GANGRENE PRECIPITATED BY CISPLATIN BASED CONCURRENT CHEMORADIATION IN CANCER CERVIX

Gangrene of hand leading to its amputation may be the worst after-effects of cisplatin. Here we report the case of cisplatin-induced gangrene in a patient of the cancer cervix who was treated with concurrent chemo radiation

Femtosecond carrier dynamics and saturable absorption in graphene suspensions

Nonlinear optical properties and carrier relaxation dynamics in graphene, suspended in three different solvents, are investigated using femtosecond (80 fs pulses) Z-scan and degenerate pumpprobe spectroscopy at 790 nm. The results demonstrate saturable absorption property of graphene with a nonlinear absorption coefficient, $beta$, of ~2 to 9x10^-8 cm/W. Two distinct time scales associated with the relaxation of photoexcited carriers, a fast one in the range of 130-330 fs (related to carrier-carrier scattering) followed by a slower one in 3.5-4.9 ps range (associated with carrier-phonon scattering) are observed.Comment: 3 pages, 2 figures, 2 table

Large nonlinear absorption and refraction coefficients of carbon nanotubes estimated from femtosecond Z-scan measurements

Nonlinear transmission of 80 and 140 femtosecond pulsed light with $0.79 \mu m$ wavelength through single walled carbon nanotubes suspended in water containing sodium dodecyl sulphate is studied. Pulse-width independent saturation absorption and negative cubic nonlinearity are observed, respectively, in open and closed aperture Z-scan experiments. The theoretical expressions derived to analyze the z-dependent transmission in the saturable limit require two photon absorption coefficient $\beta_0\sim$ $1.4 cm/MW$ and a nonlinear index $\gamma \sim -5.5 \times10^{-11} cm^2/W$ to fit the data.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figures. Accepted and to appear in Applied Physics Letter

Critical exponents and the correlation length in the charge exchange manganite spin glass Eu_{0.5}Ba_{0.5}MnO_{3}

The critical regime of the charge exchange (CE) manganite spin glass Eu_{0.5}Ba_{0.5}MnO_{3} is investigated using linear and non linear magnetic susceptibility and the divergence of the third ordered susceptibility (chi{_3}) signifying the onset of a conventional freezing transition is experimentally demonstrated. The divergence in chi{_3}, dynamical scaling of the linear susceptibility and relevant scaling equations are used to determine the critical exponents associated with this freezing transition, the values of which match well with the 3D Ising universality class. Magnetic field dependence of the spin glass response function is used to estimate the spin correlation length which is seen to be larger than the charge/orbital correlation length reported in this system.Comment: 4 pages, 4 Figure

Proteinuria in early detection of human leptospirosis

Background: Leptospirosis is an infectious disease caused by spirochetes bacteria Leptospira spp. and is reported from all over the world. As the clinical signs and symptoms of Leptospirosis often are nonspecific and the disease is early mistaken for other major infectious febrile illness, laboratory test to confirm the clinical diagnosis thus is essential for optimal treatment and patient management.Methods: Serum and urine samples were collected from patients clinically suspected cases of Leptospirosis. Preparations of urine concentrate by precipitation and centrifugation.Results: It was interesting to note that immunoglobulins are present in the urine protein concentrate of patients with Leptospirosis on the day of admission in the hospital, with urine albumin reports either positive or negative. By ELISA test it was noted that antibodies present in urine and serum were of both IgM and IgG class against the Leptospiral antigens from three pathogenic serovars and one non-pathogenicserovars. In the immunospot test which was done and compared with standard ELISA test for serum antibodies using same antigen showed that antibodies present in urine protein concentrate, which was collected on the day of admission when patients come with suspecting symptoms of Leptospirosis.Conclusions: Proteinuria is the most frequent abnormality noted in all patients at some stage of illness. This is the first report on the presence of immunoglobulins in urine samples, which were found to be of IgM and IgG classes. These findings are of significant diagnostic potential as a simple immune-spot test can be done for detecting anti-leptospiral antibodies in urine samples of suspected cases. The present attempt was aimed at developing an immunospot test, a simple and rapid diagnostic test to detect Leptospirosis using urine samples of clinically suspected patients of the infection at the earliest. It was found to be in good correlation with standard ELISA method which is being used to detect serum antibodies in Leptospira infected patients using the same antigen

Time-Gating of Pulsed Eddy Current Signals for Defect Characterization and Discrimination in Aircraft Lap-Joints

Pulsed eddy current (PEC) nondestructive testing differs from conventional eddy current techniques in that the probe coil is excited by a pulse, rather than continuous excitation at a single frequency. Reviews of early work on pulsed eddy currents are given by Waidelich1 and by Renkin.2 Pulsed excitation causes the propagation of a highly attenuated traveling wave, which is governed by the diffusion equation.3 The diffusive propagation of the eddy current pulse results in spatial broadening and a delay, or travel time, proportional to the square of the distance traveled. It was realized in early work on pulsed eddy current systems that this time dependence offered certain advantages over conventional eddy currents.4 In the current study we demonstrate the ability of a prototype pulsed eddy current instrument, described elsewhere,5,6 to take advantage of this time dependence to discriminate flaws from such interfering signals as probe liftoff, air gaps, and fasteners

Morphological characterization and genetic barcoding of kuttiatoor mango accessions

A survey conducted during 2013-14 to collect and characterize the Kuttiattoor mango accessions from Kerala, revealed large unique variability in morphological, biochemical and DNA barcode data. All the accessions were polyembryonic with fruit maturity during February-March. The mature fruit length (cm), width (cm) and leaf length (cm) ranged from 5.10 – 9.60 (cm), 4.60 – 8.40 (cm) and 12.47- 30.40 (cm) respectively