Soy protein supplementation does not cause lymphocytopenia in postmenopausal women

Background  

The health benefits of soy isoflavones have been widely investigated; however, there are some concerns as to whether soy isoflavones, similar to ipriflavone, a synthetic isoflavone, cause lymphocytopenia in postmenopausal women. Hence, the purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which 12-month supplementation of 25 g soy protein containing 60 mg isoflavones alters lymphocyte counts or other hematological parameters in postmenopausal women who were not on hormone replacement therapy.     

Electrochemical pretreatment of textile effluents and effect of electrode materials on the removal of organics

The aquatic environment around the textile industries in India was severely affected due to continuous discharge of effluents. In order to avoid further deterioration, the pollution control board of Tamil Nadu, India has enforced zero discharge concepts throughout the state. Consequently, most of the industries have opted membrane technology to recover water. The present study was aimed to find out the efficacy of electrochemical techniques as pretreatment methods to reverse osmosis (RO). The textile wastewater was initially treated by electrocoagulation to remove the suspended solids. After the electrocoagulation, the wastewater was further treated by electrooxidation for COD removal. Mild steel as anode was found to be effective for coagulation of suspended solids. For electrooxidation, graphite and RuO₂/IrO₂/TaO₂ coated titanium were used as electrodes. The efficiency of these electrode materials was evaluated in terms of chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal, instantaneous current efficiency (ICE) and electrooxidation index (EOI). The COD was removed to the extent of 90-93% using graphite and 54% with RuO₂/IrO₂/TaO₂ coated titanium electrodes. The current efficiency of 40% and 11% was achieved with graphite and RuO₂/IrO₂/TaO₂ coated titanium respectively. The degradation of organics was followed using GC-MS and the reason for incomplete degradation of organics in the presence of RuO₂/IrO₂/TaO₂ coated titanium was discussed.     

An evolutionary approach for personalization of content delivery in e-learning systems based on learner behavior forcing compatibility of learning materials

This paper presents an evolutionary approach for personalizing learning content for individual learners from a very large database in an e-learning system. The proposed work improves the quality of the self-learning process in an adaptive e-learning system by providing the most suitable content for individual learners. The paper depicts the results of personalizing the learning process by tuning the compatibility level of the learning objects with respect to the learning style of the learner, the complexity level of the learning objects with respect to the knowledge level of the learner and the interactivity level of the learner based on the satisfaction level of the learner during the learning process using a modified form of genetic algorithm named as Compatible Genetic Algorithm (CGA). The proposed work improves the efficiency of the genetic algorithms by forcing compatibility in the learning objects which has not been implemented so far in existing systems. Forcing compatibility into the search space not only helps to reduce the search space but also fills the search space with better chromosomes. The results show improvement in scores of the learners and also in their satisfaction levels. A comparison with the standard algorithms shows improvement in execution time, number of executing generations and fitness values. The results indicate that personalization of content delivery based on behavioral traits of learners leads to better learning.     

Amine-gold linked single-molecule circuits: experiment and theory

A combination of theory and experiment is used to quantitatively understand the conductance of single-molecule benzenediamine-gold junctions. A newly developed analysis is applied to a measured junction conductance distribution, based on 59 000 individual conductance traces, which has a clear peak at 0.0064 G0 and a width of +/-47%. This analysis establishes that the distribution width originates predominantly from variations in conductance across different junctions rather than variations in conductance during junction elongation. Conductance calculations based on density functional theory (DFT) for 15 distinct junction geometries show a similar spread. We show explicitly that differences in local structure have a limited influence on conductance because the amine-Au bonding motif is well-defined and flexible, explaining the narrow distributions seen in the experiments. The minimal impact of junction structure on conductance permits an unambiguous comparison of calculated and measured conductance values and a direct assessment of the widely used DFT theoretical framework. The average calculated conductance (0.046 G0) is found to be seven times larger than experiment. This discrepancy is explained quantitatively in terms of electron correlation effects to the molecular level alignments in the junction.     

Single-molecule circuits with well-defined molecular conductance

We measure the conductance of amine-terminated molecules by breaking Au point contacts in a molecular solution at room temperature. We find that the variability of the observed conductance for the diamine molecule-Au junctions is much less than the variability for diisonitrile- and dithiol-Au junctions. This narrow distribution enables unambiguous conductance measurements of single molecules. For an alkane diamine series with 2-8 carbon atoms in the hydrocarbon chain, our results show a systematic trend in the conductance from which we extract a tunneling decay constant of 0.91 +/- 0.03 per methylene group. We hypothesize that the diamine link binds preferentially to undercoordinated Au atoms in the junction. This is supported by density functional theory-based calculations that show the amine binding to a gold adatom with sufficient angular flexibility for easy junction formation but well-defined electronic coupling of the N lone pair to the Au. Therefore, the amine linkage leads to well-defined conductance measurements of a single molecule junction in a statistical study.     

Zinc oxide micro- and nanoparticles: Synthesis, structure and optical properties

Zinc oxide (ZnO) spherical nanoparticles (SNPs) and bitter-melon-like (BML) microparticles were synthesized by a hydrothermal route using a zinc (Zn) plate as a source and substrate at various synthesis conditions. The structural analysis confirmed the formation of ZnO with hexagonal wurtzite phase on the hexagonal Zn substrate with growth of the ZnO microparticles along the [1 0 1] direction. The UV-vis absorption spectra of the ZnO microparticles indicated absorption peaks in the UV region which can be attributed to the band gap of ZnO. The room temperature photoluminescence (PL) of the ZnO microparticles exhibited a broad emission band, which is fitted with four Gaussian peaks and were assigned to transitions involving free excitons and various defect centers. The growth model for the formation of ZnO micro- and nanoparticles is presented.     

Process optimisation for a ready‐to‐serve breakfast smoothie from a composite milk–sorghum base

A composite milk and sorghum‐based smoothie containing varying levels of sorghum flour (2–4% w/w), sugar (9–11% w/w) and pectin (0.2–0.4% w/w) was optimised by response surface methodology on the basis of sensory (colour and appearance, flavour, consistency, sweetness and overall preference) and physical (viscosity, sedimentation and wheying off) attributes. Flour and pectin levels influenced the flavour, consistency, viscosity and sedimentation significantly. Sugar helped to increase the overall preference and had a positive correlation with sedimentation. An optimised smoothie composition of acceptable quality was obtained with 2.79% (w/w) germinated sorghum flour (GSF), 10.30% (w/w) sugar and 0.35% (w/w) pectin.     

Enhanced multi-attribute trust protocol for malicious node detection in wireless sensor networks

There has been a tremendous growth in the field of wireless sensor networks (WSNs) in recent years, which is reflected in various applications. As the use of WSN applications increases, providing security to WSNs becomes a leading issue. This is complex due to the unique features of WSNs. This paper proposes a trust-based intrusion detection that uses multi-attribute trust metrics to improve detection accuracy. It uses an enhanced distributive trust calculation algorithm that involves monitoring neighbouring nodes and trust calculation using the trust metrics message success rate (MSR), elapsed time at node (ETN), correctness (CS) and fairness (FS). In addition to the normal communication-based trust property MSR, this paper uses effective parameters like ETN, which focuses on data and address modification attacks in an effective manner, and two social-interaction-based parameters CS and FS, which address trust-related attacks effectively. Simulation results show that the proposed method has higher performance and provides more security in terms of detection accuracy and false alarm rate.     

One year soy protein supplementation has positive effects on bone formation markers but not bone density in postmenopausal women

Background  

Although soy protein and its isoflavones have been reported to reduce the risk of osteoporosis in peri- and post-menopausal women, most of these studies are of short duration (i.e. six months). The objective of this study was to examine if one year consumption of soy-containing foods (providing 25 g protein and 60 mg isoflavones) exerts beneficial effects on bone in postmenopausal women.