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Exosomes as an emerging nanoplatform for functional therapeutics
The release of a division of extracellular entities with 40-100 nm dimension from both tumor and varied mesenchymal stem cells during pathologic conditions is termed as exosomes that are shown to actively participate in chemical signaling events occurring in multicellular organisms infection. Exosomes act as a vehicle for shifting amino acids, lipids, and genetic components that are readily engulfed by far-flanging cells (or adjacent cells) at the site of release for remolding the receptor cell functions once the biological contents get activated. Furthermore, pathogens too display the dispense of exosomes to temper the hosts immune response and trigger the infection rate, making them apt investigation markers for diseases. Additionally, aiding in antigen presentation and immune response stimulation, exosomes are significant in showing contrasting role as initiating anticarcinogenic responses and involving in promoting tumorigenesis as they are released from tumor cells. Due to their site specificity, cell lineage property, and encapsulation of specific constituents, exosomes can be potentially utilized as a precious investigatory and prognostic tool along with a possible carrier of drugs and gene shipment for curative goal. Since exosome groundwork is at the infancy stage, deeper insight is required to know its composition, formation, and targeting mechanism along with its significant role in disease diagnosis and treatment. This states, as mentioned previously, we have tried to focus solely on the functional and clinical implications of exosomes in-depth in this review. 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. -
MoS2, a new perspective beyond graphene
Owing to the fascinating structural, optical, electrical, chemical properties, graphene has created new paradigm in the field of nanoscience and the common crystalline structures that can be exfoliated include the layered van der Waals (vdW) solids such as boron nitride, transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs), black phosphorus, and the layered ionic solids. Here, we bring forth the state-of-art-of materials dominated by their two-dimensional (2D) geometry beyond graphene. Being one of the most well-studied families of vdW layered materials, molybdenum disulphide (MoS2) belonging to TMDC family has gained considerable research interest. The present work is focused on attempts to optimize and characterize this material with unique properties for a host of applications. The work resolves the hydrothermal growth of hexagonal MoS2 nanoflakes with attracting optical and magnetic properties providing strong evidence for the spin orbit split valence bands of these nanostructures. The enhanced electrocatalytic activity, excitation wavelength dependent down-conversion and up-conversion photoluminescence, growth of structural polymorphs using simple hydrothermal method, and the efficient anticancer properties of MoS2 nanostructures providing greater insight into energy and biomedical applications are also discussed. The improved catalytic activity of MoS2-based nanostructures reveals the increasing number of accessible active sites, formation of large surface area and is greatly beneficial for accomplishing a clean, environmental-friendly, inexpensive hydrogen mission for energy storage and conversion applications. The synergistic effect of the MoS2 nanocomposites was able to impede angiogenesis, tumor growth, and epithelial to mesenchymal transition, elucidating the anticancer efficacy. Understanding and exploiting such unique properties of these 2D materials paves new horizons toward novel technological advances in electronic and medical field. 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. -
Experimental investigation of tribocorrosion
This chapter discusses various techniques available for evaluation of tribocorrosion behavior of industrial components, their applications, and limitations. Numerous influential factors of tribocorrosion, their mechanisms, and their characteristics have been discussed at length. Further, a case study of tribocorrosion behavior of aluminum-based in situ metal matrix composites have been deliberated comprehensively. 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. -
Digital Transformation in Higher Education: Impact of Instructor Training on Class Effectiveness During COVID-19
Digital technology is transforming society and business like never before. Digital technology has made inroads into all sections of society, especially with the pandemic restricting interaction and movement in the physical space. Education systems and institutions have witnessed a drastic change in their pedagogy. Education institutions adopting digital technologies can become drivers of growth and development for their ecosystems bringing significant changes in education, engagement, and management of class activities of educational institutions. The education system will have to adapt and evolve to take advantage of the new technologies and tools and develop strategies to play an active role in the digital transformation process. In the wake of the COVID-19 situation, higher education institutions have adopted digital platforms for teaching and learning. The study attempts to understand the instructors/academician/teachers training process adopted by selected higher education institutions in India to facilitate migration to digital platforms. Further, the study analyses the challenges faced in the new normal of education and the levels of training process initiated by institutions for teaching faculty. The authors have tried to analyse how this has enabled instructors to meet the challenges of conducting online classes and increase class effectiveness. The study unfolded the impact of high-level institutional training on class effectiveness and how individual digital preparedness is essential in engaging virtual classrooms. Further, the positive impact of training in reducing anxiety in engaging online sessions and the extent of motivation to continue online teaching as it has become inevitable with the second wave of the pandemic were examined across age and gender. An attempt is made to suggest few strategies for continued effective online class engagement as India battles through the second wave of the pandemic. 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG. -
Digital Financial Inclusion: Strategic Issues and Imperatives
