Hormonal control of scent marking in the Indian musk shrew, Suncus murinus viridescens (Blyth)

The musk shrew, Suncus murinus viridescens, marks objects in the environment employing secretions of specialized skin glands and by urination and defecation. Diverse types of scent marking exhibited a significant decline after castration. Both methyltestosterone and ethinyloestradiol have been shown to reactivate the scent marking of castrate male shrews. Ethinyloestradiol effected an immediate elevation of marking pattern of castrate males.     

A Low-Cost Stove Use Monitor to Enable Conditional Cash Transfers

Conditional cash transfers (CCTs)—cash payments provided to households or specific household members who meet defined conditions or fulfill certain behaviors—have been extensively used in India to encourage antenatal care, institutional delivery, and vaccination. This paper describes the social design and technical development of a low-cost, meal-counting stove use monitor (the Pink Key) that enables a CCT based on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) usage and presents pilot data from its testing and the initial deployment. The system consists of a sensing harness attached to a two-burner LPG stove and an easily removable datalogger. For each cooking event with LPG, households receive 2 rupees—less than the cost of fuel, but enough to partially defray LPG refill costs. The system could enable innovative “self-monitoring” at a large scale—participants initiate the CCT by bringing their Pink Key to antenatal clinic visits, where care providers download data and initiate payments, and participants return the sensor to their stove at home. The system aligns with existing Indian programs to improve health among poor, pregnant women, and contributes a new method to encourage the use of clean cooking technologies.     

The role of Hopf bifurcation dynamics in sensory processes

We emphasize here the role of the Hopf bifurcation in detection of stimuli in sensory processes—we discuss in particular chemosensors. It is shown that the essential nonlinearities inherent in the signal transduction mechanism can take advantage of the noise from the environment the system is subject to, to display a highly amplified response to stimuli in a frequency-selective manner. It is shown that in the absence of any externally applied stimulus, the feedback mechanisms playing a regulatory role in the transduction mechanism can give rise, in the presence of noise, to peaks in the spectral power density, suggesting enhanced spontaneous activity in sensory cells. The power law in this spectrum is determined.     

Subcutaneous Angiotensin II Infusion using Osmotic Pumps Induces Aortic Aneurysms in Mice

Osmotic pumps continuously deliver compounds at a constant rate into small animals. This article introduces a standard protocol used to induce aortic aneurysms via subcutaneous infusion of angiotensin II (AngII) from implanted osmotic pumps. This protocol includes calculation of AngII amount and dissolution, osmotic pump filling, implantation of osmotic pumps subcutaneously, observation after pump implantation, and harvest of aortas to visualize aortic aneurysms in mice. Subcutaneous infusion of AngII through osmotic pumps following this protocol is a reliable and reproducible technique to induce both abdominal and thoracic aortic aneurysms in mice. Infusion durations range from a few days to several months based on the purpose of the study. AngII 1,000 ng/kg/min is sufficient to provide maximal effects on abdominal aortic aneurysmal formation in male hypercholesterolemic mouse models such as apolipoprotein E deficient or low-density lipoprotein receptor deficient mice. Incidence of abdominal aortic aneurysms induced by AngII infusion via osmotic pumps is 5 - 10 times lower in female hypercholesterolemic mice and also lower in both genders of normocholesterolemic mice. In contrast, AngII-induced thoracic aortic aneurysms in mice are not hypercholesterolemia or gender-dependent. Importantly, multiple features of this mouse model recapitulate those of human aortic aneurysms.     

On the Performance of the SPRT for Correlation Coefficient: Normal and Mixtures of Normal Populations

The sequential probability ratio test (SPRT) for the correlation coefficient is examined in the normal and non-normal situations. In the latter case, we evaluate the robustness of the normal procedure when sampling from the mixtures of normal distributions. Two models are introduced for this type of nonnormality. It is shown that in the case of moderate nonnormality, the normal procedure is robust while for extreme nonnormality, the normal procedure is not recommended.     

Common protozoans as an uncommon cause of respiratory ailments in HIV-associated immunodeficiency

Opportunistic infections (OIs) are the leading cause of mortality and morbidity among HIV-positive subjects. The breadth of reports of the rare occurrence of OIs in HIV/AIDS has been increasing over the years and more recent studies have outlined the changing trends in the emergence of newer pathogens. Recent reports of the association of certain protozoans that normally do not infect sites other than their normal sites of localization have generated huge interest among scientists. The complete depression of the immune system, followed by the onset of OIs, especially due to protozoans, i.e. toxoplasmosis, isosporiasis, leishmaniasis, cyclosporosis, microsporidiosis and cryptosporidiosis, is not uncommon in AIDS. The immunologic and pathologic basis behind the susceptibility of immunodepressed individuals to these 'non-site-specific parasites' is likely to have a huge impact on HIV disease progression. Certain possible shortcomings in the immunologic armory of immunodeficient subjects, their failure to contain the establishment of these 'uncommon' agents in the human host and their significance in HIV disease progression are discussed.     

Electrical burns causing a urinary bladder fistula. Case report.

We present a patient with electrical burns which resulted in loss of the right upper arm and a urinary bladder fistula. A jump flap was used to cover the repaired bladder, and also to cover the stump of the amputated right arm.