Immunoperoxidase for the detection for the detection of antibodies in cerebrospinal fluid in neurocysticercosis: use of Cysticercus cellulosae and Cysticercus longicollis particles fixed on microscopy slides

The ORF strain of Cysticercus longicollis represents an important model for the study of heterologous antigens in the immunodiagnosis of neurocysticercosis (NC). The immunoperoxidase (IP) technique was standardized using a particulate antigen suspension of Cysticercus longicollis (Cl) and Cysticercus cellulosae (Cc). Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) samples were incubated on the antigen fixed to microscopy slides; the conjugate employed was anti-IgG-peroxidase and the enzymatic reaction was started by covering the slides with chromogen solution (diaminobenzidine/H2O2). After washing with distilled water, the slide was stained with 2% malachite green in water. Of the CSF samples from 21 patients with NC, 19 (90.5%) were positive, whereas the 8 CSF samples from the control group (100%) were negative. The results of the IP-Cl test applied to 127 CSF samples from patients with suspected NC showed 28.3% reactivity as opposed to 29.1 % for the IP-Cc test. The agreement index for the IP test (Cl x Cc) was 94.2%, with no significant difference between the two antigens.

Description of the egg of Anopheles (Anopheles) intermedius (Peryassu, 1908) (Diptera: Culicidae) by scanning electron microscopy

The egg of Anopheles (Anopheles) intermedius (Peryassu, 1908) is described and illustrated with scanning electron micrographs. Literature data on An. (Ano.) maculipes (Theobald, 1903) is provided

Diagnosis of pulmonary pneumocystosis by microscopy on wet mount preparations

We have compared the searching of the presence of "honeycomb" structures by direct microscopy on wet mount preparations with the direct immunofluorescence (DIF) for the diagnosis of Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (PCP) in 115 bronchoalveolar (BAL) fluids. The samples belonged to 115 AIDS patients; 87 with presumptive diagnosis of PCP and 28 with presumptive diagnosis other than PCP. The obtained results were coincident in 114 out of 115 studied samples (27 were positive and 87 negative) with both techniques. A higher percentage of positive results (32.18%) among patients with presumptive diagnosis of PCP with respect to those with presumptive diagnosis other than PCP (3.57%) was observed. One BAL fluid was positive only with DIF, showed scarce and isolated P. carinii elements and absence of typical "honeycomb" structures. The searching for "honeycomb" structures by direct microscopy on wet mount preparations could be considered as a cheap and rapid alternative for diagnosis of PCP when other techniques are not available or as screening test for DIF. This method showed a sensitivity close to DIF when it was applied to BAL fluids of AIDS patients with poor clinical condition and it was performed by an experienced microscopist.

Scanning electron microscopy of third-instar sarcophagid (Diptera: Sarcophagidae) recovered from a mummified human corpse in Thailand

The third-instar of an unidentified sarcophagid, recovered from a mummified body of a 32-yr-old Thai male was examined using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Although the morphological features of this larva are similar to the other sarcophagid larvae, some features could be helpful for species identification, which is a basic requirement for estimation of postmortem interval in forensic investigation. These features included number and arrangement of papillae on the anterior spiracle, structure of spines, size of circumspiracular tubercles at caudal segment and branching peculiarity of the posterior spiracular hairs. This information could benefit future identification of the sarcophagid larvae that exist in Thailand.

Disposable immunosensor using a simple method for oriented antibody immobilization for label-free real-time detection of an oxidative stress biomarker implicated in cancer diseases

