Publications related to Infection prevention and control

Epidemicity indices and reproduction numbers from infectious disease data in connected human populations

Andrea Rinaldo, Cristiano Trevisin, Lorenzo Mari, Marino Gatto

We focus on distinctive data-driven measures of the fate of ongoing epidemics. The relevance of our pursuit is suggested by recent results proving that the short-term temporal evolution of infection spread is described by an epidemicity index related to th ...

2024

Uptake without inactivation of human adenovirus type 2 by Tetrahymena pyriformis ciliates

Tamar Kohn, Margot Ninon Lauren Olive

Human adenoviruses are ubiquitous contaminants of surface water. Indigenous protists may interact with adenoviruses and contribute to their removal from the water column, though the associated kinetics and mechanisms differ between protist species. In this ...

2023

Epidemicity of cholera spread and the fate of infection control measures

Andrea Rinaldo, Cristiano Trevisin, Lorenzo Mari, Joseph Chadi Benoit Lemaitre, Damiano Pasetto, Marino Gatto

The fate of ongoing infectious disease outbreaks is predicted through reproduction numbers, defining the long-term establishment of the infection, and epidemicity indices, tackling the reactivity of the infectious pool to new contagions. Prognostic metrics ...

2022

Characterization of Pseudomonas aeruginosa mechanosensing through label-free imaging of type IV pili

Lorenzo Anton-Louis Talà

Bacteria are ubiquitously found in all sorts of environment. They're found in the ocean, soil, or even in our guts or on our skin. Independently of their niche, they can transition from a planktonic state were they freely swim in an aqueous environment to ...

EPFL2022

The interplay between human genetic variation, chronic inflammation and persistent infection: relevance for cardiovascular morbidity

Flavia Aurelia Shoko Hodel

Contemporary genomic approaches allow us to seek answers to biological questions that were previously out of reach. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified numerous genetic polymorphisms associated with human diseases, providing new insight ...

EPFL2022

Neonatal Manifestations of Chronic Granulomatous Disease: MAS/HLH and Necrotizing Pneumonia as Unusual Phenotypes and Review of the Literature

Alessandro Borghesi

Chronic granulomatous disease (CGD) is a rare inborn error of immunity (IEI), characterized by a deficient phagocyte killing due to the inability of NADPH oxidase to produce reactive oxygen species in the phagosome. Patients with CGD suffer from severe and ...

SPRINGER/PLENUM PUBLISHERS2022

Presence of sub-inhibitory concentrations of quaternary ammonium compounds in water: effects on bacteria and their inactivation by ozone and monochloramine

Margaux Océane Voumard

Disinfection agents have been present in our daily lives for several decades in detergents or in personal care products, where their role is to prevent the spread of pathogenic microor-ganisms. One of the largest class of disinfection agents is quaternary ...

EPFL2021

Highly Potent Host-Specific Small-Molecule Inhibitor of Paramyxovirus and Pneumovirus Replication with High Resistance Barrier

Gerardo Turcatti, Marc Chambon, Damiano Banfi, Jonathan Patrice Vesin

Multiple enveloped RNA viruses of the family Paramyxoviridae and Pneumoviridae, like measles virus (MeV), Nipah virus (NiV), canine distemper virus (CDV), or respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), are of high clinical relevance. Each year a huge number of live ...

AMER SOC MICROBIOLOGY2021

A Machine-Generated View of the Role of Blood Glucose Levels in the Severity of COVID-19

Henry Markram, Emmanuelle Logette, Samuel Claude Kerrien, Enrico Scantamburlo, Daniel Keller, Jay Coggan, Cyrille Pierre Henri Favreau, Francesco Casalegno, Mohameth François Sy, Anna-Kristin Kaufmann, Pierre-Alexandre Fonta, Marine Laure Bertschy

SARS-CoV-2 started spreading toward the end of 2019 causing COVID-19, a disease that reached pandemic proportions among the human population within months. The reasons for the spectrum of differences in the severity of the disease across the population, an ...

FRONTIERS MEDIA SA2021

Update on Interfacial Charge Transfer (IFTC) Processes on Films Inactivating Viruses/Bacteria under Visible Light: Mechanistic Considerations and Critical Issues

Juan Kiwi, Sami Rtimi

This review presents an update describing binary and ternary semiconductors involving interfacial charge transfer (IFCT) in composites made up by TiO2, CuO, Ag2O and Fe2O3 used in microbial disinfection (bacteria and viruses). The disinfection mechanism, k ...

