Medida de la Sección Eficaz de Producción del Quark "Single" Top y del Elemento Vtb de la Matriz CKM en CDF Run II

Tesis doctoral leída en el Departamento de Física Moderna de la Universidad de Cantabria el 22/04/2010.Peer reviewe

Economic Crisis, Unemployment and Illegal Drug Consumption in Spain

[Abstract] Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the association between drug consumption and unemployment. This paper also studies the differential association between these variables in both the preand current-crisis periods. The results are compared in an attempt to verify that the population of users is more vulnerable in terms of how likely they are to get and hold down a job in the labour market. Design/methodology/approach – Matching methods and microdata from the Survey on Alcohol and Drugs in Spain, EDADES are used. The use of these methods on the estimates carried out prove to be particularly effective in reducing treatment-selection bias. The authors’ interest is also to analyse the differential association between the interest variables in both the pre- and current-crisis periods. For this purpose, the authors also use the differences-in-differences (DID) estimation method between the two periods to check if the impact of drug use on unemployment depends on the economic context. The estimations are compared in an attempt to verify that the population of users is less likely to attain and hold down a job in the labour market than non-drug users. Findings – The results obtained in the current study are consistent with the hypothesis that drug use decreases an individual’s capacity and availability when he or she is trying to enter the labour market. In both 2007 and 2013, drug users were more likely to be unemployed, regardless of the type of drug. Differences in the probability of being unemployed intensify during an economic crisis. In light of these results, it is possible to conclude that the negative effect of drug consumption on an individual’s employability is increased during periods of economic recession. Research limitations/implications – The study presented here has some limitations. Firstly, crosssectional data were used to examine the causal relationship between consumption and employment. In this sense, the results are susceptible to bias. The unavailability of longitudinal data on the same individual made it impossible for the researchers to consider periods of abstinence, the duration of periods of consumption and how this consumption affected an individual’s productivity and his or her working situation. Another limitation is that certain relevant unemployment variables may have been omitted. Among the variables that affect an individual’s labour participation is the existence of sources of income as an alternative to market salaries. With state subsidies, income from illegal activities and money sent by family or friends, an individual may decide not to work. This problem could be mitigated if omitted variables operate in a similar way throughout both of the periods examined. Social implications – Given the results obtained in this paper, the authors believe that public policy conclusions should be mainly concerned with the importance of implementing proactive employment policies, along with family support programmes and a greater role for primary care among the people with the highest risks of exclusion. Health treatment should go jointly with measures that make it easier for individuals to enter the workforce. These steps would only be possible with an improved level of education and more complete professional profiles, to increase motivation when individuals seek employment. Originality/value – This study could make various contributions to the existing body of evidence. In the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt to document the effect of the economic crisis on the employability of the drug-using population in contrast with the general population. Moreover, a methodology is presented that provides an alternative to those used in earlier studies, in terms of reducing treatment-selection bias. At the same time, the use of a DID estimation method between pre- and current-crisis periods allow us to check if the impact of drugs consumption on unemployment depends on the economic context.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación de España; ECO2013-4821

Provisión de cuidados informales y enfermedad de Alzheimer: valoración económica y estudio de la variabilidad del tiempo.

Alzheimer's disease represents a significant burden in terms of time for the carer of the patient not institutionalized. The aim of this article is to estimate the cost of the time of the informal care depending on the type of disability and study the underlying factors of its variability. The empirical analysis has been made with data obtained through a retrospective questionnaire administered by the caregiver, using a probabilistic estimation model. The results show that most of the time is spent on personal care activities and physical mobility, increasing the average cost when considering more severe stages of the disease. Differences in time are explained mainly by the stage of the disease, the state of health of the caregiver and the availability of professional care.Alzheimer's disease; informal care, cost, time

Thalidomide analogues: Tumor necrosis factor-alpha inhibitors and their evaluation as anti-inflammatory agents

A series of related thalidomide derivatives (2-9) were synthesized by microwave irradiation and evaluated for anti-inflammatory activity. Such activity was assessed in vivo and ex vivo. Compounds 2, 8 and 9 showed the highest levels of inhibition of TNF-α production. On rat paw edema and hyperalgesia assays, compound 9, (1,4-phthalazinedione) demonstrated the highest in vivo anti-inflammatory activity. Thus, compound 9 can be considered as a promising compound to be subjected to further modification to obtain new agents for the treatment of inflammatory diseases.Fil: Casal, Juan José. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Bollini, Mariela. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Lombardo, Maria Elisa. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Centro de Investigaciones sobre Porfirinas y Porfirias. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Centro de Investigaciones sobre Porfirinas y Porfirias; ArgentinaFil: Bruno, Ana María. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

