The role of behavior change communication on knowledge and uptake of postpartum contraception among antenatal mothers in Puducherry: a randomized controlled trial

Background: India accounts for world's 17.5 percent population and is the second most populous country in the world next only to China (19.4%). Birth control pills, condoms, sterilization, IUD (intrauterine device) etc. are most commonly practiced family planning methods in India. The latest NFHS shows that 77% of sterilized women did not use a family planning method. Despite of family welfare program having a target free approach, the program has not been successful in educating people about the concept and advantages of contraceptive methods for spacing births.Methods: This randomized controlled trial was carried out in the department of obstetrics and gynecology of Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), Puducherry. All antenatal mothers >28 weeks of gestational age were enrolled and given a semi-structured questionnaire. After randomization intervention was done in the form of counselling and distribution of pamphlets for future use. The women were followed in the postnatal period and 6 weeks later.Results: A total of 280 subjects were enrolled in this study. Socio-demographic characteristics were similar in both the study groups. Majority of women in both the comparison and intervention group were in the age group 20-25 years (43.6%). Very few participants (20.0%) had used some form of contraception to delay pregnancy. However, the postpartum follow-up of the study participants revealed significant increase in the knowledge on the various contraceptive methods in the intervention group compared with the comparison group.Conclusions: The implementation of behaviour change communication strategy to communicate the benefits of uptake of postpartum contraception to antenatal mothers, is vital in improving the acceptability of family planning programs in India

Seismic Site Characterization of Delhi Region Using Microtremor Method: A Case Study

Microtremor method is the most inexpensive and convenient technique for dynamic site characterization of sedimentary basins. This study was carried out in Delhi NCR at 144 different stations and field measurements were taken using velocity sensors for a period of 1 hr at each station point. The data was analyzed using VIEW 2002 software for the estimation of fundamental resonance frequency. The results of the all 144 stations were divided into four categories (T1, T2, T3, and T4) based on the shape of the H/V spectra, resonance frequency and soil type. Since the detailed (bore hole data) soil profile at all these locations is available, the resonance frequency is compared with sedimentary thickness. It is observed that the resonance frequency is high at ridge areas and very low in places with high sedimentary thickness close to Yamuna

Wind Wave Variability In Indian Ocean During South-West Monsoon

Source: ICHE Conference Archive - https://mdi-de.baw.de/icheArchiv

Blended intelligence of FCA with FLC for knowledge representation from clustered data in medical analysis

Formal concept analysis is the process of data analysis mechanism with emergent attractiveness across various fields such as data mining, robotics, medical, big data and so on. FCA is helpful to generate the new learning ontology based techniques. In medical field, some growing kids are facing the problem of representing their knowledge from their gathered prior data which is in the form of unordered and insufficient clustered data which is not supporting them to take the right decision on right time for solving the uncertainty based questionnaires. In the approach of decision theory, many mathematical replicas such as probability-allocation, crisp set, and fuzzy based set theory were designed to deals with knowledge representation based difficulties along with their characteristic. This paper is proposing new ideological blended approach of FCA with FLC and described with major objectives: primarily the FCA analyzes the data based on relationships between the set of objects of prior-attributes and the set of attributes based prior-data, which the data is framed with data-units implicated composition which are formal statements of idea of human thinking with conversion of significant intelligible explanation. Suitable rules are generated to explore the relationship among the attributes and used the formal concept analysis from these suitable rules to explore better knowledge and most important factors affecting the decision making. Secondly how the FLC derive the fuzzification, rule-construction and defuzzification methods implicated for representing the accurate knowledge for uncertainty based questionnaires. Here the FCA is projected to expand the FCA based conception with help of the objective based item set notions considered as the target which is implicated with the expanded cardinalities along with its weights which is associated through the fuzzy based inference decision rules. This approach is more helpful for medical experts for knowing the range of patient’s memory deficiency also for people whose are facing knowledge explorer deficiency

Multi Channel Analysis of Surface Wave (MASW) Testing for Dynamic Site Characterization of Delhi Region

After the Bhuj earthquake the national capital region of Delhi attracted major attention of several scientific studies in the recent times. Since Delhi falls in zone IV (IS 1893: 2002) with high seismic activity, there is a great need for site characterization and seismic hazard mapping of the area. Multi Channel Analysis of Surface Wave (MASW) tests were done in Delhi at 118 sites in predefined grids of 2kmX3km each. Shear-wave velocity, VS, is an important parameter for evaluating dynamic behavior of soil. This test carried outdone using 48 channel digital seismograph with 4.5 Hz geophones. Data was analyzed using SeisImager/SW software and two dimensional shear wave velocity models at every 5m depth from ground surface was developed. It is observed that the value of Vs is ranging from 400 to 480 m/s in the rocky sites, it is 120 to 250m/s in trans Yamuna region and 250 to 370m/s in western side of the area. The shear wave velocity values are exactly matching with the geological and geotechnical characteristics of the subsoil strata. Also, the field shear wave velocity from MASW test is compared with the estimated values using the empirical formulae developed. It is observed that the experimental shear wave velocity and the empirically estimated values are almost equal up to 20m depth. But at depths greater 20m, Vs from MASW test are slightly higher than the calculated value using empirical formulae developed. Average shear wave velocity at 30m depth i.e., VS30 is also calculated and is ranging from 185 to 495 m/s for Delhi region. Also, correlations among Vs, SPT ‘N’, depth ‘D’ are developed using the available borehole data. These correlations are useful to estimate the shear wave velocity at any depth with out performing the actual test in Delhi region

Current dark matter annihilation constraints from CMB and low-redshift data

Updated constraints on the dark matter cross section and mass are presented combining cosmic microwave background (CMB) power spectrum measurements from Planck, WMAP9, ACT, and SPT as well as several low-redshift data sets (BAO, HST, and supernovae). For the CMB data sets, we combine WMAP9 temperature and polarization data for l ≤ 431 with Planck temperature data for 432 ≤ l ≤ 2500, ACT and SPT data for l > 2500, and Planck CMB four-point lensing measurements. We allow for redshift-dependent energy deposition from dark matter annihilation by using a “universal" energy absorption curve. We also include an updated treatment of the excitation, heating, and ionization energy fractions and provide an updated deposition efficiency factors (f[subscript eff]) for 41 different dark matter models. Assuming perfect energy deposition (f[subscript eff] = 1) and a thermal cross section, dark matter masses below 26 GeV are excluded at the 2σ level. Assuming a more generic efficiency of f[subscript eff] = 0.2, thermal dark matter masses below 5 GeV are disfavored at the 2σ level. These limits are a factor of ∼2 improvement over those from WMAP9 data alone. These current constraints probe, but do not exclude, dark matter as an explanation for reported anomalous indirect detection observations from AMS-02/PAMELA and the Fermi gamma-ray inner-Galaxy data. They also probe relevant models that would explain anomalous direct detection events from CDMS, CRESST, CoGeNT, and DAMA, as originating from a generic thermal weakly interacting massive particle. Projected constraints from the full Planck release should improve the current limits by another factor of ∼2 but will not definitely probe these signals. The proposed CMB Stage IV experiment will more decisively explore the relevant regions and improve upon the Planck constraints by another factor of ∼2.Stony Brook University-Brookhaven National Laboratory (Research Initiatives Seed Grant 37298, Project 1111593)United States. Dept. of Energy (Cooperative Research Agreement Contract DE-FG02-05ER41360

Queue-length synchronization in a communication networks

We study synchronization in the context of network traffic on a $2-d$ communication network with local clustering and geographic separations. The network consists of nodes and randomly distributed hubs where the top five hubs ranked according to their coefficient of betweenness centrality (CBC) are connected by random assortative and gradient mechanisms. For multiple message traffic, messages can trap at the high CBC hubs, and congestion can build up on the network with long queues at the congested hubs. The queue lengths are seen to synchronize in the congested phase. Both complete and phase synchronization is seen, between pairs of hubs. In the decongested phase, the pairs start clearing, and synchronization is lost. A cascading master-slave relation is seen between the hubs, with the slower hubs (which are slow to decongest) driving the faster ones. These are usually the hubs of high CBC. Similar results are seen for traffic of constant density. Total synchronization between the hubs of high CBC is also seen in the congested regime. Similar behavior is seen for traffic on a network constructed using the Waxman random topology generator. We also demonstrate the existence of phase synchronization in real Internet traffic data.Comment: 13 Pages, 15 figure

EFFECT OF SHILAJIT ON EXPERIMENTAL MODELS OF INFLAMMATORY BOWEL DISEASE IN RATS

Objective: Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic condition of the intestine with unknown etiology involving multiple immunes, genetic and environmental factors. Oxidative stress is believed to be a key factor in the pathogenesis and perpetuation of the mucosal damage in IBD. The present study is to elucidate the effects of shilajit extract on the extent and severity of enterocolitis induced by subcutaneous administration of Indomethacin (7.5 mg/kg b. w) in Wistar rats.Methods: Study comprised of 6 groups (n=6), normal vehicle control, indomethacin-induced (7.5 mg/kg, 2days), shilajit alone 50 mg/kg b. w, shilajit treated groups (25 and 50 mg/kg, p. o) and sulfasalazine treated (100 mg/kg, p. o) groups. Drug treatment continued for 11 d and on 12th d scarification was done. The colonic mucosal injury was assessed by macroscopic scoring, biochemical (LDH, MPO, GSH and LPO) tests were performed.Results: Pretreatment with shilajit showed a decrease in macroscopic scores, LDH, MPO, LPO and elevation levels of GSH as compared to the indomethacin-treated group.Conclusion: The present study suggests that the protective effect of shilajit in indomethacin-induced enterocolitis might be attributed to its scavenging effect on oxygen-derived free radicals and may be beneficial in patients with inflammatory bowel disease