Potential Risk Research Articles

Non-nutritive Sweeteners: Weight Loss or Weight Gain?

The consumption of non-nutritive sweeteners (NNS) is on the rise among different populations. In parallel, the debate about their potential health benefits and risks remains inconclusive. Numerous published studies elucidate the impact of NNS on general health, weight control, and the risk of certain diseases. However, no definitive conclusions regarding the effect of chronic NNS use on weight have been reached in humans. This review summarizes current evidence related to the biological role of NNS and their subsequent effects on weight. The mechanisms of action through which NNS impact weight are discussed, including their effect on sweet taste receptors, cognition, metabolic and endocrine functions, intestinal microbiota, and adiposity. Conflicting evidence is hindering the formulation of precise recommendations, but the evidence opposing the use of NNS remains weak, and the ultimate impact on weight largely relies on several other behavioral patterns.

Mesenchymal Stem Cells-Conditioned Medium; An Effective Cell-Free Therapeutic Option for in vitro Maturation of Oocytes.

Infertility is a major reproductive health issue worldwide. One of the main problems in infertile women is the failure to generate or release a mature egg. Therefore, the development of new technologies for in vitro generation or induction of mature oocytes can improve various ART procedures. Recently, stem cell-based therapy has opened a new window for several pathological complications. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are multipotent stem cells with the capacity to self-renew and differentiate into the mesodermal lineage. MSCs contain various bioactive molecules which are involved in the regulation of key biological processes. They can secret multiple paracrine factors, such as VEGF, IGF, HGF, EGF, and FGF to stimulate egg maturation. Although MSCs represent a promising source for cell therapy, the potential risk of tumor development reduces their clinical applications. Recent studies have suggested that the supernatant or conditioned medium of MSCs also contains similar components and regulates the oocyte behavior. The MSC-conditioned medium can eliminate the safety concerns associated with MSC transplantation and avoid rejection problems. Although MSC and MSC-CM could improve oocyte quality, ovarian function, and fertility, these improvements have not yet been demonstrated in clinical trials in humans. Hereby, we summarized recent research findings of MSCs-derived conditioned medium in in vitro development of immature oocytes.

A modified QuEChERS-based UPLC-MS/MS method for rapid determination of multiple antibiotics and sedative residues in freshwater fish

Antibiotics and sedatives are used in freshwater fish culture and transportation, and residue in freshwater fish pose potential risks to human health. Therefore, a throughput method was developed to detect antibiotic and sedative residues in fish, simultaneously quantifying 68 antibiotics and 9 sedatives in freshwater fish using a modified QuEChERS extraction method and UPLC-MS/MS. Matrix-matched calibrations demonstrated good correlation coefficients (R2 > 0.995), with a recovery range of 66.2–118.5%. The intra-day and inter-day relative standard deviation (RSD) were below 9.7% and 12.8%, respectively. The limits of detection (LOD) and quantification (LOQ) were 0.08–1.46 μg/kg and 0.25–4.86 μg/kg, respectively. 68.8% of analytes had weak matrix effects, and 13.0% had moderate matrix effects. In addition, diazepam and many types of antibiotics were detected in30 freshwater fish. The validation parameters were in agreement with the acceptable criteria of the Codex guidelines. The method was effective in analyzing antibiotic and sedative residues in freshwater fish.

Effects of glyphosate herbicide ingestion on kidney function in rats on a balanced diet.

Glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide worldwide and in Brazil. There is currently increasing concern about the effects of glyphosate on human health. The Brazilian Institute for Consumer Protection showed data on the presence of glyphosate in some of Brazil's most consumed ultra-processed products. Currently, regulations on the upper limit for these residues in ultra-processed foods have yet to be established by the National Health Surveillance, and ultra-processed food consumption is independently associated with an increased risk of incident chronic kidney disease. Since an unbalanced diet can interfere with kidney function, this study aims to investigate the effect of daily intake of 5 mg/kg bw glyphosate in conjunction with a balanced diet and the possible impact on renal function in rats. Kidney function, kidney weight, markers of renal injury, and oxidative stress were evaluated. There was a decrease in kidney weight. The main histopathological alterations in renal tissues were vacuolation in the initial stage and upregulation of the kidney injury marker KIM-1. Renal injury is associated with increased production of reactive oxygen species in mitochondria. This study showed changes in the kidney of rats exposed to a balanced diet with glyphosate, suggesting a potential risk to human kidney. Presumably, ultra-processed food that contain glyphosate can potentiate this risk. The relevance of these results lies in drawing attention to the need to regulate glyphosate concentration in ultra-processed foods in the future.

TomFi: Small Object Tracking Using Commodity WiFi

Rodent infestation has always been one of the most severe threats to humans, which to solve consumes massive manpower and resources. People usually use traps or poisons to treat rat infestation. Such passive countermeasures are inefficient. Damage often occurs when the rats are finally trapped or killed, not to mention the potential risk to injure humans or cause pollution. In this article, we propose a WiFi-based active small object tracking system named TomFi . The core components of TomFi include several deep learning techniques that bridge rat locations/motions and WiFi signal variations (represented by the channel state information). TomFi first employs a detection model to detect the appearance of the rat and then localize it based on a two-branch localization model. Through the design of the two-branch localization model, to our best knowledge, we are the first to solve the information loss and distortion problem. We conducted extensive experiments in both the laboratory environment and real-world kitchen scenarios. The results show that TomFi can achieve a detection success rate of 99%+ and a centimeter-level localization accuracy in real time.

Molecular Aspects of Carrageenan in the Pharmaceutical and Food Industries

Abstract: Carrageenan is a gel-forming polysaccharide obtained by extracting certain species of red algae. This substance is used in several food groups due to carrageenan's ability to replace fat and combine easily with milk proteins to increase solubility and improve texture. Although the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) considers carrageenan safe for consumption, this point is still subject to intense scrutiny to investigate the potential health risks associated with human consumption. In view of this, the objective of this review was to address the consumption of carrageenan in the food and pharmaceutical industries and its possible toxic effects on health. One hundred and eleven articles were related to the objective of this review. Although carrageenan is widely used for consumption and several studies describe its beneficial effects, a large number of articles have already been bringing possible toxic effects that it can generate in the long term.

Exploring the Dual Components and Mechanism of Panax notoginseng-Eucommia ulmoides for Managing Osteoporosis-Associated Lumbar Disc Herniation Using Network Pharmacology

Osteoporosis (OP) combined with lumbar intervertebral disc herniation (LDH) is a complex disease that exhibits limited efficacy in drug treatment, physical therapy, and surgical intervention, while also carrying potential side effects and risks. Traditional Chinese medicine treatment of OP combined with LDH primarily aims to address deficiencies and regulate the body. Several active ingredients found in Panax notoginseng and Eucommia ulmoides, such as quercetin and beta-sitosterol, have demonstrated the ability to enhance osteoblast proliferation and bone matrix synthesis. While historical literature contains mechanistic studies on individual herbs, there is a conspicuous dearth of comprehensive and systematic research on their mechanisms of action. By utilizing network pharmacology method, we identified 35 active ingredients present in Panax notoginseng and Eucommia ulmoides, along with 98 potential targets associated with the treatment of OP combined with LDH using Panax notoginseng-Eucommia ulmoides. Through protein-protein interaction network analysis, we identified 5 essential active ingredients (Quercetin, Beta-carotene, Kaempferol, Beta-sitosterol, and Notoginsenoside Fe) and 5 core targets (Nuclear factor kappa-B 3 [RELA], hypoxia-induciblefactor-1A [HIF-1A], Myelocytomatosis Viral Oncogene homolog [MYC], Transcription Factor AP-1 [JUN], and Estrogen Receptor 1 [ESR1]). The potential targets primarily involve IL-17, AGEs-RAGE, the TNF signaling pathway, and other pathways through which they exert therapeutic effects. The key active ingredient was docked with the core target molecule, resulting in all molecules exhibiting binding energies ≤-5 kcal/mol. This study provides preliminary evidence that treatment with Panax notoginseng-Eucommia ulmoides for OP combined with LDH may lead to improvements in inflammation, oxidative stress, cell proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis, and cytokine regulation.

