Sistemele agrosilvice pot fi practici obţinute în România?

Agroforestry system seams to be necessary in Romania because the climate has undergone important changes and some of ecosystems are degradated; agroforestry systems ensuring the long-term enhancement of environmental quality. There are some types of agro-forestry that can be applied in Romania, some have been applied to certain extent, others can be implemented for the first time. In the first category enters forestry shelterbelts for crops protection, pastures with trees, forestry shelterbelts for the protection of watercourses, the seconds includes other types of agroforestry systems among which it is presenteda case study”agroforestry hunting system” which have been developed bysmallholders farmers

Surgical treatment of biliary tract malformations in children

Clinica Chirurgie şi Ortopedie Pediatrică, UMF „Gr.T.Popa”, Departamentul Anatomie Patologică, Spitalul Clinic de Urgenţe pentru Copii “Sfânta Maria”, Iaşi, România, Al XII-lea Congres al Asociației Chirurgilor „Nicolae Anestiadi” din Republica Moldova cu participare internațională 23-25 septembrie 2015Rezumat: Tratamentul chirurgical al colestazei neonatale este cel mai bine ilustrat în două condiţii patologice particulare: atrezia de căi biliare şi chistul congenital de coledoc. A trecut aproximativ un secol de la prima tentativă de tratament chirurgical al colestazei la copil. Etiologia şi patologia acestor două condiţii rămân în continuare în mare masură o enigmă. Prima intervenţie chirurgicală specifică dedicată corecţiei atreziei biliare a fost efectuată de Morio Kasai în anul 1959, la Universitatea Sendai. Actualmente, tratamentul chirurgical atât al atreziei, cât şi al chistului congenital de coledoc sunt bine definite: portoenterostomia Kasai, respectiv excizia chistului congenital de coledoc şi refacerea circuitului digestiv prin hepaticoenteroanastomoză pe ansă în Y a la Roux. Din păcate, rezultatele mai puțin favorabile ale portoenterostomiei obligă la transplant hepatic ca ultimă soluţie pentru creşterea supravieţuirii la distanţă a acestor pacienţi. Actuala prezentare este o trecere în revistă a definirii termenilor referitori la obstacolul în scurgerea biliară determinând colestaza, a modalităţilor de diagnostic şi tratament accesibile autorilor, expunerea experienţei personale privind managementul acestor cazuri.Summary: Surgical treatment of neonatal cholestasis is best illustrated in two particular pathologic conditions: biliary atresia and congenital choledochal cyst. Almost a century passed since the first attempts of treating children’s cholestasis were undergone. The ethiology and pathology of these conditions were also poorly understood. The first surgical intervention specifically designed for the correction of biliary atresia was described by Morio Kasai in 1959.In the present time, the surgical treatment of both biliary atresia and congenital choledochal dilatation are well established: Kasai’s portoenterostomy and, accordingly, cyst excision and Roux-en-Y hepaticojejunostomy. Unfortunately, the overall poor results after portoenterostomy make liver transplantation an ultimate and mandatory solution for the long-term survival of the patients. This paper aims to define the terms regarding biliary outflow obstruction causing cholestasis, different diagnostic and therapeutical modalities accesible to the autors, exposing the personal experience in the management of congenital biliary tract malformations

Bioengineered Kidney Tubules Efficiently Clear Uremic Toxins in Experimental Dialysis Conditions

Patients with end-stage kidney disease (ESKD) suffer from high levels of protein-bound uremic toxins (PBUTs) that contribute to various comorbidities. Conventional dialysis methods are ineffective in removing these PBUTs. A potential solution could be offered by a bioartificial kidney (BAK) composed of porous membranes covered by proximal tubule epithelial cells (PTECs) that actively secrete PBUTs. However, BAK development is currently being hampered by a lack of knowledge regarding the cytocompatibility of the dialysis fluid (DF) that comes in contact with the PTECs. Here, we conducted a comprehensive functional assessment of the DF on human conditionally immortalized PTECs (ciPTECs) cultured as monolayers in well plates, on Transwell® inserts, or on hollow fiber membranes (HFMs) that form functional units of a BAK. We evaluated cell viability markers, monolayer integrity, and PBUT clearance. Our results show that exposure to DF did not affect ciPTECs’ viability, membrane integrity, or function. Seven anionic PBUTs were efficiently cleared from the perfusion fluid containing a PBUTs cocktail or uremic plasma, an effect which was enhanced in the presence of albumin. Overall, our findings support that the DF is cytocompatible and does not compromise ciPTECs function, paving the way for further advancements in BAK development and its potential clinical application

