Preparation of antiviral multispray with cationic antimicrobial dialkyldimethyl ammonium salt and sulfobetaine against new coronaviruses (SARS-CoV-2).

The novel sudden acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 is an enveloped virus currently causing severe illness and death worldwide. Common antiseptics such as alcohol have some efficacy in disinfecting everyday surroundings, but development of more effective disinfectants is imperative. A series of studies focusing on cationic antimicrobials resulted in the development of a safe and effective novel coronavirus disinfectant, DEA-171, which provides ≥99.98 % inhibition of all novel coronavirus variants within 1 min.

Clinical Significance of B-Type Natriuretic Peptide Levels at 3 Months after Atrial Fibrillation Ablation.

The role of B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP) levels as a predictor of arrhythmia recurrence (AR) after atrial fibrillation (AF) ablation remains unclear. In this study, we investigated the association of BNP levels before and 3 months after ablation with the risk of AR. A total of 234 patients undergoing their first session of AF ablation were included (68% male, mean age of 69 years). The cut-off value for discriminating AR was determined based on the maximum value of the area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve. The impact of BNP levels on AR was evaluated using Cox regression analysis. ROC curve analysis showed that the area under the curve for BNP at 3 months after the procedure was larger (0.714) compared to BNP levels before ablation (0.593). Elevated levels of BNP 3 months after the procedure (>40.5 pg/mL, n = 96) was associated with a higher risk of AR compared to those without elevated levels (34.4% vs. 10.9%, p < 0.01). Multivariate Cox regression analysis revealed that elevated BNP levels were associated with an increased risk of AR (hazard ratio 2.43; p = 0.014). Elevated BNP levels 3 months after AF ablation were a significant prognostic factor in AR, while baseline BNP levels were not.

Assessment of the Usefulness of Cefapirin and Cefalonium Disks for Susceptibility Testing of Staphylococcus aureus Isolates from Bovine Mastitis.

Cefapirin (CEP) and cefalonium (CNM) are first-generation cephalosporins widely used to treat bovine mastitis caused by Gram-positive bacteria including staphylococci. However, disks for susceptibility testing of those drugs in causative bacteria are not available. This study evaluated the efficacy of 10 µg and 30 µg pilot disks of CEP (CEP10 and CEP30) and CNM (CNM10 and CNM30) against 130 Staphylococcus aureus isolates from bovine mastitis. Scattergrams of minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) and zone diameters (ZDs) illustrated significant correlations between the MICs and ZDs of CEP10 (r = -0.912), CEP30 (r = -0.933), CNM10 (r = -0.847), and CNM30 (r = -0.807). The analysis by Normalized Resistance Interpretation indicated that the epidemiolocal cut-off value (ECV) of MIC for both cefapirin and cefalonium is ≤ 0.5 µg/mL, and the ECV of ZD for CEP10, CEP30, CNM10, and CNM30 were ≥ 22 mm, ≥ 25 mm, ≥ 22 mm, and ≥ 29 mm, respectively. We believe that both 10 µg and 30 µg CEP and CNM susceptibility disks will be helpful for guiding the appropriate use of these antibiotics for bovine mastitis. Further studies toward the establishment of clinical breakpoint of CEP and CNM would be needed for their routine use.

Elucidation of quantitative structural diversity of remarkable rearrangement regions, shufflons, in IncI2 plasmids.

A multiple DNA inversion system, the shufflon, exists in incompatibility (Inc) I1 and I2 plasmids. The shufflon generates variants of the PilV protein, a minor component of the thin pilus. The shufflon is one of the most difficult regions for de novo genome assembly because of its structural diversity even in an isolated bacterial clone. We determined complete genome sequences, including those of IncI2 plasmids carrying mcr-1, of three Escherichia coli strains using single-molecule, real-time (SMRT) sequencing and Illumina sequencing. The sequences assembled using only SMRT sequencing contained misassembled regions in the shufflon. A hybrid analysis using SMRT and Illumina sequencing resolved the misassembled region and revealed that the three IncI2 plasmids, excluding the shufflon region, were highly conserved. Moreover, the abundance ratio of whole-shufflon structures could be determined by quantitative structural variation analysis of the SMRT data, suggesting that a remarkable heterogeneity of whole-shufflon structural variations exists in IncI2 plasmids. These findings indicate that remarkable rearrangement regions should be validated using both long-read and short-read sequencing data and that the structural variation of PilV in the shufflon might be closely related to phenotypic heterogeneity of plasmid-mediated transconjugation involved in horizontal gene transfer even in bacterial clonal populations.

