Synthesis of silica (SiO2) matrix doped with Dy3+ and Eu3+ was performed, and the combined effects of Y2O3 and different acids (HCl and HNO3) are studied. The resulting samples present different SiO2 ...-Y2O3 phases. The structures show granular-stack microstructures and irregular porosity. Samples exhibit the characteristics rare earths absorption bands and a decrement in UV region due to the presence of Y2O3. This phenomenon is related to the outstanding emissions. We are looking for luminescent silica phosphors (SiO2) doped with Dy3+ or Eu3+, and the combined effects of Y2O3 and different acids (HCl and HNO3) with the aim to obtain the right combination for the best possible PL emission and lifetime. These results display SiO2-Y2O3:Eu3+ powders as excellent candidates to be used as a luminescent material and for fingerprint detection.
Abstract
Background
Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is one of the pathologies with the greatest impact on the public health system. Over the last few decades, the relevance of CKD in Mexico has ...increased, with associated overwhelming costs for care of renal disease. There are no reliable CKD statistics in Mexico.
Methodology
In June 2018, the government of Aguascalientes called on all Health Institutions to create a state registry of treated end-stage renal disease (ESRD). In the same system, a renal biopsy result registry included all the native kidney biopsies obtained in the state of Aguascalientes since 2012. We herein describe the prevalence, incidence and characteristics of the patients included in the CKD and renal biopsy registry in the state of Aguascalientes.
Results
As of April 2020, the state has documented 2827 patients on renal replacement therapy (RRT), 1877 on dialysis and 950 that have been transplanted. The prevalence of patients on dialysis is 1326 per million population (p.m.p.), and if transplanted individuals are included, it is 1997 p.m.p. The incidence of treated ESRD in 2019 was 336 p.m.p. (n = 474) in individuals with an average age of 45.6 years (standard deviation ±18), and in a higher proportion of men (61%). There is a bimodal distribution of the age at which RRT was initiated. The first and the most significant peaks are between the ages of 20 and 40 years and are usually the result of CKD of unknown cause (73%). The second peak is between 50 and 70 years of age, and CKD is usually the result of diabetes mellitus and systemic arterial hypertension (59.6%). Since January 2012, 423 biopsies have been recorded. The patient’s ages were between 20 and 30 years (n = 112), and the most frequent diagnosis was focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) (54%).
Conclusions
The prevalence of treated ESRD in the state of Aguascalientes is high. The disease mostly afflicts young people between 20 and 40 years of age, and there is a clear male predominance. In this age group, the main clinical diagnosis is CKD of unknown origin, and the most frequent biopsy diagnosis was FSGS.
Device-associated infections (DAI) remain a serious concern in modern healthcare. Bacterial attachment to a surface is the first step in biofilm formation, which is one of the main causes of DAIs. ...The development of materials capable of preventing or inhibiting bacterial attachment constitutes a promising approach to deal with this problem. The multifactorial nature of biofilm maturation and antibiotic resistance directs the research for multitargeted or combinatorial therapeutic approaches. One attractive strategy is the modification or the engineering of surfaces in order to provide antiadhesive and/or antimicrobial properties. Currently, several different approaches that involve physical and chemical surface modification deliver some possible alternatives to achieve this goal. The engineered surfaces can be coated with molecules capable of inhibiting the bacterial adhesion or with active agents that kill microorganisms. In addition, surfaces can also be modified in order to be stimuli-responsive, responding to a particular trigger and then delivering the consequent antimicrobial outcome. Here, we review the prevailing strategies to modify surfaces in order to create an antimicrobial surface and discuss how different surface functionalization can affect bacterial adhesion and/or viability.
Purpose
Determination and development of an effective set of models leveraging Artificial Intelligence techniques to generate a system able to support clinical practitioners working with COVID-19 ...patients. It involves a pipeline including classification, lung and lesion segmentation, as well as lesion quantification of axial lung CT studies.
Approach
A deep neural network architecture based on DenseNet is introduced for the classification of weakly-labeled, variable-sized (and possibly sparse) axial lung CT scans. The models are trained and tested on aggregated, publicly available data sets with over 10 categories. To further assess the models, a data set was collected from multiple medical institutions in Colombia, which includes healthy, COVID-19 and patients with other diseases. It is composed of 1,322 CT studies from a diverse set of CT machines and institutions that make over 550,000 slices. Each CT study was labeled based on a clinical test, and no per-slice annotation took place. This enabled a classification into Normal vs. Abnormal patients, and for those that were considered abnormal, an extra classification step into Abnormal (other diseases) vs. COVID-19. Additionally, the pipeline features a methodology to segment and quantify lesions of COVID-19 patients on the complete CT study, enabling easier localization and progress tracking. Moreover, multiple ablation studies were performed to appropriately assess the elements composing the classification pipeline.
Results
The best performing lung CT study classification models achieved 0.83 accuracy, 0.79 sensitivity, 0.87 specificity, 0.82 F1 score and 0.85 precision for the Normal vs. Abnormal task. For the Abnormal vs COVID-19 task, the model obtained 0.86 accuracy, 0.81 sensitivity, 0.91 specificity, 0.84 F1 score and 0.88 precision. The ablation studies showed that using the complete CT study in the pipeline resulted in greater classification performance, restating that relevant COVID-19 patterns cannot be ignored towards the top and bottom of the lung volume.
Discussion
The lung CT classification architecture introduced has shown that it can handle weakly-labeled, variable-sized and possibly sparse axial lung studies, reducing the need for expert annotations at a per-slice level.
Conclusions
This work presents a working methodology that can guide the development of decision support systems for clinical reasoning in future interventionist or prospective studies.
•We study the augmented reality educational applications and type of content.•Few studies contrast the influence of the type of content on quantifiable variables.•There is no preferred framework for ...the development of augmented reality content.•3D models have a better impact on memory and motivation than other content.
Augmented Reality (AR) has been used successfully in several industries; one of these is education. A systematic understanding of how AR contributes to education still lacks studies about the content type and its effects on learning outcomes. This article systematically analyzes the AR state-of-the-art in education, determines productivity and publication indicators in this field, and identifies research works that have studied how content type affects the learning outcomes. The methodology was performed through a bibliometric analysis using the Scopus database, focusing on AR's educational uses. Engineering education is the primary research trend, followed by simulation, tracking, and virtual reality. Education and e-learning also have leading roles within this analysis, along with gamification and human-computer interaction, whose impacts are further explored. There is no preferred design methodology for creating AR content. In its absence, most of the works suggest a design based on the developers' and researchers' experience.
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Abstract
Background
The vast impact of COVID-19 call for the identification of clinical parameter that can help predict a torpid evolution. Among these, endothelial injury has been proposed as one of ...the main pathophysiological mechanisms underlying the disease, promoting a hyperinflammatory and prothrombotic state leading to worse clinical outcomes. Leukocytes and platelets play a key role in inflammation and thrombogenesis, hence the objective of the current study was to study whether neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), platelets-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR), the systemic immune-inflammation index (SII) as well as the new parameter neutrophil-to-platelet ratio (NPR), could help identify patients who at risk of admission at Intensive Care Units.
Methods
A retrospective observational study was performed at HM Hospitales including electronic health records from 2245 patients admitted due to COVID-19 from March 1 to June 10, 2020. Patients were divided into two groups, admitted at ICU or not.
Results
Patients who were admitted at the ICU had significantly higher values in all hemogram-derived ratios at the moment of hospital admission compared to those who did not need ICU admission. Specifically, we found significant differences in NLR (6.9 4–11.7 vs 4.1 2.6–7.6,
p
< 0.0001), PLR (2 1.4–3.3 vs 1.9 1.3–2.9,
p
= 0.023), NPR (3 2.1–4.2 vs 2.3 1.6–3.2,
p <
0.0001) and SII (13 6.5–25.7 vs 9 4.9–17.5,
p <
0.0001) compared to those who did not require ICU admission. After multivariable logistic regression models, NPR was the hemogram-derived ratio with the highest predictive value of ICU admission, (OR 1.11 (95% CI: 0.98–1.22,
p
= 0.055).
Conclusions
Simple, hemogram-derived ratios obtained from early hemogram at hospital admission, especially the novelty NPR, have shown to be useful predictors of risk of ICU admission in patients hospitalized due to COVID-19.
Playa lakes developed in closed watersheds have been used as environmental impact indicators (global warming, water extractions, etc.), but they could be also sensitive to active tectonics. Our study ...area is located in the main watershed in the western Betics, the northern branch of the Gibraltar arc, which is within the fold‐and‐thrust belt. This area is characterized by an endorheic zone that includes some playa lakes floored by low‐permeable rocks. Our study shows the reduction or disappearance of playa‐lake flooded surfaces due to the reduction in their watershed area. This area reduction is favoured by stream catchments related to knickpoints, which seem to be generated by the quaternary activity of a dextral‐transpressive band within the Betics fold‐and‐thrust belt. χ map also shows the higher erosion power of Mediterranean streams, which will likely catch this endorheic area in tectonics quiescence.
Statement of significance
Playa lakes developed in closed watersheds are commonly used to study environmental impacts such as global warming or water extractions. In this work, we analyse how these endorheic systems are sensitive to small water balance variations due to active tectonics. The endorheic area we chose to apply this new approach is located in the main Atlantic‐Mediterranean water divide of the western Betics (northern branch of the Gibraltar arc). The recent tectonics in this fold‐and‐thrust belt segment provoked the Atlantic‐Mediterranean gateway closure and the Messinian Salinity Crisis at 5.6 My. Our study of playa‐lake flooded surface and watershed modifications, together with structural and other geomorphic analyses such as the χ index, never before has it been made to detect active structures. Active tectonics likely influenced in the medium‐term evolution of the studied watersheds and this study is useful to predict both landscape and drainage network evolution in the future. In fact, the possible effect of active tectonic should be taken into account when using closed watersheds to monitor the impacts of climate change and/or local stressors such as water pumping activities.
The relationship between phthalates, a group of chemical pollutants classified as endocrine disruptors, and oxidative stress is not fully understood. The aim of the present hospital-based study was ...to explore the associations between circulating levels of 10 phthalate metabolites and 8 biomarkers of oxidative stress in adipose tissue. The study population (n = 143) was recruited in two hospitals in the province of Granada (Spain). Phthalate metabolite concentrations were analyzed by isotope diluted online-TurboFlow-LC–MS/MS in serum samples, while oxidative stress markers were measured by commercially available kits in adipose tissue collected during routine surgery. Statistical analyses were performed by MM estimators’ robust linear regression and weighted quantile sum regression. Mainly, positive associations were observed of monomethyl phthalate (MMP), monoiso-butyl phthalate (MiBP), and mono-n-butyl phthalate (MnBP) (all low molecular weight phthalates) with glutathione peroxidase (GPx) and thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS), while an inverse association was found between monoiso-nonyl phthalate (MiNP) (high molecular weight phthalate) and the same biomarkers. WQS analyses showed significant effects of the phthalate mixture on GSH (β = −30.089; p-value = 0.025) and GSSG levels (β = −19.591; p-value = 0.030). Despite the limitations inherent to the cross-sectional design, our novel study underlines the potential influence of phthalate exposure on redox homeostasis, which warrants confirmation in further research.
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