Sex differences and correlates of poor glycaemic control in type 2 diabetes: a cross-sectional study in Brazil and Venezuela.

OBJECTIVE: Examine whether glycaemic control varies according to sex and whether the latter plays a role in modifying factors associated with inadequate glycaemic control in patients with type 2 diabetes (T2D) in Brazil and Venezuela. DESIGN, SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: This was a cross-sectional, nationwide survey conducted in Brazil and Venezuela from February 2006 to June 2007 to obtain information about glycaemic control and its determinants in patients with diabetes mellitus attending outpatient clinics. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Haemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) level was measured by liquid chromatography, and patients with HbA1c ≥7.0% (53 mmol/mol) were considered to have inadequate glycaemic control. The association of selected variables with glycaemic control was analysed by multivariate linear regression, using HbA1c as the dependent variable. RESULTS: A total of 9418 patients with T2D were enrolled in Brazil (n=5692) and in Venezuela (n=3726). They included 6214 (66%) women and 3204 (34%) men. On average, HbA1c levels in women were 0.13 (95% CI 0.03 to 0.24; p=0.015) higher than in men, after adjusting for age, marital status, education, race, country, body mass index, duration of disease, complications, type of healthcare, adherence to diet, adherence to treatment and previous measurement of HbA1c. Sex modified the effect of some factors associated with glycaemic control in patients with T2D in our study, but had no noteworthy effect in others. CONCLUSIONS: Women with T2D had worse glycaemic control than men. Possible causes for poorer glycaemic control in women compared with men include differences in glucose homeostasis, treatment response and psychological factors. In addition, sex modified factors associated with glycaemic control, suggesting the need to develop specific treatment guidelines for men and women

Neural Connectivity with Hidden Gaussian Graphical State-Model

The noninvasive procedures for neural connectivity are under questioning. Theoretical models sustain that the electromagnetic field registered at external sensors is elicited by currents at neural space. Nevertheless, what we observe at the sensor space is a superposition of projected fields, from the whole gray-matter. This is the reason for a major pitfall of noninvasive Electrophysiology methods: distorted reconstruction of neural activity and its connectivity or leakage. It has been proven that current methods produce incorrect connectomes. Somewhat related to the incorrect connectivity modelling, they disregard either Systems Theory and Bayesian Information Theory. We introduce a new formalism that attains for it, Hidden Gaussian Graphical State-Model (HIGGS). A neural Gaussian Graphical Model (GGM) hidden by the observation equation of Magneto-encephalographic (MEEG) signals. HIGGS is equivalent to a frequency domain Linear State Space Model (LSSM) but with sparse connectivity prior. The mathematical contribution here is the theory for high-dimensional and frequency-domain HIGGS solvers. We demonstrate that HIGGS can attenuate the leakage effect in the most critical case: the distortion EEG signal due to head volume conduction heterogeneities. Its application in EEG is illustrated with retrieved connectivity patterns from human Steady State Visual Evoked Potentials (SSVEP). We provide for the first time confirmatory evidence for noninvasive procedures of neural connectivity: concurrent EEG and Electrocorticography (ECoG) recordings on monkey. Open source packages are freely available online, to reproduce the results presented in this paper and to analyze external MEEG databases

Linking nematode communities and soil health under climate change

Soil health is intimately intertwined with ecosystem services. Climate change negatively impacts ecosystem functioning, by altering carbon and nitrogen biogeochemical cycles and shifting nutrient bioavailability, thus hampering food production and exacerbating biodiversity loss. Soil ecosystem services are provided by belowground biota, and as the most abundant metazoans on Earth, nematodes are key elements of soil food webs and reliable bioindicators of soil health. Here, we carry out a literature review from 2019, the year that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published a report relating and expressing serious concerns on the effects of climate change on the land degradation and sustainability of terrestrial ecosystems. We focus on documenting and discussing the composition of nematode communities contributing to improving soil health, and soil management practices to promote their presence and limit the effects of climate change on soils. By recognizing beneficial nematodes as plant-promoting agents, we could harness their potential to our benefit, catalyze decomposition services, improve plant performance, and increase carbon sequestration. This way, we will contribute to soil health and a well-balanced and well-managed system, making it possible to increase productivity, guarantee food security, and reduce the yield gap, with a limited human footprint on the environment.D.P. is supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, FCT/MCTES), through grant 2021.08030.BD. At CBMA, this work was supported by the “Contrato-Programa” UIDB/04050/2020 funded by national funds through the FCT I.P

