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In this study, the human health risk of mercury due to consumption of croaker (Otolithes ruber) in Mahshahr, the Persian Gulf, , was evaluated using atomic absorbtion spectrophotometer)and cold vapor techniques to measure the mercury concentration in muscle samples of 30 fresh croakers . A. Result showed the average concentration of mercury in croaker  muscle was 0.354±0.09 µg/ g of fresh wet weight, which was less than the allowable amount for human consumption determined by the international organizations such as USFDA and WHO, but more than the allowable amount for human consumption determined by MAFF and the USEPA. HQ Index was above 1 (1.18). In addition, the calculations indicated that daily and weekly mercury uptake for the Iranian consumers, according to Statistical Yearbook of Iran Fisheries organization (the amount consumed per capita),  is lower than the guideline values (PTWI and PTDI) provided by WHO, USFDA and more than USEPA. Therefore, the consumption of the croaker might be associated with some threat to the consumer’s health particularly pregnant women, fetuses and children from mercury but consumption permitted rate of 20gper dayand138 gper week is recommended for other people.

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Aims: Since the occurrence of hazards in the steel industry has often been multiple and complex, the aim of this study was to identify the risk assessment in this industry in order to study the roots and realities of the risks and the causes of their occurrence, as well as to find solutions to reduce these risks.
Instruments & Methods: This descriptive-analytical research was conducted in the cement industry in Khorasan Razavi in 2017. FMEA and AHP methods were used to determine the most important safety hazards. The Risk Priority Number (RPN) was obtained from the multiplication of 3 factors including severity, probability of occurrence, and probability of discovery. Risk tolerance was used for the acceptable and unacceptable risks in the FMEA method.
Findings: The fluctuation of the flange and its breakage due to excessive water pressure in the furnace and lack of lighting for installation of the equipment in the furnace had a high risk. In the AHP method, the risk of breaking the flange was due to excessive water pressure in the furnace and lack of lighting to install the equipment in the furnace, which had a higher weight than the other hazards.
Conclusion: Although in the developing countries, the use of risk analysis methods with a preventive approach is not common, these problems have been resolved by communicating with the industry by recent studies.
It also emphasizes the use of decision-making methods to minimize the impact of judgments on risk assessment.

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Cellular energy allocation (CEA) test was performed in order to investigate the effects and costs of bare carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and CNTs in combination with titanium dioxide nanoparticles (CNTs/TiO₂-NPs) on Glyphodes pyloalis Walker after 24, 48 and 72 hours of exposure to 100, 200, 300, 400 and 500 ppm of the treatments. Results showed the negative correlation between total lipid amounts and concentrations of treatments (i.e. CNTs and CNTs/TiO₂-NPs) as well as exposure time. Contrary to CNTs treatments, carbohydrate contents were affected by both of CNTs/TiO₂-NPs concentration and time of exposure. Results showed that the effect of bare CNTs in the enhancement of glycogen content appeared significantly faster than that of CNTs/TiO₂-NPs. Increasing time of exposure to all concentrations of CNTs, except for 100 ppm, prevented enhancement of protein content. The effect of bare CNTs on the reduction of protein contents was faster and greater than that of CNTs/TiO₂-NPs. The results indicated that G. pyloalis cannot regulate internal CNTs and CNTs/TiO₂-NPs concentrations efficiently without considerable impact on the energy reserves (Ea). The comparison of energy consumed (Ec) in treated larvae showed that CNTs/TiO₂-NPs reflected the higher energy demand of the stress response than CNTs. Generally, CEA was significantly decreased as the concentration of CNTs treatments increased. More reduction in CEA amount of all treatments by CNTs/TiO₂-NPs than that of the control is also probably considered as a cost to deal with detoxification when the concentration increased and at all the tested time points. Therefore, CEA test might be considered as an early biochemical biomarker for assessing immediate response of organisms after acute exposure to stressors and thus could be applied to risk assessment of nanomaterials.

