Geospatial techniques for assessment of bank erosion and accretion in the Marala Alexandria Reach of the River Chenab, Pakistan

Remote Sensing (RS) and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) are widely used for change detection in rivers caused by erosion and accretion. Digital image processing techniques and GIS analysis capabilities are used for detecting temporal variations of erosion and accretion characteristics between the years 1999 and 2011 in a 40 km long Marala Alexandria reach of River Chenab. Landsat satellite images for the years 1999, 2007 and 2011 were processed to analyze the river channel migration, changes in the river width and the rate of erosion and accretion. Analyses showed that the right bank was under erosion in both time spans, however high rate of deposition is exhibited in middle reaches. The maximum erosion was 1569843 m2 and 1486160 m2 along the right bank at a distance of 24-28 km downstream of the Marala barrage in the time span of 1999-2007 and 2007-2011, respectively. Along right bank mainly there is trend of accretion but erosion is much greater between 20 and 28 km reach. Maximum accretion was 5144584 m2 from 1999-2007 and 2950110 m2 from 2007-2011 on the right bank downstream of the Marala Barrage. The derived results of channel migration were validated by comparing with SRTM data to assess the accuracy of image classification. Integration of remote sensing data with GIS is efficient and economical technique to assess land losses and channel changes in large rivers

Experience of managing acute pancreatitis in a surgical unit of a tertiary care hospital

Objective: To study the etiology, diagnosis, treatment and complications of acute pancreatitis in a tertiary care hospital.  Methodology: Study Design: It was a descriptive study. The study was conducted at Surgical Unit of Benazir Bhutto Hospital (BBH) Rawalpindi from 1st January 2014 to 31 July 2017.  All the patients who presented in emergency with abdominal symptoms and diagnosed as a case of acute pancreatitis were included in the study. All the data of gender, age, serum amylase & lipase, etiology, CT severity index, Ranson’s criteria, complications, mortality and management were noted on a predesigned proforma. Percentages and frequencies were calculated for all the data by SPSS 21 version. Results: Total 161 patients were included in the study, with 60.9% females and 39.1% males. Maximum patients 31% were from age group of 26 to 40  years of age and minimum 1.2% from 71 to 85 years. Gall stones were the major cause of the disease contributing 67% of cases.  At admission Ranson’s score of the maximum patients 32.2% had total score of 1, While only 1.2% had moderate pancreatitis.  After 48 hours of admission 24.2% had 2 score while only 1.2%had severe pancreatitis.  The radiological CT severity index 82.6% patients had mild pancreatitis while1.2% patients had severe disease. 93.1% patients were managed conservatively, 1.9%  patients went Cystogastrostomy, 1.2% patients needed Exploratory laparotomy and  1.2% patients went for Pancreatic Necrosectomy.  On calculating the morbidity 67.7% patients had no significant morbidity. 32.3% had complications including pleural effusion, ascites, pancreatic necrosis, pseudo cyst formation, shock, acute renal failure and multi organ failure.  Overall mortality rate was  3.7%. Conclusion: Acute pancreatitis in our set up is mainly due to gall stones. A multidisciplinary approach, measurement of severity of disease with computerized tomography scan and Ranson’s scoring system is always helpful in disease management and its complications. Key Words : Acute pancreatitis, Gall stones, Ranson’s scoring, Pancreatic necrosis, Pseudocyst

A Machine Learning in Binary and Multiclassification Results on Imbalanced Heart Disease Data Stream

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Biochemical and Molecular Mechanisms of Folate Transport in Rat Pancreas; Interference with Ethanol Ingestion

Folic acid is an essential nutrient that is required for one-carbon biosynthetic processes and for methylation of biomolecules. Deficiency of this micronutrient leads to disturbances in normal physiology of cell. Chronic alcoholism is well known to be associated with folate deficiency which is due, in part to folate malabsorption. The present study deals with the mechanistic insights of reduced folate absorption in pancreas during chronic alcoholism. Male Wistar rats were fed 1 g/kg body weight/day ethanol (20% solution) orally for 3 months and the mechanisms of alcohol associated reduced folate uptake was studied in pancreas. The folate transport system in the pancreatic plasma membrane (PPM) was found to be acidic pH dependent one. The transporters proton coupled folate transporter (PCFT) and reduced folate carrier (RFC) are involved in folate uptake across PPM. The folate transporters were found to be associated with lipid raft microdomain of the PPM. Ethanol ingestion decreased the folate transport by reducing the levels of folate transporter molecules in lipid rafts at the PPM. The decreased transport efficiency of the PPM was reflected as reduced folate levels in pancreas. The chronic ethanol ingestion led to decreased pancreatic folate uptake. The decreased levels of PCFT and RFC expression in rat PPM were due to decreased association of these proteins with lipid rafts (LR) at the PPM

A Fly in the Ointment: Evaluation of Traditional Use of Plants to Repel and Kill Blowfly Larvae in Fermented Fish

Introduction: In rural areas in Laos, fly larvae infestations are common in fermenting fish. Blowflies (Chrysomyamegacephala, Diptera: Calliphoridae) are attracted to oviposit (and/or larviposit) onto fermenting fish which results ininfestations with fly larvae. Knowledge of traditional use of plants to repel larvae during the production of fermented fish iscommon and widespread in Lao PDR. Research Questions: How effective are the most salient species in repelling, and killing fly larvae in fermenting fish? Material and Methods: The three plant species most frequently reported to repel fly larvae during an ethnobotanical surveythroughout Lao PDR were tested for repellence and larvicidal activity of fly larvae infesting fermented fish. The lethality andrepellence of Tadehagi triquetrum (L.) H. Ohashi (Fabaceae), Uraria crinita (L.) Desv. ex DC. (Fabaceae) and Bambusa multiplex(Lour.) Raeusch. ex Schult. & Schult. f. (Poaceae) were tested in an experimental design using fermenting fish in Vientiane,Lao PDR. Results: The repellent effect of fresh material of T. triquetrum and U. crinita, and the larvicidal effect of fresh B. multiplex, issignificantly more effective than that of dried material of the same species, and the total effect (repellence and larvicidaleffect combined) for each of the three species was significantly more effective for fresh than for dry material. Fresh materialof T. triquetrum, U. crinita, or B. multiplex added on top of the fermenting fish repelled 50%, 54%, 37%, and killed 22%, 28%,and 40% of fly larvae. The total effect was not significantly different per species at 72%, 82%, and 77%, respectively. Discussion and Conclusions: The three most salient species are effective in repelling and killing fly larvae in the productionof fermented fish, and may be essential to augment food safety during traditional fermentation in open jars

Trajectories of self-rated health in people with diabetes: Associations with functioning in a prospective community sample

© 2013 Schmitz et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Background: Self-rated health (SRH) is a single-item measure that is one of the most widely used measures of general health in population health research. Relatively little is known about changes and the trajectories of SRH in people with chronic medical conditions. The aims of the present study were to identify and describe longitudinal trajectories of self-rated health (SRH) status in people with diabetes. Methods: A prospective community study was carried out between 2008 and 2011. SRH was assessed at baseline and yearly at follow-ups (n=1288). Analysis was carried out through trajectory modeling. The trajectory groups were subsequently compared at 4 years follow-up with respect to functioning. Results: Four distinct trajectories of SRH were identified: 1) 72.2% of the participants were assigned to a persistently good SRH trajectory; 2) 10.1% were assigned to a persistently poor SRH trajectory; 3) mean SRH scores changed from good to poor for one group (7.3%); while 4) mean SRH scores changed from poor to medium/good for another group (10.4%). Those with a persistently poor perception of health status were at higher risk for poor functioning at 4 years follow-up than those whose SRH scores decreased from good to poor. Conclusions: SRH is an important predictor for poor functioning in diabetes, but the trajectory of SRH seems to be even more important. Health professionals should pay attention to not only SRH per se, but also changes in SRH over time.This work was supported by Operating Grant MOP-84574 from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). GG was supported by a doctoral fellowship from the CIHR. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript

The TGF-β/Smad Repressor TG-Interacting Factor 1 (TGIF1) Plays a Role in Radiation-Induced Intestinal Injury Independently of a Smad Signaling Pathway

Despite advances in radiation delivery protocols, exposure of normal tissues during the course of radiation therapy remains a limiting factor of cancer treatment. If the canonical TGF-β/Smad pathway has been extensively studied and implicated in the development of radiation damage in various organs, the precise modalities of its activation following radiation exposure remain elusive. In the present study, we hypothesized that TGF-β1 signaling and target genes expression may depend on radiation-induced modifications in Smad transcriptional co-repressors/inhibitors expressions (TGIF1, SnoN, Ski and Smad7). In endothelial cells (HUVECs) and in a model of experimental radiation enteropathy in mice, radiation exposure increases expression of TGF-β/Smad pathway and of its target gene PAI-1, together with the overexpression of Smad co-repressor TGIF1. In mice, TGIF1 deficiency is not associated with changes in the expression of radiation-induced TGF-β pathway-related transcripts following localized small intestinal irradiation. In HUVECs, TGIF1 overexpression or silencing has no influence either on the radiation-induced Smad activation or the Smad3-dependent PAI-1 overexpression. However, TGIF1 genetic deficiency sensitizes mice to radiation-induced intestinal damage after total body or localized small intestinal radiation exposure, demonstrating that TGIF1 plays a role in radiation-induced intestinal injury. In conclusion, the TGF-β/Smad co-repressor TGIF1 plays a role in radiation-induced normal tissue damage by a Smad-independent mechanism