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4 New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis Rosely Maria Zancope-Oliveira, Rodrigo de Almeida-Paes, Manoel Marques Evangelista de Oliveira, Dayvison Francis Saraiva Freitas and Maria Clara Gutierrez Galhardo Instituto de Pesquisa Clínica Evandro Chagas – Fundação Oswaldo Cruz Brazil 1. Introduction Sporotrichosis is a subcutaneous mycosis that is globally distributed. Areas of high endemicity are Latin America, South Africa, India and Japan (Lopez-Romero et al., 2011; Queiroz-Telles et al., 2011). This infection is caused by the dimorphic fungus, previously described as the single species Sporothrix schenckii (Coura, 2005), that is now named the S. schenckii species complex (Marimon et al., 2006, 2007, 2008), which is associated with plants and soil (Ramos e Silva et al., 2007). In humans, sporotrichosis has been regarded as a job- related disease that usually occurs in the form of isolated cases or small outbreaks and affects only people exposed to plants or soil rich in organic matter and occasionally laboratory technicians (Copper et al., 1992; Hajjeh et al., 1997). The fungus S. schenckii was isolated for the first time in 1896 by Benjamin Schenck from a 36-year-old male patient who presented with lesions on his right hand and arm. This isolate was classified into the genus Sporotrichum (Schenck, 1898). Hekton and Perkins described the second sporotrichosis case in 1900. These investigators isolated the fungus and created the current denomination, Sporothrix schenckii (Hekton & Perkins, 1900, as cited in Coura, 2005). In the early 1900s, sporotrichosis was a common disease in France, and many features of the fungus and the less-common clinical manifestations were described. At the same time, potassium iodide began to be used to treat sporotrichosis (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992) and is a satisfactory therapy for treatment of sporotrichosis, until now. The first reported case of natural animal infection was described in 1907 by Lutz and Splendore in rats from Brazil (Lutz & Splendore, 1907, as cited in Coura, 2005). In 1908, in Brazil, Splendore described the asteroid bodies around Sporothrix yeast cells, which are used to diagnose sporotrichosis during histological examinations (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992). Classically, subcutaneous mycosis is usually associated with puncture injuries in farmers, florists, leisure gardeners, landscapers and greenhouse workers. However, in the zoonotic sporotrichosis endemic area of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, transmission of the disease has been occurring broadly in the populace through the scratches or bites of S. schenckii infected cats (Schubach et al., 2008). Less commonly, other form of acquisition of the infection is inhalation of fungus conidia from soil (Rohatgi, 1980) and from infected animals, being cats the most involved. Sporotrichosis is primarily a cutaneous disease. After inoculation, a www.intechopen.com 54 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives papule develops at the site of inoculation and generally ulcerates, forms into nodules and then develops proximal to the primary lesion followed by lymphatic distribution and often ulceration. This is the lymphocutaneous form and is followed in frequency by the fixed form, which is characterised by a localised lesion without lymphatic involvement (Schubach et al., 2008). Disseminated forms are unusual and frequently occur in immunosuppressed hosts (Schechtman, 2010). Disseminated cutaneous sporotrichosis is primarily characterised by multiple lesions scattered over several parts of the body or the spread of haematogenous lesions. Osteoarticular (Campos-Macías et al., 2006) and pulmonary lesions (Losman & Cavanaugh, 2004; Callens et al., 2005) are the most common extracutaneous forms. All forms are rare in normal hosts. Mucosal involvement is sporadic, and the conjunctiva is the most commonly affected mucosa (Schubach, et al., 2005). Meningitis is one of the worst complications of S. schenckii infection, and several recently reported cases describe AIDS as an underlying risk factor (Galhardo et al., 2010). Pathogenic fungi of the genus Sporothrix are dimorphic in the environment or when cultured in the laboratory at 25-30ºC. In the filamentous form, they present as hyaline, septate, branched hyphae with single-celled conidia of two types: hyaline and brown (dematiaceous). Hyaline conidia are small, ovoid and usually occur in the apical portion of conidiophores. Dematiaceous conidia are large and ovoid with a thick cell wall and are present along the entire length of the hyphae (Siegler et al., 1990). Macroscopically, filamentous S. schenckii colonies are initially white and gradually become brown to dark black as the fungus produces the conidia, which are unable to form chains. In contrast, the parasitic phase and the yeast phase of S. schenckii that develops when the fungus is cultured in appropriate culture media at 35º-37ºC, resembles cigar-shaped oval yeast cells, which may have one or more buds (Ramos e Silva et al., 2007). Macroscopically, colonies of S. schenckii grown at 37ºC have a yellowish-beige colour and a creamy texture. Sporothrix schenckii belongs to the Fungi Kingdom. After the substantial fungal taxonomy revision by Guarro and co-workers, this fungus was placed in the Ascomycota Division, Pyrenomycetes Class, Ophiostomatales Order, Ophiostomataceae Family (Guarro et al., 1999). Recently, it was suggested that S. schenckii should not be considered the only taxon, which causes sporotrichosis in human and animals because four new species have been identified (Marimon et al., 2006, 2007, 2008). Mycoses can be challenging to diagnose, and accurate interpretation of laboratory data is important to ensure appropriate treatment. Although the clinical manifestations of sporotrichosis are well described, the diagnosis of this mycosis cannot be based on clinical information alone because the symptoms of sporotrichosis overlap of with those of other diseases. Also, a definitive diagnosis requires isolation of Sporothrix spp. on specific culture media or visualisation of the yeast form during direct examination of clinical specimens using specific fungal staining techniques. However, these procedures are time consuming, usually taking a minimum of 15 days, and lack sensitivity. Furthermore, Sporothrix spp. structures can be confused with those of other fungal pathogens when visualised microscopically. Given these difficulties, other techniques have been developed to supplement culture and microscopic examination. These laboratory tests have a rapid turnaround time and reasonable specificity and sensitivity. In this chapter, some of the well-established clinical and laboratorial diagnoses will be discussed and current conventional diagnostic tools will be reviewed. Additionally, we will outline of the development of novel diagnostic methods and discuss their relative merits and disadvantages. www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 55 2. Diagnosis Sporotrichosis is classically diagnosed by correlation of clinical, epidemiological and laboratorial data. Erythematous, ulcerated, or verrucous lesions that appear at the site of a skin injury that are caused by trauma with material from vegetal origin or by a scratch or bite from an animal, such as a cat, with subsequent nodular lymphangitic spread, are strong clinical and epidemiological indicators of mycotic infection (Coura, 2005). To confirm the diagnosis, laboratorial examinations must be performed. Typical laboratory analyses involved in sporotrichosis diagnosis include microscopic examination and culture of clinical specimens, such as skin biopsies or pus, from the patient's lesions. Although, in cases of disseminated or extracutaneous sporotrichosis other specimens such as sputum, urine, blood, synovial and cerebrospinal fluids can be analysed depending on the affected organs or systems (Kwon-Chung & Bennet, 1992). Currently, there are additional diagnostic tools available for the diagnosis of sporotrichosis. For instance, serological techniques involving antibody detection against S. schenckii antigens have been developed using different enzyme linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA) formats and antigenic preparations (Almeida-Paes et al., 2007a; Bernardes- Engemman et al., 2005). Molecular methods to detect S. schenckii DNA in clinical specimens, including tissue fragments, are also being studied in several laboratories to facilitate quick diagnosis of infection (Hu et al., 2003; Kano et al., 2003). The next sections will focus on these diagnostic applications for diagnosis sporotrichosis. 