Infancy Stage Research Articles

Neonatal Diabetes mellitus: A review

Neonatal diabetes mellitus is regarded as genetic, diversified, and infrequent disorder of babies. This is developed due to mutation of specific gene. ABCC8 and KCNJ11 genes mutation are fundamental cause for the development of this. These genes encrypting the potassium network and are very much involved for seeking the monogenic diabetes like Neonatal diabetes mellitus. Neonate diabetes is classified as transient diabetes mellitus and permanent diabetes mellitus. Transient diabetes mellitus is observed at infancy stage where as Permanent diabetes mellitus is observed at 7 weeks to 26 weeks. With the help of genetic screening, this classified diabetes is discriminated. Transient diabetes is observed during infant stage and furtherly starts in later life. 22 genetic variations are very much interconnected with this type of diabetes. This article will provide a summary of current knowledge on neonatal diabetes mellitus.

Breeding Cultivars for Resistance to the African Sweetpotato Weevils, Cylas puncticollis and Cylas brunneus, in Uganda: A Review of the Current Progress.

In sub-Saharan Africa, sweetpotato weevils are the major pests of cultivated sweetpotato, causing estimated losses of between 60% and 100%, primarily during dry spells. The predominantly cryptic feeding behavior of Cylas spp. within their roots makes their control difficult, thus, host plant resistance is one of the most promising lines of protection against these pests. However, limited progress has been made in cultivar breeding for weevil resistance, partly due to the complex hexaploid genome of sweetpotato, which complicates conventional breeding, in addition to the limited number of genotypes with significant levels of resistance for use as sources of resistance. Pollen sterility, cross incompatibility, and poor seed set and germination in sweetpotato are also common challenges in improving weevil resistance. The accurate phenotyping of sweetpotato weevil resistance to enhance the efficiency of selection has been equally difficult. Genomics-assisted breeding, though in its infancy stages in sweetpotato, has a potential application in overcoming some of these barriers. However, it will require the development of more genomic infrastructure, particularly single-nucleotide polymorphism markers (SNPs) and robust next-generation sequencing platforms, together with relevant statistical procedures for analyses. With the recent advances in genomics, we anticipate that genomic breeding for sweetpotato weevil resistance will be expedited in the coming years. This review sheds light on Uganda's efforts, to date, to breed against the Cylas puncticollis (Boheman) and Cylas brunneus (Fabricius) species of African sweetpotato weevil.

Effect of lead exposure on histone modifications: A review.

Lead at any levels can result in detrimental health effects affecting various organ systems. These systematic manifestations under Pb exposure and the underlying probable pathophysiological mechanisms have not been elucidated completely. With advancements in molecular research under Pb exposure, epigenetics is one of the emerging field that has opened many possibilities for appreciating the role of Pb exposure in modulating gene expression profiles. In terms of epigenetic alterations reported in Pb toxicity, DNA methylation, and microRNA alterations are extensively explored in both experimental and epidemiological studies, however, the understanding of histone modifications under Pb exposure is still in its infant stage limited to experimental models. In this review, we aim to present a synoptic view of histone modifications explored in relation to Pb exposure attempting to bring out this potential lacunae in research. The scarcity of studies associating histone modifications with Pb toxicity, and the paucity of their validation in human cohort further emphasizes the strong research potential of this field. We summarize the review by presenting our hypotheses regarding the involvement of these histone modification in various diseases modalities associated with Pb toxicity.

