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Most environments favor defection over cooperation due to natural selection. Nonetheless, the emergence of cooperation is omnipresent in many biological, social, and economic systems, quite contrary to the well-celebrated Darwinian theory of evolution. Much research has been devoted to better understanding how and why cooperation persists among self-interested individuals despite their competition for limited resources. Here we go beyond a single social dilemma since individuals usually encounter various social challenges. In particular, we propose and study a mathematical model incorporating both the prisoner's dilemma and the snowdrift game. We further extend this model by considering ecological signatures like mutation and selfless one-sided contribution of altruist free space. The nonlinear evolutionary dynamics that results from these upgrades offer a broader range of equilibrium outcomes, and it also often favors cooperation over defection. With the help of analytical and numerical calculations, our theoretical model sheds light on the mechanisms that maintain biodiversity, and it helps to explain the evolution of social order in human societies.

The fractional order SEIQRD compartmental model of COVID-19 is explored in this manuscript with six different categories in the Caputo approach. A few findings for the new model's existence and uniqueness criterion, as well as non-negativity and boundedness of the solution, have been established. When RCovid19

Most environments favor defection over cooperation due to natural selection. Nonetheless, the emergence of cooperation is omnipresent in many biological, social, and economic systems, quite contrary to the well-celebrated Darwinian theory of evolution. Much research has been devoted to better understanding how and why cooperation persists among self-interested individuals despite their competition for limited resources. Here we go beyond a single social dilemma since individuals usually encounter various social challenges. In particular, we propose and study a mathematical model incorporating both the prisoner's dilemma and the snowdrift game. We further extend this model by considering ecological signatures like mutation and selfless one-sided contribution of altruist free space. The nonlinear evolutionary dynamics that results from these upgrades offer a broader range of equilibrium outcomes, and it also often favors cooperation over defection. With the help of analytical and numerical calculations, our theoretical model sheds light on the mechanisms that maintain biodiversity, and it helps to explain the evolution of social order in human societies.

Different factitious hosts were used to mass rear Trichogramma japonicum Ashmead in different parts of the globe because thorough details were lacking in both the laboratory and the field. The objective of this study was to compare, parasitoid, T. japonicum reared in different factitious hosts. Three commonly used factitious host eggs, Corcyra cephalonica (Stainton), Ephestia kuehniella Zeller and Sitotroga cerealella Olivier were tested under laboratory conditions and then in the field over a yellow stem borer, Scirpophaga incertulus (Walker) of rice. The highest parasitism by T. japonicum was observed on E. kuehniella eggs. The parasitoid's highest emergence (88.99%) was observed on S. cerealella eggs at 24 h exposure, whereas at 48 h it was on E. kuehniella eggs (94.66%). Trichogramma japonicum females that emerged from E. kuehniella eggs were significantly long-lived. The days of oviposition by hosts and the host species were significant individually, but not their interaction. Higher proportions of flying T. japonicum were observed when reared on E. kuehniella and C. cephalonica eggs. Field results showed that T. japonicum mass-reared on E. kuehniella showed higher parasitism of its natural host, S. incertulus eggs. Hence, by considering these biological characteristics and field results, E. kuehniella could be leveraged for the mass rearing of quality parasitoids of T. japonicum in India, the Asian continent and beyond.

In this paper we optimized QuEChERS method for extraction of nine pesticides viz. acephate, acetamiprid, chlorpyrifos, cypermethrin, imidacloprid, thiamethoxam, profenofos (insecticides), carbendazim and tebuconazole (fungicides) and performed their quantitative estimation in okra crop by HPLC-UV and GC-ECD. Decontamination treatments namely washing with running tap water, soaking in lukewarm water (50-60°C), soaking in solutions of 1% NaCl, 5% NaHCO3, 2% CH3COOH, 0.01% KMnO4 and three commercial formulations were also done for ten minutes every time, to calculate the extent of pesticide removal from okra. Results revealed that the proposed extraction method was efficient, inexpensive, accurate, rapid and precise and can suitably be used for the simultaneous quantitative determination of the above pesticides. The standard curve was linear over the concentration range of 0.05-5μg g-1 with R2 close to one (0.999). Soaking of okra in 2% acetic acid and then washing proved as the best decontamination treatments for all the pesticides. It showed the highest relative decontaminating capacity in comparison to the other solutions tested. Since the pesticide residues are usually present in higher amount in vegetables being consumed, it is of utmost importance to keep an eye over the use of pesticides to protect the crops.

