The positive impact of honeybee activity on fennel crop production and sustainability.

This study investigates the ecological interaction between honeybees (Apis mellifera) and fennel (Foeniculum vulgare) plants, examining the mutual benefits of this relationship. Field experiments conducted in Egypt from December 2022 to May 2023 recorded diverse insect pollinators attracted to fennel flowers, especially honeybees. Assessing honeybee colonies near fennel fields showed improvements in sealed brood (357.5-772.5 cells), unsealed brood (176.3-343.8 cells), pollen collection (53.25-257.5 units), honey accumulation (257.5-877.5 units), and colony strength (7.75-10) over three weeks. Fennel exposure explained 88-99% of variability in foraging metrics. Comparing open versus self-pollinated fennel revealed enhanced attributes with bee pollination, including higher flower age (25.67 vs 19.67 days), more seeds per umbel (121.3 vs 95.33), bigger seeds (6.533 vs 4.400 mm), heavier seeds (0.510 vs 0.237 g/100 seeds), and increased fruit weight per umbel (0.619 vs 0.226 g). Natural variation in seed color and shape also occurred. The outcomes demonstrate the integral role of honeybees in fennel agroecosystems through efficient pollination services that improve crop productivity and quality. Fennel provides abundant nutritional resources that bolster honeybee colony health. This research elucidates the symbiotic bee-fennel relationship, underscoring mutualistic benefits and the importance of ecological conservation for sustainable agriculture.

Dam parity and calf sex affect maternal and neonatal behaviors during the first week postpartum in stabled Maghrebi dairy camels.

Currently, a trend toward the commercialization of dromedary milk associated with recent intensive rearing systems has starting worldwide which impose constraints on animals affecting their behavioral repertoires and welfare status. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of dam parity and calf sex on parturition, neonatal, and maternal behaviors in stabled Maghrebi dairy camels (Camelus dromedarius). Thirty-six (primiparas N = 10; multiparas N = 26) periparturient females were kept under video surveillance using a digital IR camera and 24-h sessions were chosen to assess calving, maternal, and neonatal behaviors in calving pens. Duration of restlessness, process of giving birth, and expulsion of fetal membranes were assessed. After first suckling, dams and their calves were moved into an individual enclosure to assess maternal behavior at 12 h, 24 h, 48 h, 72 h, and 7d postpartum. Behavior was assessed using a camcorder for 30 min after 1 h of young separation in an adjacent enclosure. Results showed an effect of parity on the duration of the birth process which was longer for primiparous than multiparous camels (P = 0.034). During this stage, primiparous females tended to raise their tails more often (P = 0.054) and spent more time standing (P = 0.001) than multiparous camels. Neonatal behavior was affected by calf sex. Female newborns took less time to raise their heads (P = 0.041) and to stand up (P = 0.048) for the first time and were the earliest to suckle their dams (P = 0.032). Multiparous dams stood up sooner (P = 0.019) after calving and suckled their calves earlier (P = 0.043) than primiparous dams. They emitted more bleats and exhibited more sniffing during the first week postpartum than primiparas. During the first postpartum week, both primiparas and multiparas showed a decrease in the total number of bleats (P < 0.001), low-pitch bleats (P < 0.001), and high-pitch bleats (P < 0.001), in sniffing frequency (P < 0.001) and sniffing duration (P < 0.001). This is the first study to describe in detail the calving, maternal, and neonatal behaviors of dromedary camels and to show the influence of parity and calf sex. Maternal care toward the newborn calf exhibited by a high level of bleating and sniffing activities in the first 2 days suggest that they play an important role in the establishment of mother-young relationship.

Toward a model-free feedback control synthesis for treating acute inflammation.

An effective and patient-specific feedback control synthesis for inflammation resolution is still an ongoing research area. A strategy consisting of manipulating a pro and anti-inflammatory mediator is considered here as used in some promising model-based control studies. These earlier studies, unfortunately, suffer from the difficultly of calibration due to the heterogeneity of individual patient responses even under similar initial conditions. We exploit a new model-free control approach and its corresponding "intelligent" controllers for this biomedical problem. A crucial feature of the proposed control problem is as follows: the two most important outputs which must be driven to their respective desired states are sensorless. This difficulty is overcome by assigning suitable reference trajectories to the other two outputs that do have sensors. A mathematical model, via a system of ordinary differential equations, is nevertheless employed as a "virtual" patient for in silico testing. We display several simulation results with respect to the most varied situations, which highlight the effectiveness of our viewpoint.

Antimicrobial resistance activity and molecular characterization of methicillin-resistant staphylococci isolates in Tripoli Central Hospital, Libya

Background: Nosocomial infections caused by methicillin-resistant Staphylococci could lead to increased morbidity and mortality, but little is known about the prevalence of infections with these organisms in healthcare facilities and in the community in Tripoli. This study investigated the in vitro susceptibility of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and methicillin-resistant coagulase negative staphylococci (MRCNS) to antimicrobial agents, and determined the molecular characteristics of MRSA.Methods: This is a retrospective observational study aiming at determining the prevalence and antibiotic resistance pattern of (MRSA) and (MRCNS) isolated from non-duplicated clinical specimens in Tripoli Central Hospital (TCH) between June 2013 and June 2014. Isolates were identified using standard laboratory procedures. Antimicrobial susceptibility tests were carried out by disk diffusion method and automated systems. DNA of the MRSA isolates was used for PCR to determine the molecular analysis.Results: 218 isolates of Staphylococci were obtained, 71.6% were coagulase positive staphylococci (CPS) and 28.4% were coagulase negative staphylococci (CNS). 39.7% of CPS were MRSA, while 75.8% of CNS were MRCNS. The rates of hospital-acquired MRSA (HA-MRSA) and community-acquired MRSA (CA-MRSA) among MRSA isolates were 61.3% and 38.7% respectively. A similar trend was detected among MRCNS isolates, where 74.5% were HA-MRCNS and 25.5% were CA-MRCNS. All the MRSA and MRCNS isolates were susceptible (100%) to vancomycin, tigecycline, linezolid, quinupristin/dalfopristin, daptomycin and moxifloxacin. Generally, hospital-acquired strains showed higher resistance rates than community-acquired ones to the most commonly tested non-beta-lactam antibiotics. 35.5% of all staphylococcal isolates exhibited mecA+ gene and 12.9% expressed mecC+. Meanwhile, 38.7% of MRSA isolates harbored both mecA and mecC. However, 12.9% of MSSA isolates were negative for both mecA and mecC. The mecA gene was detectable in 59.1% and 40.9 % of HA-MRSA and CA-MRSA isolates respectively.Conclusion: Hospital-acquired MRSA and MRCNS isolates had higher resistance rates to non-beta lactam antimicrobial drugs than the respective community-acquired isolates. This was shown by early detection of mecC gene among MRSA isolates

Comparison of visual and electronic devices for individual identification of dromedary camels under different farming conditions.

The camel industry uses traditional (i.e., iron brands and ear tags) and modern (i.e., microchips) identification (ID) systems without having performance results of reference. Previously iron-branded ( = 45; 1 yr) and microchipped ( = 59; 7 yr) camels showed problems of healing (8.6% of brands) and reading (only 42.9% of brands and 69.5% of microchips were readable), which made their use inadvisable. With the aim of proposing suitable ID systems for different farming conditions, an on-field study was performed using a total of 528 dromedaries at 4 different locations (Egypt, = 83; Spain, = 304; Saudi Arabia, = 90; and Tunisia, = 51). The ID devices tested were visual (button ear tags, 28.5 mm diameter, = 178; double flag ear tags, 50 by 15 mm, = 83; both made of polyurethane) and electronic (ear tags, = 90, and rumen boluses, = 555). Electronic ear tags were polyurethane-loop type (75 by 9 mm) with a container in which a 22-mm transponder of full-duplex technology was lodged. Electronic boluses of 7 types, varying in dimensions (50 to 76 mm length, 11 to 21 mm width, and 12.7 to 82.1 g weight) and specific gravity (SG; 1.49 to 3.86) and each of them containing a 31-mm transponder of half-duplex technology, were all administered to the dromedaries at the beginning of the study. When a low-SG bolus was lost, a high-SG bolus was readministered. Readability rates of each ID system were evaluated during 1 to 3 yr, according to device and location, and yearly values were estimated for comparison. On a yearly basis, visual ear tag readability was not fully satisfactory; it was lower for rectangular ear tags (66.3%) than for button ear tags (80.9%). Yearly readability of electronic ear tags was 93.7%. Bolus readability dramatically varied according to their SG; the SG < 2.0 boluses were fully lost after 8 mo. In contrast, the SG > 3.0 boluses were efficiently retained (99.6 to 100%) at all locations. In conclusion, according to the expected long lifespan of camels, low ID performances were observed for iron brands, injectable microchips, and ear tags (visual and electronic), making their use inadvisable as unique ID systems in camels. The high readability of dense electronic boluses recommended their use as a permanent ID device of reference in camels.

