The lack of males due to illegal trapping is causing polygyny in the globally endangered Yellow Cardinal Gubernatrix cristata

We present breeding data from the southernmost populations of the globally “Endangered” Yellow Cardinal Gubernatrix cristata in Argentina, confirming the presence of current breeding populations in the region. We monitored a family group in a nesting territory composed of one male and three females throughout the breeding season 2017–2018. We found a low nest success and productivity, probably associated with the lower contribution of the male, since it was attending three reproductive females simultaneously. We attribute this uncommon case of polygyny to the lack of males in the area caused by the high intensity of male trapping for illegal trade.Fil: Segura, Luciano Noel. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. División Zoología de Vertebrados. Sección Ornitología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata; ArgentinaFil: Perelló, Milton. Fundación de Historia Natural Félix de Azara; Argentina. Universidad Maimónides; ArgentinaFil: Gress, Néstor H.. No especifíca;Fil: Ontiveros, Rafael. No especifíca

Influence of the adequacy of data collection, during two years, in the management of communityacquired pneumonia in emergency departments

Objective. The aim of this study was to analyze whether structured data collection of patients with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) in the Emergency Department (ED) improves compliance with clinical guidelines regarding inpatient and outpatient treatment and prescription of antibiotics at discharge. Material and methods. We performed a quasi experimental, multicenter, pre/postintervention study. The intervention consisted of basic training for the participating physicians and the incorporation of a data collection sheet in the clinical history chart, including the information necessary for adequate decision making regarding patient admission and treatment, in the case of discharge. We analyzed the adequacy of the final destination of patients classified as Fine I-II and antibiotic treatment in patients receiving outpatient treatment, with each participating physician including 8 consecutive patients (4 pre-intervention and 4 post-intervention). Results. A total of 738 patients were included: 378 pre-intervention and 360 post-intervention. In the pre-intervention group, Fine V was more frequent and patients were older, had more ischemic heart disease, active neoplasms and fewer risk factors for atypical pneumonia. Of the patients with Fine I-II, 23.7% were inadequately admitted and 19.6% of those discharged received treatment not recommended by guidelines. No differences were observed in the target variables between the two groups. Conclusion. The adequacy of the decision to admit patients with Fine I-II CAP and outpatient antibiotic treatment can be improved in the ED. Structured data collection does not improve patient outcome

Orchestrated SDN-based VDC provisioning over multi-technology optical data centre networks

©2017 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.In this paper, we describe some scenarios and technologies that have been proposed to cope with the requirements of current and next generation data centre infrastructure. In particular, we discuss the extensions that have been implemented at both orchestration and control levels to efficiently manage the data centres resources. We put the focus on the integration between the Orchestrator and the SDN Controller by describing the communication interfaces and their interaction to provision optimized Virtual Data Centres (VDC) instances over novel data centre infrastructure, with special mention to the different solutions adopted to manage multiple optical technologies at the data plane.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

SDN-based parallel link discovery in optical transport networks

This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Montero R, Agraz F, Pagès A, Perelló J, Spadaro S. SDN‐based parallel link discovery in optical transport networks. Trans Emerging Tel Tech. 2018;e3512. https://doi-org.recursos.biblioteca.upc.edu/10.1002/ett.3512, which has been published in final form at https://doi-org.recursos.biblioteca.upc.edu/10.1002/ett.3512. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving.The use of optical technologies in modern network scenarios has increased in the last decade, mostly due to their support in crucial networking topics (ie, bandwidth and scalability). In parallel, these scenarios have also experienced the emergence of a new paradigm recognized as software-defined networking (SDN), which bases on the decoupling of forwarding and control functions, with aims to provide a more efficient way to manage network resources compared to legacy networking architectures. As both SDN and optical technologies are constantly being introduced in different networking scenarios (eg, data centers, metro, and access networks), their coexistence becomes a must. In this matter, it is important to notice that SDN was initially designed for electronic-based networks; hence, its support for optical technologies is still at an early stage. Consequently, integration of both solutions still requires research efforts by the community. In this paper, we present a mechanism to address topology discovery in wavelength-switching optical transport networks (OTNs). In particular, we discuss the importance of the topology discovery function and analyse the proposed mechanism, which bases itself on the use of wavelength-specific signaling tones as link-binding data to provide preservice parallel link discovery in OTNs. Furthermore, we validate the method experimentally against an emulated OTN testbed with two different setups and compare the results to our previous work on this subject, achieving substantial reductions in the total topology discovery time.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Rotura de un aneurisma de arteria esplénica. A proposito de un caso y revisión de la literatura

