OCT angiography: a technique for the assessment of retinal and optic nerve diseases in the pediatric population

Optical coherence tomography angiography (OCT-A) is a novel, rapidly evolving, non-invasive imaging technique that allows images of the retinal vasculature to be obtained in a few seconds. Blood vessels of different retinal vascular plexuses and the foveal avascular zone (FAZ) can be examined without the administration of any contrast or dye. Due to these characteristics, OCT-A could be an excellent complementary test to study retinal vascularization in children. Until now, most of the studies with OCT-A have been conducted in adults and only a few have been carried out in children. In this review, we describe the principles and advantages of OCT-A over traditional imaging methods and provide a summary of the OCT-A findings in retinopathy of prematurity and other retinal and optic disc pathologies in children. In view of the promising results from studies, the advantages of a relatively rapid and non-invasive method to assess the retinal vasculature makes OCT-A a tool of which applications in the field of pediatric ophthalmology will be expanded in the near future for patient diagnosis and follow-up in every day clinical practice

Molecular profiling of immunoglobulin heavy-chain gene rearrangements unveils new potential prognostic markers for multiple myeloma patients

Altres ajuts: This work was partially supported by[...] , CIBERONC-CB16/12/00233, and "Una manera de hacer Europa" (Innocampus; CEI-2010-1-0010)". M.G.-A., I.P.-C., and C.J. are supported by the Fundación Española de Hematología y Hemoterapia (FEHH, co-funded by Fundación Cris in the latter case), A.M. by the European Social Fund and the Spanish Education Council through the University of Salamanca, [...]. All Spanish funding is co-sponsored by the European Union FEDER program.Multiple myeloma is a heterogeneous disease whose pathogenesis has not been completely elucidated. Although B-cell receptors play a crucial role in myeloma pathogenesis, the impact of clonal immunoglobulin heavy-chain features in the outcome has not been extensively explored. Here we present the characterization of complete heavy-chain gene rearrangements in 413 myeloma patients treated in Spanish trials, including 113 patients characterized by next-generation sequencing. Compared to the normal B-cell repertoire, gene selection was biased in myeloma, with significant overrepresentation of IGHV3, IGHD2 and IGHD3, as well as IGHJ4 gene groups. Hypermutation was high in our patients (median: 8.8%). Interestingly, regarding patients who are not candidates for transplantation, a high hypermutation rate (≥7%) and the use of IGHD2 and IGHD3 groups were associated with improved prognostic features and longer survival rates in the univariate analyses. Multivariate analysis revealed prolonged progression-free survival rates for patients using IGHD2/IGHD3 groups (HR: 0.552, 95% CI: 0.361−0.845, p = 0.006), as well as prolonged overall survival rates for patients with hypermutation ≥7% (HR: 0.291, 95% CI: 0.137−0.618, p = 0.001). Our results provide new insights into the molecular characterization of multiple myeloma, highlighting the need to evaluate some of these clonal rearrangement characteristics as new potential prognostic markers

Sanitary housing conditions modify the performance and behavioural response of weaned pigs to feed- and housing-related stressors

Pigs are confronted with changes in farming practices that may affect performance and animal well-being. The sanitary conditions of the farm can have an impact on the ability of pigs to adapt to these changes. This study aimed to analyse how weaned pigs respond to common farming practices of changes in diet and housing in terms of performance, health and behaviour, and how these responses are affected by the sanitary housing conditions, qualified here as good or poor. At weaning at 4 weeks of age, 20 piglets were assigned to 10 blocks of two littermates and each pig within a litter was randomly assigned to one of two sanitary conditions. Pigs were housed individually and received a starter diet. A diet change occurred on day 12 post weaning (starter to weaner diets) and pigs were transferred to the grower unit on day 33 post weaning and continued to receive the weaner diet. From 43 days post weaning, pigs were offered a grower diet and were vaccinated against swine influenza on day 47 and 61 post weaning. On the basis of this design, three post-weaning phases were identified: phase I from day 1 to 11 (post weaning), phase II from day 12 to 32 (after the diet change) and phase III from day 33 to 42 (after the housing change). Individual BW was measured every 3 days, and feed refusals and faecal scores were recorded on a daily basis. Behavioural observations were performed during 28 days by using the instantaneous scan sampling method. Individual blood samples were collected at the end of each phase to analyse the plasma concentration of haptoglobin and on day 68 post weaning to analyse the anti-influenza immunoglobulins G (IgG). Poor sanitary conditions resulted in a decrease in daily gain, feed intake and gain to feed ratio of, respectively, 11%, 5% and 7% (P < 0.05). Pigs in poor sanitary conditions had higher faecal scores (P < 0.05), tended to have higher plasma haptoglobin concentration in phase II (P = 0.06) and had a higher anti-influenza IgG titre (P = 0.11). The diet change affected performance and behavioural responses of pigs in poor but not in good sanitary conditions. Housing change resulted in a 30% decrease in growth and an increase in behaviour oriented towards exploration and excitement. The results of this study show an effect of sanitary conditions on the responses of pigs to a diet change, whereas those to a housing change were little affected by the sanitary conditions

RICORS2040 : The need for collaborative research in chronic kidney disease

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a silent and poorly known killer. The current concept of CKD is relatively young and uptake by the public, physicians and health authorities is not widespread. Physicians still confuse CKD with chronic kidney insufficiency or failure. For the wider public and health authorities, CKD evokes kidney replacement therapy (KRT). In Spain, the prevalence of KRT is 0.13%. Thus health authorities may consider CKD a non-issue: very few persons eventually need KRT and, for those in whom kidneys fail, the problem is 'solved' by dialysis or kidney transplantation. However, KRT is the tip of the iceberg in the burden of CKD. The main burden of CKD is accelerated ageing and premature death. The cut-off points for kidney function and kidney damage indexes that define CKD also mark an increased risk for all-cause premature death. CKD is the most prevalent risk factor for lethal coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and the factor that most increases the risk of death in COVID-19, after old age. Men and women undergoing KRT still have an annual mortality that is 10- to 100-fold higher than similar-age peers, and life expectancy is shortened by ~40 years for young persons on dialysis and by 15 years for young persons with a functioning kidney graft. CKD is expected to become the fifth greatest global cause of death by 2040 and the second greatest cause of death in Spain before the end of the century, a time when one in four Spaniards will have CKD. However, by 2022, CKD will become the only top-15 global predicted cause of death that is not supported by a dedicated well-funded Centres for Biomedical Research (CIBER) network structure in Spain. Realizing the underestimation of the CKD burden of disease by health authorities, the Decade of the Kidney initiative for 2020-2030 was launched by the American Association of Kidney Patients and the European Kidney Health Alliance. Leading Spanish kidney researchers grouped in the kidney collaborative research network Red de Investigación Renal have now applied for the Redes de Investigación Cooperativa Orientadas a Resultados en Salud (RICORS) call for collaborative research in Spain with the support of the Spanish Society of Nephrology, Federación Nacional de Asociaciones para la Lucha Contra las Enfermedades del Riñón and ONT: RICORS2040 aims to prevent the dire predictions for the global 2040 burden of CKD from becoming true

Use of SMS texts for facilitating access to online alcohol interventions: a feasibility study

A41 Use of SMS texts for facilitating access to online alcohol interventions: a feasibility study In: Addiction Science & Clinical Practice 2017, 12(Suppl 1): A4

RESCUhE Project: Cultural Heritage vulnerability in a changing and directional climate

[EN] RESCUhE Project (Improving structural RESilience of Cultural HEritage to directional extreme hydro-meteorological events in the context of the Climate Change) is a coordinated IGME-UAM research project funded by Spanish Government (MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033). The framework of this research is the predicted increase in climate change vulnerability of heritage sites and the current disconnection between both environmental research on material decay and the practical aspects of designing preventive conservation measurements.RESCUhE Project (Improving structural RESilience of Cultural HEritage to directional extreme hydro-meteorological events in the context of the Climate Change) is a coordinated IGME-UAM research project funded by Spanish Government (MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033).Peer reviewe

Global maps of soil temperature.

Research in global change ecology relies heavily on global climatic grids derived from estimates of air temperature in open areas at around 2 m above the ground. These climatic grids do not reflect conditions below vegetation canopies and near the ground surface, where critical ecosystem functions occur and most terrestrial species reside. Here, we provide global maps of soil temperature and bioclimatic variables at a 1-km &lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; resolution for 0-5 and 5-15 cm soil depth. These maps were created by calculating the difference (i.e. offset) between in situ soil temperature measurements, based on time series from over 1200 1-km &lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; pixels (summarized from 8519 unique temperature sensors) across all the world's major terrestrial biomes, and coarse-grained air temperature estimates from ERA5-Land (an atmospheric reanalysis by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts). We show that mean annual soil temperature differs markedly from the corresponding gridded air temperature, by up to 10°C (mean = 3.0 ± 2.1°C), with substantial variation across biomes and seasons. Over the year, soils in cold and/or dry biomes are substantially warmer (+3.6 ± 2.3°C) than gridded air temperature, whereas soils in warm and humid environments are on average slightly cooler (-0.7 ± 2.3°C). The observed substantial and biome-specific offsets emphasize that the projected impacts of climate and climate change on near-surface biodiversity and ecosystem functioning are inaccurately assessed when air rather than soil temperature is used, especially in cold environments. The global soil-related bioclimatic variables provided here are an important step forward for any application in ecology and related disciplines. Nevertheless, we highlight the need to fill remaining geographic gaps by collecting more in situ measurements of microclimate conditions to further enhance the spatiotemporal resolution of global soil temperature products for ecological applications

Search for leptophobic Z ' bosons decaying into four-lepton final states in proton-proton collisions at root s=8 TeV

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Search for black holes and other new phenomena in high-multiplicity final states in proton-proton collisions at root s=13 TeV

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Search for high-mass diphoton resonances in proton-proton collisions at 13 TeV and combination with 8 TeV search

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