Real Work with Real Consequences: Enlisting Community Energy Engineering as an Approach to Envisioning Engineering in Context

This study describes an illustrative case study from a year-round program that positions middle and high school youth to explore the social value of energy systems in their homes, schools, and neighborhoods. Designed to center existing youth assets, interests and values, Community Energy Engineering (CEE) frames engineering as a tool that students can enlist in order to understand and interrogate their local socio-energy system while also acting to transform it. CEE partners with Title 1 schools in Latino/a neighborhoods in the U.S. southwest. CEE situates youth community-based solar energy innovation projects as consequential, evolving in and with historically contingent engineering practices, and shaping and shaped by interactions across multiple contexts. We present our analysis of an asset-based approach to pre-college energy engineering education by following an exemplary project team across 15 months of programming. We used critical design ethnography to address the research question: How do community-centered energy engineering projects organize opportunities for productive disciplinary engagement and consequential learning? Findings are presented through the endogenous, first-person accounts of five youth as they participated in their project, and as they reflected on their participation during interviews. We consider connections to a wider array of cases reported using a sociocultural theoretical perspective on asset-based approaches to pre-college engineering education. We discuss these connections in relation to reciprocity as an asset-based approach to ingenuity and care, as well as two overarching design principles that emerged: (a) real work with real consequences and (b) everyone a learner, everyone a contributor

Desarrollo de simulador de negocios en la industria de sensores: estrategia y toma de decisiones

El presente informe tiene como tema central la toma de decisiones y el análisis de la competencia de la industria de sensores dentro del simulador Capsim. Se pretende desplegar detalladamente el proceso estratégico administrativo, el cual empieza con la definición del propósito fundamental de una compañía, el análisis de las fuerzas de la industria, la visión del negocio, la adopción de una estrategia, el diseño organizacional, la ejecución y el monitoreo del negocio

Sustainable vine shoots-to-ethanol valorisation by a sequential acid/organosolv pretreatment

In this study, a fractionation and valorisation scheme for vine shoots is proposed for biofuel and lignin production. This agricultural waste was fractionated by acid/organosolv sequential pretreatment. In the first step, acid pretreatment was optimised at 150ºC and 1.2% H2SO4 to release hemicellulosic sugars, of which 76% could be recovered. This sugar stream was co-fermented by E. coli with an ethanol yield higher than 98% after detoxification with resins or NH4OH. The solid obtained under optimal acid pretreatment conditions was delignified by organosolv treatment, and a delignification rate of 43% was reached at 180ºC. This substrate with 83% enzymatic digestibility was bio-converted into ethanol by simultaneous saccharification and fermentation, with a yield of 76%. Additionally, lignin was recovered from the organosolv liquor, aiming for the full valorisation of the biomass, which showed a syringyl/guaiacyl ratio of 0.92 by nuclear magnetic resonance, complying with the data provided for Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and confirming the aromaticity of this fraction for further valorisation.MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by “ERDF A way of making Europe” Grant PID2020-112594RB-C31, PID2020-112594RB-C33. Junta de Andalucía, predoctoral contract PREDOC_01931

Human Adipose Tissue-Derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells Abrogate Plasmablast Formation and Induce Regulatory B Cells Independently of T Helper Cells

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NKG2D expression in CD4+ T lymphocytes as a marker of senescence in the aged immune system

Human aging is characterized by changes in the immune system which have a profound impact on the T-cell compartment. These changes are more frequently found in CD8+ T cells, and there are not well-defined markers of differentiation in the CD4+ subset. Typical features of cell immunosenescence are characteristics of pathologies in which the aberrant expression of NKG2D in CD4+ T cells has been described. To evaluate a possible age-related expression of NKG2D in CD4+ T cells, we compared their percentage in peripheral blood from 100 elderly and 50 young adults. The median percentage of CD4+ NKG2D+ in elders was 5.3% (interquartile range (IR): 8.74%) versus 1.4% (IR: 1.7%) in young subjects (p < 0.3 × 10−10). CD28 expression distinguished two subsets of CD4+ NKG2D+ cells with distinct functional properties and differentiation status. CD28+ cells showed an immature phenotype associated with high frequencies of CD45RA and CD31. However, most of the NKG2D+ cells belonged to the CD28null compartment and shared their phenotypical properties. NKG2D+ cells represented a more advanced stage of maturation and exhibited greater response to CMV (5.3 ± 3.1% versus 3.4 ± 2%, p = 0.037), higher production of IFN-γ (40.56 ± 13.7% versus 24 ± 8.8%, p = 0.015), lower activation threshold and reduced TREC content. Moreover, the frequency of the CD4+ NKG2D+ subset was clearly related to the status of the T cells. Higher frequencies of the NKG2D+ subset were accompanied with a gradual decrease of NAIVE and central memory cells, but also with a higher level of more differentiated subsets of CD4+ T cells. In conclusion, CD4+ NKG2D+ represent a subset of highly differentiated T cells which characterizes the senescence of the immune system

UNITY : a low-field magnetic resonance neuroimaging initiative to characterize neurodevelopment in low and middle-income settings

DATA AVAILABILITY : Data collected as part of the UNITY network will be made available to researchers from the academic communities at varying levels of granularity depending on site-specific IRB approvals. For some sites, full access to individual raw and processed data will be provided, whilst for others, owing to national policies (e.g., those located in India) may only be able to provide de-identified composite values (e.g., regional volumes, mean relaxometry measures, etc.). The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is committed to open access and broad data availability as permitted.Measures of physical growth, such as weight and height have long been the predominant outcomes for monitoring child health and evaluating interventional outcomes in public health studies, including those that may impact neurodevelopment. While physical growth generally reflects overall health and nutritional status, it lacks sensitivity and specificity to brain growth and developing cognitive skills and abilities. Psychometric tools, e.g., the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development, may afford more direct assessment of cognitive development but they require language translation, cultural adaptation, and population norming. Further, they are not always reliable predictors of future outcomes when assessed within the first 12–18 months of a child’s life. Neuroimaging may provide more objective, sensitive, and predictive measures of neurodevelopment but tools such as magnetic resonance (MR) imaging are not readily available in many low and middle-income countries (LMICs). MRI systems that operate at lower magnetic fields (< 100mT) may offer increased accessibility, but their use for global health studies remains nascent. The UNITY project is envisaged as a global partnership to advance neuroimaging in global health studies. Here we describe the UNITY project, its goals, methods, operating procedures, and expected outcomes in characterizing neurodevelopment in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the NIHR Maudsley Biomedical Research Centre at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and King’s College London, and through a Wellcome Trust Investigator Award and a Wellcome Trust Strategic Award.https://www.elsevier.com/locate/dcnhj2024Biochemistry, Genetics and Microbiology (BGM)ImmunologyPaediatrics and Child HealthRadiologySDG-03:Good heatlh and well-beingSDG-17:Partnerships for the goal