Guide of best practices for cooperation between academia and industry based on success cases

Recommendations of good practices included in each chapter are briefly explain and record in cards showing examples of specific known cases where particular recommendation has been put in practice and also visual information about expected impact of the recommendation on the enhancement of University & Industry Cooperation, difficulty, costs, as well as personnel needs for its implementation and, estimated time for executing each practice. Agents necessary for its implementation are also indicated, in order provide easy access to companies, research groups and other innovation stakeholders a potential tailored action plan of implementation for designing a path of collaboration between the Industry and the scientific world

Geographical differences in wooping cough in Catalonia, Spain, from 1990 to 2010

BACKGROUND: Whooping cough is a communicable disease whose incidence has increased in recent years in some countries with vaccination. Since 1981, in Catalonia (Spain), cases must be reported to the Public Health Department. In 1997, surveillance changed from aggregated counts to individual report and the surveillance system was improved after 2002. Catalan public health is universal with equal coverage geographically. The aim of this study was to determine whether there are differences in whooping cough incidence in rural and urban counties. METHODS: Cases in 1990-2010 were classified as rural or urban. Incidences and risk ratios (RR) between urban and rural counties and 95% CI were calculated. Associations between rural and urban counties and structural changes during the study period were analysed. RESULTS: Twelve years of the whole study period showed differences in incidence between rural and urban counties. The incidence was higher in urban counties in seven years and rural counties in five years. There was a positive association of whooping cough incidence in rural and urban counties in four-week periods. Structural changes were detected in the following four-week periods: 4th in 1993, 7th in 1996 and 3rd 2005 in rural counties and 5th 1993, 9th in 1996 and 8th in 2007 in urban counties. CONCLUSIONS: Differences in whooping cough between rural and urban counties were found. In most years, the incidence was higher in urban than in rural counties. Rural and urban counties show similar cyclic behaviour when four-week periods were considered

Plan de Negocios: Producción y comercialización de pan a base de harina de soya.

El pan a base de harina de soya,producto que se destacará de los demás por su alto contenido nutricional tales como aminoácidos, proteínas, y nutrientes como calcio, hierro, y zinc. La empresa"SOYANICPAN" tendrá su centro de ventas, pero también el producto se comercializará por medio de la distribución propia de la panadería, la cual trazará rutas de comercio específicas; y vendedores independientes

Creencias populares sobre la menstruación y el trabajo

La menstruación sigue siendo vivida aún hoy por muchas mujeres como trauma, ya que todavía existen creencias populares en torno a la misma que pueden llegar a actuar como modificadores de la conducta. Quizás porque los mitos han dotado a la mujer menstruante con toda clase de poderes sobrenaturales, desde curativos hasta destructivos. El hecho de que durante ese periodo se les privase de acceso a ciertas actividades tuvo múltiples efectos, tanto estigmatizantes como terapéuticos, condicionados por la vivencia negativa que obliga a las mujeres a esconder la existencia del flujo menstruante porque se consideraba que era sucio, impuro o tóxico. En esta investigación se ha planteado conocer las creencias populares de las mujeres relacionadas con la menstruación y con el trabajo. El enfoque ha sido el conocimiento de estas creencias y de sus prácticas desde el punto de vista de las propias mujeres. Al ser, por esta razón, un estudio subjetivista la metodología elegida ha sido la cualitativa, con el objetivo de descubrir cuáles son sus creencias, practicas, recursos fortalezas y estrategias

Twitter as a tool for communication and disinformation. An information transparency and political corruption in Spain analysis

El discurso político encuentra en las redes sociales un medio idóneo para la difusión de sus mensajes; en especial Twitter, la red social más usada en política. Viene observándose preocupación, en parte de los votantes, por la cantidad de desinformación y fakes que reciben a través de las redes, por lo que se requiere mayor transparencia en la gestión pública. El objetivo de este estudio es descubrir el tratamiento político de la corrupción en Twitter, identificando las marcas del lenguaje falso de los candidatos y verificando la opinión de los expertos sobre la necesidad de incrementar la transparencia pública. La metodología usada parte del análisis de contenido cuantitativo, cualitativo y discursivo de enfoque comparado, focalizado en las cuentas personales de los cinco candidatos a las elecciones generales de España en 2019. Ello es completado con un panel de expertos profesionales y académicos del sector de la comunicación política. Los resultados apuntan a un uso de un discurso falaz por parte de los políticos y que, debido a ello, se hace más necesaria que nunca una política de transparencia absoluta.Political discourse finds the social networks an ideal medium for disseminating its messages, especially Twitter, the most widely used social network in politics. Voters are becoming concerned about the amount of disinformation and fakes they receive through the networks, and are demanding greater transparency in public management. The aim of this study is to discover the political treatment of corruption on Twitter, identifying the brands of false language of the candidates and verifying the opinion of experts on the need to increase public transparency. The methodology used is based on quantitative, qualitative and discursive content analysis with a comparative approach, focusing on the personal accounts of the five candidates for the Spanish General Elections in 2019. This is completed with an expert panel of professionals and academics from the political communication sector. The results point to the use of a fallacious discourse by politicians and that, as a result, a policy of absolute transparency is more necessary than ever

