The frequent occurrence of fog and haze weather in big cities of China has raised wide attention of the public to its main cause—fine particulate matters, namely, PM2.5. It has been a common concern of the public that how PM2.5 would affect people’s health. This review summarizes the latest epidemiological findings of the effect of PM2.5 on respiratory diseases. Epidemiological studies have shown that short-term exposure to relatively higher concentration of PM2.5 is positively associated with the increased risk of emergency department visits of patients with asthma, with the risk of hospital admissions for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and pneumonia, and with daily mortality in patients with COPD. Long-term exposure of relatively higher concentration of PM2.5 is positively associated with the increased risk of lung cancer mortality and pneumonia mortality, and with the increased risk of lung adenocarcinoma incidence and asthma incidence. These results, most from western countries, suggest the urgent need to reduce PM2.5 concentration, as well as to conduct vigorous local epidemiological studies on PM2.5 in China.

Bovine tuberculosis is a very important zoonosis, and its prevalence could affect the development of animal husbandry. The causative agent of bovine tuberculosis could also infect humans by many ways, and threaten the public health. In this review, we introduced the discovery of bovine tuberculosis, the relationship between human tuberculosis and bovine tuberculosis, and the diagnostic methods of bovine tuberculosis, and etc.

The purpose of the current study is to investigate the physiological effects in Mycobacterium smegmatis (M. smegmati) caused by the overexpression of GroEL1, which is a heat shock protein in Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Bacterial morphous was observed using transmission electron microscope (TEM), and bacterial population growth curve was plotted. Drug susceptibility of recombinant M. smegmatis was assayed using serial dilution. BALB/c mice infected by recombinant M. smegmatis were used as model to detect bacterial viability in vivo and virulence changes related to GroEL1 overexpression. As GroEL1 overexpressed, the level of bacteria bacterial ribosome increased significantly, so did the population growth and adaptive capacity. But for the resisrance to commonly used first-line and second-line anti-tuberculosis drugs did not change. The tesults showed that overexpression of GroEL could help M. smegmatis extend life cycle in hosts, and enhance bacterial virulence, with a significant impact on growth of bacteria in vivo or in vitro.

In order to evaluate the diagnostic value of the whole-blood interferon γ release assay (QuantiFERON TB Gold In-Tube test, QFT-GIT) in diagnosis of tuberculosis in children and adults in China (with a high rate of bacillus Calmette-Guérin vaccination and a high incidence of tuberculosis), 60 children and 60 adults with suspected tuberculosis were recruited for QFT-GIT test and clinical information collection. The results showed that among children, the sensitivity of QFT-GIT test was 83.87%, the specificity was 92%, positive predict value (PPV) was 92.86%, and negative predict value (NPV) was 82.14%. While among adults, the sensitivity of QFT-GIT test was 78.57%, the specificity was 84.62%, PPV was 84.62%, and NPV was 78.57%. Here comes a conclusion that QFT-GIT is of great value in diagnosis of tuberculosis, especially among children.

Under the essential framework of the “New Pathway” educational reform in Peking University Health Science Center (PUHSC), the new curriculum system of Medical Microbiology with a “3+1” polyphasic module has been established, composed of the original core module, the innovative module based on problem-based learning and comprehensive experiments, and the complement module including elective courses and seminars, as well as “Student Innovative Talent Project” rooted in the platform of research laboratory. Hope this work would benefit to promote Medical Microbiology educational reform and cultivate innovative talents.

Brucella protein Omp19 was Expressed and purified, and its immunogenicity was further validated by Western blotting. An indirect enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (iELISA) for detection of Brucella melitensis (B. melitensis ) was established using the purified recombinant protein Omp19 as coating antigen. Serum samples (n=90) from sheep were simultaneously tested by iELISA and standard serum agglutination test (SAT), and the data was analyzed by SPSS software. The results showed that compared with SAT the positive coincidence rate of iELISA was 95.12% and the negative coincidence rate was 67.35%, Kappa value was 0.607 7 . McNemar chisquare test showed that there was significant difference between the two methods (P<0.05). The total diagnosis coincidence rate reached 80%. The established iELISA could be used as an alternative method for serological diagnosis of brucellosis.

