Applicability of Wireless Sensor Networks in Precision Agriculture: A Review

Wireless Personal Communications - Data security is currently become a serious concern in wireless communication system for both the users and providers. Without a secure medium, the data...     

Exploring the Bioactive Potentials of C60-AgNPs Nano-Composites against Malignancies and Microbial Infections

At present, the potential role of the AgNPs/endo-fullerene molecule metal nano-composite has been evaluated over the biosystems in-vitro. The intra-atomic configuration of the fullerene molecule (C₆₀) has been studied in-vitro for the anti-proliferative activity of human breast adenocarcinoma (MDA-MB-231) cell lines and antimicrobial activity against a few human pathogens that have been augmented with the pristine surface plasmonic electrons and antibiotic activity of AgNPs. Furthermore, FTIR revealed the basic vibrational signatures at ~3300 cm⁻¹, 1023 cm⁻¹, 1400 cm⁻¹ for O-H, C-O, and C-H groups, respectively, for the carbon and oxygen atoms of the C₆₀ molecule. NMR studies exhibited the different footprints and magnetic moments at ~7.285 ppm, explaining the unique underlying electrochemical attributes of the fullerene molecule. Such unique electronic and physico-chemical properties of the caged carbon structure raise hope for applications into the drug delivery domain. The in-vitro dose-dependent application of C₆₀ elicits a toxic response against both the breast adenocarcinoma cell lines and pathogenic microbes. That enables the use of AgNPs decorated C₆₀ endo fullerene molecules to design an effective anti-cancerous drug delivery and antimicrobial agent in the future, bringing a revolutionary change in the perspective of a treatment regime.     

Green synthesis and antimicrobial activity of silver nanoparticles using wild medicinal mushroom Ganoderma applanatum (Pers.) Pat. from Similipal Biosphere Reserve,Odisha, India

In the present study, green synthesis and cost effective approach of silver nanoparticles using wild medicinal mushroom Ganoderma applanatum (Pers.) Pat. from Similipal Biosphere Reserve, Odisha, India is reported. The biosynthesised AgNPs were characterised using UV‐visible spectroscopy, particle analyser and scanning electron microscopy studies. It was found by dynamic light scattering analysis, that the average size and charges of the AgNPs were 133.0 ± 0.361 nm and −6.01 ± 5.30 mV, respectively. Moreover, the Fourier transform infrared study was also conducted to identify the biomolecules or functional groups responsible for the reduction of Ag and stabilisation of the AgNPs. The potential biomedical application with reference to antimicrobial activity of the synthesised AgNPs was investigated against some pathogenic microorganisms viz. Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus epidermidis, Vibrio cholerae, Staphylococcus aureus and Shigella flexneri.Inspec keywords: antibacterial activity, biomedical materials, nanomedicine, nanofabrication, materials preparation, ultraviolet spectra, visible spectra, scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectra, molecular biophysics, reduction (chemical), biochemistry, microorganisms, silver, nanoparticlesOther keywords: green synthesis, antimicrobial activity, silver nanoparticles, wild medicinal mushroom, Ganoderma applanatum Pat, Similipal Biosphere Reserve, Odisha, UV‐visible spectroscopy, particle analyser, scanning electron microscopy, dynamic light scattering analysis, Fourier transform infrared study, biomolecules, functional groups, silver reduction, AgNP stabilisation, biomedical application, pathogenic microorganisms, Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus epidermidis, Vibrio cholerae, Staphylococcus aureus, Shigella flexneri, Ag

Abbreviations

AgNPs

‐ Silver Nanoparticles

SPR

‐Surface plasmon resonance

AgNO3

‐Silver nitrate

nm

‐ Nanometer

mm

‐Milimetre

     

Cleaning of the Singapore River and Kallang Basin in Singapore: Economic,Social, and Environmental Dimensions

By 1977, decades of development and inadequate long-term planning in Singapore had resulted in heavy pollution in the waterways of the city-state, threatening its very survival. This paper analyzes the strategies for cleaning the Singapore River and Kallang Basin as part of an overall development plan which aimed at sustained growth. It also analyzes the economic, social, and environmental dimensions of these strategies not only to improve the conditions of the rivers and their surroundings, but also to develop the city-state, provide its population with an improved quality of life, including a clean environment, and most importantly, propel Singapore towards the path to sustainability and economic prosperity.     