2.1 Clinical types and differential diagnosis 2.1.1 Clinical types Sporotrichosis affects both sexes and can occur at any age. In most cases, sporotrichosis is a benign infection that is restricted to the skin, subcutaneous tissue and adjacent lymph vessels (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992; Rippon, 1988). The disease can be divided into four clinical forms (Sampaio et al., 1954, as cited in Ramos-e- Silva et al., 2007): The lymphocutaneous form is the most common presentation and accounts for up to 75% of cases and is the easiest sporotrichosis to diagnose. The lesions are usually located on the upper extremities and are characterised by the appearance of a primary lesion at the site of inoculation after two or three weeks. This lesion can be ulcerated with an infiltrated base or a papular, nodular, nodular-ulcerative, ulcerative-gummy or vegetative plaque. From the initial injury, it forms a chain of painless nodules along the path of the lymph vessels, which may soften and ulcerate with little exudates that can be classified as sporotrichoid (Figure 1). Usually, the regional lymph nodes are not involved, and no skin changes are observed between the nodes. Erythema can be present, but the pain is usually mild. A secondary infection may occur and is associated with increased erythema and suppuration. The fixed cutaneous form is the second most common and accounts for approximately 20% of cases. The lesion remains confined to the inoculation site and the lymph vessels are not involved. The lesions are ulcers (Figure 2), verrucous, or infiltrated plaques. Small satellite lesions are common and are frequently observed in children. The upper and low extremities are the most common sites of lesions, and children present with a high index of lesions on the face. Unlike the lymphocutaneous form, patients with the fixed cutaneous form do not present systemic symptoms. However, if left untreated, the lesions may evolve into a chronic course, and a spontaneous involution of the lesion can occur. www.intechopen.com 56 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives Fig. 1. Lymphocutaneous sporotrichosis. Fig. 2. Fixed cutaneous sporotrichosis. www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 57 The disseminated cutaneous form presents with nodular, gummy, or ulcerated disseminated lesions (Figure 3). Following inoculation of the skin, there is a haematogenous dissemination, which initially presents as softened subcutaneous lesions that can ulcerate after weeks or months. Although quite rare, it has been reported in AIDS patients and in patients submitted to a long course of steroid therapy as the first manifestation of this syndrome. Disseminated cutaneous sporotrichosis is more frequently observed (up to 16% of cases) during endemic zoonotic sporotrichosis in non-immunosuppressed patients infected by cat zoonotic transmission of the fungus (Barros et al., 2004; Freitas et al., 2010), which is attributed to multiple inoculations. Fig. 3. Disseminated cutaneous sporotrichosis. The extracutaneous form appears in less than 5% of cases and is difficult to diagnose. It arises after haematogenous spread of the fungus, conidial inhalation, contact with a skin lesion or direct inoculation of a mucosal site. Any organ or tissue can be affected by sporotrichosis, and the symptoms are specific to the organ involved and are then followed by fever and general commitment in some cases. Involvement can be unifocal or multifocal. Immunosuppression, caused by conditions such as diabetes, alcoholism, malignancy, www.intechopen.com 58 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives steroid therapy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and AIDS, is common in the pulmonary and nervous forms (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992; Rippon, 1988). Some points of emphasis are: Bones and joints are the most commonly affected sites after the skin. The most commonly affected bones are the tibia, small bones of hands, radius, ulna, skull and face. Additionally, the joints of the hands, elbow, wrist, knee and ankle are also commonly affected. Most patients have infection of a single joint, which presents as a solitary granuloma. Destructive arthritis (Figure 4) or tenosynovitis may occur. Fig. 4. Bilateral destructive lesions on the knees and on the left wrist in a patient with osteoarticular sporotrichosis. Pulmonary infection is frequently caused by inhalation of conidia and is not caused by dissemination of the fungus. Clinically, pulmonary sporotrichosis manifests as a chronic pulmonary disease with cavitation or hilar massive lymphadenopathy, the later has a certain frequency of spontaneous resolution. Ocular infection can result from an exogenous infection or haematogenous dissemination. It may manifest as conjunctivitis with characteristic visible granulomas, episcleritis, dacryocystitis, corneal ulceration, uveitis, nodular iritis, retrobulbar lesion, panophthalmitis, ulceration or ectropia and can lead to total blindness in rare cases. Cases of isolated granulomatous conjunctivitis have been reported in Brazil without cutaneous disease and are related to cat zoonotic transmission (Barros et al., 2004). The mucosa in the mouth, pharynx, larynx and nose can be infected by both direct and haematogenous routes. Exanthema, ulceration, suppuration and vegetation are clinical manifestations. Infection of the nervous system presents as brain abscesses or chronic meningitis, which is indolent and is associated with hypoglycorrhachia, hyperproteinorrhachia and low mononuclear cell counts. A common and potentially serious complication in these cases is hydrocephalus. The first-choice for treatment of the cutaneous forms is oral itraconazole. Oral terbinafine is an alternative medication. Potassium iodide, despite being a classical and inexpensive drug, is difficult to tolerate and does not have sufficient scientific background to be recommended for sporotrichosis. Treatment with venous amphotericin B is reserved for severe patients and is also an option for the disseminated forms involving internal organs. Immunosuppressed patients often need higher doses of itraconazole and longer courses of treatment (Kauffman et al., 2007). www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 59 2.1.2 Differential diagnosis Lymphocutaneous sporotrichosis is fairly common and can be confidently diagnosed. However pyoderma, atypical Mycobacterium and Nocardia infection as well as leishmaniasis must also be considered (Coura, 2005). The clinical symptoms of the fixed form can be similar to pyoderma, paracoccidioidomycosis, chromoblastomycosis, cutaneous tuberculosis, atypical mycobacteria, tertiary syphilis, leishmaniasis, and even skin cancer. Lesions of the disseminated cutaneous form can be confused with other deep mycosis, such as paracoccidioidomycosis or histoplasmosis, or with atypical mycobacteria and non- infectious granulomatous diseases. The disseminated extracutaneous forms are diagnosed differently according to the affected organ. Other fungal conjunctivitis, bacterial osteomyelitis, pulmonary fungal infections, tuberculosis and sarcoidosis should also be considered. 2.2 Conventional diagnosis Depending on which clinical specimen is sent to the mycology laboratory for diagnosis, some procedures must be performed before microscopic and culture analyses. Skin biopsies should be sent to the laboratory in a sterile physiological saline solution. Water and formaldehyde are not suitable as transporter because they interfere with the microbiological tests. In the laboratory, skin/mucosa fragments have to be triturated using surgical scissors (Figure 5). Grinding the clinical specimen with a mortar and pestle should be avoided because it can destroy fungal structures present on the material. Pus from ulcerated lesions does not require special treatment and can be analysed directly after sample collection (Molinaro et al., 2010). Fig. 5. Skin fragment being triturated for mycological examination. Direct microscopic examination of the specimens is typically performed on specimens in 10% potassium hydroxide or 4% sodium hydroxide to detect parasitic cigar shaped-budding yeast-like cells using a light microscope with a magnification of 400X to 1000X. These fungal cells are small (2-6µm in diameter), rare and hard to detect during direct examination of the www.intechopen.com 60 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives specimens obtained from human patients (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992) or from domestic animals, such as dogs (Schubach et al., 2006). On the other hand, when this test is performed on skin biopsies collected from cats infected with S. schenckii yeast cells are easily observable (Figure 6A) because cats have a high fungal burden on their lesions (Schubach et al., 2004). Although yeast-like cells can be observed during microscopic examination in a few cases, they do not provide a definitive diagnosis of sporotrichosis. Histoplasma capsulatum var. capsulatum and Candida glabrata, two other pathogenic fungi that may cause skin infections, can also appear as small, round or oval yeast cells similar to S. schenckii (Larone, 2002). To identify the fungus, fluorescent methods using calcofluor white dye or fluorescent- antibody staining can be performed. However, these techniques are expensive and are not available in most laboratories, especially in underdeveloped countries. Staining methods, including the Gram and Giemsa preparations, also aid in the microscopic identification of clinical specimens from patients with sporotrichosis. When the Gram stain is performed on the clinical specimens, the yeast cells are positively stained and occasionally surrounded by giant or polymorphonuclear cells (Figure 6B). Although both fluorescent and staining methodologies facilitate the identification of fungal cells when compared to the clarification by hydroxide solutions, both procedures lack sensitivity (Lacaz et al., 2002). Fig. 6. Direct examination of clinical specimens from patients with sporotrichosis. (A) Skin biopsy of a cat with sporotrichosis showing several yeast-like budding cells. Magnification 400X. (B) Gram stain of pus from a human patient with sporotrichosis showing cigar shaped yeast-like cells. Magnification 1000X. Histopathological examination using a tissue fragment in formaldehyde is important for the diagnosis of sporotrichosis. Although S. schenckii yeast-like cells may be seen in skin biopsies with the routinely used hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stains, other stains such as Gomori methenamine silver (GMS) or periodic acid-Schiff (PAS) can be used to confirm identification of fungal elements (Figure 7A). Parasitic cells of S. schenckii, which can be found within phagocitic cells or in the extracellular space, are difficult to see due to the paucity of these cells in lesions from human patients (Larone, 2002; Quintella et al., 2011). The reaction of the tissue is another important characteristic that should be evaluated during histopathologic examination of skin biopsies during diagnosis of sporotrichosis. S. schenckii usually causes a mixed suppurative and granulomatous inflammatory response in the dermis and adjacent subcutaneous tissue (Figure 7B). Cases of disseminated disease also present a www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 61 mixed inflammatory reaction. Fibrosis and micro abscess are frequently observed on cutaneous infections. Moreover, hyperkeratosis, parakeratosis and pseudoepitheliomatous hyperplasia may also occur (Larone, 2002). In addition to intact polymorphonuclear cells, the granuloma formed during sporotrichosis may also contain cellular debris, caseous material, lymphocytes, plasmocytes, giant and epithelioid cells, fibroblasts and yeasts (Quintella et al., 2011). Some authors also report that foreign material of vegetal origin related to the traumatic inoculation of the agent may be found in rare cases (Orellana et al., 2009). Fig. 7. Histological examination of skin biopsies from patients with sporotrichosis. (A) Gomori methenamine silver stain presenting a yeast-like cell with a cigar-shaped bud, suggestive of S. schenckii. Magnification 400X. (B) Hematoxylin and eosin stain presenting a suppurative and granulomatous reaction with neutrophils. Magnification 400X. (Courtesy of Leonardo P. Quintella.) Some histopathologic changes on analysed tissues may be also related to the observation of the etiologic agent on tissue sections. The presence or predominance of epithelioid granulomas, caseous/fibrinoid necrosis and fibrosis as well as the occurrence of foreign body granulomas with predominance of lymphocytes is related to a lack of fungal observation. Suppurative granulomas, neutrophils and liquefaction are more common when S. schenckii yeast-like cells are encountered (Quintella et al., 2011). Several authors observed the Splendore-Hoeppli reaction on histopathologic tissue sections from sporotrichosis patients. This reaction indicates a localised immunologic response to antigens of several infectious organisms, such as fungi, bacteria and parasites (Hussein, 2008), and appears as a radiating homogenous, refractile, eosinophilic, club-like material surrounding a central eosinophilic focus (Larone, 2002). Splendore first observed this structure in 1908 on tissue sections from patients with sporotrichosis and afterwards by Hoeppli in 1932 around schistosome larvae (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992). Positive identification of this structure in tissue sections from patients with sporotrichosis ranges from 20% to 66% (Gezuele & Rosa, 2005); although other authors reported that this structure was not observed in several analysed samples (Quintella et al., 2011). These histopathologic findings help to differentiate sporotrichosis from other diseases. For instance, during histoplasmosis infection, the neutrophilic inflammatory response is a mixed of suppurative and granulomatous reactions, and in sporotrichosis are not observed. Suppurative tissue reactions are observed in candidiasis, especially when it is caused by C. glabrata, where the absence of hyphae and pseudohyphae elements can mimic www.intechopen.com 62 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives sporotrichosis; however, granulomas are not usually formed (Larone, 2002). On dogs with sporotrichosis, lesions present well-formed granulomas with marked neutrophil infiltration. Frequently, lymphocytes and macrophages are absent on peripheral infiltrate, which facilitates the differentiation between sporotrichosis and leishmaniasis (Miranda et al., 2010). Definitive diagnosis of sporotrichosis is based on the isolation and identification of its etiological agent in culture (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992). Isolation of S. schenckii can be easily attained after spreading the clinical specimens on Sabouraud Dextrose Agar supplemented with 400mg/L chloramphenicol to avoid bacterial contamination and on culture media containing cycloheximide, such as Mycosel or Mycobiotic agar. Cycloheximide inhibits the growth of several anemophilous fungi that can contaminate cultures from clinical specimens obtained from non-sterile sites; however, this drug does not inhibit the mycelial form of S. schenckii, which grows well on this culture medium (Molinaro et al., 2010). Traditional identification of S. Schenckii is based on the macro and micromorphologies of the mycelial and yeast forms (Figure 8). These analyses, however, do not differentiate the newly described species in the S. schenckii complex (Marimon et al., 2007). To differentiate the species within this complex, other tests such as carbohydrate assimilation (especially sucrose and raffinose), growth rates at 30ºC and 37ºC and the production of dematiaceous conidia are necessary. Moreover, molecular methods, which will be discussed below, are also important for the differentiation of these new species of Sporothrix. Although S. schenckii can grow around body temperature, this is not the optimal temperature for this fungus growth. Therefore, to enhance the chance of fungal isolation, cultures must be incubated at 25 to 30ºC after removing the fungus from stress condition and allowing it to grow, even if the patient fungal burden is low. After five to ten days of incubation at 25ºC, filamentous hyaline colonies often start to develop. Only a few strains require extended incubation for growth. These colonies, after some time, may develop a dark colour, which is usually located in the centre or sectors of the colony (Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992). If there is no growth of S. schenckii after four weeks of incubation, cultures can be considered negative. To identify a fungal isolate as S. schenckii, one needs to determinate if it can undergo in vitro dimorphism. Thus, it is necessary to make subcultures of the fungus at 35 to 37ºC on enriched media such as brain heart infusion (BHI) agar, blood or chocolate agar, for five to seven days. Colonies with a creamy texture and with a yellow to tan colour will grow. Microscopically, they are composed of round to oval hyaline yeast-like cells that often have cigar-shaped narrow base buds (Larone, 2002; McGinnis, 1980). Because environmental fungi of the genus Sporothrix can also form yeast-like cells when grown on the appropriate medium at temperatures around 35ºC, a micromorphologic study of the filamentous form of the isolated fungus is necessary to correctly identify S. schenckii because environmental Sporothrix strains are not able to produce the virulence-related dematiaceous conidia of S. schenckii (Dixon et al., 1991). Slide culture preparations using potato dextrose agar (PDA) or corn meal agar incubated at 30ºC are ideal to study S. schenckii conidiogenesis (Marimon et al., 2007). For this test, S. schenckii strains present hyaline hyphae usually less than 3 µm in diameter with regular septation and branching produced in strands. Hyaline conidia are produced in a flower-like arrangement at the tip of the sympodial conidiophores that arises at right angles from the sides of the hyphae. Dematiaceous conidia are produced mainly along the hyphae on extremely short denticles (Dixon et al., 1991; Kwon-Chung & Bennett, 1992; Larone, 2002). www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 63 Fig. 8. S. schenckii identification: (A) Mycelial colony on Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA) after 21 days of incubation at 25ºC. (B) Slide culture of the mycelial form on PDA, incubated at 30ºC for 15 days and stained with lactophenol cotton blue. The continuous arrow indicates hyaline conidia on a sympodial conidiophore. The dashed arrow indicates dematiaceous conidia on a short denticle arising from the hypha. Magnification 400X. (C) Several white, smooth yeast colonies on a Brain Heart Infusion (BHI) agar plate after 10 days of incubation at 36ºC. (D) Lactophenol cotton blue stain of oval yeast-like cells with cigar-shaped buds after growth on BHI agar. Magnification 400X. 2.3 New diagnostic approaches Positive cultures provide the strongest evidence for sporotrichosis, but culture diagnosis has significant limitations. In particular, in some manifestations of the disease, such as S. schenckii-induced arthritis, the collection of material for culture is difficult (Morris-Jones, 2002.). Also, sporotrichosis may be mistaken for other infections, such as tuberculosis, leishmaniasis, paracoccidioidomycosis, gummatous syphilis, and chromoblastomycosis (Rippon, 1988; Sharma et al., 2005). Non-culture methods have been developed to improve the rate and speed of diagnosis. These tests include antibody detection as well as newer molecular techniques that have been developed to improve the diagnosis and identification of Sporothrix spp. in clinical specimens, as well for taxonomic purposes. The results from the described tests can provide a presumptive diagnosis of sporotrichosis and require clinical correlation for the correct evaluation and determination of the final diagnosis. www.intechopen.com 64 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives 2.3.1 Serology Several methodologies have been described for the immunological diagnosis of sporotrichosis based on antibody detection in sera from infected patients. Precipitation and agglutination techniques were first used (Albornoz et al, 1984; Blumer et al., 1973; Casserone et al., 1983; Karlin & Nielsen, 1970). Double immunodiffusion for sporotrichosis usually does not cross-react with sera from patients with chromoblastomycosis or leishmaniasis, which are infectious diseases with similar clinical manifestations. Immunoelectrophoresis has also been used, and in all positive cases, an anodic arc, called an S arc, is observed (Albornoz et al., 1984). Both methodologies that use an antigenic complex from fungal culture filtrate are highly sensitive. Tube and latex agglutination both have high sensitivity and specificity and have been used for sporotrichosis serodiagnosis since the 1970s (Blummer et al., 1973; Casserone, et al., 1983; Karlin & Nielsen, 1970). However, these tests lack sensitivity in cases of cutaneous sporotrichosis (Albornoz et.al., 1984; Rippon, 1988) and do not permit the determination of the immunoglobulin isotype involved. Immunoenzymatic assays are increasingly used for the serodiagnosis of this mycosis. The first immunoblot assay used for serodiagnosis of sporotrichosis dates back to 1989, when exoantigen preparations from a S. schenckii yeast form presented 100% sensitivity and 95% specificity for the detection of antibodies (Scott & Muchmore, 1989). Later, another immunoassay (ELISA) was developed, using the concanavalin A binding peptide- rhamnomanan from the S. schenckii yeast cell wall, and antibodies were detected in 35 serum samples from patients with culture proven sporotrichosis, resulting in 100% sensitivity. However, the specificity was lower than previous tests because the sera from patients with cutaneous leishmaniasis