VapC10 toxin of the legume symbiont Sinorhizobium meliloti targets tRNASer and controls intracellular lifestyle.

The soil bacterium Sinorhizobium meliloti can establish a nitrogen-fixing symbiosis with the model legume Medicago truncatula. The rhizobia induce the formation of a specialized root organ called nodule, where they differentiate into bacteroids and reduce atmospheric nitrogen into ammonia. Little is known on the mechanisms involved in nodule senescence onset and in bacteroid survival inside the infected plant cells.

Leveraging Campus Landscapes for Public Health: A Pilot Study to Understand the Psychological Effects of Urban Sheep Grazing on College Campuses.

Since the 1980s, college students in the U.S. have self-reported a decline in their physical and emotional health.

A pilot study on the potential for formalized nature-based instruction to mitigate stress and increase social bonds in university students.

To seek to find a way to address stress and build social bonds among U.S. college students, an East Coast private institution and a West Coast state institution each offered an undergraduate Nature Rx course.

TB-HIV co-infection in the Netherlands: estimating prevalence and under-reporting in national registration databases using a capture-recapture analysis.

Background: Knowledge of the HIV status in patients with tuberculosis (TB) and vice versa is crucial for proper individual patient management, while knowledge of the prevalence of co-infection guides preventive and therapeutic strategies. The aim of the study was to assess if national disease databases on TB and HIV are adequate sources to provide this information.

Methods: A two way capture-recapture analysis to assess the completeness of the registers, and to obtain the prevalence of TB-HIV co-infection in the Netherlands in the years 2002-2012.

Drosophila Gyf/GRB10 interacting GYF protein is an autophagy regulator that controls neuron and muscle homeostasis.

Autophagy is an essential process for eliminating ubiquitinated protein aggregates and dysfunctional organelles. Defective autophagy is associated with various degenerative diseases such as Parkinson disease. Through a genetic screening in Drosophila, we identified CG11148, whose product is orthologous to GIGYF1 (GRB10-interacting GYF protein 1) and GIGYF2 in mammals, as a new autophagy regulator; we hereafter refer to this gene as Gyf.

A vapBC-type toxin-antitoxin module of Sinorhizobium meliloti influences symbiotic efficiency and nodule senescence of Medicago sativa.

The symbiotic nitrogen-fixing soil bacterium Sinorhizobium meliloti carries a large number of toxin-antitoxin (TA) modules both on the chromosome and megaplasmids. One of them, the vapBC-5 module that belongs to the type II systems was characterized here. It encodes an active toxin vapC-5, and was shown to be controlled negatively by the complex of its own proteins.

Preferential deletion events in the direct repeat locus of Mycobacterium tuberculosis.

The "Harlingen" IS6110 restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) cluster has linked over 100 tuberculosis cases in The Netherlands since 1993. Four Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates that were epidemiologically linked to this cluster had different spoligotype patterns, as well as slightly divergent IS6110 profiles, compared to the majority of the isolates. Sequencing of the direct repeat (DR) locus revealed sequence polymorphisms at the putative deletion sites.

High-resolution typing by integration of genome sequencing data in a large tuberculosis cluster.

To investigate whether genome sequencing yields more useful markers than those currently used to study the epidemiology of tuberculosis, it was applied to three Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates of the Harlingen outbreak. Our findings suggest that single nucleotide polymorphisms can be used to identify transmission chains in restriction fragment length polymorphism clusters.

The tempo and mode of molecular evolution of Mycobacterium tuberculosis at patient-to-patient scale.

A total of six polymorphisms were identified by comparing the genomes of the first and the last isolate of a well-characterized transmission chain of Mycobacterium tuberculosis involving five patients over a 12 and a half year period. The six polymorphisms consisted of four single nucleotide changes (SNPs), a tandem repeat polymorphism (TRP) and a previously identified IS6110 transposition event. These polymorphic sites were surveyed in each of the isolates from the five patients in the transmission chain.

Transmission of Mycobacterium pinnipedii to humans in a zoo with marine mammals.

Objectives: An outbreak of tuberculosis (TB) in sea lions occurred recently in a zoo in the Netherlands. The disease was detected in a captive colony consisting of 29 animals kept in an open air basin with an indoor night house. Approximately 25 animal keepers were in close contact with the animals.

[A Somali man with a painful thyroid mass: thyroid tuberculosis].

A 21-year-old man from Somalia presented with a painful mass in the thyroid, 6 months offatigue, weight loss and fever. Two separate courses of antibiotics did not improve his condition. Thyroid function tests were normal.

A search for diagnostic AFLP markers in Cichorium species with emphasis on endive and chicory cultivar groups.

The genus Cichorium consists of two widely cultivated species C. intybus (chicory) and C. endivia (endive) and four wild species, C.

Diagnosis of Mycobacterium microti infections among humans by using novel genetic markers.

As a result of DNA typing of Mycobacterium microti isolates from animals in the United Kingdom and The Netherlands, we diagnosed four human M. microti infections. These are the first M.

Use of DNA fingerprinting in international source case finding during a large outbreak of tuberculosis in The Netherlands.

Setting: Tuberculosis outbreak in a low prevalence country.

Objective: Description of an international source tracing process in which restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis played an essential role.

Design: In 1993 a large scale source tracing process was initiated in Harlingen, a harbour town in the north of The Netherlands, after a child with tuberculous meningitis was reported for which no source could be identified.

[Border-crossing source tracing in tuberculosis via DNA fingerprint technique].

Objective: Description of the value of modern DNA analysis ('restriction fragment length polymorphism'; RFLP) as a method for mapping tuberculosis transmission.

Design: Descriptive.

Setting: Social Health Service Noord-Friesland, the Netherlands.

Nitrogen-13 and xenon-133 ventilation studies.

Due to the solubility of xenon-133 in blood and tissues, errors are introduced in the determination of regional pulmonary ventilation. We investigated these errors by comparing the results from ventilation measurements with Xe-133 and N-13 in five normal subjects (both at rest and during exercise) and in seven patients after a pneumonectomy. In the normal subjects at rest, the upper lung fields showed no significant difference in the uptake rates of the two gases.

An electromagnetic valve for rebreathing exercise studies.

An electromagnetic valve for use in exercise rebreathing studies is described. This valve enables the investigator to connect a rebreathing system immediately after the onset of inspiration even at high breathing frequencies. The rapid switching causes minimal leakage; the rebreathing bag can be washed out and refilled without disconnection during exercise testing.

Changes in functional residual capacity during exercise in patients with exercise-induced asthma.

Forty-eight patients with a history of exercise-induced asthma were exercised on ambient breathing (T = 18-20 degrees C, relative humidity = 45-55%). There were 19 responders and 29 non-responders according to post-exercise spirometry. During the first minutes of exercise at a workload of 25-50 W, the functional residual capacity (FRC) was measured by a rebreathing technique.

An improved method for the analysis of xenon-133 washin and washout curves.

A method is described for analysis of xenon-133 washin and washout curves, in the presence of a slowly varying background. The method uses least-squares fitting of a single exponential together with a quadratic function to correct for the background. The method has been applied both to simulated data and to data from 25 patients.