Micronutrient malnutrition, resulting from dietary deficiency of important minerals such as zinc (Zn) and iron (Fe), is a widespread food-related health problem. Genetic enhancement of crops with elevated levels of these micronutrients is one of the most cost effective ways of solving global micronutrient malnutrition problem. Development and dissemination of high Zn and Fe containing high-yiel...

OBJECTIVE To determine the accuracy of Ziehl-Neelsen microscopy in the diagnosis of TB in setings of high HIV prevalence. DESIGN Cross-sectional descriptive study. SETTING Hospitals serving areas of high human immunodeficiency virus prevalence in western Kenya. The study was conducted between September 2007 and September 2009. RESULTS In total, 341/872(39.1%) of the TB suspects were posit...

Rapid development of automotive industry brings also increased requirements for sheets properties, involving relatively high strength and good formability together with excellent corrosion resistance. Increasing requests for corrosion resistance lead to the production of coated car parts, protected mainly by zinc coatings. Whereas, majority of European producers of passenger cars use preferenti...

Biofortification of crops that provide major food staples to large, poor rural populations offers an appealing strategy for diminishing public health problems attributable to micronutrient deficiencies. The objective of this first-stage human study was to determine the increase in quantity of zinc (Zn) absorbed achieved by biofortifying wheat with Zn. Secondary objectives included evaluating th...

We initiate a systematic study of linear sketching over F2. For a given Boolean function f : {0, 1}n → {0, 1} a randomized F2-sketch is a distributionM over d×nmatrices with elements over F2 such that Mx suffices for computing f(x) with high probability. We study a connection between F2-sketching and a two-player one-way communication game for the corresponding XOR-function. Our results show th...

The growth of weaning piglets is effectively improved by feeding a high-Zn diet (3000 mg Zn/kg of diet). The present study examined whether feeding a diet supplemented with Zn (1016-3000 mg/kg) for 10 d induces growth benefits in rats. In addition, tissue weight, Zn content of tissues and expression of Zn transporters were examined in these rats. Zn supplementation did not significantly increas...

In this manuscript, recent research from this laboratory into physiological and molecular aspects of heavy metal (Zn) transport in the hyperaccumulating plant species, Thlaspi caerulescens is reviewed. This research is aimed at elucidating the processes that underlie the accumulation of extraordinarily high levels of Zn in the T. caerulescens shoot (up to 3% Zn dry wt.) without any associated t...

A novel and multiple metal(loid)-resistant strain Comamonas testosteroni S44 with a high Zn(2+) resistance level (10 mM) was isolated. To understand the molecular basis for the high zinc resistance, whole genome sequencing was performed and revealed a large number of genes encoding putative metal(loid) resistance proteins, mobile genetic elements (MGEs) and horizontal gene transfer (HGT) events...

consumption of whole-wheat breads prepared from high extraction flours is recommended because of their high content of fiber, vitamins, and minerals. despite the beneficial effects of these breads, they contain high amounts of undesirable compounds like phytic acid (pa) which is believed to negatively interfere with the absorption of some such nutrients as zinc (zn). wheat genotypes are differe...

Synaptic zinc (Zn), a co-factor in some glutamatergic synapses, has been implicated in plasticity effects, as well as in several excitotoxic and other pathophysiological conditions. In this study, we provide information about the distribution of Zn in inferotemporal cortex, a region at the interface of the visual and hippocampal networks. In brief, we found a lateral to medial increase in Zn, w...