Possible inundation map of coastal areas of gujarat with a tsunamigenic earthquake

The western Indian peninsula experienced the most destructive tsunami ever recorded in the Arabian Sea by the 28th November 1945 earthquake (Mw 8.1) in Makran region. The run-up height during the tsunami was of 17m at Makran coast and 11 to 11.5m in Gulf of Kachchh region. Seismic gap area along the subduction zone of Makran is possible site of future great earthquake, which could generate tsunamigenic condition along western Indian coast. Determination of run-up elevation is important aspect to study the inundation in any region, which get affected by offshore and on-shore geomorphological conditions i.e. bathymetry and near-shore topography. Inundation maps are prepared using Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission (SRTM) data and ETOPOv2v to show the possible areas of inundation due to different wave heights along coastal parts of Gujarat state. Results shows that more than 2 m run-up elevation is showing possibility of inundation in Jakhau and Kandla areas of Gulf of Kachchh region whereas, the Saurashtra region shows less possibility of inundation. As the state has important installations like ports, jetties, industries along the coast and also other socio-economical perspective which can be affected by such an event, hence the demarcation of possible inundation areas is important for determination of future tsunami hazard demanding more detailed work

Papain-like proteases: Applications of their inhibitors

Proteases are one of the most important classes of enzyme and expressed throughout the animal and plant kingdoms as well as in viruses and bacteria. The protease family has drawn special attention fordrug target for cure of several diseases such as osteoporosis, arthritis and cancer. Many proteases from various sources are being studied extensively with respect to activity, inhibition and structure. Inthis review, we hope to bring together the information available about the proteases with particular emphasis on papain-like plant cysteine proteases. Besides, protease inhibitors and their potential utilities are also discussed

Global Medical Device Nomenclature: The Concept for Reducing Device-Related Medical Errors

In the medical device field, there are a number of players, having quite different responsibilities and levels of understanding of the processes, but all with one common interest, that of ensuring the availability of sound medical devices to the general public. To assist in this very important process, there is a need for a common method for describing and identifying these medical devices in an unambiguous manner. The Global Medical Device Nomenclature (GMDN) now provides, for the first time, an international tool for identifying all medical devices, at the generic level, in a meaningful manner that can be understood by all users. Prior to the GMDN, many nomenclature systems existed, all built upon different structures, and used locally or nationally for special purposes, with unusual approaches. These diverse systems, although often workable in their own right, have had no impact on improving the overall situation of providing a common platform, whereby, medical devices could be correctly identified and the related data safely exchanged between the involved parties. Work by standard organizations such as, CEN (European Committee for Standardization) and ISO (International Organization for Standardization), from 1993 to 1996, resulted in a standard that specified a structure for a new nomenclature, for medical devices. In this article we are trying to explain GMDN as the prime method to reduce medical device errors, and to understand the concept of GMDN, to regulate the medical device throughout the globe. Here we also make an attempt to explain various aspects of the GMDN system, such as, the process of development of the GMDN-CEN report, purpose, benefits, and their structural considerations. In addition, there will be an explanation of the coding system, role of the GMDN agency, and their utilization in the unique device identification (UDI) System. Finally, the current area of focus and vision for the future are also mentioned

Inter-cluster Thread-to-core Mapping and DVFS on Heterogeneous Multi-cores

Heterogeneous multi-core platforms that contain different types of cores, organized as clusters, are emerging, e.g. ARM's big.LITTLE architecture. These platforms often need to deal with multiple applications, having different performance requirements, executing concurrently. This leads to generation of varying and mixed workloads (e.g. compute and memory intensive) due to resource sharing. Run-time management is required for adapting to such performance requirements and workload variabilities and to achieve energy efficiency. Moreover, the management becomes challenging when the applications are multi-threaded and the heterogeneity needs to be exploited. The existing run-time management approaches do not efficiently exploit cores situated in different clusters simultaneously (referred to as inter-cluster exploitation) and DVFS potential of cores, which is the aim of this paper. Such exploitation might help to satisfy the performance requirement while achieving energy savings at the same time. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a run-time management approach that first selects thread-to-core mapping based on the performance requirements and resource availability. Then, it applies online adaptation by adjusting the voltage-frequency (V-f) levels to achieve energy optimization, without trading-off application performance. For thread-to-core mapping, offline profiled results are used, which contain performance and energy characteristics of applications when executed on the heterogeneous platform by using different types of cores in various possible combinations. For an application, thread-to-core mapping process defines the number of used cores and their type, which are situated in different clusters. The online adaptation process classifies the inherent workload characteristics of concurrently executing applications, incurring a lower overhead than existing learning-based approaches as demonstrated in this paper. The classification of workload is performed using the metric Memory Reads Per Instruction (MRPI). The adaptation process pro-actively selects an appropriate V-f pair for a predicted workload. Subsequently, it monitors the workload prediction error and performance loss, quantified by instructions per second (IPS), and adjusts the chosen V-f to compensate. We validate the proposed run-time management approach on a hardware platform, the Odroid-XU3, with various combinations of multi-threaded applications from PARSEC and SPLASH benchmarks. Results show an average improvement in energy efficiency up to 33% compared to existing approaches while meeting the performance requirements

