Large Mass Diphotons From Relativistic Heavy Ion Collisions

We evaluate the production of large mass diphotons from quark annihilation at BNL RHIC and CERN LHC energies from central collisions of gold nuclei. The collision is assumed to lead to either a thermally and chemically equilibrated quark gluon plasma, or a free-streaming quark gluon gas having an identical initial entropy, or a chemically equilibrating quark gluon system, with the same entropy at $T=T_c$. We also obtain an estimate of hard photon pairs from initial state quark annihilation and find that the thermal production dominates the yield up to $M \approx$ 4 GeV at RHIC, and up to 6 GeV at LHC. A simulation study of decay versus thermal diphotons is presented.Comment: Latex file; to appear in Physics Letters

Systematics of Anti magnetic rotation in even-even Cd isotopes

The lifetimes for the high spin levels of the yrast band of $^{110}$Cd has been measured. The estimated B(E2) values decrease with increase in angular momentum. This is the characteristic of Anti magnetic rotation as reported in $^{106,108}$Cd. However, alignment behavior of $^{110}$Cd is completely different from its even-even neighbors. A model based on classical particle plus rotor has been used to explore the underlying systematics and develop a self consistent picture for the observed behavior of these isotopes.Comment: 18 pages including 6 figures. Accepted to be published in PLB, with some modification in the tex

A Rare HBV Subgenotype D4 with Unique Genomic Signatures Identified in North-Eastern India –An Emerging Clinical Challenge?

BACKGROUND/AIMS: HBV has been classified into ten genotypes (A-J) and multiple subgenotypes, some of which strongly influence disease outcome and their distribution also correlate with human migration. HBV infection is highly prevalent in India and its diverse population provides an excellent opportunity to study the distinctiveness of HBV, its evolution and disease biology in variegated ethnic groups. The North-East India, having international frontiers on three sides, is one of the most ethnically and linguistically diverse region of the country. Given the paucity of information on molecular epidemiology of HBV in this region, the study aimed to carry out an in-depth genetic characterization of HBV prevailing in North-East state of Tripura. METHODS: From sera of chronically HBV infected patients biochemical/serological tests, HBV DNA quantification, PCR-amplification, sequencing of PreS/S or full-length HBV genomes were done. HBV genotype/subgenotype determination and sequence variability were assessed by MEGA5-software. The evolutionary divergence times of different HBV subgenotypes were estimated by DNAMLK/PHYLIP program while jpHMM method was used to detect any recombination event in HBV genomes. RESULTS: HBV genotypes D (89.5%), C (6.6%) and A (3.9%) were detected among chronic carriers. While all HBV/A and HBV/C isolates belonged to subgenotype-A1 and C1 respectively, five subgenotypes of HBV/D (D1-D5) were identified including the first detection of rare D4. These non-recombinant Indian D4 (IndD4) formed a distinct phylogenetic clade, had 2.7% nucleotide divergence and recent evolutionary radiation than other global D4. Ten unique amino acids and 9 novel nucleotide substitutions were identified as IndD4 signatures. All IndD4 carried T120 and R129 in ORF-S that may cause immune/vaccine/diagnostic escape and N128 in ORF-P, implicated as compensatory Lamivudine resistance mutation. CONCLUSIONS: IndD4 has potential to undermine vaccination programs or anti-viral therapy and its introduction to North-East India is believed to be linked with the settlement of ancient Tibeto-Burman migrants from East-Asia

Multiple novel prostate cancer susceptibility signals identified by fine-mapping of known risk loci among Europeans

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified numerous common prostate cancer (PrCa) susceptibility loci. We have fine-mapped 64 GWAS regions known at the conclusion of the iCOGS study using large-scale genotyping and imputation in 25 723 PrCa cases and 26 274 controls of European ancestry. We detected evidence for multiple independent signals at 16 regions, 12 of which contained additional newly identified significant associations. A single signal comprising a spectrum of correlated variation was observed at 39 regions; 35 of which are now described by a novel more significantly associated lead SNP, while the originally reported variant remained as the lead SNP only in 4 regions. We also confirmed two association signals in Europeans that had been previously reported only in East-Asian GWAS. Based on statistical evidence and linkage disequilibrium (LD) structure, we have curated and narrowed down the list of the most likely candidate causal variants for each region. Functional annotation using data from ENCODE filtered for PrCa cell lines and eQTL analysis demonstrated significant enrichment for overlap with bio-features within this set. By incorporating the novel risk variants identified here alongside the refined data for existing association signals, we estimate that these loci now explain ∼38.9% of the familial relative risk of PrCa, an 8.9% improvement over the previously reported GWAS tag SNPs. This suggests that a significant fraction of the heritability of PrCa may have been hidden during the discovery phase of GWAS, in particular due to the presence of multiple independent signals within the same regio