Genetic characteristics of CTX-M-type extended-spectrum-ß-lactamase (ESBL)-producing enterobacteriaceae involved in mastitis cases on Japanese dairy farms, 2007 to 2011.

Sixty-five CTX-M-2/15/14 extended-spectrum-ß-lactamase-producing Enterobacteriaceae were isolated from 258,888 mastitic milk samples from Japanese dairy farms between 2007 and 2011. CTX-M-2-producing Klebsiella pneumoniae and CTX-M-15-producing Escherichia coli were the predominant strains isolated. There was no predominant clonal type, and clonal diversity was found even in strains isolated from a single farm.

Antimicrobial susceptibilities and bacteriological characteristics of bovine Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Serratia marcescens isolates from mastitis.

The presence of metallo-ß-lactamase (MBL)-producing and multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa (MDRP) strains among bovine isolates of Gram-negative bacilli, and O-serotypes of bovine Serratia marcescens and P. aeruginosa isolates have been reported rarely. The aims of this study were to (1) elucidate antimicrobial susceptibilities and O-serotypes of P. aeruginosa and S. marcescens isolates from bovine mastitis and the presence of MBL-producers and MDRP strains among them and (2) evaluate their relationships to human isolates. We investigated the MICs of 24 antimicrobials and O-serotypes for 116 P. aeruginosa and 55 S. marcescens isolates in Japan, primarily in 2006. A total of 171 isolates exhibited high antimicrobial susceptibilities with the exception of a partial drug. P. aeruginosa isolates exhibited high susceptibilities of ≥ 95.7% to ciprofloxacin, imipenem, meropenem, piperacillin, ceftazidime, cefepime, cefoperazone/sulbactam, amikacin, tobramycin, and gentamicin; however, they exhibited a susceptibility of only 69.8% to aztreonam. They exhibited substantial resistances to ceftriaxone, enrofloxacin, cefotaxime, and moxalactam. S. marcescens isolates exhibited high susceptibilities of ≥ 90.9% to kanamycin, ceftiofur, sulfamethoxazole-trimethoprim, and the 15 aforementioned drugs, but exhibited resistance to minocycline. Neither MBL-producers nor MDRP strains were detected among the 171 strains. The dominant serotypes of P. aeruginosa isolates were OG, OA, OB, OI, OF, OE, and OK; those of S. marcescens isolates were O6 and O5. Every S. marcescens isolate was pigmented. These findings suggest that bovine P. aeruginosa and S. marcescens isolates differ from human isolates from both antibiogram and phenotypic perspectives, and could help to evaluate differences in bacteriological characteristics between bovine and human isolates.

Depiction of residual emboli following pulmonary embolism with thrombotic scintigraphy.

BACKGROUND: In the treatment of pulmonary embolism (PE), the presence of residual emboli is known to seriously affect the recurrence and prognosis. We attempted to depict the residual emboli in the subacute stage of PE using indium-111-oxine labeled platelet scintigraphy (In-plt). METHODS: In-plt was performed on 22 patients with PE who showed an improvement according to lung perfusion scintigraphy. Their accumulation was assessed along with the blood coagulation ability measured on the same day. In addition, radioisotope venography (RI-veno) was performed simultaneously with In-plt to measure the circulatory findings in the lower limb for comparison. All patients received systemic heparin during the acute stage and received warfarin at the time of testing. RESULTS: Accumulation of In-pit was observed in 7 patients (32%), and positive signals were found in the lower limbs or pelvic cavity in all cases. Two patients were suspected of having poor lower limb circulation from their RI-veno findings, and these findings were largely consistent with the areas of In-plt accumulation. DISCUSSION: Some emboli persist after extensive anti-coagulation therapy. The use of In-pit is effective in determining the therapeutic measures and assessing the prognosis as this method allows us to clearly depict the existence of such emboli.