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Long-term survival of large relocated Porites colonies at the Cocos (Keeling) Islands
Get PDFIn August 2009, eight large Porites corals were relocated prior to dredging works at Cocos (Keeling) Islands. In March 2020, relocated colonies were found to have survived and grown, demonstrating that large Porites colonies growing on unconsolidated substrates can be relocated successfully if moved swiftly to a similar habitat to their source
Polyvinyl alcohol ‐based membranes for filtration of aqueous solutions: A comprehensive review
No full textThis review provides a comprehensive overview on applications, preparation methods, and most notably the performance efficiency of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-based membranes for filtration of aqueous environments. Incorporation of PVA into the membrane matrix significantly enhances such characteristics as antifouling and antibacterial properties as well as hydrophilicity and permeability in the water and wastewater filtrations. Contribution of different PVA-based modular membranes for water purification targets via a comparative review on previous researches is the main theme in this work. Alongside with the focused topic, some basic theories and principals of blend and composite polymer films as well as polymer fibers are debated before the main discussions. This review will ultimately facilitate further development of PVA membranes for the future investigations
Persistence of diatoms as trace evidence in clothing fabrics: The effects of active removal (machine washing) and passive removal (time and environment)
Get PDFLiterature available in the field of forensics covering terrestrial-based evidence is comprehensive; however, many aspects of aquatic environmental evidence have yet to be well researched. One such developing area of aquatic evidence is that of diatoms, a major group of unicellular algae that exist in natural bodies of both fresh and marine waters. Due to their unique qualities and characteristics, diatoms have the potential to be used as evidence of contact with specific water sources. While initially used in forensics to aid drowning diagnoses, more recent case studies and research have investigated diatoms in the context of their use as a form of trace evidence, as well as factors affecting initial transfer and subsequent extraction. This research was the first to investigate factors affecting the persistence of diatoms in fabrics in both passive and active removal pressure contexts. The pressure environments selected represent realistic case circumstances, in which someone may discard (passively affect), or machine wash (actively affect) their clothing after its exposure to diatoms. Additionally, this study investigated whether cross contamination of diatoms could occur between diatom enriched fabrics and blank fabrics within a washing machine environment.
Both experiments' test fabrics were immersed in diatom enriched waters containing equal parts C. Muelleri and Navicula sp. species at 2,000,000 dv/mL. The passive removal experiment tested the influence of exposure (indoor and outdoor environments) and time (week 1/2/3/4/8/12) on the concentration of diatoms across three various fabrics (cotton knit/denim weave/polyester knit). The active removal experiment tested the machine type (front loader/top loader), wash temperature (warm ~40°C/cold) and the number of washes (1/2/3) on concentrations within DEFs, in addition to testing for cross contamination using blank fabrics within the washing load. Diatoms were extracted from fabrics using the established H2O2 method and quantified under a compound light microscope (CLM) at 400x magnification.
The passive experiment (PE) showed that exposure environment and time both played an important role in diatom persistence, with concentration reductions occurring much quicker initially outdoors compared to indoors, but still featuring notable loss for the indoor group during experiment. Rainfall was noted as heavier on average when the outdoor group lost the majority of its diatom concentrations. The active experiment (AE) showed that the number of washes most greatly impacted the concentration, followed by machine type, followed by wash temperature and these trends were consistent across all tested fabrics. By the first wash all groups still contained diatoms, however at a much lower concentration, and by the second, mostly the top loader washes still contained quantifiable diatoms and by the third wash none of the groups contained quantifiable diatoms. Front loader washes removed diatoms from clothing more effectively than top loaders, and within these machine groups, warm washes were more effective at removal than cold washes. Trends observed in the PE and AE were mostly consistent across all varieties of fabrics tested. Additionally, the AE showed that cross contamination between DEFs and blank fabrics was possible, however at relatively low levels. Across both the passive and active experiments, it is consistently shown that time is of the utmost importance when it comes to retrieving DEF evidence as diatoms appear to be lost passively over time even when left alone in different environments in addition to being vulnerable to machine washing removal
Validation of selective agars for detection and quantification of Escherichia coli strains resistant to critically important antimicrobials
Get PDFSuccess in the global fight against antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is likely to improve if surveillance can be performed on an epidemiological scale. An approach based on agars with incorporated antimicrobials has enormous potential to achieve this. However, there is a need to identify the combinations of selective agars and key antimicrobials yielding the most accurate counts of susceptible and resistant organisms. A series of experiments involving 1,202 plates identified the best candidate combinations from six commercially available agars and five antimicrobials, using 18 Escherichia coli strains as either pure cultures or inocula-spiked feces. The effects of various design factors on colony counts were analyzed in generalized linear models. Without antimicrobials, Brilliance E. coli and CHROMagar ECC agars yielded 28.9% and 23.5% more colonies, respectively, than MacConkey agar. The order of superiority of agars remained unchanged when fecal samples with or without spiking of resistant E. coli strains were inoculated onto agars with or without specific antimicrobials. When antimicrobials were incorporated at various concentrations, it was revealed that ampicillin, tetracycline, and ciprofloxacin were suitable for incorporation into Brilliance and CHROMagar agars at all defined concentrations. Gentamicin was suitable for incorporation only at 8 and 16 μg/ml, while ceftiofur was suitable only at 1 μg/ml. CHROMagar extended-spectrum β-lactamase (ESBL) agar supported growth of a wider diversity of extended-spectrum-cephalosporin-resistant E. coli strains. The findings demonstrate the potential for agars with incorporated antimicrobials to be combined with laboratory-based robotics to deliver AMR surveillance on a vast scale with greater sensitivity of detection and strategic relevance
Sampling techniques for the recovery of male offender DNA from the female victim skin surfaces
Get PDFSexual assault is a very serious criminal offence with great health and welfare repercussions. Trace DNA is often referred to as the minute quantities of DNA that can be transferred between a victim, perpetrator and/or the crime scene during an assault. Often in a sexual assault case the victim’s body is the most important crime scene and sometimes the only available crime scene. Because of this it is critically important to successfully take a DNA sample after the assault. There has only been one unpublished study that has touched on the comparison of all available sampling techniques. This study aimed to compare and analyse five sampling techniques consisting of double swabbing, single swabbing, tape-lifting, mini tape-lifting and alcohol wipes which was a somewhat new method. To do this, a scenario where saliva from the male offender is found on the female victim’s neck was conducted for this study.
While the results were considerably contaminated, it was found that double swabbing obtained the highest DNA concentration of samples when compared to the other four methods. Also, these contaminated results also provided somewhat promising results in the use of tape-lifting, mini tape-lifting and alcohol wipes. But these methodologies would need to be verified via future peer reviewed research as these contaminated results were unhelpful in providing an idea of what these results were but cannot conclusively support any of the hypotheses provided. Overall, this study did not find anything ground breaking due to the largely contaminated results of this study, but it is imperative that follow-up research takes place to provide verification that while these results were contaminated something of value may have been found. Unfortunately, nothing of any statistical significance was found due to the contamination and hence in the future great care when moving samples from tube to the well plate should be taken to minimise the risk of contamination
Translational Chickpea Genomics Consortium to accelerate genetic gains in chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.)
Get PDFThe Translational Chickpea Genomics Consortium (TCGC) was set up to increase the production and productivity of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.). It represents research institutes from six major chickpea growing states (Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh) of India. The TCGC team has been engaged in deploying modern genomics approaches in breeding and popularizing improved varieties in farmers’ fields across the states. Using marker-assisted backcrossing, introgression lines with enhanced drought tolerance and fusarium wilt resistance have been developed in the genetic background of 10 elite varieties of chickpea. Multi-location evaluation of 100 improved lines (70 desi and 30 kabuli) during 2016–2017 and 2018–2019 enabled the identification of top performing desi and kabuli lines. In total, 909 Farmer Participatory Varietal Selection trials were conducted in 158 villages in 16 districts of the five states, during 2017–2018, 2018–2019, and 2019–2020, involving 16 improved varieties. New molecular breeding lines developed in different genetic backgrounds are potential candidates for national trials under the ICAR-All India Coordinated Research Project on Chickpea. The comprehensive efforts of TCGC resulted in the development and adoption of high-yielding varieties that will increase chickpea productivity and the profitability of chickpea growing farmers
Haemoprotozoan surveillance in peri-urban native and introduced wildlife from Australia
Get PDFVector-borne haemoprotozoans comprise a diverse group of eukaryote single-celled organisms transmitted by haematophagous (blood-feeding) invertebrates. They can cause debilitating diseases that impact wildlife, livestock, companion animals and humans. Recent research has shown that Australian wildlife host a diverse range of haemoprotozoan species; however, to date this work has primarily been confined to a few host species or isolated populations in rural habitats. There has been little investigation into the presence of these blood parasites in wildlife inhabiting urban and peri-urban areas. In this study, blood and tissue samples and ticks were collected from wildlife in New South Wales and Western Australia. Extracted DNA samples were screened with pan-specific molecular assays to determine the presence of haemoprotozoans using amplicon metabarcoding and Sanger sequencing approaches. In addition, light microscopy was performed on blood films. Eight haemoprotozoans were identified in the present study, which included species of Babesia, Hepatozoon, Theileria and Trypanosoma. Blood samples were collected from 134 animals; 70 black rats (Rattus), 18 common brush-tailed possums (Trichosurus vulpecula), two bush rats (Rattus fuscipes), 22 chuditch (Dasyurus geoffroii), 20 long-nosed bandicoots (Perameles nasuta), one quenda (Isoodon fusciventer) and one swamp rat (Rattus lutreolus). Molecular screening of DNA extracted from blood samples identified 52.2% (95% CI: 43.8–60.5%) of individuals were positive for at least one haemoprotozoan species, with 19.4% (95% CI: 13.4–26.7%) positive for more than one species. The present study provides the first sequences of Theileria cf. peramelis from black rats and long-nosed bandicoots. Babesia lohae was identified from brush-tailed possums. Two Hepatozoon genotypes were identified from black rats and bush rats. Black rats showed the highest haemoprotozoan diversity, with five species identified. No known human pathogens that have been described in the northern hemisphere were identified in the present study, and future work is required to understand the zoonotic potential of these microbes in Australia. This work represents the first large-scale body of research using molecular tools to investigate haemoprotozoans in animals at the urban-wildland interface. Further research is needed to investigate potential consequences of infection in wildlife, particularly effects of pathogen spillover from invasive black rats to native wildlife
New eastern Australian species in the wolf spider genus Artoriopsis (Araneae, Lycosidae, Artoriinae)
Get PDFArtoriopsis Framenau, 2007 is an Australian wolf spider (Lycosidae Sundevall, 1833) genus in the subfamily Artoriinae Framenau, 2007. One of its species, A. expolita (L. Koch, 1877), has recently been introduced to New Zealand. Five new species of Artoriopsis Framenau, 2007 are described here, A. bogabilla sp. nov. (males only); A. lacustris sp. nov. (male only), A. orientalis sp. nov. (males and females)—all only known from New South Wales—A. mulier sp. nov. (female only) from Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, and A. murphyi sp. nov. (male only) from Deal Island, Tasmania
Deep learning-based scale-invariant cancer detection from whole slide image
Get PDFConvential cancer diagnosis methods from whole slide images (WSI) train a deep Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to make patch level predictions, and then aggregate the image-level predictions to classify a tumour as either benign or malignant. To classify a patch, the CNN extracts features through convolutional layers and then process the feature maps using fully connected layers. The size of the filters used in the convolutional layers defines the receptive field of the network. Small filters are computationally efficient but do not capture a large context. On the other hand, large filters allow learning features that capture a larger context but are very expensive both in terms of computational time and memory requirements. This paper focuses on two main challenges. The First one is how to incorporate a large context while minimizing the computational overhead. The second one is that the cancerous cells can be of arbitrary size, and thus any detection and recognition approach should be scale-invariant. We introduce the Dilated SPP VGG-16 network with different dilation rates applied to every block of the VGG-16 network. The proposed dilated SPP VGG-16 architecture allows to increase the receptive field of the network without increasing the filter size or the depth of the network, and thus are very efficient to train. It also enables the multiscale analysis without changing the architecture of the network and retraining. We tested the proposed approach on the publicly available Camelyon17 dataset. Our experiments show that the proposed CNN achieves comparable or better accuracy than a conventional deep learning method, but with significantly less computational time and memory requirements
The effect of baseline exercise levels on the success of a remotely delivered exercise and behaviour change program in people with multiple sclerosis
Get PDFBACKGROUND: Exercise is now a crucial part of the standard care for MS and is considered the most effective non-pharmacological method of managing symptoms. Updated guidelines for physical activity in MS have recently been published, however many people with MS do not reach these levels. There is currently no empirical research testing the merit of the new guidelines, and there are few studies which integrate at-home/remote exercise delivery and behavioural change techniques for people with MS. OBJECTIVE: Investigate the methodology and evidence of existing literature to determine important variables when considering remote exercise and behaviour change interventions in MS. Subseuently, test the effect of pre-intervention exercise levels on change in exercise levels in a fesability randomised trisal. METHODS: Firstly, condusct a scoping review of the literature to determine the most effective remote delivery interventions, and important variables to consider (such as adherance). Secondly, run a secondary analysis and addition to Project BASE-MS (Changing Behaviour towards Aerobic and Strength Exercise), in which 72 participants were randomly allocated to a control or intervention group; comprising of active-exercisers (AE), and general-exercises (GE). Participants completed 4 months of tailored, internet-delivered aerobic, strength, balance, and stretching exercises. This was supplemented with 6 video calls and newsletters, with concepts based on social cognitive theory. The primary outcome measure was physical activity time, measured by the Godin Leisure-Time Exercise Questionnaire (GLTEQ). RESULTS: The scoping review found mixed evidence for which type of intervention is best, but that subjective measures of PA generally produce increased results, copared to objective measures. In the BASE-MS trial, only the GE group produced a high-moderate increase in GLTEQ score (