848 research outputs found
IN VITRO STUDY ON PROTEASE AND THROMBOLYTIC ACTIVITY OF AQUEOUS EXTRACT FROM LEUCAS ASPERA (L.) LEAVES
Objective: The current study is an attempt to screen for the in vitro clot lysis and proteolytic activity of aqueous extract of Leucas aspera leaves.
Methods: Thrombolytic activity and protease activity of the crude enzyme obtained by ammonium sulfate precipitation and dialysis were assayed using blood clot and casein as substrates respectively. Native PAGE and gel documentation studies were performed to calculate the molecular weight of the enzyme.
Results: In the study, 40% salt fractioned crude enzyme sample exhibited significant thrombolytic and caseinolytic activity. Further dose-dependent increased activity was observed with the maximum lytic activity of 52.11±1.04 % at 1 mg/ml of the sample when compared to the reference drug streptokinase (71.39±0.32%). Also, 68.72±0.62 U/hr of caseinolytic activity was observed for 1 mg/ml of the sample fraction.
Conclusion: The study highlights and validates the efficacy of Leucas aspera leaves extract for thrombolytic and proteolytic actions. Enzyme with an approximate molecular weight, 19.89 KDa could be responsible for the significant lytic activity
Major integrated environmental system for relocation of 540 tanneries in Kolkata City - a biggest environmental project of its kind in Asia
The tanning industry is one of the oldest and fastest
growing industries in South and South East Asia. There
are more than 3000 tanneries located in India with a
total processing capacity of 700,000 tones of hides and
skins per year. The wastewater discharge from these
tanneries is about 100,000 cubic meters per day. More
than 90% tanneries are in small and medium scale sector
with processing capacities of less than 2-3 tons of hides/
skins per day
Dust in the Host Galaxies of Supernovae
We present Spitzer/MIPS 24 micron observations of 50 supernova host galaxies
at 0.1<z<1.7 in the Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey (GOODS) fields. We
also discuss the detection of SN host galaxies in SCUBA/850 micron observations
of GOODS-N and Spitzer/Infrared Spectrograph (IRS) 16 micron observations of
GOODS-S. About 60% of the host galaxies of both Type Ia and core-collapse
supernovae are detected at 24 microns, a detection rate which is a factor of
1.5 higher than the field galaxy population. Among the 24 micron detected
hosts, 80% have far-infrared luminosities that are comparable to or greater
than the optical luminosity indicating the presence of substantial amounts of
dust in the hosts. The median bolometric luminosity of the Type Ia SN hosts is
\~10^10.5 L_sun, very similar to that of core-collapse SN hosts. Using the high
resolution Hubble/ACS data, we have studied the variation of rest-frame
optical/ultraviolet colors within the 24 micron detected galaxies at z<1 to
understand the origin of the dust emission. The 24 micron detected galaxies
have average colors which are redder by ~0.1 mag than the 24 micron undetected
hosts while the latter show greater scatter in internal colors. This suggests
that a smooth distribution of dust is responsible for the observed mid- and
far-infrared emission. 70% of supernovae that have been detected in the GOODS
fields are located within the half-light radius of the hosts where dust
obscuration effects are significant. Although the dust emission that we detect
cannot be translated into a line of sight A_V, we suggest that the factor of
2-3 larger scatter in the peak B-V colors that is seen in the high-z Type Ia
supernova sample relative to the low-z supernovae might be partially due to the
dust that we detect in the hosts.Comment: 22 pages, 4 figures, 4 tables; ApJ 635, Dec 20, 2005 issu
Lyman Break Galaxies Under a Microscope: The Small Scale Dynamics and Mass of an Arc in the Cluster 1E0657-56
Using the near-infrared integral-field spectrograph SPIFFI on the VLT, we
have studied the spatially-resolved dynamics in the z=3.2 strongly lensed
galaxy 1E0657-56 ``arc+core''. The lensing configuration suggests that the high
surface brightness ``core'' is the M=20 magnified central 1 kpc of the galaxy
(seen at a spatial resolution of about 200 pc in the source plane), whereas the
fainter ``arc'' is a more strongly magnified peripheral region of the same
galaxy at about a half-light radius, which otherwise appears to be a typical
z=3 Lyman break galaxy.
The overall shape of the position-velocity diagram resembles the ``rotation
curves'' of the inner few kpcs of nearby L* spiral galaxies. The projected
velocities rise rapidly to 75 km/s within the core. This implies a dynamical
mass of M_dyn = 10^9.3 M_sun within the central kpc, and suggests that in this
system the equivalent of the mass of a present-day L* bulge at the same radius
was already in place by z>=3. Approximating the circular velocity of the halo
by the measured asymptotic velocity of the rotation curve, we estimate a dark
matter halo mass of M_halo = 10^11.7 +/- 0.3, in good agreement with
large-scale clustering studies of Lyman break galaxies. The baryonic collapse
fraction is low compared to actively star-forming ``BX'' and low-redshift
galaxies around z=2, perhaps implying comparatively less gas infall to small
radii or efficient feedback. Even more speculatively, the high central mass
density might indicate highly dissipative gas collapse in very early stages of
galaxy evolution, in approximate agreement with what is expected for
``inside-out'' galaxy formation models.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa
Conversion of diarylchalcones into 4,5-dihydropyrazole-1-carbothioamides: molecular and supramolecular structures of two precursors and three products
HSY thanks the University Grants Commission, New Delhi for the award of a BSR Faculty Fellowship for three years.Chalcones of type 4-XC6H4C(O)CH=CHC6H4(OCH2CCH)-4, where X = Cl, Br or MeO, have been converted to the corresponding 4,5-dihydropyrazole-1-carbothioamides using a cyclocondensation reaction with thiosemicarbazide. The chalcones 1-(4-chlorophenyl)-3-[4-(prop-2-ynyloxy)phenyl]prop-2-en-1-one, C18H13ClO2, (I), and 1-(4-bromophenyl)-3-[4-(prop-2-ynyloxy)phenyl]prop-2-en-1-one, C18H13BrO2, (II), are isomorphous, and their molecules are linked into sheets by two independent C—Hπ(arene) interactions, both involving the same aryl ring with one C—H donor approaching each face. In each of the products (RS)-3-(4-chlorophenyl)-5-[4-(prop-2-ynyloxy)phenyl]-4,5-dihydropyrazole-1-carbothioamide, C19H16ClN3OS, (IV), (RS)-3-(4-bromophenyl)-5-[4-(prop-2-ynyloxy)phenyl]-4,5-dihydropyrazole-1-carbothioamide, C19H16BrN3OS, (V), and (RS)-3-(4-methoxyphenyl)-5-[4-(prop-2-ynyloxy)phenyl]-4,5-dihydropyrazole-1-carbothioamide, C20H19N3O2S, (VI), the reduced pyrazole ring adopts an envelope conformation with the C atom bearing the 4-prop-2-ynyloxy)phenyl substituent, which occupies the axial site, displaced from the plane of the four ring atoms. Compounds (IV) and (V) are isomorphous and their molecules are linked into chains of edge-fused rings by a combination of N—H···S and C—H···S hydrogen bonds. The molecules of (VI) are linked into sheets by a combination of N—H···S, N—H···N and C—H···π(arene) hydrogen bonds. Comparisons are made with the structures of some related compounds.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe
Evidences for Tsallis non-extensivity on CMR manganites
We found, from the analysis of vs. curves of some manganese oxides
(manganites), that these systems do not follow the traditional
Maxwell-Boltzmann statistics, but the Tsallis statistics, within the
\QTR{em}{normalized} formalism. Curves were calculated within the mean field
approximation, for various ferromagnetic samples and the results were compared
to measurements of our own and to various other authors published data, chosen
at random from the literature. The agreement between the experimental data and
calculated vs. curve, where is an effective
temperature, is excellent for all the compounds. The entropic parameter, ,
correlates in a simple way with the experimental value of , irrespect
the chemical composition of the compounds, heat treatment or other details on
sample preparation. Examples include (superextensivity),
(extensivity) and (subextensivity) cases.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figure
Central Structural Parameters of Early-Type Galaxies as Viewed with HST/NICMOS
We present surface photometry for the central regions of a sample of 33
early-type (E, S0, and S0/a) galaxies observed at 1.6 microns (H band) using
the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). We employ a new technique of two-dimensional
fitting to extract quantitative parameters for the bulge light distribution and
nuclear point sources, taking into consideration the effects of the
point-spread function. Parameterizing the bulge profile with a ``Nuker'' law,
we confirm that the central surface-brightness distributions largely fall into
two categories, each of which correlates with the global properties of the
galaxies. ``Core'' galaxies tend to be luminous ellipticals with boxy or pure
elliptical isophotes, whereas ``power-law'' galaxies are preferentially lower
luminosity systems with disky isophotes. Unlike most previous studies, however,
we do not find a clear gap in the distribution of inner cusp slopes; several
objects have inner cusp slopes (0.3 < gamma < 0.5) which straddle the regimes
conventionally defined for core and power-law type galaxies. The nature of
these intermediate objects is unclear. We draw attention to two objects in the
sample which appear to be promising cases of galaxies with isothermal cores
that are not the brightest members of a cluster. Unresolved nuclear point
sources are found in about 50% of the sample galaxies, roughly independent of
profile type, with magnitudes in the range m^{nuc}_H = 12.8 to 17.4 mag, which
correspond to M_H^{nuc} = -12.8 to -18.4 mag. (Abridged)Comment: To appear in The Astronomical Journal. Latex, 24 pages and 17 JPEG
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Calcium confusion--is the variability in calcium response by Sertoli cells to specific hormones meaningful or simply redundant?
When results of more than ten different studies on hormone-induced calcium
signals in Sertoli cells are taken together, a wide variety of responses
emerges. The reported changes range from increased concentrations, via no
response at all, to decreased calcium concentrations. Minor variations in
cell isolation techniques, culture conditions, or techniques for measuring
the intracellular calcium could explain some of these differences.
However, erratic variations in response are also observed within research
groups under very similar experimental conditions. Such 'negative'
findings are mainly reported orally and do not further penetrate the
scientific community. As hormone-dependent calcium responses evidently may
depend very much on the context of the cells, calcium transients would
appear to be unreliable bioassay principles with which to detect the
primary actions of FSH and effectors such as androgens on Sertoli cells. A
more important biological question is whether these sometimes opposed
calcium transients are connected with a particular cellular response. To
date there is no evidence for such a tight coupling in Sertoli cells,
implying that, at least under in vitro conditions, calcium signals might
even be redundant altogether. Such calcium variability is probably not
unique to Sertoli cells, and the aim of this commentary is to promote an
open debate that may help to transform the current state of 'calcium
confusion' into a better understanding of the intracellular calcium
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