The COVID-19 pandemic generated a large volume of scientific productions with different quality levels. The speed with which knowledge was produced and shared worldwide imposed on health management ...the challenge of seeking ways to identify the best available evidence to support its decisions. In response to this challenge, the Department of Science and Technology of the Brazilian Ministry of Health started offering a service to produce and provide scientific knowledge addressing priority public health issues in the pandemic scenario. Drug treatments, non-pharmacological measures, testing, reinfection and immunological response, immunization, pathophysiology, post-COVID syndrome and adverse events are among the topics covered. In this article, we discuss the strengths and lessons learned, as well as the challenges and perspectives that present a real example of how to offer the best scientific evidence in a timely manner in order to assist the decision-making process during a public health emergency.
This study aimed to evaluate, in vitro, the use of leaf extracts of Azadirachta indica (A. indica) and Melia azedarach (M. azedarach) as antivirals against caprine lentivirus (CLV) in colostrum and ...milk of goat nannies. These were collected from eight individuals and infected with the standard strain of CLV. Samples were then subdivided into aliquots and treated with 150 µg/mL of crude extract, and with ethyl acetate and methanol fractions for 30, 60, and 90 min. Next, somatic cells from colostrum and milk were co-cultured with cells from the ovine third eyelid. After this step, viral titers of the supernatants collected from treatments with greater efficacy in co-culture were assessed. The organic ethyl acetate fractions of both plants at 90 min possibly inhibited the viral activity of CLV by up to a thousandfold in colostrum. In milk, this inhibition was up to 800 times for the respective Meliaceae. In conclusion, the ethanolic fraction of ethyl acetate from both plants demonstrated efficacy against CLV in samples from colostrum and milk when subjected to treatment, which was more effective in colostrum.
ABSTRACT Technologies that use rhizobacteria to promote plant growth are increasing in agriculture, results have shown improvements in soil quality, increases in productivity, and decreases in the ...use of synthetic inputs, The objective of work was to characterize bacterial isolates regarding their biological activity and growth promotion of soybean plants grown in a controlled environment. Fifteen bacteria were isolated from soils with continuous use of biological fertilizer. They were evaluated for enzymes production (amylase and protease), nitrogen fixation, antagonistic activity to phytopathogenic fungi, and indoleacetic acid (IAA) production, Soybean seeds were inoculated with bacterial isolates in a greenhouse and evaluated for plant development and soil chemical attributes. The results showed that 8 of the 15 isolates presented production of amylase, protease, or both and 4 isolates presented nitrogen-fixing capacity. The percentage of isolates with high or moderate inhibitory action against the fungi Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, Macrophomina phaseolina, and Fusarium solani were 73.3%, 66.6%, and 73.3%, respectively. The IAA production varied from 8.56 to 31.33 µg mL-1 (5 isolates had low, 6 had moderate, and 4 had high production). The soybean development was significantly higher in 80% of the treatments with inoculation with bacterial isolates. Five bacterial isolates effectively present all characteristics for use as inoculant (biofertilizer) to promote the development of soybean plants.
RESUMO O uso de tecnologias utilizando rizobactérias para promover o crescimento de plantas é crescente na agricultura, resultados demonstram melhoria na qualidade dos solos, aumentando a sua produtividade e diminuindo uso de insumos sintéticos. O objetivo do trabalho foi caracterizar os isolados bacterianos quanto a sua atividade biológica e promoção do crescimento de plantas de soja em ambiente controlado. Foram isoladas 15 bactérias de solo com uso contínuo de adubo biológico. Estes foram avaliados quanto à produção de enzimas (amilase e protease), fixação de nitrogênio, atividade antagônica a fungos fitopatogênicos e produção de Ácido Indol Acético (AIA). Em casa de vegetação, sementes de soja inoculadas com os isolados bacterianos foram avaliadas quanto o desenvolvimento da plantas de soja e os atributos químicos do solo. Os resultados demonstraram que dos 15 isolados 8 apresentam a produção de amilase ou protease, ou ambos e 4 isolados apresentam capacidade de fixar nitrogênio livre. A porcentagem dos isolados com ação inibitória de moderada a alta contra os fungos Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, Macrophomina phaseolina e Fusarium solani foram 73,3%, 66,6% e 73,3% respectivamente. E, quanto a produção AIA variou de 8,56 a 31,33 µg mL-1 (5 isolados com baixa produção, 6 moderada e 4 alta). O desenvolvimento da soja foi significativamente maior em 80% dos tratamentos inoculados com os isolados bacterianos. Conclui-se que 5 isolados bacterianos efetivamente apresentam todas características para utilização como inoculante (biofertilizante) no desenvolvimento de soja.
