Gelatine properties made from skin and bone of Lizard fish (Saurida tumbil)

Type-A gelatine was extracted from skins and bones of lizard fish and analysed for functional and chemical properties. Bloom gel strength was 159.14±14 and 135±7.9g, respectively, for skin and bone gelatines compared to 2243±7.7 for porcine gelatine (P<0.05). Gelatine from skin and bone exhibited higher viscosity and lower setting temperature than porcine gelatine. Skin gelatine had higher amino acid composition than bone gelatine, with a total amino acid content of about 21.71% and 19.83% for skin and bone respectively. Alpha chains were higher than pi and 6 components in skin and bone gelatine. Both bone and skin gelatines contained peptides with low molecular weight (<a). The differences in functional properties between the skin and bone gelatines appeared to be related to differences in amino acid composition and molecular weight distribution of the gelatines

Investigation of the anticancer and antioxidant activity of the brown algae (Cystoseira indica) extract against the colorectal cancer cells

Background: Nowadays, numerous studies have been conducted on the use of bioactive compounds as anti-cancer agents regarding their antioxidant activities. The current study aimed to assess the anti-cancer and anti-oxidant activities of organic and water extracts of brown algae (Cystoseira indica) collected from the shores of Chabahar, Iran. Materials and Methods: The extraction was performed based on the method of immersion by n-hexane, ethanol, methanol, chloroform and distilled water as solvent during 24 hours. The reducing power, free radical (DPPH) scavenging activity, metal chelating activity and cytotoxicity against colorectal cancer cells were examined by the MTT test. Results: The chloroform extract showed the best reducing power compared to the other infusions, with an average of 0.36&plusmn;0.02 &micro;g/&micro;L. Also, chloroform extract showed the best metal chelating activity with an average of 62.18&plusmn;0.86 &micro;g/&micro;L (P&lt;0.05). The best free radical scavenging activity observed in the ethanol and methanol extracts with concentrations of 15.83 and 33.21 &micro;g/&micro;L, respectively; the inhibitory activity of methanol extracts was better than ethanol extract (P&lt;0.05). Regarding the anti-cancer properties, methanol extract (30&plusmn;1.33 &micro;g/&micro;L) showed the greatest effect on cancer cell death and the water extract showed the least effect (66.67&plusmn;1.11 &micro;g/&micro;L) (P&lt;0.05). Conclusion: The extract of the brown algae (Cystoseira indica) can be proposed as an antioxidant and anticancer compound for preclinical and clinical studies

The canning of small cultured shrimp (Penaeus indicus) in oil, tomato sauce and brine

Canning of non-exportable small cultured shrimp (Penaeus indices) in oil, tomato sauce and brine was investigated in Hormozgan province. Our results indicated that the best method of canning of this shrimp was to precook it at 100'c for 2 minutes in 8% salt water which Contained 0.1% citric acid, then autoclaving the can for 12 minutes at 121°C. Results of an organoleptic evaluation showed that the shrimp packed in oil, tomato sauce and brine ranked by the taste panel as the first, second and third respectively. The changes in chemical composition, total bacteria count and Clostridium botulinum for the three samples of canned shrimp were also investigated. These changes were 18.90-22.59% for protein, 2.28-3.01% for fat, 70.7046.51% for moisture, 1.45-2.53% for ash, 19.64-29.35 mg/100g for TVN, 6.28i-7.03 for pH and zero for peroxide. The results for Clostridium botulinum and total count of bacteria for all samples of canned shrimp in three dilutions (0.1, 0.01 and 0.001) were negative with statistically significant results (P<0.05)

Demographic Characteristics of Pediatric Burn in Shahid Motahhari Hospital from 2007-2011

