426 research outputs found
Strengthening SMEs to make export competitive
The importance of SMEs in any economy cannot be overlooked as they form a major chunk in the economic activity of nations. India has nearly three million SMEs, which account for almost 50 per cent of industrial output. However, SMEs which form the backbone of industrial development in India are not export competitive and contribute only about 34 percent of exports. It is this feature of the SMEs that make it an ideal target to realize its potential export competitive. Drawing from the experiences of countries that have successfully promoted the export competitiveness of SMEs, this paper has identified ways in which SMEs in India can have an access to external markets through exports, which include simplification of procedures, incentives for higher production, preferential treatments to SMEs in the market development fund, linking up SMEs with Transnational Companies or large domestic exporting firms; and formation of clusters and networks in order to reinforce their external competitiveness.Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), SWOT Analysis, Export, India
Free Convection Flow of a Non-Newtonian Fluid in a Vertical Channel
The steady two-dimensional free convection flow of a Walters fluid (model B') in a vertical channel one 'of whose walls is wavy, has been investigated analytically. The governing equationsof the fluid and the heat transfer have been solved subject to the relevant boundary conditions byassuming that the solution consists of two parts: a mean part and disturbance or perturbed part. Toobtain the perturbed part of the solution, the long wave approximation has been used and to solvethe mean part, a well-known approximation used by Ostrach has been utilised. The relevant flow and the heat transfer characteristics, namely the skin-friction and the rate ofheat transfer at both the wallshave been discussed in detail
Interview with Indra Das
Indra Das is most well-recognized as the author of The Devourers (2015), a novel that won the Lambda Literary Award for straddling the genres of sci-fi, speculative, and fantasy fiction alongside LGBT themes. Das’s short fiction is widely published is horror and sci-fi anthologies, as well as magazines like Tor.com, Strange Horizons, and Asimov’s Science Fiction. He spoke candidly with Alok Amatya over email about the current literary landscape, the work of writing transgressive genre fiction, and his own experiences as an upcoming global author
Transactivation and expression patterns of Jun and Fos/AP-1 super-family proteins in human oral cancer
Transcription factor activator protein-1 (AP-1) super-family is known to modulate expression of array of genes during development of many cancers and considered as an important target for modern therapeutics. But the role of AP-1 during development of human oral cancers is still poorly understood. Because oral cancer is one of the most common cancers in India and south-east Asia, we studied the activation and expression pattern of AP-1 family of proteins and mRNA in different stages of oral carcinogenesis. Gel-shift assay, western blotting, immunohistochemistry and northern blotting have been used to assess the binding activity and expression pattern of AP-1 family (c-Jun, JunB, JunD, c-Fos, FosB, Fra-1 and Fra-2) proteins and mRNA transcripts in a total of 100 fresh oral tissue specimens comprising precancer (n = 40), cancer (n = 50) and healthy control (n = 10). Constitutive activation of AP-1 with concomitant upregulated expression of majority of AP-1 family of proteins and mRNA was observed in cancer cases. Interestingly, almost all precancerous cases showed JunD homodimers, whereas c-Fos/JunD was the most prevalent complex found in cancer tissues. The overexpression of EGFR mRNA, p50:p50/NF-?B homodimer formation, together with overexpression of pERK and c-Fos proteins in this study suggests an interesting cross talk between AP-1 and NF-?B pathways in oral cancers. Thus, this study demonstrates differential expression and activation of AP-1 super-family proteins in relation to severity of lesion and their crucial role in human oral carcinogenesis
Leptoquarks meet and rare Kaon processes
We analyse for the first time the CP violating ratio
in decays in leptoquark (LQ) models.
