Association of the Indian summer monsoon with the northern hemisphere mid-latitude circulation

The association between the mid-latitude circulation and rainfall over the Indian region on an intraseasonal time-scale is investigated by considering 11 years (1974-1984) of Northern Hemisphere 500 hPa geopotential heights and rainfall data for the Indian summer monsoon months June through to September. On the basis of extensive correlation analysis between the geopotential heights and rainfall, it is seen that three regions over the mid-latitudes, the Manchurian region, the Algerian region and the Caspian sea region show positive correlation with rainfall over India, with higher values north of 20°N latitude. Lead and lag correlations between the heights at the locations identified above and rainfall over India reveals that some common element of low-frequency variability is influencing the mid-latitude circulation and Indian rainfall. On the interannual scale the connections between the winter-time low-frequency patterns (the Pacific/North Atlantic, the West Pacific Oscillation, the North Atlantic Oscillation and the Eurasian) and Indian summer monsoon rainfall (ISMR) are investigated. Only the West Pacific Oscillation pattern shows a significant relationship with the ISMR. Further, the interannual and the decadal variability is examined by using the Northern Hemisphere zonal index data for the period 1900-1993. Results reveal that the decadal-scale variability of the ISMR and the circulation features of the Northern Hemisphere are connected

A comparison of sequential total and activated white cell count in patients undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting, using cardiopulmonary bypass, with and without a white cell filter

Introduction Cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) has been shown to induce a systemic inflammatory response similar to the local reaction seen after tissue damage [1]. This leads to the release of toxic substances, such as elastase, which cause endothelial damage and may adversely affect outcome [2]. Use of a leucocyte depleting arterial line filter is one of many anti-inflammatory strategies that are undergoing evaluation. Leucocyte depleting filters may be capable of selectively removing activated white cells [3], but this has not been proved in vivo. The aim of the present study was to compare sequential total and activated white cells during CPB, using either a leucocyte depleting or standard arterial line filter. Materials and methods After local ethical committee approval, 20 patients undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting using CPB were prospectively randomly allocated to have either a Leukogard LG–6 (Pall Biomedical, Portsmouth, UK) or a nonleucocyte depleting filter inserted into the arterial line of the CPB circuit. Arterial limb blood samples were taken immediately after institution of CPB (0min) and at 10–min intervals throughout the bypass period. Activated white cells were identified using nitroblue tetrazolium, then both total and activated white cell numbers counted after staining with Leucoplate.Results Table 1 shows the number of white cells counted/1.25 ? l (volume of a single channel of Nageotte counting chamber) using light microscopy (× 25).Conclusion The LG6 leucocyte filter reduces the total white cell count and is capable of selectively removing activated white cells during CPB. The exact relationship between leucocyte depletion and improved patient outcome still remains unclear

Diffuse small bowel thickening in aids patient - a case report

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Diarrhea is common in HIV/AIDS patients, caused by both classic enteric pathogens and different opportunistic agents. <it>Infection with these different pathogens may lead to similar radiological findings, thus causing diagnostic confusion</it>.</p> <p>Case presentation</p> <p>A 30-yr-old female with AIDS presented with chronic diarrhea of 4 months duration. She had diffuse small bowel thickening present on CT scan of her abdomen, with stool examination showing no parasites. She was erroneously diagnosed as abdominal tuberculosis and given antituberculosis drugs with which she showed no improvement. Repeat stool examination later at a specialized laboratory revealed <it>Cryptosporidium parvum </it>infection.</p> <p>The patient was given an extended course of nitazoxanide treatment, as her stool examination was positive for <it>Cryptosporidium parvum </it>even after 2 weeks of drug consumption. Parasite clearance was documented after 10 weeks of treatment. Interestingly, the bowel thickening reversed with parasitological clearance.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p><it>Cryptosporidium parvum </it>may lead to small bowel thickening in AIDS patients. This small bowel thickening may reverse following parasitological clearance.</p

Symbols in engineering drawings (SiED): an imbalanced dataset benchmarked by convolutional neural networks.

