Flora de interés corológico para Andalucía occidental

Flora of chorologycal interest for Western AndalusiaPalabras clave. Corología, Biogeografía, Andalucía Occidental, España.Key words. Chorology, Biogeography, Western Andalusia, Spain

Metabolic spatial connectivity in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis as revealed by independent component analysis

Objectives. Positron emission tomography (PET) and volume of interest (VOI) analysis have recently shown in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) an accuracy of 93% in differentiating patients from controls. The aim of this study was to disclose by spatial independent component analysis (ICA) the brain networks involved in ALS pathological processes and evaluate their discriminative value in separating patients from controls. Experimental design. Two hundred fifty-nine ALS patients and 40 age- and sex-matched control subjects underwent brain 18F-2-fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose PET (FDG-PET). Spatial ICA of the preprocessed FDG-PET images was performed. Intensity values were converted to z-scores and binary masks were used as data-driven VOIs. The accuracy of this classifier was tested versus a validated system processing intensity signals in 27 brain meta-VOIs. A support vector machine was independently applied to both datasets and the \u27leave-one-out\u27 technique verified the general validity of results. Principal observations: The 8 components selected as pathophysiologically meaningful discriminated patients from controls with 99.0% accuracy, the discriminating value of bilateral cerebellum/midbrain alone representing 96.3%. Among the meta-VOIs, right temporal lobe alone reached an accuracy of 93.7%. Conclusions: Spatial ICA identified in a very large cohort of ALS patients distinct spatial networks showing a high discriminatory value, improving substantially on the previously obtained accuracy. The cerebellar/midbrain component accounted for the highest accuracy in separating ALS patients from controls. Spatial ICA and multivariate analysis perform better than univariate semi-quantification methods in identifying the neurodegenerative features of ALS and pave the way for inclusion of PET in clinical trials and early diagnosis

Utilización de imágenes de dosis portal para el cálculo de dosis pre-tratamiento: resultados preliminares

Los detectores de mega-voltaje se utilizan como herramientas de verificación pre-tratamiento de los planes de irradiación, comparando las mediciones obtenidas por el dispositivo y aquellas predichas por el sistema de planificación utilizando el índice gamma. Sin embargo, esto puede enmascarar errores de significancia clínica en términos de dosis recibida por el paciente. El presente artículo registra el estado de avance de un proyecto de investigación cuyo objetivo es el de realizar una herramienta que permita evaluar la distribución volumétrica de dosis a partir de imágenes provenientes del detector de mega-voltaje. De esta manera, se constatará la dosis 3D medida contra aquella calculada por el sistema de planificación de tratamiento. Al momento de remitir este artículo, se ha cumplimentado de manera parcial la etapa correspondiente a la deconvolución de las imágenes portales para la obtención de la fluencia primaria de fotones.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

Utilización de imágenes de dosis portal para el cálculo de dosis pre-tratamiento: resultados preliminares

Los detectores de mega-voltaje se utilizan como herramientas de verificación pre-tratamiento de los planes de irradiación, comparando las mediciones obtenidas por el dispositivo y aquellas predichas por el sistema de planificación utilizando el índice gamma. Sin embargo, esto puede enmascarar errores de significancia clínica en términos de dosis recibida por el paciente. El presente artículo registra el estado de avance de un proyecto de investigación cuyo objetivo es el de realizar una herramienta que permita evaluar la distribución volumétrica de dosis a partir de imágenes provenientes del detector de mega-voltaje. De esta manera, se constatará la dosis 3D medida contra aquella calculada por el sistema de planificación de tratamiento. Al momento de remitir este artículo, se ha cumplimentado de manera parcial la etapa correspondiente a la deconvolución de las imágenes portales para la obtención de la fluencia primaria de fotones.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

Utilización de imágenes de dosis portal para el cálculo de dosis pre-tratamiento: resultados preliminares

Los detectores de mega-voltaje se utilizan como herramientas de verificación pre-tratamiento de los planes de irradiación, comparando las mediciones obtenidas por el dispositivo y aquellas predichas por el sistema de planificación utilizando el índice gamma. Sin embargo, esto puede enmascarar errores de significancia clínica en términos de dosis recibida por el paciente. El presente artículo registra el estado de avance de un proyecto de investigación cuyo objetivo es el de realizar una herramienta que permita evaluar la distribución volumétrica de dosis a partir de imágenes provenientes del detector de mega-voltaje. De esta manera, se constatará la dosis 3D medida contra aquella calculada por el sistema de planificación de tratamiento. Al momento de remitir este artículo, se ha cumplimentado de manera parcial la etapa correspondiente a la deconvolución de las imágenes portales para la obtención de la fluencia primaria de fotones.Sociedad Argentina de Informática e Investigación Operativ

Functional pattern of Brain FDG-PET in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

