Development of an electronic driver for piezoelectric actuation in cellular studies

The behavior of cells has usually been studied regarding biochemical reactions. Nevertheless, new approaches for cellular studies have observed that cells are able to perceive and withstand forces, which can have a huge impact on cellular processes. In the present investigation, it has been developed an electronic driver for piezoelectric actuation in cellular studies, contributing to the emerging discipline of cellular mechanotransduction. Inside the project, the developing of the driver is focused on the generation of the initial signal and its later amplification. There is a great emphasis on the amplification stage, for which a PCB is designed and fabricated. The frequency range of the device will be very important in order to have different mechanical displacements on the piezoelectric material. The last step consists of the stimulation of 28 µm PVDF films. Results showed the functionality of the driver is possible, as the stimulation of the piezoelectric material does occur. Further studies are needed for the development of the PCB and a design that fixes the whole device into one piece of equipment. This research has been conducted with the Department of Electronics Technology at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, but it was closely run as well with the Department of Biomedical Engineering.Ingeniería Biomédic

Sulfonatocalixarene Counterion Exchange Binding Model in Action: Metal-Ion Catalysis Through Host-Guest Complexation

This work was supported by the Associated Laboratory for Sustainable Chemistry-Clean Processes and Technologies-LAQV (FCT/MCTES fund UID/QUI/50006/2019) and the Portuguese Fundação para a Ciencia e Tecnologia (grant CEECIND/00466/2017 to N.B.). Financial support from Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad of Spain (project CTQ2017-84354-P), Xunta de Galicia (GR 2007/085; IN607 C 2016/03 and Centro singular de investigacion de Galicia accreditation 2016-2019, ED431G/09) and the European Union (European Regional Development Fund-ERDF), is gratefully acknowledged.p-Sulfonatocalixarene water soluble macrocyclic host receptors are known to form cooperative ternary complexes with complementary organic guest and metal cations. This property may be explored to enhance the interaction of weak nitrogen ligands with metal cations in a confined space showing some resemblance to metal-containing enzymes. However, the best of our knowledge, catalytic potential of this property remains unexplored. In this work the Ni2+ catalyzed hydrolysis of a picolinate ester (2,4-dinitrophenyl picolinate, 1) was used as a model reaction to evaluate the effect of sulfonatocalixarene macrocycles in the kinetics of this reaction. The results show that the host molecules promote the reaction through simultaneous complexation of the metal cation and the substrate and, in the case of the larger calixarenes containing more basic phenol groups, substantially higher rate enhancements are observed owing to additional assistance provided by base/nucleophilic catalysis. However, due the ionic nature of these receptors auto-inhibition of the reaction is observed at higher concentrations due counterion (Na+) binding that competes with the catalytically active Ni2+ -complexes.publishersversionpublishe

Characterization of reverse micelles formulated with the ionic-liquid-like surfactant Bmim-AOT and comparison with the traditional Na-AOT: Dynamic light scattering, 1H NMR spectroscopy, and hydrolysis reaction of carbonate as a probe

The present study investigated how the presence of butylmethylimidazolium cation (bmim+) alters the interfacial properties of reverse micelles (RMs) created with the ionic liquid-like surfactant 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium 1,4-bis-2-ethylhexylsulfosuccinate (bmim-AOT), in comparison to sodium 1,4-bis-2-ethylhexylsulfosuccinate (Na-AOT) RMs, employing dynamic light scattering (DLS) and 1H NMR techniques. Moreover, through the hydrolysis reaction of bis(4-nitrophenyl)carbonate inside both RMs as reaction probe, interfacial properties changes were explored in more detail. The kinetic solvent isotope effect was also analyzed. Micellar systems were formed using n-heptane as external nonpolar solvent and water as the polar component. According to the DLS studies, water is encapsulated inside the organized media; however, a different tendency is observed depending on the cationic component of the surfactant. For Na-AOT system, the results suggest that the micellar shapes are probably spherical, while in the case of bmim-AOT, a transition from ellipsoidal to spherical micelles could be occurring when water is added. 1H NMR data show that water is structured differently when Na+ cation is replaced by bmim+ in bmim-AOT RMs, the interaction of water with the surfactant is weaker and the water hydrogen-bonding network is less disturbed than in Na-AOT RMs. Kinetic studies reveal that the hydrolysis reaction in bmim-AOT RMs was much more favorable in comparison to Na-AOT RMs. In addition, when water content decreases in bmim-AOT RMs, the hydrolysis reaction rate increases and the solvent isotope effect remains constant, while for Na-AOT solutions, both the reaction rate and the solvent isotope effect decrease. Our results indicate that bmim+ cation would be located in the surfactant layer in such a way the negative charge density in the interface is less than that in Na-AOT RMs, and the reaction is more favorable. Additionally, as 1H NMR studies reveal, the interfacial water molecules would be more available in bmim-AOT RMs to participate in the nucleophilic attack. Therefore, the present study evidences how the replacement of Na+ counterion by bmim+ alters the composition of the interface of AOT RMs.Fil: Dib, Nahir. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Instituto para el Desarrollo Agroindustrial y de la Salud. - Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto para el Desarrollo Agroindustrial y de la Salud; ArgentinaFil: Falcone, Ruben Dario. Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto. Instituto para el Desarrollo Agroindustrial y de la Salud. - Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto para el Desarrollo Agroindustrial y de la Salud; ArgentinaFil: Acuña, Angel. Universidad de Santiago de Compostela; EspañaFil: García-Río, Luis. Universidad de Santiago de Compostela; Españ

Extending Amdahl's Law for the Cloud Computing Era

By extending Amdahl's law, software developers can weigh the pros and cons of moving their applications to the cloud.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad TEC2012-37868-C04-02/0

Development of a predictive model of hospitalization in primary care patients with heart failure

BACKGROUND: Heart failure (HF) is the leading cause of hospitalization in people over age 65. Predictive hospital admission models have been developed to help reduce the number of these patients. AIM: To develop and internally validate a model to predict hospital admission in one-year for any non-programmed cause in heart failure patients receiving primary care treatment. DESIGN AND SETTING: Cohort study, prospective. Patients treated in family medicine clinics. METHODS: Logistic regression analysis was used to estimate the association between the predictors and the outcome, i.e. unplanned hospitalization over a 12-month period. The predictive model was built in several steps. The initial examination included a set of 31 predictors. Bootstrapping was used for internal validation. RESULTS: The study included 251 patients, 64 (25.5%) of whom were admitted to hospital for some unplanned cause over the 12 months following their date of inclusion in the study. Four predictive variables of hospitalization were identified: NYHA class III-IV, OR (95% CI) 2.46 (1.23-4.91); diabetes OR (95% CI) 1.94 (1.05-3.58); COPD OR (95% CI) 3.17 (1.45-6.94); MLHFQ Emotional OR (95% CI) 1.07 (1.02-1.12). AUC 0.723; R2N 0.17; Hosmer-Lemeshow 0.815. Internal validation AUC 0.706.; R2N 0.134. CONCLUSION: This is a simple model to predict hospitalization over a 12-month period based on four variables: NYHA functional class, diabetes, COPD and the emotional dimension of the MLHFQ scale. It has an acceptable discriminative capacity enabling the identification of patients at risk of hospitalization.This study was financed by the Health Research Fund (FIS), grant no. PI 14/01677 and co-financed with ERDF funds from the European Union: REDISSEC - Project ISCIII (Red de Investigación en Enfermedades Crónicas del Servicio de Salud - Instituto de Salud Carlos III) concession no. RD16/0001/0004. The Foundation for Biosanitary Research and Innovation in Primary Health Care (FIIBAP) financed the costs of publishing the article. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.S

Development of a predictive model of hospitalization in primary care patients with heart failure

Background Heart failure (HF) is the leading cause of hospitalization in people over age 65. Predictive hospital admission models have been developed to help reduce the number of these patients. Aim To develop and internally validate a model to predict hospital admission in one-year for any non-programmed cause in heart failure patients receiving primary care treatment. Design and setting Cohort study, prospective. Patients treated in family medicine clinics. Methods Logistic regression analysis was used to estimate the association between the predictors and the outcome, i.e. unplanned hospitalization over a 12-month period. The predictive model was built in several steps. The initial examination included a set of 31 predictors. Bootstrapping was used for internal validation. Results The study included 251 patients, 64 (25.5%) of whom were admitted to hospital for some unplanned cause over the 12 months following their date of inclusion in the study. Four predictive variables of hospitalization were identified: NYHA class III-IV, OR (95% CI) 2.46 (1.23–4.91); diabetes OR (95% CI) 1.94 (1.05–3.58); COPD OR (95% CI) 3.17 (1.45–6.94); MLHFQ Emotional OR (95% CI) 1.07 (1.02–1.12). AUC 0.723; R2N 0.17; Hosmer-Lemeshow 0.815. Internal validation AUC 0.706.; R2N 0.134 Conclusion This is a simple model to predict hospitalization over a 12-month period based on four variables: NYHA functional class, diabetes, COPD and the emotional dimension of the MLHFQ scale. It has an acceptable discriminative capacity enabling the identification of patients at risk of hospitalization.This study was financed by the Health Research Fund (FIS), grant no. PI 14/01677 and co-financed with ERDF funds from the European Union: REDISSEC - Project ISCIII (Red de Investigación en Enfermedades Crónicas del Servicio de Salud - Instituto de Salud Carlos III) concession no. RD16/0001/0004. The Foundation for Biosanitary Research and Innovation in Primary Health Care (FIIBAP) financed the costs of publishing the articl

