The use of antibiotics in food-producing animals can induce the presence of residual substances in manure, which are then released into the environment and may contribute to soil and groundwater contamination. During the on-farm implementation of strategies to improve animal health and welfare in chicken and pig farms, the consequences of antibiotic use were evaluated in terms of the occurrence and levels of antibiotic residues in manure. A set of 35 broiler farms from Cyprus, Greece, the Netherlands and 40 pig farms from France and Italy provided a total of 350 manure samples.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBacteria developing resistance compromise the efficacy of antibiotics or bacteriophages (phages). We tested the association of these two antibacterials to circumvent resistance. With the Hollow Fiber Infection Model (HFIM), we mimicked the concentration profile of ciprofloxacin in the lungs of patients treated orally for Pseudomonas aeruginosa infections and, independently, mimicked a single inhaled administration of phages (one or two phages).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDue to restriction of the use of BPA, several structural analogues such as BPS and BPF have been proposed for its replacement in many consumer products. This has increased the prevalence of BPS and BPF in urine from tested cohorts. However, these substitutes have similar endocrine disrupting properties to BPA, particularly on reproductive and metabolic functions, which suggests that fetal exposure to these analogues could be of concern for human health.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStudy Question: Do daily manipulations of preimplantation embryos with polycarbonate (PC)-made bisphenol A (BPA)-releasing strippers influence embryo development?
Summary Answer: Compared to glass strippers, PC strippers enhance the blastocyst development rate but this does not seem to be BPA-related.
What Is Known Already: PC strippers have been shown to release tiny amounts (around 0.5 ng/ml BPA) of BPA in routine human IVF procedures.