A proposal of clinical breakpoints for amoxicillin applicable to porcine respiratory tract pathogens

In the present position paper, an attempt was made to establish clinical breakpoints of amoxicillin to classify porcine respiratory tract pathogens as susceptible, intermediate or resistant based on their minimum inhibitory concentrations of amoxicillin. For this, a thorough review of the published literature with regard to swine-specific pharmacological data (including dosages of amoxicillin applied and routes of administration used), clinical efficacy, and in vitro susceptibility of the target pathogens was performed. Based on the comparative analysis of the results, the working group "Antibiotic Resistance" of the German Veterinary Medical Society (DVG) proposed to classify porcine respiratory tract pathogens that show MIC values of amoxicillin of < or =0.5microg/ml as "susceptible", those with MICs of 1microg/ml as "intermediate", and those with MICs of > or =2microg/ml as "resistant".     

An approximately 15,000-year record of El Nino-driven alluviation in southwestern ecuador

Debris flows have deposited inorganic laminae in an alpine lake that is 75 kilometers east of the Pacific Ocean, in Ecuador. These storm-induced events were dated by radiocarbon, and the age of laminae that are less than 200 years old matches the historic record of El Nino events. From about 15,000 to about 7000 calendar years before the present, the periodicity of clastic deposition is greater than or equal to 15 years; thereafter, there is a progressive increase in frequency to periodicities of 2 to 8.5 years. This is the modern El Nino periodicity, which was established about 5000 calendar years before the present. This may reflect the onset of a steeper zonal sea surface temperature gradient, which was driven by enhanced trade winds.     

Design of nondestructive examination system for bridge cables surface defect

Aiming at the drawbacks of the current detecting methods, a nondestructive examination system design for bridge cables based on high speed digital signal processors chip DM642 is presented, and the hardware platform of the system is built. This examination system mainly consists of four parts: the image defaults acquisition part, DM642 hardware platform, creeping part and defaults locating equipment. The designed system is tested on the hardware platform based on digital image processing algorithm. The experimental results show that the detecting system has the advantages of high stability and reliability, real time, mass storage, and nondestructive examination, etc. This system uses high technology and has significant meaning on detecting the current bridge cables health, furthermore, this method can be used in other examination fields.     

东北三省番茄叶霉病生理小种分化的初步研究

采用国际通用番茄叶霉病鉴别寄主谱，利用苗期人工喷雾接种方法，参照国外Ｎ·Ｈｕｂｂｅｌｉｎｇ氏叶霉病生理小种分化表（１９７１），仿照Ｐ．Ｄａｙ分类方法，对东北三省郊区大棚番茄叶霉病进行鉴定．结果表明．东北三省郊区大棚番茄叶霉病生理小种为小种１，２，３；小种１，３和小种３；而以小种１，２，３为主．     

加工类型黄瓜品质性状的主成分及聚类分析

对19个加工类型黄瓜品种的7个品质性状进行了主成分和聚类分析.结果表明19个品种分为产量、形态和品质3个主成分因子,其主成分的累计贡献率达89.81%,而且基本上可描述7个品质性状的遗传变异.当类平均距离为1.035时,19个品种被聚为短果和长果2种类型,而当类平均距离为0.942时,19个品种被聚为短果中等品质、短果优质和长果高产3种类型.     

Evolution and functional impact of rare coding variation from deep sequencing of human exomes

As a first step toward understanding how rare variants contribute to risk for complex diseases, we sequenced 15,585 human protein-coding genes to an average median depth of 111× in 2440 individuals of European (n = 1351) and African (n = 1088) ancestry. We identified over 500,000 single-nucleotide variants (SNVs), the majority of which were rare (86% with a minor allele frequency less than 0.5%), previously unknown (82%), and population-specific (82%). On average, 2.3% of the 13,595 SNVs each person carried were predicted to affect protein function of ~313 genes per genome, and ~95.7% of SNVs predicted to be functionally important were rare. This excess of rare functional variants is due to the combined effects of explosive, recent accelerated population growth and weak purifying selection. Furthermore, we show that large sample sizes will be required to associate rare variants with complex traits.     

Layout proposal for a microtitre plate to be used in routine antimicrobial susceptibility testing of bacteria from infections of dogs and cats

The determination of minimum inhibitory concentrations by broth microdilution is recommended as method of choice for susceptibility testing of veterinary bacterial pathogens. Accordingly, broth microdilution is used in veterinary routine diagnostic laboratories at a progressive rate. To reduce the costs of susceptibility testing, it is reasonable to develop widely accepted uniform microtitre plate layouts that are produced in large quantities. Such microtitre plate layouts have already been developed and published for the susceptibility testing of pathogens from food-producing animals. However, a microtitre plate layout, especially designed for the testing of bacteria from dogs and cats, should be available, too. The choice of the antimicrobial agents or combinations of antimicrobial agents to be included in a suitable layout should be based on the following criteria: (1) the approval and availability of an antimicrobial agent or combination of agents, (2) known cross-resistances, and (3) availability of approved clinical breakpoints. The latter point is of particular importance for the choice of the numbers of concentrations per antimicrobial agent tested and the range of test concentrations. Taking into account these aspects, a science-based layout proposal for microtitre plates, which are suitable for routine testing of bacteria from dogs and cats, is presented and discussed.