Detección de deslizamientos de ladera mediante imágenes Landsat TM: el impacto de estos disturbios sobre los bosques subtropicales del noroeste de Argentina

La teledetección aplicada a estudios medioambientales ha demostrado ser de gran utilidad para identificar, cartografiar y analizar la dinámica espacial y temporal de los ecosistemas. En el caso particular de los disturbios naturales como incendios y deslizamientos de ladera, la teledetección ayudará a evaluar su impacto a escala temporal y espacial amplias. Utilizando imágenes Landsat TM de los años 1986 y 2001 detectamos deslizamientos de ladera ocurridos en los bosques subtropicales del noroeste de Argentina, y evaluamos su impacto sobre las comunidades naturales. Mediante clasificaciones supervisadas se diferenciaron los deslizamientos de ladera del resto de las unidades del terreno, con una precisión general de 91% en la imagen de 1986 y 89% en la imagen de 2001. En base a estas clasificaciones determinamos el cambio en el tiempo del área de bosque afectada por los deslizamientos de ladera en el año 1986 y en el año 2001. Los estudios sobre deslizamientos de ladera basados en teledetección pueden aportar nuevos conocimientos en cuanto a la dinámica de este tipo de disturbio, su impacto en los bosques del noroeste argentino y su relación con los cambios climáticos (principalmente aumento de precipitaciones) registrados para la zona.Remote sensing technics applied to environmental studies has been used succesfully to identified, mapping and analizyng the spatial and temporal ecosystem dinamics. In studies of natural disturbances, such fires and landslides, the remote sensing approach can be used to asses the impact of these disturbances at broad spatial and temporal scale. Using 1986 and 2001 Landsat TM images we detected landslides accured on norwest Argentina subtropical forests, and we evaluated their impact on natural communities. Using supervised classifications, we diferenciated landslides from others land cover units with an overall accuracy of 91% in the 1986 image and 89% in the 2001 image. Landslides studies based on remote sensing technics can help to a better understanding of this kind of disturbance, in terms of their impact on the subtropical forests and their relationship with the climate change (specially precipitation) registered in the zone.Fil: Paolini, Leonardo. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Tucumán. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales e Instituto Miguel Lillo. Laboratorio de Investigaciones Ecológicas de las Yungas; ArgentinaFil: Sobrino, Jose Antonio. Universidad de Valencia; EspañaFil: Jimenez Muños, Juan Carlos. Universidad de Valencia; Españ

Evaluation of the MODIS Albedo Product over a Heterogeneous Agricultural Area

In this article, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF)/Albedo product (MCD43) is evaluated over a heterogeneous agricultural area in the framework of the Earth Observation: Optical Data Calibration and Information Extraction (EODIX) project campaign, which was developed in Barrax (Spain) in June 2011. In this method, two models, the RossThick-LiSparse-Reciprocal (RTLSR) (which corresponds to the MODIS BRDF algorithm) and the RossThick-Maignan-LiSparse-Reciprocal (RTLSR-HS), were tested over airborne data by processing high-resolution images acquired with the Airborne Hyperspectral Scanner (AHS) sensor. During the campaign, airborne images were retrieved with different view zenith angles along the principal and orthogonal planes. Comparing the results of applying the models to the airborne data with ground measurements, we obtained a root mean square error (RMSE) of 0.018 with both RTLSR and RTLSR-HS models. The evaluation of the MODIS BRDF/Albedo product (MCD43) was performed by comparing satellite images with AHS estimations. The results reported an RMSE of 0.04 with both models. Additionally, taking advantage of a homogeneous barley pixel, we compared in situ albedo data to satellite albedo data. In this case, the MODIS albedo estimation was (0.210 +/- 0.003), while the in situ measurement was (0.204 +/- 0.003). This result shows good agreement in regard to a homogeneous pixel

Overall and cause-specific mortality in HIV-positive subjects compared to the general population

Poster Session – Abstract P179INTRODUCTION: Emerging non-AIDS related causes of death have been observed in HIV-positive subjects in industrialized countries. We aimed to analyze overall and cause-specific excess of mortality of HIV-positive patients compared to the general population and to assess the effect of prognostic factors. MATERIAL AND METHODS: We used generalized linear models with Poisson error structure to estimate overall and cause-specific excess of mortality in HIV-positive patients from 2004 to 2012 in the cohort of the Spanish Network of HIV Research (CoRIS), compared to Spanish general population and to assess the impact of multiple risk factors. We investigated differences between short-term and long-term risk factors effects on excess of mortality. Multiple Imputation by Chained Equations was used to deal with missing data. RESULTS: In 9162 patients there were 363 deaths, 16.0% were non-AIDS malignancies, 10.5% liver and 0.3% cardiovascular related. Excess mortality was 1.20 deaths per 100 person years (py) for all-cause mortality, 0.16 for liver, 0.10 for non-AIDS malignancies and 0.03 for cardiovascular. Short-term (first-year follow-up) excess Hazard Ratio (eHR) for global mortality for baseline AIDS was 4.27 (95% CI 3.06-6.01) and 1.47 (95% CI 0.95-2.27) for HCV coinfection; long-term (subsequent follow-up) eHR for baseline AIDS was 0.88 (95% CI 0.58-1.35) and 4.48 (95% CI 2.71-7.42) for HCV coinfection. Lower CD4 count and higher viral load at entry, lower education, being male and over 50 years were predictors for overall excess mortality. Excess of liver mortality was higher in patients with CD4 counts at entry below 200 cells compared to those above 350 (eHR: 6.49, 95% CI 1.21-34.84) and in HCV-coinfected patients (eHR: 3.85, 95% CI 0.85- 17.37), although it was borderline significant. Patients over 50 years old (eHR: 5.55, 95%CI 2.4-12.85) and HCV coinfected (eHR: 5.81, 95% CI 2.6-13) showed a higher risk of non-AIDS malignancies mortality excess. Excess of cardiovascular mortality was related with HCV coinfection (eHR: 6.68, 95% CI 1.25-35.73). CONCLUSIONS: Our results show overall, liver, non-AIDS malignancies and cardiovascular excess of mortality associated with being HIV-positive, despite improvements in HIV disease management and antiretroviral therapies. Differential short-term and long-term effect of AIDS before entry and HCV coinfection was found for overall mortality.S

Policy challenges for agroforestry implementation in Europe

Agroforestry (AF) is a sustainable land use practice and system that increases the ecosystem services delivery from agricultural lands compared with treeless systems. Agroforestry can be considered a practice when linked to plot scale (silvoarable, silvopasture, homegarden, woody linear landscape strips, and forest farming), and a system when associated with the global farm scale. The enhancement of the ecosystem services is associated with the use and promotion of the biodiversity caused by the presence of trees that optimizes the use of the resources if adequate species are mixed. Agroforestry can be implemented at temporal and spatial scales. At the temporal scale, the use of woody perennials to increase soil fertility is a traditional technique that improves soil health and reduces the need of using herbicides (e.g., the legume Ulex sown for 10 years in between crop cultivation). Five agroforestry practices can be implemented at the plot level: silvopasture, silvoarable/alley cropping, homegardens/kitchengardens, woody linear landscape strips, and forest farming. A farm including these practices is considered an agroforestry system working at the landscape level when several farms are mixed. In spite of the acknowledgment that AF has at the European level for being included as part of Pillars I and II, the spread of AF is limited across Europe. Four challenges, linked with technical, economic, educational, and policy development, have been identified by the AFINET thematic network that, if addressed, may foster policy adoption across the EU. This article proposes 15 different policy recommendations to overcome them and the need of developing an AF strategy for the EU.We acknowledge funding through Grant 101086563 from the European Commission (Project AF4EU, HEUROPE). This study was supported by National Funds by the FCT—Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology, under the project UIDB/04033/2020. NF-D was funded by the Pilot Program of the University of Santiago de Compostela (USC) for the hiring of distinguished research staff—call 2021, funded under the collaboration agreement between USC and Banco Santander, for the years 2021–2024. JJS-F was supported by the USC and the Spanish Ministry of Universities through the “Convocatoria de Recualificación del Sistema Universitario Español” on its modality “Margarita Salas”; Ministry of Universities - Recovery Transformation and Resilience Plan (funded by the European Union through the NextGenerationEU).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Impact of late presentation of HIV infection on short-, mid- and long-term mortality and causes of death in a multicenter national cohort: 2004–2013

