THE ECOLOGY AND BEHAVIOR OF THE LONG BILLED CURLEW (NUMENIUS AMERICANUS) IN SOUTHEASTERN WASHINGTON

The primary objective of this study was to examine in depth the nesting ecology and behavior of the Long-billed Curlew on a breeding area relatively free of disruptive human activity. Two surruners of field work were devoted to that end; a post-breeding season survey in 1976 of the major National Wildlife Refuges in Washington, Southern Idaho, Utah, Nevada California, and Oregon enlarged the scope by including unpublished records of Long-billed Curlews in these areas

Composite materials for innovative urban farming of alternative food sources (macroalgae and crickets)

Facing an inexorable growth of the human population along with substantial environmental changes, the assurance of food security is a major challenge of the present century. To ensure responsible food consumption and production (SDG 12), new approaches in the food system are required. Thus, environmentally controlled, sustainable production of alternative food sources are of key interest for both urban agriculture and food research. To face the current challenge of integrating food production systems within existing structures, multidisciplinary discourses are required. Here, we bring together novel technologies and indoor farming techniques with the aim of supporting the development of sustainable food production systems. For this purpose, we investigated the feasibility of 10 composite materials for their innovative use as structural support in macroalgal cultivation (settlement substrates) and cricket rearing (housing). Considering material resistance, rigidity, and direct material-organism interactions, the bio-based composite polylactic acid (PLA) was identified as a suitable material for joint farming. For macroalgae cultivation, PLA sustained the corrosive cultivation conditions and provided a suitable substrate without affecting the macroalgal physiology or nutritional composition (carotenoids and chlorophylls). For cricket rearing, PLA provided a suitable and recyclable shelter, which was quickly accepted by the animals without any observed harm. In contrast, other common composite components like phenolic resin or aramid were found to be unsuitable due to being harmful for the cultivated organisms or instable toward the applied sterilization procedure. This multidisciplinary study not only provides profound insights in the developing field of urban indoor food production from a new perspective, but also bridges material science and farming approaches to develop new sustainable and resilient food production systems

Systemic Effects by Intrathecal Administration of Triamcinolone Acetonide in Patients With Multiple Sclerosis

In patients suffering from multiple sclerosis (MS), intrathecal injection of triamcinolone acetonide (TCA) has been shown to improve symptoms of spasticity. Although repeated intrathecal injection of TCA has been used in a number of studies in late-stage MS patients with spinal cord involvement, no clinical-chemical data are available on the distribution of TCA in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) or serum. Moreover, the effects of intrathecal TCA administration on the concentrations of endogenous steroids remain poorly understood. Therefore, we have quantified TCA and selected endogenous steroids in CSF and serum of TCA-treated MS patients suffering from spasticity. Concentrations of steroids were quantified by LC-MS, ELISA, or ECLIA and compared with the blood-brain barrier status, diagnosed with the Reibergram. The concentration of TCA in CSF significantly increased during each treatment cycle up to >5 mu g/ml both in male and female patients (p30 ng/ml (p< 0.001) and severely depressed serum levels of cortisol and corticosterone (p< 0.001). In addition, concentrations of circulating estrogen were significantly suppressed (p< 0.001). Due to the potent suppressive effects of TCA on steroid hormone concentrations both in the brain and in the periphery, we recommend careful surveillance of adrenal function following repeated intrathecal TCA injections in MS patients

Global seasonal influenza mortality estimates:a comparison of three different approaches

Prior to updating global influenza-associated mortality estimates, the World Health Organization convened a consultation in July 2017 to understand differences in methodology and implications for results of 3 influenza mortality projects from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Netherlands Institute for Health Service Research’s Global Pandemic Mortality Project II (GLaMOR), and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME). The expert panel reviewed estimates and discussed differences in data sources, analysis, and modeling assumptions. We performed a comparison analysis of the estimates. Influenza-associated respiratory death counts were comparable between CDC and GLaMOR; the IHME estimate was considerably lower. The greatest country-specific influenza-associated fold differences in mortality rate between CDC and IHME estimates and between GLaMOR and IHME estimates were among countries in Southeast Asia and the Eastern Mediterranean region. The data envelope used for the calculation was one of the major differences (CDC and GLaMOR: all respiratory deaths; IHME: lower-respiratory infection deaths). With the assumption that there is only one cause of death for each death, IHME estimates a fraction of the full influenza-associated respiratory mortality that is measured by the other 2 groups. Wide variability of parameters was observed. Continued coordination between groups could assist with better understanding of methodological differences and new approaches to estimating influenza deaths globally

