Safety and Feasibility of Enhanced Recovery after Surgery in Pediatric Colostomy Closure.

Aims: To study the safety and feasibility of enhanced recovery after surgery (ERAS) protocol in pediatric colostomy closure. Materials and Methods: Retrospective observational study of children who underwent colostomy closure. Data were collected from the electronic medical records and telephonic follow-up calls of patients from October 2013 to October 2023, in the Department of Pediatric Surgery of a Tertiary level Medical College. The parameters obtained were age, gender, type of stoma, primary diagnosis, discrepancy in luminal diameters, time to reach full feeds, postoperative hospital stay, and complications. The protocol followed for colostomy closure included the following-no bowel preparation or nasogastric tube, no overnight fasting, single dose of antibiotic prophylaxis, avoiding opioids, packing proximal stoma till mobilization and starting early oral feeds postoperatively. The continuous parameters were expressed as mean ± standard deviation or median (range) while the descriptive parameters were expressed as number and percentage. Results: A total of 90 patients were included in the study. Most of the patients had colostomy for anorectal malformation. Five of them had significant luminal discrepancy of 4 or more times. Full feeds were reached within 2 days in 79 patients. Postoperative hospital stay was 2-3 days in 62 patients. Six patients stayed for more than 5 days, due to complications requiring further management. We noted surgical site infection in 6 patients all of whom were managed with regular wound dressings and fecal fistula in 4 cases, two of which resolved spontaneously. Conclusion: ERAS protocol in colostomy closure reduces the hospital stay and is cost effective, with early recovery and no added complications.

An effective role-oriented binary Walrus Grey Wolf approach for feature selection in early-stage chronic kidney disease detection.

In clinical decision-making for chronic disorders like chronic kidney disease, high variability often leads to uncertainty and negative outcomes. Deep learning techniques have been developed as useful tools for minimizing the chance and improving clinical decision-making. Moreover, traditional techniques for chronic kidney disease recognition frequently the accuracy is compromised as it relies on limited sets of biological attributes. Therefore, in the proposed work, a combination of deep radial bias network and the puma optimization algorithm is suggested for precised chronic kidney disease classification. Initially, the accessed data undergo preprocessing using Spectral Z score Bag Boost K-Means SMOTE transformation, which includes robust scaling, data cleaning, balancing, encoding, handling missing values, min-max scaling, and z-standardization. Feature selection is then conducted using the hybrid methodology of Role-oriented Binary Walrus Grey Wolf Algorithm to choose discriminative features for improving classification accuracy. Then, Auto Encoder with Patch-Based Principal Component Analysis is employed for dimensionality reduction to minimize the processing time. Finally, the proposed classification method utilizes deep radial bias and the puma optimization search algorithm for effective chronic kidney disease classification. The introduced scheme is tested on two datasets: the risk factor prediction of chronic kidney disease dataset and chronic kidney disease dataset, which provides accuracies of 99.02%, and 99.15%, respectively. Experiments demonstrate that the proposed model identifies chronic kidney disease more accurately than the existing approaches.

Vegetal protein hydrolysates reduce the yield losses in off-season crops under combined heat and drought stress.

To deal with the vagaries of climate change, it is essential to develop climate-resilient agricultural practices, which improve crop productivity, and ensure food security. The impacts of high temperature and water deficit stress conditions pose serious challenges to a sustainable crop production. Several adaptation measures are practiced globally to address these challenges and among these altering the crop's typical growing season is one of the key management practices. Application of biostimulants and other growth hormones helps in compensating yield losses under abiotic stress significantly. Therefore, this study was conducted to evaluate the influence of vegetal protein hydrolysate based biostimulant to reduce the yield losses of off-season crops (soybean and chilli in summer and chickpea in early Kharif) when the temperature was higher than the regular season under water deficit stress conditions. The experiments were carried out with the foliar application of different protein hydrolysates (PHs) concentrations. The study revealed that the application of PHs significantly improved the membrane stability index, relative water content, total chlorophyll and proline content of leaves. Consequently, it led to an increase in the number of pods in soybean and chickpea, and fruits in chilli, leading to improved yields when plants were treated with the appropriate amount of PHs. Compared to untreated plants, PHs helped improve the efficiency of PS-II with significantly high photochemical efficiency (QYmax) even at higher excised leaf water loss or reduction in loss of relative water content. This study concluded that foliar application of PHs at 4, 2, and 6 ml L-1 can be beneficial for soybean, chickpea and chilli, which exhibited 17, 30, and 25% yield improvement respectively, over the untreated plants under water deficit stress. It is suggested that the benefits of PHs can be realized in soybean, chickpea and chilli under high temperature and water deficit stress. Therefore, vegetal PHs may be able to assist farmers in arid regions for boosting their income by raising market value and decreasing production barriers during the off-season. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12298-023-01334-4.

Physicochemical properties and angiotensin-I converting enzyme inhibitory activity of lipid-free ribbon fish (Lepturacanthus savala) protein hydrolysate.

The study aims at removal of lipid from ribbon fish protein hydrolysate (FPH) to enhance the protein content and analyse its physicochemical and bioactive properties. Ribbon fish protein hydrolysate was prepared using commercially available papain enzyme (1.5% w/v for 4 h). The resulting supernatant was further treated with lipase (0.5-2.0% w/v for 1-5 h). The treatment used in this study reduced ~ 98% of lipids depending on the enzyme concentration, temperature, pH, and duration of the treatment. Lipase treatment for 2 h increased the protein content from 62.87 to 94.11%. FPH after lipase treatment showed 1.21 folds increase in angiotensin-converting enzyme-I (ACE-I) inhibitory activity and 1.7 folds increase in standard amino acids composition (32.193 to 61.493 g/100 g). The physicochemical properties of FPH samples were analyzed by solubility, hygroscopicity, color, FT-IR, SEM, SDS-PAGE, and Zeta Potential. Use of lipase enzyme for separating the lipid content from protein hydrolysate without conferring any undesirable adverse effects on the physicochemical properties of protein hydrolysate. Lipid-free protein hydrolysates can be of commercial importance for their enhanced ACE-I inhibitory activity, replacing the side effect causing synthetic drugs for hypertension, and can have potential applications in developing functional food formulations. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13197-022-05620-z.

Impact of pandemic COVID-19 lockdown on penetrating keratoplasty patients.

Purpose: To study the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown on the regular follow-up of keratoplasty patients. Methods: This retrospective interventional case series included 30 patients who had immunological corneal endothelial rejection out of 190 patients who came for post-PKP follow-up between September 15, 2019, and September 30, 2020. The demographics, primary diagnosis, surgical technique, time of presentation, recovery of graft, associated ocular problems, and visual acuity at 1 month were analyzed. Forward stepwise (likelihood ratio) binary logistic regression was used to find significant variables. Results: The study population had 19 males (63.33%) and 11 females (36.67%). The mean age of the study group was 42.83 ± 18.89 (8-80) years. Of 30 patients, 19 (63.3%) presented before and 11 (36.7%) after the COVID-19 lockdown. Overall, 23 (77%) showed a reversal of graft rejection. Logistic regression showed that preoperative indications, large-sized grafts, and deep corneal vascularization were significant risk factors for non-resolution of graft rejection. It was noted that patients who presented to the hospital late had poor recovery (P = 0.002). The delay in the presentation was a significant risk factor for non-resolution of graft rejection (P < 0.01). Z-test for proportions revealed that the difference in the non-resolution of rejection on immediate or delayed treatment in patients presenting during lockdown (P = 0.002) was significant. Conclusion: This article is to highlight the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown on graft rejection recovery of PKP patients due to delays in follow-up. Early treatment helps in the recovery of graft transparency and the reversal of immunological graft rejection. Also, primary diagnosis, deep vascularization, and large-sized grafts were significant risk factors for non-resolution of graft rejection.

The effect of nutritional status on the pharmacokinetic profile of acetaminophen.

Nutritional imbalance (low protein / high fat) is a public health problem affecting many people in developing and developed nations. Such an imbalance will influence pathophysiological homeostasis in individuals and thereby considerably impact drug pharmacokinetics. It was reported that short-term fasting increases acetaminophen exposure in healthy subjects, whereas no effect was observed after a high-fat diet. These findings suggest the necessity of considering nutritional status when assessing the risk of acetaminophen-induced hepatotoxicity. Additionally, the role of nutrition status on the pharmacokinetic profile of acetaminophen (APAP) at toxic doses is either scanty or not available. With this background, we aimed to compare the effects of nutrition status on the pharmacokinetic profile of APAP at a toxic dose in three different dietary regimens like - Normal diet (ND), Low protein diet (LPD), and High-fat diet (HFD). Balb/C female mice were divided into three groups after weaning, and for the next 15 weeks, they were fed with their respective diets (ND, LPD, and HFD). After that, mice were dosed with APAP (300 mg/kg p.o), and blood sampling was done at different time intervals and centrifuged at 3000 rpm for 5 min to collect plasma samples. Plasma samples were analyzed using the HPLC method. Data analysis was done by Non-compartment analysis using Phoenix WinNonlin 8.3 software. LPD group shows higher values of Cmax, tmax, t1/2, and AUC0-4, AUC0-x values than ND and HFD groups. Both Cmax and AUC follow the pattern of drug exposure where LPD > ND > HFD. In conclusion, nutrition in the diet alters APAP pharmacokinetic profile at a toxic dose in three different diet regimes. Further study on CYP450 concentration and activity is essential to understand the pharmacokinetics difference between these dietary regimens.