Reduced-order spectral data modeling based on local proper orthogonal decomposition.

Spectral imaging typically generates a large amount of high-dimensional data that are acquired in different sub-bands for each spatial location of interest. The high dimensionality of spectral data imposes limitations on numerical analysis. As such, there is an emerging demand for robust data compression techniques with loss of less relevant information to manage real spectral data. In this paper, we describe a reduced-order data modeling technique based on local proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) in order to compute low-dimensional models by projecting high-dimensional clusters onto subspaces spanned by local reduced-order bases. We refer to the proposed method as the local-based approach because POD finds locally optimal solutions on each group split by k-means clustering. Experimental results are reported on three public domain databases and an in-house database. Comparisons with three leading spectral recovery techniques, three decomposition techniques used for hyperspectral imaging, and two baseline techniques show that the proposed method leads to promising improvement on spectral and colorimetric accuracy corresponding to the reconstructed spectral reflectance.

Combining robust state estimation with nonlinear model predictive control to regulate the acute inflammatory response to pathogen.

The inflammatory response aims to restore homeostasis by means of removing a biological stress, such as an invading bacterial pathogen. In cases of acute systemic inflammation, the possibility of collateral tissue damage arises, which leads to a necessary down-regulation of the response. A reduced ordinary differential equations (ODE) model of acute inflammation was presented and investigated in [10]. That system contains multiple positive and negative feedback loops and is a highly coupled and nonlinear ODE. The implementation of nonlinear model predictive control (NMPC) as a methodology for determining proper therapeutic intervention for in silico patients displaying complex inflammatory states was initially explored in [5]. Since direct measurements of the bacterial population and the magnitude of tissue damage/dysfunction are not readily available or biologically feasible, the need for robust state estimation was evident. In this present work, we present results on the nonlinear reachability of the underlying model, and then focus our attention on improving the predictability of the underlying model by coupling the NMPC with a particle filter. The results, though comparable to the initial exploratory study, show that robust state estimation of this highly nonlinear model can provide an alternative to prior updating strategies used when only partial access to the unmeasurable states of the system are available.

Preferential image segmentation using trees of shapes.

A novel preferential image segmentation method is proposed that performs image segmentation and object recognition using mathematical morphologies. The method preferentially segments objects that have intensities and boundaries similar to those of objects in a database of prior images. A tree of shapes is utilized to represent the content distributions in images, and curve matching is applied to compare the boundaries. The algorithm is invariant to contrast change and similarity transformations of translation, rotation and scale. A performance evaluation of the proposed method using a large image dataset is provided. Experimental results show that the proposed approach is promising for applications such as object segmentation and video tracking with cluttered backgrounds.

Interaction of ribavirin with azathioprine metabolism potentially induces myelosuppression.

