Beta vulgaris L. (Beetroot) is a nutrient-dense root vegetable known for its extensive health benefits, owing to its abundance of phytochemicals and bioactive compounds with well-documented medicinal properties. Beetroot belongs to the Chenopodiaceae family and is recognized for its rich content of betalains, saponins, alkaloids, phenolic acids, and steroids/triterpenes. Beetroot grows relatively well in various climatic zones, and its availability is also extensive. Furthermore, its phytochemical-rich profile makes it an ideal choice for developing functional foods. Besides the well-researched antioxidant properties, it has recently been reported to exhibit anti-cancerous, antiviral, anti-inflammatory, and anti-hypertensive activities. Although the fresh consumption of this root vegetable is limited due to its earthy taste, growing awareness of the health-promoting roles of phytochemicals has led to an increase in its intake in fresh form and the development of various value-added, novel food products, such as beetroot chips, ice cream, and yogurt. Beetroot processing generates substantial waste in the form of pomace and skin, which contain significant amounts of bioactive compounds that may degrade rapidly during processing. Despite its potent functional properties, this tuberous vegetable continues to strive for commercial recognition in both fresh and processed forms. This review highlights the bioactive, nutritional, and potential functional properties of beetroot. It further explores opportunities for value addition, waste valorization, and genetic improvement to enhance quality and consumer acceptance. Finally, it discusses key challenges and future directions for the scientific community in utilizing this high-value crop for the development of novel products.
In this article, an efficient class of product-type compromised methods of imputation has been considered, and their corresponding resultant point estimators have been suggested for missing data in survey sampling. This study gives a first-of-its-kind compromised imputation framework, offering improved efficiency over existing imputation methods. The bias and mean square error expressions for the suggested estimators have been developed. These estimators are more efficient than the mean method of imputation, Singh and Deo (2003) method of imputation, Shakti (2018) method of imputation, Prasad and Yadav (2023) methods of imputation, and adapted estimators for the method of imputation (Pandey and Dubey (1988), Bahl and Tuteja (1991), Upadhyaya and Singh (1999), Singh (2003), and Singh et al. (2004)). The numerical illustration and simulation studies illustrate that the proposed estimators are more efficient estimators than the existing estimators in this article.
Spinocerebellar ataxia type 43 (SCA43) is a rare autosomal dominant ataxia caused by pathogenic variants in the MME gene and typically presents with late-onset gait ataxia and sensory neuropathy. Hyperkinetic movement disorders are uncommon, and prominent craniofacial orobuccolingual dystonia-dominant presentations have not been documented. We report a 63-year-old woman who developed progressive orobuccolingual dystonia and stereotypical choreiform movements of the right hand several years before the onset of gait ataxia. These involuntary movements significantly interfered with feeding and speech and were initially isolated, creating diagnostic uncertainty. Examination revealed prominent craniofacial dyskinesias, postural tremor, gait ataxia, and distal lower limbs vibration loss with otherwise normal sensory modalities. MRI showed chronic small-vessel changes without cerebellar atrophy, and nerve conduction studies were normal. Whole-exome sequencing identified a heterozygous MME exon 21 variant (NM_000902.4:c.2067C > A; p.Asn689Lys), classified as a variant of uncertain significance, which segregated with disease in two affected sisters and was present in a minimally symptomatic son with a long-standing mild head tremor, supporting autosomal dominant inheritance. The phenotype was notable for the temporal dissociation between involuntary movements and cerebellar signs, normal electrophysiology despite sensory impairment, and the absence of cerebellar atrophy on imaging. This case expands the clinical spectrum of SCA43 by demonstrating that a hyperkinetic movement disorder phenotype, including tremor, choreiform movements, and craniofacial dystonia, may precede overt cerebellar dysfunction by several years. Recognition of such atypical manifestations is essential to avoid misdiagnosis and to prompt timely genetic evaluation in patients presenting with mixed or unexplained movement disorders, particularly in the presence of a supportive family history.
To harness the power of Language Models in answering domain specific specialized technical questions, Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) is been used widely. In this work, we have developed a Q&A application inspired by the Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG), which is comprised of an in-house database indexed on the arXiv articles related to the Electron-Ion Collider (EIC) experiment - one of the largest international scientific collaboration and incorporated an open-source LLaMA model for answer generation. This is an extension to it's proceeding application built on proprietary model and Cloud-hosted external knowledge-base for the EIC experiment. This locally-deployed RAG-system offers a cost-effective, resource-constraint alternative solution to build a RAG-assisted Q&A application on answering domain-specific queries in the field of experimental nuclear physics. This set-up facilitates data-privacy, avoids sending any pre-publication scientific data and information to public domain. Future improvement will expand the knowledge base to encompass heterogeneous EIC-related publications and reports and upgrade the application pipeline orchestration to the LangGraph framework.
In this study, we explore a strategy to enhance the thermoelectric (TE) performance of materials by constructing Janus-embedded superlattices (SLs), where the incorporation of Janus layers at the internal interfaces and van der Waals (vdW) interactions collectively modulate electronic and phonon transport properties. Using first-principles density functional theory (DFT) and Boltzmann transport theory, we investigate three SL configurations-HfSe2/HfSSe/HfTe2, HfSe2/HfSTe/HfTe2, and HfSe2/HfSeTe/HfTe2-designed by embedding a Janus MXY (M = Hf; X/Y = S, Se, and Te) monolayer between conventional HfSe2 and HfTe2 layers. The asymmetric Janus interface induces significant modifications in electronic structure and phonon dynamics, including strong band convergence, phonon bunching, and ZO mode softening, which collectively enhance TE transport. Among the three systems, HfSTe exhibits the most favourable properties, highest Seebeck coefficient (2438 µV K-1), strong phonon scattering, and ultralow lattice thermal conductivity (0.65 W m-1 K-1) leading to a peak ZT of ∼2.94 for p-type and ∼0.95 for n-type at 700 K. The corresponding energy conversion efficiency reaches 17.3% for p-type carriers. Interestingly, for n-type, HfSeTe achieves the highest ZT value (∼1.62), primarily attributed to its superior electrical conductivity. Our results reveal that interface engineering through Janus embedding and vdW interaction is a robust strategy for optimizing the thermoelectric performance of TMD-based layered materials.
