The investigation of emerging and re-emerging viral diseases: a paradign

Emerging virus infections are defined as previously nonthreatening viruses that can decimate new populations by finding fresh hosts and vectors--often with the help of humans who introduce new species into virgen environment, Several etiologic agents of these diseases, some of the interacting factors that contribute to their development and the role of molecular medicine in their understanding is discussed.     

The balance between caseins and whey proteins in cow's milk determines its allergenicity

Cow's milk allergy is quite common in the first years of human life. Protein composition plays an important role in this pathology, particularly the casein/whey protein ratio. It is known that milks from different species have different sensitization capacities although their protein sources are quite similar. Thus, the objective of this work was to compare the allergenicity of native cow's milk and milk with a modified ratio of casein and whey proteins in a murine model of atopy. Twenty-four Balb/c mice were orally sensitized to native cow's milk or modified cow's milk with a casein/whey protein ratio of 40:60. During the sensitization period, the number of mice suffering from diarrhea was significantly higher in the native cow's milk-sensitized group than in the modified milk-sensitized group. Once mice were killed, plasma histamine levels were shown to be significantly higher in native cow's milk-sensitized mice. In addition, cow's milk proteins induced a higher lymphocyte sensitization in the native milk-sensitized mice, with a significant increase in the specific proliferation ratio of these cells.These results suggest that the balance between caseins and whey proteins plays an important role in the sensitization capacity of cow's milk, and its modification might be a way to reduce the allergenicity of cow's milk.     

Inactivation of Escherichia coli O157:H7, Salmonella Typhimurium and Listeria monocytogenes by underwater shock waves

Underwater shock waves are pressure discontinuities generated by means of high voltage electric discharges in water. Escherichia coli O157:H7, Salmonella Typhimurium and Listeria monocytogenes were exposed to shock waves. The influence of the pulse of light produced by the electric discharge, acoustic cavitation produced by the shock waves, the phase of growth and shock wave dosage on bacteria inactivation was evaluated. Inactivation of bacteria by shock waves ranged from 0 to 3.18 log₁₀ CFU/ml. L. monocytogenes was the most susceptible microorganism, 3.17 log₁₀ CFU/ml inactivation was achieved with 350 shock waves. At the same shock wave dosage, 1.68 log₁₀ CFU/ml and 0.56 log₁₀ CFU/ml inactivation was achieved for S. Typhimurium and E. coli O157:H7, respectively. Even if the achieved inactivation still is of little practical value, higher shock wave energy may enhance bactericidal activity. The analysis of variance revealed that synergy between light and the other factors contributed to bacterial inactivation. Differences in the response of bacteria, along with data analysis, suggest different mechanisms of inactivation by shock waves.Industrial relevance: Underwater shock waves generated via high voltage electric discharge or the use of explosives have been reported for microbial inactivation and for softening of animal tissue. The current paper deals with the interaction of underwater shock waves, the associated cavitation and pulse of light generated in the UV and visible spectra. Although the data generated don't show spectacular microbial inactivation, systematic studies like this can lead to the development of new combination processes with specific applications (e.g., microbial inactivation within containers).     

Optimization of Supercritical Fluid Consecutive Extractions of Fatty Acids and Polyphenols from Vitis Vinifera Grape Wastes

In this study, supercritical fluid extraction has been successfully applied to a sequential fractionation of fatty acids and polyphenols from wine wastes (2 different vitis vinifera grapes). To this aim, in a 1st step just fatty acids were extracted and in a 2nd one the polyphenols. The variables that affected to the extraction efficiency were separately optimized in both steps following an experimental design approach. The effect of extraction temperature flow, pressure, and time were thoroughly evaluated for the extraction of fatty acids, whereas the addition of methanol was also considered in the case of the polyphenols extraction. A quantitative extraction with high efficiency was achieved at a very short time and low temperatures. Concerning quantification, fatty acids were determined by means of gas chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry after a derivatization step, whereas the polyphenols were analyzed by means of high performance liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry and the Folin–Ciocalteu method.     

A synchronous engine for wireless sensor networks

The development and deployment of robust and highly populated Wireless Sensor Networks require addressing a wide variety of challenges. Among them, the synchronization and energy management of the nodes composing the network have been identified as two of the main challenges to be addressed. In this paper, we follow a cross-layer approach by defining a synchronous engine built across the radio and MAC and network layers. The design of our proposal has been based on the results of our previous research efforts dealing with various experimental platforms and experimental trials.     

A test procedure for extruded polymeric solar thermal absorbers

An indentation test is proposed to study the degradation of extruded polymeric solar absorbers. The thermal degradation caused by accelerated aging is investigated. The results are compared with the thermal and mechanical impacts during the operation of the solar collector.     

Efficient construction of bounding volume hierarchies into a complete octree for ray tracing

This paper proposes an efficient construction scheme for bounding volume hierarchies based on a complete tree. This construction offers up to 4× faster construction times than binned‐surface area heuristic and offers competitive ray traversal performance. The construction is fully parallelized on x86 CPU architectures; it takes advantage of the eight‐wide vector units and exploits the advance vector extensions available for current x86 CPU architectures. Additionally, this work presents a clustering algorithm for grouping primitives, which can be computed in linear time O(n). Furthermore, this construction uses the graphics processing unit to perform intensive operations efficiently. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.