SummaryObjectivesTo analyze the impact of late presentation (LP) on overall mortality and causes of death and describe LP trends and risk factors (2004–2013).MethodsCox models and logistic regression were used to analyze data from a nation-wide cohort in Spain. LP is defined as being diagnosed when CD4 < 350 cells/ml or AIDS.ResultsOf 7165 new HIV diagnoses, 46.9% (CI95%:45.7–48.0) were LP, 240 patients died.First-year mortality was the highest (aHRLP.vs.nLP = 10.3[CI95%:5.5–19.3]); between 1 and 4 years post-diagnosis, aHRLP.vs.nLP = 1.9(1.2–3.0); and >4 years, aHRLP.vs.nLP = 1.5(0.7–3.1).First-year's main cause of death was HIV/AIDS (73%); and malignancies among those surviving >4 years (32%). HIV/AIDS-related deaths were more likely in LP (59.2% vs. 25.0%; p < 0.001). LP declined from 55.9% (2004–05) to 39.4% (2012–13), and reduced in 46.1% in men who have sex with men (MSM) and 37.6% in heterosexual men, but increased in 22.6% in heterosexual women.Factors associated with LP: sex (ORMEN.vs.WOMEN = 1.4[1.2–1.7]); age (OR31–40.vs.<30 = 1.6[1.4–1.8], OR41–50.vs.<30 = 2.2[1.8–2.6], OR>50.vs.<30 = 3.6[2.9–4.4]); behavior (ORInjectedDrugUse.vs.MSM = 2.8[2.0–3.8]; ORHeterosexual.vs.MSM = 2.2[1.7–3.0]); education (ORPrimaryEducation.vs.University = 1.5[1.1–2.0], ORLowerSecondary.vs.University = 1.3[1.1–1.5]); and geographical origin (ORSub-Saharan.vs.Spain = 1.6[1.3–2.0], ORLatin-American.vs.Spain = 1.4[1.2–1.8]).ConclusionsLP is associated with higher mortality, especially short-term- and HIV/AIDS-related mortality. Mid-term-, but not long-term mortality, remained also higher in LP than nLP. LP decreased in MSM and heterosexual men, not in heterosexual women. The groups most affected by LP are low educated, non-Spanish and heterosexual women

Incidence and clearance of anal high-risk human papillomavirus in HIV-positive men who have sex with men: Estimates and risk factors

Background: To estimate incidence and clearance of high-risk human papillomavirus (HR-HPV), and their risk factors, in men who have sex with men (MSM) recently infected by HIV in Spain; 2007-2013. Methods: Multicenter cohort. HR-HPV infection was determined and genotyped with linear array. Two-state Markov models and Poisson regression were used. Results: We analysed 1570 HR-HPV measurements of 612 MSM over 13 608 person-months (p-m) of follow-up. Median (mean) number of measurements was 2 (2.6), median time interval between measurements was 1.1 years (interquartile range: 0.89-1.4). Incidence ranged from 9.0 [95% confidence interval (CI) 6.8-11.8] per 1000 p-m for HPV59 to 15.9 (11.7-21.8) per 1000 p-m for HPV51. HPV16 and HPV18 had slightly above average incidence: 11.9/1000 p-m and 12.8/1000 p-m. HPV16 showed the lowest clearance for both 'prevalent positive' (15.7/1000 p-m; 95% CI 12.0-20.5) and 'incident positive' infections (22.1/1000 p-m; 95% CI 11.8-41.1). More sexual partners increased HR-HPV incidence, although it was not statistically significant. Age had a strong effect on clearance (P-value < 0.001) due to the elevated rate in MSM under age 25; the effect of HIV-RNA viral load was more gradual, with clearance rate decreasing at higher HIV-RNA viral load (P-value 0.008). Conclusion: No large variation in incidence by HR-HPV type was seen. The most common incident types were HPV51, HPV52, HPV31, HPV18 and HPV16. No major variation in clearance by type was observed, with the exception of HPV16 which had the highest persistence and potentially, the strongest oncogenic capacity. Those aged below 25 or with low HIV-RNA- viral load had the highest clearanceThis work was supported by grants from the Fondo de Investigacio´n Sanitaria [PI06/0372, PS09/2181], Red de Investigacio´n en SIDA (RIS) [RD06/006/0026 and RD12/0017/0018 to C.G.] and CIBERESP [group 54A-CB06/02/1009

Vedolizumab and ART in recent HIV-1 infection unveil the role of α4β7 in reservoir size

BACKGROUND. We evaluated the safety and viral rebound, after analytical treatment interruption (ATI), of vedolizumab and ART in recent HIV-1 infection. We used this model to analyze the effect of alpha 4 beta 7 on the HIV-1 reservoir size. METHODS. Participants started ART with monthly vedolizumab infusions, and ATI was performed at week 24. Biopsies were obtained from ileum and cecum at baseline and week 24. Vedolizumab levels, HIV-1 reservoir, flow cytometry, and cell-sorting and antibody competition experiments were assayed. RESULTS. Vedolizumab was safe and well tolerated. No participant achieved undetectable viremia off ART 24 weeks after ATI. Only a modest effect on the time to achieve more than 1,000 HIV-1 RNA copies/mL and the proportion of participants off ART was observed, being higher in the vedolizumab group compared with historical controls. Just before ATI, alpha 4 beta 7 expression was associated with HIV-1 DNA and RNA in peripheral blood and with PD1 and TIGIT levels. Importantly, a complete blocking of alpha 4 beta 7 was observed on peripheral CD4+ T cells but not in gut (ileum and cecum), where alpha 4 beta 7 blockade and vedolizumab levels were inversely associated with HIV-1 DNA. CONCLUSION. Our findings support alpha 4 beta 7 as an important determinant in HIV-1 reservoir size, suggesting the complete alpha 4 beta 7 blockade in tissue as a promising tool for HIV-cure combination strategies. TRIAL REGISTRATION. ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03577782. FUNDING. This work was supported by the Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional, a way to make Europe, research contracts FI17/00186 and FI19/00083 and research projects PI18/01532, PI19/01127, PI22/01796), Conserjer & iacute;a de Econom & iacute;a, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad, Junta de Andaluc & iacute;a (research projects P20/00906), the Red Tem & aacute;tica de Investigaci & oacute;n Cooperativa en SIDA (RD16/0025/0020), and the Spanish National Research Council

Multi-ancestry GWAS reveals excitotoxicity associated with outcome after ischaemic stroke