Glutathione S Transferase Theta1 and Mu1 (GSTT1 and GSTM1) Deletion Among Autistic Population of India

Introduction: Oxidative stress is an imbalance between an organism's reactive oxygen species (ROS) production and antioxidant defence capacity. Long-term oxidative stress contributes to cellular ageing and plays a role in the pathogenesis of several diseases. Several investigations indicated that oxidative stress has a role in the pathogenesis of ASD. Objectives: Present study was undertaken to record the association of GSTTT1 and GSTM1 null genotype among the autistic population of India. Methods: Genomic DNA was isolated from 108 autistic children along with healthy agematched control. The quality and quantity of the isolated genomic DNA were analysed. GSTT1 and GSTM1 null genotype was analysed using polymerase chain reaction with internal positive control. Statistical analysis was performed using SPSS 15.0. Results: Present study included 85 males and 23 females with a mean age of 11.7 ± 3.5 and 75 males and 33 females with a mean age of 11 ± 2.0 in the control group. 32 (29.6%) autistic cases showed null genotypes for GSTT1 and 21(19.4%) autistic children showed null genotypes for GSTM1. 3 (2.85%) control children showed a null genotype for GSTT1 and 5 (4.6%) control children showed a null genotype for GSTM1. The GSTT1 and GSTM1 null genotypes were observed to be significantly associated with the risk of autism (p value-0.0001, OR-14.73, 95% CI 4.35-49.90) and (p value-0.003, OR-4.731, 95% CI 1.71-13.08) respectively. Conclusion: The findings of our study suggested that GSTT1 and GSTM1 null genotype is one of the potential risk factors for autism through oxidative stress mechanism in our population.

Semiparametric Probit Regression Model with General Interval-Censored Failure Time Data

Interval-censored data frequently arise in various biomedical areas involving periodical follow-ups where the failure or event time of interest cannot be observed exactly but is only known to fall into a time interval. This article considers a semiparametric probit regression model, a valuable alternative to other commonly used semiparametric models in survival analysis, to investigate potential risk factors for the interval-censored failure time of interest. We develop an expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm to conduct the pseudo maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) using the working independence strategy for general or mixed-case interval-censored data. The resulting estimators of regression parameters are shown to be consistent and asymptotically normal with the empirical process techniques. In addition, we propose a novel penalized EM algorithm for simultaneously achieving variable selection and parameter estimation in the case of high-dimensional covariates. The proposed variable selection method can be readily implemented with some existing software and considerably reduces the estimation error of the proposed pseudo-MLE approach. Simulation studies demonstrate the satisfactory performance of the proposed methods. An application to a set of interval-censored data on prostate cancer further confirms the utility of the methodology. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.

Deep practice of internet of things image recognition technology based on deep learning in intelligent financial supervision system

With the deepening development of the financial market, the role of regulatory systems in ensuring green and safe financial environment is becoming increasingly prominent. The traditional intelligent financial regulatory systems on the market lack precise and effective real-time monitoring and recognition capabilities, making it difficult to effectively process and analyze large-scale financial data. In order to improve the real-time recognition of abnormal situations or potential risks, achieve automation and intelligence of supervision, this article combines deep learning technology to study the deep practice of IoT image recognition technology in intelligent financial supervision systems. In response to the “data silos” and cross regional linkage issues faced by financial industry regulation, this article designs and implements an intelligent regulatory system based on IoT image recognition technology through deep learning. Using Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) algorithm to classify and analyze system images for regulatory and risk control purposes. The research results indicate that the intelligent financial regulatory system constructed in this article has high stability and responsiveness, which can effectively meet the real-time regulatory needs of finance and help promote the healthy development of the financial market.

From shower to table: fate of organic micropollutants in hydroponic systems for greywater treatment and lettuce cultivation

ABSTRACT This study evaluated the dual functionality of hydroponic systems to grow edible crops while treating greywater (GW) containing 20 organic micropollutants (OMPs). Various conditions with differing nutrient contents were tested: raw GW, GW with struvite, and GW with commercial nutrient solution. System performance was assessed with plant growth and standard parameters and OMP removal. After 4-week exposure, all conditions produced healthy-looking plants, proving GW as a viable hydroponic growth medium. However, only the condition with commercial solution yielded plants comparable to the biotic control, indicating the necessity of nutrient supplementation. Effluent from conditions with well-developed plants met the requirements of the European water reuse legislation (EU 2020/741) for scenarios B–D (food crops not in direct contact with the reclaimed water and industrial crops), and had the highest OMP removal, showcasing the effectiveness of the system for OMP treatment. Estimated calculations of OMP detected in leaves (10/20 OMP detected, predominantly positive and small) resulted in calculated potential human health risks through lettuce intake for two compounds: atenolol and epoxycarbamazepine. These findings support a continued evaluation of the behavior of other OMPs and their transformation products in water–plant systems, and their consideration in legislation on water reuse and food safety.

