Producción agroecológica de Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni (variedad criolla) en la Universidad Nacional de Lanús y elaboración de edulcorantes para transferencia a micro escala / Agro-ecological production of Stevia Rebaudiana Bertoni (creole variety) at the National University of Lanús and sweeteners preparation for micro-scale transfer

FUNDAMENTOS: Se desarrolló y evaluó un edulcorante natural, utilizando tecnologías simples, en base a Stevia rebaudiana, reproducibles a escala familiar. MÉTODOS: Se evaluó el cultivo agroecológico de Stevia rebaudiana, con la cual se elaboraron mezclas para infusiones de consumo habitual, las cuales fueron evaluadas sensorialmente. RESULTADOS: El cultivo, cumple objetivos productivos, que permiten la elaboración de mezclas para infusiones de consumo familiar. La prueba de preferencia no mostró diferencias significativas. CONCLUSIONES: La región es apta para el cultivo y producción de Stevia rebaudiana, teniendo un rendimiento adecuado para la aplicación de procedimientos tecnológicos simples para consumo familiar

BACKGROUND: A natural sweetener was developed and evaluated, using simple technologies, based on Stevia rebaudiana, reproducible on a family scale. METHODS: The agroecological culture of Stevia rebaudiana was evaluated, with which mixtures were elaborated for infusions of habitual consumption, which were evaluated sensorially. RESULTS: The crop fulfills productive objectives (20 plants / 4m2), which allow the elaboration of mixtures for family consumption. The preference test showed no significant differences. CONCLUSIONS: The region is suitable for the cultivation and production of Stevia rebaudiana, having an adequate yield for the application of simple technological procedures for family consumption

Detection of sleep-disordered breating with Pressure Bed Sensor.

A Pressure Bed Sensor (PBS) can offer an unobtrusive method for sleep monitoring. This study focuses on the detection of the sleep related breathing disorders using a PBS in comparison to the methods used in a sleep laboratory. A newly developed PCA modeling approach for the eight sensor signals of the PBS is evaluated using the Reduced Respiratory Amplitude Index (RRAI) as a central measure. The method computes the respiration amplitude with the Hilbert transform, and then detects the events based on a 20% amplitude reduction from the baseline signal. A similar calculation was used for the sleep laboratory RIP measurements, and both PBS and RIP were compared against the reference based on the nasal flow signal. In the reference RRAI method, the respiratory-disordered events were obtained using RemLogic respiration analyzer to detect over 50% amplitude reduction in the nasal respiratory flow, but removing the RemLogic standard hypopnea event associations on the oxygen desaturation events and the sleep arousals. The movement artifacts were automatically detected based on the movement activity signal of the PBS. Twenty-five (25) out of 28 patients were finally analysed. On average 87% of a night measurement has been covered by the system. The correlation coefficient was 0.92 between the PBS and the reference RRAI, and the performance of the PBS was similar with the RIP belts. Classifying the severity of the sleep related breathing by dividing RRAI in groups according to the severity criteria, the sensitivity was 92% and the specificity was 70% for the PBS. The results suggest that PBS recording can provide an easy and un-obstructive alternative method for the detection of the sleep disordered breathing and thus has a great promise for the home monitoring.