The present study was carried out to assess and document ethnobotanical knowledge of the plants of Sabalan District in Ardabil Province, as the area has diverse flora and high ethnobotanical potential. Medicinal plants of Sabalan were studied through collections of plant specimens and by interviewing local informants from several villages. For Each plant species the scientific and vernacular name, the parts of the plants used, specific medicinal uses, modes of preparation and administration and way of obtaining them were listed. Plants were used mainly for diseases of digestive tract, infectious diseases of external tissues, respiratory disorders, cardiovascular diseases, urinary diseases and indigenous people use some of them as food. After clinical and experimental tests and phyochemical analysis, these Medicinal plants may be broadly applied in modern medicine.

Background: The aim of this study was to conduct a sero-epidemiological survey in Meshkinshahr, Ardabil Province, northwestern Iran to detect the rate of hydatidosis in the city and nearby villages. Literature shows that no such study has been conducted so far.Methods: Overall, 670 serum samples were collected from 194 males and 476 females from patients referred to different health centers of the region. All patients filled out a questionnaire and an informed consent. Sera were analyzed using indirect-ELISA test. Ten mg /ml antigens (Antigen B derived from hydatid cyst fluid), serum dilutions of 1: 500 and conjugate anti-human coombs with 1: 10000 dilutions were utilized to perform the test. Data analysis was conducted using SPSS software ver.11.5.Results: The seroprevalence of human hydatidosis was 1.79% by ELISA test in the region. This rate for females was 1.68% and males 2.6%, respectively. There was no significant difference as regards all factors studied and the seropositivity. According to job, farmers and ranchmen had the highest rate of infection as 3.17%. The sero-prevalence of infection was 2.6%% in illiterate people which showed the highest rate. As regards residency, urban life showed no significant difference with rural life (1.1% vs.2.58%).Age group of 69-90 yr old, with 4.62% as prevalence had the highest rate of positivity.Conclusion: Obtained sero-prevalence of hydatidosis shows more or less a resemblance to other cities of Iran, although due to the specific condition of the city we expected more rate of sero-positivity.

This study evaluated the livability of 11 tourist target villages in the Ardabil District (Ardebil, Nemin, Sarein and Nair counties) using a descriptive-analytical approach. A number of indicators and items related to livability have been determined based on the studies conducted (4 dimensions, 14 indicators, and 65 items). In the next step, the questionnaire was developed by the researcher and after confirming the validity and reliability,It was distributed according to the population of the entire region. The sample size was determined using the Cochran method (360 samples) and the number of samples for the studied villages was determined according to the population of each village. In the following, Shannon's entropy technique was used to weight the indicators, and based on Prescott Allen's point of view and Vicor's technique, the livability status of the studied villages was examined at 5 levels (completely favorable to completely unfavorable). The results show that none of the studied villages are in a completely unfavorable state of livability, and the village of Bileh-Dargh is in first place with a score of 0. 84 and is in a state of complete desirability of livability. 53. 7 percent of the studied villages have a favorable livability status. With a score of 0. 57, the village of Ilanjuq is ranked 8th and has an average livability status. 27. 2 percent of the villages, i. e. 3 villages of Golestan, Sardabe and Korabaslu, while being in an unfavorable condition of livability, have occupied the 9th to 11th ranks. This research showed that tourism development has played an important role in improving the livability of the studied villages.

Background and Aim: Visceral leishmaniasis (Kala-azar) is known as an endemic disease in some parts of Iran such as Ardabil, East Azarbaijan, Bushehr and Fars provinces. Sporadic forms of the disease are reporting from the rest areas of the country. Regarding to most reports of kala-azar disease from Germi District to the health centers of Ardabil province, study on kala-azar in Germi was necessary.Material and Methods: Therefore this is a seraepidemiological study of visceral leishmaniasis in Germi District in 2004. Cluster sampling has been performed from ≤12 years old and 10 % of the adult population in Germi District. Altogether 1155 blood specimens were collected to detect anti-Leishmania antibodies. The samples were tested by direct agglutination test (DAT). Results showed that 32 (2.8%) of the collected specimens have anti-Leishmania antibodies with titers ≥1:800 and from total specimens 7(0.6%) were positive with ≥1:3200 titers. The positive and suspicious specimens in DAT were tested by IFA and ELISA methods too. Out of 22 ownership dogs examined, 3 (2.6%) were detected to have anti-Leishmania antibodies using DAT (≥1:320) and Dipstick rk39. Results: Necropsy was performed on three dogs that one of them was parasitological positive. The isolate was cultured successfully and identified as L.infantum by RAPD-PCR .In this study, no statistically significant difference was found between male (2.7%) and female (2.8%) sera-prevalence (P = 0.8) and visceral leishmania infection is more prevalent in children under 4 years old (P< 0.05).Conclusion: These findings offered that, kala-azar is a health problem in Germi District of Ardabil province and further studies are necessary and facilities requires for health, treatment and diagnosis in this region.

