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Early detection of esophageal neoplasia enables curative endoscopic therapy, but the current diagnostic standard of care has low sensitivity because early neoplasia is often inconspicuous with conventional white light endoscopy. Here we hypothesized that spectral endoscopy could enhance contrast for neoplasia in surveillance of patients with Barrett’s esophagus (BE). A custom spectral endoscope was deployed in a pilot clinical study of 20 patients to capture 715 in vivo tissue spectra matched with gold standard diagnosis from histopathology. Spectral endoscopy was sensitive to changes in neovascularization during the progression of disease; both non-dysplastic and neoplastic BE showed higher blood volume relative to healthy squamous tissue (p = 0.001 and 0.02, respectively), and vessel radius appeared larger in neoplasia relative to non-dysplastic BE (p = 0.06). We further developed a deep learning algorithm capable of classifying spectra of neoplasia vs. non-dysplastic BE with high accuracy (84.8% accuracy, 83.7% sensitivity, 85.5% specificity, 78.3% positive predictive value and 89.4% negative predictive value). Exploiting the newly acquired library of labeled spectra to model custom color filter sets identified a potential 12-fold enhancement in contrast between neoplasia and non-dysplastic BE using application-specific color filters compared to standard-of-care white light imaging (perceptible color difference = 32.4, 2.7 respectively). This work demonstrates the potential of endoscopic spectral imaging to extract vascular properties in BE, to classify disease stages using deep learning, and to enable high-contrast endoscopy.

Background Human papillomavirus (HPV)–associated oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) has excellent control rates compared to nonvirally associated OPSCC. Multiple trials are actively testing whether de-escalation of treatment intensity for these patients can maintain oncologic equipoise while reducing treatment-related toxicity. We have developed OP-TIL, a biomarker that characterizes the spatial interplay between tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) and surrounding cells in histology images. Herein, we sought to test whether OP-TIL can segregate stage I HPV-associated OPSCC patients into low-risk and high-risk groups and aid in patient selection for de-escalation clinical trials. Methods Association between OP-TIL and patient outcome was explored on whole slide hematoxylin and eosin images from 439 stage I HPV-associated OPSCC patients across 6 institutional cohorts. One institutional cohort (n = 94) was used to identify the most prognostic features and train a Cox regression model to predict risk of recurrence and death. Survival analysis was used to validate the algorithm as a biomarker of recurrence or death in the remaining 5 cohorts (n = 345). All statistical tests were 2-sided. Results OP-TIL separated stage I HPV-associated OPSCC patients with 30 or less pack-year smoking history into low-risk (2-year disease-free survival [DFS] = 94.2%; 5-year DFS = 88.4%) and high-risk (2-year DFS = 82.5%; 5-year DFS = 74.2%) groups (hazard ratio = 2.56, 95% confidence interval = 1.52 to 4.32; P Conclusions OP-TIL can identify stage I HPV-associated OPSCC patients likely to be poor candidates for treatment de-escalation. Following validation on previously completed multi-institutional clinical trials, OP-TIL has the potential to be a biomarker, beyond clinical stage and HPV status, that can be used clinically to optimize patient selection for de-escalation.

BACKGROUND: Patients with p16(+) oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) are potentially cured with definitive treatment. However, there are currently no reliable biomarkers of treatment failure for p16(+) OPSCC. Pathologist-based visual assessment of tumor cell multinucleation (MN) has been shown to be independently prognostic of disease-free survival (DFS) in p16(+) OPSCC. However, its quantification is time intensive, subjective, and at risk of interobserver variability. METHODS: We present a deep-learning–based metric, the multinucleation index (MuNI), for prognostication in p16(+) OPSCC. This approach quantifies tumor MN from digitally scanned H&E-stained slides. Representative H&E-stained whole-slide images from 1094 patients with previously untreated p16(+) OPSCC were acquired from 6 institutions for optimization and validation of the MuNI. RESULTS: The MuNI was prognostic for DFS, overall survival (OS), or distant metastasis–free survival (DMFS) in p16(+) OPSCC, with HRs of 1.78 (95% CI: 1.37–2.30), 1.94 (1.44–2.60), and 1.88 (1.43–2.47), respectively, independent of age, smoking status, treatment type, or tumor and lymph node (T/N) categories in multivariable analyses. The MuNI was also prognostic for DFS, OS, and DMFS in patients with stage I and stage III OPSCC, separately. CONCLUSION: MuNI holds promise as a low-cost, tissue-nondestructive, H&E stain–based digital biomarker test for counseling, treatment, and surveillance of patients with p16(+) OPSCC. These data support further confirmation of the MuNI in prospective trials. FUNDING: National Cancer Institute (NCI), NIH; National Institute for Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering, NIH; National Center for Research Resources, NIH; VA Merit Review Award from the US Department of VA Biomedical Laboratory Research and Development Service; US Department of Defense (DOD) Breast Cancer Research Program Breakthrough Level 1 Award; DOD Prostate Cancer Idea Development Award; DOD Lung Cancer Investigator-Initiated Translational Research Award; DOD Peer-Reviewed Cancer Research Program; Ohio Third Frontier Technology Validation Fund; Wallace H. Coulter Foundation Program in the Department of Biomedical Engineering; Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA) program, Case Western Reserve University; NCI Cancer Center Support Grant, NIH; Career Development Award from the US Department of VA Clinical Sciences Research and Development Program; Dan L. Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center Support Grant, NIH; and Computational Genomic Epidemiology of Cancer Program, Case Comprehensive Cancer Center. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH, the US Department of VA, the DOD, or the US Government.

The objectives of this study were to determine differences in knowledge and perception of animal welfare (with emphasis on dairy cattle) among undergraduate students from two universities with different missions and visions and between students from different faculties. One thousand surveys were obtained from Universidad de Chile (UChile, n = 500) and Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (PUC, n = 500) students. The students from both universities were from the following faculties: Agronomy, Architecture, Biology, Economic Sciences, Psychology, Law, Philosophy, Basic Education, Civil Engineering and Medicine. The majority (77%) of students from both universities were aware of animal welfare. Most (56%) students understand animal welfare as the ‘mental and physical state of animals’. Regardless of their faculty, around 97% of the total respondents perceived animal welfare as important for production systems. Regarding specific knowledge about cows’ welfare related to milk management and behavior, students from Economic Sciences, Psychology, Law, Philosophy, Basic Education, and Civil Engineering had less (p &lt, 0.001) self-reported knowledge about cows’ basic behavior and specific management practices such as milking and were more negative in their perceptions of dairy production. Overall, results showed that the students’ faculty explained most of the differences among undergraduate students in relation to their perceptions and knowledge about animal welfare. Our data is important, as undergraduate students will make purchasing and power decisions as well as having potential influence on future policies that could modify the animal production industry.

