Aves del municipio de Manizales-Caldas, Colombia

El municipio de Manizales se encuentra ubicado en la vertiente occidental de la Cordillera Central (4°59 ́-5°09 ́N y 75°21 ́-75°43 ́W). Cubre un área de 55000 ha y se extiende desde el Río Cauca, a 800 m de altura, hasta el Páramo de Letras a 3800 m. Está localizado en una de las regiones más transformadas del país, debido principalmente al crecimiento urbano y agrícola (Renjifo 1998). Hecho que ha tenido como resultado la fragmentación masiva de los hábitats naturales, con efectos tan graves que las ecoregiones de esta zona están consideradas en estado “crítico” de conservación (Dinerstein et al. 1995). La marcada variación altitudinal favorece la diversidad en las condiciones abióticas y bióticas y por lo tanto la diversidad de especies de aves presentes en el municipio. Esa diversidad es también favorecida por la existencia de zonas protegidas. El Bosque de Río Blanco, por ejemplo, localizado en las zonas de vida bosque muy húmedo montano bajo y muy húmedo montano (Espinal 1990) y con un área de 3217 ha, es refugio importante para especies de bosque. Fragmentos de menor tamaño, como Monteleón y los ecoparques Los Alcázares y Adolfo Hoyos, también son hogar de una avifauna diversa. Adicionalmente, existen otras áreas de interés ambiental que son de importancia debido a que son los últimos relictos existentes en sus respectivas zonas de vida y a la diversidad «exclusiva» que albergan. Este es el caso del Bosque de la Estación de Cenicafé (Planalto), localizado en la zona de vida bosque muy húmedo premontano, y los guaduales, en la zona de vida bosque húmedo tropical. La protección legal de estas áreas debe ser considerada como prioritaria dentro de las acciones de conservación del municipio

Detection of embryo mortality and hatch using thermal differences among incubated chicken eggs

Accurate diagnosis of both the stage of embryonic mortality and the hatch process in incubated eggs is a fundamental component in troubleshooting and hatchery management. However, traditional methods disturb incubation, destroy egg samples, risk contamination, are time and labour-intensive and require specialist knowledge and training. Therefore, a new method to accurately detect embryonic mortality and hatching time would be of significant interest for the poultry industry if it could be done quickly, cheaply and be fully integrated into the process. In this study we have continuously measured individual eggshell temperatures and the corresponding micro-environmental air temperatures throughout the 21 days of incubation using standard low-cost temperature sensors. Moreover, we have quantified the thermal interaction between eggs and air by calculating thermal profile changes (temperature drop time, drop length and drop magnitude) that allowed us to detect four categories of egg status (infertile/early death, middle death, late death and hatch) during incubation. A decision tree induction classification model accurately (93.3%) predicted the status of 105 sampled eggs in comparison to the classical hatch residue breakout analyses. With this study we have provided a major contribution to the optimisation of incubation processes by introducing an alternative method for the currently practiced hatch residue breakout analyses.status: publishe

Design of protease-resistant myelin basic protein-derived peptides by cleavage site directed amino acid substitutions

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is considered to be a T cell-mediated autoimmune disease. An attractive strategy to prevent activation of autoaggressive T cells in MS, is the use of altered peptide ligands (APL), which bind to major histocompatibility complex class II (MHC II) molecules. To be of clinical use, APL must be capable of resisting hostile environments including the proteolytic machinery of antigen presenting cells (APC). The current design of APL relies on cost- and labour-intensive strategies. To overcome these major drawbacks, we used a deductive approach which involved modifying proteolytic cleavage sites in APL. Cleavage site-directed amino acid substitution of the autoantigen myelin basic protein (MBP) resulted in lysosomal protease-resistant, high-affinity binding peptides. In addition, these peptides mitigated T cell activation in a similar fashion as conventional APL. The strategy outlined allows the development of protease-resistant APL and provides a universal design strategy to improve peptide-based immunotherapeutics

Ecología del Dacnis Turquesa (dacnis hartlaubi) en la zona cafetera de Támesis, Antioquia

El Dacnis Turquesa es una especie endémica de Colombia (Hilty y Brown 1996, Stiles 1998), cuya distribución es aparentemente muy restringida y fragmentada (Collar et al. 1992, Hilty y Brown 1996, Botero y Verhelst 2001).BogotáPrograma de Becas para la Conservación de Especies de Fauna y Flor

Antibiotic susceptibility of Atopobium vaginae

BACKGROUND: Previous studies have indicated that a recently described anaerobic bacterium, Atopobium vaginae is associated with bacterial vaginosis (BV). Thus far the four isolates of this fastidious micro-organism were found to be highly resistant to metronidazole and susceptible for clindamycin, two antibiotics preferred for the treatment of BV. METHODS: Nine strains of Atopobium vaginae, four strains of Gardnerella vaginalis, two strains of Lactobacillus iners and one strain each of Bifidobacterium breve, B. longum, L. crispatus, L. gasseri and L. jensenii were tested against 15 antimicrobial agents using the Etest. RESULTS: All nine strains of A. vaginae were highly resistant to nalidixic acid and colistin while being inhibited by low concentrations of clindamycin (range: < 0.016 μg/ml), rifampicin (< 0.002 μg/ml), azithromycin (< 0.016 – 0.32 μg/ml), penicillin (0.008 – 0.25 μg/ml), ampicillin (< 0.016 – 0.94 μg/ml), ciprofloxacin (0.023 – 0.25 μg/ml) and linezolid (0.016 – 0.125 μg/ml). We found a variable susceptibility for metronidazole, ranging from 2 to more than 256 μg/ml. The four G. vaginalis strains were also susceptible for clindamycin (< 0.016 – 0.047 μg/ml) and three strains were susceptible to less than 1 μg/ml of metronidazole. All lactobacilli were resistant to metronidazole (> 256 μg/ml) but susceptible to clindamycin (0.023 – 0.125 μg/ml). CONCLUSION: Clindamycin has higher activity against G. vaginalis and A. vaginae than metronidazole, but not all A. vaginae isolates are metronidazole resistant, as seemed to be a straightforward conclusion from previous studies on a more limited number of strains