Biosciences

With growing pressure on service providers to reduce cost and improve quality of deliverables in shorter timelines, CDM organizations and professionals need to think out of the box to retain existing clients and win new clients. Traditionally LEAN techniques have been the stronghold of manufacturing, but in the last few decades they have been effectively used in the service industry, including healthcare. In CDM, LEAN has emerged as an impactful tool in improving process efficiency and reducing operational costs. It also allows professionals to engage with senior leadership in discussions around successful deployment of LEAN. The presentation will focus on the main LEAN principles, practices, tools and methodologies and a strategic approach for its successful deployment in CDM. It will focus on the key benefits that CDM can derive from LEAN techniques such as reducing waste, rework, redundancy in process, and providing deliverables with greater accuracy and shorter timeframes while also addressing challenges such as determining process/input/output metrics, end to end process streamline, longer wait/cycle times, resource utilization and measuring deliverables with less effort. This in turn will drive client delight.

Trichomonas vaginalis causes the Trichomoniasis, in women and urethritis and prostate cancer in men. Presently Metronidazole, nitroimidazoles and tinidazole are used as the drugs of choice. But the emergence of drug resistant and cross resistance varieties of T. vaginalis has led to a search for novel drug targets. We have performed an insilico comparative analysis of metabolic pathways of the host Homo sapiens and the pathogen T. vaginalis. Enzymes from the biochemical pathways of T. vaginalis from the KEGG metabolic pathway database were compared with proteins from the host H. sapiens, by performing a BLASTp search against the non-redundant database restricted to the H. sapiens subset. The e-value threshold cutoff was set to 0.005. Enzymes, which do not show similarity to any of the host proteins, below this threshold, were filtered out as potential drug targets. Out of total 55 metabolic pathway in humans 26 metabolic pathways were identified when compared to the host H. sapiens. These 26 identified metabolic pathways contain 30 unique enzymes which are only present in T. vaginalis and absent in humans. The T. vaginalis genes for the identified enzymes were also retrieved for BLASTP search to identify any homologous protein in humans. Cysteine synthase and methionine gamma-lyase are two novel drug targets which were also reported well in literature and thus can be used to designing of inhibitors for the remedy of trichomoniasis.

Wheat is an annual herbaceous plant whose breeding is done all over the world. Triticum monococcum with 2n chromosomes is known as the oldest wheat. T. turgidum has four set of chromosomes and used for pasta making. Emmer wheat (T. turgidum ssp. dicoccoides) is wild form of nearly all the domesticated wheats. T. aestivum has six set of chromosomes and used for bread making. bZIP transcription factors have DNA binding motifs and form the leucine zipper dimerization. Most of WRKY transcription factors control regulation of important functions for the development of plants. In this study, bZIP and WRKY genes were firstly cloned and compared between different wheat cultivars. For this, genes were amplified in PCR and transferred to pENTR™/D-TOPO® vector. Plasmids were sequenced and aligned. bZIP gene with 450 bp and WRKY gene with 672 bp in length were successfully cloned. DNA sequence of genes were translated to protein sequence. A total of 150 amino acids for bZIP and 224 amino acids for WRKY proteins were determined. With this study, sequences of bZIP and WRKY genes were firstly identified in ancestral and modern wheat cultivars. Obtained results from this study may be used for development of abiotic stress resistance plants.

