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A study was conducted to evaluate the effects of dietary supplementation of probiotic (Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Lactobacillus sporogenes) on growth, blood profile and economic traits of broiler rabbits. Thirty weaned Soviet Chinchilla rabbits were randomly divided into three groups and fed experimental diets for a period of 8 weeks. The three treatments were-T1: basal diet without probiotic supplementation (control), T2: basal diet + probiotic supplementation @ 0.5 g/kg of feed and T3: basal diet + probiotic supplementation @ 1.0 g/kg of feed. The net body weight gain was significantly (P

A carcass of nearly 7 year old intact female New Zealand White rabbit was presented for postmortem examination. On necropsy, both uterine horns were gray to black, markedly thickened, multinodular and occupied almost 35 to 40% space of abdominal cavity. Neoplastic nodules were soft and gray to black. Multinodular/polypoid coalescing masses were noted in uterine lumen. Neoplasm was metastasised to lungs and wall of thoracic cavity. On microscopic examination, moderately cellular neoplasm composed of polygonal cells that arranged in tubules or acini and separated by variably dense fibrovascular stroma. Within the neoplasm there were focal extensive to multifocal large areas of necrosis, hemorrhages and infiltration of inflammatory cells. Microscopically, metastasized neoplasm in lungs and thoracic wall showed similar histopathology. On the basis of histopathology, this neoplasm was diagnosed as endometrial carcinoma.

Twenty crossbred cows (HF ×Jersey) yielding 18–20 kg milk/d were divided into two groups of ten each based on milk yield, fat% and stage of lactation during hot summer months. The animals in both the groups were fed basal diet comprising 9.0 kg concentrates, 25.0 kg green fodder and 3.5 kg dry fodder. In addition to basal diet, animals in experimental group were supplemented with betaine hydrochloride @ 30 g/d and buffer @ 100 g/d for 90 d. The average temperature-humidity index was 71.78 and 78.12 at 09: 00 and 14: 00 h, respectively. Study revealed that betaine supplementation improved (P

The pressure induced phase transition in uranium monochalcogenides, UX (X = S, Se, and Te) is studied by two-body potential approach. It is found that US, USe and UTe undergo a structural phase transition from NaCl (B1) type to CsCl (B2) type at 78.5, 21 and 9.5 GPa, respectively, which is in good agreement with the recent experimental data. In addition, second-order elastic constants (SOECs) (C 11, C 12 and C 14) have been calculated which can be used to establish the nature of the forces in these materials. The present study shows that the considered two-body potential model can be used to predict the phase transition pressure in UX compounds provided the strength and hardness parameters in B1 and B2 phases are different.

The morphological and cuticular features of new sterile, branched coniferous foliage shoot, Walkomiella sahnii sp. nov. collected from the carbonaceous shale samples of Karharbari Formation, Rajhara Colliery of Daltonganj Coalfield, Jharkhand State are described. New species is characterized by homomorphic leaves showing rhomboidal shape, acuminate apex, broad base, uninerved; cuticle is differentiated into thick abaxial and thin adaxial surfaces and stomata are irregularly distributed only on adaxial surface. Fertile structures are not known. Specimen represents the first report of Walkomiella as coalified compression in Lower Gondwana sediments of India. Earlier records of W. indica Surange & Singh 1951 and Walkomiella sp. are based on dispersed cuticles of leaf and seed bearing shoot recovered through maceration of samples.

The radiation induced changes taking place in α-phased poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) films exposed to gamma rays were investigated in correlation with the applied doses. Samples were irradiated in vacuum at room temperature by a 1.25 MeV Co 60 source with the doses in the range of 0–300 kGy. Optical and chemical properties of the irradiated as well as un-irradiated PVDF films were studied using UV–visible and FTIR techniques. Gamma irradiation was found to induce changes vary depending on the radiation dose.

