Current status of herbal and their future perspectives

Traditional medicine is the synthesis of therapeutic experience of generations of practicing physicians of indigenous systems of medicine. Throughout the history of mankind, many infectious diseases have been treated with herbals. The traditional medicine is increasingly solicited through the tradipractitioners and herbalists in the treatment of infectious diseases. Among the remedies used, plant drugs constitute an important part. A number of scientific investigations have highlighted the importance and the contribution of many plant families i.e. Asteraceae, Liliaceae, Apocynaceae, Solanaceae, Caesalpinaceae, Rutaceae, Piperaceae, Sapotaceae used as medicinal plants. Medicinal plants play a vital role for the development of new drugs (export and import diverse parts or bioactive compounds in the current market). The bioactive extract should be standardized on the basis of active compound. The bioactive extract should undergo limited safety studies

Stability of Supersonic Boundary Layers on a Cone at an Angle of Attack

The stability and receptivity of three-dimensional supersonic boundary layers over a 7deg sharp tipped straight cone at an angle of attack of 4.2deg is numerically investigated at a free stream Mach number of 3.5 and at two high Reynolds numbers, 0.25 and 0.50x10(exp 6)/inch. The generation and evolution of stationary crossflow vortices are also investigated by performing simulations with three-dimensional roughness elements located on the surface of the cone. The flow fields with and without the roughness elements are obtained by solving the full Navier-Stokes equations in cylindrical coordinates using the fifth-order accurate weighted essentially non-oscillatory (WENO) scheme for spatial discretization and using the third-order total-variation-diminishing (TVD) Runge-Kutta scheme for temporal integration. Stability computations reveal that the azimuthal wavenumbers are in the range of m approx. 25-50 for the most amplified traveling disturbances and in the range of m approx. 40-70 for the stationary disturbances. The N-Factor computations predicted that transition would occur further forward in the middle of the cone compared to the transition fronts near the windward and the leeward planes. The simulations revealed that the crossflow vortices originating from the nose region propagate towards the leeward plane. No perturbations were observed in the lower part of the cone

Control in industrial relations: regulation and decision-making in a Singapore enterprise

This thesis approaches .the study of industrial relations from a very basic feature of social and organisational behaviour. Because the various activities, relationships and phenomena in industrial relations are essentially manifestations of control, the concept of control, it is argued, has tremendous potential for substantive theorising. At a theoretical level, the research has developed a definition of the field of industrial relations and proposes the integration and balance of the 'action' and 'environmental' schools of thought, via the notion of the 'industrial relations setting'. The concept of control developed in the thesis brings together various ideas and theories developed in industrial relations and the other behavioural areas of the social sciences. The method proposed for research, investigation and practice is situational, i.e. using concepts as they apply to the situation being considered. The primary purpose of the exercise, however, was to investigate a practical issue. The practical investigation focuses on the nature of control in the Singapore situation, in particular, the issues relating to job control in Singapore's shipbuilding and repairing industry. The study scans the environmental factors and closes in on the local factors - objectives, perceptions, motivation, power and influence, held by the various actors: State, management, union and the workers. While at the macro-level the study shows a picture of peace and stability between the powerful entities - State, management and union, the research also uncovers the not-so-healthy implications of problems on the shopfloor. The thesis concludes with suggestions and points to the challenges of the future

Transition and Breakdown to Turbulence in Incompressible Boundary Layers

We have developed a code where the nonlinear terms are treated implicitly. The equations are discretized using the two-point fourth order compact scheme in the y-direction and the backward Euler method in the x-direction. We investigated the transition process in a Blasius boundary layer due to fundamental type breakdown. With 8 modes in the w and 3 planes, we could compute the evolution of disturbances up to Re(x)=910, which is well into the strongly nonlinear region. The transition onset point is located around Re(x)=850. The comparison with the measurements and with the DNS computations are very good up to Re(x)=880

A study on the effect of Stress on performance of employees in Commercial Bank of Ceylon in the Eastern Province

Many executives feel they could make better decisions and perform more effectively if they worked under less stress. Stress has also been linked to absenteeism, turnover, and industrial accidents. As such, this study was carried out with the  primary objective of  understanding  the level and relationship between stress and performance of Commercial bank PLC employees in the Eastern Province of Sri Lanka. It also tried to identify the impact of  Job related stress, Organizational related stress, and Individual related stress on  performance. These objectives are reached through  the application of descriptive analysis , correlation technique and regression technique. Descriptive analysis is applied to find out the level of stress and  correlation coefficient is useful for finding out the relationship between variables. Regression analysis is applied to test the impact of stress on performance. The results revealed when mean value is compared, mean value of the organizational related stress is higher than the other two. It is also found that there is a negative relationship between stress and performance. It is concluded that stress is having  an  impact on Commercial bank PLC employees performance, at the same time The influence of organizational related stress is higher than job related and individual related stress. Key words: Job related stress, Organizational related stress, Individual related stress and performanc

Receptivity of Hypersonic Boundary Layers over Straight and Flared Cones

The effects of adverse pressure gradients on the receptivity and stability of hypersonic boundary layers were numerically investigated. Simulations were performed for boundary layer flows over a straight cone and two flared cones. The steady and the unsteady flow fields were obtained by solving the two-dimensional Navier-Stokes equations in axi-symmetric coordinates using the 5th order accurate weighted essentially non-oscillatory (WENO) scheme for space discretization and using third-order total-variation-diminishing (TVD) Runge-Kutta scheme for time integration. The mean boundary layer profiles were analyzed using local stability and non-local parabolized stability equations (PSE) methods. After the most amplified disturbances were identified, two-dimensional plane acoustic waves were introduced at the outer boundary of the computational domain and time accurate simulations were performed. The adverse pressure gradient was found to affect the boundary layer stability in two important ways. Firstly, the frequency of the most amplified second-mode disturbance was increased relative to the zero pressure gradient case. Secondly, the amplification of first- and second-mode disturbances was increased. Although an adverse pressure gradient enhances instability wave growth rates, small nose-tip bluntness was found to delay transition due to the low receptivity coefficient and the resulting weak initial amplitude of the instability waves. The computed and measured amplitude-frequency spectrums in all three cases agree very well in terms of frequency and the shape except for the amplitude

