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The molasse deposits in the Indus Basin of India-Asia collision zone (Indus Suture Zone) of Ladakh, NW Himalaya, preserve a record of orogenic sedimentation associated with uplift and erosion of the southern margin of Asia in the course of ongoing India–Eurasia collision. Fossils from these continental deposits are scarce but hold important clues to the early history of India-Asia collision. Here we describe a small collection of dental remains of cyprinids, a family of freshwater fishes, from the Late Eocene Liyan Formation exposed in a high altitude (>5000 m) locality in the Indus Suture Zone of Eastern Ladakh. The find assumes significance since, unlike the Liyan Formation, most other molassic deposits of Ladakh rest unconformably over the Ladakh Batholith and are much younger (Late Oligocene/Early Miocene). The Liyan cyprinids, which represent the oldest record of Cyprinidae in India, suggest fluvial connections with contemporary Eocene ecosystems in Mainland Asia where this family originated in the middle Eocene or earlier. Dispersal of cyprinids from the Mainland Asia into the Indus Suture Zone of Ladakh took place from Tibet via alluvial drainage of the paleo-Indus river during floods or high runoff following the India-Asia collision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The major contributing factors for the causation of treatment failure in cases of pulmonary tuberculosis under Category-II directly observed treatment short-course treatment (DOTS) are treatment after default, poor treatment compliance, and development of multi-drug resistant (MDR) tuberculosis. The objective of the present study is to find out the demographic profile and drug susceptibility pattern in Category-II failure patients of pulmonary tuberculosis under Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP) of India. Two hundreds and twenty four patients with Category-II treatment failure of pulmonary tuberculosis were enrolled from Department of Pulmonary Medicine, at Chatrapati Sahuji Maharaj Medical University, UP, Lucknow, India, from August 2003 to July 2008. Their complete bacteriological assessment in terms of sputum smear for acid-fast bacilli, culture for Mycobacterium tuberculosis and drug sensitivity pattern were done in the Department of Microbiology. Among 224 patients, 16 (7.1%) patients were lost to follow-up and the final analysis was done among 208 (92.8%) cases. The reasons for inclusion of these 224 cases in the Category II regimen were treatment failure in the previous regimen (n = 75, 33%), default in 57% (n = 129 cases), and relapse in 8.9% (n = 20 cases). Among 208 patients, culture was positive in 170 (81.7%) cases, negative in 17 (8.1%) cases and contaminated in 21 (10%) cases. The drug sensitivity pattern of culture positive cases of Category-II failure patients revealed that, 58.2% (n = 99) had MDR tuberculosis and 40.5% (n = 69) were resistant but were non-MDR tuberculosis and 1.1 % (n = 2) cases were sensitive to all first line antituberculosis drugs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Malignant myeloma (MM) is a clonal proliferation of plasma cells with multiple osteolytic lesions. Extramedullary dissemination of multiple myeloma in lung is relatively uncommon. Hereby, we present a case of multiple myeloma with lung plasmacytoma of lung in a 45-years-old, non-smoker, female. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Various geophysical parameters including soil radon (222Rn) are being continuously monitored at Ghuttu, Garhwal Himalaya, India since 2007 as a part of earthquake precursor studies. To analyse the earthquake precursory changes in soil radon, it is essential to clean the soil radon data from other effects. For this, we used data for the period of nine years from 2011 to 2019 and assessed the relationship of soil radon with five other parameters using regression analysis. These parameters are water level, atmospheric pressure, rainfall, air temperature and soil temperature at 10 m depth. We also added one more parameter, i.e. the difference of air temperature (Tout) and soil temperature at 10 m depth (Tin). From the observed six parameters, four showed strong correlation with soil radon. These are (i) water level (correlation coefficient (CC) = -0.9), (ii) atmospheric pressure (CC = 0.6), (iii) air temperature (CC = -0.6) and (iv) temperature difference (Tout - Tin; CC = 0.5). For regression analysis, data during the period 2011-2014 were used for training, while data during 2015-2019 were used for testing purpose. Based on different models, the one developed using all the six input parameters suggests lowest errors and highest correlation. The observed values of root mean square error, mean absolute error and CC were 0.332, 0.281 and 0.931 respectively. The regression coefficients obtained from this model were used to calculate the theoretical radon and residuals. By this approach, the effects of hydrological and atmospheric parameters were found to be reduced to a great extent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An arsenic resistant bacteria SMSKVR-3 has been isolated from the rhizospheric soil of the metal-contaminated site of khetri copper mines situated in the Jhunjhunu district of Rajasthan, India. The strain showed homology with Pseudomonas mendocina strain ATCC 25411. This gram-negative isolate exhibited optimal growth in M9 minimal media with temperature and salt concentration as 30 °C and 0.25% (w/v), respectively, at pH 7.0. The similar growth pattern and SEM analysis of this strain exposed to M9 minimal media alone, M9 media supplemented with 300 mM arsenate [As(V)] or M9 media supplemented with 1.34 mM arsenite [As(III)] indicate the existence of the strong arsenic resistance mechanism. The isolate was able to produce siderophores and was able to reduce As(V) to As(III). A decrease in polyP concentration from 354.8 µg/10 10  CFU mL -1 at 0 h to 0.043 µg/10 10  CFU mL -1 at 8 h incubation with As(V) was in correlation with the change in intracellular As(V) concentration (116.98 mg L -1 /10 10 cells at 0 h to 88.65 mg L -1 /10 10 at 8 h) with time. This shows the possible role of polyP bodies in the regulation of As(V) concentration inside the cell. The presence of arsC gene in P.mendocina SMSKVR-3 was confirmed by the PCR amplification of arsC gene. The BLAST analysis of the sequenced gene represented 98.59% identity with the P. mendocina S5.2 arsenate reductase. These results indicate that the observed arsenic resistance in SMSKVR-3 is due to a combination of siderophore production, the transformation of As(V) to As(III) by arsenate reductase, multi-drug efflux pump, and polyP bodies mediated metal resistance mechanism., (© 2022. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)