The main purpose of the research is to find the most common serotypes and tdh and (or) trh carrying rate of Vibrio parahaemolyticus (V. parahaemolyticus) isolates from diarrhea cases and food in Shanghai, 2012. Isolates were collected in diarrhea surveillance system from 15 district Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCs). All isolates were serotyped with O and K antisera. tdh and trh genes were detected by a duplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay. Totally 88.1% of all 854 isolates could be serotyped with both O and K antisera, and 89.8% were virulent. Among the serotyped isolates from diarrhea cases, 93.8% were O3:K6 (56.2%), O4:K8 (13.5%), O1:K25 (6.8%), O4:K68 (7.0%), O4:K9 (4.5%), O1:K36 (2.9%) and O3:K29 (2.9%), which were considered as the most common serotypes in Shanghai. Central tendency was shown in the distribution of all isolates by month, and the peak appeared during July to August. While for isolates of O4:K9 and O1:K36 serotypes were different without central tendency in monthly distribution. The serotypes distribution in food isolates was different from that of diarrhea isolates. The proportion of virulent strains in diarrhea isolates (95.6%) was higher than that in food isolates (5.5%). Among diarrhea isolates, the proportion of virulent strains in the most common serotypes (99.9%) was higher than that in non-common serotypes (71.1%). tdh detection rate in the serotypeable (97.5%) was higher than that in the untypeable (67.6%), but trh detection rate in the serotypeable (0.8%) was lower than that in the untypeable (42.6%). The results hint that the serotype constitute is different from that of historical data, and tdh（trh）carrying or not is likely to be related to serotypes. The isolates from diarrhea cases and food show separation phenomena in serotypes and virulent factors, indicating the importance of serotyping and virulent factor detection in surveillance and detection of V. parahaemolyticus.

Recently, hospital-acquired pneumonia with Gram-positive bacterial infection has risen. Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has become a major pathogen of iatrogenic infection, which is characterized by multi-drug resistance and difficulties in clinic treatment. Linezolid is the first new type of oxazolidinone antibiotic used in clinic，with broad-spectrum antibacterial activity against staphylococci，streptococci，and enterococci. To evaluate the efficacy and safety of linezolid, a patient with hospital-acquired pneumonia caused by Gram-positive cocci infection was reported in the present paper. The results showed that linezolid was effective．

As a well-known biological vertebrate model, zebrafish is an ideal object to study pathogen infection and immunity. Many bacteria-zebrafish infection models have been constructed successfully. On its translucent larval stage, only innate immune system has developed perfectly. So using zebrafish to study innate immunity has many advantages and can avoid the interference of adaptive immunity. As a highly conservative intracellular degradation process, autophagy is an important event of innate immunity. It can initiate a response against bacteria through Toll-like receptors or mucosal immune system. A preliminary study on autophagy of zebrafish associated with its development and eliminating maternal residues has been going on. And now a new bacteria-zebrafish model for studying autophagy has been constructed successfully, which is of great significance to research the mechanisms of xenophagy. Here we summarize the results gained from zebrafish on pathogen infection and immunity as well as autophagy in recent years.

High-risk human papillomavirus (HPV) could integrate into host cell genome in some tumors such as cervical carcinoma. Epidemiological and experimental data support that high-risk HPV genome integration plays an important role in cervical carcinogenesis. High-risk HPV genome integration may have close relationship with chromosome instability and DNA methylation. In recent years, clone selection is relative to interferon pathway. The impact on the function of several genes by integration and integration sites detection are in progress. Here the recent researches on high-risk HPV integration are reviewed.

Natural killer T (NKT) cells are a population of T cells that share some characteristics with natural killer (NK) cells, which can recognize glycolipids presented by CD1d molecules expressed on antigen-presenting cells through cell recognition pathway. Activated NKT cells modulate the activity of other cells including B and T cells, NK cells, granulocytes, and dendritic cells through secreting a vast array of cytokines and chemokines. NKT cells also play an important role in linking innate and adaptive immune responses. Studies have shown that NKT cells not only play an important role in anti-bacteria, but also in anti-virus and anti-parasite infection.