Wooded biocorridors substantially improve soil properties in low-altitude rural benchlands.

This study examines soil properties in 30- and 60-year-old agricultural biocorridors and provides a comparative overview with neighbouring farmland. Both mixed and undisturbed soil samples were collected from six farmland/biocorridor study areas to assess a wide spectrum of physical, hydrophysical, chemical and biological soil properties. Biocorridor soils were characterised by higher water retention capacities, porosity, aeration and soil carbon stock, the latter increasing with depth.

Endoscopic removal of a weight-loss device with stoma closure using a tack-and-suture device.

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Endoscopic revision of one-anastomosis gastric bypass (ER-OAGB) for weight recurrence: a case series of 17 adults.

Weight recurrence after one-anastomosis gastric bypass (OAGB), the third most common metabolic and bariatric surgery performed worldwide, is observed in a subset of patients due to the chronic, progressive nature of obesity. Endoscopic revision of the OAGB (ER-OAGB) through full-thickness suturing to reduce the gastrojejunal anastomosis and gastric pouch is a potential alternative to surgical revision. Here, we present a case series of ER-OAGB and long-term nutritional support at two international centers with expertise in bariatric endoscopy.

Early-life telomeres are influenced by environments acting at multiple temporal and spatial scales.

An individual's telomere length early in life may reflect or contribute to key life-history processes sensitive to environmental variation. Yet, the relative importance of genetic and environmental factors in shaping early-life telomere length is not well understood as it requires samples collected from multiple generations with known developmental histories. We used a confirmed pedigree and conducted an animal model analysis of telomere lengths obtained from nestling house sparrows (Passer domesticus) sampled over a span of 22 years.

Endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty in class III obesity: Efficacy, safety, and durability outcomes in 404 consecutive patients.

Background: Endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty (ESG) is an effective therapy for class I-II obesity, but there are knowledge gaps in the published literature about its implementation in patients with class III obesity [body mass index (BMI) ≥ 40 kg/m].

Aim: To evaluate the safety, clinical efficacy, and durability of ESG in adults with class III obesity.

Methods: This was a retrospective cohort study that used prospectively collected data on adults with BMI ≥ 40 kg/m who underwent ESG and longitudinal lifestyle counseling at two centers with expertise in endobariatric therapies from May 2018-March 2022.

COVID-19 Impact on Cerebrospinal Fluid Diversion: A Single Institution Experience.

Introduction: Several studies have demonstrated that the absolute numbers of select surgical interventions for myocardial infarction, stroke, and appendicitis decreased during the COVID-19 pandemic, possibly due to overall decreased hospital presentation. We sought to identify if this pattern was also true for children with hydrocephalus and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) diversion procedures. We hypothesized that there would be a detectable decrease in CSF diversion procedures performed during the COVID-19 pandemic, as compared to a pre-COVID-19 baseline.

Early childhood caries sequelae and relapse rates in an Australian public dental hospital.

Background: Early childhood caries (ECC) remains one of the most prevalent childhood diseases in Australia, disproportionately affecting disadvantaged populations.

Aim: To investigate the ECC experience including risk factors, incidence of caries, pain and infection as well as relapse rates of caries and secondary dental general anaesthesia (GA).

Design: A retrospective cohort study included dental records of children with ECC, aged <72 months at an Australian public dental hospital paediatric dentistry department from 2013 to 2015 (n = 102).

Prescriptions of Psychotropic Medications by Providers Treating Children of Military Service Members.

Introduction: There are approximately 1.5 million U.S.

Refutation Text Facilitates Learning: a Meta-Analysis of Between-Subjects Experiments.

Unlabelled: Scientific misconceptions are ubiquitous, and in our era of near-instant information exchange, this can be problematic for both public health and the public understanding of scientific topics. Refutation text is one instructional tool for addressing misconceptions and is simple to implement at little cost. We conducted a random-effects meta-analysis to examine the effectiveness of the refutation text structure on learning.

On the macrofinancial determinants of life and non-life insurance premiums.

This paper tests potential determinants of the development of the insurance sector. Using a rich dataset for 24 European countries spanning two decades, we identify a set of macrofinancial factors that are the most robust predictors of growth of gross premiums in the life and non-life insurance sectors. We show that both life and non-life premiums co-move with the business cycle and are positively related to higher savings and a more developed financial system.

The World Spider Trait database: a centralized global open repository for curated data on spider traits.

Spiders are a highly diversified group of arthropods and play an important role in terrestrial ecosystems as ubiquitous predators, which makes them a suitable group to test a variety of eco-evolutionary hypotheses. For this purpose, knowledge of a diverse range of species traits is required. Until now, data on spider traits have been scattered across thousands of publications produced for over two centuries and written in diverse languages.

Complications of COVID-19 Pneumonia and Multiple Sclerosis Exacerbation.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common autoimmune disease in the United States, in which demyelination of the brain and spinal cord disrupts the transmission of signals throughout the body. With an average life expectancy of 30 years from the start of the disease, treatment relies on symptom management through steroids and disease-modifying agents, as there is no cure. While MS patients have not been shown to be at increased risk for coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) infection, prolonged hospitalizations and severe COVID-19 sequelae have been linked to various MS subgroups.

Preliminary Validation of the Learning Ratio for the HVLT-R and BVMT-R in Older Adults.

Background: The learning slope is typically represented as the raw difference between the final score and the score of the first learning trial. A new method for calculating the learning slope, the learning ratio (LR), was recently developed; it is typically represented as the number of items that are learned after the first trial divided by the number of items that are yet to be learned.

