Self Help Group Participation and Employment of the Women: Myths and the Reality

The self help groups were formed to provide micro credit facilities to rural poor women to engage them in economic activities. Present paper investigates the factors influencing the employment status of a selected group of self help group members. The same set of self help group members has been surveyed twice, once during 2005 and again during 2009 to collect information. During 2005 survey all the members were employed but during 2009 it were observed that about 55 percent of the self help group members have turned into housewives. The present study will try to examine the influence of socio economic, demographic and political factors on the employment status of the members based on primary survey conducted in some villages of North 24 Parganas, West Bengal, India. The paper has also tried to investigate the loan use pattern of this set of self help group members. Along with the past occupation of the member the local politics at village level have been found to influence the employment status as well as loan use pattern of the members. Jel classification: G21, O12.Self Help Group, Employment Status, Loan use pattern

Breast Cancer Stem Cells Survive Periods of Farnesyl-Transferase Inhibitor-Induced Dormancy by Undergoing Autophagy

A cancer stem cell has been defined as a cell within a tumor that possesses the capacity to self-renew and to cause the heterogeneous lineages of cancer cells that comprise the tumor. These tumor-forming cells could hypothetically originate from stem, progenitor, or differentiated cells. Previously, we have shown that breast cancer cells with low metastatic potential can be induced into a reversible state of dormancy by farnesyl transferase inhibitors (FTIs). Dormancy was induced by changes in RhoA and RhoC GTPases. Specifically, RhoA was found to be hypoactivated while RhoC was hyperactivated. In the current study we demonstrate that these dormant cells also express certain known stem cell markers such as aldehyde dehydrogenase I (ALDHI) and cluster of differentiation 44 (CD44). We also show that autophagy markers Atg5, Atg12, and LC3-B are expressed in these dormant stem cell-like breast cancer cells. Inhibiting autophagy by inhibitor 3-methyladenine (3-MA) blocked the process of autophagy reversing the dormant phenotype. Further, we show that c-jun NH2 terminal kinase (JNK/SAPK) is upregulated in these dormant stem cell-like breast cancer cells and is responsible for increasing autophagy

Museum object handling groups in older adult mental health inpatient care

Emerging evidence indicates that museum object handling sessions offer short-term benefits to healthcare participants. This study aimed to further understand psychological and social aspects of object handling in mental health inpatients. Older adults (N ¼ 42) from a psychiatric inpatient ward with diagnoses of depression or anxiety took part in a series of object handling group sessions with 5–12 participants per group. Session audio recordings were subjected to thematic analysis. Five main themes were identified: ‘responding to object focused questions’, ‘learning about objects and from each other’, ‘enjoyment, enrichment through touch and privilege’, ‘memories, personal associations and identity’ and ‘imagination and storytelling’. The first four were congruent with literature associated with positive wellbeing and engagement outcomes but the fifth was a new finding for group contexts. Limitations include the relatively small sample and variable week-to-week group attendance. Audio recordings did not provide information on non-verbal communication and how objects were handled. Future studies should control for attendance and examine effects of multiple sessions over time, ideally with video recording. This study offers preliminary support for museum object handling as a group intervention in mental health care with potential to develop therapeutic aspects of the sessions. Findings indicate that object handling is a novel yet effective intervention with potential for conferring additional advantages by conducting sessions in group settings

Lesson of the month 2: An easily missed cause of confusion

We describe the case of an 85-year-old woman who developed acute confusion, acute kidney injury and temperature spikes while on extended courses of beta-lactams for osteomyelitis. The cause of her deterioration was felt to be due to sepsis when in fact it was as a result of toxicity from antibiotics. This was demonstrated by a rapid resolution in her condition following haemodialysis. We also performed a literature review to appraise the neuro and nephrotoxicity of various antibiotics and how best to manage toxicity when it occurs

A state-space approach to understand responses of organisms, populations and communities to multiple environmental drivers

