targets the host ubiquitin-specific protease, , through the effector protein, TcpB, for facilitating infection of macrophages.

species are Gram-negative intracellular bacterial pathogens that cause the worldwide zoonotic disease brucellosis. can infect many mammals, including humans and domestic and wild animals. manipulates various host cellular processes to invade and multiply in professional and non-professional phagocytic cells.

Immuno-profiling of proteins for developing improved vaccines and DIVA capable serodiagnostic assays for brucellosis.

Brucellosis remains a worldwide zoonotic disease with a serious impact on public health and livestock productivity. Controlling brucellosis in livestock is crucial for limiting human infections in the absence of effective human vaccines. Brucellosis control measures are majorly dependent on rigorous monitoring of disease outbreaks and mass vaccination of livestock.

Outer membrane protein 25 of Brucella suppresses TLR-mediated expression of proinflammatory cytokines through degradation of TLRs and adaptor proteins.

Toll-like receptors (TLRs) are essential components of innate immunity that serves as the first line of defense against the invaded microorganisms. However, successful infectious pathogens subvert TLR signaling to suppress the activation of innate and adaptive responses. Brucella species are infectious intracellular bacterial pathogens causing the worldwide zoonotic disease, brucellosis, that impacts economic growth of many countries.

Host F-Box Protein 22 Enhances the Uptake of Brucella by Macrophages and Drives a Sustained Release of Proinflammatory Cytokines through Degradation of the Anti-Inflammatory Effector Proteins of Brucella.

Brucella species are intracellular bacterial pathogens, causing the worldwide zoonotic disease brucellosis. Brucella invades professional and nonprofessional phagocytic cells, followed by resisting intracellular killing and establishing a replication permissive niche. Brucella also modulates the innate and adaptive immune responses of the host for its chronic persistence.

Clinical profile and disease progression of HIV in adolescents and young adults in Vadodara, India.

Introduction: Adolescents are vulnerable to HIV for many reasons. Unfortunately, there are little data available on adolescents and young adults who have contracted HIV. Only few studies have been conducted in India with an aim to assess the clinical presentation, disease progression, and clinical profile of HIV in adolescents.

Competency- Based Curriculum for Post- graduation in Community Medicine at a Medical College located in western India.

This article was migrated. The article was marked as recommended. Curriculum or course needs to be monitored and evaluated to ensure that it is working as planned and also to identify areas for improvement.

Stigma, Discrimination, and Domestic Violence Experienced by Women Living with HIV: A Cross-sectional Study from Western India.

Background: In India, social issues such as stigma and discrimination are still experienced by many women living with HIV (WLHIV) at various levels such as family, community, or health care settings even after a decline trend in HIV prevalence.

Objectives: To assess stigma, discrimination, and domestic violence among WLHIV attending an antiretroviral therapy (ART) center and its association with unsafe sexual practices.

Materials And Methods: This cross-sectional study was carried out among WLHIV attending an ART center of a tertiary care hospital after obtaining approval from the institutional ethics committee.

The Current Status of Sexually Transmitted Infections/Reproductive Tract Infections in Vadodara City: Health-care Provider Perspective.

Background: Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and reproductive tract infections (RTIs) are a major public health problem worldwide, affecting the quality of life and causing serious morbidity and mortality. STIs/RTIs have a direct impact on reproductive and child health through infertility, cancers and pregnancy complications, and they have an indirect impact through their role in facilitating the sexual transmission of human immunodeficiency virus.

Objectives: (1) To estimate the number/proportion of cases of STI/RTI being treated by health-care providers.

Inhibitors of Apoptosis Protein Antagonists (Smac Mimetic Compounds) Control Polarization of Macrophages during Microbial Challenge and Sterile Inflammatory Responses.

Apoptosis is a physiological cell death process essential for development, tissue homeostasis, and for immune defense of multicellular animals. Inhibitors of apoptosis proteins (IAPs) regulate apoptosis in response to various cellular assaults. Using both genetic and pharmacological approaches we demonstrate here that the IAPs not only support opportunistic survival of intracellular human pathogens like but also control plasticity of iNOS+ M1 macrophage during the course of infection and render them refractory for immune stimulation.

Knowledge, attitudes, and practices of private sector immunization service providers in Gujarat, India.

Background: India is responsible for 30% of the annual global cohort of unvaccinated children worldwide. Private practitioners provide an estimated 21% of vaccinations in urban centers of India, and are important partners in achieving high vaccination coverage.

Methods: We used an in-person questionnaire and on-site observation to assess knowledge, attitudes, and practices of private immunization service providers regarding delivery of immunization services in the urban settings of Surat and Baroda, in Gujarat, India.

Incidence of Maternal "Near-Miss" Events in a Tertiary Care Hospital of Central Gujarat, India.

Background: Constant decline in maternal mortality ratio has given rise to the need of a new indicator. This search has motivated investigation of severe maternal morbidity-"maternal near-miss" (MNM) event. World Health Organization (WHO) defines MNM as "a woman who, being close to death, survives a complication that occurred during pregnancy, delivery or up to 42 days after the end of her pregnancy".