cross-reacted (Loureiro Y Penha & Lopes Bezerra, 2000). The same group reported an ELISA test using the same antigenic preparation against sera from 92 patients with different clinical forms of sporotrichosis in Rio de Janeiro and reported 90% sensitivity, 80% specificity, and a global efficiency of 86% (Bernardes-Engemann, et al. 2005). Other studies showed that the use of different strains during the preparation of the antigen might result in different sensitivity and specificity, despite the purification of the antigen involved in this methodology. This difference is due to the O-glycan residues linked to the molecules (Bernardes-Engemann, et al. 2009). The development of an enzyme immunoassay using exoantigens produced by the mycelia phase of a S. schenckii strain isolated in the zoonotic sporotrichosis endemic area of Rio de Janeiro was also reported (Almeida-Paes et al., 2007a). This antigen was described by Mendoza and collaborators (2002) and showed no cross-reactivity with the antigen and serum samples from patients with coccidioidomycosis, histoplasmosis and paracoccidioidomycosis (Mendoza et al., 2002). The same antigen was used previously in immunodiffusion and immunoelectrophoresis techniques without cross-reactivity with sera from patients with leishmaniasis or chromoblastomycosis (Albornoz et.al., 1984). This test had a sensitivity of 97% and specificity of 89% when performed on 90 sera from patients with different clinical forms of sporotrichosis, 72 sera from patients with other infectious diseases and 76 healthy controls (Almeida-Paes et al., 2007a). The overall efficiency of this test for diagnosis and follow-up of human sporotrichosis is increased when IgG, IgM, and IgA isotypes are also measured providing the most accurate results (Almeida-Paes et al., 2007b). When the immunoassays probed with different antigenic preparations are compared, the crude exoantigens (Almeida-Paes et al., 2007a) gave values of sensitivity and specificity a little higher than those using the concanavalin A binding fraction of the S. schenckii yeast cell wall (Bernardes-Engemann, et al. 2005). A similar observation was found when using this www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 65 purified antigen and crude exoantigens for the serodiagnosis of feline sporotrichosis. Purified antigens showed 90% sensitivity and 96% specificity, whereas crude exoantigens presented 96% sensitivity and 98% specificity (Fernandes et al., 2011). 2.3.2 Molecular or DNA-based The Sporothrix genus is traditionally identified by phenotypic characteristics, such as macro- and micromorphology and sugar assimilation, but Sporothrix spp. colonies grow slowly, and differentiation from other fungi that have similar colony or microscopic morphology is challenging. To confirm the diagnosis, conversion to the yeast phase should be performed, which takes at least 2 to 3 weeks. Methods to identify fungal isolates, such as species-specific DNA, can decrease this time-consuming step while maintaining or improving the specificity, accuracy and sensitivity. Until now, few molecular methods have been applied to the diagnosis of sporotrichosis to detect S. schenckii DNA from clinical specimens, and to identify Sporothrix spp. in culture. Diagnosis using the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) is based on the amplification of fungal gene sequences and is a powerful tool for identifying mycoses. One of the pioneering DNA-based methodologies used for the diagnosis of fungal infections was reported by Sandhu and collaborators who developed 21 specific nucleic acid probes targeting the large subunit rRNA gene from several fungi, including S. schenckii. The results show a high level of specificity (Sandhu et al., 1995). In past years, several molecular taxonomic studies using different methodologies, such as restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) from different gene targets, random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD), DNA sequencing of internal transcriber spacer (ITS) regions of the ribosomal RNA (rRNA), PCR targeting the DNA topoisomerase II gene, amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP), and M13 PCR fingerprinting have demonstrated that Sporothrix schenckii isolates have different genetic characteristics, which suggests that they do not belong to the same species (Ishizaki et al., 2000; de Beer et al., 2003; Gutierrez-Galhardo et al., 2008; Kanbe et al., 2005; Mesa–Arango et al., 2002; Neyra et al., 2005; Reis et al., 2009; Watanabe et al., 2004; Zhang et al., 2006). In addition, Marimon and collaborators (2007) supported these findings by suggesting that, according to a combination of phenotypic and genetic features, S. schenckii should not be considered a single taxon that causes sporotrichosis in human and animals but should instead be considered a species complex that is comprised of at least four species: S. brasiliensis, S. globosa, S. luriei, and S. schenckii (Marimon et al., 2006, 2007, 2008). S. globosa is distributed worldwide (Madrid et al., 2009; Oliveira et al., 2010), whereas S. mexicana is restricted to Mexico and S. brasiliensis to Brazil. Also, S. brasiliensis, S. globosa and S. luriei are related as etiological agents of sporotrichosis (Marimon et al., 2007, 2008). Additionally, other phylogenetic analysis based on the rDNA and the α-tubulin regions from S. albicans, S. pallida and S. nivea revealed a significant similarity. Therefore, it has been proposed that all the three species were called S. pallida when they were first described (de Meyer et al., 2008). An identification key for the Sporothrix complex has now been proposed (Marimon et al., 2007) that includes analysis of conidial morphology, auxonogram analysis using raffinose and sucrose, genotyping via PCR amplification, and sequencing of the calmodulin gene. Based on this last analysis, Romeo and collaborators (2011), who were studying the molecular phylogeny and epidemiology of a S. schenckii species complex isolated in Italy, demonstrated that 26 environmental strains co-clustered with S. albicans, and two clinical isolates grouped with S. schenckii stricto sensu (Romeo et al., 2011). www.intechopen.com 66 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives PCR diagnosis based on the amplification of the fungal gene sequences is a powerful tool for identifying invasive mycoses. The first description of PCR for the diagnosis of sporotrichosis was reported by Kano and colleagues (2001). Specific oligonucleotide primers based on the chitin synthase 1 gene were designed, and with this primer pair, PCR was able to detect a 10 pg genomic DNA fragment of S. schenckii. A nested PCR assay for the detection of S. schenckii was evaluated in clinical samples using the 18S rRNA gene sequence as the target. However, nested PCR could detect S. schenckii DNA in tissue samples from infected animals or from clinical specimens from patients with sporotrichosis confirmed by culture or histochemical staining. The test showed high sensitivity and specificity, indicating that the assay could provide rapid diagnosis with sufficient accuracy to be clinically useful for patients with sporotrichosis (Hu et al., 2003). More recently, the same assay was used to detect S. schenckii DNA from 38 strains (including all 24 mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) types) collected from different areas of the world, in the tissues of eight mice infected with the ATCC10268 strain of the fungus, and in skin biopsies of nine patients with sporotrichosis. In addition, the same procedures were used with two strains of Ceratocystis minor and isolates of 10 species of other pathogenic fungi. The authors demonstrated that nested PCR could identify S. schenckii from all of the mtDNA types and in isolates recovered from different areas of the world, corroborating the data obtained by Hu and collaborators (2003) that the nested PCR assay is highly sensitive and specific and is a rapid method for diagnosis of sporotrichosis under contamination free conditions (Xu et al., 2010). 3. Conclusions Sporotrichosis is a chronic infection caused by the dimorphic fungus now named the S. schenckii species complex. Lymphocutaneous infection is the most common presentation. The diagnosis of sporotrichosis is classically attained by correlation of clinical, epidemiological and laboratorial data. Considerable advances have been made in non-culture-based diagnosis of sporotrichosis with the development of a scarcity of methods for the detection of antibodies, antigens, and nucleic acids. The methods described for the diagnosis of sporotrichosis each have their strengths and weaknesses and require critical analysis by microbiologists and clinicians. However, not all tests described are universally available, which complicates the capacity to diagnose and treat individuals with sporotrichosis. Also, the immunological status of the patient and manifestation of the disease influences the efficacy of the diagnostic test. Continuing efforts to improve or develop diagnostic tests will facilitate our diagnostic aptitude. However, such assays will require validation in populations from diverse regions of the world prior to general applications in routine diagnosis. Results obtained from a panel of serological diagnostic test play an important role in the diagnosis of sporotrichosis. Nevertheless, nucleotide probes, specific for the Sporothrix species complex, and DNA amplification procedures, such as PCR, allow more rapid and precise diagnosis, which can lead to earlier treatment. However, the gold standard in diagnosis continues to be culture and the correlation of molecular data and phenotypic characteristics. 