Face Verification with Veridical and Caricatured Images using Prominent Attributes

Caricatures, with their exaggerated features, offer a surprisingly efficient means for individuals to recognize each other compared to veridical (real) images. However, it is still a difficult task in machine learning to match veridical images to caricatures. This is due to the poor quality of caricature datasets, which often lack clear labels and contain low-quality images. Widely utilized veridical image datasets like CelebA also suffer from inadequate labeling. These label inconsistencies pose significant issues in accurate face verification tasks. Moreover, the effectiveness of neural networks has led to a shift in focus away from attribute-based representations, further complicating the matching process. In this thesis, we introduce a classification protocol for prominent facial feature recognition along with a verification protocol for matching celebrity veridical images to their caricatures. We utilize CarVer, a recently curated dataset comprising both veridical and caricature images accompanied by detailed prominent feature labels

પી.ટી.સી. તાલીમાર્થીઓની સિદ્ધિપ્રેરણા, અનુકૂલન અને નવા અભ્યાસક્રમ પ્રત્યેના વલણોનો અભ્યાસ

શિક્ષણ એ સારા ભાવિ નાગરિકો તૈયાર કરવા માટેનું અગત્યનું ક્ષેત્ર છે. જેમાં શિક્ષક મહત્ત્વનું અંગ છે. રાષ્ટ્રના વિકાસમાં ફાળો આપી શકે એવા સંસ્કારી નાગરિકોનું ઘડતર કરવાની જવાબદારી શિક્ષકના શિરે રહે છે. શિક્ષિત અને સંસ્કારી નાગરિક એ લોકશાહી શાસનપ્રણાલીની સફળતા માટેની પૂર્વશરત છે. સારા નાગરિકોના ઘડતર માટે શિક્ષકોને યોગ્ય કેળવણી મળી રહે તે માટે પ્રશિક્ષણ કાર્યક્રમ પણ એટલો જ ગુણવત્તાસભર હોય તે જરૂરી છે. શિક્ષણના ક્ષેત્રમાં વલણ અને વલણમાપનની વિચારણા થોડું વિશેષ મહત્ત્વ ધરાવે છે, શિક્ષક અને વિદ્યાર્થી બંન્નેને પ્રત્યક્ષ રીતે સ્પર્શતું આ પરિબળ આધુનિક શિક્ષણમાં ખુબજ અગત્યનું છે. શિક્ષક બનતા પુર્વેના તાલીમગાળા દરમ્યાન જો તેમનું અભ્યાસક્રમ પ્રત્યેનું વલણ યોગ્ય હશે તો જ તે અભ્યાસક્રમ અનુરૂપ કૌશલ્યોનો તેમનામાં વિકાસ થશે

Effect of Hyaluronic Acid and Kappa-Carrageenan on Milk Properties: Rheology, Protein Stability, Foaming, Water-Holding, and Emulsification Properties

Hyaluronic acid (HA) is now widely known for its ability to bind water and impart texture. The combined effects of HA and kappa-carrageenan (KC) have not yet been investigated, though. In this study, we looked at the synergistic effects of HA and KC (concentrations of 0.1 and 0.25%, and ratios of 85:15, 70:30, and 50:50 for each concentration) on the rheological properties, heat stability, protein phase separation, water-holding capacity, emulsification properties, and foaming properties of skim milk. When HA and KC were combined in various ratios with a skim milk sample, this resulted in lesser protein phase separation and a higher water-holding capacity than when HA and KC were utilized separately. Similarly, for the sample with a 0.1% concentration, the combination of HA + KC blends demonstrated a synergistic impact with greater emulsifying activity and stability. The samples with a concentration of 0.25% did not exhibit this synergistic effect, and the emulsifying activity and stability were mostly due to the HA’s higher emulsifying activity and stability at 0.25% concentration. Similarly, for rheological (apparent viscosity, consistency coefficient K, and flow behavior index n) and foaming properties, the synergistic effect of the HA + KC blend was not readily apparent; rather, these values were mostly due to an increase in the amount of KC in the HA + KC blend ratios. When HC-control and KC-control samples were compared to various HA + KC mix ratios, there was no discernible difference in the heat stability. With the added benefits of protein stability (reduced phase separation), increased water-holding capacity, improved emulsification capabilities, and foaming abilities, the combination of HA + KC would be highly helpful in many texture-modifying applications

