The usefulness of rapid diagnostic tests in the new context of low malaria transmission in zanzibar.

BACKGROUND\ud \ud We assessed if histidine-rich-protein-2 (HRP2) based rapid diagnostic test (RDT) remains an efficient tool for Plasmodium falciparum case detection among fever patients in Zanzibar and if primary health care workers continue to adhere to RDT results in the new epidemiological context of low malaria transmission. Further, we evaluated the performance of RDT within the newly adopted integrated management of childhood illness (IMCI) algorithm in Zanzibar.\ud \ud METHODS AND FINDINGS\ud \ud We enrolled 3890 patients aged ≥2 months with uncomplicated febrile illness in this health facility based observational study conducted in 12 primary health care facilities in Zanzibar, between May-July 2010. One patient had an inconclusive RDT result. Overall 121/3889 (3.1%) patients were RDT positive. The highest RDT positivity rate, 32/528 (6.1%), was found in children aged 5-14 years. RDT sensitivity and specificity against PCR was 76.5% (95% CI 69.0-83.9%) and 99.9% (95% CI 99.7-100%), and against blood smear microscopy 78.6% (95% CI 70.8-85.1%) and 99.7% (95% CI 99.6-99.9%), respectively. All RDT positive, but only 3/3768 RDT negative patients received anti-malarial treatment. Adherence to RDT results was thus 3887/3889 (99.9%). RDT performed well in the IMCI algorithm with equally high adherence among children <5 years as compared with other age groups.\ud \ud CONCLUSIONS\ud \ud The sensitivity of HRP-2 based RDT in the hands of health care workers compared with both PCR and microscopy for P. falciparum case detection was relatively low, whereas adherence to test results with anti-malarial treatment was excellent. Moreover, the results provide evidence that RDT can be reliably integrated in IMCI as a tool for improved childhood fever management. However, the relatively low RDT sensitivity highlights the need for improved quality control of RDT use in primary health care facilities, but also for more sensitive point-of-care malaria diagnostic tools in the new epidemiological context of low malaria transmission in Zanzibar.\ud \ud TRIAL REGISTRATION\ud \ud ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01002066

Whispering to the Deaf: Communication by a Frog without External Vocal Sac or Tympanum in Noisy Environments

Atelopus franciscus is a diurnal bufonid frog that lives in South-American tropical rain forests. As in many other frogs, males produce calls to defend their territories and attract females. However, this species is a so-called “earless” frog lacking an external tympanum and is thus anatomically deaf. Moreover, A. franciscus has no external vocal sac and lives in a sound constraining environment along river banks where it competes with other calling frogs. Despite these constraints, male A. franciscus reply acoustically to the calls of conspecifics in the field. To resolve this apparent paradox, we studied the vocal apparatus and middle-ear, analysed signal content of the calls, examined sound and signal content propagation in its natural habitat, and performed playback experiments. We show that A. franciscus males can produce only low intensity calls that propagate a short distance (<8 m) as a result of the lack of an external vocal sac. The species-specific coding of the signal is based on the pulse duration, providing a simple coding that is efficient as it allows discrimination from calls of sympatric frogs. Moreover, the signal is redundant and consequently adapted to noisy environments. As such a coding system can be efficient only at short-range, territory holders established themselves at short distances from each other. Finally, we show that the middle-ear of A. franciscus does not present any particular adaptations to compensate for the lack of an external tympanum, suggesting the existence of extra-tympanic pathways for sound propagation

Patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models in basic and translational breast cancer research

Patient-derived xenograft (PDX) models of a growing spectrum of cancers are rapidly supplanting long-established traditional cell lines as preferred models for conducting basic and translational preclinical research. In breast cancer, to complement the now curated collection of approximately 45 long-established human breast cancer cell lines, a newly formed consortium of academic laboratories, currently from Europe, Australia, and North America, herein summarizes data on over 500 stably transplantable PDX models representing all three clinical subtypes of breast cancer (ER+, HER2+, and "Triple-negative" (TNBC)). Many of these models are well-characterized with respect to genomic, transcriptomic, and proteomic features, metastatic behavior, and treatment response to a variety of standard-of-care and experimental therapeutics. These stably transplantable PDX lines are generally available for dissemination to laboratories conducting translational research, and contact information for each collection is provided. This review summarizes current experiences related to PDX generation across participating groups, efforts to develop data standards for annotation and dissemination of patient clinical information that does not compromise patient privacy, efforts to develop complementary data standards for annotation of PDX characteristics and biology, and progress toward "credentialing" of PDX models as surrogates to represent individual patients for use in preclinical and co-clinical translational research. In addition, this review highlights important unresolved questions, as well as current limitations, that have hampered more efficient generation of PDX lines and more rapid adoption of PDX use in translational breast cancer research

Extension d’une espèce envahissante : suivi de la population d’écrevisse signal (Pacifastacus leniusculus Dana) au Léman à l’ouest de Thonon - les Bains, entre 2001 et 2005 - Impact de la pêche

National audienc

Open-ended treasury purchases: From market functioning to financial easing

We exploit the Fed's Treasury purchases conducted from March 2020 to March 2022 to assess whether asset purchases can be tailored to accomplish different objectives: restoring market functioning and providing stimulus. We find that, on average, flow effects are significant in the market-functioning (MF) period (March-September 2020), while stock effects are strong in the QE period (September 2020-March 2022). In the MF period, the elevated frequency and size of the purchase operations allowed flow effects to greatly improve relative price deviations, especially at the long-end of the yield curve. But stock effects remained localized, thus not large enough to be stimulative. In contrast, in the QE period, stock effects were stimulative because cross-asset price impacts got larger as the Fed communication and implementation moved toward "traditional" QE, increasing purchases' predictability. Lower uncertainty about the expected size and duration of total purchases facilitated their impounding into prices. Overall, these findings suggest that communication and implementation can be used to tailor the goals of asset purchases

Introduction aux humanités numériques: Méthodes et pratiques

info:eu-repo/semantics/published

Inventaire de la flore vasculaire (Ptéridophytes et Spermaphytes) de Franche-Comté : Indigénats, raretés, menaces, protections

National audienc