Infection by Mycobacterium caprae in three cattle herds in Emilia-Romagna Region, Northern Italy

Bovine tuberculosis (bTB) is a contagious chronic disease associated with progressive emaciation (starvation) and tubercles (granuloma) formation commonly caused by Mycobacterium bovis. In cattle, M. caprae may also be responsible for bTB. In EU, human tuberculosis due to M. bovis had a notification rate of 0.04 cases per 100,000 inhabitants in 2017, but data did not include M. caprae human infections. From September 2018 to April 2019, bTB outbreaks were investigated in three neighbouring cattle herds in Parma province, Northern Italy. Parma municipality belongs to an officially free of bovine tuberculosis (OTF) Italian region. Official testing on cattle herds, performed every three years as legally required, revealed no positive animals. Tubercular lesions were found during the post mortem (PM) examination of slaughtered cattle and M. caprae genotype SB0418/VNTR 4,3,5,3,4,5,2,2,4,3,15,5 was isolated. This report confirms the crucial importance of PM veterinary inspection at slaughterhouse, despite the OTF status of cattle herds

Psychometric Properties Of The Social Phobia And Anxiety Inventory For Children (Spai-C): A Sample Of Italian School-Aged Children From The General Population

Unarticulated assumptions rarely help our students. The assumption that students can learn to do high-quality literature reviews without guidance from program faculty is surely unhelpful. And our failure to articulate our performance expectations further deprives students of guidance. With most doctoral programs unwilling or unable to teach students to write high-quality literature reviews, students have turned to other sources. Unfortunately, those other sources often misdirect students and inculcate unproductive habits. Academic librarians have specialized knowledge and skills that are invaluable for our students. However, my experience is that they tend to focus on searching library databases, which is rarely a productive way to start. Similarly, most of the published research methodology textbooks and literature review reference books tend to focus on database searching (Onwuegbuzie and Leech, 2005). Taken together, it would be easy for students to conclude that “the review of literature is a preliminary, cursory exercise that must be endured prior to the start of the ‘real’ study” (Dellinger, 2005: 52)

Specific immune response to occupational antigens in asymptomatic egg processing workers.

Hen's egg proteins are known sensitizers and may cause occupational respiratory diseases in exposed workers. The study was conducted in order to ascertain the prevalence of sensitization to work-related antigens in asymptomatic egg processing factory workers. METHODS: Clinical history, respiratory function, atopy and the presence of specific antibodies to environmental and occupational antigens were evaluated in 77 workers. A total of 116 unexposed and non-professionally exposed controls were also studied. The antigen concentration of the factory environment was measured. RESULTS: Specific IgE and precipitin positivity to egg components was more frequently present in workers than in the two control groups. The egg white protein concentration was higher in the egg breaking area. CONCLUSIONS: The avian proteins inhaled induced immune responses to occupational antigens in asymptomatic, professionally exposed subjects. Measures to decrease environmental antigen concentrations and thorough clinical monitoring of sensitized workers are advocated

Electroactive monolayers on Si(100) from covalently bound porphyrins and metalloporphyrins: An AFM, XPS and electrochemical study

Journal of Porphyrins and Phtalocyanins, Volume 10, p. 52

Single and double pH-driven Cu2+ translocation with molecular rearrangement in alkyne-functionalized polyamino polyamido ligands

A new series of ligands, containing one (L1H(2)-L4H(2)) or two (L5H(4)-L6H(4)) 1,4,8,11-tetraaza-5,7-dione units and functionalized with a propargyl group on the C atom between the C=O moieties, has been synthesized. Protonation constants for the ligand and formation constants of their Cu2+ complexes have been determined in water, and the coordination geometry of the complexes existing at various pH values has been investigated by coupled pH-metric and spectrophotometric titrations. Ligands capable of simple uptake of Cu2+ with the formation of neutral, square-planar complexes containing the -2-charged diamino-diimido donor sets and ligands containing further coordinating groups (quinoline or pyridine) capable of single and double cation translocation have been investigated. The role of the substituents on the amino groups and the structural role played by the propargyl group have been examined as regards Cu2+ complexation and translocation. In the double-translocating ligand L6H(4), when the two Cu2+ ions move inside the diamino-diamido donor set, the slim propargyl group allows an unprecedented folding of the whole ligand with apical coordination of one pyridine to form a five-coordinate, square-pyramidal Cu2+ ion. The crystal and molecular structures of this unusual [L6Cu(2)] complex have been determined by X-ray diffraction. Finally, oxidation of Cu2+ to Cu3+ has been studied by cyclic voltammetry in water, which revealed that the redox reaction occurs only when the copper cation is within the diamino-diimido compartment. Moreover, both functionalization of the primary amines with bulky substituents and apical coordination of Cu2+ make access to the 3+ oxidation state more difficult and disrupt the reversibility of the electrochemical process

Suitability of a Salmonella control programme based on serology in slaughter heavy pigs

The key component of most European pig Salmonella control programmes is the classification of herds according to seroprevalence at slaughter. The objectives of this study were to estimate the true Salmonella seroprevalence, and investigate the association between the true status of infection and serology in slaughter heavy pigs. Blood of 3340 pigs was collected and tested with ELISA. From 385 pigs, also lymph nodes and cecal content were collected for bacteriology. Analysis was performed in a Bayesian framework. Results showed that a large proportion of pigs was serologically positive (herd seroprevalence 93% and within-herd seroprevalence higher than 81% in half of herds at cut-off 10 OD%). The association between the true status of infection and serology was not significant, and therefore the classification of heavy pig herds according to seroprevalence at slaughter would not be suitable to reduce the risk of introducing Salmonella into the food chain

Suitability of a Salmonella control programme based on serology in slaughter heavy pigs

The key component of most European pig Salmonella control programmes is the classification of herds according to seroprevalence at slaughter. The objectives of this study were to estimate the true Salmonella seroprevalence, and investigate the association between the true status of infection and serology in slaughter heavy pigs. Blood of 3340 pigs was collected and tested with ELISA. From 385 pigs, also lymph nodes and cecal content were collected for bacteriology. Analysis was performed in a Bayesian framework. Results showed that a large proportion of pigs was serologically positive (herd seroprevalence 93% and within-herd seroprevalence higher than 81% in half of herds at cut-off 10 OD%). The association between the true status of infection and serology was not significant, and therefore the classification of heavy pig herds according to seroprevalence at slaughter would not be suitable to reduce the risk of introducing Salmonella into the food chain

Cathodic Electrografting of Versatile Ligands on (100) as a Low-Impact Approach for Establishing a Si-C bond: A Surface-Coordination Study of Substituted 2,2'-Bipyridines with CuI Ions.

Three distinct wet chemistry recipes were applied to hydrogen-terminated n- and p-Si(100) surfaces in a comparative study of the covalent grafting of two differently substituted 2,2'-bipyridines. The applied reactions require the use of heat, or visible light under a controlled atmosphere, or a suitable potential in an electrochemical cell. In this last case, hydrogen-terminated silicon is the working electrode in a cathodic electrografting (CEG) reaction, in which it is kept under reduction conditions. The resulting Si-C bound hybrids were characterized by a combination of AFM, dynamic contactangle, and XPS analysis, with the help of theoretical calculations. The three distinct approaches were found to be suitable for obtaining ligand-functionalized Si surfaces. CEG resulted in the most satisfactory anchoring procedure, because of its better correlation between high coverage and preservation of the Si surface from both oxidation and contamination. The corresponding Si-bipyridine hybrid was reacted in a solution of CH3CN containing Cu-1 ions coordinatively bound to the anchored ligands, as evidenced from the XPS binding-energy shift of the N atom donor functions. The reaction gave a 1:2 Cu-bipyridine surface complex, in which two ligands couple to a single Cut ion. The surface complex was characterized by the Cu Auger parameter and Cu/N XPS atomic-ratio values coincident with those for pure, unsupported Cut complex with the same 2,2'bipyridine. Further support for such a specific metal-ligand interaction at the functionalized Si surface came from the distinct values of Cu2p binding energy and the Cu Auger parameter, which were obtained for the species resulting from Cu-1 ion uptake on hydrogen-terminated Si(100

Prognostic and predictive factors in patients treated with chemotherapy for advanced urothelial cancer: Where do we stand?

The standard of care for patients with local advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma is chemotherapy. However, results with this are rather disappointing, and validated prognostic factors and biomarkers of tumor response, which are useful in the decision-making process, are still lacking. PubMed databases were searched for articles published until November 2013. Several promising clinical and biological candidate prognostic factors or markers of tumor response to first-or second-line therapy, such as hemoglobin, performance status, visceral metastasis and ERCC1, hENT1 and EMT markers, have been identified and described in this article. In summary, clinical parameters and molecular profiling could revolutionize the management of local advanced or metastatic urothelial cancer, but an improvement in individualized therapeutic approaches still seems distant