Further Rogers-Ramanujan type identities for modified lattice paths

Recently, the authors introduced the modified lattice paths which generalize Agarwal-Bressoud weighted lattice paths. Using these new objects they interpreted combinatorially two basic series identities which led to two new combinatorial Rogers-Ramanujan type identities. In this paper we obtain three more Rogers-Ramanujan type identities for modified lattice paths. This also leads to three new 3-way combinatorial identities

Nodding Syndrome - an Indian case

Background: Although nodding syndrome is a catastrophic epileptic encephalopathy, it is reported only from Africa so far. We describe the first case from the Indian sub-continent.Methods: A ten-year-old child who had an episode of Guillain Barre syndrome with incomplete recovery developed emaciation secondary to bulbar palsy and depression. Subsequently, nine months later she developed head nodding, spastic quadriparesis, choreo-athetoid movement disorder, global aphasia and depression. She improved with sodium valproate, nutritional rehabilitation and anti-spasticity and anti-depressant medications.Results: First case of nodding syndrome is described from India where possible etiology is malnutrition. She had anemia, her electroencephalography revealed parieto-occipital inter-ictal epileptiform discharges and Magnetic Resonance Imaging showed diffuse cerebral atrophy.Conclusion: Nodding syndrome is an epileptic encephalopathy of nutritional origin beyond geographical barriers but amenable to anti-convulsants and nutritional rehabilitation.Keywords: Nodding syndrome, India

A Review of Fluoride Removal from Groundwater

Most of the arid and semiarid zones of the Indian subcontinent are seriously affected by the fluorosis problem due to high concentration of the fluoride in ground water. Due to leaching of fluoride from the fluoride bearing rocks, the groundwater gets contaminated with fluoride. The different techniques for fluoride removal namely, the Activated alumina, the Nalgonda technique, bone charcoal, contact precipitation, electro-dialysis, reverse osmosis, ion-exchange, clay column, bio-adsorbents and MgO are discussed in detail. Their advantages and disadvantages together with the applicability in actual use also been discussed in the paper

Efficacy of colour doppler imaging in prediction of placenta accrete

Background: In present scenario of increasing cases of previous caesarean section the diagnosis of Placenta accreta preoperatively is of great value to the attending obstetrician. This helps in preparing, counselling the patient and also in assembling a multidisciplinary team for effective peripartum clinical management of these patients to prevent maternal morbidity and mortality.Methods: One hundred patient with persistent placenta previa after 28 weeks gestation were screened by grey scale B mode sonography. In suspicious cases of placenta accreta, further assessment by colour Doppler ultrasound was done. The color doppler imaging (CDI) criteria used were - diffuse intra parenchymal placental lacunar flow, focal intra parenchymal placental lacunar flow, bladder-uterine serosa interphase hypervascularity, prominent sub-placental venous complex and loss of sub-placental vascular signal in areas lacking peripheral sub-placental hypoechoic zone. Patients were prospectively followed up till delivery and the CDI findings were analysed with reference to final diagnosis made during caesarean section.Results: Six of hundred patients exhibited characteristic CDI patterns highly specific for placenta accreta according to the criteria used. In all 6 patients, morbidly adherent placenta was present intraoperatively. The sensitivity and specificity of CDI in the diagnosis of placenta accreta in presentstudy was 100%. Caesarean hysterectomy was required in five patients. Patients with CDI features of lacunar flow had higher incidence of blood loss, transfusion requirements and need for caesarean hysterectomy compared to patients with nonlacunar flow. The remaining 94 patients with placenta previa, not suspicious for placenta accreta on sonography underwent uncomplicated caesarean section.Conclusions: The use of CDI along with conventional grey-scale sonography improves the diagnostic accuracy for prediction of placenta accreta in patients with persistent placenta previa

Serum placental growth factor in late first trimester of pregnancy for prediction of preeclampsia in primigravida - a case control study

Background: We studied the correlation of serum PLGF levels at 11-14 weeks in primigravida for prediction of future preeclampsia in a prospective nested case control study and estimated the critical levels of PLGF for possible use as screening test.Methods: Subjects with preeclampsia/gestational hypertension were taken as cases with an equal number of controls.Results: Out of 300 participants, final analysis was possible in 291 subjects. Thirty five were cases; two had early PE, 15 late PE and 18 had GH. PLGF level was lower in cases (20 pg/ml) compared to controls (79 pg/ml). PLGF was significantly lower in PE cases (15 pg/ml) compared to GH cases (34 pg/ml). PLGF had maximum area under the ROC curve (AUC) for PE with value of 0.867. Further, late PE had more AUC (0.853) as compared to GH (0.759). The cut off value for prediction of PE was found to be <30 pg/ml with 88.2% sensitivity and 71.4% specificity.Conclusions: PLGF levels were significantly lower in first trimester serum samples of subjects who later developed either preeclampsia or gestational hypertension. PLGF had better detection rate for PE and late PE as compared to GH

Nodding syndrome- an Indian case

Background: Although nodding syndrome is a catastrophic epileptic encephalopathy, it is reported only from Africa so far. We describe the first case from the Indian sub-continent. Methods: A ten-year-old child who had an episode of Guillain Barre syndrome with incomplete recovery developed emaciation secondary to bulbar palsy and depression. Subsequently, nine months later she developed head nodding, spastic quadriparesis, choreo-athetoid movement disorder, global aphasia and depression. She improved with sodium valproate, nutritional rehabilitation and anti-spasticity and anti-depressant medications. Results: First case of nodding syndrome is described from India where possible etiology is malnutrition. She had anemia, her electroencephalography revealed parieto-occipital inter-ictal epileptiform discharges and Magnetic Resonance Imaging showed diffuse cerebral atrophy. Conclusion: Nodding syndrome is an epileptic encephalopathy of nutritional origin beyond geographical barriers but amenable to anti-convulsants and nutritional rehabilitation

