Infrared spectra, thermogravimetric analysis and antifungal studies of noval Cr(III), Fe(III) and Cu(II) 2-methyl-quinazolinone complexes

Some new solid complexes [CrCl3(L)3]×6H2O, [FeCl3(L)3]×6H2O and [Cu(CH3COO)2(L)3]×2H2O have been synthesized quantitatively by the interactions of 2-methyl-quinazolinone (L) with CrCl3.6H2O, FeCl3.6H2O and Cu(CH3COO)2.2H2O in a mixture of an ethanol-bidistilled water (1:1), at 60 °C. They were characterized by melting point, molar conductivity, magnetic moment, elemental analysis, infrared spectra and thermal analyses. The results supported the formation of the complexes and indicated that the ligand reacted as a monodentate ligand bound to the metal ion through the oxygen atom. The antifungal activity of the free ligand and their metal complexes were evaluated against several species, such as Fusarium solani, Rizoctonia solani, Sclortium rolfsii and Botryodiplodia and they showed a good antifungal activity to some selected fungal strain as compared with free ligand. KEY WORDS: Quinazolinone; Cr(III); Fe(III); Cu(II); Antifungal activity, Thermal analyses Bull. Chem. Soc. Ethiop. 2014, 28(1), 53-66.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/bcse.v28i1.

The dilemma of widal test - which brand to use? a study of four different widal brands: a cross sectional comparative study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Serodiagnosis of typhoid fever by Widal test based on demonstrating the presence of agglutinins (antibodies) in the serum of an infected patient, against the H (flagellar) and O (somatic) antigens of <it>Salmonella enterica </it>serotype Typhi has been associated with many debates. This is why the aim of this study was to: (i) Compare the diagnostic accuracy of four different commercial kits used to perform Widal test (Remel, BioSystems, Dialab and Biotec). (ii) Compare the sensitivity and specificity of both anti-O and anti-H antibodies. (iii) Compare the validity of single versus paired serum samples with a rising titer for the diagnosis of typhoid fever.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Duplicate serum samples were obtained from150 patients clinically diagnosed as typhoid fever patients. Moreover, single serum samples were obtained from 25 patients with febrile diseases other than typhoid fever. All samples were tested using the four different Widal brands and <it>Salmonella </it>Typhi IgM anti-LPS ELISA</p> <p>Results</p> <p><b>-</b>The results of Widal tests differed markedly using the four Widal brands in terms of sensitivity and specificity at three cut-off values of 1/80, 1/160 and 1/320. Remel brand gave the highest sensitivities and the lowest specificities and Dialab brand gave the highest specificities and the lowest sensitivities for both anti-O and anti-H antibodies at the three cut-off values.</p> <p><b>-</b>Four fold rise in the antibodies titer was not demonstrable among clinically diagnosed typhoid fever patients</p> <p>-H agglutinins were less sensitive and less specific than O agglutinins</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>-Widal test results showed marked discrepancies using different Widal brands. None of the serum samples of the typhoid fever patients showed four fold rise in the antibody titers. Raised O agglutinins were of slightly greater diagnostic value than raised H agglutinins.</p> <p>Significance and impact of study</p> <p>Widal test done sequentially using two brands could be of value in typhoid fever diagnosis. Single serum sample could be used for typhoid fever diagnosis relying on anti O titer.</p

Spectroscopic, thermal analyses, XRD spectra and nematicidal activity study of some new N2O2 tetradentate Schiff base metal ions complexes

ABSTRACT. A series of metal complexes [Co(HL)2(H2O)2]Cl2.5H2O (A), [Cu(HL)2](CH3COO)2.2H2O (B), [Y(HL)2]Cl3.2H2O (C), [ZrO(HL)2H2O]Cl2.H2O (D), [La(HL)2(H2O)2]Cl3.5H2O (E) and [UO2(HL)2](CH3COO)2 (F) were prepared. The structures of the compounds in solid state were detected by micro analytical, Fourier transform IR, 1H NMR, UV-Vis, mass, X-ray diffraction spectra, molar conductivity, magnetic susceptibility measurements and TG/DTG analysis. The IR spectral data point out that the ligand behaves as tridentate in nature with Cu(II), Y(III), U(VI) and bidentate with Co(II), Zr(IV) and La(III) metal ions. The conductivity values showed that the complexes found as electrolytes and the XRD models of the complexes indicated crystalline nature. The thermodynamic parameters of compounds have been detected using Coats-Redfern and Horowitz-Metzeger methods at n = 1 and n ≠ 1 and values point out more ordered activated complex formation. The nematicidal efficacy of compounds was assessed. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; KEY WORDS: Schiff base, Spectroscopic analysis, Thermal analysis, XRD, Nematicidal &nbsp; Bull. Chem. Soc. Ethiop. 2021, 35(2), 381-397. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.4314/bcse.v35i2.1

Computer Vision and Sensor Fusion for Autonomous Vehicles

Cars, particularly manually-driven cars, are one of the most commonly used modes of transportation today. However, millions of people are either killed or left with disabilities annually due to road traffic accidents caused by human error or sensor failures. Despite that, a lot of people seem reluctant to look into alternatives to manually driven vehicle transportation. This is understandable as driving cars has been the trustworthy mode of transportation for many years, and it is widely used in everyday life around the world. However, technological advances in the fields of machine learning and cyber-physical systems contributed to the emergence of nearly or fully autonomous vehicles, or driverless cars, as a true viable alternative for the current human-controlled driving mode. The technology still has a long way to go, mainly because the advances in vision and depth measurement sensors such as LIDARs can not achieve the levels of safety needed to make fully autonomous cars. Progress on this front is being made every day, and it seems inevitable that they will be readily available in the near future. Our team aims to further investigate the application of Computer Vision and sensor fusion to achieve independent self-driving without external guides. To accomplish this, we combine a depth camera with a LiDAR to provide better coverage of the surroundings and allow more accurate detection and thus accurate avoidance of obstacles. We are mounting the vision system on a model driverless car and using the vision data to guide the car control system. A computer vision algorithm will be run by the NVIDIA Jetson Nano to determine what course of action the car should take. The final prototype should be capable of driving at a reasonable speed without colliding with any objects and making decisions such as braking or turning when necessary

Discrete wavelet transform based freezing of gait detection in Parkinson's disease

Wearable on body sensors have been employed in many applications including ambulatory monitoring and pervasive computing systems. In this work, a wearable assistant has been created for people suffering from Parkinson’s disease (PD), specifically with the Freezing of Gait (FoG) symptom. Wearable accelerometers were placed on the person’s body and used for movement measure. When FoG is detected, a rhythmic audio signal was given from the wearable assistant to motivate the wearer to continue walking. Long term monitoring results in collecting huge amounts of complex raw data; therefore, data analysis becomes impractical or infeasible resulting in the need for data reduction. In the present study, Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) has been used to extract the main features inherent in the key movement indicators for FoG detection. The discrimination capacities of these features were assessed using, i) Support Vector Machine (SVM) using a linear kernel function, and ii) Artificial Neural Network (ANN) with a two-layer feed-forward with hidden layer of 20 neurons that trained with conjugate gradient back- propagation. Using these two different machine learning techniques, we were capable of detecting FoG with an accuracy of 87.50% and 93.8%, respectively. Additionally, the comparison between the extracted features from DWT coefficients with those using Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) established accuracies of 93.8% and 81.3%, respectively. Finally, the discriminative features extracted from DWT yield to a robust multidimensional classification model compared to models in the literature based on a single feature. The work presented paves the way for reliable, real-time wearable sensors to aid people with PD

Enhanced neutralising antibody response to bovine viral diarrhoea virus (BVDV) induced by DNA vaccination in calves

DNA vaccination is effective in inducing potent immunity in mice; however it appears to be less so in large animals. Increasing the dose of DNA plasmid to activate innate immunity has been shown to improve DNA vaccine adaptive immunity. Retinoic acid-inducible gene I (RIG-I) is a critical cytoplasmic double-stranded RNA pattern receptor required for innate immune activation in response to viral infection. RIG-I recognise viral RNA and trigger antiviral response, resulting in type I interferon (IFN) and inflammatory cytokine production. In an attempt to enhance the antibody response induced by BVDV DNA in cattle, we expressed BVDV truncated E2 (E2t) and NS3 codon optimised antigens from antibiotic free-plasmid vectors expressing a RIG-I agonist and designated either NTC E2t(co) and NTC NS3(co). To evaluate vaccine efficacy, groups of five BVDV-free calves were intramuscularly injected three times with NTC E2t(co) and NTC NS3(co) vaccine plasmids individually or in combination. Animals vaccinated with our (previously published) conventional DNA vaccines pSecTag/E2 and pTriExNS3 and plasmids expressing RIG-I agonist only presented both the positive and mock-vaccine groups. Our results showed that vaccines coexpressing E2t with a RIG-I agonist induced significantly higher E2 antigen specific antibody response (p < 0.05). Additionally, E2t augmented the immune response to NS3 when the two vaccines were delivered in combination. Despite the lack of complete protection, on challenge day 4/5 calves vaccinated with NTC E2t(co) alone or NTC E2t(co) plus NTC NS3(co) had neutralising antibody titres exceeding 1/240 compared to 1/5 in the mock vaccine control group. Based on our results we conclude that co-expression of a RIG-I agonist with viral antigen could enhance DNA vaccine potency in cattle

AUTOMATED MEASUREMENT AND SYSTEM DATA LOGGER FOR CONTINUOUS MONITORING OF SLICED BANANA FRUIT DURING DRYING PROCESS BY A SOLAR HOT- AIR DRYER

The aim of this work is developing and evaluating an automated measurement and system datalogger for continuous monitoring of solar hot air drier for natural convection solar cabinet drier. Measurements includes monitoring of drying process for sliced Banana (Musa acuminata) relation to weather parameters such as ambient air temperature, relative humidity and wind velocity which ensures precise measurements and reproduction of experiments. An electronic measurement system was used for measurement of temperature, humidity, air speed, a solar intensity. A programmable microcontroller ship and code were used to control measurement, timing, and data storage twenty-four hours/day. All measurements data was collected and saved in storage memory card. Results showed that the solar drier drying rate achieved (-0.018gH2O/g dm.h), while the drying rate with mean of electrical thermal drier were  (-0.956 018gH2O/gdm.h) at 105°C, (-0.552 018gH2O/g dm.h) at 70°C and (-0.513 018gH2O/gdm.h) at 50°C. The electronic measurement - datalogging system was able to give an accurate measurement and assessment to the drying system and process. It was found that air leakage from the system and poor insulation inhibit the airflow over the solar absorber plate and drying chamber causing thermal leakage form the bottom and drier sides. It was recommended to supply the solar drier with an air fan, seal the drying air leakage, and air-lock at the entrance to control airflow as well as the temperature of the drying process