Trichomonas vaginalis Infection and Associated Risk Factors in a Socially-Marginalized Female Population in Coastal Peru

Objective. The epidemiology of Trichomonas vaginalis infection among sexually active socially-marginalized women in three urban, coastal Peruvian cities was examined in order to quantify the prevalence of trichomonas infection and identify associated risk factors. Methods. We conducted a cross-sectional, venue-based study of women from socially-marginalized populations in three coastal Peruvian cities. Results. Among the 319 women enrolled, the overall prevalence of trichomonal infection was 9.1% (95% CI, 5.9%–12.3%). The mean age was 26.3 years, and 35.5% reported having had unprotected intercourse with nonprimary partners and 19.8% reported two or more sex partners in the last three months. Trichomonal infection was associated with increased number of sex partners (PR 2.5, 95% CI 1.4–4.6) and unprotected sex with nonprimary partner in the last three months (PR 2.3, 95% CI 1.1–4.9). Conclusions. A moderately high prevalence of trichomonal infection was found among women in our study. Trichomonal infection was associated with unprotected sex and multiple sex partners. Efforts to control the continued spread of trichomonal infection are warranted

LEDAkem: a post-quantum key encapsulation mechanism based on QC-LDPC codes

This work presents a new code-based key encapsulation mechanism (KEM) called LEDAkem. It is built on the Niederreiter cryptosystem and relies on quasi-cyclic low-density parity-check codes as secret codes, providing high decoding speeds and compact keypairs. LEDAkem uses ephemeral keys to foil known statistical attacks, and takes advantage of a new decoding algorithm that provides faster decoding than the classical bit-flipping decoder commonly adopted in this kind of systems. The main attacks against LEDAkem are investigated, taking into account quantum speedups. Some instances of LEDAkem are designed to achieve different security levels against classical and quantum computers. Some performance figures obtained through an efficient C99 implementation of LEDAkem are provided.Comment: 21 pages, 3 table

Paliperidone: 3-{2-[4-(6-fluoro-1,2-benzoxazol-3-yl)piperidin-1-yl]eth­yl}-9-hy­droxy-2-methyl-1,6,7,8,9,9a-hexa­hydro­pyrido[1,2-a]pyrimidin-4-one

The title compound (also known as 9-hy­droxy­risperidone), C23H27FN4O3, is a heterocyclic compound with manifold pharmacological properties. The hy­droxy group shows disorder over two positions, with site-occupancy factors of 0.856 (2) and 0.144 (2). The piperidine ring adopts a chair conformation, while the annulated ring bearing the hy­droxy group is present in a half-chair conformation. Classical O—H⋯O hydrogen bonds as well as C—H⋯N contacts connect the mol­ecules into undulating sheets lying perpendicular to the crystallographic b axis. The shortest centroid–centroid distance between two centers of gravity is 3.5867 (8) Å and is apparent between the benzoxazole moiety and the six-membered ring bearing the keto substituent

Algebraic Attack against Variants of McEliece with Goppa Polynomial of a Special Form

International audienceIn this paper, we present a new algebraic attack against some special cases of Wild McEliece Incognito, a generalization of the original McEliece cryptosystem. This attack does not threaten the original McEliece cryptosystem. We prove that recovering the secret key for such schemes is equivalent to solving a system of polynomial equations whose solutions have the structure of a usual vector space. Consequently, to recover a basis of this vector space, we can greatly reduce the number of variables in the corresponding algebraic system. From these solutions, we can then deduce the basis of a GRS code. Finally, the last step of the cryptanalysis of those schemes corresponds to attacking a McEliece scheme instantiated with particular GRS codes (with a polynomial relation between the support and the multipliers) which can be done in polynomial-time thanks to a variant of the Sidelnikov-Shestakov attack. For Wild McEliece & Incognito, we also show that solving the corresponding algebraic system is notably easier in the case of a non-prime base eld Fq. To support our theoretical results, we have been able to practically break several parameters de ned over a non-prime base field q in {9; 16; 25; 27; 32}, t < 7, extension degrees m in {2,3}, security level up to 2^129 against information set decoding in few minutes or hours

Clinical severity classes in COVID-19 pneumonia have distinct immunological profiles, facilitating risk stratification by machine learning

ObjectiveClinical triage in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) places a heavy burden on senior clinicians during a pandemic situation. However, risk stratification based on serum biomarker bioprofiling could be implemented by a larger, nonspecialist workforce.MethodMeasures of Complement Activation and inflammation in patientS with CoronAvirus DisEase 2019 (CASCADE) patients (n = 72), (clinicaltrials.gov: NCT04453527), classified as mild, moderate, or severe (by support needed to maintain SpO2 &gt; 93%), and healthy controls (HC, n = 20), were bioprofiled using 76 immunological biomarkers and compared using ANOVA. Spearman correlation analysis on biomarker pairs was visualised via heatmaps. Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) models were generated to identify patients likely to deteriorate. An X-Gradient-boost (XGB) model trained on CASCADE data to triage patients as mild, moderate, and severe was retrospectively employed to classify COROnavirus Nomacopan Emergency Treatment for covid 19 infected patients with early signs of respiratory distress (CORONET) patients (n = 7) treated with nomacopan.ResultsThe LDA models distinctly discriminated between deteriorators, nondeteriorators, and HC, with IL-27, IP-10, MDC, ferritin, C5, and sC5b-9 among the key predictor variables during deterioration. C3a and C5 were elevated in all severity classes vs. HC (p &lt; 0.05). sC5b-9 was elevated in the “moderate” and “severe” categories vs. HC (p &lt; 0.001). Heatmap analysis shows a pairwise increase of negatively correlated pairs with IL-27. The XGB model indicated sC5b-9, IL-8, MCP1, and prothrombin F1 and F2 were key discriminators in nomacopan-treated patients (CORONET study).ConclusionDistinct immunological fingerprints from serum biomarkers exist within different severity classes of COVID-19, and harnessing them using machine learning enabled the development of clinically useful triage and prognostic tools. Complement-mediated lung injury plays a key role in COVID-19 pneumonia, and preliminary results hint at the usefulness of a C5 inhibitor in COVID-19 recovery

