• 제목/요약/키워드: Tunisia

검색결과 55건 처리시간 0.029초

Characterization of Coolia spp. (Gonyaucales, Dinophyceae) from Southern Tunisia: first record of Coolia malayensis in the Mediterranean Sea

  • Abdennadher, Moufida;Zouari, Amel Bellaaj;Medhioub, Walid;Penna, Antonella;Hamza, Asma
    • ALGAE
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    • 제36권3호
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    • pp.175-193
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    • 2021
  • This study provides the first report of the presence of Coolia malayensis in the Mediterranean Sea, co-occurring with C. monotis. Isolated strains from the Gulf of Gabès, Tunisia (South-eastern Mediterranean) were identified by morphological characterization and phylogenetic analysis. Examination by light and scanning electron microscopy revealed no significant morphological differences between the Tunisian isolates and other geographically distant strains of C. monotis and C. malayensis. Phylogenetic trees based on ITS1-5.8S-ITS2 and D1-D3/28S rDNA sequences showed that C. monotis strains clustered with others from the Mediterranean and Atlantic whereas the C. malayensis isolate branched with isolates from the Pacific and the Atlantic, therefore revealing no geographical trend among C. monotis and C. malayensis populations. Ultrastructural analyses by transmission electron microscopy revealed the presence of numerous vesicles containing spirally coiled fibers in both C. malayensis and C. monotis cells, which we speculate to be involved in mucus production.

Human Laughter Generation using Hybrid Generative Models

  • Mansouri, Nadia;Lachiri, Zied
    • KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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    • 제15권5호
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    • pp.1590-1609
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    • 2021
  • Laughter is one of the most important nonverbal sound that human generates. It is a means for expressing his emotions. The acoustic and contextual features of this specific sound are different from those of speech and many difficulties arise during their modeling process. During this work, we propose an audio laughter generation system based on unsupervised generative models: the autoencoder (AE) and its variants. This procedure is the association of three main sub-process, (1) the analysis which consist of extracting the log magnitude spectrogram from the laughter database, (2) the generative models training, (3) the synthesis stage which incorporate the involvement of an intermediate mechanism: the vocoder. To improve the synthesis quality, we suggest two hybrid models (LSTM-VAE, GRU-VAE and CNN-VAE) that combine the representation learning capacity of variational autoencoder (VAE) with the temporal modelling ability of a long short-term memory RNN (LSTM) and the CNN ability to learn invariant features. To figure out the performance of our proposed audio laughter generation process, objective evaluation (RMSE) and a perceptual audio quality test (listening test) were conducted. According to these evaluation metrics, we can show that the GRU-VAE outperforms the other VAE models.

Environmental Contamination by Echinococcus granulosus sensu lato Eggs in Relation to Slaughterhouses in Urban and Rural Areas in Tunisia

  • Chaabane-Banaoues, Raja;Oudni-M'rad, Myriam;M'rad, Selim;Mezhoud, Habib;Babba, Hamouda
    • Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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    • 제54권1호
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    • pp.113-118
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    • 2016
  • Hydatidosis has become a real concern for health care institutions and animal rearers in Tunisia. The Tunisian endemicity is aggravated by the growing number of dogs and the difficulty of getting rid of contaminated viscera because of the lack of equipment in most slaughterhouses. Therefore, microscopic and molecular tools were applied to evaluate the role of slaughterhouses in canine infection and Echinococcus granulosus sensu lato (s. l.) egg dissemination. Exposure risk to E. granulosus s. l. eggs in urban and rural areas was explored in order to implant preventive and adapted control strategies. Microscopic examinations detected taeniid eggs in 152 amongst 553 fecal samples. The copro-PCR demonstrated that 138 of 152 taeniid samples analyzed were positive for E. granulosus s. l. DNA. PCR-RFLP demonstrated that all isolated samples belonged to E. granulosus sensu stricto (s. s.). An important environmental contamination index (25.0%) by E. granulosus s. l. eggs was demonstrated. The average contamination index from the regions around slaughterhouses (23.3%; 95% CI: 17.7-28.9%) was in the same range as detected in areas located far from slaughterhouses (26.0%, 95% CI: 21.3-30.8%). Echinococcosis endemic areas were extended in both rural (29.9%, 95% CI: 24.8-34.9%) and urban locations (18.1%, 95% CI: 13.0-22.9%). The pathogen dissemination is related neither to the presence/absence of slaughterhouses nor to the location in urban or rural areas, but is probably influenced by human activities (home slaughtering) and behavior towards the infected viscera.

