Few more hidden variables which would fortify person centred approach of self-regulated learning

Upon reading the original article on person centred approach in self regulated learning, I felt that few more hidden variables tend to operate in the process of self-regulated learning. The motivation level of students and its regulation determines the willingness of students invested towards the process and it is imperative for the educators to gauge this process during mentoring sessions. Similarly, understanding the role of epistemological beliefs could also be considered as a pertinent role player in person centred apporach. I hope that this letter, penned from the existing literature and from personal experiences, would serve as an effective adjuvant to the original article

mKRISHI® Fisheries - A Blue Ocean Innovation

India is blessed with a vast coastline of around 8110 km. Every day around one million fishermen from 3,202 fishing villages venture into the sea to catch fishes. The allied sector of fish processing and marketing build their hope on this catch. While everyone is hoping for a good catch, climate change impacts and over-fishing has led to declining catch

Diesel price hikes and farmer distress: the myth and the reality

FuelsDiesel oilPricesFarmers attitudesPumpingCostsGroundwater irrigationWellsOwnershipEconomic impactWater productivityFarm incomeMilk production

Generation of serine/threonine check points in HN(C)N spectra

We describe here a simple modification of the HN(C)N experiment for the generation of serine/threonine check points in the three-dimensional experiment. The various 'triplet of residue' specific peak patterns in the spectra are documented for ease of analysis and sequential backbone resonance assignment. The performance of this experiment, referred to as HN(C)N-ST, is demonstrated using two proteins, one properly folded and the other completely denatured. It is noteworthy that, even in the denatured protein, where spectral dispersions are rather poor, about 90% of the sequential connectivities through the chain could be established from this single experiment. This would have great implications for structural genomics efforts

Design, Synthesis and Pharmacological Evaluation of Novel Heterocyclic PCSK9 Inhibitors as Antihyperlipidemic Agents

Medicinal chemistry primarily aims to discover novel chemical molecule which have the potential to prevent or treat a disease / infection. According to the WHO reports, Hyperlipidemia is one of the leading causes of death globally. Therefore, the current work aimed to design and synthesize some novel antihyperlipidemic compounds. Based on the literature review, PCSK9 has been considered as potential therapeutic target for selective LDLR regulation in the treatment of hyperlipidemia. Based on the literature review, pharmacophoric features such as 1 HBD, 1 HBA and 1 Aromatic ring were identified. Hence a scaffold library has been generated with 150 newly designed ligands which were screened with high docking score against PCSK9 using Autodock4.2.6. software and further optimized by drug likeliness properties such as Lipinski rule of five and ADMET properties. All the designed ligands were found to obey lipinski’s rule of five and possess drug likeliness property. Results of the in silico toxicity studies showed that all the designed compounds found to be non-toxic. Based on high docking scores and synthetic feasibility ligand 7, ligand 8, ligand 10, ligand 12 and ligand 13 was selected for synthesis. All the selected ligands were chemically synthesized with different aromatic carboxylic acids. Completion of the reaction was determined by TLC. The synthesized compounds are labelled as VD1, VD2, VD3, VD4 and VD5. The purity of the synthesized compounds was checked by determining Melting point. The chemical nature of synthesized compounds was characterized by different spectral studies such as IR, 1HNMR and LC- MS spectroscopy. All the synthesized compounds were subjected to acute oral toxicity studies as per the OECD Guidelines 423 to access the toxicity and also to fix the dose. The LD50 value of the test compound VD1, VD2, VD3, VD4 and VD5 does not found to 2000mg/kg and also no mortality was observed. Based on high docking score CompoundVD1 was selected for further pharmacological evaluation. The dose 100mg/kg and 200mg/kg were selected. In vivo antihyperlipidemic activity was evaluated for compound VD1 against HFD induce Hyperlipidemia in wistar rats. The rats were divided into five groups of 6 animals each. From In vivo activity study, it was found that the body weight of Group B rats (rats treated with HFD) were significantly increased (P < 0.001) in comparison with normal control rats. The increment in the body weight was reduced considerably (P < 0.001) by the administration of Atorvastatin and test compound VD1 (200mg/kg and 100mg/kg). However, Group D (200mg/kg) showed decrease in body weight to normal as that of Group E. The level of serum TC, TG, LDL, VLDL were significantly increased (P < 0.001) in disease Control group in comparison with normal control group. Administration of test compound VD1 at the dose of 100mg/kg and 200mg/kg showed considerable reduction in serum TC, TG, LDL, VLDL in comparison with disease control. In comparison of the two doses of test group, the test compound at the dose of 200mg/kg was revealed considerable reduction of LDL and VLDL as that of Atorvastatin treated group. The level of serum HDL were significantly decreased (P<0.001) in disease Control group in comparison with normal control group. Administration of test compound VD1 at the dose of 100mg/kg and 200mg/kg showed considerable raised serum HDL in comparison with disease control. In comparison of the two doses of test group, the test compound at the dose of 200mg/kg was revealed considerable raise in HDL as that of Atorvastatin treated group. It has been shown that the Atherogenic index is strong marker to predict the risk of atherosclerosis and CVD. Test compound showed significant reduction of AI in compared to disease control group. From the histopathological studies, the compound VD1 at 200mg/kg normalize the tissue of both liver and heart compared to disease control group. CONCLUSION: Drug design approach as well as clinical studies has revealed that the PCSK9 have a crucial role in LDLR regulation for the treatment of Hyperlipidemia. The present study also provides important structural insight of benzoxazole, amino triazole and oxadiazole in designing better PCSK9 inhibitor as potent antihyperlipdimic agents. The designed compounds were docked against PCSK9 using Autodock4.2.6. The synthesized compounds VD1, VD2, VD3, VD4 and VD5 found to obey Lipinski’s rule of five and also possess drug likeliness property. Based on high docking score Compound VD1 has been selected for evaluating in vivo antihyperlipidemic activity and it found to reduce LDL level effectively with significance of P value 0.001 when compared to the standard drug Atorvastatin. Further evaluation studies including in vitro, in vivo antihyperlipidemic screening and PCSK9 enzyme Inhibition assay method using ELISA kit. will be performed for all the remaining synthesized compound (VD2, VD3, VD4, VD5) in future

