Low-Intensity physical activity beneficially alters the ultrastructural renal morphology of spontaneously hypertensive rats

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE: Kidney disorders can cause essential hypertension, which can subsequently cause renal disease. High blood pressure is also common among those with chronic kidney disease; moreover, it is a well-known risk factor for a more rapid progression to kidney failure. Because hypertension and kidney function are closely linked, the present study aimed to observe the beneficial effects of low-intensity physical activity on structural and ultrastructural renal morphology and blood pressure in normotensive and spontaneously hypertensive rats. METHOD: Male Wistar-Kyoto rats and spontaneously hypertensive rats were randomly allocated into four groups: sedentary or exercised Wistar-Kyoto and sedentary or exercised spontaneously hypertensive rats. The exercise lasted 20 weeks and consisted of treadmill training for 1 hour/day, 5 days/week. RESULTS: The exercised, spontaneously hypertensive rats showed a significant blood pressure reduction of 26%. The body masses of the Wistar-Kyoto and spontaneously hypertensive strains were significantly different. There were improvements in some of the renal structures of the animals treated with physical activity: (i) the interdigitations of the proximal and distal convoluted tubules; (ii) the basal membrane of the proximal and distal convoluted tubules; and (iii) in the basal membrane, slit diaphragm and pedicels of the glomerular filtration barrier. The spontaneously hypertensive rats also showed a decreased expression of connexin-43. CONCLUSION: Physical exercise could be a therapeutic tool for improving kidney ultrastructure and, consequently, renal function in hypertensive individuals

StarVZ: Performance Analysis of Task-Based Parallel Applications

High-performance computing (HPC) applications enable the solution of compute-intensive problems in feasible time. Among many HPC paradigms, task-based programming has gathered community attention in recent years. This paradigm enables constructing an HPC application using a more declarative approach, structuring it in a direct acyclic graph (DAG). The performance evaluation of these applications is as hard as in any other programming paradigm. Understanding how to analyze these applications, employing the DAG and runtime metrics, presents opportunities to improve its performance. This article describes the StarVZ R-package available on CRAN for performance analysis of task-based applications. StarVZ enables transforms runtime trace data into different vi-sualizations of the application behavior. An analyst can understand their applications' performance limitations and compare multiple executions. StarVZ has been successfully applied to several study-cases, showing its applicability in a number of scenarios

ATIVA: um ambiente virtual para apoiar o ensino e aprendizagem de Aluno com deficiência intelectual

Este artigo apresenta um ambiente virtual, denominado de Ativa, que tem a finalidade de permitir aos professores de instituições de ensino de alunos comdeficiência intelectual (DI) gerenciar as atividades de suas aulas por meio de jogos sérios, o coordenador pedagógico gerenciar as turmas e o aluno executar a aula. A pesquisa é de natureza aplicada e usou da observação nas aulas de informática em uma instituição de modalidade de educação especial da região para relatar e identificar os requisitos do ambiente. O ambiente foi criado usando a metodologia Rapid Application Development (RAD) e envolveu a criação de quatro módulos. Como resultado o Ativa permite ao professor reusar aulas que já estão cadastradas, mantém uma base de dados sobre os jogos sérios gratuitos que podem ser aplicados aos alunos com DI como fixação de conteúdo, é um ambiente integrado contendo aulas de várias matérias e atende as individualidades dos alunos

Robust estimation of bacterial cell count from optical density

Optical density (OD) is widely used to estimate the density of cells in liquid culture, but cannot be compared between instruments without a standardized calibration protocol and is challenging to relate to actual cell count. We address this with an interlaboratory study comparing three simple, low-cost, and highly accessible OD calibration protocols across 244 laboratories, applied to eight strains of constitutive GFP-expressing E. coli. Based on our results, we recommend calibrating OD to estimated cell count using serial dilution of silica microspheres, which produces highly precise calibration (95.5% of residuals <1.2-fold), is easily assessed for quality control, also assesses instrument effective linear range, and can be combined with fluorescence calibration to obtain units of Molecules of Equivalent Fluorescein (MEFL) per cell, allowing direct comparison and data fusion with flow cytometry measurements: in our study, fluorescence per cell measurements showed only a 1.07-fold mean difference between plate reader and flow cytometry data

Rationale, study design, and analysis plan of the Alveolar Recruitment for ARDS Trial (ART): Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial

Background: Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is associated with high in-hospital mortality. Alveolar recruitment followed by ventilation at optimal titrated PEEP may reduce ventilator-induced lung injury and improve oxygenation in patients with ARDS, but the effects on mortality and other clinical outcomes remain unknown. This article reports the rationale, study design, and analysis plan of the Alveolar Recruitment for ARDS Trial (ART). Methods/Design: ART is a pragmatic, multicenter, randomized (concealed), controlled trial, which aims to determine if maximum stepwise alveolar recruitment associated with PEEP titration is able to increase 28-day survival in patients with ARDS compared to conventional treatment (ARDSNet strategy). We will enroll adult patients with ARDS of less than 72 h duration. The intervention group will receive an alveolar recruitment maneuver, with stepwise increases of PEEP achieving 45 cmH(2)O and peak pressure of 60 cmH2O, followed by ventilation with optimal PEEP titrated according to the static compliance of the respiratory system. In the control group, mechanical ventilation will follow a conventional protocol (ARDSNet). In both groups, we will use controlled volume mode with low tidal volumes (4 to 6 mL/kg of predicted body weight) and targeting plateau pressure <= 30 cmH2O. The primary outcome is 28-day survival, and the secondary outcomes are: length of ICU stay; length of hospital stay; pneumothorax requiring chest tube during first 7 days; barotrauma during first 7 days; mechanical ventilation-free days from days 1 to 28; ICU, in-hospital, and 6-month survival. ART is an event-guided trial planned to last until 520 events (deaths within 28 days) are observed. These events allow detection of a hazard ratio of 0.75, with 90% power and two-tailed type I error of 5%. All analysis will follow the intention-to-treat principle. Discussion: If the ART strategy with maximum recruitment and PEEP titration improves 28-day survival, this will represent a notable advance to the care of ARDS patients. Conversely, if the ART strategy is similar or inferior to the current evidence-based strategy (ARDSNet), this should also change current practice as many institutions routinely employ recruitment maneuvers and set PEEP levels according to some titration method.Hospital do Coracao (HCor) as part of the Program 'Hospitais de Excelencia a Servico do SUS (PROADI-SUS)'Brazilian Ministry of Healt

Mortality of emergency abdominal surgery in high-, middle- and low-income countries

Background: Surgical mortality data are collected routinely in high-income countries, yet virtually no low- or middle-income countries have outcome surveillance in place. The aim was prospectively to collect worldwide mortality data following emergency abdominal surgery, comparing findings across countries with a low, middle or high Human Development Index (HDI). Methods: This was a prospective, multicentre, cohort study. Self-selected hospitals performing emergency surgery submitted prespecified data for consecutive patients from at least one 2-week interval during July to December 2014. Postoperative mortality was analysed by hierarchical multivariable logistic regression. Results: Data were obtained for 10 745 patients from 357 centres in 58 countries; 6538 were from high-, 2889 from middle- and 1318 from low-HDI settings. The overall mortality rate was 1⋅6 per cent at 24 h (high 1⋅1 per cent, middle 1⋅9 per cent, low 3⋅4 per cent; P < 0⋅001), increasing to 5⋅4 per cent by 30 days (high 4⋅5 per cent, middle 6⋅0 per cent, low 8⋅6 per cent; P < 0⋅001). Of the 578 patients who died, 404 (69⋅9 per cent) did so between 24 h and 30 days following surgery (high 74⋅2 per cent, middle 68⋅8 per cent, low 60⋅5 per cent). After adjustment, 30-day mortality remained higher in middle-income (odds ratio (OR) 2⋅78, 95 per cent c.i. 1⋅84 to 4⋅20) and low-income (OR 2⋅97, 1⋅84 to 4⋅81) countries. Surgical safety checklist use was less frequent in low- and middle-income countries, but when used was associated with reduced mortality at 30 days. Conclusion: Mortality is three times higher in low- compared with high-HDI countries even when adjusted for prognostic factors. Patient safety factors may have an important role. Registration number: NCT02179112 (http://www.clinicaltrials.gov)

Stratégies d'analyse de performance pour les applications basées sur tâches sur plates-formes hybrides

