Serum amyloid A and haptoglobin levels in crossbred cows with endometritis following different therapy

Abstract Aim: To determine the serum variations of two major acute phase proteins, serum amyloid A (SAA) and haptoglobin (Hp) levels in crossbred endometritis cows following pre and post immunomodulation therapy. Materials and Methods: 21 endometritis cows were randomly assigned to three groups (n=7) and treated with three different immunomodulators while seven healthy cows served as control. Uterine flushing collected from all animals was subjected to bacteriological study and serum samples were analyzed for SAA and Hp by sandwich ELISA method. Results: Escherichia coli was most prevalent Gram-negative bacteria (6.02 × 10 6 CFU/ml) while Staphylococcus (0.86 × 10 6 CFU/ml) and Streptococcus (0.52 × 10 6 CFU/ml) were most predominant Gram-positive species isolated from uterine flushing. The pre-treatment SAA values (μg/ml) varied significantly (p<0.01) between the treatment groups whereas no difference was observed in post-treatment groups. No significant difference (p<0.01) was observed for Hp values between the treatment groups, but the mean SAA (μg/ml) and Hp (μg/ml) levels were significantly (p<0.01) higher in pre-treatment when compared to post-treatment within the groups. Conclusion: In the diagnosis and monitoring of bovine endometritis, both SAA and Hp might serve as reliable biomarkers

Drug Metabolism in Human Brain: High Levels of Cytochrome P4503A43 in Brain and Metabolism of Anti-Anxiety Drug Alprazolam to Its Active Metabolite

Cytochrome P450 (P450) is a super-family of drug metabolizing enzymes. P450 enzymes have dual function; they can metabolize drugs to pharmacologically inactive metabolites facilitating their excretion or biotransform them to pharmacologically active metabolites which may have longer half-life than the parent drug. The variable pharmacological response to psychoactive drugs typically seen in population groups is often not accountable by considering dissimilarities in hepatic metabolism. Metabolism in brain specific nuclei may play a role in pharmacological modulation of drugs acting on the CNS and help explain some of the diverse response to these drugs seen in patient population. P450 enzymes are also present in brain where drug metabolism can take place and modify therapeutic action of drugs at the site of action. We have earlier demonstrated an intrinsic difference in the biotransformation of alprazolam (ALP) in brain and liver, relatively more α-hydroxy alprazolam (α-OHALP) is formed in brain as compared to liver. In the present study we show that recombinant CYP3A43 metabolizes ALP to both α-OHALP and 4-hydroxy alprazolam (4-OHALP) while CYP3A4 metabolizes ALP predominantly to its inactive metabolite, 4-OHALP. The expression of CYP3A43 mRNA in human brain samples correlates with formation of relatively higher levels of α-OH ALP indicating that individuals who express higher levels of CYP3A43 in the brain would generate larger amounts of α-OHALP. Further, the expression of CYP3A43 was relatively higher in brain as compared to liver across different ethnic populations. Since CYP3A enzymes play a prominent role in the metabolism of drugs, the higher expression of CYP3A43 would generate metabolite profile of drugs differentially in human brain and thus impact the pharmacodynamics of psychoactive drugs at the site of action

Development and use of genic molecular markers (GMMs) for construction of a transcript map of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.)

A transcript map has been constructed by the development and integration of genic molecular markers (GMMs) including single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), genic microsatellite or simple sequence repeat (SSR) and intron spanning region (ISR)-based markers, on an inter-specific mapping population of chickpea, the third food legume crop of the world and the first food legume crop of India. For SNP discovery through allele re-sequencing, primer pairs were designed for 688 genes/expressed sequence tags (ESTs) of chickpea and 657 genes/ESTs of closely related species of chickpea. High-quality sequence data obtained for 220 candidate genic regions on 2–20 genotypes representing 9 Cicer species provided 1,893 SNPs with an average frequency of 1/35.83 bp and 0.34 PIC (polymorphism information content) value. On an average 2.9 haplotypes were present in 220 candidate genic regions with an average haplotype diversity of 0.6326. SNP2CAPS analysis of 220 sequence alignments, as mentioned above, provided a total of 192 CAPS candidates. Experimental analysis of these 192 CAPS candidates together with 87 CAPS candidates identified earlier through in silico mining of ESTs provided scorable amplification in 173 (62.01%) cases of which predicted assays were validated in 143 (82.66%) cases (CGMM). Alignments of chickpea unigenes with Medicago truncatula genome were used to develop 121 intron spanning region (CISR) markers of which 87 yielded scorable products. In addition, optimization of 77 EST-derived SSR (ICCeM) markers provided 51 scorable markers. Screening of easily assayable 281 markers including 143 CGMMs, 87 CISRs and 51 ICCeMs on 5 parental genotypes of three mapping populations identified 104 polymorphic markers including 90 markers on the inter-specific mapping population. Sixty-two of these GMMs together with 218 earlier published markers (including 64 GMM loci) and 20 other unpublished markers could be integrated into this genetic map. A genetic map developed here, therefore, has a total of 300 loci including 126 GMM loci and spans 766.56 cM, with an average inter-marker distance of 2.55 cM. In summary, this is the first report on the development of large-scale genic markers including development of easily assayable markers and a transcript map of chickpea. These resources should be useful not only for genome analysis and genetics and breeding applications of chickpea, but also for comparative legume genomics

Genetic diversity analysis in the section Caulorrhizae (genus Arachis) using microsatellite markers

Diversity in 26 microsatellite loci from section Caulorrhizae germplasm was evaluated by using 33 accessions of A. pintoi Krapov. & W.C. Gregory and ten accessions of Arachis repens Handro. Twenty loci proved to be polymorphic and a total of 196 alleles were detected with an average of 9.8 alleles per locus. The variability found in those loci was greater than the variability found using morphological characters, seed storage proteins and RAPD markers previously used in this germplasm. The high potential of these markers to detect species-specific alleles and discriminate among accessions was demonstrated. The set of microsatellite primer pairs developed by our group for A. pintoi are useful molecular tools for evaluating Section Caulorrhizae germplasm, as well as that of species belonging to other Arachis sections

Chickpea

The narrow genetic base of cultivated chickpea warrants systematic collection, documentation and evaluation of chickpea germplasm and particularly wild Cicer species for effective and efficient use in chickpea breeding programmes. Limiting factors to crop production, possible solutions and ways to overcome them, importance of wild relatives and barriers to alien gene introgression and strategies to overcome them and traits for base broadening have been discussed. It has been clearly demonstrated that resistance to major biotic and abiotic stresses can be successfully introgressed from the primary gene pool comprising progenitor species. However, many desirable traits including high degree of resistance to multiple stresses that are present in the species belonging to secondary and tertiary gene pools can also be introgressed by using special techniques to overcome pre- and post-fertilization barriers. Besides resistance to various biotic and abiotic stresses, the yield QTLs have also been introgressed from wild Cicer species to cultivated varieties. Status and importance of molecular markers, genome mapping and genomic tools for chickpea improvement are elaborated. Because of major genes for various biotic and abiotic stresses, the transfer of agronomically important traits into elite cultivars has been made easy and practical through marker-assisted selection and marker-assisted backcross. The usefulness of molecular markers such as SSR and SNP for the construction of high-density genetic maps of chickpea and for the identification of genes/QTLs for stress resistance, quality and yield contributing traits has also been discussed

Application of ANN and ANFIS for predicting the ultimate bearing capacity of eccentrically loaded rectangular foundations

Extensive laboratory model tests were conducted on a rectangular embedded foundation resting over homogeneous sand bed and subjected to an eccentric load to determine the ultimate bearing capacity. Tests were conducted for foundations with width-to-length ratios (B/L) of zero (strip case), 0.333, 0.5, and 1. The depth of embedment varies from 0 to 1 B with an increment of 0.5 B; where B is the width of foundation and the eccentricity ratio (e/B) varies from 0 to 0.15 with an increment of 0.05. Based on the laboratory model test results, two different approaches are proposed to determine the ultimate bearing capacity. Firstly, a neural network model is developed to estimate the reduction factor. The reduction factor can be used to estimate the ultimate bearing capacity of an eccentrically loaded foundation from the ultimate bearing capacity of a centrally loaded foundation. A thorough sensitivity analysis was carried out to determine the important parameters affecting the reduction factor. Importance was given to the construction of neural interpretation diagram. Based on this diagram, whether direct or inverse relationships exist between the input and output parameters were determined. Secondly, an adaptive neuro-fuzzy interface system (ANFIS) is used to predict the ultimate bearing capacity. The neuro-fuzzy models combine the transparent, linguistic representation of a fuzzy system with learning ability of artificial neural networks (ANNs). The results from the ANN and ANFIS were compared with the laboratory model test results. It is clearly seen that the performance of the ANFIS model in our study is better than that of the ANN model

Not Available

Not AvailableAs India lives in its villages, village development has been the core of developmental perspective of India since decades. In this line, the concept of model village development is now in the forefront for overall sustainable village development. But keeping in view the stagnant growth the present study was designed and accordingly, the objective was formulated to identify the constraints that are coming in the way of developing model villages. The research was purposively conducted in Ralegan Siddhi of Maharashtra state; declared as a model village and three common villages namely Pimpalgaon Rotha, Randhe, Garkhindi were selected in the vicinity of the model village for validation of the indicators. Thirty-five respondents comprising fifteen females, fifteen male respondents, and five officials were selected from each of the four villages randomly. An open-ended questionnaire was used to obtain the perception of the villagers about the constraints. Garrette ranking technique was used to rank the constraints and a structured schedule was also used to collect information related to the constraints. Friedman test was used to find the most severe constraint. It was found that the most severe constraint in developing model villages was decreased community participation followed by increased migration, the presence of social evil and lack of responsiveness towards society.Not Availabl

Swelling and sorption behaviour of PVA and PVA/silica nanocomposite membrane at different silica loadings

44-51Intercalation of nanomaterial with a polymer is an intriguing approach for modifying the microstructure of polymer to improve the swelling property, performance, and selectivity of the membrane. The effect of sorption and swelling on membrane selectivity of organic-inorganic polyvinyl alcohol/silica (PVA/SiO2) membranes with a different weight percentage of silica has been investigated using propanol/water, isopropanol/water, and butanol/water mixture. The PVA composite membrane is prepared using solution casting method, and sol-gel derived route using tetraethoxysilane (TEOS) as the precursor material for silica and PVA as a polymer. Swelling experiment results show an inverse relationship between the degree of swelling and the silica concentration due to the formation of a rigid structure with increase in weight of the nanomaterial. Dense structure results in less free volume and decreases the amount of absorbed liquid in the polymer at a lower concentration of nanoparticles. The result is also modeled using Flory Huggins parameter, and the similar trend was observed as for the experimental value for the degree of swelling