Integrated Approaches Towards Solid Waste Management, 2021
Li-ion or lithium-ion batteries (also called LIBs) in the modern time are used everywhere be it t... more Li-ion or lithium-ion batteries (also called LIBs) in the modern time are used everywhere be it the automobile sector, IT sector or anywhere else. As we are heading towards development, the advancements in technology have led to an increase in electric and electronic appliances, which would in turn result in an increased demand for batteries. Hence, the amount of battery waste is also rising day by day. Globally, the amount of e-waste, which is disposed off per year is around 20–50 million tonnes, of which batteries are a major part. Although there is no definite official data on the generation and disposal of battery waste in India, the amount can be estimated indirectly using the approximate e-waste data, which is based on independent studies conducted by the NGOs or government agencies. According to the Battery University, the global battery market is about 50 billion US dollars out of which approximately 5.5 billion US dollars is for rechargeable batteries. The annual growth rate was about 6% through 2006 which was estimated to increase steadily after that. As per a UN report, in India, there is a prediction of 500% rise in the waste from discarded computers by 2020, and rise in the waste from discarded mobile phones is estimated to be about 18 times than 2007. In spite of the advancements in technology, the waste disposal and management practices are still poor, outdated and sometimes illegal.
Indian Journal of Physiology and Pharmacology, 2021
Objectives: The objective of the present study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of 0.1% no... more Objectives: The objective of the present study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of 0.1% novel folic acid gel in blunt dental instrument-induced oral ulcer in animal models (both rats and rabbits). Materials and Methods: The study was conducted in the Experimental Laboratory, Department of Pharmacology, Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Aligarh Muslim University. Animals were randomly divided into three interventional groups, namely Group 1 (folic acid gel), Group 2 (triamcinolone oromucosal paste) and Group 3 (control). We created a linear oral ulcer of 5 mm with the blunt dental instrument in both rats and rabbits. Each group consists of 10 animals (6 rats + 4 rabbits). Group 1 received test drug 0.1% novel folic acid gel formulated by us, Group 2 was positive control and received standard local drug 0.1% Kenacort triamcinolone oromucosal paste and Group 3 served as a negative control group where no treatment was given. Results: No untoward reaction was observed on the irrit...
International Journal of Advance Research and Innovative Ideas in Education, 2017
Dynamic Proof of Storage (PoS) is a useful cryptographic primitive that enables a user to check t... more Dynamic Proof of Storage (PoS) is a useful cryptographic primitive that enables a user to check the integrity of outsourced _les and to efficiently update the files in a cloud server. Although researchers have proposed many dynamic PoS schemes in single user environments, the problem in multi-user environments has not been investigated sufficiently. A practical multi-user cloud storage system needs the secure client-side cross-user deduplication technique, which allows a user to skip the uploading process and obtain the ownership of the files immediately, when other owners of the same files have uploaded them to the cloud server. To the best of our knowledge, none of the existing dynamic PoSs can support this technique. In this paper, we introduce the concept of deduplicatable dynamic proof of storage and propose an efficient construction called DeyPoS, to achieve dynamic PoS and secure cross-user deduplication, simultaneously. Considering the challenges of structure diversity and p...
Agile methodology uses an iterative and incremental development prototyping that are widely used ... more Agile methodology uses an iterative and incremental development prototyping that are widely used in various Industries. Agile methodology is gaining more popularity and attention in software engineering research communities. Methodology is well introduced in 2000 that are adopted by software development industries in the last 18 years many researchers have been conducted on agile methodologies a large number of methods have been introduced and number of researches has also been presented by many authors. In this paper that different agile methodologies which has been introduced from the 2000 till 2017 we are going to have a clear picture of every agile methodologies used. Beside the benefits of the Agile, criticism on agile methodology states that it fails to listen to beaux arts and style problems and so is absolute to turn out tiny design-decisions. Here, during this paper we tend to determine the impacts that agile methodology has on Software development processes with relevancy ...
