To determine laboratory-to-laboratory variability of the limulus amoebocyte lysate (LAL) test for evaluating endotoxin content in influenza virus vaccine, a collaborative study was designed. Participants were six influenza virus vaccine manufacturers and the Bureau of Biologics (BoB). Lysate lot 116, Reference Influenza Virus Vaccine for Endotoxin Assay E-1, and four test vaccines having differ...

INTRODUCTION Pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan L. Millsp.) is an important pulse crop in the semi-arid tropics and subtropical farming systems, providing high quality vegetable protein, animal feed and firewood (Mittal and Ujagir, 2005). The crop yields are generally hampered by many pests, which are problematic over years (Kumar and Nath, 2002). Major constraint in the production of pigeonpea is the da...

We have developed a novel method for detection of endotoxin with extra-high sensitivity by using substitutional stripping voltammetry (SSV). In this method, a p-aminophenol (pAP) conjugated peptide (Boc-Leu-Gly-Arg-pAP; LGR-pAP) was used as a substrate for a protease, which is activated at the last step of the endotoxin-induced Limulus amebocyte lysate (LAL) cascade reaction. Extra-highly sensi...

Artificially selected aggressive (SAL) and non-aggressive (LAL) male house mice were tested in a hexagonal tunnel maze and light-dark preference (LD) box to determine if the bidirectional selection for aggressive behavior leads to a coselection for different levels of trait anxiety. The tunnel maze consists of an open, brightly lit central arena surrounded by a complex system of interconnecting...

BACKGROUND Biological purity of dialysis water is considered as one of the primary conditions to deliver optimal haemodialysis. METHODS The present study explores the added value of a novel cytokine (IL-1ss) induction assay, using a monocytic THP-1 cell line, compared to the classical detection methods for microbial dialysis fluid contaminants. RESULTS In contrast to the Limulus Amebocyte L...

Lal et al. have recently argued (1, 2) that restoring soil carbon levels worldwide is important for a number of purposes, including reducing atmospheric CO 2 concentrations. We agree, but we question how much eroded soil C is ultimately delivered to the atmosphere. Previous estimates of the proportion of eroded soil carbon oxidized range from 0% to near 100% (3, 4). We believe that the true val...

AIMS Endotoxin detection assays are not validated for use in end-stage kidney disease (ESKD). We investigated the accuracy and precision of the kinetic turbidimetric Limulus amoebocyte lysate (LAL) assay to detect endotoxin in plasma from patients with ESKD. Optimisation of endotoxin recovery from plasma using the detergent Tween 80 was also explored. METHODS Plasma samples from 7 patients wi...

Systems of conjunction, particularly where the conjunction of noncanonical constituents is involved, are not invariant across the range of natural languages. In this paper, we examine a number of problems involving conjunction and show that one apparent watershed between diierent systems of conjunction corresponds to a distinction in the scope of associativity rules in the landscape of substruc...

Mechanical load influences embryonic ventricular growth, morphogenesis, and function. However, little is known about changes in regional passive ventricular properties during the development of altered mechanical loading conditions in the embryo. We tested the hypothesis that regional mechanical loads are a critical determinant of embryonic ventricular passive properties. We measured biaxial pa...

We focus on how the choice of input-output representation has a crucial impact on the expressiveness of so-called “logics of polynomial time.” Our analysis illustrates this dependence in the context of Light Affine Logic (LAL), which is both a restricted version of Linear Logic, and a primitive functional programming language with restricted sharing of arguments. By slightly relaxing representa...