The lack of knowledge about the majority of fish species harvested in Amazonian small-scale fisheries, in association with impacts from hydroelectric power plants, may lead to biodiversity loss and a ...decrease in the protein food supply for riverine Amazonians. This study uses existing datasets on fisheries and riverine developmental projects to infer effects associated with fish losses where actual data and outcomes are not available. The targeted fish species' status may be regarded as either threatened or there being no knowledge of their conservation requirements, biology or ecology. Among the 90 Amazonian fish species that are the most important for the diet of the riverine fishers, 78% are not assessed or their biological information is unknown, according to the IUCN Red List. Consequently, the effects created by the thoroughly disregarded trade-off between energy generation and food security in the planning of Amazonian land use have been worsened by the lack of biological and ecological information on fish species.
Aim
The Enhanced Recovery After Surgery (ERAS) programme is a multimodal approach to improve peri‐operative care in colon surgery. The aim of this study was to report on the adherence to and outcomes ...of ERAS in the first years after implementation.
Method
Data of patients undergoing elective colon resections for malignancy in 2006 until 2010 were compared with patients receiving conventional care in 2005. Retrospective analysis was performed including length of stay (LOS), protocol adherence and complications. The predictive values of ERAS items and baseline characteristics on LOS and complications were analysed using univariate and multivariate analysis.
Results
Length of stay (LOS) was significantly shorter in 2006 and 2007 (P ≤ 0.009 and P ≤ 0.004) but not in 2008 and 2009. The mean adherence rate to the ERAS items was 84.1% in 2006 and 2007 and 72.4% in 2008 and 2009 (P < 0.001). In 2005, 2008 and 2009 LOS was significantly shorter for laparoscopically operated patients than for patients with open resections (P < 0.002, P < 0.001 and P < 0.004 respectively). Multivariate analysis showed that age, laparoscopic surgery, removal of nasogastric tube before extubation, mobilization within 24 h after surgery, starting nonsteroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs at day 1 and removal of thoracic epidural analgesia at day 2 were independent predictors of LOS.
Conclusion
Strict adherence to the ERAS protocol was associated with reduced LOS and improved outcome in elective colon surgery for malignancy. These benefits were lost when protocol adherence was lower. Embedding the ERAS protocol into an organization and repetitive education are vital to sustain its beneficial effects on LOS and outcome.
Summary
We studied the effect of including GWAS results on the accuracy of single‐ and multipopulation genomic predictions. Phenotypes (backfat thickness) and genotypes of animals from two sire lines ...(SL1, n = 1146 and SL3, n = 1264) were used in the analyses. First, GWAS were conducted for each line and for a combined data set (both lines together) to estimate the genetic variance explained by each SNP. These estimates were used to build matrices of weights (D), which was incorporated into a GBLUP method. Single population evaluated with traditional GBLUP had accuracies of 0.30 for SL1 and 0.31 for SL3. When weights were employed in GBLUP, the accuracies for both lines increased (0.32 for SL1 and 0.34 for SL3). When a multipopulation reference set was used in GBLUP, the accuracies were higher (0.36 for SL1 and 0.32 for SL3) than in single‐population prediction. In addition, putting together the multipopulation reference set and the weights from the combined GWAS provided even higher accuracies (0.37 for SL1, and 0.34 for SL3). The use of multipopulation predictions and weights estimated from a combined GWAS increased the accuracy of genomic predictions.
Infections with protozoan parasites are a major cause of disease and mortality in many tropical countries of the world. Diseases caused by species of the genera Trypanosoma (Human African ...Trypanosomiasis and Chagas Disease) and Leishmania (various forms of Leishmaniasis) are among the seventeen "Neglected Tropical Diseases" (NTDs) defined as such by WHO due to the neglect of financial investment into research and development of new drugs by a large part of pharmaceutical industry and neglect of public awareness in high income countries. Another major tropical protozoan disease is malaria (caused by various Plasmodium species), which -although not mentioned currently by the WHO as a neglected disease- still represents a major problem, especially to people living under poor circumstances in tropical countries. Malaria causes by far the highest number of deaths of all protozoan infections and is often (as in this review) included in the NTDs. The mentioned diseases threaten many millions of lives world-wide and they are mostly associated with poor socioeconomic and hygienic environment. Existing therapies suffer from various shortcomings, namely, a high degree of toxicity and unwanted effects, lack of availability and/or problematic application under the life conditions of affected populations. Development of new, safe and affordable drugs is therefore an urgent need. Nature has provided an innumerable number of drugs for the treatment of many serious diseases. Among the natural sources for new bioactive chemicals, plants are still predominant. Their secondary metabolism yields an immeasurable wealth of chemical structures which has been and will continue to be a source of new drugs, directly in their native form and after optimization by synthetic medicinal chemistry. The current review, published in two parts, attempts to give an overview on the potential of such plant-derived natural products as antiprotozoal leads and/or drugs in the fight against NTDs.
We report constraints on light dark matter (DM) models using ionization signals in the XENON1T experiment. We mitigate backgrounds with strong event selections, rather than requiring a scintillation ...signal, leaving an effective exposure of (22±3) tonne day. Above ∼0.4 keV_{ee}, we observe <1 event/(tonne day keV_{ee}), which is more than 1000 times lower than in similar searches with other detectors. Despite observing a higher rate at lower energies, no DM or CEvNS detection may be claimed because we cannot model all of our backgrounds. We thus exclude new regions in the parameter spaces for DM-nucleus scattering for DM masses m_{χ} within 3-6 GeV/c^{2}, DM-electron scattering for m_{χ}>30 MeV/c^{2}, and absorption of dark photons and axionlike particles for m_{χ} within 0.186-1 keV/c^{2}.
Abstract Many studies have been dedicated to the development of scaffolds for improving post-traumatic nerve regeneration. The goal of this study was to develop and test hybrid chitosan membranes to ...use in peripheral nerve reconstruction, either alone or enriched with N1E-115 neural cells. Hybrid chitosan membranes were tested in vitro , to assess their ability in supporting N1E-115 cell survival and differentiation, and in vivo to assess biocompatibility as well as to evaluate their effects on nerve fiber regeneration and functional recovery after a standardized rat sciatic nerve crush injury. Functional recovery was evaluated using the sciatic functional index (SFI), the static sciatic index (SSI), the extensor postural thrust (EPT), the withdrawal reflex latency (WRL) and ankle kinematics. Nerve fiber regeneration was assessed by quantitative stereological analysis and electron microscopy. All chitosan membranes showed good biocompatibility and proved to be a suitable substrate for plating the N1E-115 cellular system. By contrast, in vivo nerve regeneration assessment after crush injury showed that the freeze-dried chitosan type III, without N1E-115 cell addition, was the only type of membrane that significantly improved posttraumatic axonal regrowth and functional recovery. It can be thus suggested that local enwrapping with this type of chitosan membrane may represent an effective approach for the improvement of the clinical outcome in patients receiving peripheral nerve surgery.
Among a small series of tested N-acylhydrazones (NAHs), the compound 8a was selected as a selective submicromolar phosphodiesterase-4 (PDE4) inhibitor associated with anti-TNF-α properties measured ...both in vitro and in vivo. The recognition pattern of compound 8a was elucidated through molecular modeling studies based on the knowledge of the 3D-structure of zardaverine, a PDE4 inhibitor resembling the structure of 8a, cocrystallized with the PDE4. Based on further conformational analysis dealing with N-methyl-NAHs, a quinazoline derivative (19) was designed as a conformationally constrained NAH analogue and showed similar in vitro pharmacological profile, compared with 8a. In addition 19 was found active when tested orally in LPS-evoked airway hyperreactivity and fully confirmed the working hypothesis supporting this work.
The search for food resources is a constant in human history. Nowadays, the search for natural and safe food supplies is of foremost importance. Accordingly, there is a renewed interest in ...eco-friendly and natural products for substitution of synthetic additives. In addition, microbial contamination of food products during their obtaining and distribution processes is still a sanitary issue, and an important target for the food industry is to avoid food contamination and its related foodborne illnesses. These diseases are fundamentally caused by certain microorganisms listed in this review and classified according to their Gram negative or positive character. Algae have proven to possess high nutritional value and a wide variety of biological properties due to their content in active compounds. Among these capabilities, macroalgae are recognized for having antimicrobial properties. Thus, the present paper revises the actual knowledge of microbial contaminants in the food industry and proposes antimicrobial algal compounds against those pathogenic bacteria responsible for food contamination as valuable molecules for its growth inhibition. The capacity of algae extracts to inhibit some major food pathogen growth was assessed. Moreover, the main applications of these compounds in the food industry were discussed while considering their favorable effects in terms of food safety and quality control.
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