AYURAKSHA, a prophylactic Ayurvedic immunity boosting kit reducing positivity percentage of IgG COVID-19 among frontline Indian Delhi police personnel: A non-randomized controlled intervention trial.

Objective: The world continues to face the COVID-19 crisis, and efforts are underway to integrate traditional medicine interventions for its effective management. The study aimed to determine the efficacy of the "AYURAKSHA" kit in terms of post-interventional percentage of COVID-19 IgG positivity, immunity levels, and quality of life (QoL) against COVID-19. Method: This was a non-randomized controlled, prospective intervention trial, done after the distribution of 80,000 AYURAKSHA kits (constituent of Sanshamani Vati, AYUSH Kadha, and Anu Taila) among Delhi police participants in India. Among 47,827 participants, the trial group (n = 101) was evaluated with the positivity percentage of IgG COVID-19 and Immune Status Questionnaire (ISQ) scores as a primary outcome and the WHO Quality of Life Brief Version (QOL BREF) scores along with hematological parameters as a secondary outcome in comparison to the control group (n = 71). Results: The data showed that the percentage of COVID-19 IgG positivity was significantly lower in the trial group (17.5 %) as compared to the control group (39.4 %, p = 0.003), indicating the lower risk (55.6%) of COVID-19 infection in the trial group. The decreased incidence (5.05%) and reduced mortality percentage (0.44%) of COVID-19 among Delhi police officers during peak times of the pandemic also corroborate our findings. The ISQ score and WHO-QOL BREF tool analysis showed the improved scores in the trial group when compared with the controls. Furthermore, no dysregulated blood profile and no increase in inflammation markers like C-reactive protein, erythrocyte sedimentation rate, Interleukin-6 (IL-6) were observed in the trial group. However, significantly enhanced (p = 0.027) IL-6 levels and random blood sugar levels were found in the control group (p = 0.032), compared to a trial group (p = 0.165) post-intervention. Importantly, the control group showed more significant (p = 0.0001) decline in lymphocyte subsets CD3+ (% change = 21.04), CD4+ (% change = 20.34) and CD8+ (% change = 21.54) levels than in trial group, confirming more severity of COVID-19 infection in the control group. Conclusion: The AYURAKSHA kit is associated with reduced COVID-19 positivity and with a better quality of life among the trial group. Hence, the study encourages in-depth research and future integration of traditional medicines for the prevention of the COVID-19 pandemic. Clinical trial registration: http://ctri.nic.in/, identifier: CTRI/2020/05/025171.

Sugarcane Root Transcriptome Analysis Revealed the Role of Plant Hormones in the Colonization of an Endophytic Diazotroph.

Some sugarcane germplasms can absorb higher amounts of nitrogen via atmospheric nitrogen fixation through the bacterial diazotrophs. Most endophytic diazotrophs usually penetrate through the root, colonize inside the plant, and fix the nitrogen. To assess the plant's bacterial association during root colonization, strain GXS16 was tagged with a plasmid-bear green fluorescent protein (GFP) gene. The results demonstrated that the strain can colonize roots all the way to the maturation zone. The strain GXS16 showed maximum nitrogenase enzyme activity at pH 8 and 30°C, and nitrogenase activity is less affected by different carbon sources. Further, strain GXS16 colonization response was investigated through plant hormones analysis and RNAseq. The results showed that the bacterial colonization gradually increased with time, and the H2O2 and malondialdehyde (MDA) content significantly increased at 1 day after inoculation. There were no substantial changes noticed in proline content, and the ethylene content was detected initially, but it decreased with time. The abscisic acid (ABA) content showed significant increases of 91.9, 43.9, and 18.7%, but conversely, the gibberellin (GA3) content decreased by 12.9, 28.5, and 45.2% at 1, 3, and 5 days after inoculation, respectively. The GXS16 inoculation significantly increased the activities of catalase (CAT), superoxide dismutase (SOD), polyphenol oxidase (PPO), ascorbate peroxidase (APX), and glutathione reductase (GR) at different timepoint. In contrast, the peroxisome (POD) activity had no changes detected during the treatment. In the case of RNAseq analysis, 2437, 6678, and 4568 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified from 1, 3, and 5 days inoculated root samples, and 601 DEGs were shared in all samples. The number or the expression diversity of DEGs related to ethylene was much higher than that of ABA or GA, which indicated the critical role of ethylene in regulating the sugarcane roots response to GXS16 inoculation.

A review on role of psychological factors in the etiopathogenesis of Pandu Roga with reference to iron deficiency anemia.

"Pandu" Roga is a disease entity described in Ayurveda which has clinical features similar to that of various types of anemia, in which there develops a pale-yellow discoloration on the skin. Besides the various etiological factors, Acharya Charaka has specially described some psychological causative factors among which Chinta (excessive worry), Bhaya (fear) and Shoka (grief) are three main factors, which play an important role in the pathogenesis of Pandu Roga. This paper aims to explore the scientific explanations for the above stated factors in the causation of Pandu Roga (anemia). Hence, a thorough search was made on the internet using the keywords anemia, psychological stress, anger, fear and some scientific studies were found on the concerned topic. It reveal that these factors disturb the process of iron distribution within the body and affects the process of erythropoiesis causing iron deficiency anemia.