Transfersomes as a Carrier for Transdermal Delivery of Acarbose

This study was to investigate the possible influence of Acarbose on glucagons like peptide-1 release and gastric emptying in type 2 diabetic patients after mixed test meal. It concluded that hyper-glycaemic type 2 diabetic patients, ingestion of Acarbose with a mixed test meal failed to enhance glucogon like peptide-1 release and did not influence gastric emptying.On the basis of these results, the Acarbose trnasfersomes (Formulation-3) showed better characteristic behaviour. The drug entrapment in formulation – 3 is higher than the other formulations. The diffusion study of Acarbose transfersome gave extended release of the drug which suffices to decreased dose, lesser frequent dose of treatment and more patient compliance. In anti - diabetic studies, the formulation - 3 considerable decrease of blood glucose by topical application, when compared with other formulation. This proved its targeting efficiency. So it was concluded that Acarbose transfersomes (Formulation – 3) was a better and efficient formulation than existing formulations

Elements of Effective Communication

Communication is central to the success of human beings and organizations. The ability to effectively communicate at work, home and in life is probably one of the most important sets of skills a person needs. Effective communication is not just a business skill-it is a life skill and the most important source of personal power at work, family and social situations. Communication is the process of understanding and being understood through ideas, facts, thoughts and emotions. Good communication is determined not by how well we say things but by how well we have been understood. (www.careerindia.com) Communication is a process by which message is conveyed to someone or a group of people. If the message is conveyed clearly and unambiguously, and is received by the receiver in the same way as intended by the sender, then communication is said to be effective. If the message reaches the receiver in a distorted form or somehow fails to create meaning or understanding, the communicator should realize that his/her communication has been affected by barriers. So we can say that communication becomes successful only if the receiver understands what the sender is trying to convey. The feedback received by the sender from the receiver allows the sender to determine how the message was interpreted and, if necessary, whether there is an opportunity to modify future messages. A careful communicator will remember that “to effectively communicate, we must realize that we are all different in the way we perceive the world and use this understanding as a guide to our communication with other.” An effective communicator anticipates the unlimited ways a message can be understood or misunderstood. Thus the communicator must not only take care of his/her message but also he/she has to keep his/her audience’s background in mind to ensure his/her communication receives desired feedback and his/her communication goal is achieved. In this context, John Powells’s observations sound sensible: “Communication works for those who work at it.” You can be sure of your communication skills when you get the ability to act and react quickly at a subconscious level

The effect of fuel and fuel-oxidizer combinations on ZnO nanoparticles synthesized by solution combustion technique

We report on the synthesis of nanocrystalline ZnO particles by solution combustion technique using new organic fuels such as l-Glutamine, Leucine and l-Valine. The thermal decomposition and combustion of nitrate-organic fuels (precursors) were investigated through TG-DTA and XRD techniques. The results show that, the nitrate-organic fuel (precursor) gels exhibit self-propagating behavior at 400 °C after ignition in air. The effect of fuel and fuel to oxidizer ratio on structural properties of as-synthesized ZnO powder was investigated. It was observed that, the particle size of as-synthesized ZnO powder depends on F/O ratio, which influences the combustion process. The detailed analysis on the structure of as-synthesized ZnO powder was carried out by Rietveld refinement on XRD data and through TEM studies. Further, adiabatic temperature (Tad) was calculated through thermodynamic theoretical calculations for different fuel to oxidizer ratios. The results were discussed on the basis of the correlations established between the Tad, nature of the combustion and structural properties of the resulting powders

EFFECT OF SALINITY GRADIENT SOLAR POND UPON ADDITION OF CaCO3

This study involves the experimental optimisation of the performance of with and without adding CaCO3 in solar pond. The experiment was carried out at Government College of Engineering, Salem, India. Readings were taken for a period of 10 days. The temperature distribution and the amount of heat energy stored were evaluated. For comparison of ambient temperature and three convective zones temperature, the solar pond of volume 0.176 m3 and height of 0.45 m was constructed. The shape of the solar pond is trapezoidal and the inclination angle of the pond is 56º. The temperatures of the solar pond with and without adding CaCO3 were obtained as 50.7º C and 46º C respectively. The solar pond at lower convective zone (LCZ) indicated an increase of 10.2% in temperature. The difference between the amounts of heat energy stored is 12.6 kJ. From the result it is concluded that by adding CaCO3 increases the temperature of lower convective zone (LCZ) and also increases the amount of heat energy stored in the solar pond