Anticonvulsant activity of nicardipine in experimentally induced seizures in wistar albino rats.

Background: The objective of the study was to evaluate the anticonvulsant activity of nicardipine in wistar albino rats.Methods: Anticonvulsant activity of nicardipine in a dose 10 mg/kg, and its effect with the standard drug lamotrigine (5 mg/kg) was studied in a maximal electroshock seizures (MES) experimental animal model.Results: Nicardipine in dose of 10 mg/kg showed significant anticonvulsant effect (p<0.001) and combination with standard drug lamotrigine (p<0.001) also showed more significant anticonvulsant effect in MES model.Conclusions: Nicardipine is having anticonvulsant activity and it also potentiates the anticonvulsant effect of lamotrigine in MES model

Influence of Potting Media on Growth of Asparagus densiflorus 'Meyersii'

A study was conducted on the influence of growth media on development of&nbsp;Asparagus densiflorus&nbsp;'Meyersii' at Horticultural Research Station, Yercaud during the years 2011-12. The pot experiment was laid out under open condition, with nine set of treatments comprising various combinations of soil, sand, FYM, vermicompost and microbial consortia (Azospirillum, phosphobacteria&nbsp;and&nbsp;Pseudomonas fluorescens). From among the media combinations used, the treatment involving Soil + Sand + FYM + Vermicompost (T3) @ 2:1:1:0.5 (670g+375g+375g+165g) was found to be the best substrate for vegetative and root characters like plant height, shoot number, leaflet number, leaflet length, leaflet width, root number, root length, bulb number, bulb length, bulb width and vase-life in&nbsp;Asparagus densiflorus&nbsp;'Meyersii'

Neuroprotective effect of secretin in chronic hypoxia induced neurodegeneration in rats

Background: Hypoxia is a condition in any stage in the delivery of oxygen to cells which include decreased partial pressures of oxygen, less diffusion of oxygen in the lungs, insufficient hemoglobin, inefficient blood flow to the end tissue, and breathing rhythm. Secretin is an amino acid which plays proper functioning of gastro intestinal system.Methods: The current study was conducted to evaluvate the effect of exogenously administrated secretin on chronic hypoxic damage of brain in rat model. Experimental design consists of control animals, Control animals + secretin hypoxia exposed animals; hypoxia exposed animals +secretin (20ng/kg.bw).Results: The results of this study point to a possible role of Secretin as neuroprotectant.Conclusions: Further research on secretin needs to be conducted in order to confirm the deductions made by this study

Automated Aqua-Hydroponics System Using Arduino, Plc and IoT

Promotion of soil-less organic horticulture farming practices in small and large scale markets. The promotion is done in the traditional way of aquaponics or hydroponics as a separate farming technique. The combination of this technique with the help of automation in a single system will promote high reach in the development of organic horticulture farming. The automation is done with the help of Arduino for small-scale purposes and PLC for large-scale purposes. IoT is used for displaying the necessary parameters of the system

Evaluation of analgesic and anti-inflammatory activity of a combination of tramadol-pregabalin in animal models of pain and inflammation

Background: A major goal of pain management is to provide pain relief that is clinically meaningful, sustained, and associated with minimum and reversible adverse effects. Since single analgesic drug is not effective in all patients, there is a need either to develop new and more effective drugs or to identify favourable combinations of drugs that are already available. The aim of the present was to evaluate the analgesic and anti-inflammatory activity of tramadol and pregabalin when used alone or in combination in animal models of pain and inflammation.Methods: The animals (rats and mice) were divided into eight groups with six animals in each group. Analgesia was assessed by acetic acid induced writhing and tail flick methods in mice and hot plate method in rats. Paw oedema model in rats after induction with 0.1 ml of 1% carrageenan was used to assess the anti‑inflammatory activity. The percentage inhibition of writhes and prolongation of reaction time were used for assessing analgesic activity and reduction in paw volume was used for assessing anti-inflammatory activity. The results obtained were analysed by ANOVA and Tukey HSD Post-hoc Test.Results: Treatment with tramadol pregabalin alone or in combination reduced writhing episodes significantly in acetic acid induced writhing in mice as compared to control indicating its analgesic effect and the highest percentage inhibition of pain was seen with high dose tramadol plus pregabalin. Treatment in Hot plate and Tail flick methods significantly prolonged the reaction time at all time points.Conclusions: Tramadol when combined with pregabalin may enhance its anti-nociceptive effects. If confirmed in additional models of acute and/or chronic pain this combination might be useful in the clinical management of pain not associated with inflammation

The evolution of lung cancer and impact of subclonal selection in TRACERx

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-associated mortality worldwide. Here we analysed 1,644 tumour regions sampled at surgery or during follow-up from the first 421 patients with non-small cell lung cancer prospectively enrolled into the TRACERx study. This project aims to decipher lung cancer evolution and address the primary study endpoint: determining the relationship between intratumour heterogeneity and clinical outcome. In lung adenocarcinoma, mutations in 22 out of 40 common cancer genes were under significant subclonal selection, including classical tumour initiators such as TP53 and KRAS. We defined evolutionary dependencies between drivers, mutational processes and whole genome doubling (WGD) events. Despite patients having a history of smoking, 8% of lung adenocarcinomas lacked evidence of tobacco-induced mutagenesis. These tumours also had similar detection rates for EGFR mutations and for RET, ROS1, ALK and MET oncogenic isoforms compared with tumours in never-smokers, which suggests that they have a similar aetiology and pathogenesis. Large subclonal expansions were associated with positive subclonal selection. Patients with tumours harbouring recent subclonal expansions, on the terminus of a phylogenetic branch, had significantly shorter disease-free survival. Subclonal WGD was detected in 19% of tumours, and 10% of tumours harboured multiple subclonal WGDs in parallel. Subclonal, but not truncal, WGD was associated with shorter disease-free survival. Copy number heterogeneity was associated with extrathoracic relapse within 1 year after surgery. These data demonstrate the importance of clonal expansion, WGD and copy number instability in determining the timing and patterns of relapse in non-small cell lung cancer and provide a comprehensive clinical cancer evolutionary data resource

Genomic–transcriptomic evolution in lung cancer and metastasis

Intratumour heterogeneity (ITH) fuels lung cancer evolution, which leads to immune evasion and resistance to therapy. Here, using paired whole-exome and RNA sequencing data, we investigate intratumour transcriptomic diversity in 354 non-small cell lung cancer tumours from 347 out of the first 421 patients prospectively recruited into the TRACERx study. Analyses of 947 tumour regions, representing both primary and metastatic disease, alongside 96 tumour-adjacent normal tissue samples implicate the transcriptome as a major source of phenotypic variation. Gene expression levels and ITH relate to patterns of positive and negative selection during tumour evolution. We observe frequent copy number-independent allele-specific expression that is linked to epigenomic dysfunction. Allele-specific expression can also result in genomic–transcriptomic parallel evolution, which converges on cancer gene disruption. We extract signatures of RNA single-base substitutions and link their aetiology to the activity of the RNA-editing enzymes ADAR and APOBEC3A, thereby revealing otherwise undetected ongoing APOBEC activity in tumours. Characterizing the transcriptomes of primary–metastatic tumour pairs, we combine multiple machine-learning approaches that leverage genomic and transcriptomic variables to link metastasis-seeding potential to the evolutionary context of mutations and increased proliferation within primary tumour regions. These results highlight the interplay between the genome and transcriptome in influencing ITH, lung cancer evolution and metastasis

The evolution of non-small cell lung cancer metastases in TRACERx

Metastatic disease is responsible for the majority of cancer-related deaths. We report the longitudinal evolutionary analysis of 126 non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) tumours from 421 prospectively recruited patients in TRACERx who developed metastatic disease, compared with a control cohort of 144 non-metastatic tumours. In 25% of cases, metastases diverged early, before the last clonal sweep in the primary tumour, and early divergence was enriched for patients who were smokers at the time of initial diagnosis. Simulations suggested that early metastatic divergence more frequently occurred at smaller tumour diameters (less than 8 mm). Single-region primary tumour sampling resulted in 83% of late divergence cases being misclassified as early, highlighting the importance of extensive primary tumour sampling. Polyclonal dissemination, which was associated with extrathoracic disease recurrence, was found in 32% of cases. Primary lymph node disease contributed to metastatic relapse in less than 20% of cases, representing a hallmark of metastatic potential rather than a route to subsequent recurrences/disease progression. Metastasis-seeding subclones exhibited subclonal expansions within primary tumours, probably reflecting positive selection. Our findings highlight the importance of selection in metastatic clone evolution within untreated primary tumours, the distinction between monoclonal versus polyclonal seeding in dictating site of recurrence, the limitations of current radiological screening approaches for early diverging tumours and the need to develop strategies to target metastasis-seeding subclones before relapse