In vitro availability of essential amino acids, and the protein efficiency ration of cooked cicer arietinum

The legume Cicer arietinum (chick-pea) is a commonly used source of dietary protein in India because of its high biological value and non-toxic nature. The objective of this investigation was to study the effects of cooking on the availability of four essential amino acids in chick-peas and on the utilization of its protein for tissue synthesis. Acid hydrolysis for varying periods of time was used to determine the optimum level of each amino acid present in raw, roasted, boiled, and steam-cooked chick-peas. Enzymatic hydrolysis with pepsin and pancreatin for varying periods of time was used to study the quantitative release of the amino acids in vitro. The lysine, threonine, valine, and leucines present in the acid and enzyme hydrolysates were identified by 1-dimensional polychromatic paper chromatography using n-butanol, acetic acid, and water as the solvent for resolution. Quantitative estimations were based on the elution and colorimetric readings of the chromatograms. A growth experiment with weanling rats was employed to evaluate the overall quality of the protein. Using a randomized block design, five groups of 3 week old male rats of the Holtzman strain were fed a basal diet supplying 10% protein through casein, and experimental diets supplying 10% protein through raw, roasted, boiled, and steam-cooked chick-peas for a 4 week period

Jewelry sets

The following thesis is the beginning of a novel about immigration that follows three generations of women from India to America. The short story form is utilized throughout the text

Monitoring sessile droplet evaporation on a micromechanical device.

A bulk acoustic mode micro-electro-mechanical dual resonator platform is utilised to study the evaporation of sub-microliter water droplets from the surface of the resonator. An analytical formulation for the observed frequency shift and the measure dependence of resonant frequency on the modes of evaporation which is consistent with the optically derived data. The resonators access only a thin layer of the liquid through shear contact and, hence, the response is not affected by the bulk mass of the droplet to first order. A relationship between the droplet contact area and the elapsed time was established for the evaporation process and is used to derive a value of the diffusion coefficient of water in air that is found to be in reasonable agreement with literature values. This work introduces a new tool for the electro-mechanical monitoring of droplet evaporation with relevance to applications such as biosensing in liquid samples of sub-microliter volumes.Funding from the Royal Society and the Cambridge Trusts is acknowledged.This is the accepted manuscript version. The final version is available from the RSC at http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2014/an/c4an01389a#!divAbstract

Clinical intestinal transplantation: New perspectives and immunologic considerations

Background: Although tacrolimus-based immunosuppression has made intestinal transplantation feasible, the risk of the requisite chronic high- dose treatment has inhibited the widespread use of these procedures. We have examined our 1990-1997 experience to determine whether immunomodulatory strategies to improve outlook could be added to drug treatment. Study Design: Ninety-eight consecutive patients (59 children, 39 adults) with a panoply of indications received 104 allografts under tacrolimus-based immunosuppression: intestine only (n = 37); liver and intestine (n = 50); or multivisceral (n = 17). Of the last 42 patients, 20 received unmodified adjunct donor bone marrow cells; the other 22 were contemporaneous control patients. Results: With a mean followup of 32 ± 26 months (range, 1-86 months), 12 recipients (3 intestine only, 9 composite grafts) are alive with good nutrition beyond the 5-year milestone. Forty-seven (48%) of the total group survive bearing grafts that provide full (91%) or partial (9%) nutrition. Actuarial patient survival at 1 and 5 years (72% and 48%, respectively) was similar with isolated intestinal and composite graft recipients, but the loss rate of grafts from rejection was highest with intestine alone. The best results were in patients between 2 and 18 years of age (68% at 5 years). Adjunct bone marrow did not significantly affect the incidence of graft rejection, B-cell lymphoma, or the rate or severity of graft-versus-host disease. Conclusions: These results demonstrate that longterm rehabilitation similar to that with the other kinds of organ allografts is achievable with all three kinds of intestinal transplant procedures, that the morbidity and mortality is still too high for their widespread application, and that the liver is significantly but marginally protective of concomitantly engrafted intestine. Although none of the endpoints were markedly altered by donor leukocyte augmentation (and chimerism) with bone marrow, establishment of the safety of this adjunct procedure opens the way to further immune modulation strategies that can be added to the augmentation protocol

Literati or Monks? Jokes about Buddhist Monks’ Literary Identities in Northern Song Biji

[English abstract] This article sheds new light on the Song literati perception of Buddhist identity through the jokes on Buddhist vegetarianism that are preserved in the biji (miscellaneous jottings), an idiosyncratic genre that became popular during the Song dynasty. I first discuss how mockery was used by literati to problematize Buddhist monks’ ever deepening engagement in secular endeavors by playfully linking precept-breaking carnivorism to monks’ poetry writing. Due to the intrinsic ambiguity between enmity and friendship in playfulness, I next demonstrate how playfulness was used as a reconciliatory force in the controversies over Buddhist precepts and practice

The Drunken Man's Talk: Tales from Medieval China, compiled by Luo Ye, translated by Alister D. Inglis [book review]

Review of The Drunken Man’s Talk: Tales from Medieval China. By Luo Ye. Translated by Alister D. Inglis. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2015. Pp. xxiii + 214. $50 (cloth);$30 (paper)

Humor under the Guise of Chan: Stories of Su Shi and Encounter Dialogues

This article examines a group of Song-dynasty biji (miscellaneous jottings) anecdotes featuring the Northern Song literary giant Su Shi (style name Dongpo, 1037–1101) playfully engaging with Buddhist encounter dialogues. These religious accounts are well known for their riddle-like language and the baffling effect they create among their readers, prompting the question of whether they were read for humor. Previous scholarship on encounter dialogues focuses on the religious perspective, demonstrating that their perplexing language and rhetoric serve pedagogical and monastic functions. By contrast, this article explores Chan Buddhist humor from the perspective of the literati and vernacular culture by examining how encounter dialogues were incorporated in Song-dynasty vernacular plays and literati storytelling. Focusing on stories that depict Su Shi’s playful engagement with encounter dialogues as a case study, this article reveals that an important part of Su Shi’s humorous image is inspired and shaped by Buddhism. It also shows that humor in these biji stories is contingent on the readers’ knowledge of Chan literature such as “recorded dialogues” (yulu) and “transmission records” (denglu), which were popular among literati during the Song. The anecdotal materials preserved in biji suggests a mutual influence between Chan literature and vernacular entertainment during the Song. I argue that, in addition to religious functions, literary factors of performance and aesthetics played significant roles in conditioning the entertaining effect of encounter dialogues, particularly when they were received outside of monastic circles

The Age of Irreverence: A New History of Laughter in China, by Christopher Rea [book review]

Review of Christopher Rea. The Age of Irreverence: A New History of Laughter in China. Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2015. xvi, 335 pp. Hardcover $70.00, ISBN 978-0-520-28384-8

Intravenously delivered graphene nanosheets and multiwalled carbon nanotubes induce site-specific Th2 inflammatory responses via the IL-33/ST2 axis

Carbon-based nanomaterials (CBN), such as graphene nanosheets (GNS) and multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT), have been proposed for potential nanomedicine applications such as biomedical devices and carriers for drug delivery. However, our current understanding regarding the systemic toxicity of these CBN through intravenous (iv) injection is limited. In this study, we compare the immune response resulting from GNS and MWCNT exposure. We hypothesize that iv administration of GNS and MWCNT would result in divergent systemic inflammatory responses due to physicochemical differences between these two CBN. In the lungs of C57BL/6 mice, GNS actuate a Th2 immune response 1 day following iv administration, which consists of neutrophilic influx and a significant increase in interleukin (IL)-5, IL-13, IL-33, and its soluble receptor (sST2) in the bronchoalveolar lavage fluid. MWCNT elicited a significant increase in the messenger ribonucleic acid expression of cytokines in the spleen including IL-4 and IL-33, which are associated with an increase in splenic cell differentiation (CD)4+ and CD8+ T-cells in C57BL/6 mice following iv injection. The observed Th2 responses in both the lung and spleen are absent in ST2−/− mice administrated GNS or MWCNT, suggesting a critical role for IL-33. In conclusion, the use of GNS or MWCNT as nanocarriers for drug delivery may result in Th2 immune responses that are mediated through the IL-33/ST2 axis and therefore may promote adverse allergic reactions