Long-term impact of grazing and tillage on soil quality in the semi-arid Chaco (Argentina)

Deforestation of Chacoan native forests and reorientation of land use are transforming the region into agricultural use. The main purpose of this work was to evaluate the impact of different land uses on soil quality in the semi-arid Chaco (Argentina). We assessed the behaviour of soil parameters over four years of experimental conditions: 1) Exclosure pasture (EP) used as reference level, 2) Grazed pasture (GP), 3) Grazed pasture transformed to agriculture with Zero tillage (ZT) and 4) Grazed pasture transformed to agriculture under Conventional tillage (CT). Soil organic carbon, particulate and heavy organic carbon (C), total nitrogen (N), C:N ratio, pH, electric conductivity and soil respiration were measured. Soil samples were taken yearly at 0-5, 5-20 and 20-40 cm of soil depth. Differences among treatments across time were assessed by Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) with time (years) as covariate factor, treatments as group factor and individual scores from Principal Component Analysis (PCA) as responses. Correlated changes in the soil characteristics were detected, especially at the top soil layer. Both carbon and nitrogen contents increased in both GP and ZT systems. An opposite trend was found for CT, which also had a negative impact on salinity. Both land use change and management practices in the Chaco region represent the main human activities that modify the landscape; thus, they should be analysed by recognizing heterogeneity on farming practices and identifying their impacts on a specific site. The results of this work reinforce the utility of soil organic carbon as a single parameter for monitoring land management systems, especially for monitoring large region like Chaco that are subject to continuous transformation processes.La deforestación del bosque nativo chaqueño y la reorientación del uso del suelo están en camino de transformar la región hacia uso agrícola. El principal objetivo de este trabajo es evaluar el impacto de diferentes prácticas de uso sobre la calidad del suelo en el Chaco semiárido (Argentina). Estudiamos el comportamiento de parámetros edáficos a lo largo de cuatro años de condiciones experimentales: 1) Clausura (EP) usada como nivel de referencia, 2) Ganadería pastoril (GP), 3) Agricultura vía siembra directa (ZT) y 4) Agricultura vía labranza convencional (CT). Se midieron los parámetros de carbono orgánico del suelo, carbono orgánico (C) particulado y pesado, nitrógeno total (N), C:N ratio, pH, conductividad eléctrica y respiración del suelo. Las muestras fueron tomadas anualmente a 0-5, 5-20 y 20-40 cm de profundidad de suelo. Las diferencias entre tratamientos a lo largo del tiempo fueron evaluadas por un Análisis de Covarianza (ANCOVA) con el tiempo (años) como covariable, los tratamientos como factor grupal y los valores de los componentes resultantes del Análisis de Componentes Principales (PCA) como respuestas. Se detectaron cambios correlacionados con las características del suelo, especialmente en la capa superficial del suelo. Los contenidos de nutrientes incrementaron en los sistemas GP y ZT. Una tendencia opuesta fue detectada para CT donde, además, hubo un impacto negativo sobre la salinidad. Tanto el cambio en el uso del suelo como en las prácticas de manejo dentro de la región del Chaco representan las principales actividades humanas que modifican el paisaje; de esta forma, estas deberían ser analizadas reconociendo la heterogeneidad en las prácticas de producción e identificando sus impactos en sitios específicos. Los resultados de este trabajo refuerzan la utilidad del carbono orgánico del suelo como parámetro individual para monitorear sistemas de manejo de la tierra, especialmente regiones extensas como Chaco que están sujetas a continuos procesos de transformación.A desflorestação da mata nativa do Chaco e a reorientação do uso do solo estão a transformar a região no sentido do seu uso agrícola. O principal objetivo deste trabalho é avaliar o impacto de diferentes práticas de uso na qualidade do solo no Chaco semi-árido. Foi estudado o comportamento, ao longo de quatro anos, dos parâmetros edáficos em condições experimentais: 1) Pastagem de exclusão (PE) utilizada como nível de referência, 2) Pastagem Ativa (GP), 3) Pastagem transformada em agricultura com sementeira direta (ZT) e 4) Pastagem transformada em agricultura sob preparação convencional (CT). Determinou-se no solo o carbono orgânico, o carbono orgânico particulado e pesado (C), o nitrogénio total (N), a relação C:N, pH, condutividade elétrica e a respiração do solo. As amostras de solo foram colhidas anualmente a 0-5, 5-20 e 20-40 cm de profundidade. As diferenças entre tratamentos ao longo do tempo foram avaliadas por Análise de Covariância (ANCOVA) com o tempo (anos) como uma covariável, os tratamentos como fator de grupo e os valores dos componentes resultantes de Análise de Componentes Principais (PCA) como respostas. Foram detetadas alterações correlacionadas com as características do solo, principalmente na sua camada superficial. As concentrações em carbono e nitrogénio aumentaram nos sistemas GP e ZT. Uma tendência oposta foi observada para o sistema TC, onde, além disso, houve um impacto negativo na salinidade. A mudança no uso da terra e as práticas de gestão na região do Chaco representam as principais atividades humanas que modificam a paisagem. Deste modo, estas deveriam ser analisadas reconhecendo a heterogeneidade das práticas de produção e identificando os seus impactos em locais específicos. Os resultados deste trabalho reforçam a utilidade do carbono orgânico do solo como um parâmetro individual para monitorizar os sistemas de gestão da terra, especialmente em regiões de grande dimensão como a região de Chaco que estão sujeitas a processos contínuos de transformação.Instituto de Investigación Animal del Chaco SemiáridoFil: Banegas, Natalia Romina. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Instituto de Investigación Animal del Chaco Semiárido; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Tucumán. Facultad de Agronomía y Zootecnia; ArgentinaFil: Maza, Marianela. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Instituto de Investigación Animal del Chaco Semiárido; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Viruel, Emilce. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Instituto de Investigación Animal del Chaco Semiárido; Argentina.Fil: Nasca, Jose Andres. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Instituto de Investigación Animal del Chaco Semiárido; Argentina.Fil: Canteros, Francisco H. Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA). Instituto de Investigación Animal del Chaco Semiárido; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Tucumán. Facultad de Agronomía y Zootecnia; ArgentinaFil: Corbella, Roberto. Universidad Nacional de Tucumán. Facultad de Agronomía y Zootecnia; ArgentinaFil: Dos Santos, Daniel Andrés. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Cientificas y Tecnicas. Centro Cientifico Tecnologico Tucuman. Instituto de Biodiversidad Neotropical; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Tucumán. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales e Instituto Miguel Lillo; Argentin

