The average daily maximum temperature for the coldest month during the winters of 1977-1978 and 1978-1979, when bluetongue (BT) virus overwintered in a cycle between Culicoides spp. and cattle in western Turkey (Aydin and Izmir provinces), was found to be 12.5 degrees C. This temperature agreed with the lowest temperatures found for Culicoides activity and for flight over long distances. Overwi...

The authors prospectively studied the effect of demographic, reproductive, stress-related, and health behavior factors measured at study entry on age of natural menopause in 185 healthy US women. At study entry, women were 42.5-47.5 years old and premenopausal. After a baseline examination (1983-1985), women were followed for 7-9 years, during which time they reported on a monthly basis their m...

OBJECTIVE To describe the construction of a disease model incorporating both genetic an environmental factors in the etiology of Alzheimer's disease (AD), using data generated from the Indianapolis-Ibadan dementia project (I-IDP). METHOD The I-IDP is a longitudinal comparative study of the prevalence and incidence o dementia in 2 communities: elderly African Americans living in Indianapolis, ...

In this study of autoimmunity among a population of Gullah African Americans in South Carolina, the links between environmental exposures and autoimmunity (presence of antinuclear antibodies (ANA)) have been assessed. The study population included patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (n = 10), their first degree relatives (n = 61), and unrelated controls (n = 9) where 47.5% (n = 38) were ...

African swine fever (ASF) is now established beyond Africa, in the Caucasus and the Russian Federation, where it is having a particularly devastating impact on small-scale pig farmers, who are losing a valuable protein source and cash income. In the past, the virus was already detected outside Africa from the 1950s to the 1980s in Europe, the Caribbean and Brazil. The recent developments in Eas...

Introduction Institutionalizing research and training for the management of neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) through establishment of a worldclass research centre In a recent article titled ‘‘Neglected No Longer: New Progress on NTDs,’’ Richard Hartfield argues that NTDs are now mainstream because they are on the agenda of three key policy forums_the African Union (AU), the World Health Assem...

African horsesickness (AHS) is a devastating disease of horses. The disease is caused by the double-stranded RNA-containing African horsesickness virus (AHSV). Using electron cryomicroscopy and three-dimensional image reconstruction, we determined the architecture of an AHSV serotype 4 (AHSV-4) reference strain. The structure revealed triple-layered AHS virions enclosing the segmented genome an...

Confounding due to population stratification is a potential source of concern in population-based genetic association studies, particularly in recently admixed populations such as African Americans. Several methods have been developed to control for population stratification in the context of genome-wide association studies. Because these approaches require thousands of genotypes from genetic m...

A traveler to East Africa developed fever, an eschar on his forearm and thrombocytopenia shortly after returning home to Chennai, India. Trypanosoma brucei rhodesiense infection was diagnosed on examination of his peripheral smear. He made a full recovery after receiving a course of suramin.