Post-Coital Antifertility Activity of Hibiscus rosa-sinensis Linn. roots

Ancient literature mentions the use of a number of plants/preparations for fertility regulation. Some local contraceptive agents have also been described in Ayurvedic and Unani texts. Documented experiments or clinical data are, however, lacking. Therefore, the present study was undertaken to explore the antifertility and estrogenic activity of ethanolic extract of the roots of Hibiscus rosa-sinensis Linn. A strong anti-implantation (inhibition 100%) and uterotropic activity was observed at the dose level of 400 mg/kg body weight. Histological studies were carried out to confirm this effect

Adaptive stochastic-deterministic chemical kinetic simulations

Motivation: Biochemical signaling pathways and genetic circuits often involve very small numbers of key signaling molecules. Computationally expensive stochastic methods are necessary to simulate such chemical situations. Single-molecule chemical events often co-exist with much larger numbers of signaling molecules where mass-action kinetics is a reasonable approximation. Here, we describe an adaptive stochastic method that dynamically chooses between deterministic and stochastic calculations depending on molecular count and propensity of forward reactions. The method is fixed timestep and has first order accuracy. We compare the efficiency of this method with exact stochastic methods. Results: We have implemented an adaptive stochastic-deterministic approximate simulation method for chemical kinetics. With an error margin of 5%, the method solves typical biologically constrained reaction schemes more rapidly than exact stochastic methods for reaction volumes >1-10 μm3. We have developed a test suite of reaction cases to test the accuracy of mixed simulation methods

Vascular corrosion casting of human heart

Variation in the morphological pattern of coronary arteries and their major branches is an important factor in the assessment and treatment of coronary heart disease. Detailed knowledge of the blood supply of the heart is necessary today because of the wider practice of cardiac surgery, and also for better understanding of the anomalous branches, anastomosis and dominance pattern in circulation caused by coronary vasculature. We utilized 80 human heart specimens and found right dominance in 69 specimens, left dominance in 9 specimens and balanced type of circulation in 2 specimens. We observed anastomosis between the major arteries in arteriogram but in vascular corrosion method we did not found because cast substance interpretation to minor vessels is too difficult. The present study acknowledges about Coronary vascular pattern, circulatory dominance of the arteries and by using the vascular corrosion method

Bony impressions on caput and neck of human femora in Indian Population.

Idiopathic osteoarthritis of the hip has been currently attributed by researchers to the repetitive microtrauma caused to the femoral neck by its impingement against the acetabular rim. This impingement occurs as a result of abnormal morphological traits like Allen’s fossa, Poirier’s Facet, and Posterior Cervical Imprint that appear on the proximal end of femur especially on the neck. Hence, this study was undertaken to investigate the incidence of these traits in the Indian population and to find a correlation between the occurrence of the trait and the side and sex of the bone. The study was conducted on 152 adult dried femora in the Department of Anatomy, Maulana Azad Medical College, New Delhi, India. The positive findings were photographed. The significance of the correlation was found out using Chi-square test. Allen’s Fossa was found to occur in 71.1% of the total bones assessed Poirier’s Facet in 31.6% and Posterior Cervical Imprint in 19.7%. Out of these, a significant side association was found for the Poirier’s Facet with a predominance of the left side. All the traits were found to be more in males with a significant sex variation for Poirier’s Facet. Each trait demonstrated a significant side and gender dimorphism

A rare constellation of multiple upper limb anomalies

We describe an unusual combination of unilateral upper limb variations, including an axillary arch, absence of a “typical” musculocutaneous nerve, direct lateral cord innervation of the muscles usually supplied by the musculocutaneous nerve, variant superficial brachial artery, a high anomalous origin of the common interosseous artery and a superficial ulnar artery noted during routine cadaver dissection. The embryological basis, recent molecular insights concerning such a constellation of anomalies and its clinical relevance are discussed

CURRENT PHARMACOLOGICAL STATUS OF CARDIOPROTECTIVE PLANTS AGAINST ISOPROTERENOL INDUCED MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION

 Objective: Cardiovascular diseases are the major cause of morbidity and mortality in the modern era. Myocardial infarction is a condition where there is a significant decrease or block in the blood (oxygen) supply to the part of heart, leading to degeneration of a portion of the myocardium which triggers a cascade of cellular, inflammatory and biochemical events, leading eventually to the irreversible death (necrosis) of heart muscle cells. Various therapeutic interventions, including lifestyle modification, pharmacological treatment options, and surgical techniques are available. The present review focus on the plants that have been evaluated for cardioprotective activity against isoproterenol-induced myocardial infarction.Method: The current status of Cardioprotective plants was obtained from a literature search of electronic databases such as Google Scholar, Pubmed and Scopus up to 2017 for publications on medicinal plants used against isoproterenol-induced myocardial infarction. Isoproterenol, Isoprenaline, myocardial infarction, cardioprotective were used as keywords for the searching.Result: A total of 117 different plant parts and their extracts have till now been published to possess cardioprotection against isoproterenol-induced myocardial infarction. Isoproterenol a beta-adrenergic receptors agonist causes severe stress in myocardium resulting in the infarct-like lesion and produced cardiotoxic effects by elevating the levels of cardiac biomarkers and causing changes in ECG. Plant-based medicines with their antioxidant, antiapoptotic, antihyperlipidemic, platelet antiaggregatory, anti-lipid peroxidation property provide substantial evidence for the management of Ischemia.Conclusion: This review, therefore, provides a useful resource to enable a thorough assessment of the profile of plants that have cardioprotective activity against isoproterenol-induced myocardial infarction