2662 Background: Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) are currently approved for use as therapy in advanced stage lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD). ICIs can decrease risk of progression by up to 60% when compared to chemotherapy, but only about 20% of patients (pts) show response. Given that high levels of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) have been shown to be associated with better prognosis, here, we assess whether computationally derived TIL density measures on digitized H&E images can predict RECIST derived response to nivolumab in LUAD in Checkmate 057 (CM057). CM057 is a clinical trial designed to compare the overall survival of metastatic non-squamous non-small cell lung cancer subjects treated with either nivolumab or docetaxel after failing platinum-based chemotherapy. Methods: H&E-stained samples of 683 LUAD pts were collected from TCGA (n = 421), University of Bern (UBern) (n = 100), and CM057 (n = 162). Tumor response was assessed using RECIST v1.1. Samples were digitized as whole slide images. 294 pts randomly selected from TCGA formed the training set. The remaining 389 pts were used for validation in response to nivolumab in CM057 and prognosticating overall survival (OS) in UBern and TCGA. Computerized algorithms automatically identified TILs and extracted features related to quantity and compactness of TILs with respect to other surrounding nuclei. The top 6 features, determined by least absolute shrinkage and selection operator, were used to train Cox regression models that assign a death risk score to each patient. Pts with risk scores higher than the training median score were considered “high risk” or “non-responders” while pts with lower scores were considered “low risk” or “responders”. Results: The classifier predicted objective response in CM057 with an AUC = 0.61. Additionally, survival analysis showed that the model was prognostic for OS with hazard ratios of 2.38 (confidence interval (CI): 1.32-4.29, p = 0.01, n = 127) in TCGA and 2.37 (CI: 1.32-4.25, p < 0.01, n = 100) in UBern. Conclusions: A computerized image analysis model based on measurements of TIL density showed association with response to treatment in LUAD pts who received nivolumab and was prognostic of OS. Although the AUC was not high, the results suggest analysis of TILs has potential to identify pts who will respond to treatment. Future work will include training a classifier using response to treatment as endpoint and combining the TIL measures with other biomarkers like TMB or PD-L1.

Collagen fiber organization has been found to be implicated in breast cancer prognosis. In this study, we evaluated whether computerized features of Collagen Fiber Orientation Disorder in Tumor-associated Stroma (CFOD-TS) on Hematoxylin & Eosin (H&E) slide images were prognostic of Disease Free Survival (DFS) in early stage Estrogen Receptor Positive (ER+) Invasive Breast Cancers (IBC). A Cox regression model named MCFOD-TS, was constructed using cohort St (N = 78) to predict DFS based on CFOD-TS features. The prognostic performance of MCFOD-TS was validated on cohort Sv (N = 219), a prospective clinical trial dataset (ECOG 2197). MCFOD-TS was prognostic of DFS in both St and Sv, independent of clinicopathological variables. Additionally, the molecular pathways regarding cell cycle regulation were identified as being significantly associated with MCFOD-TS derived risk scores. Our results also found that collagen fiber organization was more ordered in patients with short DFS. Our study provided a H&E image-based pipeline to derive a potential prognostic biomarker for early stage ER+ IBC without the need of special collagen staining or advanced microscopy techniques.

Purpose: We used computerized image analysis and machine learning approaches to characterize spatial arrangement features of the immune response from digitized autopsied H&E tissue images of the lung in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients. Additionally, we applied our approach to tease out potential morphometric differences from autopsies of patients who succumbed to COVID-19 versus H1N1. Approach: H&E lung whole slide images from autopsy specimens of nine COVID-19 and two H1N1 patients were computationally interrogated. 606 image patches ([Formula: see text] per patient) of [Formula: see text] were extracted from the 11 autopsied patient studies. A watershed-based segmentation approach in conjunction with a machine learning classifier was employed to identify two types of nuclei families: lymphocytes and non-lymphocytes (i.e., other nucleated cells such as pneumocytes, macrophages, and neutrophils). Based off the proximity of the individual nuclei, clusters for each nuclei family were constructed. For each of the resulting clusters, a series of quantitative measurements relating to architecture and density of nuclei clusters were calculated. A receiver operating characteristics-based feature selection method, violin plots, and the t-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding algorithm were employed to study differences in immune patterns. Results: In COVID-19, the immune response consistently showed multiple small-size lymphocyte clusters, suggesting that lymphocyte response is rather modest, possibly due to lymphocytopenia. In H1N1, we found larger lymphocyte clusters that were proximal to large clusters of non-lymphocytes, a possible reflection of increased prevalence of macrophages and other immune cells. Conclusion: Our study shows the potential of computational pathology to uncover immune response features that may not be obvious by routine histopathology visual inspection.

The winter diet of dairy cows in Mediterranean climate regions is usually a total mixed ration with a base of conserved summer crops such as corn silage and alfalfa hay. However, there is increased labor and financial cost related to this kind of feeding, which could be reduced if fresh forages were used in place of some of the conserved forage in the cow diet. The objective of our study was to evaluate the effect of including fresh mixed annual ryegrass and berseem clover into the diet of dairy cows on milk, nitrogen utilization, and methane emission. Twenty-four lactating dairy cows were split into two groups and offered either a diet similar to that usually offered to the cows (CON) or one where a mixture of fresh annual ryegrass and berseem clover was used to partially substitute the corn silage and alfalfa hay in the diet (MIX). Milk yield was recorded automatically, and methane emissions were estimated using the SF6 tracer technique. The MIX diet had lower crude protein concentration (148 vs. 170 g/kg DM) but higher DM digestibility (81.6 vs. 78.6%) than the CON diet. Compared to the cows offered the CON diet, milk yield was reduced when cows were fed the MIX diet (36.4 vs. 31.9 kg/d), but methane emissions (381 vs. 332 g/d) and nitrogen excretion were also reduced (238 vs. 180 g/d). Nitrogen use efficiency was unaffected (30.8%). In addition, milk from cows fed the MIX diet had a fatty acid profile considered to be more beneficial to human health than that of the milk from cows fed the CON diet. Increasing the protein concentration in the MIX diet, either by direct supplementation or increasing the proportion of legume in the mixed herbage, could overcome the reduction on milk and positively affect methane emission and N use efficiency.

This study compared the chemical composition and fatty acid (FA) profile of Manchego type cheese and Panela cheese made from hair sheep milk and compared these with both types of cheese manufactured with cow milk as a reference. In addition, this study aimed to determine differences in sensory characteristics between Manchego type cheeses manufactured with either hair sheep milk or cow milk. A total of 25 and 14 Manchego type cheeses from hair sheep milk and cow milk were manufactured, respectively. In addition, 30 and 15 Panela cheeses from hair sheep milk and cow milk were manufactured, respectively. The chemical composition and FA profile were determined in all cheeses. In addition, a sensory analysis was performed in Manchego type cheeses manufactured from either hair sheep milk or cow milk. Moisture content was lower in Manchego type cheeses (37.5 ± 1.26 and 37.5 ± 1.26 g/100 g in cheeses manufactured from hair sheep milk and cow milk, respectively) than in Panela cheeses (54.0 ± 1.26 and 56.1 ± 1.26 g/100 g in cheeses manufactured from hair sheep milk and cow milk, respectively). Ash, protein, and sodium contents were higher in Manchego type cheeses than in Panela cheeses. Manchego type cheese manufactured from hair sheep milk contained more C4:0, C6:0, C8:0, C10:0, C12:0, C14:0, C18:2 cis-9,cis-12, total saturated FA, total short-chain FA, total medium-chain FA, total polyunsaturated FA, and de novo FA than Manchego type cheeses from cow milk. Total content of short-chain FA was higher in hair sheep cheeses (24.4 ± 1.30 and 19.6 ± 1.30 g/100 g in Manchego type and Panela cheeses, respectively) than in cow cheeses (8.89 ± 1.30 and 8.26 ± 1.30 g/100 g in Manchego type and Panela cheeses, respectively). Manchego type cheeses from hair sheep milk obtained higher scores for odor (7.05), texture (6.82), flavor (7.16), and overall acceptance (7.16) compared with those made from cow milk (6.37, 6.12, 6.17, and 6.83, respectively). In conclusion, both Manchego type cheese and Panela cheese manufactured with hair sheep milk had a similar chemical composition and contained higher levels of short-chain FA, total polyunsaturated FA, and de novo FA than those manufactured with cow milk.