4. References Albornoz, M.B., Villanueva, E. & Torres, E.D. (1984). Application of immunoprecipitation techniques to the diagnosis of cutaneous and extracutaneous forms of sporotrichosis. Mycopathologia, Vol. 85, No. 3, (March, 1984), pp. 177-183, ISSN0301486X . www.intechopen.com New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis 67 Almeida-Paes, R., Pimenta, M.A., Pizzini, C.V., Monteiro, P.C.F., Peralta, J.M., Nosanchuk, J.D. & Zancopé-Oliveira, R.M. (2007a). Use of mycelial-phase Sporothrix schenckii exoantigens in an Enzyme-linked Immunosorbent Assay for diagnosis of sporotrichosis by antibody detection. Clinical and Vaccine Immunology. Vol. 14, No. 3, (March, 2007), pp. 244-249, ISSN 1556-679X. Almeida-Paes, R., Pimenta, M.A., Monteiro, P.C., Nosanchuk, J.D. & Zancopé-Oliveira, R.M. (2007b). Immunoglobulins G, M, and A against Sporothrix schenckii exoantigens in patients with sporotrichosis before and during treatment with itraconazole. Clinical Vaccine Immunology. Vol. 14, No.9, (September, 2007), pp.1149-1157, ISSN 1556- 679X. Barros, M.B., Schubach, A.O., Valle, A.C., Galhardo, M.C.G., Conceição-Silva, F., Schubach, T.M.P., Reis, R.S., Wanke, B., Marzochi, K.B.F. & Conceição, M.J. (2004). Cat- transmitted sporotrichosis epidemic in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: description of a series of cases. Clinical Infectious Dieases. Vol. 38, No. 4, (February, 2004), pp. 529-535, ISSN 1058-4838. Bernardes-Engemann, A.R., Costa, R.C., Miguens, B.R., Penha, C.V., Neves, E., Pereira, B.A., Dias, C.M., Matos, M., Gutierrez-Galhardo, M.C., Schubach, A.O., Oliveira-Neto, M.P., Lazéra, M. & Lopes-Bezerra, L.M. (2005). Development of an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay for the serodiagnosis of several clinical forms of sporotrichosis. Medical Mycology. Vol. 43, No. 6, (September, 2005), pp. 487-493, ISSN 1369-3786. Bernardes-Engemann, A.R., Loureiro y Penha, C.V., Benvenuto, F., Braga, J.U., Barros, M. L., Orofino-Costa, R. & Lopes-Bezerra, L.M.. (2009). A comparative serological study of the SsCBF antigenic fraction isolated from three Sporothrix schenckii strains. Medical Mycology . Vol. 47, No. (December, 2008), pp. 874-8, ISSN 1369-3786. Blumer S.O., Kaufman L., Kaplan W., McLaughlin D.W. & Kraft D. E. (1973). Comparative evaluation of five serological methods for the diagnosis of sporotrichosis. Applied Microbiology. Vol. 26, No. 1, (March, 1973), pp. 4-8, ISSN 1472-765X. Callens, S.F.J., Kitetele, F., Lukun, P., Van Rie, A., Behets, F. & Colebunders, R. (2005). Pulmonary Sporothrix schenckii infection in HIV positive child. Journal of Tropical Pediatrics, Vol. 52, No. 2, (November, 2005), pp. 144-146, ISSN 0142-6338. Campos-Macías, P., Arenas, R., Veja-Memije, M. & Kawasaki, M. (2006). Sporothrix schenckii type 3D (mtDNA-RFLP): Report of an osteoarticular case. Journal of Dermatology. Vol. 33, No. 4, (October, 2005), pp. 295-299, ISSN 0385-2407. Casserone S., Conti-Diaz I.A., Zanetta E. & Pereira M.E.P. (1983). Serologia de la esporotricosis cutânea. Sabouraudia. Vol. 21, No. 2, (March, 1983), pp.317-321, ISSN 0036-2174. Cooper, C.R., Dixon, D.M. & Salkin, I.F. (1992). Laboratory-acquired sporotrichosis. Journal Medical Veterinary Mycology, Vol. 30, (October, 1991), pp. 169-171, ISSN 1365-280X. Coura J.R. (Ed.). (2005). Dinâmica das Doenças Infecciosas e Parasitárias, pp. 1161-1171, Guanabara Koogan, ISBN 85-277-1093-5, Rio de Janeiro – RJ. de Beer, Z.W., Harrington, T.C., Vismer, H.F., Wingfield, B.D. & Wingfield, M.J. (2003). Phylogeny of the Ophiostoma stenoceras-Sporothrix schenckii complex. Mycologia. Vol. 95, No. 3, (September, 2002), pp. 434-441, ISSN: 0027-5514. de Meyer, E.M., de Beer, Z.W., Summerbell, R.C., Moharram, A.M., de Hoog, G.S., Vismer, H.F. & Wingfield, M.J. (2008). Taxonomy and phylogeny of new wood- and soil- www.intechopen.com 68 Skin Biopsy – Perspectives inhabiting Sporothrix species in the Ophiostoma stenoceras-Sporothrix schenckii complex. Mycologia. 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Vol. 45, No. 3, (May, 2004), pp. 165-175, ISSN 0916-4804 Xu, T.H., Lin, J.P., Gao, X.H., Wei, H., Liao, W. & Chen, H.D. (2010). Identification of Sporothix schenckii of various mtDNA types by nested PCR assay. Medical Mycology. Vol. 48, No. 1, (January, 2010), pp. 161–165, ISSN 1369-3786. Zhang, Z., Liu, X., Yang, G., Gao, X., Jin, L. & An, L. (2006). Genotyping of Sporothrix schenckii by analysis of ribosomal DNA regions. Mycoses. Vol. 49, No. 4, (February, 2006), pp. 305-310, ISSN 1439-0507 www.intechopen.com Skin Biopsy - Perspectives Edited by Dr. Uday Khopkar ISBN 978-953-307-290-6 Hard cover, 336 pages Publisher InTech Published online 02, November, 2011 Published in print edition November, 2011 Skin Biopsy - Perspectives is a comprehensive compilation of articles that relate to the technique and applications of skin biopsy in diagnosing skin diseases. While there have been numerous treatises to date on the interpretation or description of skin biopsy findings in various skin diseases, books dedicated entirely to perfecting the technique of skin biopsy have been few and far between. This book is an attempt to bridge this gap. Though the emphasis of this book is on use of this technique in skin diseases in humans, a few articles on skin biopsy in animals have been included to acquaint the reader to the interrelationship of various scientific disciplines. All aspects of the procedure of skin biopsy have been adequately dealt with so as to improve biopsy outcomes for patients, which is the ultimate goal of this work. How to reference In order to correctly reference this scholarly work, feel free to copy and paste the following: Rosely Maria Zancope-Oliveira, Rodrigo de Almeida-Paes, Manoel Marques Evangelista de Oliveira, Dayvison Francis Saraiva Freitas and Maria Clara Gutierrez Galhardo (2011). New Diagnostic Applications in Sporotrichosis, Skin Biopsy - Perspectives, Dr. Uday Khopkar (Ed.), ISBN: 978-953-307-290-6, InTech, Available from: http://www.intechopen.com/books/skin-biopsy-perspectives/new-diagnostic-applications-in- sporotrichosis InTech Europe InTech China University Campus STeP Ri Unit 405, Office Block, Hotel Equatorial Shanghai Slavka Krautzeka 83/A No.65, Yan An Road (West), Shanghai, 200040, China 51000 Rijeka, Croatia Phone: +385 (51) 770 447 Phone: +86-21-62489820 Fax: +385 (51) 686 166 Fax: +86-21-62489821 www.intechopen.com
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Tutorials at Strata + Hadoop World San Jose: Architecture, Hadoop Ops, Interactive SQL-on-Hadoop
Strata + Hadoop World San Jose 2015 (Feb. 17-20) is a focal point for learning about production-izing Hadoop.
Strata + Hadoop World sessions have always been indispensable for learning about Hadoop internals, use cases, and admin best practices. When deep learning is needed, however—and deep dives are a necessity if you're running Hadoop in production, or aspire to—tutorials are your ticket.
How-to: Deploy Apache Hadoop Clusters Like a Boss
- by Jeff Holoman and Kevin O'Dell
- January 16, 2015
- 5 comments
Learn how to set up a Hadoop cluster in a way that maximizes successful production-ization of Hadoop and minimizes ongoing, long-term adjustments.
Previously, we published some recommendations on selecting new hardware for Apache Hadoop deployments. That post covered some important ideas regarding cluster planning and deployment such as workload profiling and general recommendations for CPU, disk, and memory allocations. In this post, we'll provide some best practices and guidelines for the next part of the implementation process: configuring the machines once they arrive. Between the two posts, you'll have a great head start toward production-izing Hadoop.
New Advanced Analytics and Data Wrangling Tutorials on Cloudera Live
- by Alex Gutow
- January 08, 2015
- no comments
A new Spark tutorial and Trifacta deployment option make Cloudera Live even more useful for getting started with Apache Hadoop.
When it comes to learning Hadoop and CDH (Cloudera's open source platform including Hadoop), there is no better place to start than Cloudera Live (cloudera.com/live). With a quick, one-button deployment option, Cloudera Live launches a four-node Cloudera cluster that you can learn and experiment in free for two-weeks. To help plan and extend the capabilities of your cluster, we also offer various partner deployments. Building on the addition of interactive tutorials and Tableau and Zoomdata integration, we have added a new tutorial on Apache Spark and a new Trifacta partner deployment.
New in CDH 5.3: Transparent Encryption in HDFS
- by Charles Lamb, Yi Liu & Andrew Wang
- January 07, 2015
- 10 comments
Support for transparent, end-to-end encryption in HDFS is now available and production-ready (and shipping inside CDH 5.3 and later). Here's how it works.
Apache Hadoop 2.6 adds support for transparent encryption to HDFS. Once configured, data read from and written to specified HDFS directories will be transparently encrypted and decrypted, without requiring any changes to user application code. This encryption is also end-to-end, meaning that data can only be encrypted and decrypted by the client. HDFS itself never handles unencrypted data or data encryption keys. All these characteristics improve security, and HDFS encryption can be an important part of an organization-wide data protection story.
The Top 10 Posts of 2014 from the Cloudera Engineering Blog
Our "Top 10″ list of blog posts published during a calendar year is a crowd favorite (see the 2013 version here), in particular because it serves as informal, crowdsourced research about popular interests. Page views don't lie (although skew for publishing date—clearly, posts that publish earlier in the year have pole position—has to be taken into account).
In 2014, a strong interest in various new components that bring real time or near-real time capabilities to the Apache Hadoop ecosystem is apparent. And we're particularly proud that the most popular post was authored by a non-employee.
- How-to: Create a Simple Hadoop Cluster with VirtualBox
by Christian Javet
Explains how t set up a CDH-based Hadoop cluster in less than an hour using VirtualBox and Cloudera Manager.
- Why Apache Spark is a Crossover Hit for Data Scientists
by Sean Owen
An explanation of why Spark is a compelling multi-purpose platform for use cases that span investigative, as well as operational, analytics.
- How-to: Run a Simple Spark App in CDH 5
by Sandy Ryza
Helps you get started with Spark using a simple example.
- New SQL Choices in the Apache Hadoop Ecosystem: Why Impala Continues to Lead
by Justin Erickson, Marcel Kornacker & Dileep Kumar
Open benchmark testing of Impala 1.3 demonstrates performance leadership compared to alternatives (by 950% or more), while providing greater query throughput and with a far smaller CPU footprint.
