Observations on the culture of M.leprae in medium V.

This paper reports the preliminary findings of an investigation using Medium V for culture of M. leprae. The medium was prepared adhering to the procedures adopted by Veeraraghavan. Tissues from 7 cases of lepromatous leprosy (Bacteriological Index of 3 or more) were inoculated into Medium V and incubated at 8–10°C for 72 hours. Quantitative estimation of leprosy bacilli were made employing the enumeration technique of Veeraraghavan. There was no evidence of multiplication in any of the cultures. The findings are in conformity with those of Kato (1983) and of Katoch and Desikan (1983)

Introducing standardized “readbacks” to improve patient safety in surgery: a prospective survey in 92 providers at a public safety-net hospital

Background: Communication breakdowns represent the main root cause of preventable complications which lead to harm to surgical patients. Standardized readbacks have been successfully implemented as a main pillar of professional aviation safety for decades, to ensure a safe closed-loop communication between air traffic control and individual pilots. The present study was designed to determine the perception of staff in perioperative services regarding the role of standardized readbacks for improving patient safety in surgery at a single public safety-net hospital and level 1 trauma center. Methods: A 12-item questionnaire was sent to 180 providers in perioperative services at Denver Health Medical Center. The survey was designed to determine the individual participants’ perception of (1) appropriateness of current readback processes; (2) willingness to attend a future training module on this topic; (3) specific scenarios in which readbacks may be effective; and (4) perceived major barriers to the implementation of standardized readbacks. Survey results were compared between departments (surgery versus anesthesia) and between specific staff roles (attending or midlevel provider, resident physician, nursing staff), using non-parametric tests. Results: The response rate to the survey was 50.1 % (n = 92). Respondents overwhelmingly recognized the role of readbacks in reducing communication errors and improving patient safety. There was a strong agreement among respondents to support participation in a readbacks training program. There was no difference in the responses between the surgery and anesthesia departments. There was a statistically significant difference in the healthcare providers willingness to attend a short training module on readbacks (p < 0.001). Resident physicians were less likely to endorse the importance of readbacks in reducing communication errors (p = 0.01) and less willing to attend a short training module on readbacks (p < 0.001), as compared to staff providers and nursing staff. The main challenge for respondents, which emanated from their responses, appeared to relate to determining the ideal scenarios in which readbacks may be most appropriately used. Overall, respondents strongly felt that readbacks had an important role in patient handoffs, patient orders regarding critical results, counting and verifying surgical instruments, and delegating multiple perioperative tasks. Conclusion: The majority of all respondents appear to perceive standardized readbacks as an effective tool for reducing and/or preventing adverse events in the care of surgical patients, derived from a breakdown in communication among perioperative caregivers. Further work needs to be done to define the exact clinical scenarios in which readbacks may be most efficiently implemented, including the definition of a uniform set of scripted quotes and phrases, which should likely be standardized in concert with the aviation safety model

Design and Analysis of FS-TSPC-DET Flip-Flop for IoT Applications

The paper outlines the utmost importance of energy-efficient devices for IoT applications and recommends adual edge-triggeredTSPC flip-flop in fully-static mode at 45nm technology with low supply rail carried out in CMOS using MENTOR GRAPHICS tool.The proposed flip-flop proved to be energy efficient compared to traditional double and single edge-triggered flip-flops in terms of latency, power, the figure of merit and area for IoT applications. A comparison of two types of dual-edge triggered flip-flops are analyzed concerning the mentioned performance metrics and deduces the best flip-flop for IoT applications. Clock overlap issues are turning down in dual edge-triggered TSPC flip-flopcompared with a conventional dual edge-triggered flip-flop in full static modeand allow stringent operation at 1V supply rail thatdelivers1.14uW power, 0.60fJ figure of merit and 531.99ps latency at 45nm CMOS

A double-blind controlled clinical trial to assess the role of anti-histamines in the treatment of multi-bacillary leprosy

A double blind controlled clinical trial to assess the role of antihistamines as a supplement in the treatment of leprosy was conducted in multibacillary cases of leprosy. In all, 120 patients with lepromatous or borderline leprosy were randomly allocated to a regimen of clofazimine and dapsone for 12 months with or without a supplement of pheniramine maleate for the first 3 months. During the 12-month period, 92% of the patients who received the supplement and 86% of the patients who had not received it had moderate or marked clinical improvement. The BI values decreased from 4.1 to 3.4 and 4.2 to 3.3, respectively. The results over the 12-month period showed that the addition of the antihistamine had not enhanced the efficacy of the regimen as evidenced by clinical and bacteriological findings

Improvement in hot corrosion resistance of dissimilar alloy 825 and AISI 321 CO2-laser weldment by HVOF coating in aggressive salt environment at 900°C

This study investigated the hot corrosion performance of a dissimilar weldment of Ni-based superalloy and stainless steel joined by CO2-laser welding and improved by high-velocity oxy-fuel (HVOF) coating in a Na2SO4-60wt%V2O5 environment at 900°C. A dissimilar butt joint of AISI 321 and alloy 825 was fabricated by CO2-laser welding with low heat input after obtaining the optimum welding parameters by bead-on-plate trials. The metallurgical and mechanical properties of the laser weldment were evaluated. The tensile test results indicated the occurrence of fracture in the base metal AISI 321 side. The HVOF process was employed to coat Ni-20wt%Cr on the weldment. To evaluate the surface morphology of the corrosion products formed on the uncoated and Ni-20wt%Cr-coated weldments, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis was performed. Energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) was used to determine the different elements present on the surface scales. The existence of oxide phases on the weldments was determined by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The cross sections of the weldments were characterized by SEM with EDS line mapping analysis. The results indicated that the Ni-20wt%Cr-coated weldment exhibited superior hot corrosion resistance due to the development of Cr2O3 and NiCr2O4 protective oxide scales

The International Natural Product Sciences Taskforce (INPST) and the power of Twitter networking exemplified through #INPST hashtag analysis

Background: The development of digital technologies and the evolution of open innovation approaches have enabled the creation of diverse virtual organizations and enterprises coordinating their activities primarily online. The open innovation platform titled "International Natural Product Sciences Taskforce" (INPST) was established in 2018, to bring together in collaborative environment individuals and organizations interested in natural product scientific research, and to empower their interactions by using digital communication tools. Methods: In this work, we present a general overview of INPST activities and showcase the specific use of Twitter as a powerful networking tool that was used to host a one-week "2021 INPST Twitter Networking Event" (spanning from 31st May 2021 to 6th June 2021) based on the application of the Twitter hashtag #INPST. Results and Conclusion: The use of this hashtag during the networking event period was analyzed with Symplur Signals (https://www.symplur.com/), revealing a total of 6,036 tweets, shared by 686 users, which generated a total of 65,004,773 impressions (views of the respective tweets). This networking event's achieved high visibility and participation rate showcases a convincing example of how this social media platform can be used as a highly effective tool to host virtual Twitter-based international biomedical research events

A novel iterative frequency offset estimation in an OFDM system

The Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is a form of Multi-Carrier Modulation where the data stream is transmitted over a number of carriers which are orthogonal to each other i.e. the carrier spacing is selected such that each carrier is located at the zeroes of all other carriers in the spectral domain. This paper proposes a new novel iterative frequency offset estimation algorithm for an OFDM system in order to receive the OFDM data symbols error-free over the noisy channel at the receiver and to achieve frequency synchronization between the transmitter and the receiver. The performance of this algorithm has been studied in AWGN, ADSL and SUI channels successfully

A novel fractional sampling offset estimation in an OFDM system

The Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) is a form of Multi-Carrier Modulation where the data stream is transmitted over a number of carriers which are orthogonal to each other i.e. the carrier spacing is selected such that each carrier is located at the zeroes of all other carriers in the spectral domain. This paper proposes a new novel sampling offset estimation algorithm for an OFDM system in order to receive the OFDM data symbols error-free over the noisy channel at the receiver and to achieve fine timing synchronization between the transmitter and the receiver. The performance of this algorithm has been studied in AWGN, ADSL and SUI channels successfully