The distribution and ecological effects of the introduced Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas (Thunberg, 1793) in Northern Patagonia

In this work we studied the actual coverage, distribution patterns and ecologic effects of the introduced oyster Crassostrea gigas 20 y after their introduction to the Northern Argentinean Patagonia (Bahia Anegada; 39º50´S to 40º40´S and 61º59 to 62º28 W). Using satellite imagery and field and aerial inspections we found 10 oyster beds that cover less than 0.05% of the bay intertidal (area covered: 36.45 ha). These beds are restricted to intertidal zones with superficial hard substrata (limestone outcrops). Most epifaunal organisms (the crabs Cyrtagrapsus angulatus, Chasmagnathus granulatus, the isopod Melita palmata. and the snail Heleobia australis) showed higher densities inside oyster beds compared with outside and experiments showed that artificially deployed oyster beds increased the densities of their at three intertidal zones (high intertidal marsh, low intertidal marsh. and low intertidal with hard substrata) and also increased densities of infaunal organisms (the polychaetes Laeonereis acuta, Nepthys fluviatilis, and the priapulid Priapulus tuberculatospinosus) at the low intertidal with hard substrata. This may be the result of increasing habitat structure and refuge for epifaunal organisms, and enhancement of deposition and sediment stability that may benefit infaunal organisms. Densities bird species (Local species: Larus dominicanus, Haematopus palliatits: Regional migratory shorebird: Charadrius falklandicus; Long range migratory shorebirds: Pluvialis dominica, Calidris canutus, Tringa flavipes) were higher inside oyster beds compared with similar zones without oysters, which may be the result of higher prey availability. Foraging rate was also higher for some of these species (P. dominica, C. falklandicus). However, due to the limited availability of hard substratum the distribution of oysters is small. In conclusion, no negative effects were observed as a result of this introduction. There was an increase in species abundance and the area was preferred by local and migratory bird species, which also showed higher feeding rates.Fil: Escapa, Carlos Mauricio. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; ArgentinaFil: Isacch, Juan Pablo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; ArgentinaFil: Daleo, Pedro. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; ArgentinaFil: Alberti, Juan. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; ArgentinaFil: Iribarne, Oscar Osvaldo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata; ArgentinaFil: Borges, Mónica Elisa. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; ArgentinaFil: Dos Santos, Eder Paulo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; ArgentinaFil: Gagliardini, Domingo Antonio. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Lasta, Mario. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Mar del Plata. Instituto de Investigaciones Marinas y Costeras. Subsede Instituto Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo Pesquero; Argentin

Job´s syndrome and to miliary tuberculosis

El síndrome de hiper IgE también denominado síndrome de Job, es una inmunodeficiencia primaria poco frecuente, cuyo modo de herencia puede ser autosómico recesivo o dominante. Se caracteriza por altos niveles de IgE, eosinofilia, abscesos cutáneos, eccema, candidiasis mucocutánea crónica e infecciones pulmonares recidivantes que contribuyen al desarrollo de neumatoceles y bronquiectasias. El germen más frecuentemente aislado es el Staphylococcus aureus. En la actualidad, ante la mayor supervivencia de los pacientes se han comunicado infecciones oportunistas y linfomas. Existen escasas publicaciones de pacientes con enfermedad por Mycobacterium tuberculosis asociada a síndrome de hiper IgE, por lo que consideramos relevante comunicar el caso de un paciente con antecedentes de una tuberculosis pulmonar, que presentó una tuberculosis miliar con grave compromiso respiratorio, con buena respuesta al tratamiento estándar con drogas de primera línea.The hyper Immunoglobulin E syndrome, also known as Job´s syndrome, is a rare primary immunodeficiency, its mechanisms of inheritance maybe recessive or dominant autosomal. It is characterized by high levels of IgE, eosinophilia, skin abscesses, eczema, chronic mucocutaneous candidiasis and recurrent pulmonary infections all of which contribute to the development of pneumatoceles and bronchiectasis. The most frequently isolated bacteria is Staphylococcus aureus. Currently, despite the highest survival of patients, lymphomas and other opportunistic infections have been reported. There are few reports of patients with Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection associated with hyper IgE syndrome. Therefore it is relevant that we report a case history of a patient with pulmonary tuberculosis, presenting miliary tuberculosis and severe respiratory compromise, who responded positively to standard anti-tuberculous treatment with first line drugs.Fil: Gamberale, Ana. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital de Infecciosas ; ArgentinaFil: Moreira, Ileana. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital General de Niños ; ArgentinaFil: Bartoletti, Bruno. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital de Infecciosas ; ArgentinaFil: Cruz, Víctor. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital de Infecciosas ; ArgentinaFil: Bezrodnik, Liliana. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital General de Niños ; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Alberti, Federico. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital de Infecciosas ; ArgentinaFil: Castro Zorrilla, Liliana. Universidad de Buenos Aires; ArgentinaFil: Palmero, Domingo. Gobierno de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. Hospital de Infecciosas ; Argentin

