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SARS-CoV-2 es un coronavirus de ARN que causa infecciones respiratorias como la actual pandemia de COVID-19. Los sistemas de salud combaten esta infección con cuidados paliativos; sin embargo, existen pocos tratamientos específicos para este patógeno. Este contexto representa la posibilidad de buscar tratamientos alternativos, como el uso de moléculas naturales. El objetivo de este estudio fue determinar in silico la interacción de péptidos de plantas aromáticas con proteínas específicas de SARS-CoV-2 que no comprometan la respuesta inmune. Se procesaron quinientos ochenta y tres péptidos con menos de 30 aminoácidos de Thymus vulgaris L., Cymbopogon citratus, Salvia officinalis, Ocimum basilicum L y Zingiber officinale. La metodología aplicó filtros de acuerdo a los más altos puntajes de docking molecular para encontrar 20 péptidos por cada planta. Los péptidos registraron interacción molecular fuerte de los sitios activos de las proteínas Spike RBD, S2 y Nsp4, empleando una energía de menos de –150 kcal/mol. La proteína Nsp4 mostró la mayor interacción con todas las especies. El 35% y el 65% de estos péptidos se registraron con baja activación de la respuesta inmune a través de la antigenicidad, puntuación inferior a 0,5 y ausencia de alergenicidad. Estos resultados indican el uso de moléculas de origen vegetal que pueden implementarse en el consumo para combatir la replicación viral del SARS-CoV-2.

Rail traffic control systems are undergoing an important transformation. ERMTS/ECTS, CBTC, PTC and other train control systems based on radio communication are being deployed in different countries. These systems meet the high safety requirements for passenger traffic, and cover from congested urban areas to high-speed trains. However, there is a set of facilities, such as ports, dry ports, facilities for the repair and maintenance of trains, logistic centers, mines, etc., whose trains, that only carry freight, circulate in a controlled environment at a low speed. These facilities have low safety requirements. For them, present commercial systems become too expensive, so that, in most cases, railway traffic is still handled manually. This paper presents a system to aid in the exploitation of rail traffic for this type of facilities, called SFPS (Seville Ferro-Port System). SFPS presents many of the features of the most advanced traffic control systems, but incorporates innovations based on Information and Communications Technologies to reduce costs. To this end, train location is based on a satellite global positioning system, physical signs are replaced by virtual ones, displayed in an On-Board Unit, and communication is almost entirely wireless. SFPS has been in a trial phase since March 2016, covering part of the railway facilities of the Port Authority of Seville, with satisfactory results.

The Gulf of Mexico (GOM) is home to thousands of deep water wells in a variety of status such as production, temporary or permanently abandoned. Regardless of the status of the well, the condition and integrity of the cement sheath behind casing is critical for the safety, performance, economics and life span of the well. For temporary or permanent abandonment, the condition of the cement sheath is an integral part of the overall risk assessment and associated well controlled measures designed to contain and prevent migration of undesired fluids to surface. Challenges related to the GOM environment highly influence the successful placement of the cement behind the casing and its subsequent evaluation. With typical water depths in excess of 2,500ft., a wellbore trajectory can reach and exceed 30,000ft measured depth and can be highly inclined. Hydrocarbons bearing formations may be unconsolidated sands with high risk of sand production. Within the same wellbore, a succession of pressure-depleted zones, water zones, hydrocarbons zones, high pressure zones, faults, etc. may be encountered. The typical completion strategy is referred to as cased-hole frac-packing. This completion methodology provides substantial benefits in alleviating potential sand production, reservoir fluids production stabilization, and reduction of near wellbore skin by creating network of high-conductivity channels deeply into the formation. However, the creation of these deep fractured-channels poses additional risks for out-of-zone fracture growth along the wellbore in the absence of a competent cement sheath. Different types of cements and placement techniques are used in the GOM. These cements are specifically designed to address each challenge expected in any wellbore–highly depleted zones (thief zones), over-pressured zones, unconsolidated high porosity/permeability zones, highly inclined wellbores, etc. In addition to the complexity of the different cement recipe, the conditions inside the wellbore are of equal importance during the cement evaluation–borehole size, borehole fluid (oil vs. water), borehole fluid density, solids content, gasified fluids, etc. This paper focuses on two cement evaluation technologies. The first technology, based on an ultrasonic compressional wave, presents the distinctive advantage of reducing borehole fluids influences such as highly attenuating oil based or synthetic muds. The second technology uses innovative electro-magnetic acoustic transducers (EMAT). The EMAT acoustic signal is generated directly in the casing wall, making the measurement wellbore-fluid neutral. Multiple wave modes enables qualitative and quantitative interpretation in a wide range of slurry densities, including light-weight and foam cements. This technology provides the industry most direct solid behind-pipe evaluation through the attenuation of a shear wave which is a unique indication of solids. Selection of either technology, provides GOM operators with added confidence in evaluating cement sheath based on expected conditions, avoiding costly unusable log data.

