Development of a validation protocol to determine the ability of screw-top containers to be watertight and to withstand impact damage from accidental dropping

Polypropylene screw-top containers are used to collect, transport and store a variety of tissues within tissue banks. These containers are validated for use by tissue banks but no standard validation protocol is used. We present here a protocol for testing screw-top containers for leakage, evaporation and the ability to withstand accidental impact damage. Three different containers were tested, MedFor S072, MedFor S277 and MacoPharma PROT0483. The validation can detect differences between different manufacturer’s containers and this protocol will be used in future validations of screw-top containers within National Blood Service Tissue Services.     

Is the Exact Test Better than the Asymptotic Test for Testing Marginal Homogeneity in 2 × 2 Tables?

McNemar test is commonly used to test for the marginal homogeneity in 2 × 2 contingency tables. McNemar test is an asymptotic test based either on standard normal distribution or on the chi‐square distribution. When the total sample size is small, an exact version of McNemar test is available based on the binomial probabilities. The example in the paper came from a clinical study to investigate the effect of epidermal growth factor for children who had microvillus inclusion diseases. There were only six observations available. The test results differ between the exact test and the asymptotic test. It is a common belief that with this small sample size the exact test be used. However, we claim that McNemar test performs better than the exact test even when the sample size is small. In order to investigate the performances of McNemar test and the exact test, we identify the parameters that affect the test results and then perform sensitivity analysis. In addition, through Monte Carlo simulation studies we compare the empirical sizes and powers of these tests as well as other asymptotic tests such as Wald test and the likelihood ratio test.     

两种Ames试验方法在槲皮素致突变试验中灵敏度的研究

目的:通过传统Ames试验与改进彷徨试验对槲皮素的致突变试验结果,比较两种试验的灵敏度。方法:Ames试验方法采用平板掺入法,选择3.2、16、80、400、2000μg/mL 5个剂量组的槲皮素在有或无代谢话化条件下处理鼠伤寒沙门氏菌株TA98和TA100 48小时后计数回复突变菌落数;改进彷徨试验采用96孔板法,选择0.128、0.64、3.2、16、80μg/mL 5个剂量组的槲皮素在有或无代谢活化条件下处理鼠伤寒沙门氏菌株TA98和TA100 24小时后计数变色孔数。结果:Ames试验结果显示槲皮素在80-2000μg/mL回复突变菌落数明显增加并超过对照2倍并有明显剂量反应关系,Ames试验结果阳性;改进彷徨试验结果显示槲皮素在0.64-80μg/mL变色孔数明显增加(P<0.01),并有剂量反应关系,结果为阳性;而在0.64-16μg/mL剂量下,改进彷徨试验能检测出阳性结果,而Ames试验未检测出阳性结果。结论:在较低浓度时,改进彷徨试验能检测出Ames试验检测不出的阳性结果,表明改进彷徨试验灵敏度较Ames试验高。     

重组乙型肝炎疫苗(CHO细胞)鉴别试验的方法研究

目的：建立重组乙型肝炎疫苗(CHO细胞)鉴别试验的方法。方法：取重组乙型肝炎疫苗(CHO细胞)以1：10比例加入lmol/L盐酸调节pH值,采用ELISA双抗体夹心法检测,同时设以氢氧化铝、未处理的重组乙型肝炎疫苗、狂犬疫苗、出血热疫苗,以及试剂盒的阴、阳性作为对照。结果：狂犬疫苗、出血热疫苗及氢氧化铝对照为阴性,直接检测重组乙型肝炎疫苗(CHO细胞)呈弱阳性,加入盐酸调节pH值后原倍样品呈弱阳性,10倍稀释后呈强阳性。采用该方法检测5批疫苗均呈强阳性。组内平行试验,组间重复试验。结论：将重组乙型肝炎疫苗(CHO细胞)调节pH值后10倍稀释,用ELISA双抗体夹心法检测呈阳性,而且稳定可靠,该方法可用于该疫苗的鉴别试验。     

