Thursday 10 August 2017

Multi-Scale Blood Vessel Detection and Segmentation in Breast MRIs


An algorithm is proposed to perform segmentation of blood vessels in 3D breast MRIs. The blood vessels play an essential role as an additional tool to detect tumors. Radiologists use a maximum-intensity projection for the exposure of vasculature. The breast is a challenging organ in detecting vascular structures, because of noise bias and presence of fat tissues. There are several existing algorithms for the detection of blood vessels in MRI images, but these usually prove insufficient when it comes to the breast.

blood vessels peer reviewed articles
Our algorithm provides a three-dimensional model of the blood vessels by utilizing texture enhancement followed by Hessian-based methods. In addition to this, we tackled blood vessel completion by employing center line tracking, where the seeds are the end points of detached blood vessels found through skeletonizing. The results were compared to the manually segmented golden models defined by radiologists in 24 different patients, which yielded an 86% Sensitivity to the ground truth and 88.3% specificity. It appears that with the application of mass detection as the last step, our algorithm provides a helpful tool for tumour enhancement and automated detection of breast cancer.

Monday 7 August 2017

Computational Drug Design and Molecular Dynamic Studies-A Review


Drug designing and molecular dynamic studies were an intense, lengthy and an interdisciplinary venture. At present, a new approach towards the use of computational chemistry and molecular modeling for in-silico drug design. Computational in-silico drug design skills are used in bioinformatics, computational biology and molecular biology.

drug design impact factor
Drug designing using in-silico methods is cost effective in research and development of drugs. Currently, a vast number of software’s used in drug design. In-silico drug designing and molecular dynamic studies can be performed by using different methods namely homology modeling, molecular dynamic studies, energy minimization, docking and QSAR etc. By using in-silico drug designing we can produce an active lead molecule from the preclinical discovery stage to late stage clinical development. The lead molecules which are developed will help us in selection of only potent leads to cure particular diseases. Therefore in-silico methods have been of great importance in target identification and in prediction of novel drugs.

Wednesday 2 August 2017

Multi-Scale Blood Vessel Detection and Segmentation in Breast MRIs


heart and blood vessels journal
An algorithm is proposed to perform segmentation of blood vessels in 3D breast MRIs. The blood vessels play an essential role as an additional tool to detect tumors. Radiologists use a maximum-intensity projection for the exposure of vasculature. The breast is a challenging organ in detecting vascular structures, because of noise bias and presence of fat tissues. There are several existing algorithms for the detection of blood vessels in MRI images, but these usually prove insufficient when it comes to the breast. Our algorithm provides a three-dimensional model of the blood vessels by utilizing texture enhancement followed by Hessian-based methods. In addition to this, we tackled blood vessel completion by employing centerline tracking, where the seeds are the endpoints of detached blood vessels found through skeletonizing.


Tuesday 1 August 2017

Decision Tree Eliminates the Computational Complexities of Big Data Processing


Hadoop is one of the reputed general purpose computing platforms used to process big data. Mapreduce is the Hadoop project’s main processing engine that provides a framework for distributed computing. This is generated from the combination of ‘Map’ and Reduce concepts in the functional programming. This functional programming model hides the entire complexities related to distributive computing nodes, so that the developer can focus on the implementation of the Map and Reduce functions.

computing peer reviewed journals
Decision Tree is one of the most efficient ways of classification and decision making. Decision tree consist of root node and decision nodes and the data related to a training module for example can be divided based on the measurable, functional attribute. The entire data thus can be divided into number of partitions based on the attributes fixed. If the samples within a partition belong to a single class, then the algorithm gets terminated automatically. Otherwise the division process continues until it eliminates all the non-identical samples. The samples that don’t fit into the attributed partitions are labeled as unknown category.

Wednesday 26 July 2017

Selenoergothionein as a Potential Inhibitor against Amyloid β-Protein (Aβ): Docking and Molecular Dynamics Studies


Alzheimer‘s disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder, encircling the deterioration of cognitive functions and behavioral changes, characterized by the aggregation of amyloid β-protein (Aβ) into fibrillar amyloid plaques in elected areas of the brain with the lipid-carrier protein apolipoprotein E (apoE), the microtubule associated protein tau, and the presynaptic protein α-synuclein. High levels of fibrillary Aβ, the main constituent of senile plaques, are deposited in the AD brain that outcome in the thrashing of synapses, neurons and destruction of neuronal role.

molecular docking journals
Aβ is derived from the amyloid precursor protein through sequential protein cleavage by aspartyl protease, β-secretase and presenilin-dependent β-secretase triggering a spill of events such as oxidative damage, neurotoxicity, and inflammation that contributes to the progression of AD. Therefore the Aβ protein may be a target for anti-Alzheimer drugs. Aβ protein was retrieved from the Protein data bank and energy minimized and subjected to molecular dynamic simulations using NAMD 2.9 software with CHARMM27 force field in water.

Monday 24 July 2017

Neuroprotective Effects of Pine Bark and Aloe vera on the Locomotor Activity in Focal Cerebral Ischemia: Possible Antioxidant Mechanisms


biomedical engineering impact factor
Stroke is one of the principal causes of death and disability worldwide. Cerebral ischemia is the result of insufficient cerebral blood flow for cerebral metabolic functions. Oxidative stress and inflammation have an important role in cerebral infarction which mediated by ischemia and reperfusion. Reperfusion injury stimulates many pathological mechanisms such as leukocyte infiltration, oxidative stress, inflammation, destruction of blood-brain barrier, platelet activation, nitric oxide release, and apoptosis. Consequently, potent anti-inflammatory and antioxidant mediators may be beneficial in the treatment of cerebral ischemia and reperfusion injury. The lack of effective and widely applicable pharmacological treatments for ischemic stroke patients may explain a growing interest in the traditional medicines.

Wednesday 19 July 2017

Aloe Vera and Pine Bark as Alternative Traditional Medicine to Heal Ischemia


cerebral cortex impact factor
Ischemia is a condition that happens as a result of insufficient cerebral blood flow, necessary for the brain to conduct the cerebral metabolic functions. Ischemia and reperfusion also lead to Oxidative stress and the inflammation. Reperfusion injury ignites certain pathological mechanisms, including leukocyte infiltration, destruction of blood-brain barrier, platelet activation, nitric oxide release, and apoptosis. Absence of widely applicable treatment procedures compel people to adapt to traditional or alternative medicines. Pine bark extracts that is known for rich flavonoids can act as a natural antioxidant and free radical scavenger. Aloe Vera, known for its curative and therapeutic properties for centuries possess antibacterial, antifungal and antiviral qualities can be effectively used as cure for ischemia.  Topical and oral uses of Aloe vera gel are also effective in addressing this issue.