Quantification of impact of COVID-19 pandemic on cancer screening programmes – a case study from Argentina, Bangladesh, Colombia, Morocco, Sri Lanka, and Thailand

Q1Q1Pacientes con Cáncer de cuello uterinoPacientes con Cáncer de mamaIt is quite well documented that the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted cancer screening services in all countries, irrespective of their resources and healthcare settings. While quantitative estimates on reduction in volume of screening tests or diagnostic evaluation are readily available from the high-income countries, very little data are available from the low- and middle-income coun tries (LMICs). From the CanScreen5 global cancer screening data repository we identified six LMICs through purposive sampling based on the availability of cancer screening data at least for the years 2019 and 2020. These countries represented those in high human development index (HDI) cate gories (Argentina, Colombia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand) and medium HDI categories (Bangladesh and Morocco). No data were available from low HDI countries to perform similar analysis. The reduction in the volume of tests in 2020 compared to the previous year ranged from 14.1% in Bangladesh to 72.9% in Argentina (regional programme) for cervical screening, from 14.2% in Bangladesh to 49.4% in Morocco for breast cancer screening and 30.7% in Thailand for colorectal cancer screening. Number of colposcopies was reduced in 2020 compared to previous year by 88.9% in Argentina, 38.2% in Colombia, 27.4% in Bangladesh, and 52.2% in Morocco. The reduction in detection rates of CIN 2 or worse lesions ranged from 20.7% in Morocco to 45.4% in Argentina. Reduction of breast cancer detection by 19.1% was reported from Morocco. No association of the impact of pandemic could be seen with HDI categories. Quantifying the impact of service disruptions in screening and diagnostic tests will allow the programmes to strategize how to ramp up services to clear the back logs in screening and more crucially in further evaluation of screen positives. The data can be used to estimate the impact on stage distribution and avoidable mortality from these common cancers.https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7187-9946Revista Internacional - IndexadaA1N

Puesta a punto y simulación del concentrador fresnel lineal de 86 m2 instalado en San Carlos

En este trabajo se muestra la puesta a punto de un Concentrador Lineal tipo Fresnel el cual está siendo instalado en la ciudad de San Carlos (Salta) en el marco del proyecto PFIP 2009 del MINCYT. El prototipo de concentrador fue construido a escala real con un factor de concentración cercano a 40 y un área de colección de 86m2 correspondientes a dos módulos instalados en serie. El ensayo preliminar permitió corroborar el correcto desempeño de las partes que forman el sistema completo. Mediante el software SIMUSOL se simuló el comportamiento térmico del equipo en condiciones normales de funcionamiento. Este programa es una herramienta útil para simulación de sistemas térmicos y predice correctamente el comportamiento de este equipoFil: Altamirano, Martin. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina;Fil: Hongn, Marcos Ezequiel. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina;Fil: Fernandez, C.. Universidad Nacional de Salta; Argentina;Fil: Bárcena, Humberto Francisco. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina;Fil: Hoyos, Daniel. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina;Fil: Saravia Mathon, Luis Roberto. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina;Fil: Flores Larsen, Silvana Elinor. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina;Fil: Gea, Marcelo Daniel. Universidad Nacional de Salta; Argentina;Fil: Placco, Cora. Universidad Nacional de Salta; Argentina;Fil: Suligoy, Hugo Cesar. Consejo Nacional de Invest.cientif.y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnol.conicet - Salta. Instituto de Invest.en Energia No Convencional; Argentina

Circulating clonotypic B cells in multiple myeloma and monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance

This is an open-access paper.The B-cell compartment in which multiple myeloma stem cells reside remains unclear. We investigated the potential presence of mature, surface-membrane immunoglobulin-positive B lymphocytes clonally related to the tumor bone marrow plasma cells among different subsets of peripheral blood B cells from ten patients (7 with multiple myeloma and 3 with monoclonal gammopathies of undetermined significance). The presence of clonotypic immunoglobulin heavy chain gene rearrangements was determined in multiple highly-purified fractions of peripheral blood B-lymphocytes including surface-membrane IgM+ CD27- naïve B-lymphocytes, plus surface-membrane IgG+, IgA+ and IgM+ memory CD27+ B cells, and normal circulating plasma cells, in addition to (mono)clonal plasma cells, by a highly-specific and sensitive allele-specific oligonucleotide polymerase chain reaction directed to the CDR3 sequence of the rearranged IGH gene of tumor plasma cells from individual patients. Our results showed systematic absence of clonotypic rearrangements in all the different B-cell subsets analyzed, including M-compo-nent isotype-matched memory B-lymphocytes, at frequencies <0.03 cells/mL (range: 0.0003-0.08 cells/mL); the only exception were the myeloma plasma cells detected and purified from the peripheral blood of four of the seven myeloma patients. These results indicate that circulating B cells from patients with multiple myeloma and monoclonal gammopathies of undetermined significance are usually devoid of clonotypic B cells while the presence of immunophenotypically aberrant myeloma plasma cells in peripheral blood of myeloma patients is a relatively frequent finding.This work was supported by grants from European Union FP6 STREP MSCNet (N. E06005FF), Cooperative Research Thematic Network on Cancer (RTICs; RTICC RD06/0020/0035-FEDER, RD06/0020/0006, RD12/0036/0048, RD12/0036/0069 and G03/136), Instituto de Salud Carlos III/Subdirección General de Investigación Sanitaria Ministerio de Sanidad y Consumo (FIS: PI060339; 02/0905; 01/0089/01-02;PS09/01897, and PI06/0824-FEDER), Asociacion Española Contra el Cancer AECC (GCB120981SAN) and Gerencia Regional de Salud de Castilla y León; Ayuda de Excelencia de Castilla y León, Consejería de Educación (EDU/894/2009, GR37) Junta de Castilla y León, Valladolid, Spain. LST received a CAPES/Ministério da Educação scholarship from the Brazilian Government.Peer Reviewe