Recreational use of psychedelics at music festivals: Motivation, nature of experiences and learnings

AbstractThe present research study investigated the phenomenon of recreational use of psychedelics at music festivals, analysing whether the resulting experiences could possibly be recognized as valuable in terms of preventive mental health strategies. Quantitative (online survey) and qualitative (interviews) research methods have been combined to illuminate 3 main topics: motivation for the setting choice; the nature of the resulting experiences & their influence on people's lives; learnings from psychedelic experiences at music festivals (PEMF).Among other findings, motivation evolved around fun, enhancing the sensory exploration of the world, and deepening the connection to its diverse parts through engagement with art, nature and other beings. Factors, distinguishing music festivals from other settings, were significant for the setting choice (non-controllability of the environment, community & connection aspect, diversity & richness of the surroundings, pharmacological specifics). Remarkably, the non-controllability of the environment, otherwise avoided in the psychedelic research, contributed to the life-changing effects of PEMF. Exploration of their nature showed that, mostly rooted in poly-drug use, the enjoyable were clearly dominating over the challenging ones. The mystical PEMF appeared to be surprisingly common. Participants shared the related life-changing effects, centred around changed perception (increased empathy, awareness, acceptance; new perspectives, etc.) and changed behaviours (increased mindfulness in all life areas; making different life choices; changed approach to relationships, etc.). Except for post MDMA recovery, a positive impact of PEMF on mental health and the emotional state of the participants was reported, referring to increased levels of happiness, compassion, awe, trust and to emotional balance. This study showed the potential value of PEMF in terms of preventive mental health strategies in various forms. Acknowledging these findings as well as the existence of potential risks for triggering psychiatric conditions, de-stigmatization of recreational use could help introduce meaningful changes, including substance testing availability, prioritization of education as well as mandatory welfare and harm reduction services on-site.

Assessment of drug utilization and potentially inappropriate medications in hemodialysis patients with end-stage renal dysfunction: A study in a tertiary care hospital in Bahrain.

Patients undergoing dialysis pose therapeutic challenges in terms of polypharmacy, administration of potentially inappropriate drugs, and drugs with the potential risk of toxicity. This study evaluated the use of drugs, potentially inappropriate medicines (PIM), drugs with risk of Torsades de Pointes (TdP), and the complexity of the prescribed regimen using the medication regimen complexity index scale in patients undergoing hemodialysis. A retrospective cohort study was carried out amongst patients receiving hemodialysis. Drugs were classified into one of four classes: (i) drugs used in managing renal complications, (ii) cardiovascular drugs, (iii) anti-diabetic drugs, (iv) drugs for symptomatic management, and (v) others. Drugs were considered as PIM according to the Can-SOLVE CKD working group from a network of Canadian nephrology health professionals. The study adhered to the CredibleMeds classification of drugs with known, possible, and conditional risk of TdP and the complexity of prescribed medicines was evaluated based on the pre-validated medication regimen complexity index scale based on form/route, frequency of dosing, and requirement of special instructions. Sixty-three participants were included in the study (49 males and 14 females) with the median (range) age of 45 (21-66) years. Cardiovascular drugs followed by drugs used for managing renal complications were the most common classes administered. Notably, 12 (19.1%) patients received one of the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, 21 (33.3%) received a proton pump inhibitor, three (4.8%) received pregabalin, two (3.2%) received opioid drugs, and one (1.6%) was administered celecoxib. Atorvastatin, furosemide, omeprazole, and allopurinol were the most common PIM drugs administered to the study participants followed by others. Drugs used for symptomatic management had significantly more PIM compared to other classes (p <0.0001). Six (9.5%) patients received drugs with known TdP risk, one with possible TdP risk, and 61 with conditional risk. Median (range) medical regimen complexity index score was 26.5 (2-62.5). A huge burden of drug therapy was observed in the hemodialysis patients in terms of higher proportions of PIM, complex medical regimen, and prescription of drugs with risk of TdP. Implementation of clinical decision support tools enhancing rational prescription and identification of drugs with TdP risk, introducing antimicrobial stewardship, and stepwise deprescription of the drugs with the least benefit-risk ratio are warranted.