Structure-Guided Synthesis and Evaluation of Small-Molecule Inhibitors Targeting Protein-Protein Interactions of BRCA1 tBRCT Domain.

The tandem BRCT domains (tBRCT) of BRCA1 engage phosphoserine-containing motifs in target proteins to propagate intracellular signals initiated by DNA damage, thereby controlling cell cycle arrest and DNA repair. Recently, we identified Bractoppin, the first small-molecule inhibitor of the BRCA1 tBRCT domain, which selectively interrupts BRCA1-mediated cellular responses evoked by DNA damage. Here, we combine structure-guided chemical elaboration, protein mutagenesis and cellular assays to define the structural features responsible for Bractoppin's activity. Bractoppin fails to bind mutant forms of BRCA1 tBRCT bearing K1702A, a key residue mediating phosphopeptide recognition, or F1662R or L1701K that adjoin the pSer-recognition site. However, the M1775R mutation, which engages the Phe residue in the consensus phosphopeptide motif pSer-X-X-Phe, does not affect Bractoppin binding, confirming a binding mode distinct from the substrate phosphopeptide binding. We explored these structural features through structure-guided chemical elaboration and characterized structure-activity relationships (SARs) in biochemical assays. Two analogues, CCBT2088 and CCBT2103 were effective in abrogating BRCA1 foci formation and inhibiting G2 arrest induced by irradiation of cells. Collectively, our findings reveal structural features underlying the activity of a novel inhibitor of phosphopeptide recognition by the BRCA1 tBRCT domain, providing fresh insights to guide the development of inhibitors that target protein-protein interactions.

Targeting Phosphopeptide Recognition by the Human BRCA1 Tandem BRCT Domain to Interrupt BRCA1-Dependent Signaling.

Intracellular signals triggered by DNA breakage flow through proteins containing BRCT (BRCA1 C-terminal) domains. This family, comprising 23 conserved phosphopeptide-binding modules in man, is inaccessible to small-molecule chemical inhibitors. Here, we develop Bractoppin, a drug-like inhibitor of phosphopeptide recognition by the human BRCA1 tandem (t)BRCT domain, which selectively inhibits substrate binding with nanomolar potency in vitro. Structure-activity exploration suggests that Bractoppin engages BRCA1 tBRCT residues recognizing pSer in the consensus motif, pSer-Pro-Thr-Phe, plus an abutting hydrophobic pocket that is distinct in structurally related BRCT domains, conferring selectivity. In cells, Bractoppin inhibits substrate recognition detected by Förster resonance energy transfer, and diminishes BRCA1 recruitment to DNA breaks, in turn suppressing damage-induced G2 arrest and assembly of the recombinase, RAD51. But damage-induced MDC1 recruitment, single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) generation, and TOPBP1 recruitment remain unaffected. Thus, an inhibitor of phosphopeptide recognition selectively interrupts BRCA1 tBRCT-dependent signals evoked by DNA damage.

A Clinical, Biochemical Profile of Type-2 Diabetes in Women with Special Reference to Vitamin-D Status in Obese and Non-Obese.

