Expedient Synthesis of Phenanthro-Imidazo-Pyridine Fused Heteropolynuclear Framework via CDC coupling: A New Class of Luminophores

All the reagents and solvents used in this study, were purchased from Sigma Aldrich, Thermo Fischer Scientific and TCI chemicals respectively. Open capillary was used to measure all the melting points. IR spectrum of the solid sample was recorded in the range 500 to 3500 cm-1 in an FT-IR spectrometer in KBr cell. Bruker 600 MHz spectrometer was used to record all 1H and 13C NMR spectra. EI mass spectral analysis was done using JEOL The Mstation JMS-700 instrument. All the UV & Fluorescence data were collected using Jasco & Cary Eclipse spectrophotometer respectively. Bruker Kappa Apex II X-raycrystallography machine was used to solve the crystal structure. Singlet (s), doublet (d), triplet (t) & multiplet (m) were designated as 1H NMR multiplicity patterns. Silica gel (60-120 mesh) and (100-200 mesh) were used for column chromatographic separations

"The fruits of independence": Satyajit Ray, Indian nationhood and the spectre of empire

Challenging the longstanding consensus that Satyajit Ray's work is largely free of ideological concerns and notable only for its humanistic richness, this article shows with reference to representations of British colonialism and Indian nationhood that Ray's films and stories are marked deeply and consistently by a distinctively Bengali variety of liberalism. Drawn from an ongoing biographical project, it commences with an overview of the nationalist milieu in which Ray grew up and emphasizes the preoccupation with colonialism and nationalism that marked his earliest unfilmed scripts. It then shows with case studies of Kanchanjangha (1962), Charulata (1964), First Class Kamra (First-Class Compartment, 1981), Pratidwandi (The Adversary, 1970), Shatranj ke Khilari (The Chess Players, 1977), Agantuk (The Stranger, 1991) and Robertsoner Ruby (Robertson's Ruby, 1992) how Ray's mature work continued to combine a strongly anti-colonial viewpoint with a shifting perspective on Indian nationhood and an unequivocal commitment to cultural cosmopolitanism. Analysing how Ray articulated his ideological positions through the quintessentially liberal device of complexly staged debates that were apparently free, but in fact closed by the scenarist/director on ideologically specific notes, this article concludes that Ray's reputation as an all-forgiving, ‘everybody-has-his-reasons’ humanist is based on simplistic or even tendentious readings of his work

On detection and Assessment of Statistical Significance of Genomic Islands

Many of the available methods for detecting Genomic Islands (GIs) in prokaryotic genomes use markers such as transposons, proximal tRNAs, flanking repeats etc., or they use other supervised techniques requiring training datasets. Most of these methods are primarily based on the biases in GC content or codon and amino acid usage of the islands. However, these methods either do not use any formal statistical test of significance or use statistical tests for which the critical values and the P-values are not adequately justified. We propose a method, which is unsupervised in nature and uses Monte-Carlo statistical tests based on randomly selected segments of a chromosome. Such tests are supported by precise statistical distribution theory, and consequently, the resulting P-values are quite reliable for making the decision. Our algorithm (named Design-Island, an acronym for Detection of Statistically Significant Genomic Island) runs in two phases. Some 'putative GIs' are identified in the first phase, and those are refined into smaller segments containing horizontally acquired genes in the refinement phase. This method is applied to Salmonella typhi CT18 genome leading to the discovery of several new pathogenicity, antibiotic resistance and metabolic islands that were missed by earlier methods. Many of these islands contain mobile genetic elements like phage-mediated genes, transposons, integrase and IS elements confirming their horizontal acquirement. The proposed method is based on statistical tests supported by precise distribution theory and reliable P-values along with a technique for visualizing statistically significant islands. The performance of our method is better than many other well known methods in terms of their sensitivity and accuracy, and in terms of specificity, it is comparable to other methods

MicroRNA Detection and Target Prediction: Integration of Computational and Experimental Approaches

In recent years, microRNAs (miRNAs), a class of 19–25 nucleotides noncoding RNAs, have been shown to play a major role in gene regulation across a broad range of metazoans and are important for a diverse biological functions. These miRNAs are involved in the regulation of protein expression primarily by binding to one or more target sites on an mRNA transcript and causing cleavage or repression of translation. Computer-based approaches for miRNA gene identification and miRNA target prediction are being considered as indispensable in miRNA research. Similarly, effective experimental techniques validating in silico predictions are crucial to the testing and finetuning of computational algorithms. Iterative interactions between in silico and experimental methods are now playing a central role in the biology of miRNAs. In this review, we summarize the various computational methods for identification of miRNAs and their targets as well as the technologies that have been developed to validate the predictions

Vibrio cholerae O395 Outer Membrane Vesicles Modulate Intestinal Epithelial Cells in a NOD1 Protein-dependent Manner and Induce Dendritic Cell-mediated Th2/Th17 Cell Responses

Vibrio cholerae, the etiologic agent of cholera, secretes outer membrane vesicles (OMVs) that are internalized into host cells. OMVs activate an inflammatory response in intestinal epithelial cells (ECs) via a NOD1-dependent pathway thatactivates dendritic cells (DCs) and promotes T cell polarization toward Th2/Th17 responses. OMVs stimulate EC-DC cross-talk in generating an inflammatory response.Findings are important for the development of efficient vaccine strategies with OMV

An approach for the identification of microRNA with an application to Anopheles gambiae

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are an abundant class of 20-27 nt long noncoding RNAs, involved in post-transcriptional regulation of genes in eukaryotes. These miRNAs are usually highly conserved between the genomes of related organisms and their pre-miRNA transcript, about 60-120 nt long, forms extended stem-loop structure. Keeping these facts in mind miRsearch is developed which relies on searching the homologues of all known miRNAs of one organism in the genome of a related organism allowing few mismatches depending on the phylogenetic distance between them, followed by assessing for the capability of formation of stem-loop structure. The precursor sequences so obtained were then screened through the RNA folding program MFOLD selecting the cut-off values on the basis of known Drosophila melanogaster pre-miRNAs. With this approach, about 91 probable candidate miRNAs along with pre-miRNAs were identified in Anopheles gambiae using known D. melanogaster miRNAs. Out of these, 41 probable miRNAs have 100% similarity with already known D. melanogaster miRNAs and others were found to be at least 85% similar to the miRNAs of various other organisms

Unsupervised statistical identification of genomic islands using oligonucleotide distributions with application to Vibrio genomes

Vibrio cholerae, Vibrio vulnificus, Vibrio parahaemolyticus and several other related Vibrio species show distinctly similar two-chromosomal genome organization. However, the modes of pathogenicity are very different among these species, and this is largely attributed to externally acquired genetic elements. We develop some statistical methods to determine these external genetic elements or genomic islands in genomes based on their differential oligonucleotide usage patterns compared to the rest of the genome. Genomic islands identified by these unsupervised statistical methods include integron and pathogenicity islands. After statistical determination of the genomic islands, we investigate their gene contents and their possible association with the pathogenic behaviour of the corresponding Vibrio species. These investigations lead to observations that are of evolutionary and biological significance