Near-Infrared and Optical Studies of the fast nova V4643 Sgr (Nova Sagittarii 2001)

V4643 Sagittarii or Nova Sagittarii 2001 was discovered in outburst at 7.7 mag. on 2001 February 24. Here, we present near-infrared results of this fast classical nova obtained in the early decline phase in 2001 March followed by optical observations about one month later. Subsequently we also present near-infrared spectra taken later in the nova's evolution, about four months after the outburst, when V4643 Sgr had entered the coronal phase. The spectra in the early decline phase are dominated by emission lines of the HI Brackett series and also the Paschen beta and gamma lines. We study the cause of the excitation of the the OI line at 1.128 micron and discuss the variation in its strength with time after outburst. We discuss the role of optical depth effects on the observed strengths of the hydrogen Brackett and Paschen lines and discuss possible reasons for the puzzling behavior of the Br gamma line strength and whether it is correlated with the OI 1.128 micron line behavior. An optical spectrum is presented which shows that HeII lines are the most prominent features - after HI - to be seen in early 2001 April. We present and also discuss spectra taken in 2001 June and August which prominently show coronal lines of [Si VI] and [Si VII] at 1.9641 micron and 2.4807 micron respectively.Comment: Accepted in MNRA

Fungal Load on Zea mays Seeds and their Biocontrol

Seed borne fungi of maize (Zea mays) were isolated from fifteen varieties on blotter and different agar media. Total eleven, twelve and twenty fungi were isolated from fifteen varieties of maize on blotter paper, Czepek dox Agar (CZA) and Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA) respectively. Seed mycoflora of abnormal seeds was studied. Maximum incidence of fungi was observed on discoloured seeds followed by cracked and shrunken seeds. Attempts were also made to control seed mycoflora by using Trichoderma viride. Trichoderma viride showed maximum inhibition zone against Alternaria alternata, Fusarium oxysporum, Helminthosporium tetramera, Penicillium notatum and Rhizoctonia solani. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1Department of Botany, Lal Bahadur Shashtri College Partur, Dist Jalna, India; 2Department of Botany, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University, Aurangabad- 431 004. (M.S.) India* Corresponding Author, Email:  [email protected] Cite This Article As: Anil U. Kulkarni and Ashok M.Chavan. 2010. Fungal Load on Zea mays Seeds and their Biocontrol. J. Exp. Sci. 1(2): 20-25

Starting A Peripheral Nerve Surgery Unit in an Area of Limited Resources - Our Experience

Dedicated peripheral nerve surgery centers are few in developing countries where majority of affected patients either remain untreated or are simply palliated with just physiotherapy. In this chapter, we review our experience with surgery for peripheral nerve lesions and peripheral nerve injuries over a 5-year period. A total of 68 procedures were carried out for 58 patients with various peripheral nerve lesions and injuries. Among the 19 surgeries for adult brachial plexus injuries, 10 were for pan-brachial plexus injury, 2 procedures for lower brachial plexus injuries, and 7 procedures for upper brachial plexus injury, while 11 repair surgeries were done for pediatric brachial plexus injuries. The remaining 38 surgeries included 21 peripheral nerve sheath tumor excisions, 5 ablative procedures for chronic neuralgia, 8 procedures for non-carpal tunnel peripheral nerve entrapments, and 4 adults with upper or lower limb isolated nerve injury repairs. The patients were followed up between 6 months and 2 years post-surgery for functional outcome assessment. Overall, as many as 57.5% of the patients had significant neurologic improvement noticed at 2 years of follow-up. Despite its challenges, optimal outcomes following surgery are still possible for patients with nerve injuries, entrapments, and nerve tumors in developing countrie

Darboux transformation and multi-soliton solutions of Two-Boson hierarchy

We study Darboux transformations for the two boson (TB) hierarchy both in the scalar as well as in the matrix descriptions of the linear equation. While Darboux transformations have been extensively studied for integrable models based on $SL(2,R)$ within the AKNS framework, this model is based on $SL(2,R)\otimes U(1)$. The connection between the scalar and the matrix descriptions in this case implies that the generic Darboux matrix for the TB hierarchy has a different structure from that in the models based on $SL(2,R)$ studied thus far. The conventional Darboux transformation is shown to be quite restricted in this model. We construct a modified Darboux transformation which has a much richer structure and which also allows for multi-soliton solutions to be written in terms of Wronskians. Using the modified Darboux transformations, we explicitly construct one soliton/kink solutions for the model.Comment:

ASSESSMENT OF LOW BONE MASS USING PERIPHERAL DUAL X-RAY ABSORPTIOMETRY (PDXA) IN DIFFERENT ETHNIC GROUPS

  Objectives: The main aim of this study was to assess the low bone mass in younger adults using peripheral dual X-ray absorptiometry (pDXA) and also to find the co-relational aspect of Indian, Nepal-Bhutan, and Afghanistan men.Methods: In this study, 70 younger adults aged from 18 to 25 years were incorporated. In every adult, bone mineral density (BMD) of the left forearm (LF-BMD), right forearm (RF-BMD), left calcaneum (LC-BMD), and right calcaneum (RC-BMD) were measured by pDXA. The back-propagation neural network classifier is used in the classification of low bone mass and healthy controls, and the statistical tool was used to find the co-relational aspect of various BMD measurements.Results: The LC-BMD positively correlated (p<0.05) with subject's body weight and body mass index (BMI) r=0.40 in Indian men. The LC-BMD and RC-BMD were positively correlated (p<0.05 and p<0.01) with BMI (r=0.549 and r=0.63) in Nepal-Bhutan men. In Afghanistan men, LF-BMD and RF-BMD are positively correlated (p<0.05 and p<0.01) with BMI (r=0.49 and r=0.80). The accuracy of the classifier was found to be 94.3% and 97.1% with RF-BMD and RC-BMD in the total population.Conclusion: The result suggested that the forearm and calcaneum BMD measured by pDXA shows statistically high significant correlation with BMI, which can be used for screening purpose, and also it will be helpful in the evaluation of low bone mass in the developing countries

Association of sleep quality and internet addiction among the medical students

Background: The side effects of Internet overuse have been emerging progressively causing the emergence of a problem that is defined as internet addiction or problematic internet use. It also disrupts the sleep wake cycle so adversely affecting quality of sleep. This study is a preliminary step toward understanding the effect of internet addiction on sleep quality among medical college students in India.Methods: This was an observational, cross-sectional, single-centred, and self-assessable. Questionnaire based study administrated among 525 consenting medical students. The participants were assessed by proforma containing demographic details, variables related with internet use, questionnaires of IAT (Internet Addiction Test for Internet Use) and PSQI (Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index for Sleep quality. Statistical data were analysed by Graph Pad InStat version 3.06 using Chi–square test and Mann-Whitney test.Results: There were 9.3% of all participants were considered problematic internet users with frequency of internet addiction 0.9%. Participants with problematic internet use are likely to have poor sleep quality (p<0.0001). 23.8% of all participants had poor sleep quality and 76.2% of the students had good quality of sleep. Participants with poor quality of sleep were having high IAT scores in comparison to participants with good quality of sleep. Severity of poor sleep quality is positively correlated with internet addiction (r2=0.233, p<0.0001).Conclusions: Participants with problematic internet use were more likely to have poor quality of sleep and vice a versa