Association of Subpubic Angle Measurement with Age and Gender in a Group of Adult Sudanese Patients

Background: The measurement of the subpubic angle (SPA) has been used for determining gender with a high degree of accuracy in various ethnic groups. This measurement can also be helpful in forensic and physical anthropology. The aim of this study was to compare the SPA in different adult age groups (males and females) and to use the SPA to estimate the demarking point (DP) for the determination of gender. Methods: This study included 158 subjects – 59 male and 99 female. The SPA was measured electronically using antero-posterior pelvis X-rays. Measurements were taken retrospectively using the Picture Archiving and Communication System.  SPA measurements were compared between the male and female participants  in different adult age groups. To determine the gender, the DP was calculated from the means of SPA in male and female participants.   Results: A comparison of the means of SPA between males and females showed that females (134.94 ± 15.33º)  had wider SPA than males (105.88 ± 10.33) with a significant difference (P = 0.012). While a DP > 126.5 is most likely indicative of a female pelvis, a DP < 104.3 is indicative of a male pelvis. The accuracy levels based on the measured DP of participants in this study were 45.8% and 69.7% for males and females, respectively. Besides, with regards to age, the mean values for different age groups in males and females were statistically insignificant (P-values were 0.21 and 0.75, respectively).   Conclusions: According to the obtained results, the variations in the measurements of the SPA from pelvic X-rays can be used to determine gender. The calculated SPA range and DP were found to predict female gender with higher accuracy. Age was not associated with any notable differences in SPA measurements. Keywords: subpubic angle, pelvis, Sudanese, sex differences&nbsp

PRODUCTION, PURIFICATION, AND CHARACTERIZATION OF BIOACTIVE METABOLITES PRODUCED FROM RARE ACTINOBACTERIA PSEUDONOCARDIA ALNI

ABSTRACTObjectives: Pseudonocardia alni exhibits antimicrobial activity against tested pathogenic Staphylococcus aureus, Microsporum canis, and Trichophytonmentagrophyte. The present paper aimed to optimize various cultural conditions for antimicrobial metabolite production, purification, andcharacterization of the active substance.Methods: The effects of various parameters such as culture media, carbon and nitrogen sources, phosphate concentration, pH, temperature, incubationperiod, and agitation rate on bioactive metabolite production were studied using a flask scale with varying single parameter. The active substanceswere purified by adsorption chromatography using Silica gel column and Sephadex LH 20 column, and the physical, chemical, and biological propertieswere characterized.Results: The metabolite production by P. alni was greatly influenced by various cultural conditions. It produced high levels of the antimicrobialsubstance in International Streptomyces project-2 broth compared with that in potato dextrose broth. The optimum parameters for antimicrobialproduction from the actinobacterium occurred in the production medium consisting of glucose (1%) and tryptone (1%), 0.001 M of K2HPO4 and0.05M glycine at initial pH 8.5 and incubated at 30°C for 4 d in stand incubator. The higher concentration of phosphate buffer salts (˃0.01M) repressedthe bioactive production. The purified active substance had relative factor Rf=0.53 in the mobile phase of a thin layer chromatography system andthe maximum absorbance (λ max) at 216 nm. The results of infrared spectra Fourier transform-infrared spectroscopy analysis indicate that it may beregarded to glycopeptide antibiotic. The purified substance had antibacterial and antifungal activities as well as cytotoxic activity in breast cancer cellline Michigan Cancer Foundation-7 and normal hepatic cell line (WRL-68) at a percentage up to 23.7% and 7.64%, respectively.Conclusions: The actinobacterium P. alni was a novel strain having the ability to produce antimicrobial and anticancer substances.Keywords: Pseudonocardia alni, Antifungal–antibacterial, Anticancer optimization, Production, Purification, Characterization

Density and Mobility Impact on MANET Routing Protocols in a Maritime Environment

Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks (MANETS) are multi hop wireless networks, where a packet hops through a number of intermediate nodes within coverage range of each other to reach the intended destination. The novel application of MANET routing protocols in the marine environment using available technology is one of the contributions of this work. The high cost of other available technologies which require direct connection to IP networks make our approach an attractive proposition for small craft. In this paper we investigate the effect of different maritime traffic patterns on the performance of three different MANET routing protocols which are Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector (AODV), Ad hoc On-Demand Multi Path Distance Vector (AOMDV) and Destination-Sequenced Distance Vector (DSDV). The traffic patterns are represented by different node densities and mobility behaviours which are likely to be found in the marine environment. Performance evaluation of the MANET protocols is compared in terms of packet delivery ratio

