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Aflatoxicosis is one of the major issues for the public health. Control of aflatoxins is necessary to avoid the health hazards in human and animals. Present study was designed to evaluate the efficacy of Bacillus licheniformis as a novel feed additive for control of aflatoxicosis. A total of 40 rats were equally divided into the four groups. The first group (BD) was kept as control, treated with basal diet. In second group (AF), the rats were treated with aflatoxins (28 μg/kg BW). In the third group (AFBL) the rats were treated with aflatoxins (28 µg/g BW) and Bacillus licheniformis (1 × 108 cfu/mL). In the fourth group (BDBL) the rats were treated with only Bacillus licheniformis (1 × 108 cfu/mL). The parameters studied were, phagocytic response by carbon clearance assay system, lymphoproliferative response to PHA-P, antibody response to SRBCs, total antioxidant capacity and total oxidant status of the rats and interleukin concentrations, along with histopathology of organs. Results of this study confirmed the immunomodulation and antioxidant capacity of Bacillus licheniformis against 28 µg/kg BW of aflatoxins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Leishmaniasis is a zoonotic disease transmitted in humans by the bite of Leishmania-infected phlebotomine sandflies. Each year approximately 58,500 cases of leishmaniasis are diagnosed across the globe, with a mortality rate of nearly seven percent. There are over 20 parasitic strains of Leishmania which are known to cause distinct types of leishmaniasis and pose an endemic threat to humans worldwide. Therefore, it is crucial to develop potential medications and vaccines to combat leishmaniasis. However, the task of developing therapeutic solutions is challenging due to Leishmania's digenetic lifecycle. The challenge is further intensified by cases of resistance against the available drugs. Owing to these challenges, the conventional drug development regimen is further limited by target discovery and ligand suitability for the targets. On the other hand, as an added advantage, the emergence of omics-based tools, such as high-end proteomics, transcriptomics and genomics, has hastened the pace of target discovery and target-based drug development. It is now becoming apparent that multi-omics convergence and an inter-connected systems approach is less time-consuming and more cost-effective for any drug-development process. This comprehensive review is an attempt to summarize the current knowledge on the muti-omics approach in drug development against leishmaniasis. In particular, it elaborates the potential target identification from secreted proteins in various stages of Leishmania infection and also illustrates the convergence of transcriptomic and genomic data towards the collective goal of drug discovery. This review also provides an understanding of the potential parasite's drug targets and drug resistance characteristics of the parasite, which can be used in designing effective and specific therapeutics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Severe acute respiratory viral infections are frequently associated with multiple organ failure, including acute kidney damage. The present study aimed to investigate the associated influence of COVID-19 on renal function in patients admitted to the intensive care unit in Asir region, Saudi Arabia. Thirty patients infected with COVID-19 who were referred to the intensive care unit during November and October 2020 at Asir central hospital, Asir region, Saudi Arabia were recruited. The age of patients ranged between 30 and 90 years old. Renal function tests exhibited dramatic changes in the renal biomarkers in patients with COVID-19. Blood urea levels in COVID-19 patients were significantly higher than in the control group. In addition, significantly lower albumin levels with abnormally decreased total protein levels were found in COVID-19 patients. Among the different electrolytes analyzed, a significantly lower calcium level was observed in COVID-19 patients' groups than in the controls. Renal function tests for COVID-19-infected ICU patients revealed significant changes, indicating the major impact of COVID-19 on kidney function. Monitoring renal function tests may assist in the early prognosis of COVID-19 patients. It is, therefore, crucial to increase the understanding of renal function tests in COVID-19 patients who were admitted to the hospital before their condition deteriorated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modern medicine has established three central antimicrobial therapeutic concepts: vaccination, antibiotics, and, recently, the use of active immunotherapy to enhance the immune response toward specific pathogens. The efficacy of vaccination and antibiotics is limited by the emergence of new pathogen strains and the increased incidence of antibiotic resistance. To date, immunotherapy development has focused mainly on cytokines. Here we report the successful therapeutic application of a complement component, a recombinant form of properdin (Pn), with significantly higher activity than native properdin, which promotes complement activation via the alternative pathway, affording protection against N. menigitidis and S. pneumoniae. In a mouse model of infection, we challenged C57BL/6 WT mice with N. menigitidis B-MC58 6 h after i.p. administration of Pn (100 ug/mouse) or buffer alone. Twelve hours later, all control mice showed clear symptoms of infectious disease while the Pn treated group looked healthy. After 16 hours, all control mice developed sepsis and had to be culled, while only 10% of Pn treated mice presented with sepsis and recoverable levels of live Meningococci. In a parallel experiment, mice were challenged intranasally with a lethal dose of S. pneumoniae D39. Mice that received a single i.p. dose of Pn at the time of infection showed no signs of bacteremia at 12 h postinfection and had prolonged survival times compared with the saline-treated control group (P < 0.0001). Our findings show a significant therapeutic benefit of Pn administration and suggest that its antimicrobial activity could open new avenues for fighting infections caused by multidrug-resistant neisserial or streptococcal strains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To ascertain the prevalence of transfusion transmissible infections (TTIs) across diverse donor groups in the Najran province. Additionally, to establish a potential association between the development of TTI and the donors' blood group, as determined by the ABO/Rh blood grouping system., Methods: Blood donation data of 4120 donors, spanning from January to December 2020, were retrospectively reviewed. The blood were screened for TTI markers, including hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg), anti-hepatitis B core (anti-HBc), anti-hepatitis C virus (anti-HCV), anti-human immunodeficiency viruses 1 and 2 (anti-HIV1&2), anti-human T-lymphotropic virus types 1 and 2 (anti-HTLV-1&2), and syphilis antigen., Results: Positive TTI markers were detected in 10.9% of the donors. The most detected TTI marker was anti-HBc (8.9%), followed by HBsAg (0.7%). Other markers were individually detected in <1% of the donors. Anti-HBc-positive was significantly elevated among non-Saudi blood donors. There was an association between age groups and anti-HCV ( p =0.002), anti-HTLV ( p =0.004) and syphilis antigen ( p =0.02) markers positivity. The AB positive blood group exhibited the most positivity for TTI markers, followed by O positive blood group. Similarly, association was found between ABO group and HBsAg ( p =0.01), anti-HBc ( p =0.001), and anti-HCV ( p <0.001) markers positivity., Conclusion: Emphasis on implementing robust screening measures for donated blood is underscored by this study. There is the need for future study to extensively evaluate TTI status to enhance our understanding of the trend in TTI., (Copyright: © Saudi Medical Journal.)

