Virtual Location-Based Services: Merging the Physical and Virtual World

Location-based services gained much popularity through providing users with helpful information with respect to their current location. The search and recommendation of nearby locations or places, and the navigation to a specific location are some of the most prominent location-based services. As a recent trend, virtual location-based services consider webpages or sites associated with a location as 'virtual locations' that online users can visit in spite of not being physically present at the location. The presence of links between virtual locations and the corresponding physical locations (e.g., geo-location information of a restaurant linked to its website), allows for novel types of services and applications which constitute virtual location-based services (VLBS). The quality and potential benefits of such services largely depends on the existence of websites referring to physical locations. In this paper, we investigate the usefulness of linking virtual and physical locations. For this, we analyze the presence and distribution of virtual locations, i.e., websites referring to places, for two Irish cities. Using simulated tracks based on a user movement model, we investigate how mobile users move through the Web as virtual space. Our results show that virtual locations are omnipresent in urban areas, and that the situation that a user is close to even several such locations at any time is rather the normal case instead of the exception

A study on role of magnetic resonance imaging in the evaluation of intracranial neoplastic lesions

Background: Neoplastic central nervous system (CNS) lesions are a heterogeneous group of diseases with a variable outcome that reflects the precision of diagnosis and the delivery of optimal and specific treatment. CNS imaging has a pivotal role in directing management decisions. In the present study, cases of either clinically suspected intracranial neoplastic lesions or already diagnosed cases of neoplastic lesions were studied by cross sectional imaging of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Methods: In this prospective study, 30 cases of intracranial neoplastic lesions were studied by 1.5T Siemens Essenza MR scanner over a period of 6 months. Imaging findings were evaluated and tabulated. Results: Total 30 cases of in intracranial neoplastic lesions were studied aged between 12 to 87 years (17 men and 13 women). Most common presenting complaint was headache. Solitary lesions were present in 21 patients (70%) and multiple lesions in 9 patients (30%). 80% of the lesions were supratentorial, 13.3% were infratentorial and 6.6% were seen in both infra and supratentorial region. 76.6% were intra-axial and 23.3% were extra-axial. Metastasis were the most common neoplastic lesions; glial tumors are the second most common neoplastic lesions. Meningiomas were the most common benign tumors. Mass effect and perilesional edema were the most common associated findings. Conclusions: MRI is the first line of investigation for diagnosis and evaluation of intracranial neoplastic lesions with reasonable degree of diagnostic accuracy. Neuroimaging in combination with clinical findings can be helpful in early diagnosis and timed intervention

A genome-scale integrated approach aids in genetic dissection of complex flowering time trait in chickpea

A combinatorial approach of candidate gene-based association analysis and genome-wide association study (GWAS) integrated with QTL mapping, differential gene expression profiling and molecular haplotyping was deployed in the present study for quantitative dissection of complex flowering time trait in chickpea. Candidate gene-based association mapping in a flowering time association panel (92 diverse desi and kabuli accessions) was performed by employing the genotyping information of 5724 SNPs discovered from 82 known flowering chickpea gene orthologs of Arabidopsis and legumes as well as 832 gene-encoding transcripts that are differentially expressed during flower development in chickpea. GWAS using both genome-wide GBS- and candidate gene-based genotyping data of 30,129 SNPs in a structured population of 92 sequenced accessions (with 200–250 kb LD decay) detected eight maximum effect genomic SNP loci (genes) associated (34 % combined PVE) with flowering time. Six flowering time-associated major genomic loci harbouring five robust QTLs mapped on a high-resolution intra-specific genetic linkage map were validated (11.6–27.3 % PVE at 5.4–11.7 LOD) further by traditional QTL mapping. The flower-specific expression, including differential up- and down-regulation (>three folds) of eight flowering time-associated genes (including six genes validated by QTL mapping) especially in early flowering than late flowering contrasting chickpea accessions/mapping individuals during flower development was evident. The gene haplotype-based LD mapping discovered diverse novel natural allelic variants and haplotypes in eight genes with high trait association potential (41 % combined PVE) for flowering time differentiation in cultivated and wild chickpea. Taken together, eight potential known/candidate flowering time-regulating genes [efl1 (early flowering 1), FLD (Flowering locus D), GI (GIGANTEA), Myb (Myeloblastosis), SFH3 (SEC14-like 3), bZIP (basic-leucine zipper), bHLH (basic helix-loop-helix) and SBP (SQUAMOSA promoter binding protein)], including novel markers, QTLs, alleles and haplotypes delineated by aforesaid genome-wide integrated approach have potential for marker-assisted genetic improvement and unravelling the domestication pattern of flowering time in chickpea

Probabilistic metadata generation for places based on user data

In recent years, there has been a wide adoption of mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets. This wide adoption is supported by numerous mobile and Web applications which help users to consume and generate data on the go. Users generate large volumes of data using these applications which represent real time contextual information about them. Most of the current mobile and Web applications analyse user data such as social interests and physical presence of users at places to deliver better services and user experience in applications. However, studies have shown that spatial databases lack sufficient metadata for places as users are required to manually provide this information. Since this is time consuming work, users rarely annotate places in spite of having knowledge about them. Automatically generating annotations for places by exploiting user generated data on mobile and Web applications can potentially be used to overcome the lack of metadata for places. Rich metadata about places can be used by geospatial web services and location based services to provide accurate results. Automatic generation of place metadata requires new sophisticated data mining algorithms. This thesis focuses on unsolved questions regarding the utilization of physical presence and social data of users to generate metadata for places. Specifically, we have developed probabilistic models and text processing algorithms for short text snippet or tag generation for locations using social interest profiles and check-ins of users at places. Then, we have studied how only the user presence data at places can be used to infer real world events at those places. To this end, we discuss a probabilistic outlier detection model and an algorithm to detect any unusual presence of huge crowds at places. We have then defined and implemented an approach to generate tags by analysing textual data generated during events conducted at locations. We have evaluated all the discussed models and algorithms with both synthetic and real world data. Our experiments show that rich metadata for places can be derived by analysing user generated data

Extractives of Balsamodendron pubescens: Stocks, Hook. Isolation and a new synthesis of siderin

β-Sitosterol and cedrelone have been obtained from the hexane extract of the roots ofBalsamodendron pubescens Stocks, Hook. A dimethoxy methyl coumarin isolated has been characterised as siderin (VIII) (4,7-dimethoxy-5-methyl coumarin). A new synthesis of siderin as well as 6,8-dimethoxy-4-methyl coumarin (II) is also reported

21. Occurrence of Painted Kaloula Kaloula Taprobanica (Family Microhylidae) At Point Calimere, Tamil Nadu

Volume: 98Start Page: 121End Page: 12

The Relationship between Dental Age, Bone Age and Chronological Age in Children with Short Stature

 Background and objective: The knowledge of bone age and dental age is of great importance for pediatrician and pediatric dentist.Therefore objective of this study is to determine and compare dental age, bone age and chronological age in children with short stature. Method: 60 short statured children between the age group of 18-14 years were selected. Chronological age was assessed by recording date of birth. Dental age assessment was done using orthopantamogram following the method described by Demirjian. Bone age assessment was carried out using hand wrist radiograph following Bjork, Grave and Brown’s method. Results: Dental age and Bone age was delayed compared to chronological age in both sexes. The correlations between chronological age, dental age and bone age were all positive. Statistically very highly significant correlation was found in females. Interpretation and conclusion: The data supports the concept that dental age and bone age delay is a significant feature in short statured children. It is important to consider dental age and bone age as variables for diagnosing short stature children.To support our findings further a well designed,controlled as well as longitudinal studies with a larger sample size is required.   Keywords: Short Stature; Dental Age; Bone Age; Demirjian’s Method

Isolation and structure of wightional and wightiolide from Andrographis wightiana

Two new ent-labdane-type diterpenoids, wightional and wightiolide have been isolated from the leaves of Andrographis wightiana. Their structures were determined on the basis of extensive 1H and 13C, 1H homonuclear COSY, and HMBC NMR spectroscopic studies. To correlate the newly isolated diterpenes with wightionolide, a number of derivatives of wightionolide have been prepared and characterized