Formulation and Evaluation of Controlled-Release Tablet of Zolpidem Tartrate by Melt Granulation Technique

The present investigation describes the influence of the concentration of PEG 6000 as a melt binder and ratio of HPMC K4M : PVP on Zolpidem tartrate controlled-release tablet formulations using 32 full factorial design. The ratio of HPMC K4M and PVP K30 (X1) and the concentration of melt binder (X2) were selected as independent variables, and drug release at 1 hr (Q1), 4 hr (Q4), 8 hr (Q8), diffusion coefficient (n), and release rate constant (K) were selected as a dependent variable. Tablets were prepared by melt granulation technique and evaluated for various evaluation parameters. It was observed that concentration of melt binder had significant effect on Q1, Q4, n, and K Binder concentration 25% w/w was found optimum. Optimized formulation (F7) showed good similarity with theoretical profile of drug. The X2 variable had a significant effect on dependent variables, and the X1 variable had no significant effect on dependent variables

In vitro evaluation of marketed antimalarial chloroquine phosphate tablets

Background & objectives: The aim of the present study is to investigate the physicochemicalequivalence of seven brands of tablets containing chloroquine phosphate, an antimalarial purchasedfrom different retail pharmacy outlets.Methods: The quality and physicochemical equivalence of seven different brands of chloroquinephosphate tablets were assessed. The assessment included the evaluation of uniformity of weight,friability, crushing strength, disintegration and dissolution tests as well as chemical assay of thetablets.Results: All the seven brands of the tablets passed the British Pharmacopoeia (BP) standards foruniformity of weight, disintegration and crushing strength. One of seven brands failed the friabilitytest. One of the brands did not comply with the standard assay of content of active ingredients.Dissolution test passes the pharmacopoeial standards for chloroquine phosphate tablets. There wereno significant differences in the amounts of chloroquine phosphate released from the different brands.Interpretation & conclusion: Out of the seven brands of anti-malarial chloroquine phosphate tabletsonly one brand fails to meet BP quality specifications which shows constant market monitoring ofnew products to ascertain their equivalency to pharmacopoeial standards

Experimental Shear Study on Reinforced High Strength Concrete Beams Made Using Blended Cement

With the increased application of High Strength Concrete (HSC) inconstruction and lack of proper guidelines for structural design in India,behavioral study of high strength concrete is an important aspect ofresearch. Research on the behavior of HSC reinforced beams with concretestrength more than 60 MPa has been carried out in the past and is stillcontinuing to understand the structural behavior of HSC beams. Along withthe many benefits of the high strength concrete, the more brittle behavior isof concern which leads to sudden failure. This paper presents the behaviorof reinforced HSC beams in shear with considering the effects of variousfactors like shear reinforcement ratio, longitudinal reinforcement ratio, l/dratio (length to depth ratio), etc. Ten numbers Reinforced Concrete Beamsof various sizes using concrete mix with three different w/c ratios (0.46, 0.26and 0.21) were cast for shear strength assessment. The beams were tested insimply supported condition over two fixed steel pedestals with load rate of0.2 mm/minute in displacement control. Mid-point deflection was measuredusing LVDT. A comparative analysis of theoretical approaches of Eurocode, extension of current IS code up to M90 and the experimental datawas done to understand the behavior of beams. Shear capacities of beamswithout any factors of safety were used to assess the actual capacities andthen was compared with the experimental capacity obtained. Results ofthis study can be used in the design of high strength concrete and will bemore reliable in Indian continent as the regional materials and exposureconditions were considered

Impact of ISO: 17020 for Quality Assurance System in Construction Sector

The objective of the paper is to analyze the various factors and loop holes that have a significant impact on effectiveness of quality and quality assurance system and to suggest recommendations to increase the quality performance of the construction projects. The paper also highlights the difference in Quality Assurance system of projects wherein ISO: 17020 is not implemented and the project wherein it is implemented.  In the current paper, National Council for Cement and Building Materials, India monitored 30 construction projects were selected with a construction cost between five to thirty Crores covering 15 project with ISO:17020 procedures and 15 project without ISO:17020 procedures. The data was collected from these projects on various quality and management related aspects. These projects cover structures such as school buildings, community hall, hostel block, convention centers etc. The study was conducted for construction projects of different government bodies. This analysis has been mainly done covering the factors playing key role in quality of a structure during construction such as client’s commitment towards quality, quality of material, documentation, work practices, personnel etc. Based on the data analysis, quality assurance system for these projects were categorized as Excellent, Good, Average and Poor in Quality Grading based on the various factors that directly or indirectly affects the quality and smooth functioning of project during and post construction. The difference in implementation of quality system with and without ISO: 17020 is highlighted in the paper

Changes in WBC and platelet count in patients with malaria: a hospital based comparative study

Introduction: Malaria is one of the most common infectious diseases of tropics. It presents with varied clinicopathological manifestations. Most of the complication in malaria occurs due to various hematological abnormalities. Present study was aimed to find out abnormalities in WBC and platelet counts in patients with malaria. Methods: A total 135 patients either hospitalized or treated on an outpatient basis were included in the study after positive identification for malarial parasites on Giemsa stained PSMP smears. WBC and platelet count was carried out on 3 part hematology analyzer (Sysmax KX 21). WBC count less than 4000/cumm was considered as leucopenia and platelet count less than 150000/cumm was considered as thrombocytopenia. Results: The present study includes 135 patients with malaria from which 72.59% of subjects were male and 27.41% of subjects were female. P. falciparum was present in 68.89% of cases, P. vivax in 28.15% of cases. Majority of patients had normal leucocyte count (97.03%). Neutrophilia with lymphopenia was observed in both species of malaria in our study. Thrombocytopenia was observed in89.62% of cases in malaria. Thrombocytopenia in P. falciparum was found in 92.48% of cases and in P. vivax it was 81.57% of cases. Conclusion: Present study did not show any significant change in WBC count. Present study showed neutrophilia with relative lymphopenia in both group of malaria. Incidence of thrombocytopenia was observed in both species of malaria without any statistical significance.

Induction and characterization of anti-tumor endothelium immunity elicited by ValloVax therapeutic cancer vaccine.

ValloVax is a placental endothelium derived vaccine which induces tissue-nonspecific antitumor immunity by blocking tumor angiogesis. To elucidate mechanisms of action, we showed that production of ValloVax, which involves treating placental endothelial cells with IFN-gamma, results in upregulation of HLA and costimulatory molecules. It was shown that in mixed lymphocyte reaction, ValloVax induces Type I cytokines and allo-proliferative responses. Plasma from ValloVax immunized mice was capable of killing in vitro tumor-like endothelium but not control endothelium. Using defined antigens associated with tumor endothelial cells, specific molecular entities were identified as being targeted by ValloVax induced antibodies. Binding of predominantly IgG antibodies to ValloVax cells was confirmed by flow cytometry. Further suggesting direct killing of tumor endothelial cells was expression of TUNEL positive cells, as well as, reduction in tumor oxygenation. Supporting a role for antibody mediated responses, cell depletion experiments suggested a predominant role of B cells in maintaining an intact anti-tumor endothelial response. Adoptive transfer experiments suggested that infusion of CD3+ T cells from immunized mice was sufficient to transfer tumor protection. Generation of memory T cells selective to tumor endothelial specific markers was observed. Functional confirmation of memory responses was observed in tumor rechallenge experiments. Furthermore, we observed that both PD-1 or CTLA-4 blockade augmented antitumor effects of ValloVax. These data suggest a T cell induced B cell mediated anti-tumor endothelial response and set the framework clinical trials through elucidation of mechanism of action

Genesis-DB: a database for autonomous laboratory systems

Artificial intelligence (AI)-driven laboratory automation - combining robotic labware and autonomous software agents - is a powerful trend in modern biology. We developed Genesis-DB, a database system designed to support AI-driven autonomous laboratories by providing software agents access to large quantities of structured domain information. In addition, we present a new ontology for modeling data and metadata from autonomously performed yeast microchemostat cultivations in the framework of the Genesis robot scientist system. We show an example of how Genesis-DB enables the research life cycle by modeling yeast gene regulation, guiding future hypotheses generation and design of experiments. Genesis-DB supports AI-driven discovery through automated reasoning and its design is portable, generic, and easily extensible to other AI-driven molecular biology laboratory data and beyond

SCMR level II/independent practitioner training guidelines for cardiovascular magnetic resonance: integration of a virtual training environment

Cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) is an important non-invasive imaging modality used for the evaluation of patients with known or suspected heart disease. Despite its clinical importance, CMR is currently not widely available, in part, because of a scarcity of well-trained physicians to perform and interpret the exam. Moreover, current 2018 Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance (SCMR) training guidelines [1] and also training guidelines from other societies [2, 3] require a significant amount of in-person hands-on experience making training inaccessible for many individuals. This limits the availability of physicians appropriately trained to perform and interpret CMR exams. The purpose of this statement is to provide guidance for implementing a high-quality virtual CMR training program to complement in-person training options