(AMDC) Algorithm for wireless sensor networks in the marine environment

Abstract—Data compression is known today as one of the most important enabling technologies that form the foundation of the majority of data applications and networks as we know them, including wireless sensor networks and the popular world wide net (internet). Marine data networks are gaining increasing interest in the research community due to the increasing request for data services over the sea. There are a very narrow range of available solutions because of the absence of infrastructure over such vast water surfaces. We have previously proposed applying MANET networks in the marine environment using VHF technology available on the majority of ships and vessels in order to gather different sensor data such as sea depth, temperature, wind speed and direction, etc. and send it to a central server to produce a public information map. We also discusses the gains and drawbacks of our proposal including the problem of low rate data transmission offered by VHF radio limited to 9.6 Kbps. In this paper we investigate the application of appropriate data quantization and compression techniques to the marine sensor data collected in order to reduce the burden on the channel links and achieve better transmission efficiency. Keywords—Wireless sensor network, Mobile Ad hoc Network, Very High Frequency, Sensor

Lymphatic expression of CLEVER-1 in breast cancer and its relationship with lymph node metastasis

BACKGROUND Mechanisms regulating breast cancer lymph node metastasis are unclear. Staining of CLEVER-1 (common lymphatic endothelial and vascular endothelial receptor-1) in human breast tumors was used, along with in vitro techniques, to assess involvement in the metastatic process. METHODS 148 sections of primary invasive breast cancers, with 10 yr follow-up, were stained with anti-CLEVER-1. Leukocyte infiltration was assessed, along with involvement of specific subpopulations by staining with CD83 (mature dendritic cells, mDC), CD209 (immature DC, iDC) and CD68 (macrophage, Mϕ). In vitro expression of CLEVER-1 on lymphatic (LEC) and blood endothelial cells (BEC) was examined by flow cytometry. RESULTS In vitro results showed that although both endothelial cell types express CLEVER-1, surface expression was only evident on LEC. In tumour sections CLEVER-1 was expressed in blood vessels (BV, 61.4% of samples), lymphatic vessels (LV, 18.2% of samples) and in Mϕ/DCs (82.4% of samples). However, only CLEVER-1 expression in LV was associated with LN metastasis (p = 0.027) and with Mϕ indices (p = 0.021). Although LV CLEVER-1 was associated with LN positivity there was no significant correlation with recurrence or overall survival, BV CLEVER-1 expression was, however, associated with increased risk of recurrence (p = 0.049). The density of inflammatory infiltrate correlated with CLEVER-1 expression in BV (p < 0.001) and LV (p = 0.004). CONCLUSIONS The associations between CLEVER-1 expression on endothelial vessels and macrophage/leukocyte infiltration is suggestive of its regulation by inflammatory conditions in breast cancer, most likely by macrophage-associated cytokines. Its upregulation on LV, related surface expression, and association with LN metastasis suggest that it may be an important mediator of tumor cell metastasis to LN

An IOT-enabled System for Marine Data Acquisition and Cartography

Current satellite communication remains very expensive and impractical for most small to mid-sized vessels, and at the same time marine wireless networking is lack of network coverage. To solve this problem, this paper proposes a novel IOT (Internet of Things) enabled system for marine data acquisition and cartography based on Ship Ad-hoc Networks (SANET’s). Ships are equipped with Very High Frequency (VHF) radios and several sensors such as sea depth, temperature, wind speed and direction, etc. The collected sensory data is sent to 5G edge clouds incorporated at sink/base station nodes on shore, and ultimately aggregated at a central cloud on the internet to produce up to date cartography. The routing protocols deployed are DSDV (Destination-Sequenced Distance Vector), AODV (Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector), AOMDV (Ad hoc On-Demand Multipath Distance Vector) and DSR (Dynamic Source Routing) protocols, which are very popular in Mobile Ad-hoc Networks (MANET’s) and compatible with multi hop routing environments and scalability towards increased traffic and mobility. Simulation results verify the feasibility and efficiency of the proposed system that has packet delivery rates of up to 80% at shore base stations

Influence of Cultivar Type of Strawberry Fruits on Its Volatile Constituents

Five strawberry (Fragaria x ananassa. Duch.) cultivars (Festival, Red Merlin, Suzana, Tamar and Winter Dawn) were analysed using solvent-solvent extraction method and GC/MS system to compare between the volatile constituents responsible for the aroma in different fresh and frozen cultivars. The main identified compounds were Tetradecene (15.41%), 2E-dodecene-1-ol (13.78%), Nerolidol (11.37%), E-14-hexadecenal (17.27%) and Octadecanol (17.65%). The present study explains the effect of freezing on aroma content for different strawberry cultivars. Nutritional value contents of the fruits were also estimated which illustrate the importance of fruits as a main source of vitamin C and potassium. The antimicrobial activity of the volatile constituents were estimated and were exhibited a significant results (20-32mm zone of inhibition) against number of human pathogenic microorganisms, compared with the standard antibiotic (20-22 mm zone of inhibition) using the agar well diffusion method. Keywords:Fragaria x ananassa, antimicrobial, cultivars, volatile constituents