Evolution of Microbiota in a Pharmacy Classroom Pre and Post the First Wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Microbiota varies over time, therefore during 2019-20 academic year, coinciding with the SARS-COV-2 pandemic, the evolution of it was evaluated in a classroom of the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University of Salamanca with mass spectrometry Matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight. In addition, this study was compared with others, as well as with guidelines of the European Community Commission on indoor air quality./nAfter the study, it was concluded that said classroom had very low contamination degree and that most of microbiota was saprophytic. Furthermore, it can be concluded that quantitatively fungi and quantitatively and qualitatively the bacteria did not present a health risk./nOn the other hand, the most important variables that were found were the influx of people, the frequency of cleaning and ventilation. Finally, this study shows off the lack of regulation that exists on air quality in non-industrial and non-hospital interiors.La microbiota varía con el tiempo, por ello durante el curso académico 2019-20, coincidiendo con la pandemia SARS-COV-2, se evaluó la evolución de la misma en un aula de la Facultad de Farmacia de la Universidad de Salamanca con la espectrometría de masas Matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization time-of-flight. Además, se comparó con otros estudios, así como con las directrices de la Comisión de la Comunidad Europea de calidad del aire de interiores./nTras el estudio se concluyó que dicha aula presentaba un grado de contaminación muy bajo, y que la mayoría de la microbiota era saprofítica. Asimismo, de forma general se puede concluir que de forma cuantitativa los hongos y de forma cuali-cuantitativa las bacterias no presentaban un riesgo para la salud./nPor otro lado, entre las variables más importantes encontramos la afluencia de personas, la frecuencia de limpieza y la ventilación. Finalmente, este estudio recoge la poca normativa que existe sobre la calidad del aire en interiores no industriales y no hospitalarios

Endothelial Activin Receptor-Like Kinase 1 (ALK1) Regulates Myofibroblast Emergence and Peritubular Capillary Stability in the Early Stages of Kidney Fibrosis

This work was supported by grants from Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación: PI18/00996 and RETICS RD016/0009/0025 (REDINREN), co-funded by FEDER funds, and from Consejeria de Educación, Junta de Castilla y León: IES160P20 and Universidad de Salamanca (Programas Propios de la Agencia de Gestión de la Investigación).[EN]Renal tubulo-interstitial fibrosis is characterized by the excessive accumulation of extracellular matrix (ECM) in the tubular interstitium during chronic kidney disease. The main source of ECM proteins are emerging and proliferating myofibroblasts. The sources of myofibroblasts in the renal tubular interstitium have been studied during decades, in which the epithelial contribution of the myofibroblast population through the epithelial-to-mesenchymal (EMT) process was assumed to be the major mechanism. However, it is now accepted that the EMT contribution is very limited and other mechanisms such as the proliferation of local resident fibroblasts or the transdifferentiation of endothelial cells seem to be more relevant. Activin receptor-like kinase 1 (ALK1) is a type I receptor which belongs to the transforming growth factor beta (TGF-β) superfamily, with a key role in tissue fibrosis and production of ECM by myofibroblast. Predominantly expressed in endothelial cells, ALK1 also plays an important role in angiogenesis and vessel maturation, but the relation of these processes with kidney fibrosis is not fully understood. We show that after 3 days of unilateral ureteral obstruction (UUO), ALK1 heterozygous mice (Alk1 +/- ) display lower levels of kidney fibrosis associated to a lower number of myofibroblasts. Moreover, Alk1 +/- mice have a lower degree of vascular rarefaction, showing improved peritubular microvasculature after UUO. All these data suggest an important role of ALK1 in regulating vascular rarefaction and emergence of myofibroblasts

Food and nutrition myths among future secondary school teachers: A problem of trust in inadequate sources of information

The Internet and social networks are full of nutrition information, offering people guidance to make healthy eating choices. These sources always present themselves as a gateway to reliable information on healthy eating; however, too often this is not the case. Far from being trustworthy, there are usually plenty of food myths. A food myth is a widespread false belief about food, nutrition, and eating facts that gives rise to certain behaviors, from fashionable trends to diets. Academic training is a valuable tool to combat food myths and the pseudoscience linked to them, but educators must participate in this battle. To test this idea, we analyzed the prevalence of nine highly popular food myths held by 201 secondary school Spanish teachers. The aim was to assess whether expertise in science areas prevents teachers from falling into these food misconceptions. Our study results showed that food myths are held regardless of specialty area. The power of the media in popularizing and spreading nutrition myths among educators may be the cause, even more potent than academic training. We conclude that since scientific knowledge is not enough to erase food myths, we need further actions if we aim to prevent the problems that food myths may cause

MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometry Is a Fast and Reliable Platform for Identification and Ecological Studies of Species from Family Rhizobiaceae

Family Rhizobiaceae includes fast growing bacteria currently arranged into three genera, Rhizobium, Ensifer and Shinella, that contain pathogenic, symbiotic and saprophytic species. The identification of these species is not possible on the basis of physiological or biochemical traits and should be based on sequencing of several genes. Therefore alternative methods are necessary for rapid and reliable identification of members from family Rhizobiaceae. In this work we evaluated the suitability of Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption Ionization-Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) for this purpose. Firstly, we evaluated the capability of this methodology to differentiate among species of family Rhizobiaceae including those closely related and then we extended the database of MALDI Biotyper 2.0 including the type strains of 56 species from genera Rhizobium, Ensifer and Shinella. Secondly, we evaluated the identification potential of this methodology by using several strains isolated from different sources previously identified on the basis of their rrs, recA and atpD gene sequences. The 100% of these strains were correctly identified showing that MALDI-TOF MS is an excellent tool for identification of fast growing rhizobia applicable to large populations of isolates in ecological and taxonomic studies

Pretreatment of urine samples with SDS improves direct identification of urinary tract pathogens with matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight mass spectrometry

[EN]We pretreated with SDS 71 urine samples with bacterial counts of >10(5) CFU/ml and matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization-time of flight (MALDI-TOF) identification scores of <2, in order to minimize failure rates. Identification improved in 46.5% of samples, remained unchanged in 49.3%, and worsened in 4.2%. The improvement was more evident for Gram-negative (54.3%) than for Gram-positive (32%) bacteria

Evolution and implementation of CDIO initiatives at ETSII-UPM

The School of Industrial Engineering at Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (ETSII-UPM) has been promoting student-centred teaching-learning activities, according to the aims of the Bologna Declaration, well before the official establishment of the European Area of Higher Education. Such student-centred teaching-learning experiences led us to the conviction that project based learning is rewarding, both for students and academics, and should be additionally promoted in our new engineering programmes, adapted to the Grade-Master structure. The level of commitment of our teachers with these activities is noteworthy, as the teaching innovation experiences carried out in the last ten years have led to the foundation of 17 Teaching Innovation Groups at ETSII-UPM, hence leading the ranking of teaching innovation among all UPM centres. Among interesting CDIO activities our students have taken part in especially complex projects, including the Formula Student, linked to the complete development of a competition car, and the Cybertech competition, aimed at the design, construction and operation of robots for different purposes. Additional project-based learning teamwork activities have been linked to toy design, to the development of medical devices, to the implementation of virtual laboratories, to the design of complete industrial installations and factories, among other activities detailed in present study. The implementation of Bologna process will culminate at ETSII-UPM with the beginning of the Master’s Degree in Industrial Engineering, in academic year 2014-15. The program has been successfully approved by the Spanish Agency for Accreditation (ANECA), with the inclusion of a set of subjects based upon the CDIO methodology denominated generally “INGENIA”, linked to the Spanish “ingeniar” (to provide ingenious solutions), also related etymologically in Spanish with “ingeniero”, engineer. INGENIA students will live through the complete development process of a complex product or system and there will be different kind of projects covering most of the engineering majors at ETSII-UPM

Evaluación de un programa de intervención formativa del profesorado de habilidades clínicas y quirúgicas basado en la modelación mediante video y un sistema de participación activa (activeclassroom)

Memoria ID12-0244. Ayudas de la Universidad de Salamanca para la innovación docente, curso 2012-2013

Fabricación aditiva de piezas anatómicas con fines docentes para diferentes titulaciones de ciencias de la salud

Memoria ID-109. Ayudas de la Universidad de Salamanca para la innovación docente, curso 2018-2019

Elaboración de materiales didácticos para la enseñanza/aprendizaje del proceso de identificación mediante MALDI-TOF MS y secuenciación de ácidos nucleicos de hongos filamentosos aislados a partir de queso

Memoria ID-157. Ayudas de la Universidad de Salamanca para la innovación docente, curso 2019-2020

Desarrollo de material audiovisual de innovación tecnológica para la mejora de la formación virtual en ciencias de la salud

Memoria ID-0041. Ayudas de la Universidad de Salamanca para la innovación docente, curso 2014-2015