Recent progress on gene silencing/suppression by virus-derived small interfering RNAs in rice viruses especially Rice grassy stunt virus.

Noncoding RNAs play essential functions during epigenetic regulation of gene expression and development in numerous organisms. Three type of small noncoding RNAs found in eukaryotes, which are small interfering RNAs (siRNAs), microRNAs (miRNAs) and piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs). Small RNAs (sRNAs) originated from infecting viruses are known as virus-derived small interfering RNAs (vsiRNAs), are responsible for RNA silencing in plants.

The Amygdala, Sleep Debt, Sleep Deprivation, and the Emotion of Anger: A Possible Connection?

The association of sleep with emotions has long been studied. However, not much has been studied about the association of sleep deprivation and sleep debt with the emotion of anger. In this article, we focused on the association of sleep with anger.

Hypoalbuminemia predicts intensive care need among adult inpatients with community acquired pneumonia: a cross sectional study.

Introduction: Various scales helped physicians to decide the site of care of pneumonia patients, but had certain limitations. Literature review suggested that serum albumin and B/A ratio predict the site of care but more evidences were required. Therefore, the study was aimed to evaluate the role of serum albumin and B/A ratio in the prediction of intensive care need among patients with community acquired pneumonia.

In vitro biological screening of a critically endangered medicinal plant, Atropa acuminata Royle Ex Lindl of north western Himalaya.

Atropa acuminata Royle Ex Lindl (Atropa acuminata) under tremendous threat of extinction in its natural habitat. However, the antimicrobial, antileishmanial and anticancer effects of the plant's extracts have not been reported yet. In the current study, an attempt has been made to evaluate the pharmacological potential of this plant's extracts against microbes, Leishmania and cancer.

The Psycho-cardiac Coupling, Myocardial Remodeling, and Neuroendocrine Factor Levels: The Psychosomatics of Major Depressive Disorder.

The association of major depressive disorder (MDD) with myocardial infarction (MI) and vice versa is not unknown. Depression, along with many other systemic factors like atherosclerosis, obesity, diabetes and vascular dysfunction, contributes to the development of adverse cardiac events in the future and, has always been a topic of interest in the fields of cardiology and psychosomatics. We wrote this review article to elaborate this relationship in detail.

The unprecedented magnitude of the 2017 dengue outbreak in Sri Lanka provides lessons for future mosquito-borne infection control and prevention.

Background: The outbreak of dengue during 2017 in Sri Lanka is the worst incidence of this mosquito-borne virus infection in the South Asian country since records began.

Methods: In this retrospective study, up to the end of December 2017 over 185,000 clinical cases were reported from all regions of the island nation.

Results: This crisis placed an overwhelming burden on Sri Lanka's public health system and also had a significant negative impact on its economy.

Glycyrrhiza glabra HPLC fractions: identification of Aldehydo Isoophiopogonone and Liquirtigenin having activity against multidrug resistant bacteria.

Background: Medicinal plants have been founded as traditional herbal medicine worldwide. Most of the plant's therapeutic properties are due to the presence of secondary metabolites such as alkaloids, glycosides, tannins and volatile oil.

Methods: The present investigation analyzed the High-Pressure Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) fractions of Glycyrrhiza glabra (Aqueous, Chloroform, Ethanol and Hexane) against multidrug resistant human bacterial pathogens (Escherichia coli, Acinetobacter baumannii, Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa).

In vitro oxidative stress regulatory potential of Citrullus colocynthis and Tephrosia apollinea.

The present study investigates the potential role of medicinal plants Citrullus colocynthis and Tephrosia apollinea in ameliorating the oxidative stress developed during the generation of reactive oxygen species. Organic extracts of different organs (leaf, stem and root) of these medicinal plants obtained in n-hexane, chloroform, n-butanol and water were assayed for radical scavenging, total antioxidant capacity, anti-lipid peroxidation and reduced glutathione. The total phenolic content (TPC) of both selected medicinal plants was also evaluated.

A nation-wide genetic survey revealed a complex population structure of Bemisia tabaci in Pakistan.

The whitefly, Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) (Hemiptera: Aleyrodidae) is a cryptic species complex distributed worldwide. In Pakistan, B. tabaci poses a serious threat to agriculture production.

Unusual Presentation of Differentiated Thyroid Cancer Metastasis.

 The rates of thyroid cancers are on a rise, especially well-differentiated thyroid cancers. This could be partly due to newer diagnostic modalities, like high-resolution ultrasound, that can pick up smaller lesions. Differentiated thyroid cancers with distant metastases are not common, and even rarer is the initial presentation with complaints not related to the neck.

Optimized inhibited-coupling Kagome fibers at Yb-Nd:Yag (8.5 dB/km) and Ti:Sa (30 dB/km) ranges.

We report on the development of hypocycloid core-contour inhibited-coupling (IC) Kagome hollow-core photonic crystal fibers (HC-PCFs) with record transmission loss and spectral coverage that include the common industrial laser wavelengths. Using the scaling of the confinement loss with the core-contour negative curvature and the silica strut thickness, we fabricated an IC Kagome HC-PCF for Yb and Nd:Yag laser guidance with record loss level of 8.5 dB/km associated with a 225-nm-wide 3-dB bandwidth.

Spatial modeling of rat bites and prediction of rat infestation in Peshawar valley using binomial kriging with logistic regression.

In this study, we propose to develop a geostatistical computational framework to model the distribution of rat bite infestation of epidemic proportion in Peshawar valley, Pakistan. Two species Rattus norvegicus and Rattus rattus are suspected to spread the infestation. The framework combines strengths of maximum entropy algorithm and binomial kriging with logistic regression to spatially model the distribution of infestation and to determine the individual role of environmental predictors in modeling the distribution trends.

