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Objective This study aimed to identify the risk factors for autoimmune hemolytic anemia (AIHA) in children with transfusion-dependent thalassemia (TDT). Methodology This cross-sectional study was conducted at the Department of Child Health, Khyber Teaching Hospital, Peshawar, Pakistan, from March 25, 2024, to September 25, 2024. A total of 300 patients under 18 years of age, diagnosed with TDT, were included in the study. Relevant demographic, clinical, and laboratory investigations were conducted for each patient, with AIHA diagnosed based on the Coombs test. Risk factors, including demographic data, disease characteristics, transfusion history, clinical factors, and laboratory parameters, were recorded and analyzed. The significance of these risk factors was assessed by using the chi-square test for categorical variables and the independent t-test for continuous variables, comparing Coombs test-compatible and incompatible patients. A p-value of less than 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results The mean±SD age of participants in this study was 6.82±4.2 years with an age range of one to 16 years. The male gender was 56.33%. The results of the Coombs test showed that 48.66% of these children had developed AIHA. The comparison between incompatible and compatible patients at Coombs test showed that age of patients (5.87±3.93 vs. 7.68±4.28 years, p = 0.00), age at the time of diagnosis (2.21±0.99 vs. 4.64±3.03 years, p = 0.00), age at the time of first infusion (3.05±1.28 vs. 5.49±3.2 years, p = 0.00), transfusion interval < 3 weeks (48.6% vs. 37%, p = 0.04) and duration of transfusion (2.87±3.2 vs. 2.21±1.93 years, p = 0.03) were the significant risk factors in the development of AIHA. Conclusion The patient's age, age at diagnosis, age at the time of first transfusion, the transfusion interval, and the duration of blood transfusion are the significant risk factors influencing the development of AIHA., Competing Interests: Human subjects: Consent for treatment and open access publication was obtained or waived by all participants in this study. Institutional Research and Ethical Review Board, Khyber Medical College, Peshawar issued approval (218/DME/KMC). Animal subjects: All authors have confirmed that this study did not involve animal subjects or tissue. Conflicts of interest: In compliance with the ICMJE uniform disclosure form, all authors declare the following: Payment/services info: All authors have declared that no financial support was received from any organization for the submitted work. Financial relationships: All authors have declared that they have no financial relationships at present or within the previous three years with any organizations that might have an interest in the submitted work. Other relationships: All authors have declared that there are no other relationships or activities that could appear to have influenced the submitted work., (Copyright © 2024, Khan et al.)

Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae (Xoo) injects major transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs) into plant cells to activate susceptibility (S) genes for promoting bacterial leaf blight in rice. Numerous resistance (R) genes have been used to construct differential cultivars of rice to identify races of Xoo, but the S genes were rarely considered. Different edited lines of rice cv. Kitaake were constructed using CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing, including single, double and triple edits in the effector-binding elements (EBEs) located in the promoters of rice S genes OsSWEET11a, OsSWEET13 and OsSWEET14. The near-isogenic lines (NILs) were used as tracers to detect major TALEs (PthXo1, PthXo2, PthXo3 and their variants) in 50 Xoo strains. The pathotypes produced on the tracers determined six major TALE types in the 50 Xoo strains. The presence of the major TALEs in Xoo strains was consistent with the expression of S genes in the tracers, and it was also by known genome sequences. The EBE editing had little effect on agronomic traits, which was conducive to balancing yield and resistance. The rice-tracers generated here provide a valuable tool to track major TALEs of Xoo in Asia which then shows what rice cultivars are needed to combat Xoo in the field., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Purpose: To determine the incidence, characteristics, disposition, and economic burden of emergency department (ED) visits for ophthalmic trauma in the United States (US)., Design: Retrospective study., Methods: The Nationwide Emergency Department Sample was used to calculate and characterize ED visits for ophthalmic trauma in the US from 2009 to 2018. Linear regression was used to estimate trends in annual incidence and mean inflation-adjusted ED charges. Logistic regression was used to assess variables associated with inpatient admission., Results: There were over 7.3 million ED visits for ophthalmic trauma in the US over the 10 years, with an annual incidence of 233 per 100,000 population. Patients were predominantly male (65 %), 21-44 years old (39 %), and from low-income households (56 %). Only 1 % of patients were hospitalized. Older age, male sex, metropolitan teaching hospitals, and trauma centers were associated with significantly higher odds of inpatient admission. The mean inflation-adjusted ED charge per visit more than doubled over the decade ($1,333 to $3,187) with total charges exceeding $14 billion. Superficial injuries (44 %) and eyelid/orbit wounds (20 %) accounted for the majority of visits. Orbital floor fractures (4 %) and open globe injuries (2 %) accounted for a minority of visits but were responsible for most admissions (49 % and 29 %, respectively) and the highest mean ED charge ($7,157 and $6,808, respectively)., Conclusions: Ophthalmic trauma represents an increasingly significant burden to EDs in the US. Preventive efforts should target young males from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Strategies to improve outpatient access and redirect non-urgent injuries may help alleviate costs., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare there is no conflict of interests., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Bacterial leaf streak of small-grain cereals is an economically important disease of wheat and barley crops. The disease occurs in many countries across the globe, with particular importance in regions characterized by high precipitation or areas in which sprinkler irrigation is used. Three genetically distinct lineages of the Gram-negative bacterium Xanthomonas translucens ( X. translucens pv. undulosa , X. translucens pv. translucens , and X. translucens pv. cerealis ) are responsible for most of the bacterial leaf streak infections on wheat and barley crops. Considering the seedborne nature of the pathogens, they are included in the A2 (high-risk) list of quarantine organisms for some European countries; hence, they are under strict quarantine control and zero tolerance. Due to the taxonomic complexities within X. translucens , the exact geographic distribution of each pathovar has not yet been determined. In this mini review, we provide an updated overview of the detection and diagnosis of the bacterial leaf streak pathogens. First, a short history of the leaf streak pathogens is provided, followed by the symptomology and host range of the causal agents. Then, the utility of conventional methods and high-throughput molecular approaches in the precise detection and identification of the pathogens is explained. Finally, we highlight the role of quarantine inspections and early detection of the pathogen in combating the risk of bacterial leaf streak in the 21st century's small-grains cereals' industry., Competing Interests: The author(s) declare no conflict of interest.

Xanthomonas translucens pv. cerealis causes bacterial leaf streak disease on small grain cereals. Type II and III secretion systems (T2SS and T3SS) play a pivotal role in the pathogenicity of the bacterium, while no data are available on the transcriptomic profile of wheat cultivars infected with either wild type (WT) or mutants of the pathogen. In this study, WT, TAL-effector mutants, and T2SS/T3SS mutants of X. translucens pv. cerealis strain NXtc01 were evaluated for their effect on the transcriptomic profile of two wheat cultivars, 'Chinese Spring' and 'Yangmai-158', using Illumina RNA-sequencing technology. RNA-Seq data showed that the number of differentially expressed genes (DEGs) was higher in Yangmai-158 than in Chinese Spring, suggesting higher susceptibility of Yangmai-158 to the pathogen. In T2SS, most suppressed DEGs were related to transferase, synthase, oxidase, WRKY, and bHLH transcription factors. The gspD mutants showed significantly decreased disease development in wheat, suggesting an active contribution of T2SS in virulence. Moreover, the gspD mutant restored full virulence and its multiplication in planta by addition of gspD in trans . In the T3SS-deficient strain, downregulated DEGs were associated with cytochrome, peroxidases, kinases, phosphatases, WRKY, and ethylene-responsive transcription factors. In contrast, upregulated DEGs were trypsin inhibitors, cell number regulators, and calcium transporter. Transcriptomic analyses coupled with quantitative real-time-PCR indicated that some genes are upregulated in Δ tal 1/Δ tal 2 compared with the tal -free strain, but no direct interaction was observed. These results provide novel insight into wheat transcriptomes in response to X. translucens infection and pave the way for understanding host-pathogen interactions., Competing Interests: The author(s) declare no conflict of interest.

