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There is an unmet clinical need for developing novel methods to complement and replace the current radiation-emitting imaging-based methods for the detection of loose pedicle screws as a complication after spinal fusion surgery which fail to identify a substantial amount of loose implants. In this work, we propose a new methodology and paradigm for the radiation-free, non-destructive, and easy-to-integrate detection of pedicle screw loosening based on vibroacoustic sensing. Furthermore, we propose a novel simulation technique for pedicle screw loosening, which is biomechanically validated. For the detection of a loose implant, we excite the vertebra of interest with a sine sweep vibration at the spinous process and attach a custom highly-sensitive piezo contact microphone to the screw head to capture the propagated vibration characteristics which are analyzed using a detection pipeline based on spectrogram features and a SE-ResNet-18. To validate the proposed approach, we conducted experiments using four human cadaveric lumbar spine specimens and evaluate our algorithm in a cross validation experiment. Our method reaches a sensitivity of 91.50 +- 6.58% and a specificity of 91.10 +- 2.27%. The proposed system shows great potentials for the development of alternative assessment methods for implant loosening based on vibroacoustic sensing.

In this work, we propose a novel data augmentation method for clinical audio datasets based on a conditional Wasserstein Generative Adversarial Network with Gradient Penalty (cWGAN-GP), operating on log-mel spectrograms. To validate our method, we created a clinical audio dataset which was recorded in a real-world operating room during Total Hip Arthroplasty (THA) procedures and contains typical sounds which resemble the different phases of the intervention. We demonstrate the capability of the proposed method to generate realistic class-conditioned samples from the dataset distribution and show that training with the generated augmented samples outperforms classical audio augmentation methods in terms of classification performance. The performance was evaluated using a ResNet-18 classifier which shows a mean Macro F1-score improvement of 1.70% in a 5-fold cross validation experiment using the proposed augmentation method. Because clinical data is often expensive to acquire, the development of realistic and high-quality data augmentation methods is crucial to improve the robustness and generalization capabilities of learning-based algorithms which is especially important for safety-critical medical applications. Therefore, the proposed data augmentation method is an important step towards improving the data bottleneck for clinical audio-based machine learning systems.

We investigated SARS-CoV-2 potential tropism by surveying expression of viral entry-associated genes in single-cell RNA-sequencing data from multiple tissues from healthy human donors. We co-detected these transcripts in specific respiratory, corneal and intestinal epithelial cells, potentially explaining the high efficiency of SARS-CoV-2 transmission. These genes are co-expressed in nasal epithelial cells with genes involved in innate immunity, highlighting the cells’ potential role in initial viral infection, spread and clearance. The study offers a useful resource for further lines of inquiry with valuable clinical samples from COVID-19 patients and we provide our data in a comprehensive, open and user-friendly fashion at www.covid19cellatlas.org., QC 20200625

Scedosporium prolificans is one of the most life-threatening fungal opportunistic pathogens due to its high resistance to common systemic antifungal agents. While a close relative of Pseudallescheria boydii, S. prolificans has a more limited geographic range being primarily found in Australia, USA and Spain. Infections have also been reported from several other European countries and from Chile. Twenty patients with Scedosporium prolificans infection or colonization from August 1993 to May 2007 were retrospectively reviewed in Germany. They had all been identified at or reported to the Reference Laboratory for Pseudallescheria/Scedosporium spp. in Berlin. Twelve of 13 patients with haematological disorders and/or on immunosuppressive therapy developed a fatal invasive scedosporiosis. Colonization of the respiratory tract was reported for one patient after heart-lung-transplantation, all six patients with cystic fibrosis and one with chronic sinusitis. Molecular studies of the S. prolificans isolates confirmed that parts of the 18S, the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) regions and the D1/D2 domain of the 28S region of rDNA are monomorphic. However, sequencing of parts of the translation elongation factor EF1-alpha (EF-1alpha) and the chitin synthase (CHS-1) genes revealed the presence of three and two distinct genotypes, respectively. Two informative mutations were found in EF-1alpha and a single nucleotide exchange in the CHS-1 gene., Scedosporium prolificans is one of the most life-threatening fungal opportunistic pathogens due to its high resistance to common systemic antifungal agents. While a close relative of Pseudallescheria boydii, S. prolificans has a more limited geographic range being primarily found in Australia, USA and Spain. Infections have also been reported from several other European countries and from Chile. Twenty patients with Scedosporium prolificans infection or colonization from August 1993 to May 2007 were retrospectively reviewed in Germany. They had all been identified at or reported to the Reference Laboratory for Pseudallescheria/Scedosporium spp. in Berlin. Twelve of 13 patients with haematological disorders and/or on immunosuppressive therapy developed a fatal invasive scedosporiosis. Colonization of the respiratory tract was reported for one patient after heart-lung-transplantation, all six patients with cystic fibrosis and one with chronic sinusitis. Molecular studies of the S. prolificans isolates confirmed that parts of the 18S, the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) regions and the D1/D2 domain of the 28S region of rDNA are monomorphic. However, sequencing of parts of the translation elongation factor EF1-alpha (EF-1alpha) and the chitin synthase (CHS-1) genes revealed the presence of three and two distinct genotypes, respectively. Two informative mutations were found in EF-1alpha and a single nucleotide exchange in the CHS-1 gene.

