No abstract

investigation is required in order to confirm these results and delineate the potential mechanisms by which urinary pathogens and antibiotics may affect calcium-based stone formation.

RESULTS: DM tolerated 3 hours of constant CO2 anesthesia in combination with X-ray radiation exposure throughout the uCT acquisition, during which the optimal scanning protocol achieved DM survival and minimal image-noise. With this method, successful 3D reconstruction and visualization of DM adults were reproduced at 5.72 um isotropic voxel spacing, with stones clearly present (Fig.1). Analysis of the impact of BS168 on stone formation is ongoing. CONCLUSIONS: We have demonstrated that using CO2 gas during uCT imaging of live DM induces safe, repeatable, temporary fullbody immobilization without motion artefacts, for the purpose of visualizing stones. DM could fully recover after scans and we demonstrated the capability of this tool in time-course studies, as the same individuals were repeatedly scanned throughout the experiment. Currently this technique is being applied to characterize the effect of stone-modulating treatments such as probiotic bacteria with future potential in evaluating pharmaceuticals.