UNLABELLED The distribution, genome location, and evolution of the four paralogous zinc metalloproteases, IgA1 protease, ZmpB, ZmpC, and ZmpD, in Streptococcus pneumoniae and related commensal species were studied by in silico analysis of whole genomes and by activity screening of 154 representatives of 20 species. ZmpB was ubiquitous in the Mitis and Salivarius groups of the genus Streptococcu...

The human palatine tonsils, which belong to the central antigen handling sites of the mucosal immune system, are frequently affected by acute and recurrent infections. This study compared the microbiota of the tonsillar crypts in children and adults affected by recurrent tonsillitis with that of healthy adults and children with tonsillar hyperplasia. An in-depth 16S rRNA gene based pyrosequenci...

Blood culture, the gold standard for diagnosis of neonatal sepsis has low sensitivity and is time consuming. Therefore, objective is development and application of Polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based DNA sequencing to detect and identify bacterium causing neonatal sepsis in culture negative specimens. Sixty three peripheral blood and 8 cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) referred from tertiary level Ne...

The introduction of pneumococcal conjugate vaccines necessitates continued monitoring of circulating strains to assess vaccine efficacy and replacement serotypes. Conventional serological methods are costly, labor-intensive, and prone to misidentification, while current DNA-based methods have limited serotype coverage requiring multiple PCR primers. In this study, a computer algorithm was devel...

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