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This paper focused on the analysis of test items constructed in the paper of teaching Physical Science for B.Ed. class. It involved the analysis of difficulty level and discrimination power of each test item. Item analysis allows selecting or omitting items from the test, but more importantly item analysis is a tool to help the item writer improve an item. There were 100 objective type questions in the achievement test and was administered to a sample of 100 students from B.Ed. colleges. The result of the work showed that most of the test items fall in the acceptable range of difficulty index and discrimination index. However, 17 of the test items was excluded due to very high or very low difficulty level and poor discrimination power. Purposive sampling was adopted for this study and 100 B.Ed. Physical Science students were taken from private B.Ed. Colleges in Pondicherry, India. A test of 100 items was used for data collection. Using the findings relationship between the difficulty index of each item and the corresponding discrimination index is carried out using the Pearson correlation formula. From the analysis, it was found that item discrimination power increased with the increase in difficulty value but got decreased for very easy and very difficult test items. This work is significant for the researcher in framing test items with optimum difficulty and discrimination power. The findings also show that, most of the items were falling in the acceptable range of difficulty and discrimination level, however, some items were rejected due to their poor discrimination index.

This paper reconstructs the history of the trigonometrical surveying of Kashmir from 1855 to 1865. It highlights the strategies through which surveyors had to justify the employment of high-precision instruments and methods in Himalayan terrain. Only by tediously manipulating their institutional environment in India and Britain did the staff of the Kashmir survey manage to complete its operations in light of constant financial and physical hardship. To sustain their measurements, surveyors aligned themselves with various political projects, entertaining and shifting allegiances with local rulers, scientific societies, and colonial institutions. After suffering severe cuts to instruments and assistance staff, the party was entirely stripped of funds by the East India Company in 1857 and relied on the material support of Maharaja Gulab Singh. Subsequently, surveyors adopted an expansionist rhetoric to gather the support of the Royal Geographical Society. In doing so, they framed precision as an essential contribution to imperial expansion, effective colonial rule, and intervention in 'backward' Kashmiri society and infrastructure. The Kashmir survey illustrates that rendering precision valuable requires an ongoing performative effort of justification to align epistemic with political and institutional interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The changing population age structure has a significant influence on the economy, society, and numerous other aspects of a country. This paper has innovatively applied the method of compositional data forecasting for the prediction of population age changes of the young (aged 0–14), the middle-aged (aged 15–64), and the elderly (aged older than 65) in China, India, and Vietnam by 2030 based on data from 1960 to 2016. To select the best-suited forecasting model, an array of data transformation approaches and forecasting models have been extensively employed, and a large number of comparisons have been made between the aforementioned methods. The best-suited model for each country is identified considering the root mean squared error and mean absolute percent error values from the compositional data. As noted in this study, first and foremost, it is predicted that by the year 2030, China will witness the disappearance of population dividend and get mired in an aging problem far more severe than that of India or Vietnam. Second, Vietnam’s trend of change in population age structure resembles that of China, but the country will sustain its good health as a whole. Finally, the working population of India demonstrates a strong rising trend, indicating that the age structure of the Indian population still remains relatively “young”. Meanwhile, the continuous rise in the proportion of elderly population and the gradual leveling off growth of the young population have nevertheless become serious problems in the world. The present paper attempts to offer crucial insights into the Asian population size, labor market and urbanization, and, moreover, provides suggestions for a sustainable global demographic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore the problem of establishing a network among the stocks of a market at high frequency level and give an application to program trading. Our work uses high frequency data from the National Stock Exchange, India, for the year 2014. To begin, we analyse the spectrum of the correlation matrix to establish the presence of linear relations amongst the stock returns. A comparison of correlations with pairwise mutual information shows the further existence of non-linear relations which are not captured by correlation. We also see that the non-linear relations are more pronounced at the high frequency level in comparison to the daily returns used in earlier work. We provide two applications of this approach. First, we construct minimal spanning trees for the stock network based on mutual information and study their topology. The year 2014 saw the conduct of general elections in India and the data allows us to explore their impact on aspects of the network, such as the scale-free property and sectorial clusters. Second, having established the presence of non-linear relations, we would like to be able to exploit them. Previous authors have suggested that peripheral stocks in the network would make good proxies for the Markowitz portfolio but with a much smaller number of stocks. We show that peripheral stocks selected using mutual information perform significantly better than ones selected using correlation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Understanding the causality between energy consumption, carbon emissions and economic growth is helpful for policymakers to formulate energy, environmental and economic policies. For the first time, based on nonlinear dynamics, this paper employs multispatial convergent cross mapping (CCM) to revisit the energy-carbon-economy causation for China, India and the G7 countries using both aggregate data and per capita data. The findings indicate that there are significant differences between developing