Efficacy of a bioactive alloplast, in the treatment of human periodontal osseous defects-a clinical study

Presently, bone replacement grafts are one of the modalities of therapy for which there is histologic evidence of regeneration coronal to the base of the previous osseous defect. Bioactive glasses are used extensively in medicine and dentistry. This study evaluated the additional efficacy of a bioactive alloplast, PerioGlas, in comparison with open flap debridement only. 8 systemically healthy volunteers were chosen, each having 2 collateral sites with ?6 mm clinical probing depth and radiographic evidence of an intrabony defect. Randomly, one defect was treated with open flap debridement plus bioactive glass (test) and the other with open flap debridement alone (control). At baseline, 3, 6, 9 months measurements were recorded which included plaque index, gingival index, pocket probing depth, clinical attachment level, and increase in gingival recession. Standardized radiographs were used to measure defect fill and alveolar crest resorption. The data were subjected to statistical analysis. Both treatments showed no significant differences between the two groups at any point of time. However, radiographically, bioactive glass group showed significant improvement in bone fill over the sites treated with open flap debridement alone. The alloplastic bone graft material, PerioGlas, demonstrated clinical advantages beyond that achieved by debridement alone

The Susceptibility to Hydrogen Peroxide of Indian and British Isoniazid-Sensitive and Isoniazid- Resistant Tubercle Bacilli

The present work describes an attempt to modify the method of Kreis and Le Joubioux (1957a) so that it would accurately estimate the relative proportions of catalase-positive and catalase-negative organisms in strains containing mixtures of the two types. A bactericidal test was chosen in preference to a bacteriostatic test, since it is difficult to obtain quantitative measurement with the latter technique. In performing a bactericidal test residual peroxide must be inactivated or removed by dilution so that it does not inhibit the growth of surviving organisms. Knox, Meadow and Worssam (1956) removed peroxide by centrifugation and washing, but this method was considered impracticable if this test were to be used on a large scale, and likely to produce inaccurate counts on the surviving organisms. In the present work the method of removal of peroxide was studied as well as the determination of the optimal peroxide concentration and period of exposure which would kill all catalase-negative organisms, but would leave catalase-positive organisms unaffected. In addition, the method of Kreis & Le Joubioux (1957a) was modified by reducing the inoculum of organisms exposed to peroxide so that catalase-positive bacilli would not be able to destroy peroxide during the test itself. The standardised bactericidal test was then employed in comparing the susceptibility to peroxide of isoniazid-sensitive strains from British and Indian patients, and in investigating the relationship between the peroxide susceptibility and the catalase activity of their isoniazid-resistant mutant strains

A simple paper test for isoniazid in urine

Tests for the presence of chemotherapeutic drugs or their metabolites in urine play an important part in the management of the treatment of tuberculosis (Dixon et al., 1957; Fox, 1958). A previous report from this Centre (Gangadharam et al., 1958) presented a comparison of a number of methods for detecting isoniazid in urine including the direct naphthoquinone-mercuric chloride (N-M) test (Short and Case, 1957), and also a modification of this test which employed alkaline hydrolysis to liberate isoniazid from its conjugated forms. The direct-and hydrolysis N-M tests have been employed in this Centre for the past four years to control the self-administration of isoniazid used in the domiciliary treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis. The effect of irregularity in taking isoniazid as detected by these tests on the response to treatment has been reported elsewhere (Tuberculosis Chemotherapy Centre, 1960). Since this method has the disadvantage that it requires a certain amount of equipment and trained personnel, it is not suitable for routine use in all chest clinics or under field conditions. An attempt was therefore made in this Centre to simplify the direct N-M test by incorporating the reagents in absorbent papers; Though impregnation of the paper with the pHl0 buffer and naphthoquinone reagent was successful, impregnation with the aqueous solution of the mercuric chloride was unsatisfactory. In 1960, Cattaneo, Fantoli and Belasio published details of a paper test modification of the N-M test in which this difficulty was overcome by impregnating absorbent papers with a solution of mercuric chloride in ether. Since then this modification has been adopted for the preparation of the test-paper developed in this Centre. Since a lower concentration of the naphthoquinone reagent and a shorter period of exposure was used in the preparation of the testpaper developed in this Centre than described by Cattaneo et al. (1960), both the paper tests have been compared with the direct and combined N-M tests described previously (Gangadharam et al., 1958). This paper presents the results of the comparison and of an of the specificity of the paper test

Design of supply chain in fuzzy environment

Nowadays, customer expectations are increasing and organizations are prone to operate in an uncertain environment. Under this uncertain environment, the ultimate success of the firm depends on its ability to integrate business processes among supply chain partners. Supply chain management emphasizes cross-functional links to improve the competitive strategy of organizations. Now, companies are moving from decoupled decision processes towards more integrated design and control of their components to achieve the strategic fit. In this paper, a new approach is developed to design a multi-echelon, multi-facility, and multi-product supply chain in fuzzy environment. In fuzzy environment, mixed integer programming problem is formulated through fuzzy goal programming in strategic level with supply chain cost and volume flexibility as fuzzy goals. These fuzzy goals are aggregated using minimum operator. In tactical level, continuous review policy for controlling raw material inventories in supplier echelon and controlling finished product inventories in plant as well as distribution center echelon is considered as fuzzy goals. A non-linear programming model is formulated through fuzzy goal programming using minimum operator in the tactical level. The proposed approach is illustrated with a numerical example

Multi-objective optimization approach for cost management during product design at the conceptual phase

The effective cost management during the conceptual design phase of a product is essential to develop a product with minimum cost and desired quality. The integration of the methodologies of quality function deployment (QFD), value engineering (VE) and target costing (TC) could be applied to the continuous improvement of any product during product development. To optimize customer satisfaction and total cost of a product, a mathematical model is established in this paper. This model integrates QFD, VE and TC under multi-objective optimization frame work. A case study on domestic refrigerator is presented to show the performance of the proposed model. Goal programming is adopted to attain the goals of maximum customer satisfaction and minimum cost of the product

THE EFFECT OF BIODIESEL AND BIOETHANOL BLENDED DIESEL FUEL ON THE PERFORMANCE AND EMISSION CHARACTERISTICS OF A DIRECT INJECTION DIESEL ENGINE

History has seen fuel innovations being driven majorly by transportation needs rather than the overall need to revolutionize the energy needs of the society. Biofuels such as biodiesel and bioethanol are now receiving the impetus required for becoming a fuel source for the future. One of the ways to reduce the dependence on fossil diesel is the blending of bioethanol with conventional diesel. However, an emulsifier or a co-solvent is required to stabilize the blend. The ricebran oil biodiesel offers an alternative application as an emulsifier for diesel-ethanol blends to form diesel-biodiesel-ethanol blends. In the present study the rice bran oil biodiesel was used in different ways such as pure biodiesel, blending with diesel and diesel- ethanol blends. The performance and emission characteristics of a direct injection (DI) diesel engine when fuelled with conventional diesel fuel, pure biodiesel, a blend of diesel and biodiesel and three blends of diesel-biodiesel-ethanol were studied over the entire range of load on the engine. The experimental results showed that the highest brake thermal efficiency was observed with 30% ethanol in diesel-biodiesel-ethanol blends. The exhaust gas temperature and sound reduced with the increase of ethanol percentage in diesel-biodiesel-ethanol blends. The Carbon monoxide, smoke, exhaust gas temperature and sound reduced with the increase of ethanol percentage in diesel-biodiesel-ethanol blends. The minimum values of Carbon monoxides, smoke, exhaust gas temperature and sound intensity were observed with the blend BE30 and were respectively 41.23%, 14.5%, 0.57% and 11.53% lower than that of the diesel fuel. The Oxides of nitrogen and carbon dioxide emissions increased with the increased percentage of ethanol in diesel-biodiesel-ethanol blends. The hydrocarbon emissions increased with ethanol but lower than that of the diesel fuel by a maximum of 35.35% with 10% ethanol in diesel-biodiesel-ethanol blend. The blending of 20% biodiesel into diesel-ethanol blends allowed higher percentage (30%) of ethanol mixing with diesel, increased the brake thermal efficiency and reduced the carbon monoxide, sound, hydrocarbons and smoke than that of the diesel fuel. So the rice bran oil biodiesel can be used as an emulsifier to mix higher percentage of ethanol with fossil diesel to improve the performance and reduce the emissions of a diesel engine

Identification of Tubercle Bacilli from Indian Patients with Pulmonary Tuberculosis

Pretreatment cultures of bacilli from Indian patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis admitted to a controlled domiciliary chemotherapy study by the Tuberculosis Chemotherapy Centre, Madras, were subjected to a series of in vitro tests designed to identify the bacilli as human or bovine tubercle bacilli, or as anonymous mycobacteria. For the purposes of comparison, pretreatment cultures from British patients with pulmonary tuberculosis were examined by the same series of identification tests. Cultures identifiable as mammalian tubercle bacilli were obtained from all the 341 Indian patients admitted to the chemotherapy study. Tests for niacin production were carried out on the cultures from 277 of these patients ; all gave positive results, indicating that the bacilli in question were Mycobacterium tuberculosis var. hominis. The culture from the Indian patients yielded results similar to those of the cultures from the British patients in all the in vitro tests except the thiacetazone-sensitivity test. In this test the Indian cultures differed from the British cultures, being on the average less sensitive and showing greater variation in sensitivity among themselves

Vortex matching effect in engineered thin films of NbN

We report robust vortex matching effects in antidot arrays fabricated on thin films of NbN. The near absence of hysteresis between field sweep directions indicates a negligible residual pinning in the host thin film. Owing to the very small coherence length of NbN thin films ($\xi < 5 nm$), the observations suggests the possibility of probing physics of vortices at true nanometer length scales in suitably fabricated structures.Comment: Submitted to Appl. Phys. Let

A Comparison of the Results of Bacteriological Examination of a Sputum Collection and a Pair of Laryngeal Swab Specimens in Patients Receiving Chemotherapy for Pulmonary Tuberculosis

pulmonary tuberculosis is of prime importance. The most valuable assessment of a treatment is its effect on the bacterial population of the sputum. A reduction in the number of organisms being excreted, or their complete elimination, is the best evidence that the patient is responding to treatment, and bacteriological negativity is the crucial desideratum of the quiescence of the disease (American Trudeau Society, 1959; Devadatta et al., 1961). In a previous report from this Centre (Andrews and Radhakrishna, 1959) a comparison was made of the results of smear and culture examinations of specimens of sputum obtained in 2 different ways from patients receiving chemotherapy. It was found that “spot” specimens, that is, specimens produced in the Centre within the course of a few minutes were less frequently positive than “collection” specimens, that is, specimens produced overnight in the home. During treatment and usually within a few months of the start of effective chemotherapy, the majority of patients find it difficult to expectorate and it, therefore, becomes of interest to study the relative usefulness of collection specimens of sputum and laryngeal swabs in detecting the presence of tubercle bacilli. This report presents the results of a comparison of an overnight collection specimen of sputum (referred to as sputum specimen in the rest of the report) with a pair of laryngeal swabs (considered as a single specimen in the laboratory) taken from patients during the third to twelfth month of anti-tuberculosis chemotherapy