Transcriptomics of the Bed Bug (Cimex lectularius)

BACKGROUND: Bed bugs (Cimex lectularius) are blood-feeding insects poised to become one of the major pests in households throughout the United States. Resistance of C. lectularius to insecticides/pesticides is one factor thought to be involved in its sudden resurgence. Despite its high-impact status, scant knowledge exists at the genomic level for C. lectularius. Hence, we subjected the C. lectularius transcriptome to 454 pyrosequencing in order to identify potential genes involved in pesticide resistance. METHODOLOGY AND PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Using 454 pyrosequencing, we obtained a total of 216,419 reads with 79,596,412 bp, which were assembled into 35,646 expressed sequence tags (3902 contigs and 31744 singletons). Nearly 85.9% of the C. lectularius sequences showed similarity to insect sequences, but 44.8% of the deduced proteins of C. lectularius did not show similarity with sequences in the GenBank non-redundant database. KEGG analysis revealed putative members of several detoxification pathways involved in pesticide resistance. Lamprin domains, Protein Kinase domains, Protein Tyrosine Kinase domains and cytochrome P450 domains were among the top Pfam domains predicted for the C. lectularius sequences. An initial assessment of putative defense genes, including a cytochrome P450 and a glutathione-S-transferase (GST), revealed high transcript levels for the cytochrome P450 (CYP9) in pesticide-exposed versus pesticide-susceptible C. lectularius populations. A significant number of single nucleotide polymorphisms (296) and microsatellite loci (370) were predicted in the C. lectularius sequences. Furthermore, 59 putative sequences of Wolbachia were retrieved from the database. CONCLUSIONS: To our knowledge this is the first study to elucidate the genetic makeup of C. lectularius. This pyrosequencing effort provides clues to the identification of potential detoxification genes involved in pesticide resistance of C. lectularius and lays the foundation for future functional genomics studies

Evaluation of a pulsed xenon ultraviolet disinfection system to decrease bacterial contamination in operating rooms

Abstract Background Environmental cleanliness is one of the contributing factors for surgical site infections in the operating rooms (ORs). To decrease environmental contamination, pulsed xenon ultraviolet (PX-UV), an easy and safe no-touch disinfection system, is employed in several hospital environments. The positive effect of this technology on environmental decontamination has been observed in patient rooms and ORs during the end-of-day cleaning but so far, no study explored its feasibility between surgical cases in the OR. Methods In this study, 5 high-touch surfaces in 30 ORs were sampled after manual cleaning and after PX-UV intervention mimicking between-case cleaning to avoid the disruption of the ORs’ normal flow. The efficacy of a 1-min, 2-min, and 8-min cycle were tested by measuring the surfaces’ contaminants by quantitative cultures using Tryptic Soy Agar contact plates. Results We showed that combining standard between-case manual cleaning of surfaces with a 2-min cycle of disinfection using a portable xenon pulsed ultraviolet light germicidal device eliminated at least 70% more bacterial load after manual cleaning. Conclusions This study showed the proof of efficacy of a 2-min cycle of PX-UV in ORs in eliminating bacterial contaminants. This method will allow a short time for room turnover and a potential reduction of pathogen transmission to patients and possibly surgical site infections

Edema pulmonar não cardiogênico após circulação extracorpórea Non-cardiogenic pulmonary edema after cardiopulmonary bypass

O edema pulmonar não cardiogênico é uma complicação grave, de conhecimento recente, que se segue a cirurgias cardíacas com circulação extracorpórea. O quadro clínico é de instalação rápida, caracterizando-se, principalmente, por broncoespasmo, secreção sero-hemorrágica pelas vias aéreas e hipotensão arterial. O diagnóstico diferencial com insuficiência ventricular esquerda é realizado pela constatação de pressões normais, ou baixas, em território pulmonar e átrio esquerdo, sugerindo mecanismo de aumento súbito da permeabilidade capilar. Os autores relatam a ocorrência desta síndrome em 6 pacientes submetidos a operações cardíacas com circulação extracorpórea, tecendo considerações sobre os mecanismos fisiopatológicos aventados, meios de diagnóstico, terapêutica adotada, bem como os achados histopatológicos dos pacientes com má evolução.Non-cardiogenic pulmonary edema is a recently described serious complication which follows heart surgery under cardiopulmonary bypass. The onset of symptoms is rapid, with bronchospasm, sero-hemorrhagic secretion through the airways, and arterial hypotension. Differential diagnosis with left ventricular failure is obtained from the normal or low pressures in the pulmonary circulation. This points out to an increased vascular permeability as the main ethiological agent. The authors report the occurrence of this syndrome in six patients submitted to heart operations under cardiopulmonary bypass and discuss physiopathology, diagnosis, therapy and histopathological findings in patients with lethal evolution