A study of ultrasonographic transcerebellar diameter in assessment of fetal gestational age

Background: Accurate assessment of gestational age is of paramount importance for the clinician to impart holistic antenatal care and is also essential prerequisite to plan the various clinical tests and interventions. Ultrasound (USG) morphometric measurements of fetal parts have been used to assess gestational age of the fetus with improved accuracy. The present study aims at comparing the ultrasonographic measurement of transverse cerebellar diameter (TCD) with other previously established fetal ultrasound biometric parameters, to study its role in patients of suspected intrauterine growth retardation (IUGR) and to study ultrasonographic appearance of fetal cerebellum with advancing gestational age.Methods: A total of 153 pregnant women who were referred for antenatal ultrasound examination were divided into two groups-Group I had 137 healthy pregnant women with normal fetuses between 14-40 weeks of gestation and Group II had 16 patients suspected to have IUGR clinically.Results: In group I, there was a curvilinear relationship between TCD and BPD, TCD and HC, TCD and AC and TCD and FL with correlation coefficients being 0.9810, 0.9181, 0.9649 and 0.9513 respectively. In group II, TCD correlated with gestational age predicted by last menstrual period. The remaining biometric parameters in group-II predicted a fetus of much earlier grade. The study findings also suggested a gradual and steady change in ultrasonographic appearances of cerebellum with advancing gestation.Conclusions: Ultrasonographic measurement of TCD shows excellent correlation with advancing gestational age and with other previously established biometric parameters. TCD can serve as an independent and reliable indicator of gestational age and a standard against which aberrations in fetal growth may be compared

Simple vs ugly adnexal lesions: is ultrasonography alone good enough?

Background: Ultrasound (USG) is easily available and effective imaging modality for adnexal lesions. A simple looking lesion on ultrasound is usually benign and an ugly looking adnexal lesion is either benign or malignant. This study aims to evaluate the varied appearance of simple and ugly benign adnexal lesions on USG and to find out any additional role of colour Doppler in such suspected benign lesions. The confirmation of diagnosis was done either by follow up appearance of lesions on USG or by histopathological evaluation.Methods: A total of 55 consecutive female patients with age between 18 to 50 years were enrolled in this prospective cross sectional study. USG and colour Doppler for all the lesions were done. The patients found to have malignant lesions on histopathological examination, were later excluded from the analysis. Follow up USG was done for all the cases. Those cases wherein there was no resolution of lesions even after 08 weeks, were given an option to undergo laparoscopy as next management step.Results: Out of 50 benign adnexal masses, 88% masses were ovarian in origin and 12% were tubal masses. Ovarian masses included hemorrhagic cysts, endometriosis, simple cysts, serous cystadenomas and ovarian dermoid. All extra-ovarian masses were hydrosalpinx. Colour Doppler did not add any additional finding. Some of the patients underwent diagnostic laparoscopy followed by excision of masses in majority of them.Conclusions: Benign adnexal lesions can have varied appearance ranging from simple to ugly on USG. Ultrasonographic features of benign lesions on USG can be appreciated very well even without further use of colour Doppler or cross sectional imaging. Follow up USG remains key modality for benign adnexal masses in absence of MRI

Casting of thrown away tool steel bits in the centrifugal casting route

Cutting tools get worn out due to wear and are ground in order to use them again. This wear may be due to abrasive wear, diffusion wear, fatigue wear, adhesive wear. Wear of tool steels leads to shortening of the length, so small that the tool bits are no more usable. These waste and thrown away tool bits were collected which may include steel waste, pig iron, molybdenum iron, chromium iron, vanadium iron, tungsten iron and other waste material. This mixture was melted in induction furnace at temperature about 1600 o C to 1700 o C. After that the casting of the melt was done through the centrifugal route at speeds of 200 rpm and 250 rpm. The cast obtained is in the shape of tool steel cylinder. Then the samples were prepared for the hardness test, machinability test and SEM analysis. The hardness was measured across the radius of the cast cylinder by using Rockwell hardness test machine in C-scale. The machinability test specimens were taken from the outer zone of the cast cylinder and the test was carried out in Lathe by keeping the variables such as rotation speed (420 rpm), feed rate (0.15 KM), rack angle (10 0 ) material to be machined (mild steel) and time of machining (5 minutes 40 seconds) constant. The machinability of the centrifugally cast samples were compared with the as-cast samples. SEM micrographs were taken for the outer region of the cast cylinder and a comparative study was made with the as-cast samples. We found that there is an increase in hardness values with the distance from the centre to the outer periphery of the cast samples also the hardness values are higher for speed 250 rpm than 200 rpm. The Machinability of the centrifugally cast samples was better than generally used tool steels

Advancements in nano-enabled therapeutics for neuroHIV management

This viewpoint is a global call to promote fundamental and applied research aiming toward designing smart nanocarriers of desired properties, novel noninvasive strategies to open the blood–brain barrier (BBB), delivery/release of single/multiple therapeutic agents across the BBB to eradicate neurohuman immunodeficiency virus (HIV), strategies for on-demand site-specific release of antiretroviral therapy, developing novel nanoformulations capable to recognize and eradicate latently infected HIV reservoirs, and developing novel smart analytical diagnostic tools to detect and monitor HIV infection. Thus, investigation of novel nanoformulations, methodologies for site-specific delivery/release, analytical methods, and diagnostic tools would be of high significance to eradicate and monitor neuroacquired immu-nodeficiency syndrome. Overall, these developments will certainly help to develop personalized nanomedicines to cure HIV and to develop smart HIV-monitoring analytical systems for disease management

