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Given the wide usage of Roundup, a common herbicide, the impacts of its presence in ecological communities are of great interest. Many studies have investigated the effects of glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, on different factions of an ecosystem including on animals, plants, microorganisms, and nutrients. The current study expanded upon these works using Roundup instead of glyphosate to provide a realistic application in which to observe the development of microbial assemblages and nutrient composition in two different habitats. Winogradsky columns were prepared using benthic material from a ditch and a pond. Varying concentrations of Roundup were introduced to the columns at the beginning of the study and microbial growth and nutrient compositions from each column were measured weekly. The results indicate that the presence of Roundup has varying effects on microorganisms and nutrients. While photosynthetic microbes were negatively impacted, a shift in the microbial composition to heterotrophic microbes indicates that these microorganisms were able to utilize some ingredients in Roundup as a nutrient source. Additionally, the temporal analysis of nutrient compositions indicated that microbes metabolize glyphosate starting with the phosphate moiety even when the other compounds in Roundup are present. While these trends were observed in both benthic habitats, the composition of the ecological community can affect its ability to utilize the ingredients in Roundup as a nutrient source.

IntroductionThe COVID-19 pandemic has had a tremendous negative effect on the mental health and well-being of Canadians. These mental health challenges are especially acute among vulnerable Canadian populations. People living in Canada’s most populous province, Ontario, have spent prolonged time in lockdown and under public health measures and there is a gap in our understanding of how this has impacted the mental health system. This protocol describes the Mental health and Addictions Service and Care Study that will use a repeated cross-sectional design to examine the effects, impacts, and needs of Ontario adults during the COVID-19 pandemic.Methods and analysisA cross-sectional survey of Ontario adults 18 years or older, representative of the provincial population based on age, gender and location was conducted using Delvinia’s AskingCanadians panel from January to March 2022. Study sample was 2500 in phases 1 and 2, and 5000 in phase 3. The Alcohol, Smoking and Substance Involvement Screening Test and Diagnostic Statistical Manual-5 Self-Rated Level 1 Cross-Cutting Symptom Measure-Adult were used to assess for substance and mental health concerns. Participants were asked about mental health and addiction service-seeking and/or accessing prior to and during the pandemic. Analyses to be conducted include: predictors of service access (ie, sociodemographics, mental illness and/or addiction, and social supports) before and during the pandemic, and χ2 tests and logistic regressions to analyse for significant associations between variables and within subgroups.Ethics and disseminationEthics approval was obtained from the Sunnybrook Research Ethics Board. Dissemination plans include scientific publications and conferences, and online products for stakeholders and the general public.

Pulses have been an excellence source of foods due to their nutritional profile including high protein content. In addition, they have less concerns about allergens, gluten, and genetically modified organisms. In this study, high moisture meat analogs (HMMA) that contained commercial pea protein (55.4% protein), lentil protein (55.4% protein), or faba bean protein (61.5% protein) mixed with other constant ingredients (pea isolates, and wheat gluten and canola oil) were produced using a twin‐screw extruder (TX‐52) with an attached cooling chamber. For consumer sensory tests and texture profile analysis, vegetable hamburger patties with HMMA were produced with the addition of spices, binders, and so on. Trained panelists reported that HMMA with pulses had higher scores on bean‐like, sweet, and cohesiveness of mass compared to HMMA with soy that had higher soy, cardboardy, hardness, and springiness scores. Compared to the control, consumer panelists indicated that samples containing pulse proteins had no differences in consumers’ liking for the cooked appearance and overall flavor, but had a lower overall texture liking score, and samples with faba bean proteins (FP) had a lower overall liking score. Cooked patties containing pulse proteins were redder and had more cooking yield. Patties with FP required less cooking time. Therefore, vegetable patties with pulse proteins are competitive with soy‐based samples. Consumer like (a) or dislike (b) descriptors for vegetable patties containing high moisture meat analog with lentil proteins.

