Rastrejant el càncer

El càncer és una malaltia produïda pel creixement descontrolat. Entrendre'n l'origen i millorar-ne el diagnòstic són dos dels punts clau a tractar per reduir-ne la incidència i la mortalitat. La cerca de marcadors tumorals específics de cada tipus de càncer és l'escenari ideal per assolir aquestes fites. L'estudi de mostres de pacients obtingudes de manera mínimament invasiva o no invasiva comporta la millora del seu diagnòstic, tant per la reducció de les molèsties en el pacient com per la disminució del cost del tractament per a la societat en general. En aquest article s'exposen tres projectes com a exemple d'aquest tipus de recerca: el càncer d'ovari, el càncer d'endometri i el càncer de pròstata

Biomarcadors de diagnòstic, pronòstic i predicció de resposta a tractaments oncològics

Better biomarkers are urgently needed to improve diagnosis, prognosis, and targeted intherapy across a wide range of diseases. Currently, scientists are moving forward to solve this problem. New developments in research help to discover many more biomarkers than ever before. However, although the number of articles that have been published in this area is increasing, only few biomarkers have been implemented in the clinical practice. This is mainly due to two reasons: biomarkers fail to meet the demands of the clinic; and false discoveries fail during the long way that represents the validation phases. The new biomarker pipeline, which currently includes new phases in the middle of the process, has significantly increased the percentage of success. In other words, the chances that the new findings are incorporated into routine clinical practice and improve the patient care are higher than before. This improvement in diagnosis, prognosis and targeted therapy, which is increasingly more specific for each patient who suffers a certain disease, brings us step by step closer to what is known as personalized medicine.La necessitat d'identificar nous biomarcadors que aportin una millora significativa del diagnòstic, pronòstic i del seguiment de teràpia de moltes malalties fa que avui dia la cerca de nous biomarcadors sigui un camp de la ciència increïblement explorat. Alhora, l'avenç tecnològic en el camp de la biomedicina ha fet que avui, més que mai, el nombre de nous candidats a biomarcadors hagi crescut de manera exponencial. No obstant això, en els últims anys, tot i l'elevat nombre de publicacions en aquest àmbit, només uns pocs marcadors han arribat a ser emprats en la pràctica clínica. Això es deu principalment a dues raons: els biomarcadors validats no compleixen amb les exigències de la clínica, i la fallida de molts d'aquests en la llarga i feixuga etapa de validació. El nou pipeline de cerca de biomarcadors, que afegeix etapes intermèdies en aquest procés, comporta que el percentatge d'èxit millori significativament; dit en altres paraules, que les possibilitats que aquestes noves troballes siguin incorporades a la rutina hospitalària i millorin la pràctica clínica siguin més elevades. Aquesta millora en el diagnòstic, pronòstic i seguiment de teràpia, que cada vegada més és específica del pacient que pateix la malaltia, fa que pas a pas ens trobem més a prop del que es coneix com a medicina personalitzada

Light Intensity Alters the Behavior of Monilinia spp. in vitro and the Disease Development on Stone Fruit-Pathogen Interaction

The development of brown rot caused by the necrotrophic fungi Monilinia spp. in stone fruit under field and postharvest conditions depends, among others, on environmental factors. The effect of temperature and humidity are well studied but there is little information on the role of light in disease development. Herein, we studied the effect of two lighting treatments and a control condition (darkness) on: (i) several growth parameters of two Monilinia spp. (M. laxa and M. fructicola) grown in vitro and (ii) the light effect in their capacity to rot the fruit (nectarines) when exposed to the different lighting treatments. We also assessed the effect of such abiotic factors in the development of the disease on inoculated nectarines during postharvest storage. Evaluations also included testing the effect of fruit bagging on disease development as well as on ethylene production. Under in vitro conditions, lighting treatments altered colony morphology and conidiation of M. laxa but this effect was less acute in M. fructicola. Such light-induced changes under in vitro development also altered the capacity of M. laxa and M. fructicola to infect nectarines, with M. laxa becoming less virulent. The performance of Monilinia spp. exposed to treatments was also determined in vivo by inoculating four bagged or unbagged nectarine cultivars, indicating an impaired disease progression. Incidence and lesion diameter of fruit exposed to the different lighting treatments during postharvest showed that the effect of the light was intrinsic to the nectarine cultivar but also Monilinia spp. dependent. While lighting treatments reduced M. laxa incidence, they enhanced M. fructicola development. Preharvest conditions such as fruit bagging also impaired the ethylene production of inoculated fruit, which was mainly altered by M. laxa and M. fructicola, while the bag and light effects were meaningless. Thus, we provide several indications of how lighting treatments significantly alter Monilinia spp. behavior both in vitro and during the interaction with stone fruit. This study highlights the importance of modulating the lighting environment as a potential strategy to minimize brown rot development on stone fruit and to extent the shelf-life period of fruit in postharvest, market, and consumer’s house.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Cost-Effectiveness of the EdAl (Educacio en Alimentacio) Program: A Primary School-Based Study to Prevent Childhood Obesity

Background: The cost-effectiveness of childhood obesity prevention interventions is critical for their sustained implementation. This study evaluated the cost-effectiveness of the Educacio en Alimentacio (EdAl) program, a school-based intervention for reducing obesity. Methods: Total EdAl program implementation costs and per-child costs were estimated. Cost-effectiveness, defined using the incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER), was estimated as the difference between the intervention and control group costs divided by the obesity-related outcome effects for boys (avoided cases of obesity', obesity prevalence, body mass index [BMI], and BMI z-score units) for each group. As a significant difference (4.39%) in the reduction of obesity prevalence between the intervention and control groups was observed for boys in the EdAl program, the data were calculated only for boys. Results: The intervention cost was 24,246.53 (sic) for 1,550 children (15.64 (sic)/child/3 years) or 5.21 f/child/year. The ICERs/ boy were 968.66 (sic) to avoid one case of obesity, 3.6 (sic) to reduce the obesity prevalence by 1%, 44.68 (sic) to decrease BMI by one unit, and 65.16 (sic) to reduce the BMI z-score by one unit. Conclusions: The cost of reducing the obesity prevalence in boys by 4.39% was 5.21 (sic)/child/year, half the cost proposed by the Spanish Health Ministry, indicating that the EdAl program is cost-effective

The present and future of prostate cancer urine biomarkers

In order to successfully cure patients with prostate cancer (PCa), it is important to detect the disease at an early stage. The existing clinical biomarkers for PCa are not ideal, since they cannot specifically differentiate between those patients who should be treated immediately and those who should avoid over-treatment. Current screening techniques lack specificity, and a decisive diagnosis of PCa is based on prostate biopsy. Although PCa screening is widely utilized nowadays, two thirds of the biopsies performed are still unnecessary. Thus the discovery of non-invasive PCa biomarkers remains urgent. In recent years, the utilization of urine has emerged as an attractive option for the non-invasive detection of PCa. Moreover, a great improvement in high-throughput 'omic' techniques has presented considerable opportunities for the identification of new biomarkers. Herein, we will review the most significant urine biomarkers described in recent years, as well as some future prospects in that field

Environmental fate and behaviour of the biocontrol agent Bacillus amyloliquefaciens CPA-8 after preharvest application to stone fruit

BACKGROUND:Bacillus amyloliquefaciensstrain CPA-8 has been described as an effective biocontrol agent to control brownrot in stone fruit for both preharvest and postharvest applications. However, no information about the environmental fate andbehaviour of this strain under field conditions is available.RESULTS: The dispersion of the CPA-8 application was evaluated using water-sensitive papers, and complete coverage wasobserved on the leaves of treated trees, while<1% of non-treated tree leaves had CPA-8. CPA-8 persisted on the fruit of treatedtrees during preharvest and postharvest conditions, while a significant decrease on leaves and weeds was observed 21 daysafter treatment. On non-treated trees, CPA-8 was detected on leaves until 180 days after treatment, and on weeds, the CPA-8population was dependent on the distance from the treated trees. A high persistence of CPA-8 was detected on inert materials,suchasclothesandgloveswornbyhandlersandplasticharvestingboxes.Morethan99%ofthesampleswithaCPA-8phenotypewere confirmed as CPA-8 using polymerase chain reaction (PCR).CONCLUSION: This work demonstrated a good distribution, persistence and adaptation of the CPA-8 strain to field andpostharvest conditions. Monitoring of dispersion and persistence is an excellent tool to determine the time of application andprovides valuable information for registering issues.© 2017 Society of Chemical Industryinfo:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

A youth-led social marketing intervention to encourage healthy lifestyles, the EYTO (European Youth Tackling Obesity) project : a cluster randomised controlled0 trial in Catalonia, Spain

Acknowledgements This research project has been funded by European Direction General HEALTH-2012 12 19. This funder did not play a role in the Spanish study design, data collection, study management, data analysis, interpretation of data, writing of the report, or the decision to submit the report for publication. This research project has been developed as an EYTO component, and the National Children’s Bureau of the United Kingdom is responsible for the general data analysis of the four EYTO project participating countries; however, the Spanish data will be analysed by our research team. We appreciate the enthusiastic support of our European partners: Komunikujeme (Czech Republic), Companhia de Ideias (Portugal) and the National Children’s Bureau (United Kingdom). The Spanish research project has been supported by Central Market of Reus, Spain (Mercat Central de Reus), which provides fresh food for the intervention, and the Municipality of Reus, Spain [Ajuntament de Reus, Spain]. We thank the professors, parents and young people of the high-schools of Reus for their enthusiastic participation in this study.Peer reviewedPublisher PD