Rat-bites of an epidemic proportion in Peshawar vale; a GIS based approach in risk assessment.

Contemporary studies demonstrate that rodent bites do not occur frequently. However, a huge number of cases were reported from Peshawar vale, Pakistan during 2016. Two species, the local black rat Rattus rattus (Linnaeus, 1758) and the invasive brown rat Rattus norvegicus (Berkenhout, 1769) might be the suspected cause.

Plant microRNAs: Front line players against invading pathogens.

Plants are attacked by a large number of pathogens. To defend against these pathogens, plants activate or repress a vast array of genes. For genetic expression and reprogramming, host endogenous small RNAs (sRNAs) are the key factors.

Author Correction: Phosphate-Solubilizing Bacteria Nullify the Antagonistic Effect of Soil Calcification on Bioavailability of Phosphorus in Alkaline Soils.

A correction to this article has been published and is linked from the HTML and PDF versions of this paper. The error has been fixed in the paper.

A Review of CRISPR-Based Genome Editing: Survival, Evolution and Challenges.

Precise nucleic acid editing technologies have facilitated the research of cellular function and the development of novel therapeutics, especially the current programmable nucleases-based editing tools, such as the prokaryotic clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)-associated nucleases (Cas). As CRISPR-based therapies are advancing toward human clinical trials, it is important to understand how natural genetic variation in the human population may affect the results of these trials and even patient safety. The development of "base-editing" technique allows the direct, stable transformation of target DNA base into an alternative in a programmable way, without DNA double strand cleavage or a donor template.

All Sequential Dip-Coating Processed Perovskite Layers from an Aqueous Lead Precursor for High Efficiency Perovskite Solar Cells.

A novel, sequential method of dip-coating a ZnO covered mesoporous TiO electrode was performed using a non-halide lead precursor in an aqueous system to form a nanoscale perovskite film. The introduction of a ZnO interfacial layer induced significant adsorption in the non-halide lead precursor system. An efficient successive solid-state ion exchange and reaction process improved the morphology, crystallinity, and stability of perovskite solar cells.

Antibacterial activity of selected medicinal plants of northwest Pakistan traditionally used against mastitis in livestock.

The present study aimed to investigate the efficacy of traditionally used anti-mastitis plants ( and ) in northwest Pakistan against bacterial pathogens. Selected plants were phytochemically screened for Alkaloids, Flavonoids, and Saponins and checked for antibacterial activity at concentration of 50 mg/ml against and by agar well diffusion method. Minimum inhibitory concentration and minimum bactericidal concentration was determined against multidrug resistant bacteria using tube dilution method.

Traditional uses of medicinal plants used by Indigenous communities for veterinary practices at Bajaur Agency, Pakistan.

Background: The pastoral lifestyle of Indigenous communities of Bajaur Agency is bringing them close to natural remedies for treating their domestic animals. Several studies have been conducted across the globe describing the importance of traditional knowledge in veterinary care. Therefore, this study was planned with the aim to record knowledge on ethnoveterinary practices from the remote areas and share sit with other communities through published literature.

Liming induces carbon dioxide (CO) emission in PSB inoculated alkaline soil supplemented with different phosphorus sources.

Agricultural land is a major sink of global organic carbon (C). Its suitable management is crucial for improving C sequestration and reducing soil CO emission. Incubation experiments were performed to assess the impact of phosphate solubilizing bacterial (PSB) inoculation (inoculated and uninoculated) and soil calcification (4.

Traditional uses of medicinal plants practiced by the indigenous communities at Mohmand Agency, FATA, Pakistan.

Background: Plant-derived products have an imperative biological role against certain pathogenic organisms and were considered to be a major source of modern drugs. Rural people residing in developing countries are relying on traditional herbal medical system due to their strong believe and minimum access to allopathic medicines. Hence, ethnomedicinal knowledge is useful for the maintenance of community's based approaches under this medical system.

Carbon Catabolite Repression in Filamentous Fungi.

Carbon Catabolite Repression (CCR) has fascinated scientists and researchers around the globe for the past few decades. This important mechanism allows preferential utilization of an energy-efficient and readily available carbon source over relatively less easily accessible carbon sources. This mechanism helps microorganisms to obtain maximum amount of glucose in order to keep pace with their metabolism.

Rubus: A compiler for seamless and extensible parallelism.

Nowadays, a typical processor may have multiple processing cores on a single chip. Furthermore, a special purpose processing unit called Graphic Processing Unit (GPU), originally designed for 2D/3D games, is now available for general purpose use in computers and mobile devices. However, the traditional programming languages which were designed to work with machines having single core CPUs, cannot utilize the parallelism available on multi-core processors efficiently.

Review: Ethnomedicinal, phytochemical and antibacterial activities of medicinal flora of Pakistan used against Pseudomonas aeruginosa-A Review.

Medicinal plants have been used from ancient time against different infectious diseases caused by microorganisms across the globe. The present review represents different medicinal plants of Pakistan used traditionally for the treatment of variety of ailments caused by Pseudomonas aeruginosa, their in-vitro activities against P. aeruginosa and phytochemistry.

Phosphate-Solubilizing Bacteria Nullify the Antagonistic Effect of Soil Calcification on Bioavailability of Phosphorus in Alkaline Soils.

Phosphate-solubilizing bacteria (PSB) reduce the negative effects of soil calcification on soil phosphorus (P) nutrition. In this incubation study, we explored the ability of PSB (control and inoculated) to release P from different P sources [single super phosphate (SSP), rock phosphate (RP), poultry manure (PM) and farm yard manure (FYM)] with various soil lime contents (4.78, 10, 15 and 20%) in alkaline soil.