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High prevalence of Vitamin D deficiency has been reported in pediatric population from different parts of the country. However, this study investigated the prevalence and risk factors associated with vitamin D deficiency in children. To assess the serum Vitamin D level and also to find out the prevalence of Vitamin D deficiency among children and adolescents in Gwalior, a major northern city of Madhya Pradesh. Cross sectional descriptive study The serum 25(OH)D levels of 258 children from age five to below 18 years, attending the out-patient clinics of the hospital were analyzed from June 2021 to Dec 2021. Data being non-parametric was presented as median and interquartile range. The group differences were computed by Mann Whitney U test. A p value < 0.05 was considered as statistically significant. 60% of the study population had insufficient levels of Vitamin D, with girls having significantly lower levels of serum vitamin D. Only 27% of adolescents had optimum level of serum Vitamin D. A high prevalence of vitamin D insufficiency and Vitamin D deficiency was found among the children living in the urban and sub urban areas of Gwalior city in northern Madhya Pradesh India.

Background: India has the third largest number of people living with HIV/Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS). It is important to understand the presentation of HIV disease in the local context and culture. Aims and Objectives: The present study is aimed at identifying the socio-demographic characteristics, clinical presentations of HIV/ AIDS patients, opportunistic infections (OI), and the possible risk factors for acquiring HIV infection. Materials and Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on HIV patients from September 2021 to December 2021. The HIV-positive patients of all age groups and all categories were included in the study. However, the clinical staging was done according to the World Health Organization (WHO) classification of HIV/AIDS. Data were expressed as mean and percentage proportion with chi square test for measuring statistically significance. Results: Among 140 HIV patients 88 (62.9%) were males. More than half were 101 (72.1%) in the reproductive age group 18–40 years with mean age 35±11.5 years. The commonest mode of HIV transmission was heterosexual 114 (81.4%). Maximum belonged to social Class IV 51 (36.4%) and Class III 47 (33.6%) of socioeconomic status. Fever 92 (65.7%), weight loss 82 (58.7%), and cough 68 (48.6%) were the common presenting. Pulmonary tuberculosis and diarrhea were the most predominant secondary OI accounting for 46 (32.9%) and 35 (25.0%), respectively. More than half 82 (58.6%) of patients were in the WHO clinical Stage II of HIV disease. CD4 counts of the patients were significantly inversely correlated with the number of symptoms and the number of OI. Conclusion: There was a high frequency of behavioral risk factors, together with unawareness among HIV patients, socio- demographic, and clinical profile of study participants reflects an impact of early case detection and timely institution of highly active antiretroviral therapy.

Lichens, algae and fungi-based symbiotic associations, are sources of many important secondary metabolites, such as antibiotics, anti-inflammatory, antioxidants, and anticancer agents. Wide range of experiments based on in vivo and in vitro studies revealed that lichens are a rich treasure of anti-cancer compounds. Lichen extracts and isolated lichen compounds can interact with all biological entities currently identified to be responsible for tumor development. The critical ways to control the cancer development include induction of cell cycle arrests, blocking communication of growth factors, activation of anti-tumor immunity, inhibition of tumor-friendly inflammation, inhibition of tumor metastasis, and suppressing chromosome dysfunction. Also, lichen-based compounds induce the killing of cells by the process of apoptosis, autophagy, and necrosis, that inturn positively modulates metabolic networks of cells against uncontrolled cell division. Many lichen-based compounds have proven to possess potential anti-cancer activity against a wide range of cancer cells, either alone or in conjunction with other anti-cancer compounds. This review primarily emphasizes on an updated account of the repository of secondary metabolites reported in lichens. Besides, we discuss the anti-cancer potential and possible mechanism of the most frequently reported secondary metabolites derived from lichens.

Heavy metals-containing drinking water and wastewater are posing a severe threat to the environment, and living beings on land, air and water. Different conventional, advanced nanomaterials-based and biological method has been employed for the treatment of heavy metals. Among the biological methods, microalgae are an important group of micro-organisms that have numerous environmental applications and can remediate heavy metals from wastewater. Also, it has numerous advantages over conventional remediation processes. Microalgae cells can uptake the heavy metal via different physiological and biological methods and are utilized as a nutrient source to regulate its metabolic process for the production of biomass. Furthermore, the enhancement in heavy metal removal efficiency can be improved using different strategies such as immobilization of algal cells, development of algal consortia and designing of microalgae-based nanocomposite materials. Also, it can significantly contribute towards environmental sustainability and future. Thus, the review provides a critical overview of heavy metals and their existence along with their negative effects on humans. This review provides insight on recent advanced nanomaterial approaches for the removal of heavy metals, overviews of microalgae-based heavy metal uptake mechanisms and their potential for the amputation of different heavy metals. Furthermore, the special focus is on recent strategies that enhance heavy metal removal efficiency and contribute towards sustainability for the development of a microalgae-based future.

