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Presents a correction to the article "Influence of the incubation atmosphere on the production of biofilm by staphylocci," written by S. Stepanovic, et al, and published in a 2003 issue of the journal "Clinical Microbiology and Infection".

Health benefits of physical activity (PA) are well known; however, specific PA patterns that relate most strongly to cognitive aging outcomes are poorly understood. We characterized latent profiles of PA among older adults and examined associations with cognition and vascular burden. 124 functionally normal older adults wore a Fitbit™ for 30 days. Daily average step count, sedentary time (0 steps/min), and high-intensity time (≥120 steps/min) were calculated. Participants completed neurocognitive testing assessing cognitive domains of executive functioning and memory; medical history, from which vascular burden (i.e., a count of cardiovascular conditions) was calculated; and brain MRI (n = 44). Subgroups with similar PA patterns were identified via latent profile analysis. Three latent PA classes emerged: Class 1 Low PA (n = 49), Class 2 Average PA (n = 59), and Class 3 High-intensity PA (n = 16). PA class related to executive functioning and vascular burden, driven by better outcomes in Class 3 than Class 1. Sex-stratified analyses revealed these associations were strongest in males. Post hoc analyses showed a positive association between high-intensity PA and white matter integrity among males. High-intensity PA related to better cognitive and vascular health, particularly among males. Findings inform physical activity-specific and person-specific recommendations for optimal cognitive aging., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors have no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Physical activity (PA) is associated with preserved age-related body and brain health. However, PA quantification can vary. Commercial-grade wearable monitors are objective, low burden tools to capture PA but are less well validated in older adults. Self-report PA questionnaires are widely accepted and more frequently used but carry inherent limitations. We aimed to compare these commonly used PA measures against one another and examine their convergent validity with a host of relevant outcomes. We also examined the factors that drive differences in PA self-reporting styles in older adults. 179 older adults completed 30-day Fitbit Flex2™ monitoring and reported PA levels via two widely used PA questionnaires: PASE and CHAMPS-METs (metabolic expenditure calories burned). Participants also completed measures of cardiometabolic (hypertension diagnosis, resting heart rate, A1C levels), cognitive (memory, processing speed, executive functioning), and brain MRI (medial temporal lobe volume) outcomes. The discrepancy between objective Fitbit monitoring and self-reported PA was evaluated using a sample-based z difference score. There were only modest relationships across all PA metrics. Fitbit step count demonstrated a stronger association with the PASE, whereas Fitbit calories burned was more strongly associated with CHAMPS-MET. Fitbit outcomes had more consistent convergence with relevant outcomes of interest (e.g., cardiometabolic and brain health indices) when compared to subjective measures; however, considerable heterogeneity within these associations was observed. A higher degree of overreporting was associated with worse memory and executive performances, as well as hypertension diagnoses. We build on prior findings that wearable, digital health indicators of PA demonstrate greater construct validity than self-report in older adults. We further show important clinical features (e.g., poorer cognitive status) of older adults that could contribute to a higher level of overreporting on self-report measures. Characterization of what PA measures truly operationalize will help elucidate relationships between most relevant facets of PA and outcomes of interest., Competing Interests: Joel H. Kramer receives royalties from Pearson’s Inc. The authors report no other conflict of interest., (© 2022 VandeBunte, Gontrum, Goldberger, Fonseca, Djukic, You, Kramer and Casaletto.)

Introduction: Wearables have great potential to improve monitoring and delivery of physical activity interventions to older adults with downstream benefits to multisystem health and longevity; however, benefits obtained from wearables depend on their uptake and usage. Few studies have examined person-specific factors that relate to wearable adherence. We characterized adherence to using a wearable activity tracker for 30 days and examined associations between adherence and demographics, cognitive functioning, brain volumes, and technology familiarity among community-dwelling older adults., Methods: Participants were 175 older adults enrolled in the UCSF Longitudinal Brain Aging Study who were asked to wear a Fitbit TM Flex 2 during waking hours for 30 days. Sixty two of these participants were also asked to sync their devices to the Fitbit smartphone app daily to collect minute-level data. We calculated adherence to wearing the Fitbit daily (i.e., proportion of days with valid activity data) and adherence to daily device syncing (i.e., proportion of days with minute-level activity data). Participants also completed a brain MRI and in-person cognitive testing measuring memory, executive functioning, and processing speed. Spearman correlations, Wilcoxon rank sum tests, and logistic regression tested relationships between wearable adherence and clinicodemographic factors., Results: Participants wore the Fitbits for an average of 95% of study days and were 85% adherent to the daily syncing protocol. Greater adherence to wearing the device was related to female sex. Greater adherence to daily device syncing was related to better memory, independent of demographic factors. Wearable adherence was not significantly related to age, education, executive functioning, processing speed, brain gray matter volumes, or self-reported familiarity with technology. Participants reported little-to-no difficulty using the wearable and all reported willingness to participate in another wearable study in the future., Conclusions: Older adults have overall high adherence to wearable use in the current study protocol. Person-specific factors, however, may represent potential barriers to equitable uptake of wearables for physical activity among older adults, including demographics and cognitive functioning. Future studies and clinical providers utilizing wearable activity trackers with older adults may benefit from implementation of reminders (e.g., texts, calls) for device use, particularly among men and individuals with memory impairment., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. The handling editor RM declared a past collaboration with the EP., (Copyright © 2022 Paolillo, Lee, VandeBunte, Djukic, Fonseca, Kramer and Casaletto.)

