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This study assessed the hand hygiene performance in French nursing homes using the consumption of alcohol-based hand rubs (AHRs) as a surrogate. Nursing homes from the 17 French regions were contacted to collect their AHR consumption and occupancy in 2018 and 2019. A total of 1290 nursing homes from 15 French regions participated in the survey. The estimated median number of hand hygiene actions per resident-day was 1.48 (interquartile range: 1.04-2.03) in 2018 and 1.60 (1.10-2.26) in 2019. A significantly higher AHR consumption was observed in public nursing homes with an infection control team or link nurse.

Siderophores are low molecular weight secondary metabolites produced by microorganisms under low iron stress as a specific iron chelator. In the present study, a rhizospheric bacterium was isolated from the rhizosphere of sesame plants from Salem district, Tamil Nadu, India and later identified as Bacillus subtilis LSBS2. It exhibited multiple plant-growth-promoting (PGP) traits such as hydrogen cyanide (HCN), ammonia, and indole acetic acid (IAA), and solubilized phosphate. The chrome azurol sulphonate (CAS) agar plate assay was used to screen the siderophore production of LSBS2 and quantitatively the isolate produced 296 mg/L of siderophores in succinic acid medium. Further characterization of the siderophore revealed that the isolate produced catecholate siderophore bacillibactin. A pot culture experiment was used to explore the effect of LSBS2 and its siderophore in promoting iron absorption and plant growth of Sesamum indicum L. Data from the present study revealed that the multifarious Bacillus sp. LSBS2 could be exploited as a potential bioinoculant for growth and yield improvement in S. indicum.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of increasing sulfate concentrations on chromium removal, to evaluate the effect of the presence of Cr(VI) on sulfate removal by Streptomyces sp. MC1 and to analyze the differential protein expression profile in the presence of this metal for the identification of proteins repressed or overexpressed. In the presence of Cr(VI) but in the absence of sulfate ions, bacterial growth was negligible, showing the Cr(VI) toxicity for this bacterium. However, the sulfate presence stimulated bacterium growth and Cr(VI) removal, regardless of its concentrations. Streptomyces sp. MC1 showed ability to remove chromium and sulfate simultaneously. Also, the sulfate presence favored the decrease of total chromium concentration from supernatants reaching a decrease of 50% at 48 h. In presence of chromium, seven proteins were down‐expressed and showed homology to proteins involved in protein biosynthesis, energy production and free radicals detoxification while two proteins involved in oxidation‐reduction processes identified as dihydrolipoamide dehydrogenase and S‐adenosyl‐l‐methionine synthase were overexpressed.

Since long ago, pelagic Sargassum mats have been known to be abundant in the Sargasso Sea, where they provide habitat to diverse organisms. However, over the last few years, massive amounts of pelagic Sargassum have reached the coast of several countries in the Caribbean and West Africa, causing economic and environmental problems. Aiming for lessening the impacts of the blooms, governments and private companies remove the seaweeds from the shore, but this process results expensive. The valorization of this abundant biomass can render Sargassum tides into an economic opportunity and concurrently solve their associated environmental problems. Despite the diverse fields where algae have found applications and the relevance of this recurrent situation, Sargassum biomass remains without large scale applications. Therefore, this review aims to present the potential uses of these algae, identifying the limitations that must be assessed to effectively valorize this bioresource. Due to the constraints identified for each of the presented applications, it is concluded that a biorefinery approach should be developed to effectively valorize this abundant biomass. However, there is an urgent need for investigations focusing on holopelagic Sargassum to be able to truly valorize this seaweed.

Building, bridge or wind turbine maintenance requires manual dexterity tasks by a specialist rope-access trained workforce via two principal means: harness suspension of individual workers from above, or deployment of a suspended platform or cradle from which workers access the structure to be maintained. Currently no published research compares accuracy and efficiency of simulated maintenance tasks between these modalities. This study investigated manual dexterity task performance of peg placement and shape delineation in seated, standing and suspended environments in 16 healthy controls and 26 professional rope-access trained individuals. Both seated and standing assessments were superior to those suspended, and height of suspension, total mass and years of experience had no influence on the task outcome. These findings suggest that, where feasible, cradle suspension mechanisms which permit standing maintenance are favourable in terms of task efficacy and where feasible, should be considered for deployment in wind energy and other engineering applications.

Breathing and oxygenation were monitored in 78 asymptomatic volunteers on two successive nights of sleep. Four groups of subjects were recruited: 20 young men, 20 young women, 20 men older than 40 years, and 18 postmenopausal women. In random order, subjects ingested either 2 ml/kg (body weight) of 100-proof vodka in orange juice or a similar amount of water in orange juice before bedtime. Alcohol ingestion shortened sleep in the older men and in the postmenopausal women. No effect of alcohol ingestion on breathing or oxygenation during sleep was seen in any group of women. In men, alcohol ingestion increased the numbers of desaturation episodes and caused more severe oxygen desaturation during sleep. The effect of alcohol ingestion on breathing and oxygenation during the sleep of asymptomatic volunteers appears to be limited to men.

Experiments were carried out to determine the accuracy and validity of estimations of hepatic blood flow from systemic clearances of ethanol during very low dose (8 μmol∙min−1∙kg−1) infusions of ethanol in anesthetized cats. Systemic clearances were compared with directly measured hepatic blood flow using a hepatic venous long-circuit technique. This technique allowed direct measurement and alteration of hepatic blood flow and collection of arterial, portal, and hepatic venous blood samples without depletion of the animal's blood volume. In 18 cats, Vmax for ethanol was 93 ± 7 μmol∙min−1 per 100 g liver or 21 ± 2 μmol∙min−1∙kg·body weight−1 and Km was 144 ± 19 μM in terms of logarithmic mean sinusoidal concentration. At the dose of 8 μmol∙min−1∙kg body weight−1 used for estimation of hepatic blood flow, extraction was 0.95 ± 0.07 (mean ± SD). Systemic clearance of ethanol overestimated directly measured hepatic blood flow by 15 ± 16%. Hepatic blood flow changes expressed as percentages of the control level were accurately estimated from systemic ethanol clearance (100 ± 10%). Since 73 ± 12% of the infused ethanol was eliminated by the liver and 83 ± 11% was eliminated by the splanchnic bed, an extrasplanchnic uptake of 17% accounted for the overestimation of hepatic blood flow. Estimation of hepatic blood flow from systemic clearances of ethanol during very low dose infusions may have advantages over other clearance methods. Its use in cats was illustrated in a separate series of experiments and it was shown that surgery significantly reduced hepatic blood flow. The method may merit trial for estimation of hepatic blood flow in humans.

Abstract Synchronous cultures of the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe 972 h −1 are most sensitive to killing by 15 min, 49 °C pulses during a stage stretching from nuclear division through short G1 and S phases to a point early in G2. In this work the cell cycle position of the S phase has been altered by growing the cells in the presence of 2-phenylethanol. The heat sensitivity of these cells was greater at all stages of the cell cycle compared with the cells grown without 2-phenylethanol. However, the position of the most heat sensitive stage in the cell cycle was unaltered. This heat sensitive stage did not include S phase in the cells grown with 2-phenylethanol.