Role of diffusion: weighted magnetic resonance imaging in evaluation of renal masses

Background: Diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (DWI) is a valuable tool to narrow down the differential diagnosis of renal masses. Studies have shown that benign renal masses have higher Apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) value than malignant renal masses. Aim of study was to evaluate the role of diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging in the characterization of renal masses.Methods: The study was conducted in department of Radio diagnosis at ABVIMS and Dr. RML Hospital, New Delhi between June 2017 to March 2019. This was a cross-sectional observational study comprising of 28 patients. Patients found to have renal mass on ultrasound and computed tomography (CT) were evaluated further on 3T siemens Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner. In addition to routine sequences, DWI using b value of 0,500,1000 s/mm2 sequence was used to study to differentiate benign and malignant renal masses.Results: Of a total of 28 cases, the most common malignant mass was renal cell carcinoma (RCC). Angiomyolipoma (AML) was the most common benign masses. DWI showed low ADC values in most of the malignant masses and high ADC values in most of the benign masses. The cut-off level of ADC value for differentiation among benign and malignant renal masses was 1.08×10-3 mm2/s. DWI-MR findings were correlated with histopathological diagnosis.Conclusion: DWI with ADC measurements are a non-invasive, problem solving tool for characterization of renal masses helping to differentiate malignant from benign masses.

Impact of integrated nutrient management on vegetative growth and flowering quality of gladiolus (Gladiolus hybridus Hort.) cv. American Beauty

A field study on ‘effects of integrated nutrient management on vegetative growth and flowering quality of gladiolus (Gladiolus hybridus Hort.) cv. American Beauty’ was carried out at College of Horticulture and Forestry, Jhalawar during 2016-17. It was found that cv. American Beauty with treatment the tallest plants (121.50 cm), maximum number of leaves per plant (9.03), the maximum  leaf length (38.20 cm), earliest spike emergence (59.22 days), minimum number of days to floret opening (12.50 days), maximum number of florets per spike (17.53), maximum spike length (108.50 cm), maximum floret diameter (9.01 cm), maximum rachis length (39.03 cm) was found in T12 (RDF 75% + Azotobacter + PSB + Mycorrhiza). The maximum stem diameter (1.52 cm) and maximum spike girth (0.97 cm) was recorded in T10 (RDF 75% + PSB + Mycorrhiza). On the basis of foregoing summary, the results may be concluded as follow: The different bio-fertilizer treatments had significant influence on the vegetative growth, flowering and post-harvest of gladiolus in the present study. Application of bio fertilizer singly and in different combinations has significant effect on all the vegetative, floral and corms parameters. Therefore, among various bio fertilizers and their combinations, Azotobacter, PSB and Myccorhiza were found the best, followed by un-inoculated treatment show least value for these parameters during the seasons of experiment

The morphological and phenological performance of different cotton genotypes under different plant density

The field experiment conducted with different plant density and different Genotypes showed significant differences in their morphological characters and phenological characters. Among the genotypes, AKA-7 possessed higher plant height (116.4 cm), No. of sympodia (19.27 plant-1) and leaf area index (3.628) compared to other geno-types but leaf area (33.02 dm-2) and dry matter weight (103.21g/plant) were recorded higher with genotype Balwan. However, Normal plant density (100%) was registered higher plant height (102.6 cm), no of sympodia (17.33 plant-1), leaf area (27.02 dm2) and dry matter weight (58.13 g/plant) but higher leaf area index (3.430) was recorded with higher plant density (200%). Among the genotypes, AKH-081 was comparatively earlier in phenological characters i.e. first square (47.9 days), first flower (67.9 days), first boll burst (116.1 days), first picking (128.7 days) and final picking (178 days). However, Higher planting density (200%) was recorded earlier in first square (49.3 day), first flower (67.8 days), first boll burst (116.9 days), first picking (130.6 day) and final picking (179.7 days). On the basis of this experiment, genotype Balwan and normal planting density level (100%) recorded higher morphological development wherever phenological development recorded earlier with the each respective phenophase in the Gen-otype AKH-081 and highest planting density level (200%)

Behaviour of lime stabilized reinforced flyash under uniaxial loading

The use of reinforcement in improving the strength parameters of geomaterials has taken momentum due to the availability of variety of synthetic materials commercially at cheaper rates. The basic principles involved in earth reinforcement techniques are simple and have been used by mankind for centuries

Atypical presentation of intra-articular osteochondroma of knee in adolescent- case report

Osteochondroma is most common benign bone tumor around knee joint. They occur during the period of growth, grows away from joint line and rarely responsible for mechanical symptoms. This paper reports a rare presentation of intra-articular osteochondroma in knee with mechanical instability symptoms, mild to moderate pain and swelling of knee joint. Patient was 20 years old male and misdiagnosed as chronic nonspecific synovitis, tubercular arthritis and anterior cruciate ligament tear of knee. We assessed him clinically and radiologically and diagnosis was established based on MRI and arthroscopy. He was treated by open excision of tumor, and patients recover uneventfully. Instability of knee joint in this case can be attributed due to rough surface of osteochondroma just beneath lower attachment of patellar tendon