The emergence of medication resistance and unfavorable side effects from existing antibiotics has prompted the quest for novel antimicrobial agents over the last 2 decades. Plant extracts have been shown to have antibacterial effects in numerous studies. The objective of this study was the evaluation of the antibacterial effect of economically important medicinal plants found in Pakistan. Onosma bracteatum (flowers and leaves), Viola odorata (flowers and leaves), Cuscuta reflexa (whole plant), Swertia chirata (whole plant), and Fagonia arabica (whole plant) were used against Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli , and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Water and ethanol extracts were obtained from different parts of the plants. To evaluate the antibacterial effect of these plants, qualitative assay agar well diffusion method was performed. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) was determined by the broth micro dilution method. Results revealed that the highest inhibition zone (18 mm) was shown by ethanol extract of V odorata flower against P aeruginosa . Ethanol extract of C reflexa plants is best for all 3 tested microbes ( P aeruginosa, B subtilis , and E coli ). The results concluded that all these plants have abilities to fight against these tested bacteria. Ethanol extract of V odorata flower has the highest activity against P aeruginosa ., Competing Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2023.)

Traditional advertising techniques seek to govern the consumer's opinion toward a product, which may not reflect their actual behavior at the time of purchase. It is probable that advertisers misjudge consumer behavior because predicted opinions do not always correspond to consumers' actual purchase behaviors. Neuromarketing is the new paradigm of understanding customer buyer behavior and decision making, as well as the prediction of their gestures for product utilization through an unconscious process. Existing methods do not focus on effective preprocessing and classification techniques of electroencephalogram (EEG) signals, so in this study, an effective method for preprocessing and classification of EEG signals is proposed. The proposed method involves effective preprocessing of EEG signals by removing noise and a synthetic minority oversampling technique (SMOTE) to deal with the class imbalance problem. The dataset employed in this study is a publicly available neuromarketing dataset. Automated features were extracted by using a long short-term memory network (LSTM) and then concatenated with handcrafted features like power spectral density (PSD) and discrete wavelet transform (DWT) to create a complete feature set. The classification was done by using the proposed hybrid classifier that optimizes the weights of two machine learning classifiers and one deep learning classifier and classifies the data between like and dislike. The machine learning classifiers include the support vector machine (SVM), random forest (RF), and deep learning classifier (DNN). The proposed hybrid model outperforms other classifiers like RF, SVM, and DNN and achieves an accuracy of 96.89%. In the proposed method, accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, precision, and F1 score were computed to evaluate and compare the proposed method with recent state-of-the-art methods.

The liver and kidneys are the vital organs of the body and perform important life-sustaining functions in the body. Synthetic drugs used in the treatment of liver and kidney diseases are sometimes inadequate and can lead to serious side effects. Medicinal herbs and plants were used to combat diseases for a long time and combination therapy is preferred over single plant therapy. In the current study, the Asparagus racemosus, Mucuna pruriens, Anacyclus pyrethrum , and Tribulus terrestris polyherbal preparation (PHP) was selected to evaluate its hepatoprotective, antioxidant, and anti-nephrotoxic potential. The methanolic extract of PHP was prepared following standard protocols. Fifty-six albino rats were divided into 7 groups (n = 8). The negative control (NC) having the healthy rats and the remaining 6 groups were induced liver toxicity by intraperitoneally injecting 0.5 mL/kg of 50% CCl 4 in olive oil. Group 2 was positive control and group 3 and 4 received silymarin standard drug at the dose of 100 and 200 mg/kg body weight. Groups 5, 6, and 7 (PHP-1, PHP-2, PHP-3) were the liver-damaged rats receiving the PHP at a dose of 50, 100, and 150 mg/kg body weight. Blood samples were collected at 21 of the trial, to evaluate oxidative stress, hepatoprotective and anti-nephrotoxic potential. Results of liver function tests revealed significant ( P < .05) hepatoprotective activities of PHP after intoxication with CCl 4 of albino rats as compared to standard groups. Moreover, results of renal functions also showed that PHP has a significant ( P < .05) restoring the capacity of blood urea, creatinine, and uric acid in intoxicated rats as compared with the control group. The PHP also reduced the oxidative stress in the treatment groups by increasing the total antioxidant capacity and reducing the total oxidative status. It can be concluded that selected medicinal plants have a potential role in the management of liver and kidney disorders. So, by running the clinical trial on a large scale and by isolating the phytochemical constituents responsible for hepatoprotective and nephroprotective activities, locally prepared drugs could be developed to manage liver and renal disorders., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2022.)

Picrorhiza kurroa (P.K) usually familiar as kutki is a well-known plant in the Ayurvedic system of medicine due to its reported activities including antidiabetic, antibacterial, antioxidant, antitumor, anti-inflammatory, and hepatoprotective. The current research was intended to evaluate the antioxidant, inhibition activity of the ethanolic, methanolic, and aqueous extracts of P.K roots against α-amylase and α-glucosidase in vitro, after the phytochemical analysis . For this purpose, P.K roots were extracted with ethanol (EthPk), methanol (MthPk), and distilled water (AqPk) and phytochemical study of the extracts were performed to recognize the total phenolic content (TPC) and total flavonoids content (TFC). Antioxidant capability of the extracts was assessed by FRAP, ABTS, and DPPH assay. α-amylase inhibitory and α-glucosidase inhibitory activities were also determined. Software SPSS-23 was used to statistically analyze with One Way ANOVA and results were stated as mean standard deviation. Result of the study showed that MthPk contained the maximum concentration of TPC and TFC than EthPk and AqEh. Antioxidants in terms of DPPH (lowest IC 50 = .894 ± .57), FRAP (612.54 ± 11.73) and ABTS (406.42 ± 4.02) assay was also maximum in MthPk. MthPk was also showed maximum inhibition activity against α-amylase and α-glucosidase with lowest IC 50 (.39 ± .41; .61 ± .24), respectively. The extracts α-amylase and α-glucosidase inhibitory activities order was as MthPk > EthPk> AqPk. Results clearly specified that the methanolic extract of Picrorhiza kurroa have the maximum antioxidant, α-amylase, and α-glucosidase inhibitory activities. A positive correlation of TPC, TFC with antioxidant, and α-amylase and α-glucosidase inhibition activities of the P.K roots were also shown. The plant has capability to diminish the oxidative stress and can be used to treat diabetes by inhibiting α-amylase and α-glucosidase actions., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2022.)