Effect of Different Molecular Weight Hyaluronic Acids on Skim Milk Functional Properties

Hyaluronic acid (HA), a naturally occurring polysaccharide with recognized health benefits, has gained approval for use in the food industry as a food additive, ingredient, and health supplement in numerous countries. HA can increase viscosity in solutions and is available commercially in various molecular weights (MW) depending on end applications. Nevertheless, no research has explored the impact of different MW HAs on functionality, rheological properties, and texture-building benefits in the dairy product matrix wherein they are incorporated. Therefore, the objective of this study was to evaluate how varying MWs of HA—specifically 8 kDa, 320 kDa, 980 kDa, and 2550 kDa at 0.25% (w/w) concentration—impact rheological characteristics, functional attributes, heat stability, protein stability, protein structure, and protein fractions within skim milk. The addition of HA led to an increase in the apparent viscosity of all samples. A higher G″ value over G′ values for all HA samples was observed in frequency sweep, indicating the absence of interparticle interactions between HA particles. Protein stability and heat stability were significantly lower for 980 kDa and 2550 kDa HA as compared to the control and 8 kDa HA samples. As the MW increased, WHC, emulsion properties, and foaming stability notably increased. However, reversed results were found in the case of foaming activity. Moreover, no significant changes were observed in the percent area of individual protein fractions and the hydrodynamic diameter of protein particles. This study would help to understand the effect of HA when incorporated in dairy products for water binding or enhancement in viscosity-based applications

Transbuccal delivery of salbutamol sulphate: in vitro determination of routes of buccal transport

Se estudió la influencia de la concentración de fármaco, el pH del compartimento dador y el coeficiente de partición 1-octanol/tampón en la permeación transbucal del sulfato de salbutamol (pKa1 = 9,3; pKa2 = 10,3) a través de mucosa bucal porcina utilizando una célula de difusión de Franz en línea a 37 ºC. El pH se ajustó a varios valores y la solubilidad del fármaco se midió en distintos pH. La solubilidad del sulfato de salbutamol descendió al aumentar el pH. Se evaluó la permeabilidad del fármaco a diferentes concentraciones de fármaco y pH dador. Se calculó la permeabilidad de especies ionizadas (Pi) y no ionizadas (Pu) del fármaco. El flujo de estado estable aumentó de forma lineal con la concentración dadora (r2=0,9683) con pH 7,4. El coeficiente de partición y permeabilidad aumentaron al aumentar el pH. Los valores de Pu y Pi del sulfato de salbutamol fueron 8,89 · 10-6 cm·s-1 y 2,49 · 10-6 cm·s-1, respectivamente. El coeficiente de permeabilidad total aumentó al aumentar la fracción de la forma no ionizada del fármaco. El fármaco penetró a través de la mucosa bucal mediante un proceso de difusión pasivo. El coeficiente de partición y la dependencia del pH de la permeabilidad del fármaco indicaron que el sulfato de salbutamol se transportó principalmente a través de la ruta paracelular mediante un mecanismo de partición.The influence of drug concentration, pH in donor chamber, and 1-octanol/buffer partition coefficient on transbuccal permeation of salbutamol sulphate (pKa1 = 9.3, pKa2 = 10.3) across porcine buccal mucosa was studied by using in-line franz type diffusion cell at 37ºC. The pH was adjusted to several values, and the solubility of the drug in different pH was measured. Solubility of salbutamol sulphate decreased with increasing the pH. The permeability of the drug was evaluated at different donor pH and drug concentrations. Permeability of unionized (Pu) and ionized (Pi) species of drug was calculated. The steady state flux increased linearly with the donor concentration (r2=0.9683) at pH 7.4. The permeability and the partition coefficient increased with increasing pH. The value of Pu and Pi of salbutamol sulphate were 8.89 · 10-6 cm·s-1 and 2.49 · 10-6 cm·s-1 respectively. The total permeability coefficient increased with increasing the fraction of unionized form of the drug. The drug permeated through buccal mucosa by a passive diffusion process. The partition coefficient and pH dependency of drug permeability indicated that salbutamol sulphate was transported mainly via the paracellular route by a partition mechanism

