Burden of Hepatitis B and C Infection According to Socioeconomic Status

Objective: To determine the burden of hepatitis B and C infection according to socioeconomic status.Methodology: This cross-sectional study was conducted at medicine department of Peoples University of Medical and Health science study duration was 1 year from March 2016 to February 2017. All the hepatitis B and Hepatitis C infected patients with all age groups either gender were included in the study. All the selected patients were interviewed regarding history of previous surgeries, needle pricking history, tattooing, barber’s shaving and birth history to know the suspected transmitted risk factors. All the patients were also interviewed regarding socioeconomic status. All the data was recorded in predesigned proforma.Results: Total 200 cases were studied, most of the cases 110(55.0%) were found with age group of 31-45 years. Male were most common in this study 120(60.0%). Almost all of the male patients had a history of barber shaving, on other hand extra uses of needles/syringes were most common in both male and female as 125(63.5%) out of total study population. Hepatitis C infection was most common at 71.0%, hepatitis infection was 23.5%, while only 5.5% patients were with co-infection of HCV and HBV. The poor population is mostly infected by hepatitis B and C 48.0%. Patients having poor socioeconomic status were found significantly associated with hepatitis C infection p-value 0.001. No significant difference was in hepatitis B infection according to socioeconomic status p-value 0.282.Conclusion: It is concluded that poor socioeconomic status was significantly associated with hepatitis C infection. Socioeconomic status not a direct risk factor of hepatitis B and C, but it is significantly responsible to develop the other risk factors.&nbsp

Trust-based energy efficient routing protocol for wireless sensor networks

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) consist of a number of distributed sensor nodes that are connected within a specified area. Generally, WSN is used for monitoring purposes and can be applied in many fields including health, environmental and habitat monitoring, weather forecasting, home automation, and in the military. Similar, to traditional wired networks, WSNs require security measures to ensure a trustworthy environment for communication. However, due to deployment scenarios nodes are exposed to physical capture and inclusion of malicious node led to internal network attacks hence providing the reliable delivery of data and trustworthy communication environment is a real challenge. Also, malicious nodes intentionally dropping data packets, spreading false reporting, and degrading the network performance. Trust based security solutions are regarded as a significant measure to improve the sensor network security, integrity, and identification of malicious nodes. Another extremely important issue for WSNs is energy conversation and efficiency, as energy sources and battery capacity are often limited, meaning that the implementation of efficient, reliable data delivery is an equally important consideration that is made more challenging due to the unpredictable behaviour of sensor nodes. Thus, this research aims to develop a trust and energy efficient routing protocol that ensures a trustworthy environment for communication and reliable delivery of data. Firstly, a Belief based Trust Evaluation Scheme (BTES) is proposed that identifies malicious nodes and maintains a trustworthy environment among sensor nodes while reducing the impact of false reporting. Secondly, a State based Energy Calculation Scheme (SECS) is proposed which periodically evaluates node energy levels, leading to increased network lifetime. Finally, as an integrated outcome of these two schemes, a Trust and Energy Efficient Path Selection (TEEPS) protocol has been proposed. The proposed protocol is benchmarked with A Trust-based Neighbour selection system using activation function (AF-TNS), and with A Novel Trust of dynamic optimization (Trust-Doe). The experimental results show that the proposed protocol performs better as compared to existing schemes in terms of throughput (by 40.14%), packet delivery ratio (by 28.91%), and end-to-end delay (by 41.86%). In conclusion, the proposed routing protocol able to identify malicious nodes provides a trustworthy environment and improves network energy efficiency and lifetime

Agricultural Waste Management by Hydrothermal Carbonization

There has been a huge emphasis on converting waste into energy in developing countries like India since a couple of decades now. Agriculture is a huge industry in India and produces huge amount of agricultural waste which goes around 350 million tons every year.  Out of this huge weight of waste more than 40 million tons is sugarcane bagasse. Only a small percentage of this waste is collected and out of that, less than 20% gets advanced treatments like incineration, pyrolysis etc. and the rest of it ends up in landfills. In this study Hydrothermal Carbonization of bagasse is carried out in order to raise its carbon content and achieve a higher calorific value. The waste after undergoing the HTC is called hydrochar and mostly resembles the properties of lignite coal. A number of tests are performed on the feedstock at 200 ° C and 220 ° C for three reaction periods viz. 2, 4 and 6 hours. The yield of the char is found to decreases with increase in temperature and retention time whereas the Carbon percentage shows a positive trend and goes as high as 69.1 % at 220° C with Calorific value as 24.44 MJ/kg at 6 hours reaction period

DOSE RESPONSE OF MTLN3 CELLS TO SERIAL DILUTIONS OF ARSENIC TRIOXIDE AND IONIZING RADIATION

MTLn3 cells derived from mouse mammary epithelium are known to be highly malignant and are resistant to both radio- and chemo-therapy. We exposed MTLn3 cells to various doses of inorganic Arsenic trioxide (As2O3) in combination with ionizing radiation. Cells were treated with a series of As2O3 concentrations ranging from 20 μM to 1.22 nM for 8 hour, 24 hour and 48 hour periods. Post-treated cell proliferation was quantified by measuring mitochondrial activity and DNA analysis. Cells exposed to radiation and As2O3 at concentration greater than 1.25 μM showed apoptosis and radiations alone treated cells were statistically not different from the control. Hormesis was observed for As2O3 concentrations in the range of 0.078 μM to 0.625 μM while the combined chemo and radiation treatments of the cells did not affect the hormetic effect. We have demonstrated that As2O3 (in the presence and absence of ionizing radiation) in specific low concentrations induced apoptosis in the otherwise chemoresistant cancer cells. This low concentrationmediated cell death is immediately followed by a surge in cell survival. Low dosing dosimetry is highly desirable in metronomic therapy however, it has a narrow window since necrosis, hormesis, apoptosis and other dose-dependent biological processes take place in this region. Further quantifiable dosimetry is highly desired for routine clinical practice

Wireless sensor network performance analysis and effect of blackhole and sinkhole attacks

The widespread usage of Wireless sensor networks in various fields and application make it vulnerable to variety of security threats and attacks. These security attacks occur when an adversary compromised a sensor node by inject false measurements and divert real time network traffic. Sinkhole and Blackhole attacks are very common attacks in network, where an attacker advertises un-authorized routing update in network. To deal with these types of attacks, there is a need to tighten the network security and prevent from attackers. In this study, we discuss security threats and presents the effects of Black and Sink hole attacks. Further, the study presents related work and current issues in wireless sensor network. The simulation results illustrated that, how these attacks affect the network performance

Geographical Forwarding Methods in Vehicular Ad hoc Networks

Vehicular ad hoc networks are new and emerging technology and special class of mobile ad hoc networks that provide wireless communication between vehicles without any fixed infrastructure. Geographical routing has appeared as one of the most scalable and competent routing schemes for vehicular networks. A number of strategies have been proposed for forwarding the packets in geographical direction of the destination, where information of direct neighbors is gained through navigational services. Due to dynamically changing topologies and high mobility neighbor information become outdated. To address these common issues in network different types of forwarding strategies have been proposed. In this review paper, we concentrate on beaconless forwarding methods and their forwarding methods in detail

Stability of Silk and Collagen Protein Materials in Space

Collagen and silk materials, in neat forms and as silica composites, were flown for 18 months on the International Space Station [Materials International Space Station Experiment (MISSE)-6] to assess the impact of space radiation on structure and function. As natural biomaterials, the impact of the space environment on films of these proteins was investigated to understand fundamental changes in structure and function related to the future utility in materials and medicine in space environments. About 15% of the film surfaces were etched by heavy ionizing particles such as atomic oxygen, the major component of the low-Earth orbit space environment. Unexpectedly, more than 80% of the silk and collagen materials were chemically crosslinked by space radiation. These findings are critical for designing next-generation biocompatible materials for contact with living systems in space environments, where the effects of heavy ionizing particles and other cosmic radiation need to be considered

Hypokalaemic periodic paralysis in patients presenting with severe limb paralysis at PUMHSW Nawabshah

Objective: To determine the hypokalemic periodic paralysis rate in patients presenting with severe limb paralysis at PUMHSW Nawabshah. Methodology: This descriptive was conducted Medical department of Peoples Medical College & hospital Nawabshah from October 2017 to April 2018. All the patients having age 20-50 years of either gender with severe limb paralysis at Intensive care unit & medical ward of Peoples Medical College Hospital Nawabshah were included. Demographics information was obtained. After clinical examination along with detailed medical history regarding hypokalemic periodic paralysis (HPP) and severe limb paralysis, patients were subjected to relevant investigations especially potassium and x-rays. Data was collected via self-made proforma. Results: Total of 150 patients were studied; their mean age was 33.4±5.69 years.  22(14.7%) study subjects were female and 128(85.3%) were male patients. Hypokalemic periodic paralysis was seen in 77(51.3%) patients, presenting with severe limb paralysis. There was significant impact of age and gender on frequency of Hypokalemic periodic paralysis. Conclusion: Hypokalemic periodic paralysis (HPP) is a significant factor of acute flaccid paralysis, as well as prompt management and early recognition of this condition would give pleasing result and in some cases, it would prevent additional attacks