Survey of All Water Treatment Plant Operators Who Fluoridate Drinking Water in Ohio

Author Institution: Department of Community Dentistry, School of Dentistry, and Department of Biology, Case Western Reserve UniversityOhio like several other states in the US is mandated by law to optimally fluoridate all public water systems serving over 5000 people. The purpose of this study was three-fold: 1) to determine if Ohioans on public water supplies are receiving optimally fluoridated water, 2) to determine the knowledge level of water treatment plant operators who fluoridate drinking water, and 3) to compare small and large water treatment plants. A pre-tested survey was sent to all 224 water treatment plants that adjust the fluoride concentration of drinking water in Ohio. A 100% response rate was accomplished, with 93 small and 131 large water treatment plants responding. A z-test was computed to compare proportions between small and large water treatment plants. Significance was assessed at p <0.05. Nearly 90% of water treatment plant operators correctly identified the optimal fluoride level, however almost 30% used incorrect means of determining the optimal level. Approximately three-quarters of the water treatment plant operators were able to maintain the fluoride concentration to within 0.1 mg F/L of their optimal level. A significantly greater proportion of large water treatment plant operators were able to maintain a fluoride concentration to within 0.1 mg F/L of their optimum level when compared to small water treatment plant operators (83.2% vs 60.2%, z = 3.60, p <0.05). Most water treatment plant operators are knowledgeable concerning fluoride levels, however small water treatment plant operators may need additional technical assistance to reach the level attained by large plants

Glycophenotypic Alterations Induced by Pteridium aquilinum in Mice Gastric Mucosa: Synergistic Effect with Helicobacter pylori Infection

The bracken fern Pteridium aquilinum is a plant known to be carcinogenic to animals. Epidemiological studies have shown an association between bracken fern exposure and gastric cancer development in humans. The biological effects of exposure to this plant within the gastric carcinogenesis process are not fully understood. In the present work, effects in the gastric mucosa of mice treated with Pteridium aquilinum were evaluated, as well as molecular mechanisms underlying the synergistic role with Helicobacter pylori infection. Our results showed that exposure to Pteridium aquilinum induces histomorphological modifications including increased expression of acidic glycoconjugates in the gastric mucosa. The transcriptome analysis of gastric mucosa showed that upon exposure to Pteridium aquilinum several glycosyltransferase genes were differently expressed, including Galntl4, C1galt1 and St3gal2, that are mainly involved in the biosynthesis of simple mucin-type carbohydrate antigens. Concomitant treatment with Pteridium aquilinum and infection with Helicobacter pylori also resulted in differently expressed glycosyltransferase genes underlying the biosynthesis of terminal sialylated Lewis antigens, including Sialyl-Lewisx. These results disclose the molecular basis for the altered pattern of glycan structures observed in the mice gastric mucosa. The gene transcription alterations and the induced glycophenotypic changes observed in the gastric mucosa contribute for the understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying the role of Pteridium aquilinum in the gastric carcinogenesis process

Antimicrobial de-escalation in the critically ill patient and assessment of clinical cure: the DIANA study

Purpose: The DIANA study aimed to evaluate how often antimicrobial de-escalation (ADE) of empirical treatment is performed in the intensive care unit (ICU) and to estimate the effect of ADE on clinical cure on day 7 following treatment initiation. Methods: Adult ICU patients receiving empirical antimicrobial therapy for bacterial infection were studied in a prospective observational study from October 2016 until May 2018. ADE was defined as (1) discontinuation of an antimicrobial in case of empirical combination therapy or (2) replacement of an antimicrobial with the intention to narrow the antimicrobial spectrum, within the first 3&nbsp;days of therapy. Inverse probability (IP) weighting was used to account for time-varying confounding when estimating the effect of ADE on clinical cure. Results: Overall, 1495 patients from 152 ICUs in 28 countries were studied. Combination therapy was prescribed in 50%, and carbapenems were prescribed in 26% of patients. Empirical therapy underwent ADE, no change and change other than ADE within the first 3&nbsp;days in 16%, 63% and 22%, respectively. Unadjusted mortality at day 28 was 15.8% in the ADE cohort and 19.4% in patients with no change [p = 0.27; RR 0.83 (95% CI 0.60\u20131.14)]. The IP-weighted relative risk estimate for clinical cure comparing ADE with no-ADE patients (no change or change other than ADE) was 1.37 (95% CI 1.14\u20131.64). Conclusion: ADE was infrequently applied in critically ill-infected patients. The observational effect estimate on clinical cure suggested no deleterious impact of ADE compared to no-ADE. However, residual confounding is likely