Leishmaniasis, a group of tropical diseases caused by protozoan parasites of genus Leishmania, is a major health problem worldwide that affects millions of people especially in the developing nations. Generic pentavalent antimonials have been the mainstay for therapy in the endemic regions due to efficacy and cost effectiveness, but the growing incidence of their resistance has seriously hampered their use. In many cases the drugs employed for the treatment are toxic, marginally effective, given by injection and, compromised by the development of resistance. Therefore, the development of new mechanism based safe, effective and affordable chemotherapeutic agents to fight leishmaniasis would be an urgent priority research. The recent researches focused on natural products have shown a wise way to get a true and potentially rich source of drug candidates against leishmaniasis, where alkaloids have been found more effective. The present review briefly illustrates an account on current status of leishmaniasis, life cycle of parasites and biology, synergy of the disease with HIV, therapeutic options available to cure this disease and, highlights why natural products especially alkaloids as folk medicines are so important? Additionally, the outlines for the leishmanicidal activities of various alkaloids including indole, quinoline, isoquinoline, pyrimidine-beta-carboline, steroidal and diterpene alkaloids from various plants as well as alkaloids from marine sources have been provided with their mechanistic studies.

The experimental study of plasma spots formation in planar surface barrier discharge system at atmospheric pressure in helium gas is presented. Spatio-temporal patterns of plasma spots are followed by varying the applied voltage and operating gas pressure. These spots melt together at high applied voltage and results in uniform glow discharge. Reduction in operating pressure also results in similar effect. Dynamics of these patterns are discussed in detail.

Diagnosis and recommendation integrated system (DRIS) norms were computed from the data on leaf mineral composition, soil available nutrients, and corresponding mean fruit yield of three years (1999–2002), collected from the set of 57 irrigated commercial ‘Nagpur’ mandarin (budded on Citrus jambhiri Lush) orchards, representing 26 locations and 3 basalt derived soil orders (Entisols, Inceptisols, and Vertisols) rich in smectite minerals. The DRIS norms derived primarily from spring-cycle index leaves from non-fruiting terminals sampled during August to October (6–8 months old) suggested optimum leaf macronutrient concentration (%) as: 1.70–2.81 nitrogen (N), 0.09–0.15 phosphorus (P), 1.02–2.59 potassium (K), 1.80–3.28 calcium (Ca), and 0.43–0.92 magnesium (Mg). While, optimum level of micronutrients (ppm) was determined as: 74.9–113.4 iron (Fe), 54.8–84.6 manganese (Mn), 9.8–17.6 copper (Cu), and 13.6–29.6 zinc (Zn) in relation to fruit yield of 47.7–117.2 kg tree− 1. Likewise, DRIS indices for s...

A simple, rapid and sensitive sensor for the assay of pyridoxine hydrochloride has been developed. The method is based upon the use of calix-8-arene as a neutral carrier in the presence of phosphotungstic acid as an ion extruder and di isooctyl phthalate as plasticizer. The sensor was found to have a short response time of 20s to pyridoxine concentration. Perfectly Nernstian slope of 60.4+/-3.1 mV/decade of activity between pH 3.0 and 7.2 for the monovalent pyridoxine hydrochloride over a wide concentration range of 1 x 10(-1) M to 6.2 x 10(-6) M was observed. The detection limit observed was 1.6 x 10(-6) M. The selectivity coefficients of the developed sensor indicated excellent selectivity for pyridoxine hydrochloride over a number of species, which normally accompany pyridoxine in various pharmaceutical formulations. The mediator o-nitrophenyl octyl ether significantly increased the lifetime of the sensor. The results obtained for pharmaceutical sample analysis using this sensor were satisfactory with excellent recovery percentage comparable and sometimes even better than the ones obtained by other routine methods for the assay.

The fertility of soil directly influenced by its physico-chemical as well as biotic contaminants. The physical properties like soil separates and texture, structure, weight and density, porosity, permeability, colour etc. chemical contaminants involving organic and inorganic matters and the biological factors like bacteria, fungi, nematodes and other micro-organisms assess the fertility potency of soil. Out of these the physical and the chemical factors are highly significant. In the present investigation an attempt has been made to convert the favourable soil conditions according to the infrastructural environment of the area for farming.