countries and developed countries. A bidirectional nexus between energy consumption, carbon emissions and economic growth is found in China and India, but various causal relationships are identified in the G7 countries, including bidirectional, unidirectional and neutral nexus. The results confirm that the decoupling phenomenon is common in most G7 countries. By leveraging a variety of samples and a new approach, this study provides new evidence for policy authorities to formulate country-specific policies to obtain better environmental quality while achieving sustainable economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Poverty affects many people, but the ramifications and impacts affect all aspects of society. Information about the incidence of poverty is therefore an important parameter of the population for policy analysis and decision making. In order to provide specific, targeted solutions when addressing poverty disadvantage small area statistics are needed. Surveys are typically designed and planned to produce reliable estimates of population characteristics of interest mainly at higher geographic area such as national and state level. Sample sizes are usually not large enough to provide reliable estimates for disaggregated analysis. In many instances estimates are required for areas of the population for which the survey providing the data was unplanned. Then, for areas with small sample sizes, direct survey estimation of population characteristics based only on the data available from the particular area tends to be unreliable. This paper describes an application of small area estimation (SAE) approach to improve the precision of estimates of poverty incidence at district level in the State of Bihar in India by linking data from the Household Consumer Expenditure Survey 2011–12 of NSSO and the Population Census 2011. The results show that the district level estimates generated by SAE method are more precise and representative. In contrast, the direct survey estimates based on survey data alone are less stable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Migrant labourers living in the slums of urban and industrial patches across India make up a key sub-population so far controlling Tuberculosis (TB) in the country is concerned. This is because many TB patients from these communities- remain under reached by the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) of India. This marginalized community usually seeks early-stage healthcare from “friendly neighbourhood” non-formal health providers (NFHPs). Because, RNTCP has limited capacity to involve the NFHPs, an implementation research project was conceived, whereby an external partner would engage with the NFHPs to enable them to identify early TB symptomatics from this key sub-population who would be then tested using Xpert MTB/RIF technology. Diagnosed TB cases among them would be referred promptly to RNTCP for treatment. This paper aimed to describe the project and its impact. Methods: Adopting a quasi-experimental before-after design, four RNTCP units from two major urban-industrial areas of Odisha were selected for intervention, which spanned five quarters and covered 151,400 people, of which 30% were slum-dwelling migrants. Two similar units comprised the control population. The hypothesis was, reaching the under reached in the intervention area through NFHPs would increase TB notification from these traditionally under-notifying units. RNTCP notification data during intervention was compared with pre-intervention era, adjusted for contemporaneous changes in control population Results: The project detected 488 Xpert+ TB cases, of whom 466 were administered RNTCP treatment. This translated into notification of additional 198 new bacteriologically positive cases to RNTCP, a 30% notification surge, after adjustment for 2% decline in control. This meant an average quarterly increase in notification of 41.20(20.08, 62.31; p<0.001) cases. The increase was immediate, evident from the rise in level in the time series analysis by 50.42(10.28, 90.55; p = 0.02) cases. Conclusion: Engagement with NFHPs contributed to an increase in TB notification to RNTCP from key under reached, slum-dwelling migrant populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Petrological assimilation is a key process in the evolution of high-grade metamorphic terrains in the continental crusts. This study examines the mechanisms of such macroscopic assimilation between felsic (F) and mafic (M) constituents as two petrologically interacting continuum phases, as observed in the Chotanagpur Granite Gneissic Complex (CGGC), India, which underwent amphibolite to granulite facies metamorphism (~775 to 900°C and 7 to 11 kb) between from the Paleoproterozoic to the late Mesoproterozoic. From field investigation we could recognized four interface patterns: planar, wavy, fingering and incoherent, which are generated at the interface between the Fand M units. We have adopted the Turing type reaction-diffusion (RD) approach, which is a well established theoretical model to interpret any complex auto-regulatory pattern in natural and physical sciences, to understand the physics of the self-organizing interface geometries observed across the CGGC. The RD model findings suggest that these patterns are constrained by a combination of: diffusion coefficients (DF, DM) of F and M, a linear or non-linear reaction term (R) that describes phase interactions and a pinning field (W) that introduces microscale heterogeneity. For linear interactions, F -- M undergo homogeneous mixing and show planar/wavy interfaces, when DF = DM and W =0. The mixing turns heterogeneous as DF * DM and W > 0, resulting in phase boundary migration with a fingering pattern. Non-linear reaction coupling enhances heterogeneous mixing and produces incoherent phase boundaries where F-phases host relics of M-phases, following a power-law size distribution. Striking similarities of interface patterns and fractal dimensions estimated from model and CGGC validate the proposed mechanism of macroscopic petrological assimilation. We argue that RD model provides a new insight into the genesis of hybrid rocks in metamorphic terrains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modelling in ecology and evolution, especially in India, is often done by researchers trained in physics or engineering without much experience of studying living systems. This is partly driven by a fallacious conviction that modelling is largely about mathematical skills and that, consequently, modellers can equally effectively apply their skills to problems in fields as diverse as physics/engineering and ecology/evolution. I discuss why this fallacy arises, and the many ways in