Inhibiting effect of graphdiyne on Ru(bpy)32+ ECL and its application in drug detection based on the host–guest interaction of cucurbit[8]uril

Graphdiyne (GDY) is considered as another promising carbon material in biosensing field. However, the application of GDY in ECL sensing is in its infancy stage, and different roles of GDY are urgent to be discovered. In this work, strong anodic Ru(bpy)32+ electrochemiluminescence (ECL) was obtained at a cucurbit[8]uril (Q[8]) modified electrode. Although GDY exhibited electrocatalytic effect on the oxidation of Ru(bpy)32+, an apparent inhibiting effect of GDY on the ECL signal was observed due to the energy transfer. An “on-off-on” mode ECL sensor was fabricated to detect pancuronium (PMD) based on the competitive host–guest interaction between ferrocene (Fc), PMD and Q[8]. Fc modified single-stranded DNA was immobilized onto the surface of GDY, which could be attached onto the electrode through the interaction between Fc and Q[8]. The quenching effect of GDY could apparently decrease ECL signal. PMD exhibited stronger combining ability with Q[8] than Fc, and could replace Fc from the cavity of Q[8], leading to the recovery of ECL signal. The variation of ECL intensity changed linearly with the PMD concentration in the range of 10 nM to 50 μM with a detection limit of 5 nM (3σ). The proposed sensor has high sensitivity, outstanding specificity and accuracy, indicating that GDY has promising potential application in ECL sensing field based on its inhibiting effect.

Self-assembly, structure and catalytic activity of Ni3 on TiO2: A triple-atom catalyst for hydrogen evolution

Triple-atom catalysts (TACs), structurally derived from single-atom catalysts (SACs) but beyond SACs in the active sites, have received increasing attention but are still in their infant stage. Using density functional theory, we study the self-assembly of the Ni3 trimer on TiO2 (Ni3/TiO2) by atom-by-atom deposition. Coordinatively unsaturated sites on the TiO2 surface are responsible for this self-assembly, resulting in different configurations of Ni3. According to the orientation relationship and lattice mismatch, an embryo of Ni crystal is thought to be born of triangle Ni3 trimer on TiO2. The hydrogen evolution reaction activity and mechanism of Ni3/TiO2 with different H coverages are evaluated using thermochemistry and kinetics calculations. Only at high H coverage would Ni3/TiO2 TACs exhibit a hydrogen production activity higher than that of Ni1/TiO2 SACs, indicating the matching relationship between multiple active sites and multi-step reaction intermediates for the active-site utilization. The quantum confinement effect throughout Nin/TiO2 (n = 1–3) is evidenced by the localization of metallic states of Nin. Our results not only open the possibility for synthesizing multimers on oxides by self-assembly, but also enrich the quantum control toolbox in few-atom catalysts by coordination modulation.

Advances in organoid technology for veterinary disease modeling.

Organoids are in vitro organ-like structures that faithfully recapitulate many characteristics of a specific organ. During the past decades, major progress has been accomplished in establishing three-dimensional (3D) culture systems toward stem cell-derived organoids. As a significant technological breakthrough, these amazing 3D organoid constructs bridge the conventional 2D in vitro models and in vivo animal models and provide an unprecedented opportunity to investigate the complexities of veterinary diseases ranging from their pathogenesis to the prevention, therapy, or even future organ replacement strategies. In this review, we briefly discuss several definitions used in organoid research and highlight the currently known achievements in modeling veterinary diseases, including infectious and inflammatory diseases, cancers, and metabolic diseases. The applications of organoid technology in veterinary disease modeling are still in their infancy stage but the future is promising.

Green Marketing: Benefits and Challenges for Marketers

The term ‘Green marketing’ was first used by the American Marketing Association (AMA) in 1975. According to the American Marketing Association, green marketing is the marketing of products that are environmentally safe. The present exploratory paper is descriptive in nature and is based on secondary data derived from online databases like SSRN, Research Gate, etc. It attempts to study various aspects of green marketing. Increased sensitivity to environmental protection has given a boost to green practices. Firms are motivated to adopt green marketing strategies due to a number of reasons like customer's preference for environmentally sound products/services, governmental pressure, competitive pressure, long term cost advantage and tag of a socially responsible firm. Green marketing helps to boost sales, reduce operating and production costs, helps to decrease the long-term risks of depletion of resources, promote corporate social responsibility, etc. The present study focuses on the meaning of Green Marketing, the push factors of going green in business, the benefits of green marketing, and various challenges in the adoption of green marketing. The study concludes that it is still in its infancy stage and faces many challenges such as lack of cooperation, lack of consumer awareness, a trade-off between short-term and long-term cost-benefit analysis, perils of green myopia and limited scientific knowledge. Businesses should attempt to overcome these challenges and adopt green marketing because the present time is favorable to capitalize on this new trend given the emergency kind of situation of our environment and increasing eco-sensitivity of consumers.

