Equine herpesvirus (EHV)-1 induces respiratory infection, neurological disorders and abortion in horses. Most of the currently available attenuated or inactivated vaccines against this infection are ...administered intramuscularly and only provide partial protection against the respiratory disease. The present study examines the effect of intranasal immunization with purified EHV-1 recombinant glycoprotein D (gD) in BALB/c mice followed by challenge with three different EHV-1 strains during early to mid-pregnancy. The induced viral infection was evaluated by virus isolation, DNA detection by polymerase chain reaction, histopathology and immunohistochemical localization of antigen in the lung, placenta and uterus. Non-immunized mice showed clinical signs of infection, positive virus isolation from lungs and uteri, and abortion induced by one of the virus strains. Endometrial lesions developed in some of these animals that have been described previously only in horses. Immunized mice and their offspring had no viral infection or typical lesions. Intranasally administered gD therefore induced partial or complete protection against three different EHV-1 strains in BALB/c mice.
Ankle-foot-orthoses (AFOs) are frequently prescribed for hemiparetic patients to compensate for the foot drop syndrome. However, there is not a systematic study either on the effectiveness of AFOs in ...the gait recovery process or pointing out the therapeutic differences among the various types of AFOs available on the market.
To perform a comparative evaluation of solid and dynamic Ankle-Foot-Orthoses (AFOs) on hemiparetic patients affected by foot drop syndrome by means of spatio-temporal, kinematic and electromyographic indicators.
Crossover design with randomization for the interventions.
A rehabilitation center for adults with neurologic disorders.
Ten chronic hemiparetic patients with foot drop syndrome met inclusion criteria and volunteered to participate.
Biomechanical gait analysis was carried out on hemiparetic subjects with foot drop syndrome under 3 conditions with randomized sequences: 1) without AFO; 2) wearing a solid AFO; 3) wearing a dynamic AFO. Significant changes in spatio-temporal, kinematic and electromyographic features of gait were investigated.
Gait analysis outcomes showed that there were no significant differences among the solid and the dynamic AFO on the spatio-temporal parameters. Both AFOs led to a reduction of the range of motion of the ankle dorsi-plantar-flexion during stance with respect to the ambulation without AFO. They also had the effect of reducing the asymmetry between the paretic and the contralateral limb in terms of ankle angle at initial contact and hip flexion. The solid AFO generally led to an increase of the co-contraction of the couples of muscles involved in the gait.
The proposed set of indicators showed that the AFOs were capable of limiting the effect of the foot-drop in hemiparetic patients and balancing the two limbs. Main differences between the two orthoses were related to muscular activity, being the level of co-contraction of the two couples of analysed muscles typically lower when the dynamic AFO was worn and closer to a normal pattern.
A more extensive use of the proposed indicators in the clinical practice is expected in order to enable the definition of clinical guidelines for the prescription of the two devices.
•This paper presents evidence of artificial recombination in published mitogenomes of Native American origin.•Some errors stem from preferential scoring of the original Cambridge Reference ...sequence.•Other errors include mismatched control and coding regions, as well as intra- and inter-haplogroup chimaeras.•Given that some errors led to an incorrect definition of haplogroup B2h, a revised definition is proposed here.•Preventive quality control measures are suggested for the field.
Available evidence allows the interpretation that some cases of absence of otherwise expected variation, based on phylogenetic expectations in mitogenomes of Native American origin, are due to artificial recombination rather than to homoplasy, while other more complex scenarios involving combination of original Cambridge Reference Sequence mistakes plus incomplete or incorrect scoring of variation are also showed. Several instances of mismatched control and coding regions as well as partially duplicated HV2 are observed in Peruvians, while intra-haplogroup chimaeras of different D1 subhaplogroups are referred to in Mexican Native Americans. A revised definition for haplogroup B2h is proposed, and preventive quality control measures are suggested.
For identifying mutation(s) that are potentially pathogenic it is essential to determine the entire mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences from patients suffering from a particular mitochondrial ...disease, such as Leber hereditary optic neuropathy (LHON). However, such sequencing efforts can, in the worst case, be riddled with errors by imposing phantom mutations or misreporting variant nucleotides, and moreover, by inadvertently regarding some mutations as novel and pathogenic, which are actually known to define minor haplogroups. Under such circumstances it remains unclear whether the disease-associated mutations would have been determined adequately. Here, we re-analyse four problematic LHON studies and propose guidelines by which some of the pitfalls could be avoided.
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•New fumaric copolymers with different compositions were synthesized.•Scaffolds by casting and electrospinning techniques were designed.•Neither of the biomaterials induced toxic ...effects.•All scaffolds shows biocompatibility and osteogenicity.
