Applications for RFID in pharmaceutical industry

Security and safety are two important features desired in pharmaceutical supply chain and achieving the same is a challenging task. The need to secure and authenticate pharmaceutical products has increased tremendously with the emerging counterfeit product market. The motivation to introduce counterfeit pharmaceutical products in the supply chain could be to gain rapid economic benefits or affecting the reputation of strong brand in the pharmaceutical industry. RFID technology can be used to deter counterfeiting attempts. It can also be used in various other domains in the pharmaceutical industry. The main aim of this paper is to outline all the applications of RFID in the pharmaceutical industry. After explaining the main applications, we discuss how information hiding techniques could be used with RFID to offer efficient expiry date management, pharmaceutical tamper detection, and fraud detection and prevention

Comparison of media selection in the U.S. and Indian advertising industries

Advertising is necessary to establish a brand and to increase the sale of the products. Media planning is an important phase of any advertising campaign. The purpose of this study was to determine the media types used in the advertising industries in India and in the U.S. Media professionals from five Indian advertising agencies and five U.S advertising agencies were interviewed to find out the media selection in both countries. The identification of media was then followed by the comparison of media selection in India and the U.S. The secondary research was carried out to find out media environment in both countries, which included information about the number of newspaper titles published, TV channels, and radio stations in both countries. The media selection depends upon different factors such as cost, geography and demographics. The secondary research was carried out to find out the differences in geography, demographics and culture between India and the U.S. The TV medium is the most important medium for advertising in both countries. Radio advertising is used in both countries but has become stagnant in India. The Internet is in its initial growing stage in India; however, in the U.S., the Internet has become the second most important medium. The major difference was found in the state of print media in India and in the U.S. In U.S., the use of print media is declining, but, in India, it is widely used for advertising. Other media types such as mobile, out-of-home, and social media are used in both countries, but the degree of the usage is different. The secondary research showed that the media environment in both countries is different. The number of newspaper titles is more in India than in the U.S. The number of TV stations is more in the U.S. than in India. The geographical area of the U.S is more than that of India, but the population in India is more than the population of the U.S. There are different ethnic groups in both countries. The literacy rate in the U.S. is more than India. There are differences in the cultures and etiquette. These factors affect the media selection and, thus, there are differences in media selection between both countries

SITUATIONAL AWARENESS WHILE FLYING A UAV: A COMPARISON OF VIDEO GAMER AND NON-VIDEO GAMER PILOTS

Unmanned aerial vehicles, also known as drones, are an important part of today’s society due to their vast use in various industries. However, there is a growing concern about the lack of situational awareness of drone operators due to the increase in the number of drone mishaps. This has led researchers to investigate if pilots or video game players would be better unmanned aerial vehicle operators due to the similarity of flying an aircraft and playing video games to flying a drone. Hence, the purpose of this study is to investigate whether the video game playing habits of pilots can affect their situational awareness while flying an unmanned aerial vehicle. This will be done by comparing the situational awareness of non-video game playing pilots and video game playing pilots while they operate a drone in a drone simulator. The study expects to find that pilots who play video games would have better situational awareness while flying a drone when compared to pilots who do not play video games. This study may help organizations that use unmanned aerial vehicles better select their operators. It can also be used to improve drone training methods by implementing the use of drones. Keywords: Situational Awareness, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Aviation Safety, Pilot, Video Game Player, Personnel Selectio

Jaffa Port, Israel: From a thriving port town to a socio-ethnic enclave

The material extant of the fortifications of Jaffa, the physical markers of memory, narrates the contrasting status and evolution of one of the oldest port towns in Israel: from grandiose to decline, from thriving multicultural neighbourhoods to immigrant communities over time, from town centre to marginalised significance and shifting centralities in the wake of political and economic events. Its town centre, propagating social interaction, existed through complex and evolving agricultural, industrial, and residential land uses. This port town bears a testimony to the dynamic and enormous shifts in land use, communities, and collective social memory. The alternate port of Tel Aviv came into existence during the revolt in 1936-39 by Arabs of Mandatory Palestine. The drastic decline of the Arab population in Jaffa and its environs and the rise in the Jewish population in the new modern city of Tel Aviv was an antagonistic process of negation and exclusion. The asymmetric planning of Tel Aviv that emerged in the early 1900s identified it as uncivilised geography, turning into a dilapidated district. Communal and national identities were built on the premise of antithesis giving rise to significant demographic transformations. This socio-spatial metamorphosis of Tel Aviv-Jaffa became a representational space leading to physical and cognitive boundaries evident in the planning policies. Since the mid-1980s, the spatial overturns have led to the radical restructuring of the urban space through gentrification with political and socio-economic implications such as population displacement and the production of urban alterities. This oxymoron of creative destruction suggests the tensions at the heart of urban life that embodies the erasure and re-inscription of culture and economics. This article will explore the historical evolution of the old port town, cultural geography, and the current state of exclusion and gentrification in Jaffa, and underlines the need for discourse on socio-spatial analysis and assessment for decision-making processes for urban heritage design.&nbsp

Applications of wireless sensor networks in pharmaceutical industry

Advances in wireless sensor networking have opened up new opportunities in healthcare systems. The future will see the integration of the abundance of existing specialized medical technology with pervasive, wireless networks. Radio frequency identification (RFID) and Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) are the two key elements of Pervasive computing and are considered as interrelated technologies. Although RFID has been used in various areas but it lacks intelligence that is its ability to process information and respond to real world events. People are using large scale WSN to monitor real-time environment status. RFID technology, if combined with other sensors, may enable a range of other applications that can exponentially increase visibility and monitoring. Combined with RFID a general sensor can be upgraded to intelligent wireless sensor (Smart node), having sensing, computation, communication into a single small device Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGA) With dazzling wireless technology now available, it's tempting for manufacturers to snatch up any wireless sensor that comes along as a means of optimizing processes and plant performance. This is especially true within the pharmaceutical industry, where vendors are plying industrial-strength wireless sensors for temperature, humidity and pressure, as well as sensitive process-monitoring wireless devices to support PAT applications. In this paper we surveyed the existing wireless sensor and RFID based technologies that target the healthcare application

Knowledge, attitude and practice regarding emergency contraceptives among married women of urban slum area

Background: Unprotected sexual intercourse & contraceptive failure lead to unintended pregnancies & unsafe abortions. Emergency contraceptives offer safe & effective emergency care intervention. The objective was to assess the knowledge, attitude & practice regarding emergency contraceptives among married women of reproductive age group and to study the influence of educational status on the awareness & willingness to use emergency contraceptives.Methods: Community based cross-sectional study was conducted from 1st May 2011- 30th Jan 2012 in 286 married women in age group 15-45 yrs residing in the field practice area of Urban Health Centre attached to Department of Community Medicine, Bagalkot, Karnataka. Data was collected by personal interview method with house-to-house visit by administering structured, pre-tested questionnaire to elicit information on knowledge, attitude & practice regarding emergency contraceptives. Chi square test was used to estimate statistical significant differences.Results: Out of total 286 females, majority were in the age group of 20-30 yrs, 94.40% were Hindus, majority i.e. 81.74% were homemakers & 59.79% were illiterate, 72.48% belonged to lower social class (class IV & V) according to modified B.G. Prasad classification. We found that 56% women had accepted one or other contraceptives. Only 12% women were aware about EC while among literates, 29% were aware about EC out of which only 4.38% had idea about the correct dosage, availability and side effects of the pills. Willingness to use EC was seen among 29% of women out of which majority i.e. 54.78% were literate and 68.32% were employed. Among the study population 3% of the women actually practiced emergency contraceptives. Educational status of females had significant association with awareness about EC pill (χ2=29.46) and positive attitude towards usage of EC pill (χ2=27.32).Conclusion: The awareness as well as the usage of emergency contraceptives is very low in our society. Still we are facing the problem of illiteracy in our country which is predominant in slum areas. More emphasis should be given to female education and empowerment in order to make them capable of taking decisions regarding their own reproductive health

Application of multi sensor data fusion based on Principal Component Analysis and Artificial Neural Network for machine tool thermal monitoring

Due to the various heat sources on a machine tool, there exists a complex temperature distribution across its structure. This causes an inherent thermal hysteresis which is undesirable as it affects the systematic tool –to-workpiece positioning capability. To monitor this, two physical quantities (temperature and strain) are measured at multiple locations. This article is concerned with the use of Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) to fuse this potentially large amount of data from multiple sources. PCA reduces the dimensionality of the data and thus reduces training time for the ANN which is being used for thermal modelling. This paper shows the effect of different levels of data compression and the application of rate of change of sensor values to reduce the effect of system hysteresis. This methodology has been successfully applied to the ram of a 5-axis gantry machine with 90 % correlation to the measured displacement