It has been known that weak structural foundation of the rural area of Iran has been the most important element of an obstacle on rural development. In this human settlement meanwhile, natural hazards such as floods and earthquakes impose serious damages on its socio – economic organization as well as physical structures. In such state, renewal of damaged villages rising from of natural hazards, with a rational approach to planning, and the government intervention in use location – spatial arrangement is the end scenario and resettlement of damaged villages is such an approach. Those among these neglected and are located in rural people and what matters will be the result of spatial and physical reconstruction programs. This validation study with emphasis on implications of social, economic and spatial strategies for rural resettlement after disasters natural (earthquakes) to measure an outcome of this Abgarm county of Ardebil in District villages during the earthquake was destroyed in 1375 deals. This research provided the following reviews outcome indicators for rural resettlement after natural disasters (earthquake) are. Looking at three aspects of social (social cohesion, social cohesion and sense of place), the economic consequences (job changes, income) and physical consequences (the destruction of pastures, changing the pattern of housing, agricultural land use change and the rate of access to infrastructure services) were performed. Research - descriptive and analytical methods, including documents and field data collection (observation, interview, and questionnaire) are. Hypothesis test using tests and independent T-test and help Mknmar SPSS software was done. The findings show that, among the criteria selected for the consequences of social, economic and spatial strategies, rural resettlement after the earthquake, the amount of social cohesion, social cohesion, sense of place, change the pattern of housing and access to better services and more appropriate approach reconstruct displacement approach is that if such criteria, income, destroyed pastures, agricultural land use change is opposite.

IntroductionMost villagers in Iran are inhabiting inadequate houses with insufficiently ventilated devices, and unsanitary conditions in villages are becoming very serious. So much so that the lack of access to proper and standard housing-an indicator of rural development-has wrought psychological and social damage on village lives, distortion, and abnormality in the residential fabric of villages and finally, economic and social upheavals in the country. Rural housing in Ardabil County has not remained untouched by this rule, as most of the rural buildings of this County are constructed with mud and clay and less durable materials. Since this County lies within an earthquake-prone area, the very lack of resistance of rural houses has created a lot of problems for these villages every few years. Hence, retrofitting and providing suitable rural housing stands as one of the main strategies in development plans for the country. This urgent matter requires that challenges faced by the rural settlements of the County be solved in order to provide such housing which can withstand accidents, and thereafter, be livable. Identifying challenges in providing desirable rural housing is critical; the rationale being that the ground for creating and building resistant units against all sorts of issues and problems that plague rural housing is thusmade possible. That becomes a possible strategy to be put forth in terms of rural planning and raising the quality of life as security achievement in rural areas; Otherwise, with this necessity in mind, the present work assesses the challenges faced in providing desirable rural housing for Central Ardabi County villages.  MethodologyThis study adopts a descriptive survey research method pertaining to quantitative research, with the applied purpose in mind. The research's statistical population is made up of rural households in the central part of Ardabil County. The specific sample villages were determined based on the two indicators (having a population of over 20 households; having some form of council/village management body). It is in this regard that, according to the available statistics (year 1400), the number of villages in the central part of Ardabil County is equal to 86, so for sampling purposes in accordance with the goals and hypotheses of the research, a stratified (multi-stage) technique was employed whereby the households served as the key criterion in estimating the sample size of the villages. Afterwards, by employing Cochran's formula, the sample size of households was determined to be 360 households, and the questionnaires were distributed among the respective villages in proportion to their number of households. For the purpose of data analysis, the structural equation test in Lisrel, Kruskal Wallis test, and ISDM method in SPSS were used.  ResultsThe results of the study indicate that about 10.28% of the respondents are on the weak perception side, 20.83% on average perception, 40.28% strong perception, and 28.61% on the very strong perception scale with regard to the challenges of rural housing. With regards to intravillage factors, the topmost factor load among physical-environmental challenges is the unavailability of temporary housing during the renovation and repair of existing houses with a factor load of 0.86, unavailability of communication networks and transportation with a factor load of 0.85, and the method of surface water collection system and sewage disposal (factor loading 0.82) whereby the economic challenges assess to poverty in rural areas (factor loading 0.85), villagers' capacity to save (factor loading 0.84) as well as the devaluation of the multiple and economic functions of rural housing (factor loading 0.82) and in regard to socio-cultural challenges, the reversal is the absence of a construction culture with respect to new building methods in the village (factor loading 0.85), upkeep of the traditional fabric in the villages (factor loading 0.82), followed by lack of access of settlements to health, social, cultural, recreational, and other good services...(factor loading 0.77). In other words, these indicators play maximum roles in changing the hidden variables (inside rural housing challenges). , In the area of extraneous rural challenges, the criteria and regulations regarding obtaining bank guarantees accounted as having the highest factor load of 0.83, following by other parameters which include: value of loans taken (0.82) and lack of availability of materials at fair price (0.80) scored within the socio-cultural challenges pertaining to a lack of teamwork and entrepreneurial spirit (loading 0.83), lack of equity and parity between rural and urban housing (loading 0.81), and weak engagement and opportunities of new media and innovations (loading 0.75), highest among management challenges to do with the problems of lacking local building models for housing-not-being-supported by rural life (0.88), same reconstruction and improvement models applied in all terrains (0.87), and relief and welfare committees' influence on citing the interest for improving household housing (0.84). In other words, these indicators have played the highest role in the changes of hidden variables (non-rural housing challenges).  Discussion and ConclusionThe first things that brought about severe depression are housing which has had a significant effect on the quality of human life. The importance attached to housing has made it become an area of interest over the ages, and its attributes have, at different times, been improved through different methods and technologies. And in particular regard to rural housing, there should be various plans on this regard. This is, in fact, the study, which was undertaken in order to show the challenges in achieving desirable rural housing in the villages centering across Ardabil city: An exploration that is unparalleled for its aims, as the specific characteristics of the particular place make it quite unique compared to studies concerning rural housing. The analysis results of the study revealed that according to factor load estimates about the intra-rural factors, the most significant intra-rural housing challenges are the physical-environmental variable (effect coefficient being 0.943), the economic variable (effect coefficient being 0.919), and the socio-cultural variable (effect coefficient being 0.889). The most important intra-rural challenges for housing thus are the managerial variable (effect coefficient being 0.928), followed by the economy (0.907), and the socio-cultural one (effect coefficient being 0.835) for the challenges of housing outside rural areas.