During the first hours after stroke onset, neurological deficits can be highly unstable: some patients rapidly improve, while others deteriorate. This early neurological instability has a major impact on long-term outcome. Here, we aimed to determine the genetic architecture of early neurological instability measured by the difference between the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) within 6 h of stroke onset and NIHSS at 24 h. A total of 5876 individuals from seven countries (Spain, Finland, Poland, USA, Costa Rica, Mexico and Korea) were studied using a multi-ancestry meta-analyses. We found that 8.7% of NIHSS at 24 h of variance was explained by common genetic variations, and also that early neurological instability has a different genetic architecture from that of stroke risk. Eight loci (1p21.1, 1q42.2, 2p25.1, 2q31.2, 2q33.3, 5q33.2, 7p21.2 and 13q31.1) were genome-wide significant and explained 1.8% of the variability suggesting that additional variants influence early change in neurological deficits. We used functional genomics and bioinformatic annotation to identify the genes driving the association from each locus. Expression quantitative trait loci mapping and summary data-based Mendelian randomization indicate that ADAM23 (log Bayes factor = 5.41) was driving the association for 2q33.3. Gene-based analyses suggested that GRIA1 (log Bayes factor = 5.19), which is predominantly expressed in the brain, is the gene driving the association for the 5q33.2 locus. These analyses also nominated GNPAT (log Bayes factor = 7.64) ABCB5 (log Bayes factor = 5.97) for the 1p21.1 and 7p21.1 loci. Human brain single-nuclei RNA-sequencing indicates that the gene expression of ADAM23 and GRIA1 is enriched in neurons. ADAM23, a presynaptic protein and GRIA1, a protein subunit of the AMPA receptor, are part of a synaptic protein complex that modulates neuronal excitability. These data provide the first genetic evidence in humans that excitotoxicity may contribute to early neurological instability after acute ischaemic stroke. Ibanez et al. perform a multi-ancestry meta-analysis to investigate the genetic architecture of early stroke outcomes. Two of the eight genome-wide significant loci identified-ADAM23 and GRIA1-are involved in synaptic excitability, suggesting that excitotoxicity contributes to neurological instability after ischaemic stroke.Peer reviewe

Risk factors for infections caused by carbapenem-resistant Enterobacterales: an international matched case-control-control study (EURECA)

Cases were patients with complicated urinary tract infection (cUTI), complicated intraabdominal (cIAI), pneumonia or bacteraemia from other sources (BSI-OS) due to CRE; control groups were patients with infection caused by carbapenem-susceptible Enterobacterales (CSE), and by non-infected patients, respectively. Matching criteria included type of infection for CSE group, ward and duration of hospital admission. Conditional logistic regression was used to identify risk factors. Findings Overall, 235 CRE case patients, 235 CSE controls and 705 non-infected controls were included. The CRE infections were cUTI (133, 56.7%), pneumonia (44, 18.7%), cIAI and BSI-OS (29, 12.3% each). Carbapenemase genes were found in 228 isolates: OXA-48/like, 112 (47.6%), KPC, 84 (35.7%), and metallo-beta-lactamases, 44 (18.7%); 13 produced two. The risk factors for CRE infection in both type of controls were (adjusted OR for CSE controls; 95% CI; p value) previous colonisation/infection by CRE (6.94; 2.74-15.53; <0.001), urinary catheter (1.78; 1.03-3.07; 0.038) and exposure to broad spectrum antibiotics, as categorical (2.20; 1.25-3.88; 0.006) and time-dependent (1.04 per day; 1.00-1.07; 0.014); chronic renal failure (2.81; 1.40-5.64; 0.004) and admission from home (0.44; 0.23-0.85; 0.014) were significant only for CSE controls. Subgroup analyses provided similar results. Interpretation The main risk factors for CRE infections in hospitals with high incidence included previous coloni-zation, urinary catheter and exposure to broad spectrum antibiotics

The Eurasian Modern Pollen Database (EMPD), version 2

The Eurasian (nee European) Modern Pollen Database (EMPD) was established in 2013 to provide a public database of high-quality modern pollen surface samples to help support studies of past climate, land cover, and land use using fossil pollen. The EMPD is part of, and complementary to, the European Pollen Database (EPD) which contains data on fossil pollen found in Late Quaternary sedimentary archives throughout the Eurasian region. The EPD is in turn part of the rapidly growing Neotoma database, which is now the primary home for global palaeoecological data. This paper describes version 2 of the EMPD in which the number of samples held in the database has been increased by 60% from 4826 to 8134. Much of the improvement in data coverage has come from northern Asia, and the database has consequently been renamed the Eurasian Modern Pollen Database to reflect this geographical enlargement. The EMPD can be viewed online using a dedicated map-based viewer at https://empd2.github.io and downloaded in a variety of file formats at https://doi.pangaea.de/10.1594/PANGAEA.909130 (Chevalier et al., 2019).Peer reviewe