Effects of Natural Antioxidants on Motor and Cognitive Deficits in an Animal Model of Aging and Obesity and Dopaminergic-Like SH-SY5Y Cell Line

Aging is a universal phenomenon. One of the greatest challenges faced by the elderly population is to sustain a healthy standard of living. Advancing age is associated with increased motor and cognitive deficits. Loss of balance, falls, hip fractures, and poor memory all contribute to a decline in the quality of life of the aging population. While ongoing research is making advances to find therapeutic interventions for neurodegenerative disorders like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases, there is a pressing need to address deficits associated with normal aging. Increase in oxidative stress and a decline of antioxidant mechanisms with aging have been attributed to the incidence of deteriorated physical function, which is purported to commence in middle age. Therefore, in this study, we explored natural antioxidants that may have the potential to combat rising oxidative stress and weakening of physiological systems, thereby improving motor and cognitive function of the older population. We supplemented the diet of middle-aged mice with resveratrol, a phytoalexin found in grapes, peanuts, wild blueberry and red wine. Resveratrol is known for its antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer properties and is also shown to be neuroprotective. During the course of our study, an unexpected confounding factor in the form of weight gain was introduced. However, by controlling for the increased bodyweight, we were able to evaluate resveratrol-mediated behavioral and molecular changes in a novel over-eating induced obesity and aging model. Our results indicated that prolonged resveratrol supplementation affected molecular changes in the brain, muscle and bone that may be potentially be beneficial for combating obesity and aging related deficits. In addition to resveratrol, we also tested its naturally occurring analog, piceid in an in vitro model of oxidative-stress induced cell death in a dopaminergic-like cell line. Piceid afforded neuroprotection against oxidative-stress induced toxicity via activation of ERK1/2 and ERK5 (extracellular signal-regulated kinases) as well as inhibition of cellular apoptosis. In conclusion, our data suggest that natural antioxidants may combat physiological deficits induced by obesity and aging and maybe potential therapeutic interventions for improving the quality of life of the elderly

Experimental and Numerical Study of Dysphagia

Dysphagia, meaning difficulty in swallowing, is a symptom of disease that occurs in young children and elderly people. It occurs particularly due to two reasons, weak neural network and/or deformities in oral section/s. The Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital’s Intensive Feeding Program takes care of children suffering from Dysphagia. In order to make the swallowing process easier and in some cases safer, thickener is added to the liquids. Depending on the requirement of thickness, the amount of thickener is varied. Although the directions to prepare the mixtures are given by the thickener product company, the required thickness is not achieved when the thickeners are added to different fluids, reason being each base fluid having its own viscosity. The hospital follows the viscosity scale given by National Dysphagia Diet (NDD) and volumetric measures for preparing Nectar thick and Honey thick liquids with various base liquids are to be determined through experimentation. The effect of time on the viscosity of the samples was studied after 24 hours of refrigeration. A Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) study was carried out in order to study the flow of the fluid in the oropharyngeal track to identify the necessity of specific viscosity in typical geometry, geometry affected due to cleft palate and geometry with poor Velo-Pharyngeal Range of Motion (VPROM). Using a viscometer, the viscosity values of Nectar and Honey thick samples were recorded and the necessary volumetric measures for Nectar and Honey thick scales were determined, followed by the viscosity analysis of the selected samples before and after 24 hours of refrigeration. The CFD study for the base case and two selected cases were carried out to study the flow patterns and the requirements of specific scale of viscosity for the specific oropharyngeal geometries were analysed. 4 After the experimental and numerical study on Dysphagia diet fluids regarding their viscosity, followed by the analysis of the results so obtained, the volumetric measures were provided to the clinic and time effect analysis was presented. The analysis of the flow patterns in the oropharyngeal track with different viscosities was carried out and the results were presented. It was found that the thickener contents react with the base fluids differently. Therefore, the amount of thickener to be added to each of these base fluids varies, to get the desired consistency. The numerical study reveals that altering the viscosity of the samples helps for easy swallowing. People suffering from Dysphagia with deformities in their oropharyngeal track can swallow easily by altering the viscosity of the sample. With the poor VPROM case, it was also noted that increasing the viscosity of the sample does not always help for easier swallowing