Adjusting O'Brien's test to control type I error for the generalized nonparametric Behrens-Fisher problem

O'Brien (1984, Biometrics 40, 1079-1087) introduced a simple nonparametric test procedure for testing whether multiple outcomes in one treatment group have consistently larger values than outcomes in the other treatment group. We first explore the theoretical properties of O'Brien's test. We then extend it to the general nonparametric Behrens-Fisher hypothesis problem when no assumption is made regarding the shape of the distributions. We provide conditions when O'Brien's test controls its error probability asymptotically and when it fails. We also provide adjusted tests when the conditions do not hold. Throughout this article, we do not assume that all outcomes are continuous. Simulations are performed to compare the adjusted tests to O'Brien's test. The difference is also illustrated using data from a Parkinson's disease clinical trial.     

A seroprevalence survey of Toxoplasma gondii in common wombats (Vombatus ursinus)

Serum was collected from 23 wild common wombats (Vombatus ursinus) on a pastoral property in the Southern Tablelands of New South Wales, Australia (231N 616E) between 3rd August 2001 and 25th March 2002. The serum was tested using three serological methods for antibodies to Toxoplasma gondii. Six animals (26.1%) were shown to have antibodies to T. gondii. The latex agglutination test proved to be less sensitive than the direct agglutination test or the modified agglutination test. This is the first serological survey of T. gondii in wombats. This is the first recorded use of the latex agglutination test on wombat serum. This study demonstrated the highest percentage of seropositive animals in any serological survey for T. gondii in marsupials.     

Intercalibration of ecotoxicity testing protocols with Artemia franciscana

The brine shrimp, Artemia spp., is widely used in ecotoxicology as a target biological model. Although several protocols were available in the early 1980s, only the 24-h acute mortality toxicity test was evaluated in a European intercalibration exercise during that period. Nevertheless, documentation of standard methods serving to provide specifications, guidelines or detailed characteristics of the 24-h protocol is still unavailable. This paper present the results of an intercalibration study of three toxicity-testing protocols using Artemia franciscana: (a) the 24-h static acute mortality test, (b) the 48-h static hatching test and (c) the 14-d static-renewal long-term mortality test. A first tier of experiments was conducted by a reference laboratory, which investigated the repeatability of the three methods. The feasibility and reproducibility of these protocols were then investigated by an intercomparison exercise involving 11 participants for the acute mortality test, seven for the acute hatching test and nine for the long-term mortality test. Protocols were tested on reference toxicants (copper sulphate pentahydrate and sodium dodecyl sulphate). The coefficients of variation were <20% and <50% for intra- and interlaboratory activities, respectively. These results encourage the standardization of the proposed methods and their use as regulatory procedures.     

Signs of deferasirox genotoxicity

Iron overload is a major health problem for patients who have to have continuous blood transfusions. It brings some metabolic problems together. Various iron chelating agents are being used for treatment of hemochromatosis which arises from excess iron accumulation. This study was conducted with the aim of determining whether deferasirox used as an iron chelator in patients with hemochromatosis has genotoxic effects. Commercial form of deferasirox, Exjade was used as test material. Test material showed a general mutagen character in mutant strains of Salmonella typhimurium. Deferasirox has also led to an increase in mutagenity-related polymorphic band count in random amplification of polymorphic DNA test done with bone marrow cells of rats. Similarly, test material has increased micronucleus formation in cultured in vitro human peripheral lymphocytes particularly in 48 h period. Consistently with the abovementioned findings, deferasirox reduced nuclear division index (NDI) compared to controls and some part of these reductions are statistically significant. NDI reductions were found at positive control levels at high concentrations.     

