Hernia de diafragma no tratada en paciente con sintomatología de larga evolución (más de una década)

ResumenLas hernias del diafragma son un reto para cualquier cirujano, y no existe un circuito de atención reconocido para estos pacientes. ¿A quién pertenece esta patología: al cirujano general, al torácico, al laparoscopista, al herniólogo? Presentamos el caso de un varón cuyo diagnóstico tardó más de 12 años en realizarse, después de repetidos ingresos médicos por problemas respiratorios y digestivos inespecíficos. Se describe el manejo y tratamiento elegido, según su tamaño. Se discute la necesidad de una colaboración entre especialistas y la centralización de casos para poder ofrecer una experiencia y resultados eficientes.AbstractDiaphragm hernias are a challenge for any surgeon and there is no care circuit recognized for these patients. Who is responsible for this pathology: the general surgeon, the chest surgeon, the laparoscopic surgeon, etc? We report the case of a man whose diagnosis took more than 12 years in the making after repeated hospitalizations for nonspecific respiratory and digestive problems. We describe the management and treatment chosen, following size criteria. We discuss the need for a collaboration between specialists and for the centralization of cases in order to offer efficient experience and results

Performance Bounds for Finite Moving Average Change Detection: Application to Global Navigation Satellite Systems

Due to the widespread deployment of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSSs) for critical road or urban applications, one of the major challenges to be solved is the provision of integrity to terrestrial environments, so that GNSS may be safety used in these applications. To do so, the integrity of the received GNSS signal must be analyzed in order to detect some local effect disturbing the received signal. This is desirable because the presence of some local effect may cause large position errors, and hence compromise the signal integrity. Moreover, the detection of such disturbing effects must be done before some pre-established delay. This kind of detection lies within the field of transient change detection. In this work, a finite moving average stopping time is proposed in order to approach the signal integrity problem with a transient change detection framework. The statistical performance of this stopping time is investigated and compared, in the context of multipath detection, to other different methods available in the literature. Numerical results are presented in order to assess their performance.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, transaction paper, IEEE Transaction on Signal Processing, 201

A collaborative approach to embedding academic literacies in first year grant projects

This paper describes the collaborative approach that Academic Language and Learning developers are using as part of a university’s First Year Experience project. This project draws on the idea of a third generation approach which utilises a bottom-up and top-down institutional framework. Intrinsic to this framework at UTS is a small grant scheme devised to support academics in designing curricula which facilitate first year students’ transition. However, smooth transition can be affected by the academic and linguistic capital of the increasingly diverse student population. This has provided the opportunity for ALL developers to become active participants in the small grant scheme and to work collaboratively with academics on the seamless integration of domain specific academic literacy. Two case studies of FYE grants illustrate the parameters and benefits of such an approach and how it may enable a discursive space to support sustainable practice

Who changes the course of history? Historical agency in the narratives of Spanish pre-service primary teachers

Brief narratives created by pre-service teachers on a primary education degree course at the University of Murcia (Spain) were analysed to identify the ways in which they presented historical agents in European and Spanish history. The main units of analysis were categorized by the type of agent introduced in each narrative (individual, collective and institutional), then by identifying agents as either active or passive, and finally by describing the characteristics of their actions in terms of reasons and causes/consequences. The results reveal an emphasis on individual agents and the persistence of a superficial historical master narrative that perpetuates a distorted image of history

Overlapping Effects of miR-21 Inhibition and Drugs for Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: Rationale for Repurposing Nintedanib as a Novel Treatment for Ischemia/Reperfusion Injury

ABSTRACT: A specific anti-miR-21 has emerged as an effective treatment for ischemia/reperfusion injury in a pig model of myocardial infarction (MI), but the perspectives for clinical translation are limited. Anti-miR-21 blunts profibrotic pathways, whose excessive activation is detrimental in the post-MI setting. Repurposing antifibrotic drugs approved for other indications is a possible strategy. We compared the molecular effects of anti-miR-21 and the 2 drugs approved for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (nintedanib and pirfenidone) through a bioinformatic approach. We report that nintedanib and anti-miR-21 share many targets, including the proto-oncogene Rous sarcoma oncogene cellular homolog. Conversely, pirfenidone and anti-miR-21 do not have common mechanisms of action. In summary, the molecular mechanisms activated by nintedanib are partially overlapping with those elicited by anti-miR-21. Nintedanib could be evaluated in animal studies or clinical trials on MI

Novel metaheuristic for parameter estimation in nonlinear dynamic biological systems

BACKGROUND: We consider the problem of parameter estimation (model calibration) in nonlinear dynamic models of biological systems. Due to the frequent ill-conditioning and multi-modality of many of these problems, traditional local methods usually fail (unless initialized with very good guesses of the parameter vector). In order to surmount these difficulties, global optimization (GO) methods have been suggested as robust alternatives. Currently, deterministic GO methods can not solve problems of realistic size within this class in reasonable computation times. In contrast, certain types of stochastic GO methods have shown promising results, although the computational cost remains large. Rodriguez-Fernandez and coworkers have presented hybrid stochastic-deterministic GO methods which could reduce computation time by one order of magnitude while guaranteeing robustness. Our goal here was to further reduce the computational effort without loosing robustness. RESULTS: We have developed a new procedure based on the scatter search methodology for nonlinear optimization of dynamic models of arbitrary (or even unknown) structure (i.e. black-box models). In this contribution, we describe and apply this novel metaheuristic, inspired by recent developments in the field of operations research, to a set of complex identification problems and we make a critical comparison with respect to the previous (above mentioned) successful methods. CONCLUSION: Robust and efficient methods for parameter estimation are of key importance in systems biology and related areas. The new metaheuristic presented in this paper aims to ensure the proper solution of these problems by adopting a global optimization approach, while keeping the computational effort under reasonable values. This new metaheuristic was applied to a set of three challenging parameter estimation problems of nonlinear dynamic biological systems, outperforming very significantly all the methods previously used for these benchmark problems

Espacio urbano y vulnerabilidad comunitaria. Efectos socio-ambientales de la estructura urbana en las áreas desfavorecidas de Andalucía

Las redes comunitarias cumplen una valiosa función social en las áreas desfavorecidas de las ciudades andaluzas. El espacio urbano tiene la capacidad de condicionar el desarrollo de éstas, por lo que, su producción sometida a los intereses y leyes del mercado, que lo adapta a sus necesidades, conlleva impactos negativos a escala comunitaria que se reflejan en el medio ambiente urbano.Erkidego-sareek andaluziar hirietako kaltetutako eremuetan gizarte betekizun baliogarria betetzen dute. Hiri-espazioak horien garapena baldintzatzeko gaitasuna du, eta ondorioz, merkatuaren interes eta legeen menpe gelditzen den, euron beharrizanetara egokituz, euren ekoizpenak hiri-ingurumenari dagokion mailan islatzen den erkide-esparruan eraso kaltegarrian dakartza.Les réseaux communautaires accomplissent une fonction sociale de grande valeur dans les milieux défavorisés des villes andalouses. L'espace urbain a la capacité de conditionner leur développement, ce qui fait que leur production soumise aux intérêts et aux lois du marché, qui l'adapte à ses besoins, en traîne des impacts négatifs à échelle communautaire qui se reflètent sur l'environne-ment urbain.The community networks fulfill a valuable social function in the disadvantaged areas of the Andalusian cities. The urban space has the aptitude to determine the development of these, for what, your production submitted to the interests and laws of the market, which he adapts it to your needs, he carries negative impacts to community scale that they reflect in the urban environment

Diel pattern of circadian clock and storage protein gene expression in leaves and during seed filling in cowpea (Vigna unguiculata)

Background Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) is an important source of protein supply for animal and human nutrition. The major storage globulins VICILIN and LEGUMIN (LEG) are synthesized from several genes including LEGA, LEGB, LEGJ and CVC (CONVICILIN). The current hypothesis is that the plant circadian core clock genes are conserved in a wide array of species and that primary metabolism is to a large extent controlled by the plant circadian clock. Our aim was to investigate a possible link between gene expression of storage proteins and the circadian clock. Results We identified cowpea orthologues of the core clock genes VunLHY, VunTOC1, VunGI and VunELF3, the protein storage genes VunLEG, VunLEGJ, and VunCVC as well as nine candidate reference genes used in RT-PCR. ELONGATION FACTOR 1-A (ELF1A) resulted the most suitable reference gene. The clock genes VunELF3, VunGI, VunTOC1 and VunLHY showed a rhythmic expression profile in leaves with a typical evening/night and morning/midday phased expression. The diel patterns were not completely robust and only VungGI and VungELF3 retained a rhythmic pattern under free running conditions of darkness. Under field conditions, rhythmicity and phasing apparently faded during early pod and seed development and was regained in ripening pods for VunTOC1 and VunLHY. Mature seeds showed a rhythmic expression of VunGI resembling leaf tissue under controlled growth chamber conditions. Comparing time windows during developmental stages we found that VunCVC and VunLEG were significantly down regulated during the night in mature pods as compared to intermediate ripe pods, while changes in seeds were non-significant due to high variance. The rhythmic expression under field conditions was lost under growth chamber conditions. Conclusions The core clock gene network is conserved in cowpea leaves showing a robust diel expression pattern except VunELF3 under growth chamber conditions. There appears to be a clock transcriptional reprogramming in pods and seeds compared to leaves. Storage protein deposition may be circadian regulated under field conditions but the strong environmental signals are not met under artificial growth conditions. Diel expression pattern in field conditions may result in better usage of energy for protein storage.This work was supported by the 7th Research Framework Programme of the European Union “Eurolegume (Enhancing of Legumes Growing in Europe through Sustainable Cropping for Protein Supply for Food and Feed)” FP7– 613781. The funding body had no role in the experimental design, analysis or results shown in the manuscript