Baseline sensitivity

Nevertheless, a rapid disappearance of resistant bacteria was observed after stopping the antibiotic treatment (fig. 5). Different kinetics of disappearance were, however, observed. The aerobic species showed a more rapid return to the baseline sensitive status whereas the anaerobic bacteria, especially the Gram-negative rods, regained sensitivity to rifaximin more slowly. In any case, 3 months after the end of treatment resistant strains were no longer detectable in the feces [82], These results support the cyclic use of rifaximin that has been adopted by the investigators in the treatment of hepatic encephalopathy [77] and colonic diverticular disease [79]. 

Establish baseline sensitivity levels in wild strains. 

Baseline Sensitivities Any changes or gradients in pH, organic modifiers, ionic strength, or temperature may lead to baseline drifting. The baseline drift is attributable to variations in the extent of surface oxide formation. 

Fig. 2. DSC-trace of cyclododecane showing the melting transition at 333.4 K and an additional phase transition at 184.4 K. The sensitivity for the upper curve and the baseline reference was increased ten times. Heating rate 2.5 K/min. (Ref.7))...

TLC analysis of the crude product (elution with 50 1 pentane ether, visualization with iodine) showed three non-baseline spots Rf 0.65 (cis isomer), Rf 0.52 (unknown impurity), and Rf 0.32 (trans isomer). The unknown impurity is intensely sensitive to iodine and largely coelutes with the cw-isomer in the subsequent column chromatography. However, the ll NMR spectrum of this isomer shows excellent purity despite the presence of this spot on TLC. In 100 1 pentane ether, Rf values of the cis and trans isomers are about 0.50 and 0.15, respectively. 

In special applications people have built telescopes with very sparse arrays of mirrors in order to sample the resolution space with minimum number of mirrors. Systems like this may give greater angular resolution (longer baseline) but have less sensitivity due to the smaller collecting area. 

Sensitivity by itself is not sufficient to completely evaluate an LCEC system for analytical purposes. The minimum detectable quantity (detection limit) is of more practical importance. The detection limit takes into consideration the amount of baseline noise as well as the response to the analyte. The detection limit is then defined as the quantity of analyte which gives a signal-to-noise ratio of three (a S/N of 3 is the generally accepted criterion although other values have been used). For a complete description of an LCEC application, both the sensitivity and detection limit, along with the S/N criteria used, should be provided. 

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