INTRODUCTION Detection of heterogeneous vancomycin-intermediate Staphylococcus aureus (hVISA) is currently problematic. Although the population analysis profile with area under the curve (PAP-AUC) is the gold standard for detecting hVISA strains, this method is time consuming. This study aimed to induce vancomycin non-susceptible Staphylococcus aureus isolates in methicillin-resistant S. aureus...

In January 2006, the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute (CLSI) updated breakpoints for vancomycin susceptibility testing for Staphylococcus aureus such that an MIC greater than 2 mg/liter was considered to represent nonsusceptibility to vancomycin. Previously, an MIC of 4 mg/liter had been considered to represent susceptibility. Additionally, in 2009, the CLSI altered the guidelines fo...

Screen video recording is a common component of usability testing. We have developed tools for reviewing and analyzing the video more efficiently. The tool: 1) breaks up a video into shorter segments and provide a compact pictorial summarization of the video; 2) provides a variety of ways for accessing video; 3) allows web-based review of video; and 4) provides a web-based way to post and view ...

As part of the R&D program towards a fourth generation light source, a Spontaneous Emission (SASE) demonstration is being prepared. The Visible Amplifier (VISA) undulator will be installed at Brookhaven National Laboratory year. The VISA undulator is an in-vacuum, 4-meter long, 1.8 cm period, pure-pe device, with a novel, strong focusing, permanent magnet FODO array included w mm undulator gap....

Questions regarding the prevalence and clinical significance of both vancomycin-intermediate Staphylococcus aureus (VISA) and, more importantly, heterogeneous VISA (hVISA) are difficult to address, mainly due to the lack of accurate methods and guidelines for the identification of hVISA. VISA strains have been isolated from many areas of the world but are few in number ( 30); however, hVISA str...

We compared the results obtained with six commercial MIC test systems (Etest, MicroScan, Phoenix, Sensititre, Vitek Legacy, and Vitek 2 systems) and three reference methods (agar dilution, disk diffusion, and vancomycin [VA] agar screen [VScr]) with the results obtained by the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute broth microdilution (BMD) reference method for the detection of VA-intermed...

Currently, an effective gene therapy strategy, which not only retains cancer-specific expression but also limits toxicity, has yet to be developed for ovarian cancer. Mounting reports over the years have shown that human telomerase activity is significantly elevated in cancer cells compared with normal cells. In this study, we evaluated the human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT; T) prom...

CONTEXT Chronic midportion Achilles tendinopathy is a common and hard-to-treat disorder characterized by degenerative changes of the tendon matrix. Ultrasonographic tissue characterization (UTC) was successfully used to quantify structural human Achilles tendon changes. This novel and reliable technique could be used in follow-up studies to relate tendon structure to symptoms. OBJECTIVE To qu...

Antimicrobial resistance in Staphylococcus aureus is a major public health threat, compounded by emergence of strains with resistance to vancomycin and daptomycin, both last line antimicrobials. Here we have performed high throughput DNA sequencing and comparative genomics for five clinical pairs of vancomycin-susceptible (VSSA) and vancomycin-intermediate ST239 S. aureus (VISA); each pair isol...

BACKGROUND Self-administrated patient outcome scores are increasingly recommended for evaluation of primary outcome in clinical studies. The VISA-P score, developed at the Victorian Institute of Sport Assessment in Melbourne, Australia, is a questionnaire developed for patients with patellar tendinopathy and the patients assess severity of symptoms, function and ability to participate in sport....