Economic Adjustment and Income Adequacy of Malay Female-Headed Households in Malaysia

The main purpose of this study was to investigate the economic adjustments and income adequacy of Malay female-headed households (FHHs) in Malaysia. The study attempted to answer the following six research questions; what are the economic resources, sources of income and economic adjustments before and after the women becoming FHHs, and what are the factors significantly influence the economic status, objective and subjective income adequacy of FHHs? Secondary data collected among female headed households for the study entitled female headed household within the context of poverty carry out in 1994195 was used in this research. The data was analyzed using Statistical Package of Social Science (SPSS). The procedures used were descriptive statistics, t-tests, multiple regression and multiple discriminant analysis. The data analysis indicated that FHHs had access to limited economic resources. One of the main economic adjustments undertaken by the women was getting involved in employment to support their living. Three models explaining the economic status, objective and subjective income adequacy for widows, divorcees and all FHHs were tested in this research. Divorcee's economic status was significantly explained by education, income earned from employment, and ownership of properties while widow's economic status was significantly explained by ownership of properties, and other sources of income. Training, education, and income earned from employment contributed significantly to discriminate the divorcee's objective income adequacy. For widows it was found that income earned from other sources, employment, and remittance from children contributed significantly to discriminate the widow's objective income adequacy. Among FHHs there were only 34.2% divorcees and 27.9% widows whose income was adequate. When subjective income adequacy was analyzed there were 13% divorcees and 14.8% widows who perceived that their income is adequate. After taking into account all sources of income, majority of FHHs in this study; widows or divorcees were poor. Their low level of educational attainment and lack of skills contributed to such situation. Improve education and skills can be one of the strategies to help FHHs cope with the changing status from being intact family to female headed. To enhance the economic status of FHHs and reduce the incidences of poverty, relevant policies and more integrated programs should be formulated targeted FHHs. Addressing the needs of female headed households can be one of the effective strategies to sustain the low level of poverty in Malaysia

Morphological and Biophysical Properties of Bovine Parietal Pericardium and Tunica Vaginalis Xenografts in a Rat Model

The study was conducted with the main objectives to evaluate the macroscopic, microscopic and biomechanical properties of lyophilized and glycerolized bovine parietal pericardium and tunica vaginalis used for repair of full thickness abdominal wall defect in the rat. Expanded polytetraflouroethylene (ePTFE) Mycro ~ e s h @was used as positive control. In addition, the effects of preservation methods used in this study on the biomechanical properties of the pre-implanted grafts were also studied. Fresh bovine parietal pericardium and tunica vaginalis sacs collected from abattoir were processed and preserved by lyophilization and glycerolization. A total of 180 adult male Sprague Dawley rats (300-400g) divided into six groups of 30 rats each were used in the study. Full thickness mid ventral abdominal wall defects of 3x2.5 cm in size were created in each rat. The defects in the first four groups of rats were repaired with the same size (3x2.5 cm) of lyophilized pericardium (IFDBP), lyophilized tunica vaginalis (IFDTV), glycerolized pericardium (GBP) and glycerolized tunica vaginalis (GTV) respectively. The remaining two groups were used as positive control and repaired with polytetraflouroethylene (ePTFE) Mycro ~esh@Th'e negative control group underwent a U shape sham-operation. Six rats fiom each group were sacrificed at post-implantation intervals of 1, 3, 6, 9 and 18 weeks for macroscopic, microscopic and biomechanical evaluations. Biomechanical evaluation of the pre-implanted grafts revealed that kze-drying has no significant effect (E-0.05) on biomechanical properties of the fresh bovine parietal pericardium and tunica vaginalis. While gamma sterilization caused significant decrease (R0.05) in biomechanical properties of the fkeeze-dried bovine pericardium and hmica vaginalis. Glycerol preservation caused significant (P<0.05) decrease in the biomechanical properties of fresh bovine parietal pericardimn, while it has no significant effect on the biomechanical properties of fiesh bovine parietal tunica vaginalis. Macroscopically, 97.66% of the rats survived until their predetermined sacrifice date. Adhesions, infections and seroma were encountered in 7.22%, 2.77% and 1.67% respectively of the rats operated. No serious post-surgical complications such as hernia, fistula and intestinal obstruction were encountered in the study. Glycerolized and lyophilized grafts were gradually resorbed and replaced by recipient tissue, while the ePTFE implants apparently remained without marked structural changes. Glycerol preservation seemed to delay the grafts resorption while lyophilization seemed to enhance grafts resorption Microscopically, the pre-implanted bovine parietal pericardium and tunica vaginalis were mainly fibro-collagenous in nature with few cellular and vascular elements. Freeze-drying and gamma sterilization has severe damaging effects on ultrastructural features of the grafts. In contrast, glycerol preservation seems to preserve the ultrastructural features of the grafts. Microscopically, the lyophilized and glycerolized grafts were replaced by collagenous tissue. Foreign body giant cells were detected in fibrous capsules around ePTFE Mycro Mesh implant starting from week three post-implantation onward. Calcium deposition was demonstrated in matrix of the ePTFE Mycro Mesh implant at 18 weeks postimplantation. No foreign body giant cells or calcium deposition were demonstrated in rats implanted with grafts of bovine origin or in sham-operated rats. The immuno-gold labeling showed that bovine type I collagen remained detectable in the implanted areas throughout the study period. The immunoperoxidase staining demonstrated that the intensity of the rat's type I collagen was increased with the advance of post-implantation intervals, while the intensity of rat's type I11 collagen showed slight changes with advance of post-implantation intervals. Post-implantation biomechanical evaluations revealed that the healing biomechanical properties between the implanted materials and the recipient abdominal tissues increased with advance of post-implantation intervals. However, there were no significant differences (P>0.05) among the overall mean values (n=15) of healing tensile strength, maximum load at break and Young's modulus of elasticity of all groups of implanted materials

Моделювання динамічних силових характеристик плунжерних токарних патронів з компенсаторами відцентрових сил

Efficient energy transfer was demonstrated in the SrF2:Eu2+, Pr3+ phosphor synthesized by the co-precipitation method. Results obtained with X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), x-ray spectroscopy (XPS), photoluminescence (PL) and decay curves proposed the UV-Vis energy transfer process. The energy transfer process between the Eu2+ and Pr3+ ions in SrF2 was investigated to evaluate the potential of the Eu2+ ion as a sensitizer for the Pr3+ ion. The results proposed that Eu2+ could be a good sensitizer for absorbing the UV photons and efficiently enhancing the Pr3+ emission intensity. The energy transfer process was effective until concentration quenching for the Pr3+ ions occurred. The concentration quenching was attributed to cross-relaxation between the Pr3+ ions. (C) 2016 Author(s).Funding Agencies|South African Research Chairs Initiative of the Department of Science and Technology; National Research Foundation of South Africa; National Research Foundation (NRF); Cluster program of the University of the Free State</p

Annexin/S100A protein family regulation through p14ARF-p53 activation: A role in cell survival and predicting treatment outcomes in breast cancer

© 2017 Hatoum et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. The annexin family and S100A associated proteins are important regulators of diverse calcium- dependent cellular processes including cell division, growth regulation and apoptosis. Dysfunction of individual annexin and S100A proteins is associated with cancer progression, metastasis and cancer drug resistance. This manuscript describes the novel finding of differential regulation of the annexin and S100A family of proteins by activation of p53 in breast cancer cells. Additionally, the observed differential regulation is found to be beneficial to the survival of breast cancer cells and to influence treatment efficacy. We have used unbiased, quantitative proteomics to determine the proteomic changes occurring post p14ARF-p53 activation in estrogen receptor (ER) breast cancer cells. In this report we identified differential regulation of the annexin/S100A family, through unique peptide recognition at the N-terminal regions, demonstrating p14ARF-p53 is a central orchestrator of the annexin/S100A family of calcium regulators in favor of pro-survival functions in the breast cancer cell. This regulation was found to be cell-type specific. Retrospective human breast cancer studies have demonstrated that tumors with functional wild type p53 (p53wt) respond poorly to some chemotherapy agents compared to tumors with a non-functional p53. Given that modulation of calcium signaling has been demonstrated to change sensitivity of chemotherapeutic agents to apoptotic signals, in principle, we explored the paradigm of how p53 modulation of calcium regulators in ER+ breast cancer patients impacts and influences therapeutic outcomes

Comparative evaluations of the processed bovine tunica vaginalis implant in a rat model

The aim of the present study was to evaluate the lyophilized and glycerolized bovine parietal tunica vaginalis for repair of a full-thickness abdominal wall defect and to compare their effectiveness with expanded polytetrafluoroethylene (ePTFE) Mycro Mesh (Gore-Tex® MYCRO MESH®; Gore and Designs, W. L. Gore & Associates, Flagstaff, AZ, USA) in a rat model. Fresh bovine parietal tunica vaginalis sacs collected from an abattoir were processed and preserved by freeze-drying and by using 99.5% glycerol. Full-thickness abdominal wall defects (3×2.5 cm) created surgically in 90 male Sprague-Dewaly rats (300–400 g) were repaired with the same size of lyophilized, glycerolized or ePTFE Mycro Mesh with 30 rats in each group. Six rats from each group were killed at post-implantation intervals of 1, 3, 6, 9 and 18 weeks for macroscopic, microscopic and tensiometric evaluations. All rats survived the procedure, except for one rat in the ePTFE Mycro Mesh group. Implants of bovine origin were gradually resorbed and replaced with recipient fibrous tissue, whereas the mesh implant was encapsulated with fibrous tissue and remained without any marked changes throughout the study period. Adhesions between the implant and underlying visceral organs were encountered in 10, 6.6 and 3.3% of rats implanted with lyophilized, glycerolized or ePTFE Mycro Mesh, respectively. Foreign body giant cells and calcification were demonstrated in fibrous capsule and mesh matrix, respectively, in rats implanted with ePTFE Mycro Mesh. Neither of these characteristics were observed in rats implanted with processed bovine tunica vaginalis. Macrophages engorged with lipofuchsin pigments were observed in the recipient tissue that replaced the implants of bovine origin at 3–18 weeks post-implantation. There were no significant (P > 0.05) differences in total mean values of healing tensile strength, load at break and Young’s modulus of elasticity between the three implant groups. The results of the present study encourage further investigation into the use of processed bovine parietal tunica vaginalis in clinical practice

Morphological features of natural cryptorchid sheep testes: a case study

The present study compares the morphological features of abdominal testes of natural bilateral cryptorchid adult sheep with that of scrotal testes in normal adult sheep. Specimens obtained from cryptorchid local sheep testes and epididymides were fixed and processed for light and scanning electron microscopy. Testes of normal sheep were fixed and processed in the same way and used for comparison. The retained testes that were detected in the pelvic cavity were small and flabby with indistinct superficial blood vessel ramification compared to the scrotal testes. Histologically, the seminiferous tubules of the retained testes were small, empty, lined with a single layer of degenerated cells resting on a thickened basement membrane surrounded with abundant interstitial tissue compared to the scrotal testis. The epididymis of the retained testes was empty and lined with high pseudostratified columnar epithelium with long streocillia, while the scrotal testis epididymis was distended with stored sperms and lined with low epithelial layer with indistinct streocillia. The connective tissue layers around the epididymis were very thick in retained testes compared to that of the scrotal testes. The outcome of this study demonstrates microscopic and macroscopic changes in cryptorchid testes. Further investigations are required regarding the ultrastructural changes in abdominal testis

Evaluation of rat soft tissue response to implantation of glycerolized bovine tunica vaginalis

The aim of this study was to evaluate glycerolized bovine parietal tunica vaginalis implant in rat model. Pieces of 3_2.5 cm bovine parietal tunica vaginalis preserved in 99.5% glycerol and stored at 4 degrees C were used to repair 3_2.5 cm full thickness abdominal wall defects created in a group of 30 male Sprague Dawley rats (300-400 g). Another group of 30 rats were underwent sham operation and used for comparison. Each group was divided into five subgroups (n=6) and sacrificed at post-surgical intervals of 1, 3, 6, 9 and 18 weeks for macroscopical, histological and mechanical evaluation. Loose adhesions were observed between the implanted graft and underlying visceral organs in 6.6% of the treated group. Histologically the graft was biocompatible and gradually replaced by the recipient fibers tissue. The graft healing tensile strength increased with time in both groups and no significant different (P>0.05) was observed between the overall means of healing tensile strength of the two groups. The outcome of this study revealed that glycerolized bovine tunica vaginalis is biocompatible surgical patch that can be used for reconstruction of soft tissue defects. However, further investigation is required regarding the glycerol preservation efficiency

