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Aims: The mechanism by which synovial fluid (SF) kills bacteria has not yet been elucidated, and a better understanding is needed. We sought to analyze the antimicrobial properties of exogenous copper in human SF against Staphylococcus aureus. Methods: We performed in vitro growth and viability assays to determine the capability of S. aureus to survive in SF with the addition of 10 µM of copper. We determined the minimum bactericidal concentration of copper (MBC-Cu) and evaluated its sensitivity to killing, comparing wild type (WT) and CopAZB-deficient USA300 strains. Results: UAMS-1 demonstrated a greater sensitivity to SF compared to USA300 WT at 12 hours (p = 0.001) and 24 hours (p = 0.027). UAMS-1 died in statistically significant quantities at 24 hours (p = 0.017), and USA300 WT survived at 24 hours. UAMS-1 was more susceptible to the addition of copper at four (p = 0.001), 12 (p = 0.005), and 24 hours (p = 0.006). We confirmed a high sensitivity to killing with the addition of exogenous copper on both strains at four (p = 0.011), 12 (p = 0.011), and 24 hours (p = 0.011). WT and CopAZB-deficient USA300 strains significantly died in SF, demonstrating a MBC-Cu of 50 µM against USA300 WT (p = 0.011). Conclusion: SF has antimicrobial properties against S. aureus, and UAMS-1 was more sensitive than USA300 WT. Adding 10 µM of copper was highly toxic, confirming its bactericidal effect. We found CopAZB proteins to be involved in copper effluxion by demonstrating the high sensitivity of mutant strains to lower copper concentrations. Thus, we propose CopAZB proteins as potential targets and use exogenous copper as a treatment alternative against S. aureus.

Monitoring chemical substances is of paramount importance in various industries and environmental contexts. In industrial settings, the presence of certain chemical substances may indicate leaks, spills, or malfunctioning equipment, posing immediate threats to both human health and the environment. Moreover, continuous monitoring of chemical compounds is crucial for ensuring compliance with safety regulations and environmental standards. In the context of air quality management, monitoring chemical compounds helps identify sources of pollution, assess the impact on public health, and implement effective pollution control measures. Timely detection and response to chemical compounds also play a vital role in preventing long-term environmental degradation. Overall, monitoring chemical substances is an indispensable component of proactive risk management, environmental stewardship, and the safeguarding of human well-being. The development of automatic and portable devices for online monitoring is an important need in the chemical industry. The smartwatch designed and presented is a home-developed prototype and built from commercially available components. All components of the smartwatch are protected with a plastic casing capable of allowing air to pass to the sensors, the device is also capable of measuring temperature and relative humidity, magnitudes that influence the detection of different odors or volatile compounds. This device is based on a microcontroller that offers low-power performance, integrated Bluetooth low energy at an affordable price, and the measurements of four digital MOX gas sensors, models BME680 SGP40, ENS160 and STC31 through I2C interface. Data are shown on a LCD display and also transmitted via Bluetooth to a smartphone at a sampling period time of 2 s. It is powered using a 3.7 V lithium polymer battery. The smartwatch has a graphical interface to show the user the data provided by the sensors. The designed smartwatch has been validated by measuring different industrial gases like toluene, xylene, and ethylbenzene at low concentrations. Toluene was measured at 6 ppm, xylene at 8 ppm, and ethylbenzene at 10 ppm. Good discrimination between the three different gases was achieved using Principal Component Analysis as multivariable analysis.

La inteligencia artificial (IA) en el país ha generado un gran impacto en la formación de estudiantes, por lo que su uso genera expectativa en los estudiantes de educación superior; la IA tiene la función de proporcionar conocimientos inmediatos, para potencializar habilidades y capacidades a través de un ordenador. El objetivo es ejecutar una revisión bibliográfica de los diferentes artículos científicos que permite visualizar de manera general la realidad del contexto, sobre el uso de la IA en educación superior, para comprender el impacto que genera la IA. Se utilizó una metodología de revisión bibliográfica con alcance descriptivo comparativo de la IA, así mismo, se revisaron diferentes artículos científicos mediante un proceso selectivo se obtuvo treinta y nueve artículos, que tienen relación directa con la IA en el uso y formación de estudiantes de educación superior, cuyo resultado fue reconocer las ventajas y desventajas que tienen la alfabetización en IA, para fortalecer capacidades cognitivas complejas en el menor tiempo posible. Concluyendo que la educación de la sociedad en el uso de la tecnología es clave para formar ciudadanos con sentido crítico y decidir la dirección en el uso de esta tecnología. La inteligencia artificial puede ser una oportunidad para mejorar nuestra sociedad y generar mejores oportunidades pedagógicas, didácticas y curriculares, en la educación superior.

Summary: Although RNA is found in the seminal fluid of diverse organisms, it is unknown whether it is functional within females. We developed a proteomic method (VESPA, Variant Enabled SILAC Proteomic Analysis) to test the hypothesis that Drosophila male seminal fluid RNA is translated by females. We found 67 male-derived, female-translated proteins (mdFTPs) in female lower reproductive tracts, many with predicted functions relevant to reproduction. Knockout experiments indicate that mdFTPs play diverse roles in postmating interactions, affecting fertilization success, and the formation/persistence of the insemination reaction mass, a trait hypothesized to be involved in sexual conflict. These findings advance our understanding of reproduction by revealing a mechanism of postmating molecular interactions between the sexes that strengthens and extends male influences on reproduction in previously unrecognized ways. Given the diverse species that carry RNA in seminal fluid, this discovery has broad significance for understanding molecular mechanisms of cooperation and conflict during reproduction.

Abstract Background The US-Mexico border is the busiest in the world, with millions of people crossing it daily. However, little is known about cross-border utilization of cancer care, or about the reasons driving it. We designed a cross sectional online survey to understand the type of care patients with cancer who live in the US and Mexico seek outside their home country, the reasons why patients traveled across the border to receive care, and the barriers faced when seeking cross-border care. Results The online survey was sent to the 248 cancer care providers working in the six Mexican border states who were registered members of the Mexican Society of Oncology. Responses were collected between September-November 2022. Sixty-six providers (response rate 26%) completed the survey. Fifty-nine (89%) reported interacting with US-based patients traveling to Mexico to receive various treatment modalities, with curative surgery (n = 38) and adjuvant chemotherapy (n = 31) being the most common. Forty-nine (74%) reported interacting with Mexico-based patients traveling to the US to receive various treatment modalities, with immunotherapy (n = 29) and curative surgery (n = 27) being the most common. The most frequently reported reason US-based patients sought care in Mexico was inadequate health insurance (n = 45). The most frequently reported reason Mexico-based patients sought care in the US was patients’ perception of superior healthcare (n = 38). Conclusions Most Mexican oncologists working along the Mexico-US border have interacted with patients seeking or receiving binational cancer care. The type of care sought, as well as the reasons for seeking it, differ between US and Mexico-based patients. These patterns of cross-border healthcare utilization highlight unmet needs for patients with cancer in both countries and call for policy changes to improve outcomes in border regions.

Background and Objective: The antihyperglycemic effect is associated with the pre-hispanic fruit xoconostle or tunillo (Stenocereus stellatus, Pfeiffer and Riccobono). This fruit includes in various varieties, distinguished by color. Xoconostle fruits are highly perishable. Therefore, the aim of this study was to assess antihyperglycemic effects of xoconostle juice before (fresh) and after pasteurization. The study focused on the white and red varieties of xoconostle. Material and Methods: In this study, the method involved collecting juice from xoconostle fruits, followed by pasteurization. Chemical, physical and microbial parameters were assessed for the juice and the ability to decrease capillary glucose levels (antihyperglycemic effect) was assessed in male Wistar rats. Results and Conclusion: Pasteurization process led to decreases in total phenolic content of the red variety of xoconostle fruit, while the white variety showed increases in malic acid content. Despite these changes, fresh and pasteurized juices of the two varieties showed lower blood glucose levels, compared to the control group. Red variety demonstrated a stronger antihyperglycemic effect. In conclusion, pasteurization did not affect pharmacological effects of xoconostle juice, making it a viable preservation method without compromising the antihyperglycemic charac-teristics. Results of this research suggest a conservation method which preserve the antihyperglycemic effects while extending its shelf life. Conflict of interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Comparison of global gene expression patterns in con- and heterospecifically mated Drosophila mojavensis and Drosophila arizonae suggest that mating-responsive genes with divergent expression also exhibit more disrupted transcriptional profiles in heterospecifically mated females, providing further insight into the evolution of postmating-prezygotic reproductive isolation.

Total hip arthroplasty (THA) is one of the most common and successful surgical procedures worldwide. At the same time, it is constantly evolving, and as a consequence, advances in implant technology have led to significant improvements in the different materials of the acetabular and femoral components. The selection of bearing surfaces and their tribology are critical to achieving a successful outcome. Pseudotumors are important, and usually misdiagnosed, complications associated with hard bearing surfaces such as metal-on-metal couples. They belong to a group of reactions called adverse local tissue reaction, which can occur in the vicinity of any THA. We present 2 cases of adverse local tissue reaction associated with the use of ceramic-on-metal bearings surfaces in 2 primary THAs that were treated with modular component exchange during single-stage revision surgery. Level of Evidence: IV

Abstract We study how information transmission biases arise by the interplay between the structural properties of the network and the dynamics of the information in synthetic scale-free homophilic/heterophilic networks. We provide simple mathematical tools to quantify these biases. Both Simple and Complex Contagion models are insufficient to predict significant biases. In contrast, a Hybrid Contagion model—in which both Simple and Complex Contagion occur—gives rise to three different homophily-dependent biases: emissivity and receptivity biases, and echo chambers. Simulations in an empirical network with high homophily confirm our findings. Our results shed light on the mechanisms that cause inequalities in the visibility of information sources, reduced access to information, and lack of communication among distinct groups.

