis area and severity index) and the levels of serum nitrite-nitrate were evaluated before and after therapy with methotrexate (Mtx). The results were compared with age- and sex-matched healthy volunteers. The relation of the results with the clinical severity and the cumulative Mtx dose were also evaluated. The serum levels of nitrite-nitrate of the psoriatic patients with active lesions were found to be significantly higher than the levels of the healthy volunteers and the patients after therapy. The elevated nitrite-nitrate serum levels in the inflammatory period may suggest the possible role of this mediator in the etiopathogenesis of psoriasis and the potential future use of No inhibitors in the treatment of psoriasis

Partitioning vs. Replication for Token-Based Commodity

The proliferation of e-commerce has enabled a new set of applications that allow globally distributed purchasing of commodities such as books, CDs, travel tickets, etc., over the Internet. These commodities can be represented on line by tokens, which can be distributed among servers to enhance the performance and availability of such applications. There are two main approaches for distributing such tokens ? replication and partitioning. Token replication requires expensive distributed synchronization protocols to provide data consistency, and is subject to both high latency and blocking in case of network partitions. On the other hand, token partitioning allows many transactions to execute locally without any global synchronization, which results in low latency and immunity against network partitions. In this paper, we examine the Data-Value Partitioning (DVP) approach to token-based commodity distribution. We propose novel DVP strategies that vary in the way they redistribute tokens among the servers of the system. Using a detailed simulation model and real Internet message traces, we investigate the performance of our DVP strategies by comparing them against a previously proposed scheme, Generalized Site Escrow (GSE), which is based on replication and escrow transactions. Our experiments demonstrate that, for the types of applications and environment we address, replication-based approaches are neither necessary nor desirable, as they inherently require quorum synchronization to maintain consistency. We show that DVP, primarily due to its ability to provide high server autonomy, performs favorably in all cases studied. (Also cross-referenced as UMIACS-TR-2000-6

Opinions of teacher candidates on the effect of emergency distance education implementations during the Covid-19 pandemic period on learning-teaching process, metacognition and social skills: A case study: Effects of emergency distance education implementations

The aim of this study is to examine the effects of emergency distance education implementations carried out during the Covid-19 process on metacognition, social skills, active participation, communication with faculty members, as well as learning and teaching processes based on the views of education faculty teacher candidates.  The research is a case study.  The study was carried out in the Education Faculty of the Kafkas (n:31) and Education Faculty of the Trakya (n:20) in the 2020-2021 Fall semester. Opinions about the process were taken from 51 volunteer participants using a semi-structured interview form.  Data was analyzed using content analysis and inductive analysis.  As a result of the research, the elements that prospective teachers think that emergency distance education applications increase the effectiveness of the learning-teaching process were obtained in the themes of metacognition, social skills, active participation, effective communication with faculty members, and learning-teaching process.  The factors that have a negative impact on the emergency distance education process are again expressed as increasing homework load, insufficient explanation of educational tasks, problems caused by the pandemic, problems originating from the internet, systemic-technological problems, inadequacies in gaining metacognition skills, and uniformity in methods and techniques

Environmental assessment of red mud by determining natural radionuclides using neutron activation analysis

WOS: 000458421700002Bauxite residues (red mud) produced by digestion of bauxite ore during the production of alumina contain naturally occurring radionuclides such as U-238, Th-232 and K-40 and toxic elements such as Al, Cr, Co, Mn and Ni. In this research, red mud collected from Eti Seydisehir Aluminium Plant in Turkey was studied to determine the concentration of natural radionuclides for evaluating their radiological effects. Short-term leaching tests of radionuclides were performed by Toxicity Characteristic Leaching Procedure (TCLP)-1311 method to assess in terms of their environmental impact. Furthermore, self-attenuation factors were experimentally determined using radioactive point sources with two different amounts to ascertain how gamma rays are attenuated in the residue depending on the energy and the volume of residue. The activity concentrations of U-234,U-235,U-238, Th-232 and K-40 in red mud and leachate samples were determined by neuron activation analysis and Compton suppression methods. The method was tested using NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) 1632d and 2709a reference materials. It can be concluded from the results of leaching tests that natural radionuclides may not easily be mobile under environmental conditions and the mobility of the radionuclides depends on the pH value of water and contact time with the water. The activity concentration index which is the most commonly used calculation method was applied to the samples and the results showed that the reuse of red mud as a secondary raw material may not be hazardous depending on the percentage of utilization of it.Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK)Turkiye Bilimsel ve Teknolojik Arastirma Kurumu (TUBITAK) [BIDEP-2219]The authors would like to express their gratitude to Eti Seydisehir Aluminium plant in Turkey for their co-operation in gathering samples and sharing technical data. We are grateful to the staff at Nuclear Engineering Teaching Lab for running the TRIGA reactor. The authors also thank the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) for supporting the postdoctoral fellowship (BIDEP-2219) of Dr. Banu Ozden, under which her work was carried out