Hydrus como una opción para el diseño del drenaje subterráneo

La presencia de Nivel Freático (NF) subsuperficial en áreas agrícolas afecta el desarrollo de los cultivos y provoca la salinización del suelo, estos problemas asociados a niveles freáticos someros se han controlado mediante la instalación de sistemas de drenaje subterráneo. Una forma de estudiar este fenómeno es a través de la evaluación experimental de modelos matemáticos, con la cual se pueden controlar las variables de entradas y salidas. En este trabajo se midió la variación del NF provocado por dos drenes paralelos instalados en un perfil de suelo saturado y se comparó con la modelación dinámica de agua utilizando Hydrus-2D® que resuelve numéricamente la ecuación de Richards. El modelo físico experimental tenía dimensiones de 2.44x1.22x122 m y contenía un perfil de suelo de 0.9 m de espesor compuesto por un estrato franco y otro franco arcilloso, con conductividades hidráulicas saturadas (Ks) de 24.96 y 6.24 cm/día, respectivamente. En el centro del contenedor del modelo experimental se instalaron nueve Pozos de Observación (PO) de 3 cm de diámetro, conectados a piezómetros externos para medir la profundidad del NF durante 17 h. Los resultados mostraron que el modelo Hydrus-2D se ajusta mejor en tiempos mayores a 10 h debido a que el RMSE varió de 14.96 a 1.03 cm, en el caso de la EF cambió de -52.45 a -0.43, por lo tanto, se considera que Hydrus-2D puede ser una herramienta útil para el diseño de drenajes subterráneos parcelarios.El autor agradece al Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACyT), por el apoyo económico para realizar este trabajo. Al Dr. Jorge Victor Prado Hernández por el asesoramiento y guía brindada, así como al Dr. Mauricio Carrillo García y Dr. Agustín Ruíz García

Impact of Long-Term Cryopreservation on Blood Immune Cell Markers in Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome : Implications for Biomarker Discovery

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) is a complex neuroimmune disorder characterized by numerous symptoms of unknown etiology. The ME/CFS immune markers reported so far have failed to generate a clinical consensus, perhaps partly due to the limitations of biospecimen biobanking. To address this issue, we performed a comparative analysis of the impact of long-term biobanking on previously identified immune markers and also explored additional potential immune markers linked to infection in ME/CFS. A correlation analysis of marker cryostability across immune cell subsets based on flow cytometry immunophenotyping of fresh blood and frozen PBMC samples collected from individuals with ME/CFS (n = 18) and matched healthy controls (n = 18) was performed. The functionality of biobanked samples was assessed on the basis of cytokine production assay after stimulation of frozen PBMCs. T cell markers defining Treg subsets and the expression of surface glycoprotein CD56 in T cells and the frequency of the effector CD8 T cells, together with CD57 expression in NK cells, appeared unaltered by biobanking. By contrast, NK cell markers CD25 and CD69 were notably increased, and NKp46 expression markedly reduced, by long-term cryopreservation and thawing. Further exploration of Treg and NK cell subsets failed to identify significant differences between ME/CFS patients and healthy controls in terms of biobanked PBMCs. Our findings show that some of the previously identified immune markers in T and NK cell subsets become unstable after cell biobanking, thus limiting their use in further immunophenotyping studies for ME/CFS. These data are potentially relevant for future multisite intervention studies and cooperative projects for biomarker discovery using ME/CFS biobanked samples. Further studies are needed to develop novel tools for the assessment of biomarker stability in cryopreserved immune cells from people with ME/CFS

Neogene Bony Fishes from the Bahía Inglesa Formation, Northern Chile

Despite being one of the richest Neogene deposits of marine fossil vertebrates along the Pacific coast of South America, no detailed study of bony fishes from the Bahía Inglesa Formation has been carried out. Through the revision of historical collections of the Caldera Paleontological Museum, we describe 27 fossil remains of bony fishes. Fossils described here are distributed in 13 taxa. Among these, Sardinops sp. cf. S. sagax (Clupeidae) represents the first fossil record of the genus for Chile, Labrodon sp. (Labridae) and Stelliferinae (Sciaenidae) are the first respective records for the southeast Pacific Ocean, Sarda sp. (Scombridae) represents the first fossil record for South America, Semicossyphus sp. (Labridae) and Anisotremus sp. (Haemulidae) are the first respective records for the Southern Hemisphere. Gymnosarda sp. (Scombridae) is described for the first time for the Neogene. We performed a paleobathymetric analysis of fossil fishes, including elasmobranchs, to understand the paleoenvironment followed by a similarity analysis that compares the faunal composition of the Bahía Inglesa Fm. with other fossil assemblages for the Pacific of South America. Our results show that the fish fauna from the Bahía Inglesa Fm. likely represents a depth range of 98 to 382 m with a mean depth range of 252 m in an uppermost bathyal environment. The assemblage from the Bahía Inglesa Fm. shows low taxonomic similarity levels with other Neogene geological units from the southeast Pacific Ocean. The study represents the first paleoecological and paleobiogeographic analysis of the fossil fish fauna from the Southeast Pacific. Key words. Atacama region. Clupeiformes. Eastern Pacific. Paleoenviroments. Perciformes. Ophidiiformes

Different pattern of stool and plasma gastrointestinal damage biomarkers during primary and chronic HIV infection

Introduction: Primary HIV infection (PHI) is the initial phase after HIV acquisition characterized by high viral replication, massive inflammatory response and irreversible immune-damage, particularly at the gastrointestinal level. In this study we aimed to characterize the dynamics of gastrointestinal damage biomarkers during the different phases of HIV infection and assess their association with HIV-disease markers and their accuracy to differentiate PHI from chronic HIV infection (CHI). Methods: PHI-individuals (n = 57) were identified as HIV-seronegative/HIV-RNA positive and were followed up for one year at the Manhiça District Hospital in Mozambique. Ten plasma and 12 stool biomarkers were quantified by Luminex or ELISA and levels were compared to CHI-naive (n = 26), CHI on antiretroviral-treatment (ART; n = 30) and HIV-uninfected individuals (n = 58). Regression models adjusted by time point were used to estimate the association of the biomarkers with HIV-disease markers. Receiver operating curves were compared for the best accuracy to distinguish PHI from CHI. Results: Soluble (s)CD14 was significantly associated with the CD4/CD8 ratio (P < 0.05) and viremia levels (P < 0.0001) during PHI. Plasma zonulin and stool lactoferrin were significantly higher in PHI as compared to CHI-individuals (P < 0.05). Plasma zonulin demonstrated the best accuracy to identify PHI among HIV-infected individuals (AUC = 0.85 [95% CI 0.75–0.94]). Using a cutoff value of plasma zonulin ≥ 8.75 ng/mL the model identified PHI with 87.7% sensitivity (95% CI 76.3–94.9) and 69.2% specificity (95% CI 48.2–85.7). An adjusted multivariate model including age, plasma zonulin and sCD14 further increased the classification performance (AUC = 0.92 [95% CI 0.86–0.99]). Conclusions: While the stool biomarkers did not provide any predictive ability to distinguish PHI from CHI-individuals, plasma sCD14 and zonulin were significantly associated with HIV-disease markers and PHI identification, respectively. These inflammatory biomarkers may be useful to monitor changes in gastrointestinal integrity during HIV infection

TAXONOMÍA Y REGISTROS DE CHRYSOPIDAE (INSECTA: NEUROPTERA) EN EL ESTADO DE MORELOS, MÉXICO

A total of 21 species of Chrysopidae occurring in the State of Morelos are presented, these are included in nine genera in the subfamily Chrysopinae. A key is given for the genera as well as keys to species in each genus and diagnosis and distribution data for each species. The identified species were as follows: Ceraeochrysa cincta (Schneider), Ceraeochrysa cubana (Hagen), Ceraeochrysa everes (Banks), Ceraeochrysa sanchezi (Navás), Ceraeochrysa valida (Banks), Chrysopa sp., Chrysoperla comanche (Banks), Chrysoperla exotera (Navás), Chrysoperla rufilabris (Burmeister), Eremochrysa hageni Banks, Leucochrysa maculata Navás, Leucochrysa pretiosa Banks, Leucochrysa texana Adams, Meleoma antennensis Tauber, Meleoma colhuaca Banks, Meleoma mexicana Banks, Meleoma pipai Tauber, Meleoma tezcucana (Banks), Plesiochrysa brasiliensis (Schneider), Plesiochrysa elongata (Navás) y Yumachrysa apache (Banks); 15 species are new records for Morelos, one of which (P. elongata) is a new record for Mexico. Ceraeochrysa and Meleoma were the genera with the largest number of species although Ceraeochrysa was the genus with the largest number of individuals. The most important species as far as their abundance in descending order were: Ceraeochrysa cincta, C. valida, C. cubana, Leucochrysa texana y Chrysoperla comanche.Se presentan 21 especies de Chrysopidae que ocurren en el Estado de Morelos, agrupadas en ocho géneros de la subfamilia Chrysopinae. Se proporciona una clave para los géneros y claves para las especies de cada género, diagnosis y datos de distribución de cada especie, así como imágenes que ilustran las claves. Las especies identificadas fueron: Ceraeochrysa cincta (Schneider), Ceraeochrysa cubana (Hagen), Ceraeochrysa everes (Banks), Ceraeochrysa sanchezi (Navás), Ceraeochrysa valida (Banks), Chrysopa sp., Chrysoperla comanche (Banks), Chrysoperla exotera (Navás), Chrysoperla rufilabris (Burmeister), Eremochrysa hageni Banks, Leucochrysa maculata Navás, Leucochrysa pretiosa Banks, Leucochrysa texana Adams, Meleoma antennensis Tauber, Meleoma colhuaca Banks, Meleoma mexicana Banks, Meleoma pipai Tauber, Meleoma tezcucana (Banks), Plesiochrysa brasiliensis (Schneider), Plesiochrysa elongata (Navás) y Yumachrysa apache (Banks); 15 especies son nuevos registros para Morelos, una de las cuales (P. elongata) representa un nuevo registro para México. Ceraeochrysa y Meleoma fueron los géneros con mayor número de especies, aunque Ceraeochrysa fue el género con el mayor número de individuos. Las especies más importantes por su abundancia en orden descendente fueron: Ceraeochrysa cincta, C. valida, C. cubana, Leucochrysa texana y Chrysoperla comanche

Chronological brain lesions after SARS-CoV-2 infection in hACE2-transgenic mice

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) causes respiratory disease, but it can also affect other organs including the central nervous system. Several animal models have been developed to address different key questions related to Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Wild-type mice are minimally susceptible to certain SARS-CoV-2 lineages (beta and gamma variants), whereas hACE2-transgenic mice succumb to SARS-CoV-2 and develop a fatal neurological disease. In this article, we aimed to chronologically characterize SARS-CoV-2 neuroinvasion and neuropathology. Necropsies were performed at different time points, and the brain and olfactory mucosa were processed for histopathological analysis. SARS-CoV-2 virological assays including immunohistochemistry were performed along with a panel of antibodies to assess neuroinflammation. At 6 to 7 days post inoculation (dpi), brain lesions were characterized by nonsuppurative meningoencephalitis and diffuse astrogliosis and microgliosis. Vasculitis and thrombosis were also present and associated with occasional microhemorrhages and spongiosis. Moreover, there was vacuolar degeneration of virus-infected neurons. At 2 dpi, SARS-CoV-2 immunolabeling was only found in the olfactory mucosa, but at 4 dpi intraneuronal virus immunolabeling had already reached most of the brain areas. Maximal distribution of the virus was observed throughout the brain at 6 to 7 dpi except for the cerebellum, which was mostly spared. Our results suggest an early entry of the virus through the olfactory mucosa and a rapid interneuronal spread of the virus leading to acute encephalitis and neuronal damage in this mouse model

A Longitudinal Analysis Reveals Early Activation and Late Alterations in B Cells During Primary HIV Infection in Mozambican Adults

Altres ajuts: Melinda Gates Foundation (OPP1068252)Primary HIV infection (PHI) and subsequent chronic infection alter B-cell compartment. However, longitudinal analysis defining the dynamics of B-cell alterations are still limited. We longitudinally studied B-cell subsets in individuals followed for 1 year after PHI (n = 40). Treated and untreated chronic HIV infected (n = 56) and HIV-uninfected individuals (n = 58) were recruited as reference groups at the Manhiça District in Mozambique. B cells were analyzed by multicolor flow-cytometry. Anti-HIV humoral response and plasma cytokines were assessed by ELISA or Luminex-based technology. A generalized activation of B cells induced by HIV occurs early after infection and is characterized by increases in Activated and Tissue-like memory cells, decreases in IgM-IgD- (switched) and IgM-only B cells. These alterations remain mostly stable until chronic infection and are reverted in part by ART. In contrast, other parameters followed particular dynamics: PD-1 expression in memory cells decreases progressively during the first year of infection, Transitional B cells expand at month 3-4 after infection, and Marginal zone-like B cells show a late depletion. Plasmablasts expand 2 months after infection linked to plasma viral load and anti-p24 IgG3 responses. Most of well-defined changes induced by HIV in B-cell activation and memory subsets are readily observed after PHI, lasting until ART initiation. However, subsequent changes occur after sustained viral infection. These data indicate that HIV infection impacts B cells in several waves over time, and highlight that early treatment would result in beneficial effects on the B-cell compartment

Simulación de flujo laminar para estimar la tortuosidad en la alfombra de Sierpinsk

Este trabajo se centra en la simulación numérica de flujo laminar para estimar la tortuosidad en una estructura geométrica fractal denominada alfombra de Sierpinski, a menudo usada para simular medios porosos sintéticos. La tortuosidad se describe como la medida de las formas irregulares o sinuosidad de los caminos, y es un parámetro muy importante para las Ciencias de la Tierra desde la Geología hasta la Ingeniería Petrolera, por su gran variedad de aplicaciones. En este estudio, se utiliza el software Comsol Multiphysics para resolver las ecuaciones que gobiernan el flujo laminar lo que permite analizar el movimiento de los fluidos a través de la alfombra de Sierpinski. Los resultados permiten obtener información valiosa sobre la eficiencia de un fluido para transportarse a través de una estructura fractal, lo que puede ser relevante en diversas áreas de investigación. Esta metodología da estimaciones de la tortuosidad comparables a las que se obtienen con otras metodologías de la literatura

Comparison of Reverse Transcription (RT)-Quantitative PCR and RT-Droplet Digital PCR for Detection of Genomic and Subgenomic SARS-CoV-2 RNA

Most individuals acutely infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) exhibit mild symptoms. However, 10 to 20% of those infected develop long-term symptoms, referred to as post-coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) condition (PCC). One hypothesis is that PCC might be exacerbated by viral persistence in tissue sanctuaries. Therefore, the accurate detection and quantification of SARS-CoV-2 are not only necessary for viral load monitoring but also crucial for detecting long-term viral persistence and determining whether viral replication is occurring in tissue reservoirs. In this study, the sensitivity and robustness of reverse transcription (RT)-droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) and RT-quantitative PCR (qPCR) techniques have been compared for the detection and quantification of SARS-CoV-2 genomic and subgenomic RNAs from oropharyngeal swabs taken from confirmed SARS-CoV-2-positive, SARS-CoV-2-exposed, and nonexposed individuals as well as from samples from mice infected with SARS-CoV-2. Our data demonstrated that both techniques presented equivalent results in the mid- and high-viral-load ranges. Additionally, RT-ddPCR was more sensitive than RT-qPCR in the low-viral-load range, allowing the accurate detection of positive results in individuals exposed to the virus. Overall, these data suggest that RT-ddPCR might be an alternative to RT-qPCR for detecting low viral loads in samples and for assessing viral persistence in samples from individuals with PCC. IMPORTANCE We developed one-step reverse transcription (RT)-droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) protocols to detect SARS-CoV-2 RNA and compared them to the gold-standard RT-quantitative PCR (RT-qPCR) method. RT-ddPCR was more sensitive than RT-qPCR in the low-viral-load range, while both techniques were equivalent in the mid- and high-viral-load ranges. Overall, these results suggest that RT-ddPCR might be a viable alternative to RT-qPCR when it comes to detecting low viral loads in samples, which is a highly relevant issue for determining viral persistence in as-yet-unknown tissue reservoirs in individuals suffering from post-COVID conditions or long COVID

Tratamiento estético en fluorosis dental grado 3 según índice Thylstrup y Fejerskov, mediante métodos conservadores

The lack of harmony in a patient's smile affects their self-esteem and behavior with their environment. Ecuador has been considered an endemic zone of fluorosis, triggering aesthetic and functional dental alterations. Fluorosis appears as opaque spots that follow a horizontal pattern in its early phase and brown spots and loss of structure in an advanced stage. In this article we present the case of a young patient, diagnosed with dental fluorosis grade three of Thylstup-Fejerskov (TF) index, treated with 40% hydrogen peroxide bleaching, followed by 35% peroxide carbamide home whitening for 30 minutes daily, during 7 days. The combination of whitening procedures was ideal to mimic the mottling characteristic of dental fluorosis, thus improving the aesthetics of the patient and guaranteeing the success of the present case. The use of a conservative treatment was effective to restore dental aesthetics, function and confidence of the patient when smiling.La ausencia de armonía en la sonrisa de un paciente constituye una causa por la cual su autoestima y comportamiento con su entorno se ven afectados. Ecuador ha sido considerado una zona endémica de fluorosis, desencadenando alteraciones dentales estéticas y funcionales; la fluorosis se presenta como manchas opacas que siguen un patrón horizontal en su fase temprana y manchas marrones y pérdida de estructura en estado avanzado. El presente caso tiene como objetivo exponer el caso de un paciente joven, diagnosticado con fluorosis grado 3 según el índice Thylstup y Fejerskov (TF), en el cual se realizó blanqueamiento con peróxido de hidrógeno al 40%, seguido de blanqueamiento casero con peróxido de carbamida al 35%, 20 minutos diarios por 7 días. La combinación de procedimientos de blanqueamiento resultó idónea en pacientes con fluorosis grado 3 según el índice de TF, mimetizando el moteado característico de la fluorosis dental mejorando así la estética del paciente y garantizando el éxito del presente caso. La aplicación de tratamientos conservadores, es eficaz, para restablecer estética dental, función y confianza en el paciente al momento de sonreír