Non small-cell lung cancer with metastasis to thigh muscle and mandible: two case reports

INTRODUCTION: Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death in Europe and the US. Isolated metastases to skeletal muscle and the mandible are very uncommon. CASE PRESENTATION: This report presents two cases. Case 1 concerns a 45-year-old Caucasian woman affected by muscle metastasis of the right thigh from non-small-cell lung cancer. Case 2 concerns a 61-year-old Caucasian man affected by mandible metastasis from non-small-cell lung cancer. Both metastases were detected by diagnostic imaging studies. Both patients were treated with radiation therapy with palliative and antalgic intent. CONCLUSION: Radiation therapy was effective and well tolerated in both cases. Both our patients are alive, with follow-up of 18 months and five months, respectively

Empirical Installation of Linear Algebra Shared-Memory Subroutines for Auto-Tuning

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10766-013-0249-6The introduction of auto-tuning techniques in linear algebra shared-memory routines is analyzed. Information obtained in the installation of the routines is used at running time to take some decisions to reduce the total execution time. The study is carried out with routines at different levels (matrix multiplication, LU and Cholesky factorizations and linear systems symmetric or general routines) and with calls to routines in the LAPACK and PLASMA libraries with multithread implementations. Medium NUMA and large cc-NUMA systems are used in the experiments. This variety of routines, libraries and systems allows us to obtain general conclusions about the methodology to use for linear algebra shared-memory routines auto-tuning. Satisfactory execution times are obtained with the proposed methodology.Partially supported by Fundacion Seneca, Consejeria de Educacion de la Region de Murcia, 08763/PI/08, PROMETEO/2009/013 from Generalitat Valenciana, the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science through TIN2012-38341-C04-03, and the High-Performance Computing Network on Parallel Heterogeneus Architectures (CAPAP-H). The authors gratefully acknowledge the computer resources and assistance provided by the Supercomputing Centre of the Scientific Park Foundation of Murcia and by the Centre de Supercomputacio de Catalunya.Cámara, J.; Cuenca, J.; Giménez, D.; García, LP.; Vidal Maciá, AM. (2014). Empirical Installation of Linear Algebra Shared-Memory Subroutines for Auto-Tuning. International Journal of Parallel Programming. 42(3):408-434. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10766-013-0249-6S408434423Agullo, E., Demmel, J., Dongarra, J., Hadri, B., Kurzak, J., Langou, J., Ltaief, H., Luszczek, P., Tomov, S.: Numerical linear algebra on emerging architectures: the PLASMA and MAGMA projects. J. Phys. Conf. Ser. 180(1), 1–5 (2009)Alberti, P., Alonso, P., Vidal, A.M., Cuenca, J., Giménez, D.: Designing polylibraries to speed up linear algebra computations. Int. J. High Perform. Comput. Netw. 1/2/3(1), 75–84 (2004)Anderson, E., Bai, Z., Bischof, C., Demmel, J., Dongarra, J.J., Du Croz, J., Grenbaum, A., Hammarling, S., McKenney, A., Ostrouchov, S., D. Sorensen, S.: LAPACK User’s Guide. Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Philadelphia (1995)Bernabé, G., Cuenca, J., Giménez, D.: Optimization techniques for 3D-FWT on systems with manycore GPUs and multicore CPUs. In: ICCS (2013)Buttari, A., Langou, J., Kurzak, J., Dongarra, J.: A class of parallel tiled linear algebra algorithms for multicore architectures. Parallel Comput. 35(1), 38–53 (2009)Cámara, J., Cuenca, J., Giménez, D., Vidal. A.M.: Empirical autotuning of two-level parallel linear algebra routines on large cc-NUMA systems. In: ISPA (2012)Caron, E., Desprez, F., Suter, F.: Parallel extension of a dynamic performance forecasting tool. Scalable Comput. Pract. Exp. 6(1), 57–69 (2005)Chen, Z., Dongarra, J., Luszczek, P., Roche, K.: Self adapting software for numerical linear algebra and LAPACK for clusters. Parallel Comput. 29, 1723–1743 (2003)Cuenca, J., Giménez, D., González, J.: Achitecture of an automatic tuned linear algebra library. Parallel Comput. 30(2), 187–220 (2004)Cuenca, J., García, L.P., Giménez, D.: Improving linear algebra computation on NUMA platforms through auto-tuned nested parallelism. In: Proceedings of the 2012 EUROMICRO Conference on Parallel, Distributed and Network Processing (2012)Frigo, M.: FFTW: An adaptive software architecture for the FFT. In: Proceedings of the ICASSP Conference, vol. 3, p. 1381 (1998)Golub, G., Van Loan, C.F.: Matrix Computations, 3rd edn. The John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore (1996)Im, E.-J., Yelick, K., Vuduc, R.: Sparsity: optimization framework for sparse matrix kernels. Int. J. High Perform. Comput. Appl. (IJHPCA) 18(1), 135–158 (2004)Intel MKL web page.: http://software.intel.com/en-us/intel-mkl/Jerez, S., Montávez, J.-P., Giménez, D.: Optimizing the execution of a parallel meteorology simulation code. In: Proceedings of the 23rd IEEE International Parallel and Distributed Processing Symposium. IEEE (2009)Katagiri, T., Kise, K., Honda, H., Yuba, T.: Fiber: a generalized framework for auto-tuning software. Springer LNCS 2858, 146–159 (2003)Katagiri, T., Kise, K., Honda, H., Yuba, T.: ABCLib-DRSSED: a parallel eigensolver with an auto-tuning facility. Parallel Comput. 32(3), 231–250 (2006)Kurzak, J., Tomov, S., Dongarra, J.: Autotuning gemm kernels for the FERMI GPU. IEEE Trans. Parallel Distrib. Syst. 23(11), 2045–2057 (2012)Lastovetsky, A.L., Reddy, R., Higgins, R.: Building the functional performance model of a processor. In: SAC, pp. 746–753 (2006)Li, J., Skjellum, A., Falgout, R.D.: A poly-algorithm for parallel dense matrix multiplication on two-dimensional process grid topologies. Concurrency Pract. Exp. 9(5), 345–389 (1997)Naono, K., Teranishi, K., Cavazos, J., Suda, R., (eds.): Software Automatic Tuning. From Concepts to State-of-the-Art Results. Springer, Berlin (2010)Nath, R., Tomov, S., Dongarra, J.: An improved MAGMA gemm for FERMI graphics processing units. IJHPCA 24(4), 511–515 (2010)Petitet, A., Blackford, L.S., Dongarra, J., Ellis, B., Fagg, G.E., Roche, K., Vadhiyar, S.S.: Numerical libraries and the grid. IJHPCA 15(4), 359–374 (2001)PLASMA.: http://icl.cs.utk.edu/plasma/Püschel, M., Moura, J.M.F., Singer, B., Xiong, J., Johnson, J.R., Padua, D.A., Veloso, M.M., Johnson, R.W.: Spiral: a generator for platform-adapted libraries of signal processing algorithms. IJHPCA 18(1), 21–45 (2004)Seshagiri, L., Wu, M.-S., Sosonkina, M., Zhang, Z., Gordon, M.S., Schmidt, M.W.: Enhancing adaptive middleware for quantum chemistry applications with a database framework. In: IPDPS Workshops, pp. 1–8 (2010)Tanaka, T., Katagiri, T., Yuba, T.: d-Spline based incremental parameter estimation in automatic performance tuning. In: PARA, pp. 986–995 (2006)Vuduc, R., Demmel, J., Bilmes, J.: Statistical models for automatic performance tuning. In: International Conference on Computational Science (1), pp. 117–126 (2001)Whaley, R.C., Petitet, A., Dongarra, J.: Automated empirical optimizations of software and the ATLAS project. Parallel Comput. 27(1–2), 3–35 (2001

Hepatitis C virus quasispecies in chronically infected children subjected to interferon–ribavirin therapy

Accumulating evidence suggests that certain features of hepatitis C virus (HCV), especially its high genetic variability, might be responsible for the low efficiency of anti-HCV treatment. Here, we present a bioinformatic analysis of HCV-1a populations isolated from 23 children with chronic hepatitis C (CHC) subjected to interferon–ribavirin therapy. The structures of the viral quasispecies were established based on a 132-amino-acid sequence derived from E1/E2 protein, including hypervariable region 1 (HVR1). Two types of HCV populations were identified. The first type, found in non-responders, contained a small number of closely related variants. The second type, characteristic for sustained responders, was composed of a large number of distantly associated equal-rank variants. Comparison of 445 HVR1 sequences showed that a significant number of variants present in non-responding patients are closely related, suggesting that certain, still unidentified properties of the pathogen may be key factors determining the result of CHC treatment

