22 research outputs found
An Online Sales System to Be Managed by People with Mental Illness
The percentage of the population aged 65 and over is increasing
during the last decades. It is one of the problems that the European health
system, and in particular the Spanish system, has to face out. This increase is
linked to the rising of dependent people, whose suffer progressive deterioration
of both their physical and mental capacities. In this context, technology plays a
key role in improving the quality of life, not only of older people but also their
caregivers. A technological ecosystem to support patients with mental illness,
their caregivers, and the connection with their relatives was developed in previous
works. This solution is prepared to evolve according to the usersâ and
organizationâs needs. In this sense, the present work describes the inclusion of a
new software tool, an online sales platform that promotes active ageing, seeking
that it can be used and managed by older people who may have cognitive
impairment problems. Although there are many e-commerce platforms on the
market, they not consider users with special needs. The objective has not been to
develop a software prototype from scratch, but to focus on aspects relating to
accessibility and usability to improve online stores and apply these improvements
to an existing solution, following the philosophy of Open Source software
development. This work aims to describe the definition process itself
Holomorphic variables in magnetized brane models with continuous Wilson lines
We analyze the action of the target-space modular group in toroidal type IIB
orientifold compactifications with magnetized D-branes and continuous Wilson
lines. The transformation of matter fields agree with that of twisted fields in
heterotic compactifications, constituting a check of type I/heterotic duality.
We identify the holomorphic N = 1 variables for these compactifications. Matter
fields and closed string moduli are both redefined by open string moduli. The
redefinition of matter fields can be read directly from the perturbative Yukawa
couplings, whereas closed string moduli redefinitions are obtained from D-brane
instanton superpotential couplings. The resulting expressions reproduce and
generalize, in the presence of internal magnetic fields, previous results in
the literature.Comment: 9 pages, no figures; v2: conventions for Wilson lines changed, major
simplifications in expressions, discussions extended, typos corrected, some
references adde
Non-perturbative Vacuum Destabilization and D-brane Dynamics
We analyze the process of string vacuum destabilization due to instanton
induced superpotential couplings which depend linearly on charged fields. These
non-perturbative instabilities result in potentials for the D-brane moduli and
lead to processes of D-brane recombination, motion and partial moduli
stabilization at the non-perturbative vacuum. By using techniques of D-brane
instanton calculus, we explicitly compute this scalar potential in toroidal
orbifold compactifications with magnetized D-branes by summing over the
possible discrete instanton configurations. We illustrate explicitly the
resulting dynamics in globally consistent models. These instabilities can have
phenomenological applications to breaking hidden sector gauge groups, open
string moduli stabilization and supersymmetry breaking. Our results suggest
that breaking supersymmetry by Polonyi-like models in string theory is more
difficult than expected.Comment: 61 pages, 6 figures, 5 tables; Minor corrections, version published
in JHE
Chiral matter wavefunctions in warped compactifications
We analyze the wavefunctions for open strings stretching between intersecting
7-branes in type IIB/F-theory warped compactifications, as a first step in
understanding the warped effective field theory of 4d chiral fermions. While in
general the equations of motion do not seem to admit a simple analytic
solution, we provide a method for solving the wavefunctions in the case of weak
warping. The method describes warped zero modes as a perturbative expansion in
the unwarped spectrum, the coefficients of the expansion depending on the
warping. We perform our analysis with and without the presence of worldvolume
fluxes, illustrating the procedure with some examples. Finally, we comment on
the warped effective field theory for the modes at the intersection.Comment: 64 pages, 1 figure. References updated, typos fixed, discussion on
varying dilaton case slightly modified. Version to appear in JHE
Granulocyte-macrophage colony stimulatory factor enhances the pro-inflammatory response of interferon-Îł-treated macrophages to pseudomonas aeruginosa infection
Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an opportunistic pathogen that can cause severe infections at compromised epithelial surfaces, such those found in burns, wounds, and in lungs damaged by mechanical ventilation or recurrent infections, particularly in cystic fibrosis (CF) patients. CF patients have been proposed to have a Th2 and Th17-biased immune response suggesting that the lack of Th1 and/or over exuberant Th17 responses could contribute to the establishment of chronic P. aeruginosa infection and deterioration of lung function. Accordingly, we have observed that interferon (IFN)-γ production by peripheral blood mononuclear cells from CF patients positively correlated with lung function, particularly in patients chronically infected with P. aeruginosa. In contrast, IL-17A levels tended to correlate negatively with lung function with this trend becoming significant in patients chronically infected with P. aeruginosa. These results are in agreement with IFN-γ and IL-17A playing protective and detrimental roles, respectively, in CF. In order to explore the protective effect of IFN-γ in CF, the effect of IFN-γ alone or in combination with granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF), on the ability of human macrophages to control P. aeruginosa growth, resist the cytotoxicity induced by this bacterium or promote inflammation was investigated. Treatment of macrophages with IFN-γ, in the presence and absence of GM-CSF, failed to alter bacterial growth or macrophage survival upon P. aeruginosa infection, but changed the inflammatory potential of macrophages. IFN-γ caused up-regulation of monocyte chemoattractant protein-1 (MCP-1) and TNF-α and down-regulation of IL-10 expression by infected macrophages. GM-CSF in combination with IFN-γ promoted IL-6 production and further reduction of IL-10 synthesis. Comparison of TNF-α vs. IL-10 and IL-6 vs. IL-10 ratios revealed the following hierarchy in regard to the pro-inflammatory potential of human macrophages infected with P. aeruginosa: untreated < treated with GM-CSF < treated with IFN-γ < treated with GM-CSF and IFN-γ
Altered Antioxidant-Oxidant Status in the Aqueous Humor and Peripheral Blood of Patients with Retinitis Pigmentosa
Retinitis Pigmentosa is a common form of hereditary retinal degeneration constituting the largest Mendelian genetic cause of blindness in the developed world. It has been widely suggested that oxidative stress possibly contributes to its pathogenesis. We measured the levels of total antioxidant capacity, free nitrotyrosine, thiobarbituric acid reactive substances (TBARS) formation, extracellular superoxide dismutase (SOD3) activity, protein, metabolites of the nitric oxide/cyclic GMP pathway, heme oxygenase-I and inducible nitric oxide synthase expression in aqueous humor or/and peripheral blood from fifty-six patients with retinitis pigmentosa and sixty subjects without systemic or ocular oxidative stress-related disease. Multivariate analysis of covariance revealed that retinitis pigmentosa alters ocular antioxidant defence machinery and the redox status in blood. Patients with retinitis pigmentosa present low total antioxidant capacity including reduced SOD3 activity and protein concentration in aqueous humor. Patients also show reduced SOD3 activity, increased TBARS formation and upregulation of the nitric oxide/cyclic GMP pathway in peripheral blood. Together these findings confirmed the hypothesis that patients with retinitis pigmentosa present reduced ocular antioxidant status. Moreover, these patients show changes in some oxidative-nitrosative markers in the peripheral blood. Further studies are needed to clarify the relationship between these peripheral markers and retinitis pigmentosa
Use of poly[ionic liquid] as a conductive binder in lithium ion batteries
In the present work, we studied the performance of different new binders based on poly[ionic liquids] (POILs) using a well-known negative electrode material such as Li4Ti5O12 (LTO) compound and ionic liquids (ILs) as solvents. We used an IL formed by Pip1,4Tf2N with N-butyl-N-methyl piperidinium (Pip1,4) as the cation and bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide (Tf2Nâ) as the anion. We tested two POILs as binders, composed of either LiTf2N, Pip1,4Tf2N, and PVDF or poly[diallyldimethylammonium]Tf2N (PDDA) as the polymer precursors (PVDF-IL and PDDA-IL, respectively). The best Li+ transport number as well as the smallest contact angle (electrolyte membrane) was obtained for the PDDA-IL polymer. The swelling effect better facilitates impregnation than the other polymers. The LTO/PDDA-IL combination showed the best specific capacity, 70 mAh gâ1, and a stable prolonged cycling. We identified the TiIV/TiIII redox reversible processes by cyclic voltammetry experiments and the differential capacity profiles. Additionally, we measured the Li+ diffusion coefficient to be approximately 10â12 cm2 sâ1. When different binders and IL-solvents are employed in a typical LTO cell, we demonstrated that the factors that determine cell performance are the ionic conductivity and the swelling effect.Fil: Chauque, Susana. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones CientĂficas y TĂ©cnicas. Centro CientĂfico TecnolĂłgico Conicet - CĂłrdoba. Instituto de Investigaciones en FĂsico-quĂmica de CĂłrdoba. Universidad Nacional de CĂłrdoba. Facultad de Ciencias QuĂmicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en FĂsico-quĂmica de CĂłrdoba; ArgentinaFil: Oliva, Fabiana Yolanda. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones CientĂficas y TĂ©cnicas. Centro CientĂfico TecnolĂłgico Conicet - CĂłrdoba. Instituto de Investigaciones en FĂsico-quĂmica de CĂłrdoba. Universidad Nacional de CĂłrdoba. Facultad de Ciencias QuĂmicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en FĂsico-quĂmica de CĂłrdoba; ArgentinaFil: Camara, Osvaldo Raul. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones CientĂficas y TĂ©cnicas. Centro CientĂfico TecnolĂłgico Conicet - CĂłrdoba. Instituto de Investigaciones en FĂsico-quĂmica de CĂłrdoba. Universidad Nacional de CĂłrdoba. Facultad de Ciencias QuĂmicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en FĂsico-quĂmica de CĂłrdoba; ArgentinaFil: Torresi, Roberto M.. Universidade de Sao Paulo; Brasi