- Apache Kafka for Beginners
by Gwen Shapira & Jeff Holoman
When used in the right way and for the right use case, Kafka has unique attributes that make it a highly attractive option for data integration.
- Apache Hadoop YARN: Avoiding 6 Time-Consuming "Gotchas"
by Jeff Bean
Understanding some key differences between MR1 and MR2/YARN will make your migration much easier.
- Impala Performance Update: Now Reaching DBMS-Class Speed
by Justin Erickson, Greg Rahn, Marcel Kornacker & Yanpei Chen
As of release 1.1.1, Impala's speed beat the fastest SQL-on-Hadoop alternatives–including a popular analytic DBMS running on its own proprietary data store.
- The Truth About MapReduce Performance on SSDs
by Karthik Kambatla & Yanpei Chen
It turns out that cost-per-performance, not cost-per-capacity, is the better metric for evaluating the true value of SSDs. (See the session on this topic at Strata+Hadoop World San Jose in Feb. 2015!)
- How-to: Translate from MapReduce to Spark
by Sean Owen
The key to getting the most out of Spark is to understand the differences between its RDD API and the original Mapper and Reducer API.
- How-to: Write and Run Apache Giraph Jobs on Hadoop
by Mirko Kämpf
Explains how to create a test environment for writing and testing Giraph jobs, or just for playing around with Giraph and small sample datasets.
5 Pitfalls of Benchmarking Big Data Systems
- by Gwen Shapira & Yanpei Chen
- December 12, 2014
- no comments
Benchmarking Big Data systems is nontrivial. Avoid these traps!
Here at Cloudera, we know how hard it is to get reliable performance benchmarking results. Benchmarking matters because one of the defining characteristics of Big Data systems is the ability to process large datasets faster. "How large" and "how fast" drive technology choices, purchasing decisions, and cluster operations. Even with the best intentions, performance benchmarking is fraught with pitfalls—easy to get numbers, hard to tell if they are sound.
For Apache Hadoop, The POODLE Attack Has Lost Its Bite
- by Michael Yoder
- December 03, 2014
- no comments
A significant vulnerability affecting the entire Apache Hadoop ecosystem has now been patched. What was involved?
By now, you may have heard about the POODLE (Padding Oracle On Downgraded Legacy Encryption) attack on TLS (Transport Layer Security). This attack combines a cryptographic flaw in the obsolete SSLv3 protocol with the ability of an attacker to downgrade TLS connections to use that protocol. The result is that an active attacker on the same network as the victim can potentially decrypt parts of an otherwise encrypted channel. The only immediately workable fix has been to disable the SSLv3 protocol entirely.
Apache Hadoop 2.6 is Released
The Apache Hadoop community has voted to release Hadoop 2.6. Congrats to all contributors!
This new release contains a variety of improvements, particularly in the storage layer and in YARN. We're particularly excited about the encryption-at-rest feature in HDFS!
The Story of the Cloudera Engineering Hackathon (2014 Edition)
Cloudera's culture is premised on innovation and teamwork, and there's no better example of them in action than our internal hackathon.
Cloudera Engineering doubled-down on its "hackathon" tradition last week, with this year's edition taking an around-the-clock approach thanks to the HQ building upgrade since the 2013 edition (just look at all that space!).
NoSQL in a Hadoop World
The number of powerful data query tools in the Apache Hadoop ecosystem can be confusing, but understanding a few simple things about your needs usually makes the choice easy.
Ah, the good old days. I recall vividly that in 2007, I was faced to store 1 billion XML documents and make them accessible as well as searchable. I had few choices on a given shoestring budget: build something one my own (it was the rage back then—and still is), use an existing open source database like PostgreSQL or MySQL, or try this thing that Google built successfully and that was now implemented in open source under the Apache umbrella: Hadoop.

subset: commoncrawl


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High school football: Mountain Crest's defense shuts down Roy in homecoming game
HYRUM — If there was any doubt before kickoff which team was going to leave Mountain Crest's homecoming game with a victory, it was erased by the end of the first quarter.
The Mustangs held Roy to 2 rushing yards in their 38-6 shellacking of the Royals.
Junior linebacker Nick Watterson had two interceptions to lead the Mountain Crest defense, which allowed just 112 total yards.
"Nick always had a knack for getting interceptions," Mountain Crest head coach Mark Wootton said. "He has a knack for the ball."
Watterson also had a sack in the game.
Mountain Crest senior running back Eddy Hall started the scoring onslaught with a 31-yard toss sweep to the left that went for six points with 9:17 left in the first quarter.
Hall helped Mountain Crest to 222 rushing yards.
Wootton said Hall is a great player who is making university coaches notice his talent.
"He's just a warrior. He's a kid who can make something out of nothing, which is hard to do," Wootton said. "He always finds a way to get something out of a play."
Mustang running back Gaje Fergeson added another first-quarter score with 8:13 left to make it 14-0 on a 7-yard run.
The junior finished with eight carries for 51 rushing yards and a touchdown.
Mountain Crest quarterback Jamison Webb jumped on the scoring bandwagon with a 55-yard pass to senior wide receiver Faimafili Laulu Pututau with 11 minutes left in the half.
The pair connected again five minutes later from 21 yards out to put Mountain Crest up 38-0.
"That's what we worked on all week, was our blocking schemes," Hall said. "That's what we did perfectly."
Roy made their first trip into Mustang territory with 3:34 left in the second quarter.
The Royals successfully recovered an onside kick to open the second half, but not much else went right for the visitors who only managed to score on Mountain Crest's second-team defense.
Watterson said he liked the sound of a defense that forced eight pass-breakups and three interceptions.
"We've just really been working a lot on our secondary, just working on really smashing down," he said. "Just taking away the pass, and then our line is doing really good."
With 7:20 left to play, the Mustangs fumbled the ball in the red zone, leading to Roy's only scoring drive. The Royals' only points came with fewer than two minutes remaining when sophomore quarterback Tyler Skidmore connected with sophomore tight end Cody Hobbs on fourth down from 11 yards out.
Skidmore's two-point conversion pass fell incomplete and Mountain Crest claimed the top seed in Region 5 with the victory.
"I'm so proud of those kids," Wootton said.
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I had a WIC apt. today, it was for a weigh in and for the next few months of vouchers. I am 33 weeks pregnant and weighed 135 pre-pregnancy, I now weigh 178. A whooping 43 lbs. The nutritionist told me that I have gained far too much weight and that I need to eat low fat, and sugar free food. She also told me that I needed to see a Dietary Nutritionist! I don't see what the big deal is! My doctors have not said anything to me about my weight gain, and when I asked my doc. they said as long as I don't gain too much too quickly I am fine!!!!!!! As soon as I got into my car I just started crying, and my DF doesn't understand why I got so upset/offeneded, maybe it's just my hormones!
WIC apt left me in tears...
Dont worry i am right there with you so i know how you feel!! I have gained a total of 47 lbs so far and im 35 weeks as of yesterday. I started out at 140 so i am right there with you!! Got told i needed to see a dietitian after i have my LO.... ummmm... i dont understand why after when the only reason i gained this weight is cause i am pregnant!! Dont let it get you down.. just know that once our little ones are here i am sure that we will be fine and loose the weight and be healthy. For now i say forget it i only have about 33 days left and i am going to eat whatever makes me and LO happy cause after that.... its back to eating "normal" for me!!
Keep your head up! :) At least you know your not the only one!!
Mr.RJ & MrsRJ=DeLanie 2007, Reginae'2010,and our newest addition Gabriella 3.3.2013. Our 3 lovely little girls.....
In all seriousness, wtf are they going to do if you gain a little more than they'd like? They can't force you to do anything. Just keep it in your mind that you ard growing a healthy baby. *hugs*
Im glad to know Im not the only one. They scheduled me another apt. for the 11th for another weigh in, which makes no sense but I'm just going to put my big girl panties on and ignore them!!!!


text: Film Freak Central tag:typepad.com,2003:weblog-99928295733106445 2015-06-16T23:01:00-05:00 TypePad Easy Virtue (2008) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01bb0842ef58970d 2015-06-16T23:01:00-05:00 2015-06-15T10:43:52-05:00 ***½/**** starring Jessica Biel, Colin Firth, Kristin Scott Thomas, Ben Barnes screenplay by Stephan Elliott & Sheridan Jobbins, based on the play by Noël Coward directed by Stephan Elliott by Walter Chaw At first glance, it would seem that Stephan Elliott's pictures follow no conventional line. Start with 1993's Frauds, starring Hugo Weaving and (yes, that) Phil Collins, then proceed to Elliott's landmark The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. Then it's on to that film's tonal antidote (think an Outback Woman in the Dunes with Rogers & Hammerstein interludes), Welcome to Woop Woop; a Hollywood sojourn (the criminally-underestimated serial killer/FBI procedural Eye of the Beholder); and finally, one near-fatal ski accident later, an oddly appropriate return to form in the Noël Coward adaptation Easy Virtue. These movies are almost Billy Wilder-ian in their variety--literally, in that Elliott seems above all keenly attuned to the comic opportunity--the Lubitsch, if you will--in relational dynamics, but also in that he begins with something like a thriller, goes to camp, goes to camp thriller, returns to thriller, and now does something almost entirely genre-peculiar. It's a vertiginous enough trajectory that for the first half-hour of Easy Virtue, I'd forgotten I was watching... Bill Chambers The Statement (2003) - DVD tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01bb082c1357970d 2015-05-10T23:01:00-05:00 2015-05-10T14:50:07-05:00 ½*/**** Image A Sound A Extras C starring Michael Caine, Tilda Swinton, Jeremy Northam, Alan Bates screenplay by Ronald Harwood, based on the novel by Brian Moore directed by Norman Jewison by Walter Chaw A so-so director even at his best (thinking of The Cincinnati Kid) who vacillates aimlessly between soft romantic comedies and undisguised, under-informed diatribes against barn sides like big business (Rollerball, F.I.S.T., Other People's Money), American racism (In the Heat of the Night, A Soldier's Story, The Hurricane), and religious intolerance (Jesus Christ Superstar, Agnes of God, The Statement), Norman Jewison is full of activism--just not terribly ripe with ideas and perspective. His fists are of ham and his pulpit is splintered from the hammering, Jewison's political films distinctive mainly for the broadness of their focus and his romantic films distinctive for the extent to which the facile cultural stereotypes he seems so concerned about elsewhere are machined into the rom-com grist mill therein. RUNNING TIME 119 minutes MPAA R ASPECT RATIO(S) 1.85:1 (16x9-enhanced) LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 French DD 5.1 CC Yes SUBTITLES English REGION 1 DISC TYPE DVD-9 STUDIO Universal Confused at its core and too befuddled to make that a virtue, Jewison's The Statement... Bill Chambers On "Pretend We're Kissing" tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01b8d107625d970c 2015-04-22T15:52:35-05:00 2015-04-22T20:32:46-05:00 by Bill Chambers I don't socialize with director Matt Sadowski, but I appeared in his John Hughes tribute documentary Don't You Forget About Me (seventh-billed, thanks to the alphabet!), and the damned if you do/don't scenario of reviewing a movie by someone you know IRL, as the kids say, is that any praise is met with skepticism and any negativity becomes personal. But since Sadowski and I haven't kept in touch in the nine (!) years since that interview, and since new Canadian films and filmmakers never get enough attention, least of all from me, a few words about his fiction-feature debut, Pretend We're Kissing, which has actually become something of a minor sensation in its city of origin by outlasting its indie-release lifespan at the Carlton in Toronto. (It's currently wrapping up its third week there.) I will be as objective as I know how. This is a beautifully-photographed movie. I mean it. When I asked Matt for a streaming link, he was disappointed I wasn't screening it theatrically. "The film is pretty much all wide shots," he said. He wasn't kidding. (Luckily, I was at least able to view an HD feed, on a 46" display.) I subsequently... Bill Chambers TIFF '14: Maps to the Stars tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01b8d064b7e0970c 2014-09-06T12:59:35-05:00 2014-09-06T13:13:28-05:00 *½/**** directed by David Cronenberg by Bill Chambers There's something vaguely pathetic about Bruce Wagner continuing to write these Los Angeles tapestries that send up the movie business, since his Hollywood career peaked in the early-'90s (and the vision of these satires is ossified thereabouts). And getting David Cronenberg--someone so insularly Canadian, and probably the last filmmaker to pore over the trades--to direct one of them is lunacy, albeit potentially inspired in the way that getting a German to helm Paris, Texas was. Indeed, though, Maps to the Stars is the blind leading the blind, taking place in an obsolete world where Carrie Fisher, playing herself, is some kind of industry gatekeeper and a remake of an old black-and-white melodrama is the hottest project in town. Fresh off the bus from Florida, the mysterious, lightly-disfigured Agatha (Mia Wasikowska) arrives in L.A. with an ally in Fisher, who helps get her a job as the personal assistant to high-maintenance Havana Segrand (Julianne Moore), an actress haunted by both her own former glory and the superstardom of her late mother (Cronenberg's paper-doll muse Sarah Gadon). Havana has regular, sexually-charged sessions with self-help guru Dr. Stafford Weiss (John Cusack), father of teen sensation... Bill Chambers Deadly Eyes (1982) - Blu-ray + DVD Combo Pack tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a3fd3bf7bd970b 2014-07-29T13:16:00-05:00 2014-07-29T12:56:16-05:00 click any image to enlarge Night Eyes **/**** Image B+ Sound B- Extras B+ starring Sam Groom, Sara Botsford, Lisa Langlois, Scatman Crothers screenplay by Charles Eglee, based on a screenplay by Lonon Smith and the novel The Rats by James Herbert directed by Robert Clouse by Bryant Frazer There's really only one thing you need to know about Deadly Eyes, and I'm going to tell you right here in the lede. Deadly Eyes is a film in which hordes of giant killer rats terrorizing downtown Toronto are played by dachshunds wearing rat costumes. That's it. A monster movie is only as good as its monster, and this monster is wiener dogs in drag. If you don't find that off-putting--perhaps you raised your eyebrows, gasped in delight, and leaned in a little closer to your computer screen upon reading those words--then it's quite possible Deadly Eyes is the terrible horror movie you've been waiting for. RUNNING TIME 87 minutes MPAA R ASPECT RATIO(S) 1.78:1 (1080p/MPEG-4) LANGUAGES English 2.0 DTS-HD MA (Mono) SUBTITLES English REGION A DISC TYPE BD-50 STUDIO Scream Factory Make no mistake, it's a pretty bad movie, but at least it's a lively one. The rat attacks come... Bill Chambers The Dreamers (2004); Rhinoceros Eyes (2003); Stealing Beauty (1996) - DVD|The Dreamers (2004) [Original Uncut NC-17 Version] - DVD tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a73de0d4dc970d 2014-06-26T23:01:00-05:00 2014-06-26T11:51:37-05:00 THE DREAMERS **½/**** Image A Sound A- Extras A starring Michael Pitt, Louis Garrel, Eva Green, Robin Renucci screenplay by Gilbert Adair directed by Bernardo Bertolucci RHINOCEROS EYES ***½/**** starring Michael Pitt, Paige Turco, Gale Harold, Matt Servitto written and directed by Aaron Woodley by Walter Chaw The danger is getting lost in fantasy, of being consumed by the lunar flame of lamplight filtered through celluloid. And the irony is that directors, the good ones, are already lost and have been for years. There have been pictures about an all-devouring cinephilia before (Cinema Paradiso, say, or 8½), and now a pair of films by two directors at opposite ends of their careers--Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers and Aaron Woodley's 2003 TIFF Discovery Award-winner Rhinoceros Eyes--strive to blur the line between movies and reality in twin tales of sexual maturation, of coming of age in a movie house--of, to parse The Judybats, learning how to kiss watching James Dean movies. Fascinatingly, the two films share Michael Pitt, forging a path for himself as the archon for the modern dreamer raised on lethal doses of popular culture, and weaning himself from that luxuriant udder only with great difficulty. RUNNING TIME 113 minutes MPAA... Bill Chambers Coffee and Cigarettes (2004) + The Saddest Music in the World (2004) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a511bc5c35970c 2014-05-20T23:01:00-05:00 2014-05-20T15:59:41-05:00 COFFEE AND CIGARETTES ***½/**** starring Roberto Benigni, Steven Wright, Joie Lee, Cinqué Lee written and directed by Jim Jarmusch THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD ***/**** starring Isabella Rossellini, Mark McKinney, Maria de Medeiros, Ross McMillan screenplay by Guy Maddin & George Toles, based on a screenplay by Kazuo Ishiguro directed by Guy Maddin by Walter Chaw Philosopher-scientist Nikola Tesla (of coil fame) once suggested that the universe winding down vibrated to a sympathetic rhythm; art, at its best, puts a tuning fork to it. The words that we use to describe tapping that fricative synergy (archetype, the sublime, the ineffable) are also the words that we use, to borrow a phrase from Frank Zappa, to dance about architecture--to describe what's indescribable about the collective experience, the existential electricity that ranks music above painting above poetry above literature (and film the twentieth century stepchild that falls somehow north and south of each). It is the unique privilege of the cinema to be all things at its best and less than nothing at its worst: to be sculpture for Matthew Barney; photography for Stanley Kubrick; ad art for Roy Andersson; poetry for Jean-Luc Godard; hymn for Abbas Kiarostami; and music for... Bill Chambers Hot Docs '14: Joy of Man's Desiring tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a73dbbceb8970d 2014-05-04T20:03:41-05:00 2014-05-04T20:03:42-05:00 Que ta joie demeure ***/**** directed by Denis Côté by Angelo Muredda Although it's set in a factory rather than a zoo, Joy of Man's Desiring makes a fitting companion piece to Denis Côté's Bestiaire. Where the minimalist, formally austere Quebec filmmaker's previous documentary unfolded through a series of static frontal tableaux featuring animals displaced into some rather unnatural habitats, surrounded by bars and cages (the most extreme one being Côté's own mise-en-scène), his newest focuses on the alienated humans behind the machines that yield all manner of metal alloys, wood cases, and garments. Following an elfin worker's dramatic monologue about the nature of