Programming paradigms in High-Performance Computing have been shiftingtoward task-based models that are capable of adapting readily toheterogeneous and scalable supercomputers. The performance oftask-based applications heavily depends on the runtime schedulingheuristics and on its ability to exploit computing and communicationresources.Unfortunately, the traditional performance analysis strategies areunfit to fully understand task-based runtime systems and applications:they expect a regular behavior with communication and computationphases, while task-based applications demonstrate no clearphases. Moreover, the finer granularity of task-based applicationstypically induces a stochastic behavior that leads to irregularstructures that are difficult to analyze.In this thesis, we propose performance analysis strategies thatexploit the combination of application structure, scheduler, andhardware information. We show how our strategies can help tounderstand performance issues of task-based applications running onhybrid platforms. Our performance analysis strategies are built on topof modern data analysis tools, enabling the creation of customvisualization panels that allow understanding and pinpointingperformance problems incurred by bad scheduling decisions andincorrect runtime system and platform configuration.By combining simulation and debugging we are also able to build a visualrepresentation of the internal state and the estimations computed bythe scheduler when scheduling a new task.We validate our proposal by analyzing traces from a Choleskydecomposition implemented with the StarPU task-based runtime systemand running on hybrid (CPU/GPU) platforms. Our case studies show howto enhance the task partitioning among the multi-(GPU, core) to getcloser to theoretical lower bounds, how to improve MPI pipelining inmulti-(node, core, GPU) to reduce the slow start in distributed nodesand how to upgrade the runtime system to increase MPI bandwidth. Byemploying simulation and debugging strategies, we also provide aworkflow to investigate, in depth, assumptions concerning the schedulerdecisions. This allows us to suggest changes to improve the runtimesystem scheduling and prefetch mechanisms.Les techniques de programmations pour le calcul de haute performanceont adopté les modèles basés sur parallélisme de tâche qui sontcapables de s’adapter plus facilement à des superordinateurs avec desarchitectures hybrides. La performance des applications basées surtâches dépende fortement des heuristiques d'ordonnancement dynamiqueset de sa capacité à exploiter les ressources de calcul et decommunication.Malheureusement, les stratégies d'analyse de performancetraditionnelles ne sont pas convenables pour comprendre les supportsd'exécution dynamiques et les applications basées sur tâches. Cesstratégies prévoient un comportement régulier avec des phases decalcul et de communication, par contre, des applications basées surtâches ne manifestent pas de phases précises. Par ailleurs, la granularitéplus fine des applications basées sur tâches typiquement provoque descomportements stochastiques qui donnent lieu aux structuresirrégulières qui sont difficiles à analyser.Dans cette thèse, nous proposons des stratégies d'analyse deperformance qui exploitent la combinaison de la structure del'application, d'ordonnancement et des informations de laplate-forme. Nous présentons comment nos stratégies peuvent aider àcomprendre des problèmes de performance dans des applications baséesur tâches qui exécutent dans des plates-formes hybrides. Nosstratégies d'analyse de performance sont construites avec des outilsmodernes pour l'analyse de données, ce que permettre la création despanneaux de visualisation personnalisés. Ces panneaux permettent lacompréhension et l'identification de problèmes de performancesoccasionnés par de mauvaises décisions d'ordonnancement etconfiguration incorrect du support d'exécution et de laplate-forme. Grâce à combinaison de simulation et débogage nouspouvons aussi construire une représentation visuelle de l'état interneet des estimations calculées par l'ordonnancer durant l'ordonnancementd'une nouvelle tâche.Nous validons notre proposition parmi de l'analyse de tracesd'exécutions d'une factorisation de Cholesky implémenté avec lesupport d'exécution StarPU et exécutée dans une plate-forme hybride(CPU/GPU). Nos études de cas montrent comment améliorer la partitiondes tâches entre le multi-(GPU, coeur) pour s'approcher des bornesinférieures théoriques, comment améliorer le pipeline des opérationsMPI entre le multi-(noeud, coeur, GPU) pour réduire le démarrage lentedans les noeuds distribués et comment optimiser le support d'exécutionpour augmenter la bande passante MPI. Avec l'emploi des stratégies desimulation et débogage, nous fournissons un workflow pourl'examiner, en détail, les décisions d'ordonnancement. Cela permet deproposer des changements pour améliorer les mécanismes d'ordonnancementet prefetch du support d'exécution

Performance Analysis Strategies for Task-based Applications on Hybrid Platforms

Les techniques de programmations pour le calcul de haute performanceont adopté les modèles basés sur parallélisme de tâche qui sontcapables de s’adapter plus facilement à des superordinateurs avec desarchitectures hybrides. La performance des applications basées surtâches dépende fortement des heuristiques d'ordonnancement dynamiqueset de sa capacité à exploiter les ressources de calcul et decommunication.Malheureusement, les stratégies d'analyse de performancetraditionnelles ne sont pas convenables pour comprendre les supportsd'exécution dynamiques et les applications basées sur tâches. Cesstratégies prévoient un comportement régulier avec des phases decalcul et de communication, par contre, des applications basées surtâches ne manifestent pas de phases précises. Par ailleurs, la granularitéplus fine des applications basées sur tâches typiquement provoque descomportements stochastiques qui donnent lieu aux structuresirrégulières qui sont difficiles à analyser.Dans cette thèse, nous proposons des stratégies d'analyse deperformance qui exploitent la combinaison de la structure del'application, d'ordonnancement et des informations de laplate-forme. Nous présentons comment nos stratégies peuvent aider àcomprendre des problèmes de performance dans des applications baséesur tâches qui exécutent dans des plates-formes hybrides. Nosstratégies d'analyse de performance sont construites avec des outilsmodernes pour l'analyse de données, ce que permettre la création despanneaux de visualisation personnalisés. Ces panneaux permettent lacompréhension et l'identification de problèmes de performancesoccasionnés par de mauvaises décisions d'ordonnancement etconfiguration incorrect du support d'exécution et de laplate-forme. Grâce à combinaison de simulation et débogage nouspouvons aussi construire une représentation visuelle de l'état interneet des estimations calculées par l'ordonnancer durant l'ordonnancementd'une nouvelle tâche.Nous validons notre proposition parmi de l'analyse de tracesd'exécutions d'une factorisation de Cholesky implémenté avec lesupport d'exécution StarPU et exécutée dans une plate-forme hybride(CPU/GPU). Nos études de cas montrent comment améliorer la partitiondes tâches entre le multi-(GPU, coeur) pour s'approcher des bornesinférieures théoriques, comment améliorer le pipeline des opérationsMPI entre le multi-(noeud, coeur, GPU) pour réduire le démarrage lentedans les noeuds distribués et comment optimiser le support d'exécutionpour augmenter la bande passante MPI. Avec l'emploi des stratégies desimulation et débogage, nous fournissons un workflow pourl'examiner, en détail, les décisions d'ordonnancement. Cela permet deproposer des changements pour améliorer les mécanismes d'ordonnancementet prefetch du support d'exécution.Programming paradigms in High-Performance Computing have been shiftingtoward task-based models that are capable of adapting readily toheterogeneous and scalable supercomputers. The performance oftask-based applications heavily depends on the runtime schedulingheuristics and on its ability to exploit computing and communicationresources.Unfortunately, the traditional performance analysis strategies areunfit to fully understand task-based runtime systems and applications:they expect a regular behavior with communication and computationphases, while task-based applications demonstrate no clearphases. Moreover, the finer granularity of task-based applicationstypically induces a stochastic behavior that leads to irregularstructures that are difficult to analyze.In this thesis, we propose performance analysis strategies thatexploit the combination of application structure, scheduler, andhardware information. We show how our strategies can help tounderstand performance issues of task-based applications running onhybrid platforms. Our performance analysis strategies are built on topof modern data analysis tools, enabling the creation of customvisualization panels that allow understanding and pinpointingperformance problems incurred by bad scheduling decisions andincorrect runtime system and platform configuration.By combining simulation and debugging we are also able to build a visualrepresentation of the internal state and the estimations computed bythe scheduler when scheduling a new task.We validate our proposal by analyzing traces from a Choleskydecomposition implemented with the StarPU task-based runtime systemand running on hybrid (CPU/GPU) platforms. Our case studies show howto enhance the task partitioning among the multi-(GPU, core) to getcloser to theoretical lower bounds, how to improve MPI pipelining inmulti-(node, core, GPU) to reduce the slow start in distributed nodesand how to upgrade the runtime system to increase MPI bandwidth. Byemploying simulation and debugging strategies, we also provide aworkflow to investigate, in depth, assumptions concerning the schedulerdecisions. This allows us to suggest changes to improve the runtimesystem scheduling and prefetch mechanisms

lu_example_float#CPUs:12#GPUs:0.31.paje.trace

File: lu_example_float#CPUs:12#GPUs:0.31.paje.trac