A Study on the Efficiency of Whey Water Pretreated Parthenium Hysterophorus L. as Potential Feedstock

Among several technologies the anaerobic digestion technology has been proved to be viable and emerged as a promising technology in India, as it requires less capital investment and per unit production cost, as compared to other renewable energies. Mass utilization of Parthenium hysterophorus biomass and environmental friendly synthesis of bioproduct-methane which is of high demand through a biomethanization is a promising approach. Biogas, a product of biomethanization process of organic substrate carried out by a consortium of microorganisms and depends on various factors like pH, temperature, C/N ratio, hydraulic retention time etc. Thus, there is a need to improve the overall efficiency of anaerobic digestion process in the biogas plants. This could be achieved by optimizing several methods such as the various operational parameters, the nutritional requirements of microbes, the pretreatment protocols, the feedstock proportions etc. Crop biomass mainly consists of cellulose, hemicelluloses and lignin, which act as limitating factors in the process of methanation. Therefore, need for pretreatment protocols to remove the various limitations and to achieve optimized gas production are dealt in the present study. The general process of applying pretreatment is to increase biodegradability and bioavailability of digested materials thus enhancing biogas production in further anaerobic process. For pretreatment of certain type of biomass, the choice of pretreatment technique has to be more efficient both in terms of economical and environmental aspects. Pretreatment has been recognized as one of the most expensive processing steps in conversion of cellulosic biomass to fermentable sugars and at the same time a very crucial step for the biological conversion of plant source into methane. The overall goal of the pretreatment routes being designed and developed is to convert the plant’s raw lignocellulosic sugars in an environmentally sustainable way. Thus in this study, the feasibility of utilizing Parthenium as potential feedstock was examined by using whey water pretreatment protocol. The results obtained with respect to that of C/N ratio, C/P ratio, lignin and holocellulose showed a significant change when compared to the untreated Parthenium biomass

Outage Probability of Multiple-Input Single-Output (MISO) Systems with Delayed Feedback

We investigate the effect of feedback delay on the outage probability of multiple-input single-output (MISO) fading channels. Channel state information at the transmitter (CSIT) is a delayed version of the channel state information available at the receiver (CSIR). We consider two cases of CSIR: (a) perfect CSIR and (b) CSI estimated at the receiver using training symbols. With perfect CSIR, under a short-term power constraint, we determine: (a) the outage probability for beamforming with imperfect CSIT (BF-IC) analytically, and (b) the optimal spatial power allocation (OSPA) scheme that minimizes outage numerically. Results show that, for delayed CSIT, BF-IC is close to optimal for low SNR and uniform spatial power allocation (USPA) is close to optimal at high SNR. Similarly, under a long-term power constraint, we show that BF-IC is close to optimal for low SNR and USPA is close to optimal at high SNR. With imperfect CSIR, we obtain an upper bound on the outage probability with USPA and BF-IC. Results show that the loss in performance due to imperfection in CSIR is not significant, if the training power is chosen appropriately.Comment: Submitted to IEEE Transactions on Communications Jan 2007, Revised Jun 2007, Revised Nov 200

Microstructural analysis of skeletal muscle force generation during aging.

Human aging results in a progressive decline in the active force generation capability of skeletal muscle. While many factors related to the changes of morphological and structural properties in muscle fibers and the extracellular matrix (ECM) have been considered as possible reasons for causing age-related force reduction, it is still not fully understood why the decrease in force generation under eccentric contraction (lengthening) is much less than that under concentric contraction (shortening). Biomechanically, it was observed that connective tissues (endomysium) stiffen as ages, and the volume ratio of connective tissues exhibits an age-related increase. However, limited skeletal muscle models take into account the microstructural characteristics as well as the volume fraction of tissue material. This study aims to provide a numerical investigation in which the muscle fibers and the ECM are explicitly represented to allow quantitative assessment of the age-related force reduction mechanism. To this end, a fiber-level honeycomb-like microstructure is constructed and modeled by a pixel-based Reproducing Kernel Particle Method (RKPM), which allows modeling of smooth transition in biomaterial properties across material interfaces. The numerical investigation reveals that the increased stiffness of the passive materials of muscle tissue reduces the force generation capability under concentric contraction while maintains the force generation capability under eccentric contraction. The proposed RKPM microscopic model provides effective means for the cellular-scale numerical investigation of skeletal muscle physiology. NOVELTY STATEMENT: A cellular-scale honeycomb-like microstructural muscle model constructed from a histological cross-sectional image of muscle is employed to study the causal relations between age-associated microstructural changes and age-related force loss using Reproducing Kernel Particle Method (RKPM). The employed RKPM offers an effective means for modeling biological materials based on pixel points in the medical images and allow modeling of smooth transition in the material properties across interfaces. The proposed microstructure-informed muscle model enables quantitative evaluation on how cellular-scale compositions contribute to muscle functionality and explain differences in age-related force changes during concentric, isometric and eccentric contractions

Current Trends in Usage of Traditional System of Medicine in Tamilnadu, India - From the Perspective of Occupation

