Role of integrated therapy and nutritional counselling in treating malnourished children in M-East ward Mumbai, India: A Longitudinal Study

Background: Under-nutrition is a big risk factor for increasing the morbidity and mortality burden in the society. Acute malnutrition contributes to almost 61% of diarrheal and 53% of pneumonia deaths. In urban slums like M-East ward, Mumbai, acute malnutrition prevalence ranges from 16% to 59.8%. Objectives: To assess the outcome of weight gain by providing nutritional supplements to the undernourished children along with nutritional counseling. Materials and Methods: RUTF (Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food) and Hyderabad mix with nutritional counselling to parents of children were used to reduce the undernourishment among the under-five children in slums of this ward. Six hundred and fifty malnourished children and their caregivers were provided nutritional supplement and nutritional counselling over 6 months. Results: There was steady wight gain of enrolled children. Highest weight gain occurred over 13th week of the program. Conclusion: A minimum of thirteen weeks nutritional supplement program including fortnightly counselling is necessary and sufficient for converting undernourished children to normal.

ENHANCED USER PLANE SELECTION FUNCTIONALITIES IN 5G DEPLOYMENTS

Within a 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) fifth generation (5G) environment, a number of user plane challenges may arise. For example, in order to achieve minimum latency in a 5G environment, it is critical to have the same User Plane Function (UPF) for both a Serving Gateway (SGW) control plane (SGW-C) function and a packet data network (PDN) Gateway (PGW) control plane (PGW-C) function call leg. Additionally, in order to handle the scale of user plane traffic in a 5G environment, the user planes must be as efficient and as optimized as possible regarding data packet processing while at the same time the control plane also needs to establish a mobile session as quickly as possible with minimum latency. To address the type of challenges that were described above, various solutions are provided herein through several techniques. A first technique, among other things, ensures a configuration-agnostic UPF selection (which does not depend upon static configuration in multiple places) which may be performed dynamically based on UPF profiles. A second technique, among other things, not only improves upon control path session setup time by removing unwanted delays every time a handover is processed, but also uplifts the UPF processing capacity by converging different legs of the same call at the same node. Features such as these are critically important to make the 5G story a success

Cross genera amplification of ginger EST-SSRs in large cardamom using genomic DNA isolated from standardized simplified protocol

323-330Large cardamom (Amomum subulatum Roxb.) is one of the most important cash crops of Sikkim. The issues crippling its production have been largely addressed through improved agronomic practices but efforts for genetic improvement have not been made. Being an orphan crop with regard to its genomic resources, the present study was carried out to standardize DNA isolation protocol for large cardamom using minimal resources and cross amplification of ginger expressed sequence tag (EST) based simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers in large cardamom. The DNA isolation protocol was standardized through various modifications in the general cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide (CTAB) procedure. The DNA isolated through standardized protocol was of high quality confirmed through both electrophoretic (clear and intact bands) and spectrophotometric studies (A260/A280 ratio 1.68 to 1.97). The isolated DNA of all the six large cardamom samples was employed for PCR studies with 73 EST-SSR primers of ginger, out of which 18 showed cross amplification. Out of 18 primers, only 5 exhibited polymorphism showing maximum of 2 alleles per locus. In total, the PIC ranged from 0 to 0.63. A total of  23 alleles were amplified with average of 1.3 alleles per marker. A null allele marker was also observed. The results indicated low cross amplification rate (24.6%).  DNA isolation protocol standardized in the study can be used across labs for extraction of quality DNA with minimal resources and primers showed cross-amplification may be further used for various molecular studies in large cardamoms

To study the estrogen (ER) and progesterone (PR) receptor in case of primary and metastatic breast cancer

Background: Worldwide, breast cancer is the most common invasive cancer in women.It comprises 22.9% of invasive cancers in women and 16% of all female cancers. It accounts for 15% of cancer deaths worldwide.Objective: to study the expression of ER/PR on breast cancer by immunocytochemistry on fine needle aspiration smears. Material and Methods:  A prospective study was carried out on 120 cases of breast lump, referred from various clinical Departments to cytopathology lab of a tertiary care center in North India, during September 2018 to March 2020. Two sets of Fine Needle Aspirate smears were obtained from breast lump and palpable lymph node, if present. Both sets of smear were air dried and fixed in propyl alcohol for 1-2 hours.First set of smear was used for cytology, in which cytology was positive, the second set of smear were packed in aluminum foil and preserved at -20 degree Celsius. Slides were then stained for ER and PR receptor. Later on when patient undergone surgery findings were correlated with histopathology. Results : The most common symptom  was breast lump (87.5%) with tumour size of 2.0-5.0 cm. ER were positive in 65.0% cases, PR were positive in 57.5% and ER+/PR+ in 55.0% of cases

Impact of size mismatch induced quenched disorder on phase fluctuation and low field magnetotransport in polycrystalline Nd0.58−xGdxSr0.42MnO3

We report the magnetic and transport properties of polycrystalline Nd0.58−xGdxSr0.42MnO3 (x ∼ 0.0, 0.04, 0.08, 0.12, 0.16, 0.20, 0.25, 0.30, 0.35, and 0.42). All the samples are single phase and have grain size ∼ 1–2 μm. As the variance σ2 increases, the paramagnetic-ferromagnetic transition shows a gradual decrease and broadening, while the decrease in insulator metal transition is sharpened. However, near equality of TC and TIM at intermediate values of σ2 could be understood in terms of the competing quenched and the grain boundary disorder. The variation in peak magnetoresistance (MR) (maximum MR around TC/TIM) with σ2 shows that maximum low field MR ≈ 35% at H = 3 kOe (68% at H = 10 kOe) is centered around σ2 = 0.009 857 Å2 (x = 0.25). This shows that huge intrinsic MR can be obtained at relatively higher temperatures and lower magnetic fields in the region of enhanced phase fluctuations

Anomalous Weak Ferromagnetism in Electron-doped Nd1−x Srx MnO3 (0.50 ≤ x ≤ 0.62) Thin Films

In the present work, we demonstrate that an anomalous weak ferromagnetism occurs in the composition range 0.50 <= x <= 0.62 in nanostructured thin films of Nd1-xSrxMnO3 (NSMO). Nanocrystalline thin films of overdoped manganite Nd1-xSrxMnO3 (x similar to 0.50, 0.55, 0.60, and 0.62) are grown on single-crystal LaAlO3 (001) substrates by using a nebulized chemical spray pyrolysis technique. These single phase films possess an average crystallite size similar to 15 nm, and the width of the grain boundaries is similar to 1 - 2 nm. In the composition range 0.50 <= x <= 0.62, the ground state of NSMO is an A-type antiferromagnetic (AFM) metallic state. However, in the present films, a broad paramagnetic (PM)-to-ferromagnetic (FM) transition is observed in all the compositions, at T-C similar to 226 K for x = 0.50 and at 235 K for rest of the samples. All the films show a well-defined M-H hysteresis loop at 5 K. The coercivity (H-C) of these films is much larger than those having compositions in the range 0.35 < x < 0.45. For x = 0.50 (0.62), the films H-C = -1210 (-1484) Oe and +1162 (+1476) Oe. The asymmetry in the coercivity suggests the presence of a weak exchange bias effect in these films. The FM ground state in these films is observed to have a smaller magnetic moment per Mn atom than the expected full moment from the rigid model; we term this as a weak ferromagnetic (WFM) state arising due to the destabilization of the AFM ordering. We propose a possible scenario based on the combined effect of spin reorganization and enhanced orbital disordering in nanosized manganites to explain the observed anomalous weak ferromagnetism in the A-type AFM spin ordered region

Structural, thermal and conductive properties of Bi4-xMxV2O11 (M = La, Gd; 0 <= x <= 0.4) compounds

Bi4−xMxV2O11 (M = La, Gd) was prepared by solid state reactions. The amount of La and Gd in the (Bi4−xMxV2O11) was varied in the range of (0 <= x <= 0.4). The addition of La and Gd to Bi4V2O11 electrolyte was found to stabilize the β crystalline phase for x ⩽ 0.3. In addition, the phase transition corresponding β- to γ-phases are evident in the ionic conductivity plots as well as in XRD, DSC profiles of x ⩾ 0.3 samples. The highest ionic conductivity was observed in Bi3.9La0.1V2O11 and Bi3.8Gd0.2V2O11 samples in the range of 10−3–10−4 S/cm for 700–500 °C. These results were supported by impedance spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC)

Pathogenic effects of <i>Salmonella enterica </i>subspecies <i>enterica </i>serovar Typhimurium on sprouting and growth of maize

1100-1106The study was undertaken to understand effects and survival of S. enterica subspecies enterica serovar Typhimurium (S. Typhimurium), a zoonotic serovar, on maize seed germination and plant growth. All the four strains of S. enteric subspecies enterica serovar Typhimurium significantly reduced germination of maize seeds in sprouting plates as well as in soil. About ≥2.7×103 Salmonella cfu ml-1 of soaking water, while ≥2.7×107 Salmonella cfu g-1 soil were required to significantly inhibit germination of maize. Similar inhibition of germination could be observed using ≥16 mg of bacteria free Salmonella cell lysate (CL) protein per g of soil or ≥0.5 mg of CL protein per ml of soaking water in sprouting plates. At the constant dose of 3.6×107 to 3.8×107 Salmonella cfu or 5 mg cell lysate protein ml-1 of soaking water, four strains of Salmonella significantly reduced germination, however difference between strains was insignificant. After germination too, maize growth was affected both by Salmonella organism and CL with little strain-to-strain variation. All Salmonella persisted in growing plants from 15 to 35 days of plant age and up to 190 days in soil. Maize plants once grown for a week in sterile soil were resistant to invasion of S. enterica subspecies enterica serovar Typhimurium in their leaves even in doses as high as 7.6×109 cfu g-1 of soil. Salmonella persisted better and longer in plants grown from contaminated seed sown in loam soil, but rarely in plants grew in sandy soil. All maize plants had Salmonella in their stumps even after 35 days of sowing irrespective of kind of soil, primary source of infection (soil or seed) and type of S. enterica subspecies enterica serovar Typhimurium strain. The study revealed that Salmonella is not only zoonotic but a phytopathogen also