172 research outputs found
Cross-aisle Stiffness Tests on Rack Upright Frames
The US Rack Manufacturers Institution (RMI) code uses a theoretical formula derived by Timoshenko and the new Eurocode EN15512 requires testing. There is a considerable difference in the stiffn ess values determined by two approaches. This paper describes the experiments conducted on 80 full sized upright frames at Oxford Brookes University varying upright size, number of panels in the frame, aspect ratio of the panel (panel length/depth), restraints at the intermediate nodes of the frame, loading pattern, lacing pattern (channels back to back or front to front) and bolt tightness. The experimental data reported can be used in proposing revised design procedures
Proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy in multiple sclerosis.
Proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy ((1)H-MRS) provides tissue metabolic information in vivo. This article reviews the role of MRS-determined metabolic alterations in lesions, normal-appearing white matter, gray matter, and spinal cord in advancing our knowledge of pathologic changes in multiple sclerosis (MS). In addition, the role of MRS in objectively evaluating therapeutic efficacy is reviewed. This potential metabolic information makes MRS a unique tool to follow MS disease evolution, understand its pathogenesis, evaluate the disease severity, establish a prognosis, and objectively evaluate the efficacy of therapeutic interventions
Knowledge Acquisition by Networks of Interacting Agents in the Presence of Observation Errors
In this work we investigate knowledge acquisition as performed by multiple
agents interacting as they infer, under the presence of observation errors,
respective models of a complex system. We focus the specific case in which, at
each time step, each agent takes into account its current observation as well
as the average of the models of its neighbors. The agents are connected by a
network of interaction of Erd\H{o}s-Renyi or Barabasi-Albert type. First we
investigate situations in which one of the agents has a different probability
of observation error (higher or lower). It is shown that the influence of this
special agent over the quality of the models inferred by the rest of the
network can be substantial, varying linearly with the respective degree of the
agent with different estimation error. In case the degree of this agent is
taken as a respective fitness parameter, the effect of the different estimation
error is even more pronounced, becoming superlinear. To complement our
analysis, we provide the analytical solution of the overall behavior of the
system. We also investigate the knowledge acquisition dynamic when the agents
are grouped into communities. We verify that the inclusion of edges between
agents (within a community) having higher probability of observation error
promotes the loss of quality in the estimation of the agents in the other
communities.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figures. A working manuscrip
Landmark Optimization Using Local Curvature for Point-Based Nonlinear Rodent Brain Image Registration
Purpose. To develop a technique to automate landmark selection for point-based interpolating transformations for nonlinear medical image registration. Materials and Methods. Interpolating transformations were calculated from homologous point landmarks on the source (image to be transformed) and target (reference image). Point landmarks are placed at regular intervals on contours of anatomical features, and their positions are optimized along the contour surface by a function composed of curvature similarity and displacements of the homologous landmarks. The method was evaluated in two cases (n = 5 each). In one, MRI was registered to histological sections; in the second, geometric distortions in EPI MRI were corrected. Normalized mutual information and target registration error were calculated to compare the registration accuracy of the automatically and manually generated landmarks. Results. Statistical analyses demonstrated significant improvement (P < 0.05) in registration accuracy by landmark optimization in most data sets and trends towards improvement (P < 0.1) in others as compared to manual landmark selection
Pulses Value Chain Development for Achieving Food and Nutrition Security in South Asia: Current Status and Future Prospects
Pulses are important crops in the cropping systems of several developing countries in
Asia, Africa, and Latin America. In South Asia, pulses account for 15% of the cropped
area and are grown mainly on less fertile and marginal lands as intercrops with
cereals and oilseeds. Besides being environmentally friendly (by fixing soil nitrogen),
pulses contribute towards food security, and more importantly nutrition security,
particularly for low-income consumers. South Asia accounts for 24% of global pulse
production with India accounting for 90% of the production. However, since the
seventies per capita pulse consumption has been declining in South Asia, although
since 2008 it started trending up at a slow pace. To meet the growing deficit of pulses
its global trade increased rapidly from 7.2 million tonnes in 2000 to 17 million tonnes
in 2016. To meet the export demand, pulse production diversified, with developed
countries emerging as the main exporters while developing countries were the main
importers. The exceptions were South Eastern Asia (Myanmar) and Eastern Africa,
which also emerged as important exporters. South Asia accounted for 49% of global
pulse imports in 2016 with India accounting for two thirds of the imports to the region.
Severe crisis of pulses in the recent past led to the path-breaking policy interventions in
South Asia, especially in India viz., increasing availability of quality seeds,
enhancement in minimum support price (MSP), assured procurement by government
agencies and maintenance of buffer stock of pulses. These interventions attracted
farmers towards growing pulses and played a key role in increasing the pulses
production. In general, Chickpea, Pigeonpea, Green gram (mungbean) Black gram
(urdbean), Lentil, Grass pea, and Soybean fall under the pulses group in South Asia.
Due to the gap between supply and demand for pulses conumption, the price of pulses
increased sharply over the years leading to import of pulses to fulfill the local
requirement. A higher consumer demand was observed for the imported products
mainly due to the quality and low price. Though pulses are low input crops, cost of
production and gross return of pulses have shown an increasing trend over the past.
