Role of a health visitor for TB patients in the community

TB is a major public health problem in India. It kills more adults in India than any other infectious disease. Every day more than 20,000 people become infected, 5,000 people developed diseases 40% of the adults are infected with the TB bacillus. Nearly 5 lakh persons die each year. 1000 people a day - one every minute - die of TB in our country. The goal of the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) is to cure at least 85% of new sputum smear positive patients detected, and to detect at least 70% of all such patients from the community but only after the desired cure rate has been achieved

Electrochemical behaviour of prussian blue deposits in presence of some non-aqueous background solutions

'J;he redox surface film of Prussian Blue (PR) is studied for its electrochemical properties in contact with I non-aqueous solutions in acetonitrile (ACN), dimethyl formamide (DMF) and dimethyl sulphoxide i (DMSO). The Cyclic VoItammetric (CV) results are quite interesting as they tend to be irreversible in contrast to the behaviour in aqueous medium. Surface coverage from CV data showed an increase in the order of H20> ACN > DMF > DMSO. A similar trend is reflected in the facile intercalationldeintercalation proceSSl::S of hydrated and solvated potassium ion computed from double potentia) step chronoamperometric studies. Diffusion coefficients and heterogeneous electron transfer rate constants are elucidated by processing I-t transients

Full Information Estimations of a System of Simultaneous Equations with Error Component Structure

In this paper we develop full information methods for estimating the parameters of a system of simultaneous equations with error component structure and establish relationships between the various structural estimator

Isolation and Partial Characterization of a Biosurfactant Produced by Pseudomonas Aeruginosa PAVIJ from Contaminated Soil

Biosurfactant compounds are produced by microorganisms. These isolates reduced surface tension both in aqueous solutions and hydrocarbon mixtures. The objective of this study was to isolate and characterize the surface active components from the crude biosurfactant produced by Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAVIJ from contaminated soil. This organism was grown on four different carbon sources (palm oil, coconut oil, honge oil and castor oil). To confirm the ability of isolates in biosurfactant production, different screening methods including blood hemolysis, emulsification, bacterial adherence test for hydrocarbon (BATH) assay, determination of surface tension, drop-collapse, cetyl tri ammonium bromide (CTAB) and methylene blue reduction assay were assessed. The fraction rich in glycolipids was obtained by the fractionation of crude biosurfactant using solid phase extraction and further indentified using thin layer chromatography and confirmed through High performance liquid chromatography. Moreover, this glycolipid rich fractions was found to be antimicrobial agent against several bacterial strains isolated from clinical samples of infected patients. Further purification steps should be carefully analyzed as each purification step will increase the costs and decreases the amounts of biosurfactants recovered

Effect of sUV-B on Essential Oil from Aerial and Sub-Aerial Parts of Cymbopogonflexuosus(Nees Ex Steud) Wats.

The effect of supplemental Ulatraviolet-B (sUV-B) radiation on essential oil yield and chemical composition were analysed in Cymbopogonflexuosus (Nees ex Steud) Wats. The exposure to sUV-B radiation for different intervals of time (15min, 30min and 1hr) showed increased percentage of essential oil in aerial parts of the plant. There was no significant variation was observed in essential oil percentage of sub-aerial parts.Theanalysis of essential oils was performed through Gas chromatography (GC) and Gas chromatography - Mass Spectroscopy (GC-MS),which indicated high citral (isomer of geranial and nearl) production in aerial part,an important compound in perfumery and pharmaceutical industry. The increase in citral percentage in UV treated plants ranged from 67.83% to 81.80% compared to control which showed 65%. The sub-aerial part of the control plantpossessed higher percentage of citral (30%)and sUV-B treated plants showed either one of the isomers in varying percentages.Neral (14.73%) and Junipene (52.70%) in sub-aerial part of sUV-B treated plants were found in higher percentages

Characterization of Bacillus polymyxa from Jamnagar mine water and biobeneficiation of bauxite ore for iron through surface modification

Preliminary screening of the mine water sample from bauxite ore deposits in Jamnagar, India showed the presence of heterotrophic bacteria B.polymyxa. Growth conditions for the bacteria to bring about max. beneficiation were standardized by using the enriched Bromfield medium. B.polymyxa brought significant changes in the surface modifications of the mineral magnetite. The interaction resulted in surface chem. changes both on the cell and on the mineral surface by studying their electrophoretic mobility using Zeta meter 3.0. Dissoln. studies in the presence of microorganisms establish the foundation in which these processes could be used for the utility of beneficiation in the efficient sepn. of the impurities from the ore, thus confirmed that B.polymyxa has greater affinity towards magnetite and could be efficiently used to remove iron from magnetite. Expts. with respect to the bauxite ore was initiated after confirming the above result. Iron removal from bauxite ore by B.polymyxa has been demonstrated under 2​% sucrose concns. brought about 12.5​% removals in four days and under similar conditions the control in absence of B. polymyxa only 6​% iron removal was seen. Thus, B. polymyxa plays a significant role in biobenficiation of bauxite mineral. These observations clearly indicate that a direct mechanism through bacterial attachment to the ore and an indirect mechanism through leaching with metabolites are involved in the biobeneficiation process

Vitamin changes in sweets with time and storage conditions

Vitamin changes assocd. with different temp. and period of storage were measured in sweets rasmalai and badam pista roll. A comparative study was done between these sweets from two different sweet marts. With std. colorimetric techniques the anal. was carried out and by applying statistical methods the variations were tabulated. The vitamin content (niacin and ascorbic acid) decreased with increase in temp. and storage period in accordance with moisture and pH

Assessing Habitat Quality of Forest-Corridors through NDVI Analysis in Dry Tropical Forests of South India: Implications for Conservation

Most wildlife habitats and migratory routes are extremely threatened due to increasing demands on forestland and forest resources by burgeoning human population. Corridor landscape in Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple Tiger Reserve (BRT) is one among them, subjected to various anthropogenic pressures. Human habitation, intensive farming, coffee plantations, ill-planned infrastructure developments and rapid spreading of invasive plant species Lantana camara, pose a serious threat to wildlife habitat and their migration. Aim of this work is to create detailed NDVI based land change maps and to use them to identify timeseries trends in greening and browning in forest corridors in the study area and to identify the drivers that are influencing the observed changes. Over the four decades in BRT, NDVI increased in the core area of the forest and reduced in the fringe areas. The change analysis between 1973 and 2014 shows significant changes; browning due to anthropogenic activities as well as natural processes and greening due to Lantana spread. This indicates that the change processes are complex, involving multiple driving factors, such as socio-economic changes, high population growth, historical forest management practices and policies. Our study suggests that the use of updated and accurate change detection maps will be useful in taking appropriate site specific action-oriented conservation decisions to restore and manage the degraded critical wildlife corridors in human-dominated landscape

Enumeration of Biosurfactant Producing Microorganisms from Oil Contaminated Soil in and around Bangalore (India)

Enhanced production of biosurfactants was carried out with six soil samples, SS-A to SS-F collected from petrochemical contaminated sites in and around Bangalore city. The enumeration of microorganisms was done by determining their colony forming units (CFU’s). Among 42 isolates, six were selected with higher CFU’s (Pseudomonas, Bacillus, Streptococcus, Micrococcus, Rhizobium and Lactobacillus) for induction of biosurfactant production with four different carbon sources (palm oil, castor oil, coconut oil and honge oil) at different concentrations of 0.5-2.0%. To confirm the ability of isolates in biosurfactant production, different screening methods including blood hemolysis, emulsification, bacterial adherence test for hydrocarbon (BATH) assay, determination of surface tension, drop-collapse, cetyl tri ammonium bromide (CTAB) and methylene blue reduction assay were assessed. The ethyl acetate extracted was detected for rhamnolipids, biosurfactant by orcinol method with rhamnose as standard and expressed as rhamnose equivalents suggesting the two species, Pseudomonas and Bacillus has high potential for biosurfactant production with palm oil and castrol oil treatment