HOW CONTEXT MATTERS IN DIGITAL LIBRARY USE

This research investigates how organizational context contributes to the use of digital libraries, an ICT-enabled information infrastructure. Traditionally digital-library use is measured with the help of statistical analysis of download and other related data, but statistics alone have limited power to explain how such an expensive information infrastructure is used to meet organizational goals. Such limitation was overcome in this study by relating digital-library use to the context of such use. In the last decade many Indian research organizations have witnessed the abundance of such information infrastructures accessible directly by end-users. The convergence of several phenomena such as current business models for digital resources, improved ICT infrastructure within organizations and several government interventions to help organizations have made this possible. Because of this recent change, the study was conducted in two Indian research organizations to understand how their respective contexts shape digital library use. This qualitative study used two theoretical constructs -- social actor (Lamb & Kling, 2003) and technology-in-practice (Orlikowski, 2000). The lens of social actor helped to look beyond the boundary of an organization in order to identify entities that reside in its environment and create information demands on the members of the organization. Information demands from those entities, making up organizational context, often pressure the members to use digital libraries. Consequently digital-library uses acquire various meanings depending on the nature and power position of those entities with respect to the members. The premise of the other lens used - technology-in-practice (Orlikowski, 2000) - is often for a technology use, the centrality does not lie in its technical capabilities, rather various other factors outweigh such capabilities resulting into a specific pattern of its use. In this study, this lens helped to identify several environmental, technological, organizational and personal factors that contribute to very limited use patterns of digital libraries. The study contributed to our understanding of digital library use beyond merely measuring downloaded data from database companies. It goes further to describe organizational context in terms of several components and how such components often create workplace demands resulting to digital library use. It also explains how some of the contextual aspects can outweigh the technical capabilities of digital libraries leading to certain use patterns

Students’ Views of a Learning Management System: A Longitudinal Qualitative Study

Over the past decade, Web-based learning management systems, such as Blackboard and WebCT, have been gradually integrated into college education. The strategic use and effectiveness of such systems have been investigated to a large extent. What is less covered is what students really think about such learning management systems. Understanding students’ evaluations can shed light on the development, selection, training, maintenance, use, and investment on such systems. In this paper, we report a longitudinal study that uses a bottom-up approach to gather qualitative data on student views of WebCT 6. Data were collected at three distinctive times that spanned two semesters to reflect students’ different experiences in using WebCT 6. Two different methods were used to collect qualitative data so that students could report their views in unconstrained ways. The content analyses results show that (1) students have an integrated view of their technology assisted learning environment, which can be represented by the notion of S-I-A (the system, the instructors and the administrators); (2) as students’ experience with WebCT 6 increases, their complaints and wishes for instructors and administrators increase; (3) communication-related features continuously dominate students’ views about WebCT 6; and (4) as their use of WebCT 6 increases, students grow more appreciative toward WebCT 6 features that support learning activities. The findings contribute to the literature with additional evidence on the nature and effectiveness of learning management systems. They provide a set of suggestions that should be carefully considered by all personnel involved. We identify a number of research implications. One particular research contribution is the identification of a fifth type of interaction that plays an important role in the technology-assisted learning context: the learner-administrator interaction

Assessment of serum nitrate-nitrite ratio vis-a-vis insulin sensitivity and resistance in type 2 diabetics in a tertiary hospital in Eastern India

Background: Insulin Resistance is of paramount importance in the pathophysiology of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus along with endothelial dysfunction is mediated by Nitric Oxide (NO). Central to this endothelial dysfunction is the action of Insulin on the Nitric oxide synthase enzyme. Since NO cannot be measured because of its short half-life, metabolites of NO (namely nitrite and nitrate) are measured towards assessing their relationship along with different direct and surrogate markers of insulin resistance in patients of Diabetes Mellitus attending a tertiary care hospital in Eastern India. Aim of the study was to assess the level of Insulin resistance with the direct and surrogate markers of insulin resistance in patients of Diabetes Mellitus attending a tertiary care hospital in Eastern India.Methods: Blood samples from newly diagnosed Type 2 Diabetic patients were assayed for fasting and postprandial sugar and insulin, lipid profile and serum nitrate and nitrite and different anthropological parameters were measured. After that, HOMA-IR and QUICKI’ index were measured.Results: Values of anthropological parameters and the direct and surrogate markers of insulin resistance showed statistically significant difference between cases and controls. Bivariate analysis of post-prandial blood glucose showed strong co-relation with HOMA-IR while serum total nitrate-nitrite ratio showed a strong co-relation with QUICKI.Conclusions: Serum nitrate-nitrite ratio showed a strong co-relation with HOMA-IR and QUICKI. The significance of this study lies in the fact that measurement of the serum nitrate-nitrite may give an idea of the level of insulin resistance of a diabetic patient

ANTIPSYCHOTIC PRESCRIBING PATTERN IN A TERTIARY CARE HOSPITAL OF EASTERN INDIA

Background: Psychotropic drugs are commonly prescribed in psychiatric practice. , their utilization and consequences on real life effectiveness and safety in actual clinical practice need continuous study. Materials and Methods: A prospective cross sectional study was carried out for 3 months. All the patients using antipsychotic drugs, between 18-60 years of age, irrespective of sex, were included in the study. However, patients who were pregnant, lactating, unable to comply due to mental retardation, any systemic illness ,unconsciousness or drug addiction were excluded from the study. The prescribing pattern was analyzed by Using World Health Organization basic drug indicators. Results: Average number of drugs /prescription 1.07..atypical antipsychotics are prescribed more commonly than typical antipsychotic.among the atypical antipsychotics olanzapine is most commonly prescribed.monotherapy of antipsychotic is the commonly prescribed than trihexyphenidyl is the anticholinergic that prescribed regularly with typical antipsychotic for the prevension of extrapyramidal symptoms. Conclusion: Psychotic illness patients mainly advised monotherapy of antipsychotic drugs, mainly atypical antipsychotic drugs, and olanzapine is the most prescribed antipsychotic drugs. Trihexyphenidyl is the only antichoninergic drug co-prescribed with typical antipsychotic drugs to avoid extrapyramidal side effects. Keywords: Drug utilization study, psychotic illness, psychotropic drug

Fibrosis in systemic sclerosis: common and unique pathobiology

Fibrosis in systemic sclerosis (SSc), a complex polygenic disease associated with autoimmunity and proliferative/obliterative vasculopathy, shares pathobiologic features in common with other fibrosing illnesses, but also has distinguishing characteristics. Fibroblast activation induced by transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β), Wnts and innate immune receptors, along with oxidative stress and reactive oxygen species (ROS) are implicated in pathogenesis. On the other hand, the roles of endothelial-mesenchymal differentiation and bone marrow-derived fibrocytes remain to be established. Fibrotic responses are modulated by transcriptional activators and cofactors, epigenetic factors, and microRNAs that can amplify or inhibit ligand-induced signaling. The nuclear orphan receptor PPAR-γ appears to be important in governing the duration and intensity of fibroblast activation and mesenchymal progenitor cell differentiation, and defects in PPAR-γ expression or function in SSc may underlie the uncontrolled progression of fibrosis. Identifying the perturbations in signaling pathways and cellular differentiation programs responsible for tissue damage and fibrosis in SSc allows their selective targeting using novel compounds, or by innovative uses of already-approved drugs (drug repurposing)

Unzipping and binding of small interfering RNA with single walled Carbon Nanotube: a platform for small interfering RNA delivery

In an effort to design efficient platform for siRNA delivery, we combine all atom classical and quantum simulations to study the binding of small interfering RNA (siRNA) by pristine single wall carbon nanotube (SWCNT). Our results show that siRNA strongly binds to SWCNT surface via unzipping its base-pairs and the propensity of unzipping increases with the increase in the diameter of the SWCNTs. The unzipping and subsequent wrapping events are initiated and driven by van der Waals interactions between the aromatic rings of siRNA nucleobases and the SWCNT surface. However, MD simulations of double strand DNA (dsDNA) of the same sequence show that the dsDNA undergoes much less unzipping and wrapping on the SWCNT in the simulation time scale of 70 ns. This interesting difference is due to smaller interaction energy of thymidine of dsDNA with the SWCNT compared to that of uridine of siRNA, as calculated by dispersion corrected density functional theory (DFT) methods. After the optimal binding of siRNA to SWCNT, the complex is very stable which serves as one of the major mechanisms of siRNA delivery for biomedical applications. Since siRNA has to undergo unwinding process with the effect of RNA- induced silencing complex, our proposed delivery mechanism by SWCNT possesses potential advantages in achieving RNA interference (RNAi).Comment: 28 pages, 7 figures, 4 table

Analysis of Transcripts Expressed in One-Day-Old Larvae and Fifth Instar Silk Glands of Tasar Silkworm, Antheraea mylitta

Antheraea mylitta is one of the wild nonmulberry silkworms, which produces tasar silk. An EST project has been undertaken to understand the gene expression profile of A. mylitta silk gland. Two cDNA libraries, one from the whole bodies of one-day-old larvae and the other from the silkglands of fifth instar larvae, were constructed and sequenced. A total of 2476 good-quality ESTs (1239 clones) were obtained and grouped into 648 clusters containing 390 contigs and 258 singletons to represent 467 potential unigenes. Forty-five sequences contained putative coding region, and represented potentially novel genes. Among the 648 clusters, 241 were categorized according to Gene Ontology hierarchy and showed presence of several silk and immune-related genes. The A. mylitta ESTs have been organized into a freely available online database “AmyBASE”. These data provide an initial insight into the A. mylitta transcriptome and help to understand the molecular mechanism of silk protein production in a Lepidopteran species

Pharmacological Inhibition of Toll-Like Receptor-4 Signaling by TAK242 Prevents and Induces Regression of Experimental Organ Fibrosis

Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a poorly understood heterogeneous condition with progressive multi-organ fibrosis. Recent genetic and genomic evidence suggest a pathogenic role for dysregulated innate immunity and toll-like receptor (TLR) activity in SSc. Levels of both TLR4, as well as certain endogenous TLR ligands, are elevated in skin and lung tissues from patients with SSc and correlate with clinical disease parameters. Conversely, genetic targeting of TLR4 or its endogenous “damage-associated” ligands ameliorates progressive tissue fibrosis. Targeting TLR4 signaling therefore represents a pharmacological strategy to prevent intractable fibrosis. We examined the effect of TAK242, a small molecule TLR4 inhibitor, in preclinical fibrosis models and in SSc fibroblasts. TAK242 treatment prevented, promoted regression of, bleomycin-induced dermal and pulmonary fibrosis, and reduced the expression of several pro-fibrotic mediators. Furthermore, TAK242 ameliorated peritoneal fibrosis and reduced spontaneous hypodermal thickness in TSK/+ mice. Importantly, TAK242 abrogated collagen synthesis and myofibroblasts differentiation in explanted constitutively active SSc fibroblast. Altogether, these findings identify TAK242 as an anti-fibrotic agent in preclinical models of organ fibrosis. TAK242 might potentially represent a novel strategy for the treatment of SSc and other fibrotic diseases