Archival Silences within the National Archival Documentary Heritage Institutions of Botswana

The study is an interpretive qualitative multiple case study, which examined archival representation of social groups in five selected heritage institutions in Botswana. Purposive sampling was used to select study participants. Data collection for the study was through semistructured interviews, non-participatory observations and document analysis. The findings indicate that archival representation of social groups is still at infancy stage in Botswana, as a result of poor interpretation and implementation of the National Archives and Records Services of 1978, (amended in 2007); lack of updated policies that inform practice and limited resources to do archival processes. The contents of the archival collection revealed a male, ethnic based, linguistic oriented and ruling party inclined image with underrepresented groups consisting of people with disabilities, the poor and women. For under-documented groups, the LGBTQ+ community, people living along borderlines and refugees come out. The causes for silences in the archival collections is attributed to discriminatory sections of the constitution, lack of reflexivity on the part of the archival institutions, mistrust of mainstream heritage institutions by communities and failure to survive time by indigenous culture which is mainly oral to name but a few. Consequently, the study recommends an acquisition and management model based on stewardship and a national archival system, that can ensure the documentation of a socially representative archival heritage.

The impact of climate change on the resilience of banking systems in selected Sub-Saharan economies

Climate change is seen as a peril to the overall financial system, yet this revelation is in its infant stage. On that note, this study investigates the impact of climate change shocks on banking system resilience in selected Sub-Saharan economies. The study relies on a quantitative research method by first employing a Generalized Auto Regressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity (GARCH) (1,1) model to forecast the volatility series of the climate change variables. Further, the study applies the panel ARDL model to disseminate the long- and short-term associations between the obtained conditional variances of climate change parameters and banking system resilience within a time frame of 1996-2017 for 29 selected economies. The results show that banking systems in SSA are resilient to temperature shocks in the long-term. However, the study finds that the banking systems in SSA are not resilient to both precipitation and greenhouse gas shocks in the long-term. For the short-term impact assessment, the study finds that banking systems in SSA are resilient to only precipitation shocks. The study concludes that banking sectors in SSA should vigorously conduct stress-testing on climate-related financial risks and also design forward-looking strategies as well as climate change risk management procedures in the wake of climate change events.

High-Resolution Structural Proteomics of Mitochondria Using the ‘Build and Retrieve’ Methodology

The application of integrated systems biology to the field of structural biology is a promising new direction, although it is still in the infant stages of development. Here we report the use of single particle cryo-EM to identify multiple proteins from three enriched heterogeneous fractions prepared from human liver mitochondrial lysate. We simultaneously identify and solve high-resolution structures of nine essential mitochondrial enzymes with key metabolic functions, including fatty acid catabolism, reactive oxidative species clearance, and amino acid metabolism. Our methodology also identified multiple distinct members of the acyl-CoA dehydrogenase family. This work highlights the potential of cryo-EM to explore tissue proteomics at the atomic level.

Hazards Associated With Nanotechnology in Clinical Dentistry.

