Subsurface signatures and timing of extreme wave events along the Southeast Indian coast

Written history's limitation becomes apparent when attempting to document the predecessors of extreme coastal events in the Indian Ocean, from 550-700 years in Thailand and 1000 years in Indonesia. Detailed ground-penetrating radar (GPR) surveys in Mahabalipuram, southeast India, complemented with sedimentological analyses, magnetic susceptibility measurements, and optical dating provide strong evidence of extreme wave events during the past 3700 years. The diagnostic event signatures include the extent and elevation of the deposits, as well as morphologic similarity of buried erosional scarps to those reported in northern Sumatra region. Optical ages immediately overlying the imaged discontinuities that coincides with high concentration of heavy minerals date the erosional events to 340 ± 35, 350 ± 20, 490 ± 30, 880 ± 40, 1080 ± 60, 1175 ± 188, 2193 ± 266, 2235 ± 881, 2489 ± 293, 2450 ± 130, 2585 ± 609, 3710 ± 200 years ago. These evidences are crucial in reconstructing paleo extreme wave events and will pave the way for regional correlation of erosional horizons along the northern margin of Indian Ocean

Molecular Analysis of Disease-Responsive Genes Revealing the Resistance Potential Against Fusarium Wilt (Fusarium udum Butler) Dependent on Genotype Variability in the Leguminous Crop Pigeonpea

Fusarium wilt (FW), caused by Fusarium udum Butler (FU), is among the challenging factors in the production of pigeonpea. Therefore, exploring a superior pigeonpea genotype from landraces or local cultivars through the selection of innate resistance to FW using different biological and molecular approaches, and validating its resistance response, could be an alternative to sustainable crop improvement. Five distinct pigeonpea genotypes, with resistant (ICP2894) and susceptible (ICP2376) controls, were selected on the basis of the incidence percentage of FW, from three different states of India. Among them, the cultivar Richa, which displayed low incidence of FW (10.0%) during the genotype evaluation, was further examined for its innate resistance to FW. Molecular characterization of antioxidant (AO) enzyme [APX and SOD] and pathogenesis-related (PR) protein [CHS and b-1, 3-glucanase] families were performed. The obtained results of reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction-based expression study and in silico analysis showed a higher level of induction of PR and AO genes, and the strong interaction of their putative proteins with fungal cellobiohydrolase-c protein established their antifungal activity, conferring early plant defense responses to FU in Richa. Our study demonstrated a strong and combinatorial approach involving biological assay, molecular experiments, and in silico analysis to identify a superior pigeonpea genotype that was resistant to FW across a major biogeographic region

The potential of siRNA based drug delivery in respiratory disorders: recent advances and progress

© 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Lung diseases are the leading cause of mortality worldwide. The currently available therapies are not sufficient, leading to the urgent need for new therapies with sustained anti-inflammatory effects. Small/short or silencing interfering RNA (siRNA) has potential therapeutic implications through post-transcriptional downregulation of the target gene expression. siRNA is essential in gene regulation, so is more favorable over other gene therapies due to its small size, high specificity, potency, and no or low immune response. In chronic respiratory diseases, local and targeted delivery of siRNA is achieved via inhalation. The effectual delivery can be attained by the generation of aerosols via inhalers and nebulizers, which overcomes anatomical barriers, alveolar macrophage clearance and mucociliary clearance. In this review, we discuss the different siRNA nanocarrier systems for chronic respiratory diseases, for safe and effective delivery. siRNA mediated pro-inflammatory gene or miRNA targeting approach can be a useful approach in combating chronic respiratory inflammatory conditions and thus providing sustained drug delivery, reduced therapeutic dose, and improved patient compliance. This review will be of high relevance to the formulation, biological and translational scientists working in the area of respiratory diseases

A Cross-Sectional Study of People with Epilepsy and Neurocysticercosis in Tanzania: Clinical Characteristics and Diagnostic Approaches.

Neurocysticercosis (NCC) is a major cause of epilepsy in regions where pigs are free-ranging and hygiene is poor. Pork production is expected to increase in the next decade in sub-Saharan Africa, hence NCC will likely become more prevalent. In this study, people with epilepsy (PWE, n=212) were followed up 28.6 months after diagnosis of epilepsy. CT scans were performed, and serum and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of selected PWE were analysed. We compared the demographic data, clinical characteristics, and associated risk factors of PWE with and without NCC. PWE with NCC (n=35) were more likely to be older at first seizure (24.3 vs. 16.3 years, p=0.097), consumed more pork (97.1% vs. 73.6%, p=0.001), and were more often a member of the Iraqw tribe (94.3% vs. 67.8%, p=0.005) than PWE without NCC (n=177). PWE and NCC who were compliant with anti-epileptic medications had a significantly higher reduction of seizures (98.6% vs. 89.2%, p=0.046). Other characteristics such as gender, seizure frequency, compliance, past medical history, close contact with pigs, use of latrines and family history of seizures did not differ significantly between the two groups. The number of NCC lesions and active NCC lesions were significantly associated with a positive antibody result. The electroimmunotransfer blot, developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, was more sensitive than a commercial western blot, especially in PWE and cerebral calcifications. This is the first study to systematically compare the clinical characteristics of PWE due to NCC or other causes and to explore the utility of two different antibody tests for diagnosis of NCC in sub-Saharan Africa

