JURNAL AGROTEKNOLOGI
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Harassment-induced changes in lion space use as a conflict mitigation tool
No full textHuman‐wildlife conflict represents a substantial threat to rural livelihoods and species persistence. Directed harassment (i.e., hazing) is one method for mitigating conflict, though gauging its effectiveness is often complicated by a lack of replication, controls, or effective contrasts. Herein we assessed whether African lions (Panthera leo) shifted their space use in response to a hazing program intended to deter lions from community lands adjacent to Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe. Using GPS‐collared lions (n = 16) from unique prides, we investigated the degree to which individuals exhibited (a) a large‐scale response by shifting their home ranges away from community lands, or (b) a fine‐scale response by increasingly avoiding areas near households post‐program initiation. Responses between “at‐risk” (those exposed to the program; n = 5) and “protected” (n = 11) lions varied, with at‐risk males shifting their home ranges to include 12.08% more national park and 9.04% less community lands post‐program (median), a shift not replicated by at‐risk females nor protected lions. However, the majority of at‐risk lions demonstrated increased attraction to households post‐program. We demonstrated that while aversive stimulus approaches may alter large‐scale space use by individual lions, constraints imposed by social structure and available habitat alternatives will affect the level of effort required to achieve program success
A robust algorithm to test the observability of large linear systems with unknown parameters
No full textThis work proposes a robust algorithm to examine the observability of linear
systems whose dynamic states and parameters are to be identified. The observability of a dynamical system plays a fundamental role in predicting whether
it would be successful to use system identification methods to estimate the dynamic states and parameters of the system from a given set of input-output
measurements. The motivation of the development of the suggested algorithm
arises from the need to address the significant physical memory requirements
of the standard implementation of the Observability Rank Condition (ORC).
The high computational cost of the ORC substantially limits its applicability
to real-world engineering systems, even when the underlying dynamics can be
reasonably approximated as linear. The framework of the algorithm is obtained
through the derivation of a recursive formula for the computation of the observability matrix of linear systems with unknown parameters. To further improve
the efficiency, robust numerical implementations of the algorithm are achieved
through random realizations of the dynamic states and parameters and the use
of modular operations. The superior performance of the algorithm is demonstrated using several examples of large linear dynamical models of engineering
systems containing up to thousands of dynamic states and parameters
Data for 'Hammond and Lewis: The rotational and divergent components of atmospheric circulation on tidally locked planets, Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci., 2021'
No full textThis archive contains the Python code used to analyse and plot the data in Hammond & Lewis 2021, "The rotational and divergent components of atmospheric circulation on tidally locked planets",
as well as the data from the "terrestrial" simulation of the atmosphere of a rocky planet using the general circulation model ExoFMS.
It contains three files:
1) HL21_plotter.ipynb
This is a Jupyter notebook containing Python code.
It reads the data from the ExoFMS simulation and finds its rotational and divergent parts.
It then plots the figures used in Hammond & Lewis 2021.
2) data/rotdiv-terr-control-1000-2000_atmos_average_interp.nc
The "terrestrial" simulation output, interpolated to uniform pressure levels.
This is used to plot quantities such as velocity at a constant pressure.
3) data/rotdiv-terr-control-1000-2000_atmos_average.nc
The "terrestrial" simulation output, on the raw model sigma-pressure levels.
This is used to calculate the dry static energy budget.
The paper also uses a "Hot Jupiter" simulation from the THOR GCM.
This is from "THOR 2.0: Major Improvements to the Open-Source General Circulation Model" (Deitrick et al. 2020).
The data is available on request to Russell Deitrick ([email protected]).
The same analysis can be made using HL21_plotter.ipynb, with small modifications due to the different grid in THOR
Leptospirosis in pregnancy: a systematic review
No full textIntroduction
Leptospirosis is a leading zoonotic disease worldwide with more than 1 million cases in the general population per year. With leptospirosis being an emerging infectious disease and as the world’s environment changes with more floods and environmental disasters, the burden of leptospirosis is expected to increase. The objectives of the systematic review were to explore how leptospirosis affects pregnancy, its burden in this population, its effects on maternal and fetal outcomes and the evidence base surrounding treatment options.
Methods
We performed a systematic review of published and unpublished literature using automated and manual methods to screen nine electronic databases since inception, with no language restriction. Two reviewers independently screened articles, completed the data extraction and assessment of risk of bias. Due to significant heterogeneity and paucity of data, we were unable to carry out a meta-analysis, but we conducted a pooled analysis of individual patient data from the case reports and case series to examine the patient and disease characteristics, diagnostic methods, differential diagnoses, antibiotic treatments, and outcomes of leptospirosis in pregnancy. The protocol for this review was registered on the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews, PROSPERO: CRD42020151501.
Results
We identified 419 records, of which we included eight observational studies, 21 case reports, three case series and identified four relevant ongoing studies. Overall the studies were with moderate bias and of ‘fair’ quality. We estimated the incidence of leptospirosis in pregnancy to be 1.3 per 10,000 in women presenting with fever or with jaundice, but this is likely to be higher in endemic areas. Adverse fetal outcomes were found to be more common in pregnant patients who presented in the second trimester compared with patients who presented in the third trimester. There is overlap between how leptospirosis presents in pregnancy and in the general population. There is also overlap between the signs, symptoms and biochemical disturbances associated with leptospirosis in pregnancy and the presentation of pregnancy associated conditions, such as Pre-Eclampsia (PET), Acute Fatty Liver of Pregnancy (AFLP) and HELLP Syndrome (Haemolysis Elevated Liver enzymes Low Platelets). In 94% of identified cases with available data, there was an indicator in the patient history regarding exposure that could have helped include leptospirosis in the clinician’s differential diagnosis. We also identified a range of suitable antibiotic therapies for treating leptospirosis in pregnancy, most commonly used were penicillins.