Towards recombinantly produced milk proteins: Physicochemical and emulsifying properties of engineered whey protein beta-lactoglobulin variants

DFG, 273937032, SPP 1934: Dispersitäts-, Struktur- und Phasenänderungen von Proteinen und biologischen Agglomeraten in biotechnologischen ProzessenBMBF, 031B0222, Basistechnologie Nachwuchsgruppe "Multiskalige Modellierung und Modifikation von Multienzymkomplexen als Basistechnologie für zellfreie Reaktionskaskaden" (II

Revision of clinical case definitions: influenza-like illness and severe acute respiratory infection

Abstract in English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, SpanishThe formulation of accurate clinical case definitions is an integral part of an effective process of public health surveillance. Although such definitions should, ideally, be based on a standardized and fixed collection of defining criteria, they often require revision to reflect new knowledge of the condition involved and improvements in diagnostic testing. Optimal case definitions also need to have a balance of sensitivity and specificity that reflects their intended use. After the 2009-2010 H1N1 influenza pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) initiated a technical consultation on global influenza surveillance. This prompted improvements in the sensitivity and specificity of the case definition for influenza - i.e. a respiratory disease that lacks uniquely defining symptomology. The revision process not only modified the definition of influenza-like illness, to include a simplified list of the criteria shown to be most predictive of influenza infection, but also clarified the language used for the definition, to enhance interpretability. To capture severe cases of influenza that required hospitalization, a new case definition was also developed for severe acute respiratory infection in all age groups. The new definitions have been found to capture more cases without compromising specificity. Despite the challenge still posed in the clinical separation of influenza from other respiratory infections, the global use of the new WHO case definitions should help determine global trends in the characteristics and transmission of influenza viruses and the associated disease burden.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Coordinating the real‐time use of global influenza activity data for better public health planning

Health planners from global to local levels must anticipate year‐to‐year and week‐to‐week variation in seasonal influenza activity when planning for and responding to epidemics to mitigate their impact. To help with this, countries routinely collect incidence of mild and severe respiratory illness and virologic data on circulating subtypes and use these data for situational awareness, burden of disease estimates and severity assessments. Advanced analytics and modelling are increasingly used to aid planning and response activities by describing key features of influenza activity for a given location and generating forecasts that can be translated to useful actions such as enhanced risk communications, and informing clinical supply chains. Here, we describe the formation of the Influenza Incidence Analytics Group (IIAG), a coordinated global effort to apply advanced analytics and modelling to public influenza data, both epidemiological and virologic, in real‐time and thus provide additional insights to countries who provide routine surveillance data to WHO. Our objectives are to systematically increase the value of data to health planners by applying advanced analytics and forecasting and for results to be immediately reproducible and deployable using an open repository of data and code. We expect the resources we develop and the associated community to provide an attractive option for the open analysis of key epidemiological data during seasonal epidemics and the early stages of an influenza pandemic

A call for standardised age-disaggregated health data.

The 2030 Sustainable Development Goals agenda calls for health data to be disaggregated by age. However, age groupings used to record and report health data vary greatly, hindering the harmonisation, comparability, and usefulness of these data, within and across countries. This variability has become especially evident during the COVID-19 pandemic, when there was an urgent need for rapid cross-country analyses of epidemiological patterns by age to direct public health action, but such analyses were limited by the lack of standard age categories. In this Personal View, we propose a recommended set of age groupings to address this issue. These groupings are informed by age-specific patterns of morbidity, mortality, and health risks, and by opportunities for prevention and disease intervention. We recommend age groupings of 5 years for all health data, except for those younger than 5 years, during which time there are rapid biological and physiological changes that justify a finer disaggregation. Although the focus of this Personal View is on the standardisation of the analysis and display of age groups, we also outline the challenges faced in collecting data on exact age, especially for health facilities and surveillance data. The proposed age disaggregation should facilitate targeted, age-specific policies and actions for health care and disease management

Von Digital-Rights-Management zu Content Identification

Das Werk zieht Bilanz über die bisherigen (Miss-)Erfolge des Einsatzes von Digital-Rights-Management-Systemen bei der Online-Vermarktung von urheberrechtlich geschützten Multimediawerken. Weiterhin wird ein neuer Ansatz zum Schutz solcher Werke im Web 2.0 in Form von Filtertechnologien, die digitalisierte geschützte Inhalte identifizieren können, vorgestellt. In rechtlicher Hinsicht wird geprüft, wie sich der Einsatz solcher Technologien durch Betreiber von Social-Media-Diensten auf deren urheberrechtliche Haftung auswirkt, vor allem im Hinblick auf die Haftungsbeschränkungen nach dem TMG und nach dem US-amerikanischen Digital Millennium Copyright Act, die einer rechtsvergleichenden Analyse unterzogen werden

Prevalence of Vancomycin resistance-genes and persistence in healthy adults

0\. Titelblatt und Inhaltsverzeichnis 1\. Einleitung 5 2\. Fragestellung 15 3\. Material und Methoden 16 4\. Ergebnisse 39 5\. Diskussion 48 6\. Zusammenfassung 65 7\. Literaturverzeichnis 68 8\. Liste der verwendeten Abkürzungen 82 9\. Danksagung 83Hintergrund Unter den Enterokokken weist der Enterococcus (E.) faecium am häufigsten eine erworbene Vancomycinresistenz auf. Vancomycin resistente Enterokokken (VRE) werden zunehmend als Erreger nosokomialer Infektionen nachgewiesen. Fragestellung Wie häufig tritt der genotypische Nachweis von Vancomycin-resistenten E. faecium bei Gesunden auf, insbesondere wie häufig findet man die genetische Resistenz bei phänotypisch sensiblen Isolaten? Wie lange persistieren E. faecium-Stämme bei gesunden Probanden? Material und Methoden Die Probensammlung waren für eine Studie zur Untersuchung der Inzidenz von VRE bei Gesunden angelegt worden. Dafür waren zwischen August 1996 und Februar 1997 monatliche Rektalabstriche von gesunden Erwachsenen durchgeführt worden. Die Differenzierung erfolgte auf Enterococcosel-Agar ohne und mit Zusatz von Vancomycin. Eine Speziesdifferenzierung (E. Faecium/E. Faecais) erfolgte und eine phänotypische Resistenzbestimmung. Pro Proband und Monat wurden 3-5 Enterokokken-Isolate aufbewart. Einschlusskriterien für diese Arbeit waren: 1.) Proben von Probanden, mit monatlichem Enterokokken Nachweis. 2.) Alle Isolate dieser Probanden, die als E. faecium oder andere Enterokokken identifiziert worden waren. Die Spezies- und Resistenzgen-Bestimmung wurde mit der Polymerase-Ketten-Reaktion (PCR) durchgeführt. Genotypisch identifizierten E. faecium Isolate wurden mit Hilfe der Zufalls-PCR (M13 und Eric1/AP4) typisiert und verglichen. Die Auswertung der Stämme erfolgte mit Hilfe des Clusteranalyse-Programms GelCompare©. Ergebnisse 794 Isolate von 69 Probanden erfüllten die Einschlusskriterien. Die genotypische Spezies- und Resistenzgen- Bestimmung identifizierte 379 E. faecium (bei 59 Probanden), davon 109 (bei 23 Probanden) mit vanA-Resistenzgen. Unter den übrigen Isolaten wurden 38 E. gallinarum (bei 22 Probanden), 119 E. casseliflavus/E. flavescens (bei 65 Probanden) identifiziert. Alle genotypisch resistenten (vanA-Gen tragende) E. faecium waren auch phänotypisch resistent (Fünf erst in der Wiederholugnsuntersuchung). Wir typisierten die 379 genotypischen E. faecium (von 59 Probanden) und identifizierten 207 Stämme. 49 dieser Stämme trugen ein vanA-Gen (109 Isolate, 23 Probanden). Bei acht war das vanA-Gen nicht immer vorhanden. Bei 42 Probanden wurde E. faecium in mehr als einem Monat nachgewiesen, bei neun wurden genetisch identische Stämme (zehn Stämme) in verschiedenen Monaten (Persitenz zwei- sechs Monate) gefunden. Diskussion Wir konnten keinen phänotypisch Vancomycin sensiblen E. faecium mit Resitenzgen nachweisen. In dem Untersuchungszeitraum wurde bei 33% der Probanden E. faecium mit vanA-Gen nachgewiesen. Zusätzlich konnten wir häufig die niedrig Vancomycin resistenten E. casseliflavus/E. flavescens und E. gallinarum