Background: Burnout amongst radiologists is common in many different institutions and is increasing day by day. To battle burnout, we have to address the root causes already recognized in published literature. Therefore, it is crucial to examine and discern important publications., Aim: To provide evidence-based data and trends related to burnout in radiologists so that researchers can work on it further and develop preventive strategies to overcome this problem., Methods: Bibliometric analysis conducted by two independent reviewers separately used Scopus Library for data extraction by using medical subject heading and International Classification of Diseases keywords. Forty-nine articles were selected for analysis after an extensive scrutiny. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences version 20 was used for analysis. Pearson correlation coefficient, Kruskal Wallis test, and Mann-Whitney U test were applied., Results: The most productive period with regards to the number of publications was between 2017 and 2019. A total of 160 authors contributed to the topic burnout among radiologists, with an average of 3.26 authors per paper. About 41.68% of the authors were female, whilst 35% of them were first authors. The co-citation analysis by author involved 188 cited authors, 13 of whom were cited at least 70 times. Only six out of forty-nine studies were funded by various government institutions and non-governmental organizations., Conclusion: Current analysis casts a spotlight on important trends being witnessed in regard to the mental health of radiologists, including lack of funding for mental health research, narrowing of female vs male citation gap, as well as authorship and citation trends., Competing Interests: Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest among authors., (©The Author(s) 2022. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.)

Introduction: Intact Parathyroid Hormone (iPTH) has a short half-life i.e. two to four minutes therefore the sampling regimen has to pass through a stringent pre-analytical process control. The aim of this study was to identify the causes of apparently falsely low iPTH encountered while signing out Laboratory reports by the Clinical Chemistry professionals., Material and Methods: This report was conducted at the section of Clinical Chemistry, The Aga Khan University Hospital (AKUH) Karachi Pakistan from July to December 2017. Audit tool utilized was Plan-Do-Check-Act Cycle. After correlating with available clinical details and lab parameters, all low iPTH values (<16 pg/ml) were investigated by phone interview. A fresh sample was requested for non-correlating cases.Appropriate interventions were undertaken and a re-assessment was done from January to March 2018., Results: During the audit, 2559 iPTH samples were analyzed. 110 (4.3%) were identified as apparently falsely low. After recollection, the above 110 samples were immediately centrifuged, and cold chain maintained until re-analysis. 60 (2.4%) resulted with normal or elevated levels. The causes identified were poor compliance of staff with pre-analytical steps including delayed sample separation and unfavorable temperature chain maintenance. Interventions included online meetings with the staff country-wide and circulation of flyers detailing the pre-analytical steps via emails and hard copies. Re-audit showed reduction in number of apparently falsely low results to 30 out of a total of 1448 samples and 14 (0.96%) were investigated to be falsely low., Conclusion: Stringent pre-analytical process control is vital for quality reporting and patient safety., (Copyright © 2021 International Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (IFCC). All rights reserved.)

Efflux proteins are the transport proteins expressed in the plasma membrane, which are involved in the movement of unwanted toxic substances through specific efflux pumps. Several studies based on computational approaches have been proposed to predict transport proteins and thereby to understand the mechanism of the movement of ions across cell membranes. However, few methods were developed to identify efflux proteins. This paper presents an approach based on the contextualized word embeddings from Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers (BERT) with the Support Vector Machine (SVM) classifier. BERT is the most effective pre-trained language model that performs exceptionally well on several Natural Language Processing (NLP) tasks. Therefore, the contextualized representations from BERT were implemented to incorporate multiple interpretations of identical amino acids in the sequence. A dataset of efflux proteins with annotations was first established. The feature vectors were extracted by transferring protein data through the hidden layers of the pre-trained model. Our proposed method was trained on complete training datasets to identify efflux proteins and achieved the accuracies of 94.15% and 87.13% in the independent tests on membrane and transport datasets, respectively. This study opens a research avenue for the implementation of contextualized word embeddings in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

An eco-friendly environment with green strategies can help to achieve better environmental performance. However, literature on the relationship between green human resource management practices (GHRMP) and sustainable environmental efficiency (SEF) is limited. Moreover, there is limited knowledge about the factors that could mediate the relationship between GHRMP and SEF. Therefore, the present study examines the impact of green human resource management practices mediating through green psychological climate (GPC) and green organizational culture (GOC) for better environmental efficacy. For this purpose, the primary data on variables are collected by using structured assessment tools and analyzed through regression models. Unlike previous studies, this study adopts a mediation model and unfolds not only the role of green human resource practices in psychological climate and green organizational culture but also clarifies the mediating role of GPC and GOC in sustainable environmental efficiency. The findings unfolded that ecological factors such as green psychological climate, green organizational culture, and sustainable environmental efficiency are positively affected by green human resources management. In addition, green organizational culture and green psychological climate positively mediate the relationship between GHRMP and SEF. This study recommends adopting green human resource management strategies and increasing technical innovations to improve sustainability and economic performance.

Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae ( Xoo ), the causal agent of bacterial leaf blight in rice, delivers transcription activator-like effector (TALE) proteins into host cells to activate susceptibility or resistance ( R ) genes that promote disease or immunity, respectively. Nonhost plants serve as potential reservoirs of R genes; consequently, nonhost R genes may trap TALEs to trigger an immune response. In this study, we screened 17 Xoo TALEs for their ability to induce a hypersensitive response (HR) in the nonhost plant Nicotiana benthamiana ( Nb ); only AvrXa10 elicited an HR when transiently expressed in Nb . The HR generated by AvrXa10 required both the central repeat region and the activation domain, suggesting a specific interaction between AvrXa10 and a potential R -like gene in nonhost plants. Evans blue staining and ion leakage measurements confirmed that the AvrXa10-triggered HR was a form of cell death, and the transient expression of AvrXa10 in Nb induced immune responses. Genes targeted by AvrXa10 in the Nb genome were identified by transcriptome profiling and prediction of effector binding sites. Using several approaches ( in vivo reporter assays, electrophoretic mobility-shift assays, targeted designer TALEs, and on-spot gene silencing), we confirmed that AvrXa10 targets NbZnFP1 , a C2H2-type zinc finger protein that resides in the nucleus. Functional analysis indicated that overexpression of NbZnFP1 and its rice orthologs triggered cell death in rice protoplasts. An NbZnFP1 ortholog was also identified in tomato and was specifically activated by AvrXa10. These results demonstrate that NbZnFP1 is a nonhost R gene that traps AvrXa10 to promote plant immunity in Nb ., (© 2021 The Authors.)