Objective: To test the hypothesis that fundamental relationships along the amyloid, tau, and neurodegeneration (A/T/N) cascade depend on synaptic integrity in older adults in vivo and postmortem., Methods: The 2 independent observational, cross-sectional cohorts included (1) in vivo community-dwelling, clinically normal adults from the University of California, San Francisco Memory and Aging Center who completed lumbar puncture and MRI (exclusion criteria, Clinical Dementia Rating score >0) and (2) postmortem decedents from the Rush Memory and Aging Project (exclusion criteria, inability to sign informed consent). In vivo measures included CSF synaptic proteins (synaptotagmin-1, synaptosome associated protein-25, neurogranin, and growth associated protein-43), β-amyloid (Aβ 42/40 ), tau phosphorylated at amino acid 181 (ptau 181 ), and MRI gray matter volume (GMV). Postmortem measures captured brain tissue levels of presynaptic proteins (complexin-I, complexin-II, vesicle associated membrane protein (VAMP), and SNARE complex) and neuritic plaque and neurofibrillary tangle (NFT) counts. Regression models tested statistical moderation of synaptic protein levels along the A/T/N cascade (synaptic proteins × amyloid on tau, and synaptic proteins × tau on GMV)., Results: Sixty-eight in vivo older adults (age 71 years, 43% female) and 633 decedents (age 90 years, 68% female, 34% clinically normal) were included. Each in vivo CSF synaptic protein moderated the relationship between Aβ 42/40 and ptau 181 (-0.23 < β < -0.12, p < 0.05) and the relationship between ptau 181 and GMV (-0.49 < β < -0.32, p < 0.05). Individuals with more abnormal CSF synaptic protein demonstrated expected relationships between Aβ-ptau 181 and ptau 181 -brain volume, effects that were absent or reversed in those with more normal CSF synaptic protein. Postmortem analyses recapitulated CSF models. More normal brain tissue levels of complexin-I, VAMP, and SNARE moderated the adverse relationship between neuritic plaque and NFT counts (-0.10 < β < -0.08, p < 0.05)., Conclusions: Pathogenic relationships of Aβ and tau may depend on synaptic state. Synaptic markers may help identify risk or resilience to AD proteinopathy., (© 2021 American Academy of Neurology.)

Objective: Despite the losses commonly associated with aging, older adults seem to possess particularly preserved emotional regulation. To further understand this phenomenon, the authors examined longitudinal trajectories between age, depressive symptoms, brain structure, and cognition., Methods: Seven hundred and sixteen functionally intact older adults (age M = 67.9, 56.8% female), followed longitudinally (visit range: 1-13, M = 2.5), completed cognitive testing and the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS). A subset (N = 327) underwent 3T brain MRI. Mixed-effects linear regression models were conducted controlling for sex, education, and total intracranial volume., Results: There was a significant interaction between age and time on GDS, such that GDS improved with increasing age over time, but attenuated around age 71 (age*time b = 0.10, p <0.001). Fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity interacted with age to predict longitudinal changes in GDS (FA: b = -0.02, p = 0.01; MD: b = 0.03, p = 0.007), such that age-related benefits on GDS were attenuated in those with declining FA. Executive function (EF) and processing speed also interacted with age to predict longitudinal changes in GDS (EF: b = -0.04, p = 0.03; speed: b = 0.04, p = 0.04). Again, the positive effect of age on GDS attenuated in those with worsening EF and speed. There were no associations with memory, semantic fluency, or gray matter (p values >0.05)., Conclusion: EF, processing speed, and white matter integrity moderated the longitudinal relationship between age and mood. Previous studies demonstrate the link between positivity and better cognitive control, leading to improved mood in older adults. Our results are not only consistent, but establish a potential neurobiological correlate. Future research further exploring biological mechanisms driving psychological processes may have important therapeutic implications., (Copyright © 2020 American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: In this study, we compared four models for predicting rice blast disease, two operational process-based models (Yoshino and Water Accounting Rice Model (WARM)) and two approaches based on machine learning algorithms (M5Rules and Recurrent Neural Networks (RNN)), the former inducing a rule-based model and the latter building a neural network. In situ telemetry is important to obtain quality in-field data for predictive models and this was a key aspect of the RICE-GUARD project on which this study is based. According to the authors, this is the first time process-based and machine learning modelling approaches for supporting plant disease management are compared., Results: Results clearly showed that the models succeeded in providing a warning of rice blast onset and presence, thus representing suitable solutions for preventive remedial actions targeting the mitigation of yield losses and the reduction of fungicide use. All methods gave significant "signals" during the "early warning" period, with a similar level of performance. M5Rules and WARM gave the maximum average normalized scores of 0.80 and 0.77, respectively, whereas Yoshino gave the best score for one site (Kalochori 2015). The best average values of r and r 2 and %MAE (Mean Absolute Error) for the machine learning models were 0.70, 0.50 and 0.75, respectively and for the process-based models the corresponding values were 0.59, 0.40 and 0.82. Thus it has been found that the ML models are competitive with the process-based models. This result has relevant implications for the operational use of the models, since most of the available studies are limited to the analysis of the relationship between the model outputs and the incidence of rice blast. Results also showed that machine learning methods approximated the performances of two process-based models used for years in operational contexts., Conclusions: Process-based and data-driven models can be used to provide early warnings to anticipate rice blast and detect its presence, thus supporting fungicide applications. Data-driven models derived from machine learning methods are a viable alternative to process-based approaches and - in cases when training datasets are available - offer a potentially greater adaptability to new contexts.

In the past 2 decades, varicose veins surgery went through a great turbulence and various innovations. A number of new techniques have been introduced with a goal to increase the success rate, reduce the periprocedural complications and, overall, to improve patients' quality of life. The latest of them, named cyanoacrylate embolization (CAE) technique, threatens to shake the glory of the currently well-established endovenous methods. We have analyzed all previous studies by searching MEDLINE base using PubMed. Although the idea of using n-butyl cyanoacrylate (NBCA) glue in medical purposes was not new, the very first in vivo and animal experiments using NBCA for vein closure were conducted just at the beginning of this millennium. The results of these studies gave warranty to begin with the first interventions in humans. Early studies reported very high success rates of more than 90%, with the longest follow-up period of 36 months. There were no major adverse events reported, while the minor ones-mostly phlebitic reactions-were defined as mild to moderate. The newest head-to-head studies showed that CAE is a noninferior technique to other endovenous methods, with higher occlusion rates and fewer adverse events. Short procedure time and no need for tumescent anesthesia or compressive stockings reduce patients' discomfort to the minimum and definitely seem to be a step forward answering the modern "walk in-walk out surgery" demands. As an easily handling technique, CAE undoubtedly pierces its path to the top of varicose veins surgery but more head-to-head clinical trials with longer follow-up periods are necessary to obtain a plain picture., (Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Endovascular surgery represents a minimally invasive procedure for the treatment of occlusive and aneurysmal arterial disease. However, it is followed by inflammatory response, with a rise in specific inflammatory biomarkers, such as C-reactive protein, serum amyloid A and fibrinogen. Shear stress during balloon inflation and vascular injury represents triggering events for the inflammatory process, stimulating the production of proinflammatory molecules and activation of circulating monocytes. The current literature indicates that stent implantation induces more prominent inflammatory reaction. Additionally, it has been shown that muscular arteries of femoropopliteal segment react to a greater extent to stent implantation, compared with elastic carotid or iliac arteries. The endovascular treatment of thoracic and abdominal aortic aneurysm is frequently followed with post-implantation inflammatory syndrome. Most recent findings point out that stent graft material plays a significant role in the inflammatory response, representing a challenge for clinicians. Future studies should consider the pathophysiology of the inflammatory response associated with endovascular procedures as well as predictors and risk factors including preventive strategies and therapeutic algorithms. Although the potential role of anti-inflammatory drugs after endovascular procedures has been observed, it needs to be validated in upcoming trials. The Neutrophil Lymphocyte Ratio, platelet count, Platelet-to-Lymphocyte Ratio and other biomarkers should be considered in future trials to assess the inflammatory response after endovascular procedures. Inflammatory markers may also become therapeutic targets., (Copyright© Bentham Science Publishers; For any queries, please email at epub@benthamscience.org.)