In an attempt to evaluate the productivity of two varieties of cabbage-caraïbe: Xanthosoma sagittifolia (L.) Schott (violet and green), using compost from pig manure as fertilizer, a trial was conducted in Goma using a pairwise experimental design, with two blocks of three plots each, representing the two varieties tested. The planting was done at a distance of 50 x 50 cm. A total of 48 plants were planted for each of the varieties studied, at a rate of 16 plants per 4 m2 plot, for a total of 96 plants for the entire experiment.The observations made during this study were related to the number of tubers per plant, the diameter of the tubers obtained, the weight of tubers per plot and the yield in tons per hectare. The correlation between the different yield parameters observed was calculated. The effects of the pig dung compost on the production parameters were assessed using the one-criteria analysis of variance classification with SPSS 20 Software (IBM SPSS Statistic, 2015). The significance level was set at 0.05%.The results obtained showed that: 1. The violet variety produced a greater number of tubers per plant than the green variety with an average of 10.66 ± 1.15 versus 6.66 ± 0.57. The difference observed from a statistical point of view is significant (?2 = 96.000 ; P < 0.000). These results indicate that the number of tubers produced per plant does depend on the variety tested ; 2. The size of the tubers obtained does not depend on the variety tested (?2 = 263.537 ; P < 0.045) ; 3. The violet variety produced heavier tubers (15.03 kg) compared with those of the green variety (8.76 kg). The difference observed statistically was significant (?2 = 60.134 ; P < 0.000). These results indicate that tuber weight does depend on the variety tested. In addition, the violet variety gave a better yield (37.58 t/ha) compared to the green variety (21.90 t/ha) in terms of cultivated area ; 4. There is a positive correlation between the weight and the number of tubers produced on the one hand (r = 0.917 and R2 = 0.840) and on the other hand between the weight and the size of tubers (r = 0.872 and R2 = 0.760). The overall results obtained reveal that the violet variety performed better in terms of the parameters studied and is more adapted to organic fertilization compared to the green variety.

Group-B Streptococcus agalactiae is a significant cause of neonatal morbidity and mortality for over last two decades. It causes two types of GBS infection in early neonates onset disease and late onset disease, characterized by pneumonia, Septicaemia and meningitis and among adults it causes UTI, wound infections, endocarditis and intra- uterine asphyxia. This study was done to determine the prevalence of vaginal colonization of Group-B Streptococcus agalactiae, its risk factor and antibiotic susceptibility patterns among the isolates. Four hundred and twenty two samples were collected from antenatal mothers, between 7th week to 40th week of gestation were screened for Group-B Streptococci colonization from 1st Jan 2010 to 25th Dec 2013. The subjects selected were between 17 to 38 years of age group. Group-B Streptococci were isolated only 136 cases from pregnant women which is about 8.5%. Among the risk factor, low maternal age, no good nutrition, unhygienic condition and those who have animal, in their house is the major factor for Streptococcus colonization among the mothers with positive culture. Neonatal infection was only present in 33 cases of neonates born from culture positive mothers. All isolates were sensitive to Ampicillin, Erythromycin and Vancomycin but moderately sensitive to Chloramphenical and Clindamycin. All isolates were resistant to Gentamycin and Tetracycline. Study done in Central Nepal showed low colonization rate of GBS in the vagina of antenatal mothers so neonatal infection was not evident. This finding is also supported by the fact that the fatal neonates colonization with GBS only 1-2% develops clinically apparent disease. Intrapartum antibiotic therapy of women colonized with Group-B Streptococcus can decrease neonatal infection. Effective strategies to detect maternal colonization with GBS infection needs to be studied properly in different populations of the world.

Bas C. van Fraassen holds an anti-realist position that directs a damaging attack against entity realism. As it stands, the question of limits of experience is crucial to van Fraassen’s constructive empiricism and has an intricate link with his negation of the ontological status of unobservable entities. This paper essentially rebuts van Fraassen’s position with the case of drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis. It queries the sort of experiential limits placed on science by van Fraassen and argues that his epistemological or constructive empiricist dimension of discourse does not fit or tie-in properly with the question of existence of unobservable entities. Most of his critics somewhat fail to recognize differences in dimensions of discourse. To be sure, this un-appreciated difference in discourse dimension is what brings a shimmering freshness to this paper. Now, using the qualitative tool of critical analysis, the paper fronts the pragmatic and ontological dimensions as much better thresholds of argumentation in the realm of existence of unobservable entities.

A diabetic foot ulcer is one of the leading causes of the hospitalization among diabetic patients. This study was conducted to know the clinical and sensitivity profile of diabetic foot ulcer patients. Total 134 pus samples were collected from patients having diabetic foot ulcer. Samples were processed as per standard guidelines. All the pus samples yielded growth of organisms making total of 148 isolates. Out of 148 bacterial isolates, 85 were gram negative bacilli and 58 were gram positive cocci. In gram positive organism Staphylococcus aureus (17%) was the predominant isolate followed by CONS (12%), while Escherichia coli (20%) was the predominant isolate followed by Pseudomonas spp., (18%) in gram negative organism. The Gram negative bacteria showed good activity against amikacin, cefotaxime, ceftazidime, ceftriaxone, gentamicin and imipenem. E. coli, Klebsiella spp., and Proteus spp., showed 55.5% to 100% resistance to amoxyclav and ampicillin. Pseudomonas spp., showed 100% resistance to ampicillin and 96.2% to amoxyclav. All the Gram-positive bacteria showed good sensitivity to most of the antibiotics. It showed good sensitivity for amikacin, gentamycin, amoxyclav, ofloxacin, ciprofloxacin and vancomycin. E. coli, Pseudomonas spp., and Staphylococcus aureus were the most common cause of infections. Most isolates were multi-drug resistance.

In the present study bacterial species isolated from textile industry effluent were evaluated for their decolourization and degradation abilities. The textile waste has a high number of organic as well as inorganic pollutants which would be harmful to aquatic flora and faunas well as cause health problems if the industrial effluent is directly discharged into water bodies. Seven microbial strains were isolated and from them two strains identified as Pseudomonas fluorescens and Bacillus cereus were evaluated for their capability to degrade different dyes. Further the various condition for maximum dye degradation were analysed and Pseudomonas fluorescens was seen to give 95-98 % dye degradation under aerobic and agitated conditions at neutral pH.

The dried leaves of Ocimum basilicum 100 g, produced 8.25% of concentrated volatile oil by hydro distillation method, the constituent of the oil were examined by GC-MS, it contained, Methyl eugenol (54.02%), Linalool (21.34%)?-cubebene (5.200%), Limonene (1.01%) nerol (0.875%), epsilon-muurolene(0.831% )?-pinene (0.76%) as the major compounds. The effect of volatile oil of Ocimum basilicum L, against six different pathogenic bacteria Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, Pseudomona aeruginosa, Salmonella typhimurium, Klebsiella pneumonia and Bacillus cereus, were carried out by using a disc diffusion technique, the highest antibacterial activity was detected against Pseudomonas aeruginosa (16.5 mm inhibition zone); and its lowest against Klebsiella pneumonia (11.95mm inhibition zone).The antibacterial activity of the synthetic antibiotics, (Ciprofloxacin, Tetracycline Ceftriaxone, Chloramphenicol and Gentamycin, were tested by the disc diffusion method, and by measuring zones of inhibition, shows that there were significant differences, among all antibiotic the highest activity of antibiotic against bacteria was due to the action of ciprofloxacin (22.12 mm inhibition zone) and the lowest activity was due to the action of Ceftriaxone (10.8mm inhibition zone), among the bacteria, the highest inhibition zone by antibiotic is Salmonella typhimurium(17.8 mm inhibition zone), the lowest inhibition zone by antibiotic is Klebsiella pneumonia (10.96mm inhibition zone), there was no significant different between antibiotic and the volatile oil of Ocimmum basilicum in this study.

Testing the presence of sugar in urine will serve as an additional diagnostic tool to verify and correlate with the glucose level in plasma. The earliest test was done by using benedict’s reagent and the reports were given ranging from nil to several positives depending upon colour changes. Dry Chemistry is now emerging as the latest technology for detecting sugar in urine, both qualitative and quantitative and some companies have developed instruments to read the intensity of colour obtained using reflectance principle and to report the urine sugar results quantitatively. Several commercial brand of test strips are available for urine sugar testing and many studies have been done in evaluating their merits and demeirts. This research paper is an attempt to find out the correlation between plasma and urine glucose both estimated quantitatively. Good correlation was found between plasma and urine glucose (P<0.00001). While dialab reagents and DIRUI CS 1300B analyser were used to measure plasma glucose, DIRURI H 100 reflectance analyser and multistix marketed by the same company was used to measure urine glucose. This research work suggests that every lab using quantitative urine glucose measurement based on dry chemistry test strips should evaluate its performance.