2021

Adjuvant-free immunization with infective filarial larvae as lymphatic homing antigen carriers

Melody Swartz, Marcela Rincón-Restrepo, Sachiko Hirosue, Witold Waldemar Kilarski, Alexandre de Titta, Esra Güç, David Scott Wilson

Controlled infection with intestinal nematodes has therapeutic potential for preventing the symptoms of allergic and autoimmune diseases. Here, we engineered larvae of the filarial nematode Litomosoides sigmodontis as a vaccine strategy to induce adaptive ...

Nature Research2020

Sulfonated Nanomaterials with Broad-Spectrum Antiviral Activity Extending beyond Heparan Sulfate-Dependent Viruses

Francesco Stellacci, Valeria Cagno, Matteo Gasbarri, Chiara Medaglia

Viral infections are among the main causes of death worldwide, and we lack antivirals for the majority of viruses. Heparin-like sulfated or sulfonated compounds have been known for decades for their ability to prevent infection by heparan sulfate proteogly ...

AMER SOC MICROBIOLOGY2020

Automatic detection of hand hygiene using computer vision technology

Alexandre Massoud Alahi

Hand hygiene is essential for preventing hospital-acquired infections but is difficult to accurately track. The gold-standard (human auditors) is insufficient for assessing true overall compliance. Computer vision technology has the ability to perform more ...

2020

Rationally designed Human Cytomegalovirus gB nanoparticle vaccine with improved immunogenicity

Davide Demurtas

Author summary Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) infection is the foremost viral cause of congenital birth defects. Attempts to vaccinate against HCMV brought moderate, though not sufficient, reduction in infection. Moreover, phase II clinical trial with gB for ...

2020

Infection with a small intestinal helminth, Heligmosomoides polygyrus bakeri, consistently alters microbial communities throughout the murine small and large intestine

Nicola Harris, Benjamin John Marsland, Mario Michael Zaiss, Alexis Rapin, Luc Xavier Marie Lebon, Audrey Geneviève Chuat

Increasing evidence suggests that intestinal helminth infection can alter intestinal microbial communities with important impacts on the mammalian host. However, all of the studies to date utilize different techniques to study the microbiome and access dif ...

2020

Photocatalytic Nanowires-Based Air Filter: Towards Reusable Protective Masks

László Forró, Endre Horvath, Andrzej Sienkiewicz, Caroline Lehmann

In the last couple decades, several viral outbreaks resulting in epidemics and pandemics with thousands of human causalities have been witnessed. The current Covid-19 outbreak represents an unprecedented crisis. In stopping the virus' spread, it is fundame ...

WILEY-V C H VERLAG GMBH2020

cis-regulatory variation modulates susceptibility to enteric infection in the Drosophila genetic reference panel

Bart Deplancke, Vincent Roland Julien Gardeux, Maroun Bou Sleiman, Virginie Sandra Braman, Riccardo Dainese, Maria Litovchenko, Michael Vincent Frochaux, Dani Osman, Brian Dennis Hollis, Tommaso Andreani

Background: Resistance to enteric pathogens is a complex trait at the crossroads of multiple biological processes. We have previously shown in the Drosophila Genetic Reference Panel (DGRP) that resistance to infection is highly heritable, but our understan ...

2020

Population Structure, Molecular Epidemiology, and beta-Lactamase Diversity among Stenotrophomonas maltophilia Isolates in the United States

Luciano Andres Abriata

Stenotrophomonas maltophilia is a Gram-negative, nonfermenting, environmental bacillus that is an important cause of nosocomial infections, primarily associated with the respiratory tract in the immunocompromised population. Aiming to understand the popula ...

2019

Risk Perception and Epidemics in Complex Computer Networks

Emanuele Massaro

We present a self-organised method for quickly obtaining the epidemic threshold of infective processes on networks. Starting from simple percolation models, we introduce the possibility that the effective infection probability is affected by the perception ...

IEEE2018

Using NanoSIMS coupled with microfluidics to visualize the early stages of coral infection by Vibrio coralliilyticus

Anders Meibom, Isabelle Domart-Coulon, Emma Mary Gibbin

Background: Global warming has triggered an increase in the prevalence and severity of coral disease, yet little is known about coral/pathogen interactions in the early stages of infection. The point of entry of the pathogen and the route that they take on ...

2018