BackgroundImmunosignaturing is a new peptide microarray based technology for profiling of humoral immune responses. Despite new challenges, immunosignaturing gives us the opportunity to explore new and fundamentally different research questions. In addition to classifying samples based on disease status, the complex patterns and latent factors underlying immunosignatures, which we attempt to model, may have a diverse range of applications.MethodsWe investigate the utility of a number of statistical methods to determine model performance and address challenges inherent in analyzing immunosignatures. Some of these methods include exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, classical significance testing, structural equation and mixture modeling.ResultsWe demonstrate an ability to classify samples based on disease status and show that immunosignaturing is a very promising technology for screening and presymptomatic screening of disease. In addition, we are able to model complex patterns and latent factors underlying immunosignatures. These latent factors may serve as biomarkers for disease and may play a key role in a bioinformatic method for antibody discovery.ConclusionBased on this research, we lay out an analytic framework illustrating how immunosignatures may be useful as a general method for screening and presymptomatic screening of disease as well as antibody discovery.

The ulnar collateral ligament stabilizes the elbow joint from valgus stress associated with the throwing motion. During baseball pitching, this ligament is subjected to tremendous stress and injury if the force on the ulnar collateral ligament during pitching exceeds the physiological limits of the ligament. Injuries to the throwing elbow in baseball pitchers result in significant time loss and typically surgical intervention. The purpose of this paper is to provide a review of current information to sports medicine clinicians on injury epidemiology, injury mechanics, injury risk factors, injury prevention, surgical interventions, nonsurgical interventions, rehabilitation, and return to play outcomes in baseball pitchers of all levels.

No abstract

Nasal secretions, faecal samples and buffy coats were obtained from 102 cattle from a North Dakota dairy herd with a history of calf scours. Treated buffy coats, faecal samples and nasal secretions were inoculated into tetrathionate broth (TB), incubated at 37 degrees C overnight, and plated onto brilliant green agar medium with novobiocin (BGAN). The TB was left at room temperature for 5 days and then used to inoculate fresh TB. The fresh TB was incubated at 37 degrees C over night and plated onto BGAN medium. All the plates were incubated at 37 degrees C over night and observed for Salmonella-like growth. Suspect colonies were further tested and Salmonella isolates were serotyped by the National Veterinary Services laboratory. Twenty-two of the 36 calves sampled harboured S. typhimurium in their faeces, but no samples from cows were positive. No Salmonella were isolated from the buffy coats, but 4 calves were shown to have Salmonella in their nasal secretions. Extended enrichment of the faecal cultures in TB resulted in a significant increase in Salmonella isolations, although 2 samples were positive following the initial enrichment period and not after secondary enrichment. The typical Salmonella isolate detected from this herd contained a transmissible R-plasmid encoding resistance to tetracycline, kanamycin, sulphisoxazole and ampicillin. This study confirmed that delayed secondary enrichment in TB is superior to primary enrichment for detection of Salmonella from cattle.