Simulation of the behavior of bidders in first-price sealed-bid auctions on communication networks

Auction mechanisms have arisen as very efficient methods for scarce resource allocations. For this reason there is a current research topic based on the application of these economics mechanisms to the design of communication networks, mainly in the provision of QoS to new multimedia services. The main research works are oriented to the assignment and pricing rules, that is, the network resource assigned to the user (the bandwidth on a link, or the route of a traffic demand) and the amount of money it is going to cost to him respectively. However, as far as we know, there is a little research focused in the analysis of the behaviour of the user. Note that an auction is in fact a competition where the user will behave selfishly in order to obtain the greater profit. In this paper we present the first results of a simulator which analyzes the behaviour of the user in an auction over a communication link. They obtain the revenue of the auctioneer that is the network provider, and the resource allocation under different schemes of user behaviour, from a very conservative character up to most risky behaviours

Influence of lipophilicity in O-acyl and O-alkyl derivatives of juglone and lawsone: a structure–activity relationship study in the search for natural herbicide models

Naphthoquinones are known for their broad range of biological activities. Given the increasing demands of consumers in relation to food quality and growing concerns about the impact of synthetic herbicides, it is necessary to search for newagrochemicals. Natural products and allelopathy provide newalternatives for the development of pesticides with lower toxicity and greater environmental compatibility. A structure–activity relationship to evaluate the effect of bioavailability was performed. A total of 44 O-acyl and O-alkyl derivatives of juglone and lawsone with different linear chain lengths were prepared. These compounds were tested on etiolated wheat coleoptiles, standard target species (STS) and four weeds, Echinochloa crus-galli L., Lolium rigidum Gaud., Lolium perenne L. and Avena fatua L. The results showed a strong influence of lipophilicity and, in most cases, the data fitted a logP-dependent quadratic mathematical model. The effects producedwere mostly stunting and necrosis caused by growth inhibition. The potential structure and activity behaviour is described

A genetic algorithm for solving the first price sealed bid auction in communication networks

This paper shows the first result obtained in the application of economic mechanisms for the efficient assignment of resources in communication networks. The final objective is to determine which Service Provider will carry their traffic over the network of a Network Provider, which will be the most profitable route and which price the ISPs will pay for it to the Network provider. As the price is a key driver a good approach to select the ISP may be an auction mechanism. The implementation of these kind of auction mechanisms becomes a NP complete problem which is solved in this paper using novel metaheuristics, specifically a genetic algorithm

Urinary Microbiome: Yin and Yang of the Urinary Tract

This study was supported by "Programa Estatal de Investigacio ' n, Desarrollo e Innovacion Orientada a los Retos de la Sociedad" (grant SAF-SAF2015-71714-RMINECO/FEDER) and by " Instituto de Salud Carlos III" under the frame of EuroNanoMed III (AC18/00008). VP-C was supported by "Programa de Promocion de Empleo Joven e Implantacion de la Garantia Juvenil en I+D+i", MIMECO, Spain, and AS-L was supported by a fellowship from the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport (FPU 17/05413).We would like to thank all members of the lab for helpful comments and discussion.The application of next generation sequencing techniques has allowed the characterization of the urinary tract microbiome and has led to the rejection of the pre-established concept of sterility in the urinary bladder. Not only have microbial communities in the urinary tract been implicated in the maintenance of health but alterations in their composition have also been associated with different urinary pathologies, such as urinary tract infections (UTI). Therefore, the study of the urinary microbiome in healthy individuals, as well as its involvement in disease through the proliferation of opportunistic pathogens, could open a potential field of study, leading to new insights into prevention, diagnosis and treatment strategies for urinary pathologies. In this review we present an overview of the current state of knowledge about the urinary microbiome in health and disease, as well as its involvement in the development of new therapeutic strategies.Programa Estatal de Investigacio' n, Desarrollo e Innovacion Orientada a los Retos de la Sociedad SAF-SAF2015-71714-RMINECO/FEDERInstituto de Salud Carlos III European Commission AC18/00008"Programa de Promocion de Empleo Joven e Implantacion de la Garantia Juvenil en I+D+i", MIMECO, SpainMinistry of Education, Culture and Sport FPU 17/0541

Quadruplex Ligands in Cancer Therapy

Nucleic acids can adopt alternative secondary conformations including four-stranded structures known as quadruplexes. To date, quadruplexes have been demonstrated to exist both in human chromatin DNA and RNA. In particular, quadruplexes are found in guanine-rich sequences constituting G-quadruplexes, and in cytosine-rich sequences forming i-Motifs as a counterpart. Quadruplexes are associated with key biological processes ranging from transcription and translation of several oncogenes and tumor suppressors to telomeres maintenance and genome instability. In this context, quadruplexes have prompted investigations on their possible role in cancer biology and the evaluation of small-molecule ligands as potential therapeutic agents. This review aims to provide an updated close-up view of the literature on quadruplex ligands in cancer therapy, by grouping together ligands for DNA and RNA G-quadruplexes and DNA i-Motifs

Resistance modulatory and efflux-inhibitory activities of capsaicinoids and capsinoids

Capsaicinoids are reported to have a bunch of promising pharmacological activities, among them antibacterial effects against various strains of bacteria. In this study the effect on efflux pumps of mycobacteria was investigated. The importance of efflux pumps, and the inhibition of these, is rising due to their involvement in antibiotic resistance development. In order to draw structure and activity relationships we tested natural and synthetical capsaicinoids as well as synthetical capsinoids. In an accumulation assay these compounds were evaluated for their ability to accumulate ethidium bromide into mycobacterial cells, a well-known substrate for efflux pumps. Capsaicin and dihydrocapsaicin, the two most abundant capsaicinoids in Capsicum species, proved to be superior efflux pump inhibitors compared to the standard verapamil. A dilution series showed dose dependency of both compounds. The compound class of less pungent capsinoids qualified for further investigation as antibacterials against Mycobacterium smegmatis

In Silico Evaluation of Sesquiterpenes and Benzoxazinoids Phytotoxins against M-pro, RNA Replicase and Spike Protein of SARS-CoV-2 by Molecular Dynamics. Inspired by Nature

In the work described here, a number of sesquiterpenes and benzoxazinoids from natural sources, along with their easily accessible derivatives, were evaluated against the main protease, RNA replicase and spike glycoprotein of SARS-CoV-2 by molecular docking. These natural products and their derivatives have previously shown remarkable antiviral activities. The most relevant compounds were the 4-fluoro derivatives of santamarine, reynosin and 2-amino-3H-phenoxazin-3-one in terms of the docking score. Those compounds fulfill the Lipinski's rule, so they were selected for the analysis by molecular dynamics, and the kinetic stabilities of the complexes were assessed. The addition of the 4-fluorobenzoate fragment to the natural products enhances their potential against all of the proteins tested, and the complex stability after 50 ns validates the inhibition calculated. The derivatives prepared from reynosin and 2-amino-3H-phenoxazin-3-one are able to generate more hydrogen bonds with the M-pro, thus enhancing the stability of the protein-ligand and generating a long-term complex for inhibition. The 4-fluoro derivate of santamarine and reynosin shows to be really active against the spike protein, with the RMSD site fluctuation lower than 1.5 angstrom. Stabilization is mainly achieved by the hydrogen-bond interactions, and the stabilization is improved by the 4-fluorobenzoate fragment being added. Those compounds tested in silico reach as candidates from natural sources to fight this virus, and the results concluded that the addition of the 4-fluorobenzoate fragment to the natural products enhances their inhibition potential against the main protease, RNA replicase and spike protein of SARS-CoV-2

Identification of keystone taxa in root canals and periapical lesions of post-treatment endodontic infections: Next generation microbiome research

Aim: The aim of this study was to analyse and compare the microbiome present in root canals and periapical lesions of teeth with post-treatment infections, and to identify the presence of keystone taxa in both habitats using next-generation sequencing analysis. Methodology: Apices and periapical lesions of patients with post-treatment apical periodontitis were surgically extracted. Specimens were cryo-pulverized, bacterial DNA was extracted, and the V3–V4 hypervariable regions of the 16S rRNA gene were sequenced using the Illumina Miseq platform. Bioinformatic analysis was carried out with Mothur software, whilst diversity indices were obtained using operational taxonomic units (OTUs). The diversity indices were compared with the Kruskal–Wallis test, and community composition differences were explored with Permutational Multivariate Analysis of Variance (PERMANOVA). A bacterial functional study was performed with the Phylogenetic Investigation of Communities by Reconstruction of Unobserved States (PICRUSt) analysis. Co-occurrence network analyses were performed using the Sparse Correlations for Compositional data (SparCC). Eigencentrality, clr-based abundance and ubiquitousness were applied to infer keystone taxa. P values <.05 were considered statistically significant. Results: Thirty-two apices and thirty-nine periapical lesions were sequenced and analysed. A similar alpha-diversity (p < .05) and community composition (p = .91) was observed for apices and lesion samples. The most abundant OTUs identified amongst all samples included Fusobacterium nucleatum, Prevotella loescheii, Streptococcus intermedius, Porphyromonas gingivalis, Parvimonas micra, Synergistetes bacterium, Tannerella forsythia and Peptostreptococcus stomatis. The metabolic pathways with >0.81% abundances included membrane transport, genetic information processing and metabolic pathways. F. nucleatum was identified as a keystone taxon as it showed ubiquitousness, an eigenvector centrality value of 0.83 and a clr-based abundance >4. Conclusions: The microbiome in apices and periapical lesions of post-treatment endodontic infections showed a similar diversity and taxonomic composition. Co-occurrence network analyses at OTU level identified F. nucleatum as a keystone taxon candidate in these infections.FEDER/Junta de Andalucía-Consejería de Economía y Conocimiento (Project ref: A1-CTS-174-UGR18)Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain co-financed with European Regional Development Funds (Project ref: PID2020-120481RB-I00) and University of Almería (Project Ref: PPUENTE2021-006)Fellowship from the Ministry of Universities, Spain (FPU20/03952)Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Granada / CBU

Incremento de la capacidad del canal óptico submarino mediante técnicas MISO en presencia de dispersión y turbulencia oceánica

En este trabajo se presenta un sistema con múltiples transmisores y un único receptor (MISO) con el objetivo de analizar las prestaciones en términos de capacidad ergódica de un canal óptico submarino bajo efecto de desvanecimiento de la potencia óptica recibida inducido por la dispersión del medio y turbulencias oceánicas bajo diferentes tipos de agua, distancias y severidad de turbulencias. Con este fin, se obtienen nuevas expresiones matemáticas en forma cerrada que permiten obtener la capacidad ergódica del sistema. Además, se aportan expresiones asintóticas que facilitan el análisis de las prestaciones en función de los diferentes parámetros físicos del sistema. Los resultados obtenidos confirman la mejora de prestaciones del sistema mediante el uso de un mayor número de transmisores en los diferentes escenarios estudiados. Todos los resultados presentados son validados a través de simulaciones Monte Carlo.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech