Occasional essay: upper motor neuron syndrome in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

The diagnosis of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) requires recognition of both lower (LMN) and upper motor neuron (UMN) dysfunction.1 However, classical UMN signs are frequently difficult to identify in ALS.2 LMN involvement is sensitively detected by electromyography (EMG)3 but, as yet, there are no generally accepted markers for monitoring UMN abnormalities,4 the neurobiology of ALS itself, and disease spread through the brain and spinal cord,.5 Full clinical assessment is therefore necessary to exclude other diagnoses and to monitor disease progression. In part, this difficulty regarding detection of UMN involvement in ALS derives from the definition of ‘the UMN syndrome’. Abnormalities of motor control in ALS require reformulation within an expanded concept of the UMN, together with the neuropathological, neuro-imaging and neurophysiological abnormalities in ALS. We review these issues here

Portuguese and Brazilian children understanding the inverse relation between quantities: the case of fractions

This study compares Portuguese and Brazilian fourth-graders (n=84) understanding of the inverse relation between quantities when fractions are presented in quotient and part-whole interpretations. It addresses three questions: 1) How do children understand this inverse relation in quotient interpretations of fractions? 2) How do children understand this inverse relation in part-whole interpretation of fractions? 3) Are there differences in performance between Brazilian and Portuguese children concerning these issues? A survey by questionnaire was applied and 16 part-whole and quotient problems were analyzed. Results indicate that quotient interpretation promotes more the understanding of this inverse relation; Portuguese and Brazilian children perform differently when solving the fraction problems.CIEC - Centro de Investigação em Estudos da Criança, IE, UMinho (UI 317 da FCT), PortugalFundos Nacionais através da FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia) e cofinanciado pelo Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional (FEDER) através do COMPETE 2020 – Programa Operacional Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI) com a referência POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007562info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Producción de lípidos funcionales y antioxidantes naturales a partir de semillas de maracuyá

The wild passion fruit species Passiflora setacea, Passiflora alata, and Passiflora tenuifila are native to the Brazilian biomass. The seed waste generated from the extraction of passion fruit juice contains functional polyunsaturated fatty acids and phenolic compounds. The aims of this study were to obtain lipids and natural antioxidants from passion fruit seeds. Passion seed oils were extracted using a lab-scale continuous press and their oxidative stability was evaluated using the Rancimat® method. Higher antioxidant extract capacity was observed when using an ethanol-water solution (70:30) at 45 ºC. In these cases, the total phenolic contents expressed as gallic acid equivalents from P. setacea, P. alata, and P. tenuifila cakes were approximately 1800, 600 and 900 mg·100g−1 of extract. Induction periods increased up to two-fold when adding these extracts to their respective seed oil. Therefore, passion fruit seed extract can contribute to increasing the oxidative stability of polyunsaturated oils.Las especies de maracuyá silvestre Passiflora setacea, Passiflora alata y Passiflora tenuifila son nativas de la biomasa brasileña. El desecho de semillas generado después de la extracción del jugo de maracuyá contiene ácidos grasos poliinsaturados funcionales y compuestos fenólicos. Los objetivos de este estudio fueron obtener lípidos y antioxidantes naturales de las semillas de maracuyá. Los aceites de semillas de la pasión se extrajeron usando una prensa continua a escala de laboratorio y su estabilidad oxidativa se evaluó usando el método Rancimat®. Se observó una mayor capacidad antioxidante del extracto cuando se usó una solución de etanol-agua (70:30) a 45 ºC. En estos casos, el contenido fenólico total expresado como equivalentes de ácido gálico de las tortas de P. setacea, P. alata y P. tenuifila fue de aproximadamente 1800, 600 y 900 mg·100g−1 de extracto. Los períodos de inducción aumentaron hasta dos veces al agregar estos extractos a sus respectivos aceites de semillas. Por lo tanto, el extracto de semillas de maracuyá puede contribuir a aumentar la estabilidad oxidativa de los aceites poliinsaturados

Obtaining efficient collisional engines via velocity dependent drivings

Brownian particles interacting sequentially with distinct temperatures and driving forces at each stroke have been tackled as a reliable alternative for the construction of engine setups. However they can behave very inefficiently depending on the driving used for the worksource and/or when temperatures of each stage are very different from each other. Inspired by some models for molecular motors and recent experimental studies, a coupling between driving and velocities is introduced as an alternative ingredient for enhancing the system performance. Here, the role of this new ingredient for levering the engine performance is detailed investigated from stochastic thermodynamics. Exact expressions for quantities and distinct maximization routes have been obtained and investigated. The search of an optimal coupling provides a substantial increase of engine performance (mainly efficiency), even for large $\Delta T$. A simple and general argument for the optimal coupling can be estimated, irrespective the driving and other model details.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figures, comments are welcom

Efeito da endogamia sobre pesos aos 120 e 210 dias de idade de bovinos da raça Nelore mocho criado no bioma cerrado.

Objetivou-se com este trabalho estudar os efeitos da endogamia sobre pesos calculados aos 120 e 210 dias de idade, em bovinos da raça Nelore pertencentes ao rebanho da Embrapa Cerrados. Os dados foram coletados no período de 1990 a 2010. O coeficiente de endogamia foi calculado por meio do aplicativo MTDFREML. A matriz de parentesco incluiu 23.513 animais, cuja estimativa média e máxima dos animais endogâmicos foi 2,17% e 14,10%, respectivamente. Os resultados indicaram que a endogamia direta provocou redução dos pesos calculados aos 120 e 210 dias de idade, possivelmente, devido à redução na variância genética aditiva. A endogamia é um processo prejudicial para as características de interesse econômico, quando utilizada indiscriminadamente e deve ser utilizada com parcimônia e bastante cuidado ao se promover acasalamentos entre animais consanguíneos

Interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 production by mononuclear cells from patients with advanced head and neck cancer

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to evaluate the production of interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 by stimulated peripheral blood mononuclear cells isolated from patients with supraglottic laryngeal cancer before and after surgical treatment. METHODS: Fourteen patients with advanced supraglottic laryngeal cancer were studied. Cultures of peripheral blood mononuclear cells isolated during the preoperative and late postoperative periods were stimulated with concanavalin A and Bacille Calmette-Guerin, and the supernatant concentrations of interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 were measured. RESULTS: For non-stimulated cultures, the interferon-gamma levels produced by the preoperative period and the late postoperative period cultures were lower than the levels produced by the control group cultures. The interferon-gamma levels after stimulation with concanavalin A were higher in the late postoperative period cultures than in the preoperative evaluation cultures. Stimulation with Bacille Calmette-Guerin led to the production of similar levels of interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 by all cultures; thus, stimulation increased the levels of interferon-gamma produced by both the preoperative and postoperative cultures relative to the levels produced by the corresponding unstimulated cultures. CONCLUSION: Patients with advanced supraglottic laryngeal cancer exhibit an in vitro deficiency in interferongamma secretion by mononuclear cells. Stimulated cells seem to recover this function during the postoperative period

Interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 production by mononuclear cells from patients with advanced head and neck cancer

OBJECTIVE: This study aims to evaluate the production of interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 by stimulated peripheral blood mononuclear cells isolated from patients with supraglottic laryngeal cancer before and after surgical treatment. METHODS: Fourteen patients with advanced supraglottic laryngeal cancer were studied. Cultures of peripheral blood mononuclear cells isolated during the preoperative and late postoperative periods were stimulated with concanavalin A and Bacille Calmette-Guerin, and the supernatant concentrations of interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 were measured. RESULTS: For non-stimulated cultures, the interferon-gamma levels produced by the preoperative period and the late postoperative period cultures were lower than the levels produced by the control group cultures. The interferon-gamma levels after stimulation with concanavalin A were higher in the late postoperative period cultures than in the preoperative evaluation cultures. Stimulation with Bacille Calmette-Guerin led to the production of similar levels of interferon-gamma and interleukin-10 by all cultures; thus, stimulation increased the levels of interferon-gamma produced by both the preoperative and postoperative cultures relative to the levels produced by the corresponding unstimulated cultures. CONCLUSION: Patients with advanced supraglottic laryngeal cancer exhibit an in vitro deficiency in interferongamma secretion by mononuclear cells. Stimulated cells seem to recover this function during the postoperative period

Learning prognostic models using a mixture of biclustering and triclustering: predicting the need for non-invasive ventilation in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)Longitudinal cohort studies to study disease progression generally combine temporal features produced under periodic assessments (clinical follow-up) with static features associated with single-time assessments, genetic, psychophysiological, and demographic profiles. Subspace clustering, including biclustering and triclustering stances, enables the discovery of local and discriminative patterns from such multidimensional cohort data. These patterns, highly interpretable, are relevant to identifying groups of patients with similar traits or progression patterns. Despite their potential, their use for improving predictive tasks in clinical domains remains unexplored. In this work, we propose to learn predictive models from static and temporal data using discriminative patterns, obtained via biclustering and triclustering, as features within a state-of-the-art classifier, thus enhancing model interpretation. triCluster is extended to find time-contiguous triclusters in temporal data (temporal patterns) and a biclustering algorithm to discover coherent patterns in static data. The transformed data space, composed of bicluster and tricluster features, capture local and cross-variable associations with discriminative power, yielding unique statistical properties of interest. As a case study, we applied our methodology to follow-up data from Portuguese patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) to predict the need for non-invasive ventilation (NIV) since the last appointment. The results showed that, in general, our methodology outperformed baseline results using the original features. Furthermore, the bicluster/tricluster-based patterns used by the classifier can be used by clinicians to understand the models by highlighting relevant prognostic patterns.This work was partially supported by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, the Portuguese public agency for science, technology and innovation, funding to projects AIpALS (PTDC/CCI-CIF/4613/2020), LASIGE (UIDB/ 00408/2020 and UIDP/00408/2020) and INESC-ID (UIDB/ 50021/2020) Research Units, and PhD research scholarship (2020.05100.BD) to DFS; and by the BRAINTEASER project which has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, under the grant agreement No 101017598.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Relações entre o mérito genético dos touros e suas progênies para as características de crescimento, fertilidade e carcaça de bovinos da raça Nelore de provas de ganho em peso a pasto.

Objetivou-se com este estudo predizer os valores genéticos bovinos da raça Nelore provenientes de provas de ganho em peso a pasto e avaliar a relação touro x progênie com base em seus respectivos valores genéticos. As características avaliadas foram peso calculado aos 210 dias (P210), aos 365 dias (P365) e aos 450 dias de idade (P450), ganho médio diário pré desmame e pós desmame (GPPRE e GPPOS), perímetro escrotal aos 365 dias e 450 dias de idade (PE365 e PE450), área de olho de lombo (AOL) e acabamento de carcaça (ACAB), avaliadas no teste de desempenho de touros jovens conduzidos a pasto na Embrapa Arroz e Feijão e Embrapa Cerrados. As analise estatística dos dados foram estimadas por meio do aplicativo SAS e os valores genéticos dos animais foram estimados por meio do programa MTDFREML. Para os inter-relacionamentos genéticos dos touros e de suas respectivas progênies foram realizadas analises de correlação de Spearman e correlação canônica. Os valores de correlação encontrados são de alta magnitude para todas as características avaliadas 0,71 (PE365), 0,67 (PE450), 0,77 (ACAB), 0,73 (AOL), 0,63 (P210), 0,68 (P365), 0,62 (P450), 0,64 (GPPRE), 0,66 (GPPOS). Os valores genéticos e correlações encontrados nesse estudo mostraram que houve relação positiva e crescente entre valor genético dos touros e de suas respectivas progênies. Portanto, a seleção dos melhores touros, tem sido eficientes em termos de progresso genético

Efeito da suplementação com aditivos nutricionais sobre características de crescimento de bovinos da raça Nelore em Testes de Desempenho de Touros Jovens.

Objetivou-se com este estudo avaliar o efeito da suplementação, com diferentes tipos de aditivos, sobre características de crescimento de bovinos da raça Nelore em Testes de Desempenho de Touros Jovens. Foram avaliadas três provas de ganho em peso (PGP 1, PGP 2 e PGP 3). Em cada PGP, foi utilizado um aditivo diferente, tanto no período da seca quanto das águas. Dessa forma, os aditivos utilizados foram: PGP 1, monensina sódica; PGP 2, probiótico; e, PGP 3, virginiamicina. O valor genético dos animais foi predito pelo método da máxima verossimilhança restrita, o qual foi subtraído de sua respectiva pesagem, de forma que todos os animais apresentassem valor genético igual à zero. As análises de dados longitudinais foram realizadas utilizando o método de medidas repetidas no tempo. Os animais suplementados com monensina sódica e virginiamicina apresentaram os maiores pesos médios. Entretanto, os animais alimentados com o aditivo virginiamicina no suplemento, apresentaram maior velocidade de crescimento e desenvolvimento. Portanto, a utilização de virginiamicina promoveu incrementos positivos tanto no peso quando ganho em peso diário dos animais participantes dos Testes de Desempenho de Touros Jovens