• Abstract
• Painful diabetic neuropathy is associated with impaired opioid analgesia; however, the precise mechanism in sensory neurons remains unclear. This study aimed to identify putative mechanisms involved in modified opioid responsiveness during early streptozotocin-induced diabetes in rats. In this study, we demonstrate that in diabetic animals, impaired peripheral opioid analgesia is associated with a reduction in functional mu-opioid receptor (MOR) G protein coupling. Mu-opioid receptor immunoreactive neurons colocalized with activated forms of protein kinase C (PKC) and with the receptor for advanced glycation end products (RAGE) during streptozotocin-induced diabetes. Moreover, MOR phosphorylation at Thr370 in sensory neurons of diabetic rats, and thus desensitization, was due to RAGE-dependent PKC activation. Importantly, blocking PKC activation using PKC selective inhibitor, silencing RAGE with intrathecal RAGE siRNA, or inhibiting advanced glycation end product (AGE) formation prevented sensory neuron MOR phosphorylation and, consequently, restored MOR G protein coupling and analgesic efficacy. Thus, our findings give the first in vivo evidence of a RAGE-dependent PKC-mediated heterologous MOR phosphorylation and desensitization in sensory neurons under pathological conditions such as diabetic neuropathy. This may unravel putative mechanisms and suggest possible prevention strategies of impaired opioid responsiveness.

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This paper presents a novel secure and robust steganographic technique in the compressed video domain namely embedding-based byte differencing (EBBD). Unlike most of the current video steganographic techniques which take into account only the intra frames for data embedding, the proposed EBBD technique aims to hide information in both intra and inter frames. The information is embedded into a compressed video by simultaneously manipulating the quantized AC coefficients (AC-QTCs) of luminance components of the frames during MPEG-2 encoding process. Later, during the decoding process, the embedded information can be detected and extracted completely. Furthermore, the EBBD basically deals with two security concepts: data encryption and data concealing. Hence, during the embedding process, secret data is encrypted using the simplified data encryption standard (S-DES) algorithm to provide better security to the implemented system. The security of the method lies in selecting candidate AC-QTCs within each non-overlapping 8 × 8 sub-block using a pseudo random key. Basic performance of this steganographic technique verified through experiments on various existing MPEG-2 encoded videos over a wide range of embedded payload rates. Overall, the experimental results verify the excellent performance of the proposed EBBD with a better trade-off in terms of imperceptibility and payload, as compared with previous techniques while at the same time ensuring minimal bitrate increase and negligible degradation of PSNR values.

This chapter aims, to highlight a review of IAS history, followed by approaches of accounting regulations. The development of accounting regulation within developing countries is also highlighted and discussed in the context of cultural diversity. It also aims to shed light into the motives that drive the adoption and implementation of IASs/IFRS. The political nature of lobbying and accounting standards setting process is also discussed in this chapter. In addition, the chapter discusses those factors that may be perceived as challenges which may delay or even block the convergence into the IASs/IFRS. Finally the authors provide key remarks about the IASs and venues for future research

The measurement errors problem is endemic in many econometric studies, and one of the oldest known statistical problems. Instrumental variable (IV) method is one of the popular solutions adopted to deal with the mismeasured variables in statistical and econometric analyses. This paper proposes an efficient IV estimator to the parameters of the simple regression model where both variables are subject to measurement errors. The proposed IV is defined using simple mathematical transformation of the manifest independent variable (mismeasured variable). The proposed method is straightforward, and easy to implement. The theoretical superiority of the proposed estimator over the existing IV based estimators due to Wald (1940), Bartlett (1949), and Durbin (1954) is established by analytical comparison and geometric expositions. Simulation based numerical comparisons of the proposed estimator with four different existing estimators are also included.

Abstract- Many methods have been applied in order to reduce nitrate concentration in aqueous solutions, among them

is the adsorption onto the surface of agricultural wastes. In this study, batch experiments were carried out to investigate

the adsorption of nitrate onto olive pomace (OP), a solid by-product of olive oil industry. To achieve this, six parameters

were studied by varying only one parameter at a time. These parameters were the effect of: pH, contact time,

temperature, adsorbent weight, agitation speed and nitrate concentration. The optimum pH was found to be 5, while the

optimum time was 75 minutes. Nitrate removal percentage was found to increase with increasing adsorbent weight or

temperature, with 92.5% of nitrate removed by using 2 g of OP and 48% of nitrate was removed at 60ºC. Generally,

agitation speed increased the nitrate removal percentage, while high initial concentration of nitrate was found to decrease

its removal percentage. These findings, combined with the low cost of OP and its abundance, suggest that OP is a

potential adsorbent for nitrate removal provided that the optimum conditions are applied. Applying this method for

nitrate removal will make drinking water safer to drink and wastewater safer to discharge.