The authors develop an RNA sequencing-based platform, PERSIST-seq, to simultaneously delineate in-cell mRNA stability, ribosome load, and in-solution stability of a diverse mRNA library to derive design principles for improved mRNA therapeutics.

Dissolved oxygen (DO) and water temperature vary in coastal environments. In tropical regions, the ability of aquatic ectotherms to cope with hypoxia and high-temperature interactive effects is fundamental for their survival. The mechanisms underlying both hypoxia and thermal tolerance are known to be interconnected, therefore, the idea of cross-tolerance between both environmental stressors has been put forward. We investigated the combined role of hypoxia and temperature changes on the physiological responses of blue crab Callinectes sapidus living in the southern Gulf of Mexico. We measured oxygen consumption, plasmatic biochemical indicators, total hemocyte count (THC), and antioxidant activity biomarkers in muscle and gill tissues of blue crab acclimated to moderate hypoxia or normoxia and exposed to a thermal fluctuation or a constant temperature, the former including a temperature beyond the optimum range. Animals recovered their routine metabolic rate (RMR) after experiencing thermal stress in normoxia, reflecting physiological plasticity to temperature changes. In hypoxia, the effect of increasing temperature was modulated as reflected in the RMR and plasmatic biochemical indicators concentration, and the THC did not suggest significant alterations in the health status. In both DO, the antioxidant defense system was active against oxidative (OX) damage to lipids and proteins. However, hypoxia was associated with an increase in the amelioration of OX damage. These results show that C. sapidus can modulate its thermal response in a stringent dependency with DO, supporting the idea of local acclimatization to tropical conditions, and providing insights into its potential as invasive species.

Objectives: To validate the use of a patient experience survey composed of the Spanish version of the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) survey and of questions locally created in our institution, a private hospital in Panama. To identify which domains of our patient experience survey have the strongest association with the overall inpatient hospital experience rating. Methods: A retrospective analysis of 1619 electronic survey results of adult inpatient experience data was performed using exploratory factor and Pearson correlation analyses. The data was collected between March 2018 and December 2019 from a web-survey application, accessible through a link sent by email after hospital discharge. Results: Results from analyses showed that questions grouping occurred under the same domains as the HCAHPS English version (factor loading 0.456 to 0.918) and that a new domain named administrative processes (0.818 to 0.846) arose for the newly created questions. Cronbach's alpha values ranged from 0.32 to 0.85, with an α of0.65 for the new local questions. Correlation analyses were higher for the domains of communication from nurses (0.670) and administrative processes (0.618). Conclusions: Our investigation validates the use of our patient experience survey, composed of questions from the Spanish version of the HCAHPS survey and locally created ones. In our institution, communication from nurses is most correlated with the inpatient hospital experience rating. Hospital administrative processes were also strongly associated with the overall inpatient hospital rating, and we argue that these later aspects should be addressed to improve the patient experience.

Abstract Background Despite the growing interest in the female side of copulatory interactions, the roles played by differential expression and alternative splicing mechanisms of pre-RNA on tissues outside of the reproductive tract have remained largely unknown. Here we addressed these questions in the context of con- vs heterospecific matings between Drosophila mojavensis and its sister species, D. arizonae. We analyzed transcriptional responses in female heads using an integrated investigation of genome-wide patterns of gene expression, including differential expression (DE), alternative splicing (AS) and intron retention (IR). Results Our results indicated that early transcriptional responses were largely congruent between con- and heterospecific matings but are substantially perturbed over time. Conspecific matings induced functional pathways related to amino acid balance previously associated with the brain’s physiology and female postmating behavior. Heterospecific matings often failed to activate regulation of some of these genes and induced expression of additional genes when compared with those of conspecifically-mated females. These mechanisms showed functional specializations with DE genes mostly linked to pathways of proteolysis and nutrient homeostasis, while AS genes were more related to photoreception and muscle assembly pathways. IR seems to play a more general role in DE regulation during the female postmating response. Conclusions We provide evidence showing that AS genes substantially perturbed by heterospecific matings in female heads evolve at slower evolutionary rates than the genome background. However, DE genes evolve at evolutionary rates similar, or even higher, than those of male reproductive genes, which highlights their potential role in sexual selection and the evolution of reproductive barriers.

