Relationship between incidence of Leucinodes orbonalis (Guenee) and Chlorophyll content in leaves of Brinjal (Solanum melongena L.)

The present study on biochemical basis of resistance against Leucinodes orbonalis infestation was conducted during the year 2011-2012. The results revealed that highest chlorophyll-‘a’- content of 0.497 mg/gfw was recorded in the susceptible genotype SHB-1.The lowest amount of 0.319 and 0.381 mg/gfw was observed in the resistant genotypes Brinjal-85 and Local long respectively, which were significantly different from other evaluated genotypes. The chlorophyll ‘a’content was positively correlated with the brinjal shoot and fruit borer infestation. Thehighest chlorophyll -‘b’- content of 0.442 mg/gfw was recorded at 70 DAT (days after transplanting). The amount of chlorophyll -‘b’- varied significantly among the genotypes at different ages and decreased with the age of crop. The average highest amount of chlorophyll -‘b’- was estimated in the genotype SBH-1 which was significantly at par with hybrid SBH-2. The lowest chlorophyll -‘b’- content was recorded at 40 DAT in the genotype Brinjal-85 followed by Local Long. The lowest amount of total chlorophyll was estimated in the resistant variety as compared to susceptible therefore exhibiting lowest level of infestation

Implications of risk conferred by 5p15.33 loci genetic variants; human telomerase reverse transcriptase rs2736098 and rs2736100 in predisposition of bladder cancer

Background: The polymorphic variations of human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT) gene play an important role in predisposition to carcinogenesis. The current study aimed to elucidate the genetic predisposition to bladder cancer in two important variants, rs2736098 and rs2736100 of hTERT gene. Materials and methods: Confirmed 130 patients of bladder cancer and 200 healthy controls were genotyped by PCR-RFLP to determine different variants of hTERT rs2736098 and rs2736100. Results: hTERT rs2736098 homozygous variant AA genotype frequency was observed to significantly differ 2-fold between cases and controls (26.15% vs. 13.5%) (p = 0.02). In addition, rare ‘A’ allele significantly differed among two groups (cases: 47% versus controls: 39%: p = 0.03). hTERT rs2736098 was observed to be presented significantly more in high stage tumors (p = 0.02). hTERT rs2736100 genotype AA or variant allele A showed no significant difference between cases and controls. Haplotype CA displayed significantly different pattern of frequency as 0.5 in cases as compared to 0.16 in controls (p < 0.0001). Combination of variant A/G haplotype frequency implicated more in cases than in controls (0.34 vs. 0.16, p = 0.001). Conclusions: It is concluded that hTERT rs2736098 polymorphic variant has a vital role to confer a strong risk to bladder cancer in our population. Further, hTERT haplotypes CA and AG inhTERT could prove to be a promising tool to screen the risk for bladder cancer

Fluorescent Organic Nanoparticles: New Generation Materials with Diverse Analytical and Biomedical Applications

This book provides a critical review of recent advances in the development of fluorescent organic nanoparticles as materials of choice for the design and fabrication of sensors, bioimaging agents and drug delivery systems. The properties and functions of nanoparticles differ significantly from those of their parent entities or their bulk phases. Two of their most important features are their increased surface-to volume ratio, and the formation of surface structures differing from those in their bulk phases. In addition, the book discusses the synthesis of fluorescent conjugated polymers, self-assembled fluorescent nanoparticles, polydopamine nanoparticles, and aggregation-induced-emission or aggregation-induced-emission enhancement nanomaterials. In closing, the book provides an outlook on future research and development in fluorescent organic nanoparticles as smart materials with an impressive range of potential applications

Neutrosophic robust ratio type estimator for estimating finite population mean

Various authors have put their sincere efforts into proposing ratio estimators for estimating the population's mean and variance under different situations and sampling methods. But the problem arises when data is unstable, imprecise, ambiguous, incomplete and vague. In such situations, classical methods of estimation do not yield precise results, as these methods are not meant for such problems. Given this difficulty, Neutrosophic statistics are the only alternative as it deals with indeterminacy. So in this study, we have proposed a generalized Neutrosophic robust ratio type estimator which can be used to provide good results in such situations, as well as in the case of the presence of outliers. For the evaluation point of view, we have made use of real data set and simulation study to check the efficacy of our suggested estimators over the mentioned existed estimators

Colourful and antioxidant silk with chlorogenic acid: Process development and optimization by central composite design

Both the conventional one-factor-at-a-time (OFT) optimization, in which one of the factors is varied maintaining the other parameters fixed at constant levels, and the central composite design (CCD) optimization, in which all factors are varied simultaneously, were carried out for silk dyeing with chlorogenic acid. The CCD experiments were designed with the help of Design-Expert 10.0.3 software (trial version) and used for evaluating the interactive effects of the four most important operating variables namely pH, temperature, time and dye concentration. The colour characteristics, fastness properties, FT-IR spectra and antioxidant activity of dyed fabrics were also evaluated. The silk fabrics dyed with chlorogenic acid displayed light yellowish brown colour, and exhibited good fastness properties and excellent antioxidant activity

Quantitative and qualitative evaluation of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) for genetic variability, character association and path analysis: Genetic variability, character association and path analysis in saffron

Different accessions of saffron were studied to analyze genetic diversity and heritable component of variation in yield and yield related traits. Dry pistil weight, fresh pistil weight, fresh flower weight corm-1 line-1, number of flowers corm-1 line-1, and big corm index, all had high genotypic coefficient of variation, heritability and genetic advance. The traits included in the selection scheme, correlation among traits (floral and agronomic) are important as varieties must have high yield associated with exemplary quality parameters. At both phenotypic and genotypic levels, the association was found significant among the traits. Stigma length and fresh flower weight had strong direct effect with respect to dry pistil weight followed by number of flowers corm-1 line-1, fresh pistil weight and big corm index. Therefore, these parameters can be taken as criteria for selection

Development of engineered Candida tropicalis strain for efficient corncob-based xylitol-ethanol biorefinery

Abstract Background Xylitol has a wide range of applications in the pharmaceuticals, cosmetic, food and beverage industry. Microbial xylitol production reduces the risk of contamination and is considered as environment friendly and sustainable compared to the chemical method. In this study, random mutagenesis and genetic engineering approaches were employed to develop Candida tropicalis strains with reduced xylitol dehydrogenase (XDH) activity to eliminate co-substrate requirement for corn cob-based xylitol-ethanol biorefinery. Results The results suggest that when pure xylose (10% w/v) was fermented in bioreactor, the Ethyl methane sulfonate (EMS) mutated strain (C. tropicalis K2M) showed 9.2% and XYL2 heterozygous (XYL2/xyl2Δ::FRT) strain (C. tropicalis K21D) showed 16% improvement in xylitol production compared to parental strain (C. tropicalis K2). Furthermore, 1.5-fold improvement (88.62 g/L to 132 g/L) in xylitol production was achieved by C. tropicalis K21D after Response Surface Methodology (RSM) and one factor at a time (OFAT) applied for media component optimization. Finally, corncob hydrolysate was tested for xylitol production in biorefinery mode, which leads to the production of 32.6 g/L xylitol from hemicellulosic fraction, 32.0 g/L ethanol from cellulosic fraction and 13.0 g/L animal feed. Conclusions This work, for the first time, illustrates the potential of C. tropicalis K21D as a microbial cell factory for efficient production of xylitol and ethanol via an integrated biorefinery framework by utilising lignocellulosic biomass with minimum waste generation

PAMAM Dendrimers Mediated Solubility Enhancement of Poorly Soluble Drugs: A Concise Review

High solubility, high permeability and good stability are basic prerequisites for achieving the bioavailability and hencetherapeutic effectiveness. Newly developed drugs having poor solubility are rejected or exhibit suboptimal performance.Poor solubility of new chemical entities discovered or already in the market limits their use in formulation development.Poor solubility being a major obstacle in all checkpoints in drug discovery pipeline. Plethora of techniques/methods areused for the improvement of the solubility of poorly water-soluble drugs include micronization, chemical modification, pHadjustment, solid dispersion, complexation, cosolvency, micellar solubilization, hydrotropy etc. Dendrimers a nanocarriershows tremendous Solublization potential. These nonmaterial's have unique property to encapsulate the drug inside as wellas binding on surface by electrostatic interaction. The dendrimers is hypothesized to have the drug in their internal cavitieswhich are shielded by exterior groups. Various researchers have explored the Solublization potential of dendrimers usingpoorly soluble drugs to provide the proof of concept. The results, patents and dendrimers based marketed preparationsrevealed the efficacy of dendrimers for enhancement of solubility

GC-MS Analysis, Phytochemical Screening, and Antibacterial Activity of <i>Cerana indica</i> Propolis from Kashmir Region

Propolis is a resinous compound produced by honey bees. It contains bioactive molecules that possess a wide range of biological functions. The chemical composition of propolis is affected by various variables, including the vegetation, the season, and the area from which the sample was collected. The aim of this study was to analyze the chemical composition and assess Cerana indica propoli’s antibacterial efficacy from the Kashmir region. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis was used to determine the chemical composition of Kashmiri propolis. A range of bacterial strains was tested for antimicrobial activity using different extracts of propolis by agar well diffusion technique. Propolis was found to be rich in alkaloids, saponins, tannins, and resins. The chemical characterization revealed the presence of 68 distinct phytocompounds using GC-MS, and the most predominant compounds were alpha-D-mannopyranoside, methyl, cyclic 2,3:4,6-bis-ethyl boronate (21.17%), followed by hexadecanoic acid, methyl ester (9.91%), and bacteriochlorophyll-c-stearyl (4.41%). The different extracts of propolis showed specific antibacterial efficacy against multidrug-resistant (MDR) strains viz., Pseudomonas aeruginosa (MTCC1688), Escherichiacoli (MTCC443), Klebsiella pneumonia (MTCC19), Cutibacterium acnes (MTCC843), and Staphylococcus aureus (MTCC96). The EEKP showed the highest zone of inhibition against S. aureus (17.33) at 400 µg mL−1. According to the findings of this study, bee propolis contains a variety of secondary metabolites with various pharmacological activities. Furthermore, because of its broad spectrum of positive pharmacological actions and the fact that it is a promising antibacterial agent, more research on propolis is warranted

Optimisation of a Greener-Approach for the Synthesis of Cyclodextrin-Based Nanosponges for the Solubility Enhancement of Domperidone, a BCS Class II Drug

BCS class II molecules suffer from low oral bioavailability because of their poor permeability and sub-optimal aqueous solubility. One of the approaches to enhance their bioavailability is using cyclodextrin-based nanosponges. This study aimed to optimise and evaluate the feasibility of a microwave-assisted approach to synthesise nanosponges and improve domperidone’s solubility and drug delivery potential. In the production process, microwave power level, response speed, and stirring speed were optimised using the Box-Behnken approach. Ultimately, the batch with the smallest particle size and highest yield was chosen. The optimised method of synthesis of the nanosponges resulted in a product yield of 77.4% and a particle size of 195.68 ± 2.16 nm. The nanocarriers had a drug entrapment capacity of 84 ± 4.2% and a zeta potential of −9.17± 0.43 mV. The similarity and the difference factors demonstrated proof-of-concept, showing that the drug release from the loaded nanosponges is significantly greater than the plain drug. Additionally, spectral and thermal characterisations, such as FTIR, DSC, and XRD, confirmed the entrapment of the drug within the nanocarrier. SEM scans revealed the porous nature of the nanocarriers. Microwave-assisted synthesis could be used as a better and greener approach to synthesise these nanocarriers. It could then be utilised to load drugs and improve their solubility, as seen in the case of domperidone