Engineering drawings are common across different domains such as Oil & Gas, construction, mechanical and other domains. Automatic processing and analysis of these drawings is a challenging task. This is partly due to the complexity of these documents and also due to the lack of dataset availability in the public domain that can help push the research in this area. In this paper, we present a multiclass imbalanced dataset for the research community made of 2432 instances of engineering symbols. These symbols were extracted from a collection of complex engineering drawings known as Piping and Instrumentation Diagram (P&ID). By providing such dataset to the research community, we anticipate that this will help attract more attention to an important, yet overlooked industrial problem, and will also advance the research in such important and timely topics. We discuss the datasets characteristics in details, and we also show how Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) perform on such extremely imbalanced datasets. Finally, conclusions and future directions are discussed

Traffic Air Pollution and Oxidized LDL

BACKGROUND: Epidemiologic studies indirectly suggest that air pollution accelerates atherosclerosis. We hypothesized that individual exposure to particulate matter (PM) derived from fossil fuel would correlate with plasma concentrations of oxidized low-density lipoprotein (LDL), taken as a marker of atherosclerosis. We tested this hypothesis in patients with diabetes, who are at high risk for atherosclerosis. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: In a cross-sectional study of non-smoking adult outpatients with diabetes we assessed individual chronic exposure to PM by measuring the area occupied by carbon in airway macrophages, collected by sputum induction and by determining the distance from the patient's residence to a major road, through geocoding. These exposure indices were regressed against plasma concentrations of oxidized LDL, von Willebrand factor and plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 (PAI-1). We could assess the carbon load of airway macrophages in 79 subjects (58 percent). Each doubling in the distance of residence from major roads was associated with a 0.027 µm(2) decrease (95% confidence interval (CI): -0.048 to -0.0051) in the carbon load of airway macrophages. Independently from other covariates, we found that each increase of 0.25 µm(2) [interquartile range (IQR)] in carbon load was associated with an increase of 7.3 U/L (95% CI: 1.3 to 13.3) in plasma oxidized LDL. Each doubling in distance of residence from major roads was associated with a decrease of -2.9 U/L (95% CI: -5.2 to -0.72) in oxidized LDL. Neither the carbon load of macrophages nor the distance from residence to major roads, were associated with plasma von Willebrand factor or PAI-1. CONCLUSIONS: The observed positive association, in a susceptible group of the general population, between plasma oxidized LDL levels and either the carbon load of airway macrophages or the proximity of the subject's residence to busy roads suggests a proatherogenic effect of traffic air pollution

Genome wide analysis of gene expression changes in skin from patients with type 2 diabetes

Non-healing chronic ulcers are a serious complication of diabetes and are a major healthcare problem. While a host of treatments have been explored to heal or prevent these ulcers from forming, these treatments have not been found to be consistently effective in clinical trials. An understanding of the changes in gene expression in the skin of diabetic patients may provide insight into the processes and mechanisms that precede the formation of non-healing ulcers. In this study, we investigated genome wide changes in gene expression in skin between patients with type 2 diabetes and non-diabetic patients using next generation sequencing. We compared the gene expression in skin samples taken from 27 patients (13 with type 2 diabetes and 14 non-diabetic). This information may be useful in identifying the causal factors and potential therapeutic targets for the prevention and treatment of diabetic related diseases

Curation of viral genomes: challenges, applications and the way forward

BACKGROUND: Whole genome sequence data is a step towards generating the 'parts list' of life to understand the underlying principles of Biocomplexity. Genome sequencing initiatives of human and model organisms are targeted efforts towards understanding principles of evolution with an application envisaged to improve human health. These efforts culminated in the development of dedicated resources. Whereas a large number of viral genomes have been sequenced by groups or individuals with an interest to study antigenic variation amongst strains and species. These independent efforts enabled viruses to attain the status of 'best-represented taxa' with the highest number of genomes. However, due to lack of concerted efforts, viral genomic sequences merely remained as entries in the public repositories until recently. RESULTS: VirGen is a curated resource of viral genomes and their analyses. Since its first release, it has grown both in terms of coverage of viral families and development of new modules for annotation and analysis. The current release (2.0) includes data for twenty-five families with broad host range as against eight in the first release. The taxonomic description of viruses in VirGen is in accordance with the ICTV nomenclature. A well-characterised strain is identified as a 'representative entry' for every viral species. This non-redundant dataset is used for subsequent annotation and analyses using sequenced-based Bioinformatics approaches. VirGen archives precomputed data on genome and proteome comparisons. A new data module that provides structures of viral proteins available in PDB has been incorporated recently. One of the unique features of VirGen is predicted conformational and sequential epitopes of known antigenic proteins using in-house developed algorithms, a step towards reverse vaccinology. CONCLUSION: Structured organization of genomic data facilitates use of data mining tools, which provides opportunities for knowledge discovery. One of the approaches to achieve this goal is to carry out functional annotations using comparative genomics. VirGen, a comprehensive viral genome resource that serves as an annotation and analysis pipeline has been developed for the curation of public domain viral genome data . Various steps in the curation and annotation of the genomic data and applications of the value-added derived data are substantiated with case studies

Association of Same-Day Discharge After Elective Percutaneous Coronary Intervention in the United States With Costs and Outcomes

Importance Same-day discharge (SDD) after elective percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is associated with lower costs and preferred by patients. However, to our knowledge, contemporary patterns of SDD after elective PCI with respect to the incidence, hospital variation, trends, costs, and safety outcomes in the United States are unknown. Objective To examine (1) the incidence and trends in SDD; (2) hospital variation in SDD; (3) the association between SDD and readmissions for bleeding, acute kidney injury (AKI), acute myocardial infarction (AMI), or mortality at 30, 90, and 365 days after PCI; and (4) hospital costs of SDD and its drivers. Design, Setting, and Participants This observational cross-sectional cohort study included 672 470 patients enrolled in the nationally representative Premier Healthcare Database who underwent elective PCI from 493 hospitals between January 2006 and December 2015 with 1-year follow-up. Exposures Same-day discharge, defined by identical dates of admission, PCI procedure, and discharge. Main Outcomes and Measures Death, bleeding requiring a blood transfusion, AKI and AMI at 30, 90, or 365 days after PCI, and costs from hospitals’ perspective, inflated to 2016. Results Among 672 470 elective PCIs, 221 997 patients (33.0%) were women, 30 711 (4.6%) were Hispanic, 51 961 (7.7%) were African American, and 491 823 (73.1%) were white. The adjusted rate of SDD was 3.5% (95% CI, 3.0%-4.0%), which increased from 0.4% in 2006 to 6.3% in 2015. We observed substantial hospital variation for SDD from 0% to 83% (median incidence rate ratio, 3.82; 95% CI, 3.48-4.23), implying an average (median) 382% likelihood of SDD at one vs another hospital. Among SDD (vs non-SDD) patients, there was no higher risk of death, bleeding, AKI, or AMI at 30, 90, or 365 days. Same-day discharge was associated with a large cost savings of $5128 per procedure (95$5006-$5248), driven by reduced supply and room and boarding costs. A shift from existing SDD practices to match top-decile SDD hospitals could annually save$129 million in this sample and $577 million if adopted throughout the United States. However, residual confounding may be present, limiting the precision of the cost estimates. Conclusions and Relevance Over 2006 to 2015, SDD after elective PCI was infrequent, with substantial hospital variation. Given the safety and large savings of more than$5000 per PCI associated with SDD, greater and more consistent use of SDD could markedly increase the overall value of PCI care

