IGnAz SEmmElWEIS – HAnD WASHInG PIonEEr Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis (July 1, 1818 – August 13, 1865) was the Hungarian – Austrian physician who demonstrated that puerperal fever (also known as “childbed fever”) was contagious and that its incidence could be drastically reduced by enforcing appropriate hand washing by medical care-givers. He made this discovery in 1847 while head of the Maternity D...

BACKGROUND Intravaginal practices including vaginal washing have been associated with HIV-1 acquisition. This association may be mediated by mucosal disruption, changes in vaginal flora or genital tract inflammatory responses. Reducing vaginal washing could lower women's risk of HIV-1 acquisition. METHODS 23 HIV-1 seronegative women who reported current vaginal washing were recruited from a p...

The relevance of the mean retention time (MRT) of particles through the gastrointestinal tract (GIT) is well understood and MRT(particle)GIT is an important parameter in digestion models. Solute markers have been used to estimate MRT(solute)GIT (or 'fluid passage') in animals, but the relevance of this measure is less evident and is usually sought in its relation to MRT(particle)GIT. The ratio ...

The number of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) from hybrid and electric vehicles that are produced or discarded every year is growing exponentially, which may pose risks to supply lines limited resources. Thus, recycling regeneration end-of-life LIBs (EoL-LIBs) becoming an urgent critical task for a sustainable environmentally friendly future. In this regard, much attention, especially in industry,...

Beclin 1 is a crucial regulator of autophagy. It forms a complex with ATG14L, VPS34 or the class III phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase AMBRA1 to control autophagosome formation. A study in this issue of The EMBO Journal (Xia et al, 2013) reports that WASH, a protein known to regulate endosomal sorting, hampers autophagy by inhibiting the AMBRA1-dependent polyubiquitylation of Beclin 1. This modific...

BACKGROUND Diarrhoea is a common cause of morbidity and a leading cause of death among children aged less than five years, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. It is transmitted by ingesting contaminated food or drink, by direct person-to-person contact, or from contaminated hands. Hand washing is one of a range of hygiene promotion interventions that can interrupt the transmission...

Different techniques of car washing are presented in this paper, along with issues of water use, water contamination and its purification. Nowadays, technological advancements in the car wash industry fall into specific categories such as, new washing technologies (touch-free and hybrid washing technology), advanced water recycling systems (based on biological water treatment), water desalinati...