which modelling in ecology or evolution is actually a very different endeavour from that in much of physics, even though the form of the equations deployed across disciplines is typically quite similar. Since modelling is not primarily about the mathematics but about the system being studied, I believe that a reasonable degree of comfort with models and modelling is important for those researchers in ecology and evolution who primarily undertake empirical studies, whether in the laboratory or the field. Equally, I suggest that researchers doing modelling in ecology and evolution, who were trained in the mathematical or physical sciences, need to understand the systems they attempt to model and also appreciate how modelling ecological and evolutionary processes differs from much of the modelling done in classical physics and allied fields. I also discuss what models are, whether modelling is subjective or objective, and what modelling entails if it is to meaningfully add to scientific understanding. This article is aimed primarily at young researchers interested in ecological and evolutionary questions, whether coming from a background in the biological or physical/mathematical sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have attempted to reproduce the results in Development and validation of a deep learning algorithm for detection of diabetic retinopathy in retinal fundus photographs, published in JAMA 2016; 316(22), using publicly available data sets. We re-implemented the main method in the original study since the source code is not available. The original study used non-public fundus images from EyePACS and three hospitals in India for training. We used a different EyePACS data set from Kaggle. The original study used the benchmark data set Messidor-2 to evaluate the algorithm's performance. We used another distribution of the Messidor-2 data set, since the original data set is no longer available. In the original study, ophthalmologists re-graded all images for diabetic retinopathy, macular edema, and image gradability. We have one diabetic retinopathy grade per image for our data sets, and we assessed image gradability ourselves. We were not able to reproduce the original study's results with publicly available data. Our algorithm's area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.951 (95% CI, 0.947-0.956) on the Kaggle EyePACS test set and 0.853 (95% CI, 0.835-0.871) on Messidor-2 did not come close to the reported AUC of 0.99 on both test sets in the original study. This may be caused by the use of a single grade per image, or different data. This study shows the challenges of reproducing deep learning method results, and the need for more replication and reproduction studies to validate deep learning methods, especially for medical image analysis. Our source code and instructions are available at: . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reference evapotranspiration (ET0) plays a fundamental role in irrigated agriculture. The objective of this study is to simulate monthly ET0 at a meteorological station in India using a new method, an improved support vector machine (SVM) based on the cuckoo algorithm (CA), which is known as SVM-CA. Maximum temperature, minimum temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and sunshine hours were selected as inputs for the models used in the simulation. The results of the simulation using SVM-CA were compared with those from experimental models, genetic programming (GP), model tree (M5T) and the adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS). The achieved results demonstrate that the proposed SVM-CA model is able to simulate ET0 more accurately than the GP, M5T and ANFIS models. Two major indicators, namely, root mean square error (RMSE) and mean absolute error (MAE), indicated that the SVM-CA outperformed the other methods with respective reductions of 5–15% and 5–17% compared with the GP model, 12–21% and 10–22% compared with the M5T model, and 7–15% and 5–18% compared with the ANFIS model, respectively. Therefore, the proposed SVM-CA model has high potential for accurate simulation of monthly ET0 values compared with the other models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Culex quinquefasciatus is a vector of lymphatic filariasis and vector control strategies normally involve the use of synthetic insecticides targeted against them. Extensive and uncontrolled use of these synthetic insecticides has led to the development of insecticide resistance in the mosquito vectors. In this context, to study the resistance status of Cx. quinquefasciatus, field populations were collected from three districts of Northern part of West Bengal and tested against insecticides (5% malathion, 0.05% deltamethrin, 0.05% lambdacyhalothrin,0.75% permethrin, 0.1% propoxur, 4% DDT and Temephos). Qualitative and quantitative enzyme assay was also conducted in order to find the role of detoxifying enzymes behind the development of insecticide resistance. This study revealed the presence of widespread resistance amongst the field populations of Cx. quinquefasciatus throughout the studied regions. Moreover, the result of native PAGE and biochemical enzyme assay may be linked to some extent in the involvement of the detoxifying enzymes in conferring resistance against insecticides in most of the tested Cx. quinquefasciatus populations. The present study involving the survey of resistance status may be of immense help during the implementation of vector control strategies throughout this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Glucosamine dietary supplements are commonly used for the management of osteoarthritis (OA). However, clinical trials have reported varying outcomes with regard to joint function and disease progression. One of the possible reasons for variability in observed effects of glucosamine could be that, unlike prescription drugs, the quality of manufactured dietary supplements is not closely monitored in many countries. Therefore, there is the possibility that the actual amount of glucosamine present in a dietary supplement is different from that claimed on the label. The quality control of glucosamine supplements is further complicated by the unavailability of a simple and effective analytical method for the analysis of glucosamine. Therefore, the aim of this study was to develop a simple analytical method that could be easily adapted by the pharmaceutical industry for routine analysis of glucosamine. Aims: To develop a novel high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) method for the quantification of glucosamine, and determine the amount of glucosamine present in a sample of dietary supplements commercially available in Australia and India. Methods: Chromatographic separation of glucosamine was achieved using a zwitter-ionic hydrophilic interaction liquid chromatography column with a mobile phase consisting of 60% acetonitrile and 40% of 85 mM ammonium acetate, at a flow rate of 0.3 mL/min and column temperature 40°C. The developed method was validated for intra- and inter-day linearity, accuracy, precision, and reproducibility. The newly-developed method was subsequently used to analyse 12 glucosamine supplements. Results: The developed method was selective for glucosamine, which had a retention time of 5.9 min. The standard curve was linear with a correlation coefficient (r2) exceeding 0.99, over the range of 10–200 μg/mL for glucosamine. The relative standard deviations for intra- and inter-day accuracy, precision and reproducibility were all less than 4%. The amount of glucosamine determined in six Australian and six Indian glucosamine supplements ranged between 98.7–101.7% and 85.9–101.8% of the labelled values, respectively. Discussion: Unlike previous HPLC methods, this newly-developed HPLC technique does not require pre-derivatisation and can separate glucosamine from both hydrochloride and sulphate salts, and from other amino sugars, such as chondroitin sulphate present in dietary supplements. This simple and effective technique can be employed by analytical laboratories for the quality control of glucosamine dietary supplements. Conclusion: The current study has developed a new analytical technique using HPLC-Corona CAD, which can analyse underivatised glucosamine hydrochloride and sulphate within 6 minutes. Using the novel assay, we confirmed that unlike the tested Australian dietary supplements, only half of the tested Indian products had a glucosamine content within ±10% of what was claimed on the label. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Commercial surrogacy in emerging countries such as India is often associated with exploitation of vulnerable women, the assumption being that it is performed by poor and uneducated women for rich intended parents. However, the hypothesis that surrogates are poor women has rarely been confronted with field data. The objective was to compare the socioeconomic characteristics of Indian surrogates interviewed in social studies with those of Indian women in the general population in order to provide preliminary data on whether surrogates have a specific profile and are indeed disadvantaged compared with their counterparts. The study analyzes the data from four cross-sectional studies carried out in India among surrogates between 2006 and 2014. Surrogates were recruited through clinics, agencies and agents. Data were collected during face-to-face interviews. The resulting convenience sample included 96 Indian surrogates. Their sociodemographic characteristics were compared with those of the general population extracted from Indian national surveys. The surrogates interviewed had their first child at a younger age than women in the general population, but they tended to have a smaller family. Their social situation tended to be better than that of the general population in terms of education, employment and family income. These results provide first empirical evidence moderating the common assumption that Indian surrogates are the poorest and least educated women. This does not mean, however, that exploitation does not exist. More studies are needed to confirm these results and to explore the issue in new international destinations for surrogacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Most of the epidemiological studies that have examined the detrimental effects of ambient hot and cold temperatures on human health have been conducted in high-income countries. In India, the limited evidence on temperature and health risks has focused mostly on the effects of heat waves and has mostly been from small scale studies. Here, we quantify heat and cold effects on mortality in India using a nationally representative study of the causes of death and daily temperature data for 2001-2013.Methods and Findings: We applied distributed-lag nonlinear models with case-crossover models to assess the effects of heat and cold on all medical causes of death for all ages from birth (n = 411,613) as well as on stroke (n = 19,753), ischaemic heart disease (IHD) (n = 40,003), and respiratory diseases (n = 23,595) among adults aged 30-69. We calculated the attributable risk fractions by mortality cause for extremely cold (0.4 to 13.8°C), moderately cold (13.8°C to cause-specific minimum mortality temperatures), moderately hot (cause-specific minimum mortality temperatures to 34.2°C), and extremely hot temperatures (34.2 to 39.7°C). We further calculated the temperature-attributable deaths using the United Nations' death estimates for India in 2015. Mortality from all medical causes, stroke, and respiratory diseases showed excess risks at moderately cold temperature and hot temperature. For all examined causes, moderately cold temperature was estimated to have higher attributable risks (6.3% [95% empirical confidence interval (eCI) 1.1 to 11.1] for all medical deaths, 27.2% [11.4 to 40.2] for stroke, 9.7% [3.7 to 15.3] for IHD, and 6.5% [3.5 to 9.2] for respiratory diseases) than extremely cold, moderately hot, and extremely hot temperatures. In 2015, 197,000 (121,000 to 259,000) deaths from stroke, IHD, and respiratory diseases at ages 30-69 years were attributable to moderately cold temperature, which was 12- and 42-fold higher than totals from extremely cold and extremely hot temperature, respectively. The main limitation of this study was the coarse spatial resolution of the temperature data, which may mask microclimate effects.Conclusions: Public health interventions to mitigate temperature effects need to focus not only on extremely hot temperatures but also moderately cold temperatures. Future absolute totals of temperature-related deaths are likely to depend on the large absolute numbers of people exposed to both extremely hot and moderately cold temperatures. Similar large-scale and nationally representative studies are required in other low- and middle-income countries to better understand the impact of future temperature changes on cause-specific mortality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our understanding on the importance of viral lysis in the functioning of tropical estuarine ecosystem is limited. This study examines viral infection of prokaryotes and subsequent lysis of cells belonging to different morphotypes across a salinity gradient in monsoon driven estuarine ecosystem (Cochin estuary, India). High standing stock of viruses and prokaryotes accompanied by lytic infection rates in the euryhaline/mesohaline region of