Effects of Shift Work on the Postural and Psychomotor Performance of Night Workers

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effects of shift work on the psychomotor and postural performance of night workers. The study included 20 polysomnography technicians working schedule of 12-h night shift by 36-h off. On the first day of protocol, the body mass and height were measured, and an actigraph was placed on the wrist of each participant. On the second day of protocol, sleepiness by Karolinska Sleepiness Scale, postural control by force platform (30 seconds) and psychomotor performance by Psychomotor Vigilance Task (10 minutes) were measured before and after 12-h night work. Results showed that after 12-h night work, sleepiness increased by 59% (p<0.001), postural control variables increased by 9% (p = 0.048), and 14% (p = 0.006). Mean reaction time, and the number of lapses of attention increased by 13% (p = 0.006) and 425% (p = 0.015), respectively, but the mean reciprocal reaction time decreased by 7%. In addition, there were correlations between sleepiness and postural control variables with opened eyes (r = 0.616, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.361–0.815; r = 0.538; 95% CI = 0.280–0.748) and closed eyes (r = 0.557; 95% CI = 0.304–0.764, r = 0497; 95% CI = 0.325–0.715) and a pronounced effect of sleepiness on postural sway (R² = 0.393; 95% CI = 0.001–0.03). Therefore, 12-h night work system and sleepiness showed a negative impact in postural and psychomotor vigilance performance of night workers. As unexpected, the force platform was feasibility to detect sleepiness in this population, underscoring the possibility of using this method in the workplace to prevent occupational injuries and accidents.     

Physical and biological properties of fluorescent dansylated bile salt derivatives: the role of steroid ring hydroxylation

The hydroxyl groups of bile salts play a major role in determining their physical properties and physiologic behavior. To date, no fluorescent bile salt derivatives have been prepared which permit evaluation of the functional role of the steroid ring. We have prepared five fluorescent cholanoyl derivatives using a dansyl-ethylene diamine precursor linked to the sulfonyl group of taurine; N-(5-dimethylamino-1-naphthalenesulfonyl)-N'-(2-aminoethanesulf onyl)- ethylenediamine. The fluorescent dansyl-taurine was conjugated to the carboxyl group of free bile acids, enabling the labeling of the series: dehydrocholate, ursodeoxycholate, cholate, chenodeoxycholate and deoxycholate. Despite a systematic hydrophobic shift compared with the native bile salts (aqueous solubility and water:octanol partitioning), the influence of steroid ring hydroxylation was retained, with the dehydrocholate and cholate derivatives more water soluble than the dihydroxy derivatives. Similarly, the sequence of HPLC mobilities, reflecting relative hydrophilicity, was identical in the dansyl-taurine derivatives and the native taurine-conjugated bile salts. Cellular uptake of all five steroid derivatives was rapid, and partial inhibition of [3H]taurocholate uptake was observed in isolated hepatocytes. Rates of biliary excretion of the dansylated derivatives by the isolated perfused rat liver correlated closely with hydrophilicity. Collectively, these findings indicate that the influence of the hydroxyl groups is retained in this series of dansylated steroids, and that hydroxylation is a key determinant of their hepatocellular transport and biliary excretion. These fluorescent bile salt derivatives may thus serve as unique probes for investigating structure-function relationships in hepatic processing of steroid-based compounds.     

A new species of Tiddergasilus Marques & Boeger, 2018 (Copepoda: Ergasilidae) from the gills of Astyanax lacustris (Lütken) (Osteichthyes: Characidae) in Brazil

A new parasitic copepod, Tiddergasilus bipartitus n. sp. (Copepoda, Ergasilidae), is described herein based on three adult females found attached to the gills of the yellow-tail lambari Astyanax lacustris (Lütken), sampled in Pardo River, municipality of Botucatu, São Paulo State, Brazil. Tiddergasilus bipartitus n. sp. was recognized as a new member of the monotypic genus Tiddergasilus Marques & Boeger, 2018 by having: antennule 6-segmented; maxillary basis armed with 2 terminal teeth and ornamented with multiple spinules; second and third leg both with endopod 3-segmented. The new copepod can be distinguished from its congener, Tiddergasilus iheringi (Tidd, 1942), by the morphology of the antennal claw, number of somites/segments in abdomen and fourth leg, and by the ornamentation of the first leg. This report expands the geographic distribution and diversity of fish species parasitized with Tiddergasilus spp. in Brazil. Moreover, it also represents the first report of an ergasilid species in the Pardo River. A list of diagnostic features for the Brazilian species of Ergasilus von Nordmann, 1832 is provided herein, in order to aid comparisons with the species of this complex genus.

     

The SAUR gene family in coffee: genome-wide identification and gene expression analysis during somatic embryogenesis

Molecular Biology Reports - Small auxin-up RNA (SAUR) genes form a wide family supposedly involved in different physiological and developmental processes in plants such as leaf senescence, auxin...     

Low modularity and specialization in a commensalistic epiphyte–phorophyte network in a tropical cloud forest

Species interactions can shape the structure of natural communities. Such sets of interactions have been described as complex ecological networks, an example of which is the commensal network formed by epiphyte–phorophyte interactions. Vascular epiphytes germinate and grow on phorophytes (support trees), assuming a horizontal distribution (among the phorophyte species) and a vertical distribution (from the base of the tree trunk to the crown of phorophytes, i.e., through ecological zones). Here, we investigated the organization of these structural dimensions of the epiphyte–phorophyte network in a Brazilian tropical montane cloud forest. The analyzed network, comprising 66 epiphyte species and 22 phorophyte species, exhibited a nested structure with a low degree of specialization, a typical pattern for epiphyte–phorophyte networks in forests. The network was slightly modular, with 65% of the species common to three modules, and had vertical structure corresponding to the vertical organization of the phorophytes. The size (diameter at breast height) of phorophyte individuals influenced the network structure, possibly due to the increase in habitat area, the time available for colonization by epiphytes, and a greater number of microenvironments. We found that the distribution of the epiphyte species differed between the phorophyte ecological zones, with greater richness in the lower portions and greater abundance in the upper portions of the phorophytes. The results provide relevant guidance for future research on the characteristics and the vertical and horizontal organization of vascular epiphyte and phorophyte networks. Abstract in Portuguese is available with online material.     

Peptidoglycan Branched Stem Peptides Contribute to Streptococcus pneumoniae Virulence by Inhibiting Pneumolysin Release

Streptococcus pneumoniae (the pneumococcus) colonizes the human nasopharynx and is a significant pathogen worldwide. Pneumolysin (Ply) is a multi-functional, extracellular virulence factor produced by this organism that is critical for pathogenesis. Despite the absence of any apparent secretion or cell surface attachment motifs, Ply localizes to the cell envelope of actively growing cells. We sought to characterize the consequences of this surface localization. Through functional assays with whole cells and subcellular fractions, we determined that Ply activity and its release into the extracellular environment are inhibited by peptidoglycan (PG) structure. The ability of PG to inhibit Ply release was dependent on the stem peptide composition of this macromolecule, which was manipulated by mutation of the murMN operon that encodes proteins responsible for branched stem peptide synthesis. Additionally, removal of choline-binding proteins from the cell surface significantly reduced Ply release to levels observed in a mutant with a high proportion of branched stem peptides suggesting a link between this structural feature and surface-associated choline-binding proteins involved in PG metabolism. Of clinical relevance, we also demonstrate that a hyperactive, mosaic murMN allele associated with penicillin resistance causes decreased Ply release with concomitant increases in the amount of branched stem peptides. Finally, using a murMN deletion mutant, we observed that increased Ply release is detrimental to virulence during a murine model of pneumonia. Taken together, our results reveal a novel role for branched stem peptides in pneumococcal pathogenesis and demonstrate the importance of controlled Ply release during infection. These results highlight the importance of PG composition in pathogenesis and may have broad implications for the diverse PG structures observed in other bacterial pathogens.     

