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"Raz̤avī, Sajjād"
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Knowledge and Power in Muslim Societies
The study of Islam and of Islamic history is enjoying something of a revival with an emphasis on intellectual history and a greater concern with the 'subaltern' within that. Why does religion continue to hold significance in our times? Are humans better off, adaptable, less violent, consistently unpredictable? How can we understand the course of our political history and the seeming dominance of democracy and its discontents, not least the legacies of coloniality and empire? While nationalist historiographies prevail in many contexts as well as Marxist and other approaches, the trend seems to be towards connected histories, the transnational and the global. Much of this constitutes intellectual history, which as one leading expert puts it, \"seeks to restore a lost world, to recover perspectives and ideas from the ruins, to pull back the veil, and explain why the ideas resonated in the past and convinced their advocates.\" (Richard Whatmore) Ideas are expressive of cultures and norms, practices and dispositions, of actions and events that lie at the very core of human experience such as sovereignty and power, mind and matter, profanity and spirituality. There are noticeable differences of approach in the various chapters presented but what brings them together is a careful study of texts, not in a reductively philological manner derided quite often these days but in the way in which we recognise that texts are forms of speech acts and lie alongside other forms of self-expression that can elucidate and illuminate as well as occlude. This is the first volume in the new series Studies in Islamic Intellectual History (ISSN 2941-1491).
eBook
The Effect of Group Psychoeducation Program on Medication Adherence in Patients with Bipolar Mood Disorders: a Randomized Controlled Trial
Medication nonadherence is highly prevalent in patients with bipolar disorders and often results in worsening disease prognosis. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of group psychoeducation on medication adherence in female patients with bipolar mood disorder type I.
This randomized controlled trial was conducted on 76 patients with bipolar mood disorder admitted in female psychiatric wards of Razi teaching hospital, Tabriz, Iran. The participants were selected by convenience sampling method and were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. Patients in experimental group received 10 continuous 90 minutes sessions of psychoeducation, two times a week. Medication adherence was measured using the medicine check list and medication adherence rating scale (MARS) before and after intervention. Data analysis was performed with SPSS ver.13.
There was no significant difference between two groups regarding medication adherence before the intervention. After the study intervention, the mean scores of medication adherence check list and medication adherence rating scale in the experimental group were significantly higher than the control group.
Since group psychoeducation was effective in improving patients' medication adherence, it could be recommended for psychiatric nurses to apply this intervention in the clinical setting.
Journal Article
Impact of parental presence during induction of anesthesia on anxiety level among pediatric patients and their parents: a randomized clinical trial
Anesthesia induction is a stressful event for children and their parents, and may have potentially harmful consequences on the patient's physiological and mental situation. Stressful anesthesia induction has psychological adverse effects that recur with repeated anesthesia, can lead to increased pediatric discomfort during the recovery period, and may even induce reactionary postoperative behavior. A randomized controlled trial was performed to assess the impact of parental presence during induction of anesthesia (PPIA) on preoperative anxiety of pediatric patients and their parents at three different times, cooperation of child with anesthesiologist at induction of anesthesia, and parental satisfaction.
A total of 96 pediatric patients undergoing elective minor surgery (ASA 1-2) were randomly divided into two groups. Both groups received oral midazolam (0.5 mg/kg) at least 20 minutes before surgery, but in the PPIA group, the parents were also present in the operating room until loss of consciousness of child at anesthesia induction. Anxiety in the patients (as measured by the modified Yale Preoperative Anxiety Scale [mYPAS]) and parents (as measured by the State and Trait Anxiety Inventory [STAI]), the Induction Compliance Checklist (ICC), and parental satisfaction (as measured by visual analog scale) were assessed.
There was no significant difference in the mean anxiety scores (mYPAS) of participants in the control and PPIA groups at ward T0 and upon arrival to operating room T1 (
>0.05). However, between the PPIA and control groups, mean mYPAS score was different at the time of induction of anesthesia T2 (35.5±16.6 vs 59.8±22.4;
<0.001). The ICC scores showed that perfect score was significantly different in the PPIA and control groups (66.6% vs 6.3%;
<0.01). The STAI scores of the parents in the two groups did not differ in T0, T1, and T2. The mean parental satisfaction score was higher in the PPIA group than in the control group (7.6±7.0 vs 5.8±6.1;
<0.01).
PPIA may reduce preoperative state anxiety of pediatric patients and improve quality of anesthesia induction based on ICC scores and higher parental satisfaction, but it does not impact on parental state anxiety.
Journal Article
Drought tolerance of wheat genotypes is associated with rhizosphere size and enzyme system
Background and aims
Utilizing drought-tolerant genotypes with appropriate adaptive characteristics is a crucial mitigation strategy to improve wheat productivity in dry conditions. Understanding rhizosphere processes (e.g., enzyme traits) involved in nutrient acquisition and adaptation to drought stress across different genotypes is critical for the development of drought-resistant genotypes.
Methods
We grew three wheat genotypes with varying drought tolerance -Baran (rainfed drought-tolerant), Sirvan (drought-tolerant), and Marvdasht (non-drought-tolerant)- in rhizoboxes under drought stress. Through in-situ zymography and ex-situ enzyme kinetic analysis, we examined the localization and dynamic behaviors of key enzymes, acid phosphatase (ACP) and β-glucosidase (GLU), in the rhizosphere and their relationship with root traits.
Results
Baran displayed a more extensive root system with abundant lateral roots compared to other genotypes. Its rhizosphere exhibited a higher hotspot of GLU and ACP than Sirvan (1.5- and 1.2-fold higher, respectively) and Marvdasht (2- and 2.7-fold higher, respectively). Baran also demonstrated a broader enzyme activity expansion in the rhizosphere, showcasing its superior nutrient exploration capability. Drought-tolerant genotypes displayed elevated GLU and ACP activity in the rhizoplane, indicating enhanced root exudation. Notably, V
max
values of GLU were approximately 2-fold lower in drought-tolerant genotypes than in Marvdasht, revealing an energy conservation strategy in dry conditions. Additionally, drought-tolerant genotypes exhibited a higher affinity of GLU and ACP to substrates, enabling efficient nutrient extraction from soil organic matter despite lower enzyme activity.
Conclusion
Our findings demonstrate that drought-tolerant genotypes can better withstand water stress by having a broader rhizosphere extent and an effective enzyme system, both of which are primarily facilitated by lateral root growth.
Journal Article
Inhibitory effects of nafcillin and diosmin on biofilm formation by Salmonella Typhimurium
Objective
The foodborne pathogen
Salmonella
enterica serovar Typhimurium causes self-limiting gastroenteritis in humans and is difficult to eliminate due to its ability to adhere to surfaces and form biofilms that exhibit high resistance to antimicrobial agents. To explore alternative strategies for biofilm treatment, it is essential to investigate novel agents that inhibit
Salmonella
biofilms.
Method
In this study, we investigated the minimum biofilm inhibitory concentrations (MBICs) and minimum biofilm eradication concentrations (MBECs) of nafcillin and diosmin, both previously identified as Lon protease inhibitors, against biofilms formed by
S
. Typhimurium. Furthermore, we examined the expression of genes associated with the type II toxin-antitoxin system to enhance our understanding of the impact of these inhibitors.
Results
The findings indicated a strong antibiofilm effect of nafcillin, with MBIC and MBEC values of 8 µg/mL and 32 µg/mL, respectively. These results were confirmed by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), which showed that biofilm formation was reduced in the presence of nafcillin. Additionally, it revealed morphological changes in the bacteria within the nafcillin-treated biofilms. Furthermore, gene expression analyses demonstrated a significant reduction in the expression of type II TA system genes following treatment with nafcillin and diosmin.
Conclusion
This study highlights the effectiveness of nafcillin in disrupting the biofilms of
S
. Typhimurium. These results suggest promising avenues for the development of novel therapeutic strategies targeting biofilms associated with
S
. Typhimurium.
Journal Article
Impact of nafcillin and diosmin on the attachment, invasion, and stress survival of Salmonella Typhimurium
Salmonella
Typhimurium is an invasive intracellular pathogen that employs various factors for its survival within host cells. To mitigate
S
. Typhimurium survival, it is crucial to identify factors that influence bacterial survival and to develop drugs that inhibit these factors. In this study, we investigated the effects of nafcillin and diosmin, both of which have been identified as inhibitors of Lon protease, on the intracellular survival of
S
. Typhimurium and its survival under various stress conditions. Additionally, we examined the expression of genes associated with the type II toxin-antitoxin system to enhance our understanding of the impact of these systems on the bacterium’s survival. Our findings indicate that while nafcillin and diosmin did not affect
S
. Typhimurium attachment, they significantly reduced bacterial intracellular survival, particularly in Hep2 cells after 16 h. These inhibitors were also effective in decreasing bacterial survival under oxidative and acidic stress conditions. Furthermore, gene expression analysis revealed that although there were variations in the expression of TA system genes in
S
. Typhimurium across different cell lines, the
relEB
system emerged as the most effective among those studied, exhibiting the highest increase in expression. This study highlights the efficacy of nafcillin and diosmin in reducing the intracellular survival of
S
. Typhimurium as well as its survival under stress conditions. These findings suggest potential new strategies for developing therapies aimed at preventing
S
. Typhimurium infections.
Journal Article
Targeting lon protease to inhibit persister cell formation in Salmonella Typhimurium: a drug repositioning approach
Persister cells are a specific subset of bacteria capable of surviving exposure to lethal doses of antibiotics, leading to antibiotic therapy failures and infection relapses. This research explores the utilization of drug repositioning to target the Lon protease in
Typhimurium.
In this study, FDA-approved drugs sourced from the Drug Bank database were screened to identify existing pharmaceuticals with the potential to combat the Lon protease. The formation of persister cells in the presence of antibiotics, as well as the combination of antibiotics with potential Lon protease inhibitors, was examined. Furthermore, the expression of type II toxin-antitoxin system genes was analyzed to enhance our comprehension of the inhibitors' effects.
Molecular docking analysis revealed that Diosmin and Nafcillin exhibited strong binding affinity to the Lon protease. Molecular dynamics simulation trajectories analysis demonstrated that the interaction of these ligands with the enzyme did not induce instability; rather, the enzyme's structure remained stable. Combinations of ceftazidime and ciprofloxacin with either Nafcillin or Diosmin led to significant reductions in bacterial cell counts. Furthermore, the effectiveness of these combinations, when compared to antibiotics alone, highlighted the substantial impact of Nafcillin and Diosmin in reducing type II TA system gene expression.
These findings suggest promising prospects for developing novel therapeutic approaches targeting persister cells to mitigate treatment failures in
infections.
Journal Article
Adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) machine learning algorithm for assessing environmental and socio-economic vulnerability to drought: a study in Godavari middle sub-basin, India
Climate change has increased the frequency of drought occurrence in various parts of the world. Drought as a complex phenomenon causes severe impacts on ecological and socio-economic status. Short-term and long-term occurrences of drought have made many regions vulnerable globally. This paper makes an attempt to assess drought vulnerability in Godavari Middle Sub-basin of India. Twenty-four site specific socio-economic and environmental factors were identified based on the extensive literature review. Drought frequency was assessed using standardized precipitation index (SPI). These datasets were divided into training (70%) and testing (30%) data. Frequency ratio (FR) model was utilized to establish relationship among drought conditioning factors and drought frequency. Weights obtained from the FR model were used as input to the adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference systems (ANFIS) model. Drought vulnerability results were validated using the testing data and receiver operating characteristic (ROC). The accuracy of ANFIS models for 1-month (0.957), 3-months (0.882), 6-months (0.964) and 12-months (0.938) showed high suitability of ANFIS model for the assessment of drought vulnerability. The findings revealed that very low normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and increasing trend of highest maximum and mean maximum temperature were major environmental factors which influenced high drought vulnerability in the sub-basin. High proportion of area under fallow land, high infant mortality rate (IMR) and moderate literacy rate were identified as major socio-economic factors making watersheds vulnerable during short and long-term droughts. Largest area of the sub-basin was found under high vulnerability for 3-months, followed by 6-months and 12-months droughts. Thus, the study calls for policy intervention towards lessening the impact of drought in highly vulnerable watersheds.
Journal Article
ParsiNorm: A Persian Toolkit for Speech Processing Normalization
In general, speech processing models consist of a language model along with an acoustic model. Regardless of the language model's complexity and variants, three critical pre-processing steps are needed in language models: cleaning, normalization, and tokenization. Among mentioned steps, the normalization step is so essential to format unification in pure textual applications. However, for embedded language models in speech processing modules, normalization is not limited to format unification. Moreover, it has to convert each readable symbol, number, etc., to how they are pronounced. To the best of our knowledge, there is no Persian normalization toolkits for embedded language models in speech processing modules, So in this paper, we propose an open-source normalization toolkit for text processing in speech applications. Briefly, we consider different readable Persian text like symbols (common currencies, #, @, URL, etc.), numbers (date, time, phone number, national code, etc.), and so on. Comparison with other available Persian textual normalization tools indicates the superiority of the proposed method in speech processing. Also, comparing the model's performance for one of the proposed functions (sentence separation) with other common natural language libraries such as HAZM and Parsivar indicates the proper performance of the proposed method. Besides, its evaluation of some Persian Wikipedia data confirms the proper performance of the proposed method.
Paper