Essential Oils and Volatiles as Nematodicides against the Cyst Nematodes Globodera and Heterodera

The cyst nematodes of the genera Heterodera (HET) and Globodera (GLO) are among the most damaging obligate plant parasitic nematodes (PPNs) that parasitize cereals, rice, potatoes and soybean. In the absence of resistant crops, soil fumigation of pesticides provides a good strategy for population control. However, synthetic nematicides can cause negative environmental and public health impacts and are feared to lead to the development of resistance and immunity. The use of essential oils (EOs) could be a viable environmentally friendly alternative, which has been poorly explored on cyst nematodes but has shown very good results on other PPNs. The present work reviews the existing bibliography on the biological activity of EOs against GLO and HET. EOs from Allium sativum, Eucalyptus globulus, and Salvia officinalis were the most active against GLO egg hatching. The EOs extracted from Hyssopus cuspidatus, Kaempferia galanga, Mentha canadensis, Ocimum basilicum, and Valeriana amurensis had the highest activity against HET J2 juveniles. Ethyl p-methoxycinnamate, a phenylpropanoid ester, was the EO volatile with the highest toxicity against HET, showing lower EC50 values than the nematodicide fosthiazate. The study of EOs against cyst nematodes is still preliminary in comparison to other PPNs. Future works must expand this line of research and explore greener practices in cyst nematode pest management

Phytochemicals as Biopesticides against the Pinewood Nematode Bursaphelenchus xylophilus: A Review on Essential Oils and Their Volatiles

The impacts of a rapidly changing environment together with the growth in global trade activities has promoted new plant pest pandemic events in forest ecosystems. The pinewood nematode (PWN), Bursaphelenchus xylophilus, causes strong worldwide economic and ecological impacts. Direct control is performed through trunk injection of powerful nematicides, however many of these (hemi)synthetic compounds have raised ecological and human health concerns for affecting non-target species and accumulating in food products. As sustainable alternatives, essential oils (EOs) have shown very promising results. In this work, available literature on the direct activity of EOs against PWN is reviewed, as a contribution to advance the search for safer and greener biopesticides to be used in sustainable PWD pest management strategies. For the first time, important parameters concerning the bioassays performed, the PWNs bioassayed, and the EOs used are summarized and comparatively analyzed. Ultimately, an overview of the chemical composition of the most active EOs allowed to uncover preliminary guidelines for anti-PWN EO efficiency. The analysis of important information on the volatile phytochemicals composing nematicidal EOs provides a solid basis to engineer sustainable biopesticides capable of controlling the PWN under an integrated pest management framework and contributes to improved forest health

A serious games platform for cognitive rehabilitation with preliminary evaluation

In recent years Serious Games have evolved substantially, solving problems in diverse areas. In particular, in Cognitive Rehabilitation, Serious Games assume a relevant role. Traditional cognitive therapies are often considered repetitive and discouraging for patients and Serious Games can be used to create more dynamic rehabilitation processes, holding patients' attention throughout the process and motivating them during their road to recovery. This paper reviews Serious Games and user interfaces in rehabilitation area and details a Serious Games platform for Cognitive Rehabilitation that includes a set of features such as: natural and multimodal user interfaces and social features (competition, collaboration, and handicapping) which can contribute to augment the motivation of patients during the rehabilitation process. The web platform was tested with healthy subjects. Results of this preliminary evaluation show the motivation and the interest of the participants by playing the games.- This work has been supported by FCT - Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia in the scope of the projects: PEst-UID/CEC/00319/2015 and PEst-UID/CEC/00027/2015. The authors would like to thank also all the volunteers that participated in the study

Cost-Effectiveness of Haemorrhoidal Artery Ligation versus Rubber Band Ligation for the Treatment of Grade II–III Haemorrhoids: Analysis Using Evidence from the HubBLe Trial

Aim Haemorrhoids are a common condition, with nearly 30,000 procedures carried out in England in 2014/15, and result in a significant quality-of-life burden to patients and a financial burden to the healthcare system. This study examined the cost effectiveness of haemorrhoidal artery ligation (HAL) compared with rubber band ligation (RBL) in the treatment of grade II–III haemorrhoids. Method This analyses used data from the HubBLe study, a multicentre, open-label, parallel group, randomised controlled trial conducted in 17 acute UK hospitals between September 2012 and August 2015. A full economic evaluation, including long-term cost effectiveness, was conducted from the UK National Health Service (NHS) perspective. Main outcomes included healthcare costs, quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) and recurrence. Costeffectiveness results were presented in terms of incremental cost per QALY gained and cost per recurrence avoided. Extrapolation analysis for 3 years beyond the trial follow-up, two subgroup analyses (by grade of haemorrhoids and recurrence following RBL at baseline), and various sensitivity analyses were undertaken. Results In the primary base-case within-trial analysis, the incremental total mean cost per patient for HAL compared with RBL was £1027 (95% confidence interval [CI] £782– £1272, p\0.001). The incremental QALYs were 0.01 QALYs (95% CI -0.02 to 0.04, p = 0.49). This generated an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) of £104,427 per QALY. In the extrapolation analysis, the estimated probabilistic ICER was £21,798 per QALY. Results from all subgroup and sensitivity analyses did not materially change the base-case result. Conclusions Under all assessed scenarios, the HAL procedure was not cost effective compared with RBL for the treatment of grade II-III haemorrhoids at a cost-effectiveness threshold of £20,000 per QALY; therefore