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Fish is one of the most important sources of protein for human nutrition and health. Therefore, the monitoring of heavy metals accumulation in commercial fish is always important. In the present study, the accumulation of heavy metals (copper and lead) in muscle tissue and their potential hazards for consumers in three species of high-consumption fish in the south of the country(BandarAbas), namely black-spot snapper (Lutjanus ehrenbergi), javelin grunter (Pomdasys Kaakan) and Indian halibut (Psettodes erumei) was examined. The average concentrations (µg/g dry weight) of copper snapper, grunter and halibut were 0.078±0.017, 0.136±0.025, and 0.127±0.013, respectively, while the accumulation of lead in them was 0.079±0.018, 0.090±023, and 0.107±0.031, respectively. The highest daily intake (µg/ kg body weight/ day) of copper was equal to 0.023 and due to consumption of grunter, while the highest daily intake of lead was obtained due to consumption of halibut and equal to 0.018. The daily and weekly intake of both metals and all three fish species was less than the EPA reference dose and tolerable intake (TDI) values provided by the FAO / WHO Joint Commission. The risk level of target hazard quotient (THQ) calculated for both metals was significantly lower than 1. The results showed that the urban communities of Hormozgan province with the calculated consumption are not exposed to any risk due to the accumulation of heavy metals studied in this study.
 

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Background: Dairy products are considered as some staple food rich in nutrients. Among dairy products, ice cream is one of the most attractive and popular products. The popularity of ice cream is due to its great taste and unique texture. Considering the prevalence of traditional ice cream consumption in Iran and the risk of microbial contamination of these products, the microbial quality of industrial and traditional ice creams in Fars province was evaluated and compared.
Materials & Methods: A total of 470 ice cream samples were tested to determine total viable count (TVC), total coliform count (TCC), and the presence of fungi. Biochemical properties and antibiotic sensitivity of isolated bacteria were investigated.
Findings: TVC in all industrial ice cream samples was lower than the limit specified by the national standard of Iran. Coliform levels in 37% (n=100) of traditional and 1.5% (n=3) of industrial ice cream samples were higher than the permissible limit. Furthermore, 74.8 and 40% of traditional samples contained Escherichia coli and fungi and mold, respectively. Antibiogram results showed that the highest antibiotic resistance of the isolates was related to ampicillin and trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole.
Conclusion: Traditional ice creams are highly contaminated with microbial agents resistant to two or more drugs, which poses great risks for the consumers of these products, especially children. Therefore, it is necessary to implement appropriate hygiene practices to increase the safety of ice creams. Alerting people about the risks of foodborne diseases could significantly help prevent such diseases.
 

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Aims: The insurance strategy of direct insurers (reinsurers) should be in accordance with actuarial risk-based principles. Therefore, every decision and action taken by insurance institutions in relation to climate change adaptation requires a risk assessment. Therefore, examining international underwriting and dealing with the climate change insurance process in Iran can provide useful strategies to managers. This research has been done in order to investigate the situation of Iran's insurance industry in the underwriting of climate change.
Materials & methods: In the beginning, insurance plans and coverage and climate change risk management strategies are reviewed in selected developed and developing countries. Then, the experiences of global surveys, regarding climate change are used in order to develop a questionnaire in line with the current situation of Iran country in the field of climate change insurance.
Finding:  The results of the questionnaire’s analysis distributed among 35 insurance experts on climate change risk management, show that some insurance companies, despite predicting the impact of climate risks in their insurance processes and empowering their employees, don’t have any plan for the assessment and mitigation of greenhouse gases, regular assessment of climate hazards, providing incentives and modeling. Also, the strategy of annual re-pricing and risk-based pricing has the highest priority to face climate change in insurance companies.
Conclusion: Most of the country's insurance companies use different strategies to deal with climate change, of which annual repricing and risk-based pricing have been the most popular.
 

