പൗരാവകാശ രേഖ ഐ.സി.എ.ആർ. - സി.എം.എഫ്.ആർ.ഐ 2016-2017

Citizens’ Charter ICAR-Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute 2016-201

Systematics, fishery and biology of the white sardine Escualosa thoracata (Valenciennes, 1847) exploited off Kerala, south-west coast of India

Landings of the white sardine Escualosa thoracata (Valenciennes, 1847) indicated a shift in their abundance from north-east to south-west coast of India and a sharp decline in the resource landings during the last decade along the entire range of its distribution. High local demand coupled with competitive price for the species might have led to overexploitation of this otherwise seasonal resources along the major areas of its abundance along the Indian coast. Detailed study on the systematics, fishery and biology of the species landed along Kerala coast was undertaken during 2015 and 2016. Stock assessment studies indicated near optimum fishing pressure on the resource along the Kerala coast

Citizens’ Charter ICAR-Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute 2016-2017

Citizens’ Charter ICAR-Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute 2016-201

Factors influencing end-of-life morbidity: an epidemiological evaluation of population aging theories

Population aging theories were proposed to explain the effect of an increasing life expectancy on the duration of the morbid period at the end of life. Despite several decades of research, the epidemiological basis of these theories has not been investigated adequately. This dissertation uses data from the Cardiovascular Health Study, a community based cohort of older adults, to explore the epidemiologic basis of the basic tenets of these theories. Hospital stay at the end of life is an economically important measure of terminal morbidity. We examined the effect of lifestyle factors measured late in life on the duration of hospital days in the last 5 years of life. We found that alcohol consumption, smoking, obesity and social networks were independently associated with hospital stay, indicating that a late-life lifestyle could impact end-of-life morbidity after accounting for the accumulated disease burden. Cardiovascular mortality rates have been falling but it is not clear whether the morbidity associated with these events have reduced. We compared the risks for disability and death associated with cardiovascular events and found that angina, MI, CHD and CHF had stronger associations with death than disability. Cardiovascular events, therefore, do not seem to increase the disability burden in the population. The relationship between age at death and the duration of terminal morbidity has not been elucidated in community based populations with average life expectancy. We examined the association between age at death and the length of terminal self-rated poor health and found that survival is associated with the duration of end-of-life morbidity in a curvilinear fashion; morbid period is shorter for those who die in their seventies and nineties. Identifying factors that promote survival to the nineties would help delineate factors associated with a compressed period of morbidity. What are the public health implications of these findings? First, some preventive health behaviors can be harnessed to reduce the public health burden of terminal morbidity. Second, chronic diseases with low mortality risk need to be targeted to reduce the disability burden in populations. Third, survival to the nineties might hold the key to compressing morbidity in the older population

Few smooth d-polytopes with n lattice points

We prove that, for fixed n there exist only finitely many embeddings of Q-factorial toric varieties X into P^n that are induced by a complete linear system. The proof is based on a combinatorial result that for fixed nonnegative integers d and n, there are only finitely many smooth d-polytopes with n lattice points. We also enumerate all smooth 3-polytopes with at most 12 lattice points. In fact, it is sufficient to bound the singularities and the number of lattice points on edges to prove finiteness.Comment: 20+2 pages; major revision: new author, new structure, new result

Results from a meta-analysis of immune checkpoint inhibitors in first-line renal cancer patients: does PD-L1 matter?

Background: The aim of this study was to perform a literature-based meta-analysis to assess the efficacy of the novel immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) in first-line metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC), focusing on the predictive role of PD-L1 expression. Methods: The primary outcome was overall survival, and secondary outcomes were progression-free survival (PFS) and objective response. We planned a subgroup analysis for overall survival according to PD-L1 status. Results: Five studies were included in the analysis for a total of 4063 cases. Overall survival was greater in PD-L1 positive tumours (HR = 0.49, 95% CI: 0.36\u20130.67; p < 0.001). The pooled analysis of the unselected cases showed a statistically significative improvement in PFS with the use of ICIs (HR = 0.85, 95% CI: 0.72\u20130.99; p = 0.04) and we found a greater PFS benefit (HR = 0.65, 95% CI: 0.57\u20130.74; p < 0.001) in patients with PD-L1 positive tumours. Conclusions: This study supports the efficacy of ICIs and, although a significant clinical benefit has been reported in PD-L1 negative patients, a greater efficacy of ICIs was observed in PD-L1 positive patients. More prospective randomized studies are needed to clarify the role of PDL-1 status in metastatic RCC treated with ICIs

Performance of the CMS Cathode Strip Chambers with Cosmic Rays

The Cathode Strip Chambers (CSCs) constitute the primary muon tracking device in the CMS endcaps. Their performance has been evaluated using data taken during a cosmic ray run in fall 2008. Measured noise levels are low, with the number of noisy channels well below 1%. Coordinate resolution was measured for all types of chambers, and fall in the range 47 microns to 243 microns. The efficiencies for local charged track triggers, for hit and for segments reconstruction were measured, and are above 99%. The timing resolution per layer is approximately 5 ns

Hospital-onset clostridium difficile infection rates in persons with cancer or Hematopoietic stem cell transplant: A C3IC network report

A multicenter survey of 11 cancer centers was performed to determine the rate of hospital-onset Clostridium difficile infection (HO-CDI) and surveillance practices. Pooled rates of HO-CDI in patients with cancer were twice the rates reported for all US patients (15.8 vs 7.4 per 10,000 patient-days). Rates were elevated regardless of diagnostic test used