Efficacy of Withania somnifera on lipid profile of endosulfan induced toxicity in Swiss albino mice

India is an agrarian country with crops cultivated at a huge scale. Pesticides in recent times have caused serious health hazards in the population which are widely used by the farmers for the better yield of crops. Endosulfan is an organochlorine pesticide, which is widely used by the farmers. But, in the present times, it has caused serious health hazards in the exposed population causing various diseases, including cancer. Hence, the present study on animal aims to observe the protective effect of Withania somnifera against endosulfan induced toxicity in Swiss albino mice. Endosulfan at the dose of 3mg/Kg body weight per day was administered orally to Swiss albino mice for 4 weeks. Then after, W. somnifera at the dose of 1000 mg/Kg b.w. was orally administered for 4 weeks. Mice were sacrificed after the completion of the entire treatment. After dissection, the blood samples were collected for biochemical assay, especially for lipid profile analysis. The lipid profile study showed inclination in the Total cholesterol level (117±6.686 mg/dl), Cholesterol (LDL) (78.83±4.151mg/dl), level and Triglycerides level (60.83±2.613mg/dl), while declination in Cholesterol (HDL) (13.50±1.33mg/dl), level after Endosulfan exposure. But, upon W. somnifera treatment to the endosulfan treated group showed significant (p<0.001) normalisation in the lipid profile levels. Therefore, it was concluded that W. somnifera played a vital role to control the endosulfan induced toxicity

Protective effect of ascorbic acid against fenvalerate induced toxicity in air-breathing fish Clarias batrachus

The food demand in recent times has increased many folds. In order to augment the need for food, the agriculture practice is extensively carried out by the farmers and pesticides are widely used by them for the better yield of crops. Fishes are also cultivated by these farmers, and humans are consuming the fishes as they are very high nutritious food product. But, these pesticides through agricultural runoffs are contaminating the ponds as well the aquatic fauna like fish. The present research work deals with the evaluation of the protective effect of ascorbic acid on fenvalerate induced nephrotoxicity in Clarias batrachus. The pyrethroid pesticide- Fenvalerate EC 20% was administered directly in the water contained in the aquarium at the dose of 0.027 ppm, 0.042 ppm and 0.083 ppm respectively for 96 hrs hours after the dose calculation through LC50. Thereafter, ascorbic acid was administered orally by gastric intubation method at the dose of 200 mg/Kg body weight per day for 04 days to each pesticide treated group. The study revealed that, after the exposure of fenvalerate, there was significant damage at the biochemical levels like urea, creatinine, protein and albumin and histopathological study of kidney tissue in fish C. batrachus. But, after the administration of ascorbic acid, there was a significant restoration in the biochemical levels and in histopathology of the kidney of fish. The study concluded that Ascorbic acid possessed protective effect against fenvalerate induced toxicity in C. batrachus

Restorative effect of Azadirachta indica against fenvalerate induced haematological and biochemical toxicity in a freshwater fish Clarias batrachus

Pesticide use in recent times has increased many folds to enhance the yield of crops. The water bodies like ponds and others are extensively used for the cultivation of fishes. Since these fishes are a good source of protein and nutritious value, hence are consumed by humans. These pesticide-contaminated fishes are consumed by the human, causing health hazards. The objective of the present research work was to know the bio remedial effect of Azadirachta indica on fenvalerate induced toxicity in a freshwater air-breathing catfish "Mangur" known as Clarias batrachus ( Linnaeus). The fishes were treated with 1/3rd of LC50, i.e. 0.92 ppm of a pyrethroid pesticide fenvalerate and observed the fishes for 96 hours. Thereafter, the aqueous leaf extract of Azadirachta indica was administered orally, daily by gastric intubation method at the dose of 100 mg/Kg body weight per day for 15 days. The study revealed that, after the exposure of 0.92 ppm of fenvalerate, there was a significant decrease in RBC count from 2.76 to 2.14 X (106) (mm-3), Total leukocyte count from18.10 to 16.30 X (103) (mm-3), , packed ell volume from 24 % to 16% , haemoglobin from 6.89 g/100 ml to 4.23 g/100ml of blood whereas increase in the level of serum glucose and cholesterol level from 50.33 mg/dl to 103.73 mg/dl and 168.52 g/dl to 248.99 g/dl respectively. At the same time, serum protein level decreased from  3.16g/dl to2.52 g/dl due to pesticide in the experimental fishes.   But, after the administration of aqueous leaf extract of Azadirachta indica there was significant normalisation in the test parameters of the fishes. The study indicated that neem leaves possessed restorative effect against fenvalerate induced toxicity in Clarias batrachus

Heating of the auroral ionosphere by traveling ionospheric disturbances initiated by atmospheric gravity waves

In the presence of perturbations of the thermospheric auroral region produced by traveling ionospheric disturbances during the propagation of atmospheric gravity waves, an analytical expression of the velocity of the thermospheric plasma is derived through magnetohydrodynamic formalism. The expressions of the Joule heating and the viscous heating are derived, and their rates of variation are presented. A threshold height for their transition has been determined from their ratio, which is in agreement with the experimental data. The analysis indicates that the time taken by the thermospheric plasma to reach a steady-state corresponds to the nature of the traveling ionospheric disturbances in the medium

Cryo-EM model validation recommendations based on outcomes of the 2019 EMDataResource challenge