Animal Models for Studying Protein-Bound Uremic Toxin Removal—A Systematic Review

Protein-bound uremic toxins (PBUTs) are associated with the progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD) and its associated morbidity and mortality. The conventional dialysis techniques are unable to efficiently remove PBUTs due to their plasma protein binding. Therefore, novel approaches are being developed, but these require validation in animals before clinical trials can begin. We conducted a systematic review to document PBUT concentrations in various models and species. The search strategy returned 1163 results for which abstracts were screened, resulting in 65 full-text papers for data extraction (rats (n = 41), mice (n = 17), dogs (n = 3), cats (n = 4), goats (n = 1), and pigs (n = 1)). We performed descriptive and comparative analyses on indoxyl sulfate (IS) concentrations in rats and mice. The data on large animals and on other PBUTs were too heterogeneous for pooled analysis. Most rodent studies reported mean uremic concentrations of plasma IS close to or within the range of those during kidney failure in humans, with the highest in tubular injury models in rats. Compared to nephron loss models in rats, a greater rise in plasma IS compared to creatinine was found in tubular injury models, suggesting tubular secretion was more affected than glomerular filtration. In summary, tubular injury rat models may be most relevant for the in vivo validation of novel PBUT-lowering strategies for kidney failure in humans

Transplantul hepatic ortotopic de la donator decedat la adult. Experienţa Centrului de Chirurgie Generală şi transplant hepatic Fundeni

Studiul de faţă analizează experienţa Centrului de Chirurgie Generală şi Transplant Hepatic din Institutul Clinic Fundeni în transplantul hepatic ortotopic cu ficat întreg de la donator decedat la adult (THO), din aprilie 2000 până în aprilie 2006. În această perioadă au fost realizate 45 de THO – 20 femei şi 25 de bărbaţi, cu vârste cuprinse între 19-57 de ani (medie de 45 ani).Indicaţiile pentru transplantare au fost: ciroză VHB – 11, ciroză VHB VHD – 6, ciroză VHC – 13 (2 cu hepatocarcinom), ciroză VHB VHC – 2, ciroză VHB VHD etanol – 1, ciroză biliară primitivă – 5, boala Wilson – 2, ciroză toxic-nutriţională – 2, ciroza toxică non-alcoolică – 1, ciroză autoimună – 1, colangită sclerogenă primitivă – 1. Cu trei excepţii, la care s-a folosit tehnica clasică de transplantare, ficatul a fost grefat după tehnica Belghiti. Complicaţiile postoperatorii locale au survenit la 19 bolnavi (42,22%), iar generale la 19 (42,22%); complicaţiile tardive au fost înregistrate la 20 pacienţi (44,44%), iar recidiva bolii la 7 pacienţi (15,55%). Mortalitatea intraoperatorie şi postoperatorie imediată a fost de 6,66% (3 din 45 pacienţi). La peste 30 de zile de la TH, au decedat alţi cinci pacienţi (11,11%). Patru pacienţi (8,88%) au decedat la distanţă de momentul transplantului prin boală venoocluzivă, prin cancer bronho-pulmonar şi prin infarct miocardic -2. Patruzeci si doi de pacienţi au supravieţuit perioadei postoperatorii (93,33%) şi 33 peste un an (73,33%). THO reprezintă metoda principală de transplantare hepatică, cu o morbiditate şi mortalitate acceptabile

Text Mining the History of Medicine

Historical text archives constitute a rich and diverse source of information, which is becoming increasingly readily accessible, due to large-scale digitisation efforts. However, it can be difficult for researchers to explore and search such large volumes of data in an efficient manner. Text mining (TM) methods can help, through their ability to recognise various types of semantic information automatically, e.g., instances of concepts (places, medical conditions, drugs, etc.), synonyms/variant forms of concepts, and relationships holding between concepts (which drugs are used to treat which medical conditions, etc.). TM analysis allows search systems to incorporate functionality such as automatic suggestions of synonyms of user-entered query terms, exploration of different concepts mentioned within search results or isolation of documents in which concepts are related in specific ways. However, applying TM methods to historical text can be challenging, according to differences and evolutions in vocabulary, terminology, language structure and style, compared to more modern text. In this article, we present our efforts to overcome the various challenges faced in the semantic analysis of published historical medical text dating back to the mid 19th century. Firstly, we used evidence from diverse historical medical documents from different periods to develop new resources that provide accounts of the multiple, evolving ways in which concepts, their variants and relationships amongst them may be expressed. These resources were employed to support the development of a modular processing pipeline of TM tools for the robust detection of semantic information in historical medical documents with varying characteristics. We applied the pipeline to two large-scale medical document archives covering wide temporal ranges as the basis for the development of a publicly accessible semantically-oriented search system. The novel resources are available for research purposes, while the processing pipeline and its modules may be used and configured within the Argo TM platform

Co-axial Printing of Convoluted Proximal Tubule for Kidney Disease Modeling

Despite the increasing incidence of kidney-related diseases, we are still far from understanding the underlying mechanisms of these diseases and their progression. This lack of understanding is partly because of a poor replication of the diseasesin vitro,limited to planar culture. Advancing towards three-dimensional models, hereby we propose coaxial printing to obtain microfibers containing a helical hollow microchannel. These recapitulate the architecture of the proximal tubule (PT), an important nephron segment often affected in kidney disorders. A stable gelatin/alginate-based ink was formulated to allow printability while maintaining structural properties. Fine-tuning of the composition, printing temperature and extrusion rate allowed for optimal ink viscosity that led to coiling of the microfiber's inner channel. The printed microfibers exhibited prolonged structural stability (42 days) and cytocompatibility in culture. Healthy conditionally immortalized PT epithelial cells and a knockout cell model for cystinosis (CTNS-/-) were seeded to mimic two genotypes of PT. Upon culturing for 14 days, engineered PT showed homogenous cytoskeleton organization as indicated by staining for filamentous actin, barrier-formation and polarization with apical markerα-tubulin and basolateral marker Na+/K+-ATPase. Cell viability was slightly decreased upon prolonged culturing for 14 days, which was more pronounced inCTNS-/-microfibers. Finally,CTNS-/-cells showed reduced apical transport activity in the microfibers compared to healthy PT epithelial cells when looking at breast cancer resistance protein and multidrug resistance-associated protein 4. Engineered PT incorporated in a custom-designed microfluidic chip allowed to assess leak-tightness of the epithelium, which appeared less tight inCTNS-/-PT compared to healthy PT, in agreement with itsin vivophenotype. While we are still on the verge of patient-oriented medicine, this system holds great promise for further research in establishing advancedin vitrodisease models

Big Data and Causality

The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link.Causality analysis continues to remain one of the fundamental research questions and the ultimate objective for a tremendous amount of scientific studies. In line with the rapid progress of science and technology, the age of big data has significantly influenced the causality analysis on various disciplines especially for the last decade due to the fact that the complexity and difficulty on identifying causality among big data has dramatically increased. Data mining, the process of uncovering hidden information from big data is now an important tool for causality analysis, and has been extensively exploited by scholars around the world. The primary aim of this paper is to provide a concise review of the causality analysis in big data. To this end the paper reviews recent significant applications of data mining techniques in causality analysis covering a substantial quantity of research to date, presented in chronological order with an overview table of data mining applications in causality analysis domain as a reference directory