Antibiotic susceptibility pattern and the prevalence of Staphylococcus aureus isolated from skin and soft tissue in Tehran Razi skin hospital (2014-15)

Background: Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) is the most common cause of skin and soft tissue infections. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of S. aureus isolated from skin and soft tissue and antibiotic susceptibility pattern among the patient hospitalized in Razi skin hospital (Tehran-Iran). Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on patients (n=400) with skin and soft tissue infections in Razi skin hospital. Sterilized swabs were used to collect the skin infection samples. S. aureus isolates were confirmed using biochemical tests (gram staining, catalase, coagulase, DNase test and manitol fermentation tests). Result: 51.3 ( 205 out of 400) of isolates were S. aureus. Ninety six (46.8) of isolates were methicillin and penicillin-resistant S. aureus. All of the isolates showed sensitivity to vancomycin, linezolid. 98 of the isolates were susceptible to daptomycin. One-hundred sixteen (56.6) isolates were multi- drug resistant. Conclusion: More than half of the skin and soft tissue infections were caused by S.aureus. More than 46 percent of the isolates were methicillin resistant. The highest resistance to penicillin was observed

Conductance of Tomonaga-Luttinger liquid wires and junctions with resistances

We study the effect that resistive regions have on the conductance of a quantum wire with interacting electrons which is connected to Fermi liquid leads. Using the bosonization formalism and a Rayleigh dissipation function to model the power dissipation, we use both scattering theory and Green's function techniques to derive the DC conductance. The resistive regions are generally found to lead to incoherent transport. For a single wire, we find that the resistance adds in series to the contact resistance of h/e^2 for spinless electrons, and the total resistance is independent of the Luttinger parameter K_W of the wire. We numerically solve the bosonic equations to illustrate what happens when a charge density pulse is incident on the wire; the results depend on the parameters of the resistive and interacting regions in interesting ways. For a junction of Tomonaga-Luttinger liquid wires, we use a dissipationless current splitting matrix to model the junction. For a junction of three wires connected to Fermi liquid leads, there are two families of such matrices; we find that the conductance matrix generally depends on K_W for one family but is independent of K_W for the other family, regardless of the resistances present in the system.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures; added a discussion of time reversal invariance; this is the published versio

Occupational illnesses in the 2009 Zambian labour force survey

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Occupational health has received limited research attention in the Southern African Development Community (SADC). Much of the published data in this region come from South Africa and little has been reported north of the Limpopo. The present study was conducted to estimate the burden of occupational illnesses in Zambia and assess factors associated with their occurrence.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Data were obtained from the Zambian Labour Force Survey of 2009. Frequencies were used to estimate the prevalence of occupational diseases. Logistic regression analyses were conducted to determine the associations between demographic, social and economic factors and reported illness resulting from occupational exposures. Odds ratios (OR) from bivariate analyses and adjusted odds ratios (AOR) from the multivariate analysis together with their 95% Confidence Intervals (CI) are reported.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Data on 59,118 persons aged 18 years or older were available for analysis, of which 29805 (50.4%) were males. The proportions of the sample that reported to have suffered from an occupational illness were 12.7% among males and 10.4% among females (p < 0.001). Overall the proportions of respondents who reported suffering from fatigue, fever and chest infections were 38.8%, 21.7% and 17.1%, respectively. About two thirds (69.7%) of the study participants had stayed away from work due to the illness suffered at work; there was no sex differences (p = 0.216). Older age, being male, lower education level, married/cohabiting or once married (separated/divorced/widowed), and paid employee or employer/self employed were positively associated with having suffered from illness.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The findings from this study call for urgent effort for specific measures to prevent and mitigate the effects of occupational injuries. These interventions may include: public health campaigns, enforcement or change in work policies and regulations. Special attention may have to be made towards those who were more likely to suffer from occupational illnesses.</p

Evaluation of the immunity factors (THC, TPP, PO, SOD, POD) of shrimp fed with the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae compared to shrimp fed without yeast

Effects of S. cerevisiae on immune parameters and the WSSV resistance of the L. vannamei after 10 days of S. cerevisiae feeding were evaluated in this study. The experimental diet has the commercial shrimp composition, but 2 g of S. cerevisiae substituted 2 g of fish meal. Six hundred of subadult shrimp (10±1.02 g) were collected and divided to four groups; the 1st group (T1) and the 2nd group (T2) fed experimental diet for 10 days and T2 after 10 days injected with WSSV, whereas the 3ed group (T3) and 4th group (T4) fed with commercial diet for 10 days as control negative and control positive and T4 after 10 days injected with WSSV and all group maintained for 25 days. The immune parameters such as total hemocyte count (THC), total plasma protein (TPP), phenoloxidase activity (PO), superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity, peroxidase (POD) activity were measured. Shrimp immune parameter in T1 and T2 was significantly increased comparing to T3 and T4, but in T2 the immune response decreased in contrast to T1. The immune parameter in T4 also significantly decreased in contrast to T3. Survival rate in T1 and T3 was higher and significantly different (P<0.05) with T2 and T4, whereas, T2 showed significantly different (P<0.05) survival rate with T4 at the end of experiment. In conclusion these results suggest that the increased survival rate and resistance of shrimp after S. cerevisiae consumption occurs through immune modifications, such as increases in THC, TPP, SOD, SOP and PO activity, against WSSV

Study of cosolvent-induced α-chymotrypsin fibrillogenesis: Does protein surface hydrophobicity trigger early stages of aggregation reaction?

The misfolding of specific proteins is often associated with their assembly into fibrillar aggregates, commonly termed amyloid fibrils. Despite the many efforts expended to characterize amyloid formation in vitro, there is no deep knowledge about the environment (in which aggregation occurs) as well as mechanism of this type of protein aggregation. Alpha-chymotrypsin was recently driven toward amyloid aggregation by the addition of intermediate concentrations of trifluoroethanol. In the present study, approaches such as turbidimetric, thermodynamic, intrinsic fluorescence and quenching studies as well as chemical modification have been successfully used to elucidate the underlying role of hydrophobic interactions (involved in early stages of amyloid formation) in α-chymotrypsin-based experimental system. © 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC

Transient stability enhancement of a gridconnected wind farm using an adaptive neurofuzzy controlled-flywheel energy storage system

With the rapid growth of the wind energy systems in the past years and their interconnection with the existing power system networks, it has become very significant to analyse and enhance the transient stability of the wind energy conversion systems connected to the grid. This study investigates the transient stability enhancement of a grid-connected wind farm using doubly-fed induction machine-based flywheel energy storage system. A cascaded adaptive neuro-fuzzy controller (ANFC) is introduced to control the insulated gate bipolar transistor switches-based frequency converter to enhance the transient stability of the grid-connected wind farm. The performance of the proposed control strategy is analysed under a severe symmetrical fault condition on both a single-machine infinite bus model and the IEEE-39 bus New England test system. The transient performance of the system is investigated by comparing the results of the system using the proposed ANFCs with that of the black-box optimisation technique-based proportional-integral controllers. The validity of the system is verified by the simulation results which are carried out using PSCAD/EMTDC environment

Population Attributable Risk of Unintentional Childhood Poisoning in Karachi Pakistan

Background: The percentage of unintentional childhood poisoning cases in a given population attributable to specific risk factors (i.e., the population attributable risk) which can be calculated, determination of such risk factors associated with potentially modifiable risk factors, are necessary to focus on the prevention strategies. Methods: We calculated PARs, using 120 cases with unintentional poisoning and 360 controls in a hospital based matched case- control study. The risk factors were accessibility to hazardous chemicals and medicines due to unsafe storage, child behavior reported as hyperactive, storage of kerosene and petroleum in soft drink bottles, low socioeconomic class, less education of the mother and the history of previous poisoning. Results: The Following Attrubuted Risks Were Observed: 12% (95% confidence interval [CI] = 8%-16%) for both chemicals and medicines stored unsafe, 19% (15%-23%) for child reported as hyperactive, 40% (38%-42%) for storage of kerosene and petroleum in soft drink bottles, 48% (42%-54%) for low socioeconomic status, 38% (32%-42%) for no formal mothers education and 5.8% (2%-10%) for history of previous poisoning. 48% of cases for overall study population which could be attributed to at least one of the six risk factors. Among girls, this proportion was 23% and 43% among boys. About half of the unintentional childhood poisoning cases in this Pakistani population could be avoided. Conclusion: Exposure to potentially modifiable risk indicators explained about half of the cases of unintentional poisoning among children under five years of age in this Pakistani population, indicating the theoretical scope for prevention of the disease