1,586 research outputs found
Effects of Antiretroviral Molecules on Survival and Gene Expression of An Osteoblast-like Cell Line
No full textThe advent of combined antiretroviral therapy effectively undermined the evolution of HIV disease. Nevertheless, clinical observations indicated a clear association between therapy and the impairment of bone mineral density
Host restriction factors and Human immunodeficiency Virus (HIV-1): a dynamic interplay involving all phases of the viral life cycle
No full textMammalian cells have evolved several mechanisms to prevent or block lentiviral infection and spread. Among the innate immune mechanisms, the signaling cascade triggered by type I interferon (IFN) plays a pivotal role in limiting the burden of HIV-1. In presence of IFN, human cells upregulate the expression of a number of genes, referred to as IFN-stimulated genes (ISGs), many of them acting as antiviral restriction factors (RFs). RFs are dominant proteins that target different essential steps of the viral cycle, thereby providing an early line of defense against the virus. The identification and characterization of RFs have provided unique insights into the molecular biology of HIV-1, further revealing the complex host-pathogen interplay that characterizes the infection. The presence of RFs drove viral evolution, forcing the virus to develop specific proteins to counteract their activity. The knowledge of the mechanisms that prevent viral infection and their viral counterparts may offer new insights to improve current antiviral strategies. This review provides an overview of the RFs targeting HIV-1 replication and the mechanisms that regulate their expression as well as their impact on viral replication and the clinical course of the disease
La superficie oculare come porta di ingresso all’infezione da SARS-CoV-2
No full textLa standardizzazione e la validazione di un metodo per il rilevamento del SARS-CoV-2 sulla superficie oculare potrebbero essere utili per implementare il processo di diagnosi e il monitoraggio del decorso della malattia nel tempo
A rapid hemi-nested PCR for HTLV-I detection
No full textA hemi-nested PCR approach was adopted to detect HTLV-1 infection in clinical samples of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from subjects with positive or indeterminate serological results. Our results showed that the hemi-nested PCR quickly solved the diagnostic query, detecting the presence of proviral HTLV-1 DNA in two of the 252 patients with inconclusive serological results. The main advantage of this method are the typology of DNA extraction, allowing a consistent DNA recovery without amplification problems, the rapidity (4-5 hours), the performance of the assay and its comparable or better sensitivity than other HTLV-1 PCR formats
Il ruolo della working memory nel processo di scrittura
No full textDalla letteratura è noto l’importante ruolo che la Working Memory (WM) ha nella scrittura. Lo studio qui presentato si pone l’obiettivo di analizzare la relazione tra la WM, rilevata attraverso una prova di aggiornamento (updating), e la scrittura, nelle sue diverse componenti (grafica, ortografica e di espressione scritta). Sono stati coinvolti 46 bambini (terza, quarta e quinta primaria) divisi in due gruppi sulla base della loro prestazione alla prova di updating (alta versus bassa prestazione).
I risultati mostrano delle differenze significative tra i due gruppi nella maggior parte delle prove di scrittura. Questi risultati confermano l’importanza della componente attiva della WM nell’apprendimento della scrittura
Differentially expressed genes in HIV-1 tat-expressing CD4+ T-cell line
No full textSeveral studies have indicated that human immunodeficiency virus type-1 (HIV-1) transactivating Tat protein is essential for proviral DNA transcription and virus replication. In addition, it is actively released from acutely HIV-1-infected cells and interacts either with the same virus-infected and virus producing cell, or with bystander uninfected cells, influencing the expression of several genes and related cellular functions. The main goal of this paper was to determine the Tat-related expression of basic cellular genes in a permanently tat transfected CD4+ cell line, to identify the cellular genes influenced by the presence of endogenous-exogenous Tat protein. For this purpose, we analyzed, by a cDNA-membrane-array assay, cellular mRNAs expressed in serum-free cultures of lymphoblastoid CD4(+) Jurkat cells, stably transfected with a plasmid constitutively expressing tat gene, in comparison with Jurkat cells transfected with the backbone plasmid only, and parental Jurkat cells. The expression of mRNAs in permanently tat-transfected Jurkat cells showed significant differences in 24 out of 1176 analyzed genes in comparison with parental or backbone plasmid transfected cells. Most of the genes overexpressed in permanently tat-transfected Jurkat cells, belong to transcription factors, or to receptors, adaptors, and mediators of signal transduction pathways, and to factors involved in response to oxidative stress, suggesting a complex regulation of CD4(+) T-lymphoid cell survival and proliferation by HIV-1 Tat protein
There is a Role in Detection of SARS-CoV-2 in Conjunctiva and Tears: a comprehensive review
No full textData on the involvement of the ocular surface and its relationship with Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) are still minimal and not univocal.
The respiratory tract is the structure most affected by COVID-19, and the serious form of the disease is characterized by severe pneumonia, acute respiratory distress syndrome and hypercoagulation. However, accumulating evidence shows that other organs could be reached by the virus, thus causing further comorbidities. To date, the exact route / routes of transmission of COVID-19 are still unclear. The respiratory tract is probably not the only route of transmission for this viral infection and some authors have also speculated that COVID-19 droplets, or infected hands, could contaminate the conjunctiva, which could therefore represent the initial site of an infection spread.
Theoretically, the role of the ocular surface, a biological site still relatively unexplored, appears scientifically relevant in understanding the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome - Coronavirus – 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection. The purpose of this paper is to summarize the current literature in order to elucidate the potential role of tear and conjunctival sampling to detect SARS-CoV-2 for the diagnosis of COVID-19 and to monitor patients during follow-up
Boosting Fisher vector based scoring functions for person re-identification
No full textIn recent years, much effort has been put into the development of novel algorithms to solve the person re-identification problem. The goal is to match a given person's image against a gallery of people. In this paper, we propose a single-shot supervised method to compute a scoring function that, when applied to a pair of images, provides a score expressing the likelihood that they depict the same individual. The method is characterized by: (i) the usage of a set of local image descriptors based on Fisher vectors, (ii) the training of a pool of scoring functions based on the local descriptors, and (iii) the construction of a strong scoring function by means of an adaptive boosting procedure. The method has been tested on four data-sets and results have been compared with state-of-the-art methods clearly showing superior performance
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