Adamsenarmstrong8538

BACKGROUND Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) causes a range of illness severity. Mild illness has been reported, but whether illness severity correlates with infectivity is unknown. We describe the public health investigation of a mildly ill, non-hospitalized COVID-19 case who traveled to China. METHODS The case was a Maricopa County resident with multiple severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2)-positive specimens collected on January 22, 2020. Contacts were persons exposed to the case on or after the day before case diagnostic specimen collection. Contacts were monitored for 14 days after last known exposure. High-risk contacts had close, prolonged case contact (≥10 minutes within 2 meters). Medium-risk contacts wore all U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)-recommended personal protective equipment during interactions. Nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal (NP/OP) specimens were collected from the case and high-risk contacts and tested for SARS-CoV-2. RESULTS Paired case NP/OP specimens were collected for SARS-CoV-2 testing at 11 time points. In 8 pairs (73%), ≥1 specimen tested positive or indeterminate, and in 3 pairs (27%) both tested negative. Specimens collected 18 days after diagnosis tested positive. Sixteen contacts were identified; 11 (69%) had high-risk exposure, including 1 intimate contact, and 5 (31%) had medium-risk exposure. In total, 35 high-risk contact NP/OP specimens were collected for SARS-CoV-2 testing; all 35 pairs (100%) tested negative. CONCLUSIONS This report demonstrates that SARS-CoV-2 infection can cause mild illness and result in positive tests for up to 18 days after diagnosis, without evidence of transmission to close contacts. These data might inform public health strategies to manage individuals with asymptomatic infection or mild illness. Published by Oxford University Press for the Infectious Diseases Society of America 2020. This work is written by (a) US Government employee(s) and is in the public domain in the US.STUDY QUESTION Are there any differences in the pubertal development and reproductive hormone status during adolescence between singletons following ICSI therapy or spontaneous conception (SC)? SUMMARY ANSWER Pubertal development and reproductive hormone levels are largely similar between ICSI and SC adolescents, except for a tendency towards lower inhibin B levels as well as significantly higher estradiol levels and a lower testosterone-to-estradiol-ratio in male adolescents. WHAT IS KNOWN ALREADY Previous data are scarce and partly inconclusive regarding pubertal development in female ICSI adolescents as well as demonstrating a tendency towards lower inhibin B serum levels in male ICSI offspring. STUDY DESIGN, SIZE, DURATION Prospective controlled study including 274 singleton ICSI-conceived adolescents (141 girls, 133 boys) followed up for the third time, and 273 SC controls (142 girls, 131 boys) from seven German registration offices (Aachen, Eichstätt, Erfurt, Lübeck, Hamburg, Heidelberg and Schwerin). PG research grant KA 1643/4-1. The authors declare no conflict of interest. © The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology. ACY-241 molecular weight All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail journals.permissions@oup.com.Osteoarthritis (OA) is a complex disease with a multifactorial etiology. The genetic component is one of the main associated factors, resulting from interactions between genes and environmental factors. The aim of this study was to identify gene-gene interactions (epistasis) of the articular cartilage extracellular matrix (ECM) in knee OA. Ninety-two knee OA patients and 147 healthy individuals were included. Participants were genotyped in order to evaluate nine variants of eight genes associated with ECM metabolism using the OpenArray technology. Epistasis was analyzed using the multifactor dimensionality reduction (MDR) method. The MDR analysis showed significant gene-gene interactions between MMP3 (rs679620) and COL3A1 (rs1800255), and between COL3A1 (rs1800255) and VEGFA (rs699947) polymorphisms, with information gain values of 3.21% and 2.34%, respectively. Furthermore, in our study we found interactions in high-risk genotypes of the HIF1AN, MMP3 and COL3A1 genes; the most representative were [AA+CC+GA], [AA+CT+GA] and [AA+CT+GG], respectively; and low-risk genotypes [AA+CC+GG], [GG+TT+GA] and [AA+TT+GA], respectively. Knowing the interactions of these polymorphisms involved in articular cartilage ECM metabolism could provide a new tool to identify individuals at high risk of developing knee OA.The remarkable increase in the flow resistance of dense suspensions can hinder 3D-printing processes on account of flow cessation in the extruder, and filament fragility/rupture following deposition. Understanding the nature of rheological changes that occur is critical to manipulate flow conditions or to dose flow modifiers for 3D-printing. Therefore, this paper elucidates the influences of clay particulates on controlling flow cessation and the shape stability of dense cementing suspensions that typically feature poor printability. A rope coiling method was implemented with varying stand-off distances to probe the buckling stability and tendency to fracture of dense suspensions that undergo stretching and bending during deposition. The contributions of flocculation and short-term percolation due to the kinetics of structure formation to deformation rate were deconvoluted using a stepped isostress method. It is shown that the shear stress indicates a divergence with a power-law scaling when the particle volume fraction approaches the jamming limit; φ → φj ≈ φmax. Such a power-law divergence of the shear stress decreases by a factor of 10 with increasing clay dosage. Such behavior in clay-containing suspensions arises from a decrease in the relative packing fraction (φ/φmax) and the formation of fractally-architected aggregates with stronger interparticle interactions, whose uniform arrangement controls flow cessation in the extruder and suspension homogeneity, thereby imparting greater buckling stability. The outcomes offer new insights for assessing/improving the extrudability and printability behavior during slurry-based 3D-printing process.BACKGROUND The amelioration of the current COVID pandemic relies on swift and efficient case finding as well as stringent social distancing measures. Current advice suggests that fever or new onset dry cough are the commonest presenting complaints. METHODOLOGY We present a case report and case series as well as other evidence that there is an important fourth presenting syndrome, namely isolated sudden onset anosmia (ISOA), which should be considered highly suspicious for SARS-CoV-2. RESULTS A patient presenting with ISOA who went on to test positive for infection with COVID-19 and did not develop any further symptoms as well as a case series of similar patients although limited by the lack of reliable testing at the moment. CONCLUSIONS We posit the existence of a fourth common syndrome of COVID-19 infection isolated sudden onset anosmia (ISOA) and urge the international community to consider this presentation in current management advice.Influenza A viruses are human pathogens with limited therapeutic options. Therefore, it is crucial to devise strategies for the identification of new classes of antiviral medications. The influenza A virus genome is constituted of 8 RNA segments. Two of these viral RNAs are transcribed into mRNAs that are alternatively spliced. The M1 mRNA encodes the M1 protein but is also alternatively spliced to yield the M2 mRNA during infection. M1 to M2 mRNA splicing occurs at nuclear speckles, and M1 and M2 mRNAs are exported to the cytoplasm for translation. M1 and M2 proteins are critical for viral trafficking, assembly, and budding. Here we show that gene knockout of the cellular protein NS1-BP, a constituent of the M mRNA speckle-export pathway and a binding partner of the virulence factor NS1 protein, inhibits M mRNA nuclear export without altering bulk cellular mRNA export, providing an avenue to preferentially target influenza virus. We performed a high-content, image-based chemical screen using single-molecule RNA-FISH to label viral M mRNAs followed by multistep quantitative approaches to assess cellular mRNA and cell toxicity. We identified inhibitors of viral mRNA biogenesis and nuclear export that exhibited no significant activity towards bulk cellular mRNA at non-cytotoxic concentrations. Among the hits is a small molecule that preferentially inhibits nuclear export of a subset of viral and cellular mRNAs without altering bulk cellular mRNA export. These findings underscore specific nuclear export requirements for viral mRNAs and phenocopy down-regulation of the mRNA export factor UAP56. This RNA export inhibitor impaired replication of diverse influenza A virus strains at non-toxic concentrations. Thus, this screening strategy yielded compounds that alone or in combination may serve as leads to new ways of treating influenza virus infection and are novel tools for studying viral RNA trafficking in the nucleus.[This corrects the article DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0226377.].[This corrects the article DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0227828.].Distracted driving is a leading cause of traffic accidents. It is influenced by driver attitude toward secondary tasks; however, field-based studies on the effects of low-perceived-risk tasks on lateral driving have rarely been reported. A total of 17 experienced non-professional drivers were recruited to participate in two secondary tasks a cognitive experiment (conversation) and a visual distraction experiment (observation of following vehicles), each representing low-perceived-risk secondary tasks. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was conducted to evaluate the effects of low-perceived-risk tasks on lateral driving performance. ANOVA results indicated that compared with baseline (no task) lateral performance, lane-keeping ability was enhanced during cognitive distractions. In the visual distraction experiment, more than 50% of the distractions required 1-2 s. Lane deviation and its growth rate increased with the duration of distraction. Compared with cognitive distraction, lane deviation increased significantly with visual distraction, and lane-keeping performance was seriously impaired. For low-perceived-risk tasks, visual distractions impaired driving safety more seriously, compared with cognitive distractions, suggesting that drivers misjudge the risks associated with visual tasks. These results can contribute to the design of advanced driving-assistance systems and improve professional driver programs, potentially reducing the frequency of traffic accidents caused by distracted driving.Among infectious diseases, tuberculosis is the leading cause of death worldwide, and represents a serious threat, especially in developing countries. The protective effects of Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG), the current vaccine against tuberculosis, have been related not only to specific induction of T-cell immunity, but also with the long-term epigenetic and metabolic reprogramming of the cells from the innate immune system through a process termed trained immunity. Here we show that MTBVAC, a live attenuated strain of Mycobacterium tuberculosis, safe and immunogenic against tuberculosis antigens in adults and newborns, is also able to generate trained immunity through the induction of glycolysis and glutaminolysis and the accumulation of histone methylation marks at the promoters of proinflammatory genes, facilitating an enhanced response after secondary challenge with non-related bacterial stimuli. Importantly, these findings in human primary myeloid cells are complemented by a strong MTBVAC-induced heterologous protection against a lethal challenge with Streptococcus pneumoniae in an experimental murine model of pneumonia.