Development of Software for Automatic Analysis of Intervention in the Field of Homeopathy.

OBJECTIVE: To study the effect of homeopathic medicines (in higher potencies) in normal subjects, Peripheral Pulse Analyzer (PPA) has been used to record physiologic variability parameters before and after administration of the medicine/placebo in 210 normal subjects. METHODS: Data have been acquired in seven rounds; placebo was administered in rounds 1 and 2 and medicine in potencies 6, 30, 200, 1 M, and 10 M was administered in rounds 3 to 7, respectively. Five different medicines in the said potencies were given to a group of around 40 subjects each. Although processing of data required human intervention, a software application has been developed to analyze the processed data and detect the response to eliminate the undue delay as well as human bias in subjective analysis. This utility named Automatic Analysis of Intervention in the Field of Homeopathy is run on the processed PPA data and the outcome has been compared with the manual analysis. The application software uses adaptive threshold based on statistics for detecting responses in contrast to fixed threshold used in manual analysis. RESULTS: The automatic analysis has detected 12.96% higher responses than subjective analysis. Higher response rates have been manually verified to be true positive. This indicates robustness of the application software. The automatic analysis software was run on another set of pulse harmonic parameters derived from the same data set to study cardiovascular susceptibility and 385 responses were detected in contrast to 272 of variability parameters. It was observed that 65% of the subjects, eliciting response, were common. CONCLUSION: This not only validates the software utility for giving consistent yield but also reveals the certainty of the response. This development may lead to electronic proving of homeopathic medicines (e-proving).

Impact of bio-nanogold on seed germination and seedling growth in Pennisetum glaucum.

Nanotechnology is leading towards the development of low cost applications to improve the cultivation and growth of plants. The use of nanotechnology in agriculture will leads to a significant effect on food industry along with opening a new area of research in agroecosystem. In this paper gold nanoparticles were biosynthesized with Cassia auriculata leaf extract at room temperature and characterized by UV-vis spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy. The objective of this study was to investigate effect of synthesized bio-nanogold on an important food and biofuel producing plant Pennisetum glaucum. Positive effects were observed on percentage of seed germination and growth of seedlings. Improved germination and increased plant biomass have high economic importance in production of biofuel or raw materials, agriculture and horticulture. Although the impact of nanoparticles on plants depends on concentration, size and shape. The biological synthesized AuNPs can replace the chemically synthesized AuNPs used in gene transfer method. The study gives brief insight on nanoparticles effects on plants, brings attention on both positive and negative side of nanomaterial which can resolve phytopathological infections by stimulating nutrition and growth.

Scientific validation of the antidiabetic effects of Syzygium jambolanum DC (black plum), a traditional medicinal plant of India.

BACKGROUND: In spite of the tremendous progress achieved in medical sciences in the last century, the management of diabetes mellitus, a disease as old as mankind, is poor. Diabetes is currently the world's largest endocrine disorder, and estimates are that it affects almost 5% of the population. Ayurveda, the Indian traditional system of medicine, is one of the world's oldest systems to have documented the diagnosis and treatment of diabetes. METHODS: Experimental studies performed in accordance with the modern medicine principles have shown that some of the medicinal plants and polyherbal preparations made using the plants used in Ayurveda are effective in preventing both hyperglycemia and its complications. Syzygium jambolanum (Syn Syzygium cumini, Eugenia cumini, Eugenia jambolana), commonly known as black plum and originally indigenous to India, is one of the important antidiabetic plants. RESULTS: Jamun has been used in various complementary and alternative systems of medicine and, before the discovery of insulin, was a frontline antidiabetic medication even in Europe. The brew prepared by boiling the Jamun seeds in boiling water has been used in the various traditional systems of medicine in India. CONCLUSIONS: This review includes the validated antidiabetic effects of Jamun and some of its compounds. Emphasis is also placed on addressing the various mechanisms of action contributing to the pharmacological effects and the aspects that need future investigations for Jamun to be of clinical use.

The bacterial-type phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase isozyme from developing castor oil seeds is subject to in vivo regulatory phosphorylation at serine-451.

Phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase (PEPC) is a tightly controlled anaplerotic enzyme situated at a pivotal branch point of plant carbohydrate-metabolism. In developing castor oil seeds (COS) a novel allosterically-densensitized 910-kDa Class-2 PEPC hetero-octameric complex arises from a tight interaction between 107-kDa plant-type PEPC and 118-kDa bacterial-type PEPC (BTPC) subunits. Mass spectrometry and immunoblotting with anti-phosphoSer451 specific antibodies established that COS BTPC is in vivo phosphorylated at Ser451, a highly conserved target residue that occurs within an intrinsically disordered region. This phosphorylation was enhanced during COS development or in response to depodding. Kinetic characterization of a phosphomimetic (S451D) mutant indicated that Ser451 phosphorylation inhibits the catalytic activity of BTPC subunits within the Class-2 PEPC complex.