BACKGROUND: The interaction of ribavirin, an inosine monophosphate dehydrogenase inhibitor, with azathioprine metabolism, potentially leading to myelotoxicity, remains unexplored. AIM: To underline the interaction of ribavirin, an inosine monophosphate dehydrogenase inhibitor, with azathioprine metabolism, potentially leading to myelotoxicity. METHODS: The medical records of eight patients who developed severe pancytopenia following concomitant use of azathioprine and ribavirin were retrospectively reviewed. RESULTS: Bone marrow suppression reached nadir after a mean interval of 4.6 +/- 1.6 weeks following HCV therapy initiation in seven patients. At the time of pancytopenia, the mean platelet count was 69.75 +/- 82.8 x 10(-3)/mm(3), mean haemoglobin level 7.75 +/- 1.3 g/dL and mean neutrophil count 0.45 +/- 0.26 x 10(-3)/mm(3). All patients had normal thiopurine methyltransferase genotype. In two patients, a prospective monitoring of azathioprine metabolites was available. Myelotoxicity was accompanied by elevated total methylated metabolite levels (16,500 and 15,000 pmol/8 x 10(8) erythrocytes) with a concomitant decrease in 6-tioguanine nucleotide levels; 1 month after azathioprine, pegylated interferon alfa and ribavirin were discontinued and full blood count returned to normal in both patients. No haematological toxicity occurred after the reintroduction of peginterferon plus ribarivin or azathioprine alone in eight patients. CONCLUSION: Collectively, the benefit/risk ratio favours avoidance of inosine monophosphate dehydrogenase inhibitors in purine analogue-treated patients with normal thiopurine methyltransferase activity, a situation frequently encountered in clinical practice.

Successful induction of tolerance to infliximab in patients with Crohn's disease and prior severe infusion reactions.

AIM: To appraise the tolerance and efficacy of an induction of tolerance protocol to infliximab permitting the re-administration of the drug to patients with Crohn's disease having had infusion reactions requiring suspension of treatment. METHODS: Fourteen patients were included in the induction of tolerance protocol. Each infusion of infliximab (5 mg/kg) was divided into 11 escalating 15 min increments over a 3-h time period. The induction of tolerance procedure was repeated for subsequent infusions. RESULTS: Ten patients (71.4%) received all the three infusions for the induction treatment. Nine (64.3%) had a significant response and six (48.8%) still benefited from infliximab infusions. Seven patients (50%) achieved a complete remission, after a mean of 2.5 (two to three) infusions. Four patients (28.6%) had no response and the protocol was stopped. Three patients (21.4%) experienced mild immediate hypersensitivity reactions, which were controlled, two patients (14.2%) experienced severe immediate hypersensitivity reactions, leading to interruption of the treatment and one patient developed a delayed hypersensitivity reaction. CONCLUSION: Our induction of tolerance protocol allows some patients who have experienced severe or repetitive infusion reactions to infliximab to be safely retreated with the drug in a hospitalized setting, with a clinical response achieved in a majority of these patients.

Corrosion evaluation of recasting non-precious dental alloys.

The effect of recasting, up to four times, non precious Ni-Cr and Co-Cr commercial dental alloys on their corrosion behaviour in saliva and saline media was carried out. A potentiokinetic technique was utilised to analyse the electrochemical characteristics of the anodic polarisation curves of these alloys. A considerable anodic polarisation range (about 2.0 V vs SCE) was used to investigate the possibility of developing a passive regime at such high potential range. The most important feature noted was a rapid rise in current density above a certain critical potential called pitting potential, Ep. The experimental data show that the open circuit potential, Eoc does not enable differentiation between the corrosion resistance of the four alloys used in this study. However, Ep and the rupture potential Er does distinguish between them. Increasing the number of the successive recastings of Wirolloy leads to enhancing the pitting potential, thus, the corrosion resistance of Wirolloy (Ni-Cr) improves after remelting and recasting. It has been found that Wirolloy corrodes 26 times faster than Wironit alloy under the same solution. The alloys containing cobalt and molybdenum show higher corrosion resistance than those containing nickel. Additionally, their corrosion resistance was not affected by successive melting and recasting. In chloride solutions Ni-Cr alloys show a high susceptibility to pitting corrosion, while Co-Cr alloys show a noble behaviour. The corrosion resistance of the four non precious alloys were in the following order: Biocast > Wironit > Cobond > Wirolloy.

The graft-versus-host reaction and immune function. III. Functional pre-T cells in the bone marrow of graft-versus-host-reactive mice displaying T cell immunodeficiency.

Studies were performed to determine whether pre-T cells develop normally in the bone marrow of mice displaying thymic dysplasia and T cell immunodeficiency as a consequence of a graft-versus-host (GVH) reaction. GVH reactions were induced in CBAxAF1 mice by the injection of A strain lymphoid cells. To test for the presence of pre-T cells in GVH-reactive mice, bone marrow from GVH-reactive mice (GVHBM) was injected into irradiated syngeneic F1 mice and 30-40 days later thymic morphology and function were studied. Morphology studies showed nearly normal thymic architectural restoration; moreover, such glands contained normal numbers of Thy-1-positive cells. Functional pre-T cells were evaluated by transferring thymocytes from the irradiated GVHBM-reconstituted mice into T-cell-deprived mice. These thymocytes reconstituted allograft reactivity, T helper cell function and Con A and PHA mitogen responses of T-cell-deprived mice. These results suggest that the pre-T cell population in the bone marrow is not affected by the GVH reaction. Therefore, the T cell immunodeficiency associated with the GVH reaction is not due to a deficiency of pre-T cells in the bone marrow but is more likely associated with GVH-induced thymic dysplasia.

The graft-versus-host reaction and immune function. IV. B cell functional defect associated with a depletion of splenic colony-forming units in marrow of graft-versus-host-reactive mice.

Studies were conducted to determine whether a functional B cell defect occurred in the bone marrow of mice experiencing a GVH reaction (GVHBM). GVH reactions were induced in AxCBA F1 adult mice by an injection of A strain lymphoid cells. The GVH reaction was confirmed by immunosuppression and thymus histology. At various intervals after GVH induction, GVHBM was tested for its ability to restore B cell function in adult thymectomized irradiated mice reconstituted with normal thymocytes. GVHBM cells obtained seven days after GVH induction restored but slightly the plaque forming cell (PFC) response to sheep erythrocytes and the mitogen response to lipopolysaccharide (LPS). GVHBM cells obtained 10 days or later failed to reconstitute the PFC or LPS responses. GVHBM cells suppressed neither the T or B cell function of normal spleen cells nor the LPS mitogen response of normal bone marrow cells. In addition, the splenic colony-forming units (CFU-s) in GVHBM were slightly decreased by day 10 after GVH induction and markedly depressed by day 22 after GVH induction. These results suggest that the GVH reaction may affect two different events in B cell differentiation. The early decrease in functional B cells that occurs before there is any change in the CFU-s population suggests a direct effect on B cell production, whereas the later absence of functional B cells could be due to the marked decline in stem cell production (CFU-s).

The functional and histological basis for graft-versus-host-induced immunosuppression.

The GvH reaction resulting from the injection of parental strain cells into adult F1 hybrids suppresses both cell-mediated and humoral immune responses and is dependent on the donor-host combination and the number of parental cells used to induce the GvH reaction. The early suppression is due, at least in part, to the increased number of macrophages and the activation of suppressor macrophages which act directly on the T-helper cell and perhaps the B-cell as well. The macrophage suppression is associated with an increase in PGE production. The long-term T-cell immunodeficiency is mediated by GvH-induced thymic dysplasia resulting in a block or an arrest in T-cell differentiation and deficient IL-2 production. The B-cell immunodeficiency is associated with both a decrease in B-cell production from lymphoid progenitors and a decrease in CFU-s production. The GvH reaction induces 2 types of thymic lesion, a stress-related effect causing atrophy of the thymic cortex and a cytolytic process causing severe-to-moderate lesions in the thymic medulla as a consequence of injury to medullary epithelial cells and a loss of Hassall's corpuscles (thymic dysplasia). By employing the NK-cell-deficient beige mutation, it was shown that the severe-to-moderate thymic medullary lesions occurred in F1 mice only in those transplant situations in which the donor inoculum was of the +/bg genotype, regardless of the genotype of the recipient. It is proposed that activation of parental T cells may contribute to the early immunosuppressive events; however, the relatively permanent immunosuppression appears to be associated with NK-like effector cells which are capable of causing injury to lymphoid and epithelial tissue, especially epithelium of the thymic medulla. These studies raise the possibility that the GvH reaction may contribute to some T- and B-cell immunodeficiencies observed in the SCID and AIDS syndromes, as well as in patients following bone marrow transplantation.

