Dear Karlin

This is a letter to the neighborhood I lived in in Prague during my Geography FSP study abroad, where I found a ‘home’ in the city

IMMUNOLOGICAL RESPONSES OF MICE TO NATIVE PROTOPLASMIC POLYSACCHARIDE AND LIPOPOLYSACCHARIDE : Functional Separation of the Two Signals Required to Stimulate a Secondary Antibody Response

Functional separation of the two signals involved in stimulating immunological responses was achieved through the judicious use of two natural bacterial antigens. Native protoplasmic polysaccharide (NPP) extracted from Escherichia coli was immunochemically identical to the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) extracted from the same organism. However, NPP was not endotoxic, not mitogenic, did not fix complement, and was immunologically independent of T cells. The NPP, which appeared to contain only the antigenic signal, could induce a primary antibody response in mice and could sensitize mice for a secondary response. However, the antigenic signal contained in NPP was insufficient to trigger a secondary response in mice primed with either NPP or LPS. LPS, containing both the antigenic and second signals, was required to trigger a secondary response in primed mice

Effects of Amino Acid Supplements in Plant-based Yellow Perch Diets

High protein distillers dried grains (HP-DDG) were tested in combination with fermented soybean meal (FSBM) or soy protein concentrate (SPC), with and without an essential amino acid complex, to assess utility of these plant protein alternatives in Yellow Perch Perca flavescens diets in a 63-d feeding trial. Four experimental diets were formulated to contain equal amounts of HP-DDG and FSBM or SPC, each with and without essential amino acids and compared to a fish meal/HP-DDG reference diet. Fish that received diets containing SPC displayed the greatest weight gain, feed conversion, and apparent protein digestibility. Weight gain was significantly reduced and feed conversion significantly increased in the diet containing FSBM without essential amino acids. No mortalities or health assessment differences were observed during the trial and all treatment fish readily accepted the experimental diets

Transfer after process-based object-location memory training in healthy older adults

A substantial part of age-related episodic memory decline has been attributed to the decreasing ability of older adults to encode and retrieve associations among simultaneously processed information units from long-term memory. In addition, this ability seems to share unique variance with reasoning. In this study, we therefore examined whether process-based training of the ability to learn and remember associations has the potential to induce transfer effects to untrained episodic memory and reasoning tasks in healthy older adults (60-75 years). For this purpose, the experimental group (n = 36) completed 30 sessions of process-based objectlocation memory training, while the active control group (n = 31) practiced visual perception on the same material. Near (spatial episodic memory), intermediate (verbal episodic memory), and far transfer effects (reasoning) were each assessed with multiple tasks at four measurements (before, midway through, immediately after, and 4 months after training). Linear mixed-effects models revealed transfer effects on spatial episodic memory and reasoning that were still observed 4 months after training. These results provide first empirical evidence that process-based training can enhance healthy older adults' associative memory performance and positively affect untrained episodic memory and reasoning abilities

A review of the tolerability of the candidate TB vaccine, MVA85A compared with BCG and Yellow Fever vaccines, and correlation between MVA85A vaccine reactogenicity and cellular immunogenicity

© 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reservedBackground: The development of a new, more effective vaccine against tuberculosis (TB) for use in healthy and HIV-infected adults, children and infants, remains a global health priority. MVA85A is a candidate tuberculosis vaccine designed to enhance immunity to the existing vaccine, Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG). MVA85A entered clinical trials in 2002 and has now progressed to Phase IIb proof-of-concept efficacy trials in infants and HIV-infected adults in Africa. Methods: A detailed analysis was conducted of the cumulative safety data of intradermal delivery of MVA85A in 112 healthy adult subjects in a series of open label, single arm, non-controlled, Phase I safety and immunogenicity clinical trials in the UK. The trials differed with respect to previous mycobacterial exposure, vaccine regime and dose. Objective safety measures (local reaction size and body temperature) were evaluated for correlations with adaptive antigen-specific immune responses. Results: All subjects in the combined mid-dose group developed a local reaction, of which 92% were mild, 8% were moderate and no reactions were severe. Around 90% of subjects in each group reported at least one systemic adverse event, most commonly headache, myalgia, malaise, feeling feverish, fatigue and arthralgia. Of all systemic adverse events in the combined mid-dose group, 96% were mild, 3% were moderate and 1% were severe (but none of these were judged to be vaccine-related). Pre-vaccination mycobacterial exposure did not affect the adverse event profile. The size of local reaction and frequency of systemic adverse events increased with MVA85A vaccine dose. There were no documented fevers in the low-dose group, whilst 3% of subjects in the combined mid-dose group and 21% in the high-dose group had documented fevers. Peak local reactions were larger after a second poxvirus vaccination, but other local and systemic adverse events were comparable to a single MVA85A vaccination. No severe systemic AEs or serious adverse events in any group were judged to be vaccine-related. Local AEs compared favourably to BCG vaccine-induced local AE and systemic AEs after MVA85A vaccination were comparable to those after the live viral Yellow Fever vaccine in similar populations. There were no correlations found between local reaction size or body temperature and adaptive immune responses (measured by ex vivo interferon gamma Enzyme Linked Immunospot). Conclusions: The candidate TB vaccine, MVA85A has been safely administered to over 100 healthy adults in the UK. Intradermal vaccination with MVA85A induced a transient, superficial reaction local to the injection site and mild short-lived viral symptoms. The local and systemic AE profile of MVA85A vaccination was comparable to published data of other intradermal vaccines and live viral vaccines respectively. Local reaction sizes and body temperature measurements did not correlate with the adaptive cellular immune response to MVA85A.Funded by charitable grants from Europe Aid; TBVAC (EU 6th Framework Programme); The Oxford Biomedical Research Centre and the Wellcome Trus