The genotype of M. tuberculosis influenced the presenting features of pulmonary and meningeal tuberculosis. The association between the East Asian/Beijing lineage and disease progression and CSF leukocyte count suggests the lineage may alter BKM120 the presentation of meningitis by influencing the intracerebral inflammatory response. In addition, increased drug resistance among bacteria of the East Asian/Beijing lineage

might influence the response to treatment. This study suggests the genetic diversity of M. tuberculosis has important clinical consequences.”
“The reaction of nitric acid with the hydroxyl radical influences the residence time of HONO2 in the lower atmosphere. Prior studies [Brown SS, Burkholder JB, Talukdar RK, Ravishankara AIR (2001) J Phys Chem A 105:1605-1614] have revealed unusual kinetic behavior for this reaction, including a negative temperature dependence, a complex pressure dependence, and an overall reaction rate strongly affected by isotopic substitution. This behavior suggested that the reaction occurs through an intermediate, theoretically predicted to be a hydrogen-bonded OH-HONO2 complex in a six-membered

ring-like configuration. In this study, the intermediate is generated directly by the association of photolytically generated OH radicals with HONO2 and stabilized in a pulsed supersonic expansion. infrared action spectroscopy is used to identify the intermediate by the OH radical stretch (nu(1)) and OH stretch of nitric acid (nu(2)) in the OH-HONO2 complex. Two vibrational features are attributed

to OH-HONO2: a rotationally structured nu(1) band at 3516.8 cm(-1) HM781-36B mw and an extensively broadened nu(2) feature at 3260 cm(-1), both shifted from their respective monomers. NU7441 These same transitions are identified for OD-DONO2. Assignments of the features are based on their vibrational frequencies, analysis of rotational band structure, and comparison with complementary high level ab initio calculations. In addition, the OH (v = 0) product state distributions resulting from nu(1) and nu(2) excitation are used to determine the binding energy of OH-HONO2, D-0 <= 5.3 kcal.mol(-1), which is in good accord with ab initio predictions.”
“Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is a rare and aggressive skin tumor. The link between tumorigenesis and immunosuppression is well known and the increased prevalence of MCC in human immunodeficiency virus carriers and organ transplant recipients and in patients with hemato-oncological neoplasias is now well recognized over the past decade. In this respect, chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) seems to be the most frequent neoplasia associated with the development of MCC. Very recently, a newly described virus, the Merkel cell polyomavirus, was found in similar to 80% of MCC tumor samples and is in fact the first member of the polyomavirus family to be associated with human tumors.