Local organizations for natural resource management: lessons from theoretical and empirical literature

The sustainability of natural resource management depends not only on appropriate technology and prices, but also upon the institutions involved in resource management at the local level. This discussion paper aims to identify factors which condition local organization for resource management. It draws upon a review of two major bodies of literature: empirical analyses of forestry, fisheries, grazing, and irrigation management, and game theory literature. The empirical literature on resource management highlights the physical and technical characteristics of the resource, the characteristics of the group of users, and the attributes of institutional arrangements as key factors affecting the management capacity of local organizations. Simplistic game theory has often been used to predict a "tragedy of the commons" for natural resources, but more refined versions provide insights into the role of communication, group size, time horizons, trust, and social norms in supporting collective action. The evidence on voluntary organization indicates that collective management is often a viable alternative to nationalization or privatization of natural resources. Although local organizations will not be able to solve every collective action problem, in many situations they could be at least as effective as other management agencies. Knowledge of the factors which condition local organization should be used to develop policies to support local organizations for natural resource management.Natural resources Management., Collective behaviour., Appropriate technology Research Developing countries., Devolution, Gender,

Data on plasma levels of apolipoprotein E, correlations with lipids and lipoproteins stratified by <i>APOE</i> genotype, and risk of ischemic heart disease

Data on correlations of plasma apoE with levels of lipids and lipoproteins stratified by APOE genotypes as well as data exploring the association between plasma levels of apoE and risk of ischemic heart disease (IHD) are wanted.The present data on 91,695 individuals from the general population provides correlations between plasma levels of apoE and lipids and lipoproteins for the three APOE genotypes ε33, ε44 and ε22, representing each of the three apoE isoforms. Further, data on extreme groups of plasma apoE (highest 5%) versus lower levels of apoE at enrollment explores risk of IHD and myocardial infarction (MI) and is given as hazard ratios. In addition, IHD and MI as a function of apoE/high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol ratio, as well as data on lipids, lipoproteins and apolipoproteins are given as hazard ratios. Data is stratified by gender and presented for the Copenhagen General Population Study and the Copenhagen City Heart Study combined

Live-virus exposure of vaccine-protected macaques alters the anti-HIV-1 antibody repertoire in the absence of viremia

Background: We addressed the question whether live-virus challenges could alter vaccine-induced antibody (Ab) responses in vaccinated rhesus macaques (RMs) that completely resisted repeated exposures to R5-tropic simian-human immunodeficiency viruses encoding heterologous HIV clade C envelopes (SHIV-Cs). Results: We examined the Ab responses in aviremic RMs that had been immunized with a multi-component protein vaccine (multimeric HIV-1 gp160, HIV-1 Tat and SIV Gag-Pol particles) and compared anti-Env plasma Ab titers before and after repeated live-virus exposures. Although no viremia was ever detected in these animals, they showed significant increases in anti-gp140 Ab titers after they had encountered live SHIVs. When we investigated the dynamics of anti-Env Ab titers during the immunization and challenge phases further, we detected the expected, vaccine-induced increases of Ab responses about two weeks after the last protein immunization. Remarkably, these titers kept rising during the repeated virus challenges, although no viremia resulted. In contrast, in vaccinated RMs that were not exposed to virus, anti-gp140 Ab titers declined after the peak seen two weeks after the last immunization. These data suggest boosting of pre-existing, vaccine-induced Ab responses as a consequence of repeated live-virus exposures. Next, we screened polyclonal plasma samples from two of the completely protected vaccinees by peptide phage display and designed a strategy that selects for recombinant phages recognized only by Abs present after – but not before – any SHIV challenge. With this “subtractive biopanning” approach, we isolated V3 mimotopes that were only recognized after the animals had been exposed to live virus. By detailed epitope mapping of such anti-V3 Ab responses, we showed that the challenges not only boosted pre-existing binding and neutralizing Ab titers, but also induced Abs targeting neo-antigens presented by the heterologous challenge virus. Conclusions: Anti-Env Ab responses induced by recombinant protein vaccination were altered by the multiple, live SHIV challenges in vaccinees that had no detectable viral loads. These data may have implications for the interpretation of “vaccine only” responses in clinical vaccine trials