Heat/non-heat treatment alleviates β-conglycinin-triggered food allergy reactions by modulating the Th1/Th2 immune balance in a BALB/c mouse model.

With the increasing popularity of plant protein-based diets, soy proteins are favored as the most important source of plant protein worldwide. However, potential food allergy risks limit their use in the food industry. This work aims to reveal the mechanism of β-conglycinin-induced food allergy, and to explore the regulatory mechanism of heat treatment and high hydrostatic pressure (HHP) treatment in a BALB/c mouse model. Our results showed that oral administration of β-conglycinin induced severe allergic symptoms in BALB/c mice, but these symptoms were effectively alleviated through heat treatment and HHP treatment. Moreover, β-conglycinin stimulated lymphocyte proliferation and differentiation; a large number of cytokines interleukin (IL)-4, IL-5, IL-10, IL-12 and IL-13 were released and interferon γ secretion was inhibited, which disrupted the Th1/Th2 immune balance and promoted the differentiation and proliferation of naive T cells into Th2-type cells. Heat/non-heat treatment altered the conformation of soybean protein, which significantly reduced allergic reactions in mice. This regulatory mechanism may be associated with Th1/Th2 immune balance. Our results provide data support for understanding the changes in allergenicity of soybean protein within the food industry. © 2024 Society of Chemical Industry.

Neural Stem Cell-based Regenerative Therapy: A New Approach to Diabetes Treatment.

Diabetes mellitus (DM) is the most common metabolic disorder that occurs due to the loss, or impaired function of insulin-secreting pancreatic beta cells, which are of two types - type 1 (T1D) and type 2 (T2D). To cure DM, the replacement of the destroyed pancreatic beta cells of islet of Langerhans is the most widely practiced treatment. For this, isolating neuronal stem cells and cultivating them as a source of renewable beta cells is a significant breakthrough in medicine. The functions, growth, and gene expression of insulin-producing pancreatic beta cells and neurons are very similar in many ways. A diabetic patient's neural stem cells (obtained from the hippocampus and olfactory bulb) can be used as a replacement source of beta cells for regenerative therapy to treat diabetes. The same protocol used to create functional neurons from progenitor cells can be used to create beta cells. Recent research suggests that replacing lost pancreatic beta cells with autologous transplantation of insulin-producing neural progenitor cells may be a perfect therapeutic strategy for diabetes, allowing for a safe and normal restoration of function and a reduction in potential risks and a long-term cure.

Feelings in words: Emotion word use and cardiovascular reactivity in marital interactions.

Putting feelings into words is often thought to be beneficial. Few studies, however, have examined associations between natural emotion word use and cardiovascular reactivity. This laboratory-based study examined emotion word use (i.e., from computerized text analysis) and cardiovascular reactivity (i.e., interbeat interval changes from baseline) across two interaction contexts (i.e., conflict and positive conversations) in 49 mixed-sex married couples (age: M = 43.11, SD = 9.20) from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds. We focused on both frequency (i.e., relative proportion of emotion words) and diversity (i.e., relative proportion of unique emotion words) of emotion words. Data were collected between 2015 and 2017 and analyzed treating both partners and conversations as repeated measures, resulting in 196 observations overall (four per dyad). Findings showed that (a) when spouses used more negative emotion words (especially anger), they showed higher cardiovascular reactivity. This finding was robust when controlling for covariates; generalized across gender, interaction contexts, and socioeconomic status. Moreover, (b) when spouses used a more diverse negative emotion vocabulary, they showed higher cardiovascular reactivity, but this was not robust when controlling for negative emotion word frequency. Associations between (c) positive emotion word use and cardiovascular reactivity were not statistically significant. Verbalizing negative emotions thus seems to go along with higher cardiovascular reactivity, at least in the short term. Replication is needed across other relationship types, genders, and sexual orientations. These findings highlight emotion word use as an indicator of cardiovascular reactivity, which has implications for the identification of potential health risks that emerge during marital interactions. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Differentially Private Consensus for Second-Order Multiagent Systems With Quantized Communication.

