Impact Analysis of Higher Education Research Trajectory on Governance and Public Policy: A Case Study of Four Federal Universities of Pakistan

The research situates link between the graduate researches in four academic institutes of Islamabad and analyzes its impact on the public policy. The study explores the relevance of graduate research trajectory followed by various academic departments of four major federal universities in Pakistan in formulation and execution of public policy. The author collected last five years graduate level dissertation titles from four federal universities and classified them by using thematic approach. An interview guide/questionnaire is prepared accordingly. Chairpersons, deans, professors, bureaucrats, and parliamentarians were approached for semi-structured, in-depth interviews. This is a qualitative study using thematic and analytical approach. The research finds a lack of cohesion between the graduate research trajectory and policy needs of the public institutions. The absence of a national research vision and collaborative framework, difference in training cultures of bureaucracy and academia, lack of logistic support system, defective learning strategies, and an overall neglect for social sciences are the major reasons for incoherence. The analytical correlation of the recorded opinions reveals opportunities to maximize the relevance of the academic research in public policy domain

Prevalence of Bacterial Pathogens Causing Nosocomial Infections With Reference to Identification of Resistant Genes Drug Designing

One of the most common places for the development and spread of bacterial resistance are hospitals. These bacteria are present on the inanimate objects and therefore can be a possible cause of cross infections. This cross infection can rise the disease and death rates, which results in increasing costs of healthcare, prolonged hospital stays and requires further expensive medications. Therefore, the current study was aimed at determining the prevalence of these resistant bacteria, their antibiogram pattern, presence of resistant gene(s) and molecular docking studies. In our study the most common bacteria among Gram-positive was Staphylococcus aureus (81%) while in Gram-negative Citro bacter (25%) showed the highest growth followed by Pseudomonas aeruginosa (23%), Provedencia spp (16%), Proteus spp and E.coli (10%), Klebsiella spp (6%), Shigella and Serratia spp (4%) and Salmonella spp (2%). The most potent antibiotic against S. aureus and Citrobacter was Vancomycin (80% sensitive) and Amikacin (63.04%), respectively. The β-lactamase TEM and Metallo- β-lactamase NDM were most common among the Extended-β-lactamase (ESBLs) and Metalo-β-lactamase (MBLs) genes. For β-lactamase TEM, Metallo-β-lactamase and other β-lactamase proteins, numerous classes of inhibitors have been reported in the literature. These proteins revealed to be involved in providing resistance to certain antibiotics, thus, the inhibition of these proteins is vital for achieving the optimum treatment. In the current work, In-silico methods were used for the discovery of novel and potent inhibitors for these proteins. On the basis of ligands attached in the three-dimensional proteins structures, Complex-based pharmacophore models were generated for screening the drug like ZINC database. Before screening, the generated pharmacophore models were validated on a test database of active and non-active compounds. From the result Abstract xxvi | P a g e of virtual-screening, 571 structurally varied compounds from Ethyl Boronic Acid, 866 from L-Captopril and 1020 from Nacubactam were saved. The initial retrieved hits were selected for cleaning via Lipinski’s rule of five to calculate the drug-like properties. The compounds which attained the standards of drug-like properties were additionally evaluated by the docking simulations. Final concluding 30 compounds (10 for each of the selected protein) producing varied structure and the modes of binding in the active pocket of the designated proteins were concluded as new and important inhibitors. Each identified inhibitor has diverse frameworks and possibility of novel and probable inhibitors for β-lactamase TEM, Metallo-β-lactamase and β lactamase.