Highly Accurate Diagnosis of Pleural Tuberculosis by Immunological Analysis of the Pleural Effusion

Pleural TB is notoriously difficult to diagnose due to its paucibacillary nature yet it is the most common cause of pleural effusions in TB endemic countries such as The Gambia. We identified both cellular and soluble biomarkers in the pleural fluid that allowed highly accurate diagnosis of pleural TB compared to peripheral blood markers. Multi-plex cytokine analysis on unstimulated pleural fluid showed that IP-10 resulted in a positive likelihood ratio (LR) of 9.6 versus 2.8 for IFN-γ; a combination of IP-10, IL-6 and IL-10 resulted in an AUC of 0.96 and positive LR of 10. A striking finding was the significantly higher proportion of PPD-specific IFN-γ+TNF-α+ cell population (PPD-IGTA) in the pleural fluid compared to peripheral blood of TB subjects. Presence of this pleural PPD-IGTA population resulted in 95% correct classification of pleural TB disease with a sensitivity of 95% and specificity of 100%. These data suggest that analysis of the site of infection provides superior diagnostic accuracy compared to peripheral blood for pleural TB, likely due to the sequestration of effector cells at this acute stage of disease

Chiromers : conformation driven mirror image supramolecular chirality isomerism identified in a new class of helical rosette nanotubes

Rosette nanotubes are biologically inspired nanostructures, formed through the hierarchical organization of a hybrid DNA base analogue (G 27C), which features hydrogen-bonding arrays of guanine and cytosine. Several twin-G 27C motifs functionalized with chiral moieties, which undergo a self-assembly process under methanolic and aqueous conditions to produce helical rosette nanotubes (RNTs), were synthesized and characterized. The built-in molecular chirality in the twin-G 27C building blocks led to the supramolecular chirality exhibited by the RNTs, as evidenced by the CD activity. Depending on the motifs and environmental conditions, mirror-image supramolecular chirality due to absolute molecular chirality, solvent-induced and structure-dependent supramolecular chirality inversion, and pH-controlled chiroptical switching were observed.Peer reviewed: YesNRC publication: Ye

Transmission of chirality through space and across length scales

Chirality is a fundamental property and vital to chemistry, biology, physics and materials science. The ability to use asymmetry to operate molecular-level machines or macroscopically functional devices, or to give novel properties to materials, may address key challenges at the heart of the physical sciences. However, how chirality at one length scale can be translated to asymmetry at a different scale is largely not well understood. In this Review, we discuss systems where chiral information is translated across length scales and through space. A variety of synthetic systems involve the transmission of chiral information between the molecular-, meso- and macroscales. We show how fundamental stereochemical principles may be used to design and understand nanoscale chiral phenomena and highlight important recent advances relevant to nanotechnology. The survey reveals that while the study of stereochemistry on the nanoscale is a rich and dynamic area, our understanding of how to control and harness it and dial-up specific properties is still in its infancy. The long-term goal of controlling nanoscale chirality promises to be an exciting journey, revealing insight into biological mechanisms and providing new technologies based on dynamic physical properties