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PROTECTIVE EFFECT OF MAGNESIUM CHLORIDE ON SODIUM FLUORIDE INDUCED ALTERATIONS IN VARIOUS HYDROXYPROLINE FRACTIONS IN RAT LUNGS
No full textFrequent absorption of the fluoride causes tooth decay, damage of kidneys, bones, nerves and muscles. The present study was carried out to study the reported protective effect of magnesium chloride on sodium fluoride (NaF) induced alterations in rat lung hydroxyproline/ collagen content. To study the dose response of NaF following groups were studied: (i) normal rats (ii) placebo group, (iii) rats treated with two different doses of NaF. To study the protective effect of MgCl2 the following groups of rats were studied (i) normal rats (ii) rats injected with MgCl2 (iii) rats injected with NaF (iv) rats injected with MgCl2 followed by NaF. Sodium fluoride doses of 10 and 20 mg/kg body weight of rats caused a significant increase (p < 0. 001) increase in peptide -bound and total Hyp content in rat lungs. Administration of MgCl2 alone to rats also caused significant increase in peptide- bound, protein- bound and total Hyp fractions in rat lungs (p < 0. 001). Administration of MgCl2 thirty minutes before NaF restored the altered protein bound Hyp fraction to almost normal levels. The present study concludes that although MgCl2 has been reported to be protective against toxic effects of NaF, it exerts an independent effect on hydroxyproline and collagen content in rat lungs.King Saud Universit
Spectrophotometric determination of candesartan cilexetil in presence of its alkaline induced degradation product
No full textCandesartan cilexetil could be determined in presence of its alkaline degradation product (candesartan ) by second derivative spectrophotometry. The determination was linear in the range of 4-32 microgram /mL with (r ) equals to 0.99995 at wavelength 291.2nm .The method was successfully applied to tablets containing the drug which used as antihypertensive .The method was valid , accurate and precise and the results are in good agreement statistically with a reported method.King Saud Universit
Rheological and mucoadhesive characterization of poly(vinylpyrrolidone) hydrogels designed for nasal mucosal drug delivery.
No full textDirect UPLC-MS-MS Validated Method for the Quantification of 5-Aminolevulinic Acid: Application to in-vitro Assessment of Colonic-Targeted Oral Tablets
No full textA reliable, sensitive, specific, and rapid ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometric (UPLC-MS-MS) method was developed for the determination of 5-aminolevulinic acid (5-ALA) in orally-administered colonic delivery system. The prepared system is a compression-coated tablet using granulated chitosan as the coat layer. L-Tyrosine (TYR) was used as an internal standard with no need for derivatization. The chromatographic system consisted of Acquity UPLC BEH C18 column and isocratic mobile phase composed of acetonitrile and 0.1% formic acid with a flow rate of 2.5 min. The assay was based on ESI+ mode in a multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) transitions at m/z 132.08 > 86.0 and m/z 132.08 > 114.0 and m/z 182.1 > 91.2 for 5-ALA and TYR, respectively. Limit of quantification was 5.0 ng/mL and the calibration curve was linear (r(2) = 0.994). Within-run precision and between-run repeatability were expressed as relative standard deviation and were lower than 2.5%. The recoveries from control samples were > 95%. The method was successfully applied for evaluation in assay and release profile of 5-ALA colon targeted tablets media containing suspended rat cecal contents pH 6.8 medium (colonic) for colonic delivery
Enhancement of transdermal apomorphine delivery with a diester prodrug strategy
