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Listeria monocytogenes has been considered a significant food-borne pathogen in recent years, representing a major concern for public health and food safety. Consequently, the objective of the current investigation was to assess the prevalence of L. monocytogenes and other Listeria species in raw milk and certain cheese varieties. The presence of L. monocytogenes was screened in a total of 769 dairy samples, which were randomly collected from farms and dairy shops located in Cairo and Giza governorates. The samples included 212 raw milk samples from farms, 307 raw milk samples from dairy stores, and 250 cheese samples, including Kareish, Talaga, Feta, Processed, Ras, Gouda, and Cheddar (25 each). In total, twenty-two of the analyzed samples were contaminated with Listeria species, representing 2.86%. Additionally, there were only five positive samples for L. monocytogenes, accounting for 0.65%. The prevalence of Listeria spp. in the examined milk samples from dairy shops, farms, and cheese was 6.17%, 0.47%, and 0.8%, respectively. Depending on the outcomes of the biochemical identification assays, L. monocytogenes was detected in 1.30% and 0.47% of the examined milk samples from dairy shops and farms, respectively, while it couldn't be isolated from all cheese samples. L. monocytogenes isolates were confirmed positive using Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) targeting the hemolysin (hly A) gene. Furthermore, L.ivanovii and L.grayi were isolated from two samples of Kareish cheese representing 8%. In conclusion, the obtained results indicated a potential risk of milk and cheese contamination with Listeria. Thus, strict hygienic measures and frequent investigations must be applied to control such microorganisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a prion disease affecting deer, elk and moose in North America and reindeer, moose and red deer in Northern Europe. Pathogenesis is driven by the accumulation of PrPSc, a pathological form of the host's cellular prion protein (PrPC), in the brain. CWD is contagious among North American cervids and Norwegian reindeer, with prions commonly found in lymphatic tissue. In Nordic moose and red deer CWD appears exclusively in older animals, and prions are confined to the CNS and undetectable in lymphatic tissues, indicating a sporadic origin. We aimed to determine transmissibility, neuroinvasion and lymphotropism of Nordic CWD isolates using gene-targeted mice expressing either wild-type (138SS/226QQ) or S138N (138NN/226QQ) deer PrP. When challenged with North American CWD strains, mice expressing S138N PrP did not develop clinical disease but harbored prion seeding activity in brain and spleen. Here, we infected these models intracerebrally or intraperitoneally with Norwegian moose, red deer and reindeer CWD isolates. The moose isolate was the first CWD type to cause full-blown disease in the 138NN/226QQ model in the first passage, with 100% attack rate and shortened survival times upon second passage. Furthermore, we detected prion seeding activity or PrPSc in brains and spinal cords, but not spleens, of 138NN/226QQ mice inoculated intraperitoneally with the moose isolate, providing evidence of prion neuroinvasion. We also demonstrate, for the first time, that transmissibility of the red deer CWD isolate was restricted to transgenic mice overexpressing elk PrPC (138SS/226EE), identical to the PrP primary structure of the inoculum. Our findings highlight that susceptibility to clinical disease is determined by the conformational compatibility between prion inoculum and host PrP primary structure. Our study indicates that neuroinvasion of Norwegian moose prions can occur without, or only very limited, replication in the spleen, an unprecedented finding for CWD. Author summary: Chronic wasting disease (CWD) is a prion disease of cervids that is expanding its global footprint. The pathogenesis of prion disease is driven by the accumulation of PrPSc, a misfolded isoform of the cellular prion protein (PrPC). CWD prion strains from North America are lymphotropic, while Norwegian moose and red deer prions are not, and therefore considered non-contagious, sporadic CWD forms. We studied the propagation of Norwegian CWD prions in gene-targeted mice carrying cervid PrPC variants. We reveal that the Norwegian moose isolate induces clinical disease in mice expressing a PrPC variant previously shown to only display subclinical infection upon challenge with North American CWD. We report the first instance of red deer CWD transmission exclusively to mice overexpressing elk PrPC. Notably, our findings suggest a neuroinvasion route for Norwegian moose CWD prions that potentially bypasses spleen replication, underscoring the complexity of prion disease transmission, and the need for continued research into the behavior of prions across different species and protein variants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: It might be difficult to treat hypotension after spinal or epidural anesthesia in older adults. There is a danger of volume overload