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Brucella is a facultative intracellular pathogen, and brucellosis is commonest zoonotic disease worldwide. Brucella species, isolated from domestic animals, are important pathogen for humans. Annually, more than 500,000 new cases of brucellosis are reported, and this figure is an underestimate due to extended under-reporting cases in several endemic countries. Brucella has a variety of virulence mechanisms that prevent detection and activation of innate immunity, but protection against intracellular pathogen is represented by cell-mediated immunity. As yet, much research has been performed to develop a safe Brucella vaccine to control the disease in human and animals. Despite the availability of several live attenuated vaccine for animals, currently, no effective human vaccine is available. Moreover, due to the potential use of Brucella in bioterrorism or biowarfare, development of an effective vaccine against brucellosis for human use is necessary. In this paper, we aimed to review and discuss the efforts of researchers to develop vaccines against Brucellosis.

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Lovastatin is a potent agent for lowering cholesterol of blood. Since one of the main reasons of mortality in developing countries is cardiovascular disease, which is caused by precipitation of fatty acid (especially cholesterol) in blood vessels; therefore diets containing lovastatin may prevent this type of disease. In this study, Lovastatin, monacolin K or competitive inhibitor of the HMG-CoA reductase (operative enzyme for cholesterol synthesis) was produced by submerged fermentation using Monascus purpureus PTCC5303. Seven chemical and nutritional parameters including maltose, peptone, MgSO4.7H2O, MnSO4.H2O, KH2PO4, thiamin and pH screened using Plackett Burman experimental design for monacolin production. Among different parameters, maltose and MgSO4.7H2O showed significant effect on biomass and monacolin production. The concentration of these agents were optimized using response surface methodology for lovastatin production in the shaker flask. The optimized medium contained 26 g/L maltose, 5 g/L peptone, 0.1 g/L MgSO4.7H2O, MnSO4.H2O 0.5 g/L, 4 g/L KH2PO4, Vitamin B1 0.1 g/L and pH 7. After 10 days of fermentation in the shaker flask with 130 rpm agitation and 30 ºC, we achieved maximum lovastatin production which was 63 mg/l.

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Field experiment was conducted in 2010 and 2011, in order to study the effects of NPK fertilizers on the incidence of Verticillium wilt of a commercial variety 'Agria' in deficient soil at Eghlid Agriculture Research Station in the north of Fars province, Iran. Experimental design was randomized complete blocks and each treatment replicated three times. Treatments were the amounts of recommended NPK rate (180N, 125P, 100K), 20% and 40 % less and more than the rate based on the soil tests. Soil at planting sites was inoculated with 5 ml of microsclerotia suspension (70 ms/ml). Tubers weight, plant height and disease scores were recorded. Two-year combined analysis indicated that there were significant differences at 1% level between the treatments. The results showed a marked decrease in Verticillium wilt incidence and increase in yield when NPK was used at the recommended rate. Lowest disease score and highest yield even more than the cultivar potential were obtained in the plots when N was used 40 % more than the recommended level of the soil test (252 N), combined with K at the level of the soil test (100 K). P was essential for plant growth but had no effect on the disease.  

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One of the distinguishing features of Khāghāni’s Divan is the reflection of various people’s beliefs, socio-cultural customs of the people of that time including childish games, and superstitious beliefs .The popular and sometimes superstitious beliefs that have been prescribed in the past for the treatment of various disease have been reflected among the ancient Persian literary works especially Khāghāni’s Divan. One of these ancient medical beliefs about the treatment of animals and insects bites and stings, the treatment of some other disease, such as plague and colic, was the use of a tired cock which has run a lot before Dhabīḥah. In Folk medical and traditional books, different ways have been examined in order to use them in the case of this medical belief. To make run the old cock with other animals, however and according to ancient beliefs makes their meat tender. This research investigates these cases based on verses of Khāghāni’s Divan.
 