Increasing complexity and interactions of oxidative stress in chronic respiratory diseases: An emerging need for novel drug delivery systems

© 2018 Elsevier B.V. Oxidative stress is intensely involved in enhancing the severity of various chronic respiratory diseases (CRDs) including asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), infections and lung cancer. Even though there are various existing anti-inflammatory therapies, which are not enough to control the inflammation caused due to various contributing factors such as anti-inflammatory genes and antioxidant enzymes. This leads to an urgent need of novel drug delivery systems to combat the oxidative stress. This review gives a brief insight into the biological factors involved in causing oxidative stress, one of the emerging hallmark feature in CRDs and particularly, highlighting recent trends in various novel drug delivery carriers including microparticles, microemulsions, microspheres, nanoparticles, liposomes, dendrimers, solid lipid nanocarriers etc which can help in combating the oxidative stress in CRDs and ultimately reducing the disease burden and improving the quality of life with CRDs patients. These carriers improve the pharmacokinetics and bioavailability to the target site. However, there is an urgent need for translational studies to validate the drug delivery carriers for clinical administration in the pulmonary clinic

Thermoresponsive Micropatterned Substrates for Single Cell Studies

We describe the design of micropatterned surfaces for single cell studies, based on thermoresponsive polymer brushes. We show that brushes made of poly(N-isopropylacrylamide) grafted at high surface density display excellent protein and cell anti-adhesive properties. Such brushes are readily patterned at the micron scale via deep UV photolithography. A proper choice of the adhesive pattern shapes, combined with the temperature-dependent swelling properties of PNIPAM, allow us to use the polymer brush as a microactuator which induces cell detachment when the temperature is reduced below C

Photocatalytic Nanolithography of Self-Assembled Monolayers and Proteins

Self-assembled monolayers of alkylthiolates on gold and alkylsilanes on silicon dioxide have been patterned photocatalytically on sub-100 nm length-scales using both apertured near-field and apertureless methods. Apertured lithography was carried out by means of an argon ion laser (364 nm) coupled to cantilever-type near-field probes with a thin film of titania deposited over the aperture. Apertureless lithography was carried out with a helium–cadmium laser (325 nm) to excite titanium-coated, contact-mode atomic force microscope (AFM) probes. This latter approach is readily implementable on any commercial AFM system. Photodegradation occurred in both cases through the localized photocatalytic degradation of the monolayer. For alkanethiols, degradation of one thiol exposed the bare substrate, enabling refunctionalization of the bare gold by a second, contrasting thiol. For alkylsilanes, degradation of the adsorbate molecule provided a facile means for protein patterning. Lines were written in a protein-resistant film formed by the adsorption of oligo(ethylene glycol)-functionalized trichlorosilanes on glass, leading to the formation of sub-100 nm adhesive, aldehyde-functionalized regions. These were derivatized with aminobutylnitrilotriacetic acid, and complexed with Ni2+, enabling the binding of histidine-labeled green fluorescent protein, which yielded bright fluorescence from 70-nm-wide lines that could be imaged clearly in a confocal microscope

Real-time monitoring in three-dimensional hepatocytes reveals that insulin acts as a synchronizer for liver clock

Resetting the peripheral clock and understanding the integration between the circadian rhythm and metabolic pathways are fundamental questions. To test whether insulin acts as a synchronizer for the hepatic clock by cell-autonomous mechanisms, the phase-resetting capabilities of insulin were investigated in cultured hepatic cells. We provide evidence that three-dimensional (3D) cell culture conditions that preserve the differentiated state of primary hepatocytes sustained the robustness of the molecular clock, while this robustness rapidly dampened under classical monolayer cell culture conditions. Herein, we established a 3D cell culture system coupled with a real-time luciferase reporter, and demonstrated that insulin directly regulates the phase entrainment of hepatocyte circadian oscillators. We found that insulin-deficient diabetic rats had a pronounced phase advance in their hepatic clock. Subsequently, a single administration of insulin induced phase-dependent bi-directional phase shifts in diabetic rat livers. Our results clearly demonstrate that insulin is a liver clock synchronizer