INTRODUCTION: Type-2 Diabetes is a heterogeneous group of disorders characterized by variable degrees of insulin resistance, impaired insulin secretion, and increased glucose production. Obese diabetic patients have 13.5% more chances of developing diabetic complications compared to non - obese diabetic patients. Vitamin D has found to be deficient in diabetic patient and it's role in insulin regulation. Obese females are more prone to develop diabetic complications and hypovitaminosis-D. MATERIALS AND METHOD: Total of 156 female diabetic patients aged 30 to 60 years who are a case of type-2 diabetes mellitus seen in Rajarajeswari Medical College and Hospital were clinically evaluated including anthropometric measurements are done, namely height, weight, waist-hip ratio, tested for vitamin-D levels and other necessary diabetes related investigations were carried out. RESULT: Among the studies 156 patients, Mean age of study group: 48.47±9.56 years. Mean duration of diabetes in the study population: ± SD: 5.10±4.36 years mean BMI was 24.97±4.16.Mean waist circumference: 98.93±12.18 cm, Mean Waist-Hip ratio: 0.98±0.08. Mean FBS: 202.73±81.73 mg/dl, Mean PPBS: 280.99±94.14 mg/dl, Mean HbA1C: 9.33±1.83 %. Almost all diabetic females (92.5%) have Vitamin-D deficiency. Mean Vitamin-D levels: 16.19±8.97 ng/ml. Duration of diabetes (P=0.082+, Fisher Exact test), Poor Glycemic control (P<0.001**, Chi-Square test) and increased BMI (P=0.011*, Fisher Exact test) had significant role in causing Vitamin-D deficiency. CONCLUSION: Almost all diabetic females were with Waist circumference > 80 cm and Waist-Hip ratio > 0.8. Most of the diabetic patients have poor control of diabetes. Vitamin-D deficiency is found in almost all diabetic female patients (92.5%) and the most probable cause is poor glycemic control and obesity according to this study.

An Eighteen Serum Cytokine Signature for Discriminating Glioma from Normal Healthy Individuals.

Glioblastomas (GBM) are largely incurable as they diffusely infiltrate adjacent brain tissues and are difficult to diagnose at early stages. Biomarkers derived from serum, which can be obtained by minimally invasive procedures, may help in early diagnosis, prognosis and treatment monitoring. To develop a serum cytokine signature, we profiled 48 cytokines in sera derived from normal healthy individuals (n = 26) and different grades of glioma patients (n = 194). We divided the normal and grade IV glioma/GBM serum samples randomly into equal sized training and test sets. In the training set, the Prediction Analysis for Microarrays (PAM) identified a panel of 18 cytokines that could discriminate GBM sera from normal sera with maximum accuracy (95.40%) and minimum error (4.60%). The 18-cytokine signature obtained in the training set discriminated GBM sera from normal sera in the test set as well (accuracy 96.55%; error 3.45%). Interestingly, the 18-cytokine signature also differentiated grade II/Diffuse Astrocytoma (DA) and grade III/Anaplastic Astrocytoma (AA) sera from normal sera very efficiently (DA vs. normal-accuracy 96.00%, error 4.00%; AA vs. normal-accuracy 95.83%, error 4.17%). Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis using 18 cytokines resulted in the enrichment of two pathways, cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction and JAK-STAT pathways with high significance. Thus our study identified an 18-cytokine signature for distinguishing glioma sera from normal healthy individual sera and also demonstrated the importance of their differential abundance in glioma biology.

Definition of a serum marker panel for glioblastoma discrimination and identification of Interleukin 1ß in the microglial secretome as a novel mediator of endothelial cell survival induced by C-reactive protein.

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common malignant adult primary brain tumor. We profiled 724 cancer-associated proteins in sera of healthy individuals (n=27) and GBM (n=28) using antibody microarray. While 69 proteins exhibited differential abundance in GBM sera, a three-marker panel (LYAM1, BHE40 and CRP) could discriminate GBM sera from that of healthy donors with an accuracy of 89.7% and p<0.0001. The high abundance of C-reactive protein (CRP) in GBM sera was confirmed in 264 independent samples. High levels of CRP protein was seen in GBM but without a change in transcript levels suggesting a non-tumoral origin. Glioma-secreted Interleukin 6 (IL6) was found to induce hepatocytes to secrete CRP, involving JAK-STAT pathway. The culture supernatant from CRP-treated microglial cells induced endothelial cell survival under nutrient-deprivation condition involving CRP-FcγRIII signaling cascade. Transcript profiling of CRP-treated microglial cells identified Interleukin 1ß (IL1ß) present in the microglial secretome as the key mediator of CRP-induced endothelial cell survival. IL1ß neutralization by antibody-binding or siRNA-mediated silencing in microglial cells reduced the ability of the supernatant from CRP-treated microglial cells to induce endothelial cell survival. Thus our study identifies a serum based three-marker panel for GBM diagnosis and provides leads for developing targeted therapies. Biological significance A complex antibody microarray based serum marker profiling identified a three-marker panel - LYAM1, BHE40 and CRP as an accurate discriminator of glioblastoma sera from that of healthy individuals. CRP protein is seen in high levels without a concomitant increase of CRP transcripts in glioblastoma. Glioma-secreted IL6 induced hepatocytes to produce CRP in a JAK-STAT signaling dependent manner. CRP induced microglial cells to release IL1ß which in turn promoted endothelial cell survival. This study, besides defining a serum panel for glioblastoma discrimination, identified IL1ß as a potential candidate for developing targeted therapy.

A Rare Case of Presacral Paraganglioma Presenting with Hypertensive Encephalopathy

Paragangliomas are exceptionally rare tumors in children of neural crest origin. Our case report represents an extremely rare location for paraganglioma including its imaging features, perioperative challenges and histopathological characteristics. In the present case, a 10-year-old boy had headache and blurring of vision for four years but was not diagnosed until he came with malignant hypertension and hypertensive encephalopathy. The symptoms raised urinary catecholamines and CT findings confirmed the diagnosis of a functioning paraganglioma in presacral region. Challenges during surgery are to control the fluctuating blood pressure which may suddenly rise during tumor handling and suddenly fall following its removal. The unusual location of the tumor in pararectal region also made surgical resection difficult. Paragangliomas are rare and should be kept in mind while evaluating a child with hypertension and complete excision is the treatment of choice.

Echocardiographic evaluation of diastolic dysfunction in asymptomatic type 2 diabetes mellitus.

INTRODUCTION: Diabetes mellitus is one of the most common diseases in the world and is acquiring epidemic proportions. Its prevalence is growing in both developed and developing countries. Indians are genetically more susceptible to diabetes compared to other races cardiovascular complications are known to be the main cause of morbidity and death in diabetic patients. There is an increased rate of ischemic heart disease and cardiomyopathy which may lead to heart failure (Diastolic heart failure). Left ventricular diastolic dysfunction represents an early stage of heart failure, without any clinical manifestations. In the view of these above facts the present study was done to assess the diastolic dysfunction in diabetic patients. METHODS: A cross-sectional hospital-based study was done which included 50 asymptomatic patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus without evidence of cardiovascular involvement and blood pressure less than 130/80 mmHg were studied. LVDD was evaluated by Doppler echocardiography, which included E/A ratio; left atrial size was assessed in relation with age/sex, duration of diabetes and HbAlc level. RESULTS: Results showed that diastolic dysfunction was present in 32 (64%) of the patients. Diastolic dysfunction was more common among female sex (68.18%) compared to male (60.17%). Diastolic dysfunction was significantly associated with uncontrolled diabetes as assessed by HbA1c levels. Diastolic dysfunction was more common in patients who were on treatment with both oral hypoglycemic agents and insulin. The prevalence of diastolic dysfunction increased with longer duration of diabetes. There was a linear progression of diastolic dysfunction with the increase age group. CONCLUSION: The findings in our study indicate that myocardial damage in patients with diabetes affects diastolic dysfunction before systolic function. E/A ratio and Left atrial size are significantly altered in diabetic patients with diastolic dysfunction. Diastolic dysfunction is significantly associated with duration of disease, glycemic levels and the type of treatments. Doppler Echocardiography is a simple non invasive valuable tool in diagnosing diastolic dysfunction. In diabetics before they develop cardiac symptoms it has to be done routinely on every diabetic patients to assess the cardiac function.

Studies on development and storage stability of instant spice adjunct mix from seaweed (Eucheuma).

Seaweed is a macroscopic marine algae which has been used as human food since ancient times. Food values of seaweed are mainly due to significant amounts of protein, vitamin, mineral, trace elements and dietary fibre apart from substances of antibiotic nature. In this study edible red seaweed Eucheuma (Kappaphycus alvarezzi), was used as an ingredient in the preparation of spice adjunct. Functional properties such as soluble solids, water-holding capacity, oil holding capacity and swelling capacity of Eucheuma were studied. Steamed Eucheuma powder was added at levels of 15, 20 and 25% in the preparation of spice adjunct. Sensory analysis and consumer acceptability study of spice adjunct showed that the incorporation of Eucheuma upto 20% had high acceptability. Spice adjunct containing 20% Eucheuma had 6.2% moisture, 22.2% ash, 29.2% fat, 10.0% protein, 9.4% crude fibre and 23% carbohydrates. Based on equilibrium relative humidity studies metallized polyester was selected as the packaging material. Storage studies indicated that metallized polyester provided a shelf life of 120 days at both the ambient and accelerated conditions.

Caco-2 cell lines in drug discovery- an updated perspective.

Cell lines are the invitro models used for the drug permeability studies in the preclinical and clinical phases of the drug discovery. Cell line models are simple and quick to use and avoids the usage of animal models for pharmacological and toxicological studies and hence cost effective, produce reliable and reproducible results for understanding and evaluating the permeability characteristics of the potential lead drug candidates. Different cell line models used in the drug permeability studies, their characteristics has been summarized emphasizing on CACO-2. By virtue of its merits, CACO-2 cell line development, transport experiments, automated assays, optimization of experimental conditions and mechanistic uses of CACO-2 cell lines dealt comprehensively in the following context.

Serum proteomics of glioma: methods and applications.

The prognosis of patients with glioblastoma, the most malignant adult glial brain tumor, remains poor in spite of advances in treatment procedures, including surgical resection, irradiation and chemotherapy. Genetic heterogeneity of glioblastoma warrants extensive studies in order to gain a thorough understanding of the biology of this tumor. While there have been several studies of global transcript profiling of glioma with the identification of gene signatures for diagnosis and disease management, translation into clinics is yet to happen. Serum biomarkers have the potential to revolutionize the process of cancer diagnosis, grading, prognostication and treatment response monitoring. Besides having the advantage that serum can be obtained through a less invasive procedure, it contains molecules at an extraordinary dynamic range of ten orders of magnitude in terms of their concentrations. While the conventional methods, such as 2DE, have been in use for many years, the ability to identify the proteins through mass spectrometry techniques such as MALDI-TOF led to an explosion of interest in proteomics. Relatively new high-throughput proteomics methods such as SELDI-TOF and protein microarrays are expected to hasten the process of serum biomarker discovery. This review will highlight the recent advances in the proteomics platform in discovering serum biomarkers and the current status of glioma serum markers. We aim to provide the principles and potential of the latest proteomic approaches and their applications in the biomarker discovery process. Besides providing a comprehensive list of available serum biomarkers of glioma, we will also propose how these markers will revolutionize the clinical management of glioma patients.

Effect of using seaweed (eucheuma) powder on the quality of fish cutlet.

Physico-chemical properties of Eucheuma, such as soluble solids (27.5+/-0.02%), water holding capacity (17.7+/-0.08g/g) and oil holding capacity (2.14+/-0.07g/g) were estimated as measures of its functionality. Eucheuma powder was used as an ingredient in the preparation of fish cutlet. Dried Eucheuma powder was added at levels of 5, 7.5, 10, 12.5 and 15% and physicochemical characteristics of fish cutlet were studied. Sensory evaluation showed that use of Eucheuma significantly (P

Antibacterial activity of black tea (Camelia sinensis) extract against Salmonella serotypes causing enteric fever.

Alcoholic extract of black tea (Camelia sinensis) was assayed for its antibacterial activity against Salmonella serotypes causing enteric fever viz., Salmonella typhi and Salmonella paratyphi A. While all strains of S. paratyphi A tested were found sensitive, only 42.19% of S. typhi strains were inhibited by this extract. Further minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) and minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) of black tea extract against S. paratyphi A was less compared with that against S. typhi.

Quantification of trace elements in normal human brain by inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry.

Eight normal human brain autopsy samples were analyzed for Na, K, P, Ca, Mg, Si, Cr, Cu, Ni, Zn, Fe, Al, Cd, Pb and As in 12 regions of brain (frontal cerebrum, temporal cerebrum, parietal cerebrum, somatosensory cortex, occipital cerebrum, cerebellum, mid-brain, pons, hypothalamus, thalamus, hippocampus and medulla oblongata) using inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (ICPAES). The distribution of these 15 elements varied significantly from region to region of the brain. Potassium was most abundant in nearly all regions of the brain, followed by sodium and phosphorus (mg/g). The concentration of Al was found to be comparatively high and varied in different areas of the brain (58-196 microg/g). Moderate levels of Pb, Cd and As were observed in different regions. Ratios of Al to Fe were found to be high in temporal cerebrum (8.07) and hippocampus (9.05) and these two regions are significantly involved in Alzheimer's disease. The concentration of Na in mole percentage showed an inverse correlation with that of K, Ca, Mg, Fe and Cr. Direct correlation was observed in the concentration of all analyzed elements, which indicated for the first time the direct dependency of concentration of trace elements in one brain region to other regions. The mole ratios between different elements in different brain regions and total amounts of the elements in an average weight of 1.4 kg human brain were also computed. The present study provides new and in-depth data which may be used as base line data for normal human brains.