Degradation of fentrazamide herbicide in soil under aerobic condition.

Dissipation of fentrazamide in soil under aerobic conditions was studied. Fentrazamide was extracted with 0.1 N HCl: acetone (1:1 v/v) followed by partition and cleanup.

Ionic liquid-templated preparation of mesoporous silica embedded with nanocrystalline sulfated zirconia.

A series of mesoporous silicas impregnated with nanocrystalline sulphated zirconia was prepared by a sol-gel process using an ionic liquid-templated route. The physicochemical properties of the mesoporous sulphated zirconia materials were studied using characterisation techniques such as inductively coupled optical emission spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray microanalysis, elemental analysis and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Analysis of the new silicas indicates isomorphous substitution of silicon with zirconium and reveals the presence of extremely small (< 10 nm) polydispersed zirconia nanoparticles in the materials with zirconium loadings from 27.

A novel vibration device for neuromuscular stimulation for sports and rehabilitation applications.

Vibration has been increasingly sought after as new technique, due to its potential to increase muscle strength and positively affect bone remodeling. Currently, there are many vibration devices on the market advertised for different applications, in particular in sports and rehabilitation. All the available devices have two major drawbacks; firstly, they are not sufficiently adaptive to the individual user's needs and secondly, they do not require any force input from the user.

Concordant proficiency in measurement of T-cell immunity in human immunodeficiency virus vaccine clinical trials by peripheral blood mononuclear cell and enzyme-linked immunospot assays in laboratories from three continents.

The gamma interferon (IFN-gamma) enzyme-linked immunospot (ELISPOT) assay is used routinely to evaluate the potency of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) vaccine candidates and other vaccine candidates. In order to compare candidates and pool data from multiple trial laboratories, validated standardized methods must be applied across laboratories. Proficiency panels are a key part of a comprehensive quality assurance program to monitor inter- and intralaboratory performance, as well as assay performance, over time.

Acute gastrointestinal emergencies requiring surgery in children.

Background: Although abdominal pain is common in the paediatric age group, problems of misdiagnosis and serious consequences are more particular in an emergency setting. This study examined the aetiologies of acute abdominal emergencies in children.

Materials And Methods: This was a retrospective study of 100 children below the age of 12 years presenting with acute abdominal emergencies (gastrointestinal) requiring operative interventions.

A new neural network architecture with associative memory, pruning and order-sensitive learning.

A new paradigm of neural network architecture is proposed that works as associative memory along with capabilities of pruning and order-sensitive learning. The network has a composite structure wherein each node of the network is a Hopfield network by itself. The Hopfield network employs an order-sensitive learning technique and converges to user-specified stable states without having any spurious states.

Recognition of Telugu characters using neural networks.

The aim of the present work is to recognize printed and handwritten Telugu characters using artificial neural networks (ANNs). Earlier work on recognition of Telugu characters has been done using conventional pattern recognition techniques. We make an initial attempt here of using neural networks for recognition with the aim of improving upon earlier methods which do not perform effectively in the presence of noise and distortion in the characters.