“From sweet potatoes to God Almighty”: Roy Rappaport on being a hedgehog

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/71618/1/ae.2007.34.3.581.pd

ANTI-TUBERCULAR ACTIVITY OF EDTA AND HOUSEHOLD CHEMICALS AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM SMEGMATIS, A SURROGATE FOR MULTI-DRUG RESISTANT TUBERCULOSIS

Drug discovery efforts are increasingly being directed at re-purposing old drugs for use in treatment of multidrug resistant tuberculosis (MDRTB) which continues to pose serious health challenges worldwide. Recent studies suggest that Mycobacterium smegmatis, with innate resistance to isoniazid, could be used as a surrogate for MDRTB screening in laboratories without adequate containment facilities. The current study utilized resazurin microtiter assay plate (REMA) to screen common household chemicals and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) for anti-tubercular activity against Mycobacterium smegmatis, as a non-pathogenic surrogate of MDRTB. A ligand-based approach was adopted in selecting household chemicals; using molecular docking tools to probe for binding affinity to Enoyl-[acyl-carrier-protein] reductase (InhA), the main target of isoniazid. Among household chemicals and analgesics studied, EDTA and lauric acid showed the highest activity with minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 31 μg/mL and 7.8 μg/mL respectively, while Ibuprofen and aspirin exhibited activity with MIC of 125 μg/mL. Taken together, this study demonstrates the potential use of EDTA, lauric acid or NSAIDs in treatment of drug-resistant tuberculosis, a major contribution of the current stud

ANTI-TUBERCULAR ACTIVITY OF EDTA AND HOUSEHOLD CHEMICALS AGAINST MYCOBACTERIUM SMEGMATIS, A SURROGATE FOR MULTI-DRUG RESISTANT TUBERCULOSIS

Drug discovery efforts are increasingly being directed at re-purposing old drugs for use in treatment of multidrug resistant tuberculosis (MDRTB) which continues to pose serious health challenges worldwide. Recent studies suggest that Mycobacterium smegmatis, with innate resistance to isoniazid, could be used as a surrogate for MDRTB screening in laboratories without adequate containment facilities. The current study utilized resazurin microtiter assay plate (REMA) to screen common household chemicals and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) for anti-tubercular activity against Mycobacterium smegmatis, as a non-pathogenic surrogate of MDRTB. A ligand-based approach was adopted in selecting household chemicals; using molecular docking tools to probe for binding affinity to Enoyl-[acyl-carrier-protein] reductase (InhA), the main target of isoniazid. Among household chemicals and analgesics studied, EDTA and lauric acid showed the highest activity with minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 31 μg/mL and 7.8 μg/mL respectively, while Ibuprofen and aspirin exhibited activity with MIC of 125 μg/mL. Taken together, this study demonstrates the potential use of EDTA, lauric acid or NSAIDs in treatment of drug-resistant tuberculosis, a major contribution of the current stud

Family organization and the wage labor transition in a Tamang community of Nepal

This paper explores familial contexts of transition to a wage labor economy using ethnographic and survey data from Tamang communities at the northern edge of Nepal's Kathmandu Valley. Historically agro-pastoralist, the Tamang of this area have experienced social watersheds drawing them into ever closer relationships with Kathmandu. The earliest was their nineteenth century induction into corvée labor for national elites; more recent has been the accelerating monetization of the twentieth century. This analysis demonstrates trends and frames hypotheses about the social structuring of this latest process, testing them at the individual level with combined ethnographic and survey data from 1028 respondents. Multivariate analyses explore the effects of birth cohort, education, domestic group status, and settlement location on participation in non-family organized wage work. Substantive findings are related to the broader historical literature on household and family with special attention to varieties of subsistence to monetized transition .Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/44484/1/10745_2004_Article_BF00889157.pd

Microscopic theory of atom-molecule oscillations in a Bose-Einstein condensate

In a recent experiment at JILA [E.A. Donley et al., Nature (London) 417, 529 (2002)] an initially pure condensate of Rb-85 atoms was exposed to a specially designed time dependent magnetic field pulse in the vicinity of a Feshbach resonance. The production of new components of the gas as well as their oscillatory behavior have been reported. We apply a microscopic theory of the gas to identify these components and determine their physical properties. Our time dependent studies allow us to explain the observed dynamic evolution of all fractions, and to identify the physical relevance of the pulse shape. Based on ab initio predictions, our theory strongly supports the view that the experiments have produced a molecular condensate.Comment: 18 pages, 20 figure

Book reviews

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/44483/1/10745_2004_Article_BF00889024.pd

X-ray observations of three young, early-type galaxies

Massive haloes of hot plasma exist around some, but not all elliptical galaxies. There is evidence that this is related to the age of the galaxy. In this paper, new X-ray observations are presented for three early-type galaxies that show evidence of youth, in order to investigate their X-ray components and properties. NGC 5363 and NGC 2865 were found to have X-ray emission dominated by purely discrete stellar sources. Limits are set on the mass distribution in one of the galaxies observed with XMM–Newton, NGC 4382, which contains significant hot gas. We detect the X-ray emission in NGC 4382 out to 4re. The mass-to-light ratio is consistent with a stellar origin in the inner regions but rises steadily to values indicative of some dark matter by 4re. These results are set in context with other data drawn from the literature, for galaxies with ages estimated from dynamical or spectroscopic indicators. Ages obtained from optical spectroscopy represent central luminosity-weighted stellar ages. We examine the X-ray evolution with age, normalized by B- and K-band luminosities. Low values of Log(LX/LB) and Log(LX/LK) are found for all galaxies with ages between 1 and 4 Gyr. Luminous X-ray emission only appears in older galaxies. This suggests that the interstellar medium is removed and then it takes several gigayears for hot gas haloes to build up, following a merger. A possible mechanism for gas expulsion might be associated with feedback from an active nucleus triggered during a merger