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Aims: Breast cancer is among the most common cancer types. This study aimed to develop an Android-based detection application for assessing breast cancer risk.
Materials & Methods: This quasi-experimental study utilized a research and development approach, employing a pre- and post-test design with one group. The development and field-testing phase took place between July and August 2023, involving 59 women of childbearing age purposively selected within the operational vicinity of Puskesmas Simpang IV Sipin, Jambi City, Indonesia. The application successfully underwent testing, including evaluation by media and material validators. Subsequently, a comprehension test was conducted with three respondents individually, ten individuals in a small group, and 59 participants in a large group. In the field test, data are presented descriptively, including frequencies. The Wilcoxon test was utilized to determine a causal relationship between the product’s usage and the observed impact.
Findings: The development of the breast cancer risk assessment application involved several key stages, including the identification stage (comprising problem analysis, context, and literature), the application model design stage, and the material and media validation stage. The media validation process was conducted twice, with the findings yielding a score of 67, averaging 3.35 (meeting valid criteria), while material validation received an average score of 3.0 (also meeting valid criteria). A Wilcoxon test conducted on the knowledge variable revealed a significant increase, with the mean value before the intervention at 8.44 and post-intervention rising to 12.29.
Conclusion: Women of childbearing age readily accept Android-based breast cancer risk detection applications, and their usage has a positive impact on increasing their knowledge.

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Aims: Hypertension is a critical health condition requiring consistent medical adherence to prevent complications. This study aimed to evaluate the effects of a cardiovascular risk assessment and an educational intervention grounded in the Health Belief Model (HBM) on medication adherence among patients with hypertension.
Materials & Methods: A semi-experimental study was conducted with three groups: a combined risk assessment and education group, a risk assessment-only group, and a control group, each consisting of 40 patients. Cardiovascular risk was individually assessed in both intervention groups using the Framingham model, with risk categories (low, moderate, high) explained to personalize the intervention and enhance perceived susceptibility. Additionally, patients in the combined intervention group received an educational booklet structured around HBM components. All participants completed questionnaires measuring knowledge, HBM constructs, the Morisky Medication Adherence Questionnaire, and treatment compliance (measured by the ratio of consumed to prescribed medications) at baseline and after three months. Data analysis was performed using SPSS software version 26.
Findings: The three groups were demographically comparable. Over time, the combined intervention group showed significant improvements in all HBM constructs. The risk assessment-only group demonstrated improvements in perceived barriers, perceived benefits, self-efficacy, and awareness. Both intervention groups exhibited enhanced treatment compliance and medication adherence compared to the control group.
Conclusion: The combined educational and risk assessment intervention proved more effective in improving awareness and strengthening HBM constructs than risk assessment alone.

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Suitable conditions bring about a high population of pests or diseases in greenhouses. Therefore, frequent pesticide application occurs in this production system, which causes public health concerns about pesticide residue in greenhouse-grown crops such as tomatoes. Residue levels of 55 pesticides were investigated in 43 greenhouse-grown tomatoes collected from four cities in Hamadan province using modified Quick, Easy, Cheap, Effective, Rugged, Safe (QuEChERS) extraction followed by GC-MS. The residue of 8 pesticides was detected in some samples. Overall, 7% of samples had residue levels above MRLs, 33% of samples had residue at or below MRLs, and 60% of the samples had no pesticide residues. The residues of methidathion (2 samples) and fenpropathrin (3 samples) were above the MRLs (0.05 mg/kg). Non-carcinogenic probabilistic risk assessment was evaluated by Hazard Quotient (HQ) and Hazard Index (HI) based on the Monte Carlo Simulation (MCS) method. The arrangement of pesticides based on HQ ranking was methidathion > cypermethrin > chlorpyrifos > fenpropathrin > diazinon > pirimicarb > metalaxyl > malathion. HI for adults was calculated to be 0.06, and for children, 0.30 in tomato. However, as HI was less than 1, consumers were not at considerable non-carcinogenic risk.