Preparación de comprimidos de desintegración rápida de clorhidrato de ondansetrón mediante el método de compresión directa

To make rapidly disintegrating tablets containing 8 mg ondansetron hydrochloride with suffi cient mechanical integrityas well as a pleasant taste, microcrystalline cellulose (MCC), lactose anhydrous, mannitol and croscarmellose wereformulated. Tablets were prepared by a direct compression method. Tablets properties such as tensile strength, disintegrationtime, wetting time and friability were determined. The two-factor spherical second order composite experimentaldesign was used for the preparation of preliminary batches and the desirability function was employed for theoptimization of preliminary batches. For preparation of the rapidly disintegrating tablets, simplex lattice design withconstraints on the proportion of excipients was utilized. In later design, tensile strength and disintegration time wereselected as dependent variables and concentration of microcrystalline cellulose, concentration of lactose anhydrous andconcentration of mannitol were selected as controlling factors. Mathematical equations and contour plots were usedto relate independent variables with tensile strength and disintegration time. Furthermore, the composite index which considers a positive or negative deviation from an ideal value was calculated for the optimization of the formulation.Contour plots of tensile strength and disintegration time were superimposed to fi nd out the optimized region at whichtablets with an acceptable crushing strength and disintegration time can be produced. The concept of similarity factorsf2 and Sd were used to prove similarity of dissolution in distilled water and simulated saliva (pH 6.8). Rapidly disintegratingtablets with durable structure and desirable taste could be prepared by selecting proper level of MCC, lactoseanhydrous, mannitol, croscarmellose and compression force.Para elaborar comprimidos de desintegración rápida con un contenido de 8 mg de clorhidrato de ondansetrón, consufi ciente integridad mecánica y buen sabor, se preparó una formulación de celulosa microcristalina (CM), lactosaanhidra, manitol y croscarmelosa. Los comprimidos se elaboraron mediante el método de compresión directa. Sedeterminaron propiedades tales como la resistencia a la fractura, el tiempo de desintegración, el tiempo de humidificación y la friabilidad. Para la preparación de los primeros lotes se utilizó el diseño experimental de compuestode segundo orden esférico de dos factores, y para su optimización se empleó la función de deseabilidad. Para lapreparación de los comprimidos de desintegración rápida se utilizó un diseño en retículos simple con restriccionesen la proporción de los excipientes. En un diseño posterior, se seleccionaron como variables independientesla resistencia a la fractura y la concentración de celulosa microcristalina, de lactosa anhidra y de manitol. Pararelacionar las variables independientes con la resistencia a la fractura y el tiempo de desintegración, se utilizaronecuaciones matemáticas y representaciones gráfi cas. Además, para optimizar la formulación, se calculó el índicesintético que considera una desviación positiva o negativa a partir de un valor ideal. Se superpusieron las representacionesgráfi cas de la resistencia a la fractura y el tiempo de desintegración para encontrar la región optimizadaen la que se pueden producir comprimidos con resistencia al aplastamiento y tiempos de desintegración aceptables.Para demostrar la similitud de la disolución en agua destilada y saliva simulada (pH 6,8) se utilizó el concepto delos factores de similitud f2 y Sd. Se podrían preparar comprimidos de desintegración rápida con una estructuraduradera y un sabor agradable si se selecciona el nivel adecuado de CM, lactosa anhidra, manitol, croscarmelosay fuerza de compresión

