Five strains of obligately anaerobic, pectin-fermenting spirochetes were isolated from the subgingival plaque of humans. The strains produced two extracellular enzymatic activities that functioned in pectin degradation. One of these enzymatic activities was pectin methylesterase (EC 3.1.1.11), and the other was pectate lyase (EC 4.2.2.2) of the endo type. The data indicate that the cumulative action of these two enzymatic activities brought about depolymerization of pectin in spirochete cultures. Pectinor polygalacturonate-degrading hydrolases were not detected. A cell-associated lyase activity that catalyzed polygalacturonate breakdown was present in one of the spirochete strains. In addition to pectin, the isolates utilized polygalacturonic, glucuronic, or galacturonic acid as fermentable substrate but did not utilize neutral sugars, amino acids, or other substrates tested. Although the oral spirochetes did not ferment hyaluronic acid, one of the strains grew in coculture with a hyaluronidase-producing Peptostreptococcus strain in a medium containing hyaluronic acid as fermentable substrate. Two of the isolates were identified as Treponema pectinovorum strains on the basis of their substrate utilization pattern, end products of fermentation, other phenotypic characteristics, and the guanine-pluscytosine content of their DNA. Even though the pectinolytic isolates were specialized with respect to the fermentable substrates they utilized, they appeared to compete successfully with other microorganisms in their habitat.
We investigate the incorporation of larger time-scale information, such as prosody, into standard speaker ID systems. Our study is based on the Extended Data Task of the NIST 2001 Speaker ID evaluation, which provides much more test and training data than has traditionally been available to similar speaker ID investigations. In addition, we have had access to a detailed prosodic feature database of Switchboard-I conversations, including data not previously applied to speaker ID. We describe two baseline acoustic systems, an approach using Gaussian Mixture Models, and an LVCSR-based speaker ID system. These results are compared to and combined with two larger time-scale systems: a system based on an "idiolect" language model, and a system making use of the contents of the prosody database. We find that, with sufficient test and training data, suprasegmental information can significantly enhance the performance of traditional speaker ID systems.
Background:Misoprostol is known to be effective in stimulating intestinal transit both in healthy individuals and in patients with chronic constipation when evaluated in short‐term trials. The aim of this study was to determine the utility of misoprostol in the long‐term management of patients with chronic refractory constipation.Methods:Eighteen patients were offered misoprostol (600–2400 μg/day) as adjunctive therapy in an open‐ended, non‐blinded trial. All patients were encouraged to continue the drug for a minimum of 4 weeks, after which time the effect on bowel movement patterns was evaluated and continued use of misoprostol was offered to those patients who demonstrated a clinical benefit.Results:Six patients withdrew prior to 4 weeks because of side‐effects. In the 12 patients who continued the treatment and were evaluated at 4 weeks, the mean interval between bowel movement frequency had decreased from a baseline of 11.25 to 4.8 days (P=0.0004). Eight patients continued the long‐term treatment, with sustained response seen in six. In a subset of patients (n=4) the effect of single‐dose misoprostol (400 μg) was evaluated compared to healthy controls (n=5) on post‐prandial segmental colonic motility. Misoprostol augmented the colonic motility response to a meal throughout the colon, and this was significantly greater in the left versus right colonic segments (P < 0.05).Conclusions:Misoprostol can be effective as part of the long‐term medical treatment of patients with chronic refractory constipation, but side‐effects are observed at higher doses and can be a limiting factor. Part of misoprostol's action may be mediated through the augmentation of colonic motility, particularly of the left colon.
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