Proteases are one of the largest groups of hydrolytic enzymes constituting about 60% of total worldwide sales of industrial enzymes due to their wide applications in detergent, leather, textile, food and pharmaceutical industry. Microbial proteases have been preferred over animal and plant proteases because of their fundamental features and ease in production. Bacillus infantis SKS1, an alkaline protease producing bacteria has been isolated from garden soil of north India and identified using morphological, biochemical and molecular methods. 16S rDNA sequence amplified using universal primers has 99% sequence identity with corresponding gene sequence of Bacillus infantis strain FM 34 and Bacillus sp. Beige. The bacterial culture and its 16S rDNA gene sequence have been deposited to Microbial Culture Collection (Pune, India) with accession number MCC 3035 and GenBank with accession number KR092197 respectively. The partially purified extract of Bacillus infantis SKS1 was thermostable and active in presence of Mg2+, acetyl acetone and laundry detergents implicating its application in industry. Production of these enzymes using this strain was maximized by optimization of various parameters including temperature, pH, media components and other growth conditions. Our results show that fructose and dextrose serve as the best carbon sources for production of these enzymes, highlighting the use of this strain for enzyme production utilizing relatively inexpensive substrates like beet molasses and corn steep liquor. Additionally, this strain showed maximum production of enzymes at 40°C similar to bacterial species used for commercial production of alkaline proteases. Characterization of alkaline proteases from this strain of Bacillus infantis and optimization of parameters for its production would help in understanding its industrial application and large-scale production.

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) have been found to be dysregulated in epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) and may function as either tumor suppressor genes (TSGs) or as oncogenes. Hypermethylation of miRNA silences the tumour suppressive function of a miRNA or hypermethylation of a TSG regulating that miRNA (or vice versa) leads to its loss of function. The present study aims to evaluate the impact of aberrant microRNA-125b (miR-125b) expression on various clinicopathological features in epithelial ovarian cancer and its association with anomalous methylation of several TSGs. We enrolled 70 newly diagnosed cases of epithelial ovarian cancer, recorded their clinical history and 70 healthy female volunteers. Serum miR-125b levels were determined by quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) and the methylation status of various TSGs was investigated by methylation specific PCR. ROC curves were constructed to estimate the diagnostic and prognostic usefulness of miR-125b. The Kaplan-Meier method was applied to compare survival curves. Expression of miR-125b was found to be significantly upregulated (p

Understanding the origin of thermostability is of fundamental importance in protein biochemistry. Opposing views on increased or decreased structural rigidity of the folded state have been put forward in this context. They have been related to differences in the temporal resolution of experiments and computations that probe atomic mobility. Here, we find a significant (p = 0.004) and fair (R2 = 0.46) correlation between the structural rigidity of a well-characterized set of 16 mutants of lipase A from Bacillus subtilis (BsLipA) and their thermodynamic thermostability. We apply the rigidity theory-based Constraint Network Analysis (CNA) approach, analyzing directly and in a time-independent manner the statics of the BsLipA mutants. We carefully validate the CNA results on macroscopic and microscopic experimental observables and probe for their sensitivity with respect to input structures. Furthermore, we introduce a robust, local stability measure for predicting thermodynamic thermostability. Our results complement work that showed for pairs of homologous proteins that raising the structural stability is the most common way to obtain a higher thermostability. Furthermore, they demonstrate that related series of mutants with only a small number of mutations can be successfully analyzed by CNA, which suggests that CNA can be applied prospectively in rational protein design aimed at higher thermodynamic thermostability.

The occurrence of diabetes has greatly increased in low- and middle-income countries, particularly in Asia, as has the prevalence of overweight and obesity; in European-derived populations, overweight and obesity are established causes of diabetes. The shape of the association of overweight and obesity with diabetes risk and its overall impact have not been adequately studied in Asia.A pooled cross-sectional analysis was conducted to evaluate the association between baseline body mass index (BMI, measured as weight in kg divided by the square of height in m) and self-reported diabetes status in over 900,000 individuals recruited in 18 cohorts from Bangladesh, China, India, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan. Logistic regression models were fitted to calculate cohort-specific odds ratios (OR) of diabetes for categories of increasing BMI, after adjustment for potential confounding factors. OR were pooled across cohorts using a random-effects meta-analysis. The sex- and age-adjusted prevalence of diabetes was 4.3% in the overall population, ranging from 0.5% to 8.2% across participating cohorts. Using the category 22.5-24.9 kg/m²) as reference, the OR for diabetes spanned from 0.58 (95% confidence interval [CI] 0.31, 0.76) for BMI lower than 15.0 kg/m² to 2.23 (95% CI 1.86, 2.67) for BMI higher than 34.9 kg/m². The positive association between BMI and diabetes prevalence was present in all cohorts and in all subgroups of the study population, although the association was stronger in individuals below age 50 at baseline (p-value of interaction