Identification of Klebsiella pneumoniae in microwavable chicken curries using 16s rRNA analysis

Microwave heating technology is widely used in food catering and domestic households. Nonuniformity of microwave temperature distribution causes the formation of hot and cold spots in heated product has led to the survival of foodborne pathogens which may later cause food borne diseases. It is the aim of this study to determine the effect of different microwave heating on the microbiological quality of microwavable frozen chicken curries. Nine commercialised frozen chicken curries were thawed overnight in the chiller (< 4°C) and exposed to different microwave power levels and times (270 W at 60 s; 950 W at 150 s and 300 s). 25 g of chicken curry were homogenised, serial diluted and enumerated aseptically. Total Aerobic Count (TAC), Total Coliform Count (TCC), Escherichia coli count and Salmonella count were carried out and no microorganisms were detected. Enterobacteriaceae were found in the food samples after enrichment process. Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) amplification and 16S ribosomal ribonucleic acid (rRNA) sequencing were carried out. Results of 16S rRNA sequence analysis indicated that two gram-negative isolates after enrichment were identified as Klebsiella pneumoniae

Absorption, Excretion, and Biotransformation of Dimethyl Sulfoxide in Man and Miniature Pigs After Topical Application as an 80% Gel

The absorption, excretion, and biotransformation of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) 80% gel, DEMASORB®, was studied in man and in miniature pigs. DMSO 80% gel (15 cc, t.i.d.) was applied topically to the elbows of human subjects and allowed to remain there for 30 minutes after each application. Under these conditions, daily absorption of DMSO 80% gel ranged from 25 to 40% of the total dose. DMSO 80% gel (15 g, t.i.d.) was completely absorbed within 4 hours after application to the shaved backs of miniature pigs. Both man and miniature pig transformed DMSO to dimethylsulfone (DMSO2) and dimethylsulfide (DMS). DMSO and DMSO2 were excreted in the urine, whereas DMS was eliminated in the expired air. In man, the relative amounts of DMSO and DMSO2 in the plasma were similar to those found in the urine. The biological half-life of DMSO2 in both the plasma and urine of man was 2.5 to 3 days. Urinary excretion of DMSO plus DMSO2 ranged from 9 to 35% of the dose in both man and miniature pigs; only 1.6% of the dose was present in the feces of miniature pigs. Whereas DMSO2 was the main excretory product in the urine of man, DMSO was the major component in the urine of miniature pigs

Normal alkaline phosphatase levels are dependent on race/ethnicity: NationalGEP Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data

OBJECTIVE: The range of normal serum alkaline phosphatase is not well defined. We used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey from 2009 to 2016 to generate normal ranges for a racially diverse sample of healthy adults. METHODS: Respondents 18 years or older were included. Conditions known to elevate alkaline phosphatase were cause for exclusion. Alkaline phosphatase was measured using a colorimetric method based on standardised National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey protocols. Because alkaline phosphatase values were not normally distributed, log transformation was used. We calculated upper limits of normal (97.5 percentile), stratified by sex and race/ethnicity, and 90% CIs for the upper limits of normal. RESULTS: 1199 respondents (673 female, 526 male) had body mass index from 18.5 to less than 25. Upper limits of normal were highest among Hispanics (123.2 IU/L (90% CI 110.2 to 136.7) for females; 123.8 IU/L (90% CI 112.0 to 135.1) for males), followed by African Americans (109.9 IU/L (90% CI 97.3 to 122.4) for females; 116.3 IU/L (90% CI 105.0 to 126.1) for males) and whites (97.1 IU/L (90% CI 91.0 to 103.4) for females; 109.6 IU/L (90% CI 102.1 to 116.3) for males). Asian American/Pacific Islander respondents had the lowest results: 93.8 IU/L (90% CI 88.2 to 99.5) for females and 95.3 IU/L (90% CI 88.1 to 102.1) for males. CONCLUSIONS: The upper limit of normal alkaline phosphatase varies by race/ethnicity in a large US sample with body mass index of 18.5\u3c25