The aim of this study was to investigate whether social rank (SR) and stability in the order of entrance to the milking parlour are associated with production traits. The study was conducted on a dairy farm where cows (n = 215) were managed in three groups according to lactation stage (group 1: 78 cows, 0–100 days in milk (DIM); group 2: 65 cows, 101–200 DIM and group 3: 72 cows, >200 DIM). SR was calculated from observations made from agonistic behaviour performed at the water troughs and feed bunks of each pen (n = 3). The animals were classified into three levels of dominance based on at least five clear interactions, resulting in: 61 dominant, 75 intermediate and 69 subordinate cows based on SR. Stability in the order of entry was estimated as the standard deviation of the entry position. SR was weakly correlated with milk yield, urea and protein content in milk. The results showed that stable cows had higher milk production and entered the milking parlour after the non-stable animals. Stability in the order of entry to the milking parlour was not affected by SR. Overall, the use of milking facilities appears to be associated with production traits rather than SR.

Dual-purpose cattle smallholder farms (DP) exhibit a critical economic situation. The objective of this research was building a typology for DP in tropical conditions and characterizing them technologically. This will help developing more effective public policies in DP farms located in tropical conditions. A sample of 1.475 farms located in the tropical area of Mexico was selected. The typology was built using multiple correspondence analysis (MCA). Subsequently, five groups were identified by a hierarchical cluster analysis with Ward&rsquo, s method. Groups 1 and 2, covered a 46.5% of the farms, these ones presented a small-scale productive model with low levels of technological adoption, improvements were mainly associated to the area of reproduction and genetics. Very small farms (Group 3) showed orientation to subsistence. They need to improve all the technological areas. Groups 4 and 5 (29.4% of the sample) were the biggest and more specialized farms. Group four farms were located in dry tropics and showed the highest levels of technological adoption in the areas of reproduction, management, and feeding. These farms require improvement in the areas of reproduction, animal health, and feeding. Group 5 farms were located in the wet tropics and showed specialization in reproduction, genetics, and animal health areas. In this last group, it is necessary to improve management and feeding areas.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the physicochemical and texture changes of the Manchego-style cheese produced from hair sheep (Pelibuey) throughout 180 days of ripening, as well as consumer&rsquo, s acceptance. Cheese pH was constant from 1 to 180 days of ripening. Moisture, water activity, fat, elasticity and hardness decreased from day 1 to day 180, while protein, trichloroacetic acid-soluble N and free amino acid increased. Cheese lightness decreased as ripening time increased, while elasticity and hardness decreased. Principal Component Analysis was useful in discriminating cheeses according to their physicochemical composition and that allowed cheeses to be classified in two groups according to their ripening time and this resulted in those with less than 60 days and those with more than 90 days of ripening. Compared with cheeses ripened at 1 and 90 days, aged cheeses at 180 days reduced scores for appearance, color, odor, taste, texture and overall acceptance. Overall, Manchego-style cheeses from hair sheep had the usual ripened-cheese physicochemical changes.

The aim of the study was to characterize Chilean consumers of commercial fluid milk and determine if sociodemographic characteristics, knowledge and/or perception on nutritive components of milk affect its consumption. A face-to-face interview was conducted through a stratified random sampling with 501 persons in the Province of Santiago, Metropolitan Region, Chile. The interviews were conducted at the entrance of major supermarkets from 5 different municipalities of the Province of Santiago. Interviews were performed from 10.00 h a.m to 13.00 h p.m. and from 15.00 hours to 17.30 h p.m. every day. Sixteen percent of respondents declared not consuming milk due to animal cruelty followed by self-reported lactose intolerance among other reasons. The most consumed types of milk were whole (25 %), semi-skimmed (24 %) and skimmed (25 %) followed by other types. The majority of respondents that consume milk declared to do it at home (93 %; n = 393), while the rest (7 %; n = 30) declared to consume milk elsewhere (at a coffee shop, restaurant, as a guest, etc.). Participants declared to make their purchase by prioritizing price followed by brand, type of milk, expiration date, nutritional information, packaging, and milk origin. Respondents (86 %) declared to know some nutritional benefits from drinking milk: 47.6 % said that milk was important due to its mineral supply, followed by supply of vitamins (17 %), proteins (17.1 %), fat (13.5 %), sugars (4.5 %) and other components (0.4 %). Most of the answers were associated in some degree with sociodemographic factors. Overall, women declared to consume more skimmed milk whereas, males declared to consume in first place whole milk. Respondents between 18-35 years old declared to consume skimmed and whole milks, while respondents with more than 55 years declared to consume fortified milk followed by semi-skimmed. Consumption of skimmed milk was higher in the high-income socioeconomic class whereas the low-income socioeconomic class resulted in higher consumption of whole milk.

PURPOSE Glioblastoma is an aggressive and universally fatal tumor. Morphological information as captured from cellular regions on surgically resected histopathology slides has the ability to reveal the inherent heterogeneity in Glioblastoma and thus has prognostic implications. In this work, we hypothesized that capturing morphological attributes from high cellularity regions on Hematoxylin and Eosin (H&E)-stained digitized tissue slides using an end-to-end deep-learning pipeline will enable risk-stratification of GBM tumors based on overall survival. METHODS A large multi-cohort study consisting of N=514 H&E-stained digitized tissue slides along with overall-survival data (OS) was obtained from the Ivy Glioblastoma atlas project (Ivy-GAP (N=41)), TCGA (N=379), and CPTAC (N=94). Our deep-learning pipeline consisted of two stages. First stage involved segmenting cellular tumor (CT) from necrotic-regions and background using Resnet-18 model, while the second stage involved predicting OS, using only the segmented CT regions identified in the first stage. For the segmentation stage, we leveraged the Ivy-GAP cohort, where CT annotations confirmed by expert neuropathologists were available, to serve as the training set. Using this training model, the CT regions on the remaining cohort (TCGA, CPTAC) (i.e. test set) were identified. For the survival-prediction stage, the last layer of ResNet18 model was replaced with a cox layer (ResNet-Cox), and further fine-tuned using OS and censor information. Independent validation of ResNet-Cox was performed on two hold-out sites from TCGA and one from CPTAC. RESULTS Our segmentation model achieved an accuracy of 0.89 in reliably identifying CT regions on the validation data. The segmented CT regions on the test cohort were further confirmed by two experts. Our ResNet-Cox model achieved a concordance-index of 0.73 on MD Anderson Cancer Center (N=60), 0.71 on Henry Ford Hospital (N=96), and 0.68 on CPTAC data (N=41). CONCLUSION Deep-learning features captured from cellular tumor of H&E-stained histopathology images may predict survival in Glioblastoma.

Sheep production is a common activity in family farms that develop mixed farming in developing countries in South America. In the area known as the Patagonia, it is possible to find this type of farm in isolated areas with a temperate climate, where sheep production takes place in small and medium-sized flocks managed with family labor. In these systems, obtaining animal protein for family consumption and the sale of surpluses is the main objective of farmers. The Chilean Patagonia is an area that stands out for its tourist attractions. This feature has been used at the government level to develop production and commercial linkage and improvement programs. However, the proper application of these programs needs to characterize sheep production systems, define groups, determine similarities and differences among them, and identify individual or joint adaptation strategies. Thus, the objective of this research was to characterize sheep farming in an extreme mountain area in the Chilean Patagonia and provide a typology of sheep production systems, focusing on the socio-productive aspects of family farms. Within the province of Palena, the study area corresponded to the communities of Palena and Futaleufu, where a survey was given to a sample of 172 sheep farmers. Through multivariate analysis methodologies, four groups of sheep production systems were identified. The main differences between systems were farm surface, surface destined for sheep, type, duration, and supplementation strategy and presence of purebred sheep. Sheep production in extreme areas contributes to rural families' livelihood by being part of an integrated system of activities that naturally uses circular economy strategies and sustainable practices. Geographical isolation limits the marketing channels, generating that the surpluses produced are sold locally. Given the government strategies to support the study area and the strong tourist component of governmental assistance, the sheep farmers need to modify their management strategies.

Grassland based sheep production systems in the semi-arid to sub-humid Central region of Chile are expected to improve technical and economic efficiency, while at the same time decreasing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). An existing empirical, stochastic simulation model of grazing sheep production was modified to allow for a cradle-to-farm-gate quantification of GHG under a large number of scenarios. The model includes pasture availability and utilization, supplementation of sheep, milk and lamb production, and carbon sequestration by forages and soils among others. Simulated scenarios included factorial combinations of a range of farm types previously typified and a range of sheep management practices, and their interaction with dry, average, or rainy years that affected grass growth. The carbon footprint (CF) was calculated for 20 runs of each case. Numerous interactions between animal outputs, forage availability and CF, as well as trade-offs, were found. Rainfall patterns had a significant effect on range and sown pastures yields when other factors were kept constant. A decrease of 32% in average rainfall for a dry year resulted in a reduction of forage production of 13%, whereas a rainy year with rainfall 36% higher than average, increased it by 12%, Forage yields had a significant effect on CF. Three different farm types showed CF of 7.4 to 13.3 CO 2 -eq·kg − 1 LW − 1 . Farms that used higher inputs had higher forage production and lower CF, which decreased further if soil C sequestration is accounted for. Large farms that had lower stocking rates than the rest, and that used Merino sheep with high reproductive rates, had lower CF than the smaller farms that make a more intense land use. Reproductive rates had a large and significant effect on CF as they determine the number of ewes required to maintain constant production and overall flock composition. The average CF for lamb production across all scenarios was 14.8 kg CO 2 -eq·kg LW − 1 , and decreased by 2 kg CO 2 -eq·kg LW − 1 when carbon sequestration was accounted for. The simulated systems were stable in years with average rainfall, but their sustainability seems fragile if faced with a sequence of dry years. It is concluded that the abundant interactions between the rainfall pattern and management variables would be difficult to study in field experiments, and that simulation modelling is a powerful tool to assess the consequences of numerous climate and production scenarios.

Los sistemas de producción de carne bovina en una de las principales zonas ganaderas del Sur de Chile son identificados y caracterizados tomando como base de agrupación las combinaciones de aprovechamientos de especies vegetales. El objetivo del trabajo fue identificar, caracterizar y describir la evolución de sistemas de producción bovinos de carne en la región de la Araucanía y determinar su relación con la utilización de instrumentos de fomento agropecuario tanto públicos como privados. Datos obtenidos desde dos Censos agropecuarios (INE 1997, 2007) se utilizaron como variables de caracterización, permitiendo junto con la diferenciación de grupos, identificar relaciones de dependencia entre grupo, tamaño de hato, aspectos sociales y programas de fomento agropecuario. Los aprovechamientos con mayor presencia correspondieron a praderas naturales, praderas mejoradas, forrajeras perennes, especies forestales, cereales y forrajeras anuales. Tres combinaciones de aprovechamientos fueron seleccionadas por representar al total de explotaciones de la región. Se observaron diferencias significativas en variables cuantitativas y cualitativas entre grupos y años evaluados (P≤0.01).

The present study used surveys of the cattle sector over the period of 2009&ndash, 2015 to develop a typology of cattle farms to evaluate their evolution over time and to identify variables that may be associated with systems&rsquo, adaptive changes and continuance. Four groups of farms were defined using multivariate analyses as follows: Group I are small calf-cow operations using non-specialized beef breeds, Group II is similar to Group I but employs specialized beef breeds, Group III is dedicated to finishing cattle, and Group IV are larger farms (&gt, 1000 animals) with a complete cycle of breeding and fattening. In general, beef cattle production in the temperate&mdash, Mediterranean Southern Zone of Chile is declining in response to the opening up of the economy that allows for ample imports, the high opportunity cost of land, and recurrent droughts associated with climate change. Current policies and regulations have modified farms&rsquo, businesses models depending on their ease of access to markets, farm size and financial capacity. The defined groups require different development paths and strategies. Sustainable intensification is an alternative strategy for farms in Group I and II, particularly if they were to contract the finishing stage of their cattle with Group III farms. In contrast, it is suggested that Group IV farms concentrate on pastoral production using low external inputs to enhance the production of &ldquo, natural&rdquo, beef for high-value niche markets, with positive externalities.

584 Background: Approximately 30% of all breast cancers are characterized as triple-negative (TNBC). TNBC typically occurs in younger women and is associated with a poorer prognosis relative to other breast cancer subtypes. High levels of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) in residual disease after Neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT) have previously been shown to be associated with better prognosis in TNBC. In this work, we sought to evaluate the prognostic value of computationally derived measures of TIL spatial architecture in residual TNBC after NACT. Methods: H&E-stained samples from 92 patients (pts) with TNBC (41 died, 45 had disease recurrence) and residual disease after NACT were retrospectively collected from 2 sites: Instituto Nacional de Enfermedades Neoplásicas (S1) and University Hospitals (S2). 45 pts (16 deaths, 23 recurrences) from S1 formed the training set and 47 pts (25 deaths, 22 recurrences) from S2 formed the independent validation cohort. Samples were digitized at 20x. Computerized algorithms automatically identified 2 types of nuclei (TILs and non-TILs) and built clusters for each nuclei type based on cell proximity. The spatial arrangement of these clusters was then quantified using network graph metrics. The top 5 features, determined by least absolute shrinkage and selection operator, were used to train a Cox regression model that assigned a risk of death and recurrence to each patient on the training set. The percentile 33 risk score was used as a threshold for stratifying pts on the validation set as either low or high risk. For comparison, we also employed a model based on TIL density alone. Survival analysis was used to evaluate the performance of both approaches on disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS). Results: Pts in S2 (n=47) identified as “high risk” by the model based on spatial architecture of residual TILs had a significantly shorter survival time. The median OS for pts at high risk was 25 months vs. 55 months for low-risk pts. The median DFS for pts at high risk was 32 months vs 51 months for low-risk pts. Univariable analysis showed this model was prognostic for both OS (Hazard Ratio (HR) = 2.57, 95% Confidence Interval (CI): 1.07-6.16, p=0.03) and DFS (HR=2.38, CI: 1.01-5.62, p=0.04). In contrast, the model based on TIL density was not prognostic for OS (HR=1.24, CI: 0.33-4.63, p=0.73) nor DFS (HR=1.19, CI: 0.32-4.34, p=0.78). Conclusions: A computerized image analysis model based on measurements of spatial arrangement of residual TILs and surrounding cells was found to be prognostic in TNBC pts who received NACT. This method appears to be more prognostic than TIL density alone. Additional multisite validation and multivariable analysis is needed to further establish the independent prognostic utility of TIL based image biomarkers in the post-NACT TNBC.

