bacterial infections

How Do Bacteria Swim?

admin_huliq — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 08:27:12 -0600

Brown University physicists have completed the most detailed study of the swimming patterns of a microbe, showing for the first time how its movement is affected by drag and a phenomenon called Brownian motion. The findings appear online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

What is the function of NOD2 in colonic epithelial cells?

harminka — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 11:14:43 -0500

NOD2 is a cytosolic pattern recognition receptor similar in structure and function to Toll like receptors (TLRs). It can recognize and respond to a component found in the cell wall of bacteria, muramyl dipeptide (MDP), and has been shown to play an important role in the innate immune response of macrophages to bacterial infections.

New test could help catch serious infections in babies

harminka — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 06:00:46 -0500

A simple blood test may help detect serious bacterial infections (SBIs) like urinary tract infections and blood stream infections in young infants who come to the emergency department (ED) with fevers that have no clear cause.

New paper sheds light on bacterial cell wall recycling

harminka — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 10:15:02 -0500

A new paper by a team of researchers led by Shahriar Mobashery, Navari Family Professor of Life Sciences at the University of Notre Dame, provides important new insights into the process by which bacteria recycle their cell wall.

What effect does melatonin have in colitis?

harminka — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 06:43:27 -0500

In rats with experimental colitis, the marked increase in bacterial translocation in postcolitis rats has been reversed by melatonin administration. This is due to melatonin's anti-inflammatory and anti-apoptotic effects.

New Test for Joint Infection Could Spare Some Patients an Unnecessary Procedure

harminka — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 14:00:33 -0600

A potential diagnostic test that could help surgeons confirm or rule out the presence of infection-causing bacteria in prosthetic joints that require surgical revision has been developed by researchers at the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS), a part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Researchers find possible target to treat deadly bloodstream infections

harminka — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 01:40:10 -0600

Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago have discovered a possible target to treat bloodstream bacterial infections.

Scientists identify proteins that help bacteria put up a fight

harminka — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 10:28:20 -0600

Scientists have identified the role of two proteins that contribute to disease-causing bacteria cells’ versatility in resisting certain classes of antibiotics.

Amphibian Skin May Offer New Therapy Against Bacterial Infections

harminka — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 11:37:31 -0600

Researchers from Italy found that a naturally occurring agent in frog skin may inhibit multi-drug resistant bacterial strains associated with hospital-acquired infections. They report their findings in the January 2008 journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy.

Bacterial infections in premature babies more common than previously realized

harminka — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 14:12:50 -0600

Premature babies are subject to a host of threats that can result in fetal/neonatal disease. In a study published in the January 2008 issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, researchers from the University of Alabama–Birmingham Medical School and the Drexel University College of Medicine found that genital mycoplasmas are a frequent cause of congenital fetal infection.

Multiple species of bacteria may cause trachoma

harminka — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 06:26:15 -0600

In a study published in this week’s PLoS Medicine, researchers have found that more than one species of bacteria may be causing the infectious eye disease trachoma. Six million people – most of whom live in crowded and unhygienic conditions in the developing world – are blind because of the disease and many more are actively infected.

New drug targets may fight tuberculosis and other bacterial infections

harminka — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 07:51:54 -0600

Over the course of the 20th Century, doctors waged war against infectious bacterial illness with the best new weapon they had: antibiotics.