Aetiology of allergic rhinitis in Hong Kong

ABSTRACTIn a 1993 survey, allergic rhinitis was identified as the most common allergic disease in Hong Kong, affecting 29.1% of schoolchildren. Recently (1995), the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC) also reported 44.5% current rhinitis among Hong Kong teenagers. Our objective was to study the aetiology of allergic rhinitis in Hong Kong using serological tests of allergen sensitization. In 57 allergic rhinitis patients and in the same number of age- and sex-matched controls the following were measured: serum total IgE, mixed aeroallergen IgE (Phadiatop™) and specific IgE versus house dust mite (HDM), cockroach, cat and dog dander, mould mixture (Penicillium, Cladosporium, Aspergillus and Alternaria species) and four local pollens (Bermuda grass, Timothy, ragweed and mugwort). Compared with controls, allergic rhinitis patients (26 males, 31 females; mean (± SD) age 25 ±11 years) had a significantly elevated serum total IgE concentration (mean ± SEM: 496 ± 88 vs 179 ± 38 kU/L) and an increased proportion of positive Phadiatop (95 vs 33%) and specific IgE tests versus HDM (90 vs 44%) and cockroach (42 vs 9%; Mann-Whitney U-test and χ2 tests all P < 0.005). There was no significant difference in sensitization to other allergens tested. House dust mite and cockroach are ubiquitous in Hong Kong with a warm, humid climate and crowded living conditions. Their identification as aetiological agents of allergic rhinitis should help in the development of environmental strategies for reducing the inhalant allergen load to prevent and control this prevalent and costly health problem in our community

Deep learning system to predict the 5-year risk of high myopia using fundus imaging in children

Our study aims to identify children at risk of developing high myopia for timely assessment and intervention, preventing myopia progression and complications in adulthood through the development of a deep learning system (DLS). Using a school-based cohort in Singapore comprising 998 children (aged 6-12 years old), we train and perform primary validation of the DLS using 7456 baseline fundus images of 1878 eyes; with external validation using an independent test dataset of 821 baseline fundus images of 189 eyes together with clinical data (age, gender, race, parental myopia, and baseline spherical equivalent (SE)). We derive three distinct algorithms - image, clinical, and mix (image + clinical) models to predict high myopia development (SE ≤ -6.00 diopter) during teenage years (5 years later, age 11-17). Model performance is evaluated using the area under the receiver operating curve (AUC). Our image models (Primary dataset AUC 0.93-0.95; Test dataset 0.91-0.93), clinical models (Primary dataset AUC 0.90-0.97; Test dataset 0.93-0.94) and mixed (image + clinical) models (Primary dataset AUC 0.97; Test dataset 0.97-0.98) achieve clinically acceptable performance. The addition of 1 year SE progression variable has minimal impact on the DLS performance (clinical model AUC 0.98 versus 0.97 in the primary dataset, 0.97 versus 0.94 in the test dataset; mixed model AUC 0.99 versus 0.97 in the primary dataset, 0.95 versus 0.98 in test dataset). Thus, our DLS allows prediction of the development of high myopia by teenage years amongst school-going children. This has potential utility as a clinical decision support tool to identify "at-risk" children for early intervention.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

A convenient band-gap interpolation technique and an improved band line-up model for InGaAlAs on InP

The band-gap energy and the band line-up of InGaAlAs quaternary compound material on InP are essential information for the theoretical study of physical properties and the design of optoelectronics devices operating in the long-wavelength communication window. The band-gap interpolation of In1-x-y Ga (x) Al (y) As on InP is known to be a challenging task due to the observed discrepancy of experimental results arising from the bowing effect. Besides, the band line-up results of In1-x-y Ga (x) Al (y) As on InP based on previously reported models have limited success by far. In this work, we propose an interpolation solution using the single-variable surface bowing estimation interpolation method for the fitting of experimentally measured In1-x-y Ga (x) Al (y) As band-gap data with various degree of bowing using the same set of input parameters. The suggested solution provides an easier and more physically interpretable way to determine not only lattice matched, but also strained band-gap energy of In1-x-y Ga (x) Al (y) As on InP based on the experimental results. Interpolated results from this convenient method show a more favourable match to multiple independent experiment data sets measured under different temperature conditions as compared to those obtained from the commonly used weighted-sum approach. On top of that, extended framework of the model-solid theory for the band line-up of In1-x-y Ga (x) Al (y) As/InP heterostructure is proposed. Our model-solid theory band line-up result using the proposed extended framework has shown an improved accuracy over those without the extension. In contrast to some previously reported works, it is worth noting that the band line-up result based on our proposed extended model-solid theory has also shown to be more accurate than those given by Harrison's mode

Non-adjacent dependency learning in Cantonese-speaking children with and without a history of specific language impairment

Purpose: This study investigated non-adjacent dependency learning in Cantonese-speaking children with and without a history of Specific Language Impairment (SLI) in an artificial linguistic context. Method: Sixteen Cantonese-speaking children with SLI history and 16 Cantonese-speaking children with typical language development (TLD) were tested with a non-adjacent dependency learning task using artificial languages that mimic Cantonese. Results: Children with TLD performed above chance and were able to discriminate between trained and untrained non-adjacent dependencies. However, children with SLI history performed at chance and were not able to differentiate trained versus untrained non-adjacent dependencies. Conclusions: These findings, together with previous findings with English-speaking adults and adolescents with language impairments, suggested that individuals with atypical language development, regardless of age, diagnostic status, language and culture, showed difficulties in learning non-adjacent dependencies. This study provides evidence for early impairments to statistical learning in individuals with atypical language development

Automatic Diagnosis of Pathological Myopia from Heterogeneous Biomedical Data

10.1371/journal.pone.0065736PLoS ONE86

Posterior eye shape measurement with retinal OCT compared to MRI

PURPOSE. Posterior eye shape assessment by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is used to study myopia. We tested the hypothesis that optical coherence tomography (OCT), as an alternative, could measure posterior eye shape similarly to MRI. METHODS. Macular spectral-domain OCT and brain MRI images previously acquired as part of the Singapore Epidemiology of Eye Diseases study were analyzed. The right eye in the MRI and OCT images was automatically segmented. Optical coherence tomography segmentations were corrected for optical and display distortions requiring biometry data. The segmentations were fitted to spheres and ellipsoids to obtain the posterior eye radius of curvature (Rc) and asphericity (Qxz). The differences in Rc and Qxz measured by MRI and OCT were tested using paired t-tests. Categorical assignments of prolateness or oblateness using Qxz were compared. RESULTS. Fifty-two subjects (67.8 ± 5.6 years old) with spherical equivalent refraction from +0.50 to -5.38 were included. The mean paired difference between MRI and original OCT posterior eye Rc was 24.03 ± 46.49 mm (P = 0.0005). For corrected OCT images, the difference in Rc decreased to -0.23 ± 2.47 mm (P = 0.51). The difference between MRI and OCT asphericity, Qxz, was -0.052 ± 0.343 (P = 0.28). However, categorical agreement was only moderate (j = 0.50). CONCLUSIONS. Distortion-corrected OCT measurements of Rc and Qxz were not statistically significantly different from MRI, although the moderate categorical agreement suggests that individual differences remained. This study provides evidence that with distortion correction, noninvasive office-based OCT could potentially be used instead of MRI for the study of posterior eye shape

Associations of maternal retinal vasculature with subsequent fetal growth and birth size

10.1371/journal.pone.0118250PLoS ONE104e0118250GUSTO (Growing up towards Healthy Outcomes