Non Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease: A Cross Sectional study with special emphasis on the role of TNF alpha and TNF alpha gene polymorphisms in disease progression

OBJECTIVES: Study the clinical, biochemical and pathological features of patients with NAFLD and also to evaluate, for a role of TNF alpha and its promoter region polymorphisms in the disease. METHODS: It is a single center, prospective, crossectional study, conducted over 2 years. Patients with non alcoholic fatty liver disease confirmed by histology were included in the study. A group of healthy controls were also selected. Anthropometric measurements was compared in both groups. Comparisons were made between those with fibrosis and those without fibrosis. Indirect markers for fibrosis viz, AST/ALT ratio and APRI was evaluated. Enzyme immunoassay was done for serum TNF-α and PCR-RFLP was done for polymorphisms in the TNF-α promoter region (-238 and -308). Statistical analysis was done using STATA software. RESULTS: Six (20.7%) patients presented with features of chronic liver disease. Of the rest most were asymptomatic (60.9%). There was significant difference in BMI and WC between of the cases and controls. Diabetes mellitus was present in 20%, and hypertriglyceridemia in 44%. Insulin resistance is present in 83.3% patients with NAFLD. Most patients had evidence of NASH and 48.2% had evidence of liver fibrosis. An older age and a larger waist circumference is associated with an increased risk for fibrosis. AST/ALT ratio and APRI could predict fibrosis in ~ 80% of individuals. No correlation was noted between the TNF-α levels and the NAFLD activity score or the degree of fibrosis. No significant difference was noted in the allele frequency between the cases and controls for both -238 and -308 loci in the TNF α promoter region

Evaluation of anti-leishmanial activity of artemisinin combined with amphotericin B or miltefosine in Leishmania donovani promastigotes

Background: The increasing incidence of drug resistance in Leishmaniasis necessitates evaluation of combination chemotherapy. Miltefosine and amphotericin B are established anti-leishmanial drugs, while artemisinin has shown significant leishmanicidal activity in experimental models. In this study, we have evaluated the additive/synergistic effect of artemisinin with amphotericin B or miltefosine.Methods: Leishmania parasites were isolated from the bone marrow aspirate of a patient with visceral leishmaniasis. Parasites were typed as Leishmania donovani by restriction fragment length polymorphism of internal transcribed spacer 1 region of Leishmania genome. Promastigotes were incubated in a fixed ratio combination of artemisinin (0-500 µM) and amphotericin B (0-100 nM) or miltefosine (0-100 µM) and cell viability was assessed. An isobologram was constructed to evaluate the additive/synergistic effect, wherein it was considered additive if the mean sum fractional inhibitory concentration (mean ΣFIC) at the IC50 level was <2, but ≥1 and synergism, if the mean ΣFIC was <1.Results: The isobologram showed an additive effect for three combinations of artemisinin-amphotericin B and artemisinin-miltefosine, the mean ΣFICs ranging from 1.02 to 1.44 and 1.08 to 1.33 along with a synergistic effect with one combination, the mean ΣFICs being 0.58 and 0.81 respectively.Conclusions: This study supports the combination use of artemisinin-amphotericin B and artemisinin-miltefosine, worthy of future pharmacological consideration

Robust extraction of text from camera images using colour and spatial information simultaneously

The importance and use of text extraction from camera based coloured scene images is rapidly increasing with time. Text within a camera grabbed image can contain a huge amount of meta data about that scene. Such meta data can be useful for identification, indexing and retrieval purposes. While the segmentation and recognition of text from document images is quite successful, detection of coloured scene text is a new challenge for all camera based images. Common problems for text extraction from camera based images are the lack of prior knowledge of any kind of text features such as colour, font, size and orientation as well as the location of the probable text regions. In this paper, we document the development of a fully automatic and extremely robust text segmentation technique that can be used for any type of camera grabbed frame be it single image or video. A new algorithm is proposed which can overcome the current problems of text segmentation. The algorithm exploits text appearance in terms of colour and spatial distribution. When the new text extraction technique was tested on a variety of camera based images it was found to out perform existing techniques (or something similar). The proposed technique also overcomes any problems that can arise due to an unconstraint complex background. The novelty in the works arises from the fact that this is the first time that colour and spatial information are used simultaneously for the purpose of text extraction

Observational assessment and correlates to blood pressure of future physicians of Bengal

Intoduction: Hypertension is a modern day epidemic and growing public health problem. A sizable proportion of world populations suffer from prehypertension or hypertension. Objectives: The present study was carried out to detect the prevalence of undiagnosed hypertension among undergraduate medical students and to identify the associated risk factors.Materials and Methods: The study was observational in nature and was done in medical colleges of Bengal. Study tool was a predesigned, pretested, validated, and semi-structured questionnaire containing both open-ended and closeended questions. Data were collected through self-administration, clinical, and anthropometric examination. The data were then tabulated, analyzed and interpretation was done by using percentage and Chi-square test.Results: Most of the students (63%) were young adults, predominantly males (67%) and day scholars (71%). Almost one-third of them either suffered from hypertension or at risk of hypertension. Hypertension was found higher among male students. Family history of hypertension or diabetes mellitus was not associated with hypertension. Vegetarian or nonvegetarian diet or extra-salt consumption was also not associated with hypertension. Smoking was shown positively associated with hypertension but alcohol consumption was not. Higher per capita monthly income and overweight or obesity were shown positively associated with hypertension.Conclusion: The overall prevalence of hypertension in this study was 13% and there were positive association of hypertension with multiple socio-demographic factors like age, sex, type of family, per capita monthly income, residence, BMI, smoking, etc.Keywords: Associated factors, hypertension, undergraduate medical studentsNigerian Journal of Clinical Practice • Oct-Dec 2013 • Vol 16 • Issue

