RanBP2-Mediated SUMOylation Promotes Human DNA Polymerase Lambda Nuclear Localization and DNA Repair

Cellular DNA is under constant attack by a wide variety of agents, both endogenous and exogenous. To counteract DNA damage, human cells have a large collection of DNA repair factors. Among them, DNA polymerase lambda (Polλ) stands out for its versatility, as it participates in different DNA repair and damage tolerance pathways in which gap-filling DNA synthesis is required. In this work we show that human Polλ is conjugated with Small Ubiquitin-like MOdifier (SUMO) proteins both in vitro and in vivo, with Lys27 being the main target of this covalent modification. Polλ SUMOylation takes place in the nuclear pore complex and is mediated by the E3 ligase RanBP2. This post-translational modification promotes Polλ entry into the nucleus, which is required for its recruitment to DNA lesions and stimulated by DNA damage induction. Our work represents an advance in the knowledge of molecular pathways that regulate cellular localization of human Polλ, which are essential to be able to perform its functions during repair of nuclear DNA, and that might constitute an important point for the modulation of its activity in human cells

Biodiversity and distribution of macroinfauna assemblages on sandy beaches along the Gulf of Cadiz (SW Spain)

In the current study, the macroinfauna communities inhabiting 12 sandy beaches along the Spanish coast of the Gulf of Cadiz were describe in order to characterize their unexplored biodiversity, their zonation patterns and their environmental features. A total of 66 macroinfauna taxa were recorded on 12 sandy beaches, ranging from 4 to 33 species. Density reached 848 individual per m2. The individual zonation pattern ranged from two to three zones, regardless of the morphodynamic state. A common zonation pattern of the whole set of beaches was established, comprising three across-shore biological zones. Generally, the supralittoral zone was typified by the air-breathing amphipod Talitrus saltator and coleopterans; the middle zone was dominated by true intertidal species, such as Haustoriidae amphipods (Haustorius arenarius), Cirolanidae isopods (Eurydice affinis), Spionidae polychaetes (Scolelepis spp.) and nemerteans; and the lower or sublittoral zone was typified by Pontoporeiidae amphipods, mysids and spionid polychaetes. Sediment moisture, average grain size, organic matter content and elevation were the main predictor variables of zonation patterns. We used the conservation and recreation potential indices to show how this information can be useful for coastal management. Most beaches studied show a score above 5 on the conservation index, so the beaches have a reasonable potential for conservation management.En el presente estudio, se describen las comunidades de macroinfauna de doce playas arenosas de la costa española del Golfo de Cádiz con el objetivo de caracterizar su biodiversidad, sus patrones de zonación, y sus características ambientales. Un total de 66 taxones de macroinfauna fueron registrados en las playas de estudio, oscilando entre 4 y 33 especies, mientras que la densidad total fue de 848 individuos por m2. El patrón de zonación individual varió de dos a tres zonas, independientemente del estado morfodinámico de la playa. Se estableció un patrón de zonación común de todo el conjunto de playas, formado por tres zonas biológicas. En general, la zona supralitoral fue tipificada por el anfípodo Talitrus saltator y diversas familias de coleópteros. La zona media fue dominada por verdaderas especies intermareales, como anfípodos de la famila Haustoriidae (Haustorius arenarius), isópodos cirolánidos (Eurydice affinis), poliquetos (Scolelepis spp.) y nemertinos. La zona sublitoral se caracterizó por anfípodos de la familia Pontoporeiidae, misidáceos y poliquetos espiónidos. La humedad del sedimento, el tamaño medio de grano, el contenido en materia orgánica y la elevación fueron las principales variables influyentes en los patrones de zonación. Por último, toda esta información fue integrada para la aplicación de los índices de Conservación y Recreación, para mostrar cómo esta información puede ser útil para la gestión costera. La mayoría de las playas mostraron una puntuación superior a 5 en el Índice de Conservación, indicando un razonable potencial para la conservación.Gobierno de Andalucía P09- HUM-4717Ministerio de Educación AP-2009-390

Cognitive Fusion Mediates the Relationship between Dispositional Mindfulness and Negