1,720,965 research outputs found
A novel application of Gini coefficient for the quantitative measurement of bacterial aggregation
No full textNon-surface attached bacterial aggregates are frequently found in clinical settings associated with chronic infections. Current methods quantifying the extent to which a suspended bacterial population is aggregated mainly rely on: (1) cell size distribution curves that are difficult to be compared numerically among large-scale samples; (2) the average size/proportion of aggregates in a population that do not specify the aggregation patterns. Here we introduce a novel application of Gini coefficient, herein named Aggregation Coefficient (AC), to quantify the aggregation levels of cystic fibrosis Pseudomonas aeruginosa (CF-PA) isolates in vitro using 3D micrographs, Fiji and MATLAB. Different aggregation patterns of five strains were compared statistically using the numerical AC indexes, which correlated well with the size distribution curves plotted by different biovolumes of aggregates. To test the sensitivity of AC, aggregates of the same strains were treated with nitric oxide (NO), a dispersal agent that reduces the biomass of surface attached biofilms. Strains unresponsive to NO were reflected by comparable AC indexes, while those undergoing dispersal showed a significant reduction in AC index, mirroring the changes in average aggregate sizes and proportions. Therefore, AC provides simpler and more descriptive numerical outputs for measuring different aggregation patterns compared to current approaches
Comparing PMMA and calcium sulfate as carriers for the local delivery of antibiotics to infected surgical sites
No full textAntibiotic-loaded bone cement is a primary option for treatment of orthopedic infections. Poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) is a widely used cement that, when loaded with antibiotics in spacer or bead form, has been shown to reduce infection rates. However, PMMA is not resorbable and requires a second surgery for removal, while also acting as a potential foreign body for bacterial colonization. Alternatively, resorbable bone cements, such as calcium sulfate, have been proposed and present the advantage of being completely reabsorbed. It is unknown whether the antibiotic elution characteristics of absorbable bone cements are similar to PMMA. This study (1) characterized antibiotic elution from synthetic, highly purified calcium sulfate cement beads of varying sizes against pathogenic bacteria both in liquid culture and seeded on agar plates, (2) tested calcium sulfate beads against PMMA beads loaded with the same antibiotics, and (3) analyzed the structural differences between how PMMA and calcium sulfate bind to antibiotics. In every assay, the calcium sulfate beads performed as well as, or better than, the PMMA beads in inhibition of bacterial growth and elution of vancomycin in vitro with complete elution observed from calcium sulfate within three days. These data suggest that calcium sulfate, functions, as well as PMMA in the patient setting for infection control
Dataset: Proteomic response of S. aureus to HT61
No full textDataset supports: Frapwell, C.J. et al (2020). Antimicrobial activity of the quinoline derivative HT61 against Staphylococcus aureus biofilms. Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.
Data set containing mass spectrometry results for S. aureus UAMS-1 planktonic and biofilm cultures, before and after treatment with HT61.</span
Biofilm prevention of gram-negative bacterial pathogens involved in periprosthetic infection by antibiotic-loaded calcium sulfate beads in vitro
No full textIn-vitro efficacy of antibiotics released from calcium sulfate bone void filler beads
No full textFifteen different antibiotics were individually mixed with a commercially available calcium sulfate bone void filler beads. The antibiotics were: amikacin, ceftriaxone, cefuroxime, ciprofloxacin, clindamycin, colistamethate sodium, daptomycin, gentamicin, imipenem/cilastatin, meropenem, nafcillin, rifampicin, teicoplanin, tobramycin and vancomycin. The efficacy of specific released antibiotics were validated by zone of inhibition (ZOI) testing using a modified Kirby—Bauer disk diffusion method against common periprosthetic joint infection pathogens. With a subset of experiments (daptomycin, rifampin, vancomycin alone and rifampin and vancomycin in combination) we investigated how release varied over 15 days using a repeated ZOI assay. We also tested the ability of these beads to kill biofilms formed by Staphylococcus epidermidis 35984, a prolific biofilm former. The results suggest that certain antibiotics can be combined and released from calcium sulfate with retained antibacterial efficacy. The daptomycin and rifampin plus vancomycin beads showed antimicrobial efficacy for the full 15 days of testing and vancomycin in combination with rifampin prevented resistant mutants. In the biofilm killing assay all of the antibiotic combinations showed a significant reduction in biofilm bacteria after 24 hr. The exposure time was an important factor in the amount of killing and varied among the antibiotics
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
- …
