1,720,961 research outputs found
Phage-resistance in Klebsiella pneumoniae clinical isolates may correlate to augmented clearance by phagocytes
No full textHospital-acquired infections sustained by Klebsiella pneumoniae (KP) strains are often very difficult to treat, mainly due to their frequent association with complex antibiotic resistance traits. Recently, the therapeutic use of bacteriophages against multidrug resistant bacterial infections is gaining a renewed interest, although its efficacy can be limited by the insurgence of phage-resistant strains, possibly making this approach inefficient and requiring constant efforts for new phage isolations. Since we have previously reported that a φBO1E resistant K. pneumoniae strain (BO-FR-1) shows a significant reduction of virulence in a Galleria mellonella model, in the present study we further evaluate the effect of phage resistance on host-pathogen interaction.
Two KP phage-resistant mutants, BO-FR-1 and KP263-FR, have been generated in vitro using the KKBO-1 (Sequence Type 258) or KP263 (Sequence Type 147) clinical isolates. Bacterial clones were then used to infect monocyte-derived type-1 and type-2 macrophages obtained from healthy donors. Macrophage response was finally evaluated in terms of internalization index, intracellular killing capability, and inflammatory response.
Our results show that both phage-resistant clones were significantly more prone to phagocytosis and to intracellular killing when compared to their parental strains, without showing significant differences in NF-kB activation.
Although the insurgence of phage-resistance may represent a limitation for phage therapy, in the context of the interplay among phage, bacterial pathogen and host, it may be beneficial for the host by making bacterial strains more susceptible to innate immune response
Phosphaditylserine liposomes as a possible candidate for the therapeutic management of Mycobacterium abscessus infection in CF patients
No full textIntroduction: we have previously reported that phosphatidylserine liposome (PS-L) were capable to induce a significant antimycobacterial response in mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB)-infected and MTB/HIV-1-coinfected macrophages by simultaneously limiting inflammatory response and HIV replication. Here, we have assessed the therapeutic value of PS-L on human macrophages in vitro infected with M. abscessus (Mab), a non-tubercular mycobacterium which represents a relevant cause of morbidity and mortality in vulnerable patients such as those with cystic fibrosis (CF).
Materials and methods: Differentiated THP-1 cells (dTHP-1), used as a model of human macrophages, and primary macrophages derived from CF patients, were in vitro infected with Mab and then stimulated or not PS-L. the therapeutic value of the treatment was assessed in terms of intracellular mycobacterial viability, by CFU assay, and NF-kB activation (calculated as the ratio between total NF-κB and phosphorylated NF-κB) by NFκB p65 (Total/Phospho) Human InstantOneTM ELISA Kit (Invitrogen)
results: results show that in vitro stimulation with PS-L of dTHP-1 cells in vitro infected with mab significantly reduces intracellular mycobacterial viability and was associated with a significant drop in NF-κB activation. Importantly, such pro-mycobacteriocidal effect was also observed on macrophages from cystic fibrosis patients in vitro infected with Mab.
discussion and conclusions: altogether, these results extend our previously reported results obtained on MTB-infected and MTB/HIV-coinfected cells, also against a relevant difficult-to-treat non tubercular mycobacterium, such as Mab, and support the therapeutic exploitation of PS-L as host-directed therapy to simultaneously limit potentially pathogenetic proinflammatory response and intracellular Mab viability in vulnerable patients, such as CF patients
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
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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