Molecular Basis for Evolving Modularity in the Yeast Protein Interaction Network

Scale-free networks are generically defined by a power-law distribution of node connectivities. Vastly different graph topologies fit this law, ranging from the assortative, with frequent similar-degree node connections, to a modular structure. Using a metric to determine the extent of modularity, we examined the yeast protein network and found it to be significantly self-dissimilar. By orthologous node categorization, we established the evolutionary trend in the network, from an “emerging” assortative network to a present-day modular topology. The evolving topology fits a generic connectivity distribution but with a progressive enrichment in intramodule hubs that avoid each other. Primeval tolerance to random node failure is shown to evolve toward resilience to hub failure, thus removing the fragility often ascribed to scale-free networks. This trend is algorithmically reproduced by adopting a connectivity accretion law that disfavors like-degree connections for large-degree nodes. The selective advantage of this trend relates to the need to prevent a failed hub from inducing failure in an adjacent hub. The molecular basis for the evolutionary trend is likely rooted in the high-entropy penalty entailed in the association of two intramodular hubs.</p

'Ephemerality’ in game development: opportunitiees and challenges

Ephemeral Computation (Eph-C) is a newly created computation paradigm, the purpose of which is to take advantage of the ephemeral nature (limited lifetime) of computational resources. First we speak of this new paradigm in general terms, then more specifically in terms of videogame development. We present possible applications and benefits for the main research fields associated with videogame development. This is a preliminary work which aims to investigate the possibilities of applying ephemeral computation to the products of the videogame industry. Therefore, as a preliminary work, it attempts to serve as the inspiration for other researchers or videogame developers.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Tendencias y evidencias sobre el avance del proceso de concentración económica en la región pampeana tras 2002

La fuente de información que históricamente se ha empleado para mesurar el desarrollo del proceso de concentración económica en el sector rural argentino (y, dentro de éste, en la región pampeana) es el compendio de los Censos Nacionales Agropecuarios -y relevamientos afines. En el presente, la información se encuentra truncada, habida cuenta de la deficiente implementación del Censo de 2008, con lo que disminuye la posibilidad de hacer una evaluación sobre lo ocurrido en este plano en la primera década del siglo XXI. Este trabajo se propone no reconstruir la imagen perdida, sino un intento de estimación de la tendencia que siguió. Para ello, se realizan dos tareas: en primer lugar, se analizan los factores que potenciaron la concentración económica en la década del ?90 (políticos y productivos), estudiando su evolución tras el derrumbe del marco macroeconómico que la caracterizó. En segundo lugar, se reúne la información que se encuentra dispersa, y que fuera producida en estos años por diversos centros de estudios agrarios mediante encuestas a productores pampeanos. Desarrollando ambos procederes se llega a una inevitable conclusión: la imagen que el CNA 2008 hubiese mostrado sería una de una concentración de la producción, el capital y el uso del suelo mayor que en 2002.Fil: Fernández, Diego Ariel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

Note on the speculative component in the conformation of the prices of the grains

En este trabajo se presenta un análisis de la evolución de los precios de la soja y el maíz. Se ofrece una breve síntesis de los cambios operados en los mercados internacionales en la primera década del siglo XXI, con la idea de comprender su llamativa coyuntura, que ubica las cotizaciones en buenos niveles históricos de forma sostenida, por momentos elevándose hasta alcanzar valores muy pocas veces registrados. Se destacan el crecimiento de la participación de la República Popular China como mercado para la soja -fundamentalmente en forma de granos pero con una nada despreciable cuota de los subproductos de primera transformación- y las nuevas regulaciones que fomentan el empleo de biocombustibles, en particular en los Estados Unidos. Por otra parte, también cambió en varios puntos importantes la legislación estadounidense sobre inversiones. Esto permitió, en el mismo período, un vuelco considerable de fondos especulativos a los mercados de futuros de commodities. Este punto es el que se analiza específicamente en el presente escrito, aplicando un análisis de series de tiempo que permite observar la asociación existente entre aquel fenómeno y las variaciones de las cotizaciones internacionales.This paper will examine the evolution of prices of corn and soybeans. It proceed to characterize the international markets for those products in the first decade of the century, those who registered good price levels (in historical terms). The paper highlights the growth of the participation of China in the international soy market and the new regulations that promote the use of biofuels, particularly in the United States. Moreover, there were also produced important changes in several U.S. laws on investment, allowing, in the same period, a significant participation of speculative funds in the grains futures markets, to the point that this become a relevant factor in the conformation of prices. This is the objective of this paper, pursued by applying a time-series analysis that allows observing the association between that phenomenon and the evolution of international prices.Fil: Fernández, Diego Ariel. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Económicas. Instituto de Investigaciones Económicas. Centro Interdisciplinario de Estudios Agrarios; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

