Effect of the photoperiod on the glutamate level in the suprachiasmatic nucleus of pregnant and non-pregnant rabbits

[EN] Microdialysis sampling was used to measure the glutamate level (GLU) contained in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) in 10 pregnant and 10 non-pregnant, subjected to either a 16:8 h light-dark cycle or a 12 h advanced photoperiod. Results revealed that GLU levels were significantly greater in samples taken for 2 h (15 min intervals), ¿60, ¿45 and ¿30 min before parturition (P<0.009, P<0.04, P<0.02), and +45 and +60 min after birth (P<0.009, P<0.05) respectively, in pregnant rabbits subjects to a 16:8 LD photoperiod (with light from 6:00-22:00 h). Parturition in these animals occurred at day 31 of gestation. Pregnant rabbits exposed to 12 h advanced photoperiod showed lower GLU levels in the SCN, and a longer gestation period and parturition process. In non-pregnant rabbits the GLU levels in the SCN were also significantly higher (P<0.009, in all samples) in comparison with rabbits subjected to the 12 h shifted photoperiod. It is possible that the photoperiod may have influenced GLU levels, and consequently, the length of gestation, the number of young and the time of birth. However, further studies involving new biotechnologies and a greater number of animals are needed to confirm these results.Reyes-Guerrero, G.; Vázquez-García, M.; Calderón-Guzmán, D.; Donatti-Albarrán, O.; Guevara-Guzmán, R. (2008). Effect of the photoperiod on the glutamate level in the suprachiasmatic nucleus of pregnant and non-pregnant rabbits. World Rabbit Science. 16(3). doi:10.4995/wrs.2008.62316

Emerging Technologies for Urban Traffic Management

Nowadays, the number of vehicles on the road and the need of transporting people grow fast. Road transportation has become the backbone of industrialized countries. Nevertheless, the road network system in cities is not sufficient to cope with the current demands due to the size of roads available. Building additional or extending existing roads do not solve the traffic congestion problem due to the high costs and the environmental and geographical limitations. As a consequence, the modern society is facing more traffic jams, higher fuel bills and high levels of CO2 emissions

Effectiveness of vaginal analgesic electrostimulation versus sacral electroacupuncture in chronic pelvic pain of myofascial origin

Background: Chronic pelvic pain (CPP) of myofascial origin is a condition that is difficult to control and with great repercussion on the quality of life for women who suffer from it. This study objective was to compare the effectiveness of two treatments for the management of this pathology; vaginal analgesic electrostimulation (VES) versus sacral electroacupuncture (EAS).Methods: Quasi-experimental comparative study of two treatments in patients with myofascial CPP. The sample was made up of women who presented this condition during the period 2016 to 2019. The main objective was to assess the effectiveness of the treatments in comparison in terms of the decrease in the VAS score, the secondary ones were: To know the effectiveness of the VES for pain chronic pelvic myofascial (MFPP), the effectiveness of EA for the same condition, complications of therapies, main urological dysfunctions and other chronic pelvic pain associated with myofascial CPP.Results: Thirteen thousand patient files were reviewed, of which 47 were diagnosed with myofascial CCP, with 38 patients eligible for our study. The VES was more effective than the EAS in decreasing the VAS in the twelfth session from 1.36 versus 2.62 p .001. Both therapies were effective for the management of myofascial DCP as they decreased the VAS score to more than 60% of the initial VAS. Vulvodynia (34%), mixed urinary incontinence (32%), and voiding symptoms (26%) were other pelvic floor dysfunctions that presented concomitantly to the MFPP.Conclusions: In patients with myofascial CPP, vaginal VES is better than AD for the treatment of this condition

Contraction Based Nonlinear Controller for a Laser Beam Stabilization System using a Variable Gain

In this letter, we propose a contraction-based variable gain nonlinear control scheme for the laser-beam stabilizing (LBS) servo-system, which guarantees that the closed-loop system is convergent. With the variable gain acting on the velocity error, the well known waterbed effect of the low-frequency/bandwidth trade-off can be overcome. Moreover, the contraction-based framework allows us to extend the linear control performance metrics for analyzing the closed-loop nonlinear system behavior. The closed-loop system’s performance is evaluated in numerical simulations under input disturbances and/or white noise measurements and its efficacy is compared to that using PID and LQG controllers