The present paper provides insights on digital financial inclusion. Digital financial inclusion means making financial services accessible through technology intervention, i.e. via internet, mobile network, cards, digital wallets, etc. The objective of digital financial inclusion is to bring underserved and financially excluded population under the formal banking network. As per Global Findex, Financial Inclusion (adults holding bank accounts) in India has increased from 35% in 2011 to 80% in 2017. Indeed, there has been a speedy improvement in the financial inclusion index, wherein the role of Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PJDY) launched by the Government of India in 2014 has been phenomenal. Later, in the year 2016 demonetization further accelerated the process. Despite, all these concentrated efforts and policies a large section of the population still remains unbanked. With the rise in internet and smartphone users, there will be a significant increase in digital transactions in the coming years. To achieve full financial inclusion and to make the desired benefits reach unserved population there is a need to increase financial and digital literacy among masses. The paper starts with a discussion on Evolution of Digital Financial Inclusion (DFI) in India, followed by the benefits of DFI and challenges specific to India. It ends with some suggestions which can increase the pace of DFI in the country. The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2021. -
Social, Medical, and Educational Applications of IoT to Assist Visually Impaired People
General daily tasks have always been a problem for visually impaired people. Identification of daily objects becomes a hectic task. Traditional methods such as a walking stick and a guide dog have been helpful to the visually impaired for basic navigation. Such, methods have a lot of limitations and often fail under varied situations. Technologies such as Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition (CVPR), Image Processing (IP) Internet of Things (IoT), etc. have made a major contribution to overcoming the limitations. IoT brings a lot of technical and automated solutions to assist the visually impaired people. Data science and analytics are a major part of the process. Data accumulated via various sensors can be processed and used to identify obstacles and enhance basic navigation using haptic and voice feedback. Raw data goes through a series of analysis and refinement. This is then processed into a form which is understandable to the system and can be directly interpreted to perform various components of an application. These applications involve education, navigation, entertainment, security, consumer, etc. These applications are across various verticals of technologies differing in terms of hardware, software, and protocols. Various economically feasible and accurate solutions are now available. While, optimization remains an issue. These devices have generally been very helpful to ease the lives of visually impaired people. The main aim of this article is to provide essential details related to real-world applications of IoT in the field of education, healthcare, entertainment, security, navigation, and solutions to address the daily challenges faced by visually impaired people. The structure of the article includes introduction to IoT, applications of IoT in modern era is dealt in detail in Sect.10.1. Followed by hardware device and communication technologies in Sect.10.2. Section10.3 deals with state of art which focus majorly on research contributions related to applications of IoT and smart devices benefiting the lives of visually impaired. Section10.4 incorporates the future scope and concludes with a summary in Sect.10.5. The article covers more than 30 research contributions in the pastten years which includes journal papers, conference papers and patents which provide a detailed and clear view on the research being carried out in the field of IoT to help the visually impaired. 2021, The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. -
Family Caregiving in Dementia in India: Challenges and Emerging Issues
This chapter would provide an overview of the caregiving scenario in India with a focus on families as the mainstay of support and care for people with dementia. The various aspects of caregiving in dementia would be discussed in the light of the Indian sociocultural context. The impact of caregiving and challenges faced by the family and informal caregivers would be described in the light of the changing demographics and urbanization in India. The need for different kinds of caregiver education and training programmes tailored to the domiciliary and socioeconomic status of the family would be discussed. The resources available for family caregivers, like existing programmes for psychoeducation, family self-care, online and other resources for support would be described. We would discuss the challenges faced in developing culturally appropriate interventions for India that can be delivered within existing resources, such as supporting families in their role as caregivers and providing training and support for them. The chapter would discuss the emerging issues in the models of care for low- and middle-income countries like India, where the care is primarily home-based. The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2021. -
Creating a positive school culture through new educational practices
There is an increase in rates of depression and anxiety globally. Schools have moved from a traditional approach of learning and teaching to contemporary forms which includes technology. New revolution has taken place in the world of schooling, with the entry of positive education. Positive education is the application of principles in positive psychology to schooling to enhance the well-being of students and schools. The objective of this review-based chapter is to bring to light the use of various strategies of positive education in classrooms, for middle school students, in order to create a positive learning environment. An evidence-based learning approach is used in this chapter. This chapter address issues and concerns regarding the challenges in applying the strategies of positive education. The main aim of creating a positive school culture in middle school is to enhance the happiness and well-being of students The chapter brings out the need for positive education in the current generation and discusses the implications of the further scope of positive education in India. 2021, IGI Global. -
Terrorism And Regional Cooperation: What is SAARC up to?