Bioinformatics data obtained using different molecular biology techniques must be processed through different analysis tools to discover new biological knowledge. Since plain processed data have no ...explicit semantic value, the extraction of additional knowledge through data exploration would benefit from the transformation of bioinformatics data into Linked Open Data (LOD). Different approaches have been proposed to support the transformation of different types of biomedical data into LOD. However, these approaches are not flexible enough so they can be easily adapted for the transformation of semi-structured bioinformatics data into LOD. Thus, this paper proposes a novel approach to support such transformation. According to this approach, a set of competency questions drive not only the definition of transformation rules, but also the data transformation and exploration afterwards. The paper also presents a support toolset and describes the successful application of the proposed approach in the functional genomics domain.
•Transformation of semi-structured data (SSD) into linked open data (LOD).•Stepwise, competency question-oriented approach.•Language for specifying data item to ontology concept semantic equivalence.•Support toolset for the transformation of SSD into LOD.
Debriefing is used in clinical settings to support interprofessional staff, improve processes, and identify educational needs. Nurses who lead debriefing sessions are empowered to improve processes.
...Nurse leaders identified the need for debriefing outside the critical care areas due to the rising acuity levels.
Two nurse leaders developed a debriefing initiative in one urban teaching hospital following rapid responses, codes, and stressful situations. Nurses developed a Debriefing Facilitation Guide to collect qualitative aspects of clinical emergencies to improve processes, education, and team dynamics.
Following each debriefing session, we deductively purposively coded the qualitative data into 3 a priori themes: the American Heart Association's team dynamics, process improvement, and educational opportunities. We identified opportunities for improvement for these themes during our first 54 debriefing sessions.
Following each debriefing session, the debriefing nurse leader intervened on all educational and process improvement opportunities identified and facilitated positive team dynamics.
Background: Using evidence-based sepsis guidelines, nurse educators identified the nursing skills required to recognize and treat sepsis. Method: Nurse educators created an innovative, interactive ...sepsis escape room to provide sepsis education. The escape room included a manikin, puzzles, distractors, riddles, and props. Participants were given 20 minutes to solve four puzzles/riddles to treat the sepsis patient and escape the room. Results: All but two (N = 16) groups solved the clues and riddles to prioritize treatment in the allotted time. Evaluations were excellent. Mean score (1 = poor to 5 = outstanding) for overall escape room experience was 4.92. Adherence data improved on the Surviving Sepsis Campaign sepsis performance measure intervention bundles (SEP 1-3 care bundles) 2 months following the escape room. Bundles are a group of interventions that improve care. Conclusion: The escape room engaged nurses in educational gaming, stimulating critical thinking and problem solving contributing to improved clinical outcomes. J Contin Educ Nurs. 2021;52(5):217–225.
Intake of sugary beverages has been associated with obesity and chronic non-communicable diseases, thereby increasing the direct health costs related to these diseases. Front-of-package nutrition ...labeling (FoPNL) aims to help consumers understand food composition, thereby improving food choices and preventing the development of such diseases.
To estimate, over five years, the impact of implementing FoPNL in Brazil on the prevalence of excess body weight and obesity in adults who consume sugary beverages and the direct costs related to such problems.
A simulation study to performed to estimate the effect of FoPNL implementation on the prevalence of excess body weight and obesity. The VIGITEL research database (2019), published in the 2020 report, was used in this study (the final sample consisted of 12,471 data points representing 14,380,032 Brazilians). The scenarios were considered: base (trend in sugary beverage intake); 1 (base scenario associated with the changes in energy content of the purchased beverages observed after the first phase of the Chilean labeling law (-9.9%); and 2 (scenario 1 associated with reformulation of beverages, total energy reduction of -1.6%). Changes in body weight were estimated using the simulation model of Hall et al. (2011) over five years. A linear trend in the prevalence of obesity and excess body weight in the Brazilian population was considered. The impact of the prevalence of obesity and excess body weight on body mass index was estimated. In addition, the direct health costs related to obesity were estimated.
Energy consumption from sugary beverages after FoPNL implementation is expected to be reduced by approximately 28 kcal/day (95% CI, -30 to -27) considering scenario 1. In scenarios 1 and 2, without FoPNL, the prevalence of obesity and excess body weight over five years was estimated to be 25.3% and 25.2%, and 64.4% and 64.2%, respectively. By extrapolating the results to the entire Brazilian population, it was observed that the implementation of FoPNL may reduce the prevalence of obesity by -0.32 percentage points and -0.35 percentage points (scenario 1 and 2, respectively) and excess body weight by -0.42 percentage points and -0.48 percentage points (scenarios 1 and 2, respectively) in five years. It is estimated that after five years of implementation, it will be possible to save approximately US$ 5,5 millions (95% CI 4,7 to 8,8) in scenario 1, reaching approximately US$ 6,1 millions (95% CI 5,3 to 9,8) in scenario 2.
The results of this modeling study indicate that FoPNL may reduce prevalence of excess body weight and obesity, representing strategic public policies for obesity prevention.
A new concept of human-machine interface to control hand prostheses based on displacements of multiple magnets implanted in the limb residual muscles, the myokinetic control interface, has been ...recently proposed. In previous works, magnets localization has been achieved following an optimization procedure to find an approximate solution to an analytical model. To simplify and speed up the localization problem, here we employ machine learning models, namely linear and radial basis functions artificial neural networks, which can translate measured magnetic information to desired commands for active prosthetic devices. They were developed offline and then implemented on field-programmable gate arrays using customized floating-point operators. We optimized computational precision, execution time, hardware, and energy consumption, as they are essential features in the context of wearable devices. When used to track a single magnet in a mockup of the human forearm, the proposed data-driven strategy achieved a tracking accuracy of 720 <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\mu</tex-math></inline-formula>m 95% of the time and latency of 12.07 <inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">\mu</tex-math></inline-formula>s. The proposed system architecture is expected to be more power-efficient compared to previous solutions. The outcomes of this work encourage further research on improving the devised methods to deal with multiple magnets simultaneously.
E. coli cells that contain overexpressed alcohol dehydrogenases (ADHs) were screened as biocatalysts for the stereoselective reduction of chloroketones 5 a–d, the corresponding halohydrins 6 a–d of ...which are building blocks in the synthesis of antiretroviral drugs. Among them, ADH from Sphingobium yanoikuyae was found to reduce chloroketone 5 c with a high stereoselectivity (90 % de) and conversion (85 %) to furnish threo halohydrin (R,S)‐6 c. ADH from Ralstonia sp. (RasADH) was able to reduce 5 a and 5 b with complementary diastereoselectivity to provide access to both threo and erythro halohydrins through “substrate‐based” stereocontrol. The RasADH‐catalyzed reductions were optimized to provide (R,S)‐6 a with 98 % conversion and 84 % diastereomeric excess (de) and (S,S)‐6 b with 95 % conversion and 86 % de. Molecular modeling studies showed that 5 b, which features a carboxybenzyl protecting group, is able to bind to the enzyme catalytic site in an “inverted” mode in comparison to tert‐butyloxycarbonyl‐ and methyloxycarbonyl‐protected substrates 5 a and 5 c, which sheds light on the observed switching of the stereopreference. RasADH‐catalyzed reductions were optimized to provide (R,S)‐6 a with 98 % conversion and 84 % de and (S,S)‐6 b with 95 % conversion and 86 % de.
Choose your side, not your enzyme: A single alcohol dehydrogenase is able to reduce structurally related chloroketones derived from S‐amino acids with the opposite enantiopreference to furnish both (R,S) and (S,S)‐chlorohydrins. Stereocontrol is achieved by changing the N‐protecting group in the substrate, which allows the preparation of stereocomplementary halohydrins using the same biocatalyst.
Este artigo objetiva discutir o estado da arte da pesquisa em História do Canto Coral no Brasil. Para tanto, realiza uma pesquisa bibliográfica centrada em teses de doutorado e em dissertações de ...mestrado que tenham como objeto de estudo temáticas no âmbito da história do canto coral no Brasil, utilizando como principal banco de dados o catálogo de teses da CAPES. Como resultado, foi identificada uma produção relevante que aborda a história do canto coral no país a partir de diferentes perspectivas metodológicas e contextos de ensino e performance coral. Também foi possível estabelecer diálogos entre essas pesquisas e a pesquisa em música e a pesquisa em canto coral no Brasil, bem como suas principais lacunas, valorizando essa produção em meio à histórica falta de políticas de fomento à atividade coral e preservação de acervos de conjuntos corais no país.
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