Hematologic and virologic effects of lineage-specific and non-lineage-specific recombinant human and rhesus cytokines in a cohort of SIVmac239-infected macaques

The hematologic abnormalities of SIV and HIV are well described, although the mechanisms that lead to hematopoietic dysfunction are yet to be fully defined. A number of growth factors and cytokines have been used to induce the differentiation, maturation, and proliferation of appropriate lineages, with the aim that such therapy will lead to functional hematopoietic reconstitution. Within this context, some cytokines have been shown to influence HIV and SIV replication in vitro and, in selected cases, in vivo. However, few studies detail the effects of hematopoietic cytokines such as IL-3, Flt-3 ligand, G-CSF, Tpo, and Epo or correlate the effects on virus replication. In an effort to address this issue, we infected 12 rhesus macaques with 500 TCID50 of SIVmac239 and intensively evaluated hematologic, virologic, and immunologic parameters during administration of cytokines. When all animals had lymphadenopathy, hepatosplenomegaly, and CD4+ cell counts > or =1000/microl, subgroups of three rhesus macaques were administered either rhFlt-3; rrIL-3a; combination of rhG-CSF, rhTpo, and rhEpo (rhGET); or rrIL-12. Fourteen days of rhFlt-3 administration induced expansion of the bone marrow CD34+ cells and granulocyte-macrophage colony-forming units (GM-CFUs) and increased absolute peripheral blood CD34+ cells and total CFUs. Following rrIL-3 and rhGET administration absolute peripheral blood CD34+ cells and total CFUs increased. rhGET also increased granulocyte, platelet, and reticulocyte counts by day 14 of administration. Branched DNA and coculture assays did not demonstrate any significant change in viral load with any of the cytokines administered. These data suggest that SIV-infected rhesus macaques have the hematopoietic capability to expand and mobilize CD34+ and GM-CFU progenitors and formed elements at 6-8 months postinfection in response to various cytokines, without increasing viral load.     

Design development and testing of a solar PV pump based drip system for orchards

A Solar Photovoltaic (PV) pump operated drip irrigation system has been designed and developed for growing orchards in arid region considering different design parameters like pumps size, water requirements, the diurnal variation in the pressure of the pump due to change in irradiance and pressure compensation in the drippers. The system comprising a PV pump with 900 W_p PV array and 800 W dc motor-pump mono-block, micro filter, main and sub-mains and three open-able low-pressure compensating drippers on each plant was field tested. The emission uniformity was observed to be 92–94% with discharge of 3.8 l/h in the pressure range of 70–100 kPa provided by the pump and thus the system could irrigate some 1 ha area within 2 h. Based on the performance of the PV pump and the drip system, it was inferred that about 5 ha area of orchard could be covered. The projected benefit–cost ratio for growing pomegranate orchards with such a system was evaluated to be above 2 even with the costly PV pump and therefore the system was considered to be an appropriate technology for the development of arid region.     

A new control architecture with enhanced ARP, burst-based transmission, and hop-based wavelength allocation for ethernet-supported IP-over-WDM MANs

This paper focuses on the control architecture and the enabling technologies for the Ethernet-supported Internet protocol-over-wavelength-division-multiplexing metropolitan area networks. We present the general architecture of an access node of such networks and propose solutions to facilitate the essential system functionalities. The aim is to render the flexible and high-capacity metropolitan network, which provides service provisioning improvement and resource utilization efficiency for the packet-dominated data traffic. Specifically, an enhanced address resolution protocol is proposed to reduce the call setup latency and the signaling overhead associated with the address probing procedure, a burst-based transmission mechanism is adopted to improve the network throughput and resource utilization efficiency, and a wavelength allocation algorithm is investigated to provide flexible bandwidth multiplexing with fairness and high scalability. Theoretical analysis and simulations are conducted to evaluate the performance of our algorithms, demonstrating that the proposed architecture and technologies deliver substantial transport performance improvement with efficient network resource utilization.     

Corrosion inhibition by fatty acid triazoles for mild steel in formic acid

5-Heptadec-8-enyl-4-phenyl-4H–[1,2,4] triazole-3-thiol (HPTT), 4-phenyl-5-undecyl-4H–[1,2,4] triazole-3-thiol (PUTT), and 5-dec-9-enyl-4-phenyl-4H–[1,2,4] triazole-3-thiol (DPTT) were synthesized and their influence on the inhibition of corrosion of mild steel in 20% formic acid was investigated by weight loss and potentiodynamic polarization techniques. The inhibition efficiency of these compounds was found to vary with their nature and concentration, temperature and immersion time. The values of activation energy and free energy of adsorption of the triazoles were calculated to investigate the mechanism of corrosion inhibition. Good inhibition efficiency (>90%) was found even at lower concentration (i.e., 25 ppm) in acid solution. The adsorption on mild steel surfaces was found to obey Temkin's adsorption isotherm. Potentiodynamic polarization results revealed that the compounds studied are mixed type inhibitors. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy was also used to investigate the mechanism of the corrosion inhibition.     

