A Survey on Knowledge, Attitude & Practice of Yakshagana Mela Artists Towards Music-Induced Hearing Loss.

Purpose: Yakshagana is a type of folk-art theatre portraying mythological and historical stories. It includes artists who play predominantly percussion instruments besides cymbals and harmonium. Professional musicians exposing themselves to deafening sounds are prone to develop noise-induced complications. [1] One such professional in the coastal districts of Karnataka state is a Yakshagana himmela (backstage) artist. There is no reported literature concerning these artists' hearing health and problems. Hence, the proposed study was aimed at developing, validating and assessing the Knowledge, Attitude and Practice (KAP )of Yakshagana Mela artists towards Music-Induced Hearing Loss (MIHL), a possible risk factor of their profession. Method: This study was carried out on 139 yakshagana mela artists with a mean age of 41.63 years. It was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, an expert committee discussion was conducted to verify, modify and validate the questionnaire. The second phase included the administration of the developed questionnaire on the artists. Results: The sum scores for each domain of KAP were computed. Scores above 80% were defined as good knowledge, practice, and a positive attitude. The findings of the study revealed that more than half of the participants demonstrated inadequate knowledge (63.3%) and negative attitude (63.7%), but a fair level of practice (65.4%). Conclusion: From the outcome of the present study, it can be inferred that in spite of being in a profession with a high risk of MIHL, the participants considered hearing health as their least priority. The study illustrates the need for initiating hearing and conservation programs to improve awareness & combat music induced hearing loss in this population.

OTX2 exhibits cell-context-dependent effects on cellular and molecular properties of human embryonic neural precursors and medulloblastoma cells.

Medulloblastoma (MB) is the most common malignant primary pediatric brain tumor and is currently divided into four subtypes based on different genomic alterations, gene expression profiles and response to treatment: WNT, Sonic Hedgehog (SHH), Group 3 and Group 4. This extensive heterogeneity has made it difficult to assess the functional relevance of genes to malignant progression. For example, expression of the transcription factor Orthodenticle homeobox2 (OTX2) is frequently dysregulated in multiple MB variants; however, its role may be subtype specific. We recently demonstrated that neural precursors derived from transformed human embryonic stem cells (trans-hENs), but not their normal counterparts (hENs), resemble Groups 3 and 4 MB in vitro and in vivo. Here, we tested the utility of this model system as a means of dissecting the role of OTX2 in MB using gain- and loss-of-function studies in hENs and trans-hENs, respectively. Parallel experiments with MB cells revealed that OTX2 exerts inhibitory effects on hEN and SHH MB cells by regulating growth, self-renewal and migration in vitro and tumor growth in vivo. This was accompanied by decreased expression of pluripotent genes, such as SOX2, and was supported by overexpression of SOX2 in OTX2+ SHH MB and hENs that resulted in significant rescue of self-renewal and cell migration. By contrast, OTX2 is oncogenic and promotes self-renewal of trans-hENs and Groups 3 and 4 MB independent of pluripotent gene expression. Our results demonstrate a novel role for OTX2 in self-renewal and migration of hENs and MB cells and reveal a cell-context-dependent link between OTX2 and pluripotent genes. Our study underscores the value of human embryonic stem cell derivatives as alternatives to cell lines and heterogeneous patient samples for investigating the contribution of key developmental regulators to MB progression.

Ezh2 mediated H3K27me3 activity facilitates somatic transition during human pluripotent reprogramming.

Factor induced reprogramming of fibroblasts is an orchestrated but inefficient process. At the epigenetic level, it results in drastic chromatin changes to erase the existing somatic "memory" and to establish the pluripotent state. Accordingly, alterations of chromatin regulators including Ezh2 influence iPSC generation. While the role of individual transcription factors in resetting the chromatin landscape during iPSC generation is increasingly evident, their engagement with chromatin modulators remains to be elucidated. In the current study, we demonstrate that histone methyl transferase activity of Ezh2 is required for mesenchymal to epithelial transition (MET) during human iPSC generation. We show that the H3K27me3 activity favors induction of pluripotency by transcriptionally targeting the TGF-ß signaling pathway. We also demonstrate that the Ezh2 negatively regulates the expression of pro-EMT miRNA's such as miR-23a locus during MET. Unique association of Ezh2 with c-Myc was required to silence the aforementioned circuitry. Collectively, our findings provide a mechanistic understanding by which Ezh2 restricts the somatic programme during early phase of cellular reprogramming and establish the importance of Ezh2 dependent H3K27me3 activity in transcriptional and miRNA modulation during human iPSC generation.

Determination of boron at sub-ppm levels in uranium oxide and aluminum by hyphenated system of complex formation reaction and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC).

Boron, at sub-ppm levels, in U3O8 powder and aluminum metal, was determined using complex formation and dynamically modified reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC). Curcumin was used for complexing boron extracted with 2-ethyl-1,3-hexane diol (EHD). Separation of complex from excess reagent and thereafter its determination using the online diode array detector (DAD) was carried out by HPLC. Calibration curve was found to be linear for boron amounts in the sample ranging from 0.02 microg to 0.5 microg. Precision of about 10% was achieved for B determination in samples containing less than 1 ppmw of boron. The values obtained by HPLC were in good agreement with the data available from other analytical techniques. The precision in the data obtained by HPLC was much better compared to that reported by other techniques. The present hyphenated methodology of HPLC and complex formation reaction is interesting because of cost performance, simplicity, versatility and availability when compared to other spectroscopic techniques like ICP-MS and ICP-AES.