Biosafety and Proteome Profiles of Different Heat Inactivation Methods for Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Inactivation of Mycobacterium tuberculosis is an important step to guarantee biosafety for subsequent M. tuberculosis identification and related research, notably in areas of endemicity with minimal resources. However, certain biomolecules might be denatured or hydrolyzed because of the harsh inactivation process, and a standardized protocol is yet to be determined.

New Insight regarding Legionella Non- Pneumophila Species Identification: Comparison between the Traditional mip Gene Classification Scheme and a Newly Proposed Scheme Targeting the rpoB Gene

Legionella spp. are a widely spread bacteria that cause a fatal form of pneumonia. While traditional laboratory techniques have provided valuable systems for Legionella pneumophila identification, the amplification of the mip gene has been recognized as the only useful tool for Legionella non- pneumophila species identification both in clinical and environmental samples.

Pharmacoinformation studies of chondroprotectors

The pharmacoinformation approach to the assessment and modeling of drugs involves the use of modern methods of data mining. These methods include: 1) analysis of big data (selection of texts of scientific publications, search for new biomarkers); 2) computer analysis of texts (automatic classification of texts by content, identification of pseudoscientific texts); 3) analysis of metric maps (visualization and analysis of complex patterns, including clustering) and 4) chemoinformation analysis, including the assessment of the effect of drugs on the transcriptome, proteome and microbiome of a person. The article provides examples of the application of these methods of pharmacoinformatics to chondroprotectors containing standardized forms of chondroitin sulfate and glucosamine sulfate.

On Building and Evaluating a Medical Records Exploration Interface Using Text Mining Techniques

Medical records contain many terms that are difficult to process. Our aim in this study is to allow visual exploration of the information in medical databases where texts present a large number of syntactic variations and abbreviations by using an interface that facilitates content identification, navigation, and information retrieval. We propose the use of multi-term tag clouds as content representation tools and as assistants for browsing and querying tasks. The tag cloud generation is achieved by using a novelty mathematical method that allows related terms to remain grouped together within the tags. To evaluate this proposal, we have carried out a survey over a spanish database with 24,481 records. For this purpose, 23 expert users in the medical field were tasked to test the interface and answer some questions in order to evaluate the generated tag clouds properties. In addition, we obtained a precision of 0.990, a recall of 0.870, and a F1-score of 0.904 in the evaluation of the tag cloud as an information retrieval tool. The main contribution of this approach is that we automatically generate a visual interface over the text capable of capturing the semantics of the information and facilitating access to medical records, obtaining a high degree of satisfaction in the evaluation survey.

Clinical Impact of the Expanded BioFire Blood Culture Identification 2 Panel in a U.S. Children’s Hospital

The BioFire BCID2 panel is an accurate panel that is equivalent to the BioFire BCID panel compared to standard culture. The BioFire BCID2 panel offers several advantages over the BioFire BCID panel, including enterococcal species identification, Gram-negative resistance gene detection, Salmonella identification, and the added mecA / mecC and MREJ target for better Staphylococcus aureus and coagulase-negative Staphylococcus (CoNS) differentiation.

Visual Exploration of Medical Records

Medical records contain many terms which are difficult to process. Our aim in this study is to allow the visual exploration of the information in medical databases where the texts presents a large number of syntactic variations and abbreviations, through an interface which facilitates content identification, navigation and information retrieval. We propose the use of multi-term tag clouds as content representation tools and as assistants for the browsing and querying tasks. The tag cloud generation is achieved through a novelty mathematical method that allows related terms to remain grouped together within the tags To evaluate this proposal, we have used a database with 24,481 records. 23 expert users in the medical field were tasked to complete a survey to evaluate the generated tag clouds properties and we obtained a precision of 0.990, a recall of 0.870 and a F1score of 0.904 in the evaluation of the tag cloud as an information retrieval tool. The main contribution of this approach is that we automatically generate a visual interface over the text capable of capturing the semantics of the information and facilitating access to medical records.

Analysis of Diversity And Identification of SSR, SCoT, And ITAP Informative Amplicons For Grain Fe And Zn Content In Wheat Genotypes

Biofortification provides a promising method of solving microelement malnutrition in developing countries. For this purpose, a study was conducted to understand the grain Fe and Zn content variation in seventy prevalent Iranian wheat genotypes across three consecutive years, to assess genetic diversity, and to identify informative amplicons for high grain Fe and Zn content using three simple sequence repeat (SSR), start codon targeted (SCoT) polymorphism, and intron targeted amplified polymorphism (ITAP) markers. Grain Fe and Zn content was highly variable each year with high heritability. Despite the highly significant effect of year-genotype interaction, some stable genotypes were ranked highly all the three years for grain Fe and Zn content. The grain Fe and Zn contents were positively correlated in the second and third years. High genetic diversity was detected among the wheat genotypes using three different marker systems. A number of informative SSR, SCoT, and ITAP amplicons for high grain Fe and Zn were identified overall or in individual years. A few informative amplicons were common and stable for grain Fe and Zn content in the different years. The SSR alleles located on 3A, 4A, 4B, and 6B chromosomes were positively correlated with high Fe and Zn content, indicating that co-location of genes affected Fe and Zn content. Identification of informative alleles and amplicons for high grain Fe and Zn content could contribute to the development of sequence-based markers and improve the selection of genotypes with high micronutrient content.

Protein Extractions from Amphistegina lobifera: Protocol Development and Optimization

Proteins are essential to life, and the evaluation of their content, identification, and modification represents a fundamental assay in biochemistry research. Different analytical techniques and protocols have been specifically designed but have rarely been compared. Here, we test and compare a variety of methodologies and treatments for the quantification of proteins in Amphistegina lessonii, a larger symbiont-bearing benthic foraminiferal species. These analyses specifically include (a) lysis buffer (homemade vs. RIPA), (b) protein assays (Lowry, BCA, and Bradford), (c) ultrasonic bath treatment, and (d) protein staining (silver staining vs. Coomassie blue). On the basis of the comparative outcome, we suggest using the homemade lysis buffer, Lowry or BCA assays, ultrasonic bath treatment, and silver stain to maximize the extraction and characterization of protein for A. lessonii. This protocol might be suitable and extended to other benthic foraminiferal species, including the smaller ones.