poor stand establishment of canola (brassica napus l.) under flatland mechanized planting and crust-forming soil is a major problem for farmers in central iran. previous research there showed that irrigated cotton emergence on crust-forming soils under flatland planting can be significantly improved using a double-disk planter with zero-pressure press wheel tires and no crust-breaking. in that ...

BACKGROUND Performance of the left ventricle during exercise stress in thalassaemia patients is uncertain. We aimed to explore the phenomenon of dynamic dyssynchrony and assess contractile reserve in patients with beta-thalassaemia major and determine their relationships with myocardial iron load. METHODS AND RESULTS Thirty-two thalassaemia patients (16 males), aged 26.8 ± 6.9 years, without ...

Chronic alcohol consumption may lead to progressive cardiac dysfunction. The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of using real-time 3-dimensional echocardiography (3DE) on assessing left ventricular (LV) function in chronic alcoholics.We classified 92 male alcoholics into mild, moderate, and severe groups; 30 age-matched controls were also recruited. LV end-diastolic volume (LVEDV...

BACKGROUND Sperm chromatin structure is often impaired; mainly due to oxidative damage. Antioxidant treatments do not consistently produce fertility improvements and, when given at high doses, they might block essential oxidative processes such as chromatin compaction. This study was intended to assess the effect on male sub-fertility of a pure one carbon cycle nutritional support without stron...

BACKGROUND The systolic dyssynchrony index (SDI) has been introduced as a measure of mechanical dyssynchrony using three-dimensional echocardiography to select patients who may benefit from cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT). However, three-dimensional echocardiography may be inadequate in a number of patients with suboptimal acoustic window and no single echocardiographic measure of dyssy...

BACKGROUND Poverty is a major determinant of population health, but little is known about its role in modifying air pollution effects. OBJECTIVES We set out to examine whether people residing in socially deprived communities are at higher mortality risk from ambient air pollution. METHODS This study included 209 tertiary planning units (TPUs), the smallest units for town planning in the Spe...

AIM To investigate the impact of abnormal sperm morphology using the sperm deformity index (SDI) on reactive oxygen species (ROS) production and its correlation with sperm DNA damage. METHODS Semen samples were collected from men undergoing infertility screening (n = 7) and healthy donors (n = 6). Mature spermatozoa were isolated and incubated with 5 mmol/L beta-nicotinamide adenine dinucleot...

AIMS To quantify left ventricular (LV) dyssynchrony in patients with left bundle branch block (LBBB) and in patients after myocardial infarction (MI) applying an accelerated three-dimensional (3D) tagging cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) technique, and to combine dyssynchrony information with viability data obtained by late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) CMR. METHODS AND RESULTS Thirty-two pati...

Objectives. Assessment of left ventricular (LV) systolic function in patients with atrial fibrillation can be difficult. Acoustic cardiography provides several parameters for quantifying LV systolic function. We evaluated the ability of acoustic cardiography to detect LV systolic dysfunction in patients with and without atrial fibrillation. Design. We studied 194 patients who underwent acoustic...

As a key part of the forest ecosystem, soil microorganisms play extremely important roles in maintaining ecological environment and security water quality reservoir areas. However, it is not clear whether there are differences functional diversity different types water-conservation forests areas, which factors affect microorganisms. In our study, Biolog-Eco microplate technique was used to anal...