STUDY OF PHYSICOCHEMICAL PROPERTIES AND NUTRIENT CONTENT OF AGRICULTURAL SOILS OF CHITTOOR DISTRICT USING DIFFERENT ANALYTICAL METHODS

 Objective: The objective of this study is to determine the physicochemical properties and nutrient content of agricultural soils at various stations such as black soil from Kalroad Palli village (Chandragiri mandal), red soil from Ramapuram village (Ramachandrapuram Mandal), and clay from Yerpedu village (Yerpedu Mandal) of Chittoor district.Method: The physicochemical parameters such as pH was measured using pH meter (Thermo Scientific); electrical conductivity (EC) was measured by conductivity meter (CM180 Elico Technologies); organic carbon (OC) was determined by Fourier-transform infrared (Agilent technologies 630) and with ultraviolet (UV) spectrophotometer (Agilent technologies Cary UV 60); nitrogen (N2) was estimated by Kjeldahl method; potassium (K), sodium (Na), and calcium (Ca) were estimated using flame photometer (Elico Technologies CL/361); and magnesium (Mg) was estimated by titrimetric method.Results: Among these, pH (black soil - 7.41, red soil - 6.93, and clay - 7.29), EC (black soil - 1.76, red soil - 0.25, and clay - 0.14 microhoms), OC (black soil - 1.22%, red soil - 0.61%, and clay - 0.66%), N2 (black soil - 0.22%, red soil - 0.25%, and clay - 0.26%), K (black soil - 5.7 ppm, red soil - 9.1 ppm, and clay - 8.4 ppm), Na (black soil - 9.5 ppm, red soil - 4.5 ppm, and clay - 5.9 ppm), Ca (black soil - 6.2 ppm, red soil - 5.7 ppm, and clay - 7.8 ppm), Mg (black soil - 0.19%, red soil - 0.25%, and clay - 0.17%) ranges were recorded at all the stations.Conclusion: The present study is a preliminary attempt to study the nature of soils in different agricultural areas in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh, India. This could help to understand the nutrient profile of the district and to prescribe the nutrients levels of the crops for their effective growth

Brain alterations in regions associated with end‐organ diabetic microvascular disease in diabetes mellitus: A UK Biobank study

Background Diabetes mellitus (DM) is associated with structural grey matter alterations in the brain, including changes in the somatosensory and pain processing regions seen in association with diabetic peripheral neuropathy. In this case-controlled biobank study, we aimed to ascertain differences in grey and white matter anatomy in people with DM compared with non-diabetic controls (NDC). Methods This study utilises the UK Biobank prospective, population-based, multicentre study of UK residents. Participants with diabetes and age/gender-matched controls without diabetes were selected in a three-to-one ratio. We excluded people with underlying neurological/neurodegenerative disease. Whole brain, cortical, and subcortical volumes (188 regions) were compared between participants with diabetes against NDC corrected for age, sex, and intracranial volume using univariate regression models, with adjustment for multiple comparisons. Diffusion tensor imaging analysis of fractional anisotropy (FA) was performed along the length of 50 white matter tracts. Results We included 2404 eligible participants who underwent brain magnetic resonance imaging (NDC, n = 1803 and DM, n = 601). Participants with DM had a mean (±standard deviation) diagnostic duration of 18 ± 11 years, with adequate glycaemic control (HbA1C 52 ± 13 mmol/mol), low prevalence of microvascular complications (diabetic retinopathy prevalence, 5.8%), comparable cognitive function to controls but greater self-reported pain. Univariate volumetric analyses revealed significant reductions in grey matter volume (whole brain, total, and subcortical grey matter), with mean percentage differences ranging from 2.2% to 7% in people with DM relative to NDC (all p < 0.0002). The subcortical (bilateral cerebellar cortex, brainstem, thalamus, central corpus callosum, putamen, and pallidum) and cortical regions linked to sensorimotor (bilateral superior frontal, middle frontal, precentral, and postcentral gyri) and visual functions (bilateral middle and superior occipital gyri), all had lower grey matter volumes in people with DM relative to NDC. People with DM had significantly reduced FA along the length of the thalamocortical radiations, thalamostriatal projections, and commissural fibres of the corpus callosum (all; p < 0·001). Interpretation This analysis suggests that anatomic differences in brain regions are present in a cohort with adequately controlled glycaemia without prevalent microvascular disease when compared with volunteers without diabetes. We hypothesise that these differences may predate overt end-organ damage and complications such as diabetic neuropathy and retinopathy. Central nervous system alterations/neuroplasticity may occur early in the natural history of microvascular complications; therefore, brain imaging should be considered in future mechanistic and interventional studies of DM

Italian guidelines for primary headaches: 2012 revised version

The first edition of the Italian diagnostic and therapeutic guidelines for primary headaches in adults was published in J Headache Pain 2(Suppl. 1):105–190 (2001). Ten years later, the guideline committee of the Italian Society for the Study of Headaches (SISC) decided it was time to update therapeutic guidelines. A literature search was carried out on Medline database, and all articles on primary headache treatments in English, German, French and Italian published from February 2001 to December 2011 were taken into account. Only randomized controlled trials (RCT) and meta-analyses were analysed for each drug. If RCT were lacking, open studies and case series were also examined. According to the previous edition, four levels of recommendation were defined on the basis of levels of evidence, scientific strength of evidence and clinical effectiveness. Recommendations for symptomatic and prophylactic treatment of migraine and cluster headache were therefore revised with respect to previous 2001 guidelines and a section was dedicated to non-pharmacological treatment. This article reports a summary of the revised version published in extenso in an Italian version

Aspirin with or without an antiemetic for acute migraine headaches in adults.