labour and human intimacy--she's played by an actress, the first of many instances where Côté throws a theatrical dirt bomb into the staid form of nonfiction--the symphonic title sequence sets the tone. It's a montage of self-propelling machines engaged in uncannily human dance moves, more unnerving still when considered in the context of some of the curiously mechanical human behaviour that follows, like when a worker loops around a cart full of boxes, elegantly dispensing a ream of Scotch tape as if he's wrapping a mummy. That tension between the human and the machine is Côté's... Bill Chambers Manufactured Landscapes (2006) - DVD tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a511af40df970c 2014-05-03T23:01:00-05:00 2014-05-02T14:51:18-05:00 ****/**** Image A Sound A Extras A directed by Jennifer Baichwal by Walter Chaw There's something about Jennifer Baichwal's profiles of artists. After debuting with a nicely-modulated piece on writer Paul Bowles, Baichwal heard her muse with The True Meaning of Pictures, a profile of Appalachian portrait photog Shelby Lee Adams that, without overtly politicizing the subject, digs gratifyingly deep into the question of where representation becomes exploitation and, trickier still, how the audience might have as much to do with that difficult equation as the essayist himself. With Manufactured Landscapes, Baichwal looks at the work of Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky, an artist who shoots landscapes of industrial wastelands that reveal men to be astonishingly productive beasts--and destructive, too, in the same procreative stroke. It's hard to imagine the industry necessary to manufacture the scale of the freighters getting dismantled in the ship-breaking yards to which Baichwal travels with Burtynsky (I've heard a similar sense of awe attends a visit to the Vehicle Assembly Building at NASA)--hard to assimilate the amount of Nietzschian will-to-power necessary to even contemplate the construction of titans. RUNNING TIME 90 minutes MPAA Not Rated ASPECT RATIO(S) 1.78:1 (16x9-enhanced) LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 French DD 2.0... Bill Chambers Winter Solstice (2005) + Falling Angels (2003) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a3fcf92357970b 2014-04-26T23:01:00-05:00 2014-04-24T18:31:29-05:00 WINTER SOLSTICE *½/**** starring Anthony LaPaglia, Aaron Stanford, Mark Webber, Allison Janney written and directed by Josh Sternfeld FALLING ANGELS */**** starring Miranda Richardson, Callum Keith Rennie, Katharine Isabelle, Kristin Adams screenplay by Esta Spalding, based on the novel by Barbara Gowdy directed by Scott Smith by Walter Chaw So reserved that it's almost invisible, Josh Sternfeld's Winter Solstice is an illustration of what it's like to be completely incapable of accessing one's emotions. It's a response, I can only guess, to over-scripted and maudlin independent pictures--and as a finger-wagged, consider it a point-taken. Still, if I have to sit through another family dysfunction picture (ironically what most people think of when they think of an indie "genre" film), I'd prefer to watch one that provides some kind of insight into my life or, failing that, resolution for the lives of the characters in limbo. It's not that I abhor ambiguity, understand, it's that Winter Solstice is more absent than ambiguous--almost a Warholian exercise in nothing happening whatsoever for a really long time. Maybe it's a mirror held up to our own disconnection with our emotions; and maybe that mirror would be better served held underneath the film's nose. Jim... Bill Chambers Owning Mahowny (2003) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a3fcb2e98f970b 2014-02-02T21:11:19-05:00 2014-02-02T21:11:19-05:00 ****/**** starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Minnie Driver, Maury Chaykin, John Hurt screenplay by Maurice Chauvet, based on the Gary Stephen Ross book Stung: The Incredible Obsession of Brian Molony directed by Richard Kwietniowski by Walter Chaw Richard Kwietniowski's Owning Mahowny charts the mendacity of addiction with something like a poet's lyrical melancholy. The director's follow-up to his surprisingly gentle take on Thomas Mann, Love and Death on Long Island, finds another story of obsessive love that is itself obsessed with the importance of place in defining the accumulated essence of identity and desire. Kwietniowski's films seem to be about secret outsiders finding themselves at some point swept out to proverbial sea, the land fading fast. While in Love and Death on Long Island that divorce illustrates the reach traversed by reclusive novelist Giles De'Ath (John Hurt) to claim his inamorata, in Owning Mahowny, the widening gyre is considerably (and deliciously) more complicated; the film marks Kwietniowski's emergence as the most promising cartographer of self-confessional mortification since countryman Terence Davies. And Kwietniowski does it all with gentle, uncompromising humour. Dan Mahowny (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is a non-descript banker on the rise trusted with his branch's top accounts. As the film opens,... Bill Chambers The Fighting Fitzgerald: FFC Interviews Thom Fitzgerald tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a3fca5f0cb970b 2014-01-24T17:50:16-05:00 2014-01-24T21:10:51-05:00 January 25, 2004|An unwritten policy says that before interviewing a new subject for the first time, you should see the film and log the review so that the review isn't flavoured by bias, by whether you love or hate the filmmaker. It's almost impossible, particularly for an inexperienced critic, to separate affection for a person with a more diplomatic look at the person's picture--and difficult as well to separate the persona that an artist presents to media with who the person actually is. Everybody's your friend on the junket and we need each other: I need to fill my column (and hopefully with a compelling face), they need to publicize their films, and we get famous together in our respective disciplines. The whole thing is a little parasitic. That being said, Canadian filmmaker Thom Fitzgerald gets credit for not trying too hard to be likeable, cultivating an air of smug, bemused superiority that strikes me as genuine mainly because his films exude the same aroma. I've had a few interview subjects claim that they're familiar with my writing, but few have claimed it the way Fitzgerald did: "Oh yes. I'm familiar with your work." I've heard said the bookism that... Bill Chambers Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004) - DVD tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c019b02db7af4970b 2013-12-14T00:01:00-05:00 2013-12-13T21:53:07-05:00 **/**** Image A Sound A Extras B starring Katharine Isabelle, Emily Perkins, JR Bourne, Tom McCamus screenplay by Christina Ray and Stephen Massicotte directed by Grant Harvey by Walter Chaw Ravenous but not funny, the clumsily-titled Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning takes the venerable Canadian she-wolf franchise and, in Canuck fashion, de-sexualizes it by suggesting that the appearance of two relatively nubile lasses at an isolated fort populated entirely by men rouses no passions beyond a metaphorical anxiety of invasion from without. The females in horror films tend to be the consumptive dank underground--in slashers specifically, they're the avatar for teen-boy fantasies of revenge. But in Ginger Snaps Back, they're neither avatar nor holy object, really, just catalysts for the interpersonal dramas of male settlers. The implications are many, most strident among them the unavoidable one that in Canadian cinema, sex is either perfunctory, ugly, forced, or involves a dead person. We've come a long way from the budding sexuality of the first Ginger Snaps film--all the way to an almost complete evasion of both the Orientalism in a medium-hot near-tryst wet dream with a Native American warrior and subsumed homosexual buddy lust. This despite the menstrual implications so cannily... Bill Chambers Nature Calls: FFC Interviews Denis Côté|Vic + Flo Saw a Bear (2013) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c019b01747eb6970d 2013-11-22T01:12:01-05:00 2013-11-22T01:17:09-05:00 Not long into Denis Côté's equal parts unnerving and affecting Curling, we get a taste of what might charitably be called the social life of its cloistered central characters, stolid dad Jean-François (Emmanuel Bilodeau) and his taciturn daughter Julyvonne (Philomene Bilodeau): When Julyvonne does her chores, her father grants her a rare glimpse of the world beyond their home in the chilly Quebec countryside, courtesy of the living-room stereo. Father and daughter quietly tap their fingers and rock their knees to songs like Tiffany's improbably upbeat "I Think We're Alone Now"--pop hits from a bygone era that, for all the unschooled Julyvonne knows, could be the present. The irony of that reveal, which is perhaps unsurprising to anyone familiar with Côté's filmography, is that Jean-François and Julyvonne have their own, perfectly private lives outside this sheltered world, him through his work as a repairman whose job necessitates roaming into hotels and bowling alleys, her through a number of clandestine trips to the forest that put her in touch with a tiger and its possible prey. That tension between the drive to hermetically seal off one's world--to board up the windows against the dangers of cities and the unruly people who... Bill Chambers Watermark (2013) tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c019affa4b72e970d 2013-09-27T12:25:54-05:00 2013-09-27T12:42:28-05:00 ***/**** directed by Jennifer Baichwal & Edward Burtynsky by Angelo Muredda Although it's the first of her films to be co-directed (by Manufactured Landscapes subject and Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky), Watermark is less a departure for Jennifer Baichwal than it is the apotheosis of her style. Since 1988's Let it Come Down, Baichwal has been the most formally adventurous documentarian of the artistic process, not just profiling the work of makers as disparate as Paul Bowles and Shelby Lee Adams, but attempting to recreate their singular visions as well. In her previous film, Payback, that meant converting Margaret Atwood's lecture series of the same name into an evocative position paper about debt in all its global permutations, from blood feuds to legal restitution. In Manufactured Landscapes, it consisted of finding a way to translate Burtynsky's large-scale images of factories and pock-marked terrains into cinematic tableaux, with collaborator Nick de Pencier's cinematography of Burtynsky's stomping grounds effectively adding a sense of duration and movement to the print-bound stasis of the originals. Watermark might be the most radical variation on this approach, an abstract consideration of the interaction between water and human-made structures, carried out largely through wordless aerial photography of streams... Bill Chambers