Assessment of Occupational Stress among High School Teachers of Ahmedabad City, India

Background: Apart from teaching, school teachers are involved in much of the school related work which may eventually affect their psychological well being. It is important to know the psychological impacts of such work related stress among school teachers. Objectives: To find out the prevalence of variables of the occupation stress among high school teachers using scale; To find out association between the selected personal variables with different component of occupational stress as defined in The School Teachers Job Stressor Scale-STJSS; Methods: STJSS was used as a tool for data collection. The sample size was calculated and the data were analyses for components of occupational stress (Anxiety, Depression, Lack of sleep, loss of appetite and other issues like additional workload, exhaustion, and support from peers) by selecting 36 school teachers from each zone. Statistical analysis was done using proportions, Kurtosis-Skewness and Chi-square test. .Results: Among a total of 218 school teachers, Male teachers had significantly higher proportions of anxiety (72.72%) and depression (76.66%) than female counterparts. On the other hand, female teachers (38.88%) were more likely to feel “additional work-load” than the males (21.09%). Depression was more common in overweight (18.51%) and obese (23.07%) participants.Conclusion: Demographic variables like age and gender had significant associations with occupational stressors among the school teachers. The need of psychological improvements among school teachers should be the area of focus including school health

LIPIDS: Learning-based Illumination Planning In Discretized (Light) Space for Photometric Stereo

Photometric stereo is a powerful method for obtaining per-pixel surface normals from differently illuminated images of an object. While several methods address photometric stereo with different image (or light) counts ranging from one to two to a hundred, very few focus on learning optimal lighting configuration. Finding an optimal configuration is challenging due to the vast number of possible lighting directions. Moreover, exhaustively sampling all possibilities is impractical due to time and resource constraints. Photometric stereo methods have demonstrated promising performance on existing datasets, which feature limited light directions sparsely sampled from the light space. Therefore, can we optimally utilize these datasets for illumination planning? In this work, we introduce LIPIDS - Learning-based Illumination Planning In Discretized light Space to achieve minimal and optimal lighting configurations for photometric stereo under arbitrary light distribution. We propose a Light Sampling Network (LSNet) that optimizes lighting direction for a fixed number of lights by minimizing the normal loss through a normal regression network. The learned light configurations can directly estimate surface normals during inference, even using an off-the-shelf photometric stereo method. Extensive qualitative and quantitative analyses on synthetic and real-world datasets show that photometric stereo under learned lighting configurations through LIPIDS either surpasses or is nearly comparable to existing illumination planning methods across different photometric stereo backbones.Accepted in WACV 202

Método de cromatografía líquida de alta resolución para la determinación simultánea de fosinopril sódico e hidroclorotiazida en formulaciones de comprimidos

A simple, specifi c, accurate and precise reversed phase HPLC method with UV detection for the simultaneous determinationof fosinopril sodium and hydrohclorthiazide in pharmaceutical formulations was developed. The drug solutionwas prepared in mobile phase and was injected into a C18 column with UV detection at 208 nm. The mobile phasewas a mixture of 0.2%w/v phosphoric acid in water and acetonitrile (30:70) delivered at a fl ow rate of 0.5 ml/min at29 0C. The calibration graphs were linear in the range of 10-50 μg/ml (r2 > 0.99) for fosinopril sodium and 6.25-31.35 μg/ml for hydrochlorthiazide (r2 > 0.99). The detection limit was 0.5μg/ml for fosinopril sodium and 1.0 μg/mlfor hydrochlorthiazide with quantitation limit of 10 μg/ml and 6.25 μg/ml for fosinopril sodium and hydrochlorthiazide,respectively. The statistical evaluation of the method was examined by performing intra-day (n=5) and inter-day calibration(n=5) and was found to be satisfactory, with high accuracy, and precision results. Application of the suggestedmethod was successfully applied to the simultaneous determination of fosinopril sodium and hydrochlorthiazide intablets formulation, with high percentage of recovery, good accuracy with precision.Se ha desarrollado un método HPLC de fase inversa con detección de UV sencillo, específi co, exacto y preciso parala determinación de fosinopril sódico e hidroclorotiazida en formulaciones farmacéuticas. La solución de fármacose preparó en fase móvil y se inyectó en una columna C18 con detección de UV a 208 nm. La fase móvil era unamezcla de 0,2% p/v de ácido fosfórico en agua y acetonitrilo (30:70) añadida a una velocidad de fl ujo de 0,5 ml/mina 29 0C. Los gráfi cos de calibración fueron lineales en el rango de 10-50 μg/ml (r2 > 0,99) para el fosinopril sódicoy de 6,25-31,35 μg/ml para la hidroclorotiazida (r2 > 0,99). El límite de detección fue de 0,5 μg/ml para el fosinoprilsódico y de 1,0 μg/ml para la hidroclorotiazida, con un límite de cuantifi cación de 10 μg/ml y 6,25 μg/ml para elfosinopril sódico y la hidroclorotiazida, respectivamente. La evaluación estadística del método se examinó mediantecalibración intradía (n=5) e interdía (n=5) y resultó satisfactoria, con una exactitud y precisión elevadas. El métodosugerido se aplicó con éxito en la determinación simultánea de fosinopril sódico e hidroclorotiazida en formulacionesde comprimidos, con un elevado porcentaje de recuperación, buena exactitud y precisión

Evaluación y optimización simultánea de papaína inmovilizada en gránulos de alginato entrecruzado mediante un diseño factorial 3x3 y la función de deseabilidad

This paper investigates the crosslinking of sodium alginate with calcium ions through ionotropic gelation to entrap papain using ‘‘environmentally benign’’ solvents. A 3x3 full factorial design was employed to investigate the effect of three process variables namely sodium alginate concentration, calcium chloride concentration and hardening time on % entrapment, time required for 50% (T50) and 90% (T90) of enzyme release, particle size and angle of repose. The beads were prepared by dropping the sodium alginate solution containing enzyme from dropping device to magnetically stirred calcium chloride solution. Furthermore, the desirability function was employed in order to optimize the process under study. It was found that the optimum values of the responses could be obtained at the low levels of all three process variables. Topographical characterization was carried out by taking SEM and entrapment was confirmed using DSC. It was concluded that the proper selection of rate-controlling alginate concentration and their interactive potential for crosslinking is important, and will determine the overall size and shape of beads, the duration and pattern of dissolution profiles, pH sensitivity and enzyme loading capacity.En este artículo se investiga el entrecruzamiento del alginato sódico con iones de calcio a través de la gelación ionotrópica para capturar la papaína mediante disolventes «benignos para el entorno». Se empleó un diseño factorial completo 3x3 para investigar el efecto de las tres variables del proceso, que son la concentración de alginato sódico, la concentración de cloruro cálcico y el tiempo de endurecimiento sobre el porcentaje de captura, el tiempo necesario para la liberación de un 50% (T50) y un 90% (T90) de la enzima, la distribución y el ángulo de reposo. Los gránulos se prepararon mediante el uso de un dispositivo de goteo para el vertido de gotas de solución de alginato sódico que contiene la enzima en la solución de cloruro cálcico agitada magnéticamente. Además, se empleó la función de deseabilidad para optimizar el proceso sometido a estudio. Se demostró que los valores óptimos de las respuestas se pueden obtener en los niveles inferiores de las tres variables del proceso. La caracterización topográfica se realizó mediante microscopía electrónica de barrido (SEM) y la captura se confirmó a través de una calorimetría diferencial de barrido (DSC). Se concluyó que la selección adecuada de concentración de alginato con control de la velocidad de liberación y su potencial interactivo para el entrecruzamiento es importante y determina el tamaño y la forma general de los gránulos, los perfiles de patrón de disolución y duración, la sensibilidad al pH y la capacidad de carga de la enzima