Salvação que cai do céu: tecnologia de coleta de chuva permite a disponibilidade de água no Semiárido durante o ano todo.

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Nem mais nem menos: agricultura de precisão pode contribuir para o uso da água na medida certa.

Ela parece ser um bem abundante nas bordas e arredores do grandioso Rio São Francisco. Aliada ao calor permanente e à aplicação de tecnologias, permite que o Semiárido nordestino abrigue um dos maiores polos de fruticultura do Brasil. Mas o fato é que a água, seja onde e como for, precisa ser usada com bastante cautela.bitstream/item/186934/1/XXI-Ciencia-para-a-vida-n.8-p-17-18-2014.pd

Analysis of italian BRCA1/2 pathogenic variants identifies a private spectrum in the population from the Bergamo Province in northern Italy

Germline pathogenic variants (PVs) in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes cause high breast cancer risk. Recurrent or founder PVs have been described worldwide including some in the Bergamo province in Northern Italy. The aim of this study was to compare the BRCA1/2 PV spectra of the Bergamo and of the general Italian populations. We retrospectively identified at five Italian centers 1019 BRCA1/2 PVs carrier individuals affected with breast cancer and representative of the heterogeneous national population. Each individual was assigned to the Bergamo or non-Bergamo cohort based on self-reported birthplace. Our data indicate that the Bergamo BRCA1/2 PV spectrum shows less heterogeneity with fewer different variants and an average higher frequency compared to that of the rest of Italy. Consistently, four PVs explained about 60% of all carriers. The majority of the Bergamo PVs originated locally with only two PVs clearly imported. The Bergamo BRCA1/2 PV spectrum appears to be private. Hence, the Bergamo population would be ideal to study the disease risk associated with local PVs in breast cancer and other disease-causing genes. Finally, our data suggest that the Bergamo population is a genetic isolate and further analyses are warranted to prove this notion

Global overview of the management of acute cholecystitis during the COVID-19 pandemic (CHOLECOVID study)

Background: This study provides a global overview of the management of patients with acute cholecystitis during the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: CHOLECOVID is an international, multicentre, observational comparative study of patients admitted to hospital with acute cholecystitis during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data on management were collected for a 2-month study interval coincident with the WHO declaration of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and compared with an equivalent pre-pandemic time interval. Mediation analysis examined the influence of SARS-COV-2 infection on 30-day mortality. Results: This study collected data on 9783 patients with acute cholecystitis admitted to 247 hospitals across the world. The pandemic was associated with reduced availability of surgical workforce and operating facilities globally, a significant shift to worse severity of disease, and increased use of conservative management. There was a reduction (both absolute and proportionate) in the number of patients undergoing cholecystectomy from 3095 patients (56.2 per cent) pre-pandemic to 1998 patients (46.2 per cent) during the pandemic but there was no difference in 30-day all-cause mortality after cholecystectomy comparing the pre-pandemic interval with the pandemic (13 patients (0.4 per cent) pre-pandemic to 13 patients (0.6 per cent) pandemic; P = 0.355). In mediation analysis, an admission with acute cholecystitis during the pandemic was associated with a non-significant increased risk of death (OR 1.29, 95 per cent c.i. 0.93 to 1.79, P = 0.121). Conclusion: CHOLECOVID provides a unique overview of the treatment of patients with cholecystitis across the globe during the first months of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. The study highlights the need for system resilience in retention of elective surgical activity. Cholecystectomy was associated with a low risk of mortality and deferral of treatment results in an increase in avoidable morbidity that represents the non-COVID cost of this pandemic

Serum extracellular vesicle-derived microRNAs as potential biomarkers for pleural mesothelioma in a European prospective study

Malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM) is an aggressive cancer with a dismal prognosis. Early therapeutic interventions could improve patient outcomes. We aimed to identify a pattern of microRNAs (miRNAs) as potential early non-invasive markers of MPM. In a case-control study nested in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition cohort, we screened the whole miRNome in serum extracellular vesicles (EVs) of preclinical MPM cases. In a subgroup of 20 preclinical samples collected five years prior MPM diagnosis, we observed an upregulation of miR-11400 (fold change (FC) = 2.6, adjusted p-value = 0.01), miR-148a-3p (FC = 1.5, p-value = 0.001), and miR-409-3p (FC = 1.5, p-value = 0.04) relative to matched controls. The 3-miRNA panel showed a good classification capacity with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of 0.81 (specificity = 0.75, sensitivity = 0.70). The diagnostic ability of the model was also evaluated in an independent retrospective cohort, yielding a higher predictive power (AUC = 0.86). A signature of EV miRNA can be detected up to five years before MPM; moreover, the identified miRNAs could provide functional insights into the molecular changes related to the late carcinogenic process, preceding MPM development

Dietary supplementation with sodium butyrate: growth, gut response at different ages, and meat quality of female and male broiler chickens

The present study aimed to evaluate how dietary supplementation with a microencapsulated sodium butyrate (500mg/kg; 30% Na-butyrate) in 768 male and female broiler chickens affected growth performance, jejunum gut morphology and caecal microbiome at different ages (11, 24, and 35 d), slaughter results, meat quality, and myopathy (white striping, wooden breast, and spaghetti meat) occurrence. No health problem was recorded (mortality < 1%) and Na-butyrate supplementation did not affect performance throughout the trial, nor did it affect gut morphology or microbiota composition and abundance at different ages. Additionally, dietary treatment did not affect slaughter results, meat quality, or myopathy rate, whereas the rate of females affected by spaghetti meat tended to be higher in those fed the control compared with the Na-butyrate diet (33.3% versus 16.7%; p\ubc.06). Moreover, males showed a higher wooden breast (21.9% versus 7.3%; p<.01) and a lower spaghetti meat (3.1% versus 25.0%; p<.001) rate compared with females. Finally, the richness index (i.e. the number of different species represented in an ecological community, landscape, or region) in the caecum increased (p<.001) with increasing chicken age, and the community composition was also affected (adonis p<.001). In conclusions, under the good health condition of the present trial, the tested Nabutyrate had no effect on performance and gut response at different ages of broiler chickens. Moreover, the occurrence of spaghetti meat and wooden breast differed between males and females