Evaluation of Liver Function in Patients on Anti-Tuberculous Therapy

In this study of 108 patients of new sputum positive patients 57 were males and 51 were females. The age group ranged from 20-67. Out of 95 patients who completed treatment 11 patients had asymptomatic rise in serum enzymes with male: female ratio of 1:1.9. Two patients had symptomatic hepatitis with male : female ratio of 1:1 in the ages of 52year and 63 year. Patients in older age group, mild malnutrition and cavitary disease only had symptomatic hepatitis. Needle biopsy of liver conformed drug induced hepatotoxicity in 1 patient as the other did not consent for liver biopsy. Re-introduction of drugs done in the patients gradually after s. enzymes reverted back to normal levels. Both patients tolerated well on drug re-challenge. Patients closely monitored and discharged with the advice to get admit immediately if there any symptoms of hepatitis

Synthesis and Magnetic Properties of Cobalt Ferrite (CoFe2O4) Nanoparticles Prepared by Wet Chemical Route

Magnetic nanoparticles of cobalt ferrite have been synthesized by wet chemical method using stable ferric and cobalt salts with oleic acid as the surfactant. X-ray Diffraction (XRD) and Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) confirmed the formation of single phase cobalt ferrite nanoparticles in the range 15-48nm depending on the annealing temperature and time. The size of the particles increases with annealing temperature and time while the coercivity goes through a maximum, peaking at around 28nm. A very large coercivity (10.5kOe) is observed on cooling down to 77K while typical blocking effects are observed below about 260K. The high field moment is observed to be small for smaller particles and approaches the bulk value for large particles.Comment: 18 pages, accepted in JMMM, (May, 2006

Genetic diversity and population structure of leaf-nosed bat Hipposideros speoris (Chiroptera: Hipposideridae) in Indian subcontinent

Genetic variation and population structure of the leaf-nosed bat Hipposideros speoris were estimated using 16S rRNA sequence and microsatellite analysis. Twenty seven distinct mitochondrial haplotypes were identified from 186 individuals, sampled from eleven populations. FST test revealed significant variations between populations in the overall pairwise estimation (FST = 0.710; p < 0.001). In addition, haplotype network and analysis of molecular variation analysis (AMOVA) consistently suggest the prevalence of genetic structure in the sampled populations. However, the mtDNA data was not significantly different in few closely located urban populations, but significant difference has been observed with the use of microsatellite data. The Bayesian clustering analysis identified eight clusters among the populations; the clustering pattern also corresponded to the haplotype networks. Overall, the present study suggests a “macrogeographic genetic isolation-by-distance” and possibility of gene flow among closely located populations.Key words: mtDNA, 16S rRNA, microsatellite, population structure, Hipposideros speoris

Facile one-pot synthesis of CuO nanospheres: Sensitive electrochemical determination of hydrazine in water effluents

Hydrazine (HZ) is massively used in several industrial applications. Adsorption of HZ through human skin creates carcinogenicity by disturbing the human organ system and thus, the quantification of HZ levels in environmental water samples is highly needed. The present work describes the short-term development of copper oxide nanospheres (CuO NS) by one-step wet chemical approach and their implementation on glassy carbon electrode (GCE) for the sensitive and selective quantification of the environmentally hazardous HZ. The CuO NS formation was identified by X-ray diffraction (XRD), field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and UV-visible spectroscopy. SEM images exhibited the uniform CuO NS with an average size of 85 nm. The linker-free CuO NS modified GCE offered high electrocatalytic activity against HZ determination by showing the linear range determination in the range of 0.5 to 500 µM, with the detection limit of 63 nM (S/N=3), and sensitivity of 894.28 µA mM-1 cm-2. Further, the developed HZ sensor displayed excellent repeatability and reproducibility and was successfully exploited for the determination of HZ in real environmental samples, implying that GCE/CuO-NS is a confident and low-cost electrochemical platform for HZ determination

Aquaporins and their implications on seeds: A brief review

Aquaporins (AQPs) are water channel proteins. They play a key role in maintaining water balance and homeostasis in cells under stress conditions in living organisms. AQPs are pore forming transmembrane proteins that facilitate water movement and various small neutral solutes across cellular membranes. Aquaporin expression and transport functions are modulated by various phytohormones mediated signalling in plants. Transcriptome analysis revealed the role of aquaporins in regulating hydraulic conductance in plant roots and leaves. Different AQPs found in the seed system have individual functions that are more time and tissue specific, ultimately helping in the seed imbibition process to complete seed germination. Seed specific TIP3s aquaporin helps to maintain seed longevity under expressional control of ABI3 during seed maturation and heat shock proteins and late embryogenic abundant proteins. Under stress circumstances, the major significance of aquaporin expression in seeds is to maintain water influx and efflux rates, as well as protein modification, post translational alterations, nutritional acquisition and allocation, subcellular trafficking and CO2 transport. The present review mainly focused on aquaporin structure, classification, role and functional activity during solute transport, reproductive organs development, plant growth development, abiotic stress response and also various roles in seeds such as seed biology, seed development and maturation, seed dormancy, seed germination and longevity

Volatile organic compound analysis as advanced technology to detect seed quality in groundnut

An experiment was conducted to profiling the volatile organic compounds emitted from groundnut seeds during storage and also to assess the volatiles emission level during seed deterioration. Volatile organic compounds profiling of stored groundnut seeds was done through GC-MS at monthly intervals. The results showed that several volatile compounds were released from stored groundnut seeds and all the compounds are falling into eight major groups viz., alcohols, aldehydes, acids, esters, alkanes, alkenes, ketones and ethers. The study clearly demonstrated the influence of volatile organic compounds emission level on physiological and biochemical properties during storage. There was a significant decrease in physiological and biochemical quality attributes noted due to an increase in the strength of volatiles released during ageing. When the release of total volatile strength reached more than 50%, a significant reduction in physiological attributes such as germination, root and shoot length, dry matter production and vigour index were observed. With respect to biochemical properties, a significant increase in electrical conductivity of seed leachate, lipid peroxidation and lipoxygenase activity, and a decrease in dehydrogenase, catalase and peroxidase activities were observed. However, the highest reduction in all these properties was recorded when the total volatile strength reached 92.72%. The study concluded that the volatiles released during seed deterioration could be considered the signature components for detecting the seed quality during storage

RECOGNITION OF FONT AND TAMIL LETTER IN IMAGES USING DEEP LEARNING

This paper proposes a deep learning approach to recognize Tamil Letter from images which contains text. This is recognition process, the text in the images are divided to letter or characters. Each recognized letters are sending to recognition system and filter the text using deep learning algorithms. Our proposed algorithm is used to separate letter from the text using convolution neural network approach. The filtering system is used for identifying font based on that letters are found. The Tamil letters are test data and loaded in recognition systems. The trained data are input which contains filtered letter from image. For example, Tamil letters such as are available in test dataset. The trained data are applied into deep convolution neural network process. The two dataset are created which contains test data with Tamil letter and second one for recognized input data or trained data. 15 thousands of letters are taken and 512 X 512 X 3 size deep convolution network is created with font and letters. As the result, 85% Tamil letters are recognized and 82% are tested using font. TensorFlow is used for testing the accuracy and success rate

Crystallographically oriented magnetic ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles synthesized by Fe implantation into ZnO

In this paper, a correlation between structural and magnetic properties of Fe implanted ZnO is presented. High fluence Fe^+ implantation into ZnO leads to the formation of superparamagnetic alpha-Fe nanoparticles. High vacuum annealing at 823 K results in the growth of alpha-Fe particles, but the annealing at 1073 K oxidized the majority of the Fe nanoparticles. After a long term annealing at 1073 K, crystallographically oriented ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles were formed inside ZnO with the orientation relationship of ZnFe2O4(111)[110]//ZnO(0001)[1120]. These ZnFe2O4 nanoparticles show a hysteretic behavior upon magnetization reversal at 5 K.Comment: 21 pages, 7 figures, accepted by J. Phys. D: Appl. Phy

Assessment of rice (Co 51) seed ageing through volatile organic compound analysis using Headspace-Solid Phase Micro Extraction/ Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (HS-SPME/GCMS)

Seed ageing is an inevitable process that reduces seed quality during storage. When seeds deteriorate as a result of the lipid peroxidation process, it leads to produce toxic volatile organic compounds. These volatiles served as an indicator for the viability of stored seeds. With this background, the study was conducted to profile the volatile organic compounds emitted from rice seeds during storage. Volatile profiling of stored rice var. Co 51 seeds was done through Headspace-Solid phase microextraction/ Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (HS-SPME/GCMS). The study clearly demonstrated that the significant decrease in physiological and biochemical quality attributes was noted due to an increase in the strength of volatiles released during ageing. When the release of total volatile strength reached more than 40%, a significant reduction in physiological attributes such as germination, root and shoot length, dry matter production and vigour index were observed. With respect to biochemical properties, a significant increase in electrical conductivity of seed leachate, lipid peroxidation and lipoxygenase activity, and decrease in dehydrogenase, catalase and peroxidase activities were observed. However, the highest reduction in all these properties were recorded when the total volatile strength reached to 54.90%. Finally, the study concluded that, among all the volatiles, 1-hexanol, 1-butanol, ethanol, hexanal, acetic acid, hexanoic acid and methyl ester were the most closely associated volatiles with seed deterioration. It indicates that these components could be considered the signature components for assessing the seed quality in rice during storage.