Potential Benefits of Sequential Inhibitor-Mutagen Treatments of RNA Virus Infections

Lethal mutagenesis is an antiviral strategy consisting of virus extinction associated with enhanced mutagenesis. The use of non-mutagenic antiviral inhibitors has faced the problem of selection of inhibitor-resistant virus mutants. Quasispecies dynamics predicts, and clinical results have confirmed, that combination therapy has an advantage over monotherapy to delay or prevent selection of inhibitor-escape mutants. Using ribavirin-mediated mutagenesis of foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV), here we show that, contrary to expectations, sequential administration of the antiviral inhibitor guanidine (GU) first, followed by ribavirin, is more effective than combination therapy with the two drugs, or than either drug used individually. Coelectroporation experiments suggest that limited inhibition of replication of interfering mutants by GU may contribute to the benefits of the sequential treatment. In lethal mutagenesis, a sequential inhibitor-mutagen treatment can be more effective than the corresponding combination treatment to drive a virus towards extinction. Such an advantage is also supported by a theoretical model for the evolution of a viral population under the action of increased mutagenesis in the presence of an inhibitor of viral replication. The model suggests that benefits of the sequential treatment are due to the involvement of a mutagenic agent, and to competition for susceptible cells exerted by the mutant spectrum. The results may impact lethal mutagenesis-based protocols, as well as current antiviral therapies involving ribavirin

Assessment of plasma chitotriosidase activity, CCL18/PARC concentration and NP-C suspicion index in the diagnosis of Niemann-Pick disease type C: A prospective observational study

Background: Niemann-Pick disease type C (NP-C) is a rare, autosomal recessive neurodegenerative disease caused by mutations in either the NPC1 or NPC2 genes. The diagnosis of NP-C remains challenging due to the non-specific, heterogeneous nature of signs/symptoms. This study assessed the utility of plasma chitotriosidase (ChT) and Chemokine (C-C motif) ligand 18 (CCL18)/pulmonary and activation-regulated chemokine (PARC) in conjunction with the NP-C suspicion index (NP-C SI) for guiding confirmatory laboratory testing in patients with suspected NP-C. Methods: In a prospective observational cohort study, incorporating a retrospective determination of NP-C SI scores, two different diagnostic approaches were applied in two separate groups of unrelated patients from 51 Spanish medical centers (n = 118 in both groups). From Jan 2010 to Apr 2012 (Period 1), patients with =2 clinical signs/symptoms of NP-C were considered ''suspected NP-C'' cases, and NPC1/NPC2 sequencing, plasma chitotriosidase (ChT), CCL18/PARC and sphingomyelinase levels were assessed. Based on findings in Period 1, plasma ChT and CCL18/PARC, and NP-C SI prediction scores were determined in a second group of patients between May 2012 and Apr 2014 (Period 2), and NPC1 and NPC2 were sequenced only in those with elevated ChT and/or elevated CCL18/PARC and/or NP-C SI =70. Filipin staining and 7-ketocholesterol (7-KC) measurements were performed in all patients with NP-C gene mutations, where possible. Results: In total across Periods 1 and 2, 10/236 (4%) patients had a confirmed diagnosis o NP-C based on gene sequencing (5/118 4.2%] in each Period): all of these patients had two causal NPC1 mutations. Single mutant NPC1 alleles were detected in 8/236 (3%) patients, overall. Positive filipin staining results comprised three classical and five variant biochemical phenotypes. No NPC2 mutations were detected. All patients with NPC1 mutations had high ChT activity, high CCL18/PARC concentrations and/or NP-C SI scores =70. Plasma 7-KC was higher than control cut-off values in all patients with two NPC1 mutations, and in the majority of patients with single mutations. Family studies identified three further NP-C patients. Conclusion: This approach may be very useful for laboratories that do not have mass spectrometry facilities and therefore, they cannot use other NP-C biomarkers for diagnosis

Seasonal survival in a non-hibernating Mediterranean garden dormouse population

The seasonal survival pattern of a garden dormouse Eliomys quercinus population was studied in a Mediterranean agricultural field area from East Spain, a geographical location in which this species does exhibit no hibernation. Individuals were captured from nest—boxes checked monthly during a 4-year period. Data were analysed using an open population Cormack–Jolly–Seber model including sex, age class and season as factors. Best models included the effect of age and differences in survival between adult males and females. Survival rate was more variable between seasons in males than in females or juveniles. Maximum adult male survival was reached in autumn, decreased in winter and dropped to very low values in spring and summer. Survival of adult females was higher and presented a less marked seasonal pattern. Seasonal survival of juveniles was fairly constant along the year. Recapture probability also varied seasonally and was twice in winter than in the rest of the year. The local annual survival rate obtained in adult females exceeded the survival rate observed in some garden dormouse populations from Italy, but it was considerably lower in comparison to the values obtained in South Spain and France. The possible energetic consequences of the constant sexual activity exhibited by this garden dormouse population and the effect of other factors, such as the availability of food and social interactions between individuals, seem to influence in the seasonal variations in survival rate for this rodent species in this agricultural habitat

Muitidrug-resistant tuberculosis in aids patients at the beginning of the millennium

Fil: Palmero, Domingo. Hospital F.J. Muñiz. Sala 19; Argentina.Fil: Ritacco, Viviana. ANLIS Dr.C.G.Malbrán. Instituto Nacional de Enfermedades Infecciosas; Argentina.Fil: Ambroggi, Marta. Hospital de Enfermedades Infecciosas Francisco Javier Muñiz. Laboratorio de Bacteriología de la Tuberculosis A. Cetrángolo; Argentina.Fil: Poggi, Susana. Hospital de Enfermedades Infecciosas Francisco Javier Muñiz. Laboratorio de Bacteriología de la Tuberculosis A. Cetrángolo; Argentina.Fil: Güemes Gurtubay, Jose L. Hospital F.J. Muñiz. Sala 19; Argentina.Fil: Alberti, Federico. Hospital F.J. Muñiz. Sala 19; Argentina.Fil: Waisman, Jaime. Sala 19; Argentina.La tuberculosis multirresistente (TBMR) asociada al sida emergió durante los años 90 en varios países del mundo. En Argentina, el brote más importante se originó en el Hospital Muñiz y sus consecuencias persisten hasta ahora. Con el objeto de evaluar la situación de la TBMR en este hospital, analizamos las características clínico-demográfico-epidemiológicas de los 53 pacientes masculinos con TBMR/sida internados por primera vez en el trienio 2001-2003 con relación al genotipo del polimorfismo de longitud de fragmentos de restricción (RFLP) IS6110 de los aislamientos. La edad promedio de los pacientes fue 32 años, 37 (70%) residían en el conurbano bonaerense, 36 (68%) eran usuarios de drogas ilícitas y 14 (26.4%) tenían antecedentes carcelarios. El 88% presentó grave inmunodepresión (CD4+<100/µl) y el 58.5% falleció. La mortalidad se asoció a baja adherencia al tratamiento y a comorbilidades, pero no a enfermedad por Mycobacterium tuberculosis cepa “M”, causante del brote original. De los 40 casos analizados por RFLP, 29 (72.5%) conformaron clusters y 24 presentaban el genotipo “M”. La resistencia a 5 o 6 drogas resultó un indicador de enfermedad por esa cepa. El genotipo “M” se asoció significativamente a internaciones previas en el Hospital Muñiz o encarcelamiento. En síntesis, 14 años después de ocurrido el primer caso de TBMR/sida, se constata la persistencia y predominancia en el hospital de la cepa responsable del brote. Se requiere una intensificación de las medidas de control de la diseminación institucional de la tuberculosis para consolidar la tendencia decreciente de la TBMR observada en el país en la última década. Aids-related multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDRTB) emerged during the 90s in several countries around the world. In Argentina, the most notorious outbreak was documented in the Hospital Muñiz, which is still undergoing its aftermaths. In order to evaluate the situation in this hospital regarding MDRTB, we analysed clinical, demographic and epidemiological traits of the 53 male MDRTB-aids patients admitted during 2001-2003 at a ward especially dedicated to their isolation. Patients’ mean age was 32 years, 70% lived in Buenos Aires suburbs. A history of illicit drug users or imprisonment was recorded in 68% and 26% of the patients, respectively. Severe immunodepression (CD4+ count <100/µl) was found in 88% of the patients and 58% died. Mortality was associated with non-adherence to treatment and co-morbidity, but not with the genotype of the “M” strain, responsible for the original outbreak. Of 40 cases available for restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP), 29 (72.5%) resulted in cluster. RFLP patterns of 24 matched the “M” genotype. In this study, resistance to 5 or 6 drugs was found to be an indicator of disease due to the “M” strain. The “M” genotype associated significantly to previous admission at the Hospital Muñiz or imprisonment. In brief, 14 years after the detection of the first MDRTB-aids case, we report here the persistence and predominance of the original outbreak strain at the hospital. Stronger TB infection control measures are urgently needed in hospitals and jails in order to strengthen the declining trend of the MDRTB observed in our country towards the end of the last decade