Mental Well-being during Stages of COVID-19 Lockdown among pregnant women and new mothers

Acknowledgments The authors would like to thank the funders for their financial support and research assistant Sinead Shahrzad for data management. Funding This work was supported by TRYGfonden [grant number 125227] and the quality and continuing education committee for general practice in the Capital Region [grant number 19035774].Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Inducing Cross-Clade Neutralizing Antibodies against HIV-1 by Immunofocusing

Background: Although vaccines are important in preventing viral infections by inducing neutralizing antibodies (nAbs), HIV-1 has proven to be a difficult target and escapes humoral immunity through various mechanisms. We sought to test whether HIV-1 Env mimics may serve as immunogens. Methodology/Principal Findings: Using random peptide phage display libraries, we identified the epitopes recognized by polyclonal antibodies of a rhesus monkey that had developed high-titer, broadly reactive nAbs after infection with a simian-human immunodeficiency virus (SHIV) encoding env of a recently transmitted HIV-1 clade C (HIV-C). Phage peptide inserts were analyzed for conformational and linear homology using computational analysis; some peptides mimicked various domains of the original HIV-C Env, such as conformational V3 loop epitopes and the conserved linear region of the gp120 C-terminus. Next, we devised a novel prime/boost strategy to test the immunogenicity of such phage-displayed peptides and primed mice only once with HIV-C gp160 DNA followed by boosting with mixtures of recombinant phages. Conclusions/Significance: This strategy, which was designed to focus the immune system on a few Env epitopes (immunofocusing), not only induced HIV-C gp160 binding antibodies and cross-clade nAbs, but also linked a conserved HIV Env region for the first time to the induction of nAbs: the C-terminus of gp120. The identification of conserved antigen mimics may lead to novel immunogens capable of inducing broadly reactive nAbs

Pregnant women’s concerns and antenatal care during Covid-19 lockdown of the Danish society

FUNDING: TRYG Foundation and KEU, Region Copenhagen ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: Sinead Shahrzad, a Danish-English bilingual did the proofreading of the translation of questionnaires into DANISH MEDICAL JOURNAL Dan Med J 2020;67(12):A06200449 6/7 English.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Depression and anxiety symptoms in pregnant women in Denmark during COVID-19

Acknowledgements The authors would like to thank the funders for the financial support. Professor Kaj Sparle Christensen advised regarding interpretation of anxiety symptom scale. Funding This work was supported by TRYGfonden [grant number 125227] and the quality and continuing education committee for general practice in the Capital Region [grant number 19035774].Peer reviewedPostprin

A Pragmatic Machine Learning Approach to Quantify Tumor-Infiltrating Lymphocytes in Whole Slide Images

Increased levels of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) indicate favorable outcomes in many types of cancer. The manual quantification of immune cells is inaccurate and time-consuming for pathologists. Our aim is to leverage a computational solution to automatically quantify TILs in standard diagnostic hematoxylin and eosin-stained sections (H&E slides) from lung cancer patients. Our approach is to transfer an open-source machine learning method for the segmentation and classification of nuclei in H&E slides trained on public data to TIL quantification without manual labeling of the data. Our results show that the resulting TIL quantification correlates to the patient prognosis and compares favorably to the current state-of-the-art method for immune cell detection in non-small cell lung cancer (current standard CD8 cells in DAB-stained TMAs HR 0.34, 95% CI 0.17–0.68 vs. TILs in HE WSIs: HoVer-Net PanNuke Aug Model HR 0.30, 95% CI 0.15–0.60 and HoVer-Net MoNuSAC Aug model HR 0.27, 95% CI 0.14–0.53). Our approach bridges the gap between machine learning research, translational clinical research and clinical implementation. However, further validation is warranted before implementation in a clinical setting