129 research outputs found
Atmospheric Cold Plasma Inactivation of Salmonella and Escherichia coli on the Surface of Golden Delicious Apples
The contamination of fruits with human pathogens is a reoccurring concern in the fresh produce industry. Atmospheric cold plasma (ACP) is a potential alternate to customary approaches for non-thermal decontamination of foods. In this study, the efficacy of a dielectric barrier discharge ACP system against Salmonella (Salmonella Typhimurium, ATCC 13311; Salmonella Choleraesuis, ATCC 10708) and Escherichia coli (ATCC 25922, ATCC 11775) was explored. For each bacteria, a two-strain mixture at 8 log10 CFU/ml was spot inoculated on the surface of Golden Delicious apples, air dried, and exposed to ACP at a fixed distance of 35 mm, input power of 200 W for 30, 60, 120, 180, and 240 s. Bacterial inactivation was achieved in all treatment times with highest reduction of 5.3 log10 CFU/cm2 for Salmonella and 5.5 log10 CFU/cm2 for E. coli. Our results showed that reductions were interrelated to exposure time and ranged from 1.3 to 5.3 and 0.6 to 5.5 log10 CFU/cm2 for Salmonella and E. coli, respectively. Salmonella and E. coli significantly decreased (\u3e5.0 log) at 180 and 240 s as compared to 30, 60, and 120 s exposure. Microbial inactivation data was modeled by using Weibull distribution. These findings demonstrate the potential of ACP as a postharvest technology to effectively reduce pathogens on apples, with reference to Salmonella and E. coli
Access to urban parks: Comparing spatial accessibility measures using three GIS-based approaches
Urban parks are essential components of urban ecosystems, providing recreation and relaxation places to residents. Measuring the spatial accessibility to urban parks serves as an initial step in urban planning and developing urban development strategies to improve social and environmental justice. This study aims to evaluate measures of spatial accessibility to urban parks by comparing three geographic information systems (GIS)-based approaches, accounting for network complexity, transport modes, distance thresholds, and destination choices. Taking Ipswich City (Australia) and Enschede (the Netherlands) as two testbeds, we examine the spatial patterns of a total of 21 accessibility measures in the two cities and conduct a correlation and principal component analysis to unravel the interrelationship between these measures. The results suggest that among all measures under the three approaches, the selection of distance thresholds and transport modes matter more to accessibility measures than the destination choices. Furthermore, when distance threshold and transport mode are held constant, the network-based and entrance-based methods provide more realistic accessibility measures than other methods. We also discuss the generality of the entrance-based method we propose and suggest ways to choose the most appropriate accessibility measure for use in different contexts
Prevalence of Multidrug-Resistant Foodborne Pathogens and Indicator Bacteria from Edible Offal and Muscle Meats in Nashville, Tennessee
This study investigated the prevalence of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria in retail edible offal and muscle meats in Nashville, Tennessee. A total of 348 retail meats (160 edible offal and 188 muscle) were analyzed for Salmonella enterica serovar, Campylobacter, Escherichia coli, E. coli O157:H7, and enterococci. Bacteria was identified using biochemical and PCR methods. Salmonella enterica serovar (4.4% and 4.3%), Campylobacter (1.9% and 1.1%), E. coli (79.4% and 89.4%), and enterococci (88.1% and 95.7%) was detected in offal and muscle meats, respectively. Chicken liver (9.7%) was most frequently contaminated with Salmonella enterica serovar, followed by ground chicken (6.9%) and chicken wings (4.2%). No Salmonella enterica serovar was detected in beef liver, beef tripe, and ground beef. The prevalence of Campylobacter was 6.9%, 2.3%, and 1.4% in beef liver, ground beef, and ground chicken, respectively. None of the meats were positive for E. coli O157:H7. Resistance of isolates was significantly (p \u3c 0.05) highest in erythromycin (98.3%; 99.1%), followed by tetracycline (94%; 98.3%), vancomycin (88.8%; 92.2%) as compared to chloramphenicol (43.1%; 53.9%), amoxicillin/clavulanic (43.5%; 45.7%), and ciprofloxacin (45.7%; 55.7%) in offal and muscle meats, respectively. Imipenem showed the lowest resistance (0%; 0.9%). A total of 41 multidrug-resistant patterns were displayed. Edible offal could be a source of antibiotic-resistant bacteria
Social media mining under the COVID-19 context: Progress, challenges, and opportunities
Social media platforms allow users worldwide to create and share information, forging vast sensing networks that
allow information on certain topics to be collected, stored, mined, and analyzed in a rapid manner. During the
COVID-19 pandemic, extensive social media mining efforts have been undertaken to tackle COVID-19 challenges
from various perspectives. This review summarizes the progress of social media data mining studies in the
COVID-19 contexts and categorizes them into six major domains, including early warning and detection, human
mobility monitoring, communication and information conveying, public attitudes and emotions, infodemic and
misinformation, and hatred and violence. We further document essential features of publicly available COVID-19
related social media data archives that will benefit research communities in conducting replicable and repro�ducible studies. In addition, we discuss seven challenges in social media analytics associated with their potential
impacts on derived COVID-19 findings, followed by our visions for the possible paths forward in regard to social
media-based COVID-19 investigations. This review serves as a valuable reference that recaps social media mining
efforts in COVID-19 related studies and provides future directions along which the information harnessed from
social media can be used to address public health emergencies
A global portrait of expressed mental health signals towards COVID-19 in social media space
Globally, the COVID-19 pandemic has induced a mental health crisis. Social media data offer a unique oppor-
tunity to track the mental health signals of a given population and quantify their negativity towards COVID-19.
