Human neurocysticercosis (NCC) is a worldwide neglected disease caused by Taenia solium metacestode and responsible for various complications and neurological disorders. This study aimed to evaluate the use of specific immunoglobulin Y (IgY) produced by laying hens immunized with a hydrophobic fraction of Taenia crassiceps metacestodes (hFTc) in NCC diagnosis. Egg yolk IgY antibodies were fractionated, purified and characterized. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) was carried out to evaluate the production kinetics and avidity maturation of anti-hFTc IgY antibodies throughout the IgY obtention process. Antigen recognition tests were carried out by Western blotting and immunofluorescence antibody test using purified and specific anti-hFTc IgY antibodies for detection of parasitic antigens of T. crassiceps and T. solium metacestodes. Sandwich ELISA was performed to detect circulating immune complexes formed by IgG and parasitic antigens in human sera. The results showed high diagnostic values (93.2% sensitivity and 94.3% specificity) for immune complexes detection in human sera with confirmed NCC. In conclusion, specific IgY antibodies produced from immunized hens with hFTc antigens were efficient to detect T. solium immune complexes in human sera, being an innovative and potential tool for NCC immunodiagnosis.

Inclusion of legume in grass pastures optimizes protein values of the forage and promotes improved digestibility. Therefore, we hypothesized that finishing steers on a novel combination of legumes and grass pasture would produce carcasses with acceptable traits when compared to carcasses from steers finished in feedlot systems. In this study, we evaluated the effects of finishing steers on three systems including: grazing legume–grass pasture containing oats, ryegrass, white and red clover (PAST), grazing PAST plus supplementation with whole corn grain (14 g/kg BW (SUPP)), and on a feedlot-confined system with concentrate only (28 g/kg BW, consisting of 850 g/kg of whole corn grain and 150 g/kg of protein–mineral–vitamin supplement (GRAIN)) on growth performance of steers, carcass traits and digestive disorders. Eighteen steers were randomly assigned to one of three dietary treatments and finished for 91 days. Data regarding pasture and growth performance were collected during three different periods (0 to 28, 29 to 56 and 57 to 91 days). Subsequently, steers were harvested to evaluate carcass traits, presence of rumenitis, abomasitis and liver abscesses. The legume–grass pasture provided more than 19% dry matter of protein. In addition, pasture of paddocks where steers were assigned to SUPP and PAST treatments showed similar nutritional quality. When compared to PAST, finishing on SUPP increased total weight gain per hectare, stocking rate, daily and total weight gains. The increase of weight gain was high to GRAIN than SUPP and PAST. Steers finished on GRAIN had high hot carcass weight, fat thickness and marbling score when compared to PAST. However, these attributes did not differ between GRAIN and SUPP. Abomasum lesions were more prevalent in steers finished on GRAIN when compared to PAST. Results of this research showed that it is possible to produce carcasses with desirable market weight and fat thickness by finishing steers on legume–grass pasture containing oats, ryegrass, white and red clover. Moreover, supplementing steers with corn when grazing on legume–grass pasture produced similar carcass traits when compared to beef fed corn only.

In this study, we sought to evaluate the influence of cigarette smoke and pH cycling on the chemical composition and surface/cross-sectional enamel microhardness. A total of 40 dental blocks obtained from bovine incisors were divided into four groups (n=10): no treatment (control); exposure to cigarette smoke (CS); exposure to pH cycling (PC); and exposure to cigarette smoke and pH cycling (CS-PC). The samples were analyzed by synchrotron radiation micro X-ray fluorescence, bench mode X-ray fluorescence, as well as surface microhardness (SMH) and cross-sectional microhardness (CSMH) testing. The SMH results were submitted to analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Tukey’s test. The CSMH results were evaluated using split-plot ANOVA and Tukey’s test. A high amount of Cd and Pb and traces of Ni and As were observed in enamel and dentin after exposure to cigarette smoke (CS and CS-PC). The SMH and CSMH of CS were statistically higher when compared with the control. The PC and CS-PC showed lower SMH and CSMH. We conclude that exposure to cigarette smoke promoted heavy metal deposition in enamel/dentin. In addition, it increased the enamel microhardness but did not promote a protective effect on the in vitro development of caries. The clinical significance of this work is that there is significant bioaccumulation of heavy metals from cigarette smoke on the surface and in the enamel and dentin.

