An Active Contour For Underwater Target Tracking And Navigation.

This paper presents a vision based tracking system for routine underwater pipeline or cable inspection for autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV’s)

Exploiting peer group concept for adaptive and highly available services

This paper presents a prototype for redundant, highly available and fault tolerant peer to peer framework for data management. Peer to peer computing is gaining importance due to its flexible organization, lack of central authority, distribution of functionality to participating nodes and ability to utilize unused computational resources. Emergence of GRID computing has provided much needed infrastructure and administrative domain for peer to peer computing. The components of this framework exploit peer group concept to scope service and information search, arrange services and information in a coherent manner, provide selective redundancy and ensure availability in face of failure and high load conditions. A prototype system has been implemented using JXTA peer to peer technology and XML is used for service description and interfaces, allowing peers to communicate with services implemented in various platforms including web services and JINI services. It utilizes code mobility to achieve role interchange among services and ensure dynamic group membership. Security is ensured by using Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) to implement group level security policies for membership and service access.Comment: The Paper Consists of 5 pages, 6 figures submitted in Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics, 24-28 March 2003 La Jolla California. CHEP0

Piperine encourages apoptosis in human cervical adenocarcinoma cells through ROS generation, DNA fragmentation, caspase-3 activation and cell cycle arrest

Background: Cancer is one of the most common destructive diseases and the second leading cause of death in humans. Among cancer, cervical cancer is the second most common malignancy among women globally. Thus, there is a continuous need to search for chemotherapeutic chemicals or naturally occurring drugs to resolve this global health problem. Piperine (1-piperoylpeperdine) is present in the fruits of black pepper (Piper nigrum Linn.) and long pepper (Piper longum Linn.). It possesses several pharmacological properties and in the present study we have evaluated its anti-cancer potential on human cervical adenocarcinoma (HeLa) cells. Methods: The anti-proliferative effect of piperine were investigated through some potent markers of apoptosis viz. reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, cellular apoptosis and loss of mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP), DNA fragmentation, cell cycle kinetics, caspase-3 activity and cell migration against HeLa cells. Results: The results showed that piperine exposure induces apoptosis significantly in a dose-dependent manner and inhibits the growth of HeLa cells with an increase in ROS generation, nuclear condensation and delayed wound healing. In addition, piperine also encourages cell death by the loss of MMP, DNA fragmentation and the activation of caspase-3. Growth inhibition of HeLa cells was found to be associated with G2/M phase arrest and sub-G1 accumulation. Conclusions: The present study provides useful insight into the apoptotic potential of piperine and further in vivo and clinical studies will be needed for its validation and in the finding of more effective and least toxic regimens against cervical cancer

Implementation of HR Practices in University Teachers of Pakistan

The paper in your hand basically addresses the issue of organizational citizenship behavior in a particular context of Pakistani universities teachers. As education is most neglected area in Pakistan, we want to give better understanding of the concept of OCB. This paper will provide guidelines to researchers, teachers, education sector, and other education related institutions to form such policies which can help to increase the higher education standard. Our sample size is 274 university teachers from both public and private sector, including male and female, age ranges from 25 to 60 and teaching experience ranges from less than one year to 10 years. We have taken different HR practices implemented in universities and we studied their impact on the organizational citizenship behavior with mediating effect of organizational commitment it is found significantly positive from. So, we have concluded that by practicing all these independent variables in an effective and efficient way we can increase organizational commitment and it ultimately positively affect the employee positive and cooperative kind of behaviors i-e OC

Snake Bite: Clinical Profile and Evaluation of Effective Anti-Snake Venom Dose

Background: To determine the optimal dose of antisnake venom required to treat hemotoxic snake bite more effectively. Methods: In this interventional study, out of 52 patients 46 patients with the features of systemic envenomation .i.e. deranged coagulation profile, nephrotoxic or neurotoxic features were assessed clinically and through laboratory tests, while 06 patients had no feature of envenomation. Patients with systemic envenomation were given Antisnake venom. Results: Hemotoxicity was the most common clinical manifestation of snake bite i.e. 39 patients of hemotoxic envenomation, 4 with neurotoxic features while 03 patients had mixed toxicity i.e. hemotoxic, neurotoxic and nephrotoxic. 12 patients responded to single dose of 06 vials (10 ml each vial; total dose of 60 ml), 28 patients required further dose of anti snake venom after initial dose of 6 vials while 06 patients received even higher dose of anti snake venom i.e. 18 vial (180 ml) with blood transfusion. Of these 06 patients, 02 required mechanical ventilation, 02 with nephrotoxicity were referred to dialysis unit, and 02 mortalities were encountered, one with intracranial bleed and other with mixed toxicity and delayed presentation of patient. Conclusion: Most patients with envenomation require higher dose of anti snake venom . An increase in morbidity and mortality is mainly due to delayed presentation after snake bite and under dosage of ASV

Kanak - kanak didedahkan pertanian mesra alam

Effective energy consumption prediction is important for determining the demand and supply of energy. The challenge is how to predict energy consumption? This study presents an energy consumption analytical regression model and process based on the project conducted in an Australian company. This study involved the analysis of household and energy consumption datasets in the residential sector. The analytical model generation process is organised into four major stages: prepared the household and energy consumption data or data cleansing, household energy consumption clustering (segmentation or groups) using k-means clustering algorithm for similarity measure in their characteristics, stepwise multiple regression for variables selection to determine the final model's predictors, and filter the final regression model to identify the influential observations using Cook's distance and Q-Q (quantile-quantile) normal plot for improvement in the model. The final filtered regression model represents 64 percent variation to the dependent variable is explained by independent variables with correlation 0.8 between energy consumption observed and predicted values. The abovementioned process and resultant regression model seem useful for developing household energy consumptions models for managing the demand and supply of energy

PHYTOCHEMICAL INVESTIGATION, GC-MS PROFILE AND ANTIMICROBIAL ACTIVITY OF A MEDICINAL PLANT RUTA GRAVEOLENS L. FROM ETHIOPIA

Objective: This study was designed to screen the phytochemicals present in various solvents extracts of Ruta graveolens (Rue) and furthermore to investigate their antimicrobial activity.Methods: The leaves, stems and seeds of Rue were extracted using four different solvents viz. ethanolic, methanolic, chloroform, and aqueous of varying polarity. The phytochemical screening was carried out qualitatively and Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectroscopy (GC-MS) analysis was performed to identify major phytoconstituents present in the methanolic leaf extract. The antimicrobial effect of extracts was evaluated against six microbial strains namely Bacillus subtillis, Escherichia coli, Proteus vulgaris, Candida albicans, Candida tropicalis and Micrococcus luteus with disc diffusion method.Results: Phytochemical analysis revealed the presence of various secondary metabolites such as flavonoids, alkaloids, terpenoids, saponins and carotenoid. The methanolic leaf extract showed the presence of both tannin and phenolic contents in the higher amount, whereas aqueous extract displayed in the least amount. GC-MS analysis of methanolic leaf extract revealed the presence of approximately 26 phytochemical constituents. The antimicrobial assay revealed that B. subtilis showed a high zone of inhibition (20 mm) at 200 mg/ml of methanolic extract. However, E. coli and C. tropicalis did not show any zone of inhibition against each solvent extract.Conclusion: In conclusion, secondary metabolites present in the extracts have biological activities which warrant further to evaluate in vivo pharmacological studies

International Conference on Cancer Health Disparities

Background: Biochanin A, an isoflavone that is mainly present in red clover, has potent chemopreventive properties against many cancers. Ovarian carcinoma is fifth most common and deadliest gynaecological malignancy that causes the highest mortality in females worldwide. Hence a substantial need for new therapies for combating this gynaecological malignancy arises. Methods: The present study aimed to investigate anti-cancerous potentials of biochanin A on cultured human ovarian carcinoma PA-1 cells through the cell viability assay, cellular apoptosis, disruption of mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP), involvement of ROS, cell cycle kinetics, and expression of apoptosis-related genes namely, p53, Bax, Bcl-2, Noxa and Puma. Results: The results of the experiments showed that Biochanin A significantly induces morphological alterations in PA-1 cells in a dose-dependent manner and thus inhibits cell to proliferate. Significant induction of apoptosis in PA-1 cells is evident by nuclear fragmentation, accumulation of ROS, loss of MMP, Annexin V positive cells and arrest of the cell cycle at G2/M phase. The up-regulated expression of apoptosis-related genes viz. p53, Bax, Noxa, Puma and down-regulation of Bcl-2 further signifies that biochanin A induces apoptosis in PA-1 cells Conclusion: Biochanin A exhibited potent anti-cancerous properties against human ovarian carcinoma PA-1 cells by checking the proliferation and by inducing programmed cell death via accumulating ROS, changing membrane potential and by following p53 mediated apoptotic pathway