INVESTIGATION OF AN OUTBREAK OF ACUTE RESPIRATORY DISEASE IN CÔTE D’IVOIRE IN APRIL 2007

Background: This study aim was to investigate an outbreak of human cases of unexplained influenza-like illness and fatal acute respiratory infection (ARI), with simultaneous poultry illness and high mortality raising concerns of possible influenza A (H5N1), virus in Cote d’Ivoire in February and March 2007. Materials and Methods: To investigate the outbreak, we conducted active surveillance in the community and reviewed health registries. Persons meeting the case definition were asked to provide nasopharyngeal specimens. On the basis of clinical and epidemiological information, specimens were tested using conventional RT-PCR for the M gene of the influenza viruses and hemagglutinin H5 of avian influenza A (H5N1), virus; negative samples were tested for other respiratory viruses. Specimens from healthy animals were also collected. Results: Between October 2006, and February 2007, 104 suspected cases of Acute Respiratory Disease that included; 31 deaths recorded. We collected and tested 73 nasopharyngeal specimens; of which, 2, were positive for human Coronavirus OC43 and 1 for influenza C virus. No pathogens were identified in animal specimens. Conclusions: The investigation quickly ruled out influenza A (H5N1), virus as the cause and found laboratory-confirmed cases of influenza C virus and human Coronavirus OC 43 for the first time in both Côte d’Ivoire and in a Sub-Saharan African country. However we were not able to show that these viruses caused the outbreak. Monitoring of influenza viruses must be a priority but other respiratory viruses and non-viral causes may be of interest too

Quantifying cerebral asymmetries for language in dextrals and adextrals with random-effects meta analysis

Speech and language-related functions tend to depend on the left hemisphere more than the right in most right-handed (dextral) participants. This relationship is less clear in non-right handed (adextral) people, resulting in surprisingly polarized opinion on whether or not they are as lateralized as right handers. The present analysis investigates this issue by largely ignoring methodological differences between the different neuroscientific approaches to language lateralization, as well as discrepancies in how dextral and adextral participants were recruited or defined. Here we evaluate the tendency for dextrals to be more left hemisphere dominant than adextrals, using random effects meta analyses. In spite of several limitations, including sample size (in the adextrals in particular), missing details on proportions of groups who show directional effects in many experiments, and so on, the different paradigms all point to proportionally increased left hemispheric dominance in the dextrals. These results are analyzed in light of the theoretical importance of these subtle differences for understanding the cognitive neuroscience of language, as well as the unusual asymmetry in most adextrals

Impairments in Episodic-Autobiographical Memory and Emotional and Social Information Processing in CADASIL during Mid-Adulthood

Staniloiu A, Woermann FG, Markowitsch HJ. Impairments in Episodic-Autobiographical Memory and Emotional and Social Information Processing in CADASIL during Mid-Adulthood. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. 2014;8: 227.Cerebral autosomal dominant arteriopathy with subcortical infarcts and leukoencephalopathy (CADASIL) – is the most common genetic source of vascular dementia in adults, being caused by a mutation in NOTCH3 gene. Spontaneous de novo mutations may occur, but their frequency is largely unknown. Ischemic strokes and cognitive impairments are the most frequent manifestations, but seizures affect up to 10% of the patients. Herein, we describe a 47-year-old male scholar with a genetically confirmed diagnosis of CADASIL (Arg133Cys mutation in the NOTCH3 gene) and a seemingly negative family history of CADASIL illness, who was investigated with a comprehensive neuropsychological testing battery and neuroimaging methods. The patient demonstrated on one hand severe and accelerated deteriorations in multiple cognitive domains such as concentration, long-term memory (including the episodic-autobiographical memory domain), problem solving, cognitive flexibility and planning, affect recognition, discrimination and matching, and social cognition (theory of mind). Some of these impairments were even captured by abbreviated instruments for investigating suspicion of dementia. On the other hand the patient still possessed high crystallized (verbal) intelligence and a capacity to put forth a façade of well-preserved intellectual functioning. Although no definite conclusions can be drawn from a single case study, our findings point to the presence of additional cognitive changes in CADASIL in middle adulthood, in particular to impairments in the episodic-autobiographical memory domain and social information processing (e.g., social cognition). Whether these identified impairments are related to the patient’s specific phenotype or to an ascertainment bias (e.g., a paucity of studies investigating these cognitive functions) requires elucidation by larger scale research

Development of a bacterial bioassay for atrazine and cyanuric acid detection

International audienc

STAYABILITY IN THE HERD AND CULLING CAUSES OF BOARS IN FOUR PIG FARMS OF YUCATAN, MEXICO

The stayability and causes of culling of boars in four pig commercial farms in Yucatan, Mexico were studied. The get-in and get-out dates of the boars corresponded to the period of March 1994 to June 2007. Stayability was defined as the number of days between the first service of the boar (approximately 8 months) until its culling or end of the study. Information on 169 boars of which 147 were culled and 22 were in service at the end of the study were investigated. Stayability curves of the boars were obtained by survival analysis. The risk of culling of the boars between farms was determined by the proportional Cox regression method. Stayability curves between farms were statistically different (

<b>IMPACTO DA REFRIGERAÇÃO SOBRE VARIÃVEIS DE QUALIDADE DOS FRUTOS DO AÇAIZEIRO (EUTERPE OLERACEA)*</b>

<p align="justify"> Os frutos do açaizeiro (Euterpe oleracea) são processados de 24 a 72 horas após sua coleta, permanecendo este tempo em condições de umidade relativa e temperatura altas, favorecendo um rápido crescimento microbiano e a oxidação de seus principais compostos antioxidantes, as antocianinas. A fi m de diminuir estas degradações, avaliouse o impacto da refrigeração (5, 10, 15°C), frente à temperatura ambiente da região (30°C), bem como o tempo de estocagem (0, 8, 20, 27, 44 e 70 horas) sobre a perda de massa dos frutos, a carga microbiológica e a concentração de antocianinas. O tempo e as temperaturas de refrigeração tiveram um efeito altamente signifi cativo (p<0,001) nas três respostas estudadas. Determinou-se ainda a capacidade calorífica dos frutos a 30ºC (3,84 kJ kg-1°C-1). A temperatura dos frutos armazenados a temperatura ambiente aumentou de 25ºC para, aproximadamente, 30ºC depois de 11 horas de armazenamento, após este período a temperatura oscilou entre 29 e 31ºC. </p&gt

Distinct roles for NtrC and GlnK in nitrogen regulation of the Pseudomonas sp. strain ADP cyanuric acid utilization operon

8 páginas, 1 figura, 3 tablas.The Pseudomonas sp. strain ADP atzDEF operon encodes the enzymes involved in cyanuric acid mineralization, the final stage of the s-triazine herbicide atrazine degradative pathway. We have previously shown that atzDEF is under nitrogen control in both its natural host and Pseudomonas putida KT2442. Expression of atzDEF requires the divergently encoded LysR-type transcriptional regulator AtzR. Here, we take advantage of the poor induction of atzDEF in Escherichia coli to identify Pseudomonas factors involved in nitrogen control of atzDEF expression. Simultaneous production of P. putida NtrC and GlnK, along with AtzR, restored the normal atzDEF regulatory pattern. Gene expression analysis in E. coli and P. putida indicated that NtrC activates atzR expression, while the role of GlnK is to promote AtzR activation of atzDEF under nitrogen limitation. Activation of atzDEF in a mutant background deficient in GlnK uridylylation suggests that post-translational modification is not strictly required for transduction of the nitrogen limitation signal to AtzR. The present data and our previous results are integrated in a regulatory circuit that describes all the known responses of the atzDEF operon.This work was funded by grants BIO2004-01354, BIO2007-63754 and CSD2007-00005 (Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia, Spain), fellowships of the FPU program (Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia), awarded to V.G.-G. and A.B.H., and student research fellowships from the Ministerio de Educación, Política Social y Deporte and CSIC, awarded to A.J.-F.Peer reviewe

Strong room-temperature visible photoluminescence of amorphous Si nanowires prepared by electrodeposition in ionic liquids

Visible photoluminescence at room temperature is reported from the silicon nanowires prepared by electrodeposition in ionic liquids. Nanowires with diameters 110, 200 and 400 nm have been synthe-sized by a template-assisted electrodeposition using ionic liquid electrolytes. The obtained nanowires are amorphous in nature and possess robustness and good structural and compositional quality. The PL measurements at room temperature reveal a strong visible light emission from the 110 nm silicon nanowires. The strong and efficient red luminescence from the nanowires is found to be size dependent and originates from the intrinsic radiative recombination and spatial confinement of carriers in the amorphous silicon nan-owires with a thin surface oxide shell. The silicon nanowires with 110 nm diameter shows an exceptionally high quantum yield > 25%. These light emitting nanowires obtained through a simple alternative growth technique could find applications in future Si-based optoelectronic devices