Motivation: Primary and secondary active transport are two types of active transport that involve using energy to move the substances. Active transport mechanisms do use proteins to assist in transport and play essential roles to regulate the traffic of ions or small molecules across a cell membrane against the concentration gradient. In this study, the two main types of proteins involved in such transport are classified from transmembrane transport proteins. We propose a Support Vector Machine (SVM) with contextualized word embeddings from Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers (BERT) to represent protein sequences. BERT is a powerful model in transfer learning, a deep learning language representation model developed by Google and one of the highest performing pre-trained model for Natural Language Processing (NLP) tasks. The idea of transfer learning with pre-trained model from BERT is applied to extract fixed feature vectors from the hidden layers and learn contextual relations between amino acids in the protein sequence. Therefore, the contextualized word representations of proteins are introduced to effectively model complex structures of amino acids in the sequence and the variations of these amino acids in the context. By generating context information, we capture multiple meanings for the same amino acid to reveal the importance of specific residues in the protein sequence., Results: The performance of the proposed method is evaluated using five-fold cross-validation and independent test. The proposed method achieves an accuracy of 85.44 %, 88.74 % and 92.84 % for Class-1, Class-2, and Class-3, respectively. Experimental results show that this approach can outperform from other feature extraction methods using context information, effectively classify two types of active transport and improve the overall performance., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Sirtuins are a family of proteins that play a key role in regulating a wide range of cellular processes including DNA regulation, metabolism, aging/longevity, cell survival, apoptosis, and stress resistance. Sirtuins are protein deacetylases and include in the class III family of histone deacetylase enzymes (HDACs). The class III HDACs contains seven members of the sirtuin family from SIRT1 to SIRT7. The seven members of the sirtuin family have various substrates and are present in nearly all subcellular localizations including the nucleus, cytoplasm, and mitochondria. In this study, a deep neural network approach using one-dimensional Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) was proposed to build a prediction model that can accurately identify the outcome of the sirtuin protein by targeting their subcellular localizations. Therefore, the function and localization of sirtuin targets were analyzed and annotated to compartmentalize into distinct subcellular localizations. We further reduced the sequence similarity between protein sequences and three feature extraction methods were applied in datasets. Finally, the proposed method has been tested and compared with various machine-learning algorithms. The proposed method is validated on two independent datasets and showed an average of up to 85.77 % sensitivity, 97.32 % specificity, and 0.82 MCC for seven members of the sirtuin family of proteins., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Change and environmental patterns are having an immense effect upon the world. Businesses, communities, and even individuals are struggling to perform their role within environmental protection. This paper investigates the role of leadership styles on organizational citizenship behavior for the environment (OCBE) directly and through the mediation of self-efficacy and psychological ownership. The survey technique was used to collect the data from Chinese banking, insurance, medicine, and teaching service sector employees for the current study. The reliability and validity of the scale items were tested. This study used AMOS-SEM for data analysis and testing the developed hypotheses. The empirical results confirmed that responsible, inclusive, authentic, and supportive leadership styles positively impact employees' OCBE. The results further confirm that self-efficacy and psychological ownership act as mediators between leadership and OCBE. The current study widens our understanding of leadership styles and their impact on OCBE, along with limitations associated with the study and future guidelines for investigators., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Ullah, Wisetsri, Wu, Shah, Abbas and Manzoor.)

The Gram-negative bacterium Xanthomonas translucens infects a wide range of gramineous plants with a notable impact on small grain cereals. However, genomics-informed intra-species population structure and virulence repertories of the pathogen have rarely been investigated. In this study, the complete genome sequences of seven X. translucens strains representing an entire set of genetic diversity of two pathovars X. translucens pv. undulosa and X. translucens pv. translucens is provided and compared with those of seven publicly available complete genomes of the pathogen. Organization of the 25 type III secretion system genes in all the 14 X. translucens strains was exactly the same, while TAL effector genes localized singly or in clusters across four loci in X. translucens pv. translucens and five to six loci in X. translucens pv. undulosa . Beside two previously unreported endogenous plasmids in X. translucens pv. undulosa , and variations in repeat variable diresidue (RVD) of the 14 strains, tal1a of X. translucens pv. translucens strain XtKm8 encode the new RVDs HE and YI which have not previously been reported in xanthomonads. Further, a number of truncated tal genes were predicted among the 14 genomes lacking conserved Bam HI site at N-terminus and Sph I site at C-terminus. Our data have doubled the number of complete genomes of X. translucens clarifying the population structure and genomics of the pathogen to pave the way in the small grain cereals industry for disease resistance breeding in the 21st century's agriculture., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Shah, Khojasteh, Wang, Taghavi, Xu, Khodaygan, Zou, Mohammadikhah, Chen and Osdaghi.)

Xa1-mediated resistance to rice bacterial blight, caused by Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae (Xoo), is triggered by transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs) and suppressed by interfering TALEs (iTALEs). TALEs interact with the rice transcription factor OsTFIIAγ1 or OsTFIIAγ5 (Xa5) to activate expression of target resistance and/or susceptibility genes. However, it is not clear whether OsTFIIAγ is involved in TALE-triggered and iTALE-suppressed Xa1-mediated resistance. In this study, genome-edited mutations in OsTFIIAγ5 or OsTFIIAγ1 of Xa1-containing rice 'IRBB1' and Xa1-transgenic plants of xa5-containing rice 'IRBB5' did not impair the activation or suppression of Xa1-mediated resistance. Correspondingly, the expression pattern of Xa1 in mutated OsTFIIAγ5 and OsTFIIAγ1 rice lines and 'IRBB1' rice was similar. In contrast, the expression of OsSWEET11 was repressed in rice lines mutated in OsTFIIAγ5 and OsTFIIAγ1. Bimolecular fluorescence complementation (BiFC) and co-immunoprecipitation assays showed that both TALE PthXo1 and iTALE Tal3a interacted with OsTFIIAγ1 and OsTFIIAγ5 in plant nuclei. These results indicated that TALE-triggered and iTALE-suppressed Xa1-mediated resistance to bacterial blight is independent of OsTFIIAγ1 or OsTFIIAγ5 in rice, and suggest that an unknown factor is potentially involved in the interaction of Xa1, TALEs and iTALEs., (© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Experimental Biology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

The recent emergence of novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) triggered by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has resulted in substantial mortality worldwide. Presently, there is no approved treatment for COVID-19. Consequently, the clinical, scientific, and regulatory authorities have joint efforts to reduce the severe impact of COVID-19. To date, there is minimal arsenal with no definite curative drugs, licensed-vaccines, or therapeutic conducts to combat the COVID-19 infections. Keeping in view the threats of this pandemic, various global organizations, physicians, researchers, and scientists, are trying to recognize the epidemiological characteristics and pathogenic mechanisms of COVID-19 to discover potential treatment regimens, vaccines, and therapeutic modes for future anticipation. Herein, we summarize a contemporary overview of curative invasions and vaccines for COVID-19 based on the earlier information and considerate of similar earlier RNA coronaviruses. The information reviewed here establishes a paramount intellectual basis to promote ongoing research to develop vaccines and curative agents. Thus, this review suggests the furthermost accessible frontiers in the vaccine development to tackle or combat the COVID-19/SARS-CoV-2., (Copyright © 2021 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.)

Medicinal plants are gaining popularity over synthetic medicines because antibiotic resistance demands the alternative source of medication. In the present research, the crude protein extraction of 4 medicinal plants Cassia fistula, Saccharum officinarum, Albizia lebbeck and Cymbopogon citrates was carried out. Crude protein extraction was done by 2 different buffers i.e. Tris NaCl buffer and PBS buffer. Protein confirmation was done by Bradford assay in the spectrophotometer. Antibacterial potential was checked and compared against Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis, Neisseria gonorrhoea, Bacillus cereus and Proteus mirabilis. Antibacterial assay was performed by disc diffusion method, agar well method and zones of inhibition were calculated. The study results indicated that Tris NaCl extracts' antimicrobial potential is higher than that of the PBS buffer. On disc diffusion method the Tris NaCl buffer extracts of Cymbopogon citrates showed maximum zone of inhibition 11 mm and 9 mm against Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus cereus respectively and control chloramphenicol showed maximum zone of inhibition 26 mm against Bacillus subtilis. Cassia fistula showed maximum zone of inhibition of 7 mm against Bacillus cereus while Saccharum officinarum and Albizia lebbeck didn't show the any antibacterial activity. On the other hand, Protein extracts from PBS buffer didn't show zone of inhibition against any bacteria. Only Albizia lebbeck showed minute zone of inhibition against Neisseria gonorrhea . On well diffusion method, Cassia fistula Tris NaCl protein extract showed the maximum zone of inhibition 20 mm and 18 mm against Proteus mirabilis and Bacillus subtilis respectively. While Albizia lebbeck PBS protein extract showed the maximum zone of inhibition 19 mm and 17 mm against Bacillus subtilis and Bacillus cereus. The results revealed that the protein extract of Albizia lebbeck, Cymbopogon citrates and Cassia fistula can be used tosynthesize antimicrobial drugs to treat the bacterial infections., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2021.)

Aims: To characterise the epidemiology of eye trauma in the event of falls presenting to the emergency departments (ED) in the USA., Method: Retrospective cohort study. Nationwide Emergency Department Sample was used to analyse fall encounters presenting to the ED with eye trauma from 2006 to 2015. National estimates of the leading diagnoses were determined, and multivariable regression was used to determine the relationship between factors involved in fall encounters presenting with eye trauma., Results: From 2006 to 2015, an estimated 87 991 036 fall encounters presented to the ED, of which 952 781 encounters had eye trauma as either a primary or secondary diagnosis. The overall incidence of fall encounters with eye trauma per 100 000 US population increased from 30.7 encounters in 2006 to 33.8 encounters per 100 000 population in 2014 with a decrease seen in 2015. Eye trauma, including vision-threatening type, was highest in females (n=500 520, 52.5%), elderly (n=400 209, 42%) and children (n=2 06 741, 21.7%). Elderly were more likely to have eye trauma in the setting of falls (adjusted OR (aOR) 2.06, 95% CI 2.02 to 2.11) and be admitted (aOR 1.89, 95% CI 1.86 to 1.91) than adults (reference). The leading types of eye trauma were contusion of orbital tissues (n=174 292, 18.3%), laceration of eyelid and periocular area (n=172 361, 18.1%) and orbital fractures (n=151 013, 15.8%)., Conclusions: Falls are preventable, yet the incidence of falls and resulting eye trauma are increasing despite our best efforts. As ophthalmologists, we should not only develop guidelines to recognise and counsel at-risk groups under our care but also strategies for prevention of eye trauma secondary to falls., Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared., (© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2021. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.)

Uncertainty and isolation have been linked to mental health problems. Uncertainty surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic has the potential to trigger mental health problems, which include anxiety, stress, and depression. This paper evaluates the prevalence, psychological responses, and associated correlates of depression, anxiety, and stress in a global population during the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) pandemic. A cross-sectional study design was adopted. 678 completed forms were collected during the COVID-19 quarantine/lockdown. An online questionnaire was designed and DASS-21 was used as the screening tool. A non-probability sampling technique strategy was applied. 50.9% of participants showed traits of anxiety, 57.4% showed signs of stress, and 58.6% exhibited depression. Stress, anxiety, and depression are overwhelmingly prevalent across the globe during this COVID-19 pandemic, and multiple factors can influence the rates of these mental health conditions. Our factorial analysis showed notable associations and manifestations of stress, anxiety, and depressive symptoms. People aged 18-24, females, and people in non-marital relationships experienced stress, anxiety, and depression. Separated individuals experienced stress and anxiety. Married people experienced anxiety. Single and divorced people experienced depression. Unemployed individuals experienced stress and depression. Students experienced anxiety and depression. Canada, the UK, and Pakistan are all countries that are experiencing stress and depression as a whole. An extended number of days in quarantine was associated with increased stress, anxiety, and depression. Family presence yielded lower levels of stress, anxiety, and depression. Lastly, lack of exercise was associated with increased stress, anxiety, and depression.

Objective: To determine the frequency of stroke and common factors leading to it after coronary artery bypass grafting., Methods: This study was conducted at Cardiothoracic Surgery Department, Rehman Medical Institute, Peshawar. Study design was descriptive cross sectional study and the duration of the study was six months. The total sample size was 183 cases using 8.3% frequency of stroke after coronary artery bypass grafting, 95% confidence interval, 4% margin of error, using WHO sample size calculator., Results: In this study mean age was 45 years with SD ± 1.26. Seventy five percent patients were male while 46(25%) females. Six patients (3%) patients had stroke while 177(97%) patients did not have any stroke. Among the six patients who were analyzed, all of them had Diabetes Mellitus and 50% patients had recent AMI, while only one patient had prior history of Atrial Fibrillation., Conclusions: Diabetes Mellitus is an independent risk factor for stroke after CABG surgery. whereas, recent MI is also associated with increased incidence of stroke in post CABG patients., Competing Interests: Conflicts of interest: None., (Copyright: © Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences.)

Objective: To evaluate the pregnancy outcome of human immunodeficiency syndrome-positive mothers., Methods: The prospective observational study was conducted at the Department of Gynaecology and Obstetrics, Aziz Bhatti Shaheed Teaching Hospital, Gujrat, Pakistan, from June 2011 to March 2018, and comprised pregnant women screened positive for human immunodeficiency syndrome. Risk factors and perinatal outcomes were noted on a predesigned proforma. Data was analysed using SPSS 20., Results: Of the 74 subjects with a mean age of 29±5.27 years, 63(85.1%) were multiparous and 11(14.9%) were nulliparous. Major risk factors included unsterilized nasal or ear piercing in 70(94.6%) subjects, history of blood transfusion 57(77%) and history of dental procedure in unsterilized settings 23(31.1%). Spouses of 43(58.1%) subjects were positive for human immunodeficiency syndrome, 22(29.7%) were negative and 9(12.2%) had unknown status in this regard. In terms of outcome, 12(16.3%) subjects had spontaneous abortion, 11(12.2%) had intrauterine death of foetus, 6(8.1%) had preterm delivery and 45(60.8%) reached full term and were delivered. There were 2(2.6%) patients with stage 4 disease who died during pregnancy., Conclusions: Human immunodeficiency syndrome infection in pregnant women was found to be associated with poor pregnancy outcome.

Kidney-yang deficiency syndrome (KYDS) infected with the influenza virus is a suitable model to imitate a population at high-risk to influenza infection with a high rate of morbidity and mortality. However, the specific molecular mechanisms underlying this disease remain unclear. A stable reference gene is essential as an internal control for molecular biology research of this condition. Reverse-transcription-quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) is considered an extremely sensitive technique used for absolute and relative quantification of target genes transcript levels. To accurately estimate the relative expression of genes in cells from mice with KYDS in response to infection with influenza A virus subtype H1N1 (A/H1N1) virus using RT-qPCR, it is necessary to identify suitable reference genes. In the present study, analysis of 10 reference genes (Act-β, β2m, GAPDH, Gusβ, Tubα, Grcc10, Eif4h, Rnf187, Nedd8 and Ywhae) was performed across a set of 4 tissue types: Lung; heart; liver; and kidney. KYDS mice were inoculated with A/H1N1 virus or a mock control. For analysis, geNorm, BestKeeper, NormFinder, and Bio-Rad Maestro ™ statistical programs were used for the estimation of the stability of the reference genes. The results were authenticated through extended experimental settings using a group of 10 samples, parallel to 3 additional innate immune system-associated genes of the host, TLR3, TLR7 and RIG-I, which were also analyzed using the same algorithms. From the 4 algorithms, taking into account the joint analyses of the ranking order outputs, the 2 genes Ywhae and Nedd8 were identified to be the most stable for mice with KYDS following infection with A/H1N1 virus. In contrast, the least stable genes in all 4 tissues were GAPDH and β2m. These results may affect the choice of reference genes in future studies that use RT-qPCR analysis of target genes in experimental conditions, such as mice with KYDS infected with influenza A virus., (Copyright: © Fu et al.)

