A New Southern North Atlantic Isochron Map: Insights Into the Drift of the Iberian Plate Since the Late Cretaceous

This paper presents a new southern North Atlantic plate model from Late Cretaceous to present, with the aim of constraining the kinematics of the Iberian plate during the last 83.5 Myr. This model is presented along with a detailed isochron map generated through the analysis of 3 aeromagnetic tracks and ~400 ship tracks from the National Centers for Environmental Information database. We present a new technique to obtain well‐constrained estimates of the Iberia‐North America plate motions from magnetic anomalies, overcoming the scarcity of large‐offset fracture zones and transform faults. We build an integrated kinematic model for NW Africa, Morocco, Iberia, Europe, and North America, which shows that the deformation is partitioned between Pyrenees and Betic‐Rif orogenic domain during the Late Cretaceous‐Oligocene time interval. In the Eastern Betics domain, the calculated amount of NW Africa‐Iberia convergence is ~80 km between 83.5 and 34 Ma, followed by ~150 km since the Oligocene. The motion of Iberia relative to Europe in the Central Pyrenees is characterized by overall NE directed transpressional motion during the Campanian and the Paleocene, followed by NW directed transpressional movement until the Lutetian and overall NNW directed convergence from Bartonian to Chattian. This motion occurs along the axis of the Bay of Biscay from the Santonian–Campanian boundary to the middle Priabonian, subsequently jumping to King's Trough at Anomaly 17 (36.62 Ma)

Emergency hospital services utilization in Lleida (Spain): A cross-sectional study of immigrant and Spanish-born populations

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The use of emergency hospital services (EHS) has increased steadily in Spain in the last decade while the number of immigrants has increased dramatically. Studies show that immigrants use EHS differently than native-born individuals, and this work investigates demographics, diagnoses and utilization rates of EHS in Lleida (Spain).</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Cross-sectional study of all the 96,916 EHS visits by patients 15 to 64 years old, attended during the years 2004 and 2005 in a public teaching hospital. Demographic data, diagnoses of the EHS visits, frequency of hospital admissions, mortality and diagnoses at hospital discharge were obtained. Utilization rates were estimated by group of origin. Poisson regression was used to estimate the rate ratios of being visited in the EHS with respect to the Spanish-born population.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Immigrants from low-income countries use EHS services more than the Spanish-born population. Differences in utilization patterns are particularly marked for Maghrebi men and women and sub-Saharan women. Immigrant males are at lower risk of being admitted to the hospital, as compared with Spanish-born males. On the other hand, immigrant women are at higher risk of being admitted. After excluding the visits with gynecologic and obstetric diagnoses, women from sub-Saharan Africa and the Maghreb are still at a higher risk of being admitted than their Spanish-born counterparts.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>In Lleida (Spain), immigrants use more EHS than the Spanish born population. Future research should indicate whether the same pattern is found in other areas of Spain and whether EHS use is attributable to health needs, barriers to access to the primary care services or similarities in the way immigrants access health care in their countries of origin.</p

Detección y seguimiento de los efectos adversos neuropsiquiátricos en pacientes con hepatitis C crónica en tratamiento con peginterferón alfa-2 y ribavirina

La hepatitis C crónica (HCC) es un problema de salud pública de primera magnitud por sus consecuencias a medio y largo plazo en los pacientes afectados así como el riesgo de transmisión. El tratamiento del virus de la hepatitis C (VHC) es curativo, fundamental para evitar el avance de la enfermedad. Hasta el año 2014, las opciones terapéuticas disponibles se basaban en el tratamiento con peginterferón alfa-2 (PEGIFN) y ribavirina (RBV), a pesar de que ni su efectividad ni su seguridad fuesen las óptimas. Actualmente, se dispone de varios regímenes libres de interferón (IFN), de elevada eficacia y tolerancia adecuada, que suponen un gran impacto económico en el sistema sanitario. La Guía de Práctica Clínica de la European Association for the Study of the Liver (EASL) publicada en el 2015 incluye todavía tratamientos basados en IFN. 2 El objetivo principal del tratamiento de la HCC es la curación de la infección por el VHC con el fin de evitar las complicaciones hepáticas y extrahepáticas derivadas de la infección, incluida la necroinflamación hepática, la fibrogénesis, la cirrosis, las descompensaciones hepáticas, el CHC, las manifestaciones extrahepáticas graves y la muerte. La finalidad del tratamiento antiviral es la obtención de la RVS, definida actualmente como el ARN-VHC indetectable a las 12 o 24 semanas después de la finalización del tratamiento antiviral, valorada mediante un método molecular sensible con un límite de detección ≤15 UI/ml. Tanto la RVS a las 12, como las 24 semanas, ha sido aceptada como la meta del tratamiento por las agencias reguladoras europeas y de EUA, debido a que su concordancia es del 99%. En estudios de seguimiento a largo plazo se ha establecido que la RVS supone una curación definitiva de la infección por el VHC en más del 99% de los casos. Hasta la comercialización de los medicamentos AAD de primera generación en el 2011, la RVS se definía como el ARN-VHC indetectable, considerado como un nivel <50 UI/ml, después de 24 semanas de la suspensión del tratamiento de la hepatitis C.Tesis Univ. Granada. Departamento en Biología Molecular y Bioquímica I

Evidence for mantle heterogeneities in the westernmost Mediterranean from a statistical approach to volcanic petrology

The geological evolution of the westernmost Mediterranean region is characterised by widespread volcanic activity, with subduction (orogenic) or intraplate (anorogenic) geochemical imprints. Major, trace elements and isotopic ratios of 283 orogenic and 310 anorogenic volcanic samples from the western and central Mediterranean areas were merged in a single database that was processed using a statistical approach. Factor analysis, performed using the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) method, reduced the original 36 geochemical parameters that were expressed as oxides, elements or isotopic ratios to seven factors that account for ~. 84% of the variance. Combining these factors in binary diagrams clearly separates the anorogenic and orogenic fields. Anorogenic samples usually fall into a narrow compositional range, while orogenic rocks are characterised by greater variability and by alignment along different trends. These different trends are a result of large heterogeneities of the lithospheric mantle beneath the Mediterranean area because of extensive recycling of geochemically different lithologies, at least since Palaeozoic times. The results support the requirement for different mantle reservoirs in the origin of the Mediterranean volcanism. We find that the double subduction polarity model, recently proposed for the westernmost Mediterranean area, is compatible with the volcanic petrology of the last 30 My

New insights into the crust and lithospheric mantle structure of Africa from elevation, geoid, and thermal analysis

We present new crust and lithosphere thickness maps of the African mainland based on integrated modeling of elevation and geoid data and thermal analysis. The approach assumes local isostasy, thermal steady state, and linear density increase with depth in the crust and temperature-dependent density in the lithospheric mantle. Results are constrained by a new comprehensive compilation of seismic Moho depth data consisting of 551 data points and by published tomography models relative to LAB depth. The crustal thickness map shows a N-S bimodal distribution with higher thickness values in the cratonic domains of southern Africa (38–44 km) relative to those beneath northern Africa (33–39 km). The most striking result is the crustal thinning (28–30 km thickness) imaged along the Mesozoic West and Central African Rift Systems. Our crustal model shows noticeable differences compared to previous models. After excluding the Afar plume region, where the modeling assumptions are not fulfilled, our model better fits the available seismic data (76.3% fitting; root mean square error = 4.3 km). The LAB depth map shows large spatial variability (90 to 230 km), with deeper LAB related to cratonic domains and shallower LAB related to Mesozoic and Cenozoic rifting domains, in agreement with tomography models. Though crustal and lithosphere thickness maps show similar regional patterns, major differences are found in the Atlas Mountains, the West African Rift System, and the intracratonic basins. The effects of lateral variations in crustal density as well as the nonisostatic contribution to elevation in the Afar plume region, which we estimate to be ~1.8 km, are also discussed

