The Conversation

Rick talks with the CEO of Panorama Education, an ed-tech company whose college- and career-readiness tools are currently used each year in 11,500 schools.

Despite recommendations and a universal immunization program, a recent survey reported suboptimal influenza vaccination coverage in children aged 6 to 23 months in Ontario. Little is known about predictors of coverage in young children to target immunization strategies.

Full influenza vaccination coverage in young children in Ontario is <10% and declining since the 2006–2007 season. Medically high-risk children including low birth weight infants are more likely to be immunized, but maternal and health services characteristics remain important. (Read the full article)

Universal hepatitis B virus (HBV) vaccination is a cost-effective strategy to control HBV infection. Giving hepatitis B immunoglobulin to neonates of HBV carrier mothers additionally reduces transmission but is not widely used because of its expense and infrastructure requirements.

Maternal screening for hepatitis B surface antigen and hepatitis B immunoglobulin treatment of neonates of hepatitis B virus carrier mothers could be a cost-effective addition to universal vaccination in settings in which health infrastructure can support such an intervention. (Read the full article)

Health care–associated infections cause considerable morbidity and mortality among hospitalized children. Simple barrier precautions such as universal gloving of health care workers’ hands may reduce transmission of infectious agents between patients.

Mandatory use of gloves during respiratory syncytial virus season in pediatric units prevented other health care–associated infections such as central line–associated bloodstream infections, particularly in intensive care settings. These secondary benefits suggest continuing mandatory gloving throughout the year. (Read the full article)

A substantial gap exists between what is recommended for effective primary care of children and what takes place. Patient-centered health information technologies have been used to gather information and counsel parents, however, have not been integrated directly with electronic health records nor been speech-based to improve decision-making at the point-of-care.

This study shows that a ubiquitous technology, the telephone, can be successfully used to automatically assess and counsel parents before pediatric primary care visits as well as inform their primary care clinicians in a way that is feasible and effective for multiple important issues. (Read the full article)

Evidence from cohort studies has consistently found that universal bilirubin screening is associated with reductions in rates of severe hyperbilirubinemia but has shown variation in other outcomes such as phototherapy use, length of stay, emergency department visits, and readmission rates.

Universal bilirubin screening may not increase neonatal length of stay or postdischarge hospital use. Preexisting trends in health care utilization have an impact on observed effects of universal bilirubin screening. (Read the full article)

Rick talks with Larry Rosenstock, education icon, the founder and CEO of High Tech High, and recent recipient of the WISE Prize for Education, about what he's learned after a half century in education.

About two dozen teachers from across the country spent a week wrestling with questions about how to remember the Confederacy.

Recent studies highlight the abundance of commensal coagulase-negative staphylococci (CoNS) on healthy skin. Evidence suggests that CoNS actively shape the skin immunological and microbial milieu to resist colonization or infection by opportunistic pathogens, including methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), in a variety of mechanisms collectively termed colonization resistance. One potential colonization resistance mechanism is the application of quorum sensing, also called the Accessory Gene Regulator (agr) system, which is ubiquitous among staphylococci. Common and rare CoNS make autoinducing peptides (AIPs) that function as MRSA agr inhibitors, protecting the host from invasive infection. In a screen of CoNS spent media we found that Staphylococcus simulans, a rare human skin colonizer and frequent livestock colonizer, released potent inhibitors of all classes of MRSA agr signaling. We identified three S. simulans agr classes, and have shown intraspecies cross-talk between non-cognate S. simulans agr types for the first time. The S. simulans AIP-I structure was confirmed, and the novel AIP-II and AIP-III structures were solved via mass spectrometry. Synthetic S. simulans AIPs inhibited MRSA agr signaling with nanomolar potency. S. simulans in competition with MRSA reduced dermonecrotic and epicutaneous skin injury in murine models. Addition of synthetic AIP-I also effectively reduced MRSA dermonecrosis and epicutaneous skin injury in murine models. These results demonstrate potent anti-MRSA quorum sensing inhibition by a rare human skin commensal, and suggest that cross-talk between CoNS and MRSA may be important in maintaining healthy skin homeostasis and preventing MRSA skin damage during colonization or acute infection.

Background: MRSA pose significant therapeutic challenges, related to their: frequency in clinical infections; innate virulence properties; and propensity for multi-antibiotic resistance. MRSA are among the most common causes of endovascular infections, including infective endocarditis (IE).

Objective: To employ transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) to evaluate the effect of exebacase, a novel direct lytic agent, in experimental aortic valve MRSA IE.

Study Design: TTE was utilized to evaluate the in vivo effect of exebacase on MRSA-infected vegetation progression when combined with daptomycin (vs daptomycin alone). Primary intravegetation outcomes were: maximum size; weights at sacrifice; and MRSA counts at infection baseline vs after 4 days of daptomycin treatment (alone or in addition to exebacase administered once on treatment Day 1).

Results: A single dose of exebacase in addition to daptomycin cleared significantly more intravegetation MRSA than daptomycin alone. This was associated with a statistical trend toward reduced maximum vegetation size in the exebacase + daptomycin vs the daptomycin-alone therapy groups (p = 0.07). Also, mean vegetation weights in the exebacase-treated group were significantly lower vs daptomycin-alone (p < 0.0001). Maximum vegetation size by TTE correlated with vegetation weight (p = 0.005). In addition, intravegetation MRSA counts in the combination group were significantly lower vs untreated controls (p<0.0001) and the daptomycin-alone group (p<0.0001).

Conclusion: This study suggests that exebacase has a salutary impact on MRSA-infected vegetation progression when combined with daptomycin, especially in terms of vegetation MRSA burden, size and weight. Moreover, TTE appears to be an efficient non-invasive tool to assess therapeutic efficacies in experimental MRSA IE.

From a new paid membership service to the Aria Air and Versa 2, Fitbit's latest products and services make staying on top of your health and fitness easier and more accessible than ever.

The Fitbit Versa 2 takes everything we like about the original smartwatch and adds an always-on AMOLED display, a microphone for Amazon Alexa, and Fitbit Pay.

Google Translate is not the only app that can help you converse with someone speaking a different language. Here's how to translate real-time conversations with the Google Assistant.

Incredibly powerful for content creation and gaming, Corsair's One Pro i200 delivers 14-core Intel Core i9 muscle in a stylish design that's a fraction the size of a traditional workstation tower.

A worker shares the story of one girl who recently took the courageous step to leave her life of prostitution for the freedom Christ offers.

In the new A500 CPU cooler, two 2,400rpm fans can move up and down on the heatsink for greater flexibility, accommodating large RAM modules. Plus, an old-favorite Corsair keyboard gets leveled up.

To commemorate the 250th anniversary of the publication of his “Letters From a Pennsylvania Farmer” and the role John Dickinson played in setting the stage for the American Revolution, the Delaware Department of State has launched a new website, de.gov/johndickinson, and a slate of special programming to take place over the coming months.

Museum to feature a workshop on cross stitch, a form of embroidery in which X-shaped stitches are used to form a picture.

Conversational commerce, as it is more popularly known, is any form of online communication that takes place during an e-commerce purchase.

Sonam, who is currently in Delhi with her husband and in-laws, has been posting pictures of the arrangements of the intimate celebration at the Ahuja household.

 Regarding imposing of anti-dumping duty on all imports of Recordable Digital Versatile Disc [DVD] of all kinds origina

Delawareans are invited to join millions of people around the globe to celebrate Earth Day on April 22.

Retail, hair dressers able to resume limited services while maintaining health guidelines WILMINGTON, Del. – Governor John Carney on Tuesday announced a series of interim steps allowing small businesses to resume limited operations effective 8:00 a.m. on Friday, May 8. The goal of the interim steps is to provide economic relief to Delaware citizens and […]

India's love for Rabindranath Tagore is a continuing tale, thereby marking the nation's reverence for a great artist, poet and visionary.

Taking to Twitter, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee quoted the lyrics of one of Tagore's songs (Rabindrasangeet) to pay tribute to him.

Defying clouds in the sky and Covid-19 on the ground, Russia’s deadliest bombers, nimblest fighter jets and strongest transport aircraft flew over the capital in celebration of Soviet victory over Nazi Germany 75 years ago.
Read Full Article at RT.com

  In light of a recent debacle in which a family in Oregon, USA realised its conversation was surreptitiously recorded by Alexa and sent to a random contact on its phone, we thought it might be a good i...

The famous scientist, who battled amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a motor neurone disease for over 50 years, passed away at the age of 76 on March 14, 2018.

Termed "a successful failure", the spacecraft which had three astronauts- James Lovell Jr, Fred Haise Jr, and John Swigert Jr- on board managed to return to the Earth despite facing an explosion like situation after a blast in its oxygen tank.

Known as one of the most prominent figures in India's struggle for freedom from British rule, Sarojini Naidu was a political activist and a poet. Her work as a poet earned the name of "Nightingale of...

Banknet Group will publish stories of achievers, entrepreneurs from BFSI, IT

Microsoft announced it has acquired Semantic Machines, a conversational AI startup providing chatbots and AI chat apps founded in 2014 having $20.9 million in funding from investors. The acquisition will help Microsoft catch up with Amazon Alexa, though the latter is more focused on enabling consumer applications of conversational AI.

Microsoft will use Semantic Machine’s acquisition to establish a conversational AI center of excellence in Berkeley to help it innovate in natural language interfaces.

Microsoft has been stepping up its products in conversational AI. It launched the digital assistant Cortana in 2015, as well as social chatbots like XiaoIce. The latest acquisition can help Microsoft beef up its ‘enterprise AI’ offerings.

As the use of NLP (natural language processing) increases in IoT products and services, more startups are getting traction from investors and established players. In June last year, Josh.ai, avoice-controlled home automation software has raised $8M.

Followed by it was SparkCognition that raised $32.5M Series B for its NLP-based threat intelligence platform.

It appears Microsoft’s acquisition of Semantic Machines was motivated by the latter’s strong AI team. The team includes technology entrepreneur Daniel Roth who sold his previous startups Voice Signal Technologies and Shaser BioScience for $300M and $100M respectively. Other team members include Stanford AI Professor Percy Liang, developer of Google Assistant Core AI technology and former Apple chief speech scientist Larry Gillick.

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DevExpress ASP.NET File Manager versions 10.2 through 13.2.8 suffer from a directory traversal vulnerability.

Sky File version 2.1.0 for iOS suffers from cross site scripting and directory traversal vulnerabilities.