Cytogenetic profiles in multiple myeloma and monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance: a study in highly purified aberrant plasma cells

This is an open-access paper.Cytogenetic studies in clonal plasma cell disorders have mainly been done in whole bone marrow or CD138+ microbead-enriched plasma cells and suggest that recurrent immunoglobulin heavy chain translocations - e.g. t(4;14) - are primary oncogenetic events. The aim of this study was to determine cytogenetic patterns of highly purified aberrant plasma cells (median purity ≥98%) in different clonal plasma cell disorders. We analyzed aberrant plasma cells from 208 patients with multiple myeloma (n=148) and monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (n=60) for the presence of del(13q14), del(17p13) and t(14q32) using multicolor interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization. Additionally, immunoglobulin heavy chain gene arrangements were analyzed and complementarity determining region 3 was sequenced in a subset of patients and combined multicolor interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization/immunofluorescent protein staining analyses were performed in selected cases to confirm clonality and cytogenetic findings. At diagnosis, 96% of cases with multiple myeloma versus 77% of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance cases showed at least one cytogenetic alteration and/or hyperdiploidy. The cytogenetic heterogeneity of individual cases reflected coexistence of cytogenetically-defined aberrant plasma cell clones, and led to the assumption that karyotypic alterations were acquired stepwise. Cases of multiple myeloma and monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance frequently showed different but related cytogenetic profiles when other cytogenetic alterations such as deletions/gains of the immunoglobulin heavy chain or the fibroblast growth factor receptor 3 were additionally considered. Interestingly, in 24% of multiple myeloma versus 62% of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance patients with an immunoglobulin heavy chain translocation, aberrant plasma cells with and without t(14q32) coexisted in the same patient. Our data suggest that recurrent immunoglobulin heavy chain translocations might be absent in the primordial plasma cell clone in a significant proportion of patients with clonal plasma cell disorders carrying these cytogenetic alterations.This work was partially supported by grants from the Fundacion Memoria de Don Samuel Solorzano Barruso, Salamanca, Spain (FS/4-2010). The authors would also like to thank the Dr. Werner Jackstädt Foundation (Wuppertal, Germany) for grant supporting the work of Martin Schmidt-Hieber. The authors would like to thank the Cooperative Research Thematic Network (RTICs; RTICC RD06/0020/0035, RD06/0020/0006 and G03/136), MM Jevitt, SL firm, Instituto de Salud Carlos III/Subdirección General de Investigación Sanitaria (FIS: PI060339; 02/0905; 01/0089/01-02; PS09/01897) and Gerencia Regional de Salud de Castilla y León; Ayuda de Excelencia de Castilla y León, Consejeria de Educación (EDU/894/2009, GR37), and Consejería de Sanidad (557/A/10), Junta de Castilla y León, Valladolid, Spain for supporting this study. JMS is supported by a grant (CP05/00321) from the ISCIII, Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovacion, Madrid, Spain.Peer Reviewe

Dynamic Intracellular Metabolic Cell Signaling Profiles During Ag-Dependent B-Cell Differentiation