The exogenous application of acetylsalicylic acid (ASA) is stated to increase tolerance of plants against different environmental stresses. Therefore, the present study was planned to get insight into ASA-mediated regulation of growth, secondary metabolism, and oxidative defense in 2 chickpea varieties. Ten seeds of 2 chickpea varieties (DG-89 and Bittle-98) were sown in plastic pots containing sandy loam soil with 3 drought stress levels, i.e. wet conditions or flooded water (100% FC) as recommended control, 75% FC, 50% FC and 25% FC for chickpea. The moisture contents were maintained and regularly monitored through the addition of normal irrigation water. The design of experimental was completely randomized with 3 replicates per treatment. Penultimate leaves were harvested with knife after 20 days of foliar spray to observe the effect of exogenously applied ASA (100 mg/L) on growth, and key-biochemical attributes of chickpea plants (DG-89 and Bittle-98) under drought stress regimes. Drought stress regimes caused a substantial decline in shoot (37% and 35%) and root length (67% and 78%), shoot (80% and 76%) and root (62% and 68%) fresh masses, shoot (71% and 63%) and root (77% and 74%) dry masses, leaf area per plant (77% and 80%), chlorophyll a (7% and 45%), chlorophyll b (57% and 42%), total chlorophyll (30% and 39%), total carotenoids (76% and 54%), total anthocyanins (38%), reducing sugar (10% and 57%), total soluble proteins (77% and 44%), total flavonoids (61% and 59%) and total phenolics (58% and 31%) contents in both DG-89 and Bittle-98, respectively. A significant increase in MDA (25%), H 2 O 2 contents (100% and 62%), proline (145% and 131%), and ascorbic acid (133% and 203%) contents was documented in stressed plants of both varieties, respectively. Additionally, drought stress significantly improved the activities of POD (154% and 76%), CAT (87% and 45%) and SOD (248% and 143%) in both varieties. Exogenous application of ASA reduced drought-mediated oxidative stress by reducing MDA (53% and 14%), and H 2 O 2 (84% and 56%) contents, proline contents (50% and 17%) and enhanced the shoot (6% and 25%) and root (43% and 33%) dry masses, leaf area (9% and 10%), chlorophyll a (7% and 32%), b (82% and 81%), and carotenoids (53% and 33%) in both barley cultivars. When plants of chickpea was treated with ASA had greater total anthocyanins (26% and 35%), free amino acids (48% and 28%), ascorbic acid contents (135% and 179%), total soluble proteins (34% and 23%), total flavonoids (58% and 35%) and phenolic (50% and 69%)contents besides the POD (41% and 64%), CAT (23% and 56%) and SOD (73% and 72%) enzymes activities. Plants of DG-89 showed more tolerance to drought stress than that of Bittle-98 as a manifest from higher plant biomasses. Thus, our results showed that foliar-applied ASA is an effective strategy that can be used to improve the tolerance of chickpea plants to drought stress., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2020.)

Gout is arthritis caused due to Monosodium urate (MSU) crystals deposition occurring particularly in patients with associated comorbidities limiting the use of conventional therapies. This study was planned to evaluate the therapeutic efficacy of urinile (a herbal drug) for the treatment of gouty arthritis. Allopurinol was used as standard drug (positive control). The study population of 250 volunteers (gouty arthritis patients) were divided into 2 groups as test and control group (n = 125 each). Gouty arthritis patients in test and control group were treated with 300 mg each of urinile and allopurinol, respectively. Clinical symptoms of all the study volunteers were recorded and serum uric acid was determined. Significant (p < 0.05) reduction in serum uric acid level toward normal was found in test group individuals. Clinical symptoms of gouty arthritis patients were also improved in test group compared to control group. Results showed that urinile has the potential to decrease serum uric acid level in gouty arthritis patients probably because of its antioxidant potential and xanthine oxidase inhibitory activity. It can be concluded that the tested herbal drug urinile is more potent in treating gouty arthritis patients and can be used as an effective alternative to the most commonly used allopathic drugs., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2020.)

Objective: The aim of our study is to analyze the characteristics, morbidity and mortality of patients requiring an Intra-Aortic Balloon Pump (IABP) in Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting (CABG)., Methods: An analysis was done on the prospectively collected data of 1216 patients who had CABG in our center between July, 2017 and May, 2019 at our hospital. We categorized patients in to an IABP and non-IABP group on the basis of IABP use. We then compared the pre-operative, per-operative and post-operative characteristics of the two groups. We further stratified the patients according to pre-op ejection fraction (EF)., Results: Out of 1216 patients, 135(11.10%) patients required an IABP. 70(51.9%) patients of IABP group and 699(64.7%) patients of non-IABP group had hypertension (p-value 0.0036). 23.0% had previous myocardial infarction (MI) in the IABP group and 13.8% had prior myocardial infarction (MI) in non-IABP group (p-value 0.0463). Among the patients requiring an IABP, 21(15.5%) of patients had normal EF (>50%) (P-value<0.0001), 72 (53.3%) had EF 35-50%, and 41(30.3%) patients had EF<35% (p-value <0.0001). Mortality of IABP group (19.3%) was greater than non-IABP group (2.4%) (P-value 0.00001)., Conclusions: Use of IABP increased as the EF decreased. Rate of post-operative stroke, prolonged ICU stay, prolonged ventilation, re-opening due to bleeding and mortality was seen to be significantly higher in the IABP group., Competing Interests: Conflicts of interest: None., (Copyright: © Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences.)

Purpose: To describe the epidemiology of Emergency Department (ED) visits related to opioid abuse with primary ophthalmic diagnoses in the United States (US)., Methods: This retrospective cross-sectional study used National ED Sample (NEDS) (2006-2015), a representative sample of all US EDs, to analyze and compare the epidemiology of primary ophthalmic diagnoses in opioid abusers and a control group of non-opioid users. National incidence and descriptive statistics were calculated for demographics and prevalent diagnoses. Multivariable logistic regression was used to compare outcomes between primary ophthalmic diagnoses in opioid and non-opioid abusers., Results: An estimated 10,617 visits had a primary ophthalmic diagnosis and an accompanying opioid abuse diagnosis, and the incidence increased from 0.2 in 2006 to 0.6 per 100,000 US population in 2015. Opioid abuse group had more adults (6,747:63.5%) and middle-aged (3,361:31.7%) patients, while in controls adults (7,905,003:40.4%) and children (4,068,534:20.8%) were affected more. Leading etiologies were similar: traumatic and infectious etiologies were most common; however, opioid abuse patients had more severe ophthalmic diagnoses such as orbital fractures (8.4%), orbital cellulitis (7.4%), globe injury (3.4%) and endophthalmitis (3.2%) compared to controls. Patients in the opioid abuse group were also more likely to be admitted (adjusted Odds Ratio [aOR], 28.38 [95% CI, 24.50-32.87])., Conclusions: In the era of opioid crisis, an increase in ED visits with ophthalmic complaints is seen, with increasing direct and indirect costs on the healthcare system. More research is needed to establish causality and devise strategies to lower this burden.

