Existe convergência espacial da produtividade agrícola no Brasil?

This work analyzes the convergence of land productivity for Brazilian regions from 1991 to 2003. It evaluates if there is or not convergence of the agricultural productivity, controlling explicitly for spatial effects. To do so, an exploratory spatial data analysis was previously implemented and the presence of spatial autocorrelation for the land productivity was detected. In addition, spatial econometric models were developed for the convergence analysis.convergence, land productivity, spatial econometrics, spatial autocorrelation., Agribusiness, R12, C31, Q10.,

Structural shifts of aldehyde dehydrogenase enzymes were instrumental for the early evolution of retinoiddependent axial patterning in metazoans

Aldehyde dehydrogenases (ALDHs) catabolize toxic aldehydes and process the vitamin A-derived retinaldehyde into retinoic acid (RA), a small diffusible molecule and a pivotal chordate morphogen. In this study, we combine phylogenetic, structural, genomic, and developmental gene expression analyses to examine the evolutionary origins of ALDH substrate preference. Structural modeling reveals that processing of small aldehydes, such as acetaldehyde, by ALDH2, versus large aldehydes, including retinaldehyde, by ALDH1A is associated with small versus large substrate entry channels (SECs), respectively. Moreover, we show that metazoan ALDH1s and ALDH2s are members of a single ALDH1/2 clade and that during evolution, eukaryote ALDH1/2s often switched between large and small SECs after gene duplication, transforming constricted channels into wide opened ones and vice versa. Ancestral sequence reconstructions suggest that during the evolutionary emergence of RA signaling, the ancestral, narrow-channeled metazoan ALDH1/2 gave rise to large ALDH1 channels capable of accommodating bulky aldehydes, such as retinaldehyde, supporting the view that retinoid-dependent signaling arose from ancestral cellular detoxification mechanisms. Our analyses also indicate that, on a more restricted evolutionary scale, ALDH1 duplicates from invertebrate chordates (amphioxus and ascidian tunicates) underwent switches to smaller and narrower SECs. When combined with alterations in gene expression, these switches led to neofunctionalization from ALDH1-like roles in embryonic patterning to systemic, ALDH2-like roles, suggesting functional shifts from signaling to detoxification

Tuberculose miliar e febre Q em doente imunocompetente

Resumo: A tuberculose miliar é a forma de doença progressiva resultante da disseminação hematogénea maciça do Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MT). Afecta imunodeprimidos e idosos e tem manifestações clínicas insidiosas e inespecíficas. O caso clínico descrito refere-se a um homem adulto, sem imunodeficiência, com infecção simultânea por Coxiella burnetti e MT.A raridade desta associação e a sua forma de apresentação sublinham a necessidade de alto grau de suspeição clínica para a formulação dos diagnósticos, sendo este o segundo caso descrito na literatura. Abstract: Miliary tuberculosis is a progressive disease resulting from the massive hematogeneous dissemination of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Immunocompromised and elderly patients are the most affected. A case of an immunocompetent 45 year old man, with miliary tuberculosis and a simultaneous infection by Coxiella burnetti is presented.The clinical presentation demands a high awareness for the presence of tuberculosis. The rarity of this association, only one case reported in literature, appears to be a fortuity coincidence. Palavras-chave: Tuberculose miliar, febre Q, tratamento, Key-words: Miliary tuberculosis, Q fever, treatmen