f. bahrami

In this work, we investigated the effect of adding 0.3% w/w of the non-toxic substance agarose to the dosimeter formulation of genipin radiochromic gel, which was named LCA-GENA (Low Concentration Agarose-GENipin and Agarose) gel dosimeter. 

A compact linear accelerator with a beam quality of 6 MV and a dose rate of  200 cGy/min irradiated the produced gel dosimeters in a dose range of 0-10 Gy. A UV-Visible spectrophotometer was used to read out the irradiated gel dosimeters. Calibration curves for both absorbance peak and area-under-spectrum responses were investigated. Furthermore, the physical and radiological characteristics of the new formulation were investigated.

The results showed that the dose sensitivity of the LCA-GENA gel dosimeter under the irradiated conditions is (8.4 ± 0.15) × 10-3 cm-1 Gy-1. Results showed adding the abovementioned percentage of agarose will increase the melting point of the genipin gel dosimeter from 24°C to 28°C. Also, an investigation of the radiological properties of the novel formulation revealed that this radiochromic gel is water equivalent.

From the obtained results, it is verified that adding 0.3% w/w agarose to the genipin gel dosimeter leads to an increase in the melting point of the original genipin gel dosimeter, easier fabrication, and lower price than that of higher agarose concentrations. The mentioned features make this gel suitable for dosimetry applications in clinical and radiotherapy environments.

Institutions usually bring the technologies they need from their surrounding environments into the organization. Therefore, a university as one of the important social institutions, under the influence of the electronic revolution and the emergence of new technologies in its surrounding environment, has moved towards the use of multimedia systems and electronic education; however, the use of electronic education, despite countless opportunities, has also brought major problems and challenges, some of which have been mentioned in previous studies, including the lack of face-to-face communication and interaction between the educator and the learner. Hence, the solution offered in e-learning to face this problem is the blended learning approach. Studies have shown that various factors such as educational, environmental, institutional, and organizational factors are effective in applying blended learning, and not paying attention to any of them can cause the failure of this type of teaching and learning. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to investigate the impact of institutional factors on the use of blended learning by the faculty members of Malayer University.

The present study was applied research in terms of purpose, cross-sectional in terms of time, and in terms of method of collecting the required data, it adopted a descriptive-correlation design using structural equation modeling. The statistical population of the present study included all the faculty members of Malayer University with the number of 153 people. Due to the limited size of the research community, all faculty members were tested, and finally, 140 faculty members participated in the study with a return rate of 92%. The tools of data collection were questionnaires of institutional factors and blended learning. For data analysis, descriptive statistics (frequency, percentage, mean) and inferential (correlation test and path analysis) methods were used in SPSS version 22 and Smart PLS version 6 statistical software.

The findings obtained from the statistical analysis of the data indicated a positive and significant impact of the normative factor with a path coefficient (0.151) on the use of blended learning by the faculty members, and the mimetic factor with a path coefficient (0.413) on the use of blended learning by faculty members, and the coercive factor with a path coefficient (0.362) had an impact on the use of blended learning by faculty members. Also, the measurement and fit indices of the model indicated its appropriateness.

Overall, the study showed that institutional factors (normative factors, coercive factors, and mimetic factors) have a great impact on the use of blended learning by faculty members. Hence, considering the following suggestions can help to institutionalize the use of blended learning in the academic context, namely the establishment of regulations and internal laws regarding the use of blended learning in the teaching-learning process at universities, more culturalization in the use of blended learning in the teaching-learning process by faculty members, imitating successful universities and institutions in the field of implementing blended learning, training faculty members on how to apply blended learning in teaching, encouraging more faculty members to use blended learning, and finally considering more educational privileges for the use of blended learning in teaching by faculty members.

The present study aimed to investigate the dependence of the response of the genipin gel dosimeter on readout temperatures.

To this aim, after the gel preparation, they were exposed by a Varian Medical Linac accelerator with a dose range of 0-10 Gy. Then the irradiated samples were readout by a spectrophotometer device at 5°C, 10°C, 15°C and 20 °C temperatures.

Results revealed that the response of the genipin gel dosimeter is extremely temperature-dependent. For the mentioned readout temperatures, the maximum dose sensitivity was related to 10°C and its value was 35×10-3cm-1Gy-1. Investigation of the AUS (area under spectra) depicted that the maximum dose sensitivity was also related to 10°C. Furthermore, investigation of the dose resolution of this gel dosimeter showed that the minimum detectable dose was related to 10°C, and its amount was 0.24 Gy.

The results confirmed a noticeable change in the response of the genipin gel dosimeter due to variations of the readout temperature. It can be concluded that the response sensitivity of this radiochromic gel dosimeter increased by readout temperature decreasing.

Iran started malaria elimination campaigns many years ago. The purpose of this study was to review the malaria surveillance system in Iran.
 

The data of this study were obtained from the surveillance system of the Center for Communicable Disease Control, a review of records, documents, books and published articles, and also interviews with process owners and experts of malaria surveillance in 2017-2019.
 

The surveillance system of malaria in Iran has a coherent structure, in which all identified cases are reported and monitored from the environmental levels to the center by telephone instantly. Considering that the main goals of the malaria program including disease elimination have been obtained, the surveillance system in Iran is currently aiming at strengthening the elimination phase. In this stage, all new cases are also epidemiologically investigated in addition to examination, treatment and follow-up for categorization of the cases in categories of relapse, indigenous, introduced, and induced.
 

The successful implementation of the surveillance system for malaria over time has caused indigenous cases of disease to be limited to three southeastern provinces of the country and there are fewer than 300 new cases a year. Despite success, since the goal of malaria surveillance in Iran is now disease elimination, continuous monitoring of  correct implementation of all processes and evaluation of the applied strategies are necessary.

The tendency to consume food with lower sugar content and alternatively healthy foods and food products are rising. High levels of sugar in date syrup might be used as a good alternative to sugar in various food products. Iran is one of the main producers of date fruit and it is possible to produce foods with high nutritional values from date to replace high-sugar content food. The formation of acrylamide in date syrups as the result of various procedures of heat treatment and extent of its formation has made the researchers interested in this field of study to investigate the formation of this compound quantitatively by the application of high-pressure liquid chromatography. The results indicated that some of the date syrup samples that were collected in the Iranian market had significant quantities of acrylamide. It is therefore concluded that the date syrups might be considered as a high-risk product due to the formation of acrylamide that is considered a carcinogenic compound.

Since rice is a staple food most consumed world-wide, there have been increasing health concerns regarding exposure to arsenic through rice consumption. Several studies have reported the accumulation of arsenic in rice grains cultivated in regions with elevated levels of arsenic in groundwater or contaminated soil. Therefore the principal aim of this study was determining the amount of arsenic in Iranian rice cultivated in the same farms in two consecutive years and arsenic tracking through agricultural water and soil. Therefore different provinces (Mazandaran, Gilan, Fars, Ghazvin, Lorestan and Khozestan) with high harvested area and various weather conditions were selected. Since the arsenic levels in water and soil that were used for rice cultivation are effective on adsorbed arsenic by the rice, therefore to specify the origin of the contamination, sampling from soil, water and unpolished rice of each selected farms were carried. Total arsenic content was determined from the digests by hydride generation atomic absorption spectrophotometer. The results indicated that accumulation and the increase in arsenic content of agricultural soil causes an increase in the arsenic content of white rice. The results have also shown that arsenic contents in all the investigated white rice samples are less than the maximum limit specified by the national standard (0.15 mg/kg), and no significant difference was observed in the arsenic content in two consecutive years of rice cultivation. Therefore the control of arsenic content in water used for irrigation, limited the usage of chemical fertilizers and pesticides that might affect the concentration of arsenic in the soil and maintain the aerobic conditions during either the vegetative or the reproductive stages of the rice growth that might reduce the concentration of arsenic in the soil and consequently in the rice.

In this study,rossby wave activity flux,in order to investigate budget,direction and intensity of the incoming rossby waves,into the Middle East and Iran and its relation to positive precipitation anomaly in April and October of 2018 were used.dry period(April and May 2008)was selected to compare with the wave flux in the wet period.precipitation data from the Weather station of the country's Meteorological Organization were used to calculate precipitation anomaly,NCAR / NCEP data to compute wave activity flux.Results showed that two factors convergence(divergence)of the wave activity and the sources and sinks of energy,manage the energy budget in the Mediterranean region.In wet period,wave activity is stronger and there is an area of intense wave divergence on the east of the Atlantic ocean.The waves from the Atlantic ocean,by passing the Mediterranean Sea covers Iran.In the dry period,in the west of the Atlantic,the eddy activity is more weaker than the other.So the convergence of wave stream function on the Atlantic Ocean and also the weakness of the rossby on this area,followed by the divergence of wave stream function on the east of the Mediterranean Sea and of course Iran,and also the lack of appropriate eddy activity in this region, has caused drought in this period.

This study was aimed to investigate the relationship between depression and Pre Menstrual Syndrome (PMS) with Meta Cognitive beliefs in female university students.

This was a correlation analytical study executed on the female students of psychology studying at psychology and education school of Isfahan University in 2007-2008. Thirty students were randomly selected. The instruments used for data collection included the Meta Cognition Questionnaire (MCQ) and the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), as well as a researcher-made questionnaire for assessment of Pre Menstrual Syndrome (PMS). Data was analyzed using the SPSS-13 software and the regression analysis method .

A significant correlation was found between the mean scores of the negative Meta Cognitive beliefs subscale (referring to the beliefs of dangerousness and uncontrollability of worry) with the mean scores of PMS (p < 0.05). Also, there were significant correlations between the mean total scores of all dysfunctional Meta Cognitive beliefs and the mean scores of depression during the menstrual period (p < 0.05).

Meta Cognition may play a role in development and perpetuation of PMS and depression in women.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of narrative couple therapy on couple’s family fun-ctionning. Research procedure was qu-asi experimental with pre-test and pos-t-test and control groups. Sample inc-ludred 30 couples who were referred to Kashani hospital in Isfahan pro-vince in 2007.They were placed randomly in the ex-perimental (15 couples), and control (15 couples) groups Family functioning as dependent var-iable was assessed by Bloom’s Fam-ily Function questionnaire. The experimental group were exposed to narrative couple therapy for nine se-ssions. It was hypothesized that narr-ative couple therapy would improve couple family functioning and it’s di-mesions and out come will differ based on. Results showed that narr-ative couple therapy had improved couple’s Family Functioning (P<0/01) and influenced all dimensions except enmeshment and religious commitme-nt (p<0/05).There was no gender difference (P<0/05).

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of instructing marital enrichment and increasing of marital intimacy. This research is experimental with pretest and post test groups. A sample of 30 couples were randomly selected and assigned into control and experimental groups. The subjects in the experimental group participated in Marital Enrichment program (ME). Experimental group received a 7 sessions, treatment each 2 hours per week. Marital Intimacy Questionnaire (MIQ) (Bahrami Oulia, 2006). Consists of 8 subscales (emotional, intellectual, social recreational activities, psychological, religious, sexual, communicational, Physical and total score). was applied to collect, the data.Instructing marital enrichment program improved the level of marital intimacy in experimental group. The Results showed that differences between groups were significant in total scale of intimacy. (F =16.36, P< 0.01) and all of the subscales (P < 0.05).The results of this research indicate that marital enrichment program (ME) could increase total marital intimacy. could increase emotional, intellectual, psychological, communication and social-recreational activities in marital intimacy, how every could not increase sexual, religious and physical marital intimacy.These findings are consistent with Zimpher, (1988), Olson & Fowers (1989), Guerney & Maxson, (1998). Hence ME could increase marital intimacy and decrease conflict between couples.