Evaluation of Anti-Bacterial Efficacy of Zirconium Oxide Nanoparticles (ZrO2NPs) against Streptococcus Mutans and Enterococcus Faecalis: An In Vitro study

AIM OF THE STUDY: To evaluate the anti-bacterial efficacy of Zirconium Oxide Nanoparticles (ZrO2 NPs) against Streptococcus mutans and Enterococcus faecalis. METHODOLOGY: Standard ATCC strains of Streptococcus mutans (ATCC 25175) and Enterococcus faecalis (ATCC 29212) were procured from Sigma Aldrich and sub-cultured onto Brain Heart Infusion Agar (BHIA) plate at 37 0c for 24 hours. The strains were tested for their sensitivity to ZrO2 NPs at various dilutions (100mg/mL, 75mg/mL, 50mg/mL, 25mg/mL) using Agar well diffusion method. The minimum concentration of ZrO2 NPs to inhibit 99.9% growth of S.mutans and E. faecalis was determined by the standard methods (Broth Microdilution) of Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) guidelines. Following which the ability of ZrO2 NPs to disrupt the biofilms formed by S. mutans and E. faecalis was evaluated by serial dilutions of ZrO2 NPs to determine the Minimum Biofilm Eradication Concentration. RESULTS: ZrO2 NPs exhibited clear zones of inhibition of 12mm and 15mm at a concentration of 100mg/mL against S. mutans and E. faecalis in the agar wells respectively. Similarly, ZrO2 NPs also disrupted the strongly adherent biofilms formed by S. mutans and E. faecalis at a concentration above 22μg/mL in the Broth microdilution method. CONCLUSION: The present study concluded that ZrO2 NPs have potential anti- bacterial activity against both S. mutans and E. faecalis and are also capable of eradicating the biofilms formed by them demonstrating the anti- biofilm property of ZrO2 NPs

Hardware Trojan Detection and Mitigation in NoC using Key authentication and Obfuscation Techniques

Today's Multiprocessor System-on-Chip (MPSoC) contains many cores and integrated circuits. Due to the current requirements of communication, we make use of Network-on-Chip (NoC) to obtain high throughput and low latency. NoC is a communication architecture used in the processor cores to transfer  data from source to destination through several nodes. Since NoC deals with on-chip interconnection for data transmission, it will be a good prey for data leakage and other security attacks. One such way of attacking is done by a third-party vendor introducing Hardware Trojans (HTs) into routers of NoC architecture. This can cause packets to traverse in wrong paths, leak/extract information and cause Denial-of-Service (DoS) degrading the system performance. In this paper, a novel HT detection and mitigation approach using obfuscation and key-based authentication technique is proposed. The proposed technique prevents any illegal transitions between routers thereby protecting data from malicious activities, such as packet misrouting and information leakage. The proposed technique is evaluated on a 4x4 NoC architecture under synthetic traffic pattern and benchmarks, the hardware model is synthesized in Cadence Tool with 90nm technology. The introduced Hardware Trojan affects 8% of packets passing through infected router. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed technique prevents those 10-15% of packets infected from the HT effect. Our proposed work has negligible power and area overhead of 8.6% and  2% respectively

Effects of antiplatelet therapy on stroke risk by brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases: subgroup analyses of the RESTART randomised, open-label trial

Background Findings from the RESTART trial suggest that starting antiplatelet therapy might reduce the risk of recurrent symptomatic intracerebral haemorrhage compared with avoiding antiplatelet therapy. Brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases (such as cerebral microbleeds) are associated with greater risks of recurrent intracerebral haemorrhage. We did subgroup analyses of the RESTART trial to explore whether these brain imaging features modify the effects of antiplatelet therapy