Rauwolfia serpentina has a wide range of therapeutic effects so this study was planned to explore the antihypertensive and antihyperlipidemic therapeutic responses of R serpentina doses using albino rats by measuring the blood pressure, biochemical parameters, and histological architecture of liver and kidney tissues. Thirty albino rats were divided into 5 groups (n = 6) as G1 (normal Control) received normal diet, G2 (positive control) received only 8% NaCl added diet (high salt diet); G3 was given atenolol (standard drug control) 50 mg/kg body weight, G4 and G5 groups were given methanolic plant extract as low dose (100 mg/kg body weight) and high dose (200 mg/Kg body weight) daily along with high salt diet for 4 weeks, respectively. Rauwolfia serpentina significantly ( P < .05) decreased the blood pressure in G4 and G5 groups as compared to G2 and G3. Significant ( P < .05) impact was reported, on serum lipid profile and serum proteins as well as hepatoprotective and renoprotective potential on studying tissues sections under microscope, in animal groups given herbal extract as compared to control groups. It could be concluded that R serpentina has therapeutic effect to manage the hypertension and hypercholesterolemia most probably via protecting the liver and renal architectures., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2020.)

In reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) studies, endogenous reference genes are routinely used to normalize the expression of target gene studies. In order to precisely evaluate the relative expression of genes in the cells of mice suffering from Kidney Yang Deficiency Syndrome (KYDS) in response to influenza A virus (IAV) H1N1 using RT-qPCR, it is crucial to identify reliable reference genes. In the present study, 15 candidate reference genes (Actb, β 2m, Gapdh, Gusb, Tuba, Grcc10, Eif4h, Rnf187, Nedd8, Ywhae, 18S rRNA, Rpl13, Ubc, Rpl32, and Ppia) were investigated in lung cells from KYDS mice infected with IAV H1N1. NormFinder, BestKeeper, and GeNorm were used to assess the stability of reference genes. The results were authenticated over extended experimental settings by a group of 10 samples. In the present study, we explored a novel method using dual-gene combinations; the difference in gene expression between the model and normal control groups was statistically analyzed by an independent-samples t -test, and the difference in the mean value between the two groups was compared. A P value > 0.05 and the lowest absolute value of the difference indicated the optimal reference two-gene combination. Four additional host innate immune system-related genes (TLR3, TLR4, TLR7, and RIG-I) were analyzed together with the two treatment datasets to confirm the selected reference genes. Our results indicated that none of these 15 candidate reference genes can be used as reference gene individually for relative quantitative fluorescence PCR analysis; however, the combination of Grcc10 and Ppia, based on the process of calculating the higher P value and lower difference values between groups, was the best choice as a reference gene for the lung tissue samples in KYDS mice infected with IAV. This technique may be applied to promote the selection process of the optimal reference gene in other experiments., Competing Interests: All the authors declare that they have no competing interests to disclose., (Copyright © 2020 Yepei Fu et al.)

Thymoquinone (TQ) is a bioactive phytochemical isolated from Nigella sativa and has been investigated for biochemical and biological activities in both in vitro and in vivo models. It is best known for its anticancer activities. Thymoquinone accomplishes anticancer activities through targeting multiple cancer markers including PPAR-γ, PTEN, P53, P73, STAT3, and generation of reactive oxygen species at the cancer cell surface. The radiolabeling of TQ with γ- and β-emitter radionuclide could be used as cancer diagnostic or therapeutic radiopharmaceutical, respectively. In this study, we are reporting the radiolabeling of TQ with technetium-99m ( 99m Tc), stability in saline and blood serum, internalization and externalization of 99m Tc-TQ using rhabdomyosarcoma cancer cells line. The quality control study revealed more than 95% labeling yield and stable in blood serum up to 4 hours. In vitro internalization rate was recorded 27.08% ± 0.95% at 1 hour post 2 hours internalization period and comparatively slow externalization. The results of this study are quite encourging and could be investigated for further key preclinical parameters to enter phase I clinical trials., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2020.)

Background: Bacterial blight of cotton (BBC), which is caused by the bacterium Xanthomonas citri pv. malvacearum (Xcm), is a destructive disease in cotton. Transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs), encoded by tal-genes, play critical roles in the pathogenesis of xanthomonads. Characterized strains of cotton pathogenic Xcm harbor 8-12 different tal genes and only one of them is functionally decoded. Further identification of novel tal genes in Xcm strains with virulence contributions are prerequisite to decipher the Xcm-cotton interactions., Results: In this study, we identified six tal genes in Xss-V 2 -18, a highly-virulent strain of Xcm from China, and assessed their role in BBC. RFLP-based Southern hybridization assays indicated that Xss-V 2 -18 harbors the six tal genes on a plasmid. The plasmid-encoded tal genes were isolated by cloning BamHI fragments and screening clones by colony hybridization. The tal genes were sequenced by inserting a Tn5 transposon in the DNA encoding the central repeat region (CRR) of each tal gene. Xcm TALome evolutionary relationship based on TALEs CRR revealed relatedness of Xss-V 2 -18 to MSCT1 and MS14003 from the United States. However, Tal2 of Xss-V 2 -18 differs at two repeat variable diresidues (RVDs) from Tal6 and Tal26 in MSCT1 and MS14003, respectively, inferred functional dissimilarity. The suicide vector pKMS1 was then used to construct tal deletion mutants in Xcm Xss-V 2 -18. The mutants were evaluated for pathogenicity in cotton based on symptomology and growth in planta. Four mutants showed attenuated virulence and all contained mutations in tal2. One tal2 mutant designated M2 was further investigated in complementation assays. When tal2 was introduced into Xcm M2 and expressed in trans, the mutant was complemented for both symptoms and growth in planta, thus indicating that tal2 functions as a virulence factor in Xcm Xss-V 2 -18., Conclusions: Overall, the results demonstrated that Tal2 is a major pathogenicity factor in Xcm strain Xss-V 2 -18 that contributes significantly in BBC. This study provides a foundation for future efforts aimed at identifying susceptibility genes in cotton that are targeted by Tal2.

Bacterial leaf streak caused by different pathovars of Xanthomonas translucens is the most important seedborne bacterial disease of small grain cereals. However, variations in the virulence-associated genomic areas of the pathogen remain uninvestigated. In this study, the diversity of transcription activator-like effectors (TALE) was investigated using the Southern blotting of Bam HI - digested genomic DNAs in the Iranian strains of X. translucens . All 65 X. translucens strains were assigned into 13 genotypes, where 57 X. translucens pv. undulosa strains were placed in genotypes 1 to 8, and seven X. translucens pv. translucens strains were placed in genotypes 9 to 12. Interestingly, we did not find any TALE genes in the strain XtKm7 (genotype 13), which showed to be pathogenic only on barley. Virulence and aggressiveness of these strains in greenhouse conditions were in agreement with the TALE-based clustering of the strains in the pathovar level, though variations were observed in the aggressiveness of X. translucens pv. undulosa strains. In general, strains containing higher numbers of putative TALE genes were more virulent on wheat and barley than strains containing fewer. This is the first TALE-based genetic diversity analysis on X. translucens strains and provides novel insights into the virulence repertories and genomic characteristics of the pathogen. Further investigations using TALE mutagenesis and complementation analysis are warranted to precisely elucidate the role of each detected X. translucens TALE in bacterial virulence and aggressiveness either on wheat or barley.

