The impact of highly active antiretroviral therapy on the burden of bacterial lower respiratory tract infections in children

Background. Respiratory diseases are common and associated with significant morbidity and mortality in children.Objective. To evaluate the prevalence and outcome of bacterial lower respiratory tract infections (LRTIs) in HIV-infected and uninfected children at a primary level hospital.Methods. A cross-sectional descriptive study of children aged 6 months - 18 years was conducted. Recruitment included HIV-positive children who had been on highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) for at least 6 months. A comparator group of HIV-negative children admitted with bacterial pneumonia was included. Laboratory data collected included CD4+ T-cell counts, HIV viral load and C-reactive protein (CRP). Data collected in both groups included demographic data, immunisation status, zinc supplementation, previous LRTIs, environmental exposures and treatment.Results. Fifty-nine HIV-infected and 20 uninfected children were enrolled. The HIV-positive children were older, with a mean age of 107.2 (standard deviation 50.0) months v. 12.0 (5.8) months (p<0.005). The HIV-infected group had a mean CD4 percentage of 31.5%, and had had an average of 3.9 visits for bacterial LRTIs. All were treated with amoxicillin with no complications. In the HIV-uninfected group, cough and rapid breathing were the most common presenting symptoms, and the mean CRP level was 463.0 mg/L. The mean hospital stay was 4 days.Conclusion. HAART is effective in reducing the burden of LRTIs in HIV-positive children, even when the diagnosis is delayed. Cough and fast breathing are still the most reliable presenting symptoms of pneumonia. The majority of children still respond to amoxicillin as first-line therapy, with low complication rates

Benchmarking of human Y-chromosomal haplogroup classifiers with whole-genome and whole-exome sequence data

In anthropological, medical, and forensic studies, the nonrecombinant region of the human Y chromosome (NRY) enables accurate reconstruction of pedigree relationships and retrieval of ancestral information. Using high-throughput sequencing (HTS) data, we present a benchmarking analysis of command-line tools for NRY haplogroup classification. The evaluation was performed using paired Illumina data from whole-genome sequencing (WGS) and whole-exome sequencing (WES) experiments from 50 unrelated donors. Additionally, as a validation, we also used paired WGS/WES datasets of 54 individuals from the 1000 Genomes Project. Finally, we evaluated the tools on data from third-generation HTS obtained from a subset of donors and one reference sample. Our results show that WES, despite typically offering less genealogical resolution than WGS, is an effective method for determining the NRY haplogroup. Y-LineageTracker and Yleaf showed the highest accuracy for WGS data, classifying precisely 98% and 96% of the samples, respectively. Yleaf outperforms all benchmarked tools in the WES data, classifying approximately 90% of the samples. Yleaf, Y-LineageTracker, and pathPhynder can correctly classify most samples (88%) sequenced with third-generation HTS. As a result, Yleaf provides the best performance for applications that use WGS and WES. Overall, our study offers researchers with a guide that allows them to select the most appropriate tool to analyze the NRY region using both second- and third-generation HTS data

Prediction of social structure and genetic relatedness in colonies of the facultative polygynous stingless bee Melipona bicolor (Hymenoptera, Apidae)

Stingless bee colonies typically consist of one single-mated mother queen and her worker offspring. The stingless bee Melipona bicolor (Hymenoptera: Apidae) shows facultative polygyny, which makes this species particularly suitable for testing theoretical expectations concerning social behavior. In this study, we investigated the social structure and genetic relatedness among workers from eight natural and six manipulated colonies of M. bicolor over a period of one year. The populations of M. bicolor contained monogynous and polygynous colonies. The estimated genetic relatedness among workers from monogynous and polygynous colonies was 0.75 ± 0.12 and 0.53 ± 0.16 (mean ± SEM), respectively. Although the parental genotypes had significant effects on genetic relatedness in monogynous and polygynous colonies, polygyny markedly decreased the relatedness among nestmate workers. Our findings also demonstrate that polygyny in M. bicolor may arise from the adoption of related or unrelated queens

A Deep Insight into the Sialome of Rhodnius neglectus, a vector of chagas disease

Background Triatomines are hematophagous insects that act as vectors of Chagas disease. Rhodnius neglectus is one of these kissing bugs found, contributing to the transmission of this American trypanosomiasis. The saliva of hematophagous arthropods contains bioactive molecules responsible for counteracting host haemostatic, inflammatory, and immuneresponses. Methods/Principal Findings Next generation sequencing and mass spectrometry-based protein identification were performed to investigate the content of triatomine R. neglectus saliva.We deposited 4,230 coding DNA sequences (CDS) in GenBank. A set of 636 CDS of proteins of putative secretory nature was extracted from the assembled reads, 73 of them confirmed by proteomic analysis. The sialome of R. neglectus was characterized and serine protease transcripts detected. The presence of ubiquitous protein families was revealed, including lipocalins, serine protease inhibitors, and antigen-5. Metalloproteases, disintegrins, and odorant binding protein families were less abundant. Conclusions/Significance The data presented improve our understanding of hematophagous arthropod sialomes, and aid in understanding hematophagy and the complex interplay among vectors and their vertebrate hosts