Studying Morphological, Physiological, and Molecular Regulation of Stomatal Conductance and Its Relationship to Water Use Efficiency in Alfalfa

Alfalfa (Medicago sativa), being a leguminous, highly fibrous, and proteinaceous plant has always been one of the top choices for the forage production but has high cost of irrigation in many dry and warm areas such as California and Arizona. Thus, a reduction of irrigation by using the higher water use efficiency (WUE) varieties can help the growers in reducing the cost and is critical for sustainable agriculture production. WUE is closely related to water loss through transpiring stomata. A study in our lab reported that Riverside (RS) an alfalfa genotype that has naturized in the national grassland in South Dakota, showed a higher WUE, compared to various commercial varieties and collections. Further studies in the lab revealed that RS showed a greater stomatal sensitivity to ABA in closure. In this study we examined if the stomatal density in different genotypes could play a role in the WUE of the plant by having impact on stomatal conductance. Alfalfa exhibits high density of stomata on adaxial surfaces. We found that variations in stomatal densities among genotypes exist, but stomatal density did not show correlation with the stomatal conductance, a contributing factor to WUE, emphasizing on the importance of stomatal sensitivity to ABA for higher WUE. One of the families of ABA receptors, Pyrobactin resistant like (PYL) in Arabidopsis is found to play essential role in drought conditions. We hypothesized that homologs of PYL in alfalfa could be involved in regulating stomatal conductance and hence play an essential role in WUE of the plants. The current study involved identifying the PYL-like gene family in alfalfa and analyzing the change in gene expression levels during water stress conditions. The 15 identified MsPYL proteins showed conserved domains and ABA receptor properties with START-like sequences. We demonstrated that MsPYL9 gene shows upregulation in RS genotype while showing no change in AF, genotype with lower WUE. This suggests that possibly, MsPYL9 could be related with higher WUE of RS. For this study we used two germplasms of alfalfa, but an understanding of candidate genes correlated with better WUE will bring new insights and potentially help improving alfalfa production in dry areas

Bimodal protection of DNA by Mycobacterium smegmatis DNA-binding protein from stationary phase cells

Some members of the DNA-binding protein from stationary phase cells (Dps) family of proteins have been shown to play an important role in protecting microorganisms from oxidative or nutritional stress. Dps homologs have been identified in various bacteria such as Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis, and Listeria innocua. Recently we have reported the presence of a Dps homolog, Ms-Dps, in Mycobacterium smegmatis. Ms-Dps was found to have a nonspecific DNA binding ability. Here we have detected two stable oligomeric forms of Ms-Dpsin vitro, a trimeric and a dodecameric form. Interestingly, the conversion of Dps from a trimeric to a dodecameric form takes place upon incubation at 37° C for 12 h. These two oligomeric forms differ in their DNA binding properties. The dodecameric form is capable of DNA binding and forming large crystalline arrays with DNA, whereas the trimeric form cannot do so. However, even in the absence of DNA binding, the trimeric form has the capacity to protect the DNA against Fenton's-mediated damage. The protection is afforded by the ferroxidase activity of the trimer. However, the trimeric form cannot protect DNA from DNaseI attack, for which a direct physical shielding of DNA by the dodecamer is required. Thus we suggest that Ms-Dps provides a bimodal protection of DNA by its two different oligomeric forms

Impact of cataract surgery in quality of life of patients

Background: Loss of vision invariably leads to loss of quality of life (QOL), which represents the general well-being of individuals and societies. Researchers have tended to indicate that visual acuity (VA) alone is an inadequate measure of visual impairment. Studies on QOL after cataract surgery are scarce in this part of India and there our present study holds potential to be really useful.Methods: This study was a prospective study consisting of 300 patients aged 50 years and above, who were operated for cataract in the Department of ophthalmology, GMC Jammu from May 2017-February 2018, a period of 10 months. Visual acuity was measured by logMaR method and generic health related quality of life (HRQoL) was measured using EuroQol (EQ-5D).Results: Only 182 turned up for the follow up after six months, mainly belonging to the age group: 60 to 70. 66.48% of the people studied upon belong to the lower strata of the society. Substantial improvement in visual acuity was observed with only 3.84% of patients showing less than 6/60 visual acuity during follow up after 6 months. All domains related to the generic health related QOL showed improvement. There was clear and marked improvement for performance of usual activities by the patients after surgery.Conclusions: In conclusion this study has provided valuable information about the change in vision related quality of life after cataract surgery there is statistically significant improvement in QOL of all patients enrolled in our study after the cataract surgery

Statistical Feature based Blind Classifier for JPEG Image Splice Detection

Digital imaging, image forgery and its forensics have become an established field of research now days. Digital imaging is used to enhance and restore images to make them more meaningful while image forgery is done to produce fake facts by tampering images. Digital forensics is then required to examine the questioned images and classify them as authentic or tampered. This paper aims to design and implement a blind classifier to classify original and spliced Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) images. Classifier is based on statistical features obtained by exploiting image compression artifacts which are extracted as Blocking Artifact Characteristics Matrix. The experimental results have shown that the proposed classifier outperforms the existing one. It gives improved performance in terms of accuracy and area under curve while classifying images. It supports .bmp and .tiff file formats and is fairly robust to noise

Evaluation of axial length measurements obtained using three different techniques- applanation A-scan, immersion A-scan and optical biometer

Background: To compare measurements of axial length obtained with manual A-scan, immersion A-scan and optical biometer and assess the accuracy of different techniques of intraocular lens power calculation. Methods: This was a prospective randomized study done in 90 patients over a period extending from November 2019 to October 2020 in the upgraded department of ophthalmology, Government Medical College Jammu. Intraocular lens power was calculated by measuring axial length by three different techniques and further the accuracy of the axial length values obtained were compared. Results: In this study, mean axial length measured by applanation A-scan was 22.86±0.85 mm which ranged from 20.99-24.6 mm and axial length measured by immersion technique ranged from 21.5-24.9 mm with a mean AL of 22.92±0.85 mm. AL measured by non-contact method ranged from 20-25.08 mm with a mean AL of 23.1±0.93 mm. There was a statistically significant difference between all the three techniques regarding the measured AL (p=0.0004). Conclusions: This study concludes that the optical biometry has greater accuracy than ultrasound biometry including applanation and immersion A-scan

Controlling Techniques for STATCOM using Artificial Intelligence

The static synchronous compensator (STATCOM) is a power electronic converter designed to be shunt-connected with the grid to compensate for reactive power. Although they were originally proposed to increase the stability margin and transmission capability of electrical power systems, there are many papers where these compensators are connected to distribution networks for voltage control and power factor compensation. In these applications, they are commonly called distribution static synchronous compensator (DSTATCOM). In this paper we have focussed on STATCOM and the controlling techniques which are based on artificial intelligence

Effect of elective cerclage versus rescue cerclage in pregnancy and its pregnancy outcome

Prolongation of the pregnancy in cases of incompetence of cervix or short cervix can be done by prompt diagnosis at the correct time with a decision on encirclage taken at the right time. An observational retrospective study conducted over a period of 6 months in a tertiary care centre enrolling 14 pregnant women who had various risk factors like multiple gestation, short cervix, cervical incompetence, bad obstetric history, anomalous uterus, in vitro fertilization technique, history of primary infertility ,recurrent abortions and mid-trimester losses or preterm delivery, and the results were interpreted with various tables and charts showing the benefits of elective versus emergency encirclage. Through the study, it was found that there wasn't any significant difference in the incidence of a patient who underwent cervical encirclage whether the patient had a prior antenatal registration or not. 71% of the patients enrolled for encirclage were primigravida and the most common gestation age was between 12-24 weeks. The most common age group was 21-30 years of age. Cervical incompetence and short cervix were the most important risk factor needed for cervical cerclage. Most of the patients delivered at around 34-37 weeks of gestation. 21.4% patient underwent rescue cerclage and delivered between 34-37 weeks of gestation. 57.14% underwent elective cerclage and delivered near term. Elective cerclage has a better outcome of pregnancy to reach near term than rescue cerclage.

Specialty Dentistry for the God’s Forgotten Child

Hemophilia constitute an assemblage of hereditary disorders caused due to the deficiency of one or more clotting factors leading to sustained clotting time and excessive bleeding tendency that may be ill-fated. Anticipation of bleeding during dental regimen by both patient and dental surgeon has been the elementary logic for curtailment of dutiful dental care for hemophiliacs. The apparent complexities in diagnosis and handling of a bleeding dilemma drives us to bypass suchpatients in clinical practice. This article presents a systematic approach to successful endodontic management in a patient with severe hemophilia A

Role of FNAC in the diagnosis of intraosseous jaw lesions

Background: FNAC of intraosseous jaw lesions has not been widely utilized for diagnosis due to rarity and diversity of these lesions, limited experience and lack of well established cytological features. Aim of the study was to determine the role of FNAC in the diagnosis of intraosseous jaw swellings. Material and Methods: 42 patients underwent FNAC over a period of 7 years (2007-2013), of which 37 (88.1%) aspirates were diagnostic. Histopathology correlation was available in 33 cases and diagnostic accuracy of FNAC was calculated. Results: Lesions were categorized into inflammatory 3, cysts/hamartomas 15 and neoplasms 19. Mandibular and maxillary involvement was seen in 21 and 16 patients respectively. Of these, benign cysts and malignant lesions were commonest, accounting for 27% lesions (10 cases) each. One case of cystic ameloblastoma was misdiagnosed as odontogenic cyst on cytology. Overall, sensitivity and specificity of FNAC were 94.7% and 100% respectively with a diagnostic accuracy of 97.3%. Definitive categorization of giant cell lesions, fibro-osseous lesions, odontogenic tumors and cystic lesions was not feasible on FNAC. Conclusions: FNAC is a simple, safe and minimally invasive first line investigation which can render an accurate preoperative diagnosis of intraosseous jaw lesions, especially the malignant ones in the light of clinic-radiological correlation

QC-SANE: Robust Control in DRL using Quantile Critic with Spiking Actor and Normalized Ensemble

Recently Introduced Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) Techniques in Discrete-Time Have Resulted in Significant Advances in Online Games, Robotics, and So On. Inspired from Recent Developments, We Have Proposed an Approach Referred to as Quantile Critic with Spiking Actor and Normalized Ensemble (QC-SANE) for Continuous Control Problems, Which Uses Quantile Loss to Train Critic and a Spiking Neural Network (NN) to Train an Ensemble of Actors. the NN Does an Internal Normalization using a Scaled Exponential Linear Unit (SELU) Activation Function and Ensures Robustness. the Empirical Study on Multijoint Dynamics with Contact (MuJoCo)-Based Environments Shows Improved Training and Test Results Than the State-Of-The-Art Approach: Population Coded Spiking Actor Network (PopSAN)