Nivolumab-induced fulminant diabetic ketoacidosis followed by thyroiditis

Five days following the 3rd cycle of nivolumab, a monoclonal antibody, which acts as immune checkpoint inhibitor against the programmed cell death protein-1, for metastatic lung adenocarcinoma, a 56-year-old woman presented at the hospital critically ill. On admission, she had severe diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), as evidenced by venous glucose of 47 mmol/L, blood ketones of 7.5 mmol/L, pH of 6.95 and bicarbonate of 6.6 mmol/L. She has had no personal or family history of diabetes mellitus (DM), while random venous glucose, measured 1 week prior to hospitalisation, was 6.1 mmol/L. On admission, her HbA1c was 8.2% and anti-GAD antibodies were 12 kIU/L (0–5 kU/L), while islet cell antibodies and serum C-peptide were undetectable. Nivolumab was recommenced without the development of other immune-mediated phenomena until 6 months later, when she developed hypothyroidism with TSH 18 U/L and low free T4. She remains insulin dependent and has required levothyroxine replacement, while she has maintained good radiological and clinical response to immunotherapy. This case is notable for the rapidity of onset and profound nature of DKA at presentation, which occurred two months following commencement of immunotherapy. Despite the association of nivolumab with immune-mediated endocrinopathies, only a very small number of patients developing type 1 DM has been reported to date. Patients should be closely monitored for hyperglycaemia and thyroid dysfunction prior to and periodically during immunotherapy

Roughness Induced Transition in a Supersonic Boundary Layer

Direct numerical simulation is used to investigate the transition induced by threedimensional isolated roughness elements in a supersonic boundary layer at a free stream Mach number of 3.5. Simulations are performed for two different configurations: one is a square planform roughness and the other is a diamond planform roughness. The mean-flow calculations show that the roughness induces counter rotating streamwise vortices downstream of the roughness. These vortices persist for a long distance downstream and lift the low momentum fluid from the near wall region and place it near the outer part of the boundary layer. This forms highly inflectional boundary layer profiles. These observations agree with recent experimental observations. The receptivity calculations showed that the amplitudes of the mass-flux fluctuations near the neutral point for the diamond shape roughness are the same as the amplitude of the acoustic disturbances. They are three times smaller for the square shape roughness

Acoustic Receptivity of Mach 4.5 Boundary Layer with Leading- Edge Bluntness

Boundary layer receptivity to two-dimensional slow and fast acoustic waves is investigated by solving Navier-Stokes equations for Mach 4.5 flow over a flat plate with a finite-thickness leading edge. Higher order spatial and temporal schemes are employed to obtain the solution whereby the flat-plate leading edge region is resolved by providing a sufficiently refined grid. The results show that the instability waves are generated in the leading edge region and that the boundary-layer is much more receptive to slow acoustic waves (by almost a factor of 20) as compared to the fast waves. Hence, this leading-edge receptivity mechanism is expected to be more relevant in the transition process for high Mach number flows where second mode instability is dominant. Computations are performed to investigate the effect of leading-edge thickness and it is found that bluntness tends to stabilize the boundary layer. Furthermore, the relative significance of fast acoustic waves is enhanced in the presence of bluntness. The effect of acoustic wave incidence angle is also studied and it is found that the receptivity of the boundary layer on the windward side (with respect to the acoustic forcing) decreases by more than a factor of 4 when the incidence angle is increased from 0 to 45 deg. However, the receptivity coefficient for the leeward side is found to vary relatively weakly with the incidence angle

A blood-based gene expression and signalling pathway analysis to differentiate between high and low grade gliomas

Introduction: Brain tumours are the 17th most common cancer worldwide. Gliomas are the most common of the primary brain tumours and are highly malignant. / Objectives: (a) To undertake gene expression profiling of the blood of glioma patients to determine key genetic components of signalling pathways (b) To develop a panel of genes that could be used as a potential blood-based biomarker to differentiate between high and low grade gliomas, non-glioma and control samples. / Methods: Blood samples were obtained from glioma patients, non-glioma and control subjects. Ten samples each were obtained from patients with high and low grade tumours respectively, ten samples from non-glioma patients and twenty samples from control subjects. Total RNA was isolated from each sample after which first and second strand synthesis was performed. The resulting cRNA was then hybridized with the Agilent Whole Human Genome (4x44K) microarray chip according to the manufacturer's instructions. Universal Human Reference RNA and samples were labeled with Cy3 CTP and Cy5 CTP respectively. Microarray data were analyzed by Agilent Gene Spring 12.1V software using stringent criteria which included at least a 2-fold difference in gene expression between samples. Statistical analysis was performed using the unpaired student T-test with a p-value < 0.01. Pathway enrichment was also performed with key genes within these pathways selected for validation with ddPCR. / Results: The gene expression profiling indicated that were a substantial number of genes that were differentially expressed with more than a 2-fold change (FDR corrected value < 0.01) between each of the four different conditions. We selected key genes within significant pathways that were analyzed through pathway enrichment. These key genes included regulators of cell proliferation, transcription factors, cytokines and tumour suppressor genes. / Conclusion: In this study, we have shown that key genes involved in significant and well established pathways, could possibly be used as a potential blood-based biomarker to differentiate between high and low grade gliomas, non-gliomas and control samples