The incidences of credit card fraud are increasing. It puts the hard-earned money of users at risk. The financial institutions and governing bodies are looking forward to some robust and reliable ways of detecting credit card fraudulent transactions. The task is challenging due to non-availability of enough data, high class imbalance, and high stake on false negative rates (FNR). Most of the methods available in literature perform well on the accuracy-based performance metrics. However, they fail to yield satisfactory ROC-AUC performance due to the high false positive or false negative rates. Mitigating this issue is the real challenge for the task of fraudulent credit card transaction detection. This paper investigates the problem of credit card fraudulent transaction detection and proposes a technique for it. The proposed method uses a custom selective class sampling-based class balancing technique, and subsequently, it uses random forest for classification. The experimental results show that the proposed technique has better AUC score, accuracy, precision, and recall values as compared with other similar approaches.

In today’s era, where ‘time’ is considered as ‘money,’ people are completely depending on e-commerce and online banking for their routine purchases, shopping, and financial transactions. This increasing dependency on e-commerce are increasing fraud in online transactions, and credit card fraud is one example. Such malicious and unethical practices may cause identity theft and monitory loss to the people across the world. In this research paper, our effort is to identify the best Supervised Machine Learning algorithm that helps in classifying fraudulent and non-fraudulent transactions under credit card fraud on an imbalanced dataset. To conduct this research and compare the results, we have used five different Supervised Machine Learning Classification techniques. On implementing these machine learning techniques, it has been observed that both Supervised Vector Classifier and Logistic Regression Classifier perform better for detecting credit card fraud in an imbalanced dataset.

Microalgal-based bioprocess offers several advantages including wastewater reclamations, therefore present study assessed the usability of the combination of untreated municipal sewage wastewater (UTMSWW) and secondary treated municipal sewage wastewater (STSWW) for nutrient removal and recovery by

Microalgal-based bioprocess offers several advantages including wastewater reclamations, therefore present study assessed the usability of the combination of untreated municipal sewage wastewater (UTMSWW) and secondary treated municipal sewage wastewater (STSWW) for nutrient removal and recovery by Tetraselmis indica (T. indica) BDUG001. The present study optimized the additional nutrient supplementations (e.g. ASN-III) percentage and day-night cycle, pH and pH with aeration for monitoring high-rate biomass production and nutrient recovery. The study results showed that the combination of 75% UTMSWW + 25% ASN-III supported maximum biomass production (2.65 ± 0.07 g/L). In the optimized day-night cycle (12:12 h), T. indica BDUG001 showed improved biomass production (2.75 ± 0.07 g/L), biomass productivity (165.63 ± 4.42 mg/L/d), and photosynthetic pigments production. Under optimized pH∼ 7.0 with aeration, maximum total nitrate (TN) removal efficiency (87.67 ± 3.08–91.55 ± 1.92%) was observed, while COD and TP removal was maximum at pH ∼ 9.0. The maximum biomass production (2.35 ± 0.07–2.77 ± 0.04 g/L) with biomass productivity (93.75 ± 167.19 ± 2.21 mg/L/d) and lipid content (42.98 ± 1.86–47.85 ± 0.21% DCW) were also at pH 7.0. with aeration. The present study verified the utilization of UTMSWW with the combination of conventional medium, optimized day-night cycle, pH with aeration along with designing low-cost PBR. It was the ideal system for the cultivation of T. indica BDUG001 for the recovery of nutrients from wastewater, production of biofuels and value-added feedstock.

In this paper, we look at the experimental investigation of concrete with partial substitution of fine aggregate with copper slag to improve the strength parameters of the M25 grade of concrete, such as compressive strength, split tensile strength, and flexural strength. Copper slag replaces fine aggregate in 20 percent, 30 percent, 40 percent, and 50 percent of the weight of the sand, respectively. According to Indian Standard 456: 2000, the concrete ratio for M25 grade is 1:1:2. Compressive strength, split tensile strength, and flexural strength were assessed at 7, 14, and 28 days using different tests. We can reduce river digging by replacing copper slag with fine aggregate and prevent the natural fine aggregate and also reduce the environmental pollution to produce by copper slag when it dispose in open atmosphere.

