Facilities built in areas affected by earthquake activity, such as tunnels, which have always been an integral part of human life, must withstand both dynamic and static loading. It has led to the need for practical studies on the effects of earthquakes on underground structures and the factors affecting their destruction. For this purpose, in this research, at first different patterns of tunnel’s excavation were investigated and by using Plaxis 2D software and based on Tabas earthquake in Iran, sensitivity analysis on geotechnical Parameters of the soil surrounding tunnel such as cohesion, friction angle, unit weight and modulus of elasticity was carried out, and the Parameters whose changes have the greatest and least effects on the bending moment changes on the tunnel lining are introduced. The results show that tunnel excavation patterns significantly affect the bending moment, axial forces, displacements, and surface settlement of the tunnel. Often, by dividing tunnel excavation area to small parts, the values of bending moment, axial forces, displacements, and surface settlement of the tunnel decreases in static analysis. Also, outputs of sensitivity analysis on geotechnical Parameters of the soil surrounding tunnel showed that modulus of elasticity of the soil surrounding tunnel has the most effect and cohesion changes have the least effect on bending moment induced on tunnel lining..

This study aimed to estimate the genetic Parameters of body weight traits in Markhoz goats, using B-spline random regression models. The data used in this study included 19549 records collected during 29 years (1992-2021) in Markhoz goat Breeding Research Station, located in Sanandaj, Iran. The model used to analyze data included fixed effects (year of birth, sex, type of birth and age of dam) and random effects including direct additive genetic, maternal additive genetic, permanent environmental and maternal permanent environmental assuming homogeneous and heterogeneous residual variance during the time. Akaike (BIC) and Bayesian (BIC) information criteria were used to compare the models and bspq.4.4.4.4 was selected as the best model. The direct heritability values for birth, 3-month, 6-month, 9-month and 12-month weights were estimated to be 0.14, 0.16, 0.08, 0.28 and 0.26, respectively. Genetic correlation between body weights at birth and 3-month, birth and 6-month, birth and 9-month, birth and 12-month, 3-month and 6-month, 3-month and 9-month, 3-month and 12-month, 6-months and 9-month and 9-month and 12-month were 0.22, 0.38, 0.21, 0.56, -0.26, 0.30, 0.62, 0.86 and 0.77, respectively. The highest phenotypic correlation was between the weight of 9-month and 12-month (0.82) and the lowest correlation was between birth weight and 3-month and 6-month (0.12). The results showed that the 9-month weight is a good criterion for selection in Markhoz goats.

In this study, chemical compositions of black seed meals samples were determined. 18 male weaning Zandi lambs with an average body weight of 23.5 ±1.5 kg were used in a completely randomized design in three groups of six in individual pens. Experimental treatments were: 1) control (basal diet with 12% soybean meal and without black seed meal), 2) diet containing 6% soybean meal and 9% black seed meal and 3) diet containing 18% black seed meal and without soybean meal. The concentration of dry matter, crude protein, crude fat, NDF, ADF, ADIN, and crude ash of black seed meal samples were 97.53±0.58, 31.26±0.99, 15.16 ± 0.61, 25.95 ± 1.34, 14.2±0.80, 0.69±0.04 and 5.07 ± 0.24, respectively. Replacement of soybean meal with black seed meal in the diet of experimental lambs had no effect on final body weight, daily weight gain, feed conversion ratio, dry matter intake, dressing percentage, tail and total body fat deposition. Albumin and total protein were higher for lambs fed by diet containing 18 % black seed meal compared to other treatments (P <0.05). However, the concentration of blood triglyceride, cholesterol and urea nitrogen were not differed between experimental groups. The digestibility of dry matter, organic matter, crude fat and protein were not affect by feeding of experimental diets. It seems that black seed meal can be used in the diet of fattening lambs up to 18% without adverse effect on performance and nutrients digestibility of growing lambs.

Widespread immigrant beekeeping activity, inadequate quality queen bee production and the excess of uncontrolled crossbreeding are great problems for the quality of honey bee races in Türkiye. However, the effects of uncontrolled crossbreeding on the spermatological Parameters are not fully known. In this study, samples were analyzed in terms of morphometric Parameters such as cubital index, hantel index and discoidal shift. Drones belonging to the same colonies were investigated in terms of spermatological Parameters such as total motility, Plasma Membrane Integrity (PMI), Mitochondrial Membrane Potential (MMP) and spermatozoa concentration (SCON). The wing index values of the samples were similar to the wing values of some races. Racial similarities rates were50% Caucasian (A. m. caucacia), 49% Anatolian (A. m. anatoliaca), 24% Brown (A. m. mellifera), 13% Italian (A. m. ligustica) and 8% Carnolian (A. m. carnica). These results showed that the expected Anatolian race in the region had changed greatly and there is a danger of crossbreeding of bee races (Apis mellifera anatoliaca) in Central Anatolia Region. The averages of spermatological Parameters were 85% motility, 82% PMI, 78% MMP and 5.9 × 109/ml sperm concentration. In addition, no significant correlative relationship was found between morphometric and spermatological Parameters (p˃0.05). In this study, the samples of honey bee colonies in the Central Anatolia Region showed random and uncontrolled crossbreeding among different races. The spermatological Parameters were found to be sufficient for fertility but there was no significant relationship detected statistically between the spermatological and morphometric Parameters.

This study was performed to evaluate the effect of adding a mixture of peppermint, thyme and rosemary essential oils (EOs) in a ratio of (3:1:2), respectively, to the diet, on growth performance, rumen and blood Parameters of fattening lambs. Twenty-one Mehraban lambs with an average weight of 29.80 kg were randomly allocated to one of three diets: 1) control, 2) base diet+1.25ml of EOs and 3) base diet+2.5ml of EOs. Daily weight gain was greater in the groups receiving the EOs than in the control, although this increase was mainly due to the interactions of treatment over time. Feed consumption and feed conversion ratio compared to the control did not altered. The total concentrations of VFAs and acetate in the groups receiving EOs decreased (P<0.05), while the concentration of propionate increased (P<0.05) at the level of 2.5ml of EOs and isovalerate increased (P<0.05) in both levels of EOs compared to the control. Total population of protozoa, rumen pH and ammonia nitrogen concentration were not affected by treatments. Glucose concentration increased at high level of EOs (P<0.05). Concentrations of urea, cholesterol, triglycerides, creatinine, total protein and albumin did not altered. The number of red blood cells, hemoglobin, hematocrit, number and percentage of white cells including lymphocytes and eosinophils were not affected by treatments but the percentage of monocytes decreased (P<0.05) at low level of the EOs. The results of this experiment showed that the addition of mixture of EOs to the diet did not have a significant effect on performance Parameters and immune system of lambs, although it reduced the total concentration of VFA and acetate and increased the concentration of propionate.

Introduction: Methamphetamine (MAMP) is a central nervous system stimulant, but it is increasingly abused as a psychedelic tablet by teenagers and young adults. In this experimental study, we evaluate the effects of MAMP on sperm Parameters of mature rat.Methods: MAMP or saline were injected in three experiments as follow: In the first experiment, twenty-four rats were injected one time with 10mg/kg MAMP, and sperms were sampled from tail of epididymis 6, 12, 24, 48, 72, and 168 h after injection (n=4, at each time). Six rats injected with saline served as controls. In the second experiment, four groups of rats each consisting of four rats were administered MAMP (5, 10 and 15mg/kg) or saline, respectively, and examined 24h later. In the third experiment, 16 rats were evenly divided into four groups (1, 5, and 10 mg/kg MAMP and control) and were injected MAMP or saline once daily for 14 consecutive days (spermatogenesis period) and sperms were sampled 24 h after the last injection.The motility, concentration and morphology of the sampled sperms were evaluated. We also measured the body and testis weights and used the testis/body weight ratio as an index at the end of each experiment.Results: At 24 and 48 h after injection with a single dose of 10 mg/kg MAMP, the number of sperms decreased significantly in comparison with controls (p£0.001 and P£0.05 respectively). In the second experiment, the number of sperms for three doses of MAMP significantly decreased in the two upper doses (P<0.001) and in the lower dose (P£0.05).The results of the third experiment were similar but the decrease of sperms number was more than that in the second experiment. MAMP did not change the testis/body weight ratio in the first and second experiments, but it significantly decreased this index in rats of the third experiment which received 10 and 5 mg/kg MAMP daily. We did not observe differences between experimental and control groups in motility and morphology of sperms.Conclusion: Our results indicate that the repeated administration and/or higher doses of MAMP reduce the number of mature sperms in the tail of epididymis and have adverse effects on the reproduction and fertility of MAMP users.

Distance-based clustering methods categorize samples by optimizing a global criterion, finding ellipsoid clusters with roughly equal sizes. In contrast, density-based clustering techniques form clusters with arbitrary shapes and sizes by optimizing a local criterion. Most of these methods have several hyper-Parameters, and their performance is highly dependent on the hyper-parameter setup. Recently, a Gaussian Density Distance (GDD) approach was proposed to optimize local criteria in terms of distance and density properties of samples. GDD can find clusters with different shapes and sizes without any free Parameters. However, it may fail to discover the appropriate clusters due to the interfering of clustered samples in estimating the density and distance properties of remaining unclustered samples. Here, we introduce Adaptive GDD (AGDD), which eliminates the inappropriate effect of clustered samples by adaptively updating the Parameters during clustering. It is stable and can identify clusters with various shapes, sizes, and densities without adding extra Parameters. The distance metrics calculating the dissimilarity between samples can affect the clustering performance. The effect of different distance measurements is also analyzed on the method. The experimental results conducted on several well-known datasets show the effectiveness of the proposed AGDD method compared to the other well-known clustering methods.

In traditional speech processing, feature extraction and classification were conducted as separate steps. The advent of deep neural networks has enabled methods that simultaneously model the relationship between acoustic and phonetic characteristics of speech while classifying it directly from the raw waveform. The first convolutional layer in these networks acts as a filter bank. To enhance interpretability and reduce the number of Parameters, researchers have explored the use of parametric filters, with the SincNet architecture being a notable advancement. In SincNet's initial convolutional layer, rectangular bandpass filters are learned instead of fully trainable filters. This approach allows for modeling with fewer Parameters, thereby improving the network's convergence speed and accuracy. Analyzing the learned filter bank also provides valuable insights into the model's performance. The reduction in Parameters, along with increased accuracy and interpretability, has led to the adoption of various parametric filters and deep architectures across diverse speech processing applications. This paper introduces different types of parametric filters and discusses their integration into various deep architectures. Additionally, it examines the specific applications in speech processing where these filters have proven effective.

In this experiment, the effect of garlic (GP) and tomato (TP) powders on performance, blood Parameters, sex differentiation and hatchability of Ross-308 broiler breeders were examined and compared with In-Ovo injection of garlic or tomato hydroalcoholic extracts. In first experiment, 375 hens and 25 roosters (47 wk.) were randomly allocated to 5 treatments and 5 replicates, for 4 weeks. Treatments included: 1) basal diet (control), 2 and 3) basal diet+ 2 and 4 percent of GP, and 4 and 5) basal diet + 2 and 4 percent of TP, respectively. In second experiment, 200 hens and 20 roosters were randomly allocated to 2 treatments including 1) basal diet and 2) basal diet + 4% of TP (selected treatment of the Exp. 1) in 5 replications from 52-56 wk. During incubation period, experimental treatments included: 1) control group, 2) eggs from hens fed 4% TP, 3) In-Ovo injection of physiological serum and 4 and 5) In-Ovo injection of 0.1 and 0.3 ml of garlic and tomato hydroalcoholic extracts. The results of first experiment, adding garlic and tomato powders was not significant on egg qualitative traits and blood Parameters (P>0.05). All In-Ovo injection treatments increased fertility percentage (P<0.05). The second experiment results showed that treatments had no significant effect on the percent of males and females (P>0.05). In general, addition of 4 percent tomato powder to broiler breeders in comparison to In-Ovo injection of hydroalcoholic extracts of garlic and tomato, did not increase male 1-d-old chicks’ percentage of hatched chicks.

In order to predict the behavior of soil-related phenomena, it is necessary to have knowledge about unsaturated flow and using models that provide optimal estimates of the retention curve and hydraulic conductivity of soils. Despite the widespread use of the classic van Genuchten-Mualem model (VGM), this model usually performs poorly in predicting hydraulic conductivity and modification of some of its Parameters seems necessary. In this research, 283 soils from different textures of the UNSODA bank were selected and divided into two sections of calibration and validation and their soil Parameters were exported and categorized. Then, by defining the modified unsaturated hydraulic conductivity (Ksc) instead of the saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks) and determining the limits for l and n Parameters, the hydraulic conductivity-moisture function of VGM were solved using 24600 pairs of points li and nj for each soil of the three main soil texture classes. In the following, the optimal l value (l̂) of each texture class was selected based on the minimum value of the hydraulic conductivity estimation error using the root mean square error (RMSE) index and the n values that had created the minimum errors, were selected as the optimal pore size distribution coefficients of the hydraulic conductivity-moisture function (n̂opt). In order to create pedotransfer functions for estimating n̂opt, we ran stepwise regression in MATLAB software considering the condition of statistical significance (P-value=0.05) for independent variables and functions for each soil texture class. After creating pedotransfer functions, the results of the proposed method of this research (MVGM) were compared with the VGM results using RMSE and Nash-Sutcliffe (NSE) indices. The results showed that in both sections of creation and validation functions, the MVGM performed better in estimating hydraulic conductivity and had a higher efficiency index in all textural classes of soil.