Modified Taguchi-Based Approach for Optimal Distributed Generation Mix in Distribution Networks

In this paper, a new two-stage optimization framework is proposed to determine the optimal-mix integration of dispatchable Distributed Generation (DG), in power distribution networks, in order to maximize various techno-economic and social benefits simultaneously. The proposed framework incorporates some of the newly introduced regulatory policies to facilitate low carbon networks. A modified Taguchi Method (TM), in combination with a node priority list, is proposed to solve the problem in a minimum number of experiments. Nevertheless, the standard TM is computationally fast but has some inherent tendencies of local trapping and usually converges to suboptimal solutions. Therefore, two modifications are suggested. A roulette wheel selection criterion is applied on priority list to select the most promising DG nodes and then modified TM determines the optimal DG sizes at these nodes. The proposed approach is implemented on two standard test distribution systems of 33 and 118 buses. To validate the suggested improvements, various algorithm performance parameters such as convergence characteristic, best and worst fitness values, and standard deviation are compared with existing variants of TM, and improved genetic algorithm. The comparison shows that the suggested corrections significantly improve the robustness and global searching ability of TM, even compared to meta-heuristic methods

Overcoming scale-up challenges for a First-In-Human (FIH) antibody production process at the 2000L scale: Successful optimization of bioreactor equipment and harvest conditions to improve process performance and product yield

During the development and scale-up of a FIH fed-batch cell culture process, we have encountered two major challenges that impacted culture performance and harvest process yield significantly. The first challenge relates to the oxygen requirement for this particular process, where a higher oxygen demand was observed compared to our platform processes. The high oxygen demand is met by increasing agitation and sparging of air and oxygen in bioreactors, but also negatively impacted cell health due to higher gas entrance velocities (GEV) from the higher sparging rate. The observation is exemplified in the manufacturing scale which significantly impacted cell culture performance and antibody production. Further exacerbating this issue, many sparger holes were later found to be plugged leading to a theoretical GEV as high as 300 m/s. Extensive troubleshooting studies were carried out at small scale to confirm the impact of high GEV on this antibody production process and led to the re-design of the sparger for the manufacturing scale. Once implemented, the new sparger successfully mitigated the issue. The second challenge was relating to harvest operation, where the final membrane filter was clogged at the manufacturing scale. Studies were performed at the pilot scale to evaluate different solutions including increasing depth filter area, testing different types of the final filter, and changing the chase buffer at the manufacturing scale. In the end, successful implementation of the new sparger design and optimized harvest conditions led to comparable process performance between the manufacturing scale and the pilot scale. The final process resulted not only in an increase in the overall product yield, but also prevented the need of filter change-outs during the harvest operation, therefore, significantly improving manufacturing ease

Optimal integration and management of solar generation and battery storage system in distribution systems under uncertain environment

The simultaneous placement of solar photovoltaics (SPVs) and battery energy storage systems (BESSs) in distribution systems is a highly complex combinatorial optimization problem. It not only involves siting and sizing but is also embedded with charging and discharging dispatches of BESSs under dynamically varying system states with intermittency of SPVs and operational constraints. This makes the simultaneous allocation a nested problem, where the operational part acts as a constraint for the planning part and adds complexity to the problem. This paper presents a bi-layer optimization strategy to optimally place SPVs and BESSs in the distribution system. A simple and effective operating BESS strategy model is developed to mitigate reverse power flow, enhance load deviation index and absorb variability of load and power generation which are essential features for the faithful exploitation of available renewable energy sources (RESs). In the proposed optimization strategy, the inner layer optimizes the energy management of BESSs for the sizing and siting as suggested by the outer layer. Since the inner layer optimizes each system state separately, the problem search space of GA is significantly reduced. The application results on a benchmark 33-bus test distribution system highlight the importance of the proposed method

In vitro screening of white Jute (Corchorus capsularis L) against salinity stress

The environmental stress such as salinity of soil or water is serious threat for field crops in the world, especially in arid and semiarid regions. To study salinity stress on jute (Corchorus capsularis), an experiment was laid out in factorial randomized block design keeping nine capsularis varieties (JRC-698, JRC-321, JRC-517, JRC-7447, JBC-5, JRC-212, JRC-80, JRC-532 and UPC-94) as one factor and four levels of salt concentrations i.e. control (Distilled H2O), 100, 160, 240 and 300 mM NaCl with three replications. Adverse effect of salinity increased with increasing concentration of sodium chloride. Among nine jute varieties the highest germination percentage (89.5%), root length (0.6 cm), shoot length (1.2 cm), fresh weight (93 mg) and dry weight (9.5 mg) of seedling were observed in ‘JRC-698’ at salt concentration at 160 mM NaCl as compared with other salt concentration. All growth parameters were recorded higher in control than other treatments. All growth parameters were decreased up to 240 mM NaCl concentration and it was completely inhibited at 300 mM NaCl. Variety ‘UPC-94’ was the most susceptible to salinity stress. Hence, white jute varieties, JRC-698 and JRC-517 can be grown at 160 mM NaCl concentration