Past empirical evidence has demonstrated that employees' positive mood states predict task performance. This study extends previous research by proposing and testing a model that examines mediating processes underlying the relationship between employee positive moods and task performance. Two longitudinal studies used data collected from 306 (Study 1) and 263 (Study 2) insurance sales agents in Taiwan. The results showed that employee positive moods predicted task performance indirectly through both interpersonal (helping other coworkers and coworker helping and support) and motivational (self-efficacy and task persistence) processes.

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Past researchers have found that motivating job characteristics can increase employee display of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). In this study, the authors extended previous research by investigating the mediating process of job involvement in the relationship between job characteristics and OCB. The authors collected data from 323 employees and their supervisors from 7 companies in Taiwan. Results show that, through the mediating process of job involvement, the 3 job characteristics (i.e., task identity, task significance, and autonomy) positively influenced the display of an employee's OCB, whereas skill variety had a negative effect on OCB. The authors discuss implications of their findings, contributions, limitations, and future research directions.

Staphylococcus aureus, an important human pathogen, is particularly adept at producing biofilms on implanted medical devices. Although antibiotic treatment of nonsusceptible bacteria will not kill these strains, the consequences should be studied. The present study focuses on investigating the effect of vancomycin on biofilm formation by vancomycin-non-susceptible S. aureus. Biofilm adherence assays and scanning electron microscopy demonstrated that biofilm formation was significantly enhanced following vancomycin treatment. Bacterial autolysis of some subpopulations was observed and was confirmed by the live/dead staining and confocal laser scanning microscopy. A significant increase in polysaccharide intercellular adhesin (PIA) production was observed by measuring icaA transcript levels and in a semi-quantitative PIA assay in one resistant strain. We show that the release of extracellular DNA (eDNA) via cidA-mediated autolysis is a major contributor to vancomycin-enhanced biofilm formation. The addition of xenogeneic DNA could also significantly enhance biofilm formation by a PIA-overproducing S. aureus strain. The magnitude of the development of the biofilm depends on a balance between the amounts of eDNA and PIA. In conclusion, sublethal doses of cell wall-active antibiotics like vancomycin induce biofilm formation through an autolysis-dependent mechanism in vancomycin-non-susceptible S. aureus.

Since the development of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique, genomic information has been retrievable from lesser amounts of DNA than previously possible. PCR-based amplifications require high-precision instruments to perform temperature cycling reactions; further, they are cumbersome for routine clinical use. However, the use of isothermal approaches can eliminate many complications associated with thermocycling. The application of diagnostic devices for isothermal DNA amplification has recently been studied extensively. In this paper, we describe the basic concepts of several isothermal amplification approaches and review recent progress in diagnostic device development.