Effect of preservation methods on the performance of bovine pericardium graft in a rat model

This study investigates the effect of preservation methods on the performance of bovine parietal pericardium grafts in a rat model. Mid-ventral full thickness abdominal wall defects of 3x2.5 cm in size were created in 90 male Sprague-Dawley rats (300-400 g), which were divided into three groups of 30 rats each. The abdominal defects of group one and two were repaired with lyophilized and glycerolized bovine pericardium grafts, while the defects of group three were repaired with expanded polytetrafluoroethylene (ePTFE) Mycro Mesh as a positive control. Another group of 30 rats underwent sham operation and was used for comparison as negative control. Each group of rats (n=30) was divided into five subgroups (n=6) and killed at 1, 3, 6, 9 and 18 weeks post-surgery for gross and morphological evaluations. The rats tolerated the surgical procedure well with a total mortality of 0.05%. No serious post-operative clinical complications or signs of rejection were encountered. Adhesions between the grafts and the underlying visceral organs observed in the study were mostly results of post-surgical complications. Glycerol preservation delayed degradation and replacement of the grafts, whereas lyophilization caused early resorption and replacement of the grafts. The glycerolized grafts were replaced with thick dense fibrous tissue, and the lyophilized grafts were replaced with thin loose fibrous tissue. The healing characteristic of the bovine pericardium grafts was similar to those of the sham-operated group, and quite different from those of the ePTFE Mycro Mesh. The outcome of the present study confirmed the superiority of glycerolized bovine pericardium grafts over its lyophilized counter part

Does Our Values Become Worsen? — A Study of the Effects of Fiscal Policies on Households’ Life in Sudan

As a result of the secession of South Sudan, Sudan has experienced the largest increases in the budget deficit, shortages of hard currencies, highest inflation rates, and debt accumulation. In this paper, we attempt to extend and contribute to prior research on the impacts of fiscal policies on households&rsquo; life in Sudan. An online data from 1999 until 2013 were used to examine the effects of fiscal policy on households&rsquo; life in Sudan. To do this, the OLS and VECM estimation procedures were considered. Our results supported hypotheses that the households&rsquo; life has become more worsen than the situation in post-separation of South Sudan, which caused decline in the economy. The paper contributes to prior research within this field by addressing one of the challenges households in Sudan

PORE PRESSURE PREDICTION USING SEISMIC METHODS FOR TOKER-1

Pore pressures of formations are one of the big problems facing the drillers in exploration areas. The pore pressure, together with fracture gradient, determines the amount of mud weight that is needed. Too much mud weight fractures the rock; too little mud weight allows formation fluids to come into the well and can cause blow-outs if not controlled. This work examine a feasibility of a new approach to estimate the pore pressures of formations prior to drilling operation . Knowing the pressures ahead of time will allow the drillers to adjust mud weight or take other measures to avoid problems. The required data is surface seismic data, in the vicinity of the well, and real-time logs as the wells are being drilled. This method consists of predicting the seismic velocities by simultaneous use of the surface seismic and real-time check-shot information. Then, the predicted velocities are mapped to the pore pressures using an equation or empirical relation appropriate for the area. Surface seismic data has been used in the industry to predict formation pore pressures before any well has been drilled. This is done by estimating the subsurface velocities from seismic and then using a number of velocity-pressure relations appropriate for a given region. The combination of surface seismic data with a set of real-time well logs, acquired as the well is being drilled so, as to make a more reliable estimate of velocities ahead of the bit. In particular we make use of the real-time check-shot measurement (Seismic While Drilling) that was not available to be accurately determined. To combine these two pieces of information, the surface seismic data are inverted for seismic velocities ahead of the bit while the inversion is constrained with the real-time well log and check-shot measurements