nachweisen. Für den Nachweis von VRE war die PCR sensitiver als die phänotypische Untersuchung. Wir konnten sensible und resistente Stämme in verschiedenen Monaten isolieren und Stämme mit und ohne vanA-Gen. Dies könnte ein Hinweis darauf sein, dass bei Gesunden eine Akquirierung bzw. der Verlust von Resistenzgenen möglich ist. Mehrer VRE-Stämme konnten bei einzelnen Probanden nachgewiesen werden. Dies würde bedeuten, dass mehrere Isolate untersucht werden müssen, wenn der Verdacht eines Ausbruches besteht.Background Of the Enterococcus species, Enterococcus (E.) faecium has acquired most often Vancomycin resistance. Vancomycin resistant Enterococcus (VRE) is increasingly isolated in nosocomial infections. Question How often are healthy individuals carrying genotypic resistant Enterococcus faecium, especially how often can the genetic resistance be found in phenotypic sensible isolates? How long do Enterococcus faecium strains persist in healthy individuals? Material and Methods The samples had been collected to study of the incidence of VRE in healthy individuals. For the study monthly rectal swabs form healthy adults had been collected between August 1996 and February 1997. The differentiation was done on Enterococcosel-Agar with and without Vancomycin. Three to five isolates per person were stored if they had been identified as Enterococcus. A species differentiation for E. faecalis and E. faecium was done with sugar reactions; the phenotypic resistance was tested. Inclusion criteria for this study were 1) isolates of volunteers, with monthly Enterococcus-isolates 2) all isolates of these volunteers that had been identified as E. faecium or other Enterococcus in the differentiation. A polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for the identification of the species and the resistance type was used. For the study of the persistence of E. faecium strains, genotypic identified E. faecium were typed and compared using arbitrarily primed PCR (M13 and Eric1/AP4). The analysis of the strains was done with the Cluster analysis programme GelCompare©. Results 794 Isolates of 69 volunteers were included. The genotypic species and resistance identification revealed 379 E. faecium (in 59 volunteers), including 109 (in 23 volunteers) with the vanA-gene. We identified among the other isolates 38 E. gallinarum (in 22 volunteers), and 119 E. cassseliflavus/E. favescens (in 65 volunteers). All genotypic resistant (vanA-gene carrying) E. faecium were also phenotypic resistant (Five only after repetition). The 379 genotypic identified E. faecium (from 59 volunteers) were typed and 207 strains identified. Of these, 49 strains carried the vanA-gene (109 isolates, 23 volunteers). In eight strains, the resistance-gene was not constantly identified. 42 volunteers carried E. faecium in different months. Nine volunteers had an E. faecium-strain (10 strains) in different (persistence 2-6) months. Four strains carried the vanA- gene. Discussion We did not identify a phenotypic Vancomycin sensible E. faecium carrying a resistance-gene. In the six-month study period, we could identify in 33% of the volunteers carriage of E. faecium with vanA-gene. Additionally we identified a high prevalence of carriage with the low Vancomycin resistance species E. casseliflavus/E. flavescens and E. gallinarum. The identification of VRE was more sensitive with the PCR method than with the phenotypic method. We isolated sensible and resistant strains in different months and identified strains with and without the Vancomycin resistance-gene. This could be an indication that health adults can acquire and loose the resistance-gene. With the fingerprinting, we found different VRE strains in individuals. This means that several isolates have to be compared during an outbreak investigation to identify if the person is carrying the outbreak strain