Breast Cancer in Tunisia: Association of Body Mass Index with Histopathological Aspects of Tumors

  • Bouguerra, Hichem;Guissouma, Hajer;Labidi, Soumaya;Stambouli, Nejla;Marrakchi, Raja;Chouaib, Salem;Elgaaied, Amel Ben Ammar;Boussen, Hammouda;Gati, Asma
    • Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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    • 제15권16호
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    • pp.6805-6810
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    • 2014
  • Background: Previous studies have suggested a link between obesity and breast cancer (BC). However, there is no universal consensus, especially in population based studies. Because only few studies have been conducted on African women, we aimed here to assess the relationship between BMI at time of diagnosis and the BC histopathological features among Tunisian patients according to menopausal status using a hospital-based prospective cohort study. Materials and Methods: Clinical and pathological data were collected from 262 patients stratified on four groups according to their BMI. The relationship between BMI and histopathological features at diagnosis was analysed using univariate and multivariate analysis. Receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to evaluate the performance of BMI in predicting of high tumor grade, in comparison to ki-67 index of proliferation. Results: Obesity was correlated with larger tumors, advanced grade and with ER-PR-Her2+ BC subtype. An association of BMI with tumor size and tumor grade was observed in both premenopausal and postmenopausal women. Additionally, a significant association between BMI and ER+, ER+PR+Her2+ and ER-PR-Her2+ status was revealed for premenopausal patients, while only ER+PR+Her2+ was associated with BMI for postmenopausal women. Finally, our results showed that compared to Ki67 proliferation index, BMI is a useful prognostic marker of high grade BC tumors. Conclusions: These data are the first to show that in Tunisia obese women suffering from BC have significantly larger tumors and advanced tumor grade and that higher BMI might influence tumor characteristics and behavior.

Alginate에 고정화된 Pantoea agglomerans에 의한 인광석 가용화 (Solubilization of Rock Phosphates by Alginate Immobilized Cells of Pantoea agglomerans)

  • 류정현;;;사동민
    • 한국토양비료학회지
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    • 제38권4호
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    • pp.188-193
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    • 2005
  • 본 실험은 인산가용화균인 Pantoea agglomerans를 alginate를 이용하여 고정화 시킨 후 다양한 종류의 인광석을 대상으로 인산 가용화능을 평가하고 고정화된 균의 보관 및 저장온도에 따른 인산 가용화능의 변화를 살펴보기 위하여 수행되었다. 실험에 사용된 원산지가 다른 인광석 (Tunisia, Israel, Morocco, China) 중 Morocco산 인광석의 가용화 속도가 빠르고 높은 농도의 인산이 가용화 되었다. 반면, 중국산 인광석은 가용화 속도가 느리며, 가용화된 인산의 농도도 매우 낮았다. 고정화된 균의 저장 온도는 6개월간 보관 시 인산 가용화능에 유의성 있는 차이를 나타내자 않았다.

Contribution of institutional shocks to Tunisian macroeconomic fluctuations: Structural VAR approach

  • Zouhaier, Hadhek
    • 동아시아경상학회지
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    • 제1권1호
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    • pp.8-16
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    • 2013
  • Purpose: The objective of this paper is to identify and assess the contribution of budgetary, monetary and institutional shocks affecting the Tunisian economy over the period 1976-2003. The methodology used is vector autoregressive models and structural recent techniques for the analysis of time series related. The empirical results show a significant relationship between the supply shock and institutions on the one hand, and between institutional shocks and economic activity on the other hand. Research Design, Data and Methodology: As part of this section we will try to identify and assess the contribution of various shocks to macroeconomic variables' fluctuations for the Tunisian economy. The study period is: 1976-2003 and observations are annual. Results: The real business cycle theory argues that fluctuations in aggregate economic activity are the result of the interaction of the only real factors namely agents' preferences, technological opportunities, factor endowments and possibly certain institutional constraints. Conclusions: The lowest contribution to the variability of these rights is the monetary shock. As for "civil liberties", the largest share of their variability is the shock relating to the "political rights" during the first four periods .

