Mounting and maintaining an effective immune response in the face of infection can be costly. The outcome of infection depends on two host immune strategies: resistance and tolerance. Resistance limits pathogen load, while tolerance reduces the fitness impact of an infection. While resistance strategies are well studied, tolerance has received less attention, but is now considered to play a vit...

The aim was to study the bacterial load and isolate potential pathogens and food spoilage bacteria from kitchen tables, including preparation tables and dining tables. Methods. A total of 53 households gave their consent for participation. The samples were collected by swabbing over an area of 5 cm by 5 cm of the tables and processed for bacterial count which was read as colony forming units (C...

With the aim of investigating home therapy for enterococcal endocarditis, we compared the efficacy of teicoplanin combined with gentamicin given once a day or in three daily doses (t.i.d.) with the standard treatment, ampicillin plus gentamicin administered t.i.d., for treating experimental enterococcal endocarditis. The antibiotics were administered by using "human-like pharmacokinetics" (H-L)...

Plasmacytoid dendritic cells (pDCs) are well known as the major cell type that secretes type I IFN in response to viral infections. Their role in combating other classes of infectious organisms, including bacteria, and their mechanisms of action are poorly understood. We have found that pDCs play a significant role in the acute response to the intracellular bacterial pathogen Legionella pneumop...

The diversity and abundance of retrievable pelagic heterotrophic bacteria in Kongsfjorden, an Arctic fjord, was studied during the summer of 2011 (June, August, and September). Retrievable bacterial load ranged from 103 to 107CFUL-1 in June, while it was 104-106CFUL-1 in August and September. Based on 16S rRNA gene sequence similarities, a higher number of phylotypes was observed during August ...

Innate immune responses function as a first line of host defense against the development of bacterial infection, and in some cases to preserve the sterility of privileged sites in the human host. Bacteria that enter these sites must counter host responses for colonization. From the host's perspective, the innate immune system works expeditiously to minimize the bacterial threat before colonizat...

BACKGROUND Previous studies of infant fecal samples have failed to clarify the role of gut bacteria in the pathogenesis of NEC. We sought to characterize bacterial communities within intestinal tissue resected from infants with and without NEC. METHODS 26 intestinal samples were resected from 19 infants, including 16 NEC samples and 10 non-NEC samples. Bacterial 16S rRNA gene sequences were a...

26 The urinary microbiome of healthy individuals and the way it alters with ageing have not 27 been characterised and may influence disease processes. Conventional microbiological 28 methods have limited scope to capture the full spectrum of urinary bacterial species. We 29 studied the urinary microbiota from a population of healthy individuals, ranging from 26 to 30 90 years of age, by amplifi...

The ESX systems from Mycobacterium tuberculosis are responsible for the secretion of highly immunogenic proteins of key importance for bacterial survival and growth. The two prototypic proteins, ESAT-6 (EsxA from ESX-1) and TB10.4 (EsxH from ESX-3) share a lot of characteristics regarding genome organization, size, antigenic properties, and vaccine potential but the two molecules clearly have v...

INTRODUCTION This clinical study was conducted to compare the effectiveness of 1-visit versus 2-visit root canal treatment in removing endotoxins and cultivable bacteria from primarily infected root canals. METHODS Forty-eight primarily infected root canals were selected and randomly divided into 4 groups: G1, 1% NaOCl; G2, 2% chlorhexidine (CHX) gel; G3, 1% NaOCl + Ca(OH)2; and G4, 2% CHX ge...