A toxicity assessment of hydroxyapatite nanoparticles on development and behaviour of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Drosophila melanogaster</Emphasis>

The effects of oral intake of hydroxyapatite nanoparticles (HApNPs) were investigated on growth, development and behaviour of Drosophila. The Drosophila responses to various concentrations of HApNPs were compared. At lower concentrations, i.e. 5 mg L^?1 more amount of oxidative stress was produced than that of highest concentration, i.e. 80 mg L^?1. The increased amounts of oxidative stress reflect a higher amount of ROS production and increased cell damage within the larval gut. HApNPs was further shown to interfere with the calcium and phosphorus absorption pathway. Besides all these damage, HApNPs causes developmental delay in the late third instar larvae. The most significant anomaly was observed in pupae count, fly hatching after the feeding of HApNPs. Flies hatched from treated vials have decreased body weight with defective walking behaviour. Hatched flies have a phenotypic defect in the wing, eye and thorax of the bristles. Along with these changes, the adult fly becomes more prone towards stress. The findings hint that HApNPs persuade noxious effects and alter the development, structure, function and behaviour of the fly in a concentration-dependent manner.

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Graphical abstract Effect of Hydroxyapatite on the complete life cycle of Drosophila. Flies lay eggs in Hydroxyapatite containing food. As soon as the eggs hatch to larvae they start eating the NP contained food. The effect of Hydroxyapatite on various developmental stage is summerised by biochemical, immunohistochemical, behavioral, developmental and phenotypic defects.

     

Binuclear spin state selective detection of 1H single quantum transitions using triple quantum coherence: a novel method for enantiomeric discrimination

In the present work a novel methodology is developed for the unambiguous discrimination of enantiomers aligned in chiral liquid crystalline media and the simultaneous determination of 1H-1H and 13C-1H couplings in a single experiment. An INEPT transfer and back transfer of magnetization to protons retain the 13C edited 1H magnetization which is utilized to generate spin selective homonuclear triple quantum coherence of dipolar coupled methyl protons. Spin selective correlation of triple quantum to single quantum coherence results in spin state selective detection by 13C spin and the remaining passive protons. The difference between the successive transitions in the triple quantum dimension pertains to sum of the passive couplings and results in enhanced resolution by a factor of three. This results in unambiguous chiral visualization. The masked 13C satellite transitions in the single quantum spectrum are extracted for chiral discrimination. The technique retains all the passive homo- and heteronuclear couplings in the triple quantum dimension by the application of non-selective refocusing pulse on 1H as well as on 13C spins. This, however, refocuses the chemical shift evolution in the triple quantum dimension, and also overcomes the problem of field inhomogeneity. The method enables the determination of spectral information which is otherwise not possible to derive from the broad and featureless proton spectra. The elegant experimental technique has been demonstrated on different chiral molecules.     

Real‐Time Band‐Selective Homonuclear Proton Decoupling for Improving Sensitivity and Resolution in Phase‐Sensitive J‐Resolved Spectroscopy

Real‐time band‐selective homonuclear ¹H decoupling during data acquisition of z‐filtered J‐resolved spectroscopy produces ¹H‐decoupled ¹H NMR spectra and leads to sensitivity enhancement and improved resolution, and thus aids the measurement of J couplings and residual dipolar couplings in crowded regions of ¹H NMR spectrum. High quality spectra from peptides, organic molecules, and also from enantiomers dissolved in weakly aligned chiral media are reported.     

Spin selective multiple quantum NMR for spectral simplification, determination of relative signs, and magnitudes of scalar couplings by spin state selection

In the present work we demonstrate a novel method for spectral simplification and determination of the relative signs of the scalar couplings using a spin selective multiple quantum NMR experiment. A spin selective excitation of double quantum coherence of A and M spins in a weakly coupled three spin system of the type AMX, results in a doublet in the double quantum dimension whose separation corresponds to the sum of couplings of the active spins to the passive spin X. One component of the doublet has the passive spin X in mid R:alpha state while the other component has the passive spin X in mid R:beta state. The spin selective conversion of double quantum coherence to single quantum coherence does not disturb the spin states of the passive spin thereby providing the spin state selection. There will be two domains of single quantum transitions in single quantum dimension at the chemical shift positions of A and M spins. The mid R:alpha domain of A spin is a doublet because of mid R:alpha and mid R:beta states of M spin only, while that of mid R:beta domain is another doublet in a different cross section of the spectra. The scalar coupling J(AM) can be extracted from any of the mid R:alpha and mid R:beta domain transitions while the relative displacements of the two doublets between the two domains at the two chemical shifts provides the magnitude and sign of the scalar coupling J(AX) relative to the coupling J(MX). Similar result is obtained for zero quantum studies on AMX spin system. The proposed technique is discussed theoretically using product operator approach. The new spin state selective double quantum J-resolved sequence has also been developed. The methodology is confirmed experimentally on a homonuclear weakly coupled three spin system and applied to two different heteronuclear five spin systems.     

Spin state selective detection of single quantum transitions using multiple quantum coherence: simplifying the analyses of complex NMR spectra

NMR spectra of molecules oriented in liquid-crystalline matrix provide information on the structure and orientation of the molecules. Thermotropic liquid crystals used as an orienting media result in the spectra of spins that are generally strongly coupled. The number of allowed transitions increases rapidly with the increase in the number of interacting spins. Furthermore, the number of single quantum transitions required for analysis is highly redundant. In the present study, we have demonstrated that it is possible to separate the subspectra of a homonuclear dipolar coupled spin system on the basis of the spin states of the coupled heteronuclei by multiple quantum (MQ)-single quantum (SQ) correlation experiments. This significantly reduces the number of redundant transitions, thereby simplifying the analysis of the complex spectrum. The methodology has been demonstrated on the doubly 13C labeled acetonitrile aligned in the liquid-crystal matrix and has been applied to analyze the complex spectrum of an oriented six spin system.     

Development and Validation of RP-UHPLC Method for Quantification of Gliclazide in Bulk and Pharmaceutical Dosage Form Using Quality-by-Design (QbD) Approach: A Shifting Paradigm

The current research endeavours quality-by-design (QbD)-aided chromatographic techniques for the quantification of gliclazide (GLZ) in bulk and pharmaceutical dosage forms. Analytical QbD was initiated by assigning both an analytical target profile (ATP) and critical analytical attributes (CAAs). Furthermore, risk evaluation studies, along with factor screening studies, helped identify critical method parameters (CMPs). Optimisation was carried out using a 3² full factorial design by utilising the identified CMP, that is, flow rate (X1) and pH of buffer (X2) at three different levels along with evaluation of the selected CAA, that is, the retention time (Y1) and the peak area (Y2). In addition, the influence of sole and interactive CMPs on CAAs was checked using the data obtained statistically and with response surface plots. The confirmation of significance (P?<?0.05) of the method parameters was determined using analysis of variance (ANOVA). Chromatographic separation was achieved using a stainless-steel C8 column (25 cm?×?4 mm) in isocratic elution mode using phosphate buffer (pH 3.4) and HPLC-grade acetonitrile (50:50 v/v) as the eluent. The flow rate was adjusted to 1 mL min^?1 and the eluent was detected at 230 nm. The validated method, alongside subsequent stress degradation studies conducted according to the ICH guidelines, further favours it as a highly efficient method for the analysis of regular drugs as well as their degraded products. The method proposed above provided a successful demonstration of the QbD-based approach in developing an extremely sensitive and dependable technique for estimating the GLZ for routine analysis and pre-clinical applications.

     

Transverse Relaxation of Scalar‐Coupled Protons

In a preliminary communication (B. Baishya, T. F. Segawa, G. Bodenhausen, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2009 , 131, 17538–17539), we recently demonstrated that it is possible to obtain clean echo decays of protons in biomolecules despite the presence of homonuclear scalar couplings. These unmodulated decays allow one to determine apparent transverse relaxation rates R₂^app of individual protons. Herein, we report the observation of R₂^app for three methyl protons, four amide H^N protons, and all 11 backbone H^α protons in cyclosporin A. If the proton resonances overlap, their R₂^app rates can be measured by transferring their magnetization to neighboring ¹³C nuclei, which are less prone to overlap. The R₂^app rates of protons attached to ¹³C are faster than those attached to ¹²C because of ¹³C–¹H dipolar interactions. The differences of these rates allow the determination of local correlation functions. Backbone H^N and H^α protons that have fast decay rates R₂^app also feature fast longitudinal relaxation rates R₁ and intense NOESY cross peaks that are typical of crowded environments. Variations of R₂^app rates of backbone H^α protons in similar amino acids reflect differences in local environments.     

Electrical properties of thin films of Eu2O3 substituted compounds

Europium oxide (Eu₂O₃) substituted compound has been prepared by solid-solid reaction of the powders of Eu₂O₃, BaCO₃ and CuO at 950°C for 16 hours. The thin films have been deposited by high vacuum evaporation technique (vacuum ≈ 10⁻⁶ torr). The variation of current (I) with voltage (V) at room temperature (RT) i.e. 294 K and in ice (273 K) are found to be linear. The variation of electrical resistivity (ρ) with temperature (T) by heating the sample above RT has been determined. Resistivity is found to decrease with increase in temperature. Further the variation of electrical resistivity (ρ) with temperature (T) from 77 K, liquid nitrogen temperature (LNT), to 270 K has also been determined. It is observed that resistivity suddenly becomes zero at around 87 K. Thus the prepared material has superconducting properties with superconducting transition temperature, T _c at 87 K.      

Pentacene thin film transistors using La2O3 as gate insulator

A study of Pentacene OTFTs using La₂O₃ as gate insulator is presented. The device characteristics were studied and analyzed. The OTFTs exhibit p-type conductivity with field effect mobility 6.5 × 10⁻⁸ m²/V.s, ON/OFF ratio 1.4 × 10², sub-threshold swing 2 mV/decade and hole concentration 4.5 × 10¹⁷ cm⁻³. The SEM and XRD analysis on the semiconductor film are also reported.     

Revisiting the Leinster groups

A finite group is said to be a Leinster group if the sum of the orders of its normal subgroups equals twice the order of the group itself. In this paper we give some new results concerning Leinster groups.