Cambios en el perfil bioquímico hepático de alpacas positivas a huevos de Fasciola hepática

The aim of this study was to determine changes in the liver biochemical profile in alpacas with presence of F. hepatica eggs. We used serum and feces samples of 35 male alpaca between 2-5 years old, 18 were positives and 17 were negatives in coproparasitologic analysis for F. hepatica eggs. Differences are showed (p<0.05) in the values of ALT, GGT and direct bilirubin between positives y negatives animals. We concluded that there is relationship between presence of F. hepatica eggs and high levels in the liver biochemical profile, maybe due to alterations in the hepatic parenchyma by chronic infection in alpacas.El objetivo del presente estudio fue determinar cambios en el perfil bioquímico hepático en alpacas con presencia de huevos de F. hepatica en heces. Se utilizaron muestras de suero y heces de 35 alpacas machos de entre 2 y 5 años de edad, de los cuales 18 fueron positivos y 17 negativos al examen coproparasitológico (sedimentación) para identificación de huevos de F. hepática. Se observó diferencia significativa (p<0.05) entre los valores de ALT, GGT y bilirrubina directa entre los animales positivos y negativos. Concluimos que la presencia de huevos de Fasciola hepatica guarda relación con la elevación de algunos parámetros del perfil hepática posiblemente por alguna alteración en el parénquima producto de una infección crónica en alpacas

Estudio ecológico de los pastizales de dehesa en la provincia de Badajoz. Tipificación preliminar de la vegetación empleando el análisis de correspondencias

Se han realizado inventarios de frecuencia de herbáceas {diez cuadros de 20 X 20 cm. en inventario) en 42 pastizales de dehesa de Badajoz y norte de Huelva, correspondientes a los principales tipos litológicos. La vegetación se estudió con el análisis de correspondencias. Se detectan seis tipos principales de pastizal que se han interpretado parcialmente con los datos de suelo y sustrato ahora disponibles. En comunicaciones posteriores se completará el análisis con ayuda de otras medidas ahora en realización

Entrenamiento cognitivo y mejora de la memoria prospectiva en jóvenes con retraso mental leve

Hemos realizado un estudio experimental para analizar la efectividad de un programa de entrenamiento cognitivo en personas con retraso mental leve. El entrenamiento pretende mejorar la ejecución de la memoria intencional o prospectiva por ser este uno de los elementos esenciales en la adaptación a la vida diaria y el mantenimiento de la autonomía personal y social. El estudio contó con 23 participantes de un centro educativo de Portugal. A la mitad se les evaluó su ejecución en memoria prospectiva antes y después de aplicarles un programa de entrenamiento específico de los procesos cognitivo implicados en la memoria prospectiva (procesos de memoria, atención sostenida, ejecutivos, etc.). La otra mitad continuó con sus actividades académicas normales tras la evaluación inicial. Comprobamos en una segunda evaluación seis meses más tarde que el grupo que recibió el entrenamiento cognitivo mejoró significativamente su ejecución en tareas prospectivas basadas en un evento. Hecho que no ocurrió con el grupo de jóvenes del grupo control

Drug-loaded PCL electrospun nanofibers as anti-pancreatic cancer drug delivery systems

Cancer is one of the main causes of death worldwide, being pancreatic cancer the second deadliest cancer in Western countries. Surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy form the basis of pancreatic cancer's current treatment. However, these techniques have several disadvantages, such as surgery complications, chemotherapy systemic side effects and cancer recurrence. Drug delivery systems can reduce side effects, increasing the effectivity of the treatment by a controlled release at the targeted tumor cells. In this context, coaxial electrospun fibers can increase the control on the release profile of the drug. The aim of this study was to encapsulate and release different anticancer drugs (5-Fluorouracil and Methotrexate) from a polymeric fiber mat. Different flows and ratios were used to test their effect on fiber morphology, FTIR spectrum, drug encapsulation and release. Good integration of the anticancer drugs was observed and the use of a desiccator for 24 h showed to be a key step to remove solvent remanence. Moreover, the results of this study demonstrated that the polymeric solution could be used to encapsulate and release different drugs to treat cancers. This makes coaxial electrospinning a promising alternative to deliver complex chemotherapies that involve more than one drug, such as FOLFIRINOX, used in pancreatic cancer treatment

Delineation of intracavitary electrograms for the automatic quantification of decrement-evoked potentials in the coronary sinus with deep-learning techniques

Cardiac arrhythmias cause depolarization waves to conduct unevenly on the myocardial surface, potentially delaying local components with respect to a previous beat when stimulated at faster frequencies. Despite the diagnostic value of localizing the distinct local electrocardiogram (EGM) components for identifying regions with decrement-evoked potentials (DEEPs), current software solutions do not perform automatic signal quantification. Electrophysiologists must manually measure distances on the EGM signals to assess the existence of DEEPs during pacing or extra-stimuli protocols. In this work, we present a deep learning (DL)-based algorithm to identify decrement in atrial components (measured in the coronary sinus) with respect to their ventricular counterparts from EGM signals, for disambiguating between accessory pathways (APs) and atrioventricular re-entrant tachycardias (AVRTs). Several U-Net and W-Net neural networks with different configurations were trained on a private dataset of signals from the coronary sinus (312 EGM recordings from 77 patients who underwent AP or AVRT ablation). A second, separate dataset was annotated for clinical validation, with clinical labels associated to EGM fragments in which decremental conduction was elucidated. To alleviate data scarcity, a synthetic data augmentation method was developed for generating EGM recordings. Moreover, two novel loss functions were developed to minimize false negatives and delineation errors. Finally, the addition of self-attention mechanisms and their effect on model performance was explored. The best performing model was a W-Net model with 6 levels, optimized solely with the Dice loss. The model obtained precisions of 91.28%, 77.78% and of 100.0%, and recalls of 94.86%, 95.25% and 100.0% for localizing local field, far field activations, and extra-stimuli, respectively. The clinical validation model demonstrated good overall agreement with respect to the evaluation of decremental properties. When compared to the criteria of electrophysiologists, the automatic exclusion step reached a sensitivity of 87.06% and a specificity of 97.03%. Out of the non-excluded signals, a sensitivity of 96.77% and a specificity of 95.24% was obtained for classifying them into decremental and non-decremental potentials. Current results show great promise while being, to the best of our knowledge, the first tool in the literature allowing the delineation of all local components present in an EGM recording. This is of capital importance at advancing processing for cardiac electrophysiological procedures and reducing intervention times, as many diagnosis procedures are performed by comparing segments or late potentials in subsequent cardiac cycles

Diapause as escape strategy to exposure to toxicants: response of Brachionus calyciforus to arsenic

Invertebrate organisms commonly respond to environmental fluctuation by entering diapause. Production of diapause in monogonont rotifers involves a previous switch from asexual to partial sexual reproduction. Although zooplankton have been used in ecotoxicological assays, often their true vulnerability to toxicants is underestimated by not incorporating the sexual phase. We experimentally analyzed traits involved in sexual reproduction and diapause in the cyclically parthenogenetic freshwater rotifer, Brachionus calyciflorus, exposed to arsenic, a metalloid naturally found in high concentrations in desert zones, focusing on the effectiveness of diapause as an escape response in the face of an adverse condition. Addition of sublethal concentrations of arsenic modified the pattern of diapause observed in the rotifer: investment in diapause with arsenic addition peaked earlier and higher than in non-toxicant conditions, which suggests that sexual investment could be enhanced in highly stressed environmental conditions by increased responsiveness to stimulation. Nevertheless, eggs produced in large amount with arsenic, were mostly low quality, and healthy-looking eggs had lower hatching success, therefore it is unclear whether this pattern is optimum in an environment with arsenic, or if rather arsenic presence in water bodies disturbs the optimal allocation of offspring entering diapause. We observed high accumulation of arsenic in organisms exposed to constant concentration after several generations, which suggests that arsenic may be accumulated transgenerationally. The sexual phase in rotifers may be more sensitive to environmental conditions than the asexual one, therefore diapause attributes should be considered in ecotoxicological assessment because of its ecological and evolutionary implications on lakes biodiversity

The SuperCam Instrument Suite on the Mars 2020 Rover: Science Objectives and Mast-Unit Description

On the NASA 2020 rover mission to Jezero crater, the remote determination of the texture, mineralogy and chemistry of rocks is essential to quickly and thoroughly characterize an area and to optimize the selection of samples for return to Earth. As part of the Perseverance payload, SuperCam is a suite of five techniques that provide critical and complementary observations via Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS), Time-Resolved Raman and Luminescence (TRR/L), visible and near-infrared spectroscopy (VISIR), high-resolution color imaging (RMI), and acoustic recording (MIC). SuperCam operates at remote distances, primarily 2-7 m, while providing data at sub-mm to mm scales. We report on SuperCam's science objectives in the context of the Mars 2020 mission goals and ways the different techniques can address these questions. The instrument is made up of three separate subsystems: the Mast Unit is designed and built in France; the Body Unit is provided by the United States; the calibration target holder is contributed by Spain, and the targets themselves by the entire science team. This publication focuses on the design, development, and tests of the Mast Unit; companion papers describe the other units. The goal of this work is to provide an understanding of the technical choices made, the constraints that were imposed, and ultimately the validated performance of the flight model as it leaves Earth, and it will serve as the foundation for Mars operations and future processing of the data.In France was provided by the Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES). Human resources were provided in part by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and universities. Funding was provided in the US by NASA's Mars Exploration Program. Some funding of data analyses at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) was provided by laboratory-directed research and development funds