Evaluation of Thymidylate Synthase Polymorphisms in ALL patients of Kashmir

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is a malignant disorder of lymphoid progenitor cells, affects both children and adults, with peak prevalence between the ages of 2 and 5 years, and is the most common paediatric cancer. Genetic susceptibility to leukemias can be related to the polymorphisms in multiple genes and consistent with this paradigm; several polymorphisms have been identified in the pathogenesis of lymphoid malignancies. The enzyme encoded by Thymidylate Synthase (TS) gene is a crucial enzyme in the folate metabolism and plays an important role in the DNA synthesis and repair pathway. Impairments in this enzyme have been associated with chromosome breaks and fragile site induction, which in turn have been associated with the development of lymphoid malignancies including leukemias. The aim of the study was to investigate whether the tandem repeat polymorphism in the TS promoter region is a risk factor for the development of acute lymphoblastic leukemia in Kashmiri population. The repeat polymorphism in the TS gene was evaluated in 72 ALL cases and 82 (age, sex and region matched, non malignant) controls by PCR analysis of DNA obtained from the blood of the subjects and direct sequencing of the PCR products. We observed that the TS triple tandem repeat (3R) allele frequency was 73.75 % in the controls and 67.91% in cases. This difference in frequency was found to be statistically insignificant with a P = 0.2713(P> .05). The TS 2R/2R genotype was found to be present in 13.88% of the cases and 9.75% of the controls, the 2R/3R variant in 31.94% of the cases and 31.70% of controls, and the 3R/3R genotype in 47.22% of cases and 56.09% of controls. We observed that although the proportion of patients who were homozygous for the TS tandem repeat(3R/3R) was lower in cases than in controls, the difference was not statistically significant when using 2R/2R genotype as a reference (OR= 0.5913; 95% CI, 0.2111-1.657; P = 0.3143). Similarly, we observed the frequency of the heterozygous genotype (2R/3R) when compared with 2R/2R genotype was not much different between the cases and controls hence, statistically insignificant (OR=0.7077; 95% CI, 0.2389- 2.097; P= 0.5317). Thus, our study suggests that there is no association between TS tandem repeat polymorphism and the development of ALL in Kashmiri population. However these findings need to be substantiated with larger sample size to clarify the real contribution of this gene in the susceptibility to ALL in different world populations

Could thermal fluctuations seed cosmic structure?

We examine the possibility that thermal, rather than quantum, fluctuations are responsible for seeding the structure of our universe. We find that while the thermalization condition leads to nearly Gaussian statistics, a Harrisson-Zeldovich spectrum for the primordial fluctuations can only be achieved in very special circumstances. These depend on whether the universe gets hotter or colder in time, while the modes are leaving the horizon. In the latter case we find a no-go theorem which can only be avoided if the fundamental degrees of freedom are not particle-like, such as in string gases near the Hagedorn phase transition. The former case is less forbidding, and we suggest two potentially successful ``warming universe'' scenarios. One makes use of the Phoenix universe, the other of ``phantom'' matter.Comment: minor corrections made, references added, matches the version accepted to PR

Utility of otolith weight to estimate age of Labeo bata (Actinopterygii: Cypriniformes: Cyprinidae) inhabiting the Ganga River

Fish age estimation is essential for stock assessment, population dynamics, and fisheries management. The presently reported study was conducted to evaluate the relation between otolith weight and observed age in Labeo bata (Hamilton, 1822) inhabiting the Ganga River. A total of 187 L. bata specimens were collected from Narora site of the Ganga River. Linear regression analysis was applied between otolith weight and observed age to predict the age of fish from the otolith weight. The relation between otolith weight and observed age was significant for L. bata. The otolith weight increased with the fish age. Discriminant function analysis revealed 96.3% of the predicted ages were correctly classified to their observed ages. Thus, it can be inferred that the relation between otolith weight and fish age can provide an additional method of age estimation in L. bata