Abstract Background Most studies on the safety and efficacy of antitumor necrosis factor alpha (anti-TNF) agents in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease have included few Black patients. Aims We aimed to evaluate the therapeutic response rate in Black IBD patients compared with White patients. Methods We conducted a retrospective review of IBD patients who were treated with anti-TNF agents and assessed those with therapeutic drug levels for clinical, endoscopic, and radiologic response to anti-TNF treatment. Results We identified 118 patients who met the inclusion criteria. Black IBD patients had significantly higher prevalence of endoscopic and radiologic active disease compared with White patients (62% and 34%, respectively; P = .023), despite similar proportions reaching therapeutic titers (67% and 55%, respectively; P = .20). Moreover, Black patients had significantly higher rate of IBD-related hospitalizations than White patients (30% vs 13%, respectively; P = .025) while on anti-TNF agents. Conclusions Black IBD patients on anti-TNF agents had a significantly higher prevalence of active disease and more IBD-related hospitalizations than White patients. Lay Summary This study explores the question of how IBD therapeutic efficacy may vary among racial groups.

SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 disease vary with respect to viral variant and host vaccination status. However, how vaccines, emergent variants, and their intersection shift host responses in the human nasal mucosa remains uncharacterized. We and others have shown during the first SARS-CoV-2 wave that a muted nasal epithelial interferon response at the site of infection underlies severe COVID-19. We sought to further understand how upper airway cell subsets and states associate with COVID-19 phenotypes across viral variants and vaccination. Here, we integrated new single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) data from nasopharyngeal swabs collected from 67 adult participants during the Delta and Omicron waves with data of 45 participants collected during the original (Ancestral) wave from our prior study. By characterizing detailed cellular states during infection, we identified changes in epithelial and immune cells that are both unique and shared across variants and vaccination status. By defining SARS-CoV-2 RNA+ cells for each variant, we found that Delta samples had a marked increase in abundance of viral RNA+ cells. Despite this dramatic increase in viral RNA+ cells, the nasal cellular landscapes of Delta and Omicron exhibit greater similarity, driven partly by myeloid subsets, than the Ancestral landscapes associated with specialized epithelial subsets. We found that vaccination was surprisingly associated with nasal macrophage recruitment and activation rather than adaptive immune cell signatures. While patients with severe disease caused by Ancestral or Delta variants had muted interferon responses, Omicron-infected patients had equivalent interferon responses regardless of disease severity. Our study defines the evolution of cellular targets and signatures of disease severity in the upper respiratory tract across SARS-CoV-2 variants, and suggests that intramuscular vaccines shape myeloid responses in the nasal mucosa upon SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Viral variant and host vaccination status impact infection with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), yet how these factors shift cellular responses in the human nasal mucosa remains uncharacterized. We performed single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) on nasopharyngeal swabs from vaccinated and unvaccinated adults with acute Delta and Omicron SARS-CoV-2 infections and integrated with data from acute infections with ancestral SARS-CoV-2. Patients with Delta and Omicron exhibited greater similarity in nasal cell composition driven by myeloid, T cell and SARS-CoV-2 hi cell subsets, which was distinct from that of ancestral cases. Delta-infected samples had a marked increase in viral RNA, and a subset of PER2 + EGR1 + GDF15 + epithelial cells was enriched in SARS-CoV-2 RNA + cells in all variants. Prior vaccination was associated with increased frequency and activation of nasal macrophages. Expression of interferon-stimulated genes negatively correlated with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) severity in patients with ancestral and Delta but not Omicron variants. Our study defines nasal cell responses and signatures of disease severity across SARS-CoV-2 variants and vaccination. Ordovas-Montanes and colleagues describe the composition of the nasal cellular ecosystem and signatures of disease severity in vaccinated and unvaccinated adults during infection with the ancestral, Delta and Omicron variants of SARS-CoV-2.