Tourism planning requires understanding the interaction between supply and demand and the impact of each in relation to the other; Therefore, planning the destination of tourism is one of the important factors of development planning. In the meantime, network analysis is one of the most up-to-date and efficient analytics that enhances their power over superior centers by linking small centers. Given the weakness of the attraction and the diffusion of many tourism destinations, their arrangement in the form of a network helps to synchronize the potential of these destinations; Therefore, network analysis and its applications in regional tourism development are essential. This study aimed to increase the competitiveness of these attractions within the framework of network theory by using a descriptive-analytical method, and the research data were collected by field survey method. The statistical population of the study consisted of 79 villages around 5 tourism centers of Ardebil District. Data are analyzed using NODEXL software, and density, degree, contrast, self-centered computational networks and gravity relations graph. According to the study of tourism network and presenting the spatial pattern in Ardebil area, the research findings show that most single cell villages were studied in south east and southwest part of the region. The central and western part of the region, large multicellular villages, are located in the central, western and northeastern parts of the region. The region's multi-celled villages are located around the tourist centers of the region (Ardebil and Sareen). Therefore, regional development and tourism management should strive to strengthen the link between the region's attractions, and establish a complete network and linkage for optimal use of the region's attractions.

Background: This study aimed to determine the seroprevalence of canine visceral leishmaniasis in Meshkin-Shahr District as endemic areas of human visceral leishmaniasis (HVL) for presenting control program of HVL to health authorities.Methods: A seroepidemiological study to determine seroprevalence of canine visceral leishmaniasis (CVL) among ownership dogs using direct agglutination tests (DAT) in 21 villages of Meshkin-Shahr District, Ardabil Province was carried out from June 2006 to August 2007. Three hundred and eighty four ownership dogs were selected by multi-stage cluster sampling. Chi-square and Fisher exact tests were used to compare seroprevalence values relative to gender, age and clinical signs.Results: Of the 384 serum samples tested by DAT, 17.4 %( 95%C.I, 13.2%-20.8%) were positive (1:320 and higher). No statistical significant difference was found between male (16.5%) and female (20.2%) seroprevalence (P=0.416). The highest seroprevalence rate (64.2%) was observed among the ownership dogs of three years age and above. Only 25.4% of the seropositive dogs had clinical signs and symptoms. The most clinical signs among symptomatic dogs were cachexia (75%) and alopecia (36.5%). Conclusion: The majority of seropositive dogs (74.6%) lived in endemic areas of Meshkin-Shahr District were asymptomatic. It seems that all symptomatic and asymptomatic infected dogs are the most important risk factors for human infection in VL endemic areas.

