Nonlinear Behaviour of Perforated Plate with Lining

Perforated plate with lining has a construction of plate with perforation and a lining plate welded together to form a single plate. This type of plate is used as an acoustic sonar dome. Perforated plate with lining (PPL) is prone to stress concentration and subsequently such structural system falls into the large strain category. Experimental investigation on PPL is carried out in the present study to determine the static deflection of the plate. Numerical method is also followed for geometric nonlinear analysis using finite element method as an iterative interactive procedure. The deflection obtained from the numerical method is 8 per cent less than that obtained from experimental method. From numerical analysis, von Mises stress and maximum principal stress is also estimated to understanda bout the failure mode characteristics of PPL.Defence Science Journal, 2012, 62(4), pp.248-251, DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.14429/dsj.62.92

Suppression of Fluconazole Resistant Candida albicans Biofilm Formation and Filamentation by Methylindole Derivatives

Candida albicans is an opportunistic fungal pathogen and most prevalent species among clinical outbreaks. It causes a range of infections, including from mild mucosal infections to serious life-threatening candidemia and disseminated candidiasis. Multiple virulence factors account for the pathogenic nature of C. albicans, and its morphological transition from budding yeast to hyphal form and subsequent biofilm formation is regarded as the most important reason for the severity of Candida infections. To address the demanding need for novel antifungals, we investigated the anti-biofilm activities of various methylindoles against C. albicans using a crystal violet assay, and the metabolic activity was assessed by using a 2,3-bis (2-methoxy-4-nitro-5-sulfo-phenyl)-2H-tetrazolium-5-carboxanilide reduction assay. Changes in biofilm morphologies and thicknesses were determined by confocal laser scanning microscopy and scanning electron microscopy, respectively. Of the 21 methylindoles tested, 1-methylindole-2-carboxylic acid (1MI2CA) at 0.1 mM (17.5 μg ml-1) and 5-methylindole-2-carboxylic acid (5MI2CA) at 0.1 mM effectively inhibited biofilm formation by C. albicans DAY185 and ATCC10231 strains. Moreover, 1MI2CA and 5MI2CA both effectively inhibited hyphal formation, and thus, improved C. albicans infected nematode survival without inducing acute toxic effects. Furthermore, our in silico molecular modeling findings were in-line with in vitro observations. This study provides information useful for the development of novel strategies targeting candidiasis and biofilm-related infections

Antibiofilm and Antihyphal Activities of Cedar Leaf Essential Oil, Camphor, and Fenchone Derivatives against Candida albicans

Candida albicans can form biofilms composed of yeast, hyphal, and pseudohyphal elements, and C. albicans cells in the hyphal stage could be a virulence factor. The present study describes the chemical composition, antibiofilm, and antihyphal activities of cedar leaf essential oil (CLEO), which was found to possess remarkable antibiofilm activity against C. albicans but not to affect its planktonic cell growth. Nineteen components were identified in CLEO by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry, and phenolics were the main constituents. Of these, camphor, fenchone, fenchyl alcohol, α-thujone, and borneol significantly reduced C. albicans biofilm formation. Notably, treatments with CLEO, camphor, or fenchyl alcohol at 0.01% clearly inhibited hyphal formation, and this inhibition appeared to be largely responsible for their antibiofilm effects. Transcriptomic analyses indicated that camphor and fenchyl alcohol downregulated some hypha-specific and biofilm related genes (ECE1, ECE2, RBT1, and EED1). Furthermore, camphor and fenchyl alcohol reduced C. albicans virulence in a Caenorhabditis elegans nematode model. These results demonstrate CLEO, camphor, and fenchyl alcohol might be useful for controlling C. albicans infections

