An Iconographic Study of Sultan Mohammad Naqash's Painting Called "Masti Lahouti - Nasuti "

The painting called “Lahouti (divine) and Nassotti (worldly) Intoxication”, has been drawn on a page in Divan Hafez by Sam Mirza, whose painter was Sultan Mohammad Naqash, a Tabriz Safavid School painter, who is regarded as one of the shining examples of pictorial icons for the creation of a mystical, symbolic, and theatrical atmosphere as well as visual attractions. The present study is a theoretical one and has been conducted through a descriptive-analytical method, analyzing the iconography used in the above-mentioned painting by collecting images and information using the library method. By utilizing a historical and semantic approach to Hafiz's poetry as well as the artistic style of Sultan Mohammad, this study aims at decrypting the mystical and narrative concepts in this painting. The main research question raised here is: "What are the philosophical, mystical, lyrical and mythological concepts behind the relationship between icons and the visual atmosphere dominating the image?" Review of literature was conducted on Hafez's life as well as semantics and stylistics used in his odes as well as the history of the Turkmen and Tabriz Safavid Painting Schools and the style of Sultan Mohammad Naqash, recorded in articles and books by Iranian and foreign authors. The above-mentioned resources were studied, and it was concluded that Sultan Mohammad’s exaggerated, and humorous style matches Hafiz's quick-witted outlook and it is appropriate to divide the painting into three distinctive parts from top to bottom and consider the appropriate icons for each of the sections through a mystical and separating perspective as Nassott, Malakut and Lahout. Kajian Ikonografi Lukisan Sultan Muhammad Naqash Berjudul "Masti Lahouti - Nasuti" Abstrak Lukisan yang berjudul “Lahouti (divine) and Nassotti (worldly) Intoxication”, digambar pada sebuah halaman di Divan Hafez oleh Sam Mirza, di mana pelukisnya adalah Sultan Mohammad Naqash, seorang pelukis Sekolah Tabriz Safawi, yang dianggap sebagai salah satu contoh cemerlang ikon bergambar untuk penciptaan suasana mistis, simbolis dan teatrikal serta atraksi visual. Penelitian ini bersifat teoretis dan dilakukan melalui metode deskriptif-analitik, menganalisis ikonografi yang digunakan dalam lukisan tersebut dengan mengumpulkan gambar dan informasi menggunakan metode kepustakaan. Dengan memanfaatkan pendekatan historis dan semantik pada puisi-puisi Hafez serta gaya artistik Sultan Mohammad, kajian ini bertujuan untuk mendekripsi konsep mistik dan naratif pada lukisan. Pertanyaan penelitian utama yang diangkat yaitu: "Apa konsep filosofis, mistis, liris, dan mitologis dibalik hubungan antara ikon dan suasana visual yang mendominasi gambar?" Tinjauan literatur dilakukan pada kehidupan Hafez serta semantik dan gaya yang digunakan dalam syairnya serta sejarah Sekolah Lukisan Safawi Turkmenistan dan Tabriz dan gaya Sultan Mohammad Naqash, yang dicatat dalam artikel dan buku oleh penulis Iran dan asing. Melalui sumber yang didapat maka disimpulkan bahwa gaya Sultan Mohammad yang berlebihan dan humoris cocok dengan pandangan Hafez yang cerdas dan pantas untuk membagi lukisan menjadi tiga bagian yang berbeda dari atas ke bawah dan mempertimbangkan ikon yang sesuai untuk masing-masing bagian melalui perspektif mistis dan terpisah sebagai Nassott, Malakut dan Lahout

Extracting Implicit Social Relation for Social Recommendation Techniques in User Rating Prediction

Recommendation plays an increasingly important role in our daily lives. Recommender systems automatically suggest items to users that might be interesting for them. Recent studies illustrate that incorporating social trust in Matrix Factorization methods demonstrably improves accuracy of rating prediction. Such approaches mainly use the trust scores explicitly expressed by users. However, it is often challenging to have users provide explicit trust scores of each other. There exist quite a few works, which propose Trust Metrics to compute and predict trust scores between users based on their interactions. In this paper, first we present how social relation can be extracted from users' ratings to items by describing Hellinger distance between users in recommender systems. Then, we propose to incorporate the predicted trust scores into social matrix factorization models. By analyzing social relation extraction from three well-known real-world datasets, which both: trust and recommendation data available, we conclude that using the implicit social relation in social recommendation techniques has almost the same performance compared to the actual trust scores explicitly expressed by users. Hence, we build our method, called Hell-TrustSVD, on top of the state-of-the-art social recommendation technique to incorporate both the extracted implicit social relations and ratings given by users on the prediction of items for an active user. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work to extend TrustSVD with extracted social trust information. The experimental results support the idea of employing implicit trust into matrix factorization whenever explicit trust is not available, can perform much better than the state-of-the-art approaches in user rating prediction

