Advances in mucosal vaccination

2004 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 209-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Els N. T. Meeusen ◽  
Jean-Pierre Y. Scheerlinck ◽  
Sean Wattegedera ◽  
Gary Entrican

AbstractPathogens that enter the body via mucosal surfaces face unique defense mechanisms that combine the innate barrier provided by the mucus layer with an adaptive response typified by the production and transepithelial secretion of pathogen-specific IgA. Both the measurement and induction of mucosal responses pose significant challenges for experimental and practical application and may need to be adapted to the species under study. In particular, for livestock, immunization procedures developed in small rodent models are not always effective in large animals or compatible with management practices. This paper reviews the latest advances in our understanding of the processes that lead to secretory IgA responses and how this relates to the development of mucosal immunization procedures and adjuvants for veterinary vaccines. In addition, it highlights the complex interactions that can take place between the pathogen and the host's immune response, with specific reference toChlamydia/Chlamydophilainfections in sheep.

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Sabri Embi ◽  
Zurina Shafii

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of Shariah governance and corporate governance (CG) on the risk management practices (RMPs) of local Islamic banks and foreign Islamic banks operating in Malaysia. The Shariah governance comprises the Shariah review (SR) and Shariah audit (SA) variables. The study also evaluates the level of RMPs, CG, SR, and SA between these two type of banks. With the aid of SPSS version 20, the items for RMPs, CG, SR, and SA were subjected to principal component analysis (PCA). From the PCA, one component or factor was extracted each for the CG, SR, and RMPs while another two factors were extracted for the SA. Primary data was collected using a self-administered survey questionnaire. The questionnaire covers four aspects ; CG, SR, SA, and RMPs. The data received from the 300 usable questionnaires were subjected to correlation and regression analyses as well as an independent t-test. The result of correlation analysis shows that all the four variables have large positive correlations with each other indicating a strong and significant relationship between them. From the regression analysis undertaken, CG, SR, and SA together explained 52.3 percent of the RMPs and CG emerged as the most influential variable that impacts the RMPs. The independent t-test carried out shows that there were significant differences in the CG and SA between the local and foreign Islamic banks. However, there were no significant differences between the two types of the bank in relation to SR and RMPs. The study has contributed to the body of knowledge and is beneficial to academicians, industry players, regulators, and other stakeholders.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 417
Author(s):  
Sherli Koshy-Chenthittayil ◽  
Linda Archambault ◽  
Dhananjai Senthilkumar ◽  
Reinhard Laubenbacher ◽  
Pedro Mendes ◽  
...  

The human microbiome has been a focus of intense study in recent years. Most of the living organisms comprising the microbiome exist in the form of biofilms on mucosal surfaces lining our digestive, respiratory, and genito-urinary tracts. While health-associated microbiota contribute to digestion, provide essential nutrients, and protect us from pathogens, disturbances due to illness or medical interventions contribute to infections, some that can be fatal. Myriad biological processes influence the make-up of the microbiota, for example: growth, division, death, and production of extracellular polymers (EPS), and metabolites. Inter-species interactions include competition, inhibition, and symbiosis. Computational models are becoming widely used to better understand these interactions. Agent-based modeling is a particularly useful computational approach to implement the various complex interactions in microbial communities when appropriately combined with an experimental approach. In these models, each cell is represented as an autonomous agent with its own set of rules, with different rules for each species. In this review, we will discuss innovations in agent-based modeling of biofilms and the microbiota in the past five years from the biological and mathematical perspectives and discuss how agent-based models can be further utilized to enhance our comprehension of the complex world of polymicrobial biofilms and the microbiome.


2009 ◽  
Vol 7 (S1) ◽  
pp. S19-S28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen C. Edberg

There are a number of relationships the host can establish with the microbes we ingest. For the vast majority of microbes, they have a short-lived liaison with the human host. Either they are destroyed by the stomach acid or bile, or can not establish even a temporary residency in the gastrointestinal tract. Early in life the mucosal surfaces of the body establishes a resident, and generally stable, normal flora. These normal flora microbes, the majority of which are bacteria, have specific receptors for specific areas of the alimentary tract. If the foreign microbe can establish residency, it then may transiently or permanently become part of the normal flora. However, in order to produce disease, it must possess an additional set of virulence factors. While some of these are known, many are not. Those that are known include enzymes, such as protease, lipase, and esterase. Accordingly, VFAR may not be associated with human disease and its presence or absence has no public health meaning.


2000 ◽  
Vol 68 (7) ◽  
pp. 3830-3839 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dörthe Externest ◽  
Barbara Meckelein ◽  
M. Alexander Schmidt ◽  
Andreas Frey

ABSTRACT Monitoring specific secretory immunoglobulin A (IgA) responses in the intestines after mucosal immunization or infection is impeded by the fact that sampling of small intestinal secretions requires invasive methods not feasible for routine diagnostics. Since IgA plasma cells generated after intragastric immunization are known to populate remote mucosal sites as well, secretory IgA responses at other mucosal surfaces may correlate to those in the intestines and could serve as proxy measures for IgA secretion in the gut. To evaluate the practicability of this approach, mice were immunized intragastrically with 0.2, 2, and 20 mg of ovalbumin plus 10 μg of cholera toxin, and the antigen-specific local secretory IgA responses in duodenal, ileal, jejunal, rectal, and vaginal secretions, saliva, urine, and feces, as well as serum IgG and IgA responses were analyzed by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. Correlation analysis revealed significant relationships between serum IgG and IgA, urinary IgA, salivary IgA, and secretory IgA in duodenal, jejunal, ileal, and rectal secretions for the 0.2-mg but not for the 20-mg ovalbumin dose. Fecal samples were poor predictors for intestinal antiovalbumin IgA responses, and no correlations could be established for cholera toxin, neither between local anti-cholera toxin levels nor to the antiovalbumin responses. Thus, specific IgA in serum, saliva, or urine can serve as a predictor of the release of specific IgA at intestinal surfaces after intragastric immunization, but the lack of correlations for high ovalbumin doses and for cholera toxin indicates a strong dependency on antigen type and dosage for these relationships.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Werner Solbach

Microorganisms constitute 70 percent of the biomass on Planet Earth. Comparatively few species are adapted to colonize human surfaces and form a complex Meta-Organism with manyfold mutual benefits. Occasionally, microorganisms may overcome the barriers of the skin and mucosal surfaces and may multiply locally or in multiple sites inside the body. This process is called infection. Infections can be caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites, helminths, and fungi. Immediately after infection, numerous defense mechanisms of the immune system are activated to combat replication of the microbes. There is a balance between microorganism and human defense mechanisms, which may lead to either asymptomatic infection or result in a wide spectrum of symptoms from mild to severe disease and even death. The most important factors in the diagnosis of infectious diseases are a careful history, physical examination and the appropriate collection of body fluids and tissues. Laboratory diagnosis requires between 2 and 72 hours. Wherever possible, antibiotics should only be used when sufficient evidence of efficacy is available. Then, however, they should be used as early as possible and in high doses. In addition to everyday hygiene measures, vaccination is the most effective measure to prevent infectious diseases.


Polymers ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (12) ◽  
pp. 1342 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron Alford ◽  
Brenna Tucker ◽  
Veronika Kozlovskaya ◽  
Jun Chen ◽  
Nirzari Gupta ◽  
...  

Nucleic acid therapeutics have the potential to be the most effective disease treatment strategy due to their intrinsic precision and selectivity for coding highly specific biological processes. However, freely administered nucleic acids of any type are quickly destroyed or rendered inert by a host of defense mechanisms in the body. In this work, we address the challenge of using nucleic acids as drugs by preparing stimuli responsive poly(methacrylic acid)/poly(N-vinylpyrrolidone) (PMAA/PVPON)n multilayer hydrogel capsules loaded with ~7 kDa G-quadruplex DNA. The capsules are shown to release their DNA cargo on demand in response to both enzymatic and ultrasound (US)-triggered degradation. The unique structure adopted by the G-quadruplex is essential to its biological function and we show that the controlled release from the microcapsules preserves the basket conformation of the oligonucleotide used in our studies. We also show that the (PMAA/PVPON) multilayer hydrogel capsules can encapsulate and release ~450 kDa double stranded DNA. The encapsulation and release approaches for both oligonucleotides in multilayer hydrogel microcapsules developed here can be applied to create methodologies for new therapeutic strategies involving the controlled delivery of sensitive biomolecules. Our study provides a promising methodology for the design of effective carriers for DNA vaccines and medicines for a wide range of immunotherapies, cancer therapy and/or tissue regeneration therapies in the future.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 ◽  
pp. 1-3 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Michele Markey ◽  
Lauren E. Vestal

Actinomyces meyeri bacterium resides on mucosal surfaces and is uncommonly pathogenic. When A. meyeri does cause infection, these infections are typically pulmonary in origin and have the capacity to disseminate throughout the body. A. meyeri is an uncommon cause of pelvic infection. We present a unique case of a posthysterectomy abscess caused by this particular bacterium.


2009 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Kelly ◽  
Christopher Hickey

In this article we discuss the ways in which the professional identity of Australian Football League (AFL) footballers — in a physical, high body contact sport — is shaped by concerns to develop different aspects of the body, mind and soul of the young men who want to become AFL footballers. Drawing on Michel Foucault’s later work on the care of the self we argue that narratives of identity necessarily involve a struggle for the body, mind and soul of these young men. Foucault’s work enables us to identify and analyse how relations of power, forms of regulation and arts of governing interact in ongoing attempts to develop the professional footballer. The article explores these issues via an analysis of the rationalities and techniques that inform talent identification and player management practices; and risk management in relation to these practices and processes in the AFL.


2020 ◽  
pp. 097215092093406
Author(s):  
Ahmad A. Toumeh ◽  
Sofri Yahya ◽  
Azlan Amran

Management engages in earnings manipulation for different reasons. This article argues that low-growth firms with high free cash flow will opt for income-increasing earnings management in order to obscure the low profits derived from their investments in negative net present value (NPV) projects. On the other hand, we argue that the listed companies might be interested in being listed in the first market due to its privileges and to preserve the competitiveness, through managing their earnings upwardly, so that they can satisfy the condition of achieving a particular earnings limit. This article should advance the body of earnings management literature in the Jordanian context by examining the effect of the moderating role of an independent audit committee (IAC) in the association between surplus free cash flow (SFCF) and income-increasing discretionary accruals (DAC). Further, this is the initial empirical attempt to investigate the moderation effect of IAC between stock market segmentations (SMS) and positive DAC. The results of this current study offer original and beneficial information for the Jordanian government and other countries with a similar institutional environment because the study promotes the application of applying IAC as an efficient tool to constrain management behaviour towards manipulation of the accruals. On top of that, this research offers information concerning the prevailing situation of earnings management practices and corporate governance in Jordan, in which shareholders, local and international investors, policymakers, regulators and academic researchers are interested. Finally, panel data analyses and various statistical techniques are employed to derive conclusions.


Nutrients ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 3956
Author(s):  
Camilla Barbero Mazzucca ◽  
Davide Raineri ◽  
Giuseppe Cappellano ◽  
Annalisa Chiocchetti

Nutrition and immunity are closely related, and the immune system is composed of the most highly energy-consuming cells in the body. Much of the immune system is located within the GI tract, since it must deal with the huge antigenic load introduced with food. Moreover, the incidence of immune-mediated diseases is elevated in Westernized countries, where “transition nutrition” prevails, owing to the shift from traditional dietary patterns towards Westernized patterns. This ecological correlation has fostered increasing attempts to find evidence to support nutritional interventions aimed at managing and reducing the risk of immune-mediated diseases. Recent studies have described the impacts of single nutrients on markers of immune function, but the knowledge currently available is not sufficient to demonstrate the impact of specific dietary patterns on immune-mediated clinical disease endpoints. If nutritional scientists are to conduct quality research, one of many challenges facing them, in studying the complex interactions between the immune system and diet, is to develop improved tools for investigating eating habits in the context of immunomediated diseases.


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