RNA Association, RNA Interference, and microRNA Pathways in Dengue Fever Virus-Host Interaction

Dengue fever is a fatal vector transmitted disease and is one of the most significant health problems which have magnified its impact globally by afflicting 390 million people across 110 countries. The causative agent of this life-threatening disease is a positive single-stranded RNA arbovirus known as dengue virus (DENV), which uses Aedes aegypti mosquito as an intermediate host. It has been well demonstrated that virus evades mosquito’s RNA interference (RNAi)-mediated antiviral defense and manipulates host microRNA (miRNA) profile to its own benefit. However, the exact mechanisms are still not exclusively elucidated. The molecular mechanisms which characterize the role of novel DENV-encoded small RNAs and other viral proteins in host miRNA modulation and evasion of RNA interference are still elusive. Furthermore, the possibility of small activating RNAs-(RNAa)-mediated activation in mosquitoes in conjunction with dengue virus genes is not fully explored. This book chapter pragmatically overviews intricate interplay between virus-host interactions, how virus invades host antivirus defense mechanisms, and possibly the potential emerging therapeutic role of RNA activation (RNAa) and RNAi for the infections, which can be cured by specific gene activation and gene silencing, respectively

Clinical Characteristics and Cross Analysis of HIV and HCV Co-Infection in Faisalabad Region

About 150 and about 35 million human beings are infected with HCV (hepatitis C virus) as well as HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) respectively. The increasing stress of HIV/HCV coinfection is supposed to infect five to seven million individuals globally due to their coinciding approaches of procurement. Co-infection of HCV/HIV in patients caused them to suffer from more liver-associated mortality and anguish. This paper aims to investigate the spread rate of the HIV and HCV coinfection in District Faisalabad. In this paper, blood samples of patients are evaluated and tested for anti-HIV/HCV antibodies employing the ICT (immune chromatography technique) for HIV/HCV confections. The six out 30 confirmed patients (real-time PCR) for HIV infection who also have HCV infection were analyzed for additional provisional clinical examination. In these patients, the hemoglobin (17.38±0.159 per dL), ALT (77 uL-1) and Hematocrit (50.60±0.255%) levels increased significantly than standard reference values. On the body, these facts could be developed due to HIV/HCV co-infection burden. An inverse relation has been demonstrated by these coinfected patients in the levels of hemoglobin as well as in platelets. With the usages of better supplements/nutrients, the above differential values can be improved and ultimately beneficial for the survival of the infected individuals. The Current paper could be convenient for appropriate perpetuation of HIV/HCV co-infected patients under related treatment

Experimental and Numerical Investigation of Performance and Emissions in Compression Ignition Engines with Alternative Fuels.

PhDThe experimental investigation in this work concerns the compression-ignition (CI) engine combustion process both in normal operation and dual-fuel operation. There is a bulk of literature reporting thermal efficiencies, brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC) and emissions under single and dual fueling conditions in CI engines. Most of the studies lack the full implications of changing load (power output) and speed on these performance indicators. The studies are either restricted to various loads/powers at one engine speed (neglecting the effect of engine speed) or one or two load/power conditions at various speeds (neglecting load variations). There is a scarcity of full engine maps in the open literature (these are the full contours of thermal efficiency or BSFC plotted throughout the power versus speed range of the engine, or the torque versus speed range of the engine). This thesis provides performance and emissions maps for a CI engine using two different fuels (diesel and rapeseed methyl ester used as single fuels) and two gaseous fuels (natural gas and hydrogen) used with two different pilot fuels (diesel and rapeseed methyl ester ) under what is termed dual fueling mode. A novel approach is used to present the performance and emissions over the entire engines operational range. The results are presented as iso- contours of thermal efficiency, volumetric efficiency and brake specific NOX, specific HC and specific CO2 on a power-speed graph throughout the operating range of the engine. Many studies conclude that the emissions, particularly NOX during dual fueling are expected to form in the spatial region around the pilot spray. This region is expected to be subjected to high localised temperatures as the equivalence ratio is close to stoichiometric, thus maximising heat release from combustion. The effect of changing the pilot fuel quantity on performance and emissions is rarely reported. This study addresses this scarcity in the literature and investigates the effect of changing the pilot fuel quantity and type on various combustion and emission parameters. Diesel and rapeseed methyl ester (RME) have been used as pilot fuels for both the natural gas as well as hydrogen and three different pilot fuel settings have been employed for each of the gaseous fuels. The effect of using a different pilot fuel quantity to achieve the same brake mean effective pressure (BMEP) for the two gaseous fuels has been analysed and compared. This thesis also includes a chapter on the computational modeling of the engine esmissions. This study uses combinations of different spray and combustion models to predict in-cylinder pressure, rate of heat release and emissions. The approach employs two combustion models: Unsteady Flamelet Model (UFM) with PDF method and Finite Rate Chemistry (FRC) with stiff chemistry solver implemented through In-Situ Adaptive Tabulation (ISAT) algorithm. Two spray models used includeWAVE and Kelvin Helmohltz Rayleigh Taylor (KHRT) spray models. The UFM coupled with KHRT spray model has been used to predict NOX, CO and CO2 emissions. The model captures the emissions trends well. In-cylinder contours of O2, NO and mass average temperature have also been presented. A chemical mechanism of n-heptane with 29 species and 52 reactions has been used

Quantifying Urban Karachi’s Air Quality Effect on Human Health and Policy Recommendations

Today’s environmental issues are systematic in nature and cannot be tackled in isolation from man-made activities and impacts. The change in land use and land cover resulting from urbanization has aggravated air quality in urban centers of the country. One of the main sources of air pollution is the use of automobiles in human populated regions resulting in an excess of carbon, sulfur and nitrogen compounds. The emission of greenhouse gases in the form of carbon dioxide from 1990 to 2005 showed an increase of 97.4%. The main source of this increment were vehicular and industrial emissions due to which Pakistan is facing glacier melt in northern areas, earthquakes, flooding and lack of fresh water availability. The authors analyze the effects of vehicular emission on human health; this study is focused on the commercial and industrial areas of Karachi where the flow of heavy traffic and heavy vehicular exhaust emissions are common. The sampled areas are Port Qasim, University Road, Korangi and Mosmiyat. The purpose of this study is to evaluate perceptions of health factors due to air borne pollution in 4 different localities in Karachi. The results showed predominance of headache which is due to an excessive quantity of carbon monoxide and air borne dust in the survey areas as slight exposure of Carbon monoxide affiliated with headache, the second highest complain from respondents is the  Eye Irritation, the exposure of NO2 has acute health effects which include eye irritation, cough and asthma. Based on the above study, recommendations are made to reduce GHG and other pollutants

Effects of replacing soybean meal with corn gluten meal on milk production and nitrogen efficiency in Holstein cows

The objective of the current study was to determine the effects of partial replacement of soybean meal with corn gluten meal on lactation performance and nitrogen (N) efficiency in lactating Holstein dairy cows. Nine multiparous lactating cows in mid lactation (109 ± 19 days in milk) received three treatments in a 3 × 3 Latin square design for 21 days. The three treatments consisted of i) Ctrl: low protein diet with 15.2% crude protein (CP); ii) SBM: soybean meal-based diet with 18.4% CP; and iii) CGM: soybean meal partially replaced with corn gluten meal with 18.3% CP. Two pre-planned orthogonal contrasts were used to compare the treatments: i) Prot compared Ctrl and average of SBM and CGM to see the effect of increasing protein supplies; and ii) Rep compared SBM and CGM treatments. Increasing CP supplies did not affect dry matter intake, whereas it significantly increased milk protein and lactose yield by 3.6% and 3.3%, respectively. Increasing CP supplies decreased milk nitrogen efficiency (MNE) by 10.9%. The milk yield, milk component yield, milk composition and feed efficiency were similar in the SBM and CGM treatments. Similarly, no difference was observed on dry matter, N and net energy for lactation (NEL) intakes between SBM and CGM treatments. However, MNE significantly decreased by 4.8% in the CGM treatment compared with SBM. The results indicated that soybean meal could be partially replaced with corn gluten meal without negatively affecting productive performance.Keywords: Dairy cows, feed efficiency, nitrogen utilization, production performance, protein source

Novel one time signatures (NOTS) : a compact post-quantum digital signature scheme

The future of the hash based digital signature schemes appears to be very bright in the upcoming quantum era because of the quantum threats to the number theory based digital signature schemes. The Shor's algorithm is available to allow a sufficiently powerful quantum computer to break the building blocks of the number theory based signature schemes in a polynomial time. The hash based signature schemes being quite efficient and provably secure can fill in the gap effectively. However, a draw back of the hash based signature schemes is the larger key and signature sizes which can prove a barrier in their adoption by the space critical applications, like the blockchain. A hash based signature scheme is constructed using a one time signature (OTS) scheme. The underlying OTS scheme plays an important role in determining key and signature sizes of a hash based signature scheme. In this article, we have proposed a novel OTS scheme with minimized key and signature sizes as compared to all of the existing OTS schemes. Our proposed OTS scheme offers an 88% reduction in both key and signature sizes as compared to the popular Winternitz OTS scheme. Furthermore, our proposed OTS scheme offers an 84% and an 86% reductions in the signature and the key sizes respectively as compared to an existing compact variant of the WOTS scheme, i.e. WOTS +