Outcomes from elective colorectal cancer surgery during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic

This study aimed to describe the change in surgical practice and the impact of SARS-CoV-2 on mortality after surgical resection of colorectal cancer during the initial phases of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic

Search for dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks in √s = 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for weakly interacting massive particle dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks is presented. Final states containing third-generation quarks and miss- ing transverse momentum are considered. The analysis uses 36.1 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at √s = 13 TeV in 2015 and 2016. No significant excess of events above the estimated backgrounds is observed. The results are in- terpreted in the framework of simplified models of spin-0 dark-matter mediators. For colour- neutral spin-0 mediators produced in association with top quarks and decaying into a pair of dark-matter particles, mediator masses below 50 GeV are excluded assuming a dark-matter candidate mass of 1 GeV and unitary couplings. For scalar and pseudoscalar mediators produced in association with bottom quarks, the search sets limits on the production cross- section of 300 times the predicted rate for mediators with masses between 10 and 50 GeV and assuming a dark-matter mass of 1 GeV and unitary coupling. Constraints on colour- charged scalar simplified models are also presented. Assuming a dark-matter particle mass of 35 GeV, mediator particles with mass below 1.1 TeV are excluded for couplings yielding a dark-matter relic density consistent with measurements

Defining the causes of sporadic Parkinson's disease in the global Parkinson's genetics program (GP2)

The Global Parkinson’s Genetics Program (GP2) will genotype over 150,000 participants from around the world, and integrate genetic and clinical data for use in large-scale analyses to dramatically expand our understanding of the genetic architecture of PD. This report details the workflow for cohort integration into the complex arm of GP2, and together with our outline of the monogenic hub in a companion paper, provides a generalizable blueprint for establishing large scale collaborative research consortia

Multi-ancestry genome-wide association meta-analysis of Parkinson?s disease

Although over 90 independent risk variants have been identified for Parkinson’s disease using genome-wide association studies, most studies have been performed in just one population at a time. Here we performed a large-scale multi-ancestry meta-analysis of Parkinson’s disease with 49,049 cases, 18,785 proxy cases and 2,458,063 controls including individuals of European, East Asian, Latin American and African ancestry. In a meta-analysis, we identified 78 independent genome-wide significant loci, including 12 potentially novel loci (MTF2, PIK3CA, ADD1, SYBU, IRS2, USP8, PIGL, FASN, MYLK2, USP25, EP300 and PPP6R2) and fine-mapped 6 putative causal variants at 6 known PD loci. By combining our results with publicly available eQTL data, we identified 25 putative risk genes in these novel loci whose expression is associated with PD risk. This work lays the groundwork for future efforts aimed at identifying PD loci in non-European populations

The SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics' resources: focus on curated databases

The SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (www.isb-sib.ch) provides world-class bioinformatics databases, software tools, services and training to the international life science community in academia and industry. These solutions allow life scientists to turn the exponentially growing amount of data into knowledge. Here, we provide an overview of SIB's resources and competence areas, with a strong focus on curated databases and SIB's most popular and widely used resources. In particular, SIB's Bioinformatics resource portal ExPASy features over 150 resources, including UniProtKB/Swiss-Prot, ENZYME, PROSITE, neXtProt, STRING, UniCarbKB, SugarBindDB, SwissRegulon, EPD, arrayMap, Bgee, SWISS-MODEL Repository, OMA, OrthoDB and other databases, which are briefly described in this article