Objective: To evaluate the convergent and criterion validity of the LR in order to understand its sensitivity to Alzheimer disease (AD) pathology.

A methodology for an acute exercise clinical trial called dementia risk and dynamic response to exercise.

Exercise likely has numerous benefits for brain and cognition. However, those benefits and their causes remain imprecisely defined. If the brain does benefit from exercise it does so primarily through cumulative brief, "acute" exposures over a lifetime.

Longer telomeres during early life predict higher lifetime reproductive success in females but not males.

The mechanisms that contribute to variation in lifetime reproductive success are not well understood. One possibility is that telomeres, conserved DNA sequences at chromosome ends that often shorten with age and stress exposures, may reflect differences in vital processes or influence fitness. Telomere length often predicts longevity, but longevity is only one component of fitness and little is known about how lifetime reproductive success is related to telomere dynamics in wild populations.

TA-65 does not increase telomere length during post-natal development in house sparrow chicks (Passer domesticus).

Telomeres, protective caps at the end of chromosomes, are often positively related to lifespan and are thought to be an important mechanism of organismal aging. To better understand the casual relationships between telomere length and longevity, it is essential to be able to experimentally manipulate telomere dynamics (length and loss rate). Previous studies suggest that exposure to TA-65, an extract from the Chinese root Astragalus membranaceus, activates telomerase, lengthens telomeres, increases the growth of keratin-based structures, and boosts the immune system in adults.

Examining the Relationship between a Verbal Incidental Learning Measure from the WAIS-IV and Neuroimaging Biomarkers for Alzheimer's Pathology.

Convergent validation of a verbal incidental learning (IL) task from the WAIS-IV using neuroimaging biomarkers is warranted to understand its sensitivity to Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathology. Fifty-five memory clinic patients aged 59 to 87 years received neuropsychological assessment, and measures of IL and quantitative brain imaging. Worse IL-Total Score and IL-Similarities performances were significantly associated with smaller hemispheric hippocampal volumes.

Tolerability and effectiveness of an antitrauma cream with comfrey herb extract in pediatric use with application on intact and on broken skin.

Objective: The safety of comfrey herbal cream application to broken skin is still a matter of regulatory debate. It was therefore examined in children with intact and with broken skin treated for blunt traumas and sports injuries, with the aim of collecting data for pharmacovigilance and clinical safety assessments.

Methods: A total of 712 children (386 children with intact skin and 326 children with abrasions and superficial wounds) were openly treated for up to 2 weeks with 1-5 applications daily of comfrey herb cream after presenting for blunt traumas and sports accidents.

Ecohydrological consequences of tree removal in an urban park evaluated using open data, free software and a minimalist measuring campaign.

With ongoing global climate change and an increasingly urbanized population, the importance of city parks and other forms of urban vegetation increases. Trees in urban parks can play an important role in mitigating runoff and delivering other ecosystem services. Park managers, E-NGOs, citizen scientists and others are increasingly called upon to evaluate the possible consequences of changes in park management such as, e.

Avian Semen Collection by Cloacal Massage and Isolation of DNA from Sperm.

Collection of semen may be useful for a wide range of applications including studies involving sperm quality, sperm telomere dynamics, and epigenetics. Birds are widely used subjects in biological research and are ideal for studies involving repeated sperm samples. However, few resources are currently available for those wishing to learn how to collect and extract DNA from avian sperm.

Repeated immune challenges affect testosterone but not sperm quality.

Mounting an immunological response is energetically demanding and necessarily redirects allocation of resources toward immune system activation and away from other energetically expensive processes, such as reproduction. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS), a major component of the outer membrane of the cell wall of Gram-negative bacteria Escherichia coli, mimics a bacterial infection without producing the cost of replicating the pathogen and is one of the most commonly used agents to induce an acute phase immune response. Here, we ask if a trade-off can be induced between activation of the acute phase immune response and sperm function, a key indicator of sperm competitive ability.

Validity of a verbal incidental learning measure from the WAIS-IV in older adults.

Incidental memory may reflect a form of learning in everyday life, although it is not consistently evaluated during standard neuropsychological evaluations. Further validation of a recently created measure of verbal Incidental Learning (IL) from the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-IV is necessary to understand the utility of such a measure in clinical settings. Sixty-eight adults aged 50 to 89 were recruited from a Cognitive Disorders Clinic while receiving a standard neuropsychological assessment, along with two additional measures of IL.

The multiple roles of Rab9 in the endolysosomal system.

The small GTPase Rab9 has long been described as a protein that mediates endosome-to-trans-Golgi Network (TGN) transport, and specifically mannose-6-phospate receptor (MPR) recycling. However, studies have challenged this view by showing that Rab9 also is connected to sorting pathways toward the endolysosomal compartments. We recently characterized the spatio-temporal dynamics of Rab9 and, by using live cell imaging, we showed that it enters the endosomal pathway together with CI-MPR at the transition stage between early, Rab5-positive, and late, Rab7a-positive, endosomes.

Spatiotemporal Resolution of Rab9 and CI-MPR Dynamics in the Endocytic Pathway.

Rab9 is a small GTPase that localizes to the trans-Golgi Network (TGN) and late endosomes. Its main function has long been connected to the recycling of mannose-6-phosphate receptors (MPRs). However, recent studies link Rab9 also to autophagy and lysosome biogenesis.

Technical innovation in minimally invasive repair of pectus excavatum.

The aim of study was to introduce technical innovation of MIRPE which reduces the risk of cardiac injury. Modification of MIRPE method with semiflexible thoracoscope and sternum elevating technique has been used. Volkmann bone hook has been inserted percutaneously to the sternum.