Panama boasts an expansive mangrove area and stands as one of the most biodiverse countries in America. While mangrove plants have long been utilized in traditional medicine, there are still unstudied species whose potential medicinal applications remain unknown. This study aimed to extract bioactive compounds from Mora oleifera (Triana ex Hemsl.) Ducke, an understudied mangrove species. Through bioassay-guided fractionation of the crude extract, we isolated seven active compounds identified as lupenone (1), lupeol (2), α-amyrin (3), β-amyrin (4), palmitic acid (5), sitosterol (6), and stigmasterol (7). Compound structures were determined using spectroscopic analyses, including APCI-HR-MS and NMR. Compounds 1–7 displayed concentration-dependent inhibition of the alpha-glucosidase enzyme, with IC₅₀ values of 0.72, 1.05, 2.13, 1.22, 240.20, 18.70, and 163.10 µM, respectively. Their inhibitory activity surpassed acarbose, the positive control (IC₅₀ 241.6 µM). Kinetic analysis revealed that all compounds acted as competitive inhibitors. Docking analysis predicted that all triterpenes bonded to the same site as acarbose in human intestinal alpha-glucosidase (PDB: 3TOP). A complementary metabolomic analysis of M. oleifera active fractions revealed the presence of 64 compounds, shedding new light on the plant’s chemical composition. These findings suggest that M. oleifera holds promise as a valuable botanical source for developing compounds for managing blood sugar levels in individuals with diabetes.

We evaluate the power consumption of three key kernels from several tuned dense linear algebra libraries on three general-purpose multi-core processors and a graphics processor, representative of the state-of-the-art in computing technology. The results of this study provide basic insights on the energy scalability of multi- and many-core designs and multi-threaded software as the building blocks of future EXAFLOPS systems.

In recent years power consumption of high performance computing (HPC) clusters has become a growing problem due, e.g., to the economic cost of electricity, the emission of carbon dioxide (with negative impact on the environment), and the generation of heat (which reduces hardware reliability). In past work, we developed EnergySaving cluster, a software package that regulates the number of active nodes in an HPC facility to match the users' demands. In this paper, we extend this work by presenting a simulator for this tool that allows the evaluation and analysis of the benefits of applying different energy-saving strategies and policies, under realistic workloads, to different cluster configurations.

Live migration of virtual machines is a pivotal mechanism to offer consolidation services in virtualized and cloud computing environments. In general, the standard live migration process favors short downtime periods, to avoid affecting on-line services provided by virtual machines. In particular, live migration can only be applied in scenarios where the dirty page rate is low compared to the communication network bandwidth. Furthermore, while setting a short downtime is convenient for on-line services, this may not be necessary, e.g., For long time-consuming high performance applications as, in this sort of computations, a relative large of downtime period, (say, in the order of minutes) due to a live migration, only introduces a small overhead on the total execution time. In this paper we enhance the live migration process in a variety of scenarios where the standard live migration configuration does not permit live migration. For these situations, we propose, analyse, and validate a modification of the KVM hyper visor that accommodates live migration with short downtime, independently of the type of application and services in execution on the virtual machine.

Aphis gossypii is a major pest that harms crops like industrial tomatoes in Panama. Recent resistance to synthetic insecticides has prompted interest in using plant secondary metabolites as eco-friendly alternatives. While some plants with insecticidal properties are well-known, others remain unexplored but could offer effective solutions. This study aimed to evaluate the insecticidal activity of ethanolic extracts from the stems and leaves of Eschweilera jefensis against nymphs and adults of Aphis gossypii. Extracts were tested at three concentrations (25, 50, and 100 µg/L), with mortality assessed at 24, 48, and 72 h post-application. The LC₅₀ values for the stem extract were 66.5, 36.8, and 31.0 μg/L, and for the leaf extract, they were 37.3, 28.4, and <25 μg/L at 24, 48, and 72 h, respectively. An advanced metabolomic analysis was conducted to identify the active compounds in each extract. This analysis uncovered several pentacyclic triterpenes, which, known for their insecticidal properties, are likely the key bioactive components responsible for the observed effects. Advanced metabolic analyses also revealed that the leaf extract, displaying the strongest insecticidal activity, is primarily composed of friedelin, while the stem extract contains betulin as their key active compounds. Furthermore, 29 known compounds were identified across both extracts, representing the first comprehensive report on the metabolic composition of E. jefensis, which underscores the significance of these findings. Together, these results suggest that E. jefensis extracts could serve as a promising natural alternative to synthetic insecticides for the management and control of A. gossypii.