Urban Dust Microbiome: Impact on Later Atopy and Wheezing

INTRODUCTION: Investigations in urban areas have just begun to explore how the indoor dust microbiome may affect the pathogenesis of asthma and allery. We aimed to investigate the early fungal and bacterial microbiome in house dust with allergic sensitization and wheezing later in childhood. METHODS: Individual dust samples from 189 homes of the LISAplus birth cohort study were collected shortly after birth from living room floors and profiled for fungal and bacterial microbiome. Fungal and bacterial diversity was assessed with terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism (tRFLP) and defined by the Simpson diversity index. Information on wheezing outcomes and co-variates until the age of 10 years was obtained by parental questionnaires. Information on specific allergic sensitization was available at 6 and 10 years. Logistic regression and General Estimation Equation (GEE) models were used to examine the relationship between microbial diversity and health outcomes. RESULTS: Logistic regression analyses revealed a significantly reduced risk of developing sensitization to aero-allergens at 6 years and ever wheezing until the age of 10 years for exposure to higher fungal diversity (adjusted Odds Ratio aOR (95%CI): 0.26 (0.10-0.70)), and 0.42 (0.18-0.96), respectively), in adjusted analyses. The associations were attenuated for the longitudinal analyses (GEE) until the age of 10 years. There was no association between higher exposure to bacterial diversity and the tested health outcomes. CONCLUSION: Higher early exposure to fungal diversity might help to prevent from developing sensitization to aero-allergens in early childhood, but the reasons for attenuated effects in later childhood require further prospective studies

Linking communities of practice with learning communities in computer science education

MoKEx (Mobile Knowledge Experience) is an international project in cooperation with universities and industrial partners. The project focuses on didactical, organizational and technical problems with regard to blended learning and knowledge management scenarios. In a project-based learning approach students of two different universities are being prepared for their future work. They are working on real-world problems in an interdisciplinary team and are collaborating within a geographically and temporally separated team. Therefore means for communication and collaboration over the Internet must be provided. From the didactical perspective the aspects of autodidactic education and team learning are playing an important role, while teachers are acting primarily as coaches. In the meantime the results of the first execution of the project have been enhanced and put into operation by the companies and a second execution has been started.Education for the 21 st century - impact of ICT and Digital Resources ConferenceRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Genome-wide association and HLA fine-mapping studies identify risk loci and genetic pathways underlying allergic rhinitis

Allergic rhinitis is the most common clinical presentation of allergy, affecting 400 million people worldwide, with increasing incidence in westernized countries1,2. To elucidate the genetic architecture and understand the underlying disease mechanisms, we carried out a meta-analysis of allergic rhinitis in 59,762 cases and 152,358 controls of European ancestry and identified a total of 41 risk loci for allergic rhinitis, including 20 loci not previously associated with allergic rhinitis, which were confirmed in a replication phase of 60,720 cases and 618,527 controls. Functional annotation implicated genes involved in various immune pathways, and fine mapping of the HLA region suggested amino acid variants important for antigen binding. We further performed genome-wide association study (GWAS) analyses of allergic sensitization against inhalant allergens and nonallergic rhinitis, which suggested shared genetic mechanisms across rhinitis-related traits. Future studies of the identified loci and genes might identify novel targets for treatment and prevention of allergic rhinitis

The implementation of physicians assistant in a surgical ward improves continuity in daily clinical work and increases comprehensibility of nurses and physicians

INTRODUCTION Physician Assistant (PA) have been deployed to increase the capacity of a team, supporting continuity and medical cover. The goal of this study was to assess the implementation of PAs on continuity of surgical rounds, on the collaboration of nurses and physicians and on support of administrative work. METHODS This cross-sectional survey was performed on nurses and physicians who work full-time at a surgical ward in a Swiss reference center. PAs were introduced in our institution in 2019. Participants answered a self-developed questionnaire 6 and 12 months after the implementation of PAs. Administrative work, teamwork, improvement of workflow, and training of physicians has been assessed. Participants answered questions on a 5-point Likert scale and were stratified according to profession (nurse, physician). RESULTS Participants (n = 53) reported a positive effect on the regular conduct of rounds (2.9, SD 1.1 points after 6 weeks and 3.5, SD 1.1 points after 12 weeks, p = 0.05). A significant improvement of nurse-doctor collaboration has been reported (3.6, SD 1.0 and 4.2, SD 0.8, p = 0.05). Nurses (n = 28, 52.8%) reported the that PAs are integrated in the physicians team rather than the nurses team (4.0, SD 0.0 points and 4.4, SD 0.7 points, p = 0.266) and a significant beneficial effect on the surgical clinic (3.7, SD 1.0 points and 4.4, SD 0.8 points, p = 0.043). Improved overall management of surgical cases was reported by the physicians (n = 25, 47.2%) (4.8, SD 0.4 and 4.3, SD 0.6, p = 0.046). CONCLUSION The implementation of PA has improved the collaboration of physicians and nurses substantially. Continuity of rounds has improved and the administrative workload for residents decreased substantially. Overall, the implementation of PA was reported to be beneficial for the surgical clinic

Linking communities of practice with learning communities in computer science education

MoKEx (Mobile Knowledge Experience) is an international project in cooperation with universities and industrial partners. The project focuses on didactical, organizational and technical problems with regard to blended learning and knowledge management scenarios. In a project-based learning approach students of two different universities are being prepared for their future work. They are working on real-world problems in an interdisciplinary team and are collaborating within a geographically and temporally separated team. Therefore means for communication and collaboration over the Internet must be provided. From the didactical perspective the aspects of autodidactic education and team learning are playing an important role, while teachers are acting primarily as coaches. In the meantime the results of the first execution of the project have been enhanced and put into operation by the companies and a second execution has been started.Education for the 21 st century - impact of ICT and Digital Resources ConferenceRed de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Men's preferences for women's body odours are not associated with HLA

Objective: Body odours allegedly portray information about an individual's genotype at the major histocompatibility complex (MHC, called HLA in humans). While there is strong experimental support for MHC-associated mating behaviour in animals, the situation in humans is more complex. Previous studies have suggested that women prefer the scent of men with dissimilar HLA to their own. To date only very few studies have looked at HLA-linked olfactory preferences in men and these studies have revealed inconsistent results. Here we investigate men's HLA-associated preferences for women's body odours. Methods: In contrast to previous studies, body odours were gathered at peak fertility (i.e., just before ovulation) when any HLA-associated odour preferences should be strongest. We scrutinized whether men's preference for women's body odours is modulated by (1) the number of shared HLA alleles between men and women, (2) HLA heterozygosity, and (3) the frequency of rare HLA alleles. Results: We found that men could readily differentiate between odours they found attractive and odours they found less attractive, but that these preferences were not associated with HLA. Specifically, men did not prefer odours from women who are HLA dissimilar, HLA heterozygous, or who have rare HLA alleles. Conclusions: Despite adopting rigorous methodology and a large sample size, we found no evidence that men prefer odours from women who are MHC dissimilar, MHC heterozygous, or who have rare MHC alleles. Together, these findings suggest that HLA has no effect on men's mate preferences

Mechanotunable Surface Lattice Resonances in the Visible Optical Range by Soft Lithography Templates and Directed Self-Assembly

We demonstrate a novel colloidal self-assembly approach toward obtaining mechanically tunable, cost-efficient, and low-loss plasmonic nanostructures that show pronounced optical anisotropy upon mechanical deformation. Soft lithography and template-assisted colloidal self-assembly are used to fabricate a stretchable periodic square lattice of gold nanoparticles on macroscopic areas. We stress the impact of particle size distribution on the resulting optical properties. To this end, lattices of narrowly distributed particles (∼2% standard deviation in diameter) are compared with those composed of polydisperse ones (∼14% standard deviation). The enhanced particle quality sharpens the collective surface lattice resonances by 40% to achieve a full width at half-maximum as low as 16 nm. This high optical quality approaches the theoretical limit for this system, as revealed by electromagnetic simulations. One hundred stretching cycles demonstrate a reversible transformation from a square to a rectangular lattice, accompanied by polarization-dependent optical properties. On the basis of these findings we envisage the potential applications as strain sensors and mechanically tunable filters. © 2019 American Chemical Society

Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 4: a new member of the MEN family.

OBJECTIVE Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 4 (MEN4) is caused by a CDKN1B germline mutation first described in 2006. Its estimated prevalence is less than 1/million. The aim of this study was to define the disease characteristics. METHODS Systematic review according to the PRISMA 2020 criteria. MEDLINE® and Web of ScienceTM search from January 2006 to August 2022. RESULTS Forty-eight symptomatic patients fulfilled the pre-defined eligibility criteria. Twenty-eight different CDKN1B variants, mostly missense (21/48, 44%) and frameshift mutations (17/48, 35%), were reported. The majority of patients were women (36/48, 75%). Men became symptomatic at a median age of 32.5 years (range 10-68, mean 33.7 ± 23), whereas the same event was recorded for women at a median age of 49.5 years (range 5-76, mean 44.8 ± 19.9) (p = 0.25). The most frequently affected endocrine organ was the parathyroid gland (36/48, 75%; uniglandular disease 31/36, 86%), followed by the pituitary gland (21/48, 44%; hormone-secreting 16/21, 76%), the endocrine pancreas (7/48, 15%) and the thyroid gland (4/48, 8%). Tumours of the adrenal glands and thymus were found in three and two patients, respectively. The presenting first endocrine pathology concerned the parathyroid (27/48, 56%) and the pituitary gland (11/48, 23%). There were one (27/48, 56%), two (13/48, 27%), three (3/48, 6%), or four (5/48, 10%) syn- or metachronously affected endocrine organs in a single patient, respectively. CONCLUSION MEN4 is an extremely rare disease, which most frequently affects women around 50 years of age. Primary hyperparathyroidism as a uniglandular disease is the leading pathology