This paper describes outcomes of the 2019 Cryo-EM Model Challenge. The goals were to (1) assess the quality of models that can be produced from cryogenic electron microscopy (cryo-EM) maps using current modeling software, (2) evaluate reproducibility of modeling results from different software developers and users and (3) compare performance of current metrics used for model evaluation, particularly Fit-to-Map metrics, with focus on near-atomic resolution. Our findings demonstrate the relatively high accuracy and reproducibility of cryo-EM models derived by 13 participating teams from four benchmark maps, including three forming a resolution series (1.8 to 3.1 Å). The results permit specific recommendations to be made about validating near-atomic cryo-EM structures both in the context of individual experiments and structure data archives such as the Protein Data Bank. We recommend the adoption of multiple scoring parameters to provide full and objective annotation and assessment of the model, reflective of the observed cryo-EM map density

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Impact of COVID-19 on cardiovascular testing in the United States versus the rest of the world

Objectives: This study sought to quantify and compare the decline in volumes of cardiovascular procedures between the United States and non-US institutions during the early phase of the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the care of many non-COVID-19 illnesses. Reductions in diagnostic cardiovascular testing around the world have led to concerns over the implications of reduced testing for cardiovascular disease (CVD) morbidity and mortality. Methods: Data were submitted to the INCAPS-COVID (International Atomic Energy Agency Non-Invasive Cardiology Protocols Study of COVID-19), a multinational registry comprising 909 institutions in 108 countries (including 155 facilities in 40 U.S. states), assessing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on volumes of diagnostic cardiovascular procedures. Data were obtained for April 2020 and compared with volumes of baseline procedures from March 2019. We compared laboratory characteristics, practices, and procedure volumes between U.S. and non-U.S. facilities and between U.S. geographic regions and identified factors associated with volume reduction in the United States. Results: Reductions in the volumes of procedures in the United States were similar to those in non-U.S. facilities (68% vs. 63%, respectively; p = 0.237), although U.S. facilities reported greater reductions in invasive coronary angiography (69% vs. 53%, respectively; p < 0.001). Significantly more U.S. facilities reported increased use of telehealth and patient screening measures than non-U.S. facilities, such as temperature checks, symptom screenings, and COVID-19 testing. Reductions in volumes of procedures differed between U.S. regions, with larger declines observed in the Northeast (76%) and Midwest (74%) than in the South (62%) and West (44%). Prevalence of COVID-19, staff redeployments, outpatient centers, and urban centers were associated with greater reductions in volume in U.S. facilities in a multivariable analysis. Conclusions: We observed marked reductions in U.S. cardiovascular testing in the early phase of the pandemic and significant variability between U.S. regions. The association between reductions of volumes and COVID-19 prevalence in the United States highlighted the need for proactive efforts to maintain access to cardiovascular testing in areas most affected by outbreaks of COVID-19 infection

Retrospective evaluation of whole exome and genome mutation calls in 746 cancer samples

Funder: NCI U24CA211006Abstract: The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) and International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC) curated consensus somatic mutation calls using whole exome sequencing (WES) and whole genome sequencing (WGS), respectively. Here, as part of the ICGC/TCGA Pan-Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) Consortium, which aggregated whole genome sequencing data from 2,658 cancers across 38 tumour types, we compare WES and WGS side-by-side from 746 TCGA samples, finding that ~80% of mutations overlap in covered exonic regions. We estimate that low variant allele fraction (VAF < 15%) and clonal heterogeneity contribute up to 68% of private WGS mutations and 71% of private WES mutations. We observe that ~30% of private WGS mutations trace to mutations identified by a single variant caller in WES consensus efforts. WGS captures both ~50% more variation in exonic regions and un-observed mutations in loci with variable GC-content. Together, our analysis highlights technological divergences between two reproducible somatic variant detection efforts

Bioremedial effect of turmeric (Curcuma longa) on haematological and biochemical parameters against fenvalerate induced toxicity in air-breathing fish Clarias batrachus

Indiscriminate use of insecticides has increased many folds in the recent times. Farmers for the better yield of crops, are widely utilising the pesticides. These pesticides through agricultural run offs have reached the surface water like ponds and has contaminated the flora and fauna of it. Fish is the animal which are extensively cultivated in these ponds. Humans are consuming these fishes as food as they have high nutritious value. These contaminated fish if consumed by the human has caused various health hazards to humans. The present research work is therefore focused to know the bioremedial effect of turmeric on fenvalerate induced toxicity in fish Clarias batrachus.Fenvalerate EC 20% (pyrethroid) was administered directly in water contained in aquarium at the dose of 0.92 ppm and observed for 96 hours after the dose calculation through LC50. Thereafter, aqueous rhizome extract of Turmeric was administered orally, daily by gastric intubation method at the dose of 100 mg/Kg body weight per day for 15 days. The study reveals that after the exposure of fenvalerate, there was significant damage at the haematological and biochemical levels in fish Clarias batrachus. But, after the administration of rhizome extract of turmeric, there was significant normalisation in the haematological and biochemical levels in fish. This denotes that turmeric not only possesses ameliorating and rejuvenating property but also maintains the normal functioning of the body of the fish. Thus, it proves to be one of the best antidote against fenvalerate induced toxicity.</p

Quality of life of young male catheterized patients

Introduction: It is pointless to point out that, Per-urethral or Supra-pubic Catheter compromises the Quality of life (QoL) of young male patients. Our study is about the comparison of QoL status along with depression of catheterized state with same after removal of catheter of patients. Objectives: In our study we wanted to quantify the quality of life (QoL) and distress experienced by patient following catheterisation and also to assess the improvement of QoL after catheter removal following surgical intervention. Methods: We used two tools named World Health Organization Quality of Life scale (WHOQOL BREF) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) for this purpose. Result: We found statistically significant improvements in all domains of QoL as measured by WHOQOL BREF and improvement in depression status as well, measured by Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Conclusion: As we have documented poor QoL and depression status in catheterised state and improvement of the same after catheter removal we recommend counselling of such patients regarding QoL and Psychiatry consultation for management of depression