Utilizing Alike Neighbor Influenced Similarity Metric for Efficient Prediction in Collaborative Filter-Approach-Based Recommendation System

The most popular method collaborative filter approach is primarily used to handle the information overloading problem in E-Commerce. Traditionally, collaborative filtering uses ratings of similar users for predicting the target item. Similarity calculation in the sparse dataset greatly influences the predicted rating, as less count of co-rated items may degrade the performance of the collaborative filtering. However, consideration of item features to find the nearest neighbor can be a more judicious approach to increase the proportion of similar users. In this study, we offer a new paradigm for raising the rating prediction accuracy in collaborative filtering. The proposed framework uses rated items of the similar feature of the ’most’ similar individuals, instead of using the wisdom of the crowd. The reliability of the proposed framework is evaluated on the static MovieLens datasets and the experimental results corroborate our anticipations

A Study of Financial Behaviour Among Professional Women in Northern India

Financial literacy influences everyday financial decision among people in macro aspect. It is the ability to make rational decisions and to make effective decisions on management of money. The interactions among peer groups also can influences financial behaviour. It is to be believed that right amount of saving through rational financial decisions will boost economic growth and thus further strengthening the economy. The financial literacy covers various dimensions like financial attitude, financial knowledge, social influence, and financial behaviour. In Present study, authors have studied the influence of financial attitude, financial knowledge, and social influence on financial behaviour among professional women of different cities of India. The sample size of 200 working professional from various public and private organizations has been incorporated for the research. A structured questionnaire designed on a 5-point Likert scale has been used and the homogeneity of items and the acceptance of reliability is confirmed by KMO and bartlett’s test. For, further analysis, EFA has been used for determine factor loading of the variables. The relationship between the independent variables and dependent variables are determined by the correlation analysis. The findings revealed that social influence have good association whereas financial knowledge and financial attitude having positive with weak correlation of with financial behaviour among women working professional

Probing the Role of Sigma π Interaction and Energetics in the Catalytic Efficiency of Endo-1,4-β-Xylanase

Chaetomium globosum endo-1,4-β-xylanase (XylCg) is distinguished from other xylanases by its high turnover rate (1,860 s(−1)), the highest ever reported for fungal xylanases. One conserved amino acid, W48, in the substrate binding pocket of wild-type XylCg was identified as an important residue affecting XylCg's catalytic efficiency

Biophysical Studies of Ligand Binding to Human Histone Deacetylase-8

Due to an involvement in various patho-physiological conditions, human histone deacetylases (HDACs) are high priority drug targets for the treatment of several diseases, such as cancer, heart failure, neurodegeneration, etc. An effector (inhibitor/activator) of these enzymes has a great potential to alleviate the above disease conditions. In this regard, HDAC inhibitors – Zolinza and Istodax - have already been approved by the FDA for the treatment of T-cell lymphoma, aside from several other inhibitors which are in the advanced level of clinical trials. HDAC8 serves as a prototype to study structural-functional and catalytic features of human HDACs. In order to pursue the biophysical studies of the ligand-binding, HDAC8 was cloned, expressed, and purified from E. coli. A high-throughput screening (HTS) of an in-house library of small molecules was performed utilizing a trypsin-coupled in vitro HDAC8 assay to discover novel effectors of HDAC8, and the N-acetylthiourea and the thiopyridine derivatives were discovered as the isozyme-selective inhibitors and activators of HDAC8, respectively. In vitro HDAC8 assay utilizing a fluorogenic peptide as a substrate often produces artifactual results. Therefore, a substrate-independent HDAC8 assay was developed utilizing a fluorescent analog of a pan-HDAC-inhibitor. In view of the fact that the downstream cellular response of a drug is often dictated by the transient kinetic and thermodynamic parameters of its interaction with the target, the transient kinetics and thermodynamics of interaction of the selected HDAC8 inhibitor with the enzyme were thoroughly investigated. It was observed that the dissociation off-rate and/or the enthalpy of binding of an HDAC8 inhibitor to the enzyme could play a crucial role in determining its in vivo efficacy. A rationale has been presented that the above parameters of the ligand-protein interaction could be utilized for optimizing a drug candidate (HDAC8 inhibitor) in order to enhance its in vivo potency

