The Economic Cost of Tobacco Farming in Bangladesh.

The extent of tobacco cultivation remains substantially high in Bangladesh, which is the 12th largest tobacco producer in the world. Using data from a household survey of current, former, and never tobacco farmers, based on a multi-stage stratified sampling design with a mix of purposive and random sampling of households, this study estimated the financial and economic profitability per acre of land used for tobacco cultivation. The environmental effects of tobacco cultivation on land and water resources were estimated using laboratory tests of sample water and soil collected from tobacco-cultivating and non-tobacco cultivating areas. The study finds that tobacco cultivation turns into a losing concern when the opportunity costs of unpaid family labour and other owned resources, and the health effects of tobacco cultivation are included. Tobacco cultivation poses a significantly high environmental cost that causes a net loss to society. Nevertheless, the availability of unpaid family labour and the options of advanced credit as well as a buy back guarantee from the tobacco companies attract farmers to engage in and continue tobacco cultivation. Therefore, supply side interventions to curb the tobacco epidemic in Bangladesh need to address major drivers of tobacco cultivation to correct the wrong incentives and motivate tobacco farmers to switch to alternative livelihood options.

Hepatoprotective activity of Phyllanthus reticulatus.

Two partially purified organic fractions designated by PR1 and PR2 of the fat free ethanol (95%) extract of aerial parts of Phyllanthus reticulatus were tested for the hepatoprotective activity in rats against CCl(4)-induced liver damage. The rats receiving the fractions showed promising hepatoprotective activity as evident from significant changes of pentobarbital-induced sleeping time, changes in serum levels of sGPT, sGOT, sALP and bilirubin and also from histopathological changes as compared to CCl(4)-intoxicated rats.

Report: in vitro dissolution studies of different brands of sustained release diclofenac sodium matrix tablet available in Bangladesh.

Commercially available national thirteen brands and three international brands of diclofenac sodium sustained release matrix tablets were studied in simulated gastric medium (pH 1.2) for 2 hours time period and simulated intestinal medium (pH 6.8) for 10 hours time period using USP reference dissolution apparatus. All the national and international brands complied with the USP in-vitro dissolution specification for drug releases in simulated gastric medium. However, four of the national brands (Code: DS-5, DS-8, DS-12, and DS-13) failed to fulfill their official requirement of 80% drug release within 8th hour in simulated intestinal medium. Drug release of those four national brands were 78.1%, 74.9%, 72.1%, and 77.8% respectively within the specified time period, however one national brand (Code: DS-2) released 83.2% drug within 6th hour in intestinal medium. Drug release profiles were analyzed for Higuchi equation, zero order, and first order to reveal the release kinetics perspective of diclofenac sodium sustained release matrix tablets. It was found that zero order release kinetics was predominant release mechanism than first order and Higuchi release kinetics for those brands (Code: DS-1, DS-3, DS-4, DS-6, DS-7, DS-9, DS-10, DS-11, DS-X, DS-Y and DS-Z) which complied with the USP in vitro dissolution specification for drug releases. On the other hand, first order release kinetics was predominant for five national substandard formulation brands (Code: DS-2, DS-5, DS-8, DS-12 and DS-13).

Design and synthesis of cyclic urea compounds: a pharmacological study for retinoidal activity.

Retinoids are natural and synthetic analogues of all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA). Cancer and other serious hyperproliferative diseases are attractive therapeutic targets for retinoids. We report here the design and synthesis of novel cyclic urea compounds with retinoidal activity. YR105 exhibited potent differentiation-inducing ability toward human promyelocytic leukemia HL-60 cells at the concentration of 10(-9)M: its potency was almost equal to that of the native ligand, all-trans retinoic acid.