This article considers the differentially private consensus problem of discrete-time second-order multiagent systems with partially measurable states and limited communication channel capacity, where only the integer-value information of agents can be transmitted. To reduce the potential risk of state information disclosure in digital communication, a differentially private consensus algorithm via dynamic encoding-decoding is proposed for the second-order multiagent system to make agents achieve mean-square consensus by transmitting quantized integer values with privacy protection. To deal with the uncertainty of the quantizer saturation, the statistical analysis is given for the boundedness of the input of quantizers. It is shown that the expectation of the minimum memory capacity of quantizers is 2 bits. Finally, some simulation results are given to visualize our conclusions.

First Report of Shoot Blight of Grapevine Caused by Sclerotinia sclerotiorum in Illes Balears, Mallorca, Spain.

In 2021, grapevines (Vitis vinifera L.) cv. Callet growing in a commercial vineyard located at Pollença (northeast of the island of Majorca, Spain) showed severe symptoms of shoot blight during spring and early summer, with an incidence of 70%. Symptoms consisted of elongated cankered-like lesions, surrounded by water-soaked darker tissues, that developed at the base or around the middle nodes of the shoot. For fungal isolation, shoot samples with lesions were collected, surface disinfected with 2% NaCl for 90s, rinsed twice with deionized water and placed in Petri plates containing potato dextrose agar (PDA). The plates were incubated at 25°C under 12 h light-darkness for 6 days. Isolations consistently yielded on kind of fungal colonies that produced white mycelium and black spherical to elongated sclerotia (2 to 10 mm in diameter). Morphological characterization was consistent with the description of Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (Lib.) de Bary (Bolton et al. 2006). Three isolates (UIB 118-1, UIB 118-26, and UIB 129-41) were preserved and deposited in the Culture Collection of Microbiology-Faculty of Sciences, University of Balearic Islands, Spain. Genomic DNA was extracted from isolates UIB 118-26 and UIB 129-41 using the EZNA Miniprep Kit (Omega Bio-Tek, Norcross, GA). The internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region of ribosomal DNA, β-tubulin (BTUB) and calmodulin (CAL) gene regions were amplified using ITS1F-ITS4 (Gardes and Bruns, 1996; White et al. 1990), Bt-2a/Bt-2b (Glass and Donaldson 1995) and CAL228F/CAL737R (Carbone and Kohn 1999) primer sets, respectively. Amplicons were sequenced and deposited in GenBank with accession numbers MZ604647 and MZ604648 for ITS, OK634402 and OK634403 for BTUB and OK634404 and OK634405 for CAL. BLASTn search showed that isolates were >99 % (ITS, BTUB and CAL) identical to S. sclerotiorum GenBank accession no. KF859933, CP017815 and KF871381, respectively. Pathogenicity tests were conducted using eight one-year old grapevines cv. Cabernet Sauvignon. Old and new green shoots were inoculated by inserting a 6-mm plug of mycelium taken from actively growing cultures on PDA into cuts made at the base and at the distal part of each shoot with a sterile scalpel with a total of eight inoculation points per plant. Inoculated wounds were sealed with Parafilm tape to avoid rapid dehydration. Inoculated plants and an equal number of wounded but non-inoculated plants (negative controls) were maintained at 25 ± 1°C for 48 h in plastic containers to ensure a high relative humidity (>90%). After 5 days, the infection girdled and rotted the green new shoots, whereas the older partially lignified shoots developed a localized long brown lesion that reached 16 cm in length. Due to the rotting of the basal part of the petiole, leaves turned gray, wilted, and died, easily detaching from the stem. In advanced stages of the disease, 7 days after infection, branches died and fell with the leaves remained attached (Fig 1 A, B). Reisolations from diseased shoots were successfully performed on PDA to fulfill Koch's postulates. S. slerotiorum was previously reported on grapevine causing shoot blight in Chile (Latorre and Guerrero, 2001), Korea (Jong-Han et al. 2009), California-USA (Boland and Hall, 1994) and Australia (Hall et al. 2002). AlsoS. sclerotiorum was reported among the endophytic mycobiota associated with Vitis vinifera in the Iberian Peninsula (Gonzalez and Tello, 2011) but not as a pathogen causing visible symptoms on that crop. So, this is the first report of the occurrence of S. slerotiorum as a pathogen of grapevines in Spain causing symptoms of canker and shoot blight. This finding highlights a potential risk of this fungal disease for the wine industry in the Mediterranean region and specially for Spain, the country with the largest acreage devoted to grapevines. Although chemical and biological are suitable control strategies, disease management is difficult as sclerotia of Sclerotinia can remain in the soil for up to eight years (Adams and Ayears, 1979), and preventive surveys are greatly recommended as an important epidemiological tool to monitor the epidemiology of disease and identify potential outbreaks of this new pathogen on grapevine in Spain.

