Parasites of Rattus norvegicus trapped in Durban, eThekwini Municipality, South Africa.

Doctoral Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Westville.have acquired as they spread across the globe. This work narrows the gap in our knowledge of endoparasites carried by Rattus norvegicus in the port city of Durban, South Africa. The study was conducted over a one year period to include the wet and dry seasons, and rodents were trapped at 56 sites across four locations: central business district (CBD), harbour (HBR), informal settlements (IS) and urban/peri-urban (UPU) areas. The city’s Vector Control Division conducted the trapping using custom-made live traps. Three hundred and seventy nine R. norvegicus were caught, plus by-catches of 10 R. rattus and 11 Mastomys natalensis. Rodents were humanely euthanased, blood samples drawn, all ectoparasites collected for a parallel study, various body measurements and mass recorded, then they were dissected, their organs removed and faeces collected. Organs were individually processed, parasites removed and preserved in 70% ethanol prior to identification. Faeces were collected in 10% formal saline for parasite egg and cyst identification. Parasites of public health importance recovered from R. norvegicus were: Trypanosoma lewisi (22.8%) from blood; Moniliformis moniliformis (9.5%), Hymenolepis diminuta (17.2%), H. nana (0.8%) and Gongylonema sp. (25.3%) from the small intestine; Calodium hepaticum (2.6%) from the liver and Angiostrongylus cantonensis (15.3%) from the heart and lungs. Serological testing for Toxoplasma gondii yielded a prevalence of 11.2%. Parasite ova mechanically transmitted in the rodents’ faeces, and a potential infection risk for humans, were Ascaris sp. (4.8%), Taenia sp. (0.3%), Schistosoma mansoni (0.3%), Calodium hepaticum (0.8%), Ascaridia galli (0.5%) and Toxocara sp. (0.3%). Xenopsylla cheopis, Polyplax spinulosa, Laelaps lamborni and L. echidnina were investigated as drivers of T. lewisi infection. Rats infected with T. lewisi and X. cheopis were more prevalent at CBD and HBR, and juveniles were most frequently affected. Trypanosome infections were positively associated with fleas, negatively associated with lice, and not associated with mites. Extrinsic and intrinsic interactions between helminths of the gut were examined and location and rat age were found to be the most significant drivers. The helminths were: Gongylonema neoplasticum, Protospirura muricola, Moniliformis moniliformis, Hymenolepis diminuta, H. nana, Nippostrongylus brasiliensis, Strongyloides spp., Heterakis spumosa, and Syphacia muris. Taenia taeniaformis was most prevalent and abundant at IS, in males, and in rats as they aged. Trichosomoides crassicauda was most prevalent and abundant at CBD, HBR and UPU, in males and in rats as they aged (no pups were infected). Common gut protozoans were identified and reported, as were the eggs voided by rats unrelated to their helminth infections. The city centre offers harbourage and abundant food for rats, and suitable habitats for the successful breeding of arthropod vectors of some of these parasites, making it an area of high transmission and a potential public health risk

Identifying Molecular Features Associated with Psychoneurological Symptoms in Women with Breast Cancer Using Multivariate Mixed Models

Breast cancer (BC) is the second most common cancer among women. Research shows many women with BC experience anxiety, depression, and stress (ADS). Epigenetics has recently emerged as a potential mechanism for the development of depression.1 Although there are growing numbers of research studies indicating that epigenetic changes are associated with ADS, there is currently no evidence that this association is present in women with BC. The goal of this study was to identify high-throughput methylation sites (CpG sites) that are associated with three psychoneurological symptoms (ADS) in women with BC. Traditionally, univariate models have been used to examine the relationship between methylation sites and each psychoneurological symptom; nevertheless, ADS can be treated as a cluster of related symptoms and included together in a multivariate linear model. Hence, an overarching goal of this study is to compare and contrast univariate and multivariate models when identifying methylation sites associated with ADS in women with BC. When fitting separate linear regression models for each ADS scale, 3 among 285,173 CpG sites tested were significantly associated with depression. Two significant CpG sites are located on their respective genes FAM101A and FOXJ1, and the third site cannot be mapped to any known gene at this time. In contrast, the multivariate models identified 8,535 ADS-related CpG sites. In conclusion, when analyzing correlated psychoneurological symptom outcomes, multivariate models are more powerful and thus are recommended

Penalized Ordinal Regression Methods for Predicting Stage of Cancer in High-Dimensional Covariate Spaces

The pathological description of the stage of a tumor is an important clinical designation and is considered, like many other forms of biomedical data, an ordinal outcome. Currently, statistical methods for predicting an ordinal outcome using clinical, demographic, and high-dimensional correlated features are lacking. In this paper, we propose a method that fits an ordinal response model to predict an ordinal outcome for high-dimensional covariate spaces. Our method penalizes some covariates (high-throughput genomic features) without penalizing others (such as demographic and/or clinical covariates). We demonstrate the application of our method to predict the stage of breast cancer. In our model, breast cancer subtype is a nonpenalized predictor, and CpG site methylation values from the Illumina Human Methylation 450K assay are penalized predictors. The method has been made available in the ordinalgmifs package in the R programming environment

Reaching Backward and Stretching Forward: Teaching for Transfer in Law School Clinics

In thinking about education, teachers may spend more time considering what to teach than how to teach. Unfortunately, traditional teaching techniques have limited effectiveness in their ability to help students retain and apply the knowledge either in later classes or in their professional work. What, then, is the value of our teaching efforts if students are unable to transfer the ideas and skills they have learned to later situations? Teaching for transfer is important to the authors of this article, four clinical professors and one psychologist. The purpose of this article is to provide an introduction to some of the techniques that can improve the transfer of teaching. While this article focuses on applications in the law clinic, the procedures can be profitably used in doctrinal classes as well. It is the goal of the authors of this article to help you improve your teaching so that your students will understand, remember, and be able to later use what you teach them. While this may appear overly ambitious, we are not selling snake oil. Rather, we are relying on established tenets of psychology and pedagogy that have proved successful in other areas of learning.In the first section, psychologist Shaun Archer will summarize the latest research results on memory and how to best teach so that students can retain and use information. Before transferring information or ideas from a class to a new situation, one must first anchor the concept in the mind. To do this, the student must attach the new information to the existing scaffolding in the student’s memory. Attached to the wrong structure, the new information cannot easily be used in a later application. For example, if you are told that both a successful asylum application and chlorophyll contain five elements, you might be momentarily chagrined since the word “elements” is used in two very different contexts. Your mind must travel down various discrete neural pathways to make correct sense of the use of the word in each phrase. This insight from psychology is the core of teaching for transfer. Tonya Kowalski will then introduce the principles of teaching for transfer, emphasizing “reaching backward” and “stretching forward” techniques. She will then suggest applications of these procedures in clinical teaching. In reaching backward, a student thinks back to past experiences or concepts to find existing mental scaffolding that can be used to bear the weight and provide an accessible resting place for the new material that is being taught. In stretching forward, a student consciously envisions potential future applications of the material being learned. Colleen Shanahan will demonstrate backward-reaching transfer techniques for teaching students skills and knowledge, using the examples of initial client interviews, soliciting facts from witnesses, researching eviction procedures, and developing an effective oral advocacy style. Jim Kelly will provide specific examples of stretching-forward transfer techniques. These range from “hugging,” identifying very similar future applications, such as the business record litany, to “bridging,” preparing students to be able to use new foundational skills or knowledge in complex and extremely varied situations

Reaching Backward and Stretching Forward: Teaching for Transfer in Law School Clinics

In thinking about education, teachers may spend more time considering what to teach than how to teach. Unfortunately, traditional teaching techniques have limited effectiveness in their ability to help students retain and apply the knowledge either in later classes or in their professional work. What, then, is the value of our teaching efforts if students are unable to transfer the ideas and skills they have learned to later situations? Teaching for transfer is important to the authors of this article, four clinical professors and one psychologist. The purpose of this article is to provide an introduction to some of the techniques that can improve the transfer of teaching\u27s lessons. While this article focuses on applications in the law clinic, the procedures can be profitably used in doctrinal classes as well