Osteosarcoma is a rare and aggressive malignant mesenchymal tumor. It usually presents in the lon... more Osteosarcoma is a rare and aggressive malignant mesenchymal tumor. It usually presents in the long bones about a decade prior to that in jaws. This clinical condition is characterized by radiolucent to radiopaque masses, sunburst appearance, codman's triangle and periodontal ligament space widening in the jaws. A male aged thirty years reported to us with chief complaint of severe pain in gums in the lower left back region. Intraoral examination revealed tobacco stains on his teeth revealing his habit of tobacco chewing and bidi smoking. There was moderate amount of plaque deposition and periodontal pocket ranged from 2 to 5 mm in depth. Orthopantogram revealed widening of periodontal ligament space in the 35, 36, 37, 38 region. The patient also gave history of severe bone pain in left leg for last 3 years and was referred to orthopedic department where he was diagnosed as a case of osteosarcoma of left fibula after various hematological and radiological investigations. Clinical acumen in detecting unusual periodontal ligament widening with no apparent cause as in this case lead to detection of osteosarcoma in the left fibula after clinical, radiological and histopathological correlation emphasizing the role of inter disciplinary approach.
Nanoparticles (NPs) possessing antibacterial activity represent an effective way of overcoming ba... more Nanoparticles (NPs) possessing antibacterial activity represent an effective way of overcoming bacterial resistance. In the present work, we report a novel formulation of a nanoantibiotic formed using Ampicillin/sulbactam (Ams) and a zinc oxide nanoparticle (ZnO NP). ‘ZnO NP–Ams’ nanoantibiotic formulation is optimized using response surface methodology coupled genetic algorithm approach. The optimized formulation of nanoantibiotic (ZnO NP: 49.9 μg/mL; Ams: 33.6 μg/mL; incubation time: 27 h) demonstrated 15% enhanced activity compared to the unoptimized formulation against K. pneumoniae. The reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation was directly proportional to the interaction time of nanoantibiotic and K. pneumoniae after the initial lag phase of ~18 h as evident from 2s’-7’-Dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate assay. A low minimum inhibitory concentration (6.25 μg/mL) of nanoantibiotic formulation reveals that even a low concentration of nanoantibiotic can prove to be effective aga...
Ion beam irradiation is one of the methods to tune the properties of Graphene oxide (GO) by modif... more Ion beam irradiation is one of the methods to tune the properties of Graphene oxide (GO) by modifying the ratio of sp 2 and sp 3 hybridization. However, the inherent defects present in GO during its synthesis deteriorate its properties (e.g. reduction efficiency) and are difficult to remove. We have earlier demonstrated the annealing of defects in carbon nanostructures (fullerene, CNT and graphene) at lower fluence of swift heavy ion (SHI) irradiation. In the present work, we have studied irradiation of GO film with 120 MeV Au ions at fluences ranging from 10 10 to 10 13 ions/cm 2. In-situ XRD measurements showed the increase in crystallinity of GO film at low fluence. The irradiated samples showed an increase in the intensity of aromatic carbon bonds by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) which indicates the maximization of graphitic regions for lower fluences up to 3×10 11 ions/cm 2. Higher fluences of ion beam irradiation indicated the presence of carbyne in Raman measurements. Thermal spike simulations were performed to understand the physical processes involved during ion beam irradiation by estimating the radii of core and halo of the tracks formed by SHI.
Quorum sensing (QS) is a complex bacterial intercellular communication system. It is mediated by ... more Quorum sensing (QS) is a complex bacterial intercellular communication system. It is mediated by molecules called auto-inducers (AIs) and allows coordinated responses to a variety of environmental signals by inducing alterations in gene expression. Communication through QS can tremendously stimulate the pathogenicity and virulence via multiple mechanisms in pathogenic bacteria. The present review explores the major types of multitudinous QS systems known in Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria and their roles in bacterial pathogenesis and drug resistance. Because bacterial resistance to antibiotics is increasingly becoming a significant clinical challenge to human health; alternate strategies to combat drug resistance are warranted. Targeting bacterial pathogenicity by interruptions in QS using natural QS inhibitors and synthetic quorum-quenching analogs are being increasingly considered for development of next generation antimicrobials. The review highlights the recent advancem...
The involvement of the VDR ApaI gene polymorphism in the development of pulmonary tuberculosis (P... more The involvement of the VDR ApaI gene polymorphism in the development of pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) has been reported by numerous published studies and yielded inconsistent results. The present meta-analysis evaluated the association of VDR ApaI polymorphism and risk of PTB occurrence. PubMed (Medline), EMBASE and Google Scholar web-databases were searched and a meta-analysis was performed by calculating the pooled odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs). This meta-analysis included a total of 14 eligible studies comprising of 1958 confirmed PTB cases and 2938 controls. We observed decreased risk of PTB in allelic (a vs. A: p=0.003; OR=0.873, 95% CI=0.798 to 0.955), homozygous (aa vs. AA: p=0.006; OR=0.761, 95% CI=0.626 to 0.924), dominant (aa+Aa vs. AA: p=0.039; OR=0.874, 95% CI=0.769 to 0.993) and recessive (aa vs. AA+Aa: p=0.025; OR=0.819, 95% CI=0.688 to 0.975) genetic models. During subgroup analysis, allele (a vs. A: p=0.005; OR=0.846, 95% CI=0.753 to 0.951),...
Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrids were synthesized by a facile two step process. In the first step, na... more Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrids were synthesized by a facile two step process. In the first step, nanostructured ZnO thin films were prepared by carbothermal evaporation followed by thermal annealing in oxygen atmosphere. Deposition of ultrathin Au films onto the nanostructured ZnO thin films by sputtering combined with thermal annealing resulted in the formation of Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrid thin films. The structural, optical, plasmonic and photocatalytic properties of the Au-ZnO nanohybrid thin films were studied. XRD studies on the Au-ZnO hybrid thin films revealed the presence of Au and ZnO nanostructures. UVevisible absorption studies showed two peaks corresponding to the excitonic absorption of ZnO nanostructures in the UV region and the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) absorption of Au nanoparticles in the visible region. The Au-ZnO nanohybrid thin films annealed at 400 C showed enhanced photocatalytic activity as compared to nanostructrured ZnO thin films towards sun light driven photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB) dye in water. The observed enhanced photocatalytic activity of Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrids is attributed to the efficient suppression of the recombination of photogenerated charge carriers in ZnO due to the strong electron scavenging action of Au nanoparticles combined with the improved sun light utilization capability of Au-ZnO nanohybrids coming from the plasmonic response of Au nanoparticles decorating ZnO nanostructures.
The present study was carried out to evaluate the effect of type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) and smo... more The present study was carried out to evaluate the effect of type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) and smoking on periodontal parameters and on the levels of salivary matrix metalloproteinase (MMP-8). One hundred and twenty five subjects were divided into five groups: group 1, systemically and periodontally healthy subjects (n = 25); group 2, systemically healthy subjects but with chronic periodontitis (n = 25); group 3, subjects with type 2 DM and chronic periodontitis (n = 25); group 4, smokers with chronic periodontitis (n = 25); group 5, diabetic-smokers with chronic periodontitis (n = 25). MMP-8 level in saliva was estimated by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) using Quantikine human total MMP-8 immunoassay kit. The result showed that the clinical periodontal parameters and the mean levels of the salivary MMP-8 were significantly higher for diabetic-smokers than other study groups. A highly significant positive correlation (r) between MMP-8 and periodontal parameters was also observed in diabetic-smoker patients. The findings suggest that diabetic-smokers have increased periodontal breakdown and are associated with an increased extent and severity of periodontitis.
Acta parasitologica / Witold Stefański Institute of Parasitology, Warszawa, Poland, 2016
Lymphatic filariasis (LF) is a chronic disease and is caused by the parasites Wuchereria bancroft... more Lymphatic filariasis (LF) is a chronic disease and is caused by the parasites Wuchereria bancrofti (W. bancrofti), Brugia malayi (B. malayi) and Brugia timori (B. timori). In the present study, Setaria cervi (S. cervi), a bovine filarial parasite has been used. Previously, it has been reported that the S. cervi shares some common proteins and antigenic determinants with that of human filarial parasite. The larval stages of filarial species usually cannot be identified by classical morphology. Hence, molecular characterization allows the identification of the parasites throughout all their developmental stages. The genomic DNA of S. cervi adult were isolated and estimated spectrophotometrically for the quantitative presence of DNA content. Screening of DNA sequences from filarial DNA GenBank and Expressed Sequence Tags (EST's) were performed for homologous sequences and then multiple sequence alignment was executed. The conserved sequences from multiple sequence alignment were us...
Cet article présente l'amélioration de la chaîne de mesure du LNE permettant la réalisation de l'... more Cet article présente l'amélioration de la chaîne de mesure du LNE permettant la réalisation de l'ohm à partir du farad. Celle-ci est mise en oeuvre afin de déterminer le quantum de résistance RK issu de l'effet Hall quantique à partir d'un condensateur calculable permettant la réalisation du farad dans le SI. Elle comporte différents ponts d'impédances coaxiaux en deux et quatre paires de bornes dont l'élément central est un transformateur étalon. Nous décrivons dans cet article une nouvelle génération d'autotransformateurs étalons double étage conçus et caractérisés dans le but d'améliorer la chaîne de mesure d'impédance du LNE et réduire l'incertitude globale sur la détermination de RK à une valeur proche de 10-8 .
Cholesterol oxidase (COD) is a bi-functional FAD-containing oxidoreductase which catalyzes the ox... more Cholesterol oxidase (COD) is a bi-functional FAD-containing oxidoreductase which catalyzes the oxidation of cholesterol into 4-cholesten-3-one. The wider biological functions and clinical applications of COD have urged the screening, isolation and characterization of newer microbes from diverse habitats as a source of COD and optimization and over-production of COD for various uses. The practicability of statistical/ artificial intelligence techniques, such as response surface methodology (RSM), artificial neural network (ANN) and genetic algorithm (GA) have been tested to optimize the medium composition for the production of COD from novel strain Streptomyces sp. NCIM 5500. All experiments were performed according to the five factor central composite design (CCD) and the generated data was analysed using RSM and ANN. GA was employed to optimize the models generated by RSM and ANN. Based upon the predicted COD concentration, the model developed with ANN was found to be superior to t...
Caspase-3 has been identified as a key mediator of neuronal apoptosis. The present study identifi... more Caspase-3 has been identified as a key mediator of neuronal apoptosis. The present study identifies caspase-3 as a common player involved in the regulation of multineurodegenerative disorders, namely, Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD), Huntington’s disease (HD), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The protein interaction network prepared using STRING database provides a strong evidence of caspase-3 interactions with the metabolic cascade of the said multineurodegenerative disorders, thus characterizing it as a potential therapeutic target for multiple neurodegenerative disorders.In silicomolecular docking of selected nonpeptidyl natural compounds against caspase-3 exposed potent leads against this common therapeutic target. Rosmarinic acid and curcumin proved to be the most promising ligands (leads) mimicking the inhibitory action of peptidyl inhibitors with the highest Gold fitness scores 57.38 and 53.51, respectively. These results were in close agreement wit...
Introduction Gastric (GC) and oesophageal adenocarcinoma’s (OA) are a major global health problem... more Introduction Gastric (GC) and oesophageal adenocarcinoma’s (OA) are a major global health problem. This study analysed the relationship between demographic, clinical and pathological variables on and all-cause mortality in a cohort of GC and OA patients. Method Data was captured from 227 patients for age, sex, highest histological grade in tissue, tumour type, tumour location, TNM stage, HER2 status, R0 resection, nodal status, presence of linitis plastica, inflammation, atrophic gastritis (for GC) or Barrett’s epithelium (BE) (for EC). All patients’ received standard treatment through a multidisciplinary team and tissue specimens were examined by expert pathologists. Mortality was the primary outcome and was measured from date of diagnosis to date of death from any cause to calculate median survival (MS) of assessed variables. Kaplan-Meir curves were then compared between related variables (log-rank test, Mantel-Cox) and (log-rank test for trend). Results Using Mantel-Cox analysis, MS (months=m) was significantly worse in GC vs EA (12.5 m, n = 126; 23.8 m; n = 51; p = 0.027); diffuse vs intestinal type tumours (17.4 m, n = 69; 27.9 m, n = 97; p = 0.008); poorly vs moderately differentiated tumours (20.78 m, n = 51; 32.68 m, n = 125; p = 0.08); metastatic vs localised cancers (6.5 m, n = 28; 26.4 m, n = 64; p= Conclusion Survival was worse in tumours of gastric origin, diffuse grade, poor differentiation, higher TNM stage, and for OA, in those arising from Barrett’s epithelium. Older age was a worse prognostic indicator. This data helps understand the prognostic implications of GC and OA histology when counselling patients. Disclosure of interest None Declared.
Renal graft thrombosis is a serious and devastating complication of renal transplant that ultimat... more Renal graft thrombosis is a serious and devastating complication of renal transplant that ultimately results in graft loss. It is associated with acute and hyper-acute rejections; however, the underlying cause in large proportion of patients remains unknown. We report a case of a young male who underwent live related kidney transplant but lost the graft on the operating table due to renal vein thrombosis (RVT).
Integrated Approaches Towards Solid Waste Management, 2021
Li-ion or lithium-ion batteries (also called LIBs) in the modern time are used everywhere be it t... more Li-ion or lithium-ion batteries (also called LIBs) in the modern time are used everywhere be it the automobile sector, IT sector or anywhere else. As we are heading towards development, the advancements in technology have led to an increase in electric and electronic appliances, which would in turn result in an increased demand for batteries. Hence, the amount of battery waste is also rising day by day. Globally, the amount of e-waste, which is disposed off per year is around 20–50 million tonnes, of which batteries are a major part. Although there is no definite official data on the generation and disposal of battery waste in India, the amount can be estimated indirectly using the approximate e-waste data, which is based on independent studies conducted by the NGOs or government agencies. According to the Battery University, the global battery market is about 50 billion US dollars out of which approximately 5.5 billion US dollars is for rechargeable batteries. The annual growth rate was about 6% through 2006 which was estimated to increase steadily after that. As per a UN report, in India, there is a prediction of 500% rise in the waste from discarded computers by 2020, and rise in the waste from discarded mobile phones is estimated to be about 18 times than 2007. In spite of the advancements in technology, the waste disposal and management practices are still poor, outdated and sometimes illegal.
Indian Journal of Physiology and Pharmacology, 2021
Objectives: The objective of the present study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of 0.1% no... more Objectives: The objective of the present study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of 0.1% novel folic acid gel in blunt dental instrument-induced oral ulcer in animal models (both rats and rabbits). Materials and Methods: The study was conducted in the Experimental Laboratory, Department of Pharmacology, Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Aligarh Muslim University. Animals were randomly divided into three interventional groups, namely Group 1 (folic acid gel), Group 2 (triamcinolone oromucosal paste) and Group 3 (control). We created a linear oral ulcer of 5 mm with the blunt dental instrument in both rats and rabbits. Each group consists of 10 animals (6 rats + 4 rabbits). Group 1 received test drug 0.1% novel folic acid gel formulated by us, Group 2 was positive control and received standard local drug 0.1% Kenacort triamcinolone oromucosal paste and Group 3 served as a negative control group where no treatment was given. Results: No untoward reaction was observed on the irrit...
International Journal of Advance Research and Innovative Ideas in Education, 2017
Dynamic Proof of Storage (PoS) is a useful cryptographic primitive that enables a user to check t... more Dynamic Proof of Storage (PoS) is a useful cryptographic primitive that enables a user to check the integrity of outsourced _les and to efficiently update the files in a cloud server. Although researchers have proposed many dynamic PoS schemes in single user environments, the problem in multi-user environments has not been investigated sufficiently. A practical multi-user cloud storage system needs the secure client-side cross-user deduplication technique, which allows a user to skip the uploading process and obtain the ownership of the files immediately, when other owners of the same files have uploaded them to the cloud server. To the best of our knowledge, none of the existing dynamic PoSs can support this technique. In this paper, we introduce the concept of deduplicatable dynamic proof of storage and propose an efficient construction called DeyPoS, to achieve dynamic PoS and secure cross-user deduplication, simultaneously. Considering the challenges of structure diversity and p...
Agile methodology uses an iterative and incremental development prototyping that are widely used ... more Agile methodology uses an iterative and incremental development prototyping that are widely used in various Industries. Agile methodology is gaining more popularity and attention in software engineering research communities. Methodology is well introduced in 2000 that are adopted by software development industries in the last 18 years many researchers have been conducted on agile methodologies a large number of methods have been introduced and number of researches has also been presented by many authors. In this paper that different agile methodologies which has been introduced from the 2000 till 2017 we are going to have a clear picture of every agile methodologies used. Beside the benefits of the Agile, criticism on agile methodology states that it fails to listen to beaux arts and style problems and so is absolute to turn out tiny design-decisions. Here, during this paper we tend to determine the impacts that agile methodology has on Software development processes with relevancy ...
Osteosarcoma is a rare and aggressive malignant mesenchymal tumor. It usually presents in the lon... more Osteosarcoma is a rare and aggressive malignant mesenchymal tumor. It usually presents in the long bones about a decade prior to that in jaws. This clinical condition is characterized by radiolucent to radiopaque masses, sunburst appearance, codman's triangle and periodontal ligament space widening in the jaws. A male aged thirty years reported to us with chief complaint of severe pain in gums in the lower left back region. Intraoral examination revealed tobacco stains on his teeth revealing his habit of tobacco chewing and bidi smoking. There was moderate amount of plaque deposition and periodontal pocket ranged from 2 to 5 mm in depth. Orthopantogram revealed widening of periodontal ligament space in the 35, 36, 37, 38 region. The patient also gave history of severe bone pain in left leg for last 3 years and was referred to orthopedic department where he was diagnosed as a case of osteosarcoma of left fibula after various hematological and radiological investigations. Clinical acumen in detecting unusual periodontal ligament widening with no apparent cause as in this case lead to detection of osteosarcoma in the left fibula after clinical, radiological and histopathological correlation emphasizing the role of inter disciplinary approach.
Nanoparticles (NPs) possessing antibacterial activity represent an effective way of overcoming ba... more Nanoparticles (NPs) possessing antibacterial activity represent an effective way of overcoming bacterial resistance. In the present work, we report a novel formulation of a nanoantibiotic formed using Ampicillin/sulbactam (Ams) and a zinc oxide nanoparticle (ZnO NP). ‘ZnO NP–Ams’ nanoantibiotic formulation is optimized using response surface methodology coupled genetic algorithm approach. The optimized formulation of nanoantibiotic (ZnO NP: 49.9 μg/mL; Ams: 33.6 μg/mL; incubation time: 27 h) demonstrated 15% enhanced activity compared to the unoptimized formulation against K. pneumoniae. The reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation was directly proportional to the interaction time of nanoantibiotic and K. pneumoniae after the initial lag phase of ~18 h as evident from 2s’-7’-Dichlorodihydrofluorescein diacetate assay. A low minimum inhibitory concentration (6.25 μg/mL) of nanoantibiotic formulation reveals that even a low concentration of nanoantibiotic can prove to be effective aga...
Ion beam irradiation is one of the methods to tune the properties of Graphene oxide (GO) by modif... more Ion beam irradiation is one of the methods to tune the properties of Graphene oxide (GO) by modifying the ratio of sp 2 and sp 3 hybridization. However, the inherent defects present in GO during its synthesis deteriorate its properties (e.g. reduction efficiency) and are difficult to remove. We have earlier demonstrated the annealing of defects in carbon nanostructures (fullerene, CNT and graphene) at lower fluence of swift heavy ion (SHI) irradiation. In the present work, we have studied irradiation of GO film with 120 MeV Au ions at fluences ranging from 10 10 to 10 13 ions/cm 2. In-situ XRD measurements showed the increase in crystallinity of GO film at low fluence. The irradiated samples showed an increase in the intensity of aromatic carbon bonds by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) which indicates the maximization of graphitic regions for lower fluences up to 3×10 11 ions/cm 2. Higher fluences of ion beam irradiation indicated the presence of carbyne in Raman measurements. Thermal spike simulations were performed to understand the physical processes involved during ion beam irradiation by estimating the radii of core and halo of the tracks formed by SHI.
Quorum sensing (QS) is a complex bacterial intercellular communication system. It is mediated by ... more Quorum sensing (QS) is a complex bacterial intercellular communication system. It is mediated by molecules called auto-inducers (AIs) and allows coordinated responses to a variety of environmental signals by inducing alterations in gene expression. Communication through QS can tremendously stimulate the pathogenicity and virulence via multiple mechanisms in pathogenic bacteria. The present review explores the major types of multitudinous QS systems known in Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria and their roles in bacterial pathogenesis and drug resistance. Because bacterial resistance to antibiotics is increasingly becoming a significant clinical challenge to human health; alternate strategies to combat drug resistance are warranted. Targeting bacterial pathogenicity by interruptions in QS using natural QS inhibitors and synthetic quorum-quenching analogs are being increasingly considered for development of next generation antimicrobials. The review highlights the recent advancem...
The involvement of the VDR ApaI gene polymorphism in the development of pulmonary tuberculosis (P... more The involvement of the VDR ApaI gene polymorphism in the development of pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) has been reported by numerous published studies and yielded inconsistent results. The present meta-analysis evaluated the association of VDR ApaI polymorphism and risk of PTB occurrence. PubMed (Medline), EMBASE and Google Scholar web-databases were searched and a meta-analysis was performed by calculating the pooled odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs). This meta-analysis included a total of 14 eligible studies comprising of 1958 confirmed PTB cases and 2938 controls. We observed decreased risk of PTB in allelic (a vs. A: p=0.003; OR=0.873, 95% CI=0.798 to 0.955), homozygous (aa vs. AA: p=0.006; OR=0.761, 95% CI=0.626 to 0.924), dominant (aa+Aa vs. AA: p=0.039; OR=0.874, 95% CI=0.769 to 0.993) and recessive (aa vs. AA+Aa: p=0.025; OR=0.819, 95% CI=0.688 to 0.975) genetic models. During subgroup analysis, allele (a vs. A: p=0.005; OR=0.846, 95% CI=0.753 to 0.951),...
Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrids were synthesized by a facile two step process. In the first step, na... more Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrids were synthesized by a facile two step process. In the first step, nanostructured ZnO thin films were prepared by carbothermal evaporation followed by thermal annealing in oxygen atmosphere. Deposition of ultrathin Au films onto the nanostructured ZnO thin films by sputtering combined with thermal annealing resulted in the formation of Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrid thin films. The structural, optical, plasmonic and photocatalytic properties of the Au-ZnO nanohybrid thin films were studied. XRD studies on the Au-ZnO hybrid thin films revealed the presence of Au and ZnO nanostructures. UVevisible absorption studies showed two peaks corresponding to the excitonic absorption of ZnO nanostructures in the UV region and the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) absorption of Au nanoparticles in the visible region. The Au-ZnO nanohybrid thin films annealed at 400 C showed enhanced photocatalytic activity as compared to nanostructrured ZnO thin films towards sun light driven photocatalytic degradation of methylene blue (MB) dye in water. The observed enhanced photocatalytic activity of Au-ZnO plasmonic nanohybrids is attributed to the efficient suppression of the recombination of photogenerated charge carriers in ZnO due to the strong electron scavenging action of Au nanoparticles combined with the improved sun light utilization capability of Au-ZnO nanohybrids coming from the plasmonic response of Au nanoparticles decorating ZnO nanostructures.
The present study was carried out to evaluate the effect of type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) and smo... more The present study was carried out to evaluate the effect of type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) and smoking on periodontal parameters and on the levels of salivary matrix metalloproteinase (MMP-8). One hundred and twenty five subjects were divided into five groups: group 1, systemically and periodontally healthy subjects (n = 25); group 2, systemically healthy subjects but with chronic periodontitis (n = 25); group 3, subjects with type 2 DM and chronic periodontitis (n = 25); group 4, smokers with chronic periodontitis (n = 25); group 5, diabetic-smokers with chronic periodontitis (n = 25). MMP-8 level in saliva was estimated by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) using Quantikine human total MMP-8 immunoassay kit. The result showed that the clinical periodontal parameters and the mean levels of the salivary MMP-8 were significantly higher for diabetic-smokers than other study groups. A highly significant positive correlation (r) between MMP-8 and periodontal parameters was also observed in diabetic-smoker patients. The findings suggest that diabetic-smokers have increased periodontal breakdown and are associated with an increased extent and severity of periodontitis.
Acta parasitologica / Witold Stefański Institute of Parasitology, Warszawa, Poland, 2016
Lymphatic filariasis (LF) is a chronic disease and is caused by the parasites Wuchereria bancroft... more Lymphatic filariasis (LF) is a chronic disease and is caused by the parasites Wuchereria bancrofti (W. bancrofti), Brugia malayi (B. malayi) and Brugia timori (B. timori). In the present study, Setaria cervi (S. cervi), a bovine filarial parasite has been used. Previously, it has been reported that the S. cervi shares some common proteins and antigenic determinants with that of human filarial parasite. The larval stages of filarial species usually cannot be identified by classical morphology. Hence, molecular characterization allows the identification of the parasites throughout all their developmental stages. The genomic DNA of S. cervi adult were isolated and estimated spectrophotometrically for the quantitative presence of DNA content. Screening of DNA sequences from filarial DNA GenBank and Expressed Sequence Tags (EST's) were performed for homologous sequences and then multiple sequence alignment was executed. The conserved sequences from multiple sequence alignment were us...
Cet article présente l'amélioration de la chaîne de mesure du LNE permettant la réalisation de l'... more Cet article présente l'amélioration de la chaîne de mesure du LNE permettant la réalisation de l'ohm à partir du farad. Celle-ci est mise en oeuvre afin de déterminer le quantum de résistance RK issu de l'effet Hall quantique à partir d'un condensateur calculable permettant la réalisation du farad dans le SI. Elle comporte différents ponts d'impédances coaxiaux en deux et quatre paires de bornes dont l'élément central est un transformateur étalon. Nous décrivons dans cet article une nouvelle génération d'autotransformateurs étalons double étage conçus et caractérisés dans le but d'améliorer la chaîne de mesure d'impédance du LNE et réduire l'incertitude globale sur la détermination de RK à une valeur proche de 10-8 .
Cholesterol oxidase (COD) is a bi-functional FAD-containing oxidoreductase which catalyzes the ox... more Cholesterol oxidase (COD) is a bi-functional FAD-containing oxidoreductase which catalyzes the oxidation of cholesterol into 4-cholesten-3-one. The wider biological functions and clinical applications of COD have urged the screening, isolation and characterization of newer microbes from diverse habitats as a source of COD and optimization and over-production of COD for various uses. The practicability of statistical/ artificial intelligence techniques, such as response surface methodology (RSM), artificial neural network (ANN) and genetic algorithm (GA) have been tested to optimize the medium composition for the production of COD from novel strain Streptomyces sp. NCIM 5500. All experiments were performed according to the five factor central composite design (CCD) and the generated data was analysed using RSM and ANN. GA was employed to optimize the models generated by RSM and ANN. Based upon the predicted COD concentration, the model developed with ANN was found to be superior to t...
Caspase-3 has been identified as a key mediator of neuronal apoptosis. The present study identifi... more Caspase-3 has been identified as a key mediator of neuronal apoptosis. The present study identifies caspase-3 as a common player involved in the regulation of multineurodegenerative disorders, namely, Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Parkinson’s disease (PD), Huntington’s disease (HD), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The protein interaction network prepared using STRING database provides a strong evidence of caspase-3 interactions with the metabolic cascade of the said multineurodegenerative disorders, thus characterizing it as a potential therapeutic target for multiple neurodegenerative disorders.In silicomolecular docking of selected nonpeptidyl natural compounds against caspase-3 exposed potent leads against this common therapeutic target. Rosmarinic acid and curcumin proved to be the most promising ligands (leads) mimicking the inhibitory action of peptidyl inhibitors with the highest Gold fitness scores 57.38 and 53.51, respectively. These results were in close agreement wit...
Introduction Gastric (GC) and oesophageal adenocarcinoma’s (OA) are a major global health problem... more Introduction Gastric (GC) and oesophageal adenocarcinoma’s (OA) are a major global health problem. This study analysed the relationship between demographic, clinical and pathological variables on and all-cause mortality in a cohort of GC and OA patients. Method Data was captured from 227 patients for age, sex, highest histological grade in tissue, tumour type, tumour location, TNM stage, HER2 status, R0 resection, nodal status, presence of linitis plastica, inflammation, atrophic gastritis (for GC) or Barrett’s epithelium (BE) (for EC). All patients’ received standard treatment through a multidisciplinary team and tissue specimens were examined by expert pathologists. Mortality was the primary outcome and was measured from date of diagnosis to date of death from any cause to calculate median survival (MS) of assessed variables. Kaplan-Meir curves were then compared between related variables (log-rank test, Mantel-Cox) and (log-rank test for trend). Results Using Mantel-Cox analysis, MS (months=m) was significantly worse in GC vs EA (12.5 m, n = 126; 23.8 m; n = 51; p = 0.027); diffuse vs intestinal type tumours (17.4 m, n = 69; 27.9 m, n = 97; p = 0.008); poorly vs moderately differentiated tumours (20.78 m, n = 51; 32.68 m, n = 125; p = 0.08); metastatic vs localised cancers (6.5 m, n = 28; 26.4 m, n = 64; p= Conclusion Survival was worse in tumours of gastric origin, diffuse grade, poor differentiation, higher TNM stage, and for OA, in those arising from Barrett’s epithelium. Older age was a worse prognostic indicator. This data helps understand the prognostic implications of GC and OA histology when counselling patients. Disclosure of interest None Declared.
Renal graft thrombosis is a serious and devastating complication of renal transplant that ultimat... more Renal graft thrombosis is a serious and devastating complication of renal transplant that ultimately results in graft loss. It is associated with acute and hyper-acute rejections; however, the underlying cause in large proportion of patients remains unknown. We report a case of a young male who underwent live related kidney transplant but lost the graft on the operating table due to renal vein thrombosis (RVT).
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