Alizarin and Chrysazin Inhibit Biofilm and Hyphal Formation by Candida albicans

Candida albicans is one of the most common pathogen causes fungal infections. This opportunistic pathogen can form biofilms comprised of yeast, hyphae and pseudo hyphal elements, and the hyphal form C. albicans considered as probable virulence factor. We investigated the antibiofilm activities of 13 quinones and anthraquinones related compounds against C. albicans biofilms by using crystal violet and 2,3-bis (2-Methoxy-4-Nitro-5-Sulfo-phenyl)-2H-Tetrazolium-5-Carboxanilide (XTT) reduction assays to assess inhibitions of biofilm growth. Morphological changes in biofilms and biofilm thicknesses were determined by scanning electron microscopy and confocal laser scanning microscopy, respectively. It was found alizarin (1,2-dihydroxyanthraquinone) and chrysazin (1,8-dihydroxyanthraquinone) suppressed C. albicans biofilm formation. Interestingly, alizarin and chrysazin at only 2 μg/ml effectively inhibited hyphal formation and prolonged the survival of C. albicans infected Caenorhabditis elegans, thus showing a distinct antivirulent potential. A structural activity relationship study of alizarin and 6 other anthraquinones showed the presence of a hydroxyl group at C-1 position which is important for antibiofilm and antifilamentation activities. Transcriptomic analyses revealed that alizarin downregulated the expression of several hypha-specific and biofilm related genes (ALS3, ECE1, ECE2, and RBT1). Furthermore, unlike the commercial antifungal drug fluconazole, no acute toxic effect was observed when uninfected nematodes were exposed to alizarin at concentrations up to 1 mg/ml. The results of this study indicate alizarin suppresses the virulence of C. albicans in vivo which suggests alizarin may be considered as a potential candidate for further investigations to develop antifungal agent against fungal pathogen in vivo

Adsorption of Pb²⁺ Ions from Aqueous Solution onto Porous Kappa-Carrageenan/Cellulose Hydrogels: Isotherm and Kinetics Study

Heavy metal ion pollution poses severe health risks. In this study, a kappa-carrageenan/cellulose (κ-CG/CL) hydrogel was prepared using a facile one-step method to remove Pb2+ ions from aqueous solutions. The functional groups and crystallinity nature of κ-CG/CL hydrogel have been identified via Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). In contrast, the porous morphology and size distribution on the surface of κ-CG/CL hydrogel with a pore size of 1–10 μm were identified using scanning electron microscope (SEM) and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) surface area analysis. The as-prepared κ-CG/CL hydrogel effectively removed Pb2+ ions, primary environmental pollutants. The effects of pH and contact time on Pb2+ adsorption were studied along with the adsorption isotherms and kinetics of Pb2+ adsorption onto the hydrogels from aqueous solutions. Notably, the aqueous solutions were effectively treated with the prepared κ-CG/CL hydrogels to remove Pb2+ ions. The adsorption results fit well with pseudo-first- and second-order kinetic, Elovich, intra-particle diffusion, and Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm models. Based on the fitting results, the maximum adsorption capacity was obtained with the Freundlich isotherm model of κ-CG/CL hydrogel found to be 486 ± 28.5 mg/g (79%). Reusability studies revealed that the κ-CG/CL hydrogel could remove Pb2+ ions with more than 79% removal efficiency after eight adsorption–desorption cycles. In addition, its mechanism for efficiently adsorbing and removal of Pb2+ ions was analyzed. These findings imply that the κ-CG/CL hydrogel has substantial potential for application in removing and recycling heavy metal ions from aqueous solutions

Expression of salicylic acid-related genes in Brassica oleracea var. capitata during Plasmodiophora brassicae infection

Brassica oleracea var. capitata (cabbage) is an important vegetable crop in Asian countries such as Korea, China and Japan. Cabbage production is severely affected by clubroot disease caused by the soil-borne plant pathogen Plasmodiophora brassicae. During clubroot development, methyl salicylate (MeSA) is biosynthesized from salicylic acid (SA) by methyltransferase. In addition, methyl salicylate esterase (MES) plays a major role in the conversion of MeSA back into free SA. The interrelationship between MES and methytransferases during clubroot development has not been fully explored. To begin to examine these relationships, we investigated the expression of MES genes in disease- susceptible and -resistant plants during clubroot development. We identified three MES-encoding genes potentially involved in the defense against pathogen attack. We found that SS1 was upregulated in both the leaves and roots of B. oleracea during P. brassicae infection. These results support the conclusion that SA biosynthesis is suppressed during pathogen infection in resistant plants. We also characterized the expression of a B. oleracea BSMT gene, which appears to be involved in glycosylation rather than MeSA biosynthesis. Our results provide insight into the functions and interactions of genes for MES and methyltransferase during infection. Taken together, our findings indicate that MES genes are important candidates for use to control clubroot diseases.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author

Robust Facial Expression Recognition Using an Evolutionary Algorithm with a Deep Learning Model

The most important component that can express a person’s mental condition is facial expressions. A human can communicate around 55% of information non-verbally and the remaining 45% audibly. Automatic facial expression recognition (FER) has now become a challenging task in the surveying of computers. Applications of FER include understanding the behavior of humans and monitoring moods and psychological states. It even penetrates other domains—namely, robotics, criminology, smart healthcare systems, entertainment, security systems, holographic images, stress detection, and education. This study introduces a novel Robust Facial Expression Recognition using an Evolutionary Algorithm with Deep Learning (RFER-EADL) model. RFER-EADL aims to determine various kinds of emotions using computer vision and DL models. Primarily, RFER-EADL performs histogram equalization to normalize the intensity and contrast levels of the images of identical persons and expressions. Next, the deep convolutional neural network-based densely connected network (DenseNet-169) model is exploited with the chimp optimization algorithm (COA) as a hyperparameter-tuning approach. Finally, teaching and learning-based optimization (TLBO) with a long short-term memory (LSTM) model is employed for expression recognition and classification. The designs of COA and TLBO algorithms aided in the optimal parameter selection of the DenseNet and LSTM models, respectively. A brief simulation analysis of the benchmark dataset portrays the greater performance of the RFER-EADL model compared to other approaches

Molecular and Functional Characterization of FLOWERING LOCUS T Homologs in Allium cepa

Onion bulbing is an important agricultural trait affecting economic value and is regulated by flowering-related genes. FLOWERING LOCUS T (FT)-like gene function is crucial for the initiation of flowering in various plant species and also in asexual reproduction in tuber plants. By employing various computational analysis using RNA-Seq data, we identified eight FT-like genes (AcFT) encoding PEBP (phosphatidylethanolamine-binding protein) domains in Allium cepa. Sequence and phylogenetic analyses of FT-like proteins revealed six proteins that were identical to previously reported AcFT1-6 proteins, as well as one (AcFT7) with a highly conserved region shared with AcFT6 and another (comp106231) with low similarity to MFT protein, but containing a PEBP domain. Homology modelling of AcFT7 proteins showed similar structures and conservation of amino acids crucial for function in AtFT (Arabidopsis) and Hd3a (rice), with variation in the C-terminal region. Further, we analyzed AcFT expression patterns in different transitional stages, as well as under SD (short-day), LD (long-day), and drought treatment in two contrasting genotypic lines EM (early maturation, 36101) and LM (late maturation, 36122). The FT transcript levels were greatly affected by various environmental factors such as photoperiod, temperature and drought. Our results suggest that AcFT7 is a member of the FT-like genes in Allium cepa and may be involved in regulation of onion bulbing, similar to other FT genes. In addition, AcFT4 and AcFT7 could be involved in establishing the difference in timing of bulb maturity between the two contrasting onion lines

Engineering resistance against physalis mottle tymovirus by expression of the coat protein and 3' noncoding region

A 748 nucleotides cDNA fragment corresponding to the 3' terminal of physalis mottle virus, PhMV (formerly known as belladonna mottle virus) ($\#$Y16104) genomic RNA encompassing the tymobox, coat protein ORF and 3' noncoding region was cloned into the binary vector pKYLX 71 35 $S^2$ and introduced into N. tabacum cv. Havana plants using Agrobacterium-mediated transformation. The R0 transgenic plants showed accumulation of coat protein which self-assembled into capsids in vivo. The transgenic R1 and R2 plants showed delay in symptom expression and virus accumulation upon challenge with PhMV. 55 and 65% of the plants showed no detectable symptoms in the R1 and R2 transgenic plants respectively, when challenged with 10 $\mu$g/ml virus. Further, no detectable symptoms were observed in 75% and 25% of the R1 and R2 transgenic plants respectively, after 50 days of post infection when challenged with 10 $\mu$g/ml RNA. Thus the expression of PhMV coat protein and 3' noncoding sequence confers a high level of resistance against PhMV infection