How might India's public health systems be strengthened ?

The central government’s policies, though well-intentioned, have inadvertently de-emphasized environmental health and other preventive public health services in India since the 1950s, when it was decided to amalgamate the medical and public health services and to focus public health services largely on single-issue programs. This paper discusses how successive policy decisions have diminished the Health Ministry’s capacity for stewardship of the nation’s public health. These decisions have introduced policies and fiscal incentives that have inadvertently enabled states to prioritize medical services and single-issue programs over broader public health services, and diminished the capacity of the public health workforce to deliver public health services. Diseases resulting from poor environmental health conditions continue to impose high costs even among the more affluent, and hinder development. There are many approaches to strengthening the public health system, and the authors suggest one that may require relatively little modification of existing structures and systems. They suggest establishing a focal point in the Health Ministry for public health stewardship, and re-vitalizing the states’ public health managerial cadres as well as the grassroots public health workers. The central government could consider linking its fiscal support to states with phased progress in four areas: (1) the enactment of state Public Health Acts; (2) the establishment by states of separate public health directorates; (3) the re-vitalization of grassroots public health workers; and (4) health department engagement in ensuring municipal public health. The central focal point could provide the needed support, oversight, incentives, and sanctions to ensure that states build robust public health systems. These measures can do much to help governments use public funds more effectively for protecting people’s health.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Health Systems Development&Reform,Population Policies,Disease Control&Prevention,Health Economics&Finance

Evaluation of Soya Bio-Diesel as a Gas Turbine Fuel

In the recent past, the crude oil prices have increased immensely as the fossil fuels are depleting, biodiesel has emerged as an alternative fuel for the petroleum. In this context the use of bio-diesel in the gas turbine seems a solution for power generation problems and their environmental concerns. Vegetable oils, due to their agricultural origin, are able to reduce net carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere. However, there are several operational and durability problems which may arise in using straight vegetable oils, which are because of their higher viscosity and low volatility compared to mineral diesel fuel. Bio-fuels, an alternative fuels are having environmental benefit as; they are made from renewable sources. It can be blended in any proportion with mineral Diesel. Many performance and emission tests are being carried out in reciprocating diesel engines that use bio fuel but there are very few tests has been done on gas turbine engines. The gas turbine combustion is steady flame combustion. This feature creates the wide range for the different alternative fuels for clean combustion in the gas turbine, such as natural gas, petroleum distillates, pyrolysis wood gas, biogas of methanisation, bio-diesel etc. The present work is an analysis of the Soya bio-diesel productionprocess i.e. trans-esterification, the different parameters affecting on trans-esterification. The different physical and chemical properties of this bio-diesel and diesel has been determined and compared to establish the suitability of the bio-diesel in the gas turbine. An analysis on High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) has been done to find out the composition of the different fatty acid esters. The effect of these fatty acids onthe property of the bio-diesel has also been explained such as viscosity, heat of combustion, cetane No, cold flow properties, lubricity and oxidative stability etc. This will also help us to select best suited bio-diesel for the gas turbine

Frequency-dependent (ac) Conduction in Disordered Composites: a Percolative Study

In a recent paper [Phys. Rev. B{\bf57}, 3375 (1998)], we examined in detail the nonlinear (electrical) dc response of a random resistor cum tunneling bond network ($RRTN$, introduced by us elsewhere to explain nonlinear response of metal-insulator type mixtures). In this work which is a sequel to that paper, we consider the ac response of the $RRTN$-based correlated $RC$ ($CRC$) model. Numerical solutions of the Kirchoff's laws for the $CRC$ model give a power-law exponent (= 0.7 near $p = p_c$) of the modulus of the complex ac conductance at moderately low frequencies, in conformity with experiments on various types of disordered systems. But, at very low frequencies, it gives a simple quadratic or linear dependence on the frequency depending upon whether the system is percolating or not. We do also discuss the effective medium approximation ($EMA$) of our $CRC$ and the traditional random $RC$ network model, and discuss their comparative successes and shortcomings.Comment: Revised and reduced version with 17 LaTeX pages plus 8 JPEG figure

Asymmetric vibration of polar orthotropic annular circular plates of quadratically varying thickness with same boundary conditions

In the present paper, asymmetric vibration of polar orthotropic annular circular plates of quadratically varying thickness resting on Winkler elastic foundation is studied by using boundary characteristic orthonormal polynomials in Rayleigh-Ritz method. Convergence of the results is tested and comparison is made with results already available in the existing literature. Numerical results for the first ten frequencies for various values of parameters describing width of annular plate, thickness profile, material orthotropy and foundation constant for all three possible combinations of clamped, simply supported and free edge conditions are shown and discussed. It is found that (a) higher elastic property in circumferential direction leads to higher stiffness against lateral vibration; (b) Lateral vibration characteristics of F-F plates is more sensitive towards parametric changes in material orthotropy and foundation stiffness thanC-C and S-S plates; (c) Effect of quadratical thickness variation on fundamental frequency is more significant in cases of C-C and S-S plates than that of F-F plates. Thickness profile which is convex relative to plate center-line tends to result in higher stiffness of annular plates against lateral vibration than the one which is concave and (d) Fundamental mode of vibration of C-C and S-S plates is axisymmetrical while that of F-F plates is asymmetrical

Contamination of Asian herbal drugs : Need for its critical evaluation

Herbal drugs have been used as remedies for the treatment of large number of humans, ailments since ancient times as the traditional medicine system; India has a glorious past, having first documented record of fully developed medical science known as Ayurveda written by several ancient Rishi’s. Major groups of indigenous system of medicine are based on herbal drugs. A survey made by WHO indicated that about 80% of the world population relies on herbal drugs. Herbal drugs are becoming more popularized and important even in the developednations with hope of their non-toxicity and may play a role of substitute to overcome the problems of multi drug resistant pathogens. Cultivation of drug plants has been started in large scale without considering the land quality and in certain cases irrigation with waste water. Application of different fungicides, pesticides in that specific field or in neighboring fields may be directly deposited superficially or may be absorbed by the plant system. Therefore in the present situation possibilities of the Asian herbal drugs, contaminated with large number of toxic components cannot be ignored which may severely hurt human life in place of healing or curing.These contaminants may be either alone or in combination and may be originated intrinsically, extrinsically and deliberately. Certain contaminants may be highly toxic and may cause severe adverse effect in the human system. Some of the important contaminants are the heavy metals like lead, arsenic, cadmium, mercury, copper and pesticides. Adulteration of modern drugs to enhance drug potency and heterogenous microbial population including human pathogens may contaminate both raw and powdered herbal drugs. Among these contaminants, microbial contamination seems more severe and may be due to their dual action on the drug i.e. utilization of medicinally important chemical components as nutrients and in certain cases by producing certain mycotoxins, which may be even carcinogenic under certain conditions . Critical evaluation of both raw and powdered herbal drugs for contaminants is the urgent need of the time in order to provide safety measures in herbal health care medicine

Retrofitting of a 420 kV draw-lead type bushing with a draw-rod type – Part I

On observation of deterioration of tan-δ value to 1.08 %, i.e., surpassing the limiting value of 0.7 % as defined in IEC60137 for the 420 kV OIP bushing for a 315 MVA, 400 / 220 / 33 kV transformer located at substation Katni (India), a decision was made to replace the bushing. The replacement was risky, and it was a threat of causing the catastrophic failure for the transformer itself and the colossal loss to the neighbouring equipment and structures

A scientometric research of high-cited publications in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorders during 2012-2021

