Recursos fitogenéticos: bases para un futuro resiliente al clima y libre de hambre en el Caribe

En toda la región Caribe, el cambio climático no solamente planteará desafíos sino también una amplia gama de oportunidades, que ofrecen mayor importancia a la riqueza de recursos fitogenéticos de la región. Materializar el potencial de estos recursos para contribuir a garantizar la seguridad alimentaria y crear sistemas agrícolas más resilientes frente al cambio climático requerirá de una mayor cooperación regional. Los objetivos centrales de esta cooperación deberán ser: desarrollar intervenciones oportunas en las fronteras nacionales que mejoren la colecta, conservación y el intercambio de los recursos fitogenéticos

Plant genetic resources: foundations for a food-secure and climate-resilient future in the Caribbean

Across the Caribbean, climate change will bring about not only challenges but also a wide array of opportunities, which lend greater significance to the region’s wealth of plant genetic resources. Realizing the potential of those resources to help ensure food security and build more-resilient agricultural systems in the face of climate change will require stronger regional cooperation. Its central aims should be to develop timely interventions across national borders that improve the collection, conservation, and sharing of plant genetic resources

Evolutionary Analysis of Mitogenomes from Parasitic and Free-Living Flatworms

Copyright: © 2015 Solà et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. The attached file is the published version of the article

Definition of a list of fish diseases to aid health management in Spain

Trabajo presentado en la 14th EAFP International Conference (European Association of Fish Pathologists), celebrada en Praga (República Checa), del 14 al 19 de septiembre de 2009An expert working group used a risk ranking technique to compile a list of fish disease hazards (pathogens) of relevance to Spanish aquaculture. It was possible to divide the list into three groups: I-high national risk; II-regional risk; III-low risk. The three groups were as follows: Group I (high risk) Aphanomyces invadans (EUS)**, spring viraemia of carp virus (SVCV), koi herpes virus (KHV)¿ and infectious haematopoietic necrosis virus (IHNV)¿ Group II (regional risk) Enteromyxum spp. (leei and scophthalmi), Aquabirnaviridae (incl. IPNV), viral encephalopathy and retinopathy virus (VERV), Streptococcus iniae, Philasterides dicentrarchi and Aeromonas salmonicida (in the marine environment). Group III (low risk) Sparicotyle chrysophrii/Microcotylidae, Flavobacterium maritimus, Photobacterium piscicida, Togaviridae, Sphaerospora testicularis, Edwardsiella tarda, Birnavirus (no-EVE), Lactococcus garviae, viral haemorrhagic septicaemia virus (VHSV)¿, Tenacibaculum maritimum, epizootic haematopoietic necrosis virus (EHNV)**, Renibacterium salmoninarum (BKD) and Gyrodactylus salaris. The exercise formed part of a project concerning aquaculture health management (Jacumar-GESAC¿) in Spain and is being used to help define sampling plans for disease monitoring using epidemiological and risk-based criteria. **The diseases caused by these pathogens are notifiable and exotic according to Directive 2006/88/EC ¿The diseases caused by these pathogens are notifiable and non-exotic according to Directive 2006/88/EC ¿Plan Nacional de Cultivos Marinos; Gestión sanitaria de la acuicultura: Adaptación a la nueva normativa (GESAC) ¿ financed by the Junta Nacional Asesora de Cultivos Marinos (Jacumar

Amphibian fungal panzootic causes catastrophic and ongoing loss of biodiversity

Anthropogenic trade and development have broken down dispersal barriers, facilitating the spread of diseases that threaten Earth's biodiversity. We present a global, quantitative assessment of the amphibian chytridiomycosis panzootic, one of the most impactful examples of disease spread, and demonstrate its role in the decline of at least 501 amphibian species over the past half-century, including 90 presumed extinctions. The effects of chytridiomycosis have been greatest in large-bodied, range-restricted anurans in wet climates in the Americas and Australia. Declines peaked in the 1980s, and only 12% of declined species show signs of recovery, whereas 39% are experiencing ongoing decline. There is risk of further chytridiomycosis outbreaks in new areas. The chytridiomycosis panzootic represents the greatest recorded loss of biodiversity attributable to a disease

A global experiment on motivating social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic

Finding communication strategies that effectively motivate social distancing continues to be a global public health priority during the COVID-19 pandemic. This cross-country, preregistered experiment (n = 25,718 from 89 countries) tested hypotheses concerning generalizable positive and negative outcomes of social distancing messages that promoted personal agency and reflective choices (i.e., an autonomy-supportive message) or were restrictive and shaming (i.e., a controlling message) compared with no message at all. Results partially supported experimental hypotheses in that the controlling message increased controlled motivation (a poorly internalized form of motivation relying on shame, guilt, and fear of social consequences) relative to no message. On the other hand, the autonomy-supportive message lowered feelings of defiance compared with the controlling message, but the controlling message did not differ from receiving no message at all. Unexpectedly, messages did not influence autonomous motivation (a highly internalized form of motivation relying on one’s core values) or behavioral intentions. Results supported hypothesized associations between people’s existing autonomous and controlled motivations and self-reported behavioral intentions to engage in social distancing. Controlled motivation was associated with more defiance and less long-term behavioral intention to engage in social distancing, whereas autonomous motivation was associated with less defiance and more short- and long-term intentions to social distance. Overall, this work highlights the potential harm of using shaming and pressuring language in public health communication, with implications for the current and future global health challenges

International nosocomial infection control consortium (INICC) report, data summary of 36 countries, for 2004-2009

The results of a surveillance study conducted by the International Nosocomial Infection Control Consortium (INICC) from January 2004 through December 2009 in 422 intensive care units (ICUs) of 36 countries in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Europe are reported. During the 6-year study period, using Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National Healthcare Safety Network (NHSN; formerly the National Nosocomial Infection Surveillance system [NNIS]) definitions for device-associated health care-associated infections, we gathered prospective data from 313,008 patients hospitalized in the consortium's ICUs for an aggregate of 2,194,897 ICU bed-days. Despite the fact that the use of devices in the developing countries' ICUs was remarkably similar to that reported in US ICUs in the CDC's NHSN, rates of device-associated nosocomial infection were significantly higher in the ICUs of the INICC hospitals; the pooled rate of central line-associated bloodstream infection in the INICC ICUs of 6.8 per 1,000 central line-days was more than 3-fold higher than the 2.0 per 1,000 central line-days reported in comparable US ICUs. The overall rate of ventilator-associated pneumonia also was far higher (15.8 vs 3.3 per 1,000 ventilator-days), as was the rate of catheter-associated urinary tract infection (6.3 vs. 3.3 per 1,000 catheter-days). Notably, the frequencies of resistance of Pseudomonas aeruginosa isolates to imipenem (47.2% vs 23.0%), Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates to ceftazidime (76.3% vs 27.1%), Escherichia coli isolates to ceftazidime (66.7% vs 8.1%), Staphylococcus aureus isolates to methicillin (84.4% vs 56.8%), were also higher in the consortium's ICUs, and the crude unadjusted excess mortalities of device-related infections ranged from 7.3% (for catheter-associated urinary tract infection) to 15.2% (for ventilator-associated pneumonia). Copyright © 2012 by the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

A global experiment on motivating social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic

Finding communication strategies that effectively motivate social distancing continues to be a global public health priority during the COVID-19 pandemic. This cross-country, preregistered experiment (n = 25,718 from 89 countries) tested hypotheses concerning generalizable positive and negative outcomes of social distancing messages that promoted personal agency and reflective choices (i.e., an autonomy-supportive message) or were restrictive and shaming (i.e. a controlling message) compared to no message at all. Results partially supported experimental hypotheses in that the controlling message increased controlled motivation (a poorly-internalized form of motivation relying on shame, guilt, and fear of social consequences) relative to no message. On the other hand, the autonomy-supportive message lowered feelings of defiance compared to the controlling message, but the controlling message did not differ from receiving no message at all. Unexpectedly, messages did not influence autonomous motivation (a highly-internalized form of motivation relying on one’s core values) or behavioral intentions. Results supported hypothesized associations between people’s existing autonomous and controlled motivations and self-reported behavioral intentions to engage in social distancing: Controlled motivation was associated with more defiance and less long-term behavioral intentions to engage in social distancing, whereas autonomous motivation was associated with less defiance and more short- and long-term intentions to social distance. Overall, this work highlights the potential harm of using shaming and pressuring language in public health communication, with implications for the current and future global health challenges

A large, ten-generation family with autosomal dominant preaxial polydactyly/triphalangeal thumb: Historical, clinical, genealogical, and molecular studies

We present a large, ten-generation family of 273 individuals with 84 people having preaxial polydactyly/triphalangeal thumb due to a pathogenic variant in the zone of polarizing activity regulatory sequence (ZRS) within the exon 5 of LMBR1. The causative change maps to position 396 of the ZRS, located at position c.423 + 4909C > T (chr7:156791480; hg38; LMBR1 ENST00000353442.10; rs606231153 NG_009240.2) in the intron 5 of LMBR1. The first affected individual with the disorder was traced back to mid-1700, when some settlers and workers established in Cervera de Buitrago, a small village about 82 km North to Madrid. Clinical and radiological studies of most of the affected members have been performed for 42 years (follow-up of the family by LFGA). Molecular studies have confirmed a pathogenic variant in the ZRS that segregates in this family. To the best of our knowledge, this is the largest family with preaxial polydactyly/triphalangeal thumb reported so far