Search

The emergence of a pathogen responsible for a mysterious respiratory disease was identified in China and later called a novel coronavirus. This disease was named COVID-19. The present study seeks to determine the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of COVID-19 in Pakistan. This report will exhibit a linkage between epidemiology and clinical aspects which in turn can be helpful to prevent the transmission of the virus in Pakistan. A retrospective, multiple center study was performed by collecting the data from patients' with their demographics, epidemiological status, history of co-morbid conditions, and clinical manifestations of the disease. The data was collected from 31 public-sector and 2 private hospitals across Pakistan by on-field healthcare workers. A Chi-square test was applied to assess the relationship between categorical data entries. A total of 194 medical records were examined. The median age of these patients was found to be 34 years. A total of 53.6% active cases were present including 41.2% males and 12.4% females till the end of the study. Adults accounted for most of the cases (94.3%) of COVID-19. Fever (86.60%), cough (85.05%), fatigue (36.60%), dyspnea (24.74%), and gastrointestinal discomfort (10.31%) were among the most frequently reported signs and symptoms by the patients. However, 4.12% of the total patient population remained asymptomatic. The median duration of hospital stay was found to be 14 (0–19) days. The earliest source of the spread of the virus may be linked to the foreigners traveling to Pakistan. Spread among men was more as compared to women. A few cases were found to be positive, due to the direct contact with pets or livestock. Hypertension (7.73%), diabetes (4.64%), cardiovascular conditions (2.58%) were the most common co-morbidities. The percentage mortality was 2.50% with the highest mortality among elders.

Crude oil reserves are sapping with time, therefore researchers have considerably shifted their focus to bio-lubricants which can be surrogated for petroleum-based lubricants. The objective of the present research is to cater an idea to the researchers about the lubricating potentials of Jatropha oil (JO). The study was performed using reciprocating friction monitor (RFM) machine having ball-on-flat arrangement with 52100 chromium steel ball and EN-31 steel as a tribo-pair. The experiments were conducted at three different loads at a temperature of 40 °C. JO was mixed with glycerol (G) and different percentages of molybdenum disulphide (0.5%, 1%, 2%, and 3%) micro-particles to prepare a lubricant. The friction and wear of the tribo-pair was assessed in the presence of these mixtures. The results revealed that MoS2 micro-particles were effective in reducing both friction and wear, with minimum friction recorded at 2% MoS2 concentration. The coefficient of friction (COF) was reduced by 18–52% with the addition of MoS2 as compared to the base JO. The results showed that JO has better lubrication ability as compared to the commercial lubricant SAE 10W/30. The experimental results were substantiated by examinations of tribo-pairs on scanning electron microscope, optical microscope, and optical three-dimensional profilometer. The results were found to be in close agreement with each other. It was concluded that the blend (80% JO + 20% G + 2% MoS2) is a strong candidate that can be used in the place of mineral oils as a lubricant.

Omeprazole, a proton pump inhibitor blocks the H+/K+-ATPase channels of gastric parietal cells. It is used for the treatment of peptic ulcer. Prolonged use of omeprazole may involve in inducing anemia. The key marker of eryptosis includes membrane blebbing, cell shrinkage and phosphatidylserine (PS) exposure at the cell surface. In current study, the eryptotic, oxidative as well as hemolytic effects of therapeutical doses (0.5, 1 and 1.5 µM) of omeprazole were investigated after exposing erythrocytes for 48 hours. Investigation of eryptosis was done by cell size measurement, PS exposure determination and calcium channel inhibition. As a possible mechanism of omeprazole induced eryptosis, oxidative stress was investigated by determining the catalase, glutathione peroxidase and superoxide dismutase activities. Similarly, necrotic effect of omeprazole on erythrocytes was also evaluated through hemolysis measurement. Results of our study illustrated that 1.5 µM of omeprazole may induce significant decrease in superoxide dismutase, glutathione peroxidase and catalase activities as well as triggered the erythrocytes shrinkage, PS exposure and hemolysis. Role of calcium was also confirmed in inducing erythrocyte shrinkage. It is concluded that the exposure of erythrocytes with 1.5 µM omeprazole may enhance the rate of eryptosis and hemolysis by inducing oxidative stress.

In aromatic plants species, biosynthesis of essential oils occurs through two complex natural biochemical pathways involving different enzymatic reactions. Isopentenyl diphosphate (IPP) and its isomer dimethylallyl diphosphate (DMAPP) are the universal precursors of essential oil biosynthesis and are produced by the cytosolic enzymatic MVA (mevalonic acid) pathway or by plastidic and enzymatic 1-deoxy-d-xylolose-5-phosphate (DXP) pathway, also called the 2-C-methylerythritol-4-phosphate (MEP) pathway. In the particular plant cell part, prenyl diphosphate synthases condense isopentenyl diphosphate (IPP) and dimethylallyl diphosphate (DMAPP) further to form prenyl diphosphates, which are used as substrates for geranyl diphosphate (GPP; C10) or for fernesyl diphosphate (FPP; C15). Essential oils are final terpenoid products and are formed by a huge group of enzymes known as terpene synthases (TPS). Essential oils are important secondary metabolites of plants and have been used not only in different i...

Bacillus strains have been widely used for the production of fibrinolytic enzymes having role in the treatment of cardiovascular disorders. Purification and overproduction of such enzymes has increased their usage in medical fields including metalloproteinases with the ability to degrade extracellular matrix (ECM). Camelysin, a neutral metalloproteinase has been isolated from different species of bacteria like Bacillus cereus, Bacillus anthracis, and Bacillus thuringiensis with fibrinolytic, collagenolytic and actin degradation activity. This project successfully demonstrated the presence of 734-bp coding DNA sequence (CDS) encoding a 20.72331 kDa camelysin gene in local strain of Bacillus thuringiensis containing a signal peptide with cleavage site between residues 19 and 20. The sequence was submitted to GenBank (KT023597) and the sequence showed high homology with the camelysin protein of closely related Bacillus species. The alignment of related proteins through ClustalW displayed difference of four amino acids (“Q” replaced by “P” at position 169 and at position 182–184, “NQE” replaced by “HLK”) in the isolated protein. Comparison including structural and functional analysis of camelysin sequences isolated from different Bacillus species was carried out using different bioinformatics tools and software. The information would help in better understanding the properties of camelysin protein and its role in pathogenicity and clinical treatments.

Essential oils are industrially important natural products of aromatic plants, which are biosynthesized in specialized cells types, such as osmophores, Glandular Trichomes, and ducts and cavities, present on different parts of these plants. In these cells, the essential oils are biosynthesized, accumulated and transferred to the atmosphere by different reported secretion mechanisms. Numerous environmental factors also affect biosynthesis of essential oils and their secretion in the atmosphere. A deep understanding of the entire process is important to improve the yield of biomass of aromatic plants and thus produce large quantities of commercial volatile oils. In this paper, the recent research on types and structure of essential oil-bearing cells, secretion mechanisms, and effect of different environmental factors on essential oil biosynthesis have been comprehensively reviewed. Therefore, this review article will provide new research directions for the researchers working in the field of aromatic plants physiology, essential oil production and many others applications.

In the present work, a new series of different 4-{[4-(2-furoyl)-1-piperazinyl]methyl}-N-(substituted-phenyl) benzamides (5a-h) have been synthesized as possible therapeutic agents for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. The structural confirmation of all the synthesized compounds was carried out by their IR, 1H-NMR and EI-MS spectral data. Enzyme inhibition activity was performed against butyrylcholinestrase enzyme, which revealed that, 4-{[4-(2-furoyl)-1- piperazinyl]methyl}-N-(4-ethylphenyl)benzamide (5b) showed excellent IC50 value 0.82 ± 0.001 μM relative to Eserine, a reference standard having IC50 value of 0.85 ± 0.0001 μM. The enhanced potential of this molecule may be attributed to the 4-ethylphenyl group. As the cholinesterase enzyme inhibitors are good targets for Alzheimer’s disease, therefore, the inhibition study of these synthesized molecules was carried out to discover their possible therapeutic effect as target for aforesaid disease.