Primary Malignant Melanoma of Maxilla: Report of a Case with Discussion

Primary oral malignant melanoma, very rare neoplasm of melanocytic origin, usually presents as a bluish black to tan-brown colored lesion Which is accounting for 0.2 to 8% of all melanomas, 1.6% of all head and neck malignancies, and 0.5% of all oral neoplasia. In general, the prognosis of oral melanoma is poor and worse than that of cutaneous melanoma. Here a case of oral malignant melanoma is presented, which was undetected during the first visit to a dental clinic. When a simple oral surgical treatment was carried out in that region, it resulted in the appearance of a massive pigmented lesion which was histopathologically diagnosed as malignant melanoma. This paper is presented to reemphasize the fact that any pigmented lesion in the oral cavity should be viewed with suspicion and proper investigation (biopsy) should be carried out to rule out any untoward experiences later

A cross sectional study to assess the magnitude of elderly abuse and its associated factors in the urban field practice area of a Government Medical College, Bengaluru

Introduction Elderly abuse is a distressing and widespread societal concern. Abuse of elders encompasses physical, psychological, verbal, and financial abuse. Understanding this challenge is crucial to safeguard the rights and dignity of the ageing population. Objectives To assess the magnitude of elderly abuse and its associated factors in the urban field practice area of a Government Medical College, Bengaluru. Methods A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted amongst the elderly population in the urban field practice area of a Government Medical College, Bengaluru. Using the simple random sampling method, 150 study participants were selected and elderly abuse was assessed using the Hwalek - Sengstock Elder Abuse Screening Test. Results Out of the 150 study participants, 17.3% experienced abuse. The most common type of abuse was psychological abuse (16%). Factors such as age, religion, marital status, socioeconomic status, current living arrangement, financial dependency, presence of any comorbidities, etc., were found to be significantly associated with abuse (p<0.05). Conclusion Abuse was prevalent amongst the elderly population, and psychological abuse was the most common type of abuse. Victims of abuse were reluctant to report the abuse due to the lack of awareness and in order to avoid social stigmatization

A cross sectional study to assess the magnitude of elderly abuse and its associated factors in the urban field practice area of a Government Medical College, Bengaluru

Introduction Elderly abuse is a distressing and widespread societal concern. Abuse of elders encompasses physical, psychological, verbal, and financial abuse. Understanding this challenge is crucial to safeguard the rights and dignity of the ageing population. Objectives To assess the magnitude of elderly abuse and its associated factors in the urban field practice area of a Government Medical College, Bengaluru. Methods A community-based cross-sectional study was conducted amongst the elderly population in the urban field practice area of a Government Medical College, Bengaluru. Using the simple random sampling method, 150 study participants were selected and elderly abuse was assessed using the Hwalek - Sengstock Elder Abuse Screening Test. Results Out of the 150 study participants, 17.3% experienced abuse. The most common type of abuse was psychological abuse (16%). Factors such as age, religion, marital status, socioeconomic status, current living arrangement, financial dependency, presence of any comorbidities, etc., were found to be significantly associated with abuse (p<0.05). Conclusion Abuse was prevalent amongst the elderly population, and psychological abuse was the most common type of abuse. Victims of abuse were reluctant to report the abuse due to the lack of awareness and in order to avoid social stigmatization

Laboratory preparedness for SARS-CoV-2 testing in India: Harnessing a network of Virus Research &amp; Diagnostic Laboratories