South Asia has the distinction of being one of the most affected regions by terrorism and political violence. It is also one of the least integrated regions in the world. Terrorist threats have been diverse, characterised by religious fundamentalism, separatism, left-wing extremism and transnationalism. Interestingly, the countries of the region, under the umbrella of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), possess various regional arrangements to counter terrorism. Yet, the problem of terrorism continues unabated in the region. The principal question is, despite the existence of numerous arrangements, what factors hinder counter-terrorism cooperation among the countries at the regional level?. 2022 selection and editorial matter, Adluri Subramanyam Raju. -
A Spatio-temporal Model for the Analysis and Classification of Soil Using the IoT
The Internet of Things (IoT) is an evolving trend in the field of computer applications where various hardware and software are connected together to address a specific problem. With the help of the IoT, the world has become smart and enabled itself to connect various objects (e.g., cars, computers, mobile phones, and smart appliances) with distinctive Internet protocol addresses, which allows them to interact with one another, thus accomplishing various procedures. Applications of the IoT include but are not restricted to smart cities, healthcare, industry, and robotics. Amongst a huge list of applications furnished by the IoT, agricultural IoT is the theme of this chapter. The IoT in agriculture transforms entities such as crops, soils, and livestock in a smart way by utilizing underlying technologies such as embedded systems, pervasive computing, sensor networks, ubiquitous computing, ad hoc networks, various wireless communication technologies, Internet protocols and other advanced technologies. The research here focuses on the most important agriculture entity soil. It is the soil that determines the yield of a crop. The more fertile the soil, more qualitative is the yield. The main idea behind the research is to identify the soil most suitable for agriculture. Using a spatio-temporal model, the soil samples collected from various parts of the country are classified into agricultural soil and non-agricultural soil. This classification is done by the aid of features such as the pH of the soil, and its humidity, moisture, and temperature collected from IoT sensors. The chapter begins with an introduction to the usage of IoT technology in different areas of agriculture followed by an account of the proposed state-of-the-art model, and its results, analysis, and a conclusion. 2022 selection and editorial matter, Vikram Bali, Vishal Bhatnagar, Deepti Aggarwal, Shivani Bali, and Mario JosDiv; individual chapters, the contributors. -
Active Learning from an Imbalanced Dataset: A Study Conducted on the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Dataset
The proposed chapter deals with psychological data related to depression, anxiety, and stress to study how the classification and analysis is carried out on imbalanced data. The proposed study not only contributes on providing practical information about the balancing techniques such as synthetic minority oversampling technique but also reveals the strategy for dealing with the working of many existing classification algorithms such as the support vector machine, random forest, XGBoost, etc. on the imbalanced dataset. The present use of evaluation metrics that are solely implied for the imbalanced data classification is also illustrated. It was observed that the ordinary model assessment techniques do not precisely quantify model execution when gone up against imbalanced datasets and that the common techniques such as the logistic regression and decision tree have a predisposition toward classes that have many observations. The attributes of the minority class are treated low and are routinely overlooked. Henceforth, there is a high likelihood of misclassification of the minority class when compared to the majority class. A confusion matrix which contains data about the real and predicted class is used as an assessment standard to check the exhibition of grouping calculation. Rather than going for accuracy, F-score and the area under the curve are considered as the measures to evaluate the classification model. 2022 selection and editorial matter, Vishal Jain, Sapna Juneja, Abhinav Juneja, and Ramani Kannan. -
Gut-Skin Axis: Role in Health and Disease
The human microbiome includes microorganisms and their cumulative genetic details that reside in the human body. Skin, the bodys most external organ and exposed to the external environment, is an ecosystem with 1.8 m2 area. It has a varying epidermal thickness, folds, and appendages in different areas including along with varying moisture and temperature level on the skin surface. Microbial colonization on the skin surface starts from the time of birth. The mode of delivery affects the colonization process to a considerable extent. The group of microbes colonizing the skin surface is determined by physical and chemical features of it, which applies to microbes inhabiting the gut and other ecological niches in the body as well. There is several common important characteristics shared commonly by gut and skin, where both are (1) heavily vascularized, (2) richly perfused, (3) densely innervated, (4) integrated to the immune system, (5) highly associated with the endocrine system, (6) extensively colonized with recognizable microbiota, and (7) both helps our body to communicate with its external environment. It has variously been reported that a close and bidirectional association within the gut and skin in maintaining the homeostasis and allostasis of skin and also gastrointestinal (GI) health. Therefore, numerous intestinal pathologies have been linked to skin comorbidities. It has been found that skin is directly impacted by the various circumstances that principally affect the intestine. Similarly, various gastrointestinal disorders could be linked to distinct dermatological entities. In the same context, a growing body of proof proposes an association of intestinal dysbiosis with many regular inflammatory skin pathologies including atopic dermatitis (AD), psoriasis, rosacea, and acne vulgaris. And the realization of this interconnected association between skin and gut has resulted in a new concept of the Gut-Skin Axis. An intimate bidirectional engagement between the gut and the skin has been well established by growing research evidence in this domain. Recent reports have indicated that the administration of specific Lactobacilli strains to mice can significantly alter the overall skin phenotype. Despite increasing research efforts in this domain, a systematic investigation of the Gut-Skin Axis remains ill explored by both gastroenterology as well as dermatology researchers. And in this context, here we are discussing various aspects of the Gut-Skin Axis and its role in the general well-being of individuals. The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022. -
Introduction
In the digital era, signal processing has found application in daily life from medical diagnosis to social networking. The digital domain has evolved as the preferred choice in communication system design due to its advantages over analog systems, such as high-speed transmission, improved quality, and effortless copying with high precision. The advancement of digital media brings new opportunities. The internet boom of this millennium has allowed digital data to move around the world in real time. Efficient segmentation, recognition, and analysis of multidimensional data such as hyperspectral images, medical imaging, data analysis in social media, and audio signals are still challenging issues. Digital data produced through data-processing algorithms has the fundamental advantages of transportability, proficiency, and accuracy of information content; but such data is also at significant risk because perfect illegal replicas can be made in unlimited numbers. 2021 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. -
Biomass- or Biowaste-Derived Carbon Nanoparticles as Promising Materials for Electrochemical Sensing Applications
Modern human lifestyle incorporates the use of sensors to a great extent. Electrochemical sensors are the oldest and most commonly studied type of sensor with a wide commercial usage and numerous possibilities. Porous carbons are an important class of electrode materials and have a number of benefits compared to other materials in terms of sensor fabrications. Biomass pyrolysis and hydrothermal carbonization are important techniques to synthesize cost-effective, cheap, and more environmentally friendly porous carbon nanomaterials with higher electrocatalytic efficiency, selectivity, and sensitivity and better detection limits. The surface area of hierarchical porous architecture along with the graphitic nature of bio-derived carbon materials greatly affects the performance of electrochemical sensors. Numerous techniques are performed to improve the surface properties such as activation, doping, etc., in order to enhance the electrocatalytic behavior of working electrodes. The carbon materials discussed here are promising candidates as an effective alternative to many commercial electrochemical sensors. 2022 WILEY-VCH GmbH, Boschstra 12, 69469 Weinheim, Germany. All rights reserved -
Knowing Human Gaze
Studies have examined the understanding of human gaze in animals. Gaze following in human infants has been successfully demonstrated, showing that infants can follow the eye direction of another though the ability to represent the intentions of gaze behaviour emerges only after the onset of object permanence or a period over eighteen months of age. Comparative studies indicate that gaze following or gazing at humans vary in different species of animals. Wolves for example were observed to look least at human experimenters during a performance task, whereas dogs turned to look more often and monkeys looked to a lesser extent at their experimenters. It is of interest to discuss that gaze following is different from understanding gaze. Dogs have been observed to be successful in gaze following and almost at par with young children. However, the intention of another's gaze is not as clearly understood by dogs as in humans. We (Ittyerah and Gaunet 2009) have shown that the response of dogs to the gaze of their caretakers did not differ between guide dogs of the blind and pet dogs of sighted people. Both groups of dogs seemed to have responded to the head direction of their caretakers during a search task, indicating that the visual status of the caretaker did not affect the dog's understanding of human gaze. Further some breeds of dogs may respond more often to gaze, while larger inter ocular distances in large dogs could facilitate their response to visual cues. Therefore awareness of interactions between breed and physical size could contribute to studying gaze and cognition among dogs. 2012 Nova Science Publishers, Inc. -
Multifaceted Anticancer Potential of Trigonella foenum-graecum
The past decade saw a revolution in the discovery of genetic and epigenetic factors paving way for various types of cancers. With a better understanding of the causes, comes a chance of wider possibility of targeting the root causes of cancer. Nature is a storehouse of natural anticancer molecules, many yet to be explored. Trigonella foenumgraecum (fenugreek) is one such plant, having a huge potential for modulating prophylactic and therapeutic aspects of cancer. Cuisines world over make uses of this legume in multiple ways. This small herb has been found to be loaded with many secondary metabolites like diosgenin, coumarin, trigonelline and so on that reduce inflammation, promote apoptosis, act as antioxidants, regulates cell proliferation, etc., thereby reducing the effects of various hallmarks of cancer. Components of T. foenum-graecum extracts have been found to be effective in alleviating both solid tumours and blood cancers. The milieu of phytochemicals present in T. foenum-graecum has already been shown to have antimicrobial, antioxidant and neuroprotective properties by several studies done in different parts of the world. The current chapter attempts to have a comprehensive look at the potential of various bioactive principles in Trigonella foenum-graecum to be used for the prevention and treatment of cancer. In today's global scenario, where cancer incidences are alarmingly rising, such natural remedies would indeed go a long way in preventing various types of cancer and imparting a better quality of life. 2021 Nova Science Publishers, Inc. -
