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IntroductionHydroponic cultivation systems using desalinated groundwater may play pivotal role in reducing freshwater consumption for irrigation. However, reliance on desalination remains unsustainable due to its high cost, energy demand, and the serious environmental impacts of its brine byproducts. Producing a biofertilizer that enables groundwater irrigation in hydroponics by enhancing plant halotolerance and resistance to salt stress offers a promising solution to address freshwater scarcity and low soil quality in arid and semi-arid regions, such as the Arabian Gulf.MethodsThis study investigates the potential of Bacillus spizizenii FMH45 in field experiment to enhance tomato plant production under greenhouse cultivation in hydroponics using directly groundwater for irrigation without desalination.Results and discussionResults demonstrated that the FMH45-based biofertilizer (HB45) significantly improved plant physiological parameters under greenhouse conditions. These improvements included a notable increase in shoot elongation (>13%), enhanced SPAD index values (>8%), and significant rises in flower and fruit counts (≃ 11% and 22%, respectively). B. spizizenii HB45 showed significant potential to increase bacterial densities by over 100-fold in various plant organs under saline irrigation and prevent salt infiltration into internal plant tissues. Furthermore, HB45-treatment enhanced the plant oxidative stress response as evidenced by stable catalase activity, an approximately 50% reduction in lipid peroxidation markers such as malondialdehyde (MDA), and a 35% decrease in reactive oxygen species (ROS), including hydrogen peroxide (H2O2). These findings demonstrate that B. spizizenii FMH45 holds significant potential for the development of effective biofertilizers capable of mitigating salt stress while boosting crop productivity. This approach offers a sustainable alternative to desalination-dependent hydroponics, particularly for arid and semi-arid regions, including Qatar.

Abstract Background Endodontic therapy in pediatric dentistry is a challenging procedure, especially for special needs, uncooperative, and very young patients. A new conservative approach which is the non-instrumental endodontic treatment (NIET) has been developed to simplify the management of primary teeth requiring pulpectomy. This review aimed to compare the efficiency of NIET and conventional endodontic treatment in primary teeth. Methods Electronic databases including MEDLINE (via PubMed), Cochrane Library (CENTRAL), and Scopus without restrictions on publication year or publication language were searched. Only randomized clinical trials reporting clinical and radiographical outcomes of NIET and conventional pulpectomy on primary teeth were considered eligible. Two reviewers extracted the data according to the PRISMA statement and assessed the bias risk using the revised Cochrane risk-of-bias tool and a meta-analysis was performed. Results From 3322 screened articles, seven articles meeting the inclusion criteria were included. The selected studies included 283 primary molars, of 213 children aged between 3 and 9 years, treated by NIET and conventional pulpectomy, and had follow-up periods ranging from 1 month to tooth exfoliation. Two studies reported good success rates for both the NIET technique and endodontic therapy with no statistically significant difference while three studies showed radiographical significant differences with a low success rate for the NIET technique. Only one study reported better outcomes in the pulpectomy group with statistically significant differences. The quantitative grouping of the included studies showed no significant differences between NIET and conventional endodontic therapy regarding clinical and radiographical success (p value > 0.05). Conclusion No difference between the NIET technique and the conventional endodontic therapy in primary molars requiring pulpectomy could be confirmed. Results of the present review need to be interpreted with caution since the quality of evidence according to the GRADE was considered as moderate to very low. Therefore, additional clinical trials on the NIET technique are recommended.

Abstract Aim The present survey aimed to highlight the clinical status of first permanent molars (FPMs) among a group of children aged between 6 and 13 years in public primary schools in Tunisia and to determine the association between FPMs' dental caries, gingival bleeding, malocclusion, dental fluorosis, and enamel defects. Materials and Methods The survey involved a cross‐sectional study based on a dental examination conducted in public primary schools in Monastir Tunisia. A dental caries assessment was performed on FPMs using the International Caries Detection and Assessment System classification; the number of carious lesions in permanent and temporary dentition was established using the decayed/missing/filled teeth (DMFT) index. The Gingival Index and the Dental Aesthetic Index were used to determine the occurrence of gingival bleeding and malocclusions. Dean's index and the modified Development Defects of Enamel index were used to define the enamel defects. The χ2 test was used to assess the difference between more than two groups, and the level of statistical significance was set at .05%. Results A total of 545 children and 2080 FPMs were examined. The prevalence of dental caries in FPMs was recorded to be 35.8%. The overall mean DMFT index of the study population was 1.62 and the mean DMFT index was 1.41. The proportion of carious FPMs increased significantly with the age of the children (p .05). Conclusion Although the prevalence of caries in FPMs was considered moderate, health promotion programs should be implemented on a large scale to decrease the prevalence of dental caries among school children.

Abstract Covid-19 is a disease that can lead to pneumonia, respiratory syndrome, septic shock, multiple organ failure, and death. This pandemic is viewed as a critical component of the fight against an enormous threat to the human population. Deep convolutional neural networks have recently proved their ability to perform well in classification and dimension reduction tasks. Selecting hyper-parameters is critical for these networks. This is because the search space expands exponentially in size as the number of layers increases. All existing approaches utilize a pre-trained or designed architecture as an input. None of them takes design and pruning into account throughout the process. In fact, there exists a convolutional topology for any architecture, and each block of a CNN corresponds to an optimization problem with a large search space. However, there are no guidelines for designing a specific architecture for a specific purpose; thus, such design is highly subjective and heavily reliant on data scientists’ knowledge and expertise. Motivated by this observation, we propose a topology optimization method for designing a convolutional neural network capable of classifying radiography images and detecting probable chest anomalies and infections, including COVID-19. Our method has been validated in a number of comparative studies against relevant state-of-the-art architectures.

Abstract This article presents an approach to model and simulate Plug&Play social things. Confined into silos, existing (not social) things are restricted to basic operations like sensing and actuating, which deprive them from participating in the satisfaction of complex business applications. Contrarily, social things are expected to engage in collaborative scenarios and to tap into specific relations that connect them to peers when achieving these scenarios. These relations are referred to as complimentary, antagonism, and competition, and allow to develop networks of things. To capitalize on such networks, the approach to model and simulate Plug&Play social things puts forward four stages that are referred to as connecting to demystify social relations between things, influencing to examine the impact of social relations on things, playing to make things perform while considering influence, and incentivizing to reward things based on their performance. A smart system for elderly the care centers has been developed to showcase the technical doability of Plug&Play social things. The system is an integrated development environment allowing IoT engineers to define the collaboration of social things, thanks to a set of drag&drop operations.

Abstract Regional odontodysplasia (RO) in permanent teeth is a rare developmental anomaly of mineralized tissues. Three‐dimensional images and data from CBCT allowed to provide useful information on the degree of tooth calcification and consequently confirm the diagnosis of RO and establish a treatment strategy to minimize future damages and sequels.

Abiotic and biotic stresses such as salt stress and fungal infections significantly affect plant growth and productivity, leading to reduced crop yield. Traditional methods of managing stress factors, such as developing resistant varieties, chemical fertilizers, and pesticides, have shown limited success in the presence of combined biotic and abiotic stress factors. Halotolerant bacteria found in saline environments have potential as plant promoters under stressful conditions. These microorganisms produce bioactive molecules and plant growth regulators, making them a promising agent for enhancing soil fertility, improving plant resistance to adversities, and increasing crop production. This review highlights the capability of plant-growth-promoting halobacteria (PGPH) to stimulate plant growth in non-saline conditions, strengthen plant tolerance and resistance to biotic and abiotic stressors, and sustain soil fertility. The major attempted points are: (i) the various abiotic and biotic challenges that limit agriculture sustainability and food safety, (ii) the mechanisms employed by PGPH to promote plant tolerance and resistance to both biotic and abiotic stressors, (iii) the important role played by PGPH in the recovery and remediation of agricultural affected soils, and (iv) the concerns and limitations of using PGHB as an innovative approach to boost crop production and food security.

Enteroviruses are a leading cause of upper respiratory tract, gastrointestinal, and neurological infections. Management of enterovirus-related diseases has been hindered by the lack of specific antiviral treatment. The pre-clinical and clinical development of such antivirals has been challenging, calling for novel model systems and strategies to identify suitable pre-clinical candidates. Organoids represent a new and outstanding opportunity to test antiviral agents in a more physiologically relevant system. However, dedicated studies addressing the validation and direct comparison of organoids versus commonly used cell lines are lacking. Here, we described the use of human small intestinal organoids (HIOs) as a model to study antiviral treatment against human enterovirus 71 (EV-A71) infection and compared this model to EV-A71-infected RD cells. We used reference antiviral compounds such as enviroxime, rupintrivir, and 2′-C-methylcytidine (2′CMC) to assess their effects on cell viability, virus-induced cytopathic effect, and viral RNA yield in EV-A71-infected HIOs and cell line. The results indicated a difference in the activity of the tested compounds between the two models, with HIOs being more sensitive to infection and drug treatment. In conclusion, the outcome reveals the value added by using the organoid model in virus and antiviral studies.

Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) are machine learning algorithms inspired by the structure and function of the human brain. Their popularity has increased in recent years due to their ability to learn and improve through experience, making them suitable for a wide range of applications. ANNs are often used as part of deep learning, which enables them to learn, transfer knowledge, make predictions, and take action. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of ANNs and explore potential directions for future research. To achieve this, the paper analyzes 10,661 articles and 35,973 keywords from various journals using a text-mining approach. The results of the analysis show that there is a high level of interest in topics related to machine learning, deep learning, and ANNs and that research in this field is increasingly focusing on areas such as optimization techniques, feature extraction and selection, and clustering. The study presented in this paper is motivated by the need for a framework to guide the continued study and development of ANNs. By providing insights into the current state of research on ANNs, this paper aims to promote a deeper understanding of ANNs and to facilitate the development of new techniques and applications for ANNs in the future.

PurposeThe present study aimed to investigate the prevalence and risk factors of ECC among preschool children in Monastir, Tunisia.MethodsThe survey was designed as a cross-sectional study carried out between February and April 2021 in the main region of Monastir, Tunisia. A total of 381 preschool children were randomly selected using a three-stage clustered sampling technique from 10 daycares. The dental caries were diagnosed using WHO recommendations and a questionnaire in Arabic language was used to record personnel profile of the enrolled children. The chi-square test was used in bivariate analyses to assess the association between ECC and risk factors. Variables showing significant associations were included in multiple logistic regression models.ResultsThe prevalence of ECC was 20% and the mean dmft score was 0.89 ± 0.24. The prevalence of ECC increased at the age of 48–59 months ([OR] 2.602; 95%CI: 1.122–2.302), the age of 60–71 months ([OR] 2.845; 95% CI: 1.128–2.072), in children with nocturnal feeding ([OR] 2,417; 95% CI: 1.340–4,358), who take sugary drinks in the bottle ([OR] 1.104; 95% CI: 1.667–2.826), stopped breast or bottle feeding after the age of 18 months ([OR] 2.417; 95% CI: 1.340–4.358), do not brush their teeth properly ([OR] 1.435; 95% CI: 1.207–2.915), had visited a dentist ([OR] 2.444; 95% CI: 2.072–1.108), and decreased in children with a more highly educated parents ([OR] 0.797; 95%CI: 0.171–0.650).ConclusionGiven the relatively high prevalence of ECC in Tunisia, it is important to review public dental health policies and develop effective strategies to encourage changes in behavior related to the oral health of children to prevent the spread and worsening of this disease.

Sanjad-Sakati syndrome (SSS) is a rare autosomal recessive congenital disorder. The present case report is aimed at describing the orofacial manifestations and dental management of a 4-year seven-month-old, Tunisian boy with SSS. The patient has typical dysmorphic facial features and growth retardation. Intraoral examination revealed micrognathic mandible and maxilla, an arched palate, and small dental arches with an open bite. All the maxillary and mandibular teeth were decayed due to the poor oral hygiene, plaque accumulation, and enamel hypoplasia. Oral rehabilitation involved pulpotomies and root canal therapies on decayed teeth. Resin composite restorations were performed on maxillary and mandibular incisors, and stainless-steel crowns were placed on maxillary and mandibular first and second primary molars. Dental treatment of children with SSS should improve their quality of life and their general health. Undeveloped dental arches associated with dental anomalies as well as learning deficit make very difficult of the oral rehabilitation of such patients.

Abstract Children with lymphangioma of the tongue may require a close collaboration between physician and dentist to establish preventive, conservative approaches, and eradicate any sources of dental infections before undertaking immunosuppressive therapy.

The objective of this research work is the study of the essential oils (EOs) of myrtle (MEO) and rosemary (REO) as novel and eco-friendly corrosion inhibitors. These EOs were extracted by the Clevenger technique and analyzed using the Gas Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry (GC/MS) and Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). These techniques show that MEO and REO were rich in various volatile compounds.The investigation of copper corrosion behavior in 3 wt% NaCl solution, in the presence of EOs, via open circuit potential (OCP), potentiodynamic polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) was carried out. The results of the electrochemical tests presented the same trends: EOs acting as cathodic type inhibitor for copper in 3 wt% NaCl solutions, the inhibition efficiency increasing upon the addition of EOs and the further increase with the increase of the EOs concentration and REO having moderately superior performance compared to MEO. The EOs molecules adsorption on the copper surface followed a Langmuir isotherm, and physical adsorption (vs. chemical adsorption) is dominant.

Objective. To compare the effectiveness of topical antibiotic mixtures used in noninstrumental endodontic treatment (NIET) of primary teeth. Methods. Electronic databases including MEDLINE, the Cochrane Library, and Scopus database were searched. Randomized clinical trials evaluating the clinical and radiological outcomes of topical antibiotics used in NIET were selected. The revised Cochrane risk-of-bias tool (RoB 2.0) was used to assess the quality of the methodology of the included articles. Results. Five articles comparing the outcomes of four different drugs combination were included. Three studies conducted to evaluate the success rate of two combinations of antibacterial drugs consisting of ciprofloxacin-minocycline-metronidazole (3 Mix) in one group and ciprofloxacin-minocycline-ornidazole in the other group showed no statistically significant difference between both groups (P>0.05). The ciprofloxacin-minocycline-ornidazole group showed better results compared with the 3 Mix group. One study conducted to compare the effectiveness of 3 Mix with ciprofloxacin-tinidazole-minocycline reported no significant difference between both groups, and one study that compared 3 Mix and ciprofloxacin-metronidazole-clindamycin mixture concluded that the overall success rates of both groups were 80.96% and 76.20%, respectively, with no statistically significant difference. Conclusion. Based on the overall success rates, the ciprofloxacin-minocycline-ornidazole mixture was considered more effective than the 3 Mix which was more effective than the ciprofloxacin-tinidazole-minocycline and the ciprofloxacin-metronidazole-clindamycin groups. Clinical Relevance. Different antibiotic combinations, showing good clinical and radiographic success in treating necrotic primary teeth, can be used effectively in NIET and this technique can be considered effective for teeth with advanced root resorption and when conventional endodontic treatment is contraindicated.

Dentigerous cysts (DC) are the most common odontogenic cystic lesions of inflammatory origin occurring in children. These lesions can be treated by enucleation with or without related impacted teeth or marsupialization/decompression. The latter procedures have been used successfully for many years, but decompression is increasingly recommended in children because of its good outcomes and the preservation of the developing tooth. This conservative surgical technic allows simultaneously the normal eruption of the involved permanent teeth and the ossification of the bony defect. The present report describes an 8-year-old female patient with an inflammatory DC associated with an endodontically treated primary molar accidentally discovered on panoramic radiograph. Decompression of the cyst was performed, by means of a removable space maintainer acting as an acrylic obturator after removal of teeth 83 and 84. Ten months after the decompression procedure, a complete resolution and regression of the cystic lesion with full spontaneous eruption of the premolar were observed.

Primary double teeth (PDT), referring to either gemination or fusion, are one of the most important and frequent developmental dental anomalies that can affect children’s oral health. Many clinical complications are correlated with these anomalies, such as dental caries, malocclusions, periodontal problems, and dental anomalies in permanent dentition. The aim of this report was to describe, through two cases, a case of gemination and another of fusion, the clinical management, the consequent effects, and the possible repercussions of these two developmental abnormalities on permanent successors. The first case involved gemination of the primary maxillary left central incisor (#61) in a 6-year-old boy. The patient presented with dental caries in the geminated tooth and its contiguous primary left lateral incisor (#62). The radiological examination revealed a slight developmental delay in the permanent left lateral incisor (#22). The treatment plan involved performing a pulpotomy and restoring the dental crowns of the affected teeth. The second clinical case describes a 6-year-old girl with unilateral fusion between a primary mandibular lateral incisor (#72) and a supernumerary tooth (#72’). The treatment included restoration of the deep grooves of the fused teeth using flowable composite and coronal restoration of the contiguous left primary canine (#73). Clinical and radiological follow-ups were performed every 3 months to monitor the development of teeth. No clinical and radiological symptoms were noted during the follow-up visits. PDT may require a multidisciplinary treatment. They should be diagnosed early to avoid and treat any possible complications in both the primary teeth and their permanent successors.

Hepatocyte transplantation has emerged as an alternative to liver transplant for liver disease. Hepatocytes encapsulated in alginate microbeads have been proposed for the treatment of acute liver failure, as they are able to provide hepatic functions while the liver regenerates. Furthermore, they do not require immunosuppression, as the alginate protects the hepatocytes from the recipient's immune cells. Mesenchymal stromal cells are very attractive candidates for regenerative medicine, being able to differentiate into cells of the mesenchymal lineages and having extensive proliferative ability. When co-cultured with hepatocytes in two-dimensional cultures, they exert a trophic role, drastically improving hepatocytes survival and functions. In this study we aimed to (i) devise a high throughput system (HTS) to allow testing of a variety of different parameters for cell encapsulation and (ii) using this HTS, investigate whether mesenchymal stromal cells could have beneficial effects on the hepatocytes when co-encapsulated in alginate microbeads. Using our HTS platform, we observed some improvement of hepatocyte behavior with MSCs, subsequently confirmed in the low throughput analysis of cell function in alginate microbeads. Therefore, our study shows that mesenchymal stromal cells may be a good option to improve the function of hepatocytes microbeads. Furthermore, the platform developed may be used for HTS studies on cell encapsulation, in which several conditions (e.g., number of cells, combinations of cells, alginate modifications) could be easily compared at the same time.