Terpenoids from the roots of Ceriops tagal induces apoptosis through activation of caspase-3 enzyme

Dolabr-4(17),15(16)-dien-3-one, isopimar-8(14)-en-15,16-diol, isopimar-8(14)-en-16-hydroxy-15-one, lupeol, lup-20(29)-en-3â,28-diol and lup-20(29)-en-3â-hydroxy-28-oic acid were isolated from the roots of amarine mangrove Ceriops tagal (Rhizophoraceae). The compounds were evaluated for activation of caspase-3 enzyme using Caspase-3 Colourimetric Assay. Caspase-3 enzyme was activated by all compounds in cleavingpNA from Ac-DEVD-pNA in the presence of caspase-3-inhibitor; Ac-DEVD-CHO. Lup-20(29)-en-3â- hydroxyl-28-oic acid, isopimar-8(14)-en-15,16-diol and isopimar-8(14)-en-16-hydroxy-15-one cleaved 41.7, 39.42 and 34.19 ìmol/L of pNA respectively. This study is therefore demonstrating that the isolatedcompounds may serve as leads for development of new chemotherapeutic drugs which acts by inducing apoptosis in the cancerous cells

Inferring Robot Task Plans from Human Team Meetings: A Generative Modeling Approach with Logic-Based Prior

We aim to reduce the burden of programming and deploying autonomous systems to work in concert with people in time-critical domains, such as military field operations and disaster response. Deployment plans for these operations are frequently negotiated on-the-fly by teams of human planners. A human operator then translates the agreed upon plan into machine instructions for the robots. We present an algorithm that reduces this translation burden by inferring the final plan from a processed form of the human team's planning conversation. Our approach combines probabilistic generative modeling with logical plan validation used to compute a highly structured prior over possible plans. This hybrid approach enables us to overcome the challenge of performing inference over the large solution space with only a small amount of noisy data from the team planning session. We validate the algorithm through human subject experimentation and show we are able to infer a human team's final plan with 83% accuracy on average. We also describe a robot demonstration in which two people plan and execute a first-response collaborative task with a PR2 robot. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work that integrates a logical planning technique within a generative model to perform plan inference.Comment: Appears in Proceedings of the Twenty-Seventh AAAI Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI-13

Comparative anticancer activity of dolaborane diterpenes from the roots of Ceriops tagal (Rhizophoraceae)

This study aimed at investigating the anticancer activity of tagalsins A, B, C, D, E, F and G isolated from the roots of Ceriops tagal. Their structures were established based on the IR, MS and NMR spectral data. Anticancer activity was evaluated using caspase-3 colourimetric assays and the minimum activation concentrations were established. The study revealed that tagalsin A, B, C, D, E, F and G induces apoptosis through the activation of caspase-3 enzyme. Tagalsin A was the most active (MAC value of 0.12 μg/mL) followed by tagalsin B (MAC of 0.15 μg/mL) and and tagalsin E was the least active (MAC value of 1.16 μg/mL). Structure activity relationship revealed that epoxide rings and oxygenation enhanced the activity of tagalsins in inducing caspase-3 activation of apoptotic pathway, thus, providing an avenue for the development of anticancer agents with novel mechanism of actions.Keywords: Ceriops tagal, dolaboranes, tagalsins, caspase-

Modelling the transmission of tuberculosis

Airborne infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis (TB), are spread by airborne infectious particles (viable particles with potential for TB infection) in exhaled air from infectious individuals in enclosed spaces. Exhaled air is the carrier of airborne infectious particles and carbon dioxide is used as a surrogate of this exhaled air. Using carbon dioxide as a surrogate for exhaled air, we modified the Wells-Riley model and the prior modified versions of the model, and obtained a exible but sensitive mathematical model that predicts the risks of airborne infectious diseases, such as TB under steady- state and non-steady-state conditions, without assumptions of well mixed airspace and equilibrium conditions. Applying experimental data from in vivo studies to the mathematical model developed in this study, we explored the probability of exposed guinea pigs acquiring infection in these in vivo stud- ies and quantified the number of surviving airborne infectious particles (infective organisms) required to reach the alveolar to establish infection. Our study shows that the number of infective organisms reported in the in vivo studies might have been markedly underestimated. In this study, we investi- gated TB transmission in congregate settings, such as schools, households, public transport, prisons and health care settings and suggested preventive measures. TB transmission in these locations is attributable to numerous factors, including overpopulation and air pollution, which acts as a carrier of airborne infectious particles. We explored the impact of effective contact rate on TB epidemiology using a mathematical model we developed that consists of five states of susceptible, primary infection, reinfected, active TB and treated individuals. An infectious individual with varying effective contact rate (ranging from 5 to 30 per year) was introduced among 100; 000 fully susceptible individuals and we observed the number of primary infection and reinfected individuals at stability points of a TB epidemic. We found that the number of primary infection individuals decreases at the stability point, while that of reinfected individuals increases with increasing effective contact rate. This implies that a large number of active TB cases might be reinfected individuals. Using an age-structured mathemat- ical model developed in this study that incorporates vaccination, we explored TB disease progression in different age groups (from 0 to ≥ 75 years). We found that TB disease progression is age dependent. High TB notification rate was detected for the age groups [0 - 5); [15 - 25); [45 - 55) and [55 - 65) years, and the lowest TB notification rate was detected in the age group [5 - 15) years. Furthermore, we noted that vaccination decreases active disease progression for the age groups [0 - 5) to [15 - 25) years, while TB notification remains high for the age groups [25-35) to ≥ 75) years. The findings in this study suggest that active disease progression depends on age and average duration of the waning of the vaccine effect

Factors Influencing Service Use Among Families of Children with Cerebral Palsy

The University Archives has determined that this item is of continuing value to OSU's history.Chacha, Christopher M., Ph.D., Ph.D., The University of Alabama, 2000, Tuscaloosa, Alabama - "Factors Influencing Service Use Among Families of Children with Cerebral Palsy"The Ohio State University College of Social Wor

Soda Pop Punk

It has been said that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. The inspiration for this piece was drawn from my travels to Africa. After a long hot day nothing was more refreshing than drinking soda from a cold glass bottle

Modelling the risk of airborne infectious disease using exhaled air

AbstractIn this paper we develop and demonstrate a flexible mathematical model that predicts the risk of airborne infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis under steady state and non-steady state conditions by monitoring exhaled air by infectors in a confined space. In the development of this model, we used the rebreathed air accumulation rate concept to directly determine the average volume fraction of exhaled air in a given space. From a biological point of view, exhaled air by infectors contains airborne infectious particles that cause airborne infectious diseases such as tuberculosis in confined spaces. Since not all infectious particles can reach the target infection site, we took into account that the infectious particles that commence the infection are determined by respiratory deposition fraction, which is the probability of each infectious particle reaching the target infection site of the respiratory tracts and causing infection. Furthermore, we compute the quantity of carbon dioxide as a marker of exhaled air, which can be inhaled in the room with high likelihood of causing airborne infectious disease given the presence of infectors. We demonstrated mathematically and schematically the correlation between TB transmission probability and airborne infectious particle generation rate, ventilation rate, average volume fraction of exhaled air, TB prevalence and duration of exposure to infectors in a confined space

Inferring team task plans from human meetings: A generative modeling approach with logic-based prior

We aim to reduce the burden of programming and deploying autonomous systems to work in concert with people in time-critical domains such as military field operations and disaster response. Deployment plans for these operations are frequently negotiated on-the-fly by teams of human planners. A human operator then translates the agreed-upon plan into machine instructions for the robots. We present an algorithm that reduces this translation burden by inferring the final plan from a processed form of the human team's planning conversation. Our hybrid approach combines probabilistic generative modeling with logical plan validation used to compute a highly structured prior over possible plans, enabling us to overcome the challenge of performing inference over a large solution space with only a small amount of noisy data from the team planning session. We validate the algorithm through human subject experimentations and show that it is able to infer a human team's final plan with 86% accuracy on average. We also describe a robot demonstration in which two people plan and execute a first-response collaborative task with a PR2 robot. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work to integrate a logical planning technique within a generative model to perform plan inference.United States. Dept. of Defense. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Research & Engineering (United States. Air Force Contract FA8721-05-C-0002

The Impact of Refugee camps on Host communities, a case of Nyarugusu village

The presence of refugees tends to change the lives of the local population in hosting communities. This study was carried out to determine the impacts of refugee camps on host community. It was geared specifically to determine both positive and negative impacts of refugee camps to local people in Nyarugusu Village after refugees’ influx. The study was conducted in Nyarugusu Village where Nyarugusu refugee camp is located. Data was collected from individuals in the host area. Other respondents included village executive officers and ten cell leaders. Secondary data that was used were materials from government reports, research reports, books and journals from University of Dar es Salaam library. The study revealed that opportunities available in the host communities changed in both positive and negative ways in agriculture, environment, market economy, and infrastructure and in the context of social services. On the positive side, refugees were sources of cheap agricultural labour for villagers in the study area; refugee labour was attractive to local farmers because it was cheap and readily available hence increased production of food crops, better health services due to establishment of better equipped refugee hospitals that offer a free service to Tanzanians. Despite the benefits of refugee labour, many villagers blamed refugees as source of theft, particularly of food crops, internal peace and security has been affected by increase in serious criminal activities, and conflicts. On environmental perspective, refugees affected environment due to firewood and charcoal uses. The study findings can be used by a wide range of stakeholders and the government of Tanzania to create refugees’ policies. Keywords: Refugee, Refugee Camps, Host community, Nyarugusu village

Birds of Golden Pride Project area, Nzega District, central Tanzania: an evaluation of recolonization of rehabilitated areas

In Tanzania, the success of habitat restoration in mining areas to create suitable environmental conditions for wildlife is poorly understood. Between March 2010 and December 2014 bird species were recorded at the Golden Pride Project area, a gold mine in Nzega District, central Tanzania. The aims of this study were to document bird communities in the mine area, and to assess the extent to which rehabilitated areas have been recolonised. Mist netting, point counts, timed species counts and opportunistic observations were used to document 181 species of birds at the mine area. These included two species endemic to Tanzania, the Tanzanian Red-billed Hornbill Tockus ruahae (treated here as a species separate from T. erythrorhynchus, see Kemp & Delport 2002, Sinclair & Ryan 2010) and Ashy Starling Cosmopsarus unicolor. Rehabilitated areas had about half the number of species found in the unmined areas. Bird use of areas under rehabilitation suggests that habitat restoration can be used to create corridors linking fragmented landscapes. Results suggest that as the vegetation of the rehabilitated areas becomes more structurally complex, the number of bird species found there will be similar to those in unmined areas. This study provides a baseline for future monitoring, leading to a better understanding of the process of avian colonisation of rehabilitated areas. Furthermore, results imply that in mining areas it is useful to have an unmined area where vegetation is naturally allowed to regenerate, free of human activity. These unmined areas can later act as source habitats from which birds can disperse into rehabilitation areas once the vegetation structure is sufficiently complex