Urbanization is a revolutionary and necessary step for the development of nations. However, with development emanates its drawback i.e., generation of a huge amount of wastewater. The existence of diverse types of nutrient loads and toxic compounds in wastewater can reduce the pristine nature of the ecosystem and adversely affects human and animal health. The conventional treatment system reduces most of the chemical contaminants but their removal efficiency is low. Thus, microalgae-based biological wastewater treatment is a sustainable approach for the removal of nutrient loads from wastewater. Among various microalgae, Tetraselmis sp. is a robust strain that can remediate industrial, municipal, and animal-based wastewater and reduce significant amounts of nutrient loads and heavy metals. The produced biomass contains lipids, carbohydrates, and pigments. Among them, carbohydrates and lipids can be used as feedstock for the production of bioenergy products. Moreover, the usage of a photobioreactor (PBR) system improves biomass production and nutrient removal efficiency. Thus, the present review comprehensively discusses the latest studies on Tetraselmis sp. based wastewater treatment processes, focusing on the use of different bioreactor systems to improve pollutant removal efficiency. Moreover, the applications of Tetraselmis sp. biomass, advancement and research gap such as immobilized and co-cultivation have also been discussed. Furthermore, an insight into the harvesting of Tetraselmis biomass, effects of physiological, and nutritional parameters for their growth has also been provided. Thus, the present review will broaden the outlook and help to develop a sustainable and feasible approach for the restoration of the environment.

Micronutrients are essential elements utilized by plants for a healthy growth. Each of these elements has a significant role in plant nutrition. Boron is an essential element for plants’ development. Adequate B nutrition is critical for quality of crops and high yields. In small concentrations boron compounds are used as micronutrients in fertilizers, in large concentrations it adversely affects the plant growth and can be used as. But there is a narrow range in boron deficiency and toxicity. Present review work focused on the toxic concentration level of boron and its effects on plant growth as well as the methods to overcome the boron toxicity. REFERENCES Ajay Singh, J. P. Shahi and D. M. Langade, 2013. Appraisal of heterosis for yield and yield attributing components in maize (Zea mays L.). Biolife. 1(3); 123-129. Alpaslan, M., Taban, S., 1nal, A., Kütük, C., and Erdal, I. 1996. Boron- nitrogen relationships in wheat which grown nutrient solution. Pamukkale Univ. 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Realising the hazardous effect of nickel on human health, microbes and plants are effectively used for bioremediation. The endophytic microorganisms have an important role in the phytoremediation of nickel using Vigna radiata. Therefore, in order to harness the potential of microbial strains, the present study was designed to examine the metal biosorption ability of endophytic bacterial strains isolated from plants growing in nickel-contaminated soil. A total of six endophytic nickel resistance bacteria were isolated from the plant Vigna radiata. The metal tolerant bacterial strains were identified following 16 S rRNA gene sequence analysis. Nickel biosorption estimation and plant growth-promoting (PGP) activities of isolated strains were performed and found high nickel biosorption efficiency of 91.3 ± 0.72% at 600 mg L−1 using Bacillus safensis an isolated endophytic strain from Vigna radiata. Furthermore, high indole acetic acid (IAA) and exopolysaccharide (EPS) production were obtained in all the strains as compared to without nickel-containing medium used as control. Moreover, the production of high EPS suggests improved biosorption ability of isolated endophytic strains. In addition, a kinetic study was also performed to evaluate different adsorptions isotherms and support the nickel biosorption ability of endophytic strains. The treatment of nickel electroplating industrial effluent was also demonstrated by isolated endophytic strains. Among six (6) strains, B. cereus showed maximum 57.2 ± 0.62% biosorption efficiency of nickel which resulted in the removal of 1003.50 ± 0.90 mg L−1 of nickel from the electroplating industry effluents containing initial 1791 ± 0.90 mg L−1 of nickel. All other strains were also capable of significant nickel biosorption from electroplating industry effluents as well. Thus, isolated endophytic nickel tolerant strains can be further used at large-scale biosorption of nickel from electroplating industry effluent.

Thromboangiitis obliterans (TAO) or Buerger’s disease (BD) is a non-atherosclerotic, segmental occlusive inflammatory disease that commonly affects small and medium arteries and veins in the upper and lower limbs. Our purpose of this study was to evaluate outcome of lumbar sympathectomy and omentopexy in patients with Buerger’s disease by assessing neovascularization and good clinical recovery. Thirty consecutive patients underwent omentopexy for Buerger’s disease of lower limb from June 2019 to June 2020 in our institute. Patients were followed up for 3 months postoperatively for relief of intermittent claudication and rest pain. The ulcer and amputation site healing were assessed. The oxygen saturation level was also measured and postoperative complication was noted. The mean age was 45 ± 5.5 years and male to female ratio was 29:1. Out of 30 patients, 26 (86.7%) patients had omentopexy up to below knee level, 3 (10%) patients at ankle level, and 1 (3.3%) patient up to above knee level. All patients had relief of rest pain and 25 (83.3%) patients had relief of intermittent claudication on 3rd month. Three patients who had non-healing ulcers showed ulcer healing and 27 patients who had gangrene showed healing at amputation site at 3rd month. Omentopexy improve oxygen saturation and temperature of the affected limb and helps in clinical recovery in terms of relief in intermittent claudication, rest pain, and ulcer healing. Thus, it can be considered as an effective modality for the management of Buerger’s disease as limb salvage procedure.

The poultry industry is one of the major revenue generating industries around the world. This industry generates a lot of wastes including huge amounts of chicken feathers, that are recalcitrant, thus, difficult to dispose of and have a negative environmental impact. The main methods of disposal of feathers are either incineration or dumping them with other waste materials that hinder their biodegradability by soil microorganisms. These methods are energy-intensive and also lead to the loss of valuable protein keratin that forms the major part of chicken feathers. Recently, biodegradation/metabolism of chicken feathers by microorganisms has been considered an excellent alternative for the disposal of keratin waste. Keratin degradation leads to the formation of free amino acids and soluble proteins that are a precursor of many valuable metabolites and value-added products. Thus, the present review deliberated on the importance of chicken feathers and also other keratin waste materials to be considered as an important bio-resource and their complete valorization into high-value chemicals and development of cost-effective technologies to convert poultry wastes into useful products.

The present work aims to investigate seasonal variations in air pollution levels in Lucknow and assess the ambient air quality of the city together with highlighting the health impacts of major pollutants like PM10, PM2.5, SO2, NO2, Pb, Ni and aerosols from 2010 to 2019. The maximum and minimum values of PM10, PM2.5, SO2, NO2, Pb and Ni were found to be 270.75 and 122.45 μg/m3, 124.95 and 95.52 μg/m3, 25.60 and 8.05 μg/m3, 75.65 and 23.85 μg/m3, 0.66 and 0.03 μg/m3 and 0.07 and 0.01 ng/m3, respectively. Health impact of particulate matter has also been assessed with AirQ+, and it was estimated that long-term exposure of PM10 was attributed to between 37 and 48% for post-neonatal (age 1–12 months) mortality rate due to all causes, whereas long-term attributable proportions in mortality due to exposure of PM2.5 were to about 19 to 28% from all causes. Further, an attempt has also been made to evaluate the impact of lockdown amid COVID-19 on the ambient air quality of Lucknow. During the lockdown, PM2.5 levels reduced by 65% (at Gomti Nagar), 23% (at central school), 79% (at Lalbagh) and 35% (at Talkatora), due to which, air quality index of Gomti Nagar came down to 43, well below 50 which falls in the healthy range. NO2 levels also came down. However, levels of SO2 did not show significant reduction. Correlating the data between aerosol optical depth and Angstrom exponent by Pearson correlation analysis revealed a significant positive correlation (r = 0.65, P

In the present work, the transition metal compounds i.e. CoCl2, NiCl2, and CrO3 were used as microwave sensitizer’s chemicals in combination with H3PO4. The efficiency of the pretreatment process was assessed based on sugar and ethanol generation potential from pretreated rice straw (RS). The in-house produced crude cellulase (Cr-Cell) and xylanase (Cr-Xyl) alone and in combination was used for hydrolysis of pretreated RS. The efficiency of the in-house enzyme against the commercial cellulase (Com-Cell) and xylanase (Com-Xyl) was also examined. The structural characteristics of the pretreated RS were studied using FTIR and XRD. Based on the above studies, NiCl2+H3PO4 and CrO3+H3PO4 mediated microwave pretreatment system were found to be the suitable methods with maximum sugar yield of 65.2 ± 1.01% and 70.76 ± 0.87% using a cocktail of the commercial cellulase and xylanase (ComCK-CellXyl) which are comparable to the in-house enzyme cocktail (CrCK-CellXyl). The FTIR and XRD analysis of the pretreated and untreated RS also suggested that there is a change in biomass crystallinity resulting in enhanced accessibility of enzyme to the biomass. The maximum ethanol yield of 14.39 ± 0.44 g/L and 12.41 ± 0.33 g/L was obtained for simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (SSF) of CrO3+H3PO4 pretreated RS using ComCK-CellXyl and CrCK-CellXyl. The pretreated RS when subjected to hydrolysis using in-house and commercial xylanase, several xylo-oligosaccharides i.e. xylotriose (X3), xylotetraose (X4) and xylopentoses (X5) were generated with major contribution of X5.

The major downfalls of the microalgal biorefinery are low volume of high value product accumulation, low biomass productivity and high cultivation costs. Here, we aimed to improve the biomass productivity of the industrially relevant