Overview of DNA Repair in Trypanosoma cruzi, Trypanosoma brucei, and Leishmania major

A wide variety of DNA lesions arise due to environmental agents, normal cellular metabolism, or intrinsic weaknesses in the chemical bonds of DNA. Diverse cellular mechanisms have evolved to maintain genome stability, including mechanisms to repair damaged DNA, to avoid the incorporation of modified nucleotides, and to tolerate lesions (translesion synthesis). Studies of the mechanisms related to DNA metabolism in trypanosomatids have been very limited. Together with recent experimental studies, the genome sequencing of Trypanosoma brucei, Trypanosoma cruzi, and Leishmania major, three related pathogens with different life cycles and disease pathology, has revealed interesting features of the DNA repair mechanism in these protozoan parasites, which will be reviewed here

No association between periodontal disease and GHQ-12 in a Brazilian Police population

Objectives: We attempt to investigate a possible association between periodontal disease (PD) and mental disorders (MD) in a population of Brazilian Police. Study Method: From a total study population consisting of 803 policemen, 345 police officers were obtained by a sample calculation using the finite population correction who were randomly selected in Montes Claros, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Patients who had been prescribed steroids or those diagnosed with diabetes and cardiovascular diseases were excluded from this study. The General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) was used to assess mental disorders. Odds ratios (ORs) for periodontal diseases severity and their respective 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated. The risk of advanced scores in Clinical Attachment Level (CAL) and Community Periodontal Index (CPI) were estimated using Poisson Regression analyses. Results: Only smoking and age were associated with severity in CAL and CPI index. No relation between MD and PD was observed even in different positions within the police department. Conclusions: It was not observed relation between GHQ 12 and the incidence of Periodontal Disease in a Brazi-lian Police population. Classical factors like age and smoking, however, were associated with CAL and CPI index higher scores in this population. © Medicina Oral S. L

Patrimônio e desenvolvimento: as políticas de patrimônio cultural nos anos 1960

This article aims at analyzing aspects of 1960s Brazilian cultural heritage policies, highlighting changes related to the articulation of concepts such as development, culture and heritage within the Directory of National Historical and Artistic Heritage - DPHAN, today Institute of National Historical and Artistic Heritage (IPHAN). It discusses the effects of industrialization, urban growth and development improvement measures on heritage concepts and policies, analyzing initiatives that focus on preserving cultural assets acknowledged as national historical and artistic heritage and enhancing their economical potential. The discussion emphasizes notions and understandings on heritage and preservation that had substantial bearing on preservation measures carried on by DPHAN from the 1960s on regarding the identification, valorization and protection of cultural heritage, as well as the disciplinary and institutional debates this Directory proposed.O objetivo deste artigo é analisar especificidades dos anos 1960 no que diz respeito às políticas de patrimônio, destacando algumas mudanças de entendimentos, noções e propostas, notadamente referentes às relações entre desenvolvimento, cultura e patrimônio trabalhadas pelo Instituto do Patrimônio Histórico e Artístico Nacional, então Diretoria do Patrimônio Histórico e Artístico Nacional (DPHAN). Para tanto, vai-se partir das discussões e debates desse momento acerca dos efeitos da industrialização, do crescimento urbano e das políticas desenvolvimentistas sobre as políticas de patrimônio a partir dessa década, analisando as iniciativas voltadas à patrimonialização de bens culturais, à preservação do acervo que compunha o patrimônio histórico e artístico nacional e ao fomento de suas potencialidades econômicas. Na discussão proposta neste artigo, priorizar-se-ão os entendimentos e ações de preservação da DPHAN relacionados a identificação, valoração e proteção dos bens culturais, assim como os diálogos disciplinares e institucionais que a diretoria procurou estabelecer

Photography-based taxonomy is inadequate, unnecessary, and potentially harmful for biological sciences

The question whether taxonomic descriptions naming new animal species without type specimen(s) deposited in collections should be accepted for publication by scientific journals and allowed by the Code has already been discussed in Zootaxa (Dubois & Nemésio 2007; Donegan 2008, 2009; Nemésio 2009a–b; Dubois 2009; Gentile & Snell 2009; Minelli 2009; Cianferoni & Bartolozzi 2016; Amorim et al. 2016). This question was again raised in a letter supported by 35 signatories published in the journal Nature (Pape et al. 2016) on 15 September 2016. On 25 September 2016, the following rebuttal (strictly limited to 300 words as per the editorial rules of Nature) was submitted to Nature, which on 18 October 2016 refused to publish it. As we think this problem is a very important one for zoological taxonomy, this text is published here exactly as submitted to Nature, followed by the list of the 493 taxonomists and collection-based researchers who signed it in the short time span from 20 September to 6 October 2016

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

ATLANTIC EPIPHYTES: a data set of vascular and non-vascular epiphyte plants and lichens from the Atlantic Forest