Prevalence of intestinal parasitic infections among HIV patients in Benin City, Nigeria

This study was carried out to determine the presence of intestinal parasites and their correlation with CD4+ T-cell counts and demographics among human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive patients in Benin City, Nigeria. Stool specimens from 2,000 HIV-positive patients and 500 controls (HIV-negative individuals) were examined for ova, cysts, or parasites, using standard procedures. In addition, patient's blood samples were analyzed for CD4 counts by flow cytometry. An overall prevalence rate of 15.3% was observed among HIV-positive patients while 6.2% was noted among non-HIV subjects. HIV status was a significant (P<0.0001) risk factor for acquiring intestinal parasitic infections. Male gender, CD4 count <200cell/µl, and diarrhea were significantly associated with an increased prevalence of intestinal parasitic infections among HIV-positive patients. The level of education, occupation, and source of water among HIV patients significantly (P<0.0001) affected the prevalence of intestinal parasitic infections. Ascaris lumbricoides was the most predominant parasite in both HIV-positive patients and controls. A CD4 count <200 cells/µl was significantly associated with only Isospora belli and Cryptosporidium infections. The presence of pathogenic intestinal parasites such as A. lumbricoides, hookworm, Giardia intestinalis, Entamoeba histolytica, Trichuris trichiura, and Taenia species among HIV-infected persons should not be neglected. Cryptosporidium species and I. belli were the opportunistic parasites observed in this study. Routine screening for intestinal parasites in HIV-positive patients is advocated

Effect of a Herbal-Leucine mix on the IL-1β-induced cartilage degradation and inflammatory gene expression in human chondrocytes

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Conventional treatments for the articular diseases are often effective for symptom relief, but can also cause significant side effects and do not slow the progression of the disease. Several natural substances have been shown to be effective at relieving the symptoms of osteoarthritis (OA), and preliminary evidence suggests that some of these compounds may exert a favorable influence on the course of the disease. The objective of this study was to investigate the anti-inflammatory/chondroprotective potential of a Herbal and amino acid mixture containing extract of the <it>Uncaria </it>tomentosa, <it>Boswellia spp</it>., <it>Lepidium meyenii and L-Leucine </it>on the IL-1β-induced production of nitric oxide (NO), glycosaminoglycan (GAG), matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs), aggrecan (ACAN) and type II collagen (COL2A1) in human OA chondrocytes and OA cartilage explants.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Primary OA chondrocytes or OA cartilage explants were pretreated with Herbal-<it>Leucine </it>mixture (HLM, 1-10 μg/ml) and then stimulated with IL-1β (5 ng/ml). Effect of HLM on IL-1β-induced gene expression of iNOS, MMP-9, MMP-13, ACAN and COL2A1 was verified by real time-PCR. Estimation of NO and GAG release in culture supernatant was done using commercially available kits.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>HLM tested in these <it>in vitro </it>studies was found to be an effective anti-inflammatory agent, as evidenced by strong inhibition of iNOS, MMP-9 and MMP-13 expression and NO production in IL-1β-stimulated OA chondrocytes (p < 0.05). Supporting these gene expression results, IL-1β-induced cartilage matrix breakdown, as evidenced by GAG release from cartilage explants, was also significantly blocked (p < 0.05). Moreover, in the presence of herbal-<it>Leucine </it>mixture (HLM) up-regulation of ACAN and COL2A1 expression in IL-1β-stimulated OA chondrocytes was also noted (p < 0.05). The inhibitory effects of HLM were mediated by inhibiting the activation of nuclear factor (NF)-kB in human OA chondrocytes in presence of IL-1β.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Our data suggests that HLM could be chondroprotective and anti-inflammatory agent in arthritis, switching chondrocyte gene expression from catabolic direction towards anabolic and regenerative, and consequently this approach may be potentially useful as a new adjunct therapeutic/preventive agent for OA or injury recovery.</p