Multidrug resistance has increased globally in the communities. Bacterial infections associated with health care have weakened the existing antimicrobial therapy and demand the search for alternative therapies. In the present investigation, the medicinal plant Pulicaria gnaphalodes from Quetta, Pakistan, has been screened for antimicrobial potential. In vitro antimicrobial efficacy of P gnaphalodes extracts (methanol and ethanol) was quantitatively evaluated on the basis of zone of inhibition against different bacteria and minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC). In vivo, antihypercholesterolemic activity is determined in different rat groups. The results of the study indicated that the ethanol extract of P gnaphalodes showed maximum zone of inhibition for Bacillus subtilis of 12.1 ± 1.1 mm from all others. The methanol extract showed maximum zone of inhibition for Staphylococcus aureus of 11.9 ± 1.0 mm and rifampicin showed maximum zone of inhibition of 23.1 ± 0.9 mm. The results of ethanol and methanol extract of P gnaphalodes against different bacteria revealed that this plant has greater antimicrobial activity. However, the plant extract shows nonsignificant antihypercholesterolemic activity. The extract of this plant can be utilized as medicine to inhibit several infections caused by some bacterial pathogens found in human body., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2020.)

Objective: To determine and compare epidemiology, patient demographics, and socioeconomic factors of ophthalmic procedures in the United States., Participants: All ophthalmic ambulatory procedures performed from 2012 to 2014., Methods: The State Ambulatory Surgery Databases (SASD), a collection of data from 29 participating states that represent two-thirds of the U.S. population, were used for analysis. All ophthalmic procedures performed in ambulatory settings from 2012 to 2014 were included. Incidence and demographics for each procedure were assessed, with descriptive statistics determined to highlight key differences in epidemiology and patient characteristics for each procedure. Population-based rates of procedures for each racial group were calculated using national census data., Results: Over a period of 3 years, 3 934 004 ophthalmic procedures were performed, with majority being ambulatory (98.5%). Most common procedures were lens and cataract removal (66.5%), followed by intraocular procedures (11.4%) and procedures involving eyelids, cornea, and conjunctiva (8.2%). All ambulatory procedures had a higher number of female patients except retinal tear and detachment repairs (male patients, 59.4%). Most procedures had a higher rate in blacks compared with whites and other races, and Medicare was the most common mode of payment., Conclusions: Approximately 1.3 million ambulatory ophthalmic procedures were performed every year between 2012 and 2014 in the 29 reporting states of the United States. Low-income groups and certain minorities, apart from blacks, having a lower rate of procedure suggest that disparities exist in provision of eye care. The factors leading to these differences need to be further studied in order to devise strategies to provide equitable care., (Copyright © 2019 Canadian Ophthalmological Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Aim: To develop a simple and easily applicable classification of disease severity in retinitis pigmentosa (RP)., Methods: This is a retrospective cross-sectional study. Visual acuity (VA), visual field width (VF) and ellipsoid zone width (EZ) were obtained from medical records of patients with RP. A scoring criterion was developed wherein each variable was assigned a score from 0 to 5 depending on its distribution. The cumulative score (from 0 to 15) was used to classify disease severity from grade 0 to 5. The scores were correlated with each other and the final grade. The grades were then correlated with age and disease duration., Results: The median age (range) of patients (n=93) was 55 (12-87) years, 51% were female, 70% had been diagnosed within 10 years, and 50% had autosomal recessive disease. Most eyes (n=181) at least had a VA of 20/40 (67%), a VF of 20° (75%) and an EZ of 5° (76%). All scores were correlated with each other (r=0.509-0.613; p<0.001 for all) and with the final grade (r=0.790-0.869; p<0.001 for all). Except for grade 0 (5%), all grades were evenly distributed: 21% for grade 1, 23% for grade 2, 22% for grade 3, 17% for grade 4 and 12% for grade 5. Grades were correlated with both age (r=0.252; p<0.001) and disease duration (r=0.383; p<0.001)., Conclusions: We present a simple, objective and easy to use disease severity classification for RP which can be used to categorise and compare patients., Competing Interests: Competing interests: None declared., (© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2019. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.)

Hypertension is persistent elevation in blood pressure for 3-4 weeks. Estimated global prevalence of hypertension suggested that by the Year 2025 (29%) of adult worldwide are suffering from hypertension (1.56 billion). Hypertension complications are hemorrhage, atherosclerosis, renal artery stenosis, angina pectoris end organ damage, cardiomyopathy, myocardial infarction and retinopathy. Along with other drug class Calcium channel blocker are also used for the treatment of hypertension. In this study the possible action of the n-hexane leaves fraction of the Androsace foliosa on isolated rabbit aorta was examined. Antihypertensive activity was examined in the existence of standard agonist like phenylephrine and antagonist like Verapamil. Phenylephrine (PE 1μM) high K + was used to steady the tissue materials. Additionally to observe the calcium channel blocking effect the tissues were treated with n-hexane segment of A. foliosa leaves. Aortic tissues were treated 4-5intervals with Ca +2- free preparation earlier to control calcium reaction curve (CRCs). Verapamil is utilized as standard calcium channel inhibitory mediator and is used as an antagonist. The Af. n-hexane leaves fraction completely inhibited the precontractions induced by Phenylephrine (1μM) and K + (80 mM) precontractions, with EC 50 standards of 1.0mM (0.3-1.0mg/mL) and 4.90mM (1-3mg/mL), respectively. Androsace foliosa n-hexane leaves fraction was tested for calcium channel inhibitory effect on isolated rabbit aorta. A. foliosa n- hexane leaves segment at the dosage of 1mg/mL block the calcium channel approximately (35±5%). Consequence indicates that A. foliosa n-hexane leaves segment block calcium channel in the similar manner as compared to the standard calcium channel blocker drug (verapamil).

Purpose: To determine the trends and disparities in inpatient costs for eye trauma in the United States from 2001 through 2014., Design: Retrospective population-based cross-sectional study., Methods: National Inpatient Sample, a representative sample of U.S. hospital discharges, was used to determine costs of eye trauma hospitalizations. Linear regression was used to estimate changes in mean inflation-adjusted cost per admission. Multivariable logistic regression was used to evaluate factors associated with a cost in the highest quartile (>$13 000) including age, sex, race, income quartile, primary payer, hospital location, size, and type. The model was adjusted for year of admission, length of stay, type of trauma, comorbidities, and the type and number of procedures performed., Results: The inpatient costs for eye trauma from 2001 through 2014 totaled $1.72 billion. The mean cost (95% confidence interval [CI]) per stay remained relatively constant: $12 000 ($11 000-13 000) in 2001 to $11 000 ($10 000-12 000) in 2014 (P = .643). A cost in the highest quartile was more likely in African Americans compared to whites (adjusted odds ratio, 1.3; 95% CI, 1.2-1.5), patients in the highest income quartile compared to those in the lowest (1.3; 1.2-1.5), uninsured patients compared to publicly insured patients (1.2; 1.1-1.4), teaching hospitals compared to non-teaching ones (1.5; 1.2-1.8), and the West compared to the South (2.4; 2.0-2.8)., Conclusions: Inpatient costs of eye trauma have remained steady and can be potentially reduced by addressing associated disparities. Further research including outpatient costs and eye trauma in vulnerable populations will be key to optimizing care and advancing healthcare equity., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)