311 research outputs found
Pemanfaatan Potensi Alam sebagai Alat Permainan Edukatif di PAUD Delima Jobokuto Jepara
Alat Permainan Edukatif (APE) yang tersedia di lembaga Pendidikan Anak Usia Dini masih banyak menggunakan barang siap pakai. Di lain pihak potensi alam belum banyak dimanfaatkan. Kegiatan pengabdian kepada masyarakat ini bertujuan meningkatkan kreatifitas guru PAUD Delima Jobokuto Jepara dalam membuat APE berbasis pemanfaatan potensi alam. Fokus pembuatan APE dari bahan kerang dengan tema “Sea World” karena Jobokuto merupakan daerah pesisir pantai, yang terdapat banyak potensi alam seperti kerang, batukarang, dan serpihan pasir. Metode kegiatan pengabdian ini meliputi; perencanaan yaitu identifikasi masalah mitra, koordinasi, dan sosialisasi program, pelaksanaan dengan kegiatan, yaitu 1) pemberian motivasi pemanfaatan potensi alam, 2) pelatihan pembuatan APE, dan 3) pendampingan pembuatan APE, dan evaluasi melalui FGD beserta peserta. Hasil kegiatan ini, mitra dapat memanfaatkan APE sea world dalam pembelajaran untuk mengenalkan dunia laut sehingga pelayanan serta model APE di PAUD mengalami peningkatan. Mitra dapat mengembangkan pemanfaatan bahan kerang dan pasir untuk melatih motorik anak
Disruption in Brain Phospholipid Content in a Humanized Tau Transgenic Model Following Repetitive Mild Traumatic Brain Injury
Repetitive mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is a risk factor for the development of neurodegenerative diseases such as chronic traumatic encephalopathy typified by immunoreactive tau aggregates in the depths of the sulci. However, the underlying neurobiological mechanisms involved have not been largely explored. Phospholipids are important molecules which form membrane lipid bilayers; they are ubiquitous to every cell in the brain, and carry out a host of different functions. Imbalance in phospholipid metabolism, signaling and transport has been documented in some neurological conditions. However, not much is currently known about their roles in repetitive mTBI and how this may confer risk for the development of age-related neurodegenerative diseases. To address this question, we designed a longitudinal study (24 h, 3, 6, 9, and 12 months post-injury) to comprehensively investigate mTBI dependent brain phospholipid profiles compared to sham counterparts. We use our established mouse model of repetitive mTBI that has been extensively characterized up to 1-year post-injury in humanized tau (hTau) mice, which expresses all six human tau isoforms, on a null murine background. Our data indicates a significant increase in sphingomyelin, phosphatidylethanolamine (PE), phosphatidylcholine (PC), and derivative lysoPE and lysoPC at acute and/or sub-acute time points post-injury within the cortex and hippocampus. There was also a parallel increase at early time points in monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and saturated fatty acids. Omega-6 (arachidonic acid) to omega-3 (docosahexaenoic acid) fatty acid ratio for PE and PC species was increased also at 24 h and 3 months post-injury in both hippocampus and cortex. The long-term consequences of these early changes in phospholipids on neuronal and non-neuronal cell function is unclear, and warrants further study. Understanding phospholipid metabolism, signaling and transport following TBI could be valuable; they may offer novel targets for therapeutic intervention not only in TBI but other neurodegenerative diseases
Physiotherapy intervention in Parkinson's disease: systematic review and meta-analysis
Objective To assess the effectiveness of physiotherapy compared with no intervention in patients with Parkinson’s disease. Design Systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials. Data sources Literature databases, trial registries, journals, abstract books, and conference proceedings, and reference lists, searched up to the end of January 2012. Review methods Randomised controlled trials comparing physiotherapy with no intervention in patients with Parkinson’s disease were eligible. Two authors independently abstracted data from each trial. Standard meta-analysis methods were used to assess the effectiveness of physiotherapy compared with no intervention. Tests for heterogeneity were used to assess for differences in treatment effect across different physiotherapy interventions used. Outcome measures were gait, functional mobility and balance, falls, clinician rated impairment and disability measures, patient rated quality of life, adverse events, compliance, and economic analysis outcomes. Results 39 trials of 1827 participants met the inclusion criteria, of which 29 trials provided data for the meta-analyses. Significant benefit from physiotherapy was reported for nine of 18 outcomes assessed. Outcomes which may be clinically significant were speed (0.04 m/s, 95% confidence interval 0.02 to 0.06, P<0.001), Berg balance scale (3.71 points, 2.30 to 5.11, P<0.001), and scores on the unified Parkinson’s disease rating scale (total score −6.15 points, −8.57 to −3.73, P<0.001; activities of daily living subscore −1.36, −2.41 to −0.30, P=0.01; motor subscore −5.01, −6.30 to −3.72, P<0.001). Indirect comparisons of the different physiotherapy interventions found no evidence that the treatment effect differed across the interventions for any outcomes assessed, apart from motor subscores on the unified Parkinson’s disease rating scale (in which one trial was found to be the cause of the heterogeneity). Conclusions Physiotherapy has short term benefits in Parkinson’s disease. A wide range of physiotherapy techniques are currently used to treat Parkinson’s disease, with little difference in treatment effects. Large, well designed, randomised controlled trials with improved methodology and reporting are needed to assess the efficacy and cost effectiveness of physiotherapy for treating Parkinson’s disease in the longer term