Boundedness properties of fermionic operators

The fermionic second quantization operator $d\Gamma(B)$ is shown to be bounded by a power $N^{s/2}$ of the number operator $N$ given that the operator $B$ belongs to the $r$-th von Neumann-Schatten class, $s=2(r-1)/r$. Conversely, number operator estimates for $d\Gamma(B)$ imply von Neumann-Schatten conditions on $B$. Quadratic creation and annihilation operators are treated as well.Comment: 15 page

Evolution of nocturnal temperature inversions - A numerical study

A series of numerical simulations using a one-dimensional energy balance model suggest that both the depth and the intensity of the nocturnal temperature inversion depend on surface emissivity �g and a ground cooling rate parameter β (which inthe model is a surrogate for the inverse square root of the soil thermal diffusivity), especially under calm conditions. It is found that, after a transient that may last a few hours after nominal sunset, both depth and intensity follow the classical parabolic growth law, but only under calm conditions. If the ground cools faster the transient for the inversion depth is longer and the inversion deeper. If the surface is radiatively darker, the transient is again longer but the inversion depth is lower. The temperature at the top of the inversion is not strongly influenced by �g or β, but, depending on whether the reference is taken at the surface or at screen height, the intensity of the inversion decreases (or increases) with a drop in �g; it also increases with increase in ground cooling rate but with either choice of reference temperature. With wind, the inversion may be deeper during the transient than under calm conditions, but eventually becomes both shallower and weaker, and may disappear altogether at high winds. The effect of wind is found to be negligible whenthe frictionv elocity is less than0.2 ms −1. Comparison with observations shows general qualitative agreement, but also suggests that the highly variable results reported inthe literature onin version parameters may be due to site-dependent surface characteristics whose effects, till now ignored, need explicit attentionin future field observations and models

An anomalous variation in the innervation pattern of the peroneus longus muscle by deep peroneal nerve: a case report

The muscles of the leg are partitioned into three compartments (anterior, lateral and posterior) which have separate innervations. The peroneus longus muscle is included in the lateral compartment and is innervated by the superficial peroneal nerve. We report an unusual finding in the innervation pattern of the peroneus longus muscle on the right side of a 65 year old female cadaver, in which the branches from the deep peroneal nerve were found to innervate the peroneus longus muscle. This finding is of academic interest and clinical significance to surgeons operating on the proximal fibula for nerve decompression, high tibial osteotomy andnerve transfer operations.Key words: Deep peroneal, common peroneal,nerve, peroneus longus, variations

Obstetric and neonatal outcome among women presenting with reduced fetal movements in third trimester

Background: Reduced maternal perception of fetal movements allows early identification, timely evaluation and intervention for fetuses at risk of adverse outcome. The primary objective of this study was to assess the pregnancy characteristics and outcomes of pregnant women presenting to hospital with reduced fetal movements (RFM).Methods: Prospective observational study, recruiting all women with singleton pregnancy at or beyond 28 weeks of gestation presenting with a subjective perception of RFM from April 2015 to December 2016. Maternal characteristics, antenatal risk factors, management pathways and perinatal outcome studied.Results: 47% belonged to high risk pregnancy. Among high risk women, although only 39% showed poor BPP at the first presentation, 58% were delivered irrespective of their gestational age, out of which 32.75% had poor neonatal outcome. Among low risk who had >2 episodes of RFM, 50% had poor neonatal outcome. 7% among high risk pregnancies and 18% among low risk, presented with RFM within 48 hours following steroid prophylaxis.24% of high risk women showed liquor volume abnormalities as compared to low risk (6.3%).Conclusions: Significant proportion of those with RFM belonged to high risk pregnancy. Among high risk group, there were high rates of stillbirth and poor BPP at the time of admission when compared to low risk group. Due to early approach to the hospital and timely intervention, significant women with abnormal BPP had good perinatal outcome. All those fetuses who were delivered on first episode of RFM in low risk group did not show evidence of compromise at birth, probably indicating unnecessary delivery. More than 2 episodes of RFM even among low risk group seems significant as good number of fetuses were compromised at birth. Steroids prophylaxis for the fetal lung maturity causes transient changes in BPP, hence unnecessary delivery should be avoided especially those among low risk pregnancy