Conclusion
This is the first systematic review of leptospirosis in pregnancy and it clearly shows the need to improve early diagnosis and treatment by asking early, treating early, and reporting well. Ask early—broaden differential diagnoses and ask early for potential leptospirosis exposures and risk factors. Treat early—increase index of suspicion in pregnant patients with fever in endemic areas and combine with rapid field diagnosis and early treatment. Report well—need for more good quality epidemiological studies on leptospirosis in pregnancy and better quality reporting of cases in literature
The antimalarial MMV688533 provides potential for single-dose cures with a high barrier to Plasmodium falciparum parasite resistance
No full textThe emergence and spread of Plasmodium falciparum resistance to first-line antimalarials creates an imperative to identify and develop potent preclinical candidates with distinct modes of action. Here, we report the identification of MMV688533, an acylguanidine that was developed following a whole-cell screen with compounds known to hit high-value targets in human cells. MMV688533 displays fast parasite clearance in vitro and is not cross-resistant with known antimalarials. In a P. falciparum NSG mouse model, MMV688533 displays a long-lasting pharmacokinetic profile and excellent safety. Selection studies reveal a low propensity for resistance, with modest loss of potency mediated by point mutations in PfACG1 and PfEHD. These proteins are implicated in intracellular trafficking, lipid utilization, and endocytosis, suggesting interference with these pathways as a potential mode of action. This preclinical candidate may offer the potential for a single low-dose cure for malaria
Complete genome sequences of African Salmonella enterica serovar enteritidis clinical isolates associated with bloodstream infection
No full textWe report the complete genome sequencing and annotation of four Salmonella enterica serovar Enteritidis isolates, two that are representative of the Central/Eastern African clade (CP255 and D7795) and two of the Global Epidemic clade (A1636 and P125109)
Neuropathological consensus criteria for the evaluation of Lewy pathology in post-mortem brains: a multi-centre study
No full textCurrently, the neuropathological diagnosis of Lewy body disease (LBD) may be stated according to several staging systems, which include the Braak Lewy body stages (Braak), the consensus criteria by McKeith and colleagues (McKeith), the modified McKeith system by Leverenz and colleagues (Leverenz), and the Unified Staging System by Beach and colleagues (Beach). All of these systems use semi-quantitative scoring (4- or 5-tier scales) of Lewy pathology (LP; i.e., Lewy bodies and Lewy neurites) in defined cortical and subcortical areas. While these systems are widely used, some suffer from low inter-rater reliability and/or an inability to unequivocally classify all cases with LP. To address these limitations, we devised a new system, the LP consensus criteria (LPC), which is based on the McKeith system, but applies a dichotomous approach for the scoring of LP (i.e., “absent” vs. “present”) and includes amygdala-predominant and olfactory-only stages. α-Synuclein-stained slides from brainstem, limbic system, neocortex, and olfactory bulb from a total of 34 cases with LP provided by the Newcastle Brain Tissue Resource (NBTR) and the University of Pennsylvania brain bank (UPBB) were scanned and assessed by 16 raters, who provided diagnostic categories for each case according to Braak, McKeith, Leverenz, Beach, and LPC systems. In addition, using LP scores available from neuropathological reports of LP cases from UPBB (n = 202) and NBTR (n = 134), JT (UPBB) and JA (NBTR) assigned categories according to all staging systems to these cases. McKeith, Leverenz, and LPC systems reached good (Krippendorff’s α ≈ 0.6), while both Braak and Beach systems had lower (Krippendorff’s α ≈ 0.4) inter-rater reliability, respectively. Using the LPC system, all cases could be unequivocally classified by the majority of raters, which was also seen for 97.1% when the Beach system was used. However, a considerable proportion of cases could not be classified when using Leverenz (11.8%), McKeith (26.5%), or Braak (29.4%) systems. The category of neocortical LP according to the LPC system was associated with a 5.9 OR (p
A conservative fully-discrete numerical method for the regularised shallow water wave equations
No full textThe paper proposes a new, conservative fully-discrete scheme for the
numerical solution of the regularised shallow water Boussinesq system of
equations in the cases of periodic and reflective boundary conditions. The
particular system is one of a class of equations derived recently and can be
used in practical simulations to describe the propagation of weakly nonlinear
and weakly dispersive long water waves, such as tsunamis. Studies of
small-amplitude long waves usually require long-time simulations in order to
investigate scenarios such as the overtaking collision of two solitary waves or
the propagation of transoceanic tsunamis. For long-time simulations of
non-dissipative waves such as solitary waves, the preservation of the total
energy by the numerical method can be crucial in the quality of the
approximation. The new conservative fully-discrete method consists of a
Galerkin finite element method for spatial semidiscretisation and an explicit
relaxation Runge--Kutta scheme for integration in time. The Galerkin method is
expressed and implemented in the framework of mixed finite element methods. The
paper provides an extended experimental study of the accuracy and convergence
properties of the new numerical method. The experiments reveal a new
convergence pattern compared to the standard, non-conservative Galerkin
methods
