Effect of Bibliotherapy on Stress among Children at selected Orphanages, Coimbatore

Children are most likely to have physical, psychological and social problems. Stress is an important psychological problem more commonly seen in children and orphan children face immense stress due to complex needs. An interventional study was conducted to assess the effect of Bibliotherapy on the level of stress among children at selected orphanages. Pre-experimental one group pretest- posttest design was used to conduct the study. The sampling technique adopted for the study was purposive sampling. The level of stress was assessed by the structured stress assessment questionnaire. Forty five children between the age group of 10-13 years of Don Bosco Anpuillam and Maryalaya orphanage who were having stress were included in the study. Bibliotherapy was administered for thirty days and posttest was done on the last day by using the same structured stress assessment questionnaire. Paired‘t’ test was used to assess the effect of Bibliotherapy on stress among children at selected orphanages. The result showed that the mean scores of stress before and after Bibliotherapy were, 59.33 and 39.68 with the standard deviation of 13.07 and 8.07 respectively. The calculated ‘t’ value 8.10 was compared with the table value (3.526) at 0.001 level of significance. The calculated ‘t’ value is greater than the table value. Thus the research hypothesis was accepted which shows that there is a significant difference in the level of stress of the children at selected orphanages before and after implementation of Bibliotherapy. Hence it is concluded that Bibliotherapy can be implemented for reduction of stress among children between 10-13 years of age at orphanages

Phase-shift Fault Analysis of Grain-128

Phase-shift fault attack is a type of fault attack used for cryptanalysis of stream ciphers. It involves clocking a cipher’s feedback shift registers out of phase, in order to generate faulted keystream. Grain-128 cipher is a 128-bit modification of the Grain cipher which is one of the finalists in the eSTREAM project. In this work, we propose a phase-shift fault attack against Grain-128 loaded with key-IV pairs that result in an all-zero LFSR after initialisation. We frame equations in terms of the input and output bits of the cipher and solve them using a SAT solver. By correctly guessing 40 innerstate bits, we are able to recover the entire 128-bit key with just 2 phase-shift faults for keystreams of length 200 bits

Cinnamon as a Potential Feed Additive: Beneficial Effects on Poultry Health and Production Performances – An Update

According to the Food and Agricultural Organization, global poultry output increased from approximately 115 million tons in 2016 to around 136 million tons in 2023. Poultry production has increased significantly with the dramatic uptick in meat and egg demand. Feed accounts for between 65 and 70 percent of total production costs, making it the largest chicken industry expense. This is why it's important to maximize the transformation of poultry feed into feed with a high biological value while taking as many steps as possible to protect feed quality and reduce feed costs. The use of feed additives in poultry feed has recently gained popularity and has been essential to increase feed efficiency and growth rate, which typically leads to reduced costs. The meat's texture, consistency, and nutritional content are all improved, and its shelf life is lengthened as a bonus. Feed additives are a fantastic tool for boosting a poultry farm's bottom line. For example, cinnamon (Cinnamomum verum) is often used as a traditional feed supplement. Rather than antibiotics, the poultry industry could benefit from using cinnamon as a natural antibiotic replacement, which would benefit animal welfare, consumer health, and the bottom line. The performance index, feed intake, FCE performance, and weight growth of poultry can all be improved by including cinnamon in the feed at varied concentrations. The digestive health and intestinal microbial population of hens are enhanced by a diet containing bioactive components of cinnamon. Cinnamon essential oils' popularity stems from their many valuable features, such as their ability to increase gastric enzyme synthesis and other biofunctional benefits. This review focuses on the possible advantages of cinnamon as a natural feed supplement for chickens, particularly about their intestinal microbiota, blood chemistry, nutrient absorption, gene expression, and immunology

Remediation of Pb (II), Cd (II), and Zn (II) from aqueous solutions using porous (styrene–divinylbenzene)/Cu–Ni bimetallic nanocomposite microspheres: continuous fixed-bed column study

Bimetallic nanoparticles (BNPs) have been used as a new line of defence against heavy metal contamination among several types of nanoparticles (NPs) due to their enhanced, synergistic activity. In this study, we investigated the adsorption behaviour of porous (styrene–divinylbenzene)/CuNi bimetallic nanocomposite (P(St-DVB)/CuNi BNC) in a continuous flow fixed-bed column and its ability to remove Pb (II), Cd (II), and Zn (II) ions from aqueous solutions. We examined how the initial metal concentration, flow rate, and bed height affected the adsorption characteristics. Experimental results confirmed that the adsorption capacity increased with increase in influent metal concentration and bed height and decreased with increase in flow rate. The breakthrough and the column kinetic parameters were successfully predicted with three mathematical models: Thomas, Yoon–Nelson, and Adams–Bohart models. Both Thomas and Yoon–Nelson models showed good agreement with the experimental results for all the operating conditions. Successful desorption of heavy metals from the P(St-DVB)/CuNi BNC was performed using 0.5 M NaOH solution, and it showed good reusability of the adsorbent during four adsorption–desorption cycles. The results show that P(St-DVB)/CuNi BNC are effective and low-cost adsorbents, and they can be used in real-time large-scale industrial water treatment processes for the removal of heavy metals. HIGHLIGHTS Fixed-bed column was used for the removal of Pb (II), Cd (II), and Zn (II) using poly(styrene–divinylbenzene)/CuNi nanocomposite (P(St-DVB)/CuNi BNC) microspheres, which was found to be efficient and low-cost adsorbent.; 87, 85, and 92% removal efficiencies were achieved for lead, cadmium, and zinc, respectively.; Conducted successful desorption of heavy metals from the P(St-DVB)/CuNi BNC.

Implication of salt stress induces changes in pigment production, antioxidant enzyme activity, and qRT-PCR expression of genes involved in the biosynthetic pathway of Bixa orellana L.

The effect of salt stress on pigment synthesis and antioxidant enzyme activity as well as in the genes involved in the biosynthetic pathway of bixin was studied. The 14-day germinated seedlings of Bixa orellana were induced into the various NaCl concentration (0, 25, 50, 75, 100 mM). After 45 days, leaves were taken for pigment analysis, antioxidant assays, and gene expression analysis to study the response of salt stress. The pigment content such as chlorophyll level was increased upon salt stress with a reduction in total carotenoid clearly indicating the adaptability of plants towards the stressed state. The level of β-carotene was increased in the highest concentration of salt stress treatment. The secondary metabolites such as bixin and abscisic acid (ABA) content were also high in elevated concentration of salt-treated seedling than control. The antioxidant enzyme activity was increased with the highest dose of salt stress suggesting the antioxidant enzymes to protect the plant from the deleterious effects. The mRNA transcript gene of the carotenoid biosynthetic pathway such as phytoene synthase (PSY), 1-deoxyxylulose-5-phosphate synthase (DXS), phytoene desaturase (PDS), beta-lycopene cyclase (LCY-β), epsilon lycopene cyclase (LCY-ε), carboxyl methyl transferase (CMT), aldehyde dehydrogenase (ADH), lycopene cleavage dioxygenase (LCD), and carotenoid cleavage dioxygenase (CCD) showed differential expression pattern under salt stress. In addendum, we studied the co-expression network analysis of gene to assess the co-related genes associated in the biosynthesis pathway of carotenoid. From the co-expression analysis result showed, the LCY, PDS, and PSY genes were closely correlated with other genes. These finding may provide insight to the plants to exist in the stress condition and to improve the industrially important pigment production

Structural insights into the binding mode and conformational changes of BSA induced by bixin and crocin

<p>Bixin and crocin are natural apocarotenoids utilized as food colorants and additives in food industries worldwide. For safety assessment, it is necessary to understand the biological interaction of food colorants. In our present study, we report the interaction of two apocarotenoids with bovine serum albumin (BSA) at physiological pH using spectroscopic techniques and <i>in silico</i> tools. The binding constant and the mode of binding sites have been studied. The enthalpic and entropic contribution to the intermolecular binding event was analyzed and it was found that the contribution of hydrogen bonding and hydrophobic interactions was dominant. The adverse temperature dependence in the unusual static quenching is found to be a reasonable consequence of the large activation energy requirement in the binding process, which is required to overcome the fundamental block and is a direct result of the unique microstructure of the binding sites. To confirm the experimental analysis, we investigated the binding patterns using different <i>in silico</i> tools. A combination of molecular docking, molecular dynamics, and toxicity analysis was performed, and the obtained results revealed that both the apocarotenoids had high binding affinity with a binding energy of −5.44 and −5.93 kcal/mol for bixin and crocin, respectively, with no toxic effects and are in accordance with our experimental analysis. The results directly revealed the flexibility of the protein toward bixin and crocin which has a great impact on the interaction. Thus bixin and crocin can guardedly be used as food colorants in food industries.</p

Proceedings of International Web Conference in Civil Engineering for a Sustainable Planet

This proceeding contains articles of the various research ideas of the academic community and practitioners accepted at the "International Web Conference in Civil Engineering for a Sustainable Planet (ICCESP 2021)". ICCESP 2021 is being Organized by the Habilete Learning Solutions, Kollam in Collaboration with American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), TKM College of Engineering, Kollam, and Baselios Mathews II College of Engineering, Kollam, Kerala, India. Conference Title: International Web Conference in Civil Engineering for a Sustainable PlanetConference Acronym: ICCESP 2021Conference Date: 05–06 March 2021Conference Location: Online (Virtual Mode)Conference Organizer: Habilete Learning Solutions, Kollam, Kerala, IndiaCollaborators: American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), TKM College of Engineering, Kollam, and Baselios Mathews II College of Engineering, Kollam, Kerala, India