the estuary suggests salinity to have an influential role in driving interactions between prokaryotes and viruses. High prokaryotic mortality rates, up to 42% of prokaryote population in the pre-monsoon season is further substantiated by a high virus to prokaryote ratio (VPR), suggesting that maintenance of a high number of viruses is dependent on the most active fraction of bacterioplankton. Although myoviruses were the dominant viral morphotype (mean = 43%) throughout the study period, there was significant variation among prokaryotic morphotypes susceptible to viral infection. Among them, the viral infected short rod prokaryote morphotype with lower burst estimates (mean = 18 viruses prokaryote-1) was dominant (35%) in the dry seasons whereas a substantial increase in cocci forms (30%) infected by viruses with high burst size (mean = 31 viruses prokaryote-1) was evident during the monsoon season. Such preferential infections of prokaryotic morphopopulations with respect to seasons can have a strong and variable impact on the carbon and energy flow in this tropical ecosystem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The World Health Organization recommends participatory learning and action (PLA) in women's groups to improve maternal and newborn health, particularly in rural settings with low access to health services. There have been calls to understand the pathways through which this community intervention may affect neonatal mortality. We examined the effect of women's groups on key antenatal, delivery, and postnatal behaviours in order to understand pathways to mortality reduction.Methods and Findings: We conducted a meta-analysis using data from 7 cluster-randomised controlled trials that took place between 2001 and 2012 in rural India (2 trials), urban India (1 trial), rural Bangladesh (2 trials), rural Nepal (1 trial), and rural Malawi (1 trial), with the number of participants ranging between 6,125 and 29,901 live births. Behavioural outcomes included appropriate antenatal care, facility delivery, use of a safe delivery kit, hand washing by the birth attendant prior to delivery, use of a sterilised instrument to cut the umbilical cord, immediate wrapping of the newborn after delivery, delayed bathing of the newborn, early initiation of breastfeeding, and exclusive breastfeeding. We used 2-stage meta-analysis techniques to estimate the effect of the women's group intervention on behavioural outcomes. In the first stage, we used random effects models with individual patient data to assess the effect of groups on outcomes separately for the different trials. In the second stage of the meta-analysis, random effects models were applied using summary-level estimates calculated in the first stage of the analysis. To determine whether behaviour change was related to group attendance, we used random effects models to assess associations between outcomes and the following categories of group attendance and allocation: women attending a group and allocated to the intervention arm; women not attending a group but allocated to the intervention arm; and women allocated to the control arm. Overall, women's groups practising PLA improved behaviours during and after home deliveries, including the use of safe delivery kits (odds ratio [OR] 2.92, 95% CI 2.02-4.22; I2 = 63.7%, 95% CI 4.4%-86.2%), use of a sterile blade to cut the umbilical cord (1.88, 1.25-2.82; 67.6%, 16.1%-87.5%), birth attendant washing hands prior to delivery (1.87, 1.19-2.95; 79%, 53.8%-90.4%), delayed bathing of the newborn for at least 24 hours (1.47, 1.09-1.99; 68.0%, 29.2%-85.6%), and wrapping the newborn within 10 minutes of delivery (1.27, 1.02-1.60; 0.0%, 0%-79.2%). Effects were partly dependent on the proportion of pregnant women attending groups. We did not find evidence of effects on uptake of antenatal care (OR 1.03, 95% CI 0.77-1.38; I2 = 86.3%, 95% CI 73.8%-92.8%), facility delivery (1.02, 0.93-1.12; 21.4%, 0%-65.8%), initiating breastfeeding within 1 hour (1.08, 0.85-1.39; 76.6%, 50.9%-88.8%), or exclusive breastfeeding for 6 weeks after delivery (1.18, 0.93-1.48; 72.9%, 37.8%-88.2%). The main limitation of our analysis is the high degree of heterogeneity for effects on most behaviours, possibly due to the limited number of trials involving women's groups and context-specific effects.Conclusions: This meta-analysis suggests that women's groups practising PLA improve key behaviours on the pathway to neonatal mortality, with the strongest evidence for home care behaviours and practices during home deliveries. A lack of consistency in improved behaviours across all trials may reflect differences in local priorities, capabilities, and the responsiveness of health services. Future research could address the mechanisms behind how PLA improves survival, in order to adapt this method to improve maternal and newborn health in different contexts, as well as improve other outcomes across the continuum of care for women, children, and adolescents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Women face greater challenges than men in accessing water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) resources to address their daily needs, and may respond to these challenges by adopting unsafe practices that increase the risk of reproductive tract infections (RTIs). WASH practices may change as women transition through socially-defined life stage experiences, like marriage and pregnancy. Thus, the relationship between WASH practices and RTIs might vary across female reproductive life stages. This cross-sectional study assessed the relationship between WASH exposures and self-reported RTI symptoms in 3,952 girls and women from two rural districts in India, and tested whether social exposures represented by reproductive life stage was an effect modifier of associations. In fully adjusted models, RTI symptoms were less common in women using a latrine without water for defecation versus open defecation (Odds Ratio (OR) = 0.69; Confidence Interval (CI) = 0.48, 0.98) and those walking shorter distances to a bathing location (OR = 0.79, CI = 0.63, 0.99), but there was no association between using a latrine with a water source and RTIs versus open defecation (OR = 1.09; CI = 0.69, 1.72). Unexpectedly, RTI symptoms were more common for women bathing daily with soap (OR = 6.55, CI = 3.60, 11.94) and for women washing their hands after defecation with soap (OR = 10.27; CI = 5.53, 19.08) or ash/soil/mud (OR = 6.02; CI = 3.07, 11.77) versus water only or no hand washing. WASH practices of girls and women varied across reproductive life stages, but the associations between WASH practices and RTI symptoms were not moderated by or confounded by life stage status. This study provides new evidence