Moisture-dependent engineering properties of black cumin (Nigella sativa L.) seed

The moisture-dependent physical properties are important to investigate for designing the post harvest equipments of the product.  The physical properties of black cumin were evaluated as a function of moisture content in the range of 5.1% to 18.75% w.b.  The average length, width, thickness and 1,000 seed mass were 3.11 mm, 1.59 mm, 1.09 mm and 2.76 g, respectively, at moisture content of 5.1% w.b.  The geometric mean diameter and sphericity increased from 1.75 mm to   1.79 mm and 56.34% to 56.98% as moisture content increased from 5.1% to 18.75% w.b., respectively.  In the same moisture range, the bulk density decreased from 539.3 kg/m3 to 486.4 kg/m3, whereas the corresponding true density and porosity increased from 1,009.4 kg/m3 to 1,071.2 kg/m3 and 46.5% to 54.59%, respectively.  As the moisture content increased from 5.1% to 18.75% w.b., the angle of repose, terminal velocity and surface areas were found to increase from 32.5° to 33.3°,    5.6 m/s to 5.92 m/s and 8.14 mm2 to 8.46 mm2, respectively.  The static coefficient of friction increased on four structural surfaces namely, galvanized iron sheet (0.37-0.41), mild steel (0.36-0.39), aluminum (0.32-0.34) and plywood (0.53-0.58) in the moisture range from 5.1%-18.75% w.b.Key words: black cumin, Nigella sativa, engineering properties, moisture content Citation: Gharib-Zahedi S. M. T., S. M. Mousavi, A. moayedi, A. T. Garavand, and S. M. Alizadeh.  Moisture-dependent engineering properties of black cumin (Nigella sativa L.) seed.  Agric Eng Int: CIGR Journal, 2010, 12(1): 194-202.&nbsp

A new transformation for embedded convolutional neural network approach toward real-time servo motor overload fault-detection

Overloading in DC servo motors is a major concern in industries, as many companies face the problem of finding expert operators, and also human monitoring may not be an effective solution. Therefore, this paper proposed an embedded Artificial intelligence (AI) approach using a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) using a new transformation to extract faults from real-time input signals without human interference. Our main purpose is to extract as many as possible features from the input signal to achieve a relaxed dataset that results in an effective but compact network to provide real-time fault detection even in a low-memory microcontroller. Besides, fault detection method a synchronous dual-motor system is also proposed to take action in faulty events. To fulfill this intention, a one-dimensional input signal from the output current of each DC servo motor is monitored and transformed into a 3d stack of data and then the CNN is implemented into the processor to detect any fault corresponding to overloading, finally experimental setup results in 99.9997% accuracy during testing for a model with nearly 8000 parameters. In addition, the proposed dual-motor system could achieve overload reduction and provide a fault-tolerant system and it is shown that this system also takes advantage of less energy consumption

The ethical views of Islam in international relations

Given the intrinsic orientation of humankind towards society, humans in their mutual life form communities at different levels, such as families, tribes, ethnic groups, nations, and the world. The primary goal in such a formation is self-interest. However, various conflicting interests inevitably lead to disputes and complications. Therefore, in order to avoid the harmful consequences of such situations and also to avail self-interest, humans are in need of some definite criteria. One of the most important levels of human interaction happens on the international level. This includes relations between governments, foreign groups, organizations and even individuals of different countries. These relationships remain immune to vulnerability as long as they are based on reasonable and intellectual standards. Many schools and thoughts have been pursued in order to find the most productive one in various fields, including that of international relations. Among many religions, sects and schools, Islam, emphasizing the value of justice, provides a comprehensive set of criteria based upon ethics and sharia for the purpose of regulating human relations in the international arena. In light of the aforementioned view, the authors, by referring to various resources in library-oriented research, seek to utilize the data in a descriptive-analytical methodology, in trying to investigate the question of what the approach of Islam is with regard to ethics in international relations. The authors firmly believe that Islam, in the ranks of the normative or value theories of international relations, deals with the dangers and failures of international relations theories and describes and prescribes international relations as it ought to be, putting emphasis on the ethical approach

