782 research outputs found
Novel strategies for preventing dysbiosis in the oral cavity
Oral diseases affect over three billion people worldwide, making it one of the most common infections. Recent studies show that one approach to reducing the risk of chronic infections, such as caries, gingivitis, periodontitis, and halitosis, is to control the ecology of the oral microbiome instead of completely removing both the harmful and beneficial microorganisms. This is based on the knowledge that oral diseases are not caused by a single pathogen but rather by a shift in the homeostasis of the entire microbiota, a process known as dysbiosis. Consequently, it is of the utmost importance to implement strategies that are able to prevent and control oral dysbiosis to avoid serious complications, including heart, lung, and other systemic diseases. Conventional treatments include the use of antibiotics, which further disrupt the equilibrium in the oral microbiota, together with the mechanical removal of the decayed cavity area following its formation. Therefore, it is imperative to implement alternative strategies with the potential to overcome the disadvantages of the current therapy, namely, the use of broad-spectrum antibiotics. In this sense, probiotics and postbiotics have received particular attention since they can modulate the oral microbiota and decrease the dysbiosis rate in the oral cavity. However, their mechanisms of action need to be addressed to clarify and drive their possible applications as preventive strategies. In this sense, this review provides an overview of the potential of probiotics and postbiotics, focusing on their antimicrobial and antibiofilm activities as well as their ability to modulate the inflammatory response. Finally, it also showcases the main advantages and disadvantages of orodispersible films—a promising delivery mechanism for both probiotics and postbiotics to target oral dysbiosis.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Large Neutrino Mixing from Renormalization Group Evolution
The renormalization group evolution equation for two neutrino mixing is known
to exhibit nontrivial fixed point structure corresponding to maximal mixing at
the weak scale. The presence of the fixed point provides a natural explanation
of the observed maximal mixing of if the and
are assumed to be quasi-degenerate at the seesaw scale without
constraining on the mixing angles at that scale. In particular, it allows them
to be similar to the quark mixings as in generic grand unified theories. We
discuss implementation of this program in the case of MSSM and find that the
predicted mixing remains stable and close to its maximal value, for all
energies below the (TeV) SUSY scale. We also discuss how a particular
realization of this idea can be tested in neutrinoless double beta decay
experiments.Comment: Latex file, 21 pages and 4 ps figures include
A novel lipase with dual localisation in Trypanosoma brucei
Experiment costs were supported by Université de Bordeaux (https://www.u-bordeaux.fr), CNRS (https://www.cnrs.fr) and the Agence Nationale de la Recherche through the grants GLYCONOV (grant number ANR-15-CE-15-0025-01) and ADIPOTRYP (grant number ANR19-CE15-0004-01). This work was also funded by the Laboratoire d’Excellence (LabEx) “French Parasitology Alliance For Health Care” (ANR-11-LABX-0024-PARAFRAP, https://labex-parafrap.fr). This work was also partially supported by the European Research Council (FatTryp, ref. 771714) and by Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia (CEECIND/03322/2018) awarded to LMF.Phospholipases are esterases involved in lipid catabolism. In pathogenic micro-organisms (bacteria, fungi, parasites) they often play a critical role in virulence and pathogenicity. A few phospholipases (PL) have been characterised so far at the gene and protein level in unicellular parasites including African trypanosomes (AT). They could play a role in different processes such as host–pathogen interaction, antigenic variation, intermediary metabolism. By mining the genome database of AT we found putative new phospholipase candidate genes and here we provided biochemical evidence that one of these has lipolytic activity. This protein has a unique non-canonical glycosome targeting signal responsible for its dual localisation in the cytosol and the peroxisomes-related organelles named glycosomes. We also show that this new phospholipase is excreted by these pathogens and that antibodies directed against this protein are generated during an experimental infection with T. brucei gambiense, a subspecies responsible for infection in humans. This feature makes this protein a possible tool for diagnosis.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe
Leptogenesis
I present the theoretical basis for Leptogenesis and its implications for the
structure of the universe. It is suggested that density fluctuations grow
during the transition period and remnants of this effect should be sought in
the universe. The relation between theories with Majorana neutrinos and low
energy phenomena, including oscillations, advanced considerably during the past
two years with a consistent picture developed in several models.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures.To appear in the proceedings of The IXth
International Symposium on Particles, Strings and Cosmology at the Tata
Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai (Bombay), India, during 3-8 January
200
Leptonic CP Violation and Neutrino Mass Models
We discuss leptonic mixing and CP violation at low and high energies,
emphasizing possible connections between leptogenesis and CP violation at low
energies, in the context of lepton flavour models. Furthermore we analyse weak
basis invariants relevant for leptogenesis and for CP violation at low
energies. These invariants have the advantage of providing a simple test of the
CP properties of any lepton flavour model.Comment: 26 pages, no figures, submitted to the Focus Issue on `Neutrino
Physics` edited by F. Halzen, M. Lindner and A. Suzuki, to be published in
New Journal of Physic
Emerging Chagas disease: trophic network and cycle of transmission of Trypanosoma cruzi from palm trees in the Amazon.
A trophic network involving molds, invertebrates, and vertebrates, ancestrally adapted to the palm tree (Attalaea phalerata) microhabitat, maintains enzootic Trypanosoma cruzi infections in the Amazonian county Paço do Lumiar, state of Maranhão, Brazil. We assessed seropositivity for T. cruzi infections in the human population of the county, searched in palm trees for the triatomines that harbor these infections, and gathered demographic, environmental, and socioeconomic data. Rhodnius pictipes and R. neglectus in palm-tree frond clefts or in houses were infected with T. cruzi (57% and 41%, respectively). Human blood was found in 6.8% of R. pictipes in houses, and 9 of 10 wild Didelphis marsupialis had virulent T. cruzi infections. Increasing human population density, rain forest deforestation, and human predation of local fauna are risk factors for human T. cruzi infections
The Interplay Between the "Low" and "High" Energy CP-Violation in Leptogenesis
We analyse within the "flavoured" leptogenesis scenario of baryon asymmetry
generation, the interplay of the "low energy" CP-violation, originating from
the PMNS neutrino mixing matrix , and the "high energy" CP-violation which
can be present in the matrix of neutrino Yukawa couplings, , and can
manifest itself only in "high" energy scale processes. The type I see-saw model
with three heavy right-handed Majorana neutrinos having hierarchical spectrum
is considered. The "orthogonal" parametrisation of the matrix of neutrino
Yukawa couplings, which involves a complex orthogonal matrix , is employed.
In this approach the matrix is the source of "high energy" CP-violation.
Results for normal hierarchical (NH) and inverted hierarchical (IH) light
neutrino mass spectrum are derived in the case of decoupling of the heaviest RH
Majorana neutrino. It is shown that taking into account the contribution to
due to the CP-violating phases in the neutrino mixing matrix can
change drastically the predictions for , obtained assuming only "high
energy" CP-violation from the -matrix is operative in leptogenesis. In the
case of IH spectrum, in particular, there exist significant regions in the
corresponding parameter space where the purely "high energy" contribution in
plays a subdominant role in the production of baryon asymmetry compatible
with the observations.Comment: Results unchanged; comments and references added; version to be
puplished in Eur.Phys.J.
Minimal Scenarios for Leptogenesis and CP Violation
The relation between leptogenesis and CP violation at low energies is
analyzed in detail in the framework of the minimal seesaw mechanism. Working,
without loss of generality, in a weak basis where both the charged lepton and
the right-handed Majorana mass matrices are diagonal and real, we consider a
convenient generic parametrization of the Dirac neutrino Yukawa coupling matrix
and identify the necessary condition which has to be satisfied in order to
establish a direct link between leptogenesis and CP violation at low energies.
In the context of the LMA solution of the solar neutrino problem, we present
minimal scenarios which allow for the full determination of the cosmological
baryon asymmetry and the strength of CP violation in neutrino oscillations.
Some specific realizations of these minimal scenarios are considered. The
question of the relative sign between the baryon asymmetry and CP violation at
low energies is also discussed.Comment: 36 pages, 5 figures; minor corrections and references updated. Final
version to appear in Phys. Rev.
- …