Objective: We investigated a large sample of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) at rest in order to assess the value of 18F-2-fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose (18F-FDG) PET as a biomarker to discriminate patients from controls. Methods: A total of 195 patients with ALS and 40 controls underwent brain 18F-FDG-PET, most within 5 months of diagnosis. Spinal and bulbar subgroups of ALS were also investigated. Twenty-five bilateral cortical and subcortical volumes of interest and cerebellum were taken into account, and 18F-FDG uptakes were individually normalized by whole-brain values. Group analyses investigated the ALS-related metabolic changes. Discriminant analysis investigating sensitivity and specificity was performed using the 51 volumes of interest as well as age and sex. Metabolic connectivity was explored by voxel-wise interregional correlation analysis. Results: Hypometabolismwas found in frontal, motor, and occipital cortex and hypermetabolismin midbrain, temporal pole, and hippocampus in patients with ALS compared to controls. A similar metabolic pattern was also found in the 2 subgroups. Discriminant analysis showed a sensitivity of 95% and a specificity of 83% in separating patients from controls. Connectivity analysis found a highly significant positive correlation between midbrain and white matter in corticospinal tracts in patients with ALS. Conclusions: 18F-FDG distribution changes in ALS showed a clear pattern of hypometabolism in frontal and occipital cortex and hypermetabolism in midbrain. The latter might be interpreted as the neurobiological correlate of diffuse subcortical gliosis. Discriminant analysis resulted in high sensitivity and specificity in differentiating patients with ALS from controls. Once validated by diseased-control studies, the present methodology might represent a potentially useful biomarker for ALS diagnosis. Classificaton of evidence: This study provides Class III evidence that 18F-FDG-PET accurately distinguishes patients with ALS from normal controls (sensitivity 95.4%, specificity 82.5%)

Pathogenic VCP mutations induce mitochondrial uncoupling and reduced ATP levels.

Valosin-containing protein (VCP) is a highly expressed member of the type II AAA+ ATPase family. VCP mutations are the cause of inclusion body myopathy, Paget’s disease of the bone, and frontotemporal dementia (IBMPFD) and they account for 1%–2% of familial amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Using fibroblasts from patients carrying three independent pathogenic mutations in the VCP gene, we show that VCP deficiency causes profound mitochondrial uncoupling leading to decreased mitochondrial membrane potential and increased mitochondrial oxygen consumption. This mitochondrial uncoupling results in a significant reduction of cellular ATP production. Decreased ATP levels in VCP-deficient cells lower their energy capacity, making them more vulnerable to high energy-demanding processes such as ischemia. Our findings propose a mechanism by which pathogenic VCP mutations lead to cell death

The metabolic signature of C9ORF72-related ALS: FDG PET comparison with nonmutated patients

Purpose Recently, a GGGGCC hexanucleotide repeat expansion in the C9ORF72 gene, located on chromosome 9p21 has been demonstrated to be the commonest cause of familial amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and to account for 5 to 10 % of apparently sporadic ALS. Relatively little is known about the brain metabolism profile of patients carrying the expansion. Our aim was to identify the [18F]FDG PET profile in ALS patients with the C9ORF72 expansion (C9ORF72-ALS). Methods Fifteen C9ORF72-ALS patients were compared with 12 patients with ALS and comorbid frontotemporal dementia (FTD) without the C9ORF72 expansion (ALSFTD) and 30 cognitively normal patients with ALS without mutations of ALS-related genes (sALS). The three groups were then cross-matched to 40 neurologically normal controls. All patients underwent FDG PET within 4 months of diagnosis. Results The C9ORF72-ALS patients compared with the sALS patients showed significant hypometabolism in the anterior and posterior cingulate cortex, insula, caudate and thalamus, the left frontal and superior temporal cortex, and hypermetabolism in the midbrain, bilateral occipital cortex, globus pallidus and left inferior temporal cortex. The ALS FTD patients compared with the sALS patients showed more limited hypometabolic areas, including the orbitofrontal, prefrontal, anterior cingulate and insular cortex, and hypermetabolic areas, including the bilateral occipital cortex, the left precentral and postcentral cortex and superior temporal gyrus. The C9ORF72-ALS patients compared with the ALS-FTD patients showed hypometabolism in the left temporal cortex. Conclusion ALS patients with the C9ORF72 hexanucleotide repeat expansion had a more widespread central nervous system involvement than ALS patients without genetic mutations, with or without comorbid FTD, consistent with their more severe clinical picture

Assessment of the reliability of the motor unit size index (MUSIX) in single subject “round-robin” and multi-centre settings

Objective The motor unit size index (MUSIX) is incorporated into the motor unit number index (MUNIX). Our objective was to assess the intra-/inter-rater reliability of MUSIX in healthy volunteers across single subject “round robin” and multi-centre settings. Methods Data were obtained from i). a round-robin assessment in which 12 raters (6 with prior experience and 6 without) assessed six muscles (abductor pollicis brevis, abductor digiti minimi, biceps brachii, tibialis anterior, extensor digitorum brevis and abductor hallucis) and ii). a multi-centre study with 6 centres studying the same muscles in 66 healthy volunteers. Intra/inter-rater data were provided by 5 centres, 1 centre provided only intra-rater data. Intra/inter-rater variability was assessed using the coefficient of variation (COV), Bland-Altman plots, bias and 95% limits of agreement. Results In the round-robin assessment intra-rater COVs for MUSIX ranged from 7.8% to 28.4%. Inter-rater variability was between 7.8% and 16.2%. Prior experience did not impact on MUSIX values. In the multi-centre study MUSIX was more consistent than the MUNIX. Abductor hallucis was the least reliable muscle. Conclusions The MUSIX is a reliable neurophysiological biomarker of reinnervation. Significance MUSIX could provide insights into the pathophysiology of a range of neuromuscular disorders, providing a quantitative biomarker of reinnervation

Location of chlorogenic acid biosynthesis pathway and polyphenol oxidase genes in a new interspecific anchored linkage map of eggplant

© Gramazio et al.; licensee BioMed Central. 2014. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated