Comparison of two commercial ELISA kits and magnetic stirrer method for detection of Trichinella spp. in a pig slaughterhouse

ELISA represents a useful rapid method to detect the presence of specific antibodies on serum, plasma or meat juice collected at slaughter, however, false- and positive-results may occur depending on the sensitivity and specificity of the test. In this study we compare two commercial ELISA kits for the detection of specific antibodies against Trichinella spp. with respect to the gold standard method (artificial digestion) in a pig slaughterhouse. A total of 709 Iberian pigs belonging to 79 free-range herds were randomly selected and sampled (five to ten animals/herd) (Win Episcope 2.0; 95% confidence level, 8% accepted error)

On the Nature of Fossil Galaxy Groups: Are they really fossils ?

We use SDSS-DR4 photometric and spectroscopic data out to redshift z~0.1 combined with ROSAT All Sky Survey X-ray data to produce a sample of twenty-five fossil groups (FGs), defined as bound systems dominated by a single, luminous elliptical galaxy with extended X-ray emission. We examine possible biases introduced by varying the parameters used to define the sample and the main pitfalls are discussed. The spatial density of FGs, estimated via the V/V_ MAX} test, is 2.83 x 10^{-6} h_{75}^3 Mpc^{-3} for L_x > 0.89 x 10^42 h_{75}^-2 erg/s consistent with Vikhlinin et al. (1999), who examined an X-ray overluminous elliptical galaxy sample (OLEG). We compare the general properties of FGs identified here with a sample of bright field ellipticals generated from the same dataset. These two samples show no differences in the distribution of neighboring faint galaxy density excess, distance from the red sequence in the color-magnitude diagram, and structural parameters such as a$_{4}$ and internal color gradients. Furthermore, examination of stellar populations shows that our twenty-five FGs have similar ages, metallicities, and $\alpha$-enhancement as the bright field ellipticals, undermining the idea that these systems represent fossils of a physical mechanism that occurred at high redshift. Our study reveals no difference between FGs and field ellipticals, suggesting that FGs might not be a distinct family of true fossils, but rather the final stage of mass assembly in the Universe.Comment: 18 pages, Accepted to A

Implementation of binary stochastic STDP learning using chalcogenide-based memristive devices

The emergence of nano-scale memristive devices encouraged many different research areas to exploit their use in multiple applications. One of the proposed applications was to implement synaptic connections in bio-inspired neuromorphic systems. Large-scale neuromorphic hardware platforms are being developed with increasing number of neurons and synapses, having a critical bottleneck in the online learning capabilities. Spike-timing-dependent plasticity (STDP) is a widely used learning mechanism inspired by biology which updates the synaptic weight as a function of the temporal correlation between pre- and post-synaptic spikes. In this work, we demonstrate experimentally that binary stochastic STDP learning can be obtained from a memristor when the appropriate pulses are applied at both sides of the device

Prehospital neurological deterioration in stroke

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Patients with stroke can experience neurological deterioration in the prehospital setting. We evaluated patients with stroke to determine factors associated with prehospital neurological deterioration (PND). METHODS: Among the Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky region (population ~1.3 million), we screened all 15 local hospitals' admissions from 2010 for acute stroke and included patients aged ≥20. The GCS was compared between emergency medical services (EMS) arrival and hospital arrival, with decrease ≥2 points considered PND. Data obtained retrospectively included demographics, medical history and medication use, stroke subtype (eg, ischaemic stroke (IS), intracerebral haemorrhage (ICH), subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH)) and IS subtype (eg, small vessel, large vessel, cardioembolic), seizure at onset, time intervals between symptom onset, EMS arrival and hospital arrival, EMS level of training, and blood pressure and serum glucose on EMS arrival. RESULTS: Of 2708 total patients who had a stroke, 1092 patients (median (IQR) age 74 (61-83) years; 56% women; 21% black) were analysed. PND occurred in 129 cases (12%), including 9% of IS, 24% of ICH and 16% of SAH. In multivariable analysis, black race, atrial fibrillation, haemorrhagic subtype and ALS level of transport were associated with PND. CONCLUSION: Haemorrhage and atrial fibrillation is associated with PND in stroke, and further investigation is needed to establish whether PND can be predicted. Further studies are also needed to assess whether preferential transport of patients with deterioration to hospitals equipped with higher levels of care is beneficial, identify why race is associated with deterioration and to test therapies targeting PND

Gold Binding by Native and Chemically Modified Hops Biomasses

Heavy metals from mining, smelting operations and other industrial processing facilities pollute wastewaters worldwide. Extraction of metals from industrial effluents has been widely studied due to the economic advantages and the relative ease of technical implementation. Consequently, the search for new and improved methodologies for the recovery of gold has increased. In this particular research, the use of cone hops biomass (Humulus lupulus) was investigated as a new option for gold recovery. The results showed that the gold binding to native hops biomass was pH dependent from pH 2 to pH 6, with a maximum percentage binding at pH 3. Time dependency studies demonstrated that Au(III) binding to native and modified cone hops biomasses was found to be time independent at pH 2 while at pH 5, it was time dependent. Capacity experiments demonstrated that at pH 2, esterified hops biomass bound 33.4 mg Au/g of biomass, while native and hydrolyzed hops biomasses bound 28.2 and 12.0 mg Au/g of biomass, respectively. However, at pH 5 the binding capacities were 38.9, 37.8 and 11.4 mg of Au per gram of native, esterified and hydrolyzed hops biomasses, respectively

Contrôle et lutte contre la fraude du patient européen

Il est des chiffres qui donnent le vertige. Incontestablement, ceux concernant les pertes dues à la fraude et la corruption en matière de soins en font partie. Certaines estimations font en effet état de 56 milliards d'euros perdus annuellement en Europe, ce qui représente près de 80 millions de perte chaque jour et plus de 5% de l'ensemble des budgets nationaux consacrés à la santé (Gee et alii, 2010)

Geochemistry of atmospheric aerosols in Andalusia (Southern Spain)

Comunicación presentada en: V Reunión Española de Ciencia y Tecnología de Aerosoles – RECTA 2011 celebrada del 27 al 29 de junio de 2011 en CIEMAT, Madrid

The Faber-Jackson relation for early-type galaxies: Dependence on the magnitude range

We take a sample of early-type galaxies from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-DR7, $\sim$ 90 000 galaxies) spanning a range of approximately 7 $mag$ in both $g$ and $r$ filters and analyse the behaviour of the Faber-Jackson relation parameters as functions of the magnitude range. We calculate the parameters in two ways: i) We consider the faintest (brightest) galaxies in each sample and we progressively increase the width of the magnitude interval by inclusion of the brighter (fainter) galaxies (increasing-magnitude-intervals), and ii) we consider narrow-magnitude intervals of the same width ($\Delta M = 1.0$ $mag$) over the whole magnitude range available (narrow-magnitude-intervals). Our main results are that: i) in both increasing and narrow-magnitude-intervals the Faber-Jackson relation parameters change systematically, ii) non-parametric tests show that the fluctuations in the values of the slope of the Faber-Jackson relation are not products of chance variations. We conclude that the values of the Faber-Jackson relation parameters depend on the width of the magnitude range and the luminosity of galaxies within the magnitude range. This dependence is caused, to a great extent by the selection effects and because the geometrical shape of the distribution of galaxies on the $M - \log (\sigma_{0})$ plane depends on luminosity. We therefore emphasize that if the luminosity of galaxies or the width of the magnitude range or both are not taken into consideration when comparing the structural relations of galaxy samples for different wavelengths, environments, redshifts and luminosities, any differences found may be misinterpreted.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures. A&A. Accepte