Presence of Anti-Microbial Antibodies in Liver Cirrhosis – A Tell-Tale Sign of Compromised Immunity?

Bacterial translocation plays important role in the complications of liver cirrhosis. Antibody formation against various microbial antigens is common in Crohn's disease and considered to be caused by sustained exposure to gut microflora constituents. We hypothesized that anti-microbial antibodies are present in patients with liver cirrhosis and may be associated with the development of bacterial infections.<0.001, OR:2.02) by Cox-regression analysis.The present study suggests that systemic reactivity to microbial components reflects compromised mucosal immunity in patients with liver cirrhosis, further supporting the possible role of bacterial translocation in the formation of anti-microbial antibodies

Preventing Plasmon Coupling between Gold Nanorods Improves the Sensitivity of Photoacoustic Detection of Labeled Stem Cells <i>in Vivo</i>

Gold nanorods are excellent contrast agents for imaging technologies which rely on near-infrared absorption such as photoacoustic imaging. For cell tracking applications, the cells of interest are labeled with the contrast agent prior to injection. However, after uptake into cells by endocytosis, the confinement and high concentration in endosomes leads to plasmon band broadening and reduced absorbance. This would limit the potential of multispectral optoacoustic tomography in terms of spectral processing and, consequently, sensitivity. Here, we show that steric hindrance provided by silica coating of the nanorods leads to the preservation of their spectral properties and improved photoacoustic sensitivity. This strategy allowed the detection and monitoring of as few as 2 × 10⁴ mesenchymal stem cells in mice over a period of 15 days with a high spatial resolution. Importantly, the silica-coated nanorods did not affect the viability or differentiation potential of the transplanted mesenchymal stem cells

Anti-microbial antibodies in celiac disease: Trick or treat?

AIM: To determine the prevalence of a new set of anti-glycan and anti-outer membrane protein (anti-OMP) antibodies in a Hungarian cohort of adult Celiac disease (CD) patients

Anti-microbial antibody levels in patients with cirrhosis with various levels of severity, as depicted either by Child-Pugh stages (A) or MELD score (B).

<p><b>A</b>. Individual values are shown by black spots. Mean values with standard error bars are indicated in blue. Cut-off values for positivity are 25 Units for all antibodies. <i>P</i><0.001 between all groups by ANOVA post hoc Scheffe for ASCA IgA and anti-OMP Plus™ IgA <i>P = NS</i> for ASCA IgG. <b>B</b>. MELD Q1-Q4 represent the groups of patients broken down by quartile: quartile1 patients have the lowest severity up to quartile4, representing patients with the highest level of severity. <i>P</i><0.001 between all groups by ANOVA post hoc Scheffe for ASCA IgA and anti-OMP Plus™ IgA <i>P = NS</i> for ASCA IgG.</p

Anti-microbial serological markers in cirrhotic patients according to the absence or presence of ascites.

<p>*<i>p</i><0.01,</p>#<p><i>p</i><0.001 between cirrhotic patients with or without ascites by χ²-test with Yates correction and linear-by-linear association for serological responses.</p

Association between Child-Pugh stages (A), presence of ascites (B), co-morbidities (C), seropositivity to ASCA/anti-OMP Plus™ (D) and the development of severe bacterial infection in patients with liver cirrhosis.

<p>Infection-free survival refers to the proportion of patients in the cohort without infection at a given time during the follow-up. A. Patients with Child C stage cirrhosis were at higher risk for developing severe bacterial infections compared to patients with Child A or B disease. B. Patients with ascites were at higher risk for developing severe bacterial infections compared to patients without ascites. C. Patients with co-morbidity were at higher risk for developing severe bacterial infections compared to patients without co-morbidity. D. Patients with multiple seropositivity were at higher risk for developing severe bacterial infections compared to seronegative ones.</p

Anti-microbial serological markers in patients with chronic liver diseases and healthy controls.

<p>AIH = autoimmune hepatitis, HCV = viral hepatitis C, PBC = primary biliary cirrhosis, PSC = primary sclerosing cholangitis.</p><p>*<i>p</i><0.001 between liver cirrhosis and chronic HCV, autoimmune liver diseases, healthy controls.</p>#<p><i>p</i><0.001 between chronic HCV patients and autoimmune liver diseases, healthy controls.</p>&<p><i>p</i> = 0.04 between PSC and healthy controls.</p>φ<p><i>p</i><0.001 between PSC and chronic HCV.</p>⊥<p><i>p</i><0.01 between PSC and chronic HCV.</p><p>by using Fisher's exact test or χ²-test with Yates correction if appropriate.</p