Dietary Nitrate: Effects on the health of weaning pigs and Antimicrobial activity on seven probiotic Bifidobacterium spp. strains

The potential role of nitrite as an antimicrobial substance in the stomach may be of some importance in the ecology of the gastrointestinal tract and in host physiology. It has been shown that nitrite, under the acidic conditions of the stomach, may kill gut pathogens like Salmonella enteritidis, Escherichia coli, Salmonella typhimurium, and Yersinia enterocolitica, whereas acid alone has only a bacteriostatic effect. An in vivo study was conducted in order to assess the effects of dietary nitrate on microbiota and on the health of the gut (particularly in the stomach and small intestine). 96 weaning pigs were fed a diet containing high nitrate levels (15 mg and 150 mg) and then challenged with Salmonella enterica serovar typhimurium. Differences in composition of the gut microbiota were assessed by analysing samples from the pigs: To date analysis of 48 pigs has been completed.. Preliminary results demonstrated no effect on the population densities of microbial groups either from the challenge or from nitrate intake. However, increasing the time from challenge decreased either the counts of LAB in the stomach and jejunum or of clostridia in the stomach. Bifidobacteria also decreased in the stomach contents as nitrate supplementation increased. Supplementing the feedstuff with high dietary nitrate intake and then challenging with Salmonella did not affect the gastric pH or the degree of ulceration in the pigs. The synergistic bactericidal effects of pH, nitrite and thiocyanate on seven probiotic Bifidobacterium spp. strains were also investigated in an in vitro study. The results of the in vitro study demonstrated that an inhibitory effect exists on the seven probiotic bifidobacteria investigated with an exposure longer than 2 hours and pH values < 5.0. Addition of thiocyanate also increased the susceptibility of the tested strains. In this in vitro study, the most resistant strains at all conditions were B. animalis subsp. lactis Ra 18 and P32 and B. choerinum Su 877, Su 837 and Su 891

Direct oral anticoagulants for the treatment of splanchnic vein thrombosis: A state of art

Splanchnic vein thrombosis (SVT) is a manifestation of venous thromboembolism in an unusual site. Portal, mesenteric, and splenic veins are the most common vessels involved in SVT which occurs mainly in patients with liver cirrhosis, although non-cirrhotic patients could be affected as well. Thrombosis of hepatic veins, also known as Budd-Chiari syndrome, is another manifestation of SVT. Prompt diagnosis and intervention are mandatory in order to increase the recalization rate and reduce the risk of thrombus progression and hypertensive complications. Traditional anticoagulation with heparin and vitamin-K antagonists is the treatment of choice in these cases. However, recent studies have shown promising results on the efficacy and safety of direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) in this setting. Available results are mainly based on retrospective studies with small sample size, but first clinical trials have been published in the last years. This manuscript aims to provide an updated overview of the current evidence regarding the role of DOACs for SVT in both cirrhotic and non-cirrhotic patients

Investigating the retarding effect of CAC in alkali-activated cements

This paper discusses the design of hybrid alkali-activated binders at ambient temperature, specifically the development of mixes based on ground granulated blast-furnace slag (GGBFS) with calcium aluminate cement (CAC) as an additive, aiming to obtain high early strength binders with optimised Al incorporation, increased crosslinking and degree of polymerisation. The effects of 10 wt% CAC replacement of GGBFS, activated with sodium silicate with varying modulus (SiO2/Na2O molar ratio) or with sodium hydroxide, on fresh and hardened properties are investigated. The inclusion of CAC in GGBFS mixtures activated using sodium silicate results in an unexpected retardation of the polycondensation reactions required to form the main calcium aluminosilicate hydrate gel phase. This is due to incomplete dissolution of the GGBFS precursor, inhibited by the rapid formation of additional reaction products (especially cubic aluminate hydrates, C3AH6) resulting in lowered reaction kinetics, and thus delayed setting and hardening times. For sodium silicate activators, this retarding effect appears to be only slightly dependent on the activator solution modulus. When activating with 4 M NaOH, the retarding effect is reduced, along with the incorporation of CAC in the C-A-S-H gel, increasing the amount of reactive aluminium present in the binder to form a more compact gel product. Increasing the molarity of NaOH solutions results in a similar delay in reaction kinetics. The results suggest the existence of only a limited pH range in which the addition of CAC can promote the formation of a binding gel with enhanced mechanical properties, whilst other factors including the effect of sodium silicate inclusion in CAC systems are still unclear. The typical hydration products of CAC were not detected in this study

Basic oxygen furnace (BOF) slag as an additive in sodium carbonate-activated slag cements

Basic oxygen furnace slag (BOFS) is a high-volume waste resulting from the production of steel from pig iron. Due to its high free lime content, BOFS is difficult to recycle and/or include into conventional cement systems. Alkali-activation technology offers a pathway to transform industrial wastes such as BOFS into low-carbon cements. Alternative precursors for cement systems are needed as the reliance on commonly used materials like ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS) is becoming unsustainable due to decreasing availability. This study investigates alkali-activated cements incorporating 20 and 30 wt.% of naturally weathered BOFS as a replacement for GGBFS, in both sodium silicate- and sodium carbonate-activated systems. A fraction of BOFS subject to mechanical activation is compared against the untreated BOFS in the 20 wt.% systems. It is observed that in naturally weathered BOFS, a significant portion of the free-lime is found to convert to portlandite, which accelerates alkali-activation kinetics. In sodium silicate-activated systems, the high pH of the activator results in incomplete reaction of the portlandite present in BOFS. The sodium carbonate-activated system shows near complete conversion of portlandite, causing an acceleration in the kinetics of reaction, setting, and hardening. These findings confirm the viability of sodium carbonate activated GGBFS-based systems with only a minor loss in strength properties. BOFS can be utilised as a valuable cement additive for the production of sustainable alkali-activated cements utilising sodium carbonate as a less carbon-intensive activator solution than the more commonly used sodium silicate. Mechanical activation of BOFS offers further optimisation potential for alkali-activation

Antimicrobial resistance, an update from the ward: Increased incidence of new potential pathogens and site of infection-specific antibacterial resistances

In order to monitor the spread of antimicrobial resistance, the European Union requires hospitals to be equipped with infection control centers. With this aim, we analyzed 1583 bacterial strains isolated from samples of different origin from patients with community-onset and nosocomial infections in a public tertiary University Hospital on the outskirts of Turin, Italy. Statistical analyses of the isolates (source, type) and their antimicrobial resistance (AMR) were performed. The survey revealed infections associated with bacterial species considered as not-commensal and not-pathogenic, hence potentially emerging as new threats for human health. Conversely to the general observation of nosocomial strains being more resistant to antibiotics compared to community-acquired strains, nosocomial strains isolated in this study were more resistant only to 1/42 tested antibiotics (tetracycline). By adopting an ecological approach, we observed that blood infections are associated with the broadest range of species compared to infections affecting other areas and we obtained clear indications on the antibiotics that should be preferred in the treatment of infections at specific body sites. Future investigations carried out on a larger geographical scale will clarify whether these indications are limited to the geographical region investigated over this study, or whether the same trends are visible at national or international level

Fusion barrier distributions in systems with finite excitation energy

Eigen-channel approach to heavy-ion fusion reactions is exact only when the excitation energy of the intrinsic motion is zero. In order to take into account effects of finite excitation energy, we introduce an energy dependence to weight factors in the eigen-channel approximation. Using two channel problem, we show that the weight factors are slowly changing functions of incident energy. This suggests that the concept of the fusion barrier distribution still holds to a good approximation even when the excitation energy of the intrinsic motion is finite. A transition to the adiabatic tunneling, where the coupling leads to a static potential renormalization, is also discussed.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures, Submitted to Physical Review

Learning algorithms estimate pose and detect motor anomalies in flies exposed to minimal doses of a toxicant

Pesticide exposure, even at low doses, can have detrimental effects on ecosystems. This study aimed at validating the use of machine learning for recognizing motor anomalies, produced by minimal insecticide exposure on a model insect species. The Mediterranean fruit fly, Ceratitis capitata (Diptera: Tephritidae), was exposed to food contaminated with low concentrations of Carlina acaulis essential oil (EO). A deep learning approach enabled fly pose estimation on video recordings in a custom-built arena. Five machine learning algorithms were trained on handcrafted features, extracted from the predicted pose, to distinguish treated individuals. Random Forest and K-Nearest Neighbor algorithms best performed, with an area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of 0.75 and 0.73, respectively. Both algorithms achieved an accuracy of 0.71. Results show the machine learning potential for detecting sublethal effects arising from insecticide exposure on fly motor behavior, which could also affect other organisms and environmental health