Beratung zum pränatalen Alkoholkonsum : der Einfluss von Kurzinterventionen auf den Alkoholkonsum während der Schwangerschaft

Darstellung des Themas: Alkoholkonsum in der Schwangerschaft kann zu schwerwiegenden, irreversiblen Schädigungen beim (ungeborenen) Kind führen, welche durch eine strikte maternale Alkoholabstinenz vermeidbar wären. Die Kurzintervention stellt eine mögliche Interventionsmöglichkeit bei Alkoholkonsum dar. Ziel: Ziel dieser Bachelorarbeit ist es, die in der Literatur beschriebene Wirksamkeit von Kurzinterventionen bei alkoholkonsumierenden schwangeren Frauen aufzuzeigen. Daraus wird von den Autorinnen ein Modell zur praktischen Anwendung für die Hebamme zur Beratung von alkoholkonsumierenden schwangeren Frauen abgeleitet. Methode: Es wurde eine Literaturrecherche auf verschiedenen Datenbanken durchgeführt. Vier für die Fragestellung relevante Studien wurden gefunden, bewertet und miteinander diskutiert. Relevante Ergebnisse: Durch die Anwendung von Kurzinterventionen während der Schwangerschaft kann der leichte bis moderate pränatale Alkoholkonsum reduziert, beziehungsweise eingestellt werden und das kindliche Outcome verbessert werden. Der Effekt wird durch Einbezug eines Partners oder einer Partnerin in der ersten Schwangerschaftskontrolle mittels konkreter Zielsetzung verstärkt. Schlussfolgerung: Es ist wichtig, dass alkoholkonsumierende schwangere Frauen identifiziert und über die Thematik aufgeklärt werden. Für eine optimale Betreuung sollten Hebammen in der Beratung zu pränatalem Alkoholkonsum geschult werden. Ein geeigneter Interventionsansatz stellt das von den Ergebnissen dieser Bachelorarbeit abgeleitete Beratungsmodell zum pränatalen Alkoholkonsum für Hebammen dar

Paraburkholderia sabiae Uses One Type VI Secretion System (T6SS-1) as a Powerful Weapon against Notorious Plant Pathogens

Paraburkholderia sabiae LMG24235 is a nitrogen-fixing betaproteobacterium originally isolated from a root nodule of Mimosa caesalpiniifolia in Brazil. We show here that this strain effectively kills strains from several bacterial families (Burkholderiaceae, Pseudomonadaceae, Enterobacteriaceae) which include important plant pathogens in a contact-dependent manner. De novo assembly of the first complete genome of P. sabiae using long sequencing reads and subsequent annotation revealed two gene clusters predicted to encode type VI secretion systems (T6SS), which we named T6SS-1 and T6SS-3 according to previous classification methods (G. Shalom, J. G. Shaw, and M. S. Thomas, Microbiology, 153:2689-2699, 2007, https://doi.org/10.1099/mic.0.2007/006585-0). We created P. sabiae with mutations in each of the two T6SS gene clusters that abrogated their function, and the T6SS-1 mutant was no longer able to outcompete other strains in a contact-dependent manner. Notably, our analysis revealed that T6SS-1 is essential for competition against several important plant pathogens in vitro, including Burkholderia plantarii, Ralstonia solanacearum, Pseudomonas syringae, and Pectobacterium carotovorum. The 9-log reduction in P. syringae cells in the presence of P. sabiae was particularly remarkable. Importantly, in an in vivo assay, P. sabiae was able to protect potato tubers from bacterial soft rot disease caused by P. carotovorum, and this protection was partly dependent on T6SS-1. IMPORTANCE Rhizobia often display additional beneficial traits such as the production of plant hormones and the acquisition of limited essential nutrients that improve plant growth and enhance plant yields. Here, we show that the rhizobial strain P. sabiae antagonizes important phytopathogens such as P. carotovorum, P. syringae, and R. solanacearum and that this effect is due to contact-dependent killing mediated by one of two T6SS systems identified in the complete, de novo assembled genome sequence of P. sabiae. Importantly, co-inoculation of Solanum tuberosum tubers with P. sabiae also resulted in a drastic reduction of soft rot caused by P. carotovorum in an in vivo model system. This result highlights the protective potential of P. sabiae against important bacterial plant diseases, which makes it a valuable candidate for application as a biocontrol agent. It also emphasizes the particular potential of rhizobial inoculants that combine several beneficial effects such as plant growth promotion and biocontrol for sustainable agriculture

