Boesenbergin A,a chalcone from Boesenbergia rotunda induces apoptosis via mitochondrial dysregulation and cytochrome c release in A549 cells in vitro: Involvement of HSP70 and Bcl2/Bax signalling pathways

The anti-cancer effect of Boesenbergin A (BA) isolated from Boesenbergia rotunda, via the induction of apoptosis resulting from mitochondrial dysfunction was assessed in human non-small cell lung cancer (A549) cells. The apoptotic mechanisms of BA induction on cancer cells were studied in the present study for the first time. Nuclear stain, measuring the accumulation of sub-G₁ cell population and DNA ladder were done to determine the apoptosis. Further investigations into the depletion of mitochondrial membrane potential and release of cytochrome c determined that BA treatment induced apoptosis via the regulation of the expression of pro-survival and pro-apoptotic Bcl-2 family members. The involvement of both intrinsic and extrinsic caspases (caspase 3/7, 9 and 8) were significantly increased. Moreover the role of free radicals was significantly found to be elevated with concomitant decrease in HSP70. In conclusion the results from the current study indicated BA could be a promising agent for the treatment of lung cancer.     

Process modeling and analysis of palm oil mill effluent treatment in an up-flow anaerobic sludge fixed film bioreactor using response surface methodology (RSM)

In this study, the interactive effects of feed flow rate (QF) and up-flow velocity (V up) on the performance of an up-flow anaerobic sludge fixed film (UASFF) reactor treating palm oil mill effluent (POME) were investigated. Long-term performance of the UASFF reactor was first examined with raw POME at a hydraulic loading rate (HRT) of 3 d and an influent COD concentration of 44300 mg/l. Extreme reactor instability was observed after 25 d. Raw POME was then chemically pretreated and used as feed. Anaerobic digestion of pretreated POME was modeled and analyzed with two operating variables, i.e. feed flow rate and up-flow velocity. Experiments were conducted based on a central composite face-centered design (CCFD) and analyzed using response surface methodology (RSM). The region of exploration for digestion of the pretreated POME was taken as the area enclosed by the feed flow rate (1.01, 7.63 l/d) and up-flow velocity (0.2, 3 m/h) boundaries. Twelve dependent parameters were either directly measured or calculated as response. These parameters were total COD (TCOD) removal, soluble COD (SCOD) removal, effluent pH, effluent total volatile fatty acid (TVFA), effluent bicarbonate alkalinity (BA), effluent total suspended solids (TSS), CH4 percentage in biogas, methane yield (Y M), specific methanogenic activity (SMA), food-to-sludge ratio (F/M), sludge height in the UASB portion and solid retention time (SRT). The optimum conditions for POME treatment were found to be 2.45 l/d and 0.75 m/h for QF and V up, respectively (corresponding to HRT of 1.5 d and recycle ratio of 23.4:1). The present study provides valuable information about interrelations of quality and process parameters at different values of the operating variables.     

Marshall-Olkin distributions: a bibliometric study

Scientometrics - Recently, there has been a growing interest among statistical researchers to develop new probability distributions, adding one or more parameters to previously existing ones. In...     

Present findings on rotaviruses with emphasis on rotaviruses in swine

A summary of thirty pages, concerning rotaviruses, i.e. RNA-viruses, the most frequent causal agents of infectious diarrhoea in children and young farm animals. Most of the chapters are generally focused on rotavirus morphology, structure and biology. Chapter No. 6 is especially detailed, trying to offer a complete summary of available diagnostic methods. The final chapters concern in greater detail the problems of rotaviruses in pigs, such as the immunity, prevention and treatment.     

An isogeometric analysis approach to gradient‐dependent plasticity

Gradient‐dependent plasticity can be used to achieve mesh‐objective results upon loss of well‐posedness of the initial/boundary value problem because of the introduction of strain softening, non‐associated flow, and geometric nonlinearity. A prominent class of gradient plasticity models considers a dependence of the yield strength on the Laplacian of the hardening parameter, usually an invariant of the plastic strain tensor. This inclusion causes the consistency condition to become a partial differential equation, in addition to the momentum balance. At the internal moving boundary, one has to impose appropriate boundary conditions on the hardening parameter or, equivalently, on the plastic multiplier. This internal boundary condition can be enforced without tracking the elastic‐plastic boundary by requiring ‐continuity with respect to the plastic multiplier. In this contribution, this continuity has been achieved by using nonuniform rational B‐splines as shape functions both for the plastic multiplier and for the displacements. One advantage of this isogeometric analysis approach is that the displacements can be interpolated one order higher, making it consistent with the interpolation of the plastic multiplier. This is different from previous approaches, which have been exploited. The regularising effect of gradient plasticity is shown for 1‐ and 2‐dimensional boundary value problems.     

