Syed Mudassir Raza

To speed up the olive harvesting process, a tractor-driven olive harvesting machine was designed and manufactured at the Institute of Agricultural Engineering (AEI), Islamabad. This newly developed equipment was tested on the Bari Zaitoon-I cultivar for its performance evaluation. This innovative technology has proven valuable in efficiently replacing expensive manual harvesting operations with timely and economic alternative. It was experimentally evaluated at different PTO speeds, stroke lengths (SL), and vertical clamp positions (CP) on the tree to find the harvested and leftover fruit (%) and field capacity (trees/h) of the machine. Data collected was statistically analyzed by using “Statistix 8.1” software at a 5 % le vel of probability. The best results were recorded as 92.4 % harvested fruit, 7.6 % leftover fruit and 23.6 trees/h field capacity at the PTO speed of 300 rpm along with the stroke length of 10 cm and clamp position of 1 m on the tree trunk from the ground. The use of the developed equipment will make it possible to harvest olives in a shorter time than with manual harves ting without reducing the quality and weight of the obtained products.

OBJECTIVE: The study aimed to determine the prevalence of acute kidney injury (AKI) in term neonates with persistent pulmonary hypertension of the newborn (PPHN), to identify the probable risk factors, and to find its relation to mortality. METHODS: The study recruited 758 term neonates admitted to the neonatal ICU (NICU). Diagnosis of PPHN was established on the basis of clinical and echocardiographic criteria. For diagnosis of AKI, we adopted the modified Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) AKI definition. This definition has three grades of AKI severity depending on degree of serum creatinine rise and urinary output. Patients were followed until they died or discharged from NICU. RESULTS: Among the 758 term neonates included in the study, there were 47 babies (6.2 %) fulfilling the criteria of PPHN. AKI was reported in 16 patients (34.0 %) and the reported mortality rate was 31.9 %. Neonates with AKI had significantly higher mortality rate when compared with patients without AKI (75.0 % versus 9.7 %; p = 0.0001). A significant association was noted between severe grades of PPHN and AKI. CONCLUSIONS: AKI is prevalent in neonates with PPHN. It is significantly associated with mortality. There is suggested link between AKI and severity of PPHN.