Nanotechnology has transformed the field of dentistry with immense potential to provide comprehensive oral health care using nanomaterials, advanced clinical tools, and devices. New materials with superior properties can be developed using nanotechnology by making use of their atomic or molecular properties. Although there are numerous ways in which nanomaterials impact our health, the primary causeis that they comprise chemicals that may have an inadvertent reaction in the body. Moreover, they are used on a daily basis, increasing human contact with them. It is observed to be smaller in size than the physiological barrier in our bodies, making it much simpler for them to pass through and enter the body and they are being used more frequently. It is observed to be smaller in size than the physiological barrier in our bodies, making it much simpler for them to pass through and enter the body and being used more frequently. Although there are numerous ways in which nanomaterials impact our health, the primary causeis they comprise chemicals that may have an inadvertent reaction in the body. The review discusses various types of toxicity, including the cytotoxicity of composites, carbon nanoparticles, silver nanoparticles (SNPs), and quantum dots. It also covers genotoxicity, the effect of nanoparticles on salivary secretion, oral and gastrointestinal mucosa passage of nanoparticles, the tooth surface microenvironment, and interactions with engineered nanomaterials (ENMs). It is concluded that there is scarce information regarding the presence of chemicals that are released from nanoparticles used in dental materials. Nanotechnology is at an infant stage, although it has progressed by leaps and bounds, hailing a new age that provides better treatment modalities in various branches of dentistry. Although the development and application of nanodentistry are of considerable interest, knowledge regarding the possible toxicity of such materials must be meticulously evaluated, and potential benefits must be weighed against the risks to identify potential gaps in the safety assessment. Further research is needed on workplace exposure to nanoparticles in dentistry.

Do cultural values influence how we perceive the police? Examining the cultural impact of Confucian values on the perception of police legitimacy

PurposeThis study aimed to expand the normative model of police legitimacy literature by assessing the impact of cultural values and their role as a driver of the perception of legitimacy. Specifically, the current study assessed cultural values like Confucianism and their impact on the perception of police legitimacy.Design/methodology/approachThe current study used convenience sampling of South Korean university students from all seven metropolises. A perception survey regarding their perception of the legitimacy of Korean police was asked via a six-point scale. For statistical analysis, structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to assess the hypotheses.FindingsThe authors' results indicate that Confucian values like social hierarchy and social harmony impacted various stages of police legitimacy. In particular, Confucian values significantly impacted procedural justice, the obligation to obey and cooperation. However, it failed to predict legitimacy in any capacity.Originality/valueFirst, by assessing Confucian values and their impact on police legitimacy, the current study aimed to expand the police legitimacy literature. Second, police legitimacy research in non-Western settings is still lacking and has not reached a consensus regarding the primary driver of legitimacy. Furthermore, South Korea in particular is still at an infant stage regarding police legitimacy research. The current study aimed to add to the literature by examining police legitimacy in the Korean context.

New Focus For Industrialization 4.0: Economic Growth Through Industrial Energy Management

The purpose of this article is to understand and elaborate on the impact of energy management through the use of solar energysystems in the industrial sector over the economic growth of developing countries. This study is based on Pakistan where the concept is in the infancy stage. Therefore, the significance of the study has many folds as the study will not only reflect the contemporary use of solar panels in the industrial sector but also reflect vividly upon the implications of the concept regarding the eastern and developing markets. The study collected data from employees of the energy sector to test the claim with a nonprobability sampling technique and analysis has been made through incorporating SMART-PLS. The findings of the study reflect that there is a definite association between the use of solar panels in the production sector on energy efficiency as well as the sustainable economic growth of the country. Hence the study is also beneficial for fostering research work as well as to optimize the policy formulation for the use of solar energy systems in the production sector of developing countries of the world.

Issues of Sustainable Finance Rating Assessment

The formation of a sustainable finance market creates the need for independent and reliable information necessary for making investment decisions. The most important source of such information is ESG-ratings designed to assess the degree of commitment of enterprises to the declared priorities of sustainable development. Such ratings are already included in the professional toolbox of most investors. However, the ESG-ratings market is currently in its infancy stage and is relatively immature with a number of characteristic problems inherent in it. Based on the analysis of Russian and foreign scientific literature and analytical reports of consulting companies, the key problems hindering the development of this market, limiting the practical potential of using ESG ratings and undermining the trust of customers and users to these ratings have been identified. The analysis of the correlation between ratings calculated by various providers with consideration of methodological factors that predetermine discrepancies between ratings at the fundamental level is carried out. The review of the current state of the Russian ESG-ratings market is made taking into account current geopolitical challenges and the latest regulatory initiatives proposed by the Bank of Russia

STAT3 promotes migration and invasion of cholangiocarcinoma arising from choledochal cyst by transcriptionally inhibiting miR200c through the c-myb/MEK/ERK signaling pathway.

Signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 (STAT3) have been highlighted in cancer regulation. Its roles in Cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) arising from the choledochal cyst (CC) were unclear. Here, we attempted to elucidate the roles of STAT3 in CCA-CC and explore its mechanism. A total of 20 patients with CCA arising from CC, that underwent CC excision in the infant stage were included. The expressions of STAT3, miR200c and c-Myb in clinical samples were assessed by RT-qPCR and/or western blot. Their expression correlations in tumor tissues were evaluated by Pearson correlation analysis. Their roles in CCA cell migration and invasion were investigated by gene silence using siRNA or miRNA inhibitor mediated approach and MEK activator. The expression levels of EMT, metastasis and MEK/ERK pathway-related proteins were checked by western blot. The high expressions of STAT3 and c-Myb, and low expression of miR200c were detected in CCA samples. We defined the transcription inhibition of STAT3 in miR200c expression and the negative correlation between miR200c and c-Myb expression. Silence of STAT3 increased miR200c expression and retarded the migration and invasion of CCA cells, accompanied by decreased levels of Vimentin, N-cadherin, MMP2 and MMP9, and elevated expression of E-cadherin, resulting in inactivating MEK/ERK pathway. MiR200c inhibitor reversed the changes induced by STAT3 silence, which was restored by si-c-Myb. MEK activator significantly reversed the inactivation of the MEK/ERK pathway induced by si-STAT3+miR200c inhibitor+si-c-Myb. In summary, the silence of STAT3 suppressed metastasis and progression of CCA cells by regulating miR200c through the c-Myb mediated MEK/ERK pathway, suggesting STAT3 is the effective target for CCA arising from CC.

Spatio-Temporal Analysis of Irrigation Development in Southwestern Haryana, India

Haryana is an agricultural developed state in India and agriculture here plays a significant role in the economic development of the state. However, the state is heterogeneous in terms of physiography and such difference in topography clearly distinguishes Southwestern Haryana from the rest of state. Southwestern Haryana is less developed than Rest of Haryana from agricultural point of view. There are various factors behind such a difference in the agricultural development of this region and irrigation is one of the most important one. In the Southwestern Haryana development of canals and, tubewells is different from Rest of Haryana. In this background, the present study aims to examine the development of irrigation in Southwestern Haryana from spatial and temporal prospectives using secondary sources of data. In particular, the methodology was based on trends analysis, least squares technique and cartographic representation. The finding of the study reveals that development of canals irrigation in Southwestern Haryana is in infancy stage. Out of all districts of this region Bhiwani & Charkhi Dadri district shows a measurable growth in canals irrigation with negative trends. Due to its rugged topography, Southwestern Haryana mainly depends on tubewell irrigation. Such a dependency can be justified with the positive trends of tubewell irrigation in this region. The trends of tubewells irrigation in Southwestern Haryana are ahead of Rest of Haryana. The study also reveals that except for Gurugram & Nuh district, irrigation intensity is increasing in the study area. Bhiwani has the highest per unit change in irrigation intensity over a particular period of time, while Gurugram & Nuh shows negative change from 1990-91 to 2020-21.