The experimental work reported here is a validation of Langmuir probe measurements against emission spectroscopic and discharge resistivity measurements of atmospheric glow discharge plasma parameters. The probe measurements of plasma density are close to that obtained by spectroscopy and discharge resistivity measurement. However, it is found that the electron temperature measurement by the probe is higher than that obtained by the spectroscopic technique. Variation of plasma parameters with operating voltage and frequency, which are estimated by the three techniques, shows a similar trend.

The phylogeny of Trichoderma and the phylogenetic relationships of its species was investigated by maximum parsimony analysis and distance analysis of DNA sequences from multiple genetic loci 18S rDNA sequence analysis suggests that the genus Trichoderma evolved at the same time as Hypomyces and Fusarium and thus about 110 Myr ago 28S rDNA sequence analysis shows that the genus Trichoderma is part of a monophyletic branch within the Hypocreaceae. Most isolates of the genus Trichoderma were found to act as mycoparasites of many economically important aerial and soil-borne plant pathogens. Trichoderma has attained importance as a substitute for chemical pesticides and hence an attempt was intended to corroborate the positive relatedness of molecular and morphological characters. Two fungal strains, Trichoderma koningii Tk-5201/CSAU and Trichoderma virens Tvi-4177/CSAU were isolated from a soil sample collected from CSA Farm, Kanpur district of Uttar Pradesh, India. The universal primers (internal transcribed spacer, ITS) were used for the amplification of 18S rRNA gene fragment and strains were thus characterized with the help of ITS marker. It is proposed that the identified strains T. koningii Tk-5201/CSAU and T. virens Tvi-4177/CSAU be assigned as the type strains of a species of genus Trichoderma based on phylogenetic tree analysis together with the 18S rRNA gene sequence search in Ribosomal Database Project, small subunit rRNA and large subunit rRNA databases. The sequence was deposited in GenBank with the accession numbers KC800923 and KC800924, respectively. Thus an integrated approach of morphological and molecular markers can be employed to identify a superior strain of Trichoderma for its commercial exploitation.Keywords: 18S ribosomal RNA gene, Trichoderma, phylogenetic analysis, internal transcribed spacer (ITS), DNA sequencing, GenBankAfrican Journal of Biotechnology, Vol. 13(3), pp. 449-455, 15 January, 2014

Microstructures of 76Mo–14Si–10B, 77Mo–12Si–8B–3Al, and 73.4Mo–11.2Si–8.1B–7.3Al alloys, processed by reaction hot pressing of elemental powder mixtures, have shown α-Mo, Mo 3 Si, and Mo 5 SiB 2 phases. In addition, particles of SiO 2 formed from the oxygen content of raw materials could be seen in the 76Mo–14Si–10B alloy, while α-Al 2 O 3 formed in the alloys containing Al. Parts of the Al have been found within the solid solutions of α-Mo and Mo 3 Si. The average fracture toughness determined from indentation crack lengths and three-point bend testing of single edge notch bend specimens lies in the range of 5.0–8.7 MPa√m, with alloys containing Al demonstrating higher values. Analyses of load-displacement plots, fracture profiles and indentation crack paths have shown evidence of R -curve type behaviour and operating toughening mechanisms involving crack bridging by α-Mo, crack deflection and branching. Flexural strength is related to volume fraction of the α-Mo and Al content. Compression tests on the 76Mo–14Si–10B alloy between 1100 °C and 1350 °C have shown excellent strength retention, and evidence of thermally activated plastic flow.

The effects of curing, antioxidants, and smoking on pH, total plate count (TPC), and sensory characteristics of buffalo meat stored at 0°C and packed in low density polyethylene (LDPE) bags were investigated. It was observed that treatment of curing, antioxidants (Sodium ascorbate, SA), and smoking, either alone or in combination, significantly (p

The present investigation corroborates with the vegetative counterparts belonging to conifers recovered from the fossiliferous horizons of the Upper Gondwana succession of the Early Cretaceous age. The succession, in addition, to the species of Filicales, Bennettitales, Cycadales and Coniferales, also revealed the rich assemblage of Araucarites, viz., A. cutchensis, A. minutus and Araucarites sp.

