Attempts to detect infectivity in the blood of humans and animals affected with transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs or prion diseases) have often been inconclusive because of the limitations of cross-species bioassays and the small volumes of blood that can be injected by the intracerebral route. A model has been developed for the experimental study of TSE transmission by blood tran...

The ecology of the strain of West Nile virus (WNV) introduced into the United States in 1999 has similarities to the native flavivirus, St. Louis encephalitis (SLE) virus, but has unique features not observed with SLE virus or with WNV in the old world. The primary route of transmission for most of the arboviruses in North America is by mosquito, and infected native birds usually do not suffer ...

A quantitative understanding of the spread of contaminated farm dust between locations is a prerequisite for obtaining much-needed insight into one of the possible mechanisms of disease spread between farms. Here, we develop a model to calculate the quantity of contaminated farm-dust particles deposited at various locations downwind of a source farm and apply the model to assess the possible co...

Objectives: To review the literature on the role of oral sex in the transmission of non-viral sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Method:AMedline search was performed using the keywords oro-genital sex, and those specific to each infection. Further references were then taken from each article read. Conclusions:Oral sex is a common sexual practice between both heterosexual and homosexual cou...

Multi-path routing, a routing technique that enables data transmission over multiple paths, is an effective strategy in achieving reliability in wireless sensor networks. However, multi-path routing does not guarantee deterministic transmission. This is because more than one path is available for transferring data from the source node to the destination node. A hybrid multi-path routing algorit...

During the early phase of the 2009 influenza pandemic, attempts were made to contain the spread of the virus. Success of reactive control measures may be compromised if the proportion of transmission that occurs before overt clinical symptoms develop is high. In this study we investigated the timing of transmission of an early prototypic strain of pandemic H1N1 2009 influenza virus in the ferre...

Prion diseases or transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs) of animals include scrapie of sheep and goats; transmissible mink encephalopathy (TME); chronic wasting disease (CWD) of deer, elk and moose; and bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) of cattle. The emergence of BSE and its spread to human beings in the form of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) resulted in interest in su...

Fomites involved in influenza transmission are either hand- or droplet-contaminated. We evaluated the interactions of fomite characteristics and human behaviors affecting these routes using an Environmental Infection Transmission System (EITS) model by comparing the basic reproduction numbers (R(0)) for different fomite mediated transmission pathways. Fomites classified as large versus small su...

First, crystalline NiFe2O4 powder was synthesized on a nanoscale dimension by a simple one-step coprecipitationchemical route, and then used to produce activated carbon/NiFe2O4 nanocomposite. Thestructure and morphology of the as-prepared composite was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD)pattern, transmission electron microscope (TEM) and Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR)...

Cluster-based routes help data transmission in ad hoc networks. Mobile users are organized into a cluster for requiring common multimedia service. However, node mobility does not guarantee multimedia transmission. This study presents a measure of cluster-based route’s stability based on a prediction of connection probability at a specific time in future. The selected route is sufficiently stabl...