In situ nucleic acid hybridization of cytokines in primary biliary cirrhosis: predominance of the Th1 subset

Primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC) is an autoimmune liver disease characterized by destruction of the intrahepatic bile ducts. It is generally believed that cellular immune mechanisms, particularly involving T cells, result in this bile duct damage. The relative strength of Th1 and Th2 responses has recently been proposed to be an important factor in the pathophysiology of various autoimmune diseases. In this study, we have attempted to identify the Th subset balance in PBC, by detection of cytokines specific to the two T-cell subsets, i.e., interferon gamma (IFN-gamma) for Th1 cells and interleukin-4 (IL-4) for Th2 cells. We analyzed IFN-gamma and IL-4 messenger RNA (mRNA) positive cells in liver sections from 18 patients with PBC and 35 disease controls including chronic active hepatitis C, extrahepatic biliary obstruction (EBO), and normal liver, using nonisotopic in situ hybridization and immunohistochemistry. Mononuclear cells expressing IFN-gamma and IL-4 mRNA were aggregated in inflamed portal tracts in PBC livers, but were rarely present in extrahepatic biliary obstruction, alcoholic fibrosis, or normal liver sections. The IFN-gamma and IL-4 mRNA positive cells in PBC livers were detected in significantly higher numbers than in control livers (P < .01). Moreover, IFN-gamma mRNA expression was more commonly detected than IL-4 expression in PBC livers, and the levels of IFN-gamma mRNA expression were highly correlated with the degree of portal inflammatory activity. IFN-gamma mRNA-positive cells were detected primarily around damaged bile ducts that were surrounded by lymphoid aggregates. The data indicate that Th1 cells are the more prominent T-cell subset in the lymphoid infiltrates in PBC.     

The free radicals--the hidden culprits--an update

Free radicals are normally produced as a by-product of cellular metabolism. Free radicals are capable of killing bacteria, damage biomolecules, provoke immune response, activate oncogens, cause atherogenesis and enhance ageing process. However, in healthy conditions nature has endowed human body with enormous antioxidant potential. Subtle balance exists between free radical generation and antioxidant defence system to cope with oxidative stress by various enzymes and vitamins at cellular level which prevent the occurrence of disease. However, factors tilting the balance in favour of excess free radicals generation lead to widespread oxidative tissue damage and diseases. Therefore, trouble starts when there is an excess of free radicals and the defence mechanism lags behind. Overwhelming production of free radicals in response to exposure to toxic chemicals and ageing may necessitate judicious antioxidant supplement to help alleviate free radical mediated damage.     

Surface modification of calcium carbonates studied by inverse gas chromatography and the effect on mechanical properties of filled polypropylene

Inverse gas chromatography (IGC) has been used to characterize the surfaces of a pure calcitic calcium carbonate as well as samples that had been treated with sodium polyacrylate and/or stearic acid. The dispersive components of the surface free energy for the pure material agreed well with related literature data. Polar contributions to the surface interactions with a range of probes were determined. The results show that the surface treatments reduced the polarities of the surfaces and that modification with stearic acid produced a non-polar, low-energy surface. Some mechanical properties of the polypropylene composites containing the modified calcium carbonates were found to correlate well with the filler surface energies. Copyright © 2004 Society of Chemical Industry     

Electrical conductivity,thermoelectric power and dielectric constant of a Gd2Ti2O7 single crystal

Electrical conductivity, thermoelectric power and dielectric constant of a Gd₂Ti₂O₇ single crystal have been studied in the temperature range 300–1000 K. Gd₂Ti₂O₇ is found to be an-type semiconductor with energy band gap 1.5 eV. It exhibits an extrinsic nature up to 675 K and an intrinsic nature above 675 K. The thermoelectric power increases with temperature in the region 300–675 K whereas it decreases with temperature in the region 675–1000 K. The dielectric constant increases slowly in the temperature range 300–675 K but this increase becomes fast in the temperature range 675–1000 K.     

Tunnel diode-loaded rectangular microstrip antenna for millimeter range

Theoretical investigations conducted for Ge tunnel diode-integrated rectangular patch antenna reveals that such an antenna exhibits frequency tunability with the bias voltage. The Ge tunnel diode-loaded patch can be operated in the millimeter range (51.042-54.013 GHz). The range of frequency obtainable for operation is 2971 MHz. The radiation pattern shows variation with the bias voltage and the radiated power, the beamwidth and the directivity vary inversely with the bias voltage. Thus, the Ge tunnel diode-loaded patch can be used to achieve electronic tuning (BW=5.66%) with the bias voltage.