This work proposes a novel approach for a suitable orientation of antibodies (Ab) on an immunosensing platform, applied here to the determination of 8-hydroxy-2′-deoxyguanosine (8OHdG), a biomarker of oxidative stress that has been associated to chronic diseases, such as cancer. The anti-8OHdG was bound to an amine modified gold support through its Fc region after activation of its carboxylic functions. Non-oriented approaches of Ab binding to the platform were tested in parallel, in order to show that the presented methodology favored Ab/Ag affinity and immunodetection of the antigen. The immunosensor design was evaluated by quartz-crystal microbalance with dissipation, atomic force microscopy, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and square-wave voltammetry. EIS was also a suitable technique to follow the analytical behavior of the device against 8OHdG. The affinity binding between 8OHdG and the antibody immobilized in the gold modified platform increased the charge transfer resistance across the electrochemical set-up. The observed behavior was linear from 0.02 to 7.0 ng/mL of 8OHdG concentrations. The interference from glucose, urea and creatinine was found negligible. An attempt of application to synthetic samples was also successfully conducted. Overall, the presented approach enabled the production of suitably oriented Abs over a gold platform by means of a much simpler process than other oriented-Ab binding approaches described in the literature, as far as we know, and was successful in terms of analytical features and sample application.

A Random Access Protocol incorporating Multi-Packet Reception, Retransmission Diversity and Successive Interference Cancellation

8th International Workshop on Multiple Access Communications (MACOM2015), Helsinki, Finland.

Disposable immunosensor with simple antibody orientation for label-free real-time detection of a cancer biomarker

This work proposes a novel approach for a suitable orientation of antibodies (Ab) on an immunosensing platform, applied here to the determination of 8-hydroxy-2’-deoxyguanosine (8OHdG), a biomarker of oxidative stress that has been associated to chronic diseases, such as cancer. The Anti-8OHdG was bound to an amine modified gold support through its Fc region after activation of its carboxylic functions. Non-oriented approaches of Ab binding to the platform were tested in parallel, in order to show that the presented proposal favored Ab/Ag affinity. The immunosensor design was evaluated by Quartz-Crystal microbalance with Dissipation, Atomic Force Microscopy, Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy (EIS) and Square-Wave Voltammetry. EIS was also a suitable technique to follow the analytical behavior of the device against 8OHdG. The affinity binding between 8OHdG and the antibody immobilized in the gold modified platform increased the charged transfer resistance across the electrochemical sep-up. The observed behavior was linear from 0.02 to 7.0 ng/mL of 8OHdG concentrations. The interference from Glucose, Urea and Creatinine was found negligible. An attempt of application to synthetic samples was also successfully conducted. Overall, the presented approach enabled the production of suitably oriented Abs over a gold platform by means of a much simpler process than other oriented-Ab binding approaches described in the literature, as far as we know, and was successful in terms of analytical features and sample application.

Analysis of self-interference within DAG tasks

6th Real-Time Scheduling Open Problems Seminar (RTSOPS 2015), Lund, Sweden.

On the Scalability of Constructive Interference in Low-Power Wireless Networks

12th European Conference on Wireless Sensor Networks (EWSN 2015). 9 to 11, Feb, 2015. Porto, Portugal

PIASA: A power and interference aware resource management strategy for heterogeneous workloads in cloud data centers

Cloud data centers have been progressively adopted in different scenarios, as reflected in the execution of heterogeneous applications with diverse workloads and diverse quality of service (QoS) requirements. Virtual machine (VM) technology eases resource management in physical servers and helps cloud providers achieve goals such as optimization of energy consumption. However, the performance of an application running inside a VM is not guaranteed due to the interference among co-hosted workloads sharing the same physical resources. Moreover, the different types of co-hosted applications with diverse QoS requirements as well as the dynamic behavior of the cloud makes efficient provisioning of resources even more difficult and a challenging problem in cloud data centers. In this paper, we address the problem of resource allocation within a data center that runs different types of application workloads, particularly CPU- and network-intensive applications. To address these challenges, we propose an interference- and power-aware management mechanism that combines a performance deviation estimator and a scheduling algorithm to guide the resource allocation in virtualized environments. We conduct simulations by injecting synthetic workloads whose characteristics follow the last version of the Google Cloud tracelogs. The results indicate that our performance-enforcing strategy is able to fulfill contracted SLAs of real-world environments while reducing energy costs by as much as 21%.

THE COPPER INTERFERENCE WITH THE MELANOGENESIS OF Cryptococcus neoformans

Melanin is a pigment produced by laccase, a phenoloxydase enzyme, and is related to the virulence of Cryptococcus neoformans as it is also considered an adaption mechanism to environmental conditions and protection against UV radiation, phagocytic system attack and antifungal drugs. Laccase synthesis is stimulated by several factors, including copper metabolism. The current study shows C. neoformans strains with higher melanization intensity when grown in L-dopa medium supplemented with different concentrations of copper sulfate. This increase shows that melanization rates may be enhanced in the presence of copper ions and may also enhance the virulence of C. neoformans in infected patients that present increasing copper concentrations in serum, such as those with HIV. The virulence of these strains may also be increased in the environment, where this metal is available as CuSO4 in algicidal and fungicidal compounds.

PREHISTORICAL Pediculus humanus capitis INFESTATION: QUANTITATIVE DATA AND LOW VACUUM SCANNING MICROSCOPY

A pre-Columbian Peruvian scalp was examined decades ago by a researcher from the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation. Professor Olympio da Fonseca Filho described nits and adult lice attached to hair shafts and commented about the origin of head lice infestations on mankind. This same scalp was sent to our laboratory and is the subject of the present paper. Analysis showed a massive infestation with nine eggs/cm2 and an impressive number of very well preserved adult lice. The infestation age was roughly estimated as nine months before death based on the distance of nits from the hair root and the medium rate of hair growth. A small traditional textile was associated with the scalp, possibly part of the funerary belongings. Other morphological aspects visualized by low-vacuum scanning electron microscopy are also presented here for adults and nits.

Scalable and interference aware wi-fi mesh networks using cots devices

A crescente tendencia no acesso móvel tem sido potenciada pela tecnologia IEEE 802.11. Contudo, estas redes têm alcance rádio limitado. Para a extensão da sua cobertura é possível recorrer a redes emalhadas sem fios baseadas na tecnologia IEEE 802.11, com vantagem do ponto de vista do custo e da flexibilidade de instalação, face a soluções cabladas. Redes emalhadas sem fios constituídas por nós com apenas uma interface têm escalabilidade reduzida. A principal razão dessa limitação deve-se ao uso do mecanismo de acesso ao meio partilhado Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance (CSMA/CA) em topologias multi-hop. Especificamente, o CSMA/CA não evita o problema do nó escondido levando ao aumento do número de colisões e correspondente degradação de desempenho com impacto direto no throughput e na latência. Com a redução da tecnologia rádio torna-se viável a utilização de múltiplos rádios por nó, sem com isso aumentar significativamente o custo da solução final de comunicações. A utilização de mais do que um rádio por nó de comuniações permite superar os problemas de desempenho inerentes ás redes formadas por nós com apenas um rádio. O objetivo desta tese, passa por desenvolver uma nova solução para redes emalhadas multi-cana, duar-radio, utilizando para isso novos mecanismos que complementam os mecanismos definidos no IEEE 802.11 para o estabelecimento de um Basic Service Set (BSS). A solução é baseada na solução WiFIX, um protocolo de routing para redes emalhadas de interface única e reutiliza os mecanismos já implementados nas redes IEEE 802.11 para difundir métricas que permitam à rede escalar de forma eficaz minimizando o impacto na performance. A rede multi-hop é formada por nós equipados com duas interfaces, organizados numa topologia hierárquica sobre múltiplas relações Access Point (AP) – Station (STA). Os resultados experimentais obtidos mostram a eficácia e o bom desempenho da solução proposta face à solução WiFIX original.

Scanning electron microscopy and X-ray spectroscopy applied to mycelial phase of sporothrix schenckii

Scanning electron microscopy applied to the mycelial phase of Sporothrix schenckii shows a matted mycelium with conidia of a regular pattern. X-Ray microanalysis applied in energy dispersive spectroscopy and also in wavelength dispersive spectroscopy reveals the presence of several elements of Mendeleef's classification.