Abstract: Introduction: Nowadays, about 50-65% of births in Iran occur by Cesarean Section (CS). Informed consent (IC) is one of the most important ethical, legal and professional requirements of a surgical procedure. Objectives: This study aims to assess the quality of obtaining surgical IC from women underwent CS in public hospitals of Iran. Materials and Methods: In this analytical study ...

Central to Vygotsky-inspired sociocultural theory (SCT) is the notion of ZPD seen by SLA researchers as a useful framework within which L2 teaching and learning can take place. Van Lier (2004) argues that the ZPD could be activated in diverse proximal contexts (PCs) and is not limited to the expert-novice scenario. . This study probed whether Iranian EFL learners' collaborative task performance...

Historically, it was assumed that reactive, inorganic phosphorus present in pristine environments was solely in the form of orthophosphate. However, this assumption contradicts theories of biogenesis and the observed metabolic behavior of select microorganisms. This paper discusses the role of ion chromatography (IC) in elucidating the oxidation-reduction cycle of environmental phosphorus. Thes...

Two new diterpenoids, pachydictyol B (1a/1b) and C (2), were isolated from the dichloromethane extract of the marine brown alga, Dictyota dichotoma, collected from the Red Sea coast of Egypt, along with the known metabolites, pachydictyol A (3a), dictyol E (4), cis-africanan-1α-ol (5a), fucosterol (6), tetrahydrothiophen-1,1-dioxide and poly-β-hydroxybutyric acid. GC-MS analysis of the nonpolar...

Andrographolide (AG) is a diterpenoid lactone isolated from the leaves of Andrographis paniculata. AG is a potent and low-toxicity antileishmanial agent. Chemotherapy applications of AG are, however, seriously constrained because of poor bioavailability, short plasma half-life, and inappropriate tissue localization. Nanoparticulation of AG was therefore envisaged as a possible solution. AG nano...