HER2 Expression in Ovarian Mucinous Carcinomas in Tunisia

  • Missaoui, Nabiha;Abdelkarim, Soumaya Ben;Ayachi, Malak;Hmissa, Sihem
    • Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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    • 제15권19호
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    • pp.8121-8125
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    • 2014
  • Background: Ovarian mucinous carcinoma has a poor prognosis in advanced stages and a poor response to conventional chemotherapy. An efficient treatment is not yet available. We heere investigated HER2 expression and the potential for trastuzumab therapy in ovarian mucinous tumors. Materials and Methods: Immunohistochemistry was performed in formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue from 27 ovarian mucinous tumors including 14 carcinomas and 13 borderline tumors diagnosed in the Pathology Department, Farhet Hached Hospital, Sousse, between 1993 and 2013. The HercepTest (DAKO) was used for immunohistochemistry. Results: HER2 expression was observed in only one borderline tumor (7.7%) and in 14.3% of mucinous carcinomas of the ovary. Conclusions: Our results suggest that trastuzumab therapy would be an option for patients with mucinous carcinoma when the tumor has HER2 overexpression.

Performance Limits of Three-Phase Self-Excited Induction Generator (SEIG) as a Stand Alone DER

  • Slimene, Marwa Ben;Khlifi, Mohamed Arbi
    • Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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    • 제12권1호
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    • pp.145-150
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    • 2017
  • This paper present a unified method of steady state performance analysis and limits characteristics of an autonomous three-phase self-excited induction generator (SEIG) driven by a wind turbine under different types of loads and speeds. The proposed method is based on a new mathematical function to solve for the real and imaginary components of the complex equation of the mathematical model. Performances limits, regulation and characteristics of different configurations will be thoroughly examined and compared. The proposed system will be modeled and simulated and the performance limits characteristics will be compared with variable speed and variable capacity.

Proposal Model for Programming Numerical Control Lathe Basis on the Concept by Features

  • N.Ben Yahia;Lee, Woo-Young;B. Hadj Sassi
    • International Journal of Precision Engineering and Manufacturing
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    • 제2권3호
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    • pp.27-33
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    • 2001
  • The aim of the present work is to propose a model for Computer Aided programming of numerical Control lathe. This model is based on the concept by features. It has been developed in an Artificial Intelligence environment, that offers a rapidity as well as a precision for NC code elaboration. In this study a pre-processor has been elaborated to study the geometry of turning workpiece. This pre-processor is a hybrid system which combine a module of design by features and a module of features recognition for a piece provided from an other CAD software. Then, we have conceived a processor that is the heart of the CAD/CAM software. The main functions are to study the fixture of the workpiece, to choose automatically manufacturing cycles, to choose automatically cutting tools (the most relevant), to simulate tool path of manufacturing and calculate cutting conditions, end to elaborate a typical manufacturing process. Finally, the system generates the NC program from information delivered by the processor.

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동종요법의 임상적 의미와 한의학적 응용 가능성에 관한 고찰

  • 최옥병
    • 대한약침학회지
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    • 제10권1호통권22호
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    • pp.55-66
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    • 2007
  • Objectives : The purpose of this study is to analyze the practical implications of homeopathic medicines, their status, their preparation systems and registration rules, recognized by the European Union and other countries. Contents : This paper covers the background of homeopathic medical principle, homeopathy throughout the world, the medicine status and clinical research, increases of the drug potency, the practical regulation of treatment, preparation techniques of homeopathic drugs and registration rules and the clinical practice. Homeopathy has been currently practised in over eighty countries throughout the world, especially in Europe. It had attracted considerable attentions in South and North America (notably in USA, Brazil, and Argentina), India and Pakistan. Although it is not dominantly popular in North America, constant growth has been nevertheless noted. Over the last thirty years, homeopathy has also developed or appeared in South Africa, Tunisia, Morocco, Venezuela, Israel, and Australia, etc. Result & suggestion : As over 300 million patients have put their trust in homeopathy, the study of the integration of homeopathy to oriental medicine, its development and feasibility in Korea are urgently needed. The products, substances, compositions of Homeopathic drugs are very similar to those of oriental medicine theory. Therefore their preparations and applications should prescribed and practised exclusively by oriental doctors. Applying the homeopathic theory and its preparation techniques to oriental medicine, the herbal acupuncture preparation should be modernized and various oriental products are to be developed. To this end, government and herbal acupuncture society need to interact each other for the development of oriental medicine.