THE DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF EXPERIMENTS. By Oscar Kempthorne. New York, John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1952. 631 pp. $8.50. This book by a teacher of statistics (as well as a consultant for \"experimenters\") is a comprehensive study of the philosophical background for the statistical design of experiment. It is necessary to have some facility with algebraic notation and manipulation to be able to use the volume intelligently. The problems are presented from the theoretical point of view, without such practical examples as would be helpful for those not acquainted with mathematics. The mathematical justification for the techniques is given. As a somewhat advanced treatment of the design and analysis of experiments, this volume will be interesting and helpful for many who approach statistics theoretically as well as practically. With emphasis on the \"why,\" and with description given broadly, the author relates the subject matter to the general theory of statistics and to the general problem of experimental inference. MARGARET J. ROBERTSON

The Design and Analysis of Experiments

Microbiota Modulate Behavioral and Physiological Abnormalities Associated with Neurodevelopmental Disorders

Historically, natural products have been used since ancient times and in folklore for the treatment of many diseases and illnesses. Classical natural product chemistry methodologies enabled a vast array of bioactive secondary metabolites from terrestrial and marine sources to be discovered. Many of these natural products have gone on to become current drug candidates. This brief review aims to highlight historically significant bioactive marine and terrestrial natural products, their use in folklore and dereplication techniques to rapidly facilitate their discovery. Furthermore a discussion of how natural product chemistry has resulted in the identification of many drug candidates; the application of advanced hyphenated spectroscopic techniques to aid in their discovery, the future of natural product chemistry and finally adopting metabolomic profiling and dereplication approaches for the comprehensive study of natural product extracts will be discussed.

https://minerva-access.unimelb.edu.au/bitstream/handle/11343/265172/PMC3901206.pdf

A historical overview of natural products in drug discovery.

A safe and effective rotavirus vaccine is urgently needed, particularly in developing countries. Critical to vaccine development and implementation is a knowledge base concerning the epidemiology of rotavirus G and P serotypes/genotypes throughout the world. The temporal and geographical distribution of human rotavirus G and P types was reviewed by analysing a total of 45571 strains collected globally from 124 studies reported from 52 countries on five continents published between 1989 and 2004. Four common G types (G1, G2, G3 and G4) in conjunction with P[8] or P[4] represented over 88% of the strains analysed worldwide. In addition, serotype G9 viruses associated with P[8] or P[6] were shown to have emerged as the fourth globally important G type with the relative frequency of 4.1%. When the global G and/or P type distributions were divided into five continents/subcontinents, several characteristic features emerged. For example, the P[8]G1 represented over 70% of rotavirus infections in North America, Europe and Australia, but only about 30% of the infections in South America and Asia, and 23% in Africa. In addition, in Africa (i) the relative frequency of G8 was as high as that of the globally common G3 or G4, (ii) P[6] represented almost one-third of all P types identified and (iii) 27% of the infections were associated with rotavirus strains bearing unusual combinations such as P[6]G8 or P[4]G8. Furthermore, in South America, uncommon G5 virus appeared to increase its epidemiological importance among children with diarrhea. Such findings have (i) confirmed the importance of continued active rotavirus strain surveillance in a variety of geographical settings and (ii) provided important considerations for the development and implementation of an effective rotavirus vaccine (e.g. a geographical P-G type adjustment in the formulation of next generation multivalent vaccines).

Global distribution of rotavirus serotypes/genotypes and its implication for the development and implementation of an effective rotavirus vaccine.

The perpetually increasing rate at which viral full-genome sequences are being determined is creating a pressing demand for computational tools that will aid the objective classification of these genome sequences. Taxonomic classification approaches that are based on pairwise genetic identity measures are potentially highly automatable and are progressively gaining favour with the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV). There are, however, various issues with the calculation of such measures that could potentially undermine the accuracy and consistency with which they can be applied to virus classification. Firstly, pairwise sequence identities computed based on multiple sequence alignments rather than on multiple independent pairwise alignments can lead to the deflation of identity scores with increasing dataset sizes. Also, when gap-characters need to be introduced during sequence alignments to account for insertions and deletions, methodological variations in the way that these characters are introduced and handled during pairwise genetic identity calculations can cause high degrees of inconsistency in the way that different methods classify the same sets of sequences. Here we present Sequence Demarcation Tool (SDT), a free user-friendly computer program that aims to provide a robust and highly reproducible means of objectively using pairwise genetic identity calculations to classify any set of nucleotide or amino acid sequences. SDT can produce publication quality pairwise identity plots and colour-coded distance matrices to further aid the classification of sequences according to ICTV approved taxonomic demarcation criteria. Besides a graphical interface version of the program for Windows computers, command-line versions of the program are available for a variety of different operating systems (including a parallel version for cluster computing platforms).

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0108277&type=printable

SDT: A Virus Classification Tool Based on Pairwise Sequence Alignment and Identity Calculation

Stability mechanisms for microwave-produced solid lipid nanoparticles

Performance of a MALDI-TOF MS-based imipenem hydrolysis assay incorporating zinc sulfate.

Molecular characterization of gastrointestinal microbiota in children with autism (with and without gastrointestinal dysfunction) and their neurotypical siblings

Human astroviruses (HAstV) are now recognised as important causes of acute gastroenteritis in young children world-wide. The development of improved and more reliable diagnostic methods such as enzyme immunoassays and molecular methods has led to an increase in our understanding of the characteristics of astroviruses and astrovirus infections. Astroviruses can be classified into genogroups, genotypes and serotypes depending on whether genetic or antigenic criteria are used. Epidemiological studies have shown that astrovirus infections are associated with sporadic infections of children in the community as well as focal outbreaks in settings such as hospital wards and day-care centres. Astrovirus outbreaks have also been noted among adults. Recent reports have shown that, in some settings, astrovirus is the second most common cause of diarrhoea in children, thus establishing the medical importance of HAstV. World-wide, HAstV-1 seems to be the predominant type with varied distribution of the other types. Continued studies of the epidemiology of astrovirus infection and the extent of genetic variability of clinical isolates, coupled with an increased understanding of immune responses to astrovirus infection, are needed to develop strategies for the control of disease caused by this enteric pathogen.

The biology and epidemiology of human autoviruses

Despite the removal of the mercury (Hg)-based preservative thimerosal from vaccines listed on the Australian Immunization Program Schedule for children, concerns remain among some researchers and parents for the safety of the present schedule, in part due to a fear of residual trace levels of Hg The purpose of this study was to independently assess childhood vaccines for the presence of Hg Eight vaccines administered to children under the age of 5 yr were assessed for Hg content via a DMA-80 direct mercury analyzer Seven of the 8 vaccines contained no detectable levels of Hg (less than 1 ppb); however, 1 vaccine (Infanrix hexa) tested positive for Hg at 10 ppb The result was confirmed and validated by retesting the original sample Follow-up testing was conducted on three additional samples of Infanrix hexa (one from the same production lot and two from a different lot) All three tested positive for Hg (average of 97 ppb) Although the levels of Hg detected are substantially lower than any established exposure safety limits, the results of this study reveal that inaccuracies exist in public health messages, professional communications, and official documentation regarding Hg content in at least one childhood vaccine In the interests of public health, it is incumbent on vaccine manufacturers and responsible agencies such as the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the Federal Department of Health and Ageing to address this issue as a matter of urgency

Enzo A. Palombo

Papers

Stability mechanisms for microwave-produced solid lipid nanoparticles

Performance of a MALDI-TOF MS-based imipenem hydrolysis assay incorporating zinc sulfate.

Molecular characterization of gastrointestinal microbiota in children with autism (with and without gastrointestinal dysfunction) and their neurotypical siblings

The biology and epidemiology of human autoviruses

Mercury in vaccines from the Australian childhood immunization program schedule