La señora y la criada y El acaso y el error, de Calderón de la Barca: dos comedias palatinas. [RESEÑA]

Romero Blázquez, Covadonga, ed. La señora y la criada y El acaso y el error, de Calderón de la Barca: dos comedias palatinas. Newark, Delaware: Juan de la Cuesta Hispanic Monographs, 2015. 472 pp. (ISBN: 978-1-58871-263-9

Mechanism of action of 4-phenoxyphenoxyethyl thiocyanate (WC-9) against Trypanosoma cruzi, the causative agent of Chagas' disease

We investigated the molecular basis of the activity of 4-phenoxyphenoxyethyl thiocyanate (WC-9) against Trypanosoma cruzi, the etiological agent of Chagas' disease. We found that growth inhibition of T. cruzi epimastigotes induced by this compound was associated with a reduction in the content of the parasite's endogenous sterols due to a specific blockade of their de novo synthesis at the level of squalene synthase.Fil:Rodriguez, J.B. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina

The inositol pyrophosphate synthesis pathway in Trypanosoma brucei is linked to polyphosphate synthesis in acidocalcisomes

Inositol pyrophosphates are novel signaling molecules possessing high-energy pyrophosphate bonds and involved in a number of biological functions. Here, we report the correct identification and characterization of the kinases involved in the inositol pyrophosphate biosynthetic pathway in Trypanosoma brucei: inositol polyphosphate multikinase (TbIPMK), inositol pentakisphosphate 2-kinase (TbIP5K) and inositol hexakisphosphate kinase (TbIP6K). TbIP5K and TbIP6K were not identifiable by sequence alone and their activities were validated by enzymatic assays with the recombinant proteins or by their complementation of yeast mutants. We also analyzed T. brucei extracts for the presence of inositol phosphates using polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and high-performance liquid chromatography. Interestingly, we could detect inositol phosphate (IP), inositol 4,5-bisphosphate (IP2), inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate (IP3), and inositol hexakisphosphate (IP6) in T. brucei different stages. Bloodstream forms unable to produce inositol pyrophosphates, due to downregulation of TbIPMK expression by conditional knockout, have reduced levels of polyphosphate and altered acidocalcisomes. Our study links the inositol pyrophosphate pathway to the synthesis of polyphosphate in acidocalcisomes, and may lead to better understanding of these organisms and provide new targets for drug discovery

Evaluation of Java for General Purpose GPU Computing

This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version. The final authenticated version is available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/WAINA.2013.234[Abstract] The presence of many-core units as accelerators has been increasing due to their ability to improve the performance of highly parallel workloads. General Purpose GPU(GPGPU) computing has allowed the graphical units to emerge as successful co-processors that can be employed to improve the performance of many different non-graphical applications with high parallel requirements, which make them suitable for many High Performance Computing workloads. While the main libraries developed to exploit the massive parallel capacity of GPUs are oriented to C/C++ programmers, there have been several efforts to extend this support to other languages. Among them, Java stands out for being one of the most extended languages and there are multiple projects that try to enable Java to take advantage of GPGPU computing. In this scenario, this paper presents an evaluation of the most relevant among the current solutions that exploit GPGPU computing in Java.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación; TIN2010-16735Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia: FPU AP2010-4348Xunta de Galicia; CN2012/21