Marburg virus infections are extremely fatal with a fatality range of 23% to 90%, therefore there is an urgent requirement to design and develop efficient therapeutic molecules. Here, a comprehensive temperature-dependent molecular dynamics (MD) simulation method was implemented to identify the potential molecule from the anti-dengue compound library that can inhibit the function of the VP24 protein of Marburg. Virtual high throughput screening identified five effective binders of VP24 after screening 484 anti-dengue compounds. These compounds were treated in MD simulation at four different temperatures: 300, 340, 380, and 420 K. Higher temperatures showed dissociation of hit compounds from the protein. Further, triplicates of 100 ns MD simulation were conducted which showed that compounds ID =  118717693 , and ID =  5361 showed strong stability with the protein molecule. These compounds were further validated using Δ G binding free energies and they showed: -30.38 kcal/mol, and -67.83 kcal/mol binding free energies, respectively. Later, these two compounds were used in steered MD simulation to detect its dissociation. Compound ID =  5361 showed the maximum pulling force of 199.02 kcal/mol/nm to dissociate the protein-ligand complex while ID =  118717693 had a pulling force of 101.11 kcal/mol/nm, respectively. This ligand highest number of hydrogen bonds with varying occupancies at 89.93%, 69.80%, 57.93%, 52.33%, and 50.63%. This study showed that ID =  5361 can bind with the VP24 strongly and has the potential to inhibit its function which can be validated in the in-vitro experiment.Communicated by Ramaswamy H. Sarma.

Kingella kingae is a Gram-negative bacterium that primarily causes pediatric infections such as septicemia, endocarditis, and osteoarticular infections. Its virulence is attributed to the outer membrane proteins having implications in bacterial adhesion, invasion, nutrition, and host tissue damage. TonB-dependent receptors (TBDRs) play an important role in nutrition and were previously implicated as vaccine targets in other bacteria. Therefore, we targeted the conserved β-barrel TBDR domain of these proteins for designing a vaccine construct that could elicit humoral and cellular immune responses. We used bioinformatic tools to mine TBDR-containing proteins from K. kingae ATCC 23330 and then predict B- and T-cell epitopes from their conserved β-barrel TDR domain. A chimeric vaccine construct was designed using three antigenic epitopes, covering >98% of the world population and capable of inciting humoral and adaptive immune responses. The final construct elicited a robust immune response. Docking and dynamics simulation showed good binding affinity of the vaccine construct to various receptors of the immune system. Additionally, the vaccine was predicted to be safe and non-allergenic, making it a promising candidate for further development. In conclusion, our study demonstrates the potential of immunoinformatics approaches in designing chimeric vaccines against K. kingae infections. The chimeric vaccine we designed can serve as a blueprint for future experimental studies to develop an effective vaccine against this pathogen, which can serve as a potential strategy to prevent K. kingae infections., Competing Interests: Authors IA and ZB were employed by Alpha Genomics Private Limited. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2023 Mashraqi, Alzamami, Alturki, Almasaudi, Ahmed, Alshamrani and Basharat.)

It is well-acknowledged that 'combination therapy' of antibiotics is indispensable for the treatment of patients suffering from serious bacterial infections. Therefore, it is of interest to collect data from the in vitro tests using 'rifampicin-cefotaxime' and 'rifampicin-tetracycline' combination regimens against multi drug resistant Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae strains of nosocomial source in order to determine the effectiveness of the combination therapy. The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) values for cefotaxime, tetracycline and rifampicin antibiotics were found to be comparatively high for each of the antibiotics when given individually. However, carefully prepared combination-regimens exhibited significant inhibitory effect on the same bacterial isolates. DNA fragmentation study confirmed that 'rifampicin-cefotaxime' and 'rifampicin-tetracycline' combination-regimens could cause breakage of the bacterial DNA. Thus, we show that combination-regimens namely, 'rifampicin-cefotaxime' and 'rifampicin-tetracycline' were found to be capable of maintaining rifampicin susceptibility in the E. coli and K. pneumoniae strains. However, this susceptibility was not maintained by only rifampicin. More data using animal model experiments are needed for confirming and deriving translational benefits from these findings in future., Competing Interests: The authors declare no conflict of Interest., (© 2022 Biomedical Informatics.)