A promising approach to low electrical percolation threshold in PMMA nanocomposites by using MWCNT-PEO predispersions

Electrical conductive poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) nanocomposites with low percolation threshold are very challenging to be prepared. Here, we show that the miscibility between poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) as matrix for predispersions of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and PMMA represents an efficient approach to achieve very low electrical percolation threshold. PMMA/PEO-MWCNTs nanocomposites were prepared by a two-step solution casting method involving pre-mixing of MWCNTs with PEO and then mixing of PEO-MWCNTs with PMMA, resulting in a PMMA/PEO ratio of 80/20 wt%. The electrical percolation threshold (EPT) value was determined to be ~ 0.07 wt% which is significantly lower than most of the reported EPT values in the literature for PMMA/CNT composites. The very low electrical percolation threshold was attributed to the effectual role of PEO in self-assembly of secondary structures of nanotubes into an electrically conductive network. This was further confirmed by transmission electron microscopy and by comparing the obtained EPT value with the prediction of the excluded volume model in which statistical percolation threshold is defined based on uniform distribution of high-aspect ratio sticks in a matrix. Moreover, based on UV–Vis measurements and linear viscoelastic rheological measurements, optical and rheological percolation thresholds were obtained at nearly 0.01 wt% and 0.5 wt%, respectively

The Outcome of the Parliamentary System in Islamic Republic of Iran in the Field of Civil Rights

زمینه و هدف: استقرار نظام پارلمانی در جمهوری اسلامی ایران دغدغه اندیشمندان و مرکز توجه بسیاری از پژوهش‌ها بوده است. پیش از این، امکان‌سنجی دگردیسی رژیم سیاسی به پارلمانی در ساختار نظام حقوقی ایران، و چالش‌ها و تهدیدهای آن مورد بحث و تضارب آرا قرار گرفته است. این در شرایطی است که با بذل نظر به اهمیت پیامدگرایی در سازه‌بندی نظام‌های سیاسی، نگاه تخصصی ـ تحلیلی در این حوزه اولویت بیشتری می‌یابد. تحقیق حاضر با این هدف، با رویکردی پیامدگرا، تأثیرگذاری پارلمانی‌شدن در جمهوری اسلامی ایران را بر مؤلفه‌های توسعه و حقوق شهروندی مورد توجه قرار می‌دهد. مواد و روش‌ها: پژوهش حاضر با روش توصیفی ـ تحلیلی و با استفاد از منابع کتابخانه‌ای ـ اسنادی انجام می‌پذیرد. یافته‌ها: حقوق شهروندی در سطوح سیاسی، اجتماعی و اقتصادی خاصه از مجرای مؤلفه‌های همگرایی یا واگرایی قوا و نیز مظاهر دموکراسی و شرکت شهروندان در تعیین سرنوشت خود، تحت تأثیر مستقیم یا غیر مستقیم تغییر رژیم سیاسی قرار می‌گیرد. در جمهوری اسلامی ایران به واسطه جایگاه خاص انتخابات ریاست جمهوری و شرایط حاکم بر آن و همچنین ضعف‌های تحزب و انتخابات مجلس و مضافاً کیفیت روابط قوای حاکم، تغییر رژیم از ریاستی به پارلمانی، بدون تحقق لوازم و مقدمات این تغییر، دایره حقوق سیاسی شهروندان را تضییق می‌نماید که متعاقباً در بعد آزادی‌های فردی و حقوق اجتماعی و همچنین توسعه اقتصادی، این امر می‌تواند آثار منفی را موجب گردد. نتیجه‌گیری: فراهم‌آوری ملزومات نظام پارلمانی نظیر فرهنگ تحزب، تغییرات قانونی و تحولات ساختاری، گذار به پارلمانی در نظام حقوقی ایران را توأم با ارتقای مؤلفه‌های حقوق شهروندی ممکن می‌نماید، لیکن با ملاحظه هزینه‌هایی که این امر بر دولت و شهروندان تحمیل می‌نماید، فرضیه ارتقای کیفی نظام ریاستی فعلی با هدف تأثیرگذاری مثبت بر حقوق سیاسی، اجتماعی و اقتصادی شهروندان، تقویت می‌شود.Background and Aim: The establishment of a parliamentary system in the Islamic Republic of Iran has been the challenge of thinkers and the focus of many studies. Previously, the possibility of transforming the political regime into a Parliamentary in the structure of the Iranian legal system and its challenges and threats have been discussed and conflicting. However, considering the importance of consequentialism in the construction of political systems, a specialized-analytical research in this area becomes more priority. With this objective, the present study, with a consequentialist approach, considers the impact of parliamentarization in the Islamic Republic of Iran on the components of development and citizenship rights.  Materials and Methods: The present research is done by descriptive-analytical method and using library-documentary sources. Findings: Citizenship rights at political, social and economic levels are directly or indirectly affected by the change of political regime through the components of the synergy or divergence of forces, as well as the manifestations of democracy and the participation of citizens in determining their own destiny. In the Islamic Republic of Iran due to the special status of presidential elections and the situation in it, as well as the weaknesses of the party and the parliamentary elections and also the quality of the relations between the ruling powers, changing the regime from a presidential to a parliamentary system, without fulfilling the requirements and preconditions of this change, narrows the scope of citizens' political rights which subsequently in the context of individual freedoms and social rights, as well as economic development, can have negative effects. Conclusion: Providing the requirements of the parliamentary system, such as party culture, legal changes and structural changes, makes the transition to a parliamentary in the Iranian legal system possible by promoting the components of citizenship rights, however, considering the costs that this process imposes on the government and the citizens, the hypothesis of improving the quality of the current presidential system with the aim of having a positive impact on the political, social and economic rights of the citizens is supported.   Please cite this article as: Razaghi MR, Habibnejad SA, Taheri M. The Outcome of the Parliamentary System in Islamic Republic of Iran in the Field of Civil Rights. Bioethics Journal, Special Issue on Bioethics and Citizenship Rights 2020; 199-200