 

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China is one of the largest grain producing and consuming nations in the world and the importance of grain security to the Chinese can never be overemphasized. In this paper, we present a comprehensive early-warning model for evaluating the status of grain security in China. The model is based on the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) method and the Dempster–Shafer theory (DST). We divided the risk assessment into four stages. First, we seek risk sources and identify the indices to be used in the model. Then, we preprocess the index data to obtain the index directions and risk bounds. After that, we assign index weights via AHP method. Finally, we evaluate risk of grain security via DST method and determine the overall risk degree. An empirical analysis is conducted to demonstrate the use of the model for evaluating the status of grain security in China. The result shows that the model which conforms to the reality of China is effective and can be used as a grain security pre-warning monitoring tool.

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Calculation of Derivations from every objective of the project is very ‎important for both contractors and employers. Time overrun is the function ‎of all project risks. A tool that can assess the risk levels and estimate the ‎derivations from the planed duration is very useful for contractors. This ‎research tries to propose a new methodology to determine the schedule risk ‎of construction projects and the total time overrun. This methodology uses ‎influence diagram to construct the risk model and fuzzy risk assessment ‎system to estimate time overrun for every activity. Then the information of ‎fuzzy risk assessment model is used by scheduling the softwares such as ‎MSP or Primavera to calculate the time overrun of the project. This model ‎has been used in one of the track renewal projects of Iran Railway ‎Administration. ‎ The model was validated by using the estimated data produced by model and ‎the real data of the activities’ duration. Then the mean absolute percentage ‎error (MAPE) was calculated for the activities and the project. MAPE of the ‎activities was equal to 10.75% and the estimated duration of project was ‎equal to 105.24 time unit. In comparison with the real duration of project ‎‎(which was equal to 113 time units and MAPE for the whole project was ‎equal to 6.7%), it can be concluded that fuzzy risk assessment model has ‎remarkable accuracy to be used in construction projects.‎

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The objective of this study was to measure the amount of heavy metals cadmium, lead and arsenic between the amounts of metals and the risk assessment in wheat, extracted flax from imported wheat and indigenous cultivars. Considering the wheat cultivar and the number of flour mill factories in Golestan and Mazandaran provinces. Wheat samples were harvested. Samples after flint transfer to flour mills and process of flour process for evaluation and determination of heavy metals in laboratory. Research Institute of Science and Technology Research Institute. The results of this study showed that the highest concentration of cadmium in wheat flour samples in 2017 and 2018 was related to the R sample. The highest concentration of lead in wheat flour samples is related to the R sample. The highest concentration of arsenic in wheat flour samples is related to the N sample. According to the results obtained in wheat samples, the mean values ​​of cadmium in B sample were the highest. The mean of lead values ​​in the W sample was the highest. The concentration of arsenic in A sample is also the highest. The results showed that S, M, N, K, R, D, and E samples were unsafe for adult samples in flour samples. Also, R sample flour for adults was unsafe for cadmium. The F, H and M specimens were safe in adults in terms of heavy metals. In samples of wheat, S, N, and H samples were unsafe for adults in terms of lead levels.
Keywords: Flour, Wheat, Heavy metals, Risk assessment
 
 

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The application of probiotic starter cultures in fermented products is expanding in different communities. The genetic variation makes the effects of these bacteria different and unpredictable in different human societies. Therefore, the safety control and evaluation of their non-pathogenicity is of great importance and monitoring centers are required to closely monitor the safety of the bacteria used in food products.
In this study, two strains of Lactobacillus isolated from dairy products of Ardabil (Heyran mountain road villages) and Khuzestan province (Behbahan city) in Iran were identified based on the biochemical and molecular properties through sequence analysis of 16S rRNA gene. Then, their safety was examined based on the international guidelines, especially the European :union: standard. The two identified strains included Lactobacillus fermentum (PTCC 1929) and Lactobacillus helveticus (PTCC 1930). The results showed the lack of gelatinase enzyme, inability of blood hemolysis, inability of amino acids decarboxylation and the lack of genes responsible for the invasive characteristics of pathogenic microorganisms including gelE, efaA_fm , efaA_{fs ,} agg, ace, cylM, cylA, cylB.  In addition, the results showed the sensitivity of both isolates to Penicillin, Ampicillin, Rifampicin and Tetracycline, and their resistance to Kanamycin and Ciprofloxacin. Lactobacillus fermentum was resistant to vancomycin, whereas Lactobacillus helveticus was susceptible to it. Since cases of antibiotic resistance are inherent according to scientific reports, the obtained results confirmed the potential application of these two isolated strains as starter in the fermented dairy products. It also confirmed the necessity of using safety assessment procedures for probiotic bacteria.