Epiphytes are hyper-diverse and one of the frequently undervalued life forms in plant surveys and biodiversity inventories. Epiphytes of the Atlantic Forest, one of the most endangered ecosystems in the world, have high endemism and radiated recently in the Pliocene. We aimed to (1) compile an extensive Atlantic Forest data set on vascular, non-vascular plants (including hemiepiphytes), and lichen epiphyte species occurrence and abundance; (2) describe the epiphyte distribution in the Atlantic Forest, in order to indicate future sampling efforts. Our work presents the first epiphyte data set with information on abundance and occurrence of epiphyte phorophyte species. All data compiled here come from three main sources provided by the authors: published sources (comprising peer-reviewed articles, books, and theses), unpublished data, and herbarium data. We compiled a data set composed of 2,095 species, from 89,270 holo/hemiepiphyte records, in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay, recorded from 1824 to early 2018. Most of the records were from qualitative data (occurrence only, 88%), well distributed throughout the Atlantic Forest. For quantitative records, the most common sampling method was individual trees (71%), followed by plot sampling (19%), and transect sampling (10%). Angiosperms (81%) were the most frequently registered group, and Bromeliaceae and Orchidaceae were the families with the greatest number of records (27,272 and 21,945, respectively). Ferns and Lycophytes presented fewer records than Angiosperms, and Polypodiaceae were the most recorded family, and more concentrated in the Southern and Southeastern regions. Data on non-vascular plants and lichens were scarce, with a few disjunct records concentrated in the Northeastern region of the Atlantic Forest. For all non-vascular plant records, Lejeuneaceae, a family of liverworts, was the most recorded family. We hope that our effort to organize scattered epiphyte data help advance the knowledge of epiphyte ecology, as well as our understanding of macroecological and biogeographical patterns in the Atlantic Forest. No copyright restrictions are associated with the data set. Please cite this Ecology Data Paper if the data are used in publication and teaching events. © 2019 The Authors. Ecology © 2019 The Ecological Society of Americ

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5,6,7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8,9,10,11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases.13,14,15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may eliminate pieces of the Amazon's biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological communities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple organism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region's vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most neglected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lost

Revascularização do miocárdio sem circulação extracorpórea: resultados da experiência de 18 anos de sua utilização Myocardial revascularization without extracorporeal circulation: results from 18 years experience

Introdução: A revascularização do miocárdio sem circulação extracorpórea (CEC) é hoje alternativa de revascularização em expansão não estando ainda bem definidos os limites de sua aplicabilidade. Os autores revêem sua casuística global e discutem as indicações ideais do procedimento baseados nos resultados obtidos. Casuística e Métodos: São analisados 2.495 pacientes operados sem CEC de outubro de 1981 a setembro de 1999 de um total de 10.656 pacientes revascularizados no período (23,4%). As idades variaram de 32 a 90 anos, mediana 59, e o sexo masculino predominou (67%). Insuficiência coronária crônica foi responsável por 70,8% das indicações operatórias e a maioria dos pacientes recebeu 2 pontes (51,5%). Resultados: A mortalidade (30 dias) global foi de 1,9% (48/2495) e a morbidade referente a eventos maiores foi significativamente menor em um subgrupo deste material que foi prospectivamente. Apenas 45% dos operados necessitaram de transfusão sangüínea contrastando com 90,5% dos operados com a técnica convencional. A aplicabilidade da técnica que no global foi de 23% nos últimos três anos foi de 36,8%, 35, l% e 42,2%. Conclusão: A revascularização do miocárdio sem CEC é alternativa segura de tratamento da insuficiência coronária observando-se um aumento progressivo de sua aplicação nos últimos anos. Permite o tratamento de um subgrupo de pacientes com baixa mortalidade hospitalar e menor incidência de complicações pós-operatórias, devendo seu uso ser expandido nos próximos anos com a introdução dos estabilizadores, manobras especiais e a revascularização funcional.<br>Introduction: Myocardial revascularization without cardiopulmonary bypass is today an increasing alternative of revascularization although the limits of applicability are still to be defined. The authors review a series of cases and discuss its indications based upon their results. Patients and Methods: There were analyzed 2495 patients who underwent direct myocardial revascularization without extracorporeal circulation in the period from October 1981 to September 1999, from a total of 10656 patients, submitted to coronary bypass surgery during this period (23.4%). The age varied from 32 to 90 years (medium = 59) with most males (67%). Chronic coronary insufficiency was the most common surgical indication (70.8%) and the majority of the patients received 2 grafts (51.5%). Results: The global mortality rate (30 days) was 1.9% (48/ 2495) and only 45% of these patients needed blood transfusion. The global applicability of this technique was around 23%, however in the last 3 years the applicability was 32.8%, 35.1% and 42.2%. Conclusions: Myocardial revascularization without extracorporeal circulation is a safe tactical alternative for coronary insufficiency and has increased in the last years. This treatment is indicated in this subgroup of lower mortality and small incidence of postoperative complications. In the next years the use of this technique will increase with the use of stabilizers, special manipulation and functional revascularization