Conclusion
Digital data produced through data-processing algorithms has fundamental advantages of transportability, proficiency, and accuracy; but on the other hand, the data thus produced brings in several redundancies. To solve this challenging problem with data transmission in network surroundings, research on information security and forensics provides efficient solutions that can shield the privacy, reliability, and accessibility of digital information from malicious intentions. Despite two decades of rigorous research, multicarrier communications still suffer from high complexity and low convergence, which have an immense practical impact. It is also more challenging to ensure proper transmission of multimodal data. Novel techniques have been proposed that can effectively abate these problems and provide good symbol error rate performance. The singularity expansion method provides a superior way to identify targets. This type of method may be useful for addressing contemporary problems faced by radar and antenna researchers. 2021 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. -
Crowdsourcing in Higher Education: Theory and Best Practices
The widespread use of crowdsourcing strategies in higher education institutions improves the performance of students by using collective initiatives to enhance the skills of each student, efficiently optimizes the lecturing process by exchanging and pooling research materials, and also improves the financial situation of alumni by encouraging crowdfunding of tuition. We identify four main areas in this study where the use of crowdsourcing strategies plays an important role in the success of alumni in institutions of higher education. The proposed crowd teaching approach optimizes lecturing, allowing lecture notes to be shared and exchanged according to the various curricula of Higher Education Studies. With crowd learning, students learn by execution on collaborative projects in which different students share (effectively) teaching each other under the guidance of the lecturer, learn the necessary skills to achieve the projects goals and solve the proposed issue. In relation to accessing funding, the tuition fees of students can be financed by crowdsourcing approaches through crowd tuition and even crowdfunding can be used to procure laboratory and classroom content or the learning stays of students abroad. Using this crowdsourcing tool, students can find assistance in paying university taxes and also have an interest in further learning with other students. The application of crowdsourcing to education allows for optimization of the institutions budget and a more effective use of learning time, leading eventually to better outcomes for students. 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG. -
Transforming Financial Sector Through Financial Literacy and Fintech Revolution
The current research focuses on the financial literacy among the women, youth and impact of fin-tech on the socioeconomic well-being of the economy. The researcher has incorporated extensive data mining on financial well-being and assesses the financial literacy along with attitude and behavior for financial knowledge mainly focusing on youth and usage of AI in financial services. It has been observed during research that the benefits of the technology are limited only to the urban areas, but the rural places are not much benefited and therefore more focus is needed for the financial technology to get amalgamated with rural lifestyle for convenience and transparency of financial transactions. This research paper contributes to the awareness of financial literacy and importance of financial reliance for the youth of today through knowledge sharing. The research also highlights the importance of government involvement in financial literacy and creating awareness at a global level for well-being of youth and women. Financial literacy can also improve the rate of entrepreneurs growth and financial decisions. Financial knowledge and fin-tech services can help in better financial decisions and saving culture for self-reliant youth. The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2021. -
Healthy healthcare systems in India: A prognosis
India has been an emerging economy which has retained its second position in the global healthcare market that has been tackling its economic gaps, shifting demographics, thereby, facing a wide gap between the demand and supply of healthcare products and services due to technology and increasing cost. Affordable treatment facilities for the economically low strata is still a dream. The government scheme of "Swachh Bharat Abhiyan" and "Ayushman Bharat Yojna" are the steps to uplift the backward community and make all the facilities available to them at the lowest possible cost directly and indirectly. Hence, the objective of this research was to unfold the three pillars of Healthy Healthcare which revolves around healthcare systems in India, Healthcare Employees' wellbeing and resultant patient outcomes. This research also tried studying various interventions that can be taken to improve the present scenario of affordable and quality service to the needy people. Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020.