Intake, digestibility, nitrogen (N) balance, microbial protein synthesis, weight gain, yields of the main commercial cuts and carcass morphometric measurements were evaluated in lambs fed diets containing different levels of chitosan. Sixty Santa Inês crossbred sheep with an average body weight (BW) of 24 ± 2.2 kg were assigned to three treatments (diets containing 0, 136 or 272 mg chitosan/kg BW) in a completely randomized design. There was no effect of chitosan on dry matter (DM) intake. Ingested and retained N showed a quadratic response, with the highest values estimated at the chitosan levels of 142 and 152 mg/kg BW, respectively. Similar to N balance, microbial protein synthesis showed the same quadratic response, in which the level of 136 mg/kg BW resulted in higher synthesis when compared with the other levels. No effect of chitosan was detected on average daily gain, final weight, or carcass variables (hot carcass weight, cold carcass weight, yield of commercial cuts and morphometric measurements of the carcass). Conformation, visceral fat content and fatness of carcasses were also not altered by the use of chitosan. Chitosan improves the digestibility of DM, crude protein and neutral detergent fibre, and increases N balance and microbial protein synthesis but does not change the production performance of feedlot lambs.

The present study provides a comprehensive survey of the planktonic hydrozoan fauna from the Paranaguá Estuarine System (PES; southern Brazil, 25°S 48°W), a subtropical estuary considered a Natural World Heritage site by UNESCO. Extensive collections were performed throughout the estuary in five sampling campaigns during the summer and winter periods of 2012 and 2013 and summer of 2014, totalling 185 samples. About 49,000 organisms were analysed which together with the few previous records resulted in a total of 36 hydromedusae and three siphonophore species. We highlight the presence of Cnidostoma fallax in high abundance (>19,000 individuals captured; ~40% of all planktonic hydrozoans). The high abundance of this species throughout three consecutive summers suggests a change in the local assemblage structure, since previous reports in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s had shown Liriope tetraphylla recurrently as the dominant species which now ranks fourth. It is difficult to ascertain the causes of such changes due to the paucity of previous studies on Brazilian estuaries, but one possibility is that C. fallax has been recently introduced. In any case, the high dominance of this hydromedusa was not expected and this scenario would potentially cause changes in the local food web since C. fallax and L. tetraphylla are quite different morphologically and ecologically and thus probably play different trophic roles. Future studies are necessary to check the long-term permanency of C. fallax and to assess its biology and ecology and the impact of this assemblage change on the ecosystem.

We studied the ontogenetic growth of goat wethers (castrated male goats) of the Saanen and Swiss Alpine breeds based on a large range of intraspecific body mass (BM). The body parts and the chemical constituents of the empty body were described by the allometric function by using BM and the empty body mass (EBM) as the predictors for morphological traits and chemical composition, respectively. We fitted the allometric scaling function by applying the SAS NLMIXED procedure, but to evaluate assumptions regarding variances in morphological and compositional traits, we combined the scaling function with homoscedastic (MOD1), and the heteroscedastic exponential (MOD2) and power-of-the-mean (MOD3) variance functions. We also predicted the ontogenetic growth by using the traditional log-log transformation and back-transformed results into the arithmetic scale (MOD4). We obtained predictions from MOD4 in the arithmetic scale by a two-step process, and evaluated MOD1, MOD2 and MOD3 by a model selection framework, and compared MOD4 with MOD1, MOD2 and MOD3 based on goodness-of-fit measures. Based on information criteria for model selection, heterogeneous variance functions were more likely to describe 10 over 36 traits with a low level of model selection uncertainty. One trait was predicted by averaging the MOD1 and MOD2 variance functions; and nine traits were better described by averaging the MOD2 and MOD3 variance functions. The predictions for other 16 traits were averaged from MOD1, MOD2 and MOD3. However, MOD4 better described 11 traits according to the goodness-of-fit measures. Depending on the variable being analyzed, the body parts and the chemical amounts exhibited the three types of allometric behavior with respect to BM and EBM, that is, positive, negative and isometric ontogenetic growth. Reference BMs, that is, 20, 27, 35 and 45 kg, were used to compute the net protein and energy requirements based on the first derivative of the scaling function, and the results were presented in reference to the EBM and EBM0.75. Both the net protein and energy requirements scaled to EBM0.75 increased from 20 to 45 kg of BM.