8572 Background: Small Cell Lung Cancer (SCLC) is an aggressive malignancy with a rapid growth, and Chemotherapy remains mainstay of treatment. Identifying therapeutic targets in SCLC presents a challenge, partially due to a lack of accurate and consistently predictive biomarkers. In this study we sought to evaluate the utility of a combination of computer-extracted radiographic and pathology features from pretreatment baseline CT and H&E biopsy images to predict sensitivity to platinum-based chemotherapy and overall survival (OS) in SCLC. Methods: Seventy-eight patients with extensive and limited-stage SCLC who received platinum-doublet chemotherapy were selected. Objective response to chemotherapy (RECIST criteria) and overall survival (OS) as clinical endpoints were available for 51 and 78 patients respectively. The patients were divided randomly into two sets (Training (Sd), Validation (Sv)) with a constraint (equal number of responders and nonresponders in Sd)—Sd comprised twenty-one patients with SCLC. Sv included thirty patients. CT scans and digitized Hematoxylin Eosin-stained (H&E) biopsy images were acquired for each patient. A set of CT derived (46%) and tissue derived (53%) image features were captured. These included shape and textural patterns of the tumoral and peritumoral regions from CT scans and of tumor regions on H&E images. A random forest feature selection and linear regression model were used to identify the most predictive CT and H&E derived image features associated with chemotherapy response from Sd. A Cox proportional hazard regression model was used with these features to compute a risk score for each patients in Sd. Patients in Sv were stratified into high and low-risk groups based on the median risk score. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis was used to assess the prognostic ability of the risk score on Sv. Results: The risk score comprised nine CT (intra and peri-tumoral texture) and six H&E derived (cancer cell texture and shape) features. A linear regression model in conjunction with these 15 features was significantly associated with chemo-sensitivity in Sv (AUC = 0.76, PRC = 0.81). A multivariable model with these 15 features was significantly associated with OS in Sv (HR = 2.5, 95% CI: 1.3-4.9, P = 0.0043). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis revealed a significantly reduced OS in the high-risk group compared to the low-risk group. Conclusions: A combined CT and H&E tissue derived image signature model predicted response to chemotherapy and improved OS in SCLC patients. Image features from baseline CT scans and H&E tissue slide images may help in better risk stratification of SCLC patients. Additional independent validation of these quantitative image-based biomarkers is warranted.

e12571 Background: Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women and constitutes a public health problem due to its high rates of morbidity and mortality. Diagnosis is made through routine histopathology studies that are complemented by phenotypic expression studies of hormone receptors (estrogen and progesterone receptors), human epidermal growth factor 2 (HER2) and cell proliferation index (Ki67) for their subtyping into molecular groups (luminal A, luminal B, Her2, and triple negative), which have different prognostic and therapeutic implications. Globally, a high prevalence of the Luminal A subtype has been reported, predominantly in North America, Europe, and some Latin American countries; however, the reports in the Colombian population are heterogeneous. The objective of this research is to establish an incidence profile of these molecular subtypes in a population of the coffee region in Colombia. Methods: Samples of 377 patients with a diagnosis of infiltrating breast cancer were collected retrospectively between 2015 and 2018. Inclusion criteria included: 1) Availability of personal data (year of diagnosis and age) 2) Infiltrating breast carcinoma. 3) Diagnosis between 2015 and 2018. 4) Study of complete immunohistochemistry and/or in situ hybridization (ISH) markers. Results: The histological subtypes included: NOS infiltrating ductal carcinomas (339 cases; 89.9 %), infiltrating lobular (23 cases; 6.1 %), infiltrating mucinous (6 cases; 1.5 %), infiltrating papillary (1 case; 0.2 %) and mixed patterns: ductal - lobular (3 cases; 0.7 %) and mucinous - ductal (5 cases; 1.3 %), of whom 56.2% (212 cases) correspond to luminal B, 22.2% (84 cases) to Luminal A, 14.8% (56 cases) to triple negative and 6.6% (25 cases) to HER2. Conclusions: These findings contrast with the prevalence reported worldwide. Therefore, in the population of the Colombian coffee region, this predominance of the molecular subtype luminal B should be considered when establishing prognosis and treatment plan by the medical staff.

Dairy production systems are heterogeneous as they are influenced by farm location and structure, markets, environmental conditions, and the producers' preferences and peculiarities. A typology of the existing dairy systems in Chile was developed with the objective of identifying homogenous groups that would allow for the characterization of adaptation strategies to changing environmental, social, technological, political and economic variables. Multivariate analyses were performed on data from official surveys carried out in 2009, 2011, 2013, and 2015. Six groups (I-VI) were identified representing 26.9%, 21.5%, 21.6%, 14.6%, 6.8% and 8.6% of the population surveyed. Group I was the largest, and it included non-specialized commercial dairies. Group II clustered semi-extensive, medium to large dairies that rely mostly on high yielding improved pastures. Group III included small, semi-extensive commercial farms that make a more intense use of pastoral resources, such as sown pastures and improved native grasslands. Groups IV, V, and VI corresponded to specialized dairies, highly market-oriented, that use annual forages to supplement intensively managed and planned pastures, but that differ in size and some management strategies. The observed temporal changes and adaptations over time were closely linked to farm size, intensity in the use of various technologies, the number and the breed of the dairy cows, and the presence of other agricultural activities in the property. The effect of variable prices of milk and system inputs differed by group. Given the social and economic importance of dairies throughout Central and Southern Chile, a number of interventions are proposed, including technical modifications, extension initiatives, and changes in policies.

6559 Background: While overall, patients with p16+ oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) have a favorable prognosis, subsets of patients experience disease recurrence (DR) and death despite aggressive multimodality treatment. Aside from routine staging criteria, there are no biomarkers of tumor behavior routinely employed in OPSCC to identify patients at higher risk of DR. In this study we sought to evaluate whether the interplay between tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) & cancer cells, in both stromal and epithelial compartments from digitized H&E-stained slides, can predict DR in OPSCC patients. Methods: OPSCC resected specimens from 354 patients (66 with DR) were retrospectively collected from 3 different sites. 107 (16 DR) patients from site 1 formed the training set and 247 (50 DR) patients from sites 2 & 3 formed the independent validation cohort. Computerized algorithms automatically identified 4 types of nuclei (TILs & non-TILs in both stromal & epithelial regions), defined clusters for each nuclei type based on cell proximity, and used network graph concepts to capture measurements relating to the arrangement of these clusters. The top 10 features determined by a statistical selection method (LASSO) were used to train a Cox regression model that assigns a risk of DR to each patient on the training set. The median risk score was used as threshold for stratifying patients on the validation set into low and high-risk of DR. Survival analysis was used to evaluate the stratification given by the trained model. Results: Patients identified by the TIL interplay model as high risk for DR had statistically worse disease specific survival. Univariate analysis yielded an HR=2.49 (95% CI: 1.22-5.07, p=0.04) for site 2 and HR=3.62 (95% CI: 1.39-9.43, p=0.03) for site 3. Multivariate analysis controlling the effect of different clinical variables is shown in the attached table. Conclusions: We introduce a prognostic model based on the automated quantification of the interplay between tumor microenvironment cells that is able to help distinguish OPSCC patients with higher DR risk from those who will experience longer disease-free survival. [Table: see text]

6566 Background: Oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma patients can have major morbidity from current treatment regimens, necessitating accurate identification of patients with aggressive versus indolent tumors. In this study, we sought to evaluate whether the combination of computer extracted features of tumor cell multinucleation (MN) and spatial interplay of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) is prognostic of overall survival (OS) in OPSCC patients. Methods: OPSCC specimens from 688 patients were retrospectively collected from 3 different sites. 141 patients from site 1 formed the training set (D1) and 322 patients from site 2 and 225 patients from site 3 formed the independent validation cohort (D2, n = 547). A machine learning (ML) model was employed to automatically calculate a Multi-nucleation risk index (MNI), which is the ratio of the number of MN to the number of epithelial cells, to each patient. A separate ML model was also used to capture measurements related to the interplay between TILs and tumor cells (SpaTIL), which were then used to compute a risk score using a Cox regression model. The median value of both the MNIs and the SpaTIL risk scores in D2 were used to identify patients as either low- or high-risk. A definitive label was assigned to each patient by combining the class labels obtained from the MNI and SpaTIL models using a logical AND operation. Results: In D2, the patients with high-risk scores had statistically significantly worse survival in univariate analysis. The univariate analysis yielded an HR = 1.91 (95% CI: 1.25-2.93, p = 0.0027) for D. Multivariate analysis controlling the effect of different clinical variables is shown in the table. Conclusions: We presented a computational pathology approach to prognosticate disease outcome in OPSCC by combining features relating to density of multinucleation and spatial arrangement of TILs and validated the approach on a large multi-site dataset. With additional validation the approach could potentially help identify OPSCC patients who could benefit from de-escalation of therapy. [Table: see text]