Epistructural thermodynamics of soluble proteins

The epistructural tension of a soluble protein is defined as the reversible work per unit area required to span the interfacial solvent envelope of the protein structure. It includes an entropic penalty term to account for losses in hydrogen-bonding coordination of interfacial water and is determined by a scalar field that indicates the expected coordination of a test water molecule at any given spatial location. An exhaustive analysis of structure-reported monomeric proteins reveals that disulfide bridges required to maintain structural integrity provide the thermodynamic counterbalance to the epistructural tension, yielding a tight linear correlation. Accordingly, deviations from the balance law correlate with the thermal denaturation free energies of proteins under reducing conditions. The picomolar-affinity toxin HsTX1 has the highest epistructural tension, while the metastable cellular form of the human prion protein PrPC represents the least tension-balanced protein.Fil: Fernandez, Ariel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Saavedra 15. Instituto Argentino de Matemática Alberto Calderon; Argentin

Valoración de Mezclas Asfálticas Fabricadas en Planta y en Caliente con Asfaltos Modificados con Látex UP70 SBR

Proyecto de Graduación (Licenciatura en Ingeniería en Construcción) Instituto Tecnológico de Costa Rica, Escuela de Ingeniería en Construcción, 2006.The actual condition in which the principal roads of the country are, has taken the public works autorithies to take action so that they can correct and avoid those inconvenients on the future road works. That`s why during the construction of the improvement of the 23 national road, Interamericana-Caldera section, the inclusion of polimers in the asphaltic mix to be placed in the construction was established. Taking advantageof this situation it was proceeded to colect the design and production data ,rehearsed by the involved labs in the process, to be able to value the behavior of one asphaltic mix fabricated in its plant and in hot, modified with latex UP70SBR. This valoration was done through the diametral tension and retained resistance results, wich allowed to conclude that the polimer influences favorably in its durability. The process of colocation was visualized and documented, which allowed to reflect a series of differences in the behavior of the modified mix in comparison to a virgin mix like the little energy thats needed to give the required compactation grade and the shown lost of workability.Laboratorios ITP y OJ

Artificial Itelligence Teaches Drugs to Target Proteins by Tackling the Induced Folding Problem

We explore the possibility of a deep learning (DL) platform that steers drug design to target proteins by inducing binding-competent conformations. We deal with the fact that target proteins are usually not fixed targets but structurally adapt to the ligand in ways that need to be predicted to enable pharmaceutical discovery. In contrast with protein folding predictors, the proposed DL system integrates signals for structural disorder to predict conformations in floppy regions of the target protein that rely on associations with the purposely designed drug to maintain their structural integrity. This is tantamount to solve the drug-induced folding problem within an AI-empowered drug discovery platform. Preliminary testing of the proposed DL platform reveals that it is possible to infer the induced folding ensemble from which a therapeutically targetable conformation gets selected by DL-instructed drug design.Fil: Fernandez, Ariel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto de Química del Sur. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Departamento de Química. Instituto de Química del Sur; Argentin