Rare Chimaeroid and Elasmobranch fishes from the continental slope off the West Coast of India

During exploratory trawling from the upper continental slope in depths between 180 and 450 metres off the West Coast of India, specimens of the Chimreroid fish Neoharriotta pinnata (Schnackenbeck) and the rare elasmobranchs Echinorhinus b"UC11S (Bonnaterrc) and Atractophorus armatus Gilchrist have been obtained. All three are new distributional records for Indian Seas and they are described and illustrate

Secure and Internet-Less Connectivity to a Blockchain Network for Limited Connectivity Bank Users

Over the past few years, we have seen the emergence of a wide range of banking architectures, technologies, and applications made possible by the significant improvements in hardware, software, and networking technologies. Nowadays, innovative solutions are being developed by banks to leverage the benefits of blockchain, to improve their business agility and performance, and to make their business operations more efficient and secure. However, there are still cases where regular access to Internet is impossible or unreliable due to saturated networks or harsh environments, hence limiting the deployment of typical blockchain based solutions. In this context, an approach using a new connectivity technology is needed in order to increase mobile Internet services for any device to reach nearly 95% of the world population, instantly, simply by drawing on existing mobile phone networks, with no additional infrastructure development. We aim to give the user full bank access from their device, even if the device is not a smart one, using ordinary mobile phone networks. However, providing efficient and secure communications over lossy and low bandwidth networks remains a challenge. The main objective of this paper will be to design an end-to-end and low overhead secure solution for the communications between mobile devices and their corresponding remote application servers that using blockchain via ordinary mobile networks

Supervisory Control Theory in System Safety Analysis

Development of safety critical systems requires a risk management strategy to identify and analyse hazards, and apply necessary actions to eliminate or control them as malfunctions could be catastrophic. Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) is one of the most widely used methods for safety analysis in industrial use. However, the standard FTA is manual, informal, and limited to static analysis of systems. In this paper, we present preliminary results from a model-based approach to address these limitations using Supervisory Control Theory. Taking an example from the Fault Tree Handbook, we present a systematic approach to incrementally obtain formal models from a fault tree and verify them in the tool Supremica. We present a method to calculate minimal cut sets using our approach. These compositional techniques could potentially be very beneficial in the safety analysis of highly complex safety critical systems, where several components interact to solve different tasks

Environmental impact assessment in the shrimp farming areas of Nagapattinam Quaid-E-Milleth district, Tamil Nadu

To assess the effects of shrimp farming on the environment and on the coastal population, a study was undertaken by a team of scientific and technical staff of CMFRl in Nagapattinam Quaid-e-Milleth district, Tamil Nadu in September, 1995. Several small and large farms and corporate farms in nine coastal places, where a number of farms are located were covered in the study. With the help of the mobile laboratory of the CMFR Institute, the team collected and aneilysed soil, water and plankton samples in the inlet and outlet of the farm areas, shrimp ponds and from the wells of the nearby villages. Estimations on hydrological parameters, nutrients and total and differential counts of bacteria in the water and soil samples were made following standard procedures

Association of comorbidity burden with abnormal cardiac mechanics: Findings from the HyperGEN study

BACKGROUND: Comorbidities are common in heart failure (HF), and the number of comorbidities has been associated with poor outcomes in HF patients. However, little is known about the effect of multiple comorbidities on cardiac mechanics, which could impact the pathogenesis of HF. We sought to determine the relationship between comorbidity burden and adverse cardiac mechanics. METHODS AND RESULTS: We performed speckle‐tracking analysis on echocardiograms from the HyperGEN study (n=2150). Global longitudinal, circumferential, and radial strain, and early diastolic (e') tissue velocities were measured. We evaluated the association between comorbidity number and cardiac mechanics using linear mixed effects models to account for relatedness among subjects. The mean age was 51±14 years, 58% were female, and 47% were African American. Dyslipidemia and hypertension were the most common comorbidities (61% and 58%, respectively). After adjusting for left ventricular (LV) mass index, ejection fraction, and several potential confounders, the number of comorbidities remained associated with all indices of cardiac mechanics except global circumferential strain (eg, β=−0.32 [95% CI −0.44, −0.20] per 1‐unit increase in number of comorbidities for global longitudinal strain; β=−0.16 [95% CI −0.20, −0.11] for e' velocity; P≤0.0001 for both comparisons). Results were similar after excluding participants with abnormal LV geometry (P<0.05 for all comparisons). CONCLUSIONS: Higher comorbidity burden is associated with worse cardiac mechanics, even in the presence of normal LV geometry. The deleterious effect of multiple comorbidities on cardiac mechanics may explain both the high comorbidity burden and adverse outcomes in patients who ultimately develop HF

Survey of Valinokkam Bay and adjoining area to assess its suitability for integrated sea farming — A report

The Valinokkam Bay and the adjoining area, east of the Bay surveyed, lie between Lat. 9°9' N and 9° 12' N and Long. 78°30'E and 78°42'E . The available information indicates that the bay and the adjoining grounds in the sea are highly productive and suitable for sea farming activities

Effect of Citalopram on Emotion Processing in Humans:A Combined 5-HT [C]CUMI-101 PET and Functional MRI Study

A subset of patients started on a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) initially experience increased anxiety, which can lead to early discontinuation before therapeutic effects are manifest. The neural basis of this early SSRI effect is not known. Presynaptic dorsal raphe neuron (DRN) 5-HT1A receptors are known to play a critical role in affect processing. Thus we investigated the effect of acute citalopram on emotional processing and the relationship between DRN 5-HT1A receptor availability and amygdala reactivity. Thirteen (mean age 48±9 years) healthy male subjects received either a saline or citalopram infusion intravenously (10 mg over 30 min) on separate occasions in a single-blind, random order, cross-over design. On each occasion, participants underwent a block design face-emotion processing task during fMRI known to activate the amygdala. Ten subjects also completed a positron emission tomography (PET) scan to quantify DRN 5-HT1A availability using [(11)C]CUMI-101.Citalopram infusion when compared to saline resulted in a significantly increased bilateral amygdala responses to fearful vs. neutral faces (Left p=0.025; Right p=0.038 FWE-corrected). DRN [(11)C]CUMI-101availability significantly positively correlated with the effect of citalopram on the left amygdala response to fearful faces (Z=2.51, p=0.027) and right amygdala response to happy faces (Z=2.33, p=0.032). Our findings indicate that the initial effect of SSRI treatment is to alter processing of aversive stimuli, and that this is linked to DRN 5-HT1A receptors in line with evidence that 5-HT1A receptors have a role in mediating emotional processing