Immunological survey of babesiosis ( Babesia peircei ) and toxoplasmosis in Jackass penguins in South Africa

Babesia peircei a été extrait d'érythrocytes nucléés provenant de Sphenicus demersus originaires d'Afrique du Sud infectés naturellement. Des fractions de Babesia peircei enrichies en glycoprotéines ont été obtenues par chromatographie sur colonne d'affinité concanavaline A-Sepharose et séparées par électrophorèse en gel de polyacrylamide-dodecylsulfate de sodium (SDS.PAGE). Quatorze bandes protéiques au minimum ont été observées (9, 11, 13, 20, 22, 23, 24, 43, 62, 90, 120, 204, et 205 kDa), la protéine majeure étant de 25 kDa. Des prélèvements sanguins provenant de 191 S. demersus adultes ont été testés par ELISA en utilisant les fractions de B. peircei enrichies en glycoprotéines pour détecter les IgG dirigées contre B. peircei. les prélèvements provenaient de trois groupes de manchots sauvages (n = 110), d'un groupe de manchots (n = 66) ayant été secourus après avoir été contaminés par une marée noire en mer et soignés à la Fondation Nationale Sud Africaine pour la Conservation des Oiseaux littoraux (SANCCOB), et d'un dernier groupe issu des manchots pensionnaires du SANCCOB (n = 15). La prévalence globale pour B. peircei était de 65 %, et la séropositivité moyenne s'échelonnait de 60 à 71 % parmi les cinq groupes de manchots. L'ELISA apparaissait spécifique pour les IgG dirigées contre B. peircei lorsque testée pour les IgG contre Haemoproteus columbae et les IgG contre le paludisme aviaire (Plasmodium relictum, et P. elongatum(, Les anticorps (Ac) dirigés contre Toxoplasma gondii ont été détectés par le test d'agglutination directe utilisant des tachyzoites de T. gondii tués. Tous les oiseaux étaient séronégatifs pour les Ac dirigés contre T. gondii. L'absence de manchots positifs pour T. gondii était due aux conditions sanitaires appropriées et aux méthodes de prévention contre T. gondii utilisées par le SANCCOB

Selection Mechanisms Underlying High Impact Biomedical Research - A Qualitative Analysis and Causal Model

BACKGROUND: Although scientific innovation has been a long-standing topic of interest for historians, philosophers and cognitive scientists, few studies in biomedical research have examined from researchers' perspectives how high impact publications are developed and why they are consistently produced by a small group of researchers. Our objective was therefore to interview a group of researchers with a track record of high impact publications to explore what mechanism they believe contribute to the generation of high impact publications. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Researchers were located in universities all over the globe and interviews were conducted by phone. All interviews were transcribed using standard qualitative methods. A Grounded Theory approach was used to code each transcript, later aggregating concept and categories into overarching explanation model. The model was then translated into a System Dynamics mathematical model to represent its structure and behavior. Five emerging themes were found in our study. First, researchers used heuristics or rules of thumb that came naturally to them. Second, these heuristics were reinforced by positive feedback from their peers and mentors. Third, good communication skills allowed researchers to provide feedback to their peers, thus closing a positive feedback loop. Fourth, researchers exhibited a number of psychological attributes such as curiosity or open-mindedness that constantly motivated them, even when faced with discouraging situations. Fifth, the system is dominated by randomness and serendipity and is far from a linear and predictable environment. Some researchers, however, took advantage of this randomness by incorporating mechanisms that would allow them to benefit from random findings. The aggregation of these themes into a policy model represented the overall expected behavior of publications and their impact achieved by high impact researchers. CONCLUSIONS: The proposed selection mechanism provides insights that can be translated into research coaching programs as well as research policy models to optimize the introduction of high impact research at a broad scale among institutional and governmental agencies

Ten practical realities for institutional animal care and use committees when evaluating protocols dealing with fish in the field

Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee’s (IACUCs) serve an important role in ensuring that ethical practices are used by researchers working with vertebrate taxa including fish. With a growing number of researchers working on fish in the field and expanding mandates of IACUCs to regulate field work, there is potential for interactions between aquatic biologists and IACUCs to result in unexpected challenges and misunderstandings. Here we raise a number of issues often encountered by researchers and suggest that they should be taken into consideration by IACUCs when dealing with projects that entail the examination of fish in their natural environment or other field settings. We present these perspectives as ten practical realities along with their implications for establishing IACUC protocols. The ten realities are: (1) fish are diverse; (2) scientific collection permit regulations may conflict with IACUC policies; (3) stakeholder credibility and engagement may constrain what is possible; (4) more (sample size) is sometimes better; (5) anesthesia is not always needed or possible; (6) drugs such as analgesics and antibiotics should be prescribed with care; (7) field work is inherently dynamic; (8) wild fish are wild; (9) individuals are different, and (10) fish capture, handling, and retention are often constrained by logistics. These realities do not imply ignorance on the part of IACUCs, but simply different training and experiences that make it difficult for one to understand what happens outside of the lab where fish are captured and not ordered/purchased/reared, where there are engaged stakeholders, and where there is immense diversity (in size, morphology, behaviour, life-history, physiological tolerances) such that development of rigid protocols or extrapolation from one species (or life-stage, sex, size class, etc.) to another is difficult. We recognize that underlying these issues is a need for greater collaboration between IACUC members (including veterinary professionals) and field researchers which would provide more reasoned, rational and useful guidance to improve or maintain the welfare status of fishes used in field research while enabling researchers to pursue fundamental and applied questions related to the biology of fish in the field. As such, we hope that these considerations will be widely shared with the IACUCs of concerned researchers