Impact of ionic liquids on conformational changes of bovine serum albumin - a fourier transform infrared spectroscopic study

Ionic liquids (ILs) are low melting salts composed of an organic cation and an inorganic or organic anion. Ionic liquids are of interest for their wide range of applications and unique properties, such as the negligible vapor pressure of some types of ionic liquids, and the ability to modify ionic liquid properties by selection of the cation or anion. It has been hypothesized that over one million binary ionic liquids (meaning a single cation/anion pair) are possible. Due to the vast number of potential combinations, it should be possible to design ionic liquids specifically for an application of interest. Ionic liquids not only provide a novel and highly competent reaction medium, that is the solvent, but they also serve as efficient participants in a variety of chemical and biological reaction processes. However, there is a little understanding on how ionic liquids affect proteins. Here, we investigated the impact of different ionic liquids as a function of their alkyl chain length of the cationic moiety and concentrations on the conformational changes of the Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) protein. In this work, we focused on the alternation in the secondary structures of the model protein. Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy is used to examine the changes in the secondary structure of BSA on varying concentration of a particular ionic liquid from 0 M to 1.0 M. It is observed that on increasing the concentrations of particular ionic liquid, structured regions are transformed to unstructured regions and thereby, assisting protein unfolding. Similarly, a gradual disruption of the native structure of BSA is observed with increase in the alkyl chain length of ionic liquids

Role of Economic Development and Governance in Mitigating Insurgency: A Case Study of Tripura, India

The purpose of this paper is two folds: firstly, to analyze the short run and long run relationship between insurgency on the one hand and economic development and governance on the other and secondly, to determine the direction of causality between these three variables in Tripura, one of the conflict-ridden states in India during 1980-2005. With the application of auto-regressive distributed lag model (ARDL), an inverse relationship has been established which formalises the descriptive notions about the cointegration between insurgency on the one hand and economic development and governance on the other in the long run. No short run relationship was established between them. Going one step ahead, an endeavour has been made to capture both the economic development and governance as diagnostics for peace in our model. The study suggests that economic development brings down insurgency faster than that of governance. However, improvement in governance is more certain to scale down insurgency. Furthermore, the application of Granger Causality test suggests that there exists bidirectional causality between insurgency, economic development and governance taking 6 lag and onwards

Large amplitude double layers in a four component dusty plasma with non-thermal ions

Dust acoustic double layers are studied in a four component dusty plasma. Positively and negatively charged mobile dust and Boltzmann distributed electrons are considered. The ion distribution is taken as nonthermal. The existence of compressive and rarefractive double layers is studied by pseudopotential approach. The effect of non-thermal ions on small amplitude and arbitrary amplitude double layers are also studied.Large amplitude double layers in a four component dusty plasma with non-thermal ions Gurudas Mandal1, Kaushik Roy2 and Prasanta Chatterjee2* 1Department of APCE, East West University, Mohakhali, Dhaka Bangladesh 2Department of Mathematics, Siksha Bhavana, Visva Bharati, Santiniketan-731 235, West Bengal, India E-mail : [email protected] of APCE, East West University, Mohakhali, Dhaka Bangladesh 2Department of Mathematics, Siksha Bhavana, Visva Bharati, Santiniketan-731 235, West Bengal, Indi

Learning Pharmacology by metaphors: a tale of NSAIDs

Metaphors are increasingly used for learning in medical education.1,2 Learning can be facilitated by giving homologous/analogous examples and story-telling.3-5 The undergraduate students are involved, and learning becomes enjoyable and stress-free. Here is a conversation between two NSAIDs while travelling in anthropomorphic forms (human beings) and discussing the detailed pharmacology and therapeutics of NSAIDs

A comparative evaluation of structured and unstructured forms of viva voce for internal assessment of undergraduate students in Pharmacology

Background: The study was designed to identify value of structured viva (SV) as an assessment tool, to ascertain its correlation with unstructured viva (UV) and to find relationship between viva and theory examination results.Methods: This prospective and observational study was conducted on a total of 135 students of the 2nd professional MBBS. All students faced two viva sessions (SV and UV), each of 10 marks on same topics in general pharmacology and autonomic nervous system. Time limit per student was 10 minutes. SV was conducted on pre-validated, standardized cards (n=40) with 5 questions in each card and 0.5 marks of each question. By draw of lots to be performed by students themselves, each student was given 4 cards. One week prior to the viva, the theory examination of 40 marks on same topics was conducted.Results: The mean marks of all students in SV (3.46±1.44) were significantly lower (P <0.0001) than those of UV (4.61±2.02). There was significant less deviation of mean marks in all groups of SV (P <0.05). The mean percentage marks of SV (34.63±14.37%) had similarities with results of theory examination (34.67±10.49%) (P=0.9720), while the difference between mean percentage marks of UV (46.15±20.19%) and theory was statistically highly significant (P <0.0001).Conclusions: SV increases objectivity and reduces subjectivity as compared to UV because of similar pattern of questions, difficulty levels and standardised scoring system. SV provides an opportunity to measure how well students can apply knowledge. Thus, SV can be used for formative and summative assessment

Effect of Ethnophysics - Based Instruction on Students’ Academic Performance and Attitude Towards Density, Forces and Heat Transfer in College Physics: A Case of Mufulira College of Education

This study investigated the effect of Ethnophysics – Based Instruction on students’ academic performance and attitude towards Density, Forces and Heat Transfer at Mufulira College of Education, Mufulira District, Copperbelt Province of Zambia. The study employed a quasi -experimental: pre-test – post-test control group design on 156 purposively sampled students. The research questions were answered using descriptive statistics. The hypotheses on both academic performance and attitude were tested using two sample t-test statistic, at 0.05 level of significance. The study found that the experimental group performed better than the control group t (154) = 6.06; p &lt; 0.05. It also found that Ethnophysics – Based Instruction which was used to teach the experimental group enhanced the attitude better than the conventional method which was used to teach the control group t (154) = 7.49; p &lt; 0.05. Lastly the study revealed that Ethnophysics – Based Instruction is a gender friendly teaching approach when teaching Density, Forces and Heat Transfer to students t (69) = - 0.68; p &gt; 0.05. The study concludes that this instructional approach is a viable innovation for the enhancement of students’ academic performance and attitude towards the mentioned three topics and that it is not gender biased. The study recommends that lecturers should use Ethnophysics - Based-Instructions in their teaching. Physics courses in pre-service teacher training should be taught using Ethnophysics - Based Instruction. At the in-service level, seminars and workshops should be organized to educate practicing lecturers on how to use Ethnophysics - Based Instruction in teaching. Keywords: ethnophysics, attitude, home practices, ethnophysics – based instruction DOI: 10.7176/JEP/10-20-03 Publication date:July 31st 201

Students’ feedback on exclusive 6-months online teaching during COVID-19 lockdown: a cross-sectional survey

The corona virus pandemic has disrupted the human activities all across the globe and teaching-learning activity is no exception. In India, the nation-wide lockdown was announced in late March, and since then the main mode of undergraduate (UG) medical teaching has been through online classes. This is an unprecedented situation, both for medical teachers and students. Our institute initiated online classes for UG students from as early as mid-March, 2020. It has been more than 6 months of exclusive online teaching now and it was imperative to get overall feedback from students regarding its impact on their learning. It would provide useful inputs regarding utility, efficacy and opportunities to improvise further

Prevalence of nomophobia and factors associated with it: a cross-sectional study

Background: Excessive use of mobile phones, including smart phones, is found to result in various health related, social and psychological problems. Nomophobia expands to ‘No Mobile Phobia’, i.e., fear of being out of mobile phone contact. Previous studies on nomophobia have focused on the student populations, since the younger generation is more technology savvy. This questionnaire-based study aimed to know the prevalence and factors leading to nomophobia in general population.Methods: This study was conducted in western Gujarat from September 2018 to October 2018. A prevalidated questionnaire, containing three parts, the demographic details, details about the characteristics of mobile phone use and the Nomophobia Questionnaire (NMP-Q), was sent through emails and WhatsApp to 1000 individuals. The responses were tabulated and analyzed.Results: Out of 331 respondents 192 (58%) were males and 139 (42%) females. There was no significant difference in average NMP scores with respect to gender (p = 0.401), age brackets (p = 0.135), marital status (p = 0.123) and profession (p = 0.055). However, NMP scores were significantly more in individuals who spent more time on mobile phones per day (p = 0.000), checked their mobile phones more frequently (p<0.000) and in whom phantom ringing syndrome was also present (p<0.000). 241 respondents (72.80%) felt that their mobile phone use was consuming time and affecting their other daily activities.Conclusions: Nomophobia is an emerging health related adverse effect of prolonged mobile phone use. Interventions are required to promote judicious use of mobile phones

Students’ feedback on the foundation course in competency based medical education curriculum

The Medical Council of India (MCI) has formulated a new Competency Based Medical Education (CBME) Curriculum for the Indian Medical Graduates with an objective of making medical education outcome based. A one month long Foundation Course (FC) is a hallmark of this CBME which is implemented during the first month of first professional MBBS studies. The objective is to acquaint, allay apprehension and prepare freshers for further studies using andragogical and heutagogical approaches. The MCI also released the guidelines for the medical colleges for uniform conduct of FC across the country. The FC was divided into six modules, i.e. Orientation Module, Skills Module, Community orientation module, Professional Development and Ethics Module (P and E), Enhancement of Language and Computer Skills Module, and Sports and extracurricular activities. A total of 175 hours were allotted to these modules. Like every institute, our institute also developed the implementation program and time-table of FC using MCI guidelines and taking into account the available resources.  The FC at our institute was conducted from 1st August 2019 to 31st August 2019 and was meticulously planned and implemented. The effective implementation  required committed efforts of 30 faculty members (12 Professors, 11 Associate Professors and 7 Assistant Professors), two language and one fine arts teacher,  and 4 non-teaching members  (Librarian, IT-personnel, Coach for sports and motivational Guru). The students were trained to write reflections daily in their log - books which are being analysed further.