Frailty and Risk of Falls in Community-Dwelling Older Adults Living in a Rural Setting. The Atahualpa Project.

Background: Data supporting a link between frailty and risk of falls is mostly confined to individuals living in urban centers, where risk factors and lifestyles are different from that of rural settings.

Objective: To assess the association between frailty and risk of falls in older adults living in rural Ecuador.

Design: Population-based cross-sectional study.

Effects of support and reaction pressure for the synthesis of dimethyl ether over heteropolyacid catalysts.

Dimethyl ether (DME) is an advanced second-generation biofuel produced via methanol dehydration over acid catalysts such as γ-AlO, at temperatures above 240 °C and pressures above 10 bar. Heteropolyacids such as tungstosilicic acid (HSiW) are Brønsted acid catalysts with higher DME production rates than γ-AlO, especially at low temperatures (140-180 °C). In this work, we show that the performance of supported HSiW for the production of DME is strongly affected by the nature of the support.

Neuroimaging signatures of cerebral small vessel disease and risk of falls in stroke-free older adults living in rural Ecuador. The Atahualpa Project.

Purpose: This study aimed to assess the association between neuroimaging signatures of cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD) and the risk of falls in stroke-free older adults living in rural Ecuador.

Methods: Risk of falls was evaluated by the Downton Fall Risk Index (DFRI). MRI readings focused on white matter hyperintensities (WMH) of presumed vascular origin, deep cerebral microbleeds (CMB), silent lacunar infarcts (LI), and > 10 enlarged basal ganglia-perivascular spaces (BG-PVS).

Prevalence, Severity, and Risk of Future Falls in Community-Dwelling Older Adults Living in a Rural Community: The Atahualpa Project.

Accidental falls are a leading cause of disability and death in older adults living in urban centers. However, little is known about the consequences of falls in rural communities. We aimed to assess characteristics and risk of falls in community-dwellers aged ≥ 60 years living in rural Ecuador.

Identification and editing of stem-like cells in methylcholanthrene-induced sarcomas.

The cancer stem cell (CSC) paradigm posits that specific cells within a tumor, so-called CSC-like cells, have differing levels of tumorigenicity and chemoresistance. Original studies of CSCs identified them in human cancers and utilized mouse xenograft models to define the cancer initiating properties of these cells, thereby hampering the understanding of how immunity could affect CSCs. Indeed, few studies have characterized CSCs in the context of cancer immunoediting, and it is currently not clear how immunity could impact on the levels or stem-like behavior of CSCs.