This paper presents design and development of an electronic nose system based on tin oxide gas-sensors array and artificial neural network (ANN) for the identification of some of the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) relevant to environmental monitoring such as propane-2-ol, methanol, acetone, ethyl methyl ketone, hexane, benzene and xylene. An array of SnO2-based thick-film gas sensors doped with Pd, Pt and Au is used to generate the response patterns and backpropagation neural network is used for the identification. A new data transformation technique based on mean and variance of individual gas-sensor combination has been applied to improve the classification accuracy of neural network classifier. Effect of data transformation on the classification ability of neural network is studied by varying the size of array and corrupting the data with synthetic noise. Our simulation results demonstrate that the developed system is capable to identify target vapors successfully even in the noisy conditions. It is shown that the neural network processing of transformed data has not only better noise tolerance but also can classify the vapors with the array composed of fewer number of sensors as compared to that for the raw (untransformed) data.

To extend the applicability of ZnO, with the bulk band gap of about 3.3 eV, into deep UV region, we have grown a multilayer of alumina capped ZnO quantum dots of mean in-plane sizes in the range of ∼1.8–3.6 nm at room temperature using alternate Pulsed Laser Deposition. Size dependent blue shift of the band gap of these dots up to ∼4.5 eV is observed in the optical absorbance spectra. The observed blue shift can be understood using the effective mass approximation in weak and strong confinement regimes.

Interpenetrating polymer network (IPN) based on poly(styrene) and poly(citronellol-alt-methylmethacrylate) have been synthesized by using benzoyl peroxide as initiator and divinyl benzene as crosslinking agent, in xylene under an inert atmosphere of nitrogen. The scanning electron microscopy reveals a characteristic two phase morphology of linear polymer dispersed in the matrix of copolymer. The properties like percentage swelling, average molecular weight between crosslinks (Mc), are direct function of [copolymer] and initiator [benzoyl peroxide] whereas inverse function of concentration of monomer (styrene) and crosslinker (divinyl benzene). The differential scanning calorimetry gives two values of glass transition temperature at 64.09 °C and 159.79 °C. The value of activation energy, calculated from thermogravimetric analysis, is 20 kJ mol-1.

The radical copolymerization of citronellol with acrylonitrile (AN) in xylene at 75 ± 0.1°C for 1 h in the presence of benzoylperoxide (BPO) follows ideal kinetics with bimolecular termination and results in the formation of an alternating copolymer as evidenced from the values of reactivity ratios as r 1 (acrylonitrile) = 0.0062 and r 2 (citronellol) = 0.0003, which have been calculated using the Kelen–Tudos method. The overall activation energy is computed as 30 kJ/mol. The IR spectrum of the copolymer shows the presence of brands at 3500 cm-1, assigned to the alcoholic group, and 2240 cm-1, assigned to the cyanide group. The 1H-NMR spectrum of the copolymer shows peaks between 7 and 7.7 δ, assigned to the alcoholic group of citronellol. The nitrogen percentage was evaluated by elemental analysis. The Alfrey–Price Q–e parameters for citronellol has been calculated as -0.46 and 0.97. The copolymer is highly thermally stable and has a glass transition temperature (T g) of 102°C, as evaluated by Differenti...