Method Development and Validation for Quantification of Residual Solvents in Atorvastatin Calcium Drug Substance by GC-HS Using Fid Detector

A proficient GC-HS method was developed for quantification of THIRTEEN residual solvents in Atorvastatin Calcium drugs substance with flame ionization detector (FID) using column Rtx-624, (60m length X 0.25mm diameter) 1.4µm film thickness, Part No.: 10969, Make: Restek.  Nitrogen is used as Carrier gas with Linear velocity of 27.7cm/se on Shimadzu /GC-2010 Plus/HS-20 instrument. The proposed method was validated for System suitability, Specificity, Linearity, LOD and LOQ determination, Recovery, Precision, Range and Robustness. All the parameters were found within the acceptable limits. Linearity of all thirteen residual solvents are in the range of LOQ to 150%. The established methodology was commercially useful, specific, accurate, precise and suitable for the analysis of Residual solvents in Atorvastatin Calcium drug substance

Magnetic resonance imaging of post traumatic knee: injury pattern analysis in sports activities

Background: Musculoskeletal injuries of knee are commonly encountered in sportsmen during sports activities. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is the modality of choice for evaluation of traumatic knee injuries and arthroscopic interventions. By knowing the pattern and burden of surgically significant injuries in sportsmen, the artificial intelligence (AI) software may be developed accordingly so that surgically significant injuries may be identified by the young radiologists. Methods: It was a retrospective study on MRI for knee injuries in sportsmen. The digital data from Radiology department at a zonal level hospital was analysed. The MRI findings were correlated with the arthroscopic records available. For surgically insignificant injuries, the literature was referred for the typical MRI findings of the injuries. Results: Of 272 cases of MRI knee, 74.3% cases were detected to have acute traumatic injuries. Among various types of injuries found in this study, anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear (55.9%) was the commonest injury followed by medial meniscal tear (40%). 40 (19.8%) cases were found to have surgically significant MRI findings which were subsequently corroborated with knee arthroscopy.Conclusions: Since majority of soft tissue injuries of knee constitute ACL and meniscal tears, the industries involved in developing AI software for soft tissue injuries of knee, should primarily focus on identification of ACL and meniscal injuries. The AI software may also be helpful for the young radiologists in early training days in MRI for knee injuries and may also help in big scale research projects of post traumatic MRI knees

Nanostructured Gas Sensors for Health Care: An Overview

Nanostructured platforms have been utilized for fabrication of small, sensitive and reliable gas sensing devices owing to high functionality, enhanced charge transport and electro-catalytic property. As a result of globalization, rapid, sensitive and selective detection of gases in environment is essential for health care and security. Nonmaterial such as metal, metal oxides, organic polymers, and organic-inorganic hybrid nanocomposites exhibit interesting optical, electrical, magnetic and molecular properties, and hence are found potential gas sensing materials. Morphological, electrical, and optical properties of such nanostructures can be tailored via controlling the precursor concentration and synthesis conditions resulting to achieve desired sensing. This review presents applications of nano-enabling gas sensors to detect gases for environment monitoring. The recent update, challenges, and future vision for commercial applications of such sensor are also described here

Trend of fatal poisoning in Kanpur: a two year autopsy based study

Background: Kanpur is not only the biggest city of the Uttar Pradesh but also 9th most populated city of the India and is the main centre of commercial and industrial activities. Kanpur is situated at the bank of holy river Ganga. It is very crowded city and facing the problems of population influx from neighboring towns and villages. Apart from fame for industry, Kanpur lies between two rivers Ganga and Pandu. The land of Kanpur district is plain and fertile with Cultivable Barren Land 185480 Hectare. Kanpur is an only notified metropolitan area by UP Government under Code of Criminal Procedure 1973, and therefore has a Chief Metropolitan Magistrate. Poisoning is an important public health issue in India and worldwide. The present study is aimed to assess the epidemiological variables of fatal poisonings in Kanpur.Methods: All medico legal autopsies of the city were conducted in the GSVM Medical College mortuary, Kanpur. During the study period, 582 cases of fatal poisoning were autopsied. Only autopsies with confirmed diagnosis of poisoning were included in this prospective study.Results: A total of 7648 medico legal autopsies were performed at the aforementioned centre. Poisoning deaths comprised 582 cases (7.6%) of the total autopsies conducted during the study period.Conclusions: Suicidal poisoning is accountable for majority of poisoning deaths in India. Societies at large owe a collective responsibility to this manner of death and mere condemnation or sympathy is not sufficient to curb these avoidable deaths

Numerical models of solar distillation device: present and previous

In this paper, a detailed comparison of a few numerical models (with and without considering humid air properties) for the estimation of water production from a solar water distillation device is investigated. An extensive laboratory production experiments were executed under fifteen sets of external conditions to find the properties of evaporation and condensation coefficients to incorporate with the present evaporation and condensation models (two unique and independent theoretical models), respectively. The calculation accuracy of the evaporation flux computed by two evaporation models (present and previous), Dunkle's and Ueda's model, and of the hourly condensation flux estimated by two condensation models (present and previous) was examined using the field experimental results. It was found that the previous evaporation and condensation models using empirical relationships extremely overestimated and underestimated the observed production flux, respectively. The evaporation flux calculated by the conventional models of Dunkle and Ueda notably underestimated and overestimated the observed values, respectively. Finally, it is revealed that the present models have the smallest deviation between the calculated and the observed values among these six models and can predict the daily production flux