Background: Severe burn is one of the major causes of morbidity and mortality in children and adolescents and is third most common cause of death among this age group. The aim of this study was to evaluate demographic characteristics of pediatric burn over a period of 5 years and the relationship between cause mortality in patients with burns. Method: In this cross sectional study, documents of children under 15 years, in Shahid Motahari hospital between 2007 and 2011 was evaluated. Variables such as age, sex, stay duration in hospital, burn cause, severity, accident cause burns and outcome of patients finally entered in SPSS v.16 and were analyzed. Results: In this study, 416 patients (34/8%) were female and 780 (65/2%) were male. Factors for burns in children include boiling water in 674 cases (56/4%), flame in 190 patients (15/9%), burns with flammable materials in 131 cases (11%), burns with a hot meal for 113 people (9/4%) and other hot bodies in 30 patients (2/5) and steam burns in 3 (0/3%). Increasing in burned body surface was significantly associated with mortality (P value= &lt; 0.001). Burn severity in children who died was more than other children (P value= &lt; 0.001). Also burn etiology was significantly different in patients who died and patients were discharged (P Value= 0.003). Conclusion: Based of the results of this study, burn in boys was more than girls and was common inpatients under 2 years of age. Thermal burns were the most common type of burns in children (95/4%) and hot water were also the most important cause in thermal burns in children (56/4%).Burn extent in the majority of children (75%), was less than 30% of the body surface and burns between 50 to 100% occurred in 6/3% of cases. Average stay duration in the hospital was 12/8 days and mortality rate was 7/2%. Area and depth of the burn injury were the most important determinants of mortality

Informed Consent for Inclusion into Clinical Trials: A Serious Subject to Note in the Developing World Morteza

Introduction: Informed consent is a critical issue especially in conducting clinical trials that expose human life to medical or surgical interventions. It necessitates a long and complex process through which the participant ispresented with all potential favorable and non-favorable consequences upon getting enrolled in the study.Review: The process of taking informed consent is wellunderstoodin developed countries, with every effort taken to enhance and maintain the autonomy of patients and their right to make an informed choice of whether to participate or not. This may not be the case in thedeveloping world. The information given to patients before the trial might not be properly developed and presented, an issue that can result in serious threat to the decision-making process. On the other hand, investigators should remember that enrolling people into a trial withno potential benefit for themselves cannot be considered ethical. In the current debate, we aim to address the issue of how respectfully and ethically clinical research trials can be done on human subjects and what we can do to enhance the practice in an ethical context.Conclusion: Development of a system through which we could warrant all rights of study participants in all cases around the world seems far from view. However, if we are in doubt about the ethics of a clinical trial, we can ask ourselves: &#8220;what would we do, if we were in the same position our patients are in now?&#8221

Hybrid soft soil tire model (HSSTM). Part III : Model parameterization and validation

Part I describes the tire structure model; part II the contact detection and contact interface models for rigid and deformable terrains; part III the model parameterization and validation. Model parameters are estimated using non-linear least-square optimization to minimize the error between the Hybrid Soft Soil Tire Model (HSSTM) predictions and experimental data. The parameterization routines’ initial conditions are estimated from modal analysis in radial and circumferential directions. The preliminary parameterized model is incorporated in the optimization routine to find tire sidewall and belt parameters in the radial direction using quasi-static cleat loading test data. The vertical force at the spindle and tire contact patch are used to study the model accuracy in the radial direction. FlatTrac tire longitudinal and lateral force test data are employed to estimate the parameters in these directions. The tire shear force and moment at the spindle are validated against experimental data for lateral dynamics performance.The Cooperative Agreement W56HZV-14-2-0001 US Army TARDEC/ARC, by the European Union Horizon 2020 Framework Program, Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 645736, by the Terramechanics, Multibody, and Vehicle Systems (TMVS) Laboratory and the NSF I/UCRC Center for Tire Research (CenTiRe) at Virginia Tech, U.S.A., and by the Vehicle Dynamics Group at the University of Pretoria, South Africa.http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jterra2021-04-01hj2020Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineerin

LHRH-A implantation on reproductive cycle of Iranian sturgeon

The Iranian sturgeon (Acipenser persicus) is one of most commercially important sturgeon species in the Caspian Sea and it is considered as an endemic sturgeon of the south part of the Caspian sea. Most of its populations distributed around the south coast of the sea and also the most Iranian caviar production belonged to this species. Due to overfishing, degradation of the rivers conditions as the natural reproduction places the stocks of the fish is decreasing and that is why the Islamic republic of Iran releases millions of its fingerlings to the rivers that end to the sea to stock restoration. With regard to the high expenses of the artificial propagation and fingerlings production, finding and creation of better output will play an important role to decrease the production expenditures. Now days, the decrease in the natural stocks of broodstocks and also the low quality and immature caught broodstocks are the fundamental problems which the industry of sturgeon mass production faces. These not fully matured brooders do not response the hormonal induction processes at the sturgeon hatcheries (because they do not reach to final maturation and some of them having polarization index greater than 10) and large numbers of the caught and transported brooders to the hatcheries will not produce any fry (as the data distributed and published by the sturgeon hatcheries about the production techniques). The main objective of the research study is to apply a new method for artificial reproduction (LHRH-A implantation) to gain the best output from the Iranian sturgeon brooders caught and transported from the Caspian Sea which will be done for the first time on sturgeons and there is not still any report of the application of this procedure (LHRH-A implantation) over these kinds of fishes. Most published report on the method belonged to the teleosts

On-demand fuzzy clustering and ant-colony optimisation based mobile data collection in wireless sensor network

In a wireless sensor network (WSN), sensor nodes collect data from the environment and transfer this data to an end user through multi-hop communication. This results in high energy dissipation of the devices. Thus, balancing of energy consumption is a major concern in such kind of network. Appropriate cluster head (CH) selection may provide to be an efficient way to reduce the energy dissipation and prolonging the network lifetime in WSN. This paper has adopted the concept of fuzzy if-then rules to choose the cluster head based on certain fuzzy descriptors. To optimise the fuzzy membership functions, Particle Swarm Optimisation (PSO) has been used to improve their ranges. Moreover, recent study has confirmed that the introduction of a mobile collector in a network which collects data through short-range communications also aids in high energy conservation. In this work, the network is divided into clusters and a mobile collector starts from the static sink or base station and moves through each of these clusters and collect data from the chosen cluster heads in a single-hop fashion. Mobility based on Ant-Colony Optimisation (ACO) has already proven to be an efficient method which is utilised in this work. Additionally, instead of performing clustering in every round, CH is selected on demand. The performance of the proposed algorithm has been compared with some existing clustering algorithms. Simulation results show that the proposed protocol is more energy-efficient and provides better packet delivery ratio as compared to the existing protocols for data collection obtained through Matlab Simulations

Combining Nitrous Oxide with Carbon Dioxide Decreases the Time to Loss of Consciousness during Euthanasia in Mice — Refinement of Animal Welfare?

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the most commonly used euthanasia agent for rodents despite potentially causing pain and distress. Nitrous oxide is used in man to speed induction of anaesthesia with volatile anaesthetics, via a mechanism referred to as the “second gas” effect. We therefore evaluated the addition of Nitrous Oxide (N2O) to a rising CO2 concentration could be used as a welfare refinement of the euthanasia process in mice, by shortening the duration of conscious exposure to CO2. Firstly, to assess the effect of N2O on the induction of anaesthesia in mice, 12 female C57Bl/6 mice were anaesthetized in a crossover protocol with the following combinations: Isoflurane (5%)+O2 (95%); Isoflurane (5%)+N2O (75%)+O2 (25%) and N2O (75%)+O2 (25%) with a total flow rate of 3l/min (into a 7l induction chamber). The addition of N2O to isoflurane reduced the time to loss of the righting reflex by 17.6%. Secondly, 18 C57Bl/6 and 18 CD1 mice were individually euthanized by gradually filling the induction chamber with either: CO2 (20% of the chamber volume.min−1); CO2+N2O (20 and 60% of the chamber volume.min−1 respectively); or CO2+Nitrogen (N2) (20 and 60% of the chamber volume.min−1). Arterial partial pressure (Pa) of O2 and CO2 were measured as well as blood pH and lactate. When compared to the gradually rising CO2 euthanasia, addition of a high concentration of N2O to CO2 lowered the time to loss of righting reflex by 10.3% (P<0.001), lead to a lower PaO2 (12.55±3.67 mmHg, P<0.001), a higher lactataemia (4.64±1.04 mmol.l−1, P = 0.026), without any behaviour indicative of distress. Nitrous oxide reduces the time of conscious exposure to gradually rising CO2 during euthanasia and hence may reduce the duration of any stress or distress to which mice are exposed during euthanasia