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Hadi Bazyar,1,2 Leila Maghsoumi-Norouzabad,3 Mohsen Yarahmadi,3 Hassan Gholinezhad,3 Leila Moradi,4 Parvin Salehi,5 Mohammad Hosein Haghighi-zadeh,6 Ahmad Zare Javid1,3 1Nutrition and Metabolic Diseases Research Center, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran; 2Student Research Committee, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran; 3Department of Nutrition, School of Allied Medical Sciences, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran; 4Health Research Institute, Diabetes Research Center, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran; 5Department of Periodontology, School of Dentistry, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran; 6Department of Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, IranCorrespondence: Ahmad Zare JavidNutrition and Metabolic Diseases Research Center, Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, IranTel +98 914 317 6237Email ahmaddjavid@gmail.comAim: The aim of the current study was to investigate that combination of the synbiotic supplementation in adjunct with non-surgical periodontal therapy (NSPT) is useful in treating periodontitis and biomarkers of oxidative stress in type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) patients.Methods: In this study, 47 patients suffering from DM and CP were recruited and randomly assigned to two groups. The intervention (n= 23) and control (n=24) groups received either multispecies probiotic supplement plus 100 mg fructo-oligosaccharide (500 mg in each capsule) or placebo capsule containing 500 mg wheat flour, respectively, every day for 8 weeks. All subjects were treated with NSPT during the intervention period. Serum levels of interleukin-1β (IL-1β), malondialdehyde (MDA), total antioxidant capacity (TAC), superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT), glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and periodontal indices including clinical attachment loss (CAL), pocket depth (PD) (main outcome), BOP, and plaque index were measured before and after the intervention.Results: Supplementation with the synbiotic with NSPT led to a significant decrease in the levels of IL-1β, MDA, plaque index, PD, and CAL in the intervention group post-intervention (p < 0.05). The serum levels of TAC, SOD, and GPx were significantly increased in the intervention group compared with the baseline (p < 0.05). Consumption of synbiotic with NSPT, compared to the control, resulted in a significant decrease in the mean changes of IL-1β, MDA, and CAL (p < 0.05). Also, the mean changes of TAC and GPx were significantly higher in the intervention group compared with the control group (p < 0.05). Also, in the intervention group was seen a significant reduction in plaque index (p = 0.035) and BOP (p = 0.04) compared with the control group.Conclusion: It was observed that synbiotic supplementation with NSPT may be beneficial in improving inflammatory, antioxidant, and periodontal status in T2DM patients with CP.Keywords: type 2 diabetes mellitus, inflammation, antioxidant, periodontal disease, synbiotic, non-surgical periodontal therapy

Background and Aim: Paclitaxol (PTX) is one of the well-known drugs that has been widely used for chemotherapy of a wide spectrum of cancers. Recently, advanced drug delivery systems using nanocarriers with high selectivity have been used for cancer therapy. Graphene nanostructure and its derivatives, i.e., graphene oxide (GO), are promising candidates for biological applications, such as drug delivery, because of their high specific surface areas. Due to hydrophobicity of graphene, it is not easily dispersed in water. Therefore, functional groups are added to it. In this study, we investigated adsorption of paclitaxel (PTX) drug molecule onto graphene oxide (GO) in aqueous environment. Graphene sheets typically decorated with epoxy (GO-O), and hydroxyl (GO-OH) hydrophilic functional groups can reduce apparent hydrophobicity. Materials And Methods: Using molecular dynamics (MD) simulations the influence of the functional groups on adsorption of PTX anticancer drug molecules, adsorption energy, and the average distance of drug molecules from surface were evaluated. Simulations were conducted using the LAMMPS software package. Result: The results showed when the functional groups exceeded the critical value (18%), the number of atoms with the same partial charge in GO-OH system were more than that of GO-O surface. Therefore with an increase in the repulsion forces, the molecule distance became longer due to compressive surface stresses induced in GO-OH system. Furthermore, deformation of surface will result in an increase in the distance of PTX-GO. Conclusion: Our findings suggested that type of functional groups affecting adsorption of paclitaxel on GO surface was important in drug delivery system. Moreover, the critical value of functional groups can have useful medical applications as in drug delivery systems.

The two near-identical pushbroom Thermal Infrared Sensors (TIRS) aboard Landsat 8 and 9 are currently imaging the Earth's surface at 10.9 and 12 microns from similar 705 km altitude, sun-synchronous polar orbits. This work validates the consistency in the imaging data quality, which is vital for harmonization of the data from the two sensors needed for global mapping. The overlapping operation of these two near-identical sensors, launched eight years apart, provides a unique opportunity to assess the sensitivity of the conventionally used metrics to any unexpectedly found nuanced differences in their spatial performance caused by variety of factors. Our study evaluates spatial quality metrics for bands 10 and 11 from 2022, the first complete year during which both TIRS instruments have been operational. The assessment relies on the straight-knife-edge technique, also known as the Edge Method. The study focuses on comparing the consistency and stability of eight separate spatial metrics derived from four separate water–desert boundary scenes. Desert coastal scenes were selected for their high thermal contrast in both the along- and across-track directions with respect to the platforms ground tracks. The analysis makes use of the 30 m upsampled TIRS images. The results show that the Landsat 8 and Landsat 9 TIRS spatial performance are both meeting the spatial performance requirements of the Landsat program, and that the two sensors are consistent and nearly identical in both across- and along-track directions. Better agreement, both with time and in magnitude, is found for the edge slope and line spread function's full-width at half maximum. The trend of averaged modulation transfer function at Nyquist shows that Landsat 8 TIRS MTF differs more between the along- and across-track scans than that for Landsat 9 TIRS. The across-track MTF is consistently lower than that for the along-track, though the differences are within the scatter seen in the results due to the use of the natural edges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the cosmic bulk flow through an analysis of luminosity distance variations in a perturbed Friedmann universe governed by f (R) gravity. The Hubble parameter, derived from perturbed Friedmann equations capturing intrinsic temporal fluctuations, is crucial. Redshift tomography is used to analyse observational data from the Pantheon catalogue from 0.015 to z < 2.3. Our objective is to constrain the cosmic bulk flow's direction and magnitude within this redshift range. At low redshifts (z < 0.06), the predominant bulk flow aligns with the dominating supercluster in the corresponding range, maintaining a relatively constant magnitude, consistent with Lambda cold dark matter (ΛCDM) model predictions. A shift towards (l, b) = (290 ± 21, 15 ± 20) with |$v_{\mathrm{bulk}} = 774 \pm 83 \, \mathrm{km\, s}^{-1}$| occurs between 0.06 < z < 0.1, coinciding with the cosmic microwave background dipole. For 0.1 < z < 0.2, the bulk flow shifts to (l, b) = (270 ± 21, 25 ± 20) with |$v_{\mathrm{bulk}} = 903 \pm 102 \, \mathrm{km\, s}^{-1}$|⁠ , supporting Kashlinsky et al.'s result. Beyond z > 0.2, the bulk flow's magnitude exceeds |$1000 \, \mathrm{km\, s}^{-1}$|⁠ , deviating from ΛCDM model expectations. Our findings suggest that matter density oscillations under f (R) gravity exhibit ΛCDM model properties at low redshifts. However, the microwave background anisotropy shows noticeable fluctuations at higher redshifts, validating prior findings of strong cosmic bulk flows at these scales. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a computational method based on parameterizing state and control variables is presented for solving Stochastic Optimal Control (SOC) problems. By using Chebyshev wavelets with unknown coefficients, state and control variables are parameterized, and then a stochastic optimal control problem is converted to a stochastic optimization problem. The expected cost functional of the resulting stochastic optimization problem is approximated by sample average approximation thereby the problem can be solved by optimization methods more easily. For facilitating and guaranteeing convergence of the presented method, a new theorem is proved. Finally, the proposed method is implemented based on a newly designed algorithm for solving one of the well-known problems in mathematical finance, the Merton portfolio allocation problem in finite horizon. The simulation results illustrate the improvement of the constructed portfolio return. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The erosion that occurs at the bends of rivers can damage the surrounding area during flood season and cause morphological changes in the river to some extent. Therefore, it engineers have become interested in developing measures that can control the scour process that occurs at bends in rivers. To control the outer bend of river from scour different structures such as spur dike, bendway weir and submerged vane can be used for modification of flow pattern. With interaction of these structures and water flow scour around structure occurs that is the main cause of their failures. It is assumed that the change of geometry and layout of structure can change bed topography for its stability and that is the purpose of the present study. Therefore, in this study a Triangle-shaped spur dike with different angles (23, 30, 40, 60 and 70 degrees) to the upstream direction under different hydraulic conditions (Froude numbers 0.194, 0.214, 0.233 and 0.253) was tested. For all experiments, The effective length (Le) of each Spur Dike, i.e., the horizontal distance from the outer bank to the interface of the Spur Dike and the bed, was 33% of the width of the flume (23.3 cm) and single Triangle-shaped spur dike was installed outside bend of flume in 72° position which maximum scour depth is usually occurring. For all experiments, flow depth was kept constant equal to 13 cm. The thickness of the sediment in the bed of the flume was 20 cm, and the sediment was composed of natural, uniform sand (geometric standard deviation of 1.22) with an average size of 1.5 mm. At the end of each experiment bed topography was measured and from that the scouring zone, maximum scour depth and distance of scour hole was computed. The results showed that the overall scour hole is created in toe of the spur dike that is expanded to the upstream and downstream structure. Triangle-shaped spur dike with 23 and 60 degree installation was found to create the minimum and maximum scour depth as well as its distance from the outer bank respectively. The maximum scour depth for spur dike with angles of 23 and 60° was measured to be 0.127 and 0.496 of the spur dike effective length respectively. In addition, the maximum scour depth distance of above mentioned angles from the outer bank was respectively, 0.743 and 1.6 the effective length of structure. Eroded sediments were deposited downstream the spur dike and point bars are developed. By increasing of spur dike angle, the point bars are formed away from the outer bank and extended in flume width. For spur dike angles of 23 and 70° the point bar distance from the outer bank was equal to 0.228 and 0.365 effective length of the structure respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]