The influence of electrolyte concentration on nanofractures fabricated in a 3D-printed microfluidic device by controlled dielectric breakdown

A three-dimensional-printed microfluidic device made of a thermoplastic material was used to study the creation of molecular filters by controlled dielectric breakdown. The device was made from acrylonitrile butadiene styrene by a fused deposition modeling three-dimensional printer and consisted of two V-shaped sample compartments separated by 750 µm of extruded plastic gap. Nanofractures were formed in the thin piece of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene by controlled dielectric breakdown by application voltage of 15-20 kV with the voltage terminated when reaching a defined current threshold. Variation of the size of the nanofractures was achieved by both variation of the current threshold and by variation of the ionic strength of the electrolyte used for breakdown. Electrophoretic transport of two proteins, R-phycoerythrin (RPE; <10 nm in size) and fluorescamine-labeled BSA (f-BSA; 2-4 nm), was used to monitor the size and transport properties of the nanofractures. Using 1 mM phosphate buffer, both RPE and f-BSA passed through the nanofractures when the current threshold was set to 25 µA. However, when the threshold was lowered to 10 µA or lower, RPE was restricted from moving through the nanofractures. When we increased the electrolyte concentration during breakdown from 1 to 10 mM phosphate buffer, BSA passed but RPE was blocked when the threshold was equal to, or lower than, 25 µA. This demonstrates that nanofracture size (pore area) is directly related to the breakdown current threshold but inversely related to the concentration of the electrolyte used for the breakdown process

Data-Augmentation for Bangla-English Code-Mixed Sentiment Analysis: Enhancing Cross Linguistic Contextual Understanding

In today&#x2019;s digital world, automated sentiment analysis from online reviews can contribute to a wide variety of decision-making processes. One example is examining typical perceptions of a product based on customer feedbacks to have a better understanding of consumer expectations, which can help enhance everything from customer service to product offerings. Online review comments, on the other hand, frequently mix different languages, use non-native scripts and do not adhere to strict grammar norms. For a low-resource language like Bangla, the lack of annotated code-mixed data makes automated sentiment analysis more challenging. To address this, we collect online reviews of different products and construct an annotated Bangla-English code mix (BE-CM) dataset (Dataset and other resources are available at https://github.com/fokhruli/CM-seti-anlysis). On our sentiment corpus, we also compare several alternative models from the existing literature. We present a simple but effective data augmentation method that can be utilized with existing word embedding algorithms without the need for a parallel corpus to improve cross-lingual contextual understanding. Our experimental results suggest that training word embedding models (e.g., Word2vec, FastText) with our data augmentation strategy can help the model in capturing the cross-lingual relationship for code-mixed sentences, thereby improving the overall performance of existing classifiers in both supervised learning and zero-shot cross-lingual adaptability. With extensive experimentations, we found that XGBoost with Fasttext embedding trained on our proposed data augmentation method outperforms other alternative models in automated sentiment analysis on code-mixed Bangla-English dataset, with a weighted F1 score of 87&#x0025;

General perception and self-practice of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) among undergraduate pharmacy students of Bangladesh

Abstract Background Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) is a combination of herbal medicine, traditional therapies, and mind-body intervention. This descriptive study was designed to assess the knowledge, attitudes, perception and self-use of CAM among Bangladeshi undergraduate pharmacy students. The study also evaluated their opinions about its integration into the pharmacy course curriculum. Methods It was a cross-sectional, questionnaire-based study conducted on 250 pharmacy students of five reputed public universities of Bangladesh. Results This study revealed that majority of the pharmacy students were using or had previously used at least one type of CAM. Among the students, 59% had used homeopathy followed by Ayurveda (30%), meditation (29%), massage (13%), Unani (9%), yoga (6%) and acupuncture (2%). Students’ attitudes towards CAM were influenced by family and friends, books and journals, the internet and to a lesser degree by health practitioners. A significant (p < 0.05) number of students had knowledge about CAM. A majority of the students (90%) had positive, while 10% had negative attitudes towards CAM. Lack of knowledge and trained professionals were found to be the major interruptions to CAM use. 84.45% acknowledged the importance of knowledge about CAM for them as future healthcare practitioners. Furthermore, the majority of the students also believed that ideas and methods of CAM would be beneficial for conventional medicine. Conclusions From the findings of the study, it can be recommended that an approach should be taken to educate the students about the fundamentals of CAM use so that it may fulfill the professional needs of our future pharmacists

The Effect of Socio-Demographic Factors in Health-Seeking Behaviors among Bangladeshi Residents during the First Wave of COVID-19

Background: Socio-demographic variability among nations and cultures highly influences health-seeking behavior (HSB) in managing endemic or pandemic diseases. The present study aimed to investigate the influence of socio-demographic factors on HSB among Bangladeshi residents during the first wave of COVID-19. Methods: A cross-sectional online survey was performed with Bangladeshi residents (60% male and 40% female; age range: 10&ndash;60 years or above) from May to July 2020. Information was collected from the participants who resided in slum areas or did not have internet access through face-to-face surveys, maintaining spatial distancing and proper preventive measures. A self-reported and structured questionnaire, including socio-demographic and HSB, was undertaken, and the data was analyzed using a convenience sampling method. Finally, among the 947 participants, 20 were selected using a stratified random sampling technique for in-depth-interview (IDI). The linear regression analysis was performed to determine the influence of socio-demographic factors on HSB. Results: Only about 4.2% of respondents did not wear masks, but nearly half of the participants (46.6%) did not use hand gloves. The mean score of HSB was 9.98 (SD = 2.01) out of 16, with a correct overall rate of 62.4%. As per regression analysis, higher HSBs were found among participants who reported older age (&gt;50 years) (9.96 &plusmn; 2.45), educated unemployed students (10.1 &plusmn; 1.95), higher education (10.5 &plusmn; 1.76), and higher-income (10.4 &plusmn; 1.59); in contrast, participants living in slum areas (8.18 &plusmn; 2.34) and whose source of income was business (8.46 &plusmn; 2.04) exhibited lower HSBs. Females, compared to men, showed better HSB in every aspect, apart from online food ordering. Qualitative data showed that the younger generation is more aware because of their access to information and persuaded the older generations to follow health-seeking protocols. The results also showed that some lower-income slum-dwellers have access to information and healthcare through their employers. IDIs also found cultural, religious, and mental-health affect people&rsquo;s adherence to health-seeking guidelines and regulations. Conclusions: The findings suggest that socio-demographic factors significantly influenced HSBs during COVID-19 in the Bangladeshi population. Authorities can use these observations to systematically manage future endemics or pandemics

Evaluation of bioactivities of methanol and petroleum ether extracts of Cassia renigera seed

Abstract Background To investigate in vitro antioxidant, brine shrimp lethality bioassay, antimicrobial, anthelmintic activities and in vivo peripheral analgesic activity of methanol and petroleum ether extracts of Cassia renigera seed. Methods Phytochemical screening of the crude extracts was carried out. Antioxidant activity was determined using seven different methods. Brine shrimp lethality bioassay and anthelmintic activities were done using nauplii of Artemia salina and adult earthworm (Pheretima posthuma), respectively. The antimicrobial potential was investigated against three Gram-positive and three Gram-negative bacteria. Acetic acid induced writhing test was performed to evaluate peripheral analgesic activity. Results Both methanol and petroleum ether extracts showed the presence of flavonoids, saponins, and tannins. While alkaloids, glycosides, and steroids were only found in the methanolic extract. Methanolic extract showed more potent 1,1- diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), nitric oxide scavenging capacity, cupric reducing and reducing power capacity than petroleum ether extract. While petroleum ether extract showed better results in total phenol and total antioxidant activities. In brine shrimp lethality bioassay methanolic and petroleum ether extracts showed the LC50 value of 74.44 and 121.49 μg/mL, respectively. In overall antimicrobial study methanolic extract showed better activity than petroleum ether extract. Methanolic extract of 50 mg/mL showed maximum anthelmintic activity comparable to the standard (Piperazine Citrate, 10 mg/mL). Both 500 mg/kg and 1000 mg/kg body weight dose of the methanolic extract exhibited significant 39.64% and 58.73% writhing inhibition (푃< 0.05) in test animals, consecutively. Conclusions In a nutshell, the results suggested that the seed can be used as a potential source for the aforesaid bioactivities