[EN] An exploratory study was conducted to analyze combinations of variables that define typological groups that condition the abandonment/continuity of sheep farming in the semi-arid region of Chile. Three typological groups were identified. Group I is made up of middle-aged farmers with the largest flocks. Group II has typical farms from an arid zone, own by elderly male farmers. Group III is located in areas near urban centers and has a greater presence of women farmers. The study allowed to identify the variables that influence the continuity of sheep farmers and to determine strategies that avoid/delay the abandonment of the activity., [ES] Se realizó un estudio exploratorio para analizar las combinaciones de variables que definen grupos tipológicos, condicionantes del abandono/continuidad de los sistemas ovinos de producción en la zona semiárida de Chile. Tres grupos tipológicos fueron identificados: Grupo I, formado por ganaderos de mediana edad con los rebaños de mayor tamaño; Grupo II con explotaciones típicas de zona árida, en propiedad de ganaderos de avanzada edad y Grupo III, en áreas semi-rurales con mayor presencia de mujeres ganaderas. El estudio permitió identificar las variables que influyen en la continuidad de las explotaciones ovinas y determinar estrategias que eviten/retrasen el abandono de la actividad., Dirección de Pastoral y Cultura Cristiana and Vicerrectoría de Investigación-Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (Proyecto N°9301/DPCC2017)

A methodology to discriminate retail cheeses by principal component analysis (PCA) and consequent orthogonal partial least squares discrimination analysis (OPLS-DA) using fatty acid (FA) profile differences is reported. Multivariate analysis included retail cheeses from 3 different varieties (Gouda, Chanco and Mantecoso) and 2 distinct scales of production. PCA was useful in discriminating cheeses according to their variety, but it did not allow differentiation according to the scale of production. Gouda and Chanco cheeses were differentiated by saturated FAs (C6:0, C8:0, C10:0, C11:0, C12:0, C14:0, C16:0, and C18:0) whereas Mantecoso cheese was discriminated by specific (C4:0, C14:1, C16:1, C17:0, and C18:1) FAs. OPLS-DA differentiated cheeses based on the scale of production, which would be related to the feeding regime of the dairy cattle. C16:1c9 showed the strongest association with large-scale production cheeses and intensive systems, while C15:0c9, C17:0, C20:1n9, C20:4n6, and C22:2 were characteristic of artisanal cheeses and extensive feeding regimes., This study was partly sponsored by a research grant from Fondo Nacional de Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico, Chile (FONDECYT 1170400) and Vicerrectoría de Investigación of Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (Proyecto Puente P1608). Pilar Gómez-Cortés gratefully acknowledges a Juan de la Cierva-Incorporación research contract from the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness. Rodrigo A. Ibáñez acknowledges the support of Programa de Inserción Académica (Vicerrectoría Académica of Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile).

The effects of dietary unrefined olive oil (OO) residues and hydrogenated vegetable oil (HVO) on the fatty acid profiles of milk and cheese and the sensory characteristics of cheeses were determined. For 9 weeks, animals were fed a control diet with no added lipid (n = 5 cows), or fat-supplemented diets containing OO or HVO (in both cases n = 5 cows; 30 g kg−1 dry matter). Compared with control and HVO, OO increased C18:1 cis-9, and C18:3 cis-9, cis-12, cis-15 fatty acids in milk; and also increased C18:1 trans-10, C18:1 trans-11, C18:1 cis-9, C18:2 cis-9, trans-11 and C18:3 cis-9, cis-12, cis-15 fatty acids in cheeses. OO reduced the number of holes, overall odour and acidity of cheeses, whereas HVO increased the cow milk odour, bitterness and acidity of cheeses. Overall, OO can improve the cheese fatty acid profile, but with adverse effects on sensory attributes., This study was partly sponsored by a research grant from FONDECYT 1170400 (Fondo Nacional de Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico, Chile) and Vicerrectoría de Investigación of Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (Proyecto Puente P1608).

A sheep farm typology was developed to describe the evolution of sheep farming between the censuses of 1997 and 2007 in the semiarid zone of Central Chile. The typology yielded three groups (I–III) that accounted for 81, 17 and 2.5% of the farms respectively, differing in farm size and in the ratio of sheep to cattle and other agricultural activities. Sheep represented 80–86% of the livestock units in small farms, as opposed to 53% in the larger, more diversified, ranches. Farm-based technical and economic parameters were not available. Stochastic mathematical simulation of bioeconomic performance for prototype farms representative of each of the three groups showed differences accounted for by farm size, farm diversification and animal breed. Large between-farms within group variation in performance suggest the existence of room for incorporation of technology. Smaller flock sizes in I and II were associated with larger production costs and less income per lamb and per kg live weight. Larger farms carrying Merino produced more lambs per ewe and had lower unitary costs. Unaccounted for costs of family labor in the smaller farms, together with some evidence of their gradual decapitalization, explain the continued existence of the small sheep farm sector. Implications for the future development of these farms are discussed.

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the effect of dietary supplementation of fish oil (FO) alone or in combination with hydrogenated palm oil (FOPO) on the fatty acid (FA) profile of milk and cheese from dairy cows, and the sensory characteristics of cheese. Nine Holstein cows (173 ± 21 DIM) were used in a replicated 3 × 3 Latin square design with three 21 d periods. Except for milk lactose yield, milk and cheese components were not affected by dietary treatment. Cheese elaborated from milk when cows were supplemented with FO had a more intense yellowness and higher notes for colour homogeneity than cheese elaborated from milk when cows were on control and FOPO treatments. FOPO treatment resulted in cheese with higher tough texture than control and FO treatments. Milk and cheese contents of C6:0, C8:0, C10:0 and C14:0 and atherogenicity index were lower with FO and FOPO treatments than with control. Compared with control and FOPO, FO treatment increased VA and DHA content in milk and cheese. In conclusion, supplementation of dairy cow diets with FO alone or in combination with hydrogenated palm oil can enhance the FA profile of milk and cheese without deleterious effects on sensory characteristics of cheese.

Lipid supplements can be used to alter fatty acid (FA) profiles of dairy products. For Chanco cheese, however, little information is available concerning effects of lipid supplements on sensorial properties. The objective of this study was to examine effects of supplementation of dairy cow diets with soybean (SO) and hydrogenated vegetable (HVO) oils on chemical and FA composition of milk and cheese and sensory characteristics of cheese. Nine multiparous Holstein cows averaging 169±24d in milk at the beginning of the study were used in a replicated (n=3) 3×3 Latin square design that included 3 periods of 21d. All cows received a basal diet formulated with a 56:44 forage:concentrate ratio. Dietary treatments consisted of the basal diet (control; no fat supplement), and the basal diet supplemented with SO (unrefined oil; 500g/d per cow) and HVO (manufactured from palm oil; 500g/d per cow). Milk fat yield was lower with HVO compared with control and SO. Cheese chemical composition and sensory profile were not affected by dietary treatment. Vaccenic (C18:1 trans-11) and oleic (C18:1 cis-9) acids were higher for SO than for control and HVO. Compared with control and HVO, SO decreased saturated FA and increased monounsaturated FA. The thrombogenic index of milk and cheese produced when cows were fed SO was lower than when cows were fed on control and HVO. The outcome of this study showed that, compared with control and HVO, supplementing dairy cow diets with SO improves milk and cheese FA profile without detrimental effects on the chemical composition of milk and cheese and the sensory characteristics of cheese.