Underwater imaging has been present for many decades due to its relevance in vision and navigation systems. In recent years, advances in robotics have led to the availability of autonomous or unmanned underwater vehicles (AUVs, UUVs). Despite the rapid development of new studies and promising algorithms in this field, there is currently a lack of research toward standardized, general-approach proposals. This issue has been stated in the literature as a limiting factor to be addressed in the future. The key starting point of this work is to identify a synergistic effect between professional photography and scientific fields by analyzing image acquisition issues. Subsequently, we discuss underwater image enhancement and quality assessment, image mosaicking and algorithmic concerns as the last processing step. In this line, statistics about 120 AUV articles fro recent decades have been analyzed, with a special focus on state-of-the-art papers from recent years. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to identify critical issues in autonomous underwater vehicles encompassing the entire process, starting from optical issues in image sensing and ending with some issues related to algorithmic processing. In addition, a global underwater workflow is proposed, extracting future requirements, outcome effects and new perspectives in this context.

Las fracturas de acetábulo asociadas a traumatismos de baja energía, son una identidad frecuente hoy en día en los adultos mayores. La indicación del tratamiento quirúrgico o conservador, depende de múltiples factores como la edad y las comorbilidades del paciente, el tipo y localización de la fractura, y el medio socio-económico. Independientemente del tratamiento elegido, ninguno está exento de complicaciones. Se describe a continuación un paciente con una fractura de acetábulo cerrada, de tratamiento conservador, que derivó en artritis séptica de la articulación coxofemoral.

Background: This study aims to analyze the ability to restore hip biomechanics in patients who undergo total hip arthroplasty for displaced femoral neck fractures operated by either hip surgeons (HSs) or orthopaedic residents (ORs). Methods: We retrospectively compared 95 patients treated by HSs (group A) with 110 patients treated by ORs (group B). Leg-length discrepancy, femoral offset (FO), center of rotation (COR), acetabular inclination, and acetabular anteversion were evaluated on postoperative radiographs using the healthy contralateral hip as control. Results: The median leg-length discrepancy was 2 mm for both groups (P = .74). The leg length was increased in 54% of the HS group and 57% of the OR group (P = .13). The median FO difference of groups A and B were 7 mm and 5.5 mm, respectively (P = .14). FO was increased in 80% of the HS group and 69% of the OR group (P = .19). Median discrepancies of the horizontal and vertical CORs were not statistically relevant, with P-values of .69 and .14, respectively. The horizontal COR was slightly medialized in 58% of the HS group and 53% of the OR group (P = .003). The vertical COR was slightly proximal in 66% of the HS group and 76% of the OR group (P = .28). The median acetabular inclination angles of groups A and B were 41° and 40°, respectively (P = .62). The median anteversion angle was 19° for both groups (P = .89). Conclusions: The horizontal COR was the only measurement with statistical significance. To conclude, ORs under supervision are as reliable as HSs to properly restore hip biomechanics in patients who undergo total hip arthroplasty for displaced femoral neck fractures.

Simultaneous bilateral femoral neck fractures (FNFs) are extremely rare and usually associated with an underlying condition affecting the bone quality and mineralization. Convulsions have also been described as a possible cause, mostly as a consequence of epilepsy, hyponatremia, and hypocalcemia. We present a 52-year-old female patient, with bilateral displaced FNFs due to a tonic-clonic seizure and high-dose steroid therapy related to a frontal lobe anaplastic oligodendroglioma brain tumor resection. Two days after admission, bilateral one-stage uncemented total hip arthroplasty (THA) under general anesthesia and through a posterolateral approach was performed using a metal-on-polyethylene bearing surface. Several risk factors can be identified in this unique case, such as the high-dose steroid therapy, the low-demand activity of the patient due to her functional sequelae, and finally, the convulsive episode. Surgeons should be aware of this uncommon injury to ensure early diagnosis and treatment in all patients with a previous history of seizures, chronic steroid use, severe hip pain, and inability to walk. For bone metabolic diseases, preventive measures should be indicated to avoid these complications. Bilateral one-stage uncemented THA represents an effective procedure with a low complication rate allowing early rehabilitation.

Human eye movements while driving reveal that visual attention largely depends on the context in which it occurs. Furthermore, an autonomous vehicle which performs this function would be more reliable if its outputs were understandable. Capsule Networks have been presented as a great opportunity to explore new horizons in the Computer Vision field, due to their capability to structure and relate latent information. In this article, we present a hierarchical approach for the prediction of eye fixations in autonomous driving scenarios. Context-driven visual attention can be modeled by considering different conditions which, in turn, are represented as combinations of several spatio-temporal features. With the aim of learning these conditions, we have built an encoder-decoder network which merges visual features' information using a global-local definition of capsules. Two types of capsules are distinguished: representational capsules for features and discriminative capsules for conditions. The latter and the use of eye fixations recorded with wearable eye tracking glasses allow the model to learn both to predict contextual conditions and to estimate visual attention, by means of a multi-task loss function. Experiments show how our approach is able to express either frame-level (global) or pixel-wise (local) relationships between features and contextual conditions, allowing for interpretability while maintaining or improving the performance of black-box related systems in the literature. Indeed, our proposal offers an improvement of 29% in terms of information gain with respect to the best performance reported in the literature.

La correcta puesta en marcha de la anestesia pediátrica y obstétrica es determinante para óptimos desenlaces en el manejo quirúrgico de las mujeres que durante su embarazo han presentado diagnóstico de mielomeningocele fetal (MMC). El objeto de realizar la resolución de ésta entidad antes del nacimiento se basa en menor requerimiento de derivaciones ventrículo peritoneal y mejoría en la función motora de los miembros inferiores. Dentro de las variables que representa este reto quirúrgico se encuentra la morbilidad materna, dehiscencia de histerorrafia, ruptura uterina secundaria a histerotomía y los consiguientes partos al actual por cesárea. La presente es una revisión no sistemática de la literatura acerca del manejo anestésico para el binomio madre-producto con MMC y con ello socializar al servicio de anestesiología la mejor estrategia en el manejo perioperatorio de estos pacientes.

The tracking problem (that is, how to follow a previously memorized path) is one of the most important problems in mobile robots. Several methods can be formulated depending on the way the robot state is related to the path. “Trajectory tracking” is the most common method, with the controller aiming to move the robot toward a moving target point, like in a real-time servosystem. In the case of complex systems or systems under perturbations or unmodeled effects, such as UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles), other tracking methods can offer additional benefits. In this paper, methods that consider the dynamics of the path’s descriptor parameter (which can be called “error adaptive tracking”) are contrasted with trajectory tracking. A formal description of tracking methods is first presented, showing that two types of error adaptive tracking can be used with the same controller in any system. Then, it is shown that the selection of an appropriate tracking rate improves error convergence and robustness for a UAV system, which is illustrated by simulation experiments. It is concluded that error adaptive tracking methods outperform trajectory tracking ones, producing a faster and more robust convergence tracking, while preserving, if required, the same tracking rate when convergence is achieved.

La displasia del desarrollo de la cadera (DDC) es una entidad frecuente que afecta a 4 de cada 1000 nacidos vivos y es una causa reconocida de artrosis de cadera secundaria a pesar de los controles perinatales de rutina. En la mayoría de los pacientes, el diagnóstico precoz de la patología permite una evolución sin secuelas. Sin embargo, el diagnóstico tardío con múltiples intervenciones representa un verdadero reto para el ortopedista, ya que se trata de pacientes con fisis abierta, nucleos de osificación presentes y cirugías previas en la zona de abordaje. Se reporta a continuación el caso de una paciente tratada en nuestro centro desde su nacimiento, que evolucionó con complicaciones asociadas al diagnóstico tardío y a las intervenciones quirúrgicas, describiendo la cirugía de salvataje realizada a los 12 años de edad y destacando finalmente la importancia de los controles perinatales de rutina y el diagnóstico precoz de la DDC.

Septic arthritis due to Listeria monocytogenes (LM) is extremely rare and most infections due to this organism are seen in immunocompromised patients. We describe a patient without immunological compromise, with a late total knee arthroplasty infection caused by LM treated with one-stage revision surgery. She had an elevated erythrocyte sedimentation rate (79 mm/h) and C-reactive protein (13 mg/dL). Aspiration of the knee joint yielded purulent fluid; cultures showed LM. The patient was given 6 weeks of intravenous ampicillin, followed by trimethoprim/sulfamethoxazole, and finally amoxicillin orally for 7 months. Two years after revision surgery, radiographs showed no evidence of implant loosening. This is a single case and although one-stage approach seemed to have worked, it should not be recommended on the basis of a single report. Keywords: Total knee arthroplasty, Infection, Listeria monocytogenes, Immunocompetent, One-stage revision surgery

Novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the etiologic agent of the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, which has reached 28 million cases worldwide in 1 year. The serological detection of antibodies against the virus will play a pivotal role in complementing molecular tests to improve diagnostic accuracy, contact tracing, vaccine efficacy testing, and seroprevalence surveillance. Here, we aimed first to evaluate a lateral flow assay's ability to identify specific IgM and IgG antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 and second, to report the seroprevalence estimates of these antibodies among health care workers and healthy volunteer blood donors in Panama. We recruited study participants between April 30th and July 7th, 2020. For the test validation and performance evaluation, we analyzed serum samples from participants with clinical symptoms and confirmed positive RT-PCR for SARS-CoV-2, and a set of pre-pandemic serum samples. We used two by two table analysis to determine the test positive and negative percentage agreement as well as the Kappa agreement value with a 95% confidence interval. Then, we used the lateral flow assay to determine seroprevalence among serum samples from COVID-19 patients, potentially exposed health care workers, and healthy volunteer donors. Our results show this assay reached a positive percent agreement of 97.2% (95% CI 84.2–100.0%) for detecting both IgM and IgG. The assay showed a Kappa of 0.898 (95%CI 0.811–0.985) and 0.918 (95% CI 0.839–0.997) for IgM and IgG, respectively. The evaluation of serum samples from hospitalized COVID-19 patients indicates a correlation between test sensitivity and the number of days since symptom onset; the highest positive percent agreement [87% (95% CI 67.0–96.3%)] was observed at ≥15 days post-symptom onset (PSO). We found an overall antibody seroprevalence of 11.6% (95% CI 8.5–15.8%) among both health care workers and healthy blood donors. Our findings suggest this lateral flow assay could contribute significantly to implementing seroprevalence testing in locations with active community transmission of SARS-CoV-2.

Uniformly distributing nanoparticles on nanofibres can benefit electrocatalysis by increasing surface area, but it is complex. Here the authors use facile, inexpensive, nozzle-free electrospinning to produce dispersed nanoparticles on nanofibres, attaining increased voltage in a commercial-scale fuel cell.

Abstract Background Adaptation to new hosts in phytophagous insects often involves mechanisms of host recognition by genes of sensory pathways. Most often the molecular evolution of sensory genes has been explained in the context of the birth-and-death model. The role of positive selection is less understood, especially associated with host adaptation and specialization. Here we aim to contribute evidence for this latter hypothesis by considering the case of Drosophila mojavensis, a species with an evolutionary history shaped by multiple host shifts in a relatively short time scale, and its generalist sister species, D. arizonae. Results We used a phylogenetic and population genetic analysis framework to test for positive selection in a subset of four chemoreceptor genes, one gustatory receptor (Gr) and three odorant receptors (Or), for which their expression has been previously associated with host shifts. We found strong evidence of positive selection at several amino acid sites in all genes investigated, most of which exhibited changes predicted to cause functional effects in these transmembrane proteins. A significant portion of the sites identified as evolving positively were largely found in the cytoplasmic region, although a few were also present in the extracellular domains. Conclusions The pattern of substitution observed suggests that some of these changes likely had an effect on signal transduction as well as odorant recognition and protein-protein interactions. These findings support the role of positive selection in shaping the pattern of variation at chemosensory receptors, both during the specialization onto one or a few related hosts, but as well as during the evolution and adaptation of generalist species into utilizing several hosts.

Abstract Information on site fidelity and ranging patterns of wild animals is critical to understand how they use their environment and guide conservation and management strategies. Delphinids show a wide variety of site fidelity and ranging patterns. Between September 2013 and October 2015, we used boat‐based surveys, photographic identification, biopsy sampling, clustering analysis, and geographic information systems to determine the site‐fidelity patterns and representative ranges of southern Australian bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops cf. australis) inhabiting the inner area of Coffin Bay, a highly productive inverse estuary located within Thorny Passage Marine Park, South Australia. Agglomerative hierarchical clustering (AHC) of individuals’ site‐fidelity index and sighting rates indicated that the majority of dolphins within the inner area of Coffin Bay are “regular residents” (n = 125), followed by “occasional residents” (n = 28), and “occasional visitors” (n = 26). The low standard distance deviation indicated that resident dolphins remained close to their main center of use (range = 0.7–4.7 km, X ± SD = 2.3 ± 0.9 km). Representative ranges of resident dolphins were small (range = 3.9–33.5 km2, X ± SD = 15.2 ± 6.8 km2), with no significant differences between males and females (Kruskal–Wallis, χ2 = 0.426, p = .808). The representative range of 56% of the resident dolphins was restricted to a particular bay within the study area. The strong site fidelity and restricted ranging patterns among individuals could be linked to the high population density of this species in the inner area of Coffin Bay, coupled with differences in social structure and feeding habits. Our results emphasize the importance of productive habitats as a major factor driving site fidelity and restricted movement patterns in highly mobile marine mammals and the high conservation value of the inner area of Coffin Bay for southern Australian bottlenose dolphins.

Reducing the effort required by humans in countering malware is of utmost practical value. We describe a scalable, semi-supervised framework to dig into massive data sets of Android applications and identify new malware families. Until 2010, the industrial standard for the detection of malicious applications has been mainly based on signatures; as each tiny alteration in malware makes them ineffective, new signatures are frequently created –- a task that requires a considerable amount of time and resources from skilled experts. The framework we propose is able to automatically cluster applications in families and suggest formal rules for identifying them with 100% recall and quite high precision. The families are used either to safely extend experts’ knowledge on new samples or to reduce the number of applications requiring thorough analyses. We demonstrated the effectiveness and the scalability of the approach running experiments on a database of 1.5 million Android applications. In 2018, the framework has been successfully deployed on Koodous, a collaborative anti-malware platform.