The Role of the Tight-Turn, Broken Hydrogen Bonding, Glu222 and Arg96 in the Post-translational Green Fluorescent Protein Chromophore Formation

Green fluorescent proteins (GFP) and GFP-like proteins all undergo an autocatalytic post-translational modification to form a centrally located chromophore. Structural analyses of all the GFP and GFP-like proteins in the protein databank were undertaken to determine the role of the tight-turn, broken hydrogen bonding, Gly67, Glu222 and Arg96 in the biosynthesis of the imidazolone group from 65SYG67. The analysis was supplemented by computational generation of the conformation adopted by uncyclized wild-type GFP. The data analysis suggests that Arg96 interacts with the Tyr66 carbonyl, stabilizing the reduced enolate intermediate that is required for cyclization; the carboxylate of Glu222 acts as a base facilitating, through a network of two waters, the abstraction of a hydrogen from the α-carbon of Tyr66; a tight-turn conformation is required for autocatalytic cyclization. This conformation is responsible for a partial reduction in the hydrogen bonding network around the chromophore-forming region of the immature protein

Schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminth infections in schoolchildren in north-eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo

BACKGROUND: There is a paucity of epidemiological data pertaining to schistosomiasis and soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). METHODS: A cross-sectional survey was carried out in the north-eastern part of DRC enrolling 400 schoolchildren aged 9-14 years. Stool and urine samples were subjected to standard diagnostic methods and examined under a microscope for helminth eggs. RESULTS: Four out of five children were infected with at least one helminth species. Schistosoma mansoni was the predominant species (57.8%). Urine examinations were all negative for S. haematobium. CONCLUSIONS: S. mansoni and STH infections are highly endemic in the surveyed part of the DRC, calling for interventions in school-aged children

Epigenetic Alterations and an Increased Frequency of Micronuclei in Women with Fibromyalgia

Fibromyalgia (FM), characterized by chronic widespread pain, fatigue, and cognitive/mood disturbances, leads to reduced workplace productivity and increased healthcare expenses. To determine if acquired epigenetic/genetic changes are associated with FM, we compared the frequency of spontaneously occurring micronuclei (MN) and genome-wide methylation patterns in women with FM () to those seen in comparably aged healthy controls ( (MN); (methylation)). The mean (sd) MN frequency of women with FM (51.4 (21.9)) was significantly higher than that of controls (15.8 (8.5)) (; df = 1; ). Significant differences ( sites) in methylation patterns were observed between cases and controls considering a 5% false discovery rate. The majority of differentially methylated (DM) sites (91%) were attributable to increased values in the women with FM. The DM sites included significant biological clusters involved in neuron differentiation/nervous system development, skeletal/organ system development, and chromatin compaction. Genes associated with DM sites whose function has particular relevance to FM included BDNF, NAT15, HDAC4, PRKCA, RTN1, and PRKG1. Results support the need for future research to further examine the potential role of epigenetic and acquired chromosomal alterations as a possible biological mechanism underlying FM

Monitoring of selected health indicators in children living in a copper mine development area in northwestern Zambia

The epidemiology of malaria, anaemia and malnutrition in children is potentially altered in mining development areas. In a copper extraction project in northwestern Zambia, a health impact assessment (HIA) was commissioned to predict, manage and monitor health impacts. Two cross-sectional surveys were conducted: at baseline prior to project development (2011) and at four years into development (2015). Prevalence of Plasmodium falciparum, anaemia and stunting were assessed in under-five-year-old children, while hookworm infection was assessed in children aged 9-14 years in communities impacted and comparison communities not impacted by the project. P. falciparum prevalence was significantly higher in 2015 compared to 2011 in both impacted and comparison communities (odds ratio (OR) = 2.51 and OR = 6.97, respectively). Stunting was significantly lower in 2015 in impacted communities only (OR = 0.63). Anaemia was slightly lower in 2015 compared to baseline in both impacted and comparison communities. Resettlement due to the project and migration background (i.e., moving into the area within the past five years) were generally associated with better health outcomes in 2015. We conclude that repeated cross-sectional surveys to monitor health in communities impacted by projects should become an integral part of HIA to deepen the understanding of changing patterns of health and support implementation of setting-specific public health measures