Sensitivity to Antibiotics of Bacteria Exposed to Gamma Radiation Emitted from Hot Soils of the High Background Radiation Areas of Ramsar, Northern Iran

Background: Over the past several years our laboratories have investigated different aspects of the challenging issue of the alterations in bacterial susceptibility to antibiotics induced by physical stresses. Objective: To explore the bacterial susceptibility to antibiotics in samples of Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica serovar Typhimurium (S. typhimurium), Staphylococcus aureus, and Klebsiella pneumoniae after exposure to gamma radiation emitted from the soil samples taken from the high background radiation areas of Ramsar, northern Iran. Methods: Standard Kirby-Bauer test, which evaluates the size of the zone of inhibition as an indicator of the susceptibility of different bacteria to antibiotics, was used in this study. Results: The maximum alteration of the diameter of inhibition zone was found for K. pneumoniae when tested for ciprofloxacin. In this case, the mean diameter of no growth zone in non-irradiated control samples of K. pneumoniae was 20.3 (SD 0.6) mm; it was 14.7 (SD 0.6) mm in irradiated samples. On the other hand, the minimum changes in the diameter of inhibition zone were found for S. typhimurium and S. aureus when these bacteria were tested for nitrofurantoin and cephalexin, respectively. Conclusion: Gamma rays were capable of making significant alterations in bacterial susceptibility to antibiotics. It can be hypothesized that high levels of natural background radiation can induce adaptive phenomena that help microorganisms better cope with lethal effects of antibiotics

Association between single nucleotide polymorphism in miR-499, miR-196a2, miR-146a and miR-149 and prostate cancer risk in a sample of Iranian population

AbstractMicroRNAs (miRNAs) play an important role in regulating gene expression at the post-transcriptional level and are involved in numerous physiological processes. Accumulating evidence suggests that single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in human miRNA genes may affect miRNA biogenesis pathway and influence the susceptibility to several diseases such as cancer. The present study aimed to evaluate the impact of miR-499 rs3746444, miR-196a2 rs11614913, miR-149 rs2292832, and miR-146a rs2910164 polymorphisms on prostate cancer (PCa) risk in a sample of Iranian population. This case-control study was done on 169 patients with pathologically confirmed PCa and 182 benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). The genotyping assays were done using T-ARMS-PCR or PCR-RFLP methods. The findings indicated that CC genotype of miR-499 rs3746444 polymorphism increased the risk of PCa (OR=1.76, 95% CI=1.12–2.79, P=0.019) compared to TT genotype. No statistically significant association was found between miR-196a2 rs11614913, miR-149 rs2292832, and miR-146a rs2910164 polymorphisms and PCa risk. In summary, the findings indicated that miR-499 rs3746444 polymorphism increased the risk of PCa in an Iranian population. Further studies with larger sample sizes and different ethnicities are necessary to verify the findings of the present study