Understanding the response of biotic systems to multiple environmental drivers is one of the major concerns in ecology. The most common approach in multiple driver research includes the classification of interactive responses into categories (antagonistic, synergistic). However, there are situations where the use of classification schemes limits our understanding or cannot be applied. Here, we introduce and explore an approach that allows us to better appreciate variability in responses to multiple drivers. We then apply it to a case, comparing effects of heatwaves on performance of a cold-adapted species and a warm-adapted competitor. The heatwaves had a negative effect on the native (but not on the exotic) species and the approach highlighted that the exotic species was less responsive to multivariate environmental variation than the native species. Overall, we show how the proposed approach can enhance our understanding of variation in responses due to different driver intensities, species, genotypes, ontogeny, life-phases or among spatial scales at any level of biological organization

Inhibitory activity of the peptides derived from buffalo prolactin on angiogenesis

The peptide fragments obtained by cathepsin digestion of purified buffalo prolactin (buPRL) monomer have been characterized using SDS-PAGE and FPLC with regard to size and pI. Their antiangiogenic activity was tested in chick embryo chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) assay and the human endothelial cells wound healing assay. Antiangiogenic activity was observed in cathepsin-cleaved fragments from buPRL. Further, a peptide sequence 45A- 46Q-47G-48K-49G-50F-51I-52T-53M-54A-55L-56N-57S-58C, which matched with human somatostatin (hSST), a known antiangiogenic factor, was located in the second loop between the first and second a-helices in the threedimensional structure of buPRL, obtained by homology modelling. The synthetic peptide matching with SST sequence was found to exhibit antiangiogenic activity in both in vitro and ex vivo assays. It was also observed that all the peptides related to buPRL could antagonize the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and bradykinin (BK)- dependent production of endothelial nitric oxide (NO), which is a pre-requisite for endothelial tube formation. It is concluded therefore that an internal sequence in buPRL and peptide fragments derived from cathepsin-digested buPRL exhibit antiangiogenic activities

A REVIEW ON CLINICAL EXAMINATION OF AGNIBALA (DIGESTIVE POWER)

Ayurveda, the science of life mainly deals with the preventive aspect of diseases along with curative aspect and this is the aim of Ayurveda. For that prevention purpose life style modification is very much essential now a day. Some factors are responsible for the formation of a disease among of them Agni is one of the most important factor. Agni plays an important role to sustain the life process. All the diseases are caused due to impaired function of Agni. According to modern science, Gastric juice and enzymes functioning at gastro intestinal level, all are responsible for digestion, absorption and metabolism. Altered function of the enzymes secreted from gastro intestinal tract is responsible for production of gastro intestinal diseases. Function of Agni is likely to be compared with gastric juice and different enzymes at gastro intestinal level. In the present era, the diseases related to Annavaha srota and Purishvaha srota (Gastro intestinal system) are commonly found in clinical practice. In the pathogenesis of disease, Dosha, Dusya, Srota, Agni and Ama (Prime causative factors of diseases) are required to be analyzed for fruitful treatment. In present study center of attention has given on clinically evaluation of Agnibala (Digestive power) based on Ancient classical theory

Evolutionary Model of the Personal Income Distribution

The aim of this work is to establish the personal income distribution from the elementary constituents of a free market; products of a representative good and agents forming the economic network. The economy is treated as a self-organized system. Based on the idea that the dynamics of an economy is governed by slow modes, the model suggests that for short time intervals a fixed ratio of total labour income (capital income) to net income exists (Cobb-Douglas relation). Explicitly derived is Gibrat's law from an evolutionary market dynamics of short term fluctuations. The total private income distribution is shown to consist of four main parts. From capital income of private firms the income distribution contains a lognormal distribution for small and a Pareto tail for large incomes. Labour income contributes an exponential distribution. Also included is the income from a social insurance system, approximated by a Gaussian peak. The evolutionary model is able to reproduce the stylized facts of the income distribution, shown by a comparison with empirical data of a high resolution income distribution. The theory suggests that in a free market competition between products is ultimately the origin of the uneven income distribution