or cardiac compromise when PSA hypotension is treated with fluids (colloids or crystalloids) or vasoconstrictors. When decreased peripheral vascular resistance is present, dexamethasone is utilized as a treatment. Methods: Eighty patients, aged 60 years or more were recruited to receive a single preoperative intrathecal dose of dexamethasone 8 mg (dexamethasone group) (40 patients), and 40 patients were given placebo receiving normal saline (Control group) in a randomized, double-blind trial. Variations in blood pressure and heart rate in addition to the needs of ephedrine and/or atropine following spinal anesthesia (SA) were recorded. Result: The mean age of patients in 4dexamethasone group was 67.8±6.8 years and most of them were females (72.5%). The mean arterial blood pressure showed no significant difference between the studied groups regarding their baseline and all measures of mean arterial blood pressure. However, at all measures the MAP was higher in the dexamethasone group than the control group. Conclusion: Post-spinal anesthesia hypotension in elderly patients was less common after receiving a single preoperative intrathecal dose of dexamethasone 8 mg than control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Broccoli sprouts are natural functional foods for cancer prevention because of their high content of glucosinolate and antioxidant. Sprouts and mature broccoli are of potential importance in devising chemoprotective strategies in humans. The aim of the investigation was to study the effect of essential oils on broccoli seed germination, increase their antioxidant content and determine the glucosinolate concentration and other phytochemical parameters in 3-day-old sprouts during cold storage at 4°C and 95% RH for 15 days. The results showed that all treatments of essential oils increased germination index, seed germination percentage, seedling length, seedling vigour index, yield and the antioxidant content of broccoli sprout and reduced the microbial load compared to the control. Fortunately, the coliform bacteria was not detected in all treatments. Different essential oils of fennel, caraway, basil, thyme and sage were tested. The thyme oil was the best treatment, which increased the accumulation of the phenolic compounds and glucosinolate compared to the control at different storage periods. In the sprouts treated with thyme oil treatment and the control, at the end of cold storage, 1.98% and 28.06% of total phenolic content, 1.90% and 20.28% of 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging capacity, 1.39% and 58.33% of flavonoids, 1.93% and 36.25% of vitamin C, 2.95% and 22.02% of anthocyanin and 2.18% and 49.12% of glucosinolate were lost, respectively. A slight reduction differences in all detected compound concentrations occurred between the initial content and the end of storage period because of the application of thyme oil compared to the control. Therefore, the total glucosinolate level in the sprout (27.02 μg/g F.W.) was higher than that in the florets (7.37 μg/g F.W.). Glucoraphanin was the most abundant aliphatic glucosinolate present in the sprout and reached the highest value (16.24 μg/g F.W.) followed by glucoerucin (5.9 μg/g F.W.) and glucoiberm(1.2 μg/g F.W.).

The growing concern about the environmental consequences of anthropogenic CO2 emissions significantly stimulated the research of low-cost, efficient, and recyclable solid adsorbents for CO2 capture. In this work, a series of MgO-supported mesoporous carbon nitride adsorbents with different MgO contents (xMgO/MCN) was prepared using a facile process. The obtained materials were tested for CO2 capture from 10 vol% CO2 mixture gas with N2 using a fixed bed adsorber at atmospheric pressure. At 25 ºC, the bare MCN support and unsupported MgO samples demonstrated CO2 capture capacities of 0.99, and 0.74 mmol g−1, respectively, which were lower than those of the xMgO/MCN composites.The incorporation of MgO into the MCN improved the CO2 uptake, and the 20MgO/MCN exhibited the highest CO2 capture capacity of 1.15 mmol g−1 at 25 °C. The improved performance of the 20MgO/MCN nanohybrid can be possibly assigned to the presence of high content of highly dispersed MgO NPs along with its improved textural properties in terms of high specific surface area (215 m2g−1), large pore volume (0.22 cm3g−1), and abundant mesoporous structure. The efffects of temperature and CO2 flow rate were also investigated on the CO2 capture performance of 20MgO/MCN. Temperature was found to have a negative influence on the CO2 capture capacity of the 20MgO/MCN, which decreased from 1.15 to 0.65 mmol g−1with temperature rise from 25 C to 150º C, due to the endothermicity of the process. Similarly, the capture capacity decreased from 1.15 to 0.54 mmol g−1 with the increase of the flow rate from 50 to 200 ml minute−1 respectively. Importantly, 20MgO/MCN showed excellent reusability with consistent CO2 capture capacity over five sequential sorption–desorption cycles, suggesting its suitability for the practical capture of CO2. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]