Sorption aided process for the removal and recovery of Zinc (II) using salicylaldoxime immobilised silica gel

245-250Salicylaldoxime immobilised silica gel was used as an effective solid phase surface, for the preconcentration, removal or recovery of zinc ion from aqueous phase. The efficiency was tested by the equilibrium sorption study both in batch and column operations. The efficiency increases with the shaking period, agitation speed, adsorbent dose, temperature and flow rate but is independent on the volume of the solution. Maximum adsorption was found to occur at pH 5.5. Alkali metal, alkaline earth metal and ammonium salts do not influence the adsorption process. Heavy metal ions viz. Cu(II), Ni(II), Co(II) and Fe(III) get adsorbed by the said process but at much different pH values. Complexing ligands like EDT A and cyanide markedly decrease the adsorption of Zn(II) by the said procedure. The adsorption data fits well the Langmuir adsorption isotherm model. The negative free energy change indicates that the process is favourable as well as spontaneous. The merit of the process lies with its high preconcentration factor. </span

Study of Glucose -6-Phosphate Dehydrogenase Deficiency In Neonatal Jaundice

Abstract: The enzyme

Hepatotoxicity of atenolol therapy - A report of 2 cases

This case report highlights atenolol induced episodes of chronic and acute hepatotoxicities in 2 elderly hypertensive patients. The 1st patient manifested liver dysfunction after 8 months of 50 mg daily atenolol therapy and in the 2nd patient liver dysfunction was revealed within 3 weeks of 100 mg daily atenolol intake. There was no evidence of any other possible hereditary, traumatic, surgical, metabolic, infective, organic, or pathologic causes giving rise to these conditions. Possibilities of drug interactions were carefully ruled out and these episodes of hepatotoxicities were ‘probably’ drug (atenolol) induced, as depicted by CIOMS/RUCAM scale. Withdrawal of the offending drug resulted in reversal of the diseased states. Routine liver function tests may be warranted in patients on atenolol therapy

Spectrum of Hemoglobinopathies in West Bengal, India: A CE-HPLC Study on 10407 Subjects

viii 102 ha

Local delivery systems of morphogens/biomolecules in orthopedic surgical challenges

Musculoskeletal disorders and bone deficiencies have been established among the most important human health conditions that exist today. Because of the numerous and complex functions of bone, there are many disorders, such as osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoporosis and bone cancer that arise with time. Conventional therapy alone does not always yield satisfactory results and the treatment protocol is difficult, time consuming and expensive. Systemic therapy has the disadvantages of the need for long-term treatment due to being unable to create a high local concentration and the resultant risk of toxicity in addition to problems of drug transport and cost. As a result, intensive research activity on targeted local delivery of drugs/growth factors has been initiated. Local drug delivery is potentially an advantage over standard oral/intravenous therapy/other modalities. In the present review, we have highlighted various drugs/growth factors/molecules and their potential local delivery systems for effective management of bone disorders

Mercury isotopes of atmospheric particle bound mercury for source apportionment study in urban Kolkata, India

Abstract The particle bound mercury (PBM) in urban-industrial areas is mainly of anthropogenic origin, and is derived from two principal sources: Hg bound to particulate matter directly emitted by industries and power generation plants, and adsorption of gaseous elemental mercury (GEM) and gaseous oxidized mercury (GOM) on air particulates from gas or aqueous phases. Here, we measured the Hg isotope composition of PBM in PM10 samples collected from three locations, a traffic junction, a waste incineration site and an industrial site in Kolkata, the largest metropolis in Eastern India. Sampling was carried out in winter and monsoon seasons between 2013–2015. The objective was to understand whether the isotope composition of the PBM represents source composition. The PBM collected from the waste burning site showed little mass independent fractionation (MIF) (Δ199Hg = +0.12 to -0.11‰), similar to the signature in liquid Hg and Hg ores around the world with no seasonal variations. Samples from the industrial site showed mostly negative MDF and MIF (δ202Hg = -1.34 to -3.48 ‰ and Δ199Hg = +0.01 to -0.31‰). The MDF is consistent with PBM generated by coal combustion however, the MIF is 0.15‰ more negative compared to the Hg isotope ratios in Indian coals. The traffic junction PBM is probably not produced in situ, but has travelled some distances from nearby industrial sources. The longer residence time of this PBM in the atmosphere has resulted in-aerosol aqueous photoreduction. Thus, the MIF displays a larger range (Δ199Hg = +0.33 to -0.30‰) compared to the signature from the other sites and with more positive values in the humid monsoon season. Different Hg isotopic signature of PBM in the three different sampling locations within the same city indicates that both source and post emission atmospheric transformations play important roles in determining isotopic signature of PBM