European cohorts of older HIV adults: POPPY, AGEhIV, GEPPO, COBRA and FUNCFRAIL.

AIM: The recent and rapid demographic changes affecting people living with HIV (PLWH) produced a subset of older adults demanding a prompt response both in clinical practice and research setting. The scientific community had to properly design studies that include older adults living with HIV (OALWH), aged > 50 years, or geriatric PLWH, aged > 65 years to explore the interaction between aging and HIV itself, antiretroviral therapy (ART) and non-infectious co-morbidities (NICM). Choosing between these two types of cohorts may represent a trap, but also a possibility to measure different outcomes and obtain different evidence. The aim of this paper is to describe ongoing aging HIV cohorts that include older or geriatric PLWH and present the key results obtained in those studies. METHODS: So far, in Europe, there are ongoing cohorts that comprise OALWH or geriatric PLWH: AGEhIV, POPPY, GEPPO, FUNCFRAIL and COBRA. We will summarize crucial findings from each study published up to now, which will be categorized as results related to HIV and ART, NICM and geriatric syndromes. RESULTS: Existing aging HIV cohorts are pointing out unmet medical needs of OALWH but are still not representative of the entire European HIV aging epidemic. Moreover, there are no studies designed to detect best ART strategies in this population and various outcomes that go beyond the viro-immunological success are still not routinely part of aging cohorts. CONCLUSION: Results from aging cohorts with outcomes that go beyond the undetectability will pave the way to health care providers to encounter unmet needs of OALWH.

Unprecedented plant species loss after a decade in fragmented subtropical Chaco Serrano forests.

Current biodiversity loss is mostly caused by anthropogenic habitat loss and fragmentation, climate change, and resource exploitation. Measuring the balance of species loss and gain in remaining fragmented landscapes throughout time entails a central research challenge. We resurveyed in 2013 plant species richness in the same plots of a previous sampling conducted in 2003 across 18 forest fragments of different sizes of the Chaco Serrano forest in Argentina. While the area of these forest remnants was kept constant, their surrounding forest cover changed over this time period. We compared plant species richness of both sampling years and calculated the proportion of species loss and gain at forest edges and interiors. As in 2003, we found a positive relationship between fragment area and plant richness in 2013 and both years showed a similar slope. However, we detected a net decrease of 24% of species' richness across all forest fragments, implying an unprecedentedly high rate and magnitude of species loss driven mainly by non-woody, short-lived species. There was a higher proportion of lost and gained species at forest edges than in forest interiors. Importantly, fragment area interacted with percent change in surrounding forest cover to explain the proportion of species lost. Small forest fragments showed a relatively constant proportion of species loss regardless of any changes in surrounding forest cover, whereas in larger fragments the proportion of species lost increased when surrounding forest cover decreased. We show that despite preserving fragment area, habitat quality and availability in the surroundings is of fundamental importance in shaping extinction and immigration dynamics of plant species at any given forest remnant. Because the Chaco Serrano forest has already lost 94% of its original cover, we argue that plant extinctions will continue through the coming decades unless active management actions are taken to increase native forest areas.

Extracellular enzymes produced by microorganisms isolated from maritime Antarctica.

Antarctic environments can sustain a great diversity of well-adapted microorganisms known as psychrophiles or psychrotrophs. The potential of these microorganisms as a resource of enzymes able to maintain their activity and stability at low temperature for technological applications has stimulated interest in exploration and isolation of microbes from this extreme environment. Enzymes produced by these organisms have a considerable potential for technological applications because they are known to have higher enzymatic activities at lower temperatures than their mesophilic and thermophilic counterparts. A total of 518 Antarctic microorganisms, were isolated during Antarctic expeditions organized by the Instituto Antártico Uruguayo. Samples of particules suspended in air, ice, sea and freshwater, soil, sediment, bird and marine animal faeces, dead animals, algae, plants, rocks and microbial mats were collected from different sites in maritime Antarctica. We report enzymatic activities present in 161 microorganisms (120 bacteria, 31 yeasts and 10 filamentous fungi) isolated from these locations. Enzymatic performance was evaluated at 4 and 20°C. Most of yeasts and bacteria grew better at 20°C than at 4°C, however the opposite was observed with the fungi. Amylase, lipase and protease activities were frequently found in bacterial strains. Yeasts and fungal isolates typically exhibited lipase, celullase and gelatinase activities. Bacterial isolates with highest enzymatic activities were identified by 16S rDNA sequence analysis as Pseudomonas spp., Psychrobacter sp., Arthrobacter spp., Bacillus sp. and Carnobacterium sp. Yeasts and fungal strains, with multiple enzymatic activities, belonged to Cryptococcus victoriae, Trichosporon pullulans and Geomyces pannorum.