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Copyright of Revista Ambiente e Água is the property of Revista Ambiente e Agua and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

We have previously developed and validated a one-step assay based on reverse transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) for rapid detection of the Zika virus (ZIKV) from mosquito samples. Patient diagnosis of ZIKV is currently carried out in centralized laboratories using the reverse transcription-quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR), which, while the gold standard molecular method, has several drawbacks for use in remote and low-resource settings, such as high cost and the need of specialized equipment. Point-of-care (POC) diagnostic platforms have the potential to overcome these limitations, especially in low-resource countries where ZIKV is endemic. With this in mind, here we optimized and validated our RT-LAMP assay for rapid detection of ZIKV from patient samples. We found that the assay detected ZIKV from diverse sample types (serum, urine, saliva, and semen) in as little as 20 min, without RNA extraction. The RT-LAMP assay was highly specific and up to 100 times more sensitive than RT-qPCR. We then validated the assay using 100 patient serum samples collected from suspected cases of arbovirus infection in the state of Pernambuco, which was at the epicenter of the last Zika epidemic. Analysis of the results, in comparison to RT-qPCR, found that the ZIKV RT-LAMP assay provided sensitivity of 100%, specificity of 93.75%, and an overall accuracy of 95.00%. Taken together, the RT-LAMP assay provides a straightforward and inexpensive alternative for the diagnosis of ZIKV from patients and has the potential to increase diagnostic capacity in ZIKV-affected areas, particularly in low and middle-income countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Ambiente e Água is the property of Revista Ambiente e Agua and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Ambiente e Água is the property of Revista Ambiente e Agua and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Ambiente e Água is the property of Revista Ambiente e Agua and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revista Internacional de Folkcomunicação is the property of Rede Folkcom Rede de Estudos e Pesquisas em Folkcomunicacao and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Multiple epicenters of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic have emerged since the first pneumonia cases in Wuhan, China, such as Italy, USA, and Brazil. Brazil is the third-most affected country worldwide, but genomic sequences of SARS-CoV-2 strains are mostly restricted to states from the Southeast region. Pernambuco state, located in the Northeast region, is the sixth most affected Brazilian state, but very few genomic sequences from the strains circulating in this region are available. We sequenced 101 strains of SARS-CoV-2 from patients presenting Covid-19 symptoms that reside in Pernambuco. Phylogenetic reconstructions revealed that all genomes belong to the B lineage and most of the samples (88%) were classified as lineage B.1.1. We detected multiple viral introductions from abroad (likely from Europe) as well as six local B.1.1 clades composed by Pernambuco only strains. Local clades comprise sequences from the capital city (Recife) and other country-side cities, corroborating the community spread between different municipalities of the state. These findings demonstrate that different from Southeastern Brazilian states where the epidemics were majorly driven by one dominant lineage (B.1.1.28 or B.1.1.33), the early epidemic phase at the Pernambuco state was driven by multiple B.1.1 lineages seeded through both national and international traveling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pressure to increase biomass production worldwide has pushed the boundaries of agricultural lands towards fragile soils. This process is particularly intense in Pernambuco State, NE Brazil. Pernambuco features a moisture gradient, with soils developed from similar gneisses. Resistant structures within the rock influenced the internal movement and distribution of water, consequently influencing regolith genesis. This paper presents the mineralogical characteristics of three regolith profiles with shallow soils (here assumed to be soils in which the top of the Cr horizon is at a depth of 1.5 m or less) along a transect at 8°S and discusses their weathering and pedogenetic processes. Samples were investigated via optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and total chemical analysis by inductively coupled plasma - atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES). The presence of weathering-resistant quartz veins and planes in the rock structure played a central role in controlling the water dynamics and the advancement of the weathering front. Therefore, desilication was dominantly controlled by the pore network. Hence, the weathering indexes did not differ appreciably among the climatic zones, and both 1:1- and 2:1-type clays were found in all profiles, although the amount of clay minerals that formed and the degree of dissolution of the primary minerals varied among the climate types. From an agricultural perspective, the thinness of these soil profiles and the presence of leucocratic layers are the main drawbacks of the regoliths, whereas the capacity to supply plant nutrients via primary mineral dissolution near the root zone can be an advantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• C stocks in degraded Planosol at semiarid region were halved. • Free-living diazotrophs increase N stocks in degraded Planosol by NBF. • Archaea population was higher at the Bt pedogenetic horizon. • Alkaline phosphatase producers did not differ due to soil degradation. Improper management and exploitation of the natural resources of the semiarid Planosols have triggered irreparable degradation processes in which vegetation can no longer reestablish itself naturally. We investigated preserved and degraded Planosols from Pernambuco State, Brazil, to determine total C and N stocks and quantify the functional and total microorganisms. We hypothesized that the degraded Planosol would have: i-significant reductions in C and N stocks, microbial biomass and activity in relation to the soil with preserved vegetation; ii-significant decreases in the proportion of total diazotrophic bacteria and archaea, ammonia-oxidizing bacteria, iron-reducing and -oxidizing bacteria and in alkaline phosphatase producers along the pedogenetic horizons. Thus, microbial biomass, soil basal respiration and metabolic and microbial quotients were obtained. Furthermore, total and functional gene copies were quantified by quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR), and the functionality of biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) was determined using an acetylene reduction assay. In degraded Planosols, the activity from the present diazotrophs has been responsible for maintaining soil N stocks (i.e. soil N stocks without significant differences between the evaluated Planosols), but the soil C stocks were halved. Biomass and microbial activity did not show significant differences between two Planosols and there was no apparent metabolic stress from the identified microbiota. We found a significant proportion of structural and functional microorganisms in both Planosols. There were many archaea predominating in the Bt pedogenetic horizon in both Planosols, and a high proportion of microorganismal alkaline phosphatase was also found. We highlight the need for studies on BNF efficiency, especially focusing on archaea and free-living bacteria, as they are performing this important biological function, even in totally degraded semiarid soils. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]