Enterotype May Drive the Dietary-Associated Cardiometabolic Risk Factors

Analyses of typical bacterial clusters in humans named enterotypes may facilitate understanding the host differences in the cardiometabolic profile. It stills unknown whether the three previously described enterotypes were present in populations living below the equator. We examined how the identification of enterotypes could be useful to explain the dietary associations with cardiometabolic risk factors in Brazilian subjects. In this cross-sectional study, a convenience sample of 268 adults (54.2% women) reported their dietary habits and had clinical and biological samples collected. In this study, we analyzed biochemical data and metagenomics of fecal microbiota (16SrRNA sequencing, V4 region). Continuous variables were compared using ANOVA, and categorical variables using chi-square test. Vsearch clustered the operational taxonomic units, and Silva Database provided the taxonomic signatures. Spearman coefficient was used to verify the correlation between bacteria abundances within each enterotype. One hundred subjects were classified as omnivore, 102 lacto-ovo-vegetarians, and 66 strict vegetarians. We found the same structure as the three previously described enterotypes: 111 participants were assigned to Bacteroides, 55 to Prevotella, and 102 to Ruminococcaceae enterotype. The Prevotella cluster contained higher amount of strict vegetarians individuals than the other enterotypes (40.0 vs. 20.7 and 20.6, p = 0.04). Subjects in this enterotype had a similar anthropometric profile but a lower mean LDL-c concentration than the Bacteroides enterotype (96 +/- 23 vs. 109 +/- 32 mg/dL, p = 0.04). We observed significant correlations between bacterial abundances and cardiometabolic risk factors, but coefficients differed depending on the enterotype. In Prevotella enterotype, Eubacterium ventriosum (r BMI = -0.33, p = 0.03, and r HDL-c = 0.33, p = 0.04), Akkermansia (r 2h glucose = -0.35, p = 0.02), Roseburia (r BMI = -0.36, p = 0.02 and r waist = -0.36, p = 0.02), and Faecalibacterium (r insulin = -0.35, p = 0.02) abundances were associated to better cardiometabolic profile. The three enterotypes previously described are present in Brazilians, supporting that those bacterial clusters are not population-specific. Diet-independent lower LDL-c levels in subjects from Prevotella than in other enterotypes suggest that a protective bacterial cluster in the former should be driving this association. Enterotypes seem to be useful to understand the impact of daily diet exposure on cardiometabolic risk factors. Prospective studies are needed to confirm their utility for predicting phenotypes in humans.FAPESPUniv Sao Paulo, Sch Publ Hlth, Dept Epidemiol, Sao Paulo, BrazilFundacao Oswaldo Cruz, Rene Rachou Res Ctr, Belo Horizonte, MG, BrazilUniv Fed Sao Paulo, Dept Prevent Med, Sao Paulo, BrazilUniv Sao Paulo, Sch Med, Heart Inst Incor, Lab Genet & Mol Cardiol, Sao Paulo, BrazilUniv Fed Sao Paulo, Dept Prevent Med, Sao Paulo, BrazilFAPESP: 2012/12626-9FAPESP: 2012/03880-9Web of Scienc

A list of land plants of Parque Nacional do Caparaó, Brazil, highlights the presence of sampling gaps within this protected area

Brazilian protected areas are essential for plant conservation in the Atlantic Forest domain, one of the 36 global biodiversity hotspots. A major challenge for improving conservation actions is to know the plant richness, protected by these areas. Online databases offer an accessible way to build plant species lists and to provide relevant information about biodiversity. A list of land plants of “Parque Nacional do Caparaó” (PNC) was previously built using online databases and published on the website "Catálogo de Plantas das Unidades de Conservação do Brasil." Here, we provide and discuss additional information about plant species richness, endemism and conservation in the PNC that could not be included in the List. We documented 1,791 species of land plants as occurring in PNC, of which 63 are cited as threatened (CR, EN or VU) by the Brazilian National Red List, seven as data deficient (DD) and five as priorities for conservation. Fifity-one species were possible new ocurrences for ES and MG states

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear understanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5,6,7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8,9,10,11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world's most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepresented in biodiversity databases.13,14,15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may eliminate pieces of the Amazon's biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological communities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple organism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region's vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most neglected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lost

Assessment of mutagenic, antimutagenic and genotoxicity effects of Mimosa tenuiflora

Genotoxic effects of Mimosa tenuiflora (Willd.) Poir, Fabaceae, were investigated by using both micronucleus test and bacterial reverse mutation assay in Salmonella typhimurium TA97, TA98, TA100, TA102 respectively. In respect of Ames test results show that the extract does not induce mutations in any strains of Salmonella typhimurium tested since the mutagenicity index is less than 2. In the antimutagenic effect was observed that the extract at the concentrations tested significantly decreased the mutagenicity index of all strains tested which characterized the extract as antimutagenic in these conditions. In the micronucleus test in vivo, we observed that the concentrations used did not induce an increase in the frequency of micronucleus in normochromatic erythrocytes of mice. Therefore, we concluded that the extract of M. tenuiflora is not mutagenic in the absence of exogenous metabolizing system and does not induce an increase in the frequency of the micronucleus characterized as an agent not mutagenic in these conditions. Further studies of toxicity need to be made to the use of this plant in the treatment of diseases to be stimulated