Beyond exotica : the consumption of non-European things through the case of Juan de Borja (1569-1626)

Defence date: 26 November 2018Examining Board: Prof. Luca Molà (European University Institute) - Supervisor, Prof. Jorge Flores (European University Institute), Prof. Giorgio Riello (University of Warwick), Prof. Bernardo García García (Universidad Complutense de Madrid)Rhinoceros horns, Asian textiles, Chinese porcelain and Indian furniture populate the inventories of consumers in early modern Madrid. Since the opening of direct maritime routes to Asia at the end of the fifteenth century, these goods reached Europe in ever-greater quantities. By the end of the following century, many high-ranking individuals possessed several of these items. Until now, historiography explained their consumption behaviour as an interest and curiosity in exotic goods. An interest presumed to have culminated in the creation of cabinets of curiosity or in the display of a taste for 'exotica'. In this thesis, I argue that the perception of exoticness regarding things brought into Europe from overseas is a historical construction concurrent with the arrival of items at the ports of Lisbon and Seville. I claim that it is necessary to go beyond the exoticness attributed to these goods in order to understand the consumption practises in early modern Iberia. For that purpose, this thesis offers a methodology on how to investigate consumption. It takes into consideration the historical complexity of the moment of interaction between a consumer and a thing. In other words, the main aim of my dissertation is to explain the entanglement between the driving forces that lead to consumption and the mechanisms for accessing non-European goods. To achieve this goal, I focused my study in noblemen and noblewomen who held property near the court in Madrid at the turn of the seventeenth century. I developed my research around the former ambassador in Portugal, the then royal advisor, Juan de Borja y Castro (1533-1606). Thus, I determined the social frame and the period of my study. When Juan de Borja died, he left an exceptional number of exotic items, which provided an excellent opportunity for enquiry. Besides, given Borja’s extended contacts within Portuguese networks, my case study allows bridging an analysis of consumption patterns at the court of the Hispanic Monarchy with a capacity of access to global trade

Monitoring the spreading of industrial yeast populations in the winery environment

Resumo e poster da comunicação apresentada no "22nd International Specialized Symposium on Yeasts", em 2002, Kwa Maritane, África do Sul.Nowadays, about 50% of the European wine production is based on the use of active dried wine yeast. These strains were selected due to their good fermentation performance and to their capacity to produce a wine with desirable organoleptical characteristics. From an ecological point of view, they are non-indigenous, mostly S. cerevisiae strains that are annually introduced in the ecosystem surrounding the winery. The fate of those yeasts in the natural environment in different geographical localizations is totally unknown. The present study aims to evaluate the industrial starter yeasts’ ability to survive and spread in nature, and become part of the natural microflora of musts. A large-scale sampling plan was elaborated, including 6 different vineyards (3 in Portugal 3 in France), that use the same industrial yeast strain continuously in the last 5 years, being the winery located in close proximity to the vine. In each vineyard, 6 sampling sites were chosen depending on the predominating wind direction and the relative position to the winery. From each site, before and after the harvest, a sufficient amount of grapes was collected to perform small-scale fermentations (0,5 l). Must samples were plated when 30 g/l and 70g/l of CO2 were released, and in both cases, 30 randomly selected colonies were collected. The identification of the industrial yeast strains, Zymaflore VL1 from Laffort Oenologie and a labelled starter yeast, were performed by PCR-amplification of ∂-sequences [1, 2], pulse field electrophoresis and by the use of appropriate antibiotics containing media, respectively. The overall duration of those studies is 3 years, and preliminary results of the first year will be presented

Identifying the impact of the business cycle on drug-related harms in European countries

[Abstract] Background: The evidence resulting from the analysis of the association between economic fluctuations and their impact on the substance use is mixed and inconclusive. Effects can be pro-cyclical (drug-related harms are predicted to rise when economic conditions improve), counter-cyclical (drug-related harms are predicted to rise in bad economic times) or unrelated to business cycle conditions as different transmission mechanisms could operate simultaneously. Methods: The main aim of this study is to assess, from a macroeconomic perspective, the impact of economic cycles on illegal drug-related harms in European countries over the 2000-2020 period. To this end, the regime dependent relationship between drug-related harm, proxied by unemployment, and the business cycle, proxied by overdose deaths will be identified. Applying a time dynamic linear analysis, within the framework of threshold panel data models, structural-breaks will also be tested. Results: The relationship between economic cycles (proxied by unemployment) and drug-related harms (proxied by overdose deaths) is negative, and therefore found to be pro-cyclical. One percentage point in the country unemployment rate is predicted to reduce the overdose death rate by a statistically significant percentage of 2.42. A counter-cyclical component was identified during the 2008 economic recession. The threshold model captures two effects: when unemployment rates are lower than the estimated thresholds, ranging from 3.92% to 4.12%, drug-related harms and unemployment have a pro-cyclical relationship. However, when unemployment rates are higher than this threshold, this relationship becomes counter-cyclical. Conclusions: The relationship between economic cycles and drug-related harms is pro-cyclical. However, in sit uations of economic downturns, a counter-cyclical effect is detected, as identified during the 2008 economic recession.This paper is based on work supported by the funding of the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA). Contract number: CT.21.HEA.0110.1.0. Emma Iglesias has also obtained financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, project PID2022-137923NB-I00, and from Xunta de Galicia, project ED431C 2020/26.European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction; CT.21.HEA.0110.1.0Xunta de Galicia; ED431C 2020/2

Antimalarial activity of novel imidazoisoquinolinone derivatives correlates with heme binding affinity

A series of novel imidazoisoquinolinone derivatives were synthesized and evaluated for in vitro antimalarial efficacy against chloroquine sensitive GHA strain of Plasmodium falciparum. Compounds 2, 4, 6, 9, and 17 revealed moderate to good activities in the micromolar range. Binding interaction between these active compounds and heme were determined and correlated with antimalarial activity. A good correlation (r = 0.98) was observed between antimalarial activity and the heme dissociation constants (K d). These suggest that antimalarial mode of action of this class of compounds appears to be similar to that of chloroquine and involves the inhibition of hemozoin formation.Fil: Bollini, Mariela. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay; ArgentinaFil: Casal, Juan José. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay; ArgentinaFil: Asís, Silvia Elizabeth. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay; Argentina. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; ArgentinaFil: Leal, Emilse Soledad. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay; Argentina. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; ArgentinaFil: Bruno, Ana María. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay; Argentina. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Departamento de Química Orgánica; Argentin

ICT-based applications to improve social health and social participation in older adults with dementia. A systematic literature review

Objectives: Information and communication technologies (ICT) developers, together with dementia experts have created several technological solutions to improve and facilitate social health and social participation and quality of life of older adults living with dementia. However, there is a need to carry out a systematic literature review that focuses on the validity and efficacy of these new technologies assessing their utility to promote ‘social health’ and ‘active ageing’ in people with dementia. Method: Searches in electronic databases identified 3824 articles of which 6 met the inclusion criteria and were coded according to their methodological approach, sample sizes, type of outcomes and results. Results: Six papers were identified reporting the use of 10 different interventions with people with dementia. Qualitative studies (four) showed a benefit of the use of technologies to foster social participation in people with dementia. At the same time, barriers to a widespread use of these technologies in this population were identified. A quantitative study and a mixed-method study with quantitative outcomes showed that ICT-based interventions promote more social behaviours than non-technology-based interventions. Conclusions: In the last years, several technological devices for living independently and fostering social health and social participation in people with dementia have been developed. However, specific outcome measures to assess social health and social participation are needed. Even though the analysed studies provided some evidence-base for the use of technology in this field, there is an urge to develop high quality studies and specific outcome measures

Search for a dijet resonance in events with jets and missing transverse energy in pp̄ collisions at √s=1.96 TeV

We report on a search for a dijet resonance in events with only two or three jets and a large imbalance in the total event transverse momentum. This search is sensitive to the possible production of a new particle in association with a W or Z boson, where the boson decays leptonically with one or more neutrinos in the final state. We use the full data set collected by the CDF II detector at the Tevatron collider at a proton-antiproton center-of-mass energy of 1.96 TeV. These data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 9.1 fb -1. We study the invariant mass distribution of the two jets with highest transverse energy. We find good agreement between data and standard model background expectations and measure the combined cross section for WW, WZ, and ZZ production to be 13.8-2.7+3.0 pb. No significant anomalies are observed in the mass spectrum, and 95% credibility level upper limits are set on the production rates of a potential new particle in association with a W or Z boson. © 2013 American Physical Society.This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy and National Science Foundation; the Italian Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare; the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology of Japan; the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada; the National Science Council of the Republic of China; the Swiss National Science Foundation; the A. P. Sloan Foundation; the Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, Germany; the Korean World Class University Program, the National Research Foundation of Korea; the Science and Technology Facilities Council and the Royal Society, UK; the Russian Foundation for Basic Research; the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, and Programa Consolider-Ingenio 2010, Spain; the Slovak R&D Agency; the Academy of Finland; and the Australian Research Council (ARC); and the EU community Marie Curie Fellowship Contract No. 302103.Peer Reviewe