To date, however, we know little about how negative sentiments differ across countries and how these relate to
the shifting policy landscape experienced through the pandemic. Using 2.1 billion individual-level geotagged
tweets posted between 1 February 2020 and 31 March 2021, we track, monitor and map the shifts in negativity
across 217 countries and unpack its relationship with COVID-19 policies. Findings reveal that there are important
geographic, demographic, and socioeconomic disparities of negativity across continents, different levels of a
nation’s income, population density, and the level of COVID-19 infection. Countries with more stringent policies
were associated with lower levels of negativity, a relationship that weakened in later phases of the pandemic.
This study provides the first global and multilingual evaluation of the public’s real-time mental health signals to
COVID-19 at a large spatial and temporal scale. We offer an empirical framework to monitor mental health
signals globally, helping international authorizations, including the United Nations and World Health Organi-
zation, to design smart country-specific mental health initiatives in response to the ongoing pandemic and future
public emergencies
Crowdsourcing geospatial data for Earth and human observations: a review
The transformation from authoritative to user-generated data landscapes has garnered considerable attention, notably with the proliferation of crowdsourced geospatial data. Facilitated by advancements in digital technology and high-speed communication, this paradigm shift has democratized data collection, obliterating traditional barriers between data producers and users. While previous literature has compartmentalized this subject into distinct platforms and application domains, this review offers a holistic examination of crowdsourced geospatial data. Employing a narrative review approach due to the interdisciplinary nature of the topic, we investigate both human and Earth observations through crowdsourced initiatives. This review categorizes the diverse applications of these data and rigorously examines specific platforms and paradigms pertinent to data collection. Furthermore, it addresses salient challenges, encompassing data quality, inherent biases, and ethical dimensions. We contend that this thorough analysis will serve as an invaluable scholarly resource, encapsulating the current state-of-the-art in crowdsourced geospatial data, and offering strategic directions for future interdisciplinary research and applications across various sectors
KIF2A silencing inhibits the proliferation and migration of breast cancer cells and correlates with unfavorable prognosis in breast cancer
Background; Kinesin family member 2a (KIF2A), a type of motor protein found in eukaryotic cells, is associated with development and progression of various human cancers. The role of KIF2A during breast cancer tumorigenesis and progression was studied. Methods; Immunohistochemical staining, real time RT-PCR and western blot were used to examine the expression of KIF2A in cancer tissues and adjacent normal tissues from breast cancer patients. Patients’ survival in relation to KIF2A expression was estimated using the Kaplan–Meier survival and multivariate analysis. Breast cancer cell line, MDA-MB-231 was used to study the proliferation, migration and invasion of cells following KIF2A-siRNA transfection. Results; The expression of KIF2A in cancer tissues was higher than that in normal adjacent tissues from the same patient (P < 0.05). KIF2A expression in cancer tissue with lymph node metastasis and HER2 positive cancer were higher than that in cancer tissue without (P < 0.05). A negative correlation was found between KIF2A expression levels in breast cancer and the survival time of breast cancer patients (P < 0.05). In addition, multivariate analysis indicated that KIF2A was an independent prognostic for outcome in breast cancer (OR: 16.55, 95% CI: 2.216-123.631, P = 0.006). The proliferation, migration and invasion of cancer cells in vitro were suppressed by KIF2A gene silencing (P < 0.05). Conclusions; KIF2A may play an important role in breast cancer progression and is potentially a novel predictive and prognostic marker for breast cancer
Gender-specific association between the regular use of statins and the risk of irritable bowel syndrome: A population-based prospective cohort study
Introduction: In addition to lipid-lowering effects, statins might modulate the gut microbiome and alleviate systematic inflammation, which in turn, may have a protective effect against irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). The aim of our study was to evaluate the gender-specific association between statin exposure and the risk of IBS.Method: We undertook a prospective analysis based on the United Kingdom Biobank, a large ongoing cohort including 477,293 participants aged 37–73 years. We included participants based on information on their personal statin use and also those free of IBS and cancer at the baseline. We evaluated the gender-specific hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) with Cox proportional hazards regression, adjusting for demographic factors, lifestyle factors, comorbidities, and statin indications.Result: A total of 438,805 participants (206,499 males and 232,306 females) were included in the analysis. Among male participants, the regular use of statins was associated with a decreased risk of IBS (HR: 0.77; 95% CI: 0.61–0.97). This association persists across multiple sensitivity and subgroup analyses and did not show clear evidence of variance among the major types of statins. We did not find sufficient evidence of the association between the statin use and IBS risk in females (HR: 0.98; 95% CI: 0.82–1.16).Conclusion: Our study found that the regular use of statins was associated with a decreased risk of IBS in male participants. Further studies are required to confirm the beneficial effect of statins
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