About the Authors

Sangeetha Rajenderan

Affiliation Christian Medical College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, South India

Veeraraghavan Balaji

Affiliation Christian Medical College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, South India

Shalini Anandan

Affiliation Christian Medical College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, South India

Rani Diana Sahni

Affiliation Christian Medical College, Vellore, Tamil Nadu, South India

Giannoula S. Tansarli

Affiliation Alfa Institute of Biomedical Sciences, Athens, Greece

Matthew E. Falagas

m.falagas@aibs.gr

Affiliations Alfa Institute of Biomedical Sciences, Athens, Greece, Department of Internal Medicine - Infectious Diseases, Iaso General Hospital, Iaso Group, Athens, Greece, Department of Medicine, Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America

Competing Interests

Meiji Seika Pharma Co., Ltd, Japan The sponsor “Meiji Seika Pharma Co.,ltd, Japan” provided commercial dry plates ‘EIKEN’ for the study and payment for consumables used in the study. This does not alter the authors’ adherence to PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: SR VB SA RDS. Performed the experiments: SR VB SA RDS. Analyzed the data: SR VB SA RDS GST MEF. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: SR VB SA RDS GST MEF. Wrote the paper: MEF GST SR VB SA RDS.