 

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Research Subject:Drilling operations frequently encounter numerous challenges that can lead to significant financial, human, and environmental losses. Therefore, predicting potential problems before they occur and implementing necessary preventive measures is crucial to minimizing risks. In this context, this study investigates the impact of employing artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to forecast drilling complications using real-time mud logging data collected from existing wells in an Iranian oilfield.
Research approach: A hybrid architecture combining Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) and Fully Connected neural networks was developed for the identification and detection of anomalies such as kicks and stuck pipe. Given the scarcity of these anomalies in the dataset, which could adversely affect model accuracy and performance, the Synthetic Minority Oversampling Technique (SMOTE) was applied to balance class distribution and enhance the overall effectiveness of the network. Furthermore, the influence of varying hyperparameters on reducing network error was systematically analyzed.
Main Results: Various network architectures and structures were examined. The experimental results indicated that the optimal model achieved an accuracy of 94.45% on the testing dataset with the following hyperparameters: a lookback of 7, a learning rate of 0.001, a dropout rate of 0.2, a batch size of 32, and a four-layer network architecture with 512, 256, and 256 units in the first, second, and third hidden layers, respectively. This configuration yielded higher accuracy and fewer false alarms in anomaly detection compared to other tested models. Based on the obtained results, this approach demonstrates significant potential for real-time anomaly detection in drilling operations.

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Persian with CV(C(C)) syllable structure is a language with just a double consonant final cluster. The present study is an investigation of consonant deletion in Persian final clusters. To do this 1500 words, at least 600 of them one syllable were investigated. The study has classified the clusters into two classes, with or without consonant deletion (stable or instable cluster).The consonants of the clusters were analyzed based on the sameness and distinctions of investigated features.  The study has indicated that the number of clusters with consonant deletion is less than those without. There is a direct relationship between the sameness of values and stability of clusters.  In stable clusters the same values for obstruent, continuant and voice in general, are significantly less than those with different ones. The difference between the number of + F and –F for continuant and voice are statistically significant while for obstruent is not. The study has also indicated that in addition to features phonotactic as well as word structure is also effective. In the present study consonant deletion in Persian has been analyzed in the frame work of Optimality theory. In this way it has been argued that marked constrains hierarchy stand above faithful ones. 

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Abstract The complex three-dimensional flow characteristics in river bends necessitates the use of a three-dimensional numerical model. The numerical model used in this paper is called SSIIM (Sediment Simulation In Intakes with Multiblock option).The 3D model already has showed satisfactory results in related applications. In this study, SSIIM is applied to study the variation of channel bed under steady flows in a 180 mild curved open-channel with sandy bed. Bed roughness was calibrated to ks  4.5 d90  6.25d50 . Comparison of results showed good agreement between the computed and measured bed topography. The model simulated both the point bars near the inner bank and the scour holes near the outer bank. In addition, the positions of these phenomena are in fair agreement with the measured data. Numerical results show some dependencies on the grid size. In addition, deviations of model from the experimental data as well as uncertainties in numerical modeling are discussed.

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Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), is an infectious disease with an unprecedented transmission rate. Considering that there is limited information about the prevalence of influenza co-infection among SARS-CoV-2 positive Iranian patients, and that SARS-CoV-2 co-infection with other respiratory pathogens complicates its diagnosis, prevention, and treatment, this systematic review aimed to evaluate the prevalence of influenza co-infection among SARS-CoV-2 positive Iranian population to facilitate rapid disease management.
Materials & Methods: A comprehensive search was conducted in Web of Science, PubMed, Scopus, and Google Scholar databases using relevant keywords to find all relevant articles published in English from December 2019 to July 2024. Patients of various ages with influenza-SARS-CoV-2 co-infection were evaluated. This study was conducted according to PRISMA (preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses) guidelines.
Findings: Totally, 631 articles were recognized in electronic databases, among them nine articles meeting the inclusion criteria were reviewed in this research. The prevalence of influenza co-infection among SARS-CoV-2 positive patients was 4.38%. The majority of SARS-CoV-2 positive patients were male, while the frequency distribution of influenza-SARS-CoV-2 co-infection was almost the same in both sexes. The viral load was the highest in patients aged 18-60 years.
Conclusion: The findings suggest that the prevalence of influenza co-infection among SARS-CoV-2 positive patients is low. However, the significance of this issue should not be ignored, and influenza vaccination in high-risk groups including hospitalized patients and the elderly is highly recommended due to the probability of serious complications.

