Summary: Well‐defined pentablock copolymers of styrene–[1]dimethylsilaferrocenophane–methyl methacrylate (PMMA‐b‐PFS‐b‐PS‐b‐PFS‐b‐PMMA) are synthesized using lithium naphthalide as initiator and a 1,1‐dimethylsilacyclobutane‐mediated 1,1‐diphenylethylene (DPE) end‐capping technique. Annealing under various conditions followed by analysis by transmission electron microscopy revealed good phase separation by the copolymers and the presence of ordered microstructures, such as spheres‐on/in‐spheres, and spheres‐on/in‐lamellae micromorphologies.Structure of the styrene–[1]dimethylsilaferrocenophane–methyl methacrylate pentablock copolymers.magnified imageStructure of the styrene–[1]dimethylsilaferrocenophane–methyl methacrylate pentablock copolymers.

SUMMARY:Location of the cytoplasmic droplets (CD) and their dimensions varied significantly (p<0.01) when sperm cells traverse through the regions of caput, corpus and cauda epididymis and vasdeferens respectively. The gradual diminution in the morphology of CD between the epididymal regions were related significantly (p<0.01, p<0.05). Caudal shift of the CD, along with regression in size and finally their exclusion from the sperm cells reflected one of the most important events in the maturation process of male gametes in Black Bengal buck.

Topical wound-healing potential of autologous bone marrow-derived nucleated cells along with placental extract was evaluated in comparison with buffy coat of autologous blood on full-thickness cutaneous wounds in the thoracolumbar region of 15 clinically healthy New Zealand rabbits. Three wounds of 2 × 2 cm, one on the right side of the body and two on the left side of the midline were created on the dorsal lumbar region of each rabbit under xylazine-ketamine anaesthesia. The wounds of each animal were randomly assigned to one of the three treatments: topical application of autologous bone marrow-derived cells with placental extract (group I), application of buffy coat in the autologous plasma with placental extract (group II) and autologous plasma with placental extract as control (group III). Wounds were observed for 30 days macroscopically and for granulation tissue formation, histomorphological and histochemical evaluation. Time of appearance of granulation tissues and filling of wound beds were faster in group I followed by group II and group III animals, respectively. Histomorphological findings exhibited an earlier disappearance of inflammatory reaction, better epithelialisation, significantly maximum neovascularisation, fibroplasias and collagenation in group I followed by group II and group III animals, respectively. Histochemical findings also depicted maximum number of robust, thick, interwoven type of collagen fibres, stout, highly tortuous and interwoven network of elastin fibres and numerous mesh war form of reticulin fibres within the dermal component were present in group I when compared with group II and III animals. Experiment conclude that single application of autologous bone marrow-nucleated cells with placental extract topically could be a novel option for faster healing in complicated non healing wounds both in human beings and animals.

Methodologies have been developed and implemented in LISP and OPS-S languages which address type synthesis of mechanisms. Graph theory and separation of structure from function concepts have been integrated into an expert system called DOMES (Design Of Mechanism by an Expert System) to effectively implement the following three activities: 1. enumeration of all non-isomorphic labelled graphs; 2. identification of those graphs which satisfy structural constraints; 3. sketching of mechanisms corresponding to a given graph.Developed theories and algorithms are applied to a robot gripper design and a variable-stroke piston engine design. The results from these two applications indicate that the automated techniques effectively identify all previously obtained solutions via manual techniques. Additional solutions are also identified and several errors of the manual process are detected. The developed methodologies and software appear to perform a complete and unbiased search of all possible candidate designs and are not prone to the errors of the manual process. Other important features of DOMES are: 1. it can learn and reason, by analogy, about a new design problem based on its experience of the problems previously solved by the system: 2. it has the capability to incrementally expand its knowledge base of rejection criteria by converting into LISP code information obtained through a query-based interactive session with a human designer; 3. it can select the set of rejection criteria relevant to a design problem from its knowledge base of rejection criteria. These procedures could become a powerful tool for design engineers, especially at the conceptual stage of design.

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