BENIGREEN: Blockchain-Based Energy-Efficient Privacy-Preserving Scheme for Green IoT

The energy conservative extension of Internet-of-Thing (IoT), green IoT, is a revolutionary approach in connecting people, processes, and things in an energy-efficient way. The existing research works in the domain of green IoTs forbid the use of decentralized management (e.g., blockchain) of data due to its intrinsic disadvantages of block mining, transaction incentives, and less throughput. However, the advantages of blockchains urge the development of new decentralized strategies utilizing the architecture of green IoTs. The infancy stage of the conjunction between green IoTs and blockchains, the need of decentralization in energy management in green IoTs motivate us for the present research. In this paper, we address the problems of decentralization, energy-conservation, and privacy simultaneously. We introduce the first blockchain-based privacy-preserving framework for green IoTs. We name this framework as "Blockchain-based ENergy-efficient and prIvacy-preserving data management scheme for GREEN-iot (BENIGREEN)" for smart cities. BENIGREEN uses weight metrics for energy-efficient cluster heads selection. The use of weight metrics is a novel contribution in the field of green IoTs. Further, we integrate a decentralized blockchain framework with an authentication scheme for secure transmission among Base Station (BS) and sensor nodes by employing registration, certification, and revocation phases. Consequently, BS allocates the collected information from cluster heads to decentralized blockchain and cloud storage. The BS eliminates all malicious nodes from the network by employing a certificate revocation process. We execute thorough experiments in terms of the operation time, throughput, average energy consumption, and computational latency. The comparative analysis with the state-of-the-art schemes show that BENIGREEN is efficient for IoT paradigm.

Shared Value Creation and Measurement Approaches Adopted by JSE Listed Companies

Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE)-listed companies’ adoption of shared value is still in its infancy stage. In South Africa, some JSE-listed companies in the finance sector have adopted a shared value approach similar to responsible capitalism called Responsible Investments (RI) or impact investment. The purpose of the study was to investigate Shared Value Creation approaches adopted by JSE-listed companies. A documentary research approach, which consists of reviewing, analysing and examining information was adopted. The sources included journal articles, books, Frameworks, Guidelines and Codes. The results of the study indicated that JSE-listed companies, guided by the King Code, have adopted some elements of the shared-value model although integrated reports are purportedly not using the term.

Assessment of Policy Guidelines, Strategies, and Operational Processes Associated with Plastic Waste Management in Ghana

The study sought to assess to assess the policy guidelines, strategies, and operational processes associated with plastic waste management in Ghana. A descriptive cross-sectional study design that employed both quantitative and qualitative procedures was used. The data was analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Descriptive analysis was performed on the structured questionnaire whereas thematic analysis was conducted on data from the interview guided. The results revealed that there are guidelines, strategies, and operational processes for plastic waste management in greater Kumasi and there exist different activities of stakeholders (Recycling companies, KMA and Waste collectors) in plastic waste management in Kumasi. The extent of compliance with plastic waste management guidelines (National Plastic Waste Management Policy) is dependent on the different stakeholders. Plastic recycling companies are in the infant stage with their activities being centered on six processes with pelletizing plastics for export been their major activities whereas waste collectors are solely responsible for collection, transportation and final disposal of plastic waste from different places to either dump sites or plastic recycling companies. KMA and other government institutions involved in waste management must take steps by supervising the day-to-day activities of plastic recycling companies and waste collectors to regulate the activities of companies within the plastic recycling industry.

Digital Media Coverage of the 2017–2018 Banking Crisis in Ghana: A Framing Analysis

The literature on news framing largely focuses on political news. When Ghana experienced what came to be known as the “banking crisis” in 2017/2018, there was wide media coverage of the issues that came in its wake and that provided an avenue for studies on the framing of a financial phenomenon. This paper examines the online media framing of this crisis through the quantitative content analysis of 97 news articles from two online news portals: Myjoyonline and Graphiconline, which are private, and state owned. The comparative analysis of these two websites showed the predominance of the attribution of responsibility and conflict frames in their reportage, reflecting the infant stage of digital financial journalism in Ghana. Notwithstanding, the study revealed differences in how the websites used the news frames in some significant respects.