Crustal structure beneath the Rif Cordillera, North Morocco, from the RIFSIS wide-angle reflection seismic experiment

The different geodynamic models proposed since the late 1990s to account for the complex evolution of the Gibraltar Arc System lack definite constraints on the crustal structure of the Rif orogen. Here we present the first well-resolved P-wave velocity crustal models of the Rif Cordillera and its southern continuation toward the Atlas made using controlled-source seismic data. Two 300+ km-long wide-angle reflection profiles crossed the Rif along NS and EW trends. The profiles recorded simultaneously five land explosions of 1Tn each using ~850 high frequency seismometers. The crustal structure revealed from 2-D forward modeling delineates a complex, laterally varying crustal structure below the Rif domains. The most surprising feature, seen on both profiles, is a ∼50 km deep crustal root localized beneath the External Rif. To the east, the crust thins rapidly by 20 km across the Nekkor fault, indicating that the fault is a crustal scale feature. On the NS profile the crust thins more gradually to 40 km thickness beneath Middle Atlas and 42 km beneath the Betics. These new seismic results are in overall agreement with regional trends of Bouguer gravity and are consistent with recent receiver function estimates of crustal thickness. The complex crustal structure of the Rif orogen in the Gibraltar Arc is a consequence of the Miocene collision between the Iberian and African plates. Both the abrupt change in crustal thickness at the Nekkor fault and the unexpectedly deep Rif crustal root can be attributed to interaction of the subducting Alboran slab with the North African passive margin at late Oligocene-early Miocene times

Gene sequence, developmental expression, and protein phosphorylation of RAB-17 in maize

The ABA-induced MA12 cDNA from maize, which encodes a set of highly phosphorylated embryo proteins, was used to isolate the corresponding genomic clone. This gene, called RAB-17 (responsive to ABA), encodes a basic, glycine-rich protein (mol. wt. 17 164) containing a cluster of 8 serine residues, seven of them contiguous. It is a homologue of the rice RAB-21 gene (Mundy J, Chua NH, EMBO J 7; 2279–2286, 1988). Phosphoamino acid analysis of the isolated protein indicates that only the serine residues are phosphorylated and a putative casein-type kinase phosphorylatable sequence was identified in the protein. The pattern of expression and in vivo phosphorylation of the RAB-17 protein was studied during maize embryo germination and in calli of both meristematic or embryonic origin. ABA treatment induced the synthesis of RAB-17 mRNA and protein in calli, however, the RAB-17 proteins were found to be highly phosphorylated only in embryos.This work was supported by grants BAP 0527 from EC, BI088-0162 from C.I.C.Y.T. and AR88-228 from C.I.R.I.T.Peer reviewe

Updated Bouguer anomalies of the Iberian Peninsula: a new perspective to interpret the regional geology

<p>Bouguer anomaly maps are powerful cartographic tools used mainly by geoscientists and natural resources' companies (oil, mining, etc.) since they reflect rock density distribution at different depths, allowing the identification of different tectonic features. At upper crustal levels, Bouguer anomaly maps can help, for instance, in characterizing possible ore deposits, ground water reservoirs, petroleum resources, CO₂ storage sites and sedimentary basins; at deeper crustal levels they can help to further refine seismic velocity models or other integrated geophysical models and thus help in deciphering the lateral density variations within the crust and the geometry of the base of the crust. This new Bouguer anomaly map at a 1:1,500,000 scale is based on the compilation of 210,283 gravity stations covering the Iberian Peninsula (c. 583,254 km²). The new map upgrades previous maps in two ways: (1) it is built up from a database with a 15% more spatial coverage than previous compilations and (2) it is freely available. This map show shorter wavelengths than previous published maps thus allowing investigation of smaller geological features.</p