Stability-Indicating Reverse Phase HPLC Method for the Determination of Cefazolin

Purpose: The aim of the present study was to establish the inherent stability of cefazolin through stress studies under a variety of ICH recommended test conditions and, also to develop a stability indicatingassay. Methods: A stability-indicating HPLC assay method was developed and validated for cefazolin using an isocratic RP-HPLC method which employed an SS Wakosil II- C18 column (250 mm × 4.6 mm i.d., 5 μm) with a mobile phase consisting of phosphate buffer (pH 6.8) and methanol (5:2 v/v), and UV detection at 254 nm at a flow rate of 1 ml/min. The stress testing of cefazolin was carried out under acidic, alkaline, neutral, oxidation and thermal conditions. Results: The drug peak was well resolved from the peaks of the degradation products. The proposed method was validated for sensitivity, selectivity, linearity, accuracy, precision and solution stability. From the degradation studies it was found that the drug was thermally stable but unstable in acidic, alkaline, neutral and oxidative conditions. The response of drug was linear in the concentration Range of 1 - 50 μg/ml with the number of theoretical plates, and tailing factor being 1341 and 1, respectively. Limit of detection and limit of quantification were 0.1 and 0.2, μg/ml respectively while recovery ranged from 95 - 100%. Method precision and precision of the system were within the limits of acceptance criteria. Conclusion: This study presents a simple and validated stability-indicating HPLC method for the estimation of cefazolin in the presence of degradation products. The developed method is specific, accurate, precise and robust. All the degradation products formed during forced degradation studies were well separated from the analyte peak.Keywords: Cefazolin; Stability-indicating assay; Reversed-phase HPL

Species-Specific Effects of Woody Litter on Seedling Emergence and Growth of Herbaceous Plants

The effect of litter on seedling establishment can influence species richness in plant communities. The effect of litter depends on amount, and also on litter type, but relatively little is known about the species-specific effects of litter. We conducted a factorial greenhouse experiment to examine the effect of litter type, using two woody species that commonly co-occur in boreonemoral forest—evergreen spruce (Picea abies), deciduous hazel (Corylus avellana), and a mixture of the two species—and litter amount—shallow (4 mm), deep (12 mm) and leachate—on seedling emergence and biomass of three understorey species. The effect of litter amount on seedling emergence was highly dependent on litter type; while spruce needle litter had a significant negative effect that increased with depth, seedling emergence in the presence of hazel broadleaf litter did not differ from control pots containing no litter. Mixed litter of both species also had a negative effect on seedling emergence that was intermediate compared to the single-species treatments. Spruce litter had a marginally positive (shallow) or neutral effect (deep) on seedling biomass, while hazel and mixed litter treatments had significant positive effects on biomass that increased with depth. We found non-additive effects of litter mixtures on seedling biomass indicating that high quality hazel litter can reduce the negative effects of spruce. Hazel litter does not inhibit seedling emergence; it increases seedling growth, and creates better conditions for seedling growth in mixtures by reducing the suppressive effect of spruce litter, having a positive effect on understorey species richness

Attitude and Myths Towards Rape among Medical Students in Rajkot, India

Background: Violence against women takes many forms – physical, sexual, psychological and economic. Violence against women harms families and communities across generations and reinforces other violence prevalent in society. Rape myths encompass a set of (false) beliefs about rape that places the blame on the victim and not the perpetrator. Objective: to assess the prevailing attitudes on rape myths among the medical students. Methods: The study was conducted after taking informed consent among 346 undergraduate medical students of P D U Government Medical College, Rajkot, India from January to June, 2013 by using previously validated questionnaire using updated Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale. Results: The age range of 346 medical students was 17 to 23 years with 172 male and 174 female students. Total 24.4% male and 23% female students had very good positive attitude. One fourth of male and one fifth of female students had a more negative attitude. No relation was observed for rape myth acceptance among medical students for residential or socio-economic status. Conclusion: The present study provides insight to the prevalence of attitude and rape myths towards rape among medical students. Introduction of education on gender violence with introduction of courses on ‘sexual violence’ in medical curriculum may help to decrease rape incidence and for better management of victims

Effet de l’arbre Acacia senegal sur la fertilité des sols de gommeraies au Niger

Six gommeraies des trois bassins gommiers du Niger ont été étudiées : Kiki et Kokoiyé dans le bassin gommier occidental, Bader Goula et Azzaî dans le bassin gommier central et Malam Mainari et N’Guel Kolo dans le bassin gommier oriental. L’objectif de l’étude est d’évaluer l’effet d’Acacia senegal sur la fertilité des sols sous et hors houppiers dans ces gommeraies. Les résultats obtenus à travers les paramètres retenus (le pH, le carbone organique (C), l’azote (N), la capacité d’échange cationique (CEC), le phosphore assimilable (P) et la somme des bases échangeables (S) pour appréhender cet effet d’A. senegal sur le sol montrent une amélioration de la teneur en ces éléments dans le sol sous houppier comparativement aux témoins dans la plupart des cas.Mots clés : Acacia senegal, fertilité, sol, gommeraie, Nige

Defining the 5 and 3 landscape of the Drosophila transcriptome with Exo-seq and RNaseH-seq

Cells regulate biological responses in part through changes in transcription start sites (TSS) or cleavage and polyadenylation sites (PAS). To fully understand gene regulatory networks, it is therefore critical to accurately annotate cell type-specific TSS and PAS. Here we present a simple and straightforward approach for genome-wide annotation of 5- and 3-RNA ends. Our approach reliably discerns bona fide PAS from false PAS that arise due to internal poly(A) tracts, a common problem with current PAS annotation methods. We applied our methodology to study the impact of temperature on the Drosophila melanogaster head transcriptome. We found hundreds of previously unidentified TSS and PAS which revealed two interesting phenomena: first, genes with multiple PASs tend to harbor a motif near the most proximal PAS, which likely represents a new cleavage and polyadenylation signal. Second, motif analysis of promoters of genes affected by temperature suggested that boundary element association factor of 32 kDa (BEAF-32) and DREF mediates a transcriptional program at warm temperatures, a result we validated in a fly line where beaf-32 is downregulated. These results demonstrate the utility of a high-throughput platform for complete experimental and computational analysis of mRNA-ends to improve gene annotation

A Time-Varied Probabilistic ON/OFF Switching Algorithm for Cellular Networks

In this letter, we develop a time-varied probabilistic on/off switching planning method for cellular networks to reduce their energy consumption. It consists in a risk-aware optimization approach that takes into consideration the randomness of the user profile associated with each base station (BS). The proposed approach jointly determines 1) the instants of time at which the current active BS configuration must be updated due to an increase or decrease of the network traffic load and 2) the set of minimum BSs to be activated to serve the networks’ subscribers. Probabilistic metrics modeling the traffic profile variation are developed to trigger this dynamic on/off switching operation. Selected simulation results are then performed to validate the proposed algorithm for different system parameters

Integrating genetics, biophysical, and demographic insights identifies critical sites for seagrass conservation

Ecological Applications published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of Ecological Society of America The eelgrass Zostera marina is an important foundation species of coastal areas in the Northern Hemisphere, but is continuing to decline, despite management actions. The development of new management tools is therefore urgent in order to prioritize limited resources for protecting meadows most vulnerable to local extinctions and identifying most valuable present and historic meadows to protect and restore, respectively. We assessed 377 eelgrass meadows along the complex coastlines of two fjord regions on the Swedish west coast—one is currently healthy and the other is substantially degraded. Shoot dispersal for all meadows was assessed with Lagrangian biophysical modeling (scale: 100–1,000\ua0m) and used for barrier analysis and clustering; a subset (n\ua0=\ua022) was also assessed with population genetic methods (20 microsatellites) including diversity, structure, and network connectivity. Both approaches were in very good agreement, resulting in seven subpopulation groupings or management units (MUs). The MUs correspond to a spatial scale appropriate for coastal management of “waterbodies” used in the European Water Framework Directive. Adding demographic modeling based on the genetic and biophysical data as a third approach, we are able to assess past, present, and future metapopulation dynamics to identify especially vulnerable and valuable meadows. In a further application, we show how the biophysical approach, using eigenvalue perturbation theory (EPT) and distribution records from the 1980s, can be used to identify lost meadows where restoration would best benefit the present metapopulation. The combination of methods, presented here as a toolbox, allows the assessment of different temporal and spatial scales at the same time, as well as ranking of specific meadows according to key genetic, demographic and ecological metrics. It could be applied to any species or region, and we exemplify its versatility as a management guide for eelgrass along the Swedish west coast

Padronização das técnicas de processamento e extração de RNA viral de amostras de líquido sinovial.

O LS se mostrou uma amostra adequada para a detecção de RNA genômico do vírus da artrite-encefalite caprina. A centrifugação refrigerada por 30 minutos das amostras de LS se mostrou adequada para a sedimentação e isolamento de células caprinas e RNA livre do vírus, não acarretando em degradação significativa do último por Rnases

Food Leftover Practices among Consumers in Selected Countries in Europe, South and North America

Citation: Koppel, K., Higa, F., Godwin, S., Gutierrez, N., Shalimov, R., Cardinal, P., . . . Chambers, E. (2016). Food Leftover Practices among Consumers in Selected Countries in Europe, South and North America. Foods, 5(3), 14. doi:10.3390/foods5030066Foodborne illnesses may be related to many food production factors with home practices of consumers playing an important role in food safety. Consumer behavior for handling food leftovers has been studied, however little work on comparisons among countries has been published. The objective of this study was to investigate home food leftover practices of people from North American, South American, and European countries. Surveys were conducted with approximately 100 or more consumers in Argentina, Colombia, the United States, Estonia, Italy, Russia, and Spain. The participants responded to questions related to the length of time different types of food leftovers; such as meat, fresh salads, or restaurant dishes would be kept refrigerated or would be left at room temperature before refrigeration. Researchers also investigated how consumers would determine if the food was still safe for consumption. Potentially risky behaviors were observed in all seven countries. For instance, 55.8% of Estonians, 25% of Russians and 25.8% of Argentinean participants left food out at room temperature for several hours before storing in the refrigerator. Furthermore, 25%-29% of Colombian, Estonian, and Spanish consumers would look, smell, and taste leftovers to determine its probable safety. Correct handling of leftovers is an important aspect of consumer food safety. Although the surveys cannot be representative of all consumers in each country, they do provide an initial overview of comparative practices for handling leftovers among different countries. This provides government and educators with information on potential universal and unique consumer food safety issues related to handling leftover foods among various countries

Predicting sexual problems in women: The relevance of sexual excitation and sexual inhibition

This is the post-print version of the article. The official published version can be obtained from the link below.Data from a non-clinical sample of 540 heterosexual women were used to examine the relationships between scores on the Sexual Excitation/Sexual Inhibition Inventory for Women (SESII-W) and ratings of current sexual problems, lifetime arousal difficulty, lifetime orgasm difficulty, and lifetime problems with low sexual interest. Multiple regression analyses also included several demographic/background variables as predictors: age, full-time employment, completed college, children in household, married, health ratings, importance of sex, and whether the woman was in a sexual relationship. The strongest statistical predictors of both current and lifetime sexual problems were the SESII-W inhibition factors Arousal Contingency and Concerns about Sexual Function. Demographic factors did not feature largely in any of the models predicting sexual problems even when statistically significant relationships were found. If future research supports the predictive utility of the SESII-W in identifying women who are more likely to experience sexual difficulties, these scales may be used as prognostic factors in treatment studies.This study was funded, in part, by a grant from the Lilly Centre for Women's Health