Chlamydia trachomatis infection in patients selected for HPV detection

Background: The significance of the association between the human papillomavirus (HPV) and other sexually transmitted infections in the development of cervical, penile or anal neoplasias has been investigated, and the more consistent data have pointed to an association with Chlamydia trachomatis. In Portugal, the lack of information on STI precludes any knowledge on this subject. Objective: To determine CT infection in a group of individuals selected for HPV detection in the major Portuguese STD clinic. Methods: This opportunistic screening comprehended 177 outpatients (148 women, 29 men; age: 16-61 years) suspected of HPV infection (warts, abnormal histology) between 2008 and 2010. Demographic and sexual behaviour data and a full medical history were obtained at enrolment. Genital samples (cervical, vulvar, vaginal, penile or anal) were collected from all the subjects. HPV DNA was detected by CLART HPV2 assay, which allowed the detection of 35 genotypes. CT DNA was detected by Cobas 4800. Results and Discussion: Overall, 84.5% of the individuals had at least one of the infections. Evidencing an excellent correlation with clinical signs, HPV infection was detected in 68.2% of the women and in 75.9% of the men, where CT positivity was 10.1% and 13.8%, respectively. Coinfection was observed in 8.9% of the women and in 13.8% of the men. No correlation with HPV or CT genotypes could be established. HPV infection was more frequent in CT negative (87.1%) than in CT positive women (13.8%), and the same was observed for men (81.8% versus 18.2%). Full results will be presented and discussed. Conclusions: No correlation between HPV-CT coinfection, and clinical signs was observed. However, further long-term studies are needed to elucidate the effects of HPV-CT coinfection in the clinical history of the infected patient, which would greatly contribute towards a better management of patients

Rendimento escolar em matemática vs atitudes face à matemática: Fatores de contexto e efeito escola.

Enquadramento Conceptual: A grande importância atribuída às questões relativas à qualidade da educação tem potenciado muita da investigação científica, visando o desenvolvimento de mecanismos de aferição e de estratégias de monitorização dessa qualidade, numa perspetiva de apoio à definição de políticas públicas de educação para a melhoria escolar. Objetivos: O trabalho que se apresenta procura, por um lado, compreender e analisar os efeitos das variáveis de contexto no rendimento escolar dos alunos na disciplina de Matemática e nas suas atitudes face a essa disciplina, por outro lado, perceber se as escolas em estudo, enquanto organizações escolares, se diferenciam entre si nos resultados escolares e nas atitudes dos seus alunos. Metodologia: Neste estudo participaram 444 alunos do 2.º e 3.º Ciclos do Ensino Básico (47.7% do 6º e 52.3% do 9º, com 232 rapazes e 212 raparigas), de 5 Escolas Portuguesas. Resultados Partindo do pressuposto que há fatores extrínsecos e intrínsecos às escolas, deles dependendo em grande medida o valor que cada escola acrescenta aos seus alunos. Com o fim de contribuirmos para o desenho de propostas organizacionais e de intervenção pedagógica conducentes à melhoria do rendimento escolar dos alunos, analisámos num primeiro momento o impacto de fatores de contexto nos resultados escolares e nas atitudes dos alunos em Matemática e, num segundo momento, com base na estrutura hierárquica dos dados e o recurso à análise multinível, apurámos a magnitude do efeito escola. Conclusões: Os resultados das análises já realizadas sugerem a importância da localização geográfico-territorial da escola e da escolaridade da mãe no rendimento académico a matemática e nas atitudes face a esta disciplina, nos 6º e 9º ano de escolaridade

HPV type-specific distribution in a group of women attending at Hospital Fernando Fonseca, Lisbon

Introduction: Genital HPV infection is very frequent. Nevertheless, type-specific distribution can vary greatly in different populations. Aim: To assess the HPV frequency and type-specific distribution in a highly ethnically diverse region and its association with gynecological cytology. Material and Methods: From March to July 2009, 419 LBC samples (ThinPrep) were collected from women 16-79 years old, attending Hospital Fernando Fonseca and associated Primary Health Care Centers. HPV genotyping was performed using CLINICAL ARRAY HPV 2. Statistical analysis was performed (Chi-Square test). Results: Out of 419 women (median age: 41 years), 74.0% were Caucasian and 21.0% African. Overall, 90.2% of the women had a normal cytology, 4.3% had ASCUS, 3.1% LSIL, 1.7% HSIL, and 0.7% had invasive carcinoma. HPV infection was detected in 25.8% of the cases, whereas in 75.0% of women between 20-45 years. HR-HPV genotypes were identified in 57.8% of the infected women. The most frequent HR-HPV types were HPV16 (11.4%), HPV52 (8.5%), HPV31 and 58 (7.2% each). Multiple infections (2-6 genotypes) were observed in 34.2%. HPV58, 16, 31, and 52 (9.5%, 7.4%, 7.4%, 7.4%, respectively) were the most frequent genotypes. HPV DNA was detected in 19.6% of the women with normal cytology, of which 31.0% had multiple infections. In ASCUS, LSIL, HSIL and invasive carcinoma, HPV was detected in 66.7%, 100%, 100%, and 66.7%, respectively. HPV16, 31, 52, 58 and 42 were most frequent among Caucasian and HPV16, 83, 52, 53 and 54 among African women. HPV16 and 18 were found in 4.5% and 1.0% of the women. Infection by multiple HPV was related to lesion grade (p=0.042). Conclusion: Our results are consistent with the data observed in the literature. Our findings can help achieve a better understanding of the wide spectrum of HPV infection and can contribute to a baseline for future assessment of screening and immunization strategies

Capital familiar, rendimento e atitude face a língua portuguesa em alunos do 2º e 3º ciclo do ensino básico

A literatura refere que entre as diferentes funções básicas realizadas pela família, esta tem também o dever de assegurar que os valores da sociedade, as crenças, as atitudes, os conhecimentos, as habilidades serão transmitidos à geração mais nova. As caraterísticas do contexto familiar têm sido consideradas como variáveis com importante influência no rendimento escolar. Assim, o presente trabalho pretende avaliar a relação entre covariáveis do contexto familiar, o rendimento e a atitude face a aprendizagem da Língua Portuguesa dos alunos de 2º e 3º Ciclo do Ensino Básico de escolas portuguesas. Participam no estudo 891 alunos de ambos os sexos, com idades compreendidas entre os 10 e os 18 anos. Para a análise dos dados utilizam-se os resultados das avaliações finais na disciplina de Língua Portuguesa no ano letivo 2011/12 e os dados do Questionário de Variáveis Contextuais e do Questionário de Atitudes Face à Língua Portuguesa. Os resultados preliminares, ainda em estudo, revelam, desde já, a importância de compreendermos as atitudes face a aprendizagem da Língua Portuguesa também como resultado das particularidades do contexto familiar

Epidemiological impact of waning immunization on a vaccinated population

This is an epidemiological SIRV model based study that is de- signed to analyze the impact of vaccination in containing infection spread, in a 4-tiered population compartment comprised of susceptible, infected, recov- ered and vaccinated agents. While many models assume a lifelong protection through vaccination, we focus on the impact of waning immunization due to conversion of vaccinated and recovered agents back to susceptible ones. Two asymptotic states exist, the \disease-free equilibrium" and the \endemic equi- librium" and we express the transitions between these states as function of the vaccination and conversion rates and using the basic reproduction number. We nd that the vaccination of newborns and adults have dierent consequences on controlling an epidemic. Also, a decaying disease protection within the re- covered sub-population is not sucient to trigger an epidemic on the linear level. We perform simulations for a parameter set modelling a disease with waning immunization like pertussis. For a diusively coupled population, a transition to the endemic state can proceed via the propagation of a traveling infection wave, described successfully within a Fisher-Kolmogorov framework

Category Theoretic Analysis of Hierarchical Protein Materials and Social Networks

Materials in biology span all the scales from Angstroms to meters and typically consist of complex hierarchical assemblies of simple building blocks. Here we describe an application of category theory to describe structural and resulting functional properties of biological protein materials by developing so-called ologs. An olog is like a “concept web” or “semantic network” except that it follows a rigorous mathematical formulation based on category theory. This key difference ensures that an olog is unambiguous, highly adaptable to evolution and change, and suitable for sharing concepts with other olog. We consider simple cases of beta-helical and amyloid-like protein filaments subjected to axial extension and develop an olog representation of their structural and resulting mechanical properties. We also construct a representation of a social network in which people send text-messages to their nearest neighbors and act as a team to perform a task. We show that the olog for the protein and the olog for the social network feature identical category-theoretic representations, and we proceed to precisely explicate the analogy or isomorphism between them. The examples presented here demonstrate that the intrinsic nature of a complex system, which in particular includes a precise relationship between structure and function at different hierarchical levels, can be effectively represented by an olog. This, in turn, allows for comparative studies between disparate materials or fields of application, and results in novel approaches to derive functionality in the design of de novo hierarchical systems. We discuss opportunities and challenges associated with the description of complex biological materials by using ologs as a powerful tool for analysis and design in the context of materiomics, and we present the potential impact of this approach for engineering, life sciences, and medicine.Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers (N000141010562)United States. Army Research Office. Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative (W911NF0910541)United States. Office of Naval Research (grant N000141010841)Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of MathematicsStudienstiftung des deutschen VolkesClark BarwickJacob Luri