Epidemic form of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis was reported from different geographical locations of the world, during 2023. Since the viral agents are well established behind acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis outbreaks, this study aims to investigate the bacterial agent associated with the acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis outbreak that occurred in the eastern Uttar Pradesh region of India. The bacterial infection was investigated in 91 conjunctival swabs collected from acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis patients during the outbreak. Total nucleic acid was extracted from the ocular swab collected from acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis patients, followed by the detection of human adenovirus and pan-enterovirus using PCR. Further, the isolation of bacteria was performed using these clinical samples. Characterization of the bacterial isolates was done using the VITEK-2 system and 16S ribosomal RNA sequencing. Of 64 conjunctival swabs positive for coxsackievirus-A24 samples, two clinical specimens showed bacterial growth. Both isolates were identified as Ochrobactrum anthropi via VITEK-2 with 93% and 95% confidence levels. While 16S ribosomal RNA analysis characterized the isolates as Ochrobactrum intermedium. Ochrobactrum intermedium is an emerging multidrug-resistant bacterium and is reported to cause a variety of clinical infections. This study first reported the Ochrobactrum intermedium infection in two coxsackievirus-A24 infected acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis patients.
- MeSH
- Conjunctivitis, Acute Hemorrhagic * virology microbiology epidemiology MeSH
- Coxsackievirus Infections * virology epidemiology MeSH
- Adult MeSH
- Disease Outbreaks MeSH
- Phylogeny MeSH
- Gram-Negative Bacterial Infections * microbiology epidemiology MeSH
- Coinfection * microbiology virology epidemiology MeSH
- Humans MeSH
- Enterovirus C, Human isolation & purification MeSH
- Ochrobactrum * isolation & purification genetics classification MeSH
- RNA, Ribosomal, 16S genetics MeSH
- Check Tag
- Adult MeSH
- Humans MeSH
- Male MeSH
- Female MeSH
- Publication type
- Journal Article MeSH
- Geographicals
- India MeSH
Recent anecdotal and scientific reports have provided evidence of a link between COVID-19 and chemosensory impairments, such as anosmia. However, these reports have downplayed or failed to distinguish potential effects on taste, ignored chemesthesis, and generally lacked quantitative measurements. Here, we report the development, implementation, and initial results of a multilingual, international questionnaire to assess self-reported quantity and quality of perception in 3 distinct chemosensory modalities (smell, taste, and chemesthesis) before and during COVID-19. In the first 11 days after questionnaire launch, 4039 participants (2913 women, 1118 men, and 8 others, aged 19-79) reported a COVID-19 diagnosis either via laboratory tests or clinical assessment. Importantly, smell, taste, and chemesthetic function were each significantly reduced compared to their status before the disease. Difference scores (maximum possible change ±100) revealed a mean reduction of smell (-79.7 ± 28.7, mean ± standard deviation), taste (-69.0 ± 32.6), and chemesthetic (-37.3 ± 36.2) function during COVID-19. Qualitative changes in olfactory ability (parosmia and phantosmia) were relatively rare and correlated with smell loss. Importantly, perceived nasal obstruction did not account for smell loss. Furthermore, chemosensory impairments were similar between participants in the laboratory test and clinical assessment groups. These results show that COVID-19-associated chemosensory impairment is not limited to smell but also affects taste and chemesthesis. The multimodal impact of COVID-19 and the lack of perceived nasal obstruction suggest that severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus strain 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection may disrupt sensory-neural mechanisms.
- MeSH
- Betacoronavirus isolation & purification MeSH
- Taste MeSH
- Smell MeSH
- COVID-19 MeSH
- Adult MeSH
- Coronavirus Infections complications diagnosis virology MeSH
- Middle Aged MeSH
- Humans MeSH
- Young Adult MeSH
- Pandemics MeSH
- Taste Disorders etiology virology MeSH
- Olfaction Disorders etiology virology MeSH
- Surveys and Questionnaires MeSH
- SARS-CoV-2 MeSH
- Aged MeSH
- Somatosensory Disorders etiology virology MeSH
- Pneumonia, Viral complications diagnosis virology MeSH
- Self Report MeSH
- Check Tag
- Adult MeSH
- Middle Aged MeSH
- Humans MeSH
- Young Adult MeSH
- Male MeSH
- Aged MeSH
- Female MeSH
- Publication type
- Journal Article MeSH
- Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't MeSH
The paper presents a novel encoding scheme for neuronal code generation for odour recognition using an electronic nose (EN). This scheme is based on channel encoding using multiple Gaussian receptive fields superimposed over the temporal EN responses. The encoded data is further applied to a spiking neural network (SNN) for pattern classification. Two forms of SNN, a back-propagation based SpikeProp and a dynamic evolving SNN are used to learn the encoded responses. The effects of information encoding on the performance of SNNs have been investigated. Statistical tests have been performed to determine the contribution of the SNN and the encoding scheme to overall odour discrimination. The approach has been implemented in odour classification of orthodox black tea (Kangra-Himachal Pradesh Region) thereby demonstrating a biomimetic approach for EN data analysis.
