Therapeutic evaluation of homeopathic treatment for canine oral papillomatosis

Aim: A study was conducted to evaluate the ameliorative potential of homeopathic drugs in combination (Sulfur 30C, Thuja 30C, Graphites 30C, and Psorinum 30C) in 16 dogs affected with oral papillomatosis which was not undergone any previous treatment. Materials and Methods: Dogs affected with oral papillomatosis, which have not undergone any initial treatment and fed with a regular diet. Dogs (total=16) were randomly divided into two groups, namely, homeopathic treatment group (n=8) and placebo control group (n=8). Random number table was used for allocation. Homeopathic combination of drugs and placebo drug (distilled water) was administered orally twice daily for 15 days. Clinical evaluation in both groups of dogs was performed by the same investigator throughout the period of study (12 months). Dogs were clinically scored for oral lesions on days 0, 5, 7, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 45, 60, 90, 120, and 150 after initiation of treatment. Results: The homeopathic treatment group showed early recovery with a significant reduction in oral lesions reflected by clinical score (p<0.001) in comparison to placebo-treated group. Oral papillomatous lesions regressed in the homeopathic group between 7 and 15 days, whereas regression of papilloma in the placebo group occurred between 90 and 150 days. The homeopathic treated group was observed for 12 months post-treatment period and no recurrence of oral papilloma was observed. Conclusion: The current study proves that the combination of homeopathy drugs aids in fastening the regression of canine oral papilloma and proved to be safe and cost-effective

Antiradical and Cytotoxic Activities of Varying Polarity Extracts of the Aerial Part of Euphorbia hirta L.

Euphorbia hirta is a well-known ethnomedicinal plant with diverse biological activities.The aim of the present study is to investigate the antiradical activities of various solvent extracts of the aerial part of E. hirta as well as to determine the possible cytotoxicity of these extracts. The aerial part of E. hirta was extracted with different solvent systems in order to increase polarity. The solvents used were hexane, dichloromethane (DCM), ethyl acetate (EA), ethanol (EtOH), and methanol (MeOH). The contents of total phenols and total flavonoids were analyzed byUVspectrophotometry, whereas the potential free radical-scavenging activities of the extracts were evaluated using the stable free radical 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), th

Intuitionistic FWI-ideals of residuated lattice Wajsberg algebras

The notions of intutionistic fuzzy Wajsberg implicative ideal( –ideal) and intuitionistic fuzzy lattice ideal of residuated Wajsberg algebras are introduced. Also,  we show that every intuitionistic - ideal of residuated lattice Wajsberg algebra is an intuitionistic fuzzy lattice ideal of residuated lattice Wajsberg algebra. Further, we discuss its converse part

Free-text keystroke dynamics authentication for Arabic language

This study introduces an approach for user authentication using free-text keystroke dynamics which incorporates text in Arabic language. The Arabic language has completely different characteristics to those of English. The approach followed in this study involves the use of the keyboard's key-layout. The method extracts timing features from specific key-pairs in the typed text. Decision trees were exploited to classify each of the users' data. In parallel for comparison, support vector machines were also used for classification in association with an ant colony optimisation feature selection technique. The results obtained from this study are encouraging as low false accept rates and false reject rates were achieved in the experimentation phase. This signifies that satisfactory overall system performance was achieved by using the typing attributes in the proposed approach, while typing Arabic text

A Scientific approach on the Validation of Santha Santhrothaya Mathirai (SSM) a Siddha Herbo-Mineral Preparation for its Safety and Efficacy in the Management of Hepatic disorders

Santha santhrothaya mathirai (SSM) is a herbo-mineral formulation widely prescribed for hepatic disorders. The ingredients of SSM include mercurous chloride, borax, turmeric and lemon juice all of which are said to possess hepatoprotective activity. Although, the medicinal preparations mentioned in Siddha literature are time-tested standard preparations it is need of the hour to document standardization procedures by using sophisticated instrumental analysis to maintain quality control. In the present study the preparation of SSM was standardized initially and then it was scientifically validated by adopting various analytical techniques.Toxicity and pharmacological studies were also performed to understand the safety and efficacy of the traditional drugs. The raw materials used in the preparation of SSM were identified and authenticated using contemperory accepted practice. The raw materials of mineral origin viz., pooram and vengaram were purified strictly following the classical Siddha texts. The study drug SSM was prepared adopting the method mentioned in the “Siddha Vaithiya Thirattu”. In order to standardize the preparation protocol, SSM was prepared thrice (SSM-A, SSM-B and SSM-C) by following the same protocol and the similarity was demonstrated by examining various physical and chemical nature such as total ash, moisture content. The microbial load, aflatoxins and pesticide levels were analyzed and were found to be within the WHO permissible limits in all the three samples. Quantity of heavy metals (lead, cadmium, mercury and arsenic) in all the 3 samples of SSM were estimated by using atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS) and were found to be within the permissible limits. Total curcumin content of SSM was estimated in all the three samples of SSM by HPTLC analysis. The amount of curcumin present in Sample A was 0.6589 %; Sample B was 0.6884 % and Sample C was 0.7104 %.Total curcumin content of SSM - (A-1.15%,B 1.19%, C1.23%) were analysed by UV spectroscopy. There was no significant variation in the curcumin content in all the three samples of SSM. Since all samples were similar throughout the above analysis one of them was taken for further analytical procedures. TGA analysis of SSM confirms a weight loss of 77% indicating the presence of large quantity of organic organic material in SSM. The chemical changes that have occurred during the Siddha methods of purification process were assessed by using Raman spectroscopy, FTIR, XRD and SEM Analysis. The analytical studies confirm the changes in the chemical structure of raw and purified state. The tetragonal crystalline structure of Pooram (Mercurous chloride) showed changes in its crystalline structure though the exact shape could not be established. Similarly Vengaram (Borax) also showed a change in its structure from rhombohedral form to orthorhombic form. Moreover the presence of organo-mineral complex in SSM can be due to the combination of turmeric with purified vengaram, purified pooram or both. SEM Analysis revealed the particle size of 1μm to 500 nm in various magnifications. Also the morphological structure showed variations in purified and prepared medicine SSM when compared to raw samples. In order to understand the nature of inorganic materials present in SSM, the XRF, ICP-OES and mercury analysis by tituration method was performed. Heavy metals concentration of Mercury, lead, cadmium and arsenic were observed by the ICP-OES. This analysis of raw pooram (P1), raw vengaram (V1) showed mercury level and Sodium level as 123.241ppm and 545.862ppm respectively. There was significant reduction in the content of mercury (55.87ppm) in Pooram and the content of Sodium (203.110ppm) in Vengaram in purified state. Further reduction was observed in the mercury and Sodium level in study drug SSM as 3.154ppm and 125.383 ppm respectively. The other heavy metals such as As, Cd, and Pb were below detectable level (BDL) in all the samples (Raw, Purified and prepared samples). The concentration of elements in oxide form was analyzed through X-Ray Fluorescence in the Raw, purified and prepared samples. The XRF study revealed the addition and deletion of trace elements and a reduction in the percentage of Mercury from 87.23% in raw form to 59.59% in purified form and 58.82% in SSM finished sample. From the results of tituration method, mercury content was also reduced from raw state of ingredients to purified and finished state of SSM. These analytical studies are essential since the raw materials for herbomineral preparations are often sourced from various regions and during various seasons. The present study ensures the quality control of the drug which is essential for the prevention of adulteration, reproducibility, assessment of finished product, estimation of active principle and global acceptance. SSM was accessed for its safety on short-term and long-term administration by performing acute, sub acute, subchronic toxicity in animal models. In acute toxicity study, SSM did not produce any mortality or exhibit any abnormal signs for 14 days even upto the dose of 2000mg/kg, on single oral administration.Gross necropsy of different organs revealed no abnormalities after 14 days.In subacute toxicity study, oral administration for a period of 28 days did not showany behavioural abnormality and mortality even at the dose of 250 mg/kg. Gross pathological examination and histopathological analysis of the various organs such as heart, liver, kidney, lung, spleen, stomach, brain did not reveal any lesions in any of the groups. In subchronic toxicity study, there was no behavioural abnormality and mortality throughout the study period of 90 days except mild laxative effect in high dose group. Few changes were observed in haematological and biochemical parameters of SSM treated animals when compared to control groups but were within the physiological limits. Moreover the reduction of liver parameters ALT and AST reveals the hepatoprotective effect of SSM. Histopathological examinations of the tissues revealed mild inflammatory changes in liver and kidney with no significant changes in AST, ALT, urea and creatinine which are biomarkers of hepatic and renal damage. Recovery group was maintained to assess all the above haematological, biochemical and histopathalogical parameters and were found to have no significant toxicological changes. ICP-MS analysis of renal tissue indicates that the study drug SSM does not cause any cumulative toxic effect in renal tissues as the levels of mercury was below the detectable limit in post retrieval group. The results of the toxicity study confirms the safety of SSM towards human consumption. The pharmacological activity of SSM was accessed using three different animal model that represents Paracetamol - induced liver injury, LPS +D–galactosamine induced hepatoxicity which may mimic alchohol induced liver damage, acute liver damage and viral hepatitis respectively. In all the three models, SSM was found to reduce various liver function parameters such as AST, ALT, ALP, Urea and bilirubin that were elevated due to disease induction. Moreover, SSM also increases the total proteins in all the three pharmacological models. Furthermore, treatment with SSM at the dose levels of 25 and 125mg/Kg significantly increases the hepatic antioxidant enzymes such as SOD, CAT, GRD, and GPx and decreases the level of lipid peroxidation when compared to the disease control groups. Histopathology analysis of liver showed that SSM at Low (25mg/kg) and high (125mg/Kg) doses greatly reduced the level of fibrosis and deposition of collagen fibres in alchohol induced liver injury and paracetamol induced liver injury as almost equal to the standard drug Liv 52 and the levels of fibrosis and restoration of collagen fibres in D-Galactosamine induced liver injury were almost similar to that of the standard drug Silymarin. Over all SSM was found to contain notable quantity of mercury in the form of organometallic complex. But it was found to be effective in the management of liver disorders and was experimentally very safe even at very high doses. This study clearly demonstrated the traditional mercury containing drugs are safe for oral administration plausibly may be due to the traditional purification and preparation protocols employed during the process of formulation. CONCLUSION: It is concluded that the trial drug SSM a classical Siddha formulation, was well formulated ensuring the quality by complying with the GMP and GLP standards at every step right from procurement, authentication ,purification to final product analysis. The toxicological profiling of SSM reveals that it has a large margin of safety on acute, sub acute and sub chronic toxicity in experimental rats. Also the pharmacological studies on SSM has proved it to be hepatoprotective and efficacious in the therapeutic dosage for treating liver diseases. The reverse pharmacological work to re-validate the traditional formulation, SSM confirms the safety profile and effectiveness by adopting the modern scientific and acceptable methods to satisfy the present day demands. Hence through this work, an effort has been made to bring out SSM as evidence based safe Siddha medicine for Liver disorders

Purification And Characterization Of Phosphofructokinase (PFK) Enzyme From Antarctic Yeast, Leucosporidium Antarcticum [QR84.7. S528 2008 f rb].

Leucosporidium Antarcticum telah dipencilkan daripada sampel air dari Stesen Davis di Antartika dan menunjukkan potensi untuk menghasilkan enzim intrasel fosfofruktokinase (PFK) (ATP-PFK; EC 2.7.1.11) pada suhu 5 oC di dalam medium kompleks. L.antarcticum was isolated from the freshwater sample collected from Davis Station in Antarctic and was potential to produce intracellular phosphofructokinase (PFK) (ATP-PFK; EC 2.7.1.11

The Change and Difference of the Prosody

Prosody in Tamil has changed and developed from time to time. Prosody itself helps in the creation of traditional poems. Apart from creating traditional poems, prosody is also a tool for knowing the structure and meaning of songs composed on the basis of a tradition dating back to ancient times. It is prosody that lays down the rules for the style of the verse, which treats the subject matter of the book with sound and appearance. If the ideas expressed are in the style of a poem, then the prose has no use for the reciter. That is why, compared to prose, the style of the poem becomes superior. Since all our ancient texts are composed in the style of poetry, the practice of prosody is essential for our fullest experience of them. Tolkappiya poetry is an uncommon component of understanding the structure of ancient Tamil poetry. The former praised the prosodic features and developed them from time to time. The Tholkappiyar was also well-versed in the prosodic system that existed before him. He praises the creators of prosody that existed before him as 'Yaappari Pulavar (Poets who know Prosody)'. Tolkappiyam is the first book we have today to expound the Prosody. After Tholkappiyam, books such as Kakkaipaadiniyam, Avinayam, Yaapparungalam, Yaapparungalakaarikai, Veerachozhiyam, Muthuveeriyam, Palkaayam, etc., have appeared to describe prosody. It is natural that from time to time the emergence of new types of prosody and changes in old prosodic types occur. Therefore, the prosody explained by other poets’ texts differs in some respects from the grammatical trend of Tholkappiyar. This article is based on how Tolkappiyar's opinion about prosodic parts in the grammar of prosody has been changed or different in the prosodic texts that appeared after him

Existential, Relatedness, Growth (ERG) needs’ dimensions of medical students for rural posting – An analytical study

The retention of rural doctors in India is a very big challenge. Despite the mandatory rural postings, year by year rural health statistics indicate an abysmal picture of rural doctors' vacancies and their shortfalls in many states. Various studies stipulate that rural doctors are quitting rural postings. A reliable instrument to identify the motivational needs of doctors towards their rural postings, suitable to the Indian context, which is vital for both policymakers and doctors alike.&nbsp; So, this study aims to acquire the reliability of the Existential, relatedness, and Growth needs of Doctors’ questionnaire and to obtain the dimensions of needs as an initial attempt. An ERG motivational need questionnaire was developed to explain the needs of medical graduates and rurally placed physicians in Indian context. A literature search and pilot study with 64 medical students conducted and relevant items were extracted. This study was conducted in Jaipur, Chennai, and Pondicherry. The reduction of items was done through principal component analysis in SPSS. Cronbach Alpha coefficient is considered to measure for internal consistency reliability of the instrument. The instrument is developed with three constructs namely Existential needs (EN), Relatedness Needs (RN), and Growth Needs (GN) with a 5-point Likert scale. The exploratory factor analysis after three rotations converged to 9 factors with 74.103 total variance and 0.606 Kaiser-Meyer- Olkin index indicating sampling adequacy. The initial scale items (with 58 Items) were reduced to 9 factors with 28 items in the final questionnaire. Overall scale is with Cronbach alpha value of 0.851 for these items. The result obtained has proven that the extracted 9 factors have good reliability to obtain the dimensions of Existential, relatedness, and growth needs. The study results have implications in addressing the problem of Rural doctors’ shortage

Evaluating Green Solvents and Techniques in Extraction Methods

Of all analytical techniques, extraction is a huge solvent-consuming process that could adversely impact the environment. Use of petroleum-based solvents for extraction of oilseeds is still a common practice, despite the potential fire hazard and the toxic water pollution. The rising awareness of chemical activities created immense need for sustainable development schemes and strategies that should address the environmental impact without compromising the yield. In the course of developing green extraction techniques, automation, alternative solvents, and selective extractions are the growing trend. This dissertation aligns with that progress by surveying green solvents, comparing their performance during oil extraction, examining a prototype automated extraction system, and studying the efficiency of selective adsorbents. Green solvents are of great interest as they are sourced from renewable feedstock and pose little or no danger to the environment. But their application in analytical chemistry is not widely appreciated. This dissertation aimed to study the extraction efficiency of green solvents during accelerated solvent extraction of soybean oil. Five green solvents, 2-methyltetrahydrofuran (2-MeTHF), alpha-pinene, cyclopentyl methyl ether (CPME), ethyl lactate, and t-butyl methyl ether (TBME), were chosen based on the literature, solubility, and viscosity. Using the GSK solvent-scoring system obtained from literature, the ecological and economic impact of these solvents were roughly identified with respect to n-hexane. As the solubility of analytes can influence the initial part of the extraction, relative solubility of triglycerides (of the major soybean fatty acids such as linoleic acid, oleic acid, palmitic acid, and stearic acid) in the green solvents was theoretically predicted using a computer program. Also, the viscosities of the green solvents at different temperatures was investigated prior to the extraction study. Soybean, the most dominant oilseed in the market with rich protein and oil content, was used as the sample for the extraction study. As the initial analysis indicated that the lower size particles give greater oil recovery, soybean particles of average diameter 513 μm were chosen for the elaborate extraction evaluation. For a small-scale fast extraction of analytes from solid and semisolid samples, accelerated solvent extraction (ASE) is a powerful and sophisticated device. This fully automated extraction system uses very little solvent at elevated temperature and pressure and is able to run several queued experiments at programmed conditions. To rely on the results from ASE of soybean oil using green solvents, the hot-ball model was used as a validating tool. The hot-ball model gives a theoretical extraction profile for an ideal spherical matrix that can be used to evaluate and validate any experimental extraction results. As diffusion plays a major role in the kinetics of extraction, comparing the diffusion coefficient of green solvents was the key approach. Upon assessing the performance of green solvents with respect to percent oil recovery, CPME demonstrated the highest diffusion coefficient and highest % recovery for soybean oil. A remarkable 99% recovery was attained within 30 min, which is 17 times faster than n-hexane. These results suggest CPME as a promising green alternative solvent for soybean oil extraction. The second part of this dissertation examines a new green extraction system. A prototype automated extractor from CEM was investigated in terms of its extraction efficiency. The knowledge obtained from previous ASE extraction studies were used to gauge the capabilities of this instrument, and the hot-ball model was used to validate the results. Adsorbents are a significant part of the post-extraction cleanup process and studying their efficiency could reveal their ability to green the analytical techniques. The mechanism of adsorption is complex, and it varies with each adsorbate-solvent-adsorbent system. The last part of the dissertation aimed to investigate the oil adsorption efficiency of five adsorbents – silica, florisil, activated carbon, alumina and diatomaceous earth – during ASE extractions at different temperatures and concentration. Results showed that activated carbon has remarkable tendency to retain oil, at low temperatures and high adsorbent concentrations