π\piVAE: Encoding stochastic process priors with variational autoencoders

Stochastic processes provide a mathematically elegant way model complex data. In theory, they provide flexible priors over function classes that can encode a wide range of interesting assumptions. In practice, however, efficient inference by optimisation or marginalisation is difficult, a problem further exacerbated with big data and high dimensional input spaces. We propose a novel variational autoencoder (VAE) called the prior encoding variational autoencoder ($\pi$VAE). The $\pi$VAE is finitely exchangeable and Kolmogorov consistent, and thus is a continuous stochastic process. We use $\pi$VAE to learn low dimensional embeddings of function classes. We show that our framework can accurately learn expressive function classes such as Gaussian processes, but also properties of functions to enable statistical inference (such as the integral of a log Gaussian process). For popular tasks, such as spatial interpolation, $\pi$VAE achieves state-of-the-art performance both in terms of accuracy and computational efficiency. Perhaps most usefully, we demonstrate that the low dimensional independently distributed latent space representation learnt provides an elegant and scalable means of performing Bayesian inference for stochastic processes within probabilistic programming languages such as Stan

A randomized study comparing rectally administered misoprostol after spinal anesthesia versus intramuscular oxytocin for prevention of postpartum hemorrhage in caesarean section

Background: Post-Partum Hemorrhage (PPH) is the commonest cause of maternal death worldwide. Studies suggest that the use of Misoprostol may be beneficial in clinical settings where oxytocin is unavailable. However studies are limited that show its use in prevention of PPH in high risk pregnancy involving elective caesarean section. Therefore our aim of study is to compare the effectiveness of rectal misoprostol with intramuscular oxytocin in the prevention of postpartum hemorrhage in cesarean sections.Methods: In a double-blind randomized controlled trial, 200 pregnant women who had cesarean sections were assigned into two groups: to receive either oxytocin intramuscularly or misoprostol rectally after spinal anesthesia.Results: There was no significant difference between the two groups about change in postpartum hemoglobin, need for blood transfusion and incidence of PPH. We also did not observe any significant difference in any side effects.  Conclusions: Misoprostol may be considered as an alternative for oxytocin in low resource clinical settings.

Nevirapine-induced Stevens-Johnson syndrome from a tertiary care hospital in Central India

A 42 year old man, a known case of AIDS receiving antiretroviral therapy – stavudine, lamivudine, and nevirapine since 4 weeks, was admitted with erythematous rash, with blisters, and abnormal liver function test. A diagnosis of Steven-Johnson syndrome was made excluding other opportunistic infection and differential diagnosis. Nevirapine was discontinued until the patient recovered. After recovery patient was started with stavudine, lamivudine, and efavirenz treatment without re-challenge with nevirapine

A case of Stevens-Johnson syndrome due to rifampicin

A 25 year old female known case of category II pulmonary Tuberculosis was on anti-coch’s treatment in the FDC of rifampicin, isoniazid, pyrazinamide, ethambutol and Streptomycin. Fifteen days after the commencement of Cat II anti TB treatment she developed diffuse erythematous rash on face, trunk and both extremities which turned into blisters. There were ulcers on oral and genital cavity. A diagnosis of Stevens Johnson’s syndrome was made. The patient had a history of cat I pulmonary TB and treated for 8 months and at the end of 8th month she was sputum smear negative. Four months later she had a relapse of sputum smear positive for pulmonary TB. She responded to the stoppage of drugs and oral/inj. Corticosteroids, antihistaminics and antibiotics

Bioactive Natural Products from Plants and Biotechnological Approaches for their Production

Bioactive natural products are economically important as drugs, fragrances, pigments, food additives and pesticides. The biotechnological tools are important to select, multiply, improve and analyze medicinal plants for production of such products. The utilization of medicinal plant cells for the production of natural or recombinant compounds of commercial interest has gained increasing attention over the past decades. Plant tissue culture systems are possible source of valuable medicinal compounds, fragrances and colorants, which cannot be produced by microbial cells or chemical synthesis. In vitro production of bioactive natural products in plant cell suspension culture has been reported from various medicinal plants and bioreactors are the key step towards commercial production. Genetic transformation is a powerful tool for enhancing the productivity of novel products; especially by Agrobacterium tumefacians. Combinatorial biosynthesis is another approach in the generation of novel natural products and for the production of rare and expensive natural products. Recent advances in the molecular biology, enzymology and bioreactor technology of plant cell culture suggest that these systems may become a viable source of important secondary metabolites. Genetic fingerprinting could be a powerful tool in the field of medicinal plants to be used for correct germplasm identification. In addition, when linked to emerging tools such as metabolomics and proteomics, providing fingerprints of the plant's metabolites or protein composition, it gives data on phenotypic variation, caused by growth conditions or environmental factors, and also yield data on the genes involved in the biosynthesis. DNA profiling techniques like DNA microarrays serve as suitable high throughput tools for the simultaneous analysis of multiple genes and analysis of gene expression that becomes necessary for providing clues about regulatory mechanisms, biochemical pathways and broader cellular functions. New and powerful tools in functional genomics can be used in combination with metabolomics to elucidate biosynthetic pathways of natural products

Interpolative Reich-Rus-Ciric and Hardy-Rogers Contraction on Quasi-Partial b-Metric Space and Related Fixed Point Results

[EN] The aim of this paper was to obtain common fixed point results by using an interpolative contraction condition given by Karapinar in the setting of complete metric space. Here in this paper, we have redefined the Reich-Rus-Ciric type contraction and Hardy-Rogers type contraction in the framework of quasi-partial b-metric space and proved the corresponding common fixed point theorem by adopting the notion of interpolation. The results are further validated with the application based on them.Mishra, VN.; Sánchez Ruiz, LM.; Gautam, P.; Verma, S. (2020). Interpolative Reich-Rus-Ciric and Hardy-Rogers Contraction on Quasi-Partial b-Metric Space and Related Fixed Point Results. Mathematics. 8(9):1-11. https://doi.org/10.3390/math8091598S11189Banach, S. (1922). Sur les opérations dans les ensembles abstraits et leur application aux équations intégrales. Fundamenta Mathematicae, 3, 133-181. doi:10.4064/fm-3-1-133-181Shukla, S. (2013). Partial b-Metric Spaces and Fixed Point Theorems. Mediterranean Journal of Mathematics, 11(2), 703-711. doi:10.1007/s00009-013-0327-4MATTHEWS, S. G. (1994). Partial Metric Topology. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 728(1 General Topol), 183-197. doi:10.1111/j.1749-6632.1994.tb44144.xKARAPINAR, E. (2018). Revisiting the Kannan Type Contractions via Interpolation. Advances in the Theory of Nonlinear Analysis and its Application, 85-87. doi:10.31197/atnaa.431135Reich, S. (1971). Some Remarks Concerning Contraction Mappings. Canadian Mathematical Bulletin, 14(1), 121-124. doi:10.4153/cmb-1971-024-9Hardy, G. E., & Rogers, T. D. (1973). A Generalization of a Fixed Point Theorem of Reich. Canadian Mathematical Bulletin, 16(2), 201-206. doi:10.4153/cmb-1973-036-0Karapinar, E., Agarwal, R., & Aydi, H. (2018). Interpolative Reich–Rus–Ćirić Type Contractions on Partial Metric Spaces. Mathematics, 6(11), 256. doi:10.3390/math6110256Karapınar, E., Alqahtani, O., & Aydi, H. (2018). On Interpolative Hardy-Rogers Type Contractions. Symmetry, 11(1), 8. doi:10.3390/sym11010008Aydi, H., Karapinar, E., & Roldán López de Hierro, A. (2019). ω-Interpolative Ćirić-Reich-Rus-Type Contractions. Mathematics, 7(1), 57. doi:10.3390/math7010057Debnath, P., & de La Sen, M. de L. (2019). Set-Valued Interpolative Hardy–Rogers and Set-Valued Reich–Rus–Ćirić-Type Contractions in b-Metric Spaces. Mathematics, 7(9), 849. doi:10.3390/math7090849Alqahtani, B., Fulga, A., & Karapınar, E. (2018). Fixed Point Results on Δ-Symmetric Quasi-Metric Space via Simulation Function with an Application to Ulam Stability. Mathematics, 6(10), 208. doi:10.3390/math6100208Aydi, H., Chen, C.-M., & Karapınar, E. (2019). Interpolative Ćirić-Reich-Rus Type Contractions via the Branciari Distance. Mathematics, 7(1), 84. doi:10.3390/math7010084Aydi, H., & Karapinar, E. (2012). A Meir-Keeler common type fixed point theorem on partial metric spaces. Fixed Point Theory and Applications, 2012(1). doi:10.1186/1687-1812-2012-26Ćirić, L., Samet, B., Aydi, H., & Vetro, C. (2011). Common fixed points of generalized contractions on partial metric spaces and an application. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 218(6), 2398-2406. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2011.07.005Karapınar, E., Chi, K. P., & Thanh, T. D. (2012). A Generalization of Ćirić Quasicontractions. Abstract and Applied Analysis, 2012, 1-9. doi:10.1155/2012/518734Mlaiki, N., Abodayeh, K., Aydi, H., Abdeljawad, T., & Abuloha, M. (2018). Rectangular Metric-Like Type Spaces and Related Fixed Points. Journal of Mathematics, 2018, 1-7. doi:10.1155/2018/3581768Gupta, A., & Gautam, P. (2016). Topological Structure of Quasi-Partial b-Metric Spaces. International Journal of Pure Mathematical Sciences, 17, 8-18. doi:10.18052/www.scipress.com/ijpms.17.8Gupta, A., & Gautam, P. (2015). Quasi-partial b-metric spaces and some related fixed point theorems. Fixed Point Theory and Applications, 2015(1). doi:10.1186/s13663-015-0260-

PriorVAE: Encoding spatial priors with VAEs for small-area estimation

Gaussian processes (GPs), implemented through multivariate Gaussian distributions for a finite collection of data, are the most popular approach in small-area spatial statistical modelling. In this context they are used to encode correlation structures over space and can generalise well in interpolation tasks. Despite their flexibility, off-the-shelf GPs present serious computational challenges which limit their scalability and practical usefulness in applied settings. Here, we propose a novel, deep generative modelling approach to tackle this challenge, termed PriorVAE: for a particular spatial setting, we approximate a class of GP priors through prior sampling and subsequent fitting of a variational autoencoder (VAE). Given a trained VAE, the resultant decoder allows spatial inference to become incredibly efficient due to the low dimensional, independently distributed latent Gaussian space representation of the VAE. Once trained, inference using the VAE decoder replaces the GP within a Bayesian sampling framework. This approach provides tractable and easy-to-implement means of approximately encoding spatial priors and facilitates efficient statistical inference. We demonstrate the utility of our VAE two stage approach on Bayesian, small-area estimation tasks

Assessment of knowledge of pharmacotherapeutics amongst medical undergraduates of a tertiary care teaching hospital of Chhattisgarh, India: a questionnaire based study

Background: Knowledge of pharmacology forms the basis of rational pharmacotherapy practice. Teaching the medical students about systematic application of pharmacology in patients’ care forms an essential component. It facilitates the medical students to develop a methodical approach in solving patients’ clinical problems.Methods: A questionnaire-based study was conducted, at Government Medical College Rajnandgaon involving second year MBBS students. Total 100 students participated in the study.Results: Hundred percent of the students responded that pharmacology was presently taught to them, seventy nine percent of them agreed with the fact that pharmacology was preferred to pass the MBBS, eighty eight percent of them responded that in pharmacokinetics was the least preferred topic, ninety seven of them were not aware of the essential drug list. Their suggestions regarding the change in teaching methodology was recorded.Conclusions: This study concludes that efforts are needed to develop a curriculum that encompasses important aspects of clinical pharmacology and therapeutics along with incorporation of the useful suggestions by the undergraduate students