Prevalence and characterization of human mecC methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus isolates in England

Objectives There are limited data available on the epidemiology and prevalence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) in the human population that encode the recently described mecA homologue, mecC. To address this knowledge gap we undertook a prospective prevalence study in England to determine the prevalence of mecC among MRSA isolates. Patients and methods Three hundred and thirty-five sequential MRSA isolates from individual patients were collected from each of six clinical microbiology laboratories in England during 2011–12. These were tested by PCR or genome sequencing to differentiate those encoding mecA and mecC. mecC-positive isolates were further characterized by multilocus sequence typing, spa typing, antimicrobial susceptibility profile and detection of PBP2a using commercially available kits. Results Nine out of the 2010 MRSA isolates tested were mecC positive, indicating a prevalence among MRSA in England of 0.45% (95% CI 0.24%–0.85%). The remainder were mecA positive. Eight out of these nine mecC MRSA isolates belonged to clonal complex 130, the other being sequence type 425. Resistance to non-β-lactam antibiotics was rare among these mecC MRSA isolates and all were phenotypically identified as MRSA using oxacillin and cefoxitin according to BSAC disc diffusion methodology. However, all nine mecC isolates gave a negative result using three different commercial PBP2a detection assays. Conclusions mecC MRSA are currently rare among MRSA isolated from humans in England and this study provides an important baseline prevalence rate to monitor future changes, which may be important given the increasing prevalence of mecC MRSA reported in Denmark

Report from the EPAA workshop: In vitro ADME in safety testing used by EPAA industry sectors

AbstractThere are now numerous in vitro and in silico ADME alternatives to in vivo assays but how do different industries incorporate them into their decision tree approaches for risk assessment, bearing in mind that the chemicals tested are intended for widely varying purposes? The extent of the use of animal tests is mainly driven by regulations or by the lack of a suitable in vitro model. Therefore, what considerations are needed for alternative models and how can they be improved so that they can be used as part of the risk assessment process? To address these issues, the European Partnership for Alternative Approaches to Animal Testing (EPAA) working group on prioritisation, promotion and implementation of the 3Rs research held a workshop in November, 2008 in Duesseldorf, Germany. Participants included different industry sectors such as pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, industrial- and agro-chemicals. This report describes the outcome of the discussions and recommendations (a) to reduce the number of animals used for determining the ADME properties of chemicals and (b) for considerations and actions regarding in vitro and in silico assays. These included: standardisation and promotion of in vitro assays so that they may become accepted by regulators; increased availability of industry in vivo kinetic data for a central database to increase the power of in silico predictions; expansion of the applicability domains of in vitro and in silico tools (which are not necessarily more applicable or even exclusive to one particular sector) and continued collaborations between regulators, academia and industry. A recommended immediate course of action was to establish an expert panel of users, developers and regulators to define the testing scope of models for different chemical classes. It was agreed by all participants that improvement and harmonization of alternative approaches is needed for all sectors and this will most effectively be achieved by stakeholders from different sectors sharing data

Variation in clutch size in relation to nest size in birds

Peer reviewe

Environmental Studies

With the political turmoil of the late 1960s the concern of human kind was shifted from passiv observer and sufferer of environmental problems to taking an active role in policy making.JRC.E.5-Nuclear chemistr

Characterization and Speciation of Depleted Uranium in Individual Soil Particles Using Microanalytical Methods.

Abstract not availableJRC.E-Institute for Transuranium Elements (Karlsruhe

X-ray microprobe studies of Hungarian background and urban aerosols

In order to determine the polluting atmospheric sources in urban and background areas source apportionment of the air particulate matter is necessary. Hitherto these studies were mostly based on bulk composition measurements of the aerosol. Source profiles, i.e. the concentrations of several elements for air particulate matter originating from one source, can be deduced from the receptor data using a number of multivariate techniques among which the chemical mass balance. The application is limited by the large number of observations that must be made for each of the variables. Often an elaborated sample preparation is necessary for fractionating the sample into several sub samples, according to the density, particle diameter or other relevant properties. Often this may results in poorly resolved source profiles. The aim of the present work is to find the relative abundance of the particle types originating from two different background monitoring stations in the middle of the Great Hungarian Plain. In urban areas most pollutants originate from traffic and municipal waste incineration. Since heavy metals play an important role in these samples the highly sensitive x-ray microscope (XRM) of the National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS) of the Brookhaven National Laboratory was used. A feasibility study on individual aerosol particles sampled at the above background stations and in the urban area of Budapest is discussed

X-ray microprobe studies of Hungarian background and urban aerosols

In order to determine the polluting atmospheric sources in urban and background areas source apportionment of the air particulate matter is necessary. Hitherto these studies were mostly based on bulk composition measurements of the aerosol. Source profiles, i.e. the concentrations of several elements for air particulate matter originating from one source, can be deduced from the receptor data using a number of multivariate techniques among which the chemical mass balance. The application is limited by the large number of observations that must be made for each of the variables. Often an elaborated sample preparation is necessary for fractionating the sample into several sub samples, according to the density, particle diameter or other relevant properties. Often this may results in poorly resolved source profiles. The aim of the present work is to find the relative abundance of the particle types originating from two different background monitoring stations in the middle of the Great Hungarian Plain. In urban areas most pollutants originate from traffic and municipal waste incineration. Since heavy metals play an important role in these samples the highly sensitive x-ray microscope (XRM) of the National Synchrotron Light Source (NSLS) of the Brookhaven National Laboratory was used. A feasibility study on individual aerosol particles sampled at the above background stations and in the urban area of Budapest is discussed

越中国 富山藩札 町御吟味所札 銭札 300文

日本銀行金融研究所所蔵藩札資料番号：ⅢAエドa1-38-2-18(1)科学研究費助成事業（研究成果公開促進費）で電子化を実施データベースの名称：藩札等に関する統合データベース課題番号：18HP8038藩札の利用に関するお問い合わせ：藩札画像の転載（出版物・HP等）に際しては、日本銀行貨幣博物館への申請手続きが必要です。詳しくは貨幣博物館ホームページ（http://www.imes.boj.or.jp/cm/service/）をご覧ください

Non-Destructive Characterization of Low Radioactive Particles from Irish Sea Sediment by Micro X-Ray Synchrotron Radiation Techniques: Micro X-Ray Fluorescence ( µ-XRF) and Micro X-Ray Absorption near Edge Structure ( µ-XANES) Spectroscopy.

Abstract not availableJRC.E-Institute for Transuranium Elements (Karlsruhe