Relationship between Viable Bacterial Counts and Physicochemical Properties of Cocoa Powders and Powdered Cocoa Beverages purchased in Nigerian Supermarkets.

Cocoa powders (CPs) and powdered cocoa beverages (PCBs) are largely consumed as health and vitality drinks in Nigeria. In view of the recent reports that these food products supported bacterial growth, this study determined whether there could be definite relationship between viable bacterial counts and physicochemical properties of five brands of CPs and PCBs purchased from supermarkets in Ibadan and Lagos in South West, Nigeria. The pH and titratable acidity of the products were measured by using pH meter and colorimetric acidity titration respectively. The moisture contents were determined by drying method at 105ºC in oven and ash by mineralization at 550ºC using furnace. No definite type of relationship was established between viable bacterial counts and pH, titratable acidity (lactic acid, acetic acid), moisture and ash contents vis-à-vis powdery and granular natures of the cocoa food products. Only the two PCBs tightly packed in the polythene sachets had acceptable mean viable bacterial counts, which did not exceed 5.0 x 103 cfu/ml specified for cocoa powders in food industries. Also, only two of the five brands had acceptable moisture contents, which did not exceed the national specification of 3.10% for cocoa powders. Furthermore, the ash contents of all the brands exceeded the acceptable national specification of 2.60%. Significant variations (P<0.05) were obtained in the mean pH, titratable acidity, viable bacterial counts, moisture and ash contents within and between products containing only cocoa powders and those containing additives. In conclusion, the results from this study showed that the physicochemical properties of cocoa powders and powdered cocoa beverages could not be used to predict the viable bacterial counts of these food products

PREVALENCE AND MANAGEMENT OF FALCIPARIUM MALARIA AMONG INFANTS AND CHILDREN IN OTA, OGUN STATE, SOUTHWESTERN NIGERIA

Studies were carried out to determine the prevalence of malaria parasite infection among infants and children (0-12yrs) in Ota, Southwestern Nigeria between April and December 2008. The two hospitals used were Ota General Hospital and Covenant University Health Centre, Canaanland, Ota. Thick and thin films were made and stained using standard parasitological procedures. Structured Questionnaires were distributed to ascertain the age, sex, drugs or insecticides used and state of health of the subjects before recruiting them into the study. Overall, 215 (80.5%) of the 267 children investigated were found to have malaria infection. Age group (0-5 years) had the highest frequency rate of 84.7% with mean parasite density of 900 and the difference between the age groups was statistically significant (p<0.05). Children of illiterates from suburb villages had the highest mean parasite density of 850 with 78.1% prevalence rate. 20% of the children were given local herbs and 22% used orthodox medicine as prophylaxis. Only 18% used insecticide treated mosquito nets while 24% of the parents spray insecticides to prevent mosquito bites. There is therefore need for more awareness on effective use of drugs and Insecticide Treated bed nets in malaria hyperendemic regions

Epidemiological Studies of Urinary Tract Infection (UTI) among Post-menopausal Women in Uyo Metropolis, South-South, Nigeria.

Cross-sectional studies of UTI among post menopausal women were carried out between January and June, 2009 using standard microbiological techniques. The result obtained showed that 42 (39.6%) out of 106 postmenopausal women had urinary tract infections with highest prevalence among women aged 56-60 and lowest among those aged � 61 . Microscopic examinations of forty-two (42) mid-stream urine samples revealed the presence of 13(30.9%) epithelial cells, 5 (11.9%) phosphate crystals, 16 (38.1%) pus cell , 9 (21.4%) yeast cells, 7(16.7%) red blood cells and eggs of Schistoma haematobium 2(4.8%). Bacteria isolated were: Escherichia coli 20 (25.3%), followed by Staphylococcus aureus 16 (20.3%), Pseudomonas aureginosa 10 (12.7%), Coagulase negative Staphylococcus spp 9 (11.4%), Streptococcus pyogenes 6 (7.6%), Serratia marcescens 6 (7.6%), Enterobacter spp 5 (6.3%). Klebsiella spp. 4 (5.1%) and Enterococcus faecalis 3(3.8%). E. coli showed low percentage resistance to ciprofloxacin, ceftazidime and ceftriaxone. Enterobacter spp. were susceptible to ciprofloxacin and cotrimoxazole in 80%, respectively. Between 60-80% of Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Enterobacter spp were susceptible to all the tested antibiotics, while 4(66.7%) Streptococcus pyogenes, 6 (66.7%) CON-Staphylococcus spp and 4(66.7%) Serratia marcescens were sensitive to ceftazidime. All the Enterococcus faecalis and Klebsiella spp isolated were sensitive to ciprofloxacin. The phenotypic determination identified a low ESâL rate of 28.8 % (13 of 45 isolates). ESBLs were detected among the following species: 5 Escherichia coli (25.0%), 3 Pseudomonas spp (30.0%), 1 Klebsiella spp (25.0%), Serratia marcescens2 (33.3%) and Enterobacter spp. 2 (40.0%). The result also showed that 18.9 % of the bacteria were resistant to at least 3 antibiotics with (MAR) index ranging from 0.2 to 0.8. The results obtained in this study are statistically significant (p�0.05). However, continuous surveillance to monitor the prevalence of UTI and antimicrobial resistance among post menopausal women is overwhelmingly necessary. [Akinjogunla, O. J., Odeyemi, A. T. and Olasehinde, G. I. Epidemiological Studies of Urinary Tract Infection (UTI) among Post-menopausal Women in Uyo Metropolis, South-South, Nigeria. Journal of American Science 2010;6(12):1674-1681]. (ISSN: 1545-1003). http://www.americanscience.org

Comparative Analysis of Selected Filtered Feature Rankers Evaluators for Cyber Attacks Detection

An increase in global connectivity and rapid expansion of computer usage and computer networks has made the security of the computer system an important issue with the industries and cyber communities being faced with new kinds of attacks daily The high complexity of cyberattacks poses a great challenge to the protection of cyberinfrastructures Confidentiality Integrity and availability of sensitive information stored on it Intrusion detection systems monitors network traffic for suspicious Intrusive activity and issues alert when such activity is detected Building Intrusion detection system that is computationally efficient and effective requires the use of relevant features of the network traffics packets identified by feature selection algorithms This paper implemented K-Nearest Neighbor and Na ve Bayes Intrusion detection models using relevant features of the UNSW-NB15 Intrusion detection dataset selected by Gain Ratio Information Gain Relief F and Correlation rankers feature selection technique

Design of Machine Learning Framework for Products Placement Strategy in Grocery Store

The well-known and most used support-confidence framework for Association rule mining has some drawbacks when employ to generate strong rules, this weakness has led to its poor predictive performances. This framework predict customers buying behavior based on the assumption of the confidence value, which limits its competent at making good business decision. This work presents a better Association Rule Mining conceptualized framework for mining previous customers transactions dataset of grocery store for the optimal prediction of products placement on the shelves, physical shelf arrangement and identification of products that needs promotion. Sampled transaction records were used to demonstrate the proposed framework. The proposed framework leverage on the ability of lift metric at improving the predictive performance of Association Rule Mining. The Lift discloses how much better an association rule is at predicting products to be placed together on the shelve rather than assuming. The proposed conceptualized framework will assist retailers and grocery stores owners to easily unlock the latent knowledge or patterns in their large day to day stored transaction dataset to make important business decision that will make them competitive and maximized their profit margin

In-vitro studies on the sensitivity pattern of Plasmodium falciparum to antimalarial drugs and local herbal extracts

The resistance of human malaria parasites to antimalarial compounds has become of considerable concern, particularly in view of the shortage of novel classes of antimalarial drugs. One way to prevent resistance is by using new compounds that are not based on existing synthetic antimicrobial agents. Sensitivity of one hundred (100) P. falciparum isolates to chloroquine, quinine, amodiaquine, mefloquine, sulphadoxine/pyrimethamine, artemisinin, Momordicacharantia (Ejirin) Diospyrosmonbuttensis (Eeguneja) and Morindalucida (Oruwo) was determined using the in-vitro microtest (Mark III) technique to determine the IC50 of the drugs. All the isolates tested were sensitive to quinine, mefloquine and artesunate. Only 51% of the isolates were resistant to chloroquine, 13% to amodiaquine and 5% to sulphadoxinepyrimethamine respectively. Highest resistance to chloroquine (68.9%) was recorded among isolates from Yewa zone while highest resistance to amodiaquine (30%) was observed in Ijebu zone. Highest resistance to sulphadoxine and pyrimethamine was recorded in Yewa and Egba zones respectively. A significant positive correlation was observed between the responses to artemisinin and mefloquine (P=0.001), artemisinin and quinine (P=0.05), quinine and mefloquine (P=0.01). A significant negative correlation was observed between the responses to chloroquine and mefloquine (P=0.05). Highest antiplasmodial activity was obtained with the ethanolic extract of Diospyrosmon buttensis (IC50=32 μg/ml) while the lowest was obtained from Morinda lucida (IC50=250 μg/ml). Natural products isolated from plants used in traditional medicine, which have potent antiplasmodial action in vitro, represents potential sources of new antimalarial drugs

Effect of Calcium Chloride on viability and fecundity of Biomphalaria pfeifferi, snail intermediate host of Schistosoma mansoni

Biomphalaria pfeifferi, the snail intermediate host of Schistosoma mansoni was cultured in the laboratory to show the effect of CaCl2 on its rate of production of eggs and hatchability of the eggs laid. 12 snails of approximately the same size and age were cultured in each of the 4 tanks set up. In 3 of the tanks were CaCl2 dissolved in 1000cm3 of water in various concentrations. The 4th culture tank served as control experiment where no calcium was added. Highest fecundity was recorded in the control tank while highest hatchability was recorded in the tank with minimal quantity of CaCl2. From the results of this research, it has been found that calcium in low concentrations is necessary for optimum fecundity and viability of eggs of Biomphalaria pfeifferi. Very high concentrations are lethal to the snails. Based on the outcome of this study, CaCl2 can therefore be used as an additional source of calcium for laboratory culture of the snail intermediate hosts. This is necessary for better understanding of the life cycle of Schistosoma mansoni towards eradication of schistosomiasis

IN-VITRO AND MOLECULAR STUDIES ON THE RESISTANCE P. falciparum TO ANTI-MALARIAL DRUGS IN OGUN STATE, SOUTHWESTERN NIGERIA

The widespread of drug resistant Plasmodium falciparum has led to a rise in malaria associated mortality most especially in sub-Saharan Africa. In-vitro and molecular studies were carried out in order to determine the resistant pattern of P. falciparum to antimalarial drugs and some local antimalarial herbs in Ogun State, Southwestern Nigeria. Prevalence of falciparum malaria was determined by microscopic examination of Giemsa-stained blood samples of patients who presented with fever in selected State Hospitals in Ogun State. Antimalarial drug sensitivity of one hundred (100) P. falciparum isolates to chloroquine, amodiaquine, mefloquine, quinine, sulphadoxine/pyrimethamine, artesunate and three local antimalarial herbs: Momordica charantia (Ejirin,) Diospyros monbuttensis (Eegun eja) and Morinda lucida (Oruwo) was determined using the in-vitro microtest (Mark III) technique. For molecular studies and genotyping, DNA was extracted from patient blood using the QiaAmp DNA Blood Minikit extraction method. Nested Polymerase Chain Reaction followed by Restriction Fragment Length Polymorphisms (PCR/RFLP) were used for the detection of P. falciparum chloroquine resistance transporter (Pfcrt), P. falciparum multidrug resistance 1 (pfmdr1), P. falciparum dihydrofolate reductase (Pfdhfr), P. falciparum dihydropteroate synthase (Pfdhps) and P. falciparum sarco/endoplasmic reticulum calcium-dependent ATPase (SERCA) PfATPase6 genes. Genetic diversity of the isolates was determined using merozoite surface proteins 1 and 2 (msp1 and msp2) and Glutamate rich Protein (Glurp). Structured Questionnaires were administered to patients or/and parents of infants to determine the factors that could lead to the development of drug resistance by the parasite in the study population. Out of 4066 subjects screened during the period of study, 2550 (61.1%) were positive. Highest prevalence (72%) was recorded in children 1-5 years while the same group also had the highest parasitaemia of 1080. All the isolates tested were sensitive to Quinine, Mefloquine and Artesunate. Only 51% of the isolates were resistant to chloroquine, 13% to amodiaquine and 5% to sulphadoxine pyrimethamine respectively. Highest resistance to chloroquine (68.9%) was recorded among isolates from Yewa zone while highest resistance to amodiaquine (30%) was observed in Ijebu zone. Highest resistance to sulphadoxine and pyrimethamine was recorded in Yewa and Egba zones respectively. A significant positive correlation was observed between the responses to artemisinin and mefloquine (P=0.001), artemisinin and quinine (P=0.05), Quinine and mefloquine (P= 0.01). A significant negative correlation was observed between the responses to chloroquine and mefloquine (P=0.05). For the local herbs highest antiplasmodial activity was obtained with the ethanolic extract of Diospyros monbuttensis (IC50 = 32 μg/ml). P. falciparum isolates analyzed during this study have demonstrated highly diverse nature of field isolates in respect of msp-1 (block 2) and msp-2 (central repeat region, block3). All the three reported families of msp-1(K1, MAD20 and RO33) and two of msp-2 (FC27 and 3D7) were observed among the isolates. Proportion of isolates with K1 family was 68% with 4 alleles in the range of 100 to 300 basepairs (bp). Proportion of isolates with MAD20 family was 40% and a total of 3 alleles were observed within 100 to 300 bp. RO33 proportion was 20% and the family was observed to be monomorphic with an allele size of 200 bp. In msp-2 the proportion of FC27 family was 76% and that of 3D7 was 56%. Proportional Prevalence of FC27 and 3D7 families was significantly different (χ2 = 16.5, P = 0.002). Eighty percent of the isolates harbor the genes that code for Glutamate rich protein with size ranging between 700 and 900bp. Pfcrt (K76T ) Pfmdr1 (mdr 1 ) Pfdhfr (S108N), and Pfdhps (K540E ) resistant genes were detected among the isolates while resistant SERCAPfATPase6 gene which codes for artemisinin resistance was not detected in the population. The questionnaire study showed that 24.6% of the patient visit hospitals for treatment, 12.0% use local healers while 25.0% buy antimalarial drugs without prescription. It was also observed that some use more than one method in their management of malaria. Those who combined antimalarial drugs with traditional medicine from local healers were found to be 17.4%. Only 18% of the sample population used Insecticide treated mosquito nets, 42.3% use window and door nets while 13% do not employ any mosquito preventive method. Continuous use of the current antimalarial drugs increases the chance of resistance developing to those drugs. Control of drug use and reducing exposure of parasites to the drugs are most effective where the parasite is still sensitive to the drug. Molecular methods are most effective for monitoring the spread of resistant strains of P. falciparum

Peer Influence as Predictor of Reading Habit among Public Secondary School Students in Osun Central Senatorial District, Osun State, Nigeria.

Previous studies have identified several factors that could improve the reading habit of students in Osun central senatorial district of Osun State. Observably, there is dearth of studies on the relationship that exists between peer influence and reading habit of secondary school students in public schools in the State. This research investigated the prevalence of peer influence and the extent to which peer influence predicts reading habit students. The study iss a descriptive survey of the correlational type of which a multistage sampling procedure was adopted. Twelve public secondary schools were used for the study in Osun Central senatorial district in Osun State from which 476 S.S.S. II students were proportionately selected. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics and Pearson’s product moment correlation. The hypothesis was tested at 0.05 level of significance. The respondents were Males 205 (43%) and females 271 (57%) with a mean age of 16 years ±1.36. Reading together with friend(s)” =3.21) was the major peer influence. A high level of peer influence was obtained among the students (56.7%). A weak positive significant relationship was found between peer influence and reading habit. The high level of peer influence that subsists among the students should be harnessed towards boosting reading habit among the students and assist them to record success with reading