BACKGROUND &amp; OBJECTIVES: An outbreak of respiratory illness of unknown aetiology was reported from Hubei province of Wuhan, People's Republic of China, in December 2019. The outbreak was attributed to a novel coronavirus (CoV), named as severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)-CoV-2 and the disease as COVID-19. Within one month, cases were reported from 25 countries. In view of the novel viral strain with reported high morbidity, establishing early countrywide diagnosis to detect imported cases became critical. Here we describe the role of a countrywide network of VRDLs in early diagnosis of COVID-19. METHODS: The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)-National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune, established screening as well as confirmatory assays for SARS-CoV-2. A total of 13 VRDLs were provided with the E gene screening real-time reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) assay. VRDLs were selected on the basis of their presence near an international airport/seaport and their past performance. The case definition for testing included all individuals with travel history to Wuhan and symptomatic individuals with travel history to other parts of China. This was later expanded to include symptomatic individuals returning from Singapore, Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand and South Korea. RESULTS: Within a week of standardization of the test at NIV, all VRDLs could initiate testing for SARS-CoV-2. Till February 29, 2020, a total of 2,913 samples were tested. This included both 654 individuals quarantined in the two camps and others fitting within the case definition. The quarantined individuals were tested twice - at days 0 and 14. All tested negative on both occasions. Only three individuals belonging to different districts in Kerala were found to be positive. INTERPRETATION &amp; CONCLUSIONS: Sudden emergence of SARS-CoV-2 and its potential to cause a pandemic posed an unsurmountable challenge to the public health system of India. However, concerted efforts of various arms of the Government of India resulted in a well-coordinated action at each level. India has successfully demonstrated its ability to establish quick diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 at NIV, Pune, and the testing VRDLs

Global, regional, and national burden of traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury, 1990-2016 : a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2016

Background Traumatic brain injury (TBI) and spinal cord injury (SCI) are increasingly recognised as global health priorities in view of the preventability of most injuries and the complex and expensive medical care they necessitate. We aimed to measure the incidence, prevalence, and years of life lived with disability (YLDs) for TBI and SCI from all causes of injury in every country, to describe how these measures have changed between 1990 and 2016, and to estimate the proportion of TBI and SCI cases caused by different types of injury. Methods We used results from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors (GBD) Study 2016 to measure the global, regional, and national burden of TBI and SCI by age and sex. We measured the incidence and prevalence of all causes of injury requiring medical care in inpatient and outpatient records, literature studies, and survey data. By use of clinical record data, we estimated the proportion of each cause of injury that required medical care that would result in TBI or SCI being considered as the nature of injury. We used literature studies to establish standardised mortality ratios and applied differential equations to convert incidence to prevalence of long-term disability. Finally, we applied GBD disability weights to calculate YLDs. We used a Bayesian meta-regression tool for epidemiological modelling, used cause-specific mortality rates for non-fatal estimation, and adjusted our results for disability experienced with comorbid conditions. We also analysed results on the basis of the Socio-demographic Index, a compound measure of income per capita, education, and fertility. Findings In 2016, there were 27.08 million (95% uncertainty interval [UI] 24.30-30.30 million) new cases of TBI and 0.93 million (0.78-1.16 million) new cases of SCI, with age-standardised incidence rates of 369 (331-412) per 100 000 population for TBI and 13 (11-16) per 100 000 for SCI. In 2016, the number of prevalent cases of TBI was 55.50 million (53.40-57.62 million) and of SCI was 27.04 million (24 .98-30 .15 million). From 1990 to 2016, the age-standardised prevalence of TBI increased by 8.4% (95% UI 7.7 to 9.2), whereas that of SCI did not change significantly (-0.2% [-2.1 to 2.7]). Age-standardised incidence rates increased by 3.6% (1.8 to 5.5) for TBI, but did not change significantly for SCI (-3.6% [-7.4 to 4.0]). TBI caused 8.1 million (95% UI 6. 0-10. 4 million) YLDs and SCI caused 9.5 million (6.7-12.4 million) YLDs in 2016, corresponding to age-standardised rates of 111 (82-141) per 100 000 for TBI and 130 (90-170) per 100 000 for SCI. Falls and road injuries were the leading causes of new cases of TBI and SCI in most regions. Interpretation TBI and SCI constitute a considerable portion of the global injury burden and are caused primarily by falls and road injuries. The increase in incidence of TBI over time might continue in view of increases in population density, population ageing, and increasing use of motor vehicles, motorcycles, and bicycles. The number of individuals living with SCI is expected to increase in view of population growth, which is concerning because of the specialised care that people with SCI can require. Our study was limited by data sparsity in some regions, and it will be important to invest greater resources in collection of data for TBI and SCI to improve the accuracy of future assessments. Copyright (C) 2018 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd.Peer reviewe