How do women at increased breast cancer risk perceive and decide between risks of cancer and risk-reducing treatments? A synthesis of qualitative research

Objective: Risk‐reducing procedures can be offered to people at increased cancer risk, but many procedures can have iatrogenic effects. People therefore need to weigh risks associated with both cancer and the risk‐reduction procedure in their decisions. By reviewing relevant literature on breast cancer (BC) risk reduction, we aimed to understand how women at relatively high risk of BC perceive their risk and how their risk perceptions influence their decisions about risk reduction. Methods: Synthesis of 15 qualitative studies obtained from systematic searches of SCOPUS, Web of Knowledge, PsychINFO, and Medline electronic databases (inception‐June 2015). Results: Women did not think about risk probabilistically. Instead, they allocated themselves to broad risk categories, typically influenced by their own or familial experiences of BC. In deciding about risk‐reduction procedures, some women reported weighing the risks and benefits, but papers did not describe how they did so. For many women, however, an overriding wish to reduce intense worry about BC led them to choose aggressive risk‐reducing procedures without such deliberation. Conclusions: Reasoning that categorisation is a fundamental aspect of risk perception, we argue that patients can be encouraged to develop more nuanced and accurate categorisations of their own risk through their interactions with clinicians. Empirically‐based ethical reflection is required to determine whether and when it is appropriate to provide risk‐reduction procedures to alleviate worry

Bifunctional acid-base ionic liquid for the one-pot synthesis of fine chemicals: thioethers, 2H-chromenes and 2H-quinoline derivatives

A bifunctional organocatalyst with ionic liquid properties and with an optimized distance between the acid and basic sites efficiently activates electron deficient olefins for 1,4 conjugated addition, which can be incorporated in different one-pot transformations for the preparation of cyclic and acyclic compounds of biological and synthetic interest. More specifically, the catalyst can be successfully applied for different carbon–carbon (Csingle bondC) and carbon–heteroatom (Csingle bondN, Csingle bondO, Csingle bondS) bond forming reactions integrated in a cascade sequence. The activity of the organocatalyst has been compared with that of structurally related monofunctional and bifunctional catalysts. The most attractive features of this procedure are the high atom economy and the use of inexpensive starting materials as well as the use of an environmentally friendly catalyst that can be easily recovered due to its ionic liquid properties.Financial support by Consolider-Ingenio 2010 (project MULTICAT), Spanish MICINN (Projects MAT2011-28009 and CTQ-201127550) and Program Severo Ochoa are gratefully acknowledged.Climent Olmedo, MJ.; Iborra Chornet, S.; Sabater Picot, MJ.; Vidal Castro, JD. (2014). Bifunctional acid-base ionic liquid for the one-pot synthesis of fine chemicals: thioethers, 2H-chromenes and 2H-quinoline derivatives. Applied Catalysis A: General. 481:27-38. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apcata.2014.05.004S273848

Structural basis for high-affinity adipate binding to AdpC (RPA4515), an orphan periplasmic-binding protein from the tripartite tricarboxylate transporter (TTT) family in Rhodopseudomonas palustris.

The Tripartite Tricarboxylate Transporter (TTT) family is a poorly characterised group of prokaryotic secondary solute transport systems, which employ a periplasmic substrate binding-protein (SBP) for initial ligand recognition. The substrates of only a small number of TTT systems are known and very few SBP structures have been solved, so the mechanisms of SBP-ligand interactions in this family are not well understood. The SBP RPA4515 (AdpC) from Rhodopseudomonas palustris was found by differential scanning fluorescence and isothermal titration calorimetry to bind aliphatic dicarboxylates of a chain length of six to nine carbons, with KD values in the μM range. The highest affinity was found for the C6-dicarboxylate adipate (1,6-hexanedioate). Crystal structures of AdpC with either adipate or 2-oxoadipate bound revealed a lack of positively charged amino-acids in the binding pocket and showed that water molecules are involved in bridging hydrogen bonds to the substrate, a conserved feature in the TTT SBP family that is distinct from other types of SBP. In AdpC, both of the ligand carboxylate groups and a linear chain conformation are needed for coordination in the binding pocket. RT-PCR showed that adpC expression is upregulated by low environmental adipate concentrations, suggesting adipate is a physiologically relevant substrate but as adpC is not genetically linked to any TTT membrane transport genes, the role of AdpC may be in signalling rather than transport. Our data expands the known ligands for TTT systems and identifies a novel high-affinity binding-protein for adipate, an important industrial chemical intermediate and food additive. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved

Paraburkholderia sabiae Uses One Type VI Secretion System (T6SS-1) as a Powerful Weapon against Notorious Plant Pathogens

ABSTRACT Paraburkholderia sabiae LMG24235 is a nitrogen-fixing betaproteobacterium originally isolated from a root nodule of Mimosa caesalpiniifolia in Brazil. We show here that this strain effectively kills strains from several bacterial families (Burkholderiaceae, Pseudomonadaceae, Enterobacteriaceae) which include important plant pathogens in a contact-dependent manner. De novo assembly of the first complete genome of P. sabiae using long sequencing reads and subsequent annotation revealed two gene clusters predicted to encode type VI secretion systems (T6SS), which we named T6SS-1 and T6SS-3 according to previous classification methods (G. Shalom, J. G. Shaw, and M. S. Thomas, Microbiology, 153:2689–2699, 2007, https://doi.org/10.1099/mic.0.2007/006585-0). We created P. sabiae with mutations in each of the two T6SS gene clusters that abrogated their function, and the T6SS-1 mutant was no longer able to outcompete other strains in a contact-dependent manner. Notably, our analysis revealed that T6SS-1 is essential for competition against several important plant pathogens in vitro, including Burkholderia plantarii, Ralstonia solanacearum, Pseudomonas syringae, and Pectobacterium carotovorum. The 9-log reduction in P. syringae cells in the presence of P. sabiae was particularly remarkable. Importantly, in an in vivo assay, P. sabiae was able to protect potato tubers from bacterial soft rot disease caused by P. carotovorum, and this protection was partly dependent on T6SS-1. IMPORTANCE Rhizobia often display additional beneficial traits such as the production of plant hormones and the acquisition of limited essential nutrients that improve plant growth and enhance plant yields. Here, we show that the rhizobial strain P. sabiae antagonizes important phytopathogens such as P. carotovorum, P. syringae, and R. solanacearum and that this effect is due to contact-dependent killing mediated by one of two T6SS systems identified in the complete, de novo assembled genome sequence of P. sabiae. Importantly, co-inoculation of Solanum tuberosum tubers with P. sabiae also resulted in a drastic reduction of soft rot caused by P. carotovorum in an in vivo model system. This result highlights the protective potential of P. sabiae against important bacterial plant diseases, which makes it a valuable candidate for application as a biocontrol agent. It also emphasizes the particular potential of rhizobial inoculants that combine several beneficial effects such as plant growth promotion and biocontrol for sustainable agriculture

Peptidyl arginine deiminase immunization induces anticitrullinated protein antibodies in mice with particular MHC types

International audienceAutoantibodies to citrullinated proteins (ACPAs) are present in two-thirds of patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). ACPAs are produced in the absence of identified T cell responses for each citrullinated protein. Peptidyl arginine deiminase 4 (PAD4), which binds proteins and citrullinates them, is the target of autoantibodies in early RA. This suggests a model for the emergence of ACPAs in the absence of detectable T cells specific for citrullinated antigens: ACPAs could arise because PADs are recognized by T cells, which help the production of autoantibodies to proteins bound by PADs, according to a "hapten/carrier" model. Here, we tested this model in normal mice. C3H are healthy mice whose IEβk chain is highly homologous to the β1 chain HLA-DRB1*04:01, the allele most strongly associated with RA in humans. C3H mice immunized with PADs developed antibodies and T cells to PAD and IgG antibodies to citrullinated fibrinogen peptides, in the absence of a T cell response to fibrinogen. To analyze the MHC background effect on hapten/carrier immunization, we immunized DBA/2 mice (whose IEβd chain is similar to that of HLA-DRB1*04:02, an HLA-DR4 subtype not associated with RA). DBA/2 mice failed to develop antibodies to citrullinated fibrinogen peptides. Thus, T cell immunization to PAD proteins may trigger ACPAs through a hapten/carrier mechanism. This may constitute the basis for a new mouse model of ACPA-positive RA