The graft-versus-host reaction and immune function. II. Recruitment of pre-T-cells in vivo by graft-versus-host-induced dysplastic thymuses following irradiation and bone marrow treatment.

The graft-versus-host (GVH) reaction induces thymic dysplasia and an arrest in T cell differentiation. Studies were performed to test the effect of irradiation and reconstitution with bone marrow on GVH-induced thymic dysplasia and T cell differentiation. GVH reactions were induced in CBAxAF1 adult mice by the injection of A strain lymphoid cells. All GVH-reactive mice were immunosuppressed by day 7 after GVH induction and thymic dysplasia was evident by day 24. Forty days after the induction of the GVH reaction the mice were irradiated (850 rads) and repopulated with 10-15 X 10(6) syngeneic or parental bone marrow cells. Thirty days after irradiation and bone marrow reconstitution, GVH-reactive mice were used for histological and functional studies. These mice displayed near-normal thymus morphology with scattered epithelial cells in the medulla, and normal numbers of Thy-1-positive cells. Donor cells had totally repopulated thymuses of irradiated bone marrow reconstituted mice by day 19 after irradiation. T helper cell function did not recover in the reconstituted mice. These results suggest that (1) the process responsible for GVH-induced thymic dysplasia is radiosensitive, and (2) the thymus has the potential to regenerate a normal structure, but fails to regain normal function.

The graft-versus-host reaction and immune function. I. T helper cell immunodeficiency associated with graft-versus-host-induced thymic epithelial cell damage.

The injection of parental A strain lymphoid cells into adrenalectomized CBAxA F1 (BAF1) mice induced a chronic graft-versus-host (GVH) reaction resulting in T cell and B cell immunosuppression as well as thymic epithelial cell injury, but not stress-related thymic involution. Thymocytes from BAF1 mice undergoing a GVH reaction were studied for their ability to reconstitute T helper cell (TH) function and phytohemagglutinin (PHA) and concanavalin A (Con A) mitogen responses in thymectomized, irradiated, BAF1 mice reconstituted with normal syngeneic bone marrow (ATxBM). Thymocytes from BAF1 mice early after the induction of a GVH reaction (days 10-12) were as effective as normal thymocytes in reconstituting TH and mitogen responses. Thymocytes from BAF1 mice 40 or more days after the induction of a GVH reaction did not reconstitute either the TH function or PHA and Con A responses in ATxBM mice. The inability to reconstitute ATxBM mice was not due to the presence of suppressor cells contained in the thymocyte inoculum. It is proposed that GVH-induced thymic epithelial cell injury blocks or arrests normal T cell differentiation, resulting in a population of thymocytes that lack the potential to become competent T helper cells or mitogen-responsive cells when transferred into ATxBM mice. This thymic functional defect results in a permanent TH immunodeficiency in mice experiencing a chronic GVH reaction.

T cell functional defect associated with thymid epithelial cell injury induced by a graft-versus-host reaction.

The injection of parental strain cells into adrenalectomized (CBA x A)F1 mice induced a graft-versus-host (GVH) reaction which was morphologically characterized by thymus epithelial cell injury but not stress-related thymic involution. Thymocytes from mice undergoing a GVH reaction were studied for their ability to reconstitute allograft reactivity in thymectomized, irradiated, bone marrow reconstituted (ATxBM) (CBA x A)F1 mice. Thymocytes of mice experiencing a GVH reaction were theta-positive during the course of the reaction, however, by 40 days after GVH induction these thymocytes were unable to reconstitute allograft reactivity to H-2-incompatible skin grafts. It is proposed that GVH-induced thymic epithelial cell injury prevents or arrests normal T cell differentiation, resulting in a population of thymocytes which lack complete functional capability.