Effect of Intrinsic Twist and Orthotropy on Extension–Twist–Inflation Coupling in Compressible Circular Tubes

We present effects of intrinsic twist and material orthotropy on extension–twist–inflation coupling in circular tubes about their stress-free state. Simple analytical expressions for coupling stiffnesses corresponding to extension–twist, twist–inflation and extension–inflation couplings are obtained. We show that the sign of the extension–twist coupling stiffness, which governs initial overwinding/unwinding in tubes during their extension, is not just dependent on the tube’s intrinsic twist but also on two other parameters: ratio of the Young’s moduli in the lateral surface of orthotropic tube and the excess of the Poisson’s ratio from an isotropy condition. By tuning these two parameters, one can generate the counter-intuitive overwinding as reported earlier in the case of DNA. Similarly, we show that even with positive Poisson’s ratio, an intrinsically twisted tube could inflate on being stretched. We also present a scheme to obtain all the relevant stiffnesses of chiral single-walled carbon nanotubes from a “one-atom unit cell” calculation. These stiffnesses, when plotted vs. the nanotube’s chirality, exhibit interesting periodicity which has its origin in the 6-fold symmetry of graphene. This trend is captured in the continuum model for a nanotube when it is assumed to be comprised of three families of parallel fibers on its lateral surface

COMPUTATIONAL APPROACHES FOR RATIONAL DESIGN OF PROTEINS WITH NOVEL FUNCTIONALITIES

Proteins are the most multifaceted macromolecules in living systems and have various important functions, including structural, catalytic, sensory, and regulatory functions. Rational design of enzymes is a great challenge to our understanding of protein structure and physical chemistry and has numerous potential applications. Protein design algorithms have been applied to design or engineer proteins that fold, fold faster, catalyze, catalyze faster, signal, and adopt preferred conformational states. The field of de novo protein design, although only a few decades old, is beginning to produce exciting results. Developments in this field are already having a significant impact on biotechnology and chemical biology. The application of powerful computational methods for functional protein designing has recently succeeded at engineering target activities. Here, we review recently reported de novo functional proteins that were developed using various protein design approaches, including rational design, computational optimization, and selection from combinatorial libraries, highlighting recent advances and successes

Role of conserved glycine in zinc-dependent medium chain dehydrogenase/reductase superfamily

The medium-chain dehydrogenase/reductase (MDR) superfamily consists of a large group of enzymes with a broad range of activities. Members of this superfamily are currently the subject of intensive investigation, but many aspects, including the zinc dependence of MDR superfamily proteins, have not yet have been adequately investigated. Using a density functional theory-based screening strategy, we have identified a strictly conserved glycine residue (Gly) in the zinc-dependent MDR superfamily. To elucidate the role of this conserved Gly in MDR, we carried out a comprehensive structural, functional, and computational analysis of four MDR enzymes through a series of studies including site-directed mutagenesis, isothermal titration calorimetry, electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR), quantum mechanics, and molecular mechanics analysis. Gly substitution by other amino acids posed a significant threat to the metal binding affinity and activity of MDR superfamily enzymes. Mutagenesis at the conserved Gly resulted in alterations in the coordination of the catalytic zinc ion, with concomitant changes in metal-ligand bond length, bond angle, and the affinity (K(d)) toward the zinc ion. The Gly mutants also showed different spectroscopic properties in EPR compared with those of the wild type, indicating that the binding geometries of the zinc to the zinc binding ligands were changed by the mutation. The present results demonstrate that the conserved Gly in the GHE motif plays a role in maintaining the metal binding affinity and the electronic state of the catalytic zinc ion during catalysis of the MDR superfamily enzymes