Successful maternal outcome after vaginal delivery in a patient with Eisenmenger Syndrome

Patients with Eisenmenger syndrome are advised against pregnancy. Sometimes patients are diagnosed with Eisenmenger syndrome for the first time during pregnancy. This is what has happened in our case. A primigravida was diagnosed with ventricular septal defect with severe pulmonary artery hypertension for the first time during pregnancy at 34 weeks period of gestation. Management of such patients is challenging with different studies showing variable results. Here we describe such a case which was managed conservatively and was allowed to go into labour spontaneously with vacuum extraction during second stage which subsequently led to a favourable maternal outcome

Adsorptive and Photocatalytic Removal of Rhodamine B Dye from Water by using Copper Ferrite Polyaniline Nanocomposite

558-561Preparation of copper ferrite polyaniline nanocomposite (CF-PANI) and its use for photocatalytic degradation of Rhodamine B dye from aqueous solution has been studied. Copper ferrite (CuFe2O4), a magnetic ferrite (spinel) of nano dimension was synthesized by co-precipitation method. Polyaniline nanocomposite of copper ferrite was prepared by in situ polymerization and SEM technique was used for characterization. Adsorption and photo-degradation capacity of prepared nanocomposite was evaluated under different conditions

Genomic convergence and network analysis approach to identify candidate genes in Alzheimer's disease

BACKGROUND: Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is one of the leading genetically complex and heterogeneous disorder that is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. The underlying risk factors remain largely unclear for this heterogeneous disorder. In recent years, high throughput methodologies, such as genome-wide linkage analysis (GWL), genome-wide association (GWA) studies, and genome-wide expression profiling (GWE), have led to the identification of several candidate genes associated with AD. However, due to lack of consistency within their findings, an integrative approach is warranted. Here, we have designed a rank based gene prioritization approach involving convergent analysis of multi-dimensional data and protein-protein interaction (PPI) network modelling. RESULTS: Our approach employs integration of three different AD datasets- GWL,GWA and GWE to identify overlapping candidate genes ranked using a novel cumulative rank score (S(R)) based method followed by prioritization using clusters derived from PPI network. S(R) for each gene is calculated by addition of rank assigned to individual gene based on either p value or score in three datasets. This analysis yielded 108 plausible AD genes. Network modelling by creating PPI using proteins encoded by these genes and their direct interactors resulted in a layered network of 640 proteins. Clustering of these proteins further helped us in identifying 6 significant clusters with 7 proteins (EGFR, ACTB, CDC2, IRAK1, APOE, ABCA1 and AMPH) forming the central hub nodes. Functional annotation of 108 genes revealed their role in several biological activities such as neurogenesis, regulation of MAP kinase activity, response to calcium ion, endocytosis paralleling the AD specific attributes. Finally, 3 potential biochemical biomarkers were found from the overlap of 108 AD proteins with proteins from CSF and plasma proteome. EGFR and ACTB were found to be the two most significant AD risk genes. CONCLUSIONS: With the assumption that common genetic signals obtained from different methodological platforms might serve as robust AD risk markers than candidates identified using single dimension approach, here we demonstrated an integrated genomic convergence approach for disease candidate gene prioritization from heterogeneous data sources linked to AD. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/1471-2164-15-199) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Viral Induced Oxidative and Inflammatory Response in Alzheimer's Disease Pathogenesis with Identification of Potential Drug Candidates: A Systematic Review using Systems Biology Approach

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is genetically complex with multifactorial etiology. Here, we aim to identify the potential viral pathogens leading to aberrant inflammatory and oxidative stress response in AD along with potential drug candidates using systems biology approach. We retrieved protein interactions of amyloid precursor protein (APP) and tau protein (MAPT) from NCBI and genes for oxidative stress from NetAge, for inflammation from NetAge and InnateDB databases. Genes implicated in aging were retrieved from GenAge database and two GEO expression datasets. These genes were individually used to create protein-protein interaction network using STRING database (score≥0.7). The interactions of candidate genes with known viruses were mapped using virhostnet v2.0 database. Drug molecules targeting candidate genes were retrieved using the Drug- Gene Interaction Database (DGIdb). Data mining resulted in 2095 APP, 116 MAPT, 214 oxidative stress, 1269 inflammatory genes. After STRING PPIN analysis, 404 APP, 109 MAPT, 204 oxidative stress and 1014 inflammation related high confidence proteins were identified. The overlap among all datasets yielded eight common markers (AKT1, GSK3B, APP, APOE, EGFR, PIN1, CASP8 and SNCA). These genes showed association with hepatitis C virus (HCV), Epstein- Barr virus (EBV), human herpes virus 8 and Human papillomavirus (HPV). Further, screening of drugs targeting candidate genes, and possessing anti-inflammatory property, antiviral activity along with a suggested role in AD pathophysiology yielded 12 potential drug candidates. Our study demonstrated the role of viral etiology in AD pathogenesis by elucidating interaction of oxidative stress and inflammation causing candidate genes with common viruses along with the identification of potential AD drug candidates