UNLABELLED We presented three cases of influenza-related severe pneumonia/empyema that occurred in one season. CASE 1 A 76-year-old diabetic man, developed empyema as a result of severe community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) secondary to Haemophilus influenzae, as confirmed on sputum culture. Nasal swab was positive for influenza A antigen. After drainage of empyema, intravenous peramivir and pip...

BACKGROUND In 2008, 800 rural Thai adults living within Kamphaeng Phet Province were enrolled in a prospective cohort study of zoonotic influenza transmission. Serological analyses of enrollment sera suggested this cohort had experienced subclinical avian influenza virus (AIV) infections with H9N2 and H5N1 viruses. METHODS After enrollment, participants were contacted weekly for 24 mos for ac...

Most natural and synthetic antibodies are ‘unseen’. That is, the demonstration of their neutralization effects with any antigen requires laborious costly wet-lab experiments. The existing methods that learn antibody representations from known antibody–antigen interactions unsuitable for unseen owing to absence interaction instances. DeepAAI method proposed herein learns by constructing two adap...

In order to evaluate the immunogenicity, safety and tolerability of influenza vaccination in children with inborn errors of metabolism (IEMs), we enrolled 20 patients with IEMs at risk of decompensation (14 males; mean age±SD, 8.5±3.9years) and 20 healthy age- and gender-matched controls. Four weeks after vaccination, seroconversion rates were 75-85% and seroprotection rates 85-95%, with high g...

Studies have been carried out since 1959 at the Coonoor Influenza Centre to devise a method of cultivating influenza virus in vitro which would be suitable for large-scale virus production. The authors report the successful cultivation of the virus in tissue cultures of chorioallantoic membrane on glass wool. The method described may be used equally satisfactorily for culture in volumes ranging...

Influenza infection is a potential cause of additional morbidity and mortality in patients who are immunocompromised because of cancer or its treatment. Of particular note, influenza infection may delay or interrupt chemotherapy and necessitate hospitalization. Successful immunization depends on an intact immune system that can produce antibodies in response to antigen exposure. Patients with c...

Vaccination against influenza is the most effective way to protect the population. Current vaccines provide protection by stimulating functional B- and T-cell responses; however, they are poorly immunogenic in particular segments of the population and need to be reformulated almost every year due to the genetic instability of the virus. Next-generation influenza vaccines should be designed to i...

Infection with influenza virus strongly predisposes an individual to bacterial superinfection, which is often the significant cause of morbidity and mortality during influenza epidemics. Little is known about the immunomodulating properties of the virus that lead to this phenomenon, but the effect of the viral components on the development of immune dendritic cells (DCs) may prove vital. In thi...

Identification of safe and effective adjuvants remains an urgent need for the development of inactivated influenza vaccines for mucosal administration. Here, we used a murine challenge model to evaluate the adjuvant activity of GPI-0100, a saponin-derived adjuvant, on influenza subunit vaccine administered via the intranasal or the intrapulmonary route. Balb/c mice were immunized with 1 µg A/PR...

PURPOSE Nitrocellulose membrane-based filtration system (NCFS) is widely used for protein concentration. In this study, we applied NCFS for production of virus-like particle (VLP) as a vaccine candidate and evaluated yield property and immunogenicity. MATERIALS AND METHODS Influenza VLPs were generated by baculovirus-insect cell protein expression system. NCFS and sucrose gradient ultracentri...