Amphibians on the hotspot: Molecular biology and conservation in the South American Atlantic Rainforest

Amphibians are the focus of a recent debate and public attention owing to the global decline in their populations worldwide. Amphibians are one of the most threatened and poorly known groups of vertebrates in several geographic areas, even though they play a central role in their own ecosystems. At different levels, amphibians make their contribution to proper ecosystem functioning. They act as regulators of the food web and nutrient cycling, and they also provide several valuable ecosystem services, e.g., as a food source and as animal models for lab research. In this sense, it seems clear that the maintenance of amphibian diversity should be one of the major goals for the several countries where their population decline is observed. However, we are still struggling with the very first step of this process, i.e., the correct identification of the amphibian species diversity. Over the past few decades, research on molecular identification of amphibians using DNA barcoding has encountered some difficulties related to high variability in the mitochondrial genome of amphibians, and a research gap is noticeable in the literature. We herein evaluated both COI and 16S rRNA mitochondrial genes for the molecular identification of frogs and tadpoles in a large fragment of the South American Atlantic Rainforest in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Our results suggest that both COI and 16S rRNA are informative markers for the molecular identification of the amphibian specimens with all specimens unambiguously identified at the species level. We also made publicly available 12 new sequences of Atlantic Rainforest amphibian species for the first time, and we discussed some conservation issues related to amphibians within the Atlantic Rainforest domains in the state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.The authors benefited from grants provided to CFDR (304791/2010-5; 470265/2010- 8 and 302974/2015-6) from Conselho Nacional do Desenvolvimento Cientifico e Tecnologico (CNPq) and through "Cientistas do Nosso Estado" Program from FAPERJ to CFDR (process No. E-26/ 102.765.2012 E-26/202.920.2015). We would like to thank C. Haddad (Universidade Estadual Paulista) and M. L. Lyra (Universidade Estadual Paulista) for some of the specimens and the primers used in the present manuscript and L. A. Fusinatto, who kindly revised the manuscript offering helpful suggestions. FP was supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) [IF/01356/2012] and Northern Regional Operational Programme (NORTE2020) through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) [MARINFO NORTE-01-0145-FEDER- 000031]. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript

Lymph vascular invasion in invasive mammary carcinomas identified by the endothelial lymphatic marker D2-40 is associated with other indicators of poor prognosis

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Immunohistochemical studies of lymphatic vessels have been limited by a lack of specific markers. Recently, the novel D2-40 antibody, which selectively marks endothelium of lymphatic vessels, was released. The aim of our study is to compare lymphatic and blood vessel invasion detected by hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) versus that detected by immunohistochemistry, relating them with morphologic and molecular prognostic factors.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We selected 123 cases of invasive mammary carcinomas stratified into three subgroups according to axillary lymph node status: macrometastases, micrometastases, and lymph node negative. Lymphatic (LVI) and blood (BVI) vessel invasion were evaluated by H&E and immunohistochemistry using the D2-40 and CD31 antibodies, and related to histologic tumor type and grade, estrogen and progesterone receptors, E-cadherin, Ki67, p53, and Her2/<it>neu </it>expression.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>LVI was detected in H&E-stained sections in 17/123 cases (13.8%), and in D2-40 sections in 35/123 cases (28.5%) (Kappa = 0.433). BVI was detected in H&E-stained sections in 5/123 cases (4.1%), and in CD31 stained sections in 19/123 cases (15.4%) (Kappa = 0.198). LVI is positively related to higher histologic grade (p = 0.013), higher Ki67 expression (p = 0.00013), and to the presence of macrometastases (p = 0.002), and inversely related to estrogen (p = 0.0016) and progesterone (p = 0.00017) receptors expression.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>D2-40 is a reliable marker of lymphatic vessels and is a useful tool for lymphatic emboli identification in immunostained sections of breast carcinomas with higher identification rates than H&E. Lymphatic vessel invasion was related to other features (high combined histologic grade, high Ki67 score, negative hormone receptors expression) associated with worse prognosis, probable reflecting a potential for lymphatic metastatic spread and aggressive behavior.</p

Avaliação do Ensino de Empreendedorismo entre Estudantes Universitários por meio do Perfil Empreendedor

Entrepreneurship is a socioeconomic phenomenon that has been valued for its influence on the growth and development of regional and national economies. The main promoter of this phenomenon are entrepreneurs, subjects endowed with multiple features that make up their profiles. They are dynamic and results oriented, benefitting from the fruits of their own personal efforts. Entrepreneurial education is highlighted as one of the most efficient ways to promote an entrepreneurial culture and train new entrepreneurs. However, some difficulty has been observed in assessing the effectiveness of teaching and learning this subject. The objective of this study was to analyze, by means of multivariate techniques, an instrument whose function is to measure the learning of Entrepreneurship, verifying the change in entrepreneur profiles of 407 college students participating or not in an entrepreneurial training process. The results showed that students who participated in Entrepreneurship educational training activities showed significant changes in their entrepreneurial profiles. The main contributions showed growth in the Self-realization, Planner, Innovative and Risks Assumed dimensions

Epigenomic modifications mediating antibody maturation

Epigenetic modifications, such as histone modifications, DNA methylation status, and non-coding RNAs (ncRNA), all contribute to antibody maturation during somatic hypermutation (SHM) and class-switch recombination (CSR). Histone modifications alter the chromatin landscape and, together with DNA primary and tertiary structures, they help recruit Activation-Induced Cytidine Deaminase (AID) to the immunoglobulin (Ig) locus. AID is a potent DNA mutator, which catalyzes cytosine-to-uracil deamination on single-stranded DNA to create U:G mismatches. It has been shown that alternate chromatin modifications, in concert with ncRNAs and potentially DNA methylation, regulate AID recruitment and stabilize DNA repair factors. We, hereby, assess the combination of these distinct modifications and discuss how they contribute to initiating differential DNA repair pathways at the Ig locus, which ultimately leads to enhanced antibody-antigen binding affinity (SHM) or antibody isotype switching (CSR). We will also highlight how misregulation of epigenomic regulation during DNA repair can compromise antibody development and lead to a number of immunological syndromes and cancer

Cosmic microwave background observations from the Cosmic Background Imager and Very Small Array: a comparison of coincident maps and parameter estimation methods

WWe present coincident observations of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) from the Very Small Array (VSA) and Cosmic Background Imager (CBI) telescopes. The consistency of the full data sets is tested in the map plane and the Fourier plane, prior to the usual compression of CMB data into flat bandpowers. Of the three mosaics observed by each group, two are found to be in excellent agreement. In the third mosaic, there is a 2σ discrepancy between the correlation of the data and the level expected from Monte Carlo simulations. This is shown to be consistent with increased phase calibration errors on VSA data during summer observations. We also consider the parameter estimation method of each group. The key difference is the use of the variance window function in place of the bandpower window function, an approximation used by the VSA group. A re-evaluation of the VSA parameter estimates, using bandpower windows, shows that the two methods yield consistent results