ObjectiveTo describe the experience and long-term follow-up after Roux-en-Y hepaticojejunostomy and define potential risk factors for early and late postoperative outcomes, such as bile leakage and anastomotic stricture.Summary Background dataRoux-en-Y hepaticojejunostomy is widely used in gastrointestinal surgery. Bile leakage and anastomotic stricture are of the most relevant postoperative complications. The risk factors for postoperative morbidity are poorly described.MethodsAll patients who underwent hepaticojejunostomy between January 2014 and December 2020 were included in this study. Follow-up was performed for four years. Exact logistic regression was performed, associations between clinical and operative variables were explored. Bile leakage and anastomotic stricture were defined as outcomes at early and late follow-up respectively.ResultsA total of 199 patients were included in this study. Female patients were 56.28%. Mean age 61.73yo. The mean follow-up period was 54 months. Pancreatic cancer was the most common preoperative diagnosis (52.26%). Bile leakage was observed in 4.02%, and anastomotic stricture in 4.52% after 4 years of follow-up. A body mass index (BMI) of 27 kg/m2 or higher was associated with bile leakage (p = 0.002 95% CI 1.9-13.85), A benign diagnosis was associated with an anastomotic stricture. (p = 0.001, 95% CI 2.2-21.4).ConclusionThe appropriate technique is the key factor in decreasing both biliary leak and anastomotic stricture after surgery. It seems that a BMI greater than or equal to 27 kg/m2 is associated with an increased risk of postoperative bile leakage. Oncologic conditions increase postoperative morbidity but do not affect biliary leaks or stricture. In addition, benign conditions are associated with a high risk of anastomotic stricture.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed how human beings carry out some activities that involve social interaction, such as communicating, working, studying, traveling, among others. Therefore, social interaction transformation methods are commonly performed in person or involved in paper documentation in the digital world. An example of this is the validated scales and instruments used by human behavioral scientists as tools to assess a particular emotional condition during a psychotherapeutic session. In this paper, we present a study to validate the Manifest Adult Anxiety Scale adapted for smartphones against the original paper version in a sample of university students. Two groups of 44 university students participated in this validation study. The Manifest Anxiety Scale for Adults, version C, was administered to them. It consists of 49 items related to 5 five subscales, worry/hypersensitivity, social concerns and stress, anxiety, and specific items related to university students, for example, test anxiety. The results showed that the scale adapted for smartphones has a high concordance with the paper version of AMAS-C. So this could be used to replace it.

