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Antinutrients in rice tend to impair nutrient bioavailability; hence, this study aimed to investigate the effects of cooking and simulated digestion on the antioxidant activity and phenolic content of white and brown rice, as well as the bioavailability of some minerals. The rice grains were cooked in a pressure cooker, using a 1:2 (w/v) rice-to-water ratio. The digestion of the cooked rice grains was then simulated using pepsin and pancreatin systems. The phenolic (total, free, and bound) and flavonoid content; antioxidant activity (DPPH, ABTS, and FRAP); phytic acid and tannin levels; and mineral HCl-extractability were all determined in the raw, cooked, and digested grains. The cooking process significantly lowered (p ≤ 0.05) the phenolic content of the white rice; however, the phenolic content increased significantly (p ≤ 0.05) when these cooked grains were digested. The phenolic content of brown rice decreased at a higher rate during cooking than that of white rice, and it recovered at a lower rate after digestion. The flavonoid content in both cooked and digested white and brown rice followed a similar trend with the phenolic content. This reduction in the phenolic and flavonoid content in both types of rice after cooking was associated with a large decrease in antioxidant activity, whereas, after digestion, it was associated with a considerable increase. After cooking, the levels of phytate and tannin in both types of rice decreased significantly (p ≤ 0.05), and this drop was even more pronounced in the digested grains. Although the mineral content in the cooked samples of white and brown rice decreased, it recovered after digestion; however, the mineral content remained lower than that of the raw samples. Despite this, there was also a rise in the bioavailability of the minerals in the cooked rice after digestion (p ≤ 0.05), which was considerably higher than the rise in the mineral content itself. The findings indicate that, while cooking rice decreases its phenolic content and antioxidant activity, it also lowers its antinutrient content. Additional benefits were also noted following the simulated digestion.

A field study was conducted to evaluate the effects of the mole drains in the corn crop (zea mayes L.) field during the season of 2019; this study was carried out at the Agricultural research station, University of Basrah, where the soil was silty clay loam. The results showed that the treatments of mole drains filled with gravel and sand mixture (S+G) and filled with gravel and sand layers (S/G) affected the decrease of the electrical conductivity (EC), and the exchanged sodium percentage (ESP) compared to W.M. treatment. The S/G drain gave lower values compared to the S+G drain. As well as, the values of EC decreased by the increase of the depth of the mole drain. Also, the treatments of mole drains distances of 2 m decreased the values of EC and ESP compared to the distance of 4 m. The S/G with depth of 60 cm and distance of 2m gave the lower values of EC and ESP, while the W.M. treatment gave higher values. Soil depths of 0-10 and 10-20 cm reached the lower values of EC and ESP; however depths of 50-60 cm gave the higher values. The treatment of S/G, with mole drain depth of 50 cm, and soil depth of 20-30 cm gave a lower value of EC; while, S+G, with mole drain depth of 50 cm, and soil depth of 50-60 cm gave a higher value. Finally, the ESP was decreased in the end of the growing season compared to the middle of the season.

Background: Herniated lumbar disc is a depositions of discs material (nucleus pulposus and annulus fibrosus) behind the intervertebral disk. Intervertebral disc connected the vertebral bodies together by pad of fibrocartilage. The major functions of intervertebral disc are mechanical, transferring load coming from the body weight and muscle contractions by spinal columns and letting the curving, flexion, and contortion. Aim: To assess the awareness of general population in Aseer region, southern of Saudi Arabia, regarding disc herniation and to identify the predictors for their awareness. Methodology: A descriptive cross-sectional approach was conducted through a questionnaire designed to examine the public herniated disc awareness and knowledge. The questionnaire given to individuals from general population visiting general public places in Aseer region. Content validity for the questionnaire was done as it was reviewed by three experts for any modification of corrections. Results: The study included 1,044 participants aged between 15 and 70 years with mean age of 36.3 ± 11.2 years old. The majority of respondents were males (62.4%) and Saudi (98.9%). About 71% of the participants were university graduated. Generally, only 9% of the study participants recorded good awareness level regarding all aspects of disc herniation. Conclusion: This study showed that awareness regarding disc herniation among the general population was very poor for all domains.

This paper proposes a novel variant of the Grey Wolf Optimization (GWO) algorithm, named Velocity-Aided Grey Wolf Optimizer (VAGWO). The original GWO lacks a velocity term in its position-updating procedure, and this is the main factor weakening the exploration capability of this algorithm. In VAGWO, this term is carefully set and incorporated into the updating formula of the GWO. Furthermore, both the exploration and exploitation capabilities of the GWO are enhanced in VAGWO via stressing the enlargement of steps that each leading wolf takes towards the others in the early iterations while stressing the reduction in these steps when approaching the later iterations. The VAGWO is compared with a set of popular and newly proposed meta-heuristic optimization algorithms through its implementation on a set of 13 high-dimensional shifted standard benchmark functions as well as 10 complex composition functions derived from the CEC2017 test suite and three engineering problems. The complexity of the proposed algorithm is also evaluated against the original GWO. The results indicate that the VAGWO is a computationally efficient algorithm, generating highly accurate results when employed to optimize high-dimensional and complex problems.

The field performance of movable boards ditch opener (MB) and conventional ditch opener (CD) was contrasted by using a specific resistance to determine the optimum performance of either one of them. The comparison was conducted using three operating depths (30, 40 and 50cm), three angles between the boards of MB (45, 60 and 750), one angle for CD (650) because its boards were fixed, three wings width of the foot of MB whereas, for CD, one share width (35cm) and two soil types (cultivated and uncultivated). CD could not penetrate the uncultivated soil more than 25cm so that there was one operating depth. The results of the experiments showed that SR for MB decreased as the operating depth, the angle between the boards and the width of the wings of the foot in both soil types were increased. Specific resistance (SR) for CD also decreased as the operating depth increased in the cultivated soil, but in the uncultivated soil, CD could not penetrate the soil more than 25cm. SR for MB was lower than that for CD for all operating depths, the angle between the boards, the width of the wings of the foot in both soil types. SR for MB and CD in the cultivated soil was low compared to uncultivated soil. The soil type decreased SR for MB more than the operating depth, the angle between its boards and the width of its wings. On the other hand, the angle between its boards reduced SR more than the width of the wings and the operating depth. MB surpassed CD in giving lower SR and that means the field performance of MB was higher than that for CD.

The draft force of the movable boards ditch opener (MB) was compared with that of the conventional ditch opener (CD). The parameters of the experiments were three operating depths (30, 40 and 50 cm), three angles between the boards of MB (45, 60 and 75º), the angle of the boards of CD was constant (65º), three wings widths of the foot of MB whereas, one share width (35cm) for CD and two soil types (cultivated and uncultivated soils). The texture of soils was silty clay. The results showed that MB can penetrate the soil to the required depth easily and its draft force requirements were lower than that for CD for all operating depths, angle between the boards and in the cultivated and in uncultivated soils. Whereas, CD could not penetrate the soil more than 25cm in the uncultivated soil that its draft force higher than that for MB for operating depth of 30 and 40 cm and for all angles between the boards but the contrary occurred with operating depth of 50cm. The draft force requirement of MB increased slightly with the angle between the boards but it MB increased considerably with increasing wings width of the foot. However, the wings of MB required less draft force than the share of CD which its width was 35 cm (constant width). MB surpassed CD in the field performance, it required less draft force and it could penetrate the soils easily.

Field experiments were conducted in silty clay soil, to study the effect of using the modified subsoiler-moldboard plow (MSMP) on some soil properties (bulk density, penetration resistance and electrical conductivity) and on some of broad bean growth and yield parameters (emergency rate, plant height, frock number, pods number per plant, seeds number per pods, weight of 1000 seeds, and total yield). The experiment parameters were three depths of subsoiler as a part of MSMP (30,40 and 50cm) and two depths of moldboard as a part of MSMP (20 and 30cm). The results showed that increasing the subsoiler depth from 30 to 40 cm resulted in redusing the bulk density and electrical conductivity of the soil by 2.70 and 8.29%, respectively, while increased the growth and yield parameters by 10.17, 14.29, 33.43, 7.37, 21.46, 27.31 and 45%, respectively. Increasing the subsoiler depth from 40 to 50cm decreased the soil bulk density and electrical conductivity by 1.85 and 0.60% respectively, whereas the growth and yield parameters increased by 10.22, 37.50, 49.89, 93.13 35.34, 33.34 and 117.67% respectively. The increase of the moldboard depths from 20 to 30cm leaded to increase the growth and yield parameters by 23.16%, 24.70%, 67.46%, 57.51%, 34.38%, 20.33% and 68.16% respectively. The subsoiler and moldboard depths (50 and 30cm) gave the highest emergence rate, plant height, weight of 1000 seeds and yield by 71.61%, 109.42%, 111.01% and 407.46% compared with the shallow depths of subsoiler and moldboard plow depths (30 and 20cm respectively). The results revealed that the values of the soil properties decreased by 12.50%, 60.31% and 40.86%, respectively after tillage, whereas they increased by 17.35%, 250.68% and 169.09%, respectively before harvest.

A field experiment was carried out in silty clay soil at Agricultural Research Station of Garmat Ali in order to study the effect of the plowing depths and manure application on soil moisture content at different soil depths (0-10 (d1), 10-20 (d2), 20-30 (d3), 30-40 (d4), 40-50 (d5) and 50-60 cm (d6)) and two periods (after plowing and after harvesting the sunflower crop). The experiment was conducted using an implement of plowing and manure mixing with soil, which consists of two main parts (two moldboard plows and two subsoilers).The implement was designed and manufactured in the Agriculture machines and Equipment Department in 2015. The treatments used in the study were included two levels of manure application (0 and 45.5 ton ha-1) and two plowing depths of moldboard plow (M) with three plowing depths of subsoiler (S). They were 20 cm of moldboard plow with 20, 30 and 40 cm of subsoiler (M20S20, M20S30 and M20S40), and 30 cm of moldboard plow with 10, 20 and 30 cm of subsoiler (M30S10, M30S20 and M30S30). The results showed that the soil moisture content (MC) was significantly decreased with increasing the plowing depths by the moldboard plows and subsoilers especially after soil plowing. While, the MC significantly increased with increasing the soil depth after the plowing and after harvesting the crop. In contrast, mixing the manure with soil at level 45.5 ton ha-1 by the manufactured implement increased the soil moisture content by 10.73% after the plowing and by 2.33% after the harvesting the sunflower crop compared with untreated soil with manure.

A field experiment was carried out in silty loam soil at Agricultural research station, College of Agriculture during the corn growing season of 2015. The aim of study was to determine the effect of manure (cattle residues) levels (0, 20 and 40 ton ha-1), the depth of manure application (10, 20 and 30 cm), and the method ofmanure application (mixing with soil and subsoil laying) on soil bulk density and soil water content. The manure was added at certain treatments by using a ditch opener and manure laying machine which was designed and manufactured in the Agriculture Machines and Equipment Department, College of Agriculture, University of Basrah in 2015. The field was plowed perpendicularly, and the treatments were arranged in RCBD with split-split plot design with three replicated using drip irrigation system. Corn (Zea mays L.) seeds were planted on the manure rows. All plots received NPK fertilization with the same levels. At the end of growing season, soil samples (0-30 cm) were collected to examine soil bulk density and soil water content. The results showed that, lower bulk density and higher water content were obtained at level of 40 ton ha-1compared with the levels of 0 and 20 ton ha-1. The soil bulk density decreased from1.23 to 1.20 Mg m-3 and the soil water content increased from 26.33 to 30.23 % whenthe depth of application increased from 10 to 30 cm. Mixing manure with soil resulted in lower value of bulk density and higher value of water content compared with subsoil laying method. Mixing manure with soil down to the depth of 30 cm amount of 40 ton ha-1 improved the soil bulk density which reached lower value of 1.14 Mg m-3 and soilwater content increased to 36.19% among all other treatments.