Stool microbiome reveals diverse bacterial ureases as confounders of oral urea breath testing for Helicobacter pylori and Mycobacterium tuberculosis in Bamako, Mali.

Detection of bacterial urease activity has been utilized successfully to diagnose Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori). While Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.

Predictors of unsafe sexual behavior among people living with human immunodeficiency virus/AIDS attending antiretroviral therapy center in Western India.

Background: As more and more people with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) live longer and healthier lives because of antiretroviral therapy (ART), an increasing number of sexual transmissions of HIV may arise from these people living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA). Hence, this study is conducted to assess the predictors of unsafe sexual behavior among PLWHA on ART in Western India.

Materials And Methods: The current cross-sectional study was carried out among 175 PLWHAs attending ART center of a Tertiary Care Hospital in Western India.

Low doses of gamma irradiation potentially modifies immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment by retuning tumor-associated macrophages: lesson from insulinoma.

Tumor infiltrating iNOS+ macrophages under the influence of immunosuppressive tumor microenvironment gets polarized to tumor-promoting and immunosuppressive macrophages, known as tumor-associated macrophages (TAM). Their recruitment and increased density in the plethora of tumors has been associated with poor prognosis in cancer patients. Therefore, retuning of TAM to M1 phenotype would be a key for effective immunotherapy.

Dietary pattern of schoolgoing adolescents in urban Baroda, India.

Diet plays a very important role in growth and development of adolescents, during which the development of healthy eating habits is of supreme importance. There is a dual burden of undernutrition and overnutrition in this age-group. The study assessed the food habits, food preferences, and dietary pattern of schoolgoing urban adolescents in Baroda, India.

Metabolic proximity in the order of colonization of a microbial community.

Microbial biofilms are often composed of multiple bacterial species that accumulate by adhering to a surface and to each other. Biofilms can be resistant to antibiotics and physical stresses, posing unresolved challenges in the fight against infectious diseases. It has been suggested that early colonizers of certain biofilms could cause local environmental changes, favoring the aggregation of subsequent organisms.

The COMBREX project: design, methodology, and initial results.

Experimental data exists for only a vanishingly small fraction of sequenced microbial genes. This community page discusses the progress made by the COMBREX project to address this important issue using both computational and experimental resources.

Emergence of epidemic multidrug-resistant Enterococcus faecium from animal and commensal strains.

Unlabelled: Enterococcus faecium, natively a gut commensal organism, emerged as a leading cause of multidrug-resistant hospital-acquired infection in the 1980s. As the living record of its adaptation to changes in habitat, we sequenced the genomes of 51 strains, isolated from various ecological environments, to understand how E. faecium emerged as a leading hospital pathogen.

Biochemical Characterization of Hypothetical Proteins from Helicobacter pylori.

The functional characterization of Open Reading Frames (ORFs) from sequenced genomes remains a bottleneck in our effort to understand microbial biology. In particular, the functional characterization of proteins with only remote sequence homology to known proteins can be challenging, as there may be few clues to guide initial experiments. Affinity enrichment of proteins from cell lysates, and a global perspective of protein function as provided by COMBREX, affords an approach to this problem.

Reproductive health awareness among urban school going adolescents in Vadodara city.

Aims: To identify the reproductive health issues associated with adolescence and the readiness to avail services like Adolescent Friendly Clinic (AFC) among urban school going children.

Materials And Methods: A quantitative survey was carried out using a self-administered structured questionnaire among 1440 (748 girls and 692 boys) students from classes 6 -12 in 7 English medium and 23 Gujarati medium schools. Focus group discussions, 5 each with adolescent boys and girls and teachers were held from Gujarati and English medium schools.

Deep sequencing of the oral microbiome reveals signatures of periodontal disease.

The oral microbiome, the complex ecosystem of microbes inhabiting the human mouth, harbors several thousands of bacterial types. The proliferation of pathogenic bacteria within the mouth gives rise to periodontitis, an inflammatory disease known to also constitute a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. While much is known about individual species associated with pathogenesis, the system-level mechanisms underlying the transition from health to disease are still poorly understood.

COMBREX: a project to accelerate the functional annotation of prokaryotic genomes.

COMBREX (http://combrex.bu.edu) is a project to increase the speed of the functional annotation of new bacterial and archaeal genomes.

Reproductive health awareness among rural school going adolescents of Vadodara district.

Objectives: To identify the reproductive health issues associated with adolescence and their readiness to avail services like Adolescent Friendly Clinic (AFC) among rural school going children.

Materials And Methods: A quantitative survey was carried out using a self-administered structured questionnaire among 768 (428 boys and 340 girls) students from 15 schools by systematic random sampling from schools (3 schools from 5 talukas). Focus group discussions, 5 each with adolescent boys and girls and teachers were held.

Metabolic network model of a human oral pathogen.

The microbial community present in the human mouth is engaged in a complex network of diverse metabolic activities. In addition to serving as energy and building-block sources, metabolites are key players in interspecies and host-pathogen interactions. Metabolites are also implicated in triggering the local inflammatory response, which can affect systemic conditions such as atherosclerosis, obesity, and diabetes.