T Cell Reactivity against Mycolyl Transferase Antigen 85 of M. tuberculosis in HIV-TB Coinfected Subjects and in AIDS Patients Suffering from Tuberculosis and Nontuberculous Mycobacterial Infections

The mycolyl transferase antigen 85 complex is a major secreted protein family from mycobacterial culture filtrate, demonstrating powerful T cell stimulatory properties in most HIV-negative, tuberculin-positive volunteers with latent M.tuberculosis infection and only weak responses in HIV-negative tuberculosis patients. Here, we have analyzed T cell reactivity against PPD and Ag85 in HIV-infected individuals, without or with clinical symptoms of tuberculosis, and in AIDS patients with disease caused by nontuberculous mycobacteria. Whereas responses to PPD were not significantly different in HIV-negative and HIV-positive tuberculin-positive volunteers, responses to Ag85 were significantly decreased in the HIV-positive (CDC-A and CDC-B) group. Tuberculosis patients demonstrated low T cell reactivity against Ag85, irrespective of HIV infection, and finally AIDS patients suffering from NTM infections were completely nonreactive to Ag85. A one-year follow-up of twelve HIV-positive tuberculin-positive individuals indicated a decreased reactivity against Ag85 in patients developing clinical tuberculosis, highlighting the protective potential of this antigen

Waarnemingen.be : non-native plant and animal occurrences in Flanders and the Brussels Capital Region, Belgium

Citizen scientists make important contributions to the collection of occurrence data of non-native species. We present two datasets comprising more than 520,000 records of 1,771 non-native species from Flanders and the Brussels Capital Region in Belgium, Western Europe, collected through the website http://www.waamemingen.be hosted by Stichting Natuurinformatie and managed by the nature conservation NGO Natuurpunt. Most records were collected by citizen scientists, mainly since 2008. Waarnemingen.be aims at recording all species, native and non-native, and it is shown here that this kind of biodiversity portals are also particularly well suited to collect large amounts of data on non-native species. Both datasets presented here are also discoverable through the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF)

Volume of Structures : Application to Classical and Harmonic Structures

peer reviewe

Nonparametric test performance for trends in water quality with sampling design applications

In this paper four nonparametric tests for monotonic trend detection are compared with respect to their power and accuracy. The importance of comparing powers at equal empirical significance levels rather than nominal levels is stressed. Therefore, an appropriate graphical method is presented. The effect of the sampling frequency is also assessed using Monte Carlo simulations and a trajectory representation that visualizes the dynamics of the trade-off between the type I and type II errors. These methods are applied to compare four nonparametrical tests (seasonal Mann-Kendall, modified seasonal Mann-Kendall, covariance eigenvalue and covariance inversion) under several conditions. It is concluded with respect to the power that it is not worthwhile for the modified seasonal Mann-Kendall test applied to the AR(1) process considered in this paper to increase the sampling frequency from monthly to biweekly for detecting a monotonic trend of 5 percent, 10 percent, or 15 percent of the process variance. Under these conditions the seasonal Mann-Kendall test is highly liberal, while the covariance inversion and the covariance eigenvalue test are conservative. This research is situated in the development of an efficient sampling design for the Flemish water quality monitoring network

Purulent pericarditis resulting from blunt chest trauma

SCOPUS: le.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe

pH Buffer capacity based monitoring of algal wastewater treatment

A pH buffer capacity based method for multivariate monitoring of tertiary algal wastewater treatment systems is presented. A pilot plant with algal biomass receiving the effluent of a carbon removing activated sludge municipal wastewater treatment plant was used for the experimental work. Two types of buffer capacity profiles are considered, first resulting from a titration from the actual pH to pH 2.5 (down titration), and second as a result of a titration from pH 2.5 to pH 11 (up titration). The experiments were conducted with a laboratory titrator and the buffer capacity profiles were processed by fitting mathematical models of buffer systems to them. This allowed quantification of the inorganic carbon (IC) buffer from the down titration profiles. IC is of major importance because it is the only carbon source used by algae. It is shown that the IC concentration derived from the buffer capacity profile gives different process information than a standard alkalinity measurement. The up titration profiles were successfully used for the quantification of NH4- and o-PO4, although an exact comparison of the laboratory results and the buffer capacity based results is difficult, because of the filtration step preceding laboratory analyses and possible interferences caused by unmodeled buffer systems. No filter device was used, which makes it possible to implement this measurement method in a robust and field applicable sensor. The complete measurement cycle (down titration followed by up titration and data interpretation) can be performed in less than 1 hour, with little manipulation, and could easily be automated

Automatic buffer capacity model building for the purpose of water quality monitoring

in this paper, buffer capacity profiles are used in the framework of automatic monitoring of water quality. The aim of the proposed methodology is to automatically and stepwise build buffer capacity models for each particular titrated sample, and to quantify the individual buffer systems that constitute the total buffer capacity. An automatic and robust model building algorithm has been developed and applied to many titration curves of effluent and river water samples. It is illustrated that the application of automatically built buffer capacity models mostly results in similar or better estimations of ammonium and ortho-phosphate in the samples compared to a priori fixed buffer capacity models. The automatic modelling approach is also advantageous for alarm generating purposes on e.g. river waters, because unexpected buffers are easily detected

In vivo animal demonstration of the effect of vasoactive drugs using 195m Au and gamma camera techniques

195mAu, an ultrashort-lived (physical half life=30.5 s) generator-produced radionuclide, has been used in an animal model to study, by gamma camera techniques, the peripheral effects of the vasoactive drugs norepinephrine and sodium nitroprusside systemically administered or epinephrine (intraarterially) injected at various concentrations. According to the results obtained by the analysis of time activity curves generated from areas of interest drawn on the proximal and distal parts of the limbs, the well known hemodynamic changes induced by these drugs, vasoconstriction (resulting in a decrease of the distal activity recorded), or vasodilatation (shortening the time of radioactivity appearance), could be observed. It is concluded that gamma camera techniques using the ultrashort lived radionuclide 195m Au allow the in vivo study of the effects of vasoactive drugs in an animal model and potentially in clinical situations. © 1987 Springer-Verlag.SCOPUS: ar.jinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishe