National Autonomous University of Nicaragua

About: National Autonomous University of Nicaragua is a education organization based out in Managua, Nicaragua. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Public health. The organization has 775 authors who have published 715 publications receiving 9791 citations.

Automated DNA‐based plant identification for large‐scale biodiversity assessment

Abstract: Rapid degradation of tropical forests urges to improve our efficiency in large-scale biodiversity assessment. DNA barcoding can assist greatly in this task, but commonly used phenetic approaches for DNA-based identifications rely on the existence of comprehensive reference databases, which are infeasible for hyperdiverse tropical ecosystems. Alternatively, phylogenetic methods are more robust to sparse taxon sampling but time-consuming, while multiple alignment of species-diagnostic, typically length-variable, markers can be problematic across divergent taxa. We advocate the combination of phylogenetic and phenetic methods for taxonomic assignment of DNA-barcode sequences against incomplete reference databases such as GenBank, and we developed a pipeline to implement this approach on large-scale plant diversity projects. The pipeline workflow includes several steps: database construction and curation, query sequence clustering, sequence retrieval, distance calculation, multiple alignment and phylogenetic inference. We describe the strategies used to establish these steps and the optimization of parameters to fit the selected psbA-trnH marker. We tested the pipeline using infertile plant samples and herbivore diet sequences from the highly threatened Nicaraguan seasonally dry forest and exploiting a valuable purpose-built resource: a partial local reference database of plant psbA-trnH. The selected methodology proved efficient and reliable for high-throughput taxonomic assignment, and our results corroborate the advantage of applying 'strict' tree-based criteria to avoid false positives. The pipeline tools are distributed as the scripts suite 'BAGpipe' (pipeline for Biodiversity Assessment using GenBank data), which can be readily adjusted to the purposes of other projects and applied to sequence-based identification for any marker or taxon.

Changes in childhood diarrhea incidence in nicaragua following 3 years of universal infant rotavirus immunization.

Abstract: Background—While the pentavalent rotavirus vaccine was highly efficacious against rotavirus diarrhea in clinical trials, the vaccine’s effectiveness under field conditions in the developing world is unclear. In October, 2006, Nicaragua became the first developing nation to implement universal infant immunization with the pentavalent rotavirus vaccine. To assess the impact of the immunization program, we examined the incidence of diarrhea episodes between 2003 and 2009 among children in the state of Leon, Nicaragua. Methods—We extracted data on diarrhea episodes from health ministry records. We used scaled Poisson regression models to estimate diarrhea incidence rate ratios (IRR) for the period following the program’s implementation to the period before implementation. Results—Following implementation of the immunization program, diarrhea episodes among infants were reduced (IRR 0.85, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.71–1.02) during the rotavirus season, but appear to have increased during other months. Conclusions—While the immunization program appears effective in reducing diarrhea episodes during the rotavirus season, a large burden of diarrhea persists during the remainder of the year.

Stressful life events among homeless people in León (Nicaragua): Quantity, types, timing, and perceived causality.

Abstract: Nicaragua is one of Latin America's least developed countries and has a lack of data on homeless people, a stigmatized group living in extreme poverty. We conducted structured interviews with homeless people living in the city of Leon (Nicaragua; n = 41) to obtain data on the quantity, types, timing, and perceived causality of stressful life events (SLEs) experienced during their childhood and adolescence as well as throughout their adult lives. The findings showed that our participants had experienced a high number of extremely severe SLEs at very early ages and most of these SLEs occurred before they first became homeless. In terms of the perceived causal relationship between SLEs and homelessness, the interviewees mainly attributed being homeless to material, affective, or relationship factors, or an excessive consumption of alcohol and/or drugs. Suffering from multiple and serious SLEs, largely due to living in socioeconomically disadvantaged environments, appears to be an important vulnerability factor in both becoming homeless and chronic homelessness.