No full textDiester prodrugs of apomorphine, diacetyl apomorphine (DAA), and diisobutyryl apomorphine (DIA), were synthesized, and their partition coefficients, capacity factor (log K'), enzymatic hydrolysis, and in vitro permeation across nude mouse skin were characterized. The lipophilicity of the diesters was between that of apomorphine HCl and the apomorphine base. The prodrugs were chemically stable, but enzymatically unstable in esterase medium, skin homogenate, and human plasma. DAA showed a faster hydrolysis in plasma compared to DIA. Total fluxes (nmol/cm(2)/h) of the parent drug and prodrug were significantly greater after topical treatment with the diesters in aqueous solutions (water, 30% polyethylene glycol in water, and 30% glycerol in water) compared to treatment with HCl and base forms of apomorphine. DIA flux from deionized water was 51 nmol/cm(2)/h, which exceeded the flux of apomorphine HCl by 10-fold. The extent of parent drug regeneration after topical application ranged 51%∼88% and 34%∼61% for DAA and DIA, respectively, depending on the vehicles selected. Permeation measurements using intact and stratum corneum-stripped skins demonstrated that the viable epidermis/dermis was an important barrier to prodrug permeation. Nano-sized lipid emulsions were also used as carriers for apomorphine and its prodrugs. Diester prodrugs exhibited superior skin permeation compared to the parent drug when formulated into the emulsions. DAA and DIA fluxes from lipid emulsions were 11- and 3-fold higher than that of apomorphine HCl. The results in the present work suggest the feasibility of diester prodrugs for the transdermal delivery of apomorphine. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
DOI: 10.1016/j.ejpb.2011.01.02
Sentence Boundary Detection in Colloquial Arabic Text: A Preliminary Result
No full textRecently, natural language processing tasks are more frequently conducted over online content. This poses a special problem for applications over Arabic language. Online Arabic content is usually written in informal colloquial Arabic, which is characterized to be ill-structured and lacks specific linguistic standardization. In this paper, we investigate a preliminary step to conduct successful NLP processing which is the problem of sentence boundary detection. As informal Arabic lacks basic linguistic rules, we establish a list of commonly used punctuation marks after extensively studying a large amount of informal Arabic text. Moreover, we evaluated the correct usage of these punctuation marks as sentence delimiters; the result yielded a preliminary accuracy of 70%.King Saud Universit
GoTour : A Mobile Tourist Guide For Trip Planning
No full textTourists around the world may face some difficulties during their travels. An application that is installed in a smart cell phone can be helpful for tourists. In this paper, we present a novel tourist guide project (GoTour) that works on the smart phones with Android Operating System. This project is designed for Istanbul city which is one of the most popular touristic cities and Google map supports this city as well. In order to find tourist location and to show tourist on the map GoTour uses GPS and Google Map respectively. All spots in Istanbul with their attributes such as brief description, work hours, open/close area and coordinates are stored in the GoTour database. By using GoTour, tourists are able to view the all spots based on the categories (shopping, restaurants, parks, museums, antiquities, and consulate), make his/her favorite spots list, view weather condition and request a list of available spots regarding to weather condition and current time. Also tourists can see all the nearest spots on the map including museums, restaurants and other points of interest according to their current location. In addition to this, consulate information based on tourist nationality and service information such as police, ambulance…etc. are the others utility functions of GoTour.
The most significant feature that distinguishes GoTour from similar applications [1, 2] is ability to suggest a trip plan in a smart way. Because tourists usually have limited time during the trip, they prefer to choose some interest spots.
This application suggests a trip plan taking into consideration selected spot categories, weather condition, current location of tourist and current time. The plan starts from tourist’s location and ends at the destination spot.
The plan maximizes the number of most popular spots on the plan without violating constraints (e.g., total time of the trip is not more than a specified limit). We achieve this function by developing an algorithm based on Variable Neighborhood Search which is a metaheuristic for solving combinatorial and global optimization problems. If some spots are already visited by the tourist, the tourist can edit spots. Considering this information, system can suggest a new trip plan. Figure 1 depicts the context model of the proposed solution. The software technologies used to implement the proposed solution include J2ME, SQLlite, and Google Maps API. The mobile application is developed to run on the Android smart phone.GoTour both gathers the features in the various applications in a single application and adds outstanding features. Therefore, we believe that it will be one of the most preferable tourist guide application. We would like to extend this application by including the other touristic cities in the future.Zayed University Research Center and Dubai TR
Use of Learning Portals in Education in the Arab Region
No full textWith the advancement of Internet and World Wide Web the definition of business, entertainment and education has changed in astonishing ways. In late 1990s web portals opened a new arena for organizations because the use of portals has enabled content providers to make information from various sources accessible to their employees or customers with varying interests. Nowadays we have a variety of portals available offering different services like public services, health services, educational services as well as media and entertainment. In this paper our focus is on the portals providing services in educational context called the Learning Portals.AAC
: Salubrious effects of dexrazoxane against teniposide-induced DNA damage and programmed cell death in murine marrow cells.
No full textThe intention of the present study was to answer the question whether the catalytic topoisomerase-II inhibitor, dexrazoxane, can be used as a modulator of teniposide-induced DNA damage and programmed cell death (apoptosis) in the bone marrow cells in vivo. The alkaline single cell gel electrophoresis, scoring of chromosomal aberrations, micronuclei and mitotic activity were undertaken in the current study as markers of DNA damage. Apoptosis was analysed by the occurrence of a hypodiploid DNA peak and caspase-3 activity. Oxidative stress marker such as intracellular reactive oxygen species production, lipid peroxidation, reduced and oxidised glutathione were assessed in bone marrow as a possible mechanism underlying this amelioration. Dexrazoxane was neither genotoxic nor apoptogenic in mice at the tested dose. Moreover, for the first time, it has been shown that dexrazoxane affords significant protection against teniposide-induced DNA damage and apoptosis in the bone marrow cells in vivo and effectively suppresses the apoptotic signalling triggered by teniposide. Teniposide induced marked biochemical alterations characteristic of oxidative stress including accumulation of intracellular reactive oxygen species, enhanced lipid peroxidation, accumulation of oxidised glutathione and reduction in the reduced glutathione level. Prior administration of dexrazoxane ahead of teniposide challenge ameliorated these biochemical alterations. It is thus concluded that pretreatment with dexrazoxane attenuates teniposide-induced oxidative stress and subsequent DNA damage and apoptosis in bone marrow cells. Based on our data presented, strategies can be developed to decrease the teniposide-induced DNA damage in normal cells using dexrazoxane. Therefore, dexrazoxane can be a good candidate to decrease the deleterious effects of teniposide in the bone marrow cells of cancer patients treated with teniposide
Alpha-lipoic acid rebalances redox and immune-testicular milieu in septic rats
No full textAbstract: In the present study, lipopolysaccharide(LPS), as an immune modulator in male adult rats and alpha-lipoic acid (ALA), as a powerful biological antioxidant and anti-inflammatory, are examined to help understanding the role of the immune and redox perturbation in testicular dysfunction with a possible protection. A total of 60 male Swiss albino rats were divided into 5 groups (10/group) respectively as follows Saline, ALA-vehicle, ALA (200 mg/kg), LPS (5 mg/kg) started with 20 rats and LPS + ALA. Obtained data from previously reported study, in our laboratory, and from the present one revealed that LPS induced marked reductions in sperm's count, motility and resulted in deterioration of the testicular histological features. In addition, LPS decreased testicular reduced glutathione (GSH) level and lactate dehydrogenase isoenzyme-x (LDH-x) activity. However, it increased testicular levels of malondialdehyde (MDA), nitric oxide (NO) and 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine (8-HDG) in testicular DNA, along with increased serum IL-2 level. In contrast, rats pretreated with ALA showed almost complete normalization of all the tested parameters. In conclusion, LPS induced perturbation of the immune-testicular barrier as a result of redox imbalance with a subsequent testicular dysfunction. Pretreatment with ALA ameliorated all these effects by its immune-modulator and antioxidant mechanisms suggesting a protective role against male infertility in septic or severely infected patients. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd