Continuous consumption of whey protein affects motor and cognitive functions in a mouse model of cow’s milk hypersensitivity

Hypersensitization to a food allergen can occur in the absence of immediate allergic reactions, a condition referred to as asymptomatic sensitization. Using mice asymptomatically sensitized to a bovine whey allergen, β-lactoglobulin (BLG, Bos d 5), we have previously shown that chronic exposure to the allergen results in behavior changes with increased neuroinflammation and cortical demyelination. However, whether allergen avoidance can resolve these pathologies is unknown. Thus, we aimed to compare immunological and behavioral changes in sham- or BLG-sensitized mice with or without the removal of dietary whey after the mice had consumed either a control diet (CTL) or a whey-protein-containing diet (WP) for 2 weeks. As previously reported, BLG-sensitized mice did not display overt physical reactions during the 2-week allergen exposure period, while their plasma levels of BLG-specific IgE and IgG1 were elevated compared to the respective sham groups. Following an additional 2 weeks on either the CTL or WP diet, these antibodies remained elevated in some of the sensitized mice in both diet groups. The gripstrength test indicated that sham mice that switched to the CTL diet after the 2-week WP diet increased limb strengths. In contrast, BLG-sensitized mice on either diet, as well as sham mice that stayed on the WP diet, showed a decline in limb strengths, suggesting that WP consumption, whether during sensitization or as part of the daily diet, affected their motor function. Furthermore, removing dietary WP improved spatial memory performance with the cross-maze test in both sham and BLG-sensitized mice. These results suggested that continuous exposure to a dietary allergen may influence motor and cognitive functionshttps://commons.und.edu/bms-pp/1008/thumbnail.jp

NEURAL NETWORK CAPTCHA CRACKER

NEURAL NETWORK CAPTCHA CRACKER A CAPTCHA (acronym for Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart ) is a type of challenge-response test used to determine whether or not a user providing the response is human. In this project, we used a deep neural network framework for CAPTCHA recognition. The core idea of the project is to learn a model that breaks image-based CAPTCHAs. We used convolutional neural networks and recurrent neural networks instead of the conventional methods of CAPTCHA breaking based on segmenting and recognizing a CAPTCHA. Our models consist of two convolutional layers to learn image features and a recurrent layer to output character sequence. We tried different configurations, including wide and narrow layers and deep and shallow networks. We synthetically generated a CAPTCHA dataset of varying complexity and used different libraries to avoid overfitting on one library. We trained on both fixed-and variable-length CAPTCHAs and were able to get accuracy levels of 99.8% and 80%, respectively

Psycho-Social Factors Causing Stress: A Study of Teacher Educators

Purpose: The present investigation was planned to determine the influence of type of personality, gender, age, qualification and experience causing stress among teacher educators at work.Method: A sample of 100 subjects from male and female teachers teaching in teacher training colleges, Delhi, India was drawn randomly. The data was collected by applying the following tools: (i) Organizational Role Stress Scale (ORS) by Udai Pareek (1993). This tool measures role space and role set conflict. Test carries 50 items which are rated at five point scale. (ii) R-R introversion-Extroversion Scale by Dr. R.N.Singh and Dr. R.B.Tripathi (2010). This tool measures the personality in terms of Highly Extrovert, Predominantly Extrovert, Balanced Ambivert, Predominantly Introvert and Highly Introvert. This tool consists of 50 items with ‘yes’ and ‘no’ alternative responsesResults: The results revealed that (i) Female teacher educators are more likely to experience stress as compared to male teacher educators. (ii) Younger teacher educators are more likely to experience stress as compared to older teacher educators. (iii) Less qualified teacher educators are more likely to experience stress as compared to highly qualified teacher educators.(iv) Less experienced teacher educators are more likely to experience stress as compared to highly experienced teacher educators. (v) Introvert type of teacher educators are more likely to experience stress as compared to Extrovert teacher educators. Keywords: Demographic and psychological factors, Organizational role stres

Analysis of the influence of soil temperature and soil surface conditions on soil moisture estimation using the Theta Probe

Soil moisture is an important component of numerous systems, influencing crop development, and runoff and infiltration partitioning, among other things. However, due to its spatial and temporal variability, it is difficult to estimate soil moisture consistently using conventional techniques such as gravimetric sampling, which is point-based and time-consuming. Therefore, to overcome this drawback in soil moisture estimation and mapping, and to facilitate its measurement spatially and temporarily, remote sensing in microwave, visible, near infrared and short wave infrared is being explored and is proving to be a promising technique. But to develop models using spectral data there is a need to validate these models using ground truth data collected using gravimetric measurements and various dielectric and capacitance probes. Theta probe is one such dielectric probe, which is widely used by the remote sensing community. Not only does soil surface conditions change the response of reflectance data in various spectral ranges but has been observed to influence the measurements from Theta probe. As a part of this study an attempt has been made to understand the influence of soil temperature, roughness and crusting on Theta probe measurements by analyzing moisture content as a function of time. A nonlinear relationship was observed between the actual moisture content and Theta probe soil moisture content. A t-test conducted on the estimate of temperature concluded that the effect of temperature on Theta probe measurements was insignificant, but there is a possibility that soil surface conditions involving soil roughness and crusting could be a reason for observed nonlinearity between actual and Theta probe measurements. Therefore, future work is suggested to test the feasibility of using Theta probe under different soil surface conditions

E-government for Improving Performance of Power Sector in India

The present paper endeavors to evaluate the impact of e-government applications in basic infrastructure and public utilities for which a model is developed to show that e-government has its roots in democratic values where the two reinforce each other. The model is then tested in the power sector in India using qualitative analysis. A comparative analysis of two players in the power sector, one from public sector and other from private has been made to derive conclusions and draw recommendations. Combination of research tools such as, structured survey, unstructured interviews, observations and secondary source study have been used. A major finding is that the public sector player should speed up the implementation of e-government in its operations especially to improve user-interface and to ensure competitiveness

Continuous consumption of whey protein maintains neuroinflammation in a mouse model of asymptomatic cow’s milk allergy

Using a mouse model of cow’s milk allergy (CMA), we previously showed that C57BL/6J mice sensitized to a bovine whey allergen, β-lactoglobulin (BLG), exhibited anxiety/depression-like behavior and neuroinflammation in the absence of overt anaphylaxis upon allergen exposurehttps://commons.und.edu/bms-pp/1010/thumbnail.jp

Functionalized Surface-Cross-Linked Micelles for Catalysis and Light Harvesting

This dissertation present several applications of surface cross-linked nanomaterials as potential catalysts and light-harvesting materials. The microenvironment of these covalently fixed micelles are studied and the impact of crosslinking on their surface properties is investigated. Different kinds of functionalized surfactants are synthesized and studied for their micelle formation and surface activity. Surfactants with polymerizable tail are synthesized to facilitate covalent capture of catalytic groups in the core. Chromophore-containing surfactants are also prepared and investigated for their energy transfer within and beyond a single SCM