Indigenous methods for assessment of important aspects in undergraduates on pharmacology and therapeutics: a preliminary study

Background: In pharmacology and therapeutics tutorial in current times is being disliked by most undergraduates. On the other hand, the important exercises related to analytical skill development, problem based exercise, rational use of medicine and individualized drug therapy need to be emphasize more in UG teaching and learning techniques.Methods: In the form of active learning we have framed CME pattern of conducting some important exercises including four above mentioned to facilitate the ability to think, feel or do the task which may be acceptable to the students better than or equivalent to tutorials.Results: We observed that 2 out of 8 willing participants scored higher than others in CME activity as well as terminal exams the other 2 scored borderline higher in CME activity than their score in terminal exams. Another 4 scored better in the terminal examinations as compared to CME activity.4 out of 8 i.e. 50% participants have shown acceptability as well as better performance in these exercises.Conclusions: All of these exercises are not in the curriculum/syllabus and there is no incentive of internal assessment on these. If these exercises are made mandatory, as it is the need of the hour, these can benefit the learner possibly by the way of change in their cognitive structure, keeping tutorials intact or removing them from syllabus

Schwarzschild black hole with global monopole charge

We derive the metric for a Schwarzschild black hole with global monopole charge by relaxing asymptotic flatness of the Schwarzschild field. We then study the effect of global monopole charge on particle orbits and the Hawking radiation. It turns out that existence, boundedness and stability of circular orbits scale up by $(1-8 \pi\eta^2)^{-1}$, and the perihelion shift and the light bending by $(1-8 \pi\eta^2)^{-3/2}$, while the Hawking temperature scales down by $(1 - 8 \pi \eta^2)^2$ the Schwarzschild values. Here $\eta$ is the global charge.Comment: 12 pages, LaTeX versio

Curvature driven acceleration : a utopia or a reality ?

The present work shows that a combination of nonlinear contribution from the Ricci curvature in Einstein field equations can drive a late time acceleration of expansion of the universe. The transit from the decelerated to the accelerated phase of expansion takes place smoothly without having to resort to a study of asymptotic behaviour. This result emphasizes the need for thorough and critical examination of models with nonlinear contribution from the curvature.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure

Impact of Cycle Time on Potential CTS

Upper limb musculoskeletal symptoms and upper-limb musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) have been found to be common in the working population. Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is the most commonly studied entrapment neuropathy caused by compression of the median nerve as it passes through the carpal tunnel beneath the flexor retinaculum. The present study is conducted among person engaged in connecting rod manufacturing industry to check effect of cycle time of operation on potential CTS symptoms. The study sample consists of 103 workers for data collection. The study was conducted by questionnaire, physical examination, wrist angle evaluation and on job observation. Correlation analysis and Correlation analysis using IBM SPSS 20, it is revealed that Value of Pearson correlation coefficient is found to be -0.930 which is same as the value calculated manually. So analysis by SPSS 20 also confirms that there is very high negative correlation between cycle time and percentage of CTS sufferers

Ferroelectric Properties of CuFe2O4, BaFe2O4, Ba0.2La0.8Fe2O4 Nanoparticles

In this article, we report ferroelectric properties of copper ferrite CuFe2O4 nanoparticles (CFN), Barium ferrite nanoparticles BaFe2O4 (BFN) and La substituted barium ferrite Ba0.2La0.8Fe2O4 (BLFN) nanoparticles synthesized via hydrothermal technique. The X-Ray diffraction for the synthesized particles reflects the cubic phase formation for CuFe2O4, orthorhombic phase structure for the BaFe2O4 and cubic formation of Ba0.2La0.8Fe2O4 (BLFN). The structural parameters such as crystallite size and micro-strain are computed from XRD and Williamson-Hall(W-H) analysis. The polarization- electric field (P-E) loop studies gave information about the ferroelectric nature of the synthesized samples. It was noticed that the CFN particle has a lossy dielectric nature whereas BFN, BLFN samples exhibit a multiferroic nature

Effect of precision land leveling and permanent raised bed planting on soil properties, input use efficiency, productivity and profitability under maize (Zea mays) – wheat (Triticum aestivum) cropping system

Precision land leveling with permanent raised bed planting with recommended dose of NPK can be used to improve crop yield,water and nutrient use efficiency over the existing traditional land leveling with flat beds planting with recommended dose of NPK practices. The objective of present study was to establish an understanding of maize (Zea mays L.) -wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) rotation yield and input use efficiency can be improved and how land leveling and crop establishment practices can be modified to be more efficient in water use through precision conservation crop management techniques. A farmers participatory field experiment was conducted during 2009- 2011 in the jurisdiction of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel University of Agriculture & Technology, Meerut, UP. Multi crop planter with inclined plate seed metering device machine were given to the farmers and crops were sown on permanent raised beds in maize-wheat cropping system.The data collected from the farmers participatory field experiment showed that there was about 20.4% (295.8 mm/ha for wide beds, i e 107 cm furrow centre gap) water saving and about 16.5% (310.3 mm/ha for narrow beds, i e 37 cm furrow centre gap) with grain yield increase about 13.5% (5.13 and 4.44 tonnes/ha) for wheat crop and 11.8% (4.33 and 3.82 tonnes/ha) for maize crop with precision land leveling raised bed planting compared to traditional land leveling with flat beds planting. The agronomic efficiency (AE) of N (23.4 and 30.4 kg grain/kg N for maize and wheat) and uptake of N, P and K (103.85, 25.6 and 110.7 kg/ha for maize and 112.95, 19.49 and 112.96 kg/ha for wheat) were significantly improved under precision land leveling with raised bed planting technique compared to other practices

Detection of primary sites in unknown primary tumors using FDG-PET or FDG-PET/CT

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Carcinoma of unknown primary tumors (CUP) is present in 0.5%-9% of all patients with malignant neoplasms; only 20%-27% of primary sites are identified before the patients die. Currently, 18F-fluorodeoxy-glucose positron-emission tomography (18F-FDG PET) or PET combined with computed tomography (PET/CT) is widely used for the diagnosis of CUP. However, the diagnostic yield of the primary site varies. The aim of this study was to determine whether PET or PET/CT has additional advantages over the conventional diagnostic workup in detecting the primary origin of CUP.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>Twenty patients with unknown primary tumors that underwent PET or PET/CT were included in this study. For all patients, the conventional diagnostic workup was unsuccessful in detecting the primary sites. Among 20 patients, 11 had PET scans. The remaining nine patients had PET/CT. In all 20 patients, neither the PET nor PET/CT identified the primary site of the tumor, including six cases with cervical lymph node metastases. The PET and PET/CT revealed sites of FDG uptake other than those associated with known metastases in seven patients, but these findings did not influence patient management or therapy. Two patients had unnecessary invasive diagnostic procedures due to false positive results on the PET or PET/CT.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Although it is inconclusive because of small sample size of the study, the additional value of PET or PET/CT for the detection of primary sites in patients with CUP might be less than expected; especially in patients that have already had extensive conventional diagnostic workups. Further study is needed to confirm this finding.</p

An Integrated TCGA Pan-Cancer Clinical Data Resource to Drive High-Quality Survival Outcome Analytics

For a decade, The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) program collected clinicopathologic annotation data along with multi-platform molecular profiles of more than 11,000 human tumors across 33 different cancer types. TCGA clinical data contain key features representing the democratized nature of the data collection process. To ensure proper use of this large clinical dataset associated with genomic features, we developed a standardized dataset named the TCGA Pan-Cancer Clinical Data Resource (TCGA-CDR), which includes four major clinical outcome endpoints. In addition to detailing major challenges and statistical limitations encountered during the effort of integrating the acquired clinical data, we present a summary that includes endpoint usage recommendations for each cancer type. These TCGA-CDR findings appear to be consistent with cancer genomics studies independent of the TCGA effort and provide opportunities for investigating cancer biology using clinical correlates at an unprecedented scale. Analysis of clinicopathologic annotations for over 11,000 cancer patients in the TCGA program leads to the generation of TCGA Clinical Data Resource, which provides recommendations of clinical outcome endpoint usage for 33 cancer types

Spatial Organization and Molecular Correlation of Tumor-Infiltrating Lymphocytes Using Deep Learning on Pathology Images

Beyond sample curation and basic pathologic characterization, the digitized H&E-stained images of TCGA samples remain underutilized. To highlight this resource, we present mappings of tumorinfiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) based on H&E images from 13 TCGA tumor types. These TIL maps are derived through computational staining using a convolutional neural network trained to classify patches of images. Affinity propagation revealed local spatial structure in TIL patterns and correlation with overall survival. TIL map structural patterns were grouped using standard histopathological parameters. These patterns are enriched in particular T cell subpopulations derived from molecular measures. TIL densities and spatial structure were differentially enriched among tumor types, immune subtypes, and tumor molecular subtypes, implying that spatial infiltrate state could reflect particular tumor cell aberration states. Obtaining spatial lymphocytic patterns linked to the rich genomic characterization of TCGA samples demonstrates one use for the TCGA image archives with insights into the tumor-immune microenvironment