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Human beings have certain uniqueness in their voices that helps determine their individuality. The most important characteristic of voice is the Pitch. The average vocal range for masculine voice ranges from 90-150 Hz and for feminine voice, it ranges from 190-240 Hz. This pitch is decided by the development of the vocal tract during puberty by the effect of testosterone hormone i.e. Longer the tract, lower the pitch and vice versa. However, for people belonging to the intersex community, the low production of testosterone causes the vocal tract to develop differently than males and females. Because of this reason, their pitch has its own individual range and hoarseness of quality. This study was aimed to evaluate the difference in intersex population voice characteristics as compared to normal adult males and females. It was found that intersex voice has a distinctive Pitch range of 150-190 Hz with the mean frequency being 167 Hz. It was also discovered that due the peculiar dialect practiced by the intersex community, especially in the western part of the Indian subcontinent, there is a noticeable difference in the time duration for pronouncing various vowels from the time duration taken by males and females to pronounce the same vowels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A suburban train (electric motor unit, EMU) was allegedly hijacked by a young man from Chennai central railway station on 29th April 2009 at 5am in the morning. He had started the train from the Chennai central railway station which was stationed at that time. He accelerated its speed and had driven the train in a wrong track i.e. the track which is meant for the downward (returning) trains. But within a distance of about 3 kilometers the train had collided with another goods train which was stationed in the same track of the Vyasarpadi ( next station for stoppage from the central station railway station). The alleged hijacker lost his life with multiple injuries while attempting to escape from that train just before the collision with the goods train. The case was resolved on the basis of the external findings of the victim's body and other circumstantial evidences. Though the victims' body was intact the identity of the victim is still unknown. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aldrin (ALD), a persistent-organic-pollutant (POP), an organochlorine-cyclodiene-pesticide is highly toxic in nature. Titanium dioxide nanoparticles (TNP) are widely used for various industrial applications. Despite the remarkable research on pesticide toxicity, the work with impact of nanoparticles on POP has been dealt with marginally. Chemicals co-exist in the environment and exhibit interactive effects. An investigation was carried out to evaluate the individual and combined effects of ALD (6 ppm) and TNP (60 ppm) exposure at sub-lethal concentration for 24 h in zebrafish. Significant reversal of lipid peroxidation level in liver and brain tissues and restoration in enhanced catalase activity in all examined tissues were observed in combined group. For other parameters, combined exposure of ALD and TNP does not show significant reversal action on ALD toxicity. Further studies are inline to understand combined effects of both to achieve significant reversal of ALD toxicity by TNP nanoparticles with threshold concentration of aldrin., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

The greatest challenge in environmental toxicology is to understand the effects of mixture toxicity as environmental pollutants co-exist and exhibit combined effects. Thus, it is necessary to evaluate the mixture toxicity associated with two or more co-existing compounds. Pesticides are widely used to control pest, they are ubiquitous in nature and present in all environmental components. Pesticide residue can be detected in almost all components of environment and food samples. Imidacloprid (IMD) (neonicotinoid), dichlorvos (DIC) (organophosphate) and atrazine (ATZ) are three widely used pesticides for commercial uses. Present work includes the assessment of effects of individual exposure of IMD (27.5 mg/L), DIC (15 mg/L), and ATZ (03 mg/L) and in combination of three (CMD) (13.75 + 7.5 + 1.5 mg/L IMD, DIC & ATZ, respectively) in terms of LPO, GSH content and antioxidant enzymes activities (superoxide dismutase, catalase and glutathione peroxidase) in zebrafish ( Danio rerio ), exposed for 24 h. CMD group exhibits highest lipid peroxidation than other individually exposed groups. Similarly, the activities of antioxidant enzymes were highest in CMD group with reduced GSH content. Results indicate that exposure to mixture of pesticides develops synergistic effects which were more toxic in compare to individual exposure and also produce toxicity in all examined tissues rather than selective organ toxicity.

Materials and Methods: The genetic diversity and forensic parameters based on 15 autosomal short tandem repeats (STR) loci; D8S1179,D21S11, D7S820, CSF1PO, D3S1358, TH01, D13S317,D16S539, D2S1338, D19S433, vWA, TPOX, D18S51,D5S818, and FGA in AmpFLSTR® Identifiler™ kit from Applied Biosystems, Foster City, CA, USA were evaluated in saliva samples of 297 unrelated individuals from the Bhil Tribe population of Gujarat state, India to study genetic diversities and relatedness of this population with other national and international populations., Results: Statistical analysis of the data revealed all loci were within Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium expectations with the exception of the locus vWA (0.019) and locus D18S51 (0.016). The neighbour joining phylogeny tree and Principal Co-ordinate Analysis plot constructed based on Fst distances from autosomal STRs allele frequencies of the present study and other national as well as international populations show clustering of all the South Asian populations in one branch of the tree, while Middle Eastern and African populations cluster in a separate branch., Conclusion: Our findings reveal strong genetic affinities seen between the Indo-European (IE) speaking Bhil Tribe of Gujarat and Dravidian groups of South India.