A new series of semi-conducting interpenetrating polymer networks (IPNs) based on pyridine and poly(antimony acrylate) were synthesized. Structural evidence for IPNs come from the infrared spectra indicating characteristic frequencies of (>C = O) of poly(antimony acrylate) at 1680 cm−1. Properties such as percentage swelling, average molecular weight between crosslinks (Mc) and Young's modulus are direct functions of the concentration of linear polymer and initiator (benzoyl peroxide), whereas inverse relationships with concentration of monomer (pyridine) and crosslinker (divinyl benzene) are observed. The presence of antimony in the IPNs is determined by SEM and elementac analysis. The DSC curve shows two glass transition temperatures (Tg), at 110 and 150 °C. The IPNs formed with a low content of pyridine exhibited processability, mechanical properties and conductivity. © 2003 Society of Chemical Industry

A library of 72 compounds related to N- [4-(benzyloxy) benzoyl]alanine (I) was synthesized, prepared and screened for α-glucosidase inhibitory activity. Four compounds showed potent inhibition, six compounds moderate inhibition, and 16 were weak inhibitors. One compound, N- [4-(benzyloxy) benzoyl] serine, was found to be a potent inhibitor of α-glucosidase with 100% inhibition at 1μM. This inhibitor was at least five times more potent than the lead compound I.

In recent years, tremendous progress has been made in the development of broadband erbium-doped fiber amplifiers (EDFAs), which form the backbone of high-capacity lighwave communication systems. Initially, the use of gain equalization filters increased the bandwidth of amplifiers by a factor of three (relative to first-generation amplifiers deployed in the field). Subsequently, the introduction of a two-band architecture, which includes amplifier sections for the C-band and the L-band, resulted in a further doubling of the bandwidth. In addition, this amplifier provides high output power and low noise figure to support the ever-increasing capacity demand on lightwave systems. Commercial systems with up to 80 wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) channels having a total capacity of up to 400 Gb/s are currently available, and terabit systems have been demonstrated in the laboratory. The recently discovered phenomenon of fast power transients in chains of EDFAs constituting an optical network has been shown to impair the performance of propagating channels in the event of channel failure or network reconfiguration. Several schemes to control the gain of EDFAs have been devised to mitigate the degradation caused by the fast power transient effect. Practical broadband amplifiers incorporating these and other control schemes, such as internal attenuation to control gain tilt, will enable future terabit and higher capacity networks.

Alternating copolymer(s) containing geraniol and styrene sequences have been synthesized by using benzoyl peroxide as initiator in xylene at 80 °C. The copolymerisation follows ideal kinetics. The formation of the copolymer is confirmed by the presence of peaks at 7–7.5δ due to the phenyl group and 7–7.7δ due to the alcoholic group and 2900 cm−1 due to the phenyl groups in the FTIR spectrum of the copolymer. The values of r1(Sty)=0.76 and r2(Ger)=0.03, calculated by the Kelen–Tudos method, indicates some alternating nature of the copolymer. The glass transition temperature (Tg) found by differential scanning calorimetry, is 90 °C. The Alfrey-price Q–e parameters for geraniol are 0.221 and 0.649.

The radical copolymerization of citronellol with vinyl acetate (VA) in xylene at 60 ± 0.1 °C for 90 min in the presence of benzoyl peroxide follows ideal kinetics and results in the formation of an alternating copolymer as demonstrated by the values of the reactivity ratios [r1 (VA) = 0.02 and r2 (citronellol) = 0.0002], which have been calculated with the Kelen–Tudos method. The overall activation energy is computed to be 75 kJ/mol. The IR spectrum of the copolymer shows the presence of bands at 3400 cm−1 due to an alcoholic group and 1750 cm−1 due to a 〉CO group. The values of the Mark–Houwink constants for this copolymer system have been determined with gel permeation chromatography to be α = 0.375 and K = 2.4 × 10−4. The glass-transition temperature, determined with differential scanning calorimetry, is 68.32 °C. The mechanism has been elucidated. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part A: Polym Chem 40: 1243–1252, 2002