The importance of mechanization in pulse crops is highly emphasized to reduce the cost
of production. Productivity constraints of insect pests and diseases in the field and
storage conditions are perceived as being very important. Most of the South Asian
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countries are placing high priority on modernization of agricultural practices,
improvement of productivity and competitiveness in marketing in domestic and
international markets while enhancing the value addition and product diversification to
generate new income and viable employment opportunities
Registered Bioimaging of Nanomaterials for Diagnostic and Therapeutic Monitoring
Nanomedications can be carried by blood borne monocyte-macrophages into the reticuloendothelial system (RES; spleen, liver, lymph nodes) and to end organs. The latter include the lung, RES, and brain and are operative during human immunodeficiency virus type one (HIV-1) infection. Macrophage entry into tissues is notable in areas of active HIV-1 replication and sites of inflammation. In order to assess the potential of macrophages as nanocarriers, superparamagnetic iron-oxide and/or drug laden particles coated with surfactants were parenterally injected into HIV-1 encephalitic mice. This was done to quantitatively assess particle and drug biodistribution. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) test results were validated by histological coregistration and enhanced image processing. End organ disease as typified by altered brain histology were assessed by MRI. The demonstration of robust migration of nanoformulations into areas of focal encephalitis provides '"proof of concept" for the use of advanced bioimaging techniques to monitor macrophage migration. Importantly, histopathological aberrations in brain correlate with bioimaging parameters making the general utility of MRI in studies of cell distribution in disease feasible. We posit that using such methods can provide a real time index of disease burden and therapeutic efficacy with translational potential to humans
Achievements and challenges in improving nutritional quality of chickpea
Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) grains are an excellent source of protein, carbohydrates, minerals, vitamins, dietary fibre, folate, β-carotene and health
promoting fatty acids. Their consumption
provides consumers with a variety of
nutritional and health benefits. Limited
breeding efforts have been made on nutritional quality traits of chickpea.
Potential exists for further enhancing
contents of protein, minerals (iron and zinc),
folate and β-carotene and reducing the
contents of flatulence causing raffinose
family of oligosaccharides (RFOs).
The desi types account for about 80% to
85% of the global chickpea area and largely
grown in South Asia, Eastern Africa, and
Australia and mainly consumed in South
Asia. Though the total chickpea area under
kabuli type is less (15 to 20%), the
production and consumption of kabuli type
is globally more wide spread than the desi
types. Chickpeas are mainly used for human
consumption and a very small proportion as
animal feed. The dry chickpea grains are used
whole (after soaking and/or cooking,
roasting or parching) or dehulled to make
splits (dal) or ground to produce flour (besan).
The soaked/cooked chickpea grains are used
in salads, making vegetable curries (Chhole)
and several other preparations, such as falafel
(deep fried balls or patties) and hummus
(chickpea dip or spread). The chickpea flour
is used in making a wide variety of snack
foods, soups, sweets, and condiments
besides being mixed with wheat flour to
make Indian bread (roti or chapati). Invariably,
splits (dal) and flour are made from desi type,
while hummus is made from kabuli type.
Chickpea leaves are used as leafy vegetable
and immature green grains are eaten raw or
after roasting and also used as vegetable
Process for the preparation of 3-(aminomethyl)-4,6-dimethylpyridin-2(1H)-one hydrochloride
Abstract:
Process for the preparation of 3-(aminomethyl)-4,6-dimethylpyridin-2(1H)-one hydrochloride of formula-1, which is represented by the following structural formula:
which is key intermediate for the preparation of Tazemetostat hydrobromide, which is chemically known as [1,1’-Biphenyl]-3-carboxamide, N-[(1,2-dihydro-4,6-dimethyl-2-oxo-3-pyridinyl)methyl]-5[ethyl(tetrahydro-2H-pyran-4-yl)amino]-4-methyl-4’-(4-morpholinyl methyl)-, hydrobromide (1:1)
CO-AMORPHOUS FORM OF (3S,4R)-3-ETHYL-4-(3H-IMIDAZO[1,2-A] PYRROLO[2,3-E] PYRAZIN-8-YL)-N-(2,2,2-TRIFLUOROETHYL) PYRROLIDINE-1-CARBOXAMIDE AND PROCESS FOR ITS PREPARATION THEREOF
Abstract
The present invention pertains to co-amorphous form of (3S,4R)-3-ethyl-4-(3H-imidazo[1,2-a]pyrrolo[2,3-e]pyrazin-8-yl)-N-(2,2,2-trifluoroethyl)pyrrolidine-1-carboxamide of formula (I) and process for its preparation thereof. The chemical structure of compound of formula (I) is shown below
Impact of Genomics on Chickpea Breeding
Chickpea is an economical source of vegetable protein for the poor living in the semi-arid regions globally. As a consequence of climate change and increasing climate variability, the incidences of drought and heat stresses and severity of some diseases, such as dry root rot and collar rot, have increased in chickpea crop, resulting in poor and unstable yields. By improving the efficiency of crop breeding programs, climate resilient varieties with traits desired by the farmers, industries and consumers can be developed more rapidly. Excellent progress has been made in the development of genomic resources for chickpea in the recent past. Several national and international chickpea breeding programs have started utilizing these genomic resources and tools for genetic improvement of complex traits. One of such examples includes the introgression of “QTL-hotspot” containing quantitative trait loci (QTLs) for several drought tolerance-related traits, including root traits, through marker-assisted backcrossing (MABC) for enhancing drought tolerance in popular cultivars. Several drought-tolerant introgression lines with higher yield as compared to the popular cultivars have been identified. Multi-parent advanced generation intercross (MAGIC) populations developed from using 8 parents created large genetic diversity consequently several promising lines. Marker-assisted recurrent selection (MARS) has also been explored for yield improvement in chickpea. Development of diagnostic markers or the identification of candidate genes for several traits is essential for greater use of genomic resources in chickpea improvement
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