CHITOSAN NANOBUBBLES DEVELOPMENT AND EVALUATION FOR THE DELIVERY OF SUNITINIB-AN ANTICANCER AGENT

Objective: In the current study, we introduced a novel method for creating Sunitinib nanobubbles by incorporating it into chitosan-shelled nanobubbles. Methods: The Design Expert® programme randomly assigned around 13 experiments, and multiple regression analysis was used to statistically examine the data. The effect of the amount of sunitinib, amount of chitosan, amount of Epikuron 200, amount of palmitic acid and stirring speed, on percent encapsulation efficiency and drug load while maintain minimum particle size of nanobubbles as considered through a definitive screening plan. By placing limitations on the response parameters, the optimum formulation was created using a numerical optimization approach. The three improved formulations (Batch1 through Batch3) were assessed. Results: The findings show that the nanobubbles particle size of 78.56-82.42 nm with an encapsulation efficiency of 68.48-69.56 % and loading capacity of 23.88-25.02%. The quantity of sunitinib released from nanobubbles was much larger (96.52 percent) than that from the sunitinib solution within 24 h, according to an in vitro release profile of the medication using ultrasonography. The hemolytic activity of the blank nanobubbles and sunitinib-loaded nanobubbles was measured to assess their safety up to a concentration of 10 mg/ml. With erythrocytes, drug-loaded nanobubbles had a good safety profile. FTIR, DSC studies indicated no chemical interactions, TEM images revealed nanobubbles size of 70-100 nm and stability studies shows no significant changes. Conclusion: For contrast-enhanced tumour imaging and subsequent therapeutic administration, nanobubbles were found to be superior

Use of spatiotemporal characteristics of ambient PM2.5 in rural South India to infer local versus regional contributions

This study uses spatiotemporal patterns in ambient concentrations to infer the contribution of regional versus local sources. We collected 12 months of monitoring data for outdoor fine particulate matter (PM2.5) in rural southern India. Rural India includes more than one-tenth of the global population and annually accounts for around half a million air pollution deaths, yet little is known about the relative contribution of local sources to outdoor air pollution. We measured 1-min averaged outdoor PM2.5 concentrations during June 2015-May 2016 in three villages, which varied in population size, socioeconomic status, and type and usage of domestic fuel. The daily geometric-mean PM2.5 concentration was approximately 30mugm(-3) (geometric standard deviation: approximately 1.5). Concentrations exceeded the Indian National Ambient Air Quality standards (60mugm(-3)) during 2-5% of observation days. Average concentrations were approximately 25mugm(-3) higher during winter than during monsoon and approximately 8mugm(-3) higher during morning hours than the diurnal average. A moving average subtraction method based on 1-min average PM2.5 concentrations indicated that local contributions (e.g., nearby biomass combustion, brick kilns) were greater in the most populated village, and that overall the majority of ambient PM2.5 in our study was regional, implying that local air pollution control strategies alone may have limited influence on local ambient concentrations. We compared the relatively new moving average subtraction method against a more established approach. Both methods broadly agree on the relative contribution of local sources across the three sites. The moving average subtraction method has broad applicability across locations

Analysis of microsatellite polymorphisms in south Indian patients with non syndromic cleft lip and palate

Non Syndromic Cleft Lip and/or Palate (NSCLP) is a complex congenital anomaly with varying incidence among patients of different geographical origins. Multiple contributing factors are known to trigger the cleft formation. There are several genes involved in the aetiology of NSCLP and they are different in different populations. The genetic components of clefts that underlie the susceptibility to respond to the environment still remain unclear. In this study, five microsatellite polymorphisms from five candidate genes were employed to analyze the association between these genes and NSCLP in 83 patients and 90 controls. Genotyping was performed by separating and visualizing the fluorescently-labeled Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) products. The association of the five microsatellite polymorphisms with NSCLP was tested by using the CLUMP v1.9 program that uses the Monte Carlo method. The genotypic distribution is in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium in the control group for only the MSX1 and DLX3 genes. The RARA microsatellite was significantly associated with NSCLP. Our results suggest that the RARA gene is involved in pathogenesis of cleft lip and palate in south Indians

Latitudinal variation in vertical distribution of meteor decay time and its relation with mesospheric Ozone in the altitude range of 80-90 km

115-124Investigations on meteor trail decay time and its evolution in the mesosphere and lower thermosphere are very important to estimate the temperature in this region. The present study focuses on the vertical distribution of meteor decay times at three different latitudes to understand the mechanism responsible for the deviation of meteor decay time from the theoretical estimations below 90 km of altitude. The present study is based on measurements from three identical meteor radars located at equatorial (Kototabang: 0.2° S, 100.3° E), low (Thumba: 8.5° N, 76.9° E) and polar latitudes (Eureka: 80.0° N, 85.8° W). The results reveal a pronounced seasonal variation of vertical distribution of meteor decay time turning altitude (inflection point) over polar latitudes as compared to that over equatorial and low latitudes. Apart from direct estimations from meteor radar observations, the meteor decay time is estimated using temperature and pressure measurements from the SABER/TIMED. Above 90 km of altitude, decay times estimated from both methods are in good agreement. However, below 90 km of altitude, these estimations start deviating and it has been noted that the deviation increases with decreasing altitude. Further, observed meteor decay times correlated with ozone concentration at three representative altitude bins. The correlation analysis reveals a significant negative correlation at 80 - 90 km of altitude over the three latitudes indicating that an increase in ozone concentration results in decrease in meteor decay time. The significance of the present results lies in analyzing the vertical distribution of meteor decay time simultaneously from three radar locations representing equatorial, low and polar latitudes and evaluating the relation between ozone concentration and meteor decay time, quantitatively

Indian Classical Dance Action Identification and Classification with Convolutional Neural Networks

Extracting and recognizing complex human movements from unconstrained online/offline video sequence is a challenging task in computer vision. This paper proposes the classification of Indian classical dance actions using a powerful artificial intelligence tool: convolutional neural networks (CNN). In this work, human action recognition on Indian classical dance videos is performed on recordings from both offline (controlled recording) and online (live performances, YouTube) data. The offline data is created with ten different subjects performing 200 familiar dance mudras/poses from different Indian classical dance forms under various background environments. The online dance data is collected from YouTube for ten different subjects. Each dance pose is occupied for 60 frames or images in a video in both the cases. CNN training is performed with 8 different sample sizes, each consisting of multiple sets of subjects. The remaining 2 samples are used for testing the trained CNN. Different CNN architectures were designed and tested with our data to obtain a better accuracy in recognition. We achieved a 93.33% recognition rate compared to other classifier models reported on the same dataset

ANTIMICROBIAL, WOUND HEALING AND ANTIOXIDANT ACTIVITIES OF ANTHOCEPHALUS CADAMBA

Anthocephalus cadamba (Roxb.) Miq. Syn A. chinensis (Lamk) A. Rich (Rubiaceae) is ethnomedicinally widely used in the form of paste by tribe in western Ghats for treating skin diseases. In this context, antimicrobial potential of A. cadamba against a wide range of microorganisms was studied. To validate the ethnotherapeutic claims of the plant in skin diseases, wound healing activity was studied, besides antioxidant activity to understand the mechanism of wound healing. The alchoholic and aqueous extract of this plant showed significant antibacterial and antifungal activity against almost all the organisms: Micrococcus luteus, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Proteus mirabilis, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and four fungi Candida albicans, Trichophyton rubrum—dermatophyte fungi, Aspergillus niger, Aspergillus flavus and Aspergillus nidulans—systemic fungi, with especially good activity against the dermatophyte (Trichophyton rubrum) and some infectious bacteria (Escherichia coli, Proteus mirabilis and Staphylococcus aureus) with an MIC of 2.5 µg/disc. The results show that A. cadamba extract has potent wound healing capacity as shown from the wound contraction and increased tensile strength. The results also indicated that A. cadamba extract possesses potent antioxidant activity by inhibiting lipid peroxidation and increase in the superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase activity

Building operational research capacity in the Pacific

Operational research (OR) in public health aims to investigate strategies, interventions, tools or knowledge that can enhance the quality, coverage, effectiveness or performance of health systems. Attention has recently been drawn to the lack of OR capacity in public health programmes throughout the Pacific Islands, despite considerable investment in implementation. This lack of ongoing and critical reflection may prevent health programme staff from understanding why programme objectives are not being fully achieved, and hinder long-term gains in public health. The International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease (The Union) has been collaborating with Pacific agencies to conduct OR courses based on the training model developed by The Union and Médecins Sans Frontières Brussels-Luxembourg in 2009. The first of these commenced in 2011 in collaboration with the Fiji National University, the Fiji Ministry of Health, the World Health Organization and other partners. The Union and the Secretariat of the Pacific Community organised a second course for participants from other Pacific Island countries and territories in 2012, and an additional course for Fijian participants commenced in 2013. Twelve participants enrolled in each of the three courses. Of the two courses completed by end 2013, 18 of 24 participants completed their OR and submitted papers by the course deadline, and 17 papers have been published to date. This article describes the context, process and outputs of the Pacific courses, as well as innovations, adaptations and challenges

Surfactant protein D inhibits HIV-1 infection of target cells via interference with gp120-CD4 interaction and modulates pro-inflammatory cytokine production

© 2014 Pandit et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Surfactant Protein SP-D, a member of the collectin family, is a pattern recognition protein, secreted by mucosal epithelial cells and has an important role in innate immunity against various pathogens. In this study, we confirm that native human SP-D and a recombinant fragment of human SP-D (rhSP-D) bind to gp120 of HIV-1 and significantly inhibit viral replication in vitro in a calcium and dose-dependent manner. We show, for the first time, that SP-D and rhSP-D act as potent inhibitors of HIV-1 entry in to target cells and block the interaction between CD4 and gp120 in a dose-dependent manner. The rhSP-D-mediated inhibition of viral replication was examined using three clinical isolates of HIV-1 and three target cells: Jurkat T cells, U937 monocytic cells and PBMCs. HIV-1 induced cytokine storm in the three target cells was significantly suppressed by rhSP-D. Phosphorylation of key kinases p38, Erk1/2 and AKT, which contribute to HIV-1 induced immune activation, was significantly reduced in vitro in the presence of rhSP-D. Notably, anti-HIV-1 activity of rhSP-D was retained in the presence of biological fluids such as cervico-vaginal lavage and seminal plasma. Our study illustrates the multi-faceted role of human SPD against HIV-1 and potential of rhSP-D for immunotherapy to inhibit viral entry and immune activation in acute HIV infection. © 2014 Pandit et al.The work (Project no. 2011-16850) was supported by Medical Innovation Fund of Indian Council of Medical Research, New Delhi, India (www.icmr.nic.in/)

Insecticide Susceptibility of Phlebotomus argentipes in Visceral Leishmaniasis Endemic Districts in India and Nepal

Visceral leishmaniasis (VL), also know as kala azar, is one of the major public health concerns India, Nepal and Bangladesh. In the Indian subcontinent, VL is caused by Leishmania donovani which is transmitted by Phlebotomus argentipes. To date, Indoor Residual Spraying (IRS) campaigns have been unable to control the disease. Vector resistance to the insecticides used has been postulated as one of the possible reasons explaining this failure. A number of studies in the region have shown a variable degree of resistance to DDT in areas where this insecticide has been widely used for IRS (mainly India). However there is no coordinated and standardized program to monitor resistance to insecticides in the region. In this study we tested P. argentipes susceptibility to DDT and deltamethrin in VL endemic villages in India and Nepal. The results confirmed the DDT resistance in India and in a border village of Nepal. P. argentipes from both countries were in general susceptible to deltamethrin, an insecticide used in some long lasting insecticidal nets