Introduction Reconstruction of bone defects greater than 6 cm in the upper limb is a difficult problem. Some of the surgical procedures described to treat them are: the use of allogeneic bone graft, the Masquelet technique and the vascularized fibular graft (VFG). The VFG has become the most popularized method to treat this bone defects, because of their biological advantages. The aim of this study was to evaluate the rate of bony union and the time to accomplish this union and the complications associated with this technique in a continuous series of patients. Material and methods A review in our database was performed to identify all patients who underwent reconstruction with VFG for a period of five years. All patients who were treated for defects larger than 6 cm on upper limbs were included. Reconstructions on lower limbs or associated for augmentation stability in shoulder arthrodesis were excluded. Preoperative, intraoperative, and immediate and long-term postoterative variables were analyzed. Results During the assessment period, 18 patients underwent reconstructive surgery with VFG. Six patients (4 males / 2 females) met the inclusion criteria. The average age was 47 years old (range 16 to 66 years). On average, patients had three previous surgeries (range 1 to 4). The time between the initial trauma and reconstructive surgery ranged from 2 to 21 years (mean 7 years). The causes of the defect were post-traumatic (nonunion) sequel in five patients and oncological disease in a patient with a Giant Cells Tumor. The bone segments involved were the humerus (three patients), radius (two), and ulna (one). The average bone defect was 10 cm (range 6 to 15 cm). An osteocutaneous fibular graft was performed in five cases, and in one case without associated skin flap. In all cases, we used locked fixation plates. The average follow-up was 17 months (range 5 to 40 months). Bone healing was achieved in all cases. Bone healing was on average 16 weeks (range 8 to 22 weeks). Two patients had postoperative complications. One of them had an exposure of hardware. The other one suffered loosening of the internal fixation. None of the patients had complications or functional sequelae in the donor site. Conclusion The VFG is a valid option in reconstructive surgery of segmental bone defects larger than 6 cm in the upper limb. It has a high consolidation rate, even in cases with multiple previous surgeries or long evolution time. The technical details prevent complications in the donor site.

Introduction: The intra-articular migration of the spiral lamina or screw, after close reduction and internal fixation (CRIF) with an intramedullary cervicodiaphyseal nail (cut-through), is one of the most frequent postoperative complications. We present a patient with a cut-through and cement leakage into the hip joint after TFN-A cement augmentation and spiral lamina replacement. Methods: A 83-year-old man, suffered a cut-through after CRIF of his left extracapsular hip fracture during the third postoperative month. A revision surgery was planned, including spiral lamina replacement and cement augmentation. Cement leakage into the hip joint was confirmed in the immediate postoperative radiograph and a new intervention was indicated with the removal of the third bodies. Results: The patient presented good clinical evolution, without functional limitation or pain. In routinely postoperative radiographic controls, no differences were observed respect to the immediate postoperative one. Discussion: Current literature dealing with implant revision surgery and associated cement augmentation are scarce. Conclusion: As far as we are concerned, this is the first case in the literature of a re-revision surgery of an extracapsular hip fracture due to a three months postoperative cut-through and a posterior cement leakage into the hip joint after TFN-A cement augmentation and spiral lamina replacement with the need of a posterolateral approach for removal. Keywords: Extracapsular hip fracture, Cut through, Cement augmentation, Nail revision surgery

Environmental pollution is a major cause of disease and death. Exposures in early life are especially dangerous. Patterns of exposure vary greatly across countries. In low-income and lower middle income countries (LMICs), infectious, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases are still major contributors to disease burden. By contrast, in upper middle income and high-income countries noncommunicable diseases predominate. To examine patterns of environmental exposure and disease and to relate these patterns to levels of income and development, we obtained publically available data in 12 countries at different levels of development through a global network of World Health Organization Collaborating Centres in Children's Environmental Health. Pollution exposures in early life contribute to both patterns. Chemical and pesticide pollution are increasing, especially in LMICs. Hazardous wastes, including electronic waste, are accumulating. Pollution-related chronic diseases are becoming epidemic. Future Global Burden of Disease estimates must pay increased attention to the short- and long-term consequences of environmental pollution.

Despite overall progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals, large health discrepancies persist between developed and developing countries. The world is rapidly changing and the influences of societal change and climate change will disproportionately affect the world's most vulnerable populations, thus exacerbating current inequities. Current development strategies do not adequately address these disproportionate impacts of environmental exposures. The aim of this study was to propose a new framework to address the health consequences of environmental exposures beyond 2015. This framework is transdisciplinary and precautionary. It is based on identifying social and economic determinants of health, strengthening primary health systems, and improving the health of vulnerable populations. It incorporates deliberate plans for assessment and control of avoidable environmental exposures. It sets specific, measurable targets for health and environmental improvement.