Introduction Transport is one of the most important activities and an essential component of the economy, which plays an important role in establishing spatial relationships between different locations and, like many existing networks, comprises a set of locations and links that represent inter-location communications. The most fundamental elements of a transportation network are network geometry and level of communication. Investing in transport infrastructure is one of the best ways to develop because economic development in any country requires investment in different sectors and economic activities and without it we cannot expect prosperity, the existence of rural roads and proper transportation play an important role in facilitating sales. And exports of agricultural products and rural products and provides a convenient way to market agricultural products easily. Unfortunately, in Iran, this sector has not been able to reach its true position and needs development and improvement, as many of the problems of rural and urban life are rooted in rural transport. In recent years, only efficient and effective planning can address rural transport issues, bring rural transport services into the area, improve the economic life and communication of the villagers, and solve many of the disadvantages of rural life. In rural areas of Ardebil city where a significant part of the population lives in rural areas, rural transportation and its improvement can improve the conditions and quality of life of the villagers and promote economic growth, rapid transfer of goods to market and immediate customer contact. This is because inadequate access to these areas leads to transportation, backwardness, unemployment and poor infrastructure, leading to rural migration to urban centers. Therefore, in view of the importance of the subject, the present study aimed to investigate the role of rural transport in the development of economic dimensions of rural areas in the central part of Ardebil city (Kalkhuran District) in order to answer the following questions: • From the point of view of household heads, what is the state of transport in the villages? • To what extent is the impact of rural transport components on the dimensions of economic  development? • What are the dimensions of economic development in the villages under study?  Methodology The present study is applied in terms of purpose and descriptive-analytical in terms of the nature and method of the survey component. The statistical population of this study is 12 villages of Kalkhouran village in the central part of Ardabil city with 2946 households. The sample size was estimated to be 340 according to Cochran's formula, but since in some villages the sample size was below ten, the sample size was increased to 356 for better results. The distribution of samples in the villages was proportional to the number of households and the sampling method in each village was systematic random. In order to operationalize the research variables in the independent variable section, three indicators of transport quality, transportation services and rural transport infrastructure in the form of 15 indicators and in the dependent variable four indicators in the form of 23 indicators were used. The instrument used in this study was a closed-ended Likert-type questionnaire whose face validity was evaluated and modified by experts and finally confirmed. Its reliability was estimated 0.753 for Cronbach's alpha and 0.859 for Economic Development. Multivariate regression, one-sample t-test and finally fuzzy TOPSIS technique were used to classify the villages under study.  Results and discussion After determining the weight of each rural transport indicator, fuzzy TOPSIS technique was used to classify the villages. After calculations, positive and negative ideals were identified. And then the sum of the distances of each village from the positive and negative fuzzy ideals, similarity index was calculated and the level of each village was determined. 0 is at the lowest level of the transport indicators. Multivariate regression coefficient was used to investigate the effect of rural transport on economic development to investigate the contribution of one or more independent variables to the dependent variable; The results showed that considering the significance level of the test with confidence level of 0.95 among the four indices of rural transport, transport infrastructure index with beta coefficient of 0.658 had the most effect on the dependent variable. Is 0.432 of the total variance of economic development. The results of one-sample t-test showed that the dimensions of economic development in the studied villages were desirable because the mean of economic, social and environmental dimensions was higher than 3 desirable (3 equals 60% of the respondents). The highest average (3.375) belongs to the index of job diversification and the lowest average is to economic stimulus.  Conclusion The results of the research findings to answer these questions show that the role of transport is undeniable in the process of economic development of rural areas, but its indicators have different effects on economic dimensions, such as transport infrastructure index. And the narrative has had the greatest impact on explaining the dimensions of economic development. Diversification of jobs had the highest average, followed by increased income, increased investment of urban origin, and finally, economic excitement had the lowest average. The increase in the number of tourists and travelers to the area and the direct sale of rural products have had an impact on rural incomes, with rural transport having a greater tendency to cultivate marketable and guaranteed purchasing products, on the other hand to invest in industry and Rural services have increased and in addition reduced the cost of transporting goods and manufactured goods to the consumer market.