La prevalencia de aneurismas esplénicos en la población general es del 0,8%, siendo más alta en mujeres que en hombres. El embarazo, la fibrodis plasia arterial y la hipertensión portal, con o sin esplenomegalia asociada, son factores de riesgo conocidos asociados al desarrollo de aneurismas esplénicos. Se presenta el caso clínico de una pa ciente nulípara de 24 años, sin factores de riesgo vasculares y con antecedentes de paludismo, que acudió al servicio de urgencias de nuestro centro por presentar dolor abdominal tras un vuelo en avión de larga distancia. La exploración física y las pruebas complementarias realizadas mostraron un shock hipovolémico por hemoperitoneo. A pe sar del tratamiento de apoyo, la paciente falleció antes de su entrada en quirófano. La necropsia mostró la rotura de un aneurisma sacular de la arteria esplénica como causa de muerte. Se discu te la posibilidad de que un barotrauma pueda ha ber sido la causa de rotura aneurismáti

The lack of males due to illegal trapping is causing polygyny in the globally endangered Yellow Cardinal Gubernatrix cristata

We present breeding data from the southernmost populations of the globally “Endangered” Yellow Cardinal Gubernatrix cristata in Argentina, confirming the presence of current breeding populations in the region. We monitored a family group in a nesting territory composed of one male and three females throughout the breeding season 2017–2018. We found a low nest success and productivity, probably associated with the lower contribution of the male, since it was attending three reproductive females simultaneously. We attribute this uncommon case of polygyny to the lack of males in the area caused by the high intensity of male trapping for illegal trade.Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Muse

Detection of human cytomegalovirus in bronchoalveolar lavage of intensive care unit patients

The seroprevalence of human cytomegalovirus (CMV) is very high worldwide [1, 2] and the spectrum of disease caused by it ranges from an asymptomatic state to a mononucleosis-like syndrome to severe diseases such as pneumonia, retinitis or gastrointestinal infection. The most severe disease occurs in congenital infection and in immunosuppressed patients, in whom the virus acts as an opportunistic pathogen. However, the role of CMV in other populations is less clear and is controversial [3]. Some studies in critical patients describe a relationship between CMV and increased mortality rates, longer length of stay and prolonged need for mechanical ventilation [3-5]. The incidence of active CMV infection depends on the diagnostic method used. Several epidemiological studies and systematic reviews have assessed the incidence of CMV infection in mechanically ventilated, critically ill patients, finding values ranging from 0-36% [5-7]. In this study, we aimed to assess the incidence, clinical characteristics, risk factors and outcomes for intensive care unit (ICU) patients with CMV detection by bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL)

Evaluation of Medicine Abuse Trends in Community Pharmacies: The Medicine Abuse Observatory (MAO) in a Region of Southern Europe

The misuse of medicines is a global public health concern that needs to be taken into consideration and requires actions across all government sectors and society. The aim of this study is to identify trends of drug abuse in Catalonia, a region of Spain located in the South of Europe. For this purpose, a questionnaire-based detection tool was created and implemented in 60 community pharmacies. Out of 548 questionnaires (98.4%), 64.2% of participants were men and the highest age proportion was 25-35 years (31.4%). Potential drug abuse was the highest in urban pharmacies (84.9%). The main drug class involved were benzodiazepines (31.8%), codeine (19.3%), tramadol (7.5%), methylphenidate (5.8%), gabapentinoids (5.8%), cycloplegic drops (4.4%), z-drugs (2.6%), piracetam (2.2%), dextromethorphan (1.6%) and clomethiazole (1.1%). The majority of drugs were requested without prescription (58.6%) and through probably forged prescriptions (23.7%). Slightly less than half (49.8%) of the patients request frequently to the pharmacist, especially in rural and mountain pharmacies (73.3% and 88.5%, respectively). A small proportion (10.8%) were requested with intimidation. Pharmacists only supplied in 21.7% of the cases. This study has demonstrated the suitability of the new detection system, being a useful approach to replicate in other locations with similar needs

Full blood count values as a predictor of poor outcome of pneumonia among HIV-infected patients

Background To evaluate the predictive value of analytical markers of full blood count that can be assessed in the emergency department for HIV infected patients, with community-acquired pneumonia (CAP). Methods Prospective 3-year study including all HIV-infected patients that went to our emergency department with respiratory clinical infection, more than 24-h earlier they were diagnosed with CAP and required admission. We assessed the different values of the first blood count performed on the patient as follows; total white blood cells (WBC), neutrophils, lymphocytes (LYM), basophils, eosinophils (EOS), red blood cells (RBC), hemoglobin, hematocrit, mean corpuscular volume, mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration, mean corpuscular hemoglobin, red blood cell distribution width (RDW), platelets (PLT), mean platelet volume, and platelet distribution width (PDW). The primary outcome measure was 30-day mortality and the secondary, admission to an intensive care unit (ICU). The predictive power of the variables was determined by statistical calculation. Results One hundred sixty HIV-infected patients with pneumonia were identified. The mean age was 42 (11) years, 99 (62%) were male, 79 (49%) had ART. The main route of HIV transmission was through parenteral administration of drugs. Streptococcus pneumonia was the most frequently identified etiologic agent of CAP The univariate analysis showed that the values of PLT (p < 0.009), EOS (p < 0.033), RDW (p < 0.033) and PDW (p < 0.09) were predictor of mortality, but after the logistic regression analysis, no variable was shown as an independent predictor of mortality. On the other hand, higher RDW (OR = 1.2, 95% CI 1.1-1.4, p = 0.013) and a lower number of LYM (OR 2.2, 95% CI 1.1-2.2; p = 0.035) were revealed as independent predictors of admission to ICU. Conclusion Red blood cell distribution and lymphocytes were the most useful predictors of disease severity identifying HIV infected patients with CAP who required ICU admission. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s12879-018-3090-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Results and achievements of the ALLIANCE Project: New network solutions for 5G and beyond

Leaving the current 4th generation of mobile communications behind, 5G will represent a disruptive paradigm shift integrating 5G Radio Access Networks (RANs), ultra-high-capacity access/metro/core optical networks, and intra-datacentre (DC) network and computational resources into a single converged 5G network infrastructure. The present paper overviews the main achievements obtained in the ALLIANCE project. This project ambitiously aims at architecting a converged 5G-enabled network infrastructure satisfying those needs to effectively realise the envisioned upcoming Digital Society. In particular, we present two networking solutions for 5G and beyond 5G (B5G), such as Software Defined Networking/Network Function Virtualisation (SDN/NFV) on top of an ultra-high-capacity spatially and spectrally flexible all-optical network infrastructure, and the clean-slate Recursive Inter-Network Architecture (RINA) over packet networks, including access, metro, core and DC segments. The common umbrella of all these solutions is the Knowledge-Defined Networking (KDN)-based orchestration layer which, by implementing Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques, enables an optimal end-to-end service provisioning. Finally, the cross-layer manager of the ALLIANCE architecture includes two novel elements, namely the monitoring element providing network and user data in real time to the KDN, and the blockchain-based trust element in charge of exchanging reliable and confident information with external domains.This work has been partially funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness under contract FEDER TEC2017-90034-C2 (ALLIANCE project) and by the Generalitat de Catalunya under contract 2017SGR-1037 and 2017SGR-605.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version