Synthesis of a series of novel terpolymers, consisting of two electron-donating monomers, viz. citronellol (optically active) and styrene, with one electron-accepting monomer, i.e. methyl methacrylate, using benzoyl peroxide as radical initiator and xylene as diluent at 80°C for 2 h has been extensively studied. The system follows ideal kinetics with an overall activation energy of 33 kJ mol−1. The formation of the terpolymer is confirmed by the presence of peaks at 7–8 δ because of phenyl group, 3.4–4 δ because of methoxy group, and 7–7.7 δ because of alcoholic group in 1H NMR spectrum of the terpolymer. Further, the bands at 2900 cm−1, 1750 cm−1, and 3400 cm−1, observed in FTIR spectrum of terpolymer, evidence the presence of phenyl, methoxy, and alcoholic group respectively. The monomer feed–terpolymer composition was determined by the Kelen–Tudos method. The values of reactivity ratios are r1(MMA) = 0.9 and r2(styrene + citronellol) = 0.02. © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Adv Polym Techn 21: 59–64, 2002; DOI 10.1002/adv.10009

The Ce–Co-doped BiFeO3 multiferroic, Bi1−x Ce x Fe1−x Co x O3 (x = 0.00, 0.01, 0.03, and 0.05), has been prepared by a sol–gel auto-combustion method and analyzed through Raman spectroscopy, photoluminescence, and UV–visible spectroscopy. We have observed an anomalous intensity of the second-order Raman mode at ~ 1260 cm−1 in pure BFO and suppressed intensity in doped samples, which indicates the presence of spin two-phonon coupling in these samples. The photoluminescence spectra show reduction in the intensity of emission with the increasing dopant concentration, which indicates the high charge separation efficiency. A sharp absorption with three charge transfer (C-T) and two d–d transitions are shown by UV–visible spectra in the visible region. The band gap of BiFeO3 (BFO) is decreasing with increasing dopant concentrations and the materials are suitable for photovoltaic applications.

Cadmium is considered to be one of the most toxic substances in the environment due to its wide range of organ toxicity and long elimination half-life. SAMe is recognized as the major methyl-donor for essential methylation reactions that occur in all living organisms. SAMe has been increasingly utilized as a therapeutic agent in liver and neurological disorders recently. The present study has been devised to explore the alleviating effects of SAMe in cadmium induced toxicopathological changes in rats. The rats were divided into four experimental groups: group I formed the control, group II animals were given cadmium chloride @ 200ppm in distilled water, orally, group III animals were given SAMe @ 1 mg/kg body weight, orally and group IV were given both CdCl2 and SAMe. Six rats from each group were humanely sacrificed at 30th, 60th and 90th day. The quantitative data of body weight, absolute organ weight, cadmium content and oxidative stress parameters was analyzed by Duncan's multiple range tests The group II animals showed most of the pathological changes compared to the rest of the group. The magnitude of lesions in various organs was lesser in group IV where SAMe was given. The severity of lesions increased with the advancement of experiment; most severe pathological changes occurring on the 90th day. The level of cadmium residue in liver and kidneys of rats was also found to be increasing with the time in group II and IV; with group IV showing a relatively lesser increase. Similarly the evaluation of oxidative stress parameters reflected the detrimental effect of cadmium in group II and an alleviating effect of SAMe in group IV. Based on the results obtained, SAMe is found to alleviate the toxicopathological effects of cadmium in rats which needs to be further explored.

The present investigation shows the significant improvement in the structural, magnetic and dielectric properties of Bi1−x Ce x Fe1−x Co x O3 (x = 0, 0.01, 0.03, 0.05) multiferroic materials, synthesized via an auto-combustion method. The synthesized materials are found to have structural distortion in the rhombohedral R3c structure as observed by x-ray diffraction. The high dielectric constant (~1850 at 2.5 MHz) was found for x = 0.05 multiferroic material from dielectric analysis. The presence of a weak doublet along with a sextet pattern in the Mossbauer spectra indicates the secondary phase. M–H loops of these materials demonstrate that Ce–Co doping in BiFeO3 enhances retentivity, coercivity, and saturation magnetization. Improvement in the magnetic and dielectric properties in Ce–Co doped BiFeO3 leads to multifunctional device application.

The study ‘Reconstruction of stature by percutaneous measurement of foot’ is a part of our research project ‘Reconstruction of stature from the parts of upper and lower extremities,’ of which regression equations and multiplication factors are derived for the estimation of height from the distal part of upper extremity (combined length of forearm and hand) and from leg. For stature from foot, standing height and length of right and left feet were measured in 100 adult male and female medical students of 19–25 years and analysed statistically to establish relation between height and length of foot them. Regression equations are derived separately for male and female and these are 3.35X+82.6 and 3.42X+75.8, respectively, where X stands for length of foot. By taking the foot length value of different subjects their stature is calculated and compared with the corresponding real standing height and these were close (±3 cm) in most of the cases. Multiplication factor is also calculated, which is 6.49 for male and 6.65 for female. By using these factors the calculated stature is more than ±5 cm in nearly one-third of the cases, suggesting it less reliable than regression equation.

Hypercholesterolemia-induced oxidative stress has been strongly implicated in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis, which is one of the major causes of mortality worldwide. The current work, for the first time, accounts the antioxidant, genoprotective, antilipoperoxidative, and HMG-CoA reductase (EC 1.1.1.34) inhibitory properties of traditional medicinal plant,Ficus palmataForsk. Our result showed that among sequentially extracted fractions ofFicus palmataForsk, FPBA (F. palmatabark aqueous extract) and FPLM (F. palmataleaves methanolic extract) extracts have higher phenolic content and also exhibited significantly more radical scavenging (DPPH and Superoxide) and antioxidant (FRAP) capacity. Moreover, FPBA extract also exhibited significantly higher inhibition of lipid peroxidation assay. Additionally, results showed almost complete and partial protection of oxidatively damaged DNA by these plant extracts when compared to mannitol. Furthermore, our results showed that FPBA extract (IC50=9.1±0.61 µg/mL) exhibited noteworthy inhibition of HMG-CoA reductase activity as compared to other extracts, which might suggest its role as cardioprotective agent. In conclusion, results showed that FPBA extract not only possess significant antioxidant and genoprotective property but also is able to attenuate the enzymatic activity of HMG-CoA reductase, which might suggest its role in combating various oxidative stress-related diseases, including atherosclerosis.

Alternating copolymers, containing styrene and citronellol sequences, have been synthesized by radical polymerization using benzoylperoxide (BPO)–p-acetylbenzylidenetriphenyl arsoniumylide (pABTAY) as initiator, in xylene at 80 ± 1 °C for 3 h under inert atmosphere. The kinetic expression is Rp ∝ [BPO]0.88 [citronellol]0.68 [styrene]0.56 with BPO and Rp ∝ [pABTAY]0.27 [citronellol]0.76 [styrene]0.63 with pABTAY, ie the system follows non-ideal kinetics in both cases, because of primary radical termination and degradative chain transfer reactions. The activation energy with BPO and pABTAY is 94 kJ mol−1 and 134 kJ mol−1, respectively. Different spectral techniques, such as IR, FTIR, 1H NMR and 13C NMR, have been used to characterize the copolymer, demonstrating the presence of alcoholic and phenyl groups of citronellol and styrene. The alternating nature of the copolymer is shown by the product of reactivity ratios r1 (Sty) = 0.81 and r2 (Citro) = 0.015 using BPO and r1 (Sty) = 0.37 and r2 (Citro) = 0.01 using (pABTAY), which are calculated by the Finemann–Ross method. A mechanism of copolymerization is proposed. © 2001 Society of Chemical Industry

Plant fossils collected from Bhareli Formation exposed in Pinjoli Nala section situated on Bhalukpong Bomdila Road section, West Kameng District, Arunachal Pradesh are described. The assemblage is represented by Gangamopteris karharbariensis, Glossopteris communis, G. stenoneura, G. longicaulis, G. indica, G. tenuifolia, G. spatulata, G. taeniensis, G. subtilis, Glossopteris sp. cf, G. decipiens, Glossopteris sp., Noeggerathiopsis hislopii, Samaropsis ganjrensis, seed bearing organ, Vertebraria indica, scale leaf and equisetalean axes. The flora is comparable with the floristics of Lower Barakar Formation of India.

