No abstract

Toxicity of five essential oils (EOs), viz. cardamom, cinnamon, clove, eucalyptus and neem oils were investigated against the cowpea weevil, Callosobruchus maculatus (Fab.) adults, through contact and fumigation bioassay. In the contact bioassay eucalyptus oil was found to be the most effective in inducing mortality both after 24 and 48 h of treatments. The toxicity of the oils followed in the order: eucalyptus > clove > cinnamon > cardamom > neem. In the fumigation bioassay, however, a reverse result was obtained with eucalyptus oil where it shows the last position for 24 h and fourth position for 48 h after treatments. The efficacy in respect of the toxicity followed in the order: clove > cinnamon > cardamom > neem > eucalyptus after 24 h after treatment, and clove > cinnamon > cardamom > eucalyptus > neem after 48 h after treatments.

Bladder exstrophy epispadias complex (BEEC) is a severe congenital anomaly; however, the genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying the formation of BEEC remain unclear. TP63, a member of TP53 tumor suppressor gene family, is expressed in bladder urothelium and skin over the external genitalia during mammalian development. It plays a role in bladder development. We have previously shown that p63−/− mouse embryos developed a bladder exstrophy phenotype identical to human BEEC. We hypothesised that TP63 is involved in human BEEC pathogenesis. RNA was extracted from BEEC foreskin specimens and, as in mice, ΔNp63 was the predominant p63 isoform. ΔNp63 expression in the foreskin and bladder epithelium of BEEC patients was reduced. DNA was sequenced from 163 BEEC patients and 285 ethnicity-matched controls. No exon mutations were detected. Sequencing of the ΔNp63 promoter showed 7 single nucleotide polymorphisms and 4 insertion/deletion (indel) polymorphisms. Indel polymorphisms were associated with an increased risk of BEEC. Significantly the sites of indel polymorphisms differed between Caucasian and non-Caucasian populations. A 12-base-pair deletion was associated with an increased risk with only Caucasian patients (p = 0.0052 Odds Ratio (OR) = 18.33), whereas a 4-base-pair insertion was only associated with non-Caucasian patients (p = 0.0259 OR = 4.583). We found a consistent and statistically significant reduction in transcriptional efficiencies of the promoter sequences containing indel polymorphisms in luciferase assays. These findings suggest that indel polymorphisms of the ΔNp63 promoter lead to a reduction in p63 expression, which could lead to BEEC.