RISK PERCEPTION AND KNOWLEDGE GAP BETWEEN EXPERTS AND THE PUBLIC : ISSUES OF FLOOD HAZARDS MANAGEMENT IN CANADA

ABSTRACT The goal of this research was to assist in improving the decision-making process of flood disaster management in the Red river basin of Canada, through a better understanding of risk perception and the knowledge of both experts and the public. The findings of the 1997 Red River flood in Manitoba, Canada case study have revealed that the institutional efforts aimed at reducing risk and vulnerability at the local level are likely to be successful if experts or decision makers are aware of how local residents perceive risk. This study attempted to examine and identify the differences or gap that exists in risk perception between 30 public respondents and 12 flood experts in the Red River basin, through a modified version of the Delphi method. The results of the study revealed that the gap between the public and experts concerning risk perception is not as significant as the literature suggests. However, a gap does exist concerning the mutual understanding between experts and the public, and a deficiency in risk communication between them is clearly recognized. Institutional initiatives to address risk communication problems, particularly to reduce flood loss, are therefore required

Auction versus posted price mechanisms in online sales: The roles of impatience and dissuasion

If all potential buyers participate in a first-price auction, then (theoretically) the auction price weakly exceeds the price placed by the seller under a posted price mechanism. However, it is documented that in online sales sellers prefer posted price mechanism to auction. We aim to explain this empirical contradiction in terms of partial participation of the buyers in auction, prompted by impatience and dissuasion. Auction on Internet often requires waiting, and hence, many impatient participants may not join the auction process. Furthermore, a previous experience of failure in auction may also prompt buyers’ non-participation. We show, theoretically, that in the case of partial participation, the price in auction may be lower; posted price turns out to be payoff dominant for both the buyers and the sellers. We then run a laboratory experiment and verify the presence of impatience (through waiting cost) and dissuasion factor (through previous failure) among the subjects

Solvable multi-species reaction-diffusion processes, including the extended drop-push model

By considering the master equation of asymmetric exclusion process on a one-dimensional lattice, we obtain the most general boundary condition of the multi-species exclusion processes in which the number of particles is constant in time. This boundary condition introduces the various interactions to the particles, including ones which have been studied yet and the new ones. In these new models, the particles have simultaneously diffusion, the two-particle interactions $A_\alpha A_\beta\to A_\gamma A_\delta$, and the $n$-particle extended drop-push interaction. The constraints on reaction rates are obtained and in two-species case, they are solved to obtain a solvable model. The conditional probabilities of this model are calculated.Comment: 14 pages. Minor changes have been done and a number of references are added. To be published in European Physical Journal

Immunolocalization of KATP channel subunits in mouse and rat cardiac myocytes and the coronary vasculature.

BACKGROUND: Electrophysiological data suggest that cardiac KATP channels consist of Kir6.2 and SUR2A subunits, but the distribution of these (and other KATP channel subunits) is poorly defined. We examined the localization of each of the KATP channel subunits in the mouse and rat heart. RESULTS: Immunohistochemistry of cardiac cryosections demonstrate Kir6.1 protein to be expressed in ventricular myocytes, as well as in the smooth muscle and endothelial cells of coronary resistance vessels. Endothelial capillaries also stained positive for Kir6.1 protein. Kir6.2 protein expression was found predominantly in ventricular myocytes and also in endothelial cells, but not in smooth muscle cells. SUR1 subunits are strongly expressed at the sarcolemmal surface of ventricular myocytes (but not in the coronary vasculature), whereas SUR2 protein was found to be localized predominantly in cardiac myocytes and coronary vessels (mostly in smaller vessels). Immunocytochemistry of isolated ventricular myocytes shows co-localization of Kir6.2 and SUR2 proteins in a striated sarcomeric pattern, suggesting t-tubular expression of these proteins. Both Kir6.1 and SUR1 subunits were found to express strongly at the sarcolemma. The role(s) of these subunits in cardiomyocytes remain to be defined and may require a reassessment of the molecular nature of ventricular KATP channels. CONCLUSIONS: Collectively, our data demonstrate unique cellular and subcellular KATP channel subunit expression patterns in the heart. These results suggest distinct roles for KATP channel subunits in diverse cardiac structures

Intertwining Relations for the Deformed D1D5 CFT

The Higgs branch of the D1D5 system flows in the infrared to a two-dimensional N=(4,4) SCFT. This system is believed to have an "orbifold point" in its moduli space where the SCFT is a free sigma model with target space the symmetric product of copies of four-tori; however, at the orbifold point gravity is strongly coupled and to reach the supergravity point one needs to turn on the four exactly marginal deformations corresponding to the blow-up modes of the orbifold SCFT. Recently, technology has been developed for studying these deformations and perturbing the D1D5 CFT off its orbifold point. We present a new method for computing the general effect of a single application of the deformation operators. The method takes the form of intertwining relations that map operators in the untwisted sector before application of the deformation operator to operators in the 2-twisted sector after the application of the deformation operator. This method is computationally more direct, and may be of theoretical interest. This line of inquiry should ultimately have relevance for black hole physics.Comment: latex, 23 pages, 3 figure