We evaluated a two-rapid-test serial algorithm using the Determine and Genie II rapid assays, performed on-site in four peripheral laboratories during the French Agence Nationale de Recherches sur le SIDA (ANRS) 1201/1202 Ditrame Plus cohort developed for prevention of mother-to-child transmission of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection in Côte d'Ivoire. A total of 1,039 specimens were ...

BACKGROUND Gap junctional intercellular communication decreases with HSV-2 infection. To determine the importance of functional gap junctions for infectivity, we compared HSV-2 growth in communication-competent and -deficient cell lines. METHODS HSV-2 infectivity was tested in five cell lines: WB rat liver epithelial cells (communication-competent), WB-aB1 (communication-deficient), WB-a/32-1...

The pervasiveness of explicit and implicit weight bias (WB) defined as negative stereotypes and prejudice regarding one's weight has been observed among individuals of all weight categories. As a source of WB, health messages have been discussed due to reinforcing stigmatizing notions. The present study sought to investigate whether health messages (i.e., eat healthy, become physically active) ...

Although considerable attention has been directed in the field of gene therapy toward elucidating the mechanism by which a transduced cell could kill a bystander cell, little is known about how bystander cells may affect transduced cells. We hypothesized that bystander cells, particularly if they were capable of gap junctional communication, could protect cells transduced with the herpes simple...

PURPOSE The purpose of this study was to examine the feasibility of a fast protocol for whole-body diffusion-weighted imaging (WB-DWI) using a slice-accelerated echo-planar sequence, which, when using comparable image acquisition parameters, noticeably reduces measurement time compared to a conventional WB-DWI protocol. MATERIALS AND METHODS A single-shot echo-planar imaging sequence capable ...

Proof of Lemma 1. Consider a low-performance bidder with unit valuation v who bids b and a high-performance bidder with unit valuation wv who bids wb. Both bidders get a score wb, and their payoff functions are U (y L , v, b) = y L (v − b)Pr(wb is the highest score) (W1) and U (y H , wv, wb) = y H (wv − wb)Pr(wb is the highest score). (W2) It is easy to establish that U (y H , wv, wb) = wy H y ...

The recommended algorithm for detection and characterization of serum human T-cell lymphotropic virus (HTLV) antibodies calls for first performing a screening enzyme immunoassay (EIA) and then further evaluating repeatedly reactive samples for antibodies recognizing specific HTLV glycoproteins (2, 3). A commercially available Western blot (WB) that includes both native and recombinant HTLV prot...

The mechanisms underlying stem cell acquisition of a cardiac phenotype are unresolved. We studied early events during the acquisition of a cardiac phenotype by a cloned adult liver stem cell line (WB F344) in a cardiac microenvironment. WB F344 cells express a priori the transcription factors GATA4 and SRF, connexin 43 in the cell membrane, and myoinositol 1,4,5-triphosphate receptor in the per...

Testing for Borrelia burgdorferi (BB), the spirochetal agent of Lyme disease, is problematic due to poor sensitivity of commercially available serological tests. We evaluated an in-house Western Blot (WB) prepared with a mixture of two strains of BB, B31 and 297. Sensitivity and specificity of IgG and IgM testing using the two-strain WB was compared to testing with a commercial single-strain WB...