CORROSION INHIBITION OF CARBON STEEL IN LOW CHLORIDE MEDIA BY AN AQUEOUS EXTRACT OF HIBISCUS ROSA-SINENSIS LINN

The inhibition efficiency (IE) of an aqueous extract of white flower, namely, Hibiscus rosa-sinensis Linn., in controlling corrosion of carbon steel immersed in an aqueous solution containing 60 ppm of Cl^-has been evaluated by the mass loss method. The flower extract (FE) shows good IE. In the presence of Zn²⁺, excellent IE is shown by the flower extract. A synergistic effect exists between the flower extract and Zn²⁺. The mechanistic aspects of corrosion inhibition have been investigated by polarization study and AC impedance spectra. Polarization study reveals that the formulation consisting of flower extract and Zn²⁺ functions as a mixed inhibitor. AC impedance spectra reveal that a protective film is formed on the metal surface. The active principle in the flower extract is quercetin-3-O-glucoside. This has been confirmed by UV-visible absorption spectra. The protective film formed on the metal surface has been analyzed by FT-IR and AFM spectra. It is found that the protective film consists of Fe²⁺-quercetin-3-O-glucoside complex and Zn(OH)₂.     

Production of the biomimetic small diameter blood vessels for cardiovascular tissue engineering

A novel biomimetic vascular graft scaffolds were produced by electrospinning method with the most superior characteristics to be a proper biomimetic small diameter blood vessel using Polycaprolactone(PCL), Ethyl Cellulose(EC) and Collagen Type-1 were used to create the most convenient synergy of a natural and synthetic polymer to achieve similarity to native small diameter blood vessels. Scanning Electron Microscopy(SEM), Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy(FTIR), Differential Scanning Calorimetry Analysis(DSC), tensile measurement tests, and in-vitro and in-vivo applications were performed. Results indicated significant properties such as having 39.33?nm minimum, 104.98?nm average fiber diameter, 3.2?MPa young modulus and 135% relative cell viability.     

Comparative anatomy on the vegetative organs of genus Ziziphora L. (Lamiaceae) from Turkey

The genus Ziziphora L. (Lamiaceae) is represented by five species (nine taxa) in the Turkish Flora. These taxa are Z. clinopodioides Lam. (subsp. elbursensis, subsp. filicaulis, subsp. kurdica, subsp. rigida), Z. capitata L., Z. persica Bunge, Z. tenuior L., Z. taurica Bieb. subsp. taurica, and Z. taurica Bieb. subsp. cleonioides (Boiss.) Davis which to be an endemic taxon for Turkey. They are strongly aromatic herbs which contain rich pulegone and used as herbal teas and spices and for this reason. In this study, comparative anatomy of the genus Ziziphora growing in Turkey is presented for the first time. In anatomical studies, cross sections of vegetative organs such as the root, stem, and leaf (lamina and petiole) were examined. In addition, to exhibit stomatal distribution and anatomy on adaxial and abaxial leaves were taken surface sections of the lamina and calculated stomatal index. Lamina and petiole anatomy were shown to be of great importance in the taxonomy of the Ziziphora taxa. The presence or absence of sclerenchyma in midrib of lamina and petiole, cortex parenchyma layer, mesophyll structure, and epidermal surface were found to be important characters for identification of Ziziphora taxa.     

Anatomical and histological studies of the alimentary canal of adult maize leaf weevil,Tanymecusdilaticollis Gyllenhal, 1834 (Coleoptera: Curculionidae)

In this study, ananatomical and histological study was conducted on the alimentary canal of Tanymecusdilaticollis (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), which is an economic polyphagous pest species, to study the relationship between the structure of the alimentary canal and the feeding habit. Therefore, the structure of the alimentary canal of T. dilaticollis was examined using light and electron microscopies. Results have shown that the alimentary canal in T. dilaticollis is consisted of three separate regions as foregut, midgut, and hindgut structurally between the mouth and the anus, which pass from head, thorax, and abdomen. The foregut consists of pharynx, esophagus, crop and proventriculus and in the crop part, expansion is seen compared to other foregut parts. Midgut of T. dilaticollis is the largest part of digestion system. The anterior region of midgut is twofolds wider than the posterior region. The posterior midgut extends tubularly and it is connected to eightgastric caeca. The hindgut of T. dilaticollis consists of fourparts as pylorus, ileum, colon, and rectum. Well‐developed muscle layers are found near the rectum and genital chamber. These results contribute to further studies on the ecology and biological control agents of Coleoptera and to provide a broad comparison of alimentary canal of Coleoptera species.     