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Aims: Healthcare workers are crucial in the healthcare sector, and understanding their educational prerequisites is of paramount importance. This study employed interpretive structural modeling to develop a comprehensive framework for elucidating these prerequisites in Iran.
Participants & Methods: We engaged 27 participants, including academic staff from the Universities of Medical Sciences and managers from the health and treatment network in Iran. Data were collected through self-administered questionnaires. The identified educational needs underwent validation using the Lawshe content validity index, resulting in a substantial content validity ratio (CVR) of 98%. Interpretive structural modeling was then applied to categorize and prioritize these educational needs.
Findings: The study unveiled nine essential educational needs for healthcare workers in Iran, covering domains, including effective communication skills, internet resource utilization, responsibility, work ethics, healthcare-related laws and regulations, decision-making and problem-solving abilities, teamwork, legal and ethical principles, management skills, and specialized healthcare knowledge, of which communication skills, internet resource utilization, responsibility, and work ethics emerged as the most influential factors.
Conclusion: This research offers valuable insights for the improvement of healthcare worker education and training programs in Iran.
 

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To increase agricultural crops’ quality and to minimize losses in the final product and used energy during the drying process, major drying system parameters should be continuously controlled. Precise control of such parameters is attained by using automatic control systems. To optimize the overall dryer efficiency in a forced convective solar dryer, a controller was designed, constructed and evaluated. The dryer fan speed was chosen to be the controlled variable. Based upon the mathematical relations and a monitoring of the air inlet temperature to the collector, the air outlet temperature from the collector and the air outlet temperature from the drying chamber, the dryer efficiency was determined. Using the dryer control program the current and the optimized dryer efficiencies were calculated, compared and the fan speed changed accordingly to maintain the optimized efficiency. Experiments were carried out in three replications (in three days) with the results showing that the system was capable of controlling the fan speed to obtain the optimum efficiency. The dryer equipped with the designed control system worked with its highest efficiency throughout the day. Statistical analysis showed that the control system highly improved the dryer efficiency throughout its operation at a 1% probability level.

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In biscuit production, sucrose is one of the major ingredients. Addition of sucrose is not only for the sweet taste it provides, but also for its positive effects on physical properties of the product. Since sucrose consumption is growing worldwide, finding an alternative sugar source other than sugar beet and sugar cane as the main sources of sucrose is necessary. In this research, sucrose was replaced with 0, 20, 40, 60, 80 and 100% (weight basis) of date syrup and date liquid sugar and the effects on rheological properties of biscuit dough were studied. The results from farinograph showed that the dough consistency and elasticity reduced with increasing the sucrose replacement level. However, no significant difference between the samples made with date liquid sugar and date syrup was not observed. The results of Texture Analyser showed that with reducing the sucrose content dough consistency, energy required for compression, springiness and cohesiveness reduced while adhesiveness increased. The values obtained for energy, consistency and adhesiveness of the samples containing date liquid sugar were higher than those of date syrup, while springiness was lower.  Based on the results the maximum percentage of the sucrose replacement with date liquid sugar was 60% and with date syrup was 40%. At higher percentages the quality of the dough reduced considerably.   

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In order to optimize the utilization of the advantages of packaging in the food industry, it is necessary to identify the most effective components and criteria in the packaging of food products field and to prioritize these products based on the opinions of consumers, so that the results can be considered in the planning and marketing activities of organizations. Regarding such importance, the aim is that this research evaluates the impact of those identified attitudes which shape an attitude on Packaging on customer Satisfaction and Involvement. Based on data collection, the present study is considered as descriptive. Before collecting the data through questionnaire, and so as to check the validity and reliability of the study, a pre-test was taken. Moreover, to assess the validity of the study, the diagnostic validity (DV) using an average variance extracted (AVE) was first calculated and the composite reliability (CR) was then applied to determine the reliability. Therefore, first the researchers reviewed the research literature, then, statistical sample of the population who were the customers of Shadlee in Tehran, were selected and the research hypotheses were tested using structural equations and regressions. Research findings show the significant impact of such Dimensions as “color”, “Attraction”, “Shape”, “Information on the Package”, “Size”, “Type of material” and  “Health issues”, on “attitude toward Packaging” and the significant impact of “attitude toward Packaging” on “Customer Satisfaction” and “Involvement”.

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 Date bunch fading (DBF) is a serious disease of date palm (Phoenix dactelifera L.) in Iran. Fusarium proliferatum was isolated from the xylem of fruit bunch samples sent from Kerman and Fars provinces groves to the laboratory. Koch’s postulates were completed in the greenhouse by crown injection and root inoculations. Shriveling of the fruits was induced by peduncle inoculations. Symptoms on the seedlings indicated the effects of ethylene. The possible involvement of F. prolifertum phytotoxin(s) in the induction of DBF through elicitation of ethylene is discussed. The gas is suggested to be responsible for the gums deposits and, in turn, water stress resulted in shriveling and fading of the fruits.

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Design and construction of an arch dam need two essential conditions: good rock foundation and convenient topography. When these two conditions are satisfied, arch dams would be the most desirable and the most economical type of dams. Sometimes the geometry of the valley is good, but the rock foundation is not appropriate or the rock has good material but the geometry of valley is poor. One important factor in safe design of an arch dam is the rock foundation stability problem when a large part of the external loads is transferred to the foundation by the arches. In arch dams, these forces are much larger than similar forces as compared with other dams. Moreover, the stability of an arch dam also depends on bearing capacity of the rock foundation. The idea of construction of arch dams with perimetral joint and pulvino was introduced by Italian engineers in the 40s to improve stress conditions. It was gradually expanded in the following decades. Pulvino is a thick concrete pad built between the arch dam body and the rock foundation as a strip foundation. Use of this structural component, reduces the uncertainties of the rock foundation, enabling a thinner body for the dam. Thus providing perimetral joints between the pulvino and the dam body; ensures more symmetrical distribution of stresses within the dam body. It also reduces potential tensile stresses at the boundaries of the dam body. In this study, the effect of pulvino is investigated on the behavior of an arch dam body built in a valley with weak rock layers. The results are compared with the case of a conventional arch dam (Control Dam); i.e., without pulvino in the same valley conditions. In order to maintain the same concrete design properties, the volume of the Control Dam had to increase by 40% in respect to the total volume of the dam with pulvino. The foundation has a weak layer in different situations identically for both dams. The only nonlinearity accounted for, corresponds to the perimetral joints. Applied loads include the weight and the hydrostatic pressure. The dam weight is applied step by step to simulate the staged-construction of an arch dam. The ANSYS 12.1 program is used to create the finite element models of the objective arch dam and its foundation. Results of this study show that use of pulvino causes symmetric and uniform distribution of stresses in the dam body even if the rock layers are weak and asymmetric. Contrary to the Control Dam case, higher tensile stresses occur only inside the pulvino and thus the main body of the dam is protected against such stresses. As pulvino is usually reinforced, the dam with pulvino and its perimetral joint remain acceptable. Thus, despite a rather expensive and harder construction job for such dams with pulvino and perimetral joints, their considerably lower concrete volume may well compensate the problem. Thus this type of arch dam remain still economic and competitive for the future designs.

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The present study proposes a novel numerical method for fatigue life prediction under non-proportional loading. This method is employed for fatigue life estimation of different materials including 1045 Steel, 30CrNiMo8HH, Titanium TC4, extracted AZ31B Magnesium and Aluminum alloy 6061 under both proportional and non-proportional loadings. Basis of the method is developed in the framework of two numerical modifications. The first modification modifies fatigue damage parameters by correlating damages quantities of non-proportional loading to the proportional one. The second modification uses the same equation as the first one, but the corresponding damage coefficient is replaced by the additional hardening coefficient. In addition, these modifications are applied to fatigue damage parameters including maximum shear strain, SWT, Fatemi-Socie, and Babaei-Ghasemi model and also verified against experimental observations available in literature. Furthermore, the obtained results are discussed in details and also are compared to the non-modified findings. Moreover, the variation of the fatigue life prediction error is calculated for the aforementioned models. Finally, the results show considering and implementation of these modifications significantly improves the accuracy of the predicted fatigue lives for all the studied cases.

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Three-dimensional submerged jet at a sudden expansion includes chaotic hydrodynamics. At a sudden expansion, secondary flows developed adjacent to the potential core of the jet generate turbulence, and the formed eddies cause energy transfer and dissipation and decline of fluid momentum in the zone of established flow. By utilizing an efficient mathematical model of turbulence, hydrodynamic flow parameters can be predicted with a good accuracy in various locations. This paper studies the three-equation mathematical models of turbulence, namely the Walters and Cokljat (k-kl-ω), and the seven-equation Reynolds Stress mathematical model of turbulence. Comparison between the results of computational fluid dynamics using Ansys Fluent software and experimental results shows that Reynolds Stress model of turbulence predicts the results with a higher accuracy. It can be concluded that this higher accuracy is due to the use of individual transport equations for each component of the stress tensor in the normal conditions of inhomogeneous and anisotropic turbulence. Kinetic energy, very high fluid momentum and pressure fluctuations are among characteristic of a submerged jets at a sudden expansion. How the energy is dissipated by the flow and how the secondary flow structures are generated need an extensive research. In the submerged jets, because secondary flows are developed in the vicinity of jet potential nuclear and eddies are generated in various sizes, the energy is received from the mean flow and will be being dissipated while being transferred. The dissipation process can be observed during the interaction between stress and strain fields of fluid elements (second-order tensor interaction). Formation of eddies with different sizes and decay of them into smaller structures prompt the process of turbulence diffusion. The energy-bearing eddies formed in the vicinity of the jet potential core are displaced by convection terms. After these eddies are displaced, they experience decay and reduction in size (Kolmogorov microscale) and finally disappear. Rotational dynamics around the jet potential core is of a great importance in terms of flow kinetic energy dissipation; it is why the sudden expansion ratio is a number that represents the range of rotation. Therefore, understanding the flow behavior as well as how the resulting energy is generated and dissipated requires the flow parameters to be known. In order to predict the most accurate (closest to reality) values of the hydrodynamic parameters of a submerged jet, it is necessary to utilize an efficient mathematical model. Among the proposed models of turbulence, only the multi-equation Reynolds stress mathematical model has included anisotropy. Based on what have been stated so far, it seems that the existence of discrete transport equations for each component of stress tensor for a fluid and turbulence kinetic energy dissipation as well as comparison with experimental results provide the possibility of acceptable accuracy in predicting the flow hydrodynamic parameters. In this model, the term of turbulence kinetic energy generation from the mean flow, energy dissipation term, and pressure-strain term transferring the turbulence kinetic energy toward different directions of the coordinate axes are among the very important elements of the transport equation.

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In this paper, by defining a novel analytical derivation method for a composite beam, using the suitable assumptions, the stiffness coefficients and torsional rigidity (shear modulus) for single-cell and multi-cell thin walled layer wise composite sections of a beam are calculated. The results are presented in the form of Maple and FORTRAN codes in order to calculate these parameters in a timely manner. These parameters are used for the preliminary structural analysis of the beam. The nonlinear Euler Bernoulli beam assumptions are used to derive the stress-strain and strain-curvature relations. Next, by using the potential energy and elastic curvature relation for elastic beams, the stiffness parameter is calculated. Then, the equivalent torsional rigidity is introduced for single and multi-cell thin walled layer wise composite sections, using the stiffness parameter. To verify the validity of the computations, the results are compared with the numerical results obtained from a finite element analysis. The results show that applying this method for the calculation of the torsional rigidity of single and multi-cell thin-walled composite sections is a viable method and is very useful in obtaining a suitable, initial analytical approximation in the preliminary design of engineering structures, particularly in that of composite structures utilized in aerial industries.