Ausência de transmissão vertical do HTLV-I em crianças não amamentadas

The most frequent pathway of vertical transmission of HTLV-I is breast-feeding, however bottle fed children may also become infected in a frequency varying from 4 to 14%. In these children the most probable routes of infection are transplacental or contamination in the birth canal. Forty-one bottle-fed children of HTLV-I seropositive mothers in ages varying from three to 39 months (average age of 11 months) were submitted to nested polymerase chain reaction analysis (pol and tax genes). 81.5% of the children were born by an elective cesarean section. No case of infection was detected. The absence of HTLV-I infection in these cases indicates that transmission by transplacental route may be very infrequent.A amamentação é o meio mais freqüente de transmissão vertical do HTLV-I. No entanto, crianças não amamentadas mostram-se infectadas em freqüências que variam de 4 a 14%. Nestes casos, os meios mais prováveis de infecção devem ser através da placenta ou por contaminação no canal de parto. Quarenta e um filhos de portadoras do HTLV-I aleitados artificialmente foram submetidos a pesquisa do vírus pela reação em cadeia da polimerase. 81,5% destas crianças nasceram através de cesária eletiva. Nenhum caso de infecção pelo HTLV-I foi detectado. Este fato indica que a infecção por via transplacentária é pouco freqüente e que é provável que o parto artificial tenha contribuído para a ausência de transmissão do vírus

STUDIES OF SIMULATIONS OF TWO-PHASE WATER-AIR FLOWS USING ANSYS CFX.

Normally in all simulations of flows in computational fluid dynamics, CFD, it is common to use characteristic planes to visualize the profiles of the parameters of interest, mainly in 3D simulations. The present work proposes a standard form of visualization that shows, mainly in two-phase flows, in a more realistic way, the dynamics of the development of the phase flow. This visualization is present within the CFX program in the post-processing module, in the option of representing volumes using sub option, isovolumes. Through this representation, the program highlights the volumes of the finite element mesh corresponding to the selected values of the parameter to be analyzed such as pressure, velocity, volumetric fraction, etc. By means of the volume-isovolume representation, a well representative effect of the current flow pattern is obtained, especially when the volumetric fraction of the air or the gas phase of the flow is emphasized. This form of visualization is being applied to the study of inclined two-phase flows, which will be tested in a new experiment currently under construction at the Laboratory of Experimental Thermal-Hydraulics – LTE of the Institute of Nuclear Engineering - IEN in Rio de Janeiro

Studies on enantioselective biodegradation of fluoxetine

Fluoxetine (FLX) is a chiral fluorinated pharmaceutical indicated mainly for treatment of depression and is one of the most dispensed drugs in the world. There is a clear evidence of environmental contamination with this drug. Granular sludge sequencing batch reactors (SBR) constitute a promising technology for the treatment of effluents containing micropollutants. In this study, a SBR was operated in order to assess its performance when treating a synthetic wastewater containing racemic FLX (rac-FLX), under continuous and intermittent feeding of the compound. The concentration of FLX enantiomers was followed using an enantioselective HPLC method. A removal of 70% of the total supplied FLX was observed in the first continuous feeding period. However, the subsequent feeding periods revealed a significant decrease in the FLX removal; FLX liberation occurred during periods when no compound was supplied. This can be probably explained by desorption of FLX previously adsorbed to the granules. No intermediate metabolites or fluoride release were detected, corroborating the hypothesis that adsorption of FLX to the aerobic granules occurred. Moreover, the absence of enantioselectivity in the decrease of FLX enantiomers concentration is also an indicator of an abiotic mechanism. In face of the incapacity of the aerobic granules to biodegrade FLX, the ability of Labrys portucalensis F11, a previously isolated microbial strain with the capacity to degrade a range of fluorinated aromatic compounds, to biodegrade this compound was investigated. In this study, the enantioselective biodegradation of rac-FLX and of its enantiomers was assessed. The results obtained revealed that this strain is able to degrade both enantiomers of FLX, when supplemented as a racemic mixture, as well as when supplemented as a single enantiomers. Preferential degradation of the (R)-enantiomer was observed. This feature makes L. portucalensis F11 a potential candidate for devising biodegradation technologies able to deal with contamination by this pharmaceutical. Acknowledgements: I.S. Moreira, A.R. Ribeiro and C.L. Amorim wish to acknowledge a research grant from Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal (Ref. SFRH/BPD/87251/2012, SFRH/BD/64999/2009 and SFRH/BD/47109/2008 , respectively) and Fundo Social Europeu (Programa Operacional Potencial Humano (POPH), Quadro de Referência Estratégico Nacional (QREN)). This work was supported by FCT through the projects PTDC/EBB-EBI/111699/2009, CEQUIMED-Pest-OE/SAU/UI4040/2011 and PEst-OE/EQB/LA0016/2011

Pittosporum Undulatum and Hedychium Gardnerianum: nutritive value and secondary metabolites on cattle reproductive performances

Hedychium gardnerianum (HG) and Pittospporum undulatum (PU) are invasive plants all over the world, being in the Azores supplied to cattle on periods of shortage food. As these plants produce secondary metabolites, including a diverse range of phytochemicals compounds, the aim of the presente study is to identify how these metabolites can be related to animal’s reproductive performances. For such purpose, plants were harvested on winter, compounds extracted by method of decoction and analysed by combination of liquid chromatography and mass spectrometry as well as highperformance liquid chromatography. For nutritive evaluations, Van Soest and Weende methodologies were used. In HG quercetin-3, 4'-di-O-betaglucopyranoside, myricetin rhamnoside, quercetin rhamnoside, and gibberellin A1 and A8 were identified, while for PU were found cafeic acid derivatives, including dicaffeoylquinic acid and caffeoylquinic acid. In nutritional terms, these plants can be considered as poor, presenting percentages of dry matter (DM%) of 16.34% and 40.39%, respectively for HG and PU. Values for ash 10.4%, crude protein (CP) 7.75%, neutral detergent fiber (NDF) 64.5, acid detergent fiber (ADF) 34.69%, acid detergent lignin (ADL) 3.47% and ether extract (EE) 2.03% were found for HG. For PU values were ash 6.64%, CP 6.11%, NDF 43.84%, acid ADF 35.57%, ADL 3.56% and EE 2.71%. This study clearly indicated that, besides their low nutritive values, these plants can be used to feed ruminants, especially when pasture lacks. Nevertheless, as some compounds, namely the caffeoylquinic and dicaffeoylquinic acids, are known to be associated to physiological reproductive mechanisms, one could speculate that these compounds can be directly or indirectly associated to reproductive performances in bovine fed with these plants

Maize open-pollinated populations physiological improvement: validating tools for drought response participatory selection

Participatory selection—exploiting specific adaptation traits to target environments—helps to guarantees yield stability in a changing climate, in particular under low-input or organic production. The purpose of the present study was to identify reliable, low-cost, fast and easy-to-use tools to complement traditional selection for an e ective participatory improvement of maize populations for drought resistance/tolerance. The morphological and eco-physiological responses to progressive water deprivation of four maize open-pollinated populations were assessed in both controlled and field conditions. Thermography and Chl a fluorescence, validated by gas exchange indicated that the best performing populations under water-deficit conditions were ‘Fandango’ and to a less extent ‘Pigarro’ (both from participatory breeding). These populations showed high yield potential under optimal and reduced watering. Under moderate water stress, ‘Bilhó’, originating from an altitude of 800 m, is one of the most resilient populations. The experiments under chamber conditions confirmed the existence of genetic variability within ‘Pigarro’ and ‘Fandango’ for drought response relevant for future populations breeding. Based on the easiness to score and population discriminatory power, the performance index (PIABS) emerges as an integrative phenotyping tool to use as a refinement of the common participatory maize selection especially under moderate water deprivationinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio