Candida grows on devices producing treatment resistant biofilms. A key tool for the study of biofilms includes an accurate assessment of viable cell growth. This study systematically tested seven techniques, among which the XTT assay provided the most reproducible, accurate, and efficient method for the quantitative estimation of C. albicans biofilms.

We evaluated the clonogenic survival, membrane permeability, metabolic activity (XTT reduction), and apoptosis (FLICA binding) of Cryptococcus neoformans cells subjected to gamma rays from an external source, and beta and alpha particles delivered to fungal cells by capsule-specific antibody. We found that gamma, beta, and alpha radiation affected cells through different pathways.

Introduction The determination of cellular proliferation, viability and activation are key areas in a wide variety of cell biological approaches. The need for sensitive, quantitative, reliable and automated methods led to the development of standard assays. Such an example is based on the capability of the cells to incorporate a radioactively labeled substance ([3H]thymidine), or to release a r...

The minimum effective concentration (MEC) used to assess the in vitro antifungal activity of caspofungin against Aspergillus spp. is a qualitative endpoint requiring microscopic examination of hyphae. We therefore developed a tool for the quantitative assessment of caspofungin activity against Aspergillus spp. at clinically applicable concentrations. Susceptibility to caspofungin (0.008 to 8 mi...

BACKGROUND Candida biofilms, which are often associated with device-related infections, including catheter-related bloodstream infections, are resistant to commonly used antifungal agents. Current microtitre (96-well) plate-based methods to determine the antifungal susceptibility of these biofilms do not involve clinically relevant substrates (e.g. catheters), and are not well suited for evalua...

The paper presents a new formalization for firewall systems, called the Unified Firewall Model (UFM). It offers an abstraction over firewall implementations, and uses formal concepts of Rule-Based Systems to describe firewall syntax and semantics. It is backed by the XTT/ARD design methods. It allows for improving system quality, by introducing a formal verification during the design stage.

BACKGROUND A reliable method with which to assay viability and number of adipocytes and other cellular components in adipose tissue remains to be established. METHODS The authors assessed cell viability and number obtained from 1 g of suctioned adipose tissue and respective layers (the top, middle, and bottom layers) before and after digestion and centrifugation, using cell staining with Hoec...

The paper presents a concept of an intelligent control platform for the Hexor mobile robot, based on the XTT knowledge representation method for rule-based systems. The control systems is implemented in Prolog, with use of the Embedded Prolog Platform. The paper presents real-time control capabilities provided by this solution.