Fluorescent dyes like Rhodamine B (RB) have been used to identify the spatial distribution of adhesive restorative materials in the tooth/restoration interface. Potential effects of the addition of RB to dental adhesives were addressed in the past, but no further information is available on how to determine suitable concentrations of RB in these bonding agents for imaging in the confocal laser scanning microscope. This study provides systematical strategies for adding RB to viscous dental adhesive resins, focusing on the determination of the lowest range of dye concentrations necessary to achieve an acceptable image of the dentin/adhesive interface. It was demonstrated that optimized images of the resin distribution in dentin can be produced with 0.1–0.02 mg/mL of RB in the (tested) adhesives. Our approaches took into account aspects related to the dye concentration, photophysical parameters in different host media, specimen composition and morphology to develop a rational use of the fluorescent agent with the resin-based materials. Information gained from this work can help optimize labeling methods using dispersions of low-molecular-weight dyes in different monomer blend systems.

X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission Mössbauer spectroscopy, and vibrating sample magnetometry were used to study the influence of precipitates on the magnetic properties of aged Fe–Cr–Mo alloys. XRD patterns and Mössbauer spectra showed that the alloys have body-centered cubic structure similar to that of α-Fe. Small amounts of precipitates were also identified with relative fraction found to be related to Mo content, aging times, and temperatures. Magnetic measurements showed that the increase in the density of precipitates contributes significantly to the increase in the magnetic hardness of the material. This mechanism is related to a process of pinning of magnetic domain walls. It was also found that saturation magnetization is affected by the Mo content in the alloy. The techniques used in this work were shown to be very useful to understand the mechanisms through which the formation of precipitates affects the magnetic properties of the alloys and may be used as complement to the usual microscopy-based techniques for this purpose.

New more selective and potent drugs are urgently need to treat Chagas disease (CD). Among the many synthetic compounds evaluated against Trypanosoma cruzi, aromatic amidines (AAs) and especially arylimidamides (AIAs) have potent activity against this parasite. Presently, the effect of four mono-amidines (DB2228, DB2229, DB2292 and DB2294), four diamidines (DB2232, DB2235, DB2251 and DB2253) and one AIA (DB2255) was screened in vitro against different forms (bloodstream trypomastigotes – BT and intracellular forms) and strains from discrete typing unit (DTU) I and VI of T. cruzi and their cytotoxic profile on mammalian host cells. Except for DB2253, all molecules were as active as benznidazole (Bz), resulting in 50% of reduction in the number of alive BT, with EC50 ranging from 2·7 to 10·1 µ m after 24 h of incubation. DB2255 was also the most potent against amastigotes (Tulahuen strain) showing similar activity to that of Bz (3 µ m). In silico absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion and toxicity analysis demonstrated probability of human intestinal adsorption, while mutagenicity and inhibition of hERG1 were not predicted, besides giving acceptable predicted volumes of distribution. Our findings contribute for better knowledge regarding the biological effect of this class of aromatic molecules against T. cruzi aiming to identify novel promising agent for CD therapy.

Equal channel angular pressing (ECAP) was carried out on extruded ZK60 magnesium alloy until an equivalent strain of ∼4 (corresponding to 4 passes) at 523K following route Bc. The effect of the deformation on both microstructure and texture was investigated by analysis of inverse pole figures and pole figures respectively, determined by EBSD. Additionaly, the mechanical properties were evaluated through tensile tests. The ECAPed processed ZK60 alloy showed the presence of dynamic recrystallization (DRX) process, correlated with a strong basal fiber texture. The presence of pyramidal slip was also observed, which can be correlated with the presence on twin-oriented boundaries in the material. Both the grain size reduction and the existence of texture influenced the ductility of the magnesium alloy processed by ECAP, as the ductility of the ZK60 alloy after four ECAP passes increased two times in comparation with the initial (un-processed) material.

The occurrence of cerrado (as tree and shrub savanna is called in Brazil) and forest formations side by side is common at the southern margin of the Brazilian Amazonian Forest, and previous studies have demonstrated the advance of forests over cerrado areas. The aim of the present study is to provide an accurate documentation of the transition process between the two major biomes. Tree data (≥ 5 cm diameter at 0.3 m above soil level) from three plots of cerrado sensu stricto lying near three of cerradão (the taller, denser form of cerrado) were inventoried starting in 2002 in an area of 1.5 ha made up of 150 subplots of 10 × 10 m (50 in each area). This showed that the most important species of the cerradão were invading areas previously occupied by smaller, lower forms of cerrado (although it is sometimes difficult to define which are ‘forest’ and which ‘cerrado’ species as many are flexible in size – for instance Emmotum nitens can often be intermediate, establishing in cerrado that develops into cerradão and on to forest). Some typical species such as Eriotheca gracilipes and Emmotum nitens, established since the first inventories, have increased their populations (between 27 and 210%). Tachigali vulgaris, a typical, weedy, adventive species of the Cerrado–Amazonian Forest transition, showed the largest increase in abundance in areas of cerrado sensu stricto (between 100 and 1200%), and is probably the most important pioneer species in the initial advance of the forest into cerrado at the Southern Amazonian border.

Using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test for diagnosis of canine leishmaniasis has greater sensitivity and specificity than culture and visualization of the parasite. This study compares PCR for the diagnosis of the genus and species of Leishmania with serological techniques used for the control of canine visceral leishmaniasis (CVL) in Brazil, considering two regions. We analysed peripheral blood samples collected from 195 dogs in the Campinas (SP) and Teresina (PI) regions. ELISA was performed as a serological method and PCR was performed using specific primers for the genus Leishmania spp. and the species Leishmania chagasi. In Campinas, a greater sensitivity of PCR (88·24%) (P = 0·0455) compared to Teresina (14·71%) (P < 0·0001) was observed, and an agreement was observed for Cohen's kappa index (0·9096). Both PCR and ELISA showed discordance for sensitivity (Campinas 100%, Teresina 21·74%), specificity (Campinas 30·77%, Teresina 100%), positive predictive value (Campinas 68·97%, Teresina 100%), negative predictive value (Campinas 100%, Teresina 37·94%) and Cohen's kappa index (0·1238). This study confirms the importance of PCR in analysis of the canine reservoir, and as an effective method for the detection of active and recent infection.

In this paper we report on the 532 nm Nd:YAG laser-induced crystallization of 10 nm thick boron-doped hydrogenated amorphous silicon thin films deposited on flexible polyimide and on rigid oxidized silicon wafers by hot-wire or by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition. The dark conductivity increased from ∼10-7 Ω-1cm-1, in the as-deposited films, to ∼10 and 50 Ω-1cm-1 after laser irradiation, on rigid and flexible substrates, respectively. Depending on type of substrate, laser power and fluence, a Raman crystalline fraction between 55 and 90 % was measured in HWCVD films, which was higher than observed in rf-PECVD films (35-55 %). Crystallite size remained small in all cases, in the range 6-8 nm. Due to a very high conductivity contrast (>7 orders of magnitude) between amorphous and crystallized regions, it was possible to define conductive paths in the a-Si:H matrix, by mounting the sample on a X-Y software-controlled movable stage under the laser beam, with no need for the usual lithography steps. The resistors scribed by direct laser writing had piezoresistive properties, with positive gauge factor ∼1. The details of the laser interaction process with the Si film were revealed by scanning electron microscopy imaging.

We aimed to evaluate aluminium (Al) effects on the photosynthetic apparatus of two rice cultivars with contrasting tolerances to Al. Nine-days-old seedlings were exposed to 0 or 1 mM Al for 10 days, and then dry mass, Al and chloroplastidic pigment contents and photosynthetic parameters were determined. Al accumulated mainly in the roots of the Al-treated plants. In the leaves, Al increased only in the sensitive cultivar, but there was no difference between the cultivars in Al-treated plants. The root and leaf dry mass, the net carbon assimilation rate, stomatal conductance and internal CO2 concentration were all reduced in response to Al application, but only in the sensitive cultivar. Both the initial fluorescence and potential photochemical efficiency of photosystem II were unresponsive to the Al treatments, regardless of the cultivar. In the Al-sensitive cultivar, Al provoked significant decreases in the photochemical quenching coefficient, quantum yield of photosystem II electron transport and apparent electron transport rate, in parallel to an unaltered non-photochemical quenching coefficient. All of these parameters remained at the control levels in the tolerant cultivar. The chloroplastidic pigment content increased only in the Al-tolerant cultivar, whereas it remained unaltered after Al treatment in the sensitive cultivar. In conclusion, Al induced stomatal and (most likely) photochemical constraints on photosynthesis but with no apparent signs of photoinhibition in the Al-sensitive cultivar. Despite the similar Al levels of the cultivars, unchanging biomass accumulation or photosynthetic performance in the tolerant cultivar challenged with Al highlights its higher intrinsic ability to cope with Al stress.