Assuming a mass gap to the electroweak (EW) scale, the main mechanism for LQs
to contribute to is EW gauge-mixing of semi-leptonic
into non-leptonic operators, which we treat in the Standard Model effective
theory (SMEFT). We perform also the one-loop decoupling for scalar LQs, finding
that in all models with both left-handed and right-handed LQ couplings
box-diagrams generate numerically strongly enhanced EW-penguin operators
already at the LQ scale. We then investigate correlations of
with rare Kaon processes (,
, , , and ) and find that even imposing only a moderate
enhancement of to
explain the current anomaly hinted by the Dual QCD approach and RBC-UKQCD
lattice QCD calculations leads to conflicts with experimental upper bounds on
rare Kaon processes. They exclude all LQ models with only a single coupling as
an explanation of the anomaly and put
strong-to-serious constraints on parameter spaces of the remaining models.
Future results on from the NA62 collaboration,
from the KOTO experiment and from
LHCb will even stronger exhibit the difficulty of LQ models in explaining the
measured , in case the
anomaly will be confirmed by improved lattice QCD calculations. Hopefully also
improved measurements of decays will one day help in
this context.Comment: 53 pages, 9 figures; v2: minor extensions, matches published version;
v3: corrected eq.(B.10) and figure 2 (right plot U_1,L), conclusions not
affecte
Differential expression and activation of NF-κB family proteins during oral carcinogenesis: role of high risk human papillomavirus infection
Oral cancer is one of the most common cancers in India and south-east Asian region consisting of more than 50% of all malignant tumors. Along with many known risk factors, infection of Human Papillomavirus (HPV) has been associated with the development of oral cancer and is suggested to modulate host cell transcription. Reciprocally, cellular transcription factors, such as NF-κB and AP-1 are known to modulate the expression of viral and other genes involved in the development of cancer. In the absence of data on NF-κB in relation to HPV in oral cancer, we studied the DNA binding activity and expression pattern of NF-κB family of proteins in different stages of oral cancer and correlated with HPV infection that has been associated with better prognosis of the disease. A total of 110 fresh oral tissue biopsies were collected comprising 10 normal controls, 34 precancer and 66 oral cancer lesions prior to chemotherapy/radiotherapy. Diagnosis of HPV was done by both consensus and type-specific PCR. Electrophoretic mobility shift assays, western blots and immunohistochemical analysis were performed to assess the binding activity and expression pattern of NF-κB family of proteins (p50, p65, p52, c-Rel, RelB and Bcl-3) in oral tissue biopsies. Twenty seven percent (18/66) of the oral cancer biopsies showed the presence of HPV infection exclusively of high risk HPV type 16, which was primarily associated with the well differentiated squamous cell carcinomas (WDSCC). We observed a high constitutive activation of NF-κB with concomitant upregulated expression of all the NF-κB members in oral cancer tissues. Expression of NF-κB components gradually increased as the severity of lesion increased from precancer to invasive cancer. NF-κB p50 was found to be the major DNA binding component, which is indicative of homodimerization of p50 subunits. Interestingly, in HPV16 infected oral cancers although p50 showed high binding activity, p65 also showed a partial involvement as evidenced in supershift assay. Both by western blotting and immunohistochemistry, a differential overexpression and nuclear localization of p50, p65 and partially of Bcl-3 were observed in HPV16 positive oral cancer patients that also showed an over-expression of p21. We therefore, demonstrate a constitutive activation and differential expression of NF-κB proteins, which change as a function of severity of oral lesions during development of oral cancer. The NF-κB DNA binding is primarily due to homodimerization of p50 but infection of high risk HPV promotes participation of p65 in NF-κB complex formation, leading to heterodimerization of p50/p65. We propose that the involvement of p65 in HPV infected oral cancer may be linked to improved differentiation and better prognosis of the disease when treated
Bioreduction based Bioremediation of Hexavalent Chromium Cr (VI) through Potential Indigenous Microbes
Sukinda Valley, of Orissa, contains 97% of India’s chromite ore deposits and one of the prime open cast chromite ore mines in the world. (ENVIS Newsletter, 2007). Hexavalent