Selected anthropometric variables and aerobic fitness as predictors of cardiovascular disease risk in children

The aim of this study was to assess the suitability of body mass index, waist circumference, waist-to-height ratio and aerobic fitness as predictors of cardiovascular risk factor clustering in children. A cross-sectional study was conducted with 290 school boys and girls from 6 to 10 years old, randomly selected. Blood was collected after a 12-hour fasting period. Blood pressure, waist circumference (WC), height and weight were evaluated according to international standards. Aerobic fitness (AF) was assessed by the 20-metre shuttle-run test. Clustering was considered when three of these factors were present: high systolic or diastolic blood pressure, high low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, high triglycerides, high plasma glucose, high insulin concentrations and low high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol. A ROC curve identified the cut-off points of body mass index (BMI), WC, waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) and AF as predictors of risk factor clustering. BMI, WC and WHR resulted in significant areas under the ROC curves, which was not observed for AF. The anthropometric variables were good predictors of cardiovascular risk factor clustering in both sexes, whereas aerobic fitness should not be used to identify cardiovascular risk factor clustering in these children.     

Ontology Alignment Repair through Modularization and Confidence-Based Heuristics

Ontology Matching aims at identifying a set of semantic correspondences, called an alignment, between related ontologies. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in efficient and effective matching methods for large ontologies. However, alignments produced for large ontologies are often logically incoherent. It was only recently that the use of repair techniques to improve the coherence of ontology alignments began to be explored. This paper presents a novel modularization technique for ontology alignment repair which extracts fragments of the input ontologies that only contain the necessary classes and relations to resolve all detectable incoherences. The paper presents also an alignment repair algorithm that uses a global repair strategy to minimize both the degree of incoherence and the number of mappings removed from the alignment, while overcoming the scalability problem by employing the proposed modularization technique. Our evaluation shows that our modularization technique produces significantly small fragments of the ontologies and that our repair algorithm produces more complete alignments than other current alignment repair systems, while obtaining an equivalent degree of incoherence. Additionally, we also present a variant of our repair algorithm that makes use of the confidence values of the mappings to improve alignment repair. Our repair algorithm was implemented as part of AgreementMakerLight, a free and open-source ontology matching system.     

Sugarcane (Saccharum X officinarum): A Reference Study for the Regulation of Genetically Modified Cultivars in Brazil

Global interest in sugarcane has increased significantly in recent years due to its economic impact on sustainable energy production. Sugarcane breeding and better agronomic practices have contributed to a huge increase in sugarcane yield in the last 30?years. Additional increases in sugarcane yield are expected to result from the use of biotechnology tools in the near future. Genetically modified (GM) sugarcane that incorporates genes to increase resistance to biotic and abiotic stresses could play a major role in achieving this goal. However, to bring GM sugarcane to the market, it is necessary to follow a regulatory process that will evaluate the environmental and health impacts of this crop. The regulatory review process is usually accomplished through a comparison of the biology and composition of the GM cultivar and a non-GM counterpart. This review intends to provide information on non-GM sugarcane biology, genetics, breeding, agronomic management, processing, products and byproducts, as well as the current technologies used to develop GM sugarcane, with the aim of assisting regulators in the decision-making process regarding the commercial release of GM sugarcane cultivars.     

Semantic Similarity in Biomedical Ontologies

In recent years, ontologies have become a mainstream topic in biomedical research. When biological entities are described using a common schema, such as an ontology, they can be compared by means of their annotations. This type of comparison is called semantic similarity, since it assesses the degree of relatedness between two entities by the similarity in meaning of their annotations. The application of semantic similarity to biomedical ontologies is recent; nevertheless, several studies have been published in the last few years describing and evaluating diverse approaches. Semantic similarity has become a valuable tool for validating the results drawn from biomedical studies such as gene clustering, gene expression data analysis, prediction and validation of molecular interactions, and disease gene prioritization.