Clinical safety of dichlorvos (45%), cypermethrin (5%) and piperonyl butoxide (25%) administered by spray on the skin of cattle

ABSTRACT Objective. Due to the importance of controlling ectoparasites, associated with the necessity of technical knowledge on the safety of topical treatment with organophosphates, pyrethroids and piperonyl butoxide to the animal organism, this bioassay was carried out to evaluate the clinical safety of the association of dichlorvos (45%) + cypermethrin (5%) + piperonyl butoxide (25%) administered by spray on the skin of cattle, through the study of clinical parameters, biochemical, haematological and behavioral changes. Materials and methods. Sixteen crossbred animals with a mean age of 18 months, males and females grouped into two treatments with eight animals each: T1 (1:800 v/v) and T2 (1:200 v/v). Were collected blood samples at six different times: before treatment (BT), 24, 48, 72, 96 and 192 hours post treatment (HPT). Results. The antiparasitic association administered by spray on the skin did not result in changes in the enzymatic activity of ALT, AST, GGT and ALP, as well as in serum albumin, triglycerides, cholesterol, urea and creatinine, demonstrating the safety of this antiparasitic compound for maintaining hepatic and renal functionality. The erythrocyte, leukocyte and platelet studies showed no changes caused by treatments, and no clinical signs and behavioral changes were observed after treatment. Conclusions. These findings demonstrated good safety margin for spray treatment on the skin with this antiparasitic compound, even when administered at a dilution of 1:200 v/v, which is four times the dose recommended for ectoparasite control

A comparative study of synthetic winged peptides for absolute protein quantification

A proper internal standard choice is critical for accurate, precise, and reproducible mass spectrometry-based proteomics assays. Synthetic isotopically labeled (SIL) proteins are currently considered the gold standard. However, they are costly and challenging to obtain. An alternative approach uses SIL peptides or SIL "winged" peptides extended at C- or/and N-terminus with an amino acid sequence or a tag cleaved during enzymatic proteolysis. However, a consensus on the design of a winged peptide for absolute quantification is missing. In this study, we used human serum albumin as a model system to compare the quantitative performance of reference SIL protein with four different designs of SIL winged peptides: (i) commercially available SIL peptides with a proprietary trypsin cleavable tag at C-terminus, (ii) SIL peptides extended with five amino acid residues at C-terminus, (iii) SIL peptides extended with three and (iv) with five amino acid residues at both C- and N-termini. Our results demonstrate properties of various SIL extended peptides designs, e.g., water solubility and efficiency of trypsin enzymatic cleavage with primary influence on quantitative performance. SIL winged peptides extended with three amino acids at both C- and N-termini demonstrated optimal quantitative performance, equivalent to the SIL protein

A straightforward multiallelic significance test for the Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium law

Much forensic inference based upon DNA evidence is made assuming Hardy-Weinberg Equilibrium (HWE) for the genetic loci being used. Several statistical tests to detect and measure deviation from HWE have been devised, and their limitations become more obvious when testing for deviation within multiallelic DNA loci. The most popular methods-Chi-square and Likelihood-ratio tests-are based on asymptotic results and cannot guarantee a good performance in the presence of low frequency genotypes. Since the parameter space dimension increases at a quadratic rate on the number of alleles, some authors suggest applying sequential methods, where the multiallelic case is reformulated as a sequence of “biallelic” tests. However, in this approach it is not obvious how to assess the general evidence of the original hypothesis; nor is it clear how to establish the significance level for its acceptance/rejection. In this work, we introduce a straightforward method for the multiallelic HWE test, which overcomes the aforementioned issues of sequential methods. The core theory for the proposed method is given by the Full Bayesian Significance Test (FBST), an intuitive Bayesian approach which does not assign positive probabilities to zero measure sets when testing sharp hypotheses. We compare FBST performance to Chi-square, Likelihood-ratio and Markov chain tests, in three numerical experiments. The results suggest that FBST is a robust and high performance method for the HWE test, even in the presence of several alleles and small sample sizes