© 2021 Díez, Pérez-Andrés, Bøgsted, Azkargorta, García-Valiente, Dégano, Blanco, Mateos-Gomez, Bárcena, Santa Cruz, Góngora, Elortza, Landeira-Viñuela, Juanes-Velasco, Segura, Manzano-Román, Almeida, Dybkaer, Orfao and Fuentes.Human B-cell differentiation has been extensively investigated on genomic and transcriptomic grounds; however, no studies have accomplished so far detailed analysis of antigen-dependent maturation-associated human B-cell populations from a proteomic perspective. Here, we investigate for the first time the quantitative proteomic profiles of B-cells undergoing antigen-dependent maturation using a label-free LC-MS/MS approach applied on 5 purified B-cell subpopulations (naive, centroblasts, centrocytes, memory and plasma B-cells) from human tonsils (data are available via ProteomeXchange with identifier PXD006191). Our results revealed that the actual differences among these B-cell subpopulations are a combination of expression of a few maturation stage-specific proteins within each B-cell subset and maturation-associated changes in relative protein expression levels, which are related with metabolic regulation. The considerable overlap of the proteome of the 5 studied B-cell subsets strengthens the key role of the regulation of the stoichiometry of molecules associated with metabolic regulation and programming, among other signaling cascades (such as antigen recognition and presentation and cell survival) crucial for the transition between each B-cell maturation stage.We gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Spanish Health Institute Carlos III (ISCIII) for the grants: FIS PI14/01538, FIS PI17/01930 and CB16/12/00400. We also acknowledge Fondos FEDER (EU) and Junta Castilla-León (COVID19 grant COV20EDU/00187). Fundación Solórzano FS/38-2017.The Proteomics Unit belongs to ProteoRed, PRB3-ISCIII, supported by grant PT17/0019/0023, of the PE I + D + I 2017-2020, funded by ISCIII and FEDER. AL-V is supported by VIII Centenario-USAL PhD Program. PJ-V is supported by JCYL PhD Program and scholarship JCYL-EDU/601/2020. PD and EB are supported by a JCYL-EDU/346/2013 Ph.D. scholarship

La contribución económica-ambiental de programas de conservación en México: una aplicación del Modelo Integrado Económico-Ambiental (IEEM)

En este estudio se investigan los impactos, tanto económicos como aquellos sobre el capital natural y servicios ecosistémicos, de tres programas de conservación en México. Más precisamente, se analizan el programa de pago por servicios ambientales, el programa para reducir las emisiones en el sector agrícola, silvicultura y otros usos de la tierra, y el programa de unidades de manejo para la conservación de la vida silvestre. La estimación de los beneficios de estos programas es importante para justificar su financiamiento, en un contexto en el cual los recursos públicos son cada vez más escasos. Para tal fin, se aplica el Modelo Económico-Ambiental Integrado (IEEM por sus siglas en inglés) vinculado con la modelación espacial de alta resolución de cambios en uso y cobertura de suelos y servicios ecosistémicos (IEEM+ESM). Los resultados muestran que el impacto combinado de estos tres programas sobre el producto interno bruto acumulado hasta el año 2035 es de alrededor de US$856.9 millones de dólares, mientras que el impacto sobre la riqueza es aproximadamente US$492.3 millones de dólares. En conjunto, los tres programas considerados reducen la pobreza en 1,800 individuos. IEEM+ESM permite cuantificar, además de los efectos puramente económicos, el aporte que realizan distintos servicios ecosistémicos como, por ejemplo, cultura y recreación, de abastecimiento de agua y de regulación. A modo de ejemplo, cuando se consideran los servicios ecosistémicos de regulación, el impacto conjunto de los tres programas sobre el producto interno bruto es 1.34 veces más elevado. Los resultados presentados en este estudio pueden ser de utilidad para la obtención de recursos que permitan la continuidad e, incluso, la ampliación de estos programas, considerando que contribuyen a la conservación de la biodiversidad y el capital natural, así como también al bienestar de la sociedad mexicana.Centro de Estudios Distributivos, Laborales y Sociale

High-latitude forcing of diatom productivity in the southern Agulhas Plateauduring the past 350kyr

The hydrography of the Indian-Atlantic Ocean gateway has been connected to high-latitude climate dynamics by oceanic and atmospheric teleconnections on orbital and suborbital timescales. A wealth of sedimentary records aiming at reconstructing the late Pleistocene paleoceanography around the southern African continent has been devoted to understanding these linkages. Most of the records are, however, clustered close to the southern South African tip, with comparatively less attention devoted to areas under the direct influence of frontal zones of the Southern Ocean/South Atlantic. Here we present data of the composition and concentration of the diatom assemblage together with bulk biogenic content and the alkenone-based sea surface temperature (SST) variations for the past 350?kyr in the marine sediment core MD02-2588 (approximately 41°S, 26°E) recovered from the southern Agulhas Plateau. Variations in biosiliceous productivity show a varying degree of coupling with Southern Hemisphere paleoclimate records following a glacial-interglacial cyclicity. Ecologically well-constrained groups of diatoms record the glacial-interglacial changes in water masses dynamics, nutrient availability, and stratification of the upper ocean. The good match between the glacial maxima of total diatoms concentration, Chaetoceros spores abundance, and opal content with the maximum seasonal cover of Antarctic ice and the atmospheric dust records points to a dominant Southern Hemisphere forcing of diatom production. Suborbital variability of SST suggests rapid latitudinal migrations of the Subtropical Front and associated water masses over the southern Agulhas Plateau, following millennial contractions and expansions of the subtropical gyres. Warmings of the upper ocean over site MD02-2588 during terminations IV to I occurred earlier than that in the Antarctic Vostok, which is indicative of a Northern Hemisphere lead. Our multiparameter reconstruction highlights how high-latitude atmospheric and hydrographic processes modulated orbital highs and lows in primary production and SST as triggered by northward transport of Si, eolian dust input, and latitudinal migrations of frontal zones