Description of klebsiella spallanzanii sp. Nov. and of klebsiella pasteurii sp. nov

Klebsiella oxytoca causes opportunistic human infections and post-antibiotic haemorrhagic diarrhoea. This Enterobacteriaceae species is genetically heterogeneous and is currently subdivided into seven phylogroups (Ko1 to Ko4, Ko6 to Ko8). Here we investigated the taxonomic status of phylogroups Ko3 and Ko4. Genomic sequence-based phylogenetic analyses demonstrate that Ko3 and Ko4 formed well-defined sequence clusters related to, but distinct from, Klebsiella michiganensis (Ko1), Klebsiella oxytoca (Ko2), K. huaxiensis (Ko8) and K. grimontii (Ko6). The average nucleotide identity of Ko3 and Ko4 were 90.7% with K. huaxiensis and 95.5% with K. grimontii, respectively. In addition, three strains of K. huaxiensis, a species so far described based on a single strain from a urinary tract infection patient in China, were isolated from cattle and human faeces. Biochemical and MALDI-ToF mass spectrometry analysis allowed differentiating Ko3, Ko4 and Ko8 from the other K. oxytoca species. Based on these results, we propose the names Klebsiella spallanzanii for the Ko3 phylogroup, with SPARK_775_C1T (CIP 111695T, DSM 109531T) as type strain, and Klebsiella pasteurii for Ko4, with SPARK_836_C1T (CIP 111696T, DSM 109530T) as type strain. Strains of K. spallanzanii were isolated from human urine, cow faeces and farm surfaces, while strains of K. pasteurii were found in faecal carriage from humans, cows and turtles

Internet Gaming Disorder treatment: a case study evaluation of four different types of adolescent problematic gamers

Research examining Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) has grown markedly in recent years. However, research on its psychological treatment is still scarce, especially with respect to efficacy of specific programs. The PIPATIC (Programa Individualizado Psicoterapéutico para la Adicción a las Tecnologías de la Información y la Comunicación) program is a 22-session specialized treatment for adolescents with IGD. The present paper briefly outlines the cases of four treatment-seeking male adolescents aged between 13 and 18 years with different clinical IGD profiles undergoing the treatment. A case study using an A-B-A’ withdrawal design was conducted. After completing the PIPATIC program, all participants showed clinical improvement in the amount of time spent using video games and in the symptoms of IGD. Results also demonstrated they received lower scores on clinical tests related to comorbid disorders. In an area with so few studies relating to IGD treatment, the present study is of existential value and contributes clinical information concerning the treatment of IGD in treatment-seeking adolescent patients

Implications of ICU triage decisions on patient mortality: a cost-effectiveness analysis