that WASH access and practices are associated with self-reported reproductive tract infection symptoms in rural Indian girls and women from different reproductive life stages. However, the counterintuitive directions of effect for soap use highlights that causality and mechanisms of effect cannot be inferred from this study design. Future research is needed to understand whether improvements in water and sanitation access could improve the practice of safe hygiene behaviors and reduce the global burden of RTIs in women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Asthma is a non-curable but preventable disease, responsible for higher morbidity worldwide. According to recent WHO report, nearly 235 million people are suffering from asthma leading to 383000 deaths in 2015. The burden of asthma morbidity is higher in developed countries and is increasing in developing countries. Objective: The present study was aimed at studying the change in prevalence rate of asthma, associated risk factors and estimation of morbidity burden and avoidable cases of asthma in India. Methods: The second round of Indian Human Development Survey (IHDS-II), 2011–12, was used for the study. For the present study, asthma was defines as ever diagnosed with asthma or having cough with short breath. Multiple-logistic regression was used to identify the possible risk factors associated with prevalence of reporting asthma. Population attributable fractions (PAFs) were computed to estimate the overall and risk factors specific burden of morbidity due to asthma using the extrapolated population of year 2015 using 2011 census. Results: Overall prevalence rate of asthma increased from 41.9 (per 1000 population) in 2004–05 to 54.9 (per 1000 population) in 2011–12. The prevalence rate of reporting asthma was higher in poorer states compared to richer states, and also varied by sub-geographies, with higher prevalence rate in northern states of the country and lower rates in north-eastern states of the country. The odds of reporting asthma was higher for younger and older ages, individual with fewer years of schooling (OR: 1.41; 95% CI: 1.21–1.64) for individual with zero years of schooling compared to those with 11 or more years of schooling, individual from lower economic status, individual living in household using unclean fuels (OR:1.21; 95% CI: 1.08–1.34) and smokers (OR: 1.34; 95% CI: 1.17–1.55) compared to their counterparts. In the year 2015, the overall morbidity burden of asthma was estimated at nearly 65 million and more than 82 thousand deaths were attributed due to asthma. The burden was highest among individuals living in households using solid fuels (firewood~80%, Kerosene~78%). One-third of the cases could be eliminated by minimising the use of any solid fuels. Around 17% of all the asthma cases in population could be attributed to underweight. Conclusion: Eliminating the modifiable risk factors could help reduce in huge amount of asthma cases for example by providing education, cessation in smoking, and schemes like Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY), by providing clean fuel (LPG) to poor and vulnerable households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aluminum (Al) is the third most abundant metal in earth crust, whose chemical form is mainly dependent on soil pH. The most toxic form of Al with respect to plants is Al3+, which exists in soil pH <5. Acidic soil significantly limits crop production mainly due to Al3+ toxicity worldwide, impacting approximately 50% of the world’s arable land (in North-Eastern India 80% soil are acidic). Al3+ toxicity in plants ensues root growth inhibition leading to less nutrient and water uptake impacting crop productivity as a whole. Rice is one of the chief grains which constitutes the staple food of two-third of the world population including India and is not untouched by Al3+ toxicity. Al contamination is a critical constraint to plant production in agricultural soils of North East India. 24 indigenous Indica rice varieties (including Badshahbhog as tolerant check and Mashuri as sensitive check) were screened for Al stress tolerance in hydroponic plant growth system. Results show marked difference in growth parameters (relative growth rate, Root tolerance index, fresh and dry weight of root) of rice seedlings due to Al (100 μM) toxicity. Al3+ uptake and lipid peroxidation level also increased concomitantly under Al treatment. Histochemical assay were also performed to elucidate uptake of aluminum, loss of membrane integrity and lipid peroxidation, which were found to be more in sensitive genotypes at higher Al concentration. This study revealed that aluminum toxicity is a serious harmful problem for rice crop productivity in acid soil. Based on various parameters studied it’s concluded that Disang is a comparatively tolerant variety whereas Joymati a sensitive variety. Western blot hybridization further strengthened the claim, as it demonstrated more accumulation of Glutathione reductase (GR) protein in Disang rice variety than Joymati under stressed condition. This study also observed that the emergence of lethal toxic symptoms occurs only after 48h irrespective of the dose used in the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objective: Understanding medical students’ motivation to select medical studies is particularly salient to inform practice and policymaking in countries—such as India—where shortage of medical personnel poses crucial and chronical challenges to healthcare systems. This study aims to develop and validate a questionnaire to assess the motivation of medical students to select medical studies. Methods: A Motivation for Selection of Medical Study (MSMS) questionnaire was developed using extensive literature review followed by Delphi technique. The scale consisted of 12 items, 5 measuring intrinsic dimensions of motivations and 7 measuring extrinsic dimensions. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), validity, reliability and data quality checks were conducted on a sample of 636 medical students from six medical colleges of three North Indian states. Results: The MSMS questionnaire consisted of 3 factors (subscales) and 8 items. The three principal factors that emerged after EFA were the scientific factor (e.g. research opportunities and the ability to use new cutting edge technologies), the societal factor (e.g. job security) and the humanitarian factor (e.g. desire to help others). The CFA conducted showed goodness-of-fit indices supporting the 3-factor model. Conclusion: The three extracted factors cut across the traditional dichotomy between intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and uncover a novel three-faceted motivation construct based on scientific factors, societal expectations and humanitarian needs. This validated instrument can be used to evaluate the motivational factors of medical students to choose medical study in India and similar settings and constitutes a powerful tool for policymakers to design measures able to increase selection of medical curricula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Particulate pollution has important consequences for human health, and is an issue of global concern. Outdoor air pollution has become a cause for alarm in India in particular because recent data suggest that ambient pollution levels in Indian cities are some of the highest in the world. We study the number of particles between 0.5μm and 2.5μm indoors while using affordable air purifiers in the highly polluted city of Delhi. Though substantial reductions in indoor number concentrations are observed during air purifier use, indoor air quality while using an air purifier is frequently worse than in cities with moderate pollution, and often worse than levels observed even in polluted cities. When outdoor pollution levels are higher, on average, indoor pollution levels while using an air purifier are also higher. Moreover, the ratio of indoor air quality during air purifier use to two comparison measures of air quality without an air purifier are also positively correlated with outdoor pollution levels, suggesting that as ambient air quality worsens there are diminishing returns to improvements in indoor air quality during air purifier use. The findings of this study indicate that although the most affordable air purifiers currently available are associated with significant improvements in the indoor environment, they are not a replacement for public action in regions like Delhi. Although private solutions may serve as a stopgap, reducing ambient air pollution must be a public health and policy priority in any region where air pollution is as high as Delhi’s during the winter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the impact of religious identity and village-level religious fragmentation on behavior in Tullock contests. We report on a series of two-player Tullock contest experiments conducted on a sample of 516 Hindu and Muslim participants in rural West Bengal, India. Our treatments are the identity of the two players and the degree of religious fragmentation in the village where subjects reside. Our main finding is that the effect of social identity is small and inconsistent across the two religious groups in our study. While we find small but statistically significant results in line with our hypotheses in the Hindu sample, we find no statistically significant effects in the Muslim sample. This is in contrast to evidence from Chakravarty et al. (2016), who report significant differences in cooperation levels in prisoners’ dilemma and stag hunt games, both in terms of village composition and identity. We attribute this to the fact that social identity may have a more powerful effect on cooperation than on conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Successful integration of nutrition interventions into large-scale development programmes from nutrition-relevant sectors, such as agriculture, can address critical underlying determinants of undernutrition and enhance the coverage and effectiveness of on-going nutrition-specific activities. However, evidence on how this can be done is limited. This study examines the feasibility of delivering maternal, infant, and young child nutrition behaviour change communication through an innovative agricultural extension programme serving nutritionally vulnerable groups in rural India. The existing agriculture programme involves participatory production of low-cost videos promoting best practices and broad dissemination through village-level women’s self-help groups. For the nutrition intervention, 10 videos promoting specific maternal, infant, and young child nutrition practices were produced and disseminated in 30 villages. A range of methods was used to collect data, including in-depth interviews with project staff, frontline health workers, and self-help group members and their families; structured observations of mediated video dissemination sessions; nutrition knowledge tests with project staff and self-help group members; and a social network questionnaire to assess diffusion of promoted nutrition messages. We found the nutrition intervention to be well-received by rural communities and viewed as complementary to existing frontline health services. However, compared to agriculture, nutrition content required more time, creativity, and technical support to develop and deliver. Experimentation with promoted nutrition behaviours was high, but sharing of information from the videos with non-viewers was limited. Key lessons learned include the benefits of and need for collaboration with existing health services; continued technical support for implementing partners; engagement with local cultural norms and beliefs; empowerment of women’s group members to champion nutrition; and enhancement of message diffusion mechanisms to reach pregnant women and mothers of young children at scale. Understanding the experience of developing and delivering this intervention will benefit the design of new nutrition interventions which seek to leverage agriculture platforms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tropical cyclones are extreme random meteorological events that can have profound implications to coastal biodiversities. Given that the frequency, intensity and duration of these events are poised to increase due to the global climate change, understanding the ecological impacts of such erratic occurrences becomes imperative to devise better management strategies. The eventful passage of the tropical cyclone, Phyan, along the northwestern coast of India in November 2009, coupled with the availability of historical data presented a rare opportunity to elucidate the consequences on the polychaete assemblages of the Malvan Marine Sanctuary and their subsequent recovery. This was achieved by comparison of the pre- and post-Phyan seasonal data from four different sites in and around the Sanctuary. MDS analyses and polychaete community parameters suggested conspicuous cyclone related effects on the polychaete community characteristics in the three outer stations off Malvan, whereas the relatively protected bay station remained more or less unscathed. Impacts, attributable to the cyclone apart from seasonal variations, included changes in polychaete composition, reductions in total polychaete density, species diversity, evenness and functional groups. Dominance of the opportunistic polychaete, Paraprionospiopatiens was all pervasive just after Phyan, resulting in poor diversity and evenness values. In the outer stations, diverse feeding modes present prior to the cyclone were replaced by microphagous feeders post the disturbance. However, the study also observed complete recovery as substantiated by the improvement inpolychaete density, diversity indices and re-instatement of multiple feeding guilds in affected areas. This resilience of the coastal waters off Malvan is attributed to its marine protected status, implying that reduced human interference aided rapid revival of damaged ecosystems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Spontaneous or voluntary reporting of suspected adverse drug reactions (ADRs) is one of the vital roles of all health professionals. In India, under-reporting of ADRs by health professionals is recognized as one of the leading causes of poor ADR signal detection. Therefore, reviewing the literature can provide a better understanding of the status of knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) of Pharmacovigilance (PV) activities by health professionals. Methods: A systematic review was performed through Pubmed, Scopus, Embase and Google Scholar scientific databases. Studies pertaining to KAP of PV and ADR reporting by Indian health professionals between January 2011 and July 2015 were included in a meta-analysis. Results: A total of 28 studies were included in the systematic review and 18 of them were selected for meta-analysis. Overall, 55.6% (95% CI 44.4–66.9; p<0.001) of the population studied were not aware of the existence of the Pharmacovigilance Programme in India (PvPI), and 31.9% (95% CI 16.3–47.4; p<0.001) thought that "all drugs available in the market are safe". Furthermore, 28.7% (95% CI 16.4–40.9; p<0.001) of them were not interested in reporting ADRs and 74.5%, (95% CI 67.9–81.9; p<0.001) never reported any ADR to PV centers. Conclusion: There was an enormous gap of KAP towards PV and ADR reporting, particularly PV practice in India. There is therefore an urgent need for educational awareness, simplification of the ADR reporting process, and implementation of imperative measures to practice PV among healthcare professionals. In order to understand the PV status, PvPI should procedurally assess the KAP of health professionals PV activities in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Enhydra fluctuans Lour. (Asteraceae), an edible aquatic herb, is traditionally employed against toxic effects of heavy metals in India. The present study was planned to discover the protective effect of edible extract of E. fluctuans (AEEF) against Pb toxicity. Methods: The cytoprotective role of AEEF was determined on murine hepatocytes employing MTT assay and Hoechst staining. The effects on lipid peroxidation, protein carbonylation, endogenous redox systems and the transcription levels of apoptotic proteins were studied after incubating the hepatocytes with AEEF (400 μg/ml) + Pb-acetate (6.8 μM). The defensive role of AEEF (100 mg/kg) against Pb-acetate (5 mg/kg) intoxication was measured in mice by in vivo assays. Biochemical, haematological and histological parameters, intracellular Pb burden and redox status were measured. Results: AEEF exhibited a concentration dependent cytoprotective effect against Pb-induced cytotoxicity in vitro. Pb-acetate incubation significantly (p < 0.01) altered the extents of ROS production ↑, protein carbonylation ↑, lipid peroxidation ↑, endogenous antioxidant enzymes ↓ and GSH ↓ in vitro. Besides, Pb-acetate significantly (p < 0.01) induced apoptosis in the hepatocytes apparent from the altered expressions of apoptotic proteins viz. Apaf-1 ↑, Bad ↑, Bcl-2 ↓, Cyt C ↑, cleaved caspases↑, Bid ↑ and Fas ↑. However, AEEF (400 μg/ml) could significantly (p < 0.05–0.01) attenuate the Pb-acetate mediated toxic manifestation in vitro. In in vivo assay, Pb-acetate (5 mg/kg) treated mice exhibited significantly (p < 0.01) high intracellular Pb content. A high Pb-burden within the tissues caused significant (p < 0.05–0.01) patho-physiological alterations viz. ROS production ↑, protein carbonylation↑, lipid peroxidation ↑, DNA fragmentation ↑, ATP formation ↑, mitochondrial co-enzymes Q ↓, endogenous antioxidant enzymes ↓ and GSH ↓ within the selected tissues. The haematological and serum biochemical parameters were significantly (p < 0.05–0.01) different in the Pb-acetate treated mice. Finally, histological assessment imposed significant toxic occurrence within the organs of Pb-intoxicated animals. However, concurrent administration of AEEF (100 mg/kg) could significantly (p < 0.05–0.01) reinstate the Pb-acetate mediated toxicity. Conclusion: Presence of metal chelators and phyto-antioxidants within AEEF would offer overall protection through promoting Pb clearance coupled with restoring redox balance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Emergency referral services (ERS) are being strengthened in India to improve access for institutional delivery. We evaluated a publicly financed and privately delivered model of ERS in Punjab state, India, to assess its extent and pattern of utilization, impact on institutional delivery, quality and unit cost. Methods: Data for almost 0.4 million calls received from April 2012 to March 2013 was analysed to assess the extent and pattern of utilization. Segmented linear regression was used to analyse month-wise data on number of institutional deliveries in public sector health facilities from 2008 to 2013. We inspected ambulances in 2 districts against the Basic Life Support (BLS) standards. Timeliness of ERS was assessed for determining quality. Finally, we computed economic cost of implementing ERS from a health system perspective. Results: On an average, an ambulance transported 3–4 patients per day. Poor and those farther away from the health facility had a higher likelihood of using the ambulance. Although the ERS had an abrupt positive effect on increasing the institutional deliveries in the unadjusted model, there was no effect on institutional delivery after adjustment for autocorrelation. Cost of operating the ambulance service was INR 1361 (USD 22.7) per patient transported or INR 21 (USD 0.35) per km travelled. Conclusion: Emergency referral services in Punjab did not result in a significant change in public sector institutional deliveries. This could be due to high baseline coverage of institutional delivery and low barriers to physical access. Choice of interventions for reduction in Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) should be context-specific to have high value for resources spent. The ERS in Punjab needs improvement in terms of quality and reduction of cost to health system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]