The fertilizer N equivalent (FNE) value of applied organic N (OrgN) is poorly predicted, often resulting in over-application of fertilizer N. Research was conducted for irrigated, continuous-corn (Zea mays L.) in eastern Nebraska with three rates of beef (Bos taurus) feedlot manure as main plot treatments and five pre-plant fertilizer N rates as sub-plot treatments. The objective was to determine the FNE for the first, second and third successive crops following feedlot manure application with different rates of OrgN and fertilizer N application. The in-season FNE, based on normalized difference crop reflectance for the crop canopy, was less with 74 compared with 37 Mg ha−1 manure applied for crop one after application but the manure rate effect on the subsequent two crops was inconsistent. The mean cumulative full-season FNE, based on grain yield, for the three successive crops, was 0.72 kg N kg−1 OrgN which was twice the in-season estimate of 0.36 kg kg−1 at growth stage V12, indicating significant apparent recovery of OrgN after V12. The full-season FNE varied inconsistently with pre-plant fertilizer N rate and the three successive crops following application. The mean manure N recovery efficiency was 0.139 kg N kg−1 OrgN year−1 for the three crops following application with no significant treatment effects. Manure is a valuable source of N but the N supply is highly variable for the crops following application so prediction of supply for a given season is unreliable.

Environmental flow determination is important for the management of rivers and reservoirs. This parameter allows us to calculate the water supply of basins and minimize environmental impacts associated with water harvesting. In the past, research has been performed to determine environmental flows in rivers of Antioquia. However, the results did not include annual weather variation. Mean environmental flows, evapotranspiration and infiltration in the area have been calculated with the rainfall data registered in the Olaya station during 20 years and the basin morphometric parameters. The collected data were used to build a mathematical model in MATLAB and determine the environmental flows with the Range of Variability Approach (RVA) method for each month of the year and ENSO periods. The model can be used to determine environmental flows in similar basins using new rainfall data and morphometric parameters. RESUMEN La determinación de los caudales ecológicos en fuentes es de gran importancia para el manejo de ríos y embalses, pues se puede determinar la oferta hídrica de las fuentes y ver si son aptas para los diferentes aprovechamientos antrópicos que se quieran realizar. Aunque se han adelantado algunos estudios para determinar los caudales ecológicos en cuencas de la región, los resultados obtenidos no tienen en cuenta la variabilidad hidrológica que se presenta durante el año. A partir de series de lluvia medidas por la estación Olaya durante un periodo de 20 años y parámetros geomorfológicos de la cuenca, se estimó la evapotranspiración, infiltración y escorrentías. Luego se realizó un balance hidrológico para establecer series de caudales medios. Con las series estimadas se construyó un modelo, con el fin de determinar los caudales ecológicos, mediante el método de Rango de Variabilidad Aproximado (RVA), para años de regímenes climáticos normales y con fenómenos del Niño y La Niña. El modelo puede ser replicado para otras cuencas que presenten condiciones similares, al introducir nuevos datos de precipitación y caudal.

Early preoperative progressive pneumoperitoneum (PPP) is a technique that helps large eventrations with loss of domain to reintroduce protruded organs. However, a standardized technique has not been developed. This technique has been proved in elective patients, but the evidence is scarce in patients with a high risk of incarceration/strangulation.We present a 61-year-old patient with history of a thoracoabdominal aneurysm repair, developed a massive incisional hernia with loss of domain. At admission, he presented with abdominal pain and inability to reduce the hernia by himself, however it reduced after clinical examination. Aortic syndromes were excluded.After a multidisciplinary meeting, early PPP was initially performed. Later he was taken to surgery and admitted in the ICU to prevent abdominal hypertension. Medical complications resolved within 14 days. The patient did not report long-term complications.PPP is a technique that pursues the prevention of abdominal hypertension syndrome in patients with large hernias with loss of domain electively. For patients with high risk of hernia complications, the evidence is limited regarding the applicability of early PPP. A multidisciplinary team can improve decision making and therefore reduce the risk of long-term complications. We show a case where PPP was performed in an acute painful, reducible hernia with a high risk of incarceration, showing that this approach can be an option for acutely ill patients.

River Information Services (RIS) are the European standard focused on improving inland navigation by providing a series of harmonized data services available for the community. The RIS-compliant systems are expected to improve safety, efficiency and the environmental friendliness of all the accessible resources during navigation through canals or rivers. Fiware is an open source framework and one of the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) building blocks. Its core provides tools for aggregating data from a variety of sources, generating a shared context with all the relevant information in the domain. The context may be constructed with real-time data from sensors, in addition with information provided by other systems or entities. This paper focuses on describing the details of the Fiware-based platform implemented in AIRIS project as architectural backbone for the RIS services. A web user interface adds secure access to the updated tools and configurations. New data models are also proposed to the Fiware community. It becomes an essential aid in the development of Internet of Things (IoT) platforms for inland navigation.

Developing location systems that use mobile device sensors has been a topic of interest to industry and the academy. In this paper, we describe an experiment that was performed for evaluating the feasibility to create a mobile indoor localization model at room level based on data from participatory sensing. In order to achieve it, seven subjects that had a smartphone with magnetometer collected magnetic field information in a building composed by five rooms with different dimensions. The information collected was used to train three machine learning algorithms: k Nearest Neighbors (kNN), decision trees (J48) and Naive Bayes. The performance of the algorithms was measured through the accuracy and the kappa statistics. Our results show that it is possible to create a mobile indoor localization model at room level using data from participatory sensing. The model with the highest performance was obtained with the kNN algorithm with a value of k = 3, since this offer an accuracy of 97.12% with a concordance level (kappa) of 0.9639 to estimate the localization of individual inside a room at the indoor environment. While the model with the lowest performance was Naive Bayes, it offers an accuracy of 50.79% with a concordance level of 0.3834.

Evidence from previous studies shows that in undergraduate programs, the highest rates of academic failure are in mathematics courses, especially in engineering programs. To reduce the failure rate, professors use several instructional strategies and information technologies. In this paper, a scoping review protocol is presented, based on the framework proposed by Arksey and O’Malley (2005), to answer the following research questions: 1) What are the instructional strategies that have been most successfully used for teaching mathematics at the undergraduate level? and 2) Which information technologies have been used to implement these instructional strategies? The scoping review was performed through three electronic databases: SCOPUS, ERIC and JSTOR.

With the development of the Internet of Things (IoT), Low Data Rate-Personal Area Networks (LR-WPAN) have been deployed for different applications. Now comes the need to integrate these networks in search of greater connectivity, performances, and geographic coverage. This integration is facilitated by the recent deployment of low power wide area networks (LPWAN) in the licensed bands, especially narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) and long-term evolution for machine-type communications (LTE-M), which are standardized technologies that will continue evolving as part of the fifth generation (5G) specifications. This paper proposes a design methodology for combined networks using LR-WPAN and LPWAN technologies. These networks are combined at the device level using a cluster-tree topology. An example is shown here, where an existing IEEE 802.15.4 network is combined with NB-IoT. To this end, new dual nodes are incorporated, acting as cluster heads. The paper discusses the different aspects of formation and operation of the combined network. A dynamic link selection (DLS) algorithm is also proposed, based on which cluster headers dynamically determine the preferred link, depending on link quality and type of traffic. Extensive simulations show that the DLS algorithm significantly increases battery life on dual nodes, which are the nodes with the highest power demands.

