Efficacy and safety of telithromycin 800 mg once daily for 7 days in community-acquired pneumonia: an open-label, multicenter study

BACKGROUND: Community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality throughout the world. Telithromycin (a new ketolide) has shown good in vitro activity against the key causative pathogens of CAP, including S pneumoniae resistant to penicillin and/or macrolides. METHODS: The efficacy and safety of telithromycin 800 mg orally once daily for 7 days in the treatment of CAP were assessed in an open-label, multicenter study of 442 adults. RESULTS: Of 149 microbiologically evaluable patients, 57 (9 bacteremic) had Streptococcus pneumoniae. Of the 57 S pneumoniae pathogens isolated in these patients, 9 (2 bacteremic) were penicillin- or erythromycin-resistant; all 57 were susceptible to telithromycin and were eradicated. Other pathogens and their eradication rates were: Haemophilus influenzae (96%), Moraxella catarrhalis (100%), Staphylococcus aureus (80%), and Legionella spp. (100%). The overall bacteriologic eradication rate was 91.9%. Of the 357 clinically evaluable patients, clinical cure was achieved in 332 (93%). In the 430 patients evaluable for safety, the most common drug-related adverse events were diarrhea (8.1%) and nausea (5.8%). CONCLUSION: Telithromycin 800 mg once daily for 7 days is an effective and well-tolerated oral monotherapy and offers a new treatment option for CAP patients, including those with resistant S pneumoniae

An Automated Paradigm for Drosophila Visual Psychophysics

Background: Mutations that cause learning and memory defects in Drosophila melanogaster have been found to also compromise visual responsiveness and attention. A better understanding of attention-like defects in such Drosophila mutants therefore requires a more detailed characterization of visual responsiveness across a range of visual parameters. Methodology/Principal Findings: We designed an automated behavioral paradigm for efficiently dissecting visual responsiveness in Drosophila. Populations of flies walk through multiplexed serial choice mazes while being exposed to moving visuals displayed on computer monitors, and infra-red fly counters at the end of each maze automatically score the responsiveness of a strain. To test our new design, we performed a detailed comparison between wild-type flies and a learning and memory mutant, dunce. We first confirmed that the learning mutant dunce displays increased responsiveness to a black/green moving grating compared to wild type in this new design. We then extended this result to explore responses to a wide range of psychophysical parameters for moving gratings (e.g., luminosity, contrast, spatial frequency, velocity) as well as to a different stimulus, moving dots. Finally, we combined these visuals (gratings versus dots) in competition to investigate how dunce and wild-type flies respond to more complex and conflicting motion effects. Conclusions/Significance: We found that dunce responds more strongly than wild type to high contrast and highly structured motion. This effect was found for simple gratings, dots, and combinations of both stimuli presented in competition

Tibiofibular syndesmosis in acute ankle fractures: additional value of an oblique MR image plane

Item does not contain fulltextOBJECTIVE: To evaluate the additional value of a 45� oblique MRI scan plane for assessing the anterior and posterior distal tibiofibular syndesmotic ligaments in patients with an acute ankle fracture. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Prospectively, data were collected for 44 consecutive patients with an acute ankle fracture who underwent a radiograph (AP, lateral, and mortise view) as well as an MRI in both the standard three orthogonal planes and in an additional 45� oblique plane. The fractures on the radiographs were classified according to Lauge-Hansen (LH). The anterior (ATIFL) and posterior (PTIFL) distal tibiofibular ligaments, as well as the presence of a bony avulsion in both the axial and oblique planes was evaluated on MRI. MRI findings regarding syndesmotic injury in the axial and oblique planes were compared to syndesmotic injury predicted by LH. Kappa and the agreement score were calculated to determine the interobserver agreement. The Wilcoxon signed rank test and McNemar's test were used to compare the two scan planes. RESULTS: The interobserver agreement (?) and agreement score [AS (\%)] regarding injury of the ATIFL and PTIFL and the presence of a fibular or tibial avulsion fracture were good to excellent in both the axial and oblique image planes (? 0.61-0.92, AS 84-95\%). For both ligaments the oblique image plane indicated significantly less injury than the axial plane (p?<?0.001). There was no significant difference in detection of an avulsion fracture in the axial or oblique plane, neither anteriorly (p?=?0.50) nor posteriorly (p?=?1.00). With syndesmotic injury as predicted by LH as comparison, the specificity in the oblique MR plane increased for both anterior (to 86\% from 7\%) and posterior (to 86\% from 48\%) syndesmotic injury when compared to the axial plane. CONCLUSION: Our results show the additional value of an 45� oblique MR image plane for detection of injury of the anterior and posterior distal tibiofibular syndesmoses in acute ankle fractures. Findings of syndesmotic injury in the oblique MRI plane were closer to the diagnosis as assumed by the Lauge-Hansen classification than in the axial plane. With more accurate information, the surgeon can better decide when to stabilize syndesmotic injury in acute ankle fractures

Search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum in pp collisions at √ s = 8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Results of a search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum are reported. The search uses 20.3 fb−1 of √ s = 8 TeV data collected in 2012 with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Events are required to have at least one jet with pT > 120 GeV and no leptons. Nine signal regions are considered with increasing missing transverse momentum requirements between Emiss T > 150 GeV and Emiss T > 700 GeV. Good agreement is observed between the number of events in data and Standard Model expectations. The results are translated into exclusion limits on models with either large extra spatial dimensions, pair production of weakly interacting dark matter candidates, or production of very light gravitinos in a gauge-mediated supersymmetric model. In addition, limits on the production of an invisibly decaying Higgs-like boson leading to similar topologies in the final state are presente

Measurement of the cross-section of high transverse momentum vector bosons reconstructed as single jets and studies of jet substructure in pp collisions at √s = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This paper presents a measurement of the cross-section for high transverse momentum W and Z bosons produced in pp collisions and decaying to all-hadronic final states. The data used in the analysis were recorded by the ATLAS detector at the CERN Large Hadron Collider at a centre-of-mass energy of √s = 7 TeV;{\rm Te}{\rm V}$and correspond to an integrated luminosity of$4.6\;{\rm f}{{{\rm b}}^{-1}}$. The measurement is performed by reconstructing the boosted W or Z bosons in single jets. The reconstructed jet mass is used to identify the W and Z bosons, and a jet substructure method based on energy cluster information in the jet centre-of-mass frame is used to suppress the large multi-jet background. The cross-section for events with a hadronically decaying W or Z boson, with transverse momentum${{p}_{{\rm T}}}\gt 320\;{\rm Ge}{\rm V}$and pseudorapidity$|\eta |\lt 1.9$, is measured to be${{\sigma }_{W+Z}}=8.5\pm 1.7$ pb and is compared to next-to-leading-order calculations. The selected events are further used to study jet grooming techniques

Search for direct pair production of the top squark in all-hadronic final states in proton-proton collisions at s√=8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The results of a search for direct pair production of the scalar partner to the top quark using an integrated luminosity of 20.1fb−1 of proton–proton collision data at √s = 8 TeV recorded with the ATLAS detector at the LHC are reported. The top squark is assumed to decay via t˜→tχ˜01 or t˜→ bχ˜±1 →bW(∗)χ˜01 , where χ˜01 (χ˜±1 ) denotes the lightest neutralino (chargino) in supersymmetric models. The search targets a fully-hadronic final state in events with four or more jets and large missing transverse momentum. No significant excess over the Standard Model background prediction is observed, and exclusion limits are reported in terms of the top squark and neutralino masses and as a function of the branching fraction of t˜ → tχ˜01 . For a branching fraction of 100%, top squark masses in the range 270–645 GeV are excluded for χ˜01 masses below 30 GeV. For a branching fraction of 50% to either t˜ → tχ˜01 or t˜ → bχ˜±1 , and assuming the χ˜±1 mass to be twice the χ˜01 mass, top squark masses in the range 250–550 GeV are excluded for χ˜01 masses below 60 GeV

Search for pair-produced long-lived neutral particles decaying to jets in the ATLAS hadronic calorimeter in ppcollisions at √s=8TeV

The ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN is used to search for the decay of a scalar boson to a pair of long-lived particles, neutral under the Standard Model gauge group, in 20.3fb−1of data collected in proton–proton collisions at √s=8TeV. This search is sensitive to long-lived particles that decay to Standard Model particles producing jets at the outer edge of the ATLAS electromagnetic calorimeter or inside the hadronic calorimeter. No significant excess of events is observed. Limits are reported on the product of the scalar boson production cross section times branching ratio into long-lived neutral particles as a function of the proper lifetime of the particles. Limits are reported for boson masses from 100 GeVto 900 GeV, and a long-lived neutral particle mass from 10 GeVto 150 GeV

Analysis of polyethylene wear in plain radiographs: The number of radiographs influences the results

Background and purpose Two-dimensional computerized radiographic techniques are frequently used to measure in vivo polyethylene (PE) wear after total hip arthroplasty (THA), and several variables in the clinical set-up may influence the amount of wear that is measured. We compared the repeatability and concurrent validity of linear PE wear on plain radiographs using the same software but a different number of radiographs

Suppression of Phospholipase Dγs Confers Increased Aluminum Resistance in Arabidopsis thaliana

Aluminum (Al) toxicity is the major stress in acidic soil that comprises about 50% of the world's arable land. The complex molecular mechanisms of Al toxicity have yet to be fully determined. As a barrier to Al entrance, plant cell membranes play essential roles in plant interaction with Al, and lipid composition and membrane integrity change significantly under Al stress. Here, we show that phospholipase Dγs (PLDγs) are induced by Al stress and contribute to Al-induced membrane lipid alterations. RNAi suppression of PLDγ resulted in a decrease in both PLDγ1 and PLDγ2 expression and an increase in Al resistance. Genetic disruption of PLDγ1 also led to an increased tolerance to Al while knockout of PLDγ2 did not. Both RNAi-suppressed and pldγ1-1 mutants displayed better root growth than wild-type under Al stress conditions, and PLDγ1-deficient plants had less accumulation of callose, less oxidative damage, and less lipid peroxidation compared to wild-type plants. Most phospholipids and glycolipids were altered in response to Al treatment of wild-type plants, whereas fewer changes in lipids occurred in response to Al stress in PLDγ mutant lines. Our results suggest that PLDγs play a role in membrane lipid modulation under Al stress and that high activities of PLDγs negatively modulate plant tolerance to Al