Objective. To examine the bibliometric characteristics of high-cited publications (HCPs) on Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD). Design/Methodology/Approach. The Scopus database was searched to identify HCPs on OCD published from 2002 to 2021. Three-hundred and ninety-five (n=395) articles having at least 100 citations were included in the analysis. Quantitative and qualitative indicators were applied to measure and evaluate the research productivity and citation impact of authors from the most productive countries, organizations, and authors. The VOSviewer was used to visualize the collaborative interaction among the most productive countries, organizations, authors, and keywords. Results/Discussion. The 395 HCPs published on OCD during 2012-2021 were cited 75197 times. The authors from the United States (n = 216), United Kingdom (n = 59), Netherlands (n =37), and Canada (n=30) were the most productive. Clinical studies accounted for the largest publications share among publication types, followed by studies focusing on treatment, epidemiology, genetics, risk factors, pathophysiology, and complications. Among important keywords besides OCD, other most common keywords were anxiety (n=89), Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (n=87), Clomipramine (n=68), Fluoxetine (n=65), and Behavioural Therapy (n=53). The topmost productive organizations were the Harvard Medical School, USA (n=37), Massachusetts General Hospital, USA (n=36), Columbus University, USA (n-28), and New York State Psychiatric Institute, USA (n=27). The most productive authors were D. Mataix-Cols (Sweden)(n=21), followed by B.D. Greenberg (USA)(n=18), S.L. Rauch (USA)(n=17) and D.J. Stein (South Africa)(n=17). These 395 HCPs were published in 135 journals, with The American Journal of Psychiatry publishing many papers. Papers published in Neuroscience and Bio-Behavioral Reviews had the highest number of citations per paper (n=509.0). Conclusion. The present study suggests that most HCPs have emerged from the United States, are based on funded research, and have involved authors from more than one country. Originality/Value. This study presents significant results, in a more comprehensive manner, related to the high-cited publications (HCPs) on Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

Impact of endomycorrhizal fungi and other bioinoculants on growth enhancement of Glycine max (L.) Merrill

In the present investigation, the contributions of two indigenous arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (Glomus mosseae and Acaulospora laevis), along with Trichoderma viride and Bradyrhizobium japonicum on growth parameters of Soybean, Glycine max (L.) Merrill were investigated. The results obtained indicated the dependence of soybean on mycorrhizal symbiosis. The different growth parameters increased significantly after 120 days of inoculation in comparison to control. Among all the growth parameters studied, plant height (162±3.34), fresh shoot weight (31.26±1.45), dry shoot weight (3.52±0.05), fresh root weight (4.07±0.56), dry root weight (1.03±0.03), root length (49.0±4.47) and leaf area (32.58±1.70) were highest in the combination of G. mosseae + A. laevis + T. viride + B. japonicum but arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) spore number (95.2±3.19) and percent mycorrhizal root colonization (93.26±3.96) were maximum in single inoculation of G. mosseae. Second most effective results were observed in the plants treated with G. mosseae alone. Thus the presence of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and other bioinoculants in rhizosphere of soybean had positive effect on the different growth parameters

A review on scientific technologies in practice to innovate plant based molecules and to improve herbal drug quality to overcome health problems

Medicines obtained from drug plants and other sources are commonly called traditional medicines. They have played an important role in the treatment of several human diseases since ancient times. India possessed a great wealth of traditional health care system known as Ayurveda related to the use of plant species. The global market of herbal drugs has a great potential around the world. Demand of plant based medicines is also increasing among western countries because of a general consideration that most allopathic drugs are associated with more or less side effects. Many pharmaceutical companies are now manufacturing Ayurvedic phytopharmaceutical products. However, enough efforts have not been made to get suitable substitute of modern allopathic medicines from these traditionally used drug plants and herbal drugs. This traditional system of healthcare in India still needs extensive evidence-based scientific researches in promoting its therapies. This review paper deals with modern scientific approaches to find out new plant based molecules and to develop new technologies in a continuous process and should be applied in the practice to improve the quality of herbal drugs in Indian pharmaceutical industries. Critical assessment of quality assurance including researches on pharmacognosy, chemistry, pharmacology, antimicrobial activity and clinical studies carried out on various Ayurvedic medicinal plants are also being presented