梨果仙人掌红花品系的毒性研究

通过对梨果仙人掌红花品系的小鼠急性毒性试验、小鼠骨髓嗜多染红细胞微核试验、小鼠精子畸形试验研究,梨果仙人掌红花品系雌、雄小鼠LD50均大于170．0g／kgBw,属无毒物质;小鼠骨髓嗜多染红细胞微核试验、小鼠精子畸形试验结果均为阴性。因此在本次实验条件下,梨果仙人掌红花品系为无毒物质,未显示有遗传毒性作用。     

Testing for Poisson Zero Inflation in Disease Mapping

When analyzing mortality data due to rare diseases in small areas, it is common to find several health zones with no mortality cases. In these circumstances, the classical homogeneous model based on the Poisson distribution used to estimate the relative risks within each area may encounter lack of fit due to a disproportionately large frequency of zeros. To cope with these zeros, the zero inflated Poisson model can be used. In this paper, we propose a test for detecting zero inflation in the context of disease mapping which is based on bootstrap techniques. The test is illustrated using male mortality data due to brain cancer in Navarra, Spain. In addition, comparisons with other tests for Poisson zero inflation such as the score test and the likelihood ratio test are carried out in terms of empirical power and size using the brain cancer scenario. The proposed bootstrap test has good power and size and works well when detecting the excess of zeros in small area data sets. (© 2004 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

A Multivariate Goodness-of-Fit Test for Stochastically Ordered Distributions

There are a number of nonparametric procedures known for testing goodness-of-fit in the univariate case. Similar procedures can be derived for testing goodness-of-fit in the multivariate case through an application of the theory of statistically equivalent blocks (SEB). The SEB transforms the data into coverages which are distributed as spacings from a uniform distribution on [0,1], under the null hypothesis. In this paper, we present a multivariate nonparametric test of goodness-of-fit based on the SEB when the multivariate distributions under the null hypothesis and the alternative hypothesis are “weakly” ordered. Empirical results are given on the performance of the proposed test in an application to the problem of assessing the reliability of a p-component system.     

Exact Calculation of Permutational Distributions for Two Dependent Samples I

A simple Fortran subroutine is given for the calculation of permutational distributions. Important special cases are Fisher's randomization test, the Wilcoxon signed ranks test and the sign test. The algorithm works in polynomial time. Thus it can be used even for micro-computers within justifiable time limits.     

Comparison of properties of tests for assessing tumor clonality

SUMMARY: In a recent article Begg et al. (2007, Biometrics 63, 522-530) proposed a statistical test to determine whether or not a diagnosed second primary tumor is biologically independent of the original primary tumor, by comparing patterns of allelic losses at candidate genetic loci. The proposed concordant mutations test is a conditional test, an adaptation of Fisher's exact test, that requires no knowledge of the marginal mutation probabilities. The test was shown to have generally good properties, but is susceptible to anticonservative bias if there is wide variation in mutation probabilities between loci, or if the individual mutation probabilities of the parental alleles for individual patients differ substantially from each other. In this article, a likelihood ratio test is derived in an effort to address these validity issues. This test requires prespecification of the marginal mutation probabilities at each locus, parameters for which some information will typically be available in the literature. In simulations this test is shown to be valid, but to be considerably less efficient than the concordant mutations test for sample sizes (numbers of informative loci) typical of this problem. Much of the efficiency deficit can be recovered, however, by restricting the allelic imbalance parameter estimate to a prespecified range, assuming that this parameter is in the prespecified range.     

细菌性阴道病联合测定技术在BV诊断中的应用

目的 探讨生化法在细菌性阴道病(BV)诊断中的应用价值.方法 分别使用镜检法和生化法对1466例就诊者的阴道分泌物进行检测.结果 在1 466例受检者中,使用生化法检出BV患者1 297例,使用镜检法检出BV患者1 301例.经统计学分析,二者检出BV的阳性率差异无统计学意义(x2=0.46,P＞0.05),且二者的符合率为97.14％ (1424/1466).结论 生化法检测准确快速,适宜在基层医院推广使用.