Education Research Gender, Education and Development - A Partially Annotated and Selective Bibliography

Community/Rural/Urban Development,

Vaccine hesitancy and attitude towards vaccination among parents of children between 1-5 years of age attending a tertiary care hospital in Chennai, India

Introduction: Vaccination is an effective public health intervention; however, coverage of vaccination is declining in states like Tamil Nadu which have good health indicators. Objective: To evaluate the presence of vaccine hesitancy among parents of children between 1 and 5 years of age attending the paediatric out patient department of a tertiary care hospital in Chennai and to assess its relationship with attitudes towards vaccines. Material & Methods: A cross sectional questionnaire-based survey was conducted among 100 consecutively sampled parents of children between 1 and 5 years of age attending a tertiary care paediatric out-patient department. The Parental Attitude towards Childhood Vaccines scale of vaccine hesitancy and the Beliefs and Attitudes towards Childhood Vaccines scale were used to measure vaccine hesitancy and beliefs and attitudes towards vaccination respectively. The data were analysed descriptively and statistical correlation between vaccination attitudes and vaccination hesitancy were studied. Results: In the predominantly urban, educated, working class population, the prevalence of vaccine hesitancy was 21%. But all the children had received complete vaccination appropriate for age. The major drivers for vaccine hesitancy were suspicions about newer vaccines, concerns about adverse effects of vaccines and the perception that there is no need for vaccines against uncommon diseases. The vaccine hesitancy scores were negatively correlated with the vaccine attitude scores (R = -0.266; p = 0.007). Conclusion: Vaccine hesitancy is present among the sampled mothers and is influenced mainly by concerns regarding safety of newer vaccines. Vaccine hesitancy needs to be clearly addressed for strengthening the Universal Immunization Program

Mycobacterium tuberculosis groE promoter controls the expression of the bicistronic groESL1 operon and shows differential regulation under stress conditions

Heat shock promoters of mycobacteria are strong promoters that become rapidly upregulated during macrophage infection and thus serve as valuable candidates for expressing foreign antigens in recombinant BCG vaccine. In the present study, a new heat shock promoter controlling the expression of the groESL1 operon was identified and characterized. Mycobacterium tuberculosis groESL1 operon codes for the immunodominant 10 kDa (Rv3418c, GroES/Cpn10/Hsp10) and 60 kDa (Rv3417c, GroEL1/Cpn60.1/Hsp60) heat shock proteins. The basal promoter region was 115 bp, while enhanced activity was seen only with a 277-bp fragment. No promoter element was seen in the groES-groEL1 intergenic region. This operon codes for a bicistronic mRNA transcript as determined by reverse transcriptase-PCR and Northern blot analysis. Primer extension analysis identified two transcriptional start sites (TSSs) TSS1 (-236) and TSS2 (-171), out of which one (TSS2) was heat inducible. The groE promoter was more active than the groEL2 promoter in Mycobacterium smegmatis. Further, it was found to be differentially regulated under stress conditions, while the groEL2 promoter was constitutive

Diminished Monocyte Function in Microfilaremic Patients with Lymphatic Filariasis and Its Relationship to Altered Lymphoproliferative Responses

Antigen-specific hyporesponsiveness to filarial antigens is a phenomenon observed in patent infection with lymph-dwelling filarial parasites of humans. This phenomenon has been attributed to a multitude of factors, one of which is altered monocyte function. To examine the role played by monocytes in filarial infection, we assessed the responses of monocytes obtained from normal and filarial parasite-infected individuals to both crude filarial antigen and purified recombinant filarial antigen WbSXP-1 and attempted to relate these to the altered lymphoproliferative responses seen in filarial infection. Monocytes from microfilaremic (MF) patients demonstrated an inability to respond to lipopolysaccharide compared to monocytes from endemic normal persons or from lymphedema patients. Indeed, interleukin 1β (IL-1β) production was severely limited, a finding that did not extend to monocyte responses to filarial antigens. Serum from MF patients reduced adherence and spreading of normal monocytes, a finding not seen with serum from the other clinical groups. Interestingly, there was a significant correlation between the production of IL-1β and adherence. Moreover, the levels of spontaneous production of IL-1β correlated with high levels of spontaneous secretion of IL-10. The effects observed were not a result of diminished viability or alteration in the expression of the cell surface markers CD14 and HLA-DR. These data suggest that monocyte function is dampened in MF patients, a finding which could alter lymphoproliferative responses during patent infection

High-Sensitivity Characterization of Ultra-Thin Atomic Layers using Spin-Hall Effect of Light

Magnetic/non-magnetic/heterostructured ultra-thin films' characterisation is highly demanding due to the emerging diverse applications of such films. Diverse measurements are usually performed on such systems to infer their electrical, optical and magnetic properties. We demonstrate that MOKE-based spin-Hall effect of light (SHEL) is a versatile surface characterization tool for studying materials' magnetic and dielectric ordering. Using this technique, we measure magnetic field dependent complex Kerr angle and the coercivity in ultra-thin films of permalloy (Py) and at molybdenum disulphide (MoS$_2$) - permalloy (MSPy) hetero-structure interfaces. The measurements are compared with standard magneto-optic Kerr effect (MOKE) studies to demonstrate that SHEL-MOKE is a practical alternative to the conventional MOKE method, with competitive sensitivity. A comprehensive theoretical model and simulation data are provided to further strengthen the potential of this simple non-invasive optical method. The theoretical model is applied to extract the optical conductivity and susceptibility of non-magnetic ultra-thin layers such as MoS$_2$ .Comment: 15 pages, 7 figure, one supplementary documen