In the present work the creation of a new biomaterial aimed at bone tissue regeneration is shown, covering the synthesis of the polymers, the material design and their exhaustive physicochemical and biological characterization. The copolymers of dioctyl fumarate (DOF) and N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPAM) were synthetized and characterized by size exclusion chromatography, 1H NMR and its thermal properties were studied by DSC and TGA analyses. Based on their properties, two copolymers with different DOF content were selected as raw material to design scaffolds for bone tissue regeneration. The scaffolds were prepared by casting and electrospinning technique, giving rise to biomaterials with particular chemical and topographic surface which were characterized by water contact angle and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis. The cytotoxicity and biodegradation by murine macrophage RAW 264.7 cells was assay, while biocompatibility and osteogenic induction were made using bone marrow progenitor cells (BMPC). None of the biomaterials obtained showed cytotoxicity. The biological properties suggest that the cells adhere and proliferate better on biomaterials with higher DOF content and fibrous morphology. All scaffolds support osteoblastic cell differentiation, but to a greater extent on the biomaterial that has higher DOF content prepared by casting. Altogether, our results suggesting that these biomaterials could be useful in the bone tissue engineering.
Similarly to other populations across the Americas, Argentinean populations trace back their genetic ancestry into African, European and Native American ancestors, reflecting a complex demographic ...history with multiple migration and admixture events in pre- and post-colonial times. However, little is known about the sub-continental origins of these three main ancestries. We present new high-throughput genotyping data for 87 admixed individuals across Argentina. This data was combined to previously published data for admixed individuals in the region and then compared to different reference panels specifically built to perform population structure analyses at a sub-continental level. Concerning the Native American ancestry, we could identify four Native American components segregating in modern Argentinean populations. Three of them are also found in modern South American populations and are specifically represented in Central Andes, Central Chile/Patagonia, and Subtropical and Tropical Forests geographic areas. The fourth component might be specific to the Central Western region of Argentina, and it is not well represented in any genomic data from the literature. As for the European and African ancestries, we confirmed previous results about origins from Southern Europe, Western and Central Western Africa, and we provide evidences for the presence of Northern European and Eastern African ancestries.
One of the main disadvantages of batch membrane processes is the increase of the pollutant concentration in the feedstock throughout the operation. Operating the plant at constant process conditions ...leads in many cases to weaker performances and, moreover, to heavy fouling on the membranes. Critical flux-based methods are one of the most used approaches to overcome fouling problems. Within critical flux conditions, only reversible fouling can occur, which can be periodically soft-cleaned.
This work studies the relationship between particle size distributions in the feed stream and critical flux values when different pretreatment processes are applied to an olive vegetation waste water stream. The considered pretreatment processes were: coagulation (with aluminum hydroxide and aluminum sulphate), aerobic biodigestion (by means of fungi) and photocatalytic organic matter reduction (by means of nanometric titanium dioxide anatase powders irradiated by UV light). The study was carried out at pilot plant scale (100
L batch capacity).
These results were compared with performances and effects on the critical flux value for MF, UF and NF membranes. The different pretreatment on the same waste water stream shifts differently the particle size distribution mainly by organic matter degradation, and this influences heavily the critical flux value and thus the filtration outcome.
Finally, the purification of the olive vegetation waste water stream can be performed with a MF, UF, NF and RO membrane system in series, being very careful in choosing the correct operating conditions to avoid the quick formation of an unsustainable fouling.
Phantom mutations are systematic artifacts generated in the course of the sequencing process. Contra common belief these artificial mutations are nearly ubiquitous in sequencing results, albeit at ...frequencies that may vary dramatically. The amount of artifacts depends not only on the sort of automated sequencer and sequencing chemistry employed, but also on other lab‐specific factors. An experimental study executed on four samples under various combinations of sequencing conditions revealed a number of phantom mutations occurring at the same sites of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) repeatedly. To confirm these and identify further hotspots for artifacts, > 5000 mtDNA electropherograms were screened for artificial patterns. Further, > 30 000 published hypervariable segment I sequences were compared at potential hotspots for phantom mutations, especially for variation at positions 16085 and 16197. Resequencing of several samples confirmed the artificial nature of these and other polymorphisms in the original publications. Single‐strand sequencing, as typically executed in medical and anthropological studies, is thus highly vulnerable to this kind of artifacts. In particular, phantom mutation hotspots could easily lead to misidentification of somatic mutations and to misinterpretations in all kinds of clinical mtDNA studies.
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