Integrating big data driven sentiments polarity and ABC-optimized LSTM for time series forecasting

Stock market is a dynamic and volatile market that is considered as time series data. The growth of financial data exposed the computational efficiency of the conventional systems. This paper proposed a hybrid deep learning model based on Long Short- Term Memory (LSTM) and Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) algorithm. ABC is best fit for hyper parameter selection for deep LSTM models and maintains the equilibrium of exploitation and exploration issues. Handling a large volume of multidimensional reviews from social media is a major challenge. This paper evolves the multiple aspects of market sentiments and uses the reliable Big data platform Hadoop ecosystem and its services to compute sentiment polarity index. The ABC-LSTM hybrid model is validated with other core and hybrid models with evolutionary algorithms as Differential Evolution (DE) and Genetic Algorithm (GA). For the experiments, 10 years of historical datasets and social media reviews of IT sector funds Apple Inc. (AAPL), Microsoft corporation (MSFT) and Intel corporation (INTL) from NASDAQ GS, an American stock exchange are considered to validate hybrid forecasting models. Proposed algorithm ABC-LSTM is used to tune the hyperparameters (window size, LSTM units, dropout probability, epochs, batch size and learning rate) and evaluated through Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) and Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE) as loss function. Performance analysis proves that with sentiment polarity, ABC optimized LSTM obtains improved forecasting accuracy over its counterpart models.

     

Interleukin-34-CSF1R Signaling Axis Promotes Epithelial Cell Transformation and Breast Tumorigenesis

IL-34 has been recently identified as a ligand for CSF1R that regulates various cellular processes including cell proliferation, survival, and differentiation. Although the binding of IL-34 to CSF1R modulates several cancer-driving signaling pathways, little is known about the role of IL-34/CSF1R signaling in breast cancer. Herein, we report that IL-34 induces epithelial cell transformation and breast tumorigenesis through activation of MEK/ERK and JNK/c-Jun pathways. IL-34 increased the phosphorylation of MEK1/2, ERK1/2, JNK1/2, and c-Jun through CSF1R in mouse skin epidermal JB6 C141 cells and human breast cancer MCF7 cells. IL-34 enhanced c-Fos and c-Jun promoter activity, resulting in increased AP-1 transactivation activity in JB6 Cl41 and MCF7 cells. Moreover, PIN1 enhanced IL-34-induced phosphorylation of MEK1/2, ERK1/2, JNK1/2, and c-Jun in JB6 Cl41 and MCF7 cells. Inhibition of PIN1 using juglone prevented the IL-34-induced transformation of JB6 C141 cells. Similarly, silencing of PIN1 reduced the IL-34-induced tumorigenicity of MCF7 cells. Consistent with these results, the synergistic model showed that treatment with juglone suppressed the IL-34-induced growth of tumors formed by 4T1 cells in BALB/c mice. Our study demonstrates the role of IL-34-induced MEK/ERK and JNK/c-Jun cascades in breast cancer and highlights the regulatory role of PIN1 in IL-34-induced breast tumorigenesis.     

Water Demand Management in Singapore: Involving the Public

Water demand management requires the implementation of instruments and strategies that consider pricing, mandatory water conservation requirements and the engagement of the public and private sectors as well as of the society at large. In the case of Singapore, water is treated as an economic good. It is priced to recover the full costs of production and to reflect the scarcity of the resource and the high cost of developing additional water sources. Within a framework for water conservation, public education, information and awareness instruments have played a very important part in making the public appreciate the importance of conserving the resource. This paper analyses the water demand strategies that have been developed in the city-state, with emphasis on education efforts and on the results obtained in terms of water conservation. Lessons learnt from this study can provide very useful experiences for cities in developed and developing countries on the type of policies that could be successful in reducing consumption as well as in providing alternative supplies of water for both the domestic and the industrial sectors They also provide useful insights on the different ways to make the public realise the importance of using water sustainably for its long-term conservation even when immediate access to clean water may not be an issue.     

Improved cat swarm optimization algorithm for solving global optimization problems and its application to clustering

This paper presents a cat swarm optimization (CSO) algorithm for solving global optimization problems. In CSO algorithm, some modifications are incorporated to improve its performance and balance between global and local search. In tracing mode of the CSO algorithm, a new search equation is proposed to guide the search toward a global optimal solution. A local search method is incorporated to improve the quality of solution and overcome the local optima problem. The proposed algorithm is named as Improved CSO (ICSO) and the performance of the ICSO algorithm is tested on twelve benchmark test functions. These test functions are widely used to evaluate the performance of new optimization algorithms. The experimental results confirm that the proposed algorithm gives better results than the other algorithms. In addition, the proposed ICSO algorithm is also applied for solving the clustering problems. The performance of the ICSO algorithm is evaluated on five datasets taken from the UCI repository. The simulation results show that ICSO-based clustering algorithm gives better performance than other existing clustering algorithms.     

Phyto‐assisted synthesis of bio‐functionalised silver nanoparticles and their potential anti‐oxidant,anti‐microbial and wound healing activities

Bio‐ synthesis of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) was made by using the aqueous leaf extract of Ardisia solanacea. Rapid formation of AgNPs was observed from silver nitrate upon treatment with the aqueous extract of A. solanacea leaf. The formation and stability of the AgNPs in the colloidal solution were monitored by UV–visible spectrophotometer. The mean particle diameter of AgNPs was calculated from the DLS with an average size ∼4 nm and ∼65 nm. ATR‐FTIR spectroscopy confirmed the presence of alcohols, aldehydes, flavonoids, phenols and nitro compounds in the leaf which act as the stabilizing agent. Antimicrobial activity of the synthesized AgNPs was performed using agar well diffusion and broth dilution method against the Gram‐positive and Gram‐negative bacteria. Further, robust anti‐oxidative potential was evaluated by DPPH assay. The highest antimicrobial activity of synthesized AgNPs was found against Pseudomonas aeruginosa (28.2 ± 0.52 mm) whereas moderate activity was found against Bacillus subtilis (16.1 ± 0.76), Candida kruseii (13.0 ± 1.0), and Trichophyton mentagrophytes (12.6 ± 1.52). Moreover, the potential wound healing activity was observed against the BJ‐5Ta normal fibroblast cell line. Current research revealed that A. solanacea was found to be a suitable source for the green synthesis of silver nanoparticles.Inspec keywords: antibacterial activity, nanoparticles, silver, nanomedicine, wounds, microorganisms, X‐ray diffraction, ultraviolet spectra, visible spectra, Fourier transform infrared spectra, transmission electron microscopyOther keywords: phyto‐assisted synthesis, biofunctionalised silver nanoparticles, antioxidant antimicrobial wound healing activities, silver nanoparticle biosynthesis, aqueous leaf extract, Ardisia solanacea, silver nitrate, UV–visible spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering, Fourier transform infra‐red spectroscopy, X‐ray diffraction, electron microscopy, attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infra‐red spectroscopy, dilution method, Gram‐positive bacteria, Gram‐negative bacteria, radical scavenging method, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Trichophyton mentagrophytes, Bacillus subtilis, Candida kruseii, BJ‐5Ta normal fibroblast cell line, SEM, alcohols, aldehydes, flavonoids, phenols, nitro compounds, Ag     

Bio‐inspired synthesis of silver nanoparticles from leaf extracts of Cleistanthus collinus (Roxb.): its potential antibacterial and anticancer activities

In this investigation, the biological synthesis method was adopted to synthesise silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) by using the leaf extracts of Cleistanthus collinus (C. collinus). This plant has traditionally been used to remove the harmful pest from the agriculture field. Leaf extract of C. collinus was used as bioreductant on the precursor solvent of AgNO₃. The synthesised AgNPs were characterised by spectroscopic method such as UV–vis spectroscopy, attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering and microscopic method by field‐emission scanning electron microscopy analysis. The AgNPs were studied for both antibacterial and antifungal activities and found to exhibit potential antibacterial activity against Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The anticancer activity of AgNPs was screened against A‐431 osteosarcoma cell line by [3‐(4, 5‐dimetheylthiazol‐2)‐2, 5 diphenyl tetrazolium bromide] assay and the IC₅₀ value was found to be 91.05 ± 1.53 μg/ml. This trend of eco‐friendly stable synthesis of AgNPs could prove a better substitute for the chemical methods and offer greater opportunity to use these nanosilvers in agricultural and biomedical sectors.Inspec keywords: bio‐inspired materials, silver, nanoparticles, nanomedicine, antibacterial activity, cancer, biomedical materials, microorganisms, nanofabrication, attenuated total reflection, Fourier transform infrared spectra, ultraviolet spectra, visible spectra, light scattering, scanning electron microscopy, field emission electron microscopy, cellular biophysicsOther keywords: bio‐inspired synthesis, silver nanoparticles, Cleistanthus collinus, antibacterial activity, anticancer activity, leaf extracts, biological synthesis method, bioreductant, precursor solvent, UV‐visible spectroscopy, attenuated total reflection Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, dynamic light scattering, field‐emission scanning electron microscopy, Bacillus subtilis, Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, A‐431 osteosarcoma cell line, 3‐(4, 5‐dimetheylthiazol‐2)‐2,5 diphenyl tetrazolium bromide assay, eco‐friendly stable synthesis, Ag