LEDAcrypt: QC-LDPC Code-Based Cryptosystems with Bounded Decryption Failure Rate

We consider the QC-LDPC code-based cryptosystems named LEDAcrypt, which are under consideration by NIST for the second round of the post-quantum cryptography standardization initiative. LEDAcrypt is the result of the merger of the key encapsulation mechanism LEDAkem and the public-key cryptosystem LEDApkc, which were submitted to the first round of the same competition. We provide a detailed quantification of the quantum and classical computational efforts needed to foil the cryptographic guarantees of these systems. To this end, we take into account the best known attacks that can be mounted against them employing both classical and quantum computers, and compare their computational complexities with the ones required to break AES, coherently with the NIST requirements. Assuming the original LEDAkem and LEDApkc parameters as a reference, we introduce an algorithmic optimization procedure to design new sets of parameters for LEDAcrypt. These novel sets match the security levels in the NIST call and make the C reference implementation of the systems exhibit significantly improved figures of merit, in terms of both running times and key sizes. As a further contribution, we develop a theoretical characterization of the decryption failure rate (DFR) of LEDAcrypt cryptosystems, which allows new instances of the systems with guaranteed low DFR to be designed. Such a characterization is crucial to withstand recent attacks exploiting the reactions of the legitimate recipient upon decrypting multiple ciphertexts with the same private key, and consequentially it is able to ensure a lifecycle of the corresponding key pairs which can be sufficient for the wide majority of practical purposes

High Throughput Genome-Wide Survey of Small RNAs from the Parasitic Protists Giardia intestinalis and Trichomonas vaginalis

RNA interference (RNAi) is a set of mechanisms which regulate gene expression in eukaryotes. Key elements of RNAi are small sense and antisense RNAs from 19 to 26 nt generated from double-stranded RNAs. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a major type of RNAi-associated small RNAs and are found in most eukaryotes studied to date. To investigate whether small RNAs associated with RNAi appear to be present in all eukaryotic lineages, and therefore present in the ancestral eukaryote, we studied two deep-branching protozoan parasites, Giardia intestinalis and Trichomonas vaginalis. Little is known about endogenous small RNAs involved in RNAi of these organisms. Using Illumina Solexa sequencing and genome-wide analysis of small RNAs from these distantly related deep-branching eukaryotes, we identified 10 strong miRNA candidates from Giardia and 11 from Trichomonas. We also found evidence of Giardia short-interfering RNAs potentially involved in the expression of variant-specific surface proteins. In addition, eight new small nucleolar RNAs from Trichomonas are identified. Our results indicate that miRNAs are likely to be general in ancestral eukaryotes and therefore are likely to be a universal feature of eukaryotes

Genome-wide promoter analysis of histone modifications in human monocyte-derived antigen presenting cells

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Monocyte-derived macrophages and dendritic cells (DCs) are important in inflammatory processes and are often used for immunotherapeutic approaches. Blood monocytes can be differentiated into macrophages and DCs, which is accompanied with transcriptional changes in many genes, including chemokines and cell surface markers.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>To study the chromatin modifications associated with this differentiation, we performed a genome wide analysis of histone H3 trimethylation on lysine 4 (H3K4me3) and 27 (H3K27me3) as well as acetylation of H3 lysines (AcH3) in promoter regions. We report that both H3K4me3 and AcH3 marks significantly correlate with transcriptionally active genes whereas H3K27me3 mark is associated with inactive gene promoters. During differentiation, the H3K4me3 levels decreased on monocyte-specific CD14, CCR2 and CX3CR1 but increased on DC-specific TM7SF4/DC-STAMP, TREM2 and CD209/DC-SIGN genes. Genes associated with phagocytosis and antigen presentation were marked by H3K4me3 modifications. We also report that H3K4me3 levels on clustered chemokine and surface marker genes often correlate with transcriptional activity.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Our results provide a basis for further functional correlations between gene expression and histone modifications in monocyte-derived macrophages and DCs.</p

The trend of disruption in the functional brain network topology of Alzheimer’s disease

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a progressive disorder associated with cognitive dysfunction that alters the brain’s functional connectivity. Assessing these alterations has become a topic of increasing interest. However, a few studies have examined different stages of AD from a complex network perspective that cover different topological scales. This study used resting state fMRI data to analyze the trend of functional connectivity alterations from a cognitively normal (CN) state through early and late mild cognitive impairment (EMCI and LMCI) and to Alzheimer’s disease. The analyses had been done at the local (hubs and activated links and areas), meso (clustering, assortativity, and rich-club), and global (small-world, small-worldness, and efficiency) topological scales. The results showed that the trends of changes in the topological architecture of the functional brain network were not entirely proportional to the AD progression. There were network characteristics that have changed non-linearly regarding the disease progression, especially at the earliest stage of the disease, i.e., EMCI. Further, it has been indicated that the diseased groups engaged somatomotor, frontoparietal, and default mode modules compared to the CN group. The diseased groups also shifted the functional network towards more random architecture. In the end, the methods introduced in this paper enable us to gain an extensive understanding of the pathological changes of the AD process