Understanding the regulation of gene expression is one of the key problems in current biology. A promising method for that purpose is the determination of the temporal dynamics between known initial and ending network states, by using simple acting rules. The huge amount of rule combinations and the nonlinear inherent nature of the problem make genetic algorithms an excellent candidate for finding optimal solutions. As this is a computationally intensive problem that needs long runtimes in conventional architectures for realistic network sizes, it is fundamental to accelerate this task. In this article, we study how to develop efficient parallel implementations of this method for the fine-grained parallel architecture of graphics processing units (GPUs) using the compute unified device architecture (CUDA) platform. An exhaustive and methodical study of various parallel genetic algorithm schemes—master-slave, island, cellular, and hybrid models, and various individual selection methods (roulette, elitist)—is carried out for this problem. Several procedures that optimize the use of the GPU’s resources are presented. We conclude that the implementation that produces better results (both from the performance and the genetic algorithm fitness perspectives) is simulating a few thousands of individuals grouped in a few islands using elitist selection. This model comprises 2 mighty factors for discovering the best solutions: finding good individuals in a short number of generations, and introducing genetic diversity via a relatively frequent and numerous migration. As a result, we have even found the optimal solution for the analyzed gene regulatory network (GRN). In addition, a comparative study of the performance obtained by the different parallel implementations on GPU versus a sequential application on CPU is carried out. In our tests, a multifold speedup was obtained for our optimized parallel implementation of the method on medium class GPU over an equivalent sequential single-core implementation running on a recent Intel i7 CPU. This work can provide useful guidance to researchers in biology, medicine, or bioinformatics in how to take advantage of the parallelization on massively parallel devices and GPUs to apply novel metaheuristic algorithms powered by nature for real-world applications (like the method to solve the temporal dynamics of GRNs).

There is a large body of research on utilizing online activity as a survey of political opinion to predict real world election outcomes. There is considerably less work, however, on using this data to understand topic-specific interest and opinion amongst the general population and specific demographic subgroups, as currently measured by relatively expensive surveys. Here we investigate this possibility by studying a full census of all Twitter activity during the 2012 election cycle along with the comprehensive search history of a large panel of Internet users during the same period, highlighting the challenges in interpreting online and social media activity as the results of a survey. As noted in existing work, the online population is a non-representative sample of the offline world (e.g., the U.S. voting population). We extend this work to show how demographic skew and user participation is non-stationary and difficult to predict over time. In addition, the nature of user contributions varies substantially around important events. Furthermore, we note subtle problems in mapping what people are sharing or consuming online to specific sentiment or opinion measures around a particular topic. We provide a framework, built around considering this data as an imperfect continuous panel survey, for addressing these issues so that meaningful insight about public interest and opinion can be reliably extracted from online and social media data.

Gluteal compartment syndrome (GCS) is extremely rare when compared to compartment syndrome in other anatomical regions, such as the forearm or the lower leg. It usually occurs in drug users following prolonged immobilization due to loss of consciousness. Another possible cause is trauma, which is rare and has only few reports in the literature. Physical examination may show tense and swollen buttocks and severe pain caused by passive range of motion. We present the case of a 70-year-old man who developed GCS after prolonged anterior-posterior pelvis compression. The physical examination revealed swelling, scrotal hematoma, and left ankle extension weakness. An unstable pelvic ring injury was diagnosed and the patient was taken to surgery. Measurement of the intracompartmental pressure was measured in the operating room, thereby confirming the diagnosis. Emergent fasciotomy was performed to decompress the three affected compartments. Trauma surgeons must be aware of the possibility of gluteal compartment syndrome in patients who have an acute pelvic trauma with buttock swelling and excessive pain of the gluteal region. Any delay in diagnosis or treatment can be devastating, causing permanent disability, irreversible loss of gluteal muscles, sciatic nerve palsy, kidney failure, or even death.

Un conjunto de lecturas intencionadas, arrojadas sobre un antiguo paisaje cordobés, develan las lógicas de ocupación desarrolladas a lo largo de siglos de construcción territorial, que resultan de la combinación de pautas culturales de dominio y explotación del espacio, recursos técnicos disponibles y condiciones que el medio natural impone. De dichos procesos emergen modelos de orden territorial que, como síntesis operativa del trabajo humano acumulado en el territorio, reúnen –en su propia conformación material– las claves de futuros criterios de ordenación. A la manera de estructuras constelares, los modelos de orden expresan una forma de organización espacial y un tipo de ruralidad específicos del Norte de Traslasierra. El objetivo es arribar a un conocimiento profundo de este territorio postergado, evidenciar sus recursos culturales y paisajísticos y, a través de ellos, construir una narrativa del territorio que lo resitúe en el mapa de las regiones cordobesas.