Artesunate/dihydroartemisinin pharmacokinetics in acute falciparum malaria in pregnancy: absorption, bioavailability, disposition and disease effects

AIM: To determine if reported lower plasma concentrations of artemisinin derivatives for malaria in pregnancy result from reduced oral bioavailability, expanded volume of distribution or increased clearance. METHODS: In a sequentially assigned crossover treatment study, pregnant women with uncomplicated falciparum malaria received i.v. artesunate (i.v. ARS) (4mgkg(-1) ) on the first day and oral ARS (4mgkg(-1) ) on the second, or, oral on the first and i.v. on the second, in both groups followed by oral ARS (4mgkg(-1) day(-1) ) for 5 days. Plasma concentrations of ARS and dihyroartemisinin (DHA) were measured by liquid chromatography-mass-spectrometry on days 0, 1, 2 and 6. Controls were the same women restudied when healthy (3 months post partum). RESULTS: I.v. ARS administration resulted in similar ARS and DHA pharmacokinetics in pregnant women with malaria (n= 20) and in controls (n= 14). Oral administration resulted in higher total drug exposure in pregnancy [AUC (95% CI) in (ngml(-1) h)/(mgkg(-1) )] of 55.1 (30.1, 100.0) vs. 26.5 (12.2, 54.3) for ARS, P= 0.002 and 673 (386, 1130) vs. 523 (351, 724) for DHA, P= 0.007. The corresponding median absolute oral bioavailability (F%) was 21.7 (12.6, 75.1) vs. 9.9 (6.0, 36.81) for ARS (P= 0.046) and 77.0 (42.2, 129) vs. 72.7 (42.0, 87.7) for DHA, P= 0.033. Total DHA exposure was lower at day 6 in pregnant women with malaria (P < 0.001) compared with day 0 or 1, but not in the controls (P= 0.084). CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates the effects of malaria on oral ARS drug disposition are greater than those of pregnancy. This probably results from a disease related reduction in first pass metabolism. The data are reassuring regarding current dosing recommendations

The Incidence of Oral and Oropharyngeal Cancers in Betel Quid-Chewing Populations in South Myanmar Rural Areas

Oral cancer is a very common disease in South and Southeast Asia. Betel quid (BQ)- chewing and tobaccosmoking habits are etiological factors for oral cancer patients in these regions. We conducted an oral cancer screening in BQ-chewing endemic rural areas in South Myanmar for the early detection of oral cancer in BQ-chewing and smoking individuals. We examined 105 subjects who were at high risk of oral cancer due to their oral habits (BQ users and/or smokers). Three carcinoma cases were detected, and there were 8 dysplasia cases. The carcinoma detection rate was 2.9%, and the carcinoma and precancerous lesion detection rate was 10.5%. In Myanmar, oral cancer screening has been conducted sporadically on a voluntary basis, and nationwide surveys have never been performed. There are also few reports of oral cancer screening for high-risk groups among the general population in Myanmar. Our present findings highlight the need for further screening and surveys. Education on betel quid chewing- and tobacco- related oral diseases and screening for the early detection of oral cancer are of the utmost importance in the control and prevention of oral cancer

Phylogenetic relationships among Callosciurus squirrels in the Indochina Peninsula: phylogenetic position of C. pygerythrus from Myanmar

The phylogenetic relationships among seven Callosciurus species from the Indochina Peninsula, including the C. honkhoaiensis which is endemic to Hon Khoai Island, were studied using complete mitochondrial cytochrome b gene sequences (1140 bases). We primarily focused on the phylogenetic position of C. pygerythrus, which is distributed in the western part of the peninsula. We identified two main lineages: 1) C. caniceps, C. honkhoaiensis, C. inornatus, C. phayrei and C. pygerythrus, and 2) C. erythraeus and C. finlaysonii. Estimated divergence time between the two lineages was at the junction of the Zanclean and Piacenzian in the Pliocene. Within the first linage, the divergence time of sub-lineages corresponded to the Pliocene-Pleistocene boundary, although phylogenetic relationships were unclear. These two divergence times estimated in the present study correspond to episodes of global cooling, suggesting that climate may have contributed to the divergence of these Callosciurus squirrels

An Investigation into the Effectiveness of Discovery Learning in Teaching Lower Secondary Science

The major purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of discovery learning in teaching lower secondary science. The study was conducted with both quantitative and qualitative research methods. Firstly, a descriptive study was made to explore whether there is a link between the junior assistant science teachers’ teaching-learning activities and the six stages of discovery learning cycle. The subjects for this study were selected from the Yangon City Development Area by using a stratified random sampling method. A total of (198) junior assistant science teachers from (36) schools were selected for the study. According to the results, the activities of the junior assistant science teachers are strongly linked with the engagement and readiness stage, but weakly linked with the exploration and discovery stage of the discovery learning cycle. Secondly, an experimental study was used to investigate the effectiveness of discovery learning. In this experimental study, the subjects were Grade Six students selected from the schools where there have moderate teachers' teaching-learning activities on discovery learning in each strata. The experimental design adopted in this study was one of the quasi-experimental designs, namely, nonequivalent control group design. The experimental group was treated with discovery learning and the control group was taught by using teacher-centered method. After that, a posttest was administered to two groups. Independent samples t-test was used to test whether there were significant differences between the two groups. Findings indicated that those who received a treatment by using discovery learning demonstrated significantly better than those who do not received it. Findings proved that discovery learning has positive contribution to the science teaching at the middle school level and could encourage the improvement of students’ higher order thinking skills

Comparative Study of Attribute Selection for Morphological Identification of Fishes

Taxonomy is the science of naming, describingand classifying organisms that includes all plants,animals and microorganisms of the world. Usingmorphological, behavioral, genetic information andbiochemical observations, taxonomists identify anddescribe species into classification. The taxonomicidentification of fishes is a time-consuming processand making errors is indispensable for those who arenot specialists. This system proposes an automatedspecies identification system to identify taxonomiccharacters of species based on specimen and providestatistical clues for assisting taxonomists to identifyaccurate species or revision of misdiagnosed species.For this system, feature selection is an essentialstep to effectively reduce data dimensionality.This system first selects the best relevant featuresby using combination and the classificationperformance of two classifiers, Random Forest andAttributed Selected. And then correctly classifies thefish species and compares the accuracy of these twoclassifiers

Integration of Sensor Modules to Manage Electricity Load Consumption Utilization towards IOT

Internet of Things (IoT) is being used thephysical sensors into smart sensors housinginterfaces and data processing. The proposed systemutilizes multi sensors in order to control and alsoprovides user the ability to perform load controlsbased on utility signals. It provides user to know thedemand of the appliances using wirelesscommunication technology.This control systems can support only simpleon/off control according to reduce energyconsumption in household appliances. To conserveelectrical energy taking into consideration by using acontroller. This paper presents the hardwaredemonstration of the proposed electricity loadconsumption system for managing high powerconsumption household appliances with simulationfor load consumption algorithm. The concept of theproposed system is to design the intelligent systemswitch an different sensors and wirelesscommunication interface between end user

IoT Based Temperature Control System with Real Time Data Monitoring

Internet of Things (IoT) is monitoring of the surrounding parameters and other several tiny devices connected together to the use of sensors that acquaint for wireless sensing of real time data and transfer them into the desired form and help to forward the sensed data across the network cloud via ‘Internet Connection’.The temperature monitoring is becoming more and more important in the daily life. Data monitoring is provided with real time clocks where data is sequentially stored in memory. The proposed system maintains temperature and humidity within defined range of IoT ‘Thingspeak’ web service for the sensors to monitor sensed data at cloud level to the MATLAB using a channel ID and read API key. This paper presents the hardware design use of the NodeMCU, DHT11 humidity sensor and through HTTP that helps to process and transfer the sensed data to the Thingspeak Cloud. A data monitoring shows the record of temperature measurements over a period of time

Effect of Annealing Temperature on Photovoltaic Parameters of Al doped ZnO Thin Film Solar Cell

Al doped ZnO nanoparticles were prepared by mechanochemical milling process. Al doped ZnO (AZO) films were deposited onto p-Si substrates using spin coating technique. X-ray diffraction (XRD) technique was employed to examine the crystal structure and phase identification of AZO thin film at different annealing temperatures. Microstructural properties of AZO films were observed by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM). UV- Vis spectrometer was used to study the optical properties of AZO film at different annealing temperatures. Illuminated I-V characteristics were measured under helogen lamp. From I-V characteristics curves, convection efficiency and fill factor were determined at different annealing temperatures. From results obtained, it meets the special requirements for the development of cost effective thin film solar cell