Patient: Male, 47 Final Diagnosis: Membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis Symptoms: Nephrotic syndrome Medication: — Clinical Procedure: Renal biopsy Specialty: Nephrology Objective: Rare disease Background: Visceral leishmaniasis is an important opportunistic disease in HIV-positive patients. The information available on the effects of such co-infection in the kidney is limited. We describe a patient with HIV/leishmania coinfection who developed nephrotic syndrome and membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis. As far as we know, only 2 cases of this nephropathy in HIV/leishmania coinfection have been reported. Case Report: A 47-year-old man developed nephrotic syndrome. He had been diagnosed with HIV infection and visceral leishmaniasis and was treated with antiretroviral therapy, antimonial compounds, liposomal amphotericin B and miltefosine, but the leishmania followed a relapsing course. Renal biopsy disclosed membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis and leishmania amastigotes were seen within glomerular capillary lumens. He was given miltefosine and liposomal amphotericin B but the leishmaniasis persisted. Stage 3B chronic renal disease and nephrotic range proteinuria tend to become stable by 15-month follow-up. Conclusions: Our case illustrated some aspects of leishmaniasis in HIV patients: its relapsing course, the difficulties in therapy, and the renal involvement.

We used a multivariate chemometric approach to differentiate or associate retail bovine milks with different fat contents and non-dairy beverages, using fatty acid profiles and statistical analysis. We collected samples of bovine milk (whole, semi-skim, and skim; n = 62) and non-dairy beverages (n = 27), and we analyzed them using gas-liquid chromatography. Principal component analysis of the fatty acid data yielded 3 significant principal components, which accounted for 72% of the total variance in the data set. Principal component 1 was related to saturated fatty acids (C4:0, C6:0, C8:0, C12:0, C14:0, C17:0, and C18:0) and monounsaturated fatty acids (C14:1 cis-9, C16:1 cis-9, C17:1 cis-9, and C18:1 trans-11); whole milk samples were clearly differentiated from the rest using this principal component. Principal component 2 differentiated semi-skim milk samples by n-3 fatty acid content (C20:3n-3, C20:5n-3, and C22:6n-3). Principal component 3 was related to C18:2 trans-9,trans-12 and C20:4n-6, and its lower scores were observed in skim milk and non-dairy beverages. A cluster analysis yielded 3 groups: group 1 consisted of only whole milk samples, group 2 was represented mainly by semi-skim milks, and group 3 included skim milk and non-dairy beverages. Overall, the present study showed that a multivariate chemometric approach is a useful tool for differentiating or associating retail bovine milks and non-dairy beverages using their fatty acid profile., This study was supported by Fondo Nacional de Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico (Chile; FONDECYT 11121142), Vicerrectoría de Investigación—Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (Proyecto Puente P1608), and the program: Consolidación del Programa de Inocuidad y Calidad de Alimentos de la Facultad de Agronomía e Ingeniería Forestal de la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile; como una estrategia para mejorar las herramientas de competitividad del sector alimentario (VCE4000011), as part of the Programa de Calidad e Inocuidad de los Alimentos (PCIA). Pilar Gómez-Cortés gratefully acknowledges the Spanish Ministry of Economy & Competitiveness for the Juan de la Cierva research contract.

The Brazilian hypersonic aerospace vehicle 14-X B is a technology demonstrator of a hypersonic airbreathing propulsion system, based on supersonic combustion ramjet (scramjet). It is designed for Earth\'s atmospheric flight at Mach number of 7 and an altitude of 30 km. Currently, it is under development in the Aerothermodynamics and Hypersonics Professor Henry T. Nagamatsu Laboratory at Institute for Advanced Studies (IEAv). Numerical simulations were conducted at nominal freestream Mach number and altitude for two leading edge blunting radius and several angles of attack close to horizontal flight. Initially, was selected the method of tip blunting around several types, the selection criteria were the location of shock wave, length of compression ramp and shock on-lip condition of all incident shock waves. The results show the shock interference behaviour on the blunted cowl-lip change with the angle of attack, blunted radius and method of tip blunting. Tip blunting by arc segment tangent to edge is the method that results in shock wave closer to cowl-tip. When the inlet operates in positive angles of attack higher to 1, no shock interference occurs, only the bow shock conditions. The results indicate a high air pressure at beginning of the combustor and higher pressure recovery with 2 mm radius and positives angles of attack.

Las explotaciones de ovino de raza Manchega vinculadas a la enominación de origen protegido “Queso Manchego” son caracterizadas por aspectos técnicos, sociales y comerciales. A partir de una muestra aleatoria, estratificada y proporcional de 157 explotaciones, la información se obtuvo mediante encuesta directa al productor. La caracterización se realizó mediante análisis descriptivos. La muestra se estratificó en base al número de ovejas y uso de tecnología. Los grupos se compararon mediante un ANOVAC multifactorial. La explotación media responde a un sistema extensivo mixto agricultura-ganadería, de tipo pastoril (85 %), con 888 ovejas y 1,124 ha de superficie total (ST), el 18 % de la ST se usa en agricultura, el resto es pasto natural. El productor tiene 48 años en promedio, existe esperanza de continuidad en la actividad (91 %), y de relevo generacional (74 %). La comercialización se realiza en un 91 % por los canales comerciales tradicionales, y sólo en un 9 % por los canales alternativos. El mayor desafío se asocia a los altos precios de los insumos y el precio de los productos. Las ventajas competitivas de las explotaciones la constituyen; por una parte el bajo nivel de inversiones y la realización de una actividad agrícola de baja producción, aspectos que le confieren flexibilidad. A partir de la estratificación por dimensión y uso de tecnología se establecen diferentes modelos productivos destacando explotaciones pequeñas y grandes con bajo uso de tecnologías, y grandes con elevado uso de tecnología.

Efetua-se uma análise dos principais parâmetros responsáveis pela troca de calor quando um jato de combustão supersônico, constituído de gás e partículas de alumina, incide sobre a superfície inclinada do defletor de jato em uma plataforma de lançamento. Os resultados obtidos demonstram que, com relação ao ponto de deslocamento da onda de choque, é possível utilizar ângulos de incidência mais acentuados quando os gases de exaustão contem uma fração de meio sólido. Este é um resultado que tem consequências práticas de extrema importância: maiores ângulos de incidência do jato são desejáveis, uma vez que contribuem para uma base de lançamento menos elevada, e se traduzem em menor custo no projeto da plataforma.

Organic dairy sheep farms have been analyzed by multivariate analysis to identify and characterize typological groups in organic dairy sheep systems; with the aim of evaluating their technical and economic performance, and social implications, to propose the corresponding measures of improvement or support. This analysis was conducted on 30 farms in the Spanish region of Castilla-La Mancha, where 164 technical, economic and social variables were analyzed. This analysis allowed the selection of 4 principal components related to size, use of labour, land use, level of supplementation and productive and economic performance. The subsequent cluster analysis classified the farms into three groups. Group I called the Family of Subsistence, has the smallest flocks (24.9 LU) with the lowest stocking rate (0.12 LU/ha) and the lower productivity of labour per animal (0.72 UTA/100 sheep). Group II with larger flocks (138.7 LU) is a system semi-intensive commercial, with higher levels of technology and less use of family labour (51.9%). Group III consists of family farms with a commercial profile, medium-sized flocks (72.6 LU), which has the best performance in terms of global sustainability, given the ability of farmers in organic productions with competitive vision. These systems show notable technical weaknesses due to the lack of agriculture and livestock integration; besides, the high stocking rates exceed carrying capacities and lead to an increased of supplementary feed and, consequently, of feeding cost. Hence the studied farms have a high cost of production and low profitability. As a result of this, the continuity of Groups I and II depends on a profitable result, enough to support the family economy, and is dependent on subsidies.

The technical efficiency and viability of organic dairy sheep farming systems were investigated in Castilla-La Mancha, a Spanish region with a tradition of sheep rearing. The thirty one farms sampled, had an average of 359 ha, 508 sheep and 1.9 work units (WU); the reproductive rate was 1.5 lambs per ewe and year and the human productivity reached 303 sheep/WU. There was however a high degree of variation among farms. Although the average level of technical efficiency was 66%, 74% of farms sampled operated at medium or low rates of technical efficiency. Differences in technical efficiency were largely due to the consumption of feeding supplements and productivity. A total of 45% of the farms was classified as non-viable. It was concluded that strategies for improving competitiveness and the use of resources are specific to each level of efficiency. The most efficient farms must increase their size; moderately efficient farms need to focus their efforts on improving the management of resources to enhance results. Improving competitiveness of the less efficient farms requires an increase of productivity; a better balance between the use of feeding supplements and the sheep productive capacity.

En este trabajo se revisan, desde la perspectiva de los agroecosistemas, los conceptos de susten-tabilidad reflejados en sus dimensiones: ecológica, social y económica, así como lo relativo al grado de sustitución entre capital natural y humano que se manifiesta en las versiones de la sustentabilidad: débil, que asume la capacidad de sustitución total entre estos recursos, y fuerte que postula que los sistemas naturales son de mayor entidad que los criterios de eficiencia económica. Entre las características principales de sustentabilidad de los agroecosistemas, la resiliencia, asociada a la estabilidad económica y la estabilidad social, debe ser considerada como la desencadenante de la continuidad o discontinuidad de los sistemas. La conveniencia debe ser abordada abandonando los conceptos antropocéntricos y productivistas del corto plazo en beneficio de una concepción holística de los sistemas de producción. Por último, la escala, espacial o temporal, es el factor que permite una cierta adaptación al sistema analizado, modulando la escala temporal a la jerarquización y complejidad de los sistemas agropecuarios y estableciendo como unidad espacial la explotación, sin olvidar la interacción con las actividades de explotaciones adyacentes.

Resumen La fiebre mediterranea familiar (FMF) es un sindrome hereditario de fiebre periodica caracterizada por ataques cortos de fiebre e inflamacion multisistemica (poliserositis y sinovitis, principalmente). El desarrollo de amiloidosis, sobre todo renal, es la principal complicacion. Los sintomas aparecen, en la mayoria de casos, antes de la segunda decada de vida. Se trata de una enfermedad hereditaria monogenica y el gen asociado se llama MEFV . El diagnostico genetico puede ser de gran ayuda, aunque existen aspectos que todavia no estan claros. En un porcentaje muy pequeno de pacientes, la enfermedad aparece de una forma atipica, es decir, mas tardia e iniciando con amiloidosis, sin existir antecedente de ataques previos inflamatorios o fiebres periodicas. Es el fenotipo II de la FMF. Presentamos el caso de un varon de 24 anos con amiloidosis renal que cumple estas caracteristicas, donde el estudio genetico resulto clave para el diagnostico.

A mathematical model was developed to analyze beef production systems in Southern Chile. The study considered the identification of the main components of systems under different beef steer management strategies, using pasture with or without supplementation and back grounding cattle on pasture followed by a winter period of confined feeding with pasture silage and concentrates. Validation of model outputs using 200 kg LW Hereford steers against real experimental data showed no significant differences (P ≥ 0.01) between simulated and observed final weights. In order to analyze the interaction between the stocking rate (SR) and supplementation, three SR of 2, 2.5 and 3 steers ha-1 with and without pasture silage supplementation at the rate of 5 kg DMd-1 steer-1 for the length of the entire period were simulated. Means were compared by the least significant difference (LSD, P ≤ 0.05). Significant differences were found in terms of final weights, which decreased with increasing SR regardless of the supplementation level, although silage supplementation tended to reduce differences between SR. A second set of simulation runs was carried out to simulate on-farm finishing of the steers through a final phase of confined feeding based on a ration of silage and concentrates. Final weights differed between SR and systems and results showed that the optimum corresponded to 2.5 steers ha-1, since at this SR the largest income corresponded to the smallest mean cost. It is concluded that a stocking rate of 2.5 steers ha-1 is feasible if winter supplementation is available, independently of a finishing period in feedlot.Un modelo matemático fue desarrollado para analizar sistemas de producción de carne bovina en el Sur de Chile. El estudio consideró la identificación de los componentes en diferentes estrategias usadas en novillos de carne, usando praderas con y sin suplementación y la recría seguida por una engorda a corral en invierno con ensilaje de praderas y granos. La validación de los resultados a pradera del modelo usando novillos Hereford de 200 kg PV contra resultados experimentales no mostró diferencias significativas (P ≥ 0.01) entre los pesos finales simulados y los observados. En el estudio, fueron simuladas tres carga animal (CA) de 2, 2.5 y 3 novillos ha-1 con y sin suplementación de ensilaje de pradera a una tasa de 5 kg MS novillo-1 día-1 durante todo el período de alimentación. Las medias fueron comparadas por Diferencias Significativas Mínimas (LSD, P ≤ 0.05). Diferencias significativas se encontraron en los pesos finales, que disminuyeron en razón del aumento de la CA independiente del nivel de suplementación, aunque ésta tendió a reducir las diferencias entre las CA. Se simuló además la respuesta de los novillos en el período final de engorda a corral y con una ración base de ensilaje y granos. Los pesos finales difirieron entre CA y los resultados mostraron que la CA de 2.5 novillos ha-1, entregó el mayor ingreso al menor costo medio. Se concluye que una carga animal de 2.5 novillos ha-1 es factible si existe disponibilidad de suplementación, independiente del sistema a corral para la terminación.

Over the last decade, pastoral systems have been intensified in response to an increasing demand for meat and milk, by generating environmental and social problems due to its high dependence on external inputs. The objective of this research was to analyze the economic feasibility of dairy pastoral system in La Pampa (Argentina). The main successful factors were identified through technical efficiency analysis, and subsequently improvement actions were suggested. The technique data envelopment analysis creates efficiency indexes by comparing the performance of each farm with the best practice, which defines the production frontier. The farms were classified attending to two criteria: first, the level of efficiency, second, the regular use of supplementation feed. The results showed that about 40% of the farms were efficient and the efficiency rate of the farms without supplementary feed was 80%. A 70% of the farms uses their own grassland resources adjusting milk yield to the capacity of the pasture. The technical efficiency for this group is 14% higher than the rest. Inefficient farms can adopt different strategies to enhance by practicing benchmarking. One of the examples studied shows two ways to do it: on the one hand the extensification by producing at a minimum cost; on the other hand, the technification, linked to the increase of stocking rate and the use of strategic supplementation. Finally, small changes in the management of the farms positively impact on performance, use of resources, and the sustainability of the system.