QUALITY CONTROL ASSAY OF TWO ANTIHYPERTENSIVE REPRESENTATIVES USING RP-HPLC BASED METHODOLOGY: STRESS ASSESSMENT ON ANTIHYPERTENSIVE REPRESENTATIVES

Objective: A quick simultaneous separation and quality control assay of two antihypertensive representatives, Azilsartan (AZIL) and Cilnidipine (CLIN) in bulk and tablet formulation was developed and validated using a Reverse phase (RP) HPLC method within a run time of 10 min. Methods: All chromatographic separations of AZIL and CILN were operated on a “Supelco C18 column (250 × 4.6 mm, 5 μ)”, using a mobile phase of Na2SO4 (0.1 M, pH 4.0): methanol at 60:40 (v: v) ratio and the samples were analyzed at 239 nm. Stability assessments of AZIL and CILN were carried out as per the ICH Q1A (R2) regulation. The methodology for determining AZIL and CILN in bulk and formulations tablets was verified by adhering to International Conference on Harmonization (ICH) recommendations. Results: Retention times of AZIL and CILN samples were 4.023 and 5.732 min, respectively, indicating a quick elution time. Over the tested range of 20–60 µg/ml for AZIL and 5–15 µg/ml for CILN determination, calibration curves have displayed linearity and satisfactory results. LOD of AZIL and CILN are 0.083 µg/ml and 0.056 µg/ml, respectively. The approach suggested herein has satisfactory precision (RSD: 0.1013% for AZIL and 0.4944% for CILN) and accuracy (recovery: 99.20 to 100.34 % for AZIL and 100.17 to 101.59 % for CILN). Furthermore, the approach has also been shown to be effective in detecting degradants of AZIL and CILN and resolving them with high resolution. Conclusion: This approach is shown to be acceptable for the accurate quality control assay of two antihypertensive representatives, AZIL and CLIN in both bulk and tablet formulation

SSSDET: Simple Short and Shallow Network for Resource Efficient Vehicle Detection in Aerial Scenes

Detection of small-sized targets is of paramount importance in many aerial vision-based applications. The commonly deployed low cost unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for aerial scene analysis are highly resource constrained in nature. In this paper we propose a simple short and shallow network (SSSDet) to robustly detect and classify small-sized vehicles in aerial scenes. The proposed SSSDet is up to 4x faster, requires 4.4x less FLOPs, has 30x less parameters, requires 31x less memory space and provides better accuracy in comparison to existing state-of-the-art detectors. Thus, it is more suitable for hardware implementation in real-time applications. We also created a new airborne image dataset (ABD) by annotating 1396 new objects in 79 aerial images for our experiments. The effectiveness of the proposed method is validated on the existing VEDAI, DLR-3K, DOTA and Combined dataset. The SSSDet outperforms state-of-the-art detectors in term of accuracy, speed, compute and memory efficiency.Comment: International Conference on Image Processing (ICIP) 2019, Taipei, Taiwa

Efficient Neural Architecture Search for Emotion Recognition

Automated human emotion recognition from facial expressions is a well-studied problem and still remains a very challenging task. Some efficient or accurate deep learning models have been presented in the literature. However, it is quite difficult to design a model that is both efficient and accurate at the same time. Moreover, identifying the minute feature variations in facial regions for both macro and micro-expressions requires expertise in network design. In this paper, we proposed to search for a highly efficient and robust neural architecture for both macro and micro-level facial expression recognition. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt to design a NAS-based solution for both macro and micro-expression recognition. We produce lightweight models with a gradient-based architecture search algorithm. To maintain consistency between macro and micro-expressions, we utilize dynamic imaging and convert microexpression sequences into a single frame, preserving the spatiotemporal features in the facial regions. The EmoNAS has evaluated over 13 datasets (7 macro expression datasets: CK+, DISFA, MUG, ISED, OULU-VIS CASIA, FER2013, RAF-DB, and 6 micro-expression datasets: CASME-I, CASME-II, CAS(ME)2, SAMM, SMIC, MEGC2019 challenge). The proposed models outperform the existing state-of-the-art methods and perform very well in terms of speed and space complexity

A Multi-centre Study to Evaluate the Long-Term Efficacy and Safety of Biosimilar Infliximab (Infimab™) in Ankylosing Spondylitis in Real-world Clinical Settings - A perspective from Eastern India

Introduction: Owing to dearth of data on infliximab biosimilars in Indian patients, a pan-India case database-based study with infliximab biosimilar BOW015 (Infimab™) was carried out to capture its efficacy and safety in real world clinical settings in India. Here, we assessed its efficacy and safety in ankylosing spondylitis (AS) among patients in the East India cohort. Materials and methods: Data were collected from multiple centers across the eastern region of India. Patients diagnosed with AS, within the preceding 4-6 months during the preceding one year were included in the study. Patients who were given BOW015 for other indications, prior innovator infliximab or other biologics were excluded from the study. Primary variable was Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Scale (ASDAS) response defined as change of > 2 in the ASDAS score from the baseline by 4-6 months of follow up. Results: The cohort consisted of 149 patients, predominantly male (69.8%), with mean (±SD) age of 36.75 (±11.11) years and mean (±SD) body weight of 58.26 (±15.4) kgs. Of the treated patients, 91 (61.1%) patients were administered four doses, 10 (6.7%) patients were administered three doses, 37 (24.8%) patients were administered two doses and 11 (7.4%) patients were administered only a single dose of BOW015. In the final analysis set, 81 patients had data at baseline and 4th visit. Among the 81 patients, 74 (91%) patients achieved major improvement, 5 (6%) patients achieved clinically important improvement and 2 (3%) were non-responders at 4th visit. Secondarily, cross categorization of the cohort into disease activity categories by number of infusions administered from baseline to 4th visit and assessment of trends in Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) scores were also carried out and these too confirmed the efficacy of BOW015. Conclusion: Infimab™ (BOW015) showed significant improvement in ASDAS and BASDAI in patients with AS at the end of 4-6 months of follow up with its clinical benefits being apparent as early as first dose of BOW015

Reduced cortical thickness in patients with acute-on-chronic liver failure due to non-alcoholic etiology

Background: Acute-on-chronic liver failure (ACLF) is a form of liver disease with high short-term mortality. ACLF offers considerable potential to affect the cortical areas by significant tissue injury due to loss of neurons and other supporting cells. We measured changes in cortical thickness and metabolites profile in ACLF patients following treatment, and compared it with those of age matched healthy volunteers. Methods: For the cortical thickness analysis we performed whole brain high resolution T1-weighted magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) on 15 ACLF and 10 healthy volunteers at 3T clinical MR scanner. Proton MR Spectroscopy (1H MRS) was also performed to measure level of altered metabolites. Out of 15 ACLF patients 10 survived and underwent follow-up study after clinical recovery at 3 weeks. FreeSurfer program was used to quantify cortical thickness and LC- Model software was used to quantify absolute metabolites concentrations. Neuropsychological (NP) test was performed to assess the cognitive performance in follow-up ACLF patients compared to controls. Results: Significantly reduced cortical thicknesses in multiple brain sites, and significantly decreased N-acetyl aspartate (NAA), myo-inositol (mI) and significantly increased glutamate/glutamine (glx) metabolites were observed in ACLF compared to those of controls at baseline study. Follow-up patients showed significant recovery in cortical thickness and Glx level, while NAA and mI were partially recovered compared to baseline study. When compared to controls, follow-up patients still showed reduced cortical thickness and altered metabolites level. Follow-up patients had abnormal neuropsychological (NP) scores compared to controls. Conclusions: Neuronal loss as suggested by the reduced NAA, decreased cellular density due to increased cerebral hyperammonemia as supported by the increased glx level, and increased proinflammatory cytokines and free radicals may account for the reduced cortical thickness in ACLF patients. Presence of reduced cortical thickness, altered metabolites and abnormal NP test scores in post recovery subjects as compared to those of controls is associated with incomplete clinical recovery. The current imaging protocol can be easily implemented in clinical settings to evaluate and monitor brain tissue changes in patients with ACLF during the course of treatment

Albiglutide and cardiovascular outcomes in patients with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease (Harmony Outcomes): a double-blind, randomised placebo-controlled trial

Background: Glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists differ in chemical structure, duration of action, and in their effects on clinical outcomes. The cardiovascular effects of once-weekly albiglutide in type 2 diabetes are unknown. We aimed to determine the safety and efficacy of albiglutide in preventing cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke. Methods: We did a double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled trial in 610 sites across 28 countries. We randomly assigned patients aged 40 years and older with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease (at a 1:1 ratio) to groups that either received a subcutaneous injection of albiglutide (30–50 mg, based on glycaemic response and tolerability) or of a matched volume of placebo once a week, in addition to their standard care. Investigators used an interactive voice or web response system to obtain treatment assignment, and patients and all study investigators were masked to their treatment allocation. We hypothesised that albiglutide would be non-inferior to placebo for the primary outcome of the first occurrence of cardiovascular death, myocardial infarction, or stroke, which was assessed in the intention-to-treat population. If non-inferiority was confirmed by an upper limit of the 95% CI for a hazard ratio of less than 1·30, closed testing for superiority was prespecified. This study is registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT02465515. Findings: Patients were screened between July 1, 2015, and Nov 24, 2016. 10 793 patients were screened and 9463 participants were enrolled and randomly assigned to groups: 4731 patients were assigned to receive albiglutide and 4732 patients to receive placebo. On Nov 8, 2017, it was determined that 611 primary endpoints and a median follow-up of at least 1·5 years had accrued, and participants returned for a final visit and discontinuation from study treatment; the last patient visit was on March 12, 2018. These 9463 patients, the intention-to-treat population, were evaluated for a median duration of 1·6 years and were assessed for the primary outcome. The primary composite outcome occurred in 338 (7%) of 4731 patients at an incidence rate of 4·6 events per 100 person-years in the albiglutide group and in 428 (9%) of 4732 patients at an incidence rate of 5·9 events per 100 person-years in the placebo group (hazard ratio 0·78, 95% CI 0·68–0·90), which indicated that albiglutide was superior to placebo (p<0·0001 for non-inferiority; p=0·0006 for superiority). The incidence of acute pancreatitis (ten patients in the albiglutide group and seven patients in the placebo group), pancreatic cancer (six patients in the albiglutide group and five patients in the placebo group), medullary thyroid carcinoma (zero patients in both groups), and other serious adverse events did not differ between the two groups. There were three (<1%) deaths in the placebo group that were assessed by investigators, who were masked to study drug assignment, to be treatment-related and two (<1%) deaths in the albiglutide group. Interpretation: In patients with type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, albiglutide was superior to placebo with respect to major adverse cardiovascular events. Evidence-based glucagon-like peptide 1 receptor agonists should therefore be considered as part of a comprehensive strategy to reduce the risk of cardiovascular events in patients with type 2 diabetes. Funding: GlaxoSmithKline