BACKGROUND The most common reasons for the lack of adherence among older adults is the forgetfulness due to the multiple cognitive processes associated with prospective memory involved in remembering to follow a medication regimen. Problems with prospective memory increase the demands for care. Therefore, family members play an essential role in supporting patients in activities that involve: helping with medication adherence, transmitting knowledge about medications, and helping to refill their prescriptions. To address some of these medication problems, we designed a Medication Ambient Display (MAD) to support education, motivation, and measurement of medication-taking behaviors in older adults. The functionality of MAD consists of providing external cues to convey information through abstract and stylized representations of older adults’ medication adherence. Specifically, MAD is placed as a portrait in the elderly’s home. It shows a virtual birdcage to raise elders’ consciousness about their responsibility for caring for their health, in a similar way that they gladly take care of their pets OBJECTIVE This study aimed to assess the effect of MAD’s external cues on the involvement of family members in the management of medications for the elderly. METHODS We conducted a qualitative study consisting of semi-structured interviews with older adults and their relatives identified as informal caregivers. The study lasted ten (10) weeks. We visited participants weekly to collect data about: older adults’ medication problems, help received, and their perception about older adults’ medication adherence. The first five (5) weeks of the study was used to establish baseline data to understand the involvement of relatives on medication management activities. Afterward, we introduced MAD to be used for the successive five (5) weeks. RESULTS We found that new patterns of interaction among older adults and their relatives arose while using MAD. Participants perceived that MAD reinforced the care functions of family caregivers. For instance, it made them aware of older adults' medication adherence and encouraged youngest family members to help older adults. CONCLUSIONS We identified that the external cues provided through ambient displays did not overwhelm family members, but motivated their social connectedness with older adults. We conclude this paper with a set of lessons learned from this qualitative assessment, which may help designers to develop assistive technology for older adults.

Nowadays, Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) technologies attract a lot of attention in the Internet of Things (IoT) environment. The main reason is because they are able to connect devices that are much further apart than in traditional Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), and with very low power consumption. Indeed, LPWA networks are being deployed and, at the same time, they coexist in the current paradigm with all kinds of wireless systems for IoT. In this context of heterogeneity, this work presents the options of combination of LPWA technologies with those used in WSNs so that the systems are designed together and take profit of the best of each one, and total performances are optimized by a proper design of their configuration parameters. A solution to combine IEEE 802.15.4g and Narrow Band-IoT (NB-IoT) technologies is explored and implemented. Through the addition of nodes with double connectivity, it is possible to optimize the communication links using several merit figures. Three possible NB-IoT transceivers have been tested with satisfactory results.

This work presents the development and construction of an adaptive street lighting system that improves safety at intersections, which is the result of applying low-power Internet of Things (IoT) techniques to intelligent transportation systems. A set of wireless sensor nodes using the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802.15.4 standard with additional internet protocol (IP) connectivity measures both ambient conditions and vehicle transit. These measurements are sent to a coordinator node that collects and passes them to a local controller, which then makes decisions leading to the streetlight being turned on and its illumination level controlled. Streetlights are autonomous, powered by photovoltaic energy, and wirelessly connected, achieving a high degree of energy efficiency. Relevant data are also sent to the highway conservation center, allowing it to maintain up-to-date information for the system, enabling preventive maintenance., This research was funded by the Consejería de Fomento y Vivienda of the Andalusian Regional Government, and by the European Regional Development Fund under Grant G-GI3002/IDIO.

Traditionally, to regulate the voltage at the Distribution level it is assumed that the electric grid keep its classic structure where power flow always goes from the large generators to the consumers passing through transmission and distribution grids. The Distributed Generation (DG) contradicts the previous assumption because it injects power at the distribution level, which results in a local voltage increase and can potentially reverse the active power flows in the distribution grid, causing missoperations in traditional voltage regulation schemes. This paper describes a method developed in the uruguayan utility, Administracion Nacional de Usinas y Trasmisiones Electricas (UTE), to regulate voltage considering the effect of the DG. It also describes the first regulatory testbed pilot experience implemented with this method, and the results obtained.

The systematic application of the Experimental Design plan from Design of experiments (DoE) is presented as an essential statistical method for experimentation in Software Engineering (SE). The objective is to correctly identify the factors that influence the degree to which the externalization of knowledge is generated in a software project based on knowledge, for which a factorial design was applied with two factors (a $x$ b). Factor A, corresponds to Project teams and factor B, is related to Externalization strategies. The effect of the factors and their interaction on the response variable (externalization of knowledge) were checked from the test statistics of the analysis of the variance ANOVA, showing that only the factor B significantly influences the externalization measurement according to the sample under study.