The synthesis and evaluation of nitrile-containing ferroelectric chiral liquid crystal dopants

Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal Displays offer fast switching times in the sub millisecond region and a high contrast ratio. There is a need for faster refresh rates to cope with fast moving images and the possibility of sequential red-green-blue illumination that will enable higher definition quality. This has led to a renewed interest in the ferroelectric liquid crystal display mode which employs a smectic C* material generated via addition of a chiral dopant to an achiral SmC host.This thesis first reviews liquid crystals and their properties, the smectic C* phase in particular and previous work on chiral dopants. Ferroelectricity and its use in an LCD display mode is explained.The aim is to prepare a stable chiral dopant that is compatible with a difluoroterphenyl based host FLC mixture and to provide a moderate spontaneous polarisation, a long N* pitch length and maintain the broad temperature range of the achiral host.This report first describes the synthesis of (S)-2-((3’-fluoro-4’-(octyloxy)-[1,1’- biphenyl]-4-yl)oxy)propanenitrile as a chiral dopant. The compound has a similar structure to a standard biphenyl ester dopant BE8OF2N, but replaces an ester link to the stereogenic centre with an ether link, with the main aim of increasing chemical stability. The key part of the synthesis involves an SN2 reaction between lactamide tosylate and a hydroxybiphenyl. The non-mesogenic dopant was formulated as 5, 7 and 10% w/w mixtures with an FLC host mixture (KCHM211) that contains only dialkyldifluoroterphenyls. Liquid crystal phase transitions and N* pitch lengths are reported and the phase transitions are compared with that from the BE8OF2N with KCHM211 host mixture. The spontaneous polarisation at room temperature was found to be 20 nC cm−² and the tilt angle of the SmC* phase temperature range is reported.This result lead to the synthesis of three mesogenic dopants and the synthesis is described, employing the same chiral 2-cyanoethyl group linked by oxygen to the difluoroterphenyl core used in the FLC host mixture. The derivatives with an ortho diflluorphenyl group in the middle ring or the end ring remote from the chiral centre have blue phases, but those with the fluoro-substituents adjacent to the chiral group possess an N* phase. All the mesogenic dopants were formulated in a 7% w/w mixture with KCHM211. LC phase behaviour, and electrooptic data is reported. The results are compared with those from the non-mesogenic dopant. Dopant reduce the SmC*-SmA* by only 3 ◦C from that of the host mixture, but has a low Ps (maximum 6 nC cm−²).The Ps of the terphenyl dopants is lower than expected, and molecular modelling and single crystal X-ray diffraction studies were used in an attempt to rationalise this observation. The electron distribution and dipole moments were calculated, but they follow a different trend to that of the Ps data. The single crystal structure also shows a different conformation of the chiral nitrile relative to the aromatic fluoro-substituents than that obtained by modelling. These results indicate the complexity in predicting or explaining the magnitude of Ps in ferroelectric liquid crystals

Effectiveness of Resistance Training on the Strength of Scapulo-humeral Muscles and Abdominals in Male Volley Ball Players

Background: Volleyball is a sportive modality that requires strength in the upper and lower extremities along with the trunk musculature. The improvement of muscular strength is very important along with agility and flexibility for a volleyball player. Aim of the study to find the effectiveness of resistance training on the strength of scapulo-humeral muscles and abdominals in male volley ball players. Objectives of this study is find out the effect of resistance training on the strength of the scapulo-humeral muscles by measuring peak torque by using an isokinetic dynamometer and to find out the effect of resistance training on strength of abdominals through 1RM test. Methods: A group of 30 male volleyball players who have fulfilled the inclusion criteria were assigned into two groups control and experimental groups each consisting of 15 subjects. The subjects of the experimental group underwent resistance training under my supervision and the subjects of the control group done the same protocol unsupervised for 6 weeks. Results: There was significant improvement in the strength of scapula-humeral muscles and abdominals in the experimental group when compared to the control group when the pre and post intervention values were measured (p=0.05). Conclusion: Resistance training under supervision of the therapist resulted in significant improvement in strength of the scapulo-humeral muscles and abdominals in the male volleyball players

Screening and assessment of laccase producing fungi isolated from different environmental samples

Laccase is a copper-containing polyphenol oxidase that acts on a wide range of substrates. This enzyme is found in many plant species and is widely distributed in fungi including wood-rotting fungi where it is often associated with lignin peroxidase, manganese dependent peroxidase, or both. Because of its importance in bioremediation, fungal cultures were screened for laccase positive production by plate test method using the indicator compound guaiacol. Out of 12 cultures tested, six cultures werefound to be laccase-positive with Stereum ostrea and Phanerochaete chrysosporium being the best potential cultures. Laccase production on 5 different liquid media was compared using these two white rot fungi

METHOD DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION OF CLEANING PROCEDURE FOR FENBENDAZOLE RESIDUAL DETERMINATION IN MANUFACTURING

Objectives: Cleaning validation is the methodology used to assure that a cleaning process removes residues of the active pharmaceutical ingredientsof the product manufactured in a piece of equipment. All residues are removed to predetermined levels to ensure the quality of the next product.Today, manufactured is not compromised by waste from the previous product and the quality of future products using the equipment, to prevent crosscontamination, and as a good manufacturing practices requirement. The main aim of the study was to develop and validate a new simple, precise,and accurate reverse phase high-performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method for fenbendazole (FBZF) residual determination in veterinaryactive pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturing.Methods: The method was developed using the isocratic solvent system, HPLC grade acetonitrile, and Mill-Q water in the ratio of 60:40 (volume/volume), and 1% hydrochloric methanol is used as diluent. Successful elution of the FBZF was achieved on Waters Symmetry C-18 column with250 mm×4.6 mm internal diameter and 5 μm particle size.Results: The method validation was successfully applied for routine analysis for cleaning/residual samples. The developed reverse phase liquidchromatography method was validated with respect to specificity, linearity, accuracy, precision, and high sensitivity with detection limits andquantification limits ranging from 0.2 ppm to 15 ppm.Conclusion: The present developed and validated method is run successfully for FBZF residual determination of cleaning samples in veterinary activepharmaceutical ingredient manufacturing.Keywords: Fenbendazole, Residual determination, Reversed phase high-pressure liquid chromatography and cleaning validation

Combined Crosstalk Avoidance Code with Error Control Code for Detection and Correction of Random and Burst Errors

Error correction codes are majorly important to detect and correct occurred errors because of various noise sources. When the technology is scaling down, the effect of noise sources is high. The coupling capacitance is one of the main constraints to affect the performance of on-chip interconnects. Because of coupling capacitance, the crosstalk is introduced at on-chip interconnecting wires. To control the single or multiple errors, an efficient error correction code is required. By combining crosstalk avoidance with error control code, the reliable intercommunication is obtained in network-on-chip (NoC)-based system on chip (SoC). To reduce the power consumption of error control codes, the bus invert-based low-power code is integrated to network interface of NoC. The advanced work is designed and implemented with Xilinx 14.7; thereby the performance of improved NoC is evaluated and compared with existing work. The 8×8 mesh-based NoC is simulated at various traffic patterns to analyze the energy dissipation and average data packet latency

Jekyll: Attacking Medical Image Diagnostics using Deep Generative Models

Advances in deep neural networks (DNNs) have shown tremendous promise in the medical domain. However, the deep learning tools that are helping the domain, can also be used against it. Given the prevalence of fraud in the healthcare domain, it is important to consider the adversarial use of DNNs in manipulating sensitive data that is crucial to patient healthcare. In this work, we present the design and implementation of a DNN-based image translation attack on biomedical imagery. More specifically, we propose Jekyll, a neural style transfer framework that takes as input a biomedical image of a patient and translates it to a new image that indicates an attacker-chosen disease condition. The potential for fraudulent claims based on such generated 'fake' medical images is significant, and we demonstrate successful attacks on both X-rays and retinal fundus image modalities. We show that these attacks manage to mislead both medical professionals and algorithmic detection schemes. Lastly, we also investigate defensive measures based on machine learning to detect images generated by Jekyll.Comment: Published in proceedings of the 5th European Symposium on Security and Privacy (EuroS&P '20

Nutrient effects on production of cellulolytic enzymes by Aspergillus niger

The production of cellulase (filter paper activity, endoglucanase and )-glucosidase) by Aspergillus niger on three media in liquid shake culture was compared. The culture filtrate of this organism exhibited relatively highest activity of all three enzymes and extracellular protein content at 7-day interval during the course of its growth on Czapek-Dox medium supplemented with 1.0% (w/v) cellulose. Urea as a nitrogen source and pH 5.0 were found to be optimal for growth and cellulase production by A.niger. Among various soluble organic carbon sources and lignocelluloses tested in this study, carboxymethylcellulose and sawdust at 1% supported maximum production of all three enzymes by A.niger.Keywords: Aspergillus niger, cellulase activity, nutrients, 6-glucosidas

Lignolytic Enzymes of a Mushroom Stereum ostrea Isolated from Wood Logs

Production of lignolytic enzymes by the mushroom fungus Stereum ostrea in liquid medium under conditions of vegetative growth was examined for 10 days in comparison to the reference culture Phanerochaete chrysosporium. Though growth and secretion of extracellular protein by S. ostrea were comparable to those of P. chrysosporium, yields of laccase enzyme by S. ostrea were higher than laccase titres of P. chrysosporium by more than 2 folds on the peak production time interval (IVth day of incubation). S. ostrea yielded titres of 25 units of laccase/ml as against 8.9 units of laccase/ml on the IVth day of incubation. Stereum ostrea also exhibited activities of other lignolytic enzymes, lignin peroxidase (LiP) and manganese peroxidase (MnP), higher than the reference culture. Growth of S. ostrea on the medium in the presence of Remazol orange 16 resulted in the decolourisation of dye, confirming the presence of lignolytic enzymes. S. ostrea appears to be a promising culture with complete lignolytic system

Soil Classification and Crop Prediction Using Machine

Soil classification is a major problem and a heated topic in many countries. The world's population is drastically increasing at an alarming rate which in turn makes the demand for food crops. Farmers are forced to block soil cultivation since their conventional methods are insufficient to fulfil escalating needs. To optimize agricultural output, farmers must understand the best soil type for a certain crop, which has an impact on growing food demand. There areseveral methods for categorizing soil in a scientific way, but each has its own set of disadvantages, such as time and effort. Computer-based soil classification approaches are essential since they will aid farmers in the field and will be quick. Advanced Machine Learning technique-based soil classification methodologies can be used to classify soil and extract various featuresfrom it