chromium pollution in this area has caused a major health hazard affecting 2,600,000 people in this area (Blacksmith Institute report, 2007). Our investigation involved biological treatment of Cr (VI) without producing any byproduct. Bacterial cultures tolerating high concentrations of chromium were isolated from the soil sample collected from the chromite contaminated sites of
Sukinda chromite mines and their bioaccumulation properties are investigated. Strains capable of growing at 300 mg/l of Cr (VI) are considered as chromium resistant. The mentioned stain was capable of resisting Cr (VI) up to 500 mg/l. Its resistance to different metals such as Ni, Zn, Cu,
Cd and Fe were also investigated. The effects of different operating parameters such as initial pH, temperature and initial Cr (VI) concentrations on bioaccumulation of Cr (VI) by enriched cultures were studied in a batch system. The experimental investigation showed the maximum
specific chromium uptake at pH 7 and temperature 300C. With increasing initial Cr (VI)concentration from 5 mg/l to 50 mg/l showed increase in Cr (VI) uptake. At about 50 mg l−1
initial Cr (VI) concentrations, uptake of the selected potential strain exceeded 98% within 12 hours of incubation. The bacterial isolate is identified by 16S rRNA sequencing as Brevebacterium casei. Data indicated that isolate culture can be utilized to improve efficiency of
biological treatment processes for effluents containing higher levels of Cr (VI)
A flow cytometry based method for studying embryogenesis and immune reactivity to embryogenic stages in filarial parasites
BACKGROUND: In the absence of intermediate animal hosts, the process of embryogenesis leading to fecundity of adult female filarial worms is very critical for persistence of these obligate parasites in human communities. Embryogenesis in adult female filarial parasites involves fertilization of eggs or oocytes by sperms and their subsequent development into motile microfilariae inside the uterine cavity of worms. Development of assays for monitoring embryogenesis in adult female worms is a critical requirement in filariasis research – filarial worms are known to harbour endosymbionts such as Wolbachia which play a significant role in fecundity. Tetracycline or doxycycline treatment of the infected hosts effectively eliminates the endosymbionts resulting in inhibition of embryogenesis in female worms. Currently, inhibition of embryogenesis in adult filarial worms can be monitored only by microscopic examination of in vitro harvested intrauterine stages. METHODS: Adult female filarial worms of bovine filarial parasites, Setaria digitata were collected from the peritoneum of infected animals and intrauterine stages were harvested in culture medium and were analyzed for forward and side scatter by flowcytometry using a BD FACS Calibur. Different populations were gated, sorted and identified by phase microscopy. Binding of biotinylated lectins to intra uterine stages was monitored using FITC labeled Avidin and monitored by flow cytometry of gated populations. Similarly, binding of antibodies in human filarial sera to intrauterine stages was monitored using FITC labeled anti-human immunoglobulins. RESULTS: The forward and side scatter for intrauterine stages delineated 3 distinct populations labeled as R1, R2 and R3. The three populations were sorted and identified to be a) fully stretched microfilariae, b) early and c) late developmental stages of eggs respectively. Lectins such as Wheat Germ agglutinin or Concanavalin-A were found to bind strongly to egg stages and less prominently to intra-uterine microfilariae. Similarly the binding of antibodies in filarial sera to the three intra-uterine stages could also be precisely quantified. CONCLUSION: The manuscript reports a novel flow cytometry based method to monitor progression of embryogenesis in adult filarial worms. Apart from relative quantification of different intra uterine developmental stages, the assay allows quantitative binding of lectins and antibodies to each of the intrauterine stages. It may now be possible to quantify levels of antibodies in infected and immune hosts to monitor anti-fecundity immunity in filariasis – the assay can thus be used as a powerful tool for drug development and in immunological studies in human and experimental filariasis
PACE: A test bed for the dynamics and control of flexible multibody systems
The Phillips Laboratory at Edwards AFB has constructed a test bed for the validation and comparison of modeling and control theories for the dynamics and control of flexible multibody systems. This project is called the Planar Articulating Controls Experiment (PACE). This paper presents the experimental apparatus for PACE and the problem formulation. An in-depth analysis on DC motor dynamics was also performed
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