Clostridium perfringens is the causative agent of a wide variety of diseases in animals and humans. C. perfringens can produce more than 15 toxins. However, individual strains produce a subset of these toxins. Although a small percentage of C. perfringens isolates (mostly belonging to type A) produce C. perfringens enterotoxin...
Clostridium perfringens type A is the causative agent of a variety of histotoxic and enteric diseases. The ability of C. perfringens spores to germinate in vivo might be due to the presence of nutrient germinants in the host tissue and blood. In the current study, we investigated the ability of...
Clostridium difficile is the causative agent of the majority of antibiotic associated diarrheas. C.
difficile spores are recognized as the morphotype of transmission, infection and persistence.
However, there is a lack of knowledge on how C. difficile spores interact with the host’s
epithelial surfaces. In this context, we have characterized...
High hydrostatic pressure (HHP) is the most-widely adopted novel non-thermal technology for the commercial pasteurization of foods. However, HHP-induced inactivation of bacterial spores remains a challenge due their resistance to the treatment limits of currently available industrial HHP units (i.e., ~650 MPa and 50°C). Several reports have demonstrated that high...
Clostridium difficile´s presence has been reported in meat products stored typically at low temperatures. This study evaluated the viability in phosphate buffer saline (PBS) of spores from epidemic C. difficile strain R20291 (4.6 log CFU/ml) and M120 (7.8 log CFU/ml). Viability was assessed during 4 months at -80°C, -20°C, 4°C...
English: Clostridium difficile is an emerging anaerobic, spore forming pathogen, recognized as the etiological agent of ~ 30% of antibiotic associated diarrheas. Clinical symptoms can fluctuate from mild to moderate diarrhea, pseudomembranous colitis and toxic megacolon. The incidence of C. difficile associated infections (CDAI) is ~ 1% of total hospitalized...
Consumer demand for improved-quality and fresh-like food products have led to the development of new non-thermal preservation methods. High pressure processing (HPP) is currently the novel non-thermal technology best established in the food processing industry. However, many potential HPP applications would require long treatment times to ensure an adequate inactivation...
Sporulation is an important strategy for certain bacterial species within the phylum Firmicutes to survive longer periods of time in adverse conditions. All spore-forming bacteria have two phases in their life; the vegetative form, where they can maintain all metabolic activities and replicate to increase numbers, and the spore form,...
Background: Clostridium difficile is the main cause of nosocomial infections including antibiotic associated diarrhea, pseudomembranous colitis and toxic megacolon. During the course of Clostridium difficile infections (CDI), C. difficile undergoes sporulation and releases spores to the colonic environment. The elevated relapse rates of CDI suggest that C. difficile spores has...
The most frequent cause of pseudomembranous colitis is Clostridium difficile (C. difficile) infection. This type of colitis is characterized by an endoscopic pattern of numerous small, yellowish or whitish plaques diffusely distributed, which typically compromises the rectum extending to proximal colon. Occasionally, the pseudomembranes compromise only the transverse or right...
A beta Poisson dose-response model for Vibrio vulnificus food poisoning cases leading to septicemia was used when evaluating the effect of 15°C depuration on the estimated risk of raw oyster consumption. Statistical variability sources included V. vulnificus load at harvest, time and temperature during harvest and transportation to processing plants,...
The increased severity of Clostridium difficile infection is primarily attributed to the appearance of an epidemic strain characterized as PCR ribotype 027. The only report that identified epidemic C. difficile ribotype 027 in an American country outside of North America comes from Costa Rica, raising the possibility that strains 027...
Clostridium difficile is an important nosocomial pathogen that has become a major cause of antibiotic-associated diarrhea.
There is a general consensus that C. difficile spores play an important role in C. difficile pathogenesis, contributing to infection,
persistence, and transmission. Evidence has demonstrated that C. difficile spores have an outermost layer,...
Phaseolus vulgaris, the common bean, is susceptible to many
bacterial, fungal and viral diseases. However, resistance to several
diseases has been identified in related Phaseolus species, P.
coccineus, P. acutifolius and P. lunatus. Thus, interspecific
hybridization could result in transfer of beneficial characteristics.
One of the problems encountered in interspecific...
Chlamydia trachomatis is an obligate intracellular bacterium that causes diseases of the eye and urogenital tract in humans. It is the cause of the sexual transmitted infection (STI) chlamydia, the most prevalent STI worldwide, and the ocular disease trachoma, the leading cause of infectious blindness. To date there is no...
This dissertation investigates the microbial diversity and factors influencing the assembly of microbial communities in kombucha production, using a combination of 1H Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy, 16S and ITS rRNA metabarcoding, and traditional culture-based microbiological methods. It also explores the diversity of kombucha starter cultures through shotgun sequencing and metabarcoding...
1. Foraging and migration often require different energetic and movement strategies. Though not readily apparent, constraints during one phase might influence the foraging strategies observed in another. For marine birds that fly and dive, body size constraints likely present a trade-off between foraging ability and migration as smaller bodies reduce...
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of thick-billed
murres in the Bering Sea
Orben, R. A., Paredes, R., Roby, D. D., Irons, D. B
1. Foraging and migration often require different energetic and movement strategies. Though not readily apparent, constraints during one phase might influence the foraging strategies observed in another. For marine birds that fly and dive, body size constraints likely present a trade-off between foraging ability and migration as smaller bodies reduce...
1. Foraging and migration often require different energetic and movement strategies. Though not readily apparent, constraints during one phase might influence the foraging strategies observed in another. For marine birds that fly and dive, body size constraints likely present a trade-off between foraging ability and migration as smaller bodies reduce...
Fluid-structure interaction (FSI) has been of significant research interest worldwide over the past several decades because of its variety of applications in both offshore and coastal engineering. Researchers analyzing FSI systems rely heavily on experimental tests in model scale in laboratories or large-scale sea trials. However, these tests are often...