A novel Adaptive Genetic Neural Network (AGNN) model for recommender systems using modified k-means clustering approach

Multimedia Tools and Applications - The Recommender System (RS) plays an important role in information retrieval techniques in a bid to handle massive online data effectively. It gives suggestions...     

Nontoxic pH-sensitive silver nanocomposite hydrogels for potential wound healing applications

ABSTRACT

Silver nanocomposite (SNC) containing pH sensitivity with fascinating attention may be recommended for extensive utilization in eco-friendly nanomaterial applications. In the present investigation, a strategy to fabricate new biodegradable and biocompatible hydrogels based on sodium alginate/ethylene glycol/acrylic acid functionalized with silver nanocomposites, which were synthesized by a facile greener method. The swelling profile is enhanced the stimuli responsive behavior of nanocomposite hydrogels. The synthesized nanocomposite hydrogels has showed a significant pH-sensitive behavior which induced the degradation profile, cell viability, and antimicrobial activity. Hence, this kind of biomaterials has been utilized for nontoxic, degradable wound healing dressing.     

Synthesis by enzymatic catalysis. III. Copolymerisation of amino acids and dipeptides using papain

After studying the oligomerisation reaction of L-tyrosine, we investigated polymerisation of a mixture of methionine and tyrosine, which also led to the formation of a polypeptide. Various substrate concentrations and substrate/enzyme ratios were investigated. A hexapeptide was isolated containing three tyrosine and three methionine residues. Extension of the method to enzymatic polymerisation of dipeptide esters was also examined. After optimisation of the reaction, we obtained a peptide made up of four monomers using methyl L-leucyl-L-tyrosinate as substrate. The results are discussed in the light of a possible reaction mechanism.     

An Energy Efficient Clustered Gravitational and Fuzzy Based Routing Algorithm in WSNs

Wireless Personal Communications - Wireless sensor networks consist of many tiny sensor nodes which are deployed in various geographical locations for sensing the normal spectacles and also to...     

Immune Cell‐Mediated Biodegradable Theranostic Nanoparticles for Melanoma Targeting and Drug Delivery

Although tremendous efforts have been made on targeted drug delivery systems, current therapy outcomes still suffer from low circulating time and limited targeting efficiency. The integration of cell‐mediated drug delivery and theranostic nanomedicine can potentially improve cancer management in both therapeutic and diagnostic applications. By taking advantage of innate immune cell's ability to target tumor cells, the authors develop a novel drug delivery system by using macrophages as both nanoparticle (NP) carriers and navigators to achieve cancer‐specific drug delivery. Theranostic NPs are fabricated from a unique polymer, biodegradable photoluminescent poly (lactic acid) (BPLP‐PLA), which possesses strong fluorescence, biodegradability, and cytocompatibility. In order to minimize the toxicity of cancer drugs to immune cells and other healthy cells, an anti‐BRAF V600E mutant melanoma specific drug (PLX4032) is loaded into BPLP‐PLA nanoparticles. Muramyl tripeptide is also conjugated onto the nanoparticles to improve the nanoparticle loading efficiency. The resulting nanoparticles are internalized within macrophages, which are tracked via the intrinsic fluorescence of BPLP‐PLA. Macrophages carrying nanoparticles deliver drugs to melanoma cells via cell–cell binding. Pharmacological studies also indicate that the PLX4032 loaded nanoparticles effectively kill melanoma cells. The “self‐powered” immune cell‐mediated drug delivery system demonstrates a potentially significant advancement in targeted theranostic cancer nanotechnologies.     

Hybridization of spectral filtering with particle swarm optimization for speech signal enhancement

Speech enhancement has received a significant amount of research attention over the past several decades. The enhancement of speech signal is needed so as to improve the degraded signal and the goal is to separate a single mixture into its underlying clean speech and interferer components. This is achieved by having prior knowledge through learning and generation of masks accordingly. Hybridization of the spectral filtering and optimization algorithm is employed for speech enhancement in this paper. The proposed technique uses MMSE (Minimum Mean Squared Error) and PSO (Particle Swarm Optimization) for effective enhancement. The proposed technique is three module technique consisting of pre-processing module, optimization module and spectral filtering module. Loizou’s database and Aurora dataset are used for evaluating the proposed technique using standard evaluation metrics consists of PESQ and SNR. Comparative analysis is also made by comparing with other existing techniques such as MMSE and BNMF. Highest PESQ for proposed technique is 2.75 and highest SNR came about 32.97. The technique gave average PESQ of 2.18 and average SNR of 20.53 which was higher than the average values for other techniques. Hence, we can observe that proposed technique yielded better evaluation metrics than the existing methods.