Microbiome Changes during Tuberculosis and Antituberculous Therapy.

The critical role of commensal microbiota in the human body has been increasingly recognized, and our understanding of its implications in human health and disease has expanded rapidly. The lower respiratory tract contains diverse communities of microbes known as lung microbiota, which are present in healthy individuals and in individuals with respiratory diseases. The dysbiosis of the airway microbiota in pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) may play a role in the pathophysiological processes associated with TB disease.

[Virulence factors of Mycobacterium tuberculosis].

Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the etiological agent of human tuberculosis, causes annually three million deaths and latently infects about two billion people. Immunodeficiency caused by malnutrition, senescence or co-infection with HIV enhances the risk of developing active tuberculosis, either from a primary infection or by reactivation of a latent infection. The increasing appearance of multidrug-resistant strains to existing drugs is worrisome, since it leaves patients practically without treatment options.

Effect of white cell counts on the presence of human herpes simplex virus type-1 in saliva of pediatric oncology patients.

Objective: The objective of this study was to assess if there is increased herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) salivary shedding in oncology pediatric patients with severe cytopenia (SC).

Study Design: HSV-1 was detected by real time PCR in saliva samples from oncology pediatric patients (n = 30) during SC and relative cytopenia (RC), and from healthy children (n = 27).

Results: The frequency of HSV-1 positive saliva samples was higher in patients with SC as compared to controls (P < .

The Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi tsx gene, encoding a nucleoside-specific porin, is essential for prototrophic growth in the absence of nucleosides.

The Salmonella enterica serovar Typhi tsx gene encodes a porin that facilitates the import of nucleosides. When serovar Typhi is grown under anaerobic conditions, Tsx is among the outer membrane proteins whose expression increases dramatically. This increase in expression is due, at least in part, to increased transcription and is dependent on Fnr but not on ArcA.

Up-regulation and polarized expression of the sodium-ascorbic acid transporter SVCT1 in post-confluent differentiated CaCo-2 cells.

Human cells acquire vitamin C using two different transporter systems, the sodium-ascorbic acid co-transporters with specificity for ascorbic acid, and the facilitative glucose transporters with specificity for dehydroascorbic acid. There is no information on the mechanism of vitamin C transport across the intestinal barrier, a step that determines the bioavailability of vitamin C in humans. We used the colon carcinoma cell line CaCo-2 as an in vitro model for vitamin C transport in enterocyte-like cells.