A plant fossil assemblage comprising of Matonidium indicum, Sphenopteris sp., Cladophlebis indica, Ptilophyllum cutchense, P. acutifolium, Taeniopteris spatulata, T. vittata, Pagiophyllum sp., Brachyphyllum sp., Araucarites cutchense, Elatocladus tenerrinus, E. sp., E. kingianus and Elatocladussp. A has been described from a new locality of the Bairam-Belkher area in District Amravati, Maharastra, and District Betul, Madhya Pradesh. Ptilophyllum and Matonidium are the most abundant genera in this assemblage. An attempt has also been made to compare the present assemblage which shows an affinity with the Lower Cretaceous assemblages of Peninsular India, i.e. Himmatnagar, Gardeshwar, Gollapalle, etc. On the basis of various taxa belonging to Bennettitales and Filicales, a warm and humid climate has been interpreted.

Summary Aseptic acute arthritis of the intercarpal joint was induced with 0.5 ml of turpentine oil in eight clinically healthy donkeys, aged three to four years and weighing 80–100 kg. Group A (four animals) served as control whereas in Group B, an antiarthritic drug (ART) was administered orally @ 20 grams from days 2 to 26. As compared to controls, there was an early return to normal stance and weight bearing in the treatment group. The degree of severity of lameness persisted for a longer time in the control group as compared to treated animals. Synovial total leukocytic count progressively increased in the control group whereas the antiarthritic drug treatment caused a decrease in the synovial total leukocytic count. Synovial acid phosphatase activity gradually decreased in the antiarthritic drug treated animals. Synovial aspartate aminotransferase activity was near normal on the 30th day in animals given the antiarthritic drug. Plasma total protein, alkaline phosphatase and aspartate aminotransferase did not show any significant variation in either group. Synovial and plasma lactic dehydrogenase also did not show any significant variation in the treatment group. Overall, the administration of an antiarthritic drug caused reduction in inflammation and aided in normalization of various biochemical and cytological parameters both of synovia and plasma.

This paper explores neuro-genetic applications in processing electronic nose data corrupted with additive Gaussian noise. For this study, published sensor data for different polymer-coated surface-acoustic wave (SAW) sensor arrays exposed to fixed concentrations of hazardous vapours like diethyl sulphide (DES) and iso-octane (ISO) have been used. Dimensionality of resulting pattern recognition problem is varied by taking different numbers of sensors. We show that for low dimensionality instances of this problem, back-propagation performs adequately under noisy conditions. For high dimensionality instances, back-propagation has great difficulty in training the neural classifier even with repeated restarts and different weights initializations. To alleviate this problem, we propose use of a genetic algorithm with special MRX operator introduced by us and demonstrate very encouraging results with a genetically trained neural network model.

Electrorheology is the study of the effects of electric fields on the flow properties of fluids. These materials generally exhibit an increase in apparent viscosity and a greater yield stress over an unelectrified sample. The phenomenon requires an electric field and polar particles suspended in an insulating oil. A standard concentric cylinder viscometer, fitted with with custom made electrical attachments, was converted into an electrorheometer. This system allowed control of DC voltage (0-450 Volts mm -1 ), fluid temperature (35C-40.5C), and shear rate (0.022 s -1 - 8.744 s -1 ) while observing the resulting effects on the shear stress. Dimensional analysis was used to study the rheological response of milk chocolate when subjected to electric fields. Dimensionless groups were identified to explain the phenomena, and multiple regression analysis was used to predict the electrorheological flow behavior of milk chocolate. Over the ranges of input variables, the electric field-induced forces dominated the rheological response over thermal forces, and a prediction equation for apparent viscosity was developed as a function of electric field strength and shear rate. This mathematical expression allows for prediction of milk chocolate rheology in the presence of an electric field.