National Assessment Program: ICT Literacy 2022: Public report
This public report documents the findings of the sixth National Assessment Program ICT Literacy (NAP–ICT Literacy) assessment cycle. In reporting national key performance measures (KPMs) of Australian students’ ICT literacy, the NAP–ICT Literacy assessment provides a way to monitor progress towards the Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Goals for Young Australians. Goal 2 of the Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Declaration is that “all young Australians become confident and creative individuals, successful lifelong learners, and active and informed members of the community” (Education Council 2019, p. 6). The elaboration of this goal highlights the importance of young Australians’ digital and ICT literacy in a rapidly evolving technological landscape and establishes the context and rationale for reporting on student achievement and progress in this area. For NAP–ICT Literacy 2022, ICT literacy is defined as “the ability to use ICT appropriately and safely to access, manage and evaluate information; develop new understandings; apply computational, design and systems thinking to create solutions; communicate and collaborate with others; and engage productively with emerging and future technologies” (ACARA 2020, p. 13). The NAP–ICT Literacy assessment instrument requires students to apply their ICT knowledge within real-world contexts that represent the 4 strands and integrated aspects outlined in the NAP–ICT Literacy Assessment Framework. These are: understanding ICT and digital systems, investigating and planning solutions with ICT, implementing and evaluating digital solutions, and applying safe and ethical protocols and practices when using ICT
Chronic repetitive mild traumatic brain injury results in reduced cerebral blood flow, axonal injury, gliosis, and increased T-Tau and Tau oligomers
Exposure to repetitive mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is a risk factor for chronic traumatic encephalopathy, which is characterized by patchy deposition of hyperphosphorylated tau aggregates in neurons and astrocytes at the depths of cortical sulci. We developed an mTBI paradigm to explore effects of repetitive concussive-type injury over several months in mice with a human tau genetic background (hTau). Two injuries were induced in the hTau mice weekly over a period of 3 or 4 months and the effects were compared with those in noninjured sham animals. Behavioral and in vivo measures and detailed neuropathological assessments were conducted 6 months after the first injury. Our data confirm impairment in cerebral blood flow and white matter damage. This was accompanied by a 2-fold increase in total tau levels and mild increases in tau oligomers/conformers and pTau (Thr231) species in brain gray matter. There was no evidence of neurofibrillary/astroglial tangles, neuropil threads, or perivascular foci of tau immunoreactivity. There were neurobehavioral deficits (ie, disinhibition and impaired cognitive performance) in the mTBI animals. These data support the relevance of this new mTBI injury model for studying the consequences of chronic repetitive mTBI in humans, and the role of tau in TBI
EGenBio : a data management system for evolutionary genomics and biodiversity
From The Third Annual Conference of the MidSouth Computational Biology and Bioinformatics Society Baton Rouge, Louisiana. 2–4 March, 2006.© 2006 Nahum et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0),
which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.EGenBio is a system for manipulation and filtering of large numbers of sequences,
integrating curated sequence alignments and phylogenetic trees, managing evolutionary analyses, and visualizing their output. EGenBio is organized into three conceptual divisions, Evolution, Genomics, and Biodiversity. The Genomics division includes tools for selecting pre-aligned sequences
from different genes and species, and for modifying and filtering these alignments for further
analysis. Species searches are handled through queries that can be modified based on a tree-based navigation system and saved. The Biodiversity division contains tools for analyzing individual sequences or sequence alignments, whereas the Evolution division contains tools involving phylogenetic trees. Alignments are annotated with analytical results and modification history using
our PRAED format. A miscellaneous Tools section and Help framework are also available. EGenBio was developed around our comparative genomic research and a prototype database of mtDNA genomes. It utilizes MySQL-relational databases and dynamic page generation, and calls numerous custom programs.This work was partly funded by the National Institutes of Health (R22/R33
Innovation and Development grant to David Pollock), the National Science
Foundation (CBM2/EPSCOR), and the State of Louisiana (Biological Computation and Visualization Center, Governor's iotechnology Initiative, and startup funds to David Pollock)
Increased susceptibility of Cantagalo virus to the antiviral effect of ST-246®
AbstractCantagalo virus (CTGV) is the etiologic agent of a pustular disease in dairy cows and dairy workers in Brazil with important economical and occupational impacts. Nevertheless, no antiviral therapy is currently available. ST-246 is a potent inhibitor of orthopoxvirus egress from cells and has proved its efficacy in cell culture and in animal models. In this work, we evaluated the effect of ST-246 on CTGV replication. Plaque reduction assays indicated that CTGV is 6–38 times more susceptible to the drug than VACV-WR and cowpox virus, respectively, with an EC50 of 0.0086μM and a selective index of >11,600. The analysis of β-gal activity expressed by recombinant viruses in the presence of ST-246 confirmed these results. In addition, ST-246 had a greater effect on the reduction of CTGV spread in comet tail assays and on the production of extracellular virus relative to VACV-WR. Infection of mice with CTGV by tail scarification generated primary lesions at the site of scarification that appeared less severe than those induced by VACV-WR. Animals infected with CTGV and treated with ST-246 at 100mg/kg for 5days did not develop primary lesions and virus yields were inhibited by nearly 98%. In contrast, primary lesions induced by VACV-WR were not affected by ST-246. The analysis of F13 (p37) protein from CTGV revealed a unique substitution in residue 217 (D217N) not found in other orthopoxviruses. Construction of recombinant VACV-WR containing the D217N polymorphism did not lead to an increase in the susceptibility to ST-246. Therefore, it is still unknown why CTGV is more susceptible to the antiviral effects of ST-246 compared to VACV-WR. Nonetheless, our data demonstrates that ST-246 is a potent inhibitor of CTGV replication that should be further evaluated as a promising anti-CTGV therapy
Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease and Their Quality of Life
This study aimed at exploring the assessment of Quality of Life (QOL) in patients with Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD), and aiming at assessing the QOL of patients with stages 1–5 Chronic Kidney Disease CKD on conservative treatment in order to identify a possible association between Quality Of Life QOL and progression of kidney insufficiency. The results were compared with those obtained for patients on hemodialysis. Sociodemographic, clinical and laboratory data were also evaluated. And the study concluded that research efforts have expanded significantly to determine the state of pediatric CKD patient HRQOL and the factors that impact HRQOL across all stages of CKD and all modalities of renal replacement therapy. Data from all studies suggest that children with a renal transplant fare better with respect to HRQOL than those receiving dialysis.
Effects of air-abrasion pressure on the resin bond strength to zirconia: a combined cyclic loading and thermocycling aging study
Objectives
To determine the combined effect of fatigue cyclic loading and thermocycling (CLTC) on the shear bond strength (SBS) of a resin cement to zirconia surfaces that were previously air-abraded with aluminum oxide (Al2O3) particles at different pressures.
Materials and Methods
Seventy-two cuboid zirconia specimens were prepared and randomly assigned to 3 groups according to the air-abrasion pressures (1, 2, and 2.8 bar), and each group was further divided into 2 groups depending on aging parameters (n = 12). Panavia F 2.0 was placed on pre-conditioned zirconia surfaces, and SBS testing was performed either after 24 hours or 10,000 fatigue cycles (cyclic loading) and 5,000 thermocycles. Non-contact profilometry was used to measure surface roughness. Failure modes were evaluated under optical and scanning electron microscopy. The data were analyzed using 2-way analysis of variance and χ2 tests (α = 0.05).
Results
The 2.8 bar group showed significantly higher surface roughness compared to the 1 bar group (p < 0.05). The interaction between pressure and time/cycling was not significant on SBS, and pressure did not have a significant effect either. SBS was significantly higher (p = 0.006) for 24 hours storage compared to CLTC. The 2 bar-CLTC group presented significantly higher percentage of pre-test failure during fatigue compared to the other groups. Mixed-failure mode was more frequent than adhesive failure.
Conclusions
CLTC significantly decreased the SBS values regardless of the air-abrasion pressure used
Impact of feldspar and liquid Bio-fertilizer on fruit quantity and quality of olive trees Picual cv.
The present investigation was carried out in two consecutive seasons (2022 and 2023) on eight-year-old olive trees “Picual” cv., planted at 4×6m apart around (420 trees / Fed). Trees irrigated with drip irrigation system, at a private orchard. The experiment included 3 rates of Feldspar as source of naturel potassium at 2, 4, and 6 kg/ tree and potassium dissolving bacteria as liquid Bio-fertilizers supplemented (25 ml) at two or three times to investigate the yield and fruit quality of Picual olive trees. Data indicated that the yield of Picual olive trees fertilized with feldspar and liquid Bio-fertilizer increase to 70% over control. Picual olive trees treated with (4 kg Feldspar + 25 ml liquid Bio-fertilizer at three doses) achieved the highest increase in the yield for the both seasons and also gave the highest fruit weight, volume and fruit flesh/stone ratio of olive trees Picual cv. Concerning leaf nitrogen percentage (N%) The highest percentage of N% for the both years was recorded by treatment (6 kg Feldspar + 25 ml liquid Bio-fertilizer at three doses). With respect to leaf phosphor and potassium percentage, it could be seen that most treatments gave more or less results similar to the control
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