BACKGROUND: This is an updated version of the original Cochrane review published in Issue 4, 2010 (Kirthi 2010). Migraine is a common, disabling condition and a burden for the individual, health services and society. Many sufferers choose not to, or are unable to, seek professional help and rely on over-the-counter analgesics. Co-therapy with an antiemetic should help to reduce nausea and vomiting commonly associated with migraine headaches. OBJECTIVES: To determine the efficacy and tolerability of aspirin, alone or in combination with an antiemetic, compared to placebo and other active interventions in the treatment of acute migraine headaches in adults. SEARCH METHODS: We searched the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), MEDLINE, EMBASE, the Oxford Pain Relief Database, ClinicalTrials.gov, and reference lists for studies through 10 March 2010 for the original review and to 31 January 2013 for the update. SELECTION CRITERIA: We included randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled or active-controlled studies, or both, using aspirin to treat a migraine headache episode, with at least 10 participants per treatment arm. DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Two review authors independently assessed trial quality and extracted data. Numbers of participants achieving each outcome were used to calculate relative risk and numbers needed to treat (NNT) or harm (NNH) compared to placebo or other active treatment. MAIN RESULTS: No new studies were found for this update. Thirteen studies (4222 participants) compared aspirin 900 mg or 1000 mg, alone or in combination with metoclopramide 10 mg, with placebo or other active comparators, mainly sumatriptan 50 mg or 100 mg. For all efficacy outcomes, all active treatments were superior to placebo, with NNTs of 8.1, 4.9 and 6.6 for 2-hour pain-free, 2-hour headache relief, and 24-hour headache relief with aspirin alone versus placebo, and 8.8, 3.3 and 6.2 with aspirin plus metoclopramide versus placebo. Sumatriptan 50 mg did not differ from aspirin alone for 2-hour pain-free and headache relief, while sumatriptan 100 mg was better than the combination of aspirin plus metoclopramide for 2-hour pain-free, but not headache relief; there were no data for 24-hour headache relief.Adverse events were mostly mild and transient, occurring slightly more often with aspirin than placebo.Additional metoclopramide significantly reduced nausea (P &lt; 0.00006) and vomiting (P = 0.002) compared with aspirin alone. AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: We found no new studies since the last version of this review. Aspirin 1000 mg is an effective treatment for acute migraine headaches, similar to sumatriptan 50 mg or 100 mg. Addition of metoclopramide 10 mg improves relief of nausea and vomiting. Adverse events were mainly mild and transient, and were slightly more common with aspirin than placebo, but less common than with sumatriptan 100 mg

Purification of Tomato leaf curl Bangalore virus and production of polyclonal antibodies

Tomato leaf curl Bangalore virus (ToLCBV) was successfully transmitted using viruliferous whiteflies (Bemisia tabaci) to several tomato varieties and hybrids, viz. Arka vikas, Pusa ruby, Rashmi, Rakshitha and Swaraksha. Hybrid Rashmi took 100% uniform infection, which was selected for further propagation of the virus. ToLCBV was also transmitted to Nicotiana benthamiana; the rate of infection was 30-40% in spite of two inoculations with 10-15 viruliferous B. tabaci/plant. The virus was purified and polyclonal antisera were produced in rabbits by injecting purified native virus and recombinant coat protein (rCP) of ToLCBV. The antisera of ToLCBV and ToLCBV rCP had a titre of 1:8000 and 1:400 respectively, when tested with infected leaf extract of tomato. Both sources of antisera successfully detected begomovirus infections in reservoir host plants, viz. Parthenium hysterophorus, Acanthospermum hispidum, Ageratum conyzoides, and fieldcollected tomato samples and cross-reacted with hibiscus leaf curl in DAC-ELSIA

Optimizing Energy to Minimize Errors in Approximate Ripple Carry Adders

We present a theoretical foundation and a methodology for automatically assigning supply voltages to approximate ripple carry adders in which accuracy is traded for energy consumption. The error minimization problem for a fixed energy budget is formulated as a binned geometric program. We first use geometric programming to minimize the average error of the adder and compute the supply voltages at the gate level, after which we bin the voltages to a finite set (of four or five voltages) using a heuristic. Using HSPICE in 90nm technology, we show simulation results by applying our methodology to a ripple carry adder and obtain savings of up to 2:58X (and by a median of 1:58X) in average error, when compared to uniform voltage scaling, for the same energy consumption. Compared to a naive biased voltage scaling (n-BIVOS), which is the best prior art in literature, a Binned Geometric Program Solution (BGPS) as proposed in this paper saves 32.3% energy with the same PSNR in an 8point FFT example or, alternatively, increases the PSNR by 8.5db for the same energy consumption for the FFT