STUDY OF MAO-B INHIBITOR ANALOUGES FOR PARKINSON’S DISEASE THROUGH CADD APPROACHES

New derivatives are designed as target directed MAO-B Inhibitors for medical care of the patients for neurodegenerative disorder. Molecular design and estimated pharmacokinetic properties have been evaluated by using Inventus v 1.1 software. The binding mode of the proposed compounds with target protein i.e. 1S2Q was evaluated and the resulting data from docking studies explained that newly designed derivatives have high and better affinity towards target protein. Based on these properties, the binding affinities are used for speeding up drug discovery process by eliminating less potent compounds from synthesis. Keywords: MAO-B, Inventus, Target protein, Neurodegenerative, Docking

COMPUTER AIDED DRUG DESIGN: AN OVERVIEW

Discovery and development of a new drug is generally known as a very complex process which takes a lot of time and resources. So now a day’s computer aided drug design approaches are used very widely to increase the efficiency of the drug discovery and development course. Various approaches of CADD are evaluated as promising techniques according to their need, in between all these structure-based drug design and ligand-based drug design approaches are known as very efficient and powerful techniques in drug discovery and development. These both methods can be applied with molecular docking to virtual screening for lead identification and optimization. In the recent times computational tools are widely used in pharmaceutical industries and research areas to improve effectiveness and efficacy of drug discovery and development pipeline. In this article we give an overview of computational approaches, which is inventive process of finding novel leads and aid in the process of drug discovery and development research. Keywords: computer aided drug discovery, structure-based drug design, ligand-based drug design, virtual screening and molecular dockin

Water-deficit stress - Induced physio-biochemical changes in cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) Cultivars

83-90Water stress is a serious global issue regarding growth of agricultural crops and sustainable food production for the large population. In the present situation due to low rainfall and unavailability of advanced irrigation methods, water deficit stress is the most limiting factor decreasing crop production in many regions of the world. In this study, to assess the drought tolerance mechanism in cotton cultivars was monitored by drought- induced physio-biochemical changes. To assess the tolerance in cotton cultivars, a field experiment was conducted in split- plot design in which the main plot consists of irrigated and complete rainfed conditions as a stress and cotton cultivars arranged in the main plot as a subplot. The overall comparative analysis revealed that hybrid was superior over their parents under well-watered as well as in water deficit conditions in terms of chlorophyll content, wax content, accumulation of compatible solutes, photosynthesis rate, stomatal conductance, transpiration rate and yield parameters. The findings from the results indicate that under water deficit conditions plants having a different adaptive mechanisms for coping with the stress situation. So, some of the adaptive mechanisms such as accumulation of sugars, polyphenols, amino acids, non-enzymatic antioxidants, and wax deposition helps to maintain osmotic balance, to protect cellular macromolecules, to detoxify the cells, and to scavenge free radicals under water deficit condition

Water-deficit stress - Induced physio-biochemical changes in cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) Cultivars

Water stress is a serious global issue regarding growth of agricultural crops and sustainable food production for the large population. In the present situation due to low rainfall and unavailability of advanced irrigation methods, water deficit stress is the most limiting factor decreasing crop production in many regions of the world. In this study, to assess the drought tolerance mechanism in cotton cultivars was monitored by drought induced physio-biochemical changes. To assess the tolerance in cotton cultivars, a field experiment was conducted in split plot design in which the main plot consists of irrigated and complete rainfed conditions as a stress and cotton cultivars arranged in the main plot as a subplot. The overall comparative analysis revealed that hybrid was superior over their parents under well-watered as well as in water deficit conditions in terms of chlorophyll content, wax content, accumulation of compatible solutes, photosynthesis rate, stomatal conductance, transpiration rate and yield parameters. The findings from the results indicate that under water deficit conditions plants having a different adaptive mechanisms for coping with the stress situation. So, some of the adaptive mechanisms such as accumulation of sugars, polyphenols, amino acids, non-enzymatic antioxidants, and wax deposition helps to maintain osmotic balance, to protect cellular macromolecules, to detoxify the cells, and to scavenge free radicals under water deficit condition

Women in STEM Disciplines (Meeting Report on NIAS’ collaboration with Women in STEM in India)

A consultation meeting held recently about women in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines under the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) project scrutinized issues around the themes of organizational factors, policy initiatives, institutional hierarchies and differences, and mentoring, networking and leadership

Fermentation process for alcoholic beverage production from mahua (Madhuca indica J. F. Mel.) flowers

Mahua flowers are rich in sugar (68-72%), in addition to a number of minerals and one of the most important raw materials for alcohol fermentation. The present investigation was for the development of a non-distilled alcoholic beverage from Mahua flowers. Eighteen (18) treatment combinations consisting of two temperatures (25 and 30°C), three pH (4.0, 4.5 and 5.0) and three period of fermentation (7, 14 and 21 days) were used in the fermentation conditions. The maximum yield of ethanol (9.51 %) occurred at 25°C with pH 4.5 after 14 days of  fermentation of Mahua flower juice. The fermented non-distilled alcoholic beverage contained total sugar (8.83 mg/ml), reducing sugar (0.82 mg/ml), total soluble solids (6.37°Brix) titrable acidity (0.65 %), and volatile acidity (0.086%). Methanol was not detected at any stage of fermentation. The developed fermented alcoholic beverage had characteristic flavor and aroma of Mahua flowers with about 7 to 9% alcohol.Keywords: Madhuca indica, ethanol, reducing sugar, fermentation.African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(39), pp. 5771-577