INTRODUCTION: Intensive care is generally regarded as expensive, and as a result beds are limited. This has raised serious questions about rationing when there are insufficient beds for all those referred. However, the evidence for the cost effectiveness of intensive care is weak and the work that does exist usually assumes that those who are not admitted do not survive, which is not always the case. Randomised studies of the effectiveness of intensive care are difficult to justify on ethical grounds; therefore, this observational study examined the cost effectiveness of ICU admission by comparing patients who were accepted into ICU after ICU triage to those who were not accepted, while attempting to adjust such comparison for confounding factors. METHODS: This multi-centre observational cohort study involved 11 hospitals in 7 EU countries and was designed to assess the cost effectiveness of admission to intensive care after ICU triage. A total of 7,659 consecutive patients referred to the intensive care unit (ICU) were divided into those accepted for admission and those not accepted. The two groups were compared in terms of cost and mortality using multilevel regression models to account for differences across centres, and after adjusting for age, Karnofsky score and indication for ICU admission. The analyses were also stratified by categories of Simplified Acute Physiology Score (SAPS) II predicted mortality (40%). Cost effectiveness was evaluated as cost per life saved and cost per life-year saved. RESULTS: Admission to ICU produced a relative reduction in mortality risk, expressed as odds ratio, of 0.70 (0.52 to 0.94) at 28 days. When stratified by predicted mortality, the odds ratio was 1.49 (0.79 to 2.81), 0.7 (0.51 to 0.97) and 0.55 (0.37 to 0.83) for 40% predicted mortality, respectively. Average cost per life saved for all patients was $103,771 (€82,358) and cost per life-year saved was$7,065 (€5,607). These figures decreased substantially for patients with predicted mortality higher than 40%, $60,046 (€47,656) and$4,088 (€3,244), respectively. Results were very similar when considering three-month mortality. Sensitivity analyses performed to assess the robustness of the results provided findings similar to the main analyses. CONCLUSIONS: Not only does ICU appear to produce an improvement in survival, but the cost per life saved falls for patients with greater severity of illness. This suggests that intensive care is similarly cost effective to other therapies that are generally regarded as essential

Detecting imipenem resistance in Acinetobacter baumannii by automated systems (BD Phoenix, Microscan WalkAway, Vitek 2); high error rates with Microscan WalkAway

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Increasing reports of carbapenem resistant <it>Acinetobacter baumannii </it>infections are of serious concern. Reliable susceptibility testing results remains a critical issue for the clinical outcome. Automated systems are increasingly used for species identification and susceptibility testing. This study was organized to evaluate the accuracies of three widely used automated susceptibility testing methods for testing the imipenem susceptibilities of <it>A. baumannii </it>isolates, by comparing to the validated test methods.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Selected 112 clinical isolates of <it>A. baumanii </it>collected between January 2003 and May 2006 were tested to confirm imipenem susceptibility results. Strains were tested against imipenem by the reference broth microdilution (BMD), disk diffusion (DD), Etest, BD Phoenix, MicroScan WalkAway and Vitek 2 automated systems. Data were analysed by comparing the results from each test method to those produced by the reference BMD test.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>MicroScan performed true identification of all <it>A. baumannii </it>strains while Vitek 2 unidentified one strain, Phoenix unidentified two strains and misidentified two strains. Eighty seven of the strains (78%) were resistant to imipenem by BMD. Etest, Vitek 2 and BD Phoenix produced acceptable error rates when tested against imipenem. Etest showed the best performance with only two minor errors (1.8%). Vitek 2 produced eight minor errors(7.2%). BD Phoenix produced three major errors (2.8%). DD produced two very major errors (1.8%) (slightly higher (0.3%) than the acceptable limit) and three major errors (2.7%). MicroScan showed the worst performance in susceptibility testing with unacceptable error rates; 28 very major (25%) and 50 minor errors (44.6%).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Reporting errors for <it>A. baumannii </it>against imipenem do exist in susceptibility testing systems. We suggest clinical laboratories using MicroScan system for routine use should consider using a second, independent antimicrobial susceptibility testing method to validate imipenem susceptibility. Etest, whereever available, may be used as an easy method to confirm imipenem susceptibility.</p

Earnings management and audit quality:stakeholders’ perceptions

This paper examines the perceptions of Libyan Commercial Banks’ (LCBs) stakeholders regarding the role of the external auditor in relation to earnings management (EM). A total of 28 semi-structured interviews were carried out with a range of LCB stakeholders comprising preparers of financial statements, users, regulators and academics. A questionnaire survey of stakeholders which yielded 102 Responses (response rate 53%) was also carried out. A variety of views were held which varied to some extent according to stakeholder group. A widely held perception amongst interviewees was that the auditor has the ability to detect EM practices but may not be able to prevent it. However questionnaire respondents were, in aggregate, more confident of the auditor’s ability to deter EM due to the influence of the audit report. The paper provides insights into stakeholders’ perceptions of the quality of bank audits. The findings are of particular relevance to regulators, and specifically, the Central Bank of Libya. Perceptions of audit quality raise questions about its guidance and regulations especially in connection with audit firm rotation. Perceptions of audit quality, and therefore, of the credibility of financial statements should be of interest to all stakeholders. The importance of the banking sector for society has been amply demonstrated in recent years. A well-functioning audit function is a key component of its regulation. To the best of our knowledge, this paper is the first to examine issues related to banks’ audit quality and audit firm rotation in Libya

Clonal diversity and detection of carbapenem resistance encoding genes among multidrug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii isolates recovered from patients and environment in two intensive care units in a Moroccan hospital

Background Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii has recently been defined by the World Health Organization as a critical pathogen. The aim of this study was to compare clonal diversity and carbapenemase-encoding genes of A. baumannii isolates collected from colonized or infected patients and hospital environment in two intensive care units (ICUs) in Morocco. Methods The patient and environmental sampling was carried out in the medical and surgical ICUs of Mohammed V Military teaching hospital from March to August 2015. All A. baumannii isolates recovered from clinical and environmental samples, were identified using routine microbiological techniques and Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry. Antimicrobial susceptibility testing was performed using disc diffusion method. The carbapenemase-encoding genes were screened for by PCR. Clonal relatedness was analyzed by digestion of the DNA with low frequency restriction enzymes and pulsed field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) and the multi locus sequence typing (MLST) was performed on two selected isolates from two major pulsotypes. Results A total of 83 multidrug-resistant A. baumannii isolates were collected: 47 clinical isolates and 36 environmental isolates. All isolates were positive for the bla OXA51-like and bla OXA23-like genes. The coexistence of bla NDM-1 /bla OXA-23-like and bla OXA 24-like /bla OXA-23-like were detected in 27 (32.5%) and 2 (2.4%) of A. baumannii isolates, respectively. The environmental samples and the fecally-colonized patients were significantly identified (p < 0.05) as the most common sites of isolation of NDM-1-harboring isolates. PFGE grouped all isolates into 9 distinct clusters with two major groups (0007 and 0008) containing up to 59% of the isolates. The pulsotype 0008 corresponds to sequence type (ST) 195 while pulsotype 0007 corresponds to ST 1089.The genetic similarity between the clinical and environmental isolates was observed in 80/83 = 96.4% of all isolates, belonging to 7 pulsotypes. Conclusion This study shows that the clonal spread of environmental A. baumannii isolates is related to that of clinical isolates recovered from colonized or infected patients, being both associated with a high prevalence of the bla OXA23-like and bla NDM-1genes. These findings emphasize the need for prioritizing the bio-cleaning of the hospital environment to control and prevent the dissemination of A. baumannii clonal lineages

Risk factors for multi-drug resistant Acinetobacter baumannii bacteremia in patients with colonization in the intensive care unit

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Epidemic outbreaks of multi-drug resistant (MDR) <it>Acinetobacter baumannii </it>(AB) in intensive care units (ICUs) are increasing. The incidence of MDR AB bacteremia, which develops as a result of colonization, is increasing through widespread dissemination of the pathogen, and further colonization. We sought to determine risk factors for MDR AB bacteremia in patients colonized with MDR AB in the ICU.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We conducted a retrospective, observational study of 200 patients colonized with MDR AB in the ICU at Severance Hospital, South Korea during the outbreak period between January 2008 and December 2009.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Of the 200 patients colonized with MDR AB, 108 developed MDR AB bacteremia, and 92 did not. APACHE II scores were higher in bacteremic than non-bacteremic patients at the time of ICU admission and colonization (24.0 vs. 21.6; <it>P </it>= 0.035, 22.9 vs. 16.8; <it>P </it>< 0.001, respectively). There was no difference between the two groups in the duration of time from ICU admission to colonization (7.1 vs. 7.2 days; <it>P </it>= 0.923), but the duration of time at risk was shorter in bacteremic patients (12.1 vs. 6.0 days; <it>P </it>= 0.016). A recent invasive procedure was a significant risk factor for development of bacteremia (odds ratio = 3.85; 95% CI 1.45-10.24; <it>P </it>= 0.007). Multivariate analysis indicated infection and respiratory failure at the time of ICU admission, maintenance of mechanical ventilation, maintenance of endotracheal tube instead of switching to a tracheostomy, recent central venous catheter insertion, bacteremia caused by other microorganism after colonization by MDR AB, and prior antimicrobial therapy, were significant risk factors for MDR AB bacteremia.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Patients in the ICU, colonized with MDR AB, should be considered for minimizing invasive procedures and early removal of the invasive devices to prevent development of MDR AB bacteremia.</p