Revalorization of Passiflora species peels as a sustainable source of antioxidant phenolic compounds

Food industry generates a big amount of residues. Nowadays, there is interest in adding value to these residues with the aim of increasing the sustainability of the food chain and to reduce the environmental impact of this waste whose revalorization could also originate an economical benefit. Passion fruits are cultivated for juice and pulp production generating high amounts of vegetable residues. The scarce information about passion fruit peels confers a high interest to the study of their phenolic profiles. In this work, an efficient extraction method based on pressurized hotwater extractionwas employed to obtain antioxidants from four Passiflora species peels (P. ligularis, P. edulis, P. edulis flavicarpa and P. mollissima). Antioxidant properties of the extracts were tested by in vitro assays and intracellular reactive oxygen species scavenging. P. mollissima and P. edulis peel extracts presented higher antioxidant capacity and phenolic content than P. ligularis and P. edulis flavicarpa. Tentative structural elucidation of 57 phenolics was achieved by high-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole-time of flight mass spectrometry. Flavones, chalcones and phenolic acids were the polyphenol classes that may contribute to antioxidant capacity of the Passiflora peel

The impact of immigration and vaccination in reducing the incidence of hepatitis B in Catalonia (Spain)

Background: The Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major cause of liver disease and liver cancer worldwide according to the World Health Organization. Following acute HBV infection, 1-5% of infected healthy adults and up to 90% of infected infants become chronic carriers and have an increased risk of cirrhosis and primary hepatocellular carcinoma. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the reduction in acute hepatitis B incidence and the universal vaccination programme in preadolescents in Catalonia (Spain), taking population changes into account, and to construct a model to forecast the future incidence of cases that permits the best preventive strategy to be adopted. Methods: Reported acute hepatitis B incidence in Catalonia according to age, gender, vaccination coverage, percentage of immigrants and the year of report of cases was analysed. A statistical analysis was made using three models: generalized linear models (GLM) with Poisson or negative binomial distribution and a generalized additive model (GAM). Results: The higher the vaccination coverage, the lower the reported incidence of hepatitis B (p 70%, the reduction in incidence was 2-fold higher than in groups with a coverage <70% (p <0.01). The increase in incidence was significantly-higher in groups with a high percentage of immigrants and more than 15% (p <0.01) in immigrant males of working age (19-49 years). Conclusions: The results of the adjusted models in this study confirm that the global incidence of hepatitis B has declined in Catalonia after the introduction of the universal preadolescent vaccination programme, but the incidence increased in male immigrants of working age. Given the potential severity of hepatitis B for the health of individuals and for the community, universal vaccination programmes should continue and programmes in risk groups, especially immigrants, should be strengthened

Discriminación de ingresos por género en un estado del norte de México: el caso Chihuahua

El objetivo del presente artículo es estimar las diferencias en el ingreso para hombres y mujeres en un estado de la frontera norte de México, el cual presenta especial relevancia económica a nivel nacional. El análisis consiste en la cuantificación de la proporción de las diferencias de ingreso por razón de género, debidas a factores no explicados y, por tanto, atribuibles a discriminación. Con datos del Censo de Población y Vivienda del año 2010, y a través de distintas especificaciones econométricas, se utiliza la metodología de Oaxaca-Blinder para determinar que, de la brecha de ingresos entre hombres y mujeres en el estado de Chihuahua, entre el 55 y 88 por ciento no es atribuible a las diferencias en capital humano, edad, estado civil, raza, religión, puesto de trabajo u horas trabajadas, siendo, por tanto, esta brecha atribuible a discriminación por género

Phenformin as an Anticancer Agent: Challenges and Prospects

Currently, there is increasing evidence linking diabetes mellitus (especially type 2 diabetes mellitus) with carcinogenesis through various biological processes, such as fat-induced chronic inflammation, hyperglycemia, hyperinsulinemia, and angiogenesis. Chemotherapeutic agents are used in the treatment of cancer, but in most cases, patients develop resistance. Phenformin, an oral biguanide drug used to treat type 2 diabetes mellitus, was removed from the market due to a high risk of fatal lactic acidosis. However, it has been shown that phenformin is, with other biguanides, an authentic tumor disruptor, not only by the production of hypoglycemia due to caloric restriction through AMP-activated protein kinase with energy detection (AMPK) but also as a blocker of the mTOR regulatory complex. Moreover, the addition of phenformin eliminates resistance to antiangiogenic tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI), which prevent the uncontrolled metabolism of glucose in tumor cells. In this review, we evidence the great potential of phenformin as an anticancer agent. We thoroughly review its mechanism of action and clinical trial assays, specially focusing on current challenges and future perspectives of this promising drug.This research was supported by the Fundación Mutua Madrileña (project FMM-AP16683-2017), Consejería de Salud Junta de Andalucía (PI-0089-2017), the MNat Scientitc Unit of Excellence (UCE.PP2017.0f) and the Chair “Doctors Galera-Requena in cancer stem cell research”