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Nowadays, in most of the organizations such as project-based organizations, outsourcing the projects and transferring the activities are followed by concentrating in core capabilities, reducing size, achieving the best performance, and controlling and transparency of costs. Since each of the outsourcing projects commits the responsibility of performing each part of the project activities to a contractor for a specific period of time and determined costs, this outsourcing process is it self considered as a project. Therefore, despite its numerous advantages, in some situations, it fails, and the most important reason for this failure is lack of using appropriate methods and techniques of management in risk assessment. As a result, the purpose of this paper is presenting a risk assessment model in outsourcing process using the analytic hierarchy process and PROMETHEE methods in fuzzy environment.    

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Food safety is a global concern, yet little research has focused on the heavy metal (HM) pollution and health risks associated with both cultured and captured fish. This study evaluates the bioaccumulation and human health risks of HM (Cd, Cu, Zn, Cr, and Pb) in various tissues of aquacultured fish, Oreochromis niloticus, from major lakes in Bengaluru. Over two years (August 2021 to July 2023), spanning different seasons, fish samples were collected and analyzed for heavy metal presence using Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry (AAS). Bioaccumulation levels were assessed, along with Estimated Daily Intake (EDI), Target Hazard Quotients (THQ), Hazard Index (HI), and Target Risk (TR). Results showed varying bioaccumulation patterns across different tissues and lakes. The highest concentrations of heavy metals were found in gonad and liver tissues HI values for all muscle tissue were > 1, indicating potential health risks from metal consumption. TR levels were found to be unacceptable in the case of Cd and Cr which may lead to the risk of cancer and damages the normal functionality of the kidneys and liver. This study highlights the health threats associated with consuming freshwater fish from Ulsoor and Agara lakes in Bengaluru, underscoring the importance of regular lake monitoring to mitigate heavy metal impacts on human health and the ecosystem. 

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One of the pillars of supply chain risk management is risk assessment and its aim is to analyze the risk. The first step to assess supply chain risk is identifying and classifying them. In this paper, after reviewing the literature and extracting supply chain risks, service supply chain risks  identified by focus group and Q-sort method. As the result 10 components of the most important risks as conditional characteristics in Rough modeling identified. Using Rosetta software, 5 set of rule were produced. According to extracted models among conditional attributes, market and financial risks were most important attributes. After completion of various models validation, the model by Conditional Mean/Mode fill and incompletes for complement data showed the highest reliability for predicting new observations.

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Nowadays, coercive criminal policy and harsh or terrible punishments have been replaced by friendship, adjustment and flexibility. Perhaps the reason for removing the death penalty (as an illegitimate child of royal governments) and turning to the deprivation of liberty (imprisonment) can be seen as the result of not fulfilling the goals of punishments, the usefulness and rehabilitation of criminals. Primiarily, the substitution of imprisonment for severe corporal punishment was very promising. The unfavorable use of custodial punishment turned this hope into despair. According to the Criminal Policy and Justice Department's research, until December 2021, approximately 11.5 million people have been in prison around the world! Therefore, criminal justice policymakers tried to provide strategies and policies to reduce the criminal population of prisons. This caused the emergence of new strategies in societies, including the First Step Act in US. The present article, with a descriptive-analytical method, aims to analyze the strategies of the above-mentioned law and the feasibility of its application in Iran's legal system. The research results showed that some strategies of this law, such as "risk assessment system, rehabilitation of prisoners, use of more facilities for prisoners, changing the status and serving the sentence outside of prison" are in accordance with the current policies of Iran and application of them, is considered as an effective strategy in reducing the prison's criminal population.