Optical properties from extinction cross-section of single pollen particles under laboratory-controlled relative humidity

This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through projects ELPIS (PID2020-12001-5RB-I00), by the Junta de Andalucía Excellence project ADAPNE (P20-00136), AEROPRE (P-18-RT-3820), FEDER Una manera de hacer Europa, EQC2019-006423-P, INTEGRATYON (PID2020-117825 GB-C21 and PID2020-117825 GB-C22), the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program through project ACTRIS. IMP (grant agreement No 871115), and ATMO-ACCESS (grant agreement No 101008004), and ACTRIS-España (RED2022-134824-E), FEDER/Junta de Andalucía-Consejería de Transformación Económica, Industria, Conocimiento y Universidades project DEM3TRIOS (A-RNM-430-UGR20) and by University of Granada Plan Propio through Excellence Research Unit Earth Science and Singular Laboratory AGORA (LS2022-1) programs and project Pre-GREENMITIGATION (PP2022.PP.34).A growing body of research suggests that pollen suspended in the atmosphere have a major environmental and climatic impact. However, our current knowledge of pollen is rather limited with respect to its extinction capacity, its optical properties and how these vary with atmospheric water content. Understanding their water absorption capacity can improve our understanding of their radiative effects and, thus, improve climate models. In this work, an electrodynamic Paul trap was coupled to a cavity ring down spectroscopy (CRDS) to directly measure the ring down time () of four individual types of pollen particles: Olea, Fraxinus, Populus and Salix exposed to changing relative humidity (RH). Resonant structures in values between ∼90 and 45 % RH indicated that pollen was wettable at high RHs. was used to calculate light extinction cross-section at 532 nm as a function of RH. Optical growth factor () was evaluated as the ratio between and From , the semi-empirical single hygroscopicity parameter () was found to be 0.038–0.058 for the four pollen types. Under controllable treatment of the water content and an adequate selection of complex refractive index , CRDS- data was fitted to theoretical from Mie theory. The reasonable agreement achieved allowed for gaining knowledge about the and how particle size shrugged during dehydration. As a result, a climate-lowering effect of Olea pollen particles, which contain a fraction of scattered aerosol, should be considered in the models.Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (PID2020-12001-5RB-I00)Junta de Andalucía Excellence: ADAPNE (P20-00136), AEROPRE (P-18-RT-3820), FEDER Una manera de hacer Europa, EQC2019-006423-P, INTEGRATYON (PID2020-117825GB-C21, PID2020-117825GB-C22)European Union's Horizon 2020 CTRIS.IMP 871115ATMO-ACCESS 101008004ACTRIS-España (RED2022-134824-E)FEDER/Junta de Andalucía-Consejería de Transformación Económica, Industria, Conocimiento y Universidades DEM3TRIOS (A-NM-430-UGR20)University of Granada LS2022-1, PP2022.PP.3

Descriptive analysis of histological types in women undergoing post mastectomy breast reconstruction

Background: Breast cancer is a pathological entity that widely compromises the life and quality of life of affected women; in addition to the great affectation to the current health services. Therefore, maintaining an accurate and complete cancer registry program is one of the most important factors in implementing national cancer control programs and evaluating the results of screening, diagnosis, and treatment. Among the current limitations in the studies, there is a gap in the study of the population undergoing breast reconstruction. Methods: A retrospective study was carried out at hospital general de México “Dr. Eduardo Licéaga” with the information from the clinical records of the period 2019-2020. Patients undergoing breast reconstruction after mastectomy with histological report were included. Through non-probabilistic sampling, a population of 138 women was formed. For data analysis, frequencies and percentages were calculated for the qualitative variables; while for the quantitative variables, mean and standard deviation were calculated. Results: 138 women who underwent breast reconstruction were included, the mean age was 49.9±10.85 years, the mean BMI was 26.80±4.62 kg/m2, the secondary educational level predominated (34.8%), radiotherapy was applied to 34.1%, reconstruction was late in 75.4%, the most frequent reconstruction technique was TRAM flap (44.2%), the histological type of invasive ductal carcinoma predominated (68.1%). Conclusions: In women undergoing post-mastectomy breast reconstruction, the histological type of invasive ductal carcinoma predominates.

Metodología para la restauración y puesta en marcha de una máquina fresadora CNC

The Computerized Numerical Control (CNC) is a technology that allows, through the use of a computer, to control and monitor the movements of a machine tool. The Superior Technological Institute of San Andrés Tuxtla (ITSSAT) has a CNC milling machine tool with European technology acquired by the state government in 2003 for engineering student practices. The machine was obsolete and out of operation, a situation that obligates not to use the CNC in practice for a while since the industries that manufacture them use licensed software and electronic cards that have a high cost for repair. The purpose of this article is to&nbsp;present a methodology for the restoration and start-up of CNC machines without having to resort to the manufacturer. The results show the methodology whose main function is the communication of the CNC machine with the PC through the implementation of the alternate software Mach 3 and the electronic card LPT-Mach 3 achieving the operation of the machine and the milling of materials with academic and industrial purposes.El Control Numérico Computarizado (CNC) es una tecnología que permite mediante el uso de una computadora controlar y monitorear los movimientos de una máquina herramienta. El Instituto Tecnológico Superior de San Andrés Tuxtla (ITSSAT) cuenta con una máquina herramienta fresadora CNC con tecnología europea adquirida por el gobierno del Estado en el 2003 para prácticas de los estudiantes de ingeniería. La máquina se encontraba obsoleta y sin funcionamiento, situación que provoco no hacer uso de la CNC en las prácticas durante un tiempo, ya que las industrias que las fabrican utilizan software con licencia y tarjetas electrónicas que tienen un costo elevado para su reparación. El presente artículo tiene como finalidad dar a conocer una metodología para la restauración y puesta en marcha de la máquina fresadora CNC sin necesidad de recurrir al fabricante. Los resultados muestran la metodología cuya principal función es la comunicación de la máquina CNC con la PC mediante la implementación del software alterno Mach 3 y la tarjeta electrónica LPT-Mach 3 logrando el funcionamiento de la máquina y con ello el fresado de materiales con fines académicos e industriales

Resonance phenomena of a solitonlike extended object in a bistable potential

We investigate the dynamics of a soliton that behaves as an extended particle. The soliton motion in an effective bistable potential can be chaotic in a similar way as the Duffing oscillator. We generalize the concept of geometrical resonance to spatiotemporal systems and apply it to design a nonfeedback mechanism of chaos control using localized perturbations.We show the existence of solitonic stochastic resonance.Comment: 3 postscript figure

Detection of gastrointestinal nematode populations resistant to albendazole and ivermectin in sheep

Gastrointestinal parasite infections represent a major welfare problem in small ruminants reared in extensive systems, which may be exacerbated by anthelmintic resistance. Therefore, we aimed to study the efficacy of albendazole and ivermectin in sheep. Eighty-six animals were selected from commercial farms in the temperate area of the State of Mexico at the age of seven months. These animals were randomly distributed into three groups: Group A, treated with albendazole, Group I, treated with ivermectin and Group C, left untreated. Faecal samples were collected before the anthelmintic was administered and 15 days post-treatment. Both Group A and Group I displayed a significant decrease of faecal egg counts when pre-and post-treatment values were compared (p = 0.003 and p = 0.049, respectively), and a significantly lower faecal egg count when compared with Group C after the treatment (p &lt; 0.05). However, the faecal egg count reduction test showed that gastrointestinal nematodes (GIN) developed anthelmintic resistance to both albendazole and ivermectin. The results of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) allowed the identification of Cooperia spp., and Trichostrongylus colubriformis. The allele-specific PCR results confirmed that T. colubriformis was resistant to albendazole. In conclusion, this study showed the presence of resistant GIN to albendazole and ivermectin in sheep reared in Mexican temperate zones. Therefore, nematode infections should be systematically monitored in order to implement integrated management strategies to prevent the spread of anthelmintic resistance

A mechanism for randomness

We investigate explicit functions that can produce truly random numbers. We use the analytical properties of the explicit functions to show that certain class of autonomous dynamical systems can generate random dynamics. This dynamics presents fundamental differences with the known chaotic systems. We present realphysical systems that can produce this kind of random time-series. We report theresults of real experiments with nonlinear circuits containing direct evidence for this new phenomenon. In particular, we show that a Josephson junction coupled to a chaotic circuit can generate unpredictable dynamics. Some applications are discussed.Comment: Accepted in Physics Letters A (2002). 11 figures (.eps