Ambiguous Tests of General Relativity on Cosmological Scales

There are a number of approaches to testing General Relativity (GR) on linear scales using parameterized frameworks for modifying cosmological perturbation theory. It is sometimes assumed that the details of any given parameterization are unimportant if one uses it as a diagnostic for deviations from GR. In this brief report we argue that this is not necessarily so. First we show that adopting alternative combinations of modifications to the field equations significantly changes the constraints that one obtains. In addition, we show that using a parameterization with insufficient freedom significantly tightens the apparent theoretical constraints. Fundamentally we argue that it is almost never appropriate to consider modifications to the perturbed Einstein equations as being constraints on the effective gravitational constant, for example, in the same sense that solar system constraints are. The only consistent modifications are either those that grant near-total freedom, as in decomposition methods, or ones which map directly to a particular part of theory space

Effective description of general extensions of the Standard Model: the complete tree-level dictionary

We thank Nuria Rius and Arcadi Santamaria for an interesting discussion that motivated this work. We also thank Paco del Águila and Toni Pich for useful comments.We compute all the tree-level contributions to the Wilson coefficients of the dimension-six Standard-Model effective theory in ultraviolet completions with general scalar, spinor and vector feld content and arbitrary interactions. No assumption about the renormalizability of the high-energy theory is made. This provides a complete ultraviolet/ infrared dictionary at the classical level, which can be used to study the low-energy implications of any model of interest, and also to look for explicit completions consistent with low-energy dataThe work of J.C.C., M.P.V. and J.S. has been supported by the Spanish MICINN project FPA2013- 47836-C3-2-P, the MINECO project FPA2016-78220-C3-1-P (Fondos FEDER) and the Junta de Andalucía grant FQM101. The work of J.C.C. has also been supported by the Spanish MECD grant FPU14. The work of M.P.V. and J.S. has also been supported by the European Commission through the contract PITN-GA-2012-316704 (HIGGSTOOLS). J.C.C. is grateful for the hospitality of the Dipartimento di Fisica e Astronomia \Galileo Galilei" of the University of Padova during part of this work. J.S. would like to thank the Mainz Institute for Theoretical Physics (MITP) for its hospitality and partial support during the completion of this work

Coping Strategies Used by Female Victims of the Colombian Armed Conflict: The Women in the Colombian Conflict (MUCOCO) Program

The effects of armed conflict on women in post-conflict situations are an area of analysis for social disciplines. This study will analyze the situation in Colombia, currently involved in a peace restoration process. The aim is to verify the efficacy of a coping and emotion regulation program analyzing victimization as well as the coping strategies employed in response to these violent acts. The program focuses on 62 women contacted through the Ruta Pacífica de las Mujeres, a nongovernmental organization. The program had a positive effect on women, reporting lower levels of posttraumatic stress, more functional coping strategies, and less use of dysfunctional strategies. All emotional cognitive and social indicators improved. Women felt emotionally better, perceiving greater social support and more trust in institutions. Survivors had more self-confidence to achieve their goals and solve their problems. The implications in a context of peace reconstruction and search for social cohesion are discussed.project (Proyectos CUD 2017) funded by the Oficina de Cooperación al Desarrollo (Development Cooperation Office) of the Universidad del País Vasco/Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea (University of the Basque Country, Spain) and the University of Burgos funding for the research group SIQoL (Y133GI)

Primary skin fibroblasts as a model of Parkinson's disease

Parkinson's disease is the second most frequent neurodegenerative disorder. While most cases occur sporadic mutations in a growing number of genes including Parkin (PARK2) and PINK1 (PARK6) have been associated with the disease. Different animal models and cell models like patient skin fibroblasts and recombinant cell lines can be used as model systems for Parkinson's disease. Skin fibroblasts present a system with defined mutations and the cumulative cellular damage of the patients. PINK1 and Parkin genes show relevant expression levels in human fibroblasts and since both genes participate in stress response pathways, we believe fibroblasts advantageous in order to assess, e.g. the effect of stressors. Furthermore, since a bioenergetic deficit underlies early stage Parkinson's disease, while atrophy underlies later stages, the use of primary cells seems preferable over the use of tumor cell lines. The new option to use fibroblast-derived induced pluripotent stem cells redifferentiated into dopaminergic neurons is an additional benefit. However, the use of fibroblast has also some drawbacks. We have investigated PARK6 fibroblasts and they mirror closely the respiratory alterations, the expression profiles, the mitochondrial dynamics pathology and the vulnerability to proteasomal stress that has been documented in other model systems. Fibroblasts from patients with PARK2, PARK6, idiopathic Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, and spinocerebellar ataxia type 2 demonstrated a distinct and unique mRNA expression pattern of key genes in neurodegeneration. Thus, primary skin fibroblasts are a useful Parkinson's disease model, able to serve as a complement to animal mutants, transformed cell lines and patient tissues

Nonperturbative Quantum Gravity

Asymptotic safety describes a scenario in which general relativity can be quantized as a conventional field theory, despite being nonrenormalizable when expanding it around a fixed background geometry. It is formulated in the framework of the Wilsonian renormalization group and relies crucially on the existence of an ultraviolet fixed point, for which evidence has been found using renormalization group equations in the continuum. "Causal Dynamical Triangulations" (CDT) is a concrete research program to obtain a nonperturbative quantum field theory of gravity via a lattice regularization, and represented as a sum over spacetime histories. In the Wilsonian spirit one can use this formulation to try to locate fixed points of the lattice theory and thereby provide independent, nonperturbative evidence for the existence of a UV fixed point. We describe the formalism of CDT, its phase diagram, possible fixed points and the "quantum geometries" which emerge in the different phases. We also argue that the formalism may be able to describe a more general class of Ho\v{r}ava-Lifshitz gravitational models.Comment: Review, 146 pages, many figure

A portal of educational resources: providing evidence for matching pedagogy with technology

The TPACK (Technology, Pedagogy and Content Knowledge) model presents the three types of knowledge that are necessary to implement a successful technology-based educational activity. It highlights how the intersections between TPK (Technological Pedagogical Knowledge), PCK (Pedagogical Content Knowledge) and TCK (Technological Content Knowledge) are not a sheer sum up of their components but new types of knowledge. This paper focuses on TPK, the intersection between technology knowledge and pedagogy knowledge – a crucial field of investigation. Actually, technology in education is not just an add-on but is literally reshaping teaching/learning paradigms. Technology modifies pedagogy and pedagogy dictates requirements to technology. In order to pursue this research, an empirical approach was taken, building a repository (back-end) and a portal (front-end) of about 300 real-life educational experiences run at school. Educational portals are not new, but they generally emphasise content. Instead, in our portal, technology and pedagogy take centre stage. Experiences are classified according to more than 30 categories (‘facets’) and more than 200 facet values, all revolving around the pedagogical implementation and the technology used. The portal (an innovative piece of technology) supports sophisticated ‘exploratory’ sessions of use, targeted at researchers (investigating the TPK intersection), teachers (looking for inspiration in their daily jobs) and decision makers (making decisions about the introduction of technology into schools)

The Transcriptional Repressor TupA in Aspergillus niger Is Involved in Controlling Gene Expression Related to Cell Wall Biosynthesis, Development, and Nitrogen Source Availability.

The Tup1-Cyc8 (Ssn6) complex is a well characterized and conserved general transcriptional repressor complex in eukaryotic cells. Here, we report the identification of the Tup1 (TupA) homolog in the filamentous fungus Aspergillus niger in a genetic screen for mutants with a constitutive expression of the agsA gene. The agsA gene encodes a putative alpha-glucan synthase, which is induced in response to cell wall stress in A. niger. Apart from the constitutive expression of agsA, the selected mutant was also found to produce an unknown pigment at high temperatures. Complementation analysis with a genomic library showed that the tupA gene could complement the phenotypes of the mutant. Screening of a collection of 240 mutants with constitutive expression of agsA identified sixteen additional pigment-secreting mutants, which were all mutated in the tupA gene. The phenotypes of the tupA mutants were very similar to the phenotypes of a tupA deletion strain. Further analysis of the tupA-17 mutant and the DeltatupA mutant revealed that TupA is also required for normal growth and morphogenesis. The production of the pigment at 37 degrees C is nitrogen source-dependent and repressed by ammonium. Genome-wide expression analysis of the tupA mutant during exponential growth revealed derepression of a large group of diverse genes, including genes related to development and cell wall biosynthesis, and also protease-encoding genes that are normally repressed by ammonium. Comparison of the transcriptome of up-regulated genes in the tupA mutant showed limited overlap with the transcriptome of caspofungin-induced cell wall stress-related genes, suggesting that TupA is not a general suppressor of cell wall stress-induced genes. We propose that TupA is an important repressor of genes related to development and nitrogen metabolism