High incidence of gallstones after Roux-en-Y reconstruction gastrectomy in gastric cancer: a multicenter, long-term cohort study.

Roux-en-Y reconstruction is a common anastomosis technique during gastrectomy in gastric cancer. There is a lack of studies on gallstones after Roux-en-Y reconstruction gastrectomy. This study investigated the incidence and potential risk factors associated with gallstones after Roux-en-Y reconstructive gastrectomy in gastric cancer. The study analyzed data from gastric cancer who underwent radical gastrectomy and Roux-en-Y reconstruction at two hospitals between January 2014 and December 2020. The patients fall into distal and total gastrectomy groups based on the extent of gastrectomy. The cumulative event probability curve was plotted using the Kaplan-Meier, and differences in gallstone between groups were evaluated using the Log-Rank. Propensity score matching was applied to construct a balanced total versus distal gastrectomies cohort. A Cox regression was employed to analyze the risk factors for gallstones after Roux-en-Y reconstructive gastrectomy in gastric cancer. Further subgroup analysis was performed. Five hundred thirty-one patients were included in this study, 201 in the distal gastrectomy group and 330 in the total gastrectomy. During the follow-up, gallstones occurred in 170 cases after gastrectomy, of which 145 cases accounted for 85.29% of all stones in the first two years after surgery. Then, to reduce the impact of bias, a 1:1 propensity score matching analysis was performed on the two groups of patients. A total of 344 patients were evaluated, with each subgroup comprising 172 patients. In the matched population, the Cox regression analysis revealed that females, BMI ≥23kg/m 2 , total gastrectomy, No.12 lymph node dissection, and adjuvant chemotherapy were risk factors for gallstones after Roux-en-Y reconstructive gastrectomy. Subgroup analysis showed that open surgery further increased the risk of gallstones after total gastrectomy. The incidence of gallstones increased significantly within 2years after Roux-en-Y reconstructive gastrectomy for gastric cancer. Patients with these risk factors should be followed closely after gastrectomy to avoid symptomatic gallstones.

Detection and Differentiation of Entomopathogenic Serratia spp. to Inform Reintroduction of the Critically Endangered Lord Howe Island Stick Insect Dryococelus australis.

Once rodents have been successfully eradicated from Lord Howe Island, Australia, the critically endangered Lord Howe Island stick insect (Dryococelus australis (Montrouzier)) may be reintroduced, a century after it was thought to have become extinct. In captive populations of D. australis, elevated mortalities have been associated with bacterial pathogens. To better define the infectious risk posed by entomopathogens to the reintroduction program, we investigated the bacteria isolated from captive D. australis kept at Melbourne Zoo and on Lord Howe Island and from environmental samples and free-living invertebrates collected on various parts of the island. At Melbourne Zoo, Serratia and Pseudomonas spp. were the bacteria most frequently isolated between 2013 and 2019. Serratia spp. were also the organisms most frequently isolated from insects sampled in April 2019 from the captive population on Lord Howe Island. In addition, Serratia spp. were isolated from a range of environmental samples collected on Lord Howe Island during March-April 2019. These environmental isolates had a broader range of biochemical and molecular characteristics than those obtained from the captive insect populations. A large proportion of these isolates were urease positive and had biochemical profiles previously not described for Serratia spp. This study highlights the need for better surveillance for potential pathogens in understudied regions and sites. We conclude that infections caused by Serratia spp. might pose a problem to the captive breeding program for D. australis but that the risk of introducing novel pathogens to Lord Howe Island through infected insects is low. Our study explores some of the potential risks involved in captive breeding and provides a valuable example of using pathogen surveillance to better inform an invertebrate conservation program.