Motivaciones, barreras y nivel de actividad física en la adolescencia en el entorno de Utebo

Este estudio nace de la importancia que tiene la realización de actividad física (AF) entre los adolescentes, debido a que hay una disminución de esta y un aumento del sedentarismo. Es necesario promocionar la AF entre ellos para frenar los factores de riesgo en la salud, obesidad y que puedan ser más perjudiciales en un futuro. Para ello se realizó una evaluación diagnóstica, evaluando la cantidad de AF, las barreras para la práctica de AF y las motivaciones de los adolescentes en la localidad de Utebo. Se utilizó un diseño transversal con metodología descriptiva y correlacional, junto con un análisis de diferencias en función del género y de la práctica deportiva. Los resultados mostraron que más de la mitad de los adolescentes realizan menor cantidad de AF que la recomendada por distintas instituciones oficiales, siendo en las chicas significativamente inferior que en los chicos. Se observó que la barrera más percibida fue obligaciones/falta de tiempo y existe una relación positiva entre las motivaciones intrínsecas y la realización de actividad física. Una de las principales conclusiones del estudio indica que la realización de AF por los adolescentes de Utebo es insuficiente, teniendo mayor problema en el género femenino. Los niveles de AF se relacionan con las motivaciones y las barreras y ellos a su vez con la edad, el género y la realización actualmente de actividad física. Para mejorar estos factores sería necesario realizar intervenciones desde el ayuntamiento de Utebo.<br /

Deciphering the degree of proton-transfer in pyrido-cyclophanes by chiroptical outcomes in non-aqueous solvents

Proton transfer equilibria are of pivotal importance due to the role they play in a plethora of biological and phamaceutical processes. With the aim of explaining the relative position of the hydrogen to be transferred, we investigated the behavior of chiral pyrido-cyclophanes with different morphologies using circular dichroism in the presence of different acids in acetonitrile. The results showed that all three compounds underwent double protonation and formation of cascade ion-pairs, leading to the appearance of diagnostic signals in their ECD spectra. The presence of water fosters the crystallization of several intermediates that do not correspond to those in solution. By using Brønsted correlations, it was found that proton transfer from the acid to the pyridine occurred regardless of the acid's p K a .Agencia Estatal de Investigación | Ref. PID2021-128057NB-I00Xunta de Galicia | Ref. EC431C 2021/4

On the impact of packet sampling on Skype traffic classification

Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works. P. M. Santiago del Río, D. Corral, J. L. García-Dorado, and J. Aracil, "On the Impact of Packet Sampling on Skype Traffic Classification", in IFIP/IEEE International Symposium on Integrated Network Management (IM 2013), 2013, p. 800 - 803Nowadays, traffic classification technology addresses the exciting challenge of dealing with ever-increasing network speeds, which implies more computational load especially when on-line classification is required, but avoiding to reduce classification accuracy. However, while the research community has proposed mechanisms to reduce load, such as packet sampling, the impact of these mechanisms on traffic classification has been only marginally studied. This paper addresses such study focusing on Skype application given its tremendous popularity and continuous expansion. Skype, unfortunately, is based on a proprietary design, and typically uses encryption mechanisms, making the study of statistical traffic characteristics and the use of Machine Learning techniques the only possible solution. Consequently, we have studied Skypeness, an open-source system that allows detecting Skype at multi-10Gb/s rates applying such statistical principles. We have assessed its performance applying different packet sampling rates and policies concluding that classification accuracy is significantly degraded when packet sampling is applied. Nevertheless, we propose a simple modification in Skypeness that lessens such degradation. This consists in scaling the measured packet interarrivals used to classify according to the sampling rate, which has resulted in a significant gain