Socio-economic parameters have significant impact on consumer’s attitude towards the usage of traditional system of medicine in Tamilnadu, India. Though traditional systems of medicine have made significant contributions towards fulfilling healthcare needs of the people in the past, impacts of modern medicine have been so large that traditional medicine witnessed a dark period in India. While such practices are common in the rural/ remote areas, off late, change in the trend with respect to the usage of Siddha medicine as complementary alternative therapy among urban population has been observed. Present study aims to evaluate the resurgence of interest in Siddha medicine among the people working in different sectors (occupation) in Tamilnadu, India

In Vitro Antibacterial Prospective of Crude Leaf Extracts of Melia azedarach Linn. against Selected Bacterial Strains

The present study was carried out to evaluate the antibacterial activity of the crude leaf extracts of Melia azedarach against selected Gram positive and Gram negative bacterial strains. Five plant extracts (Methanol, Ethanol, Dichloromethane, Ethyl acetate and Aqueous) under five different concentrations (1mg/ml and 5mg/ml) were tested by Disk diffusion method. Methanol, Ethyl acetate and Aqueous extracts of M. azedarach showed significant inhibition against bacteria tested

Consumer Behavior in Selection of Buying Source of Siddha Medicine in Tamilnadu, India from the Perspective of Age

With the increasing usage of traditional medicines as complementary alternative therapy, possibilities that would ensure its successful integration into the public domain of health care services needs to be evaluated. India is one of the countries with rich traditional knowledge base. Its ethnic ethno-medical practices had paved way for the evolution of several indigenous systems of medicine. Siddha is one of the oldest systems of medicine in India. Siddha holds close association with nature and has been validated in the laboratory of life, even before the advent of formal modern western system of medicine. This paper discusses the interrelations between usage of Sidhha as complementary alternative medicine and its implications on public health care related issues. We explore the impact of age of respondents in the public domain as a criterion in relation to selection of buying source of Siddha medicine in Tamilnadu, India

The WiFeS S7 AGN survey: Current status and recent results on NGC 6300

The Siding Spring Southern Seyfert Spectroscopic Snapshot Survey (S7) is a targeted survey probing the narrow-line regions (NLRs) of a representative sample of ~140 nearby (z<0.02) Seyfert galaxies by means of optical integral field spectroscopy. The survey is based on a homogeneous data set observed using the Wide Field Spectrograph WiFeS. The data provide a 25x38 arcsec$^2$ field-of-view around the galaxy centre at typically ~1.5 arcsec spatial resolution and cover a wavelength range between ~3400 - 7100 $\AA$ at spectral resolutions of ~100 km s$^{-1}$ and ~50 km s$^{-1}$ in the blue and red parts, respectively. The survey is primarily designed to study gas excitation and star formation around AGN, with a special focus on the shape of the AGN ionising continuum, the interaction between radio jets and the NLR gas, and the nature of nuclear LINER emission. We provide an overview of the current status of S7-based results and present new results for NGC 6300.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, Refereed Proceeding of the "The Universe of Digital Sky Surveys" conference held at the INAF - Observatory of Capodimonte, Naples, on 25th-28th november 2014, to be published on Astrophysics and Space Science Proceedings, edited by Longo, Napolitano, Marconi, Paolillo, Iodic

Investigations on Hepatoprotective Activity of Leaf Extracts of Aegle marmelos (L.) Corr. (Rutaceae)

The present study was carried out to screen and evaluate the hepatoprotective activity of leaf extracts of Aegle marmelos (L.) Corr. Hepatoprotective activities of ethanolic and aqueous extracts of A. marmelos were examined against carbon tetrachloride induced liver damage in mice using silymarin as control. Enzyme activities of Serum Glutamate Oxaloacetate Transaminase (SGOT), Serum Glutamate Pyruvate Transaminase (SGPT) and Alkaline Phosphatase (ALP) were analyzed. Results indicate that ethanolic and aqueous leaf extracts of A. marmelos had moderate activity over carbon tetrachloride treatment as compared to control. Results of the present investigation confirm the traditional uses of this plant as a potential hepatoprotective agent

Studies on Hepatoprotective Properties of Leaf Extracts of Azadirachta indica A. Juss (Meliaceae)

The present study was carried out to evaluate the hepatoprotective role of leaf extracts of Azadirachta indica A. Juss. Hepatoprotective activities of ethanolic and aqueous extracts of A. indica were examined against carbon tetrachloride induced liver damage in mice using silymarin as control. Enzyme activities of Serum Glutamate Oxaloacetate Transaminase (SGOT), Serum Glutamate Pyruvate Transaminase (SGPT) and Alkaline Phosphatase (ALP) were analyzed. Phytochemical leaf extracts of A. indica exhibited significant hepatoprotective activity. Ethanolic and aqueous leaf extracts of A. indica exhibited moderate activity over carbon tetrachloride treated animals. Results confirm the traditional - ethnomedicinal use of A. indica as a potential source of hepatoprotective agent