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In Costa Rica, the consumption of wine has increased as an increasingly frequent beverage option during meals and celebrations, it has also been consolidated as part of a gastronomic culture that, in addition to enjoyment, is considered to have high properties for the health when consumed in moderate amounts. Due to the growth of the local wine market and changes in preferences, as well as the need to generate information in this field, this research aims to determine the attributes that influence the retail price of wine in Costa Rica. An econometric approach was used to model hedonic price behavior. The results showed that the price of wine is significantly affected by attributes such as origin, packaging characteristics, type of grape, market segment and type of supermarket where it is purchased. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acoustic monitoring is used to assess biodiversity across large spatial and temporal scales. However, extracting meaningful information from large data sets might be exceedingly time consuming. For this reason, acoustic indices have been proposed as proxies for biodiversity monitoring. Although acoustic indices hold great promise for standardizing acoustic data analysis, the complexity of acoustic conditions requires careful examination of the relationship between an index and the underlying process of interest. We evaluated 11 acoustic indices at two operational levels: (1) acoustic community level (an aggregation of species that produces sound), using birds as an example to assess how well acoustic indices predict bird indices (abundance, richness, evenness and diversity); and (2) soundscape level (the collection of biological, geophysical and anthropogenic sounds from a landscape), using acoustic indices to classify the study sites according to their ecological condition. To study the relationship among these variables, we selected two study sites with different ecological conditions (in terms of vegetation structure and traffic noise) within the Braulio Carrillo National Park (BCNP), Costa Rica. We sampled the soundscape and bird community using 12 sampling points and four visits to each study site from June 2017 to August 2018. We continuously recorded sounds at sunrise and sunset, and for 10 minutes every hour, during two consecutive days per visit. In addition, we performed four bird counts per visit (sunrise and sunset). We performed a correlation analysis between 11 acoustic indices and 4 community bird indices. We analyzed the ability of acoustic indices to predict bird indices. Furthermore, we used acoustic indices to classify the two sites according to their ecological condition. Bird abundance and richness were positively correlated with acoustic evenness indices and negatively correlated with the acoustic diversity index, but the whole set of acoustic indices predicted bird indices weakly. However, the classification of the sites using acoustic indices was conducted with a high average precision of 0.93 (sd = 0.08). Acoustic indices appear to be more promising for evaluating the ecological condition of a site than abundance, richness or diversity of specific animal groups, in this case birds, in tropical rainforests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We assessed the structural complexity of vegetation, birds and soundscapes in two areas of Braulio Carrillo National Park, Costa Rica, with different road exposure, as baseline information for conservation and management. We measured vegetation structure complexity, surveyed birds and recorded soundscapes in an area adjacent to the National Highway 32 (Quebrada) and another area 20 km away (Ceibo). Quebrada presented a more open forest structure and lower density of trees and shrubs; lower evenness and higher acoustic complexity, higher bioacoustic activity and sound pressure level; higher bird abundance and richness. Ceibo showed a higher density of trees and shrubs, higher complexity of vegetation structure, higher proportion of biophonies than anthrophonies, and an acoustic community with higher diversity and entropy. The study sites differed in characteristics of their bird communities in an unexpected way; these differences appear to be mostly influenced by the structure and complexity of the vegetation surrounding the road. However, the soundscapes seemed to properly reflect the habitat condition, and are promising for evaluating the ecological condition of a site. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The availability and quality of recreation spaces is a topic of work within the Territorial Planning projects, in tourist areas, in addition to the population, it is necessary to consider the tourists within the users of these sites. This article presents the project: Regulatory Plan of Chira Island, Gulf of Nicoya, Costa Rica and how the methodology was developed to incorporate the aspect of recreational areas as a line of research within the territorial ordering process. The study focuses on the design of recreational areas on islands with tourist potential, following the laws of Costa Rica. It is necessary to adapt the cases according to the law of each country. .The results show the importance of having the participation of the community as a basis for decision-making and also concluded the great relevance that has to design the proposals of sites for recreation thinking the inclusion of these sites as a complement to the tourist attractions Of an area, having to take into account the needs of the visitor in the designs that are made of the spaces destined to the recreation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rs1344706, an intronic SNP within the zinc-finger protein 804A gene (ZNF804A), was identified as one of the most compelling risk SNPs for schizophrenia (SZ) and bipolar disorder (BD). It is however not clear by which molecular mechanisms ZNF804A increases disease risk. We evaluated the role of ZNF804A in SZ and BD by genotyping the originally associated rs1344706 SNP and an exonic SNP (rs12476147) located in exon four of ZNF804A in a sample of 422 SZ, 382 BD, and 507 controls from the isolated population of the Costa Rica Central Valley. We also investigated the rs1344706 SNP for allelic specific expression (ASE) imbalance in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) of 46 heterozygous postmortem brains. While no significant association between rs1344706 and SZ or BD was observed in the Costa Rica sample, we observed an increased risk of SZ for the minor allele (A) of the exonic rs12476147 SNP (p=0.026). Our ASE assay detected a significant over-expression of the rs12476147 A allele in DLPFC of rs1344706 heterozygous subjects. Interestingly, cDNA allele ratios were significantly different according to the intronic rs1344706 genotypes (p-value=0.03), with the rs1344706 A allele associated with increased ZNF804A rs12476147 A allele expression (average 1.06, p-value=0.02, for heterozygous subjects vs. genomic DNA). In conclusion, we have demonstrated a significant association of rs12476147 with SZ, and using a powerful within-subject design, an allelic expression imbalance of ZNF804A exonic SNP rs12476147 in the DLPFC. Although this data does not preclude the possibility of other functional variants in ZNF804A, it provides evidence that the rs1344706 SZ risk allele is the cis-regulatory variant directly responsible for this allelic expression imbalance in adult cortex., (Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

A missense polymorphism in the NRG1 gene, Val>Leu in exon 11, was reported to increase the risk of schizophrenia in selected families from the Central Valley region of Costa Rica (CVCR). The present study investigated the relationship between three NRG1 genetic variants, rs6994992, rs3924999, and Val>Leu missense polymorphism in exon 11, in cases and selected controls from an isolated population from the CVCR. Isolated populations can have less genetic heterogeneity and increase power to detect risk variants in candidate genes. Subjects with bipolar disorder (BD, n=358), schizophrenia (SZ, n=273), or unrelated controls (CO, n=479) were genotyped for three NRG1 variants. The NRG1 promoter polymorphism (rs6994992) was related to altered expression of NRG1 Type IV in other studies. The expression of NRG1 type IV in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and the effect of the rs6994992 genotype on expression were explored in a postmortem cohort of BD, SZ, major depressive disorder (MDD) cases, and controls. The missense polymorphism Val>Leu in exon 11 was not significantly associated with schizophrenia as previously reported in a family sample from this population, the minor allele frequency is 4%, thus our sample size is not large enough to detect an association. We observed however an association of rs6994992 with NRG1 type IV expression in DLPFC and a significantly decreased expression in MDD compared to controls. The present results while negative do not rule out a genetic association of these SNPs with BD and SZ in CVCR, perhaps due to small risk effects that we were unable to detect and potential intergenic epistasis. The previous genetic relationship between expression of a putative brain-specific isoform of NRG1 type IV and SNP variation was replicated in postmortem samples in our preliminary study., (Copyright © 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)