Scedosporium prolificans is one of the most life-threatening fungal opportunistic pathogens due to its high resistance to common systemic antifungal agents. While a close relative of Pseudallescheria boydii, S. prolificans has a more limited geographic range being primarily found in Australia, USA and Spain. Infections have also been reported from several other European countries and from Chile. Twenty patients with Scedosporium prolificans infection or colonization from August 1993 to May 2007 were retrospectively reviewed in Germany. They had all been identified at or reported to the Reference Laboratory for Pseudallescheria/Scedosporium spp. in Berlin. Twelve of 13 patients with haematological disorders and/or on immunosuppressive therapy developed a fatal invasive scedosporiosis. Colonization of the respiratory tract was reported for one patient after heart-lung-transplantation, all six patients with cystic fibrosis and one with chronic sinusitis. Molecular studies of the S. prolificans isolates confirmed that parts of the 18S, the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) regions and the D1/D2 domain of the 28S region of rDNA are monomorphic. However, sequencing of parts of the translation elongation factor EF1-alpha (EF-1alpha) and the chitin synthase (CHS-1) genes revealed the presence of three and two distinct genotypes, respectively. Two informative mutations were found in EF-1alpha and a single nucleotide exchange in the CHS-1 gene., Scedosporium prolificans is one of the most life-threatening fungal opportunistic pathogens due to its high resistance to common systemic antifungal agents. While a close relative of Pseudallescheria boydii, S. prolificans has a more limited geographic range being primarily found in Australia, USA and Spain. Infections have also been reported from several other European countries and from Chile. Twenty patients with Scedosporium prolificans infection or colonization from August 1993 to May 2007 were retrospectively reviewed in Germany. They had all been identified at or reported to the Reference Laboratory for Pseudallescheria/Scedosporium spp. in Berlin. Twelve of 13 patients with haematological disorders and/or on immunosuppressive therapy developed a fatal invasive scedosporiosis. Colonization of the respiratory tract was reported for one patient after heart-lung-transplantation, all six patients with cystic fibrosis and one with chronic sinusitis. Molecular studies of the S. prolificans isolates confirmed that parts of the 18S, the Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) regions and the D1/D2 domain of the 28S region of rDNA are monomorphic. However, sequencing of parts of the translation elongation factor EF1-alpha (EF-1alpha) and the chitin synthase (CHS-1) genes revealed the presence of three and two distinct genotypes, respectively. Two informative mutations were found in EF-1alpha and a single nucleotide exchange in the CHS-1 gene.

Fungal infections caused by the members of the genera Pseudallescheria and/or Scedosporium are important complications in patients after near-drowning. As the taxonomy of Pseudallescheria and Scedosporium has been revised, clinical isolates from 11 patients, after near-drowning, previously identified as P. boydii or S. apiospermum had to be re-identified. S. apiospermum, now separated from P. boydii as a distinct species, was found most frequently (n = 8), while S. aurantiacum, recently described as new species and P. boydii were less common (n = 2 and n = 1, respectively). Three patients near-drowned during the Tsunami 2004 were infected by different species of the P. boydii complex. In vitro testing resulted in lowest minimal inhibitory concentration (MICs) for voriconazole (range 0.25-2.0 microg ml(-1))., Fungal infections caused by the members of the genera Pseudallescheria and/or Scedosporium are important complications in patients after near-drowning. As the taxonomy of Pseudallescheria and Scedosporium has been revised, clinical isolates from 11 patients, after near-drowning, previously identified as P. boydii or S. apiospermum had to be re-identified. S. apiospermum, now separated from P. boydii as a distinct species, was found most frequently (n = 8), while S. aurantiacum, recently described as new species and P. boydii were less common (n = 2 and n = 1, respectively). Three patients near-drowned during the Tsunami 2004 were infected by different species of the P. boydii complex. In vitro testing resulted in lowest minimal inhibitory concentration (MICs) for voriconazole (range 0.25-2.0 microg ml(-1)).

Fungal infections caused by the members of the genera Pseudallescheria and/or Scedosporium are important complications in patients after near-drowning. As the taxonomy of Pseudallescheria and Scedosporium has been revised, clinical isolates from 11 patients, after near-drowning, previously identified as P. boydii or S. apiospermum had to be re-identified. S. apiospermum, now separated from P. boydii as a distinct species, was found most frequently (n = 8), while S. aurantiacum, recently described as new species and P. boydii were less common (n = 2 and n = 1, respectively). Three patients near-drowned during the Tsunami 2004 were infected by different species of the P. boydii complex. In vitro testing resulted in lowest minimal inhibitory concentration (MICs) for voriconazole (range 0.25-2.0 microg ml(-1))., Fungal infections caused by the members of the genera Pseudallescheria and/or Scedosporium are important complications in patients after near-drowning. As the taxonomy of Pseudallescheria and Scedosporium has been revised, clinical isolates from 11 patients, after near-drowning, previously identified as P. boydii or S. apiospermum had to be re-identified. S. apiospermum, now separated from P. boydii as a distinct species, was found most frequently (n = 8), while S. aurantiacum, recently described as new species and P. boydii were less common (n = 2 and n = 1, respectively). Three patients near-drowned during the Tsunami 2004 were infected by different species of the P. boydii complex. In vitro testing resulted in lowest minimal inhibitory concentration (MICs) for voriconazole (range 0.25-2.0 microg ml(-1)).