Comparative analysis of prostate-specific antigen by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and capillary electrophoresis

Serum levels of Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) are not fully specific for prostate cancer (PCa) diagnosis and several efforts are focused on searching to improve PCa markers through the study of PSA subforms that could be cancer associated. We have previously reported by 2DE a decrease in the sialic acid content of PSA from PCa compared to benign prostatic hyperplasia patients based on the different proportion of the PSA spots. However, faster and more quantitative techniques, easier to automate than 2DE, are desirable. In this study, we examined the potential of CE for resolving PSA subforms in different samples and compared the results with those obtained by 2DE. We first fractionated by OFFGEL the subforms of PSA from seminal plasma according to their pIs and analyzed each separated fraction by 2DE and CE. We also analyzed PSA and high pI PSA, both from seminal plasma, and PSA from urine of a PCa patient. These samples with different PSA spots proportions by 2DE, due to different posttranslational modifications, also presented different CE profiles. This study shows that CE is a useful and complementary technique to 2DE for analyzing samples with different PSA subforms, which is of high clinical interestThis work was supported by the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (Grant Nos. BIO 2010–16922, BIO2015-66356-R and 2015-66356-R, CTQ 2013-43236-R and CDTI Grant No. IDI20130186) and by the Generalitat de Catalunya, Spain (Grant No. 2014 SGR 229

La Convención sobre la lucha contra el Tráfico de Órganos, una mirada desde la bioética = A bioethics approach to the Convention against trafficking in Human Organs

The article analyzes the Convention against trafficking with Human Organs from the Council of Europe (2015) from a legal and bioethical perspective. It systematizes and considers the contributions of the Convention: commercialization with the human body as a violation of human rights and the delimitation of organ donations to free and informed consented acts. The Convention is significant for its contribution to the human rights and to the debate of the limits on the use and control over one’s body. But it takes no position on certain highly controversial issues: donation by incompetent people and compensation for donation; giving a broad margin of appreciation to States parties may undermine its potential effectivenessEl artículo analiza jurídicamente desde una perspectiva bioética el Convenio sobre la lucha contra el tráfico de Órganos del Consejo de Europa (2015). Se sistematizan y se reflexiona sobre los valores y novedades que aporta el Convenio: la mercantilización del cuerpo humano como vulneración de los derechos humanos y la delimitación de las donaciones de órganos a los actos de gratuidad con consentimiento informado. El Convenio es significativo por su aporte a los derechos humanos y al debate sobre la libre disponibilidad del cuerpo. Pero no se posiciona sobre ciertas cuestiones altamente controvertidas: la donación por parte de personas incapaces de consentir y la compensación por donación; dando un amplio margen de apreciación a los Estados que puede mermar su potencial efectivida

Glycemic markers and relation with arterial stiffness in Caucasian subjects of the MARK study

Effect of prediabetes and normal glucose on arterial stiffness remains controversial. The primary aim of this study was to investigate the relationship of fasting plasma glucose (FPG), postprandial glucose (PG) and glycosylated haemoglobin (HbA1c) with brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV) and cardio-ankle vascular index (CAVI) in Caucasian adults. The secondary aim was to analyse this relationship by glycaemic status. Methods Cross-sectional study. Setting: Primary care. Participants: 2,233 subjects, 35±74 years. Measures: FPG (mg/dL) and HbA1c (%) of all subjects were measured using standard automated enzymatic methods. PG (mg/dL) was self-measured at home two hours after meals (breakfast, lunch and dinner) for one day using an Accu-chek ® glucometer. CAVI was measured using a VaSera VS-1500® device (Fukuda Denshi), and baPWV was calculated using a validated equation. Results CAVI and baPWV values were significantly higher in subjects with diabetes mellitus than in glucose normal and prediabetes groups (p<0.001). FPG, PG and HbA1c were positively associated with CAVI and baPWV. The β regression coefficient for: HbA1c was 0.112 (CI 95% 0.068 to 0.155) with CAVI, 0.266 (CI 95% 0.172 to 0.359) with baPWV; for PG was 0.006 (CI 95% 0.004 to 0.009 and for FPG was 0.005 (CI 95% 0.002 to 0.008) with baPWV; and for PG was 0.002 (CI 95% 0.001 to 0.003) and 0.003 (CI 95% 0.002 to 0.004) with CAVI (p<0.01 in all cases). When analysing by hyperglycaemic status, FPG, PG and HbA1c were positively associated with CAVI and baPWV in subjects with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Conclusion FPG, PG and HbA1c show a positive association with CAVI and baPWV, in Caucasian adults with intermediate cardiovascular risk factors. When analysing by hyperglycaemic status, the association is only maintained in subjects with type 2 diabetes mellitu

Efficacy of a controlled exercise program in the prevention of excessive gestational weight gain in pregnant women: a randomized, controlled, open-label clinical trial

Background: Excessive weight gain during pregnancy is associated with short-term obstetric outcomes (gestational diabetes, pregnancy-induced hypertension, increased risk of cesarean delivery, preterm labor, increased postpartum weight retention) and short-term neonatal outcomes (macrosomic or large-for-gestational-age infants) but few adequately powered randomized controlled trials have evaluated the efficacy of a controlled exercise program during pregnancy in order to prevent that. Objective: This study examines whether a controlled exercise program during pregnancy could decrease the proportion of women who exceed the Institute of Medicine (IOM) recommendations for gestational weight gains and, therefore, the consequences arising from that, and increase the proportion of women who return to pregravid weights by 6 months post-partum compared to those that just attend to standard care and receive general counseling. Methods and study design: This study is a randomized, controlled, open-label clinical trial. A sample of 338 pregnant women will enter into the study through a non-probabilistic consecutive recruitment. Participants will be pregnant, normal-weight, overweight and obese women whose age will be between 18 and 40 years. Participants will be randomly assigned within the IOM weight category (normal-weight, overweight or obese) to standard care (n=169) or to the controlled exercise program (n=169) to prevent excessive gestational weight gain. The intervention includes 2 weekly sessions: one on land (gym hall) and one as an aquatic based activity (small pool tank). Apart from that, women can go for a fast walking on flat surface during 30 minutes the rest of the week that will have to be documented to the research team. The women’s weight will be measured at the 6th month after deliver

Nous formats en la comunicació de la química. Explorant el seu paper en el foment de la cultura i les vocacions científiques

Throughout this thesis I was involved in different science communication projects where research and innovation have been applied to improve existing proposals and exploring new formats without forget the evaluation of the impact of the outreach activity on the public, in promoting vocations and improving the social perception of science. Many of the social changes occurred during the course of the thesis have been taken as challenges of it becoming new opportunities. Among them I highlight the social networks, such as new digital communication tools, or the popularization of open knowledge, as well as flipped classroom or MOOCs as innovative methodologies in the field of educationAl llarg d’aquesta tesi s’han dut a terme projectes de comunicació científica on la innovació i la recerca han estat aplicades per millorar les propostes existents, explorar altres formats i, tot experimentant, proposar novetats sense deixar de banda l’avaluació de la repercussió de l’activitat divulgativa sobre el públic, en el foment de vocacions i en la millora de la percepció social de la ciència. Molts dels canvis socials ocorreguts durant el transcurs de la tesi han estat presos com a reptes de la mateixa esdevenint oportunitats ben aprofitades. Entre ells destaquen les xarxes socials, com a noves eines de comunicació digital, o la popularització del coneixement obert, així com els MOOC o la flipped classroom, com a metodologies innovadores en l’àmbit de l’educaci

Una recerca amb èxit: suport documental als Treball de recerca de Batxillerat

Presentació del projecte "Una recerca amb èxit: suport documental als Treball de recerca de Batxillerat", que es fa des de la Biblioteca Ramon Bordas i Estragués de Castelló d'Empúries. Aquest projecte ha estat elaborat conjuntament pel grup de treball 'BibliotecAE' i el grup de treball de coordinadors/es del Fòrum de treballs de recerca de l'Alt Empordà. Iniciativa que forma part de les fitxes de treball que acompanyen la proposta: "Projectes.com? o com no perdre el nord d'un projecte" elaborada pel Servei educatiu de l'Alt Empord

Rationalizing the relative abundances of trimetallic nitride template-based endohedral metallofullerenes from aromaticity measures

The synthesis of endohedral metallofullerenes (EMFs) from a carbon soot sample of an arc discharge leads to a variety of EMFs that are obtained in different relative abundances. In the present work, we show that these abundances can be predicted from aromaticity calculations. In particular, we use the normalized Additive Local Aromaticity (ALAN) index. Our results show that the most abundant Sc3N-based and Y3N-based EMFs in fullerene soot are the most aromatic. This study reinforces the idea that aromaticity plays a key role in determining the stability of EMFsWe are grateful for financial support from the Spanish MINECO (CTQ2014-54306-P, CTQ2014-52525-P, CTQ2014-59212-P, and RyC contract to S.O.), the Catalan DIUE (2014SGR931, ICREA Academia 2014 Award to M.S. and XRQTC), and the FEDER fund (UNGI10-4E-801). M.G.-B. thanks the Spanish MECD for a PhD grant (AP2010- 2517) and the Ramón Areces Foundation for a postdoctoral fellowship. S.O. thanks the European Community for the CIG project (PCIG14-GA-2013-630978), and acknowledges the funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (ERC-2015-StG-679001

Mass tourism and water efficiency in the hotel industry: A case study

Mass tourism, which has traditionally been associated with an unsustainable use of natural resources and intensive land use, is frequently identified as a major environmental stressor in coastal regions. Nonetheless, mass tourism resorts typically have a compact and vertical urban configuration and have been shown to make more efficient use of water resources than other low-density tourist destinations. This article investigates how the main variables identified by the literature as determinants of water consumption by hotels influences water efficiency in hotels in Lloret de Mar, a well-known mass tourism destination on the Costa Brava in Spain. The results of a generalized linear mixed model show that large, high-rise hotels that attract thousands of tourists annually also benefit from economies of scale in terms of water efficiencyAcknowledgementsThis study was carried out with the financial support of theSpanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through theproject “Analysis of trends and resilience strategies in use andwater consumption in tourist areas: The case of the Costa Brava”(CSO2013-41262-P

Transcriptional regulation of the sodium channel gene (SCN5A) by GATA4 in human heart

Aberrant expression of the sodium channel gene (SCN5A) has been proposed to disrupt cardiac action potential and cause human cardiac arrhythmias, but the mechanisms of SCN5A gene regulation and dysregulation still remain largely unexplored. To gain insight into the transcriptional regulatory networks of SCN5A, we surveyed the promoter and first intronic regions of the SCN5A gene, predicting the presence of several binding sites for GATA transcription factors (TFs). Consistent with this prediction, chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) and sequential ChIP (Re-ChIP) assays show co-occupancy of cardiac GATA TFs GATA4 and GATA5 on promoter and intron 1 SCN5A regions in fresh-frozen human left ventricle samples. Gene reporter experiments show GATA4 and GATA5 synergism in the activation of the SCN5A promoter, and its dependence on predicted GATA binding sites. GATA4 and GATA6 mRNAs are robustly expressed in fresh-frozen human left ventricle samples as measured by highly sensitive droplet digital PCR (ddPCR). GATA5 mRNA is marginally but still clearly detected in the same samples. Importantly, GATA4 mRNA levels are strongly and positively correlated with SCN5A transcript levels in the human heart. Together, our findings uncover a novel mechanism of GATA TFs in the regulation of the SCN5A gene in human heart tissue. Our studies suggest that GATA5 but especially GATA4 are main contributors to SCN5A gene expression, thus providing a new paradigm of SCN5A expression regulation that may shed new light into the understanding of cardiac diseas

Olefin Metathesis with Ru-Based Catalysts Exchanging the Typical N-Heterocyclic Carbenes by a Phosphine–Phosphonium Ylide

Density functional theory (DFT) calculations have been used to describe the first turnover of an olefin metathesis reaction calling for a new in silico family of homogenous Ru-based catalysts bearing a phosphine–phosphonium ylide ligand, with ethylene as a substrate. Equal to conventional Ru-based catalysts bearing an N-heterocyclic carbene (NHC) ligand, the activation of these congeners occurs through a dissociative mechanism, with a more exothermic first phosphine dissociation step. In spite of a stronger electron-donating ability of a phosphonium ylide C-ligand with respect to a diaminocarbene analogue, upper energy barriers were calculated to be on average ca. 5 kcal/mol higher than those of Ru–NHC standards. Overall, the study also highlights advantages of bidentate ligands over classical monodentate NHC and phosphine ligands, with a particular preference for the cis attack of the olefin. The new generation of catalysts is constituted by cationic complexes potentially soluble in water, to be compared with the typical neutral Ru–NHC onesAlbert Poater thanks the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) for a project CTQ2014-59832-JIN and Xarxa de Química Teòrica i Computacional for a VALCHEM2016 projec