This paper proposes an open and distributed clinical decision support system architecture. This technical architecture takes advantage of Electronic Health Record (EHR), data mining techniques, clinical databases, domain expert knowledge bases, available technologies and standards to provide decision-making support for healthcare professionals. The architecture will work extremely well in distributed EHR environments in which each hospital has its own local EHR, and it satisfies the compatibility, interoperability and scalability objectives of an EHR. The system will also have a set of distributed knowledge bases. Each knowledge base will be specialized in a specific domain (i.e., heart disease), and the model achieves cooperation, integration and interoperability between these knowledge bases. Moreover, the model ensures that all knowledge bases are up-to-date by connecting data mining engines to each local knowledge base. These data mining engines continuously mine EHR databases to extract the most recent knowledge, to standardize it and to add it to the knowledge bases. This framework is expected to improve the quality of healthcare, reducing medical errors and guaranteeing the safety of patients by helping clinicians to make correct, accurate, knowledgeable and timely decisions.

The problem of unsteady flow are frequently encountered in long oilpipelines without the provision of surge tank due to sudden closing oropening of valve and pump trip. The oil-hammer are analyzed andpredicted by using the Eulerian approach (MOC) and the Lagrangianapproach (WCM). The investigation was carried out for sufficiently longtime to demonstrate changing of pressure head with time. Transientconditions arising in long oil pipeline with pumping station, valve andbranches are studied in details for KRK pipeline by these two pproaches.A Computer programs for all these components were developed.The effect of valve closure, line branch junction and pump shut-down are studied taking into account the effect of line friction on pressure wave. Anumerical model "UNSTEADY_ FRIC_WH" using MOC and Barr's explicit friction factor has been presented for solution of the transient flowsituation of water hammer. Assessment of friction factor at any section in this unsteady transient flow conditions clearly indicates the effectiveness of using variable friction factor in contrast to the steady state friction as in the available numerical models.

In state of the art photoinjector electron sources, thermal emittance from photoemission dominates the final injector emittance. Therefore, low thermal emittance cathode developments and diagnostics are very important. Conventional thermal emittance measurements for the high gradient gun are time-consuming and thus thermal emittance is not measured as frequently as quantum efficiency during the lifetime of photocathodes, although both are important properties for the photoinjector optimizations. In this paper, a single shot measurement of photoemission transverse momentum, i.e., thermal emittance per rms laser spot size, is proposed for photocathode rf guns. By tuning the gun solenoid focusing, the electrons' transverse momenta at the cathode are imaged to a downstream screen, which enables a single shot measurement of both the rms value and the detailed spectra of the photoelectrons' transverse momenta. Both simulations and proof of principle experiments are reported.

Antinutrients in rice tend to impair nutrient bioavailability; hence, this study aimed to investigate the effects of cooking and simulated digestion on the antioxidant activity and phenolic content of white and brown rice, as well as the bioavailability of some minerals. The rice grains were cooked in a pressure cooker, using a 1:2 (w/v) rice-to-water ratio. The digestion of the cooked rice grains was then simulated using pepsin and pancreatin systems. The phenolic (total, free, and bound) and flavonoid content; antioxidant activity (DPPH, ABTS, and FRAP); phytic acid and tannin levels; and mineral HCl-extractability were all determined in the raw, cooked, and digested grains. The cooking process significantly lowered (p ≤ 0.05) the phenolic content of the white rice; however, the phenolic content increased significantly (p ≤ 0.05) when these cooked grains were digested. The phenolic content of brown rice decreased at a higher rate during cooking than that of white rice, and it recovered at a lower rate after digestion. The flavonoid content in both cooked and digested white and brown rice followed a similar trend with the phenolic content. This reduction in the phenolic and flavonoid content in both types of rice after cooking was associated with a large decrease in antioxidant activity, whereas, after digestion, it was associated with a considerable increase. After cooking, the levels of phytate and tannin in both types of rice decreased significantly (p ≤ 0.05), and this drop was even more pronounced in the digested grains. Although the mineral content in the cooked samples of white and brown rice decreased, it recovered after digestion; however, the mineral content remained lower than that of the raw samples. Despite this, there was also a rise in the bioavailability of the minerals in the cooked rice after digestion (p ≤ 0.05), which was considerably higher than the rise in the mineral content itself. The findings indicate that, while cooking rice decreases its phenolic content and antioxidant activity, it also lowers its antinutrient content. Additional benefits were also noted following the simulated digestion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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