Acute disseminated cryptococcosis in lupus nephritis: report of a fatal case

We report a clinical case of systemic lupus erythematosus with fatal infection from Cryptococcus neoformans. The patient had a rapidly progressive renal failure due to lupus nephritis. She was severely immunodepressed especially by the disease, and secondarily by immunosuppressive therapy. She had more probabilities to be exposed to fungal infections because she lived in a rural area. This report enhances an interesting discussion about the utility of employing antifungal drugs in immunodepressed patients submitted to empirical antibiotic treatment because of fever of unknown aetiology

Easy Surface Functionalization and Bioconjugation of Peptides as Capture Agents of a Microfluidic Biosensing Platform for Multiplex Assay in Serum

The development of assays for protein biomarkers in complex matrices is a demanding task that still needs implementation of new approaches. Antibodies as capture agents have been largely used in bioassays but their low stability, low-efficiency production, and cross-reactivity in multiplex approaches impairs their larger applications. Instead, synthetic peptides, even with higher stability and easily adapted amino acid sequences, still remain largely unexplored in this field. Here, we provide a proof-of-concept of a microfluidic device for direct detection of biomarker overexpression. The multichannel microfluidic polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) device was first derivatized with PAA (poly(acrylic acid)) solution. CRP-1, VEGF-114, and φG6 peptides were preliminarily tested to respectively bind the biomarkers, C-reactive protein (CRP), vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), and tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-α). Each PDMS microchannel was then respectively bioconjugated with a specific peptide (CRP-1, VEGF-114, or φG6) to specifically capture CRP, VEGF, and TNF-α. With such microdevices, a fluorescence bioassay has been set up with sensitivity in the nanomolar range, both in buffered solution and in human serum. The proposed multiplex assay worked with a low amount of sample (25 μL) and detected biomarker overexpression (above nM concentration), representing a noninvasive and inexpensive screening platform