Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology

1-6

Authors: Tebit E Kwenti

Helminth infections present one of the most common parasitic infections worldwide with a greater proportion occurring in the less developed areas of the world like Sub-Saharan Africa. Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest regional prevalence of HIV in the world. Due to the overlapping geographical distribution of these infections, coinfection between helminths and HIV are likely to be common. This study was therefore designed to determine the prevalence of helminth infection among HIV patients in Cameroon and to determine the effect on helminth infection in HIV by measuring the CD4+T cell count. Helminth infection was determined in faecal specimen by the formol ether concentration technique and quantifies with the Kato Katz technique. CD4+T cell count were determined with a BD FASCount™. Among the 241 HIV-positive patients that were enrolled into the study, 6(2.5%) were coinfected with helminths. Among those coinfected with helminths, 2(33.3%) were infected with Ascaris lumbricoides, 2(33.3%) with Trichuris trichiura, 1(16.7%) with Strongyloides stercoralisand 1(16.7%) with Schistosoma mansoni. Dual infection with more than one helminth was not observed in the study. The mean egg intensity were 1944, 420, 144 for the specimen which contained Ascaris lumbricoides, Trichuris trichiuraand Schistosoma mansoniova respectively. The mean CD4+T cell count among helminth coinfected patients was 627.93 cells/μl. no significant association between CD4+T cell count and helminth infection wasobserved (P = 0.4815), neither was there any significant association between CD4+T cell count in co-infectedpatients and patients without helminth infection (P = 0.1110). We came to the conclusion that the prevalence of helminth infection among HIV patients in study population was low and the influence of helminth infection on the outcome of HIV may be limited.

1-5

Authors: Sathish Kumar S

Bioaccumulation of zinc (II) by yeast isolate C. krusei was investigated in different growth media. The isolate showed maximum bioaccumulation of zinc (II) in the medium prepared from sugarcane bagasse extract. The growth and bioaccumulation properties of yeast were tested as a function of pH and initial metal concentration in bagasse extract. The optimum pH value for growth and metal accumulation was determined as 5.5. The combined effects of sugar extracted from bagasse and initial zinc (II) concentration on specific growth rate and bioaccumulation efficiency of yeast was investigated. At a constant zinc (II) concentration, the growth and zinc (II) bioaccumulation increased with increasing concentrations of sugar up to 20 g/L. The inhibition effect of zinc (II)ions on the specific growth rate of yeasts was studied by non competitive and uncompetitive inhibition models at various concentrations of zinc (II)ranging from 0-25 mg/L at constant sugar concentrations (5-20 g/L).