Mexican Technoscientific Arts, 2000-2015: Art and Science, Machine Inventions, and Political Ecologies

In the last decades, several artists have engaged directly with emerging digital technologies and science, the so-called new media arts. For the past fifteen or twenty years, such practices have experienced a paradigmatic transformation in Mexico, particularly in the capital. They have shifted from peripheral to mainstream, from contingent to ubiquitous, and from underground/experimental to official and governmentally funded. This thesis explores the development of technoscientific arts in Mexico, its evolution, main artists, and institutions. It focuses on specific technoscientific artistic projects developed in Mexico between 2000 and 2015 by artists like Tania Candiani, Gilberto Esparza, Iván Puig, and Ale de la Puente, whose approaches to science, artistic research, monumental machines, and interactive technologies have shaped a distinct artistic character in Mexico that moves beyond the mere illustration of technoscientific subjects into innovative practices through the thoughtful adoption of quasi-scientific methodology, the creation of invention-like machine artworks, and the assumption of critical political positions. Through the engagement with specific scientific disciplines, the development of invention-like artworks that produce autonomous machines, and the assumption of critical political postures via the aesthetic possibilities afforded by new technologies, the projects and artwork discussed in this study display features that frame a specific type of technoscientific art production in a country whose research in science and technology is largely underfunded and whose relationship to industrialization, globalization, and modernity in general, has generated substantial social and economic inequality, false promises of progress, and failed infrastructural projects

CONTESTED KNOWLEDGES: A RHETORICAL ANALYSIS OF \u27ECLIPSES FOR AUSTIN\u27 BY PABLO VARGAS LUGO AT THE INTERSECTION OF ART AND SCIENCE

The debate on whether art has any cognitive value might be traced to the texts of early philosophers and theorists who have approached the matter. In general, art has been constrained to contemplation and aesthetic experience while its contribution to knowledge is often disregarded. Science, on the other hand, constitutes the main system of organized knowledge production and enunciation. Contemporary artistic practices that address scientific knowledge tend to reformulate the latter in order to either produce new experiences with it or expand its cognitive capabilities. The works produced by these practices serve as artifacts that expose science\u27s biases, axiomatic tenets, priorities, and limitations, as well as contest and complete the realms of experience in which science fails to provide an account. As discursive artifacts, these artworks may be analyzed from a rhetorical framework and methodology in order to unveil their role in rearticulating science and producing responses to the specific situation in which they come into being. Through a rhetorical analysis of \u27Eclipses for Austin\u27 (2009) by Mexican artist Pablo Vargas Lugo, this thesis aims to identify and describe the way contemporary artistic practices operate to expand on knowledge produced from scientific inquiry and enunciation. The analysis, grounded in Lloyd Bitzer\u27s idea of the rhetorical situation, has shown that these works address a rhetorical exigence (generated by the differences and similarities between art and science), are limited and enabled by constraints from both realms of experience, and produce a fitting response helps to expand the knowledge and understanding formulated by science

Infection rates and distribution of Trypanosoma cruzi in triatomine insects from several public parks of Starr, Hidalgo and Cameron Counties

Chagas disease is caused by the protozoan Trypanosoma cruzi and is a major public health concern in many areas of the world, including the United States. The disease is transmitted by insect vectors known as kissing bugs from the subfamily Triatominae. While the majority of studies focus on domestic and peri-domestic collections, this study collected insect vectors from state parks in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. PCR analysis was done to obtain infection rates for collected insects, and a morphological examination was done to check insects for gender. In total 18 insects were captured with 12 of the captured insects being female, and 6 being male. A total infection rate of 67% was seen. Our results reason that the prevention of insect vectors at both the sylvatic level and domestic level may be more effective in stopping the spread of Chagas disease than prevention at the domestic level alone

Casual Elegance: The Everyday Manipulation of Design Elements for Physical, Social, and Spiritual Benefits

Designer Statement: Casual Elegance As a Southern Scholar, my Senior Project deals with a subject that is not widely talked about: the elegance of everyday. I believe that there are some design elements which can be manipulated on a daily basis to achieve Casual Elegance, and thus gain physical, social, and spiritual benefits. As a designer graduating with a B.A. in Art, I want to point out specific designs that could be used to achieve the level of elegance and sophistication to which I am referring. As an art major I had a show at the School of Visual Art and Design Gallery, located on the second floor of Brock Hall. In this show I tried to demonstrate some of the works of art that express my personal concept of casual elegance. These works of art include fashion garments designed and made, a display of graphical designs, illustrations, portraits, drawings, design-process panels, and a slide show of design elements in architecture. The purpose of these works of art was to convey my philosophy as an designer. My concept of an elegant design was strengthened by my internship in New York City, working under clothing designer Rachel Roy. I believe in living elegandy everyday as part of one\u27s identity. It is my purpose to convey that casual elegance, or being sophisticated, can be a continuous way of life. To me, casual elegance is striving to achieve an elegant lifestyle that includes the fulfillment of events that could help improve one\u27s life physically, socially and spiritually. Even when we-as humans-are not perfect, we can choose the designs for our lives to accomplish the stated purposes. I want to show that casual elegance is living a purposefully design-driven lifestyle; it is an attitude lived out every day. Such design elements can come from inspiration sources that comprise of color choices, fabrics, textures, weights, cuts and embellishments. I will try to describe such elements as they are shown. -Carlos Solan

The effects of the kappa agonist U-50,488 on morphine-induced place preference conditioning and Fos immunoreactivity in the preweanling and periadolescent rat

The effects of the kappa opioid agonist U-50,488 on morphine-induced condtioned place preference (CPP), locomotor activity and Fos immunoreactivity and assessed in 10-, 17- and 35-day old rats. It was predicted that kappa agonist treatment would block the unconditioned and conditioned behaviors produced by morhine (a mu opioid receptor agonist)

Efficient phagocytosis of Klebsiella pneumoniae strains that poorly bind to human polymorphonuclear leukocytes

The phagocytosis process of unencapsulated MIAT-negative strains that, although binding very poorly to human polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) at 4°C, are efficiently killed by these cells at 37°C, was studied. At 37°C the number of bacteria bound to the PMN external surface was similar to that observed at 4°C (about 100 bacteria/100 PMN after 60 min); on the contrary the number of internalized bacteria was much higher (from 500 bacteria/100 PMN after 60 min). Interactions between phagocytosis-sensitive Klebsiella pneumoniae strains (PSK) and PMN were then compared with those of two isogenic Escherichia coli strains with and without type 1 fimbriae. Whereas PSK strain binding to blocked PMN was very slow and became significant only after 5–6 h, that of phagocytosis-sensitive fimbriated E. coli was rapid and efficient. Phagocytosis-resistant, non fimbriated E. coli strain bound with an efficiency that, within the first 60 min, was not very different from that of the PSK strains. However, longer incubations led to increases in PSK binding, whereas unfimbriated E. coli remained constant. PSK and fimbriated E. coli strains were efficiently internalized and killed, whereas the unfimbriated E. coli strain was not. It is suggested that PMN can phagocytize unopsonized bacteria through two different mechanisms. By one mechanism, observed with the fimbriated E. coli strain, PMN bind many more bacteria than those they can internalize. By the other, observed with PSK strains, PMN bind only the bacteria they can immediately internalize