Sleep duration in school-age children with epilepsy: A cross-sectional study

Background: Normal sleep is required for the optimal growth and development of the children. Ineffective or inadequate sleep is common in children with epilepsy. Objectives: The objectives of this study were to study the sleep duration and describe the factors affecting it in school-aged children with epilepsy attending the seizure clinic of a pediatric tertiary care hospital. Materials and Methods: 6–12-year-old children with epilepsy, attending the seizure clinic formed the study subjects. They were assessed for inclusion in the study using INCLEN diagnostic tool for epilepsy (INDT-Epi) to achieve a sample size of 139. Informed written consent was obtained from parents. Background sociodemographic information, seizure type and treatment details, and duration of sleep of the child were collected from the parents. The proportion of children with epilepsy who had sleep problems were expressed as percentage. Results: The mean age of study population was 9.07±2.09 years. The average sleep duration of the study population was 9.41±1.41 h. The mean nap time of the study population was 68.51±33.88 min. No significant association was seen among the factors that determine sleep duration. Conclusion: Children with epilepsy tend to sleep for lesser hours when compared to historic controls of normal school-age children reported in literature

Investigation of Mechanical and Wear Properties of LM24/Silicate/Fly Ash Hybrid Composite Using Vortex Technique

This work has investigated to find the influence of silicate on the wear behavior of LM 24/4 wt.% fly ash hybrid composite. The investigation reveals the effectiveness of incorporation of silicate in the composite for gaining wear reduction. Silicate particles with fly ash materials were incorporated into aluminum alloy matrix to accomplish reduction in wear resistance and improve the mechanical properties. The LM24/silicate/fly ash hybrid composite was prepared with 4 wt.% fly ash particles with 4, 8, 12, 16, 20, and 24 wt.% of silicate using vortex technique. Tribological properties were evaluated under different load (15, 30, 45, 60, and 75 N); sliding velocity (0.75, 1.5, 2.25, and 3 m/sec) condition using pin on disc apparatus and mechanical properties like density, hardness, impact strength, and tensile strength of composites were investigated. In addition, the machining of the aluminum hybrid composite was studied using Taguchi L9 orthogonal array with analysis of variance. The properties of the hybrid composites containing 24 wt.% silicates exhibit the superior wear resistance and mechanical properties

<i>In vitro</i> evaluation of antiproliferative effect of ethyl gallate against human oral squamous carcinoma cell line KB

<div><p>Although some polyphenols are known to possess anticancer activity against different cancer cell lines through induction of apoptosis, the mode of antiproliferative effect of ethyl gallate against human oral squamous carcinoma cell line KB was not studied until now. Therefore, the antiproliferative effect of ethyl gallate was evaluated by 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide assay in comparison with the reference drug paclitaxel. Generation of reactive oxygen species, mitochondrial membrane potential loss, DNA damage and apoptosis were determined using 2,7-diacetyldichlorofluorescein fluorescence, uptake of rhodamine-123 by mitochondria, comet assay and acridine orange/ethidium bromide dual-dye staining method. Both ethyl gallate and paclitaxel exhibited cytotoxicity in a dose-dependent manner. The 50% inhibitory concentration for ethyl gallate was 30 and 20 μg/mL for paclitaxel. A volume of 50 μg/mL of ethyl gallate was found to be significantly effective (<i>P</i> < 0.05) in controlling the cancer cell proliferation leading to acute apoptosis.</p></div

Neuroprotective effect of Brahmi, an ayurvedic drug against oxidative stress induced by methyl mercury toxicity in rat brain mitochondrial-enriched fractions

<div><p>The present study evaluates the neuroprotective effect of Brahmi against methyl mercury (MeHg) toxicity. The results demonstrated that MeHg-decreased mitochondrial viability in MTT assay and IC₅₀ value was found to be 2.5 μg/mL. However, Brahmi at 250 μg/mL concentration effectively prevented mitochondrial damage caused by MeHg in MTT assay. Our results also demonstrated MeHg significantly inhibited catalase enzyme activity, glutathione content and increased the level of thiobarbituric acid reactive substances in mitochondrial-enriched fractions of rat brain. These alterations were prevented by preincubation with Brahmi. In addition, Brahmi reverted glutathione level to normal that was depleted by MeHg, confirming its chelating effect, one of the molecular mechanisms that underlie protection against oxidative damage. Our study also focused on total phenolic and flavonoid contents of Brahmi, and it was found to contain significant amount of phenols and flavonoids. The presence of saponins was detected by HPLC which might be responsible for neuroprotection against MeHg.</p></div