13.3‐inch 8k4k 664‐ppi foldable OLED display using crystalline oxide semiconductor FETs

A prototype 13.3‐inch 8k4k 664‐ppi high‐resolution foldable organic light emitting diode display is constructed. C‐axis aligned a‐b‐plane‐anchored crystal In–Ga–Zn oxide field effect transistors designed using a 1.5‐µm rule process are used in the backplane. Each pixel circuit has three transistors and one capacitor, and an external circuit is used to correct pixel current.     

Maintaining censorship resistance in the iTrust network for publication,search and retrieval

This paper presents the architecture of the iTrust system together with algorithms for maintaining censorship resistance. In iTrust, metadata describing documents, and requests containing keywords, are distributed to randomly chosen nodes in the iTrust network. If a node receives a request containing keywords that match metadata it holds, it sends the URL of the matching document to the requesting node, which then retrieves the document from the source node. A novel detection algorithm estimates the proportion of operational nodes in the iTrust network, by comparing the empirical probabilities of the number of responses received for a node’s request with the analytical probabilities for a match, for various proportions of operational nodes. A novel defensive adaptation algorithm increases the number of nodes to which the requests are distributed, in order to maintain the same high probability of a match when some of the nodes are non-operational or malicious as when all of the nodes are operational. Extensive experimental evaluations demonstrate the effectiveness of the architecture and the algorithms for maintaining censorship resistance in the iTrust network.     

Influence of electron donors on the initial stage of cyclopolymerization of 1,5‐hexadiene with MgCl2‐supported Ziegler catalysts analyzed by temperature rising elution fractionation

Additive effects of donors on the initial polymerization of 1,5‐hexadiene with the MgCl₂‐supported Ziegler catalysts were investigated by using the stopped‐flow method, temperature rising elution fractionation (TREF) analysis, and kinetic study. The cyclopolymerization of 1,5‐hexadiene proceeded within an extremely short period (≤ 0.2 s) and yielded a unique poly(methylene‐1,3‐cyclopentane). cis ring content and cis–cis unit in meso dyad of the resulting polymer were increased by the addition of electron donors. The influence of internal and external donors was examined by the estimation of kinetic parameters and TREF analysis. Because the addition of the internal donor caused an obvious change in one of the kinetic parameters and the microstructure, an isospecific active site was considered to be formed by the addition of the internal donor. In the case of the external donor, the additive effects on the stereospecificity were weaker than those of the internal donor. It was expected from TREF measurements that the external donor modified an aspecific active site into a lower isospecific active site. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 83: 2976–2983, 2002; DOI 10.1002/app.2326     

Oil and gas pipeline failure prediction system using long range ultrasonic transducers and Euclidean-Support Vector Machines classification approach

This paper presents an intelligent failure prediction system for oil and gas pipeline using long range ultrasonic transducers and Euclidean-Support Vector Machines classification approach. Since the past decade, the incidents of oil and gas pipeline leaks and failures which happened around the world are becoming more frequent and have caused loss of life, properties and irreversible environmental damages. This situation is due to the lack of a full-proof method of inspection on the condition of oil and gas pipelines. Onset of corrosion and other defects are undetected which cause unplanned shutdowns and disruption of energy supplies to consumers. Existing failure prediction systems for pipeline which use non-destructive testing (NDTs) methods are accurate, but they are deployed at pre-determined intervals which can be several months apart. Hence, a full-proof and reliable inspection method is required to continuously monitor the condition of oil and gas pipeline in order to provide sufficient information and time to oil and gas operators to plan and organize shutdowns before failures occur. Permanently installed long range ultrasonic transducers (LRUTs) offer a solution to this problem by providing an inspection platform that continuously monitor critical pipeline sections. Data are acquired in real-time and processed to make decision based on the condition of the pipe. The continuous nature of the data requires an automatic decision making software rather than manual inspection by operators. Support Vector Machines (SVMs) classification approach has been increasingly used in a multitude of domains including LRUT and has shown better performance than other classification algorithms. SVM is heavily dependent on the choice of kernel functions as well as fine tuning of the kernel and soft margin parameters. Hence it is unsuitable to be used in continuous monitoring of pipeline data where constant modifications of kernels and parameters are not unrealistic. This paper proposes a novel classification technique, namely Euclidean-Support Vector Machines (Euclidean-SVM), to make a decision on the integrity of the pipeline in a continuous monitoring environment. The results show that the classification accuracy of the Euclidean-SVM approach is not dependent on the choice of the kernel function and parameters when classifying data from pipes with simulated defects. Irrespective of the kernel function and parameters chosen, classification accuracy of the Euclidean-SVM is comparable and also higher in some cases than using conventional SVM. Hence, the Euclidean-SVM approach is ideally suited for classifying data from the oil and gas pipelines which are continuously monitored using LRUT.     

Micropolar fluid lubrication of one-dimensional journal bearings

A study of the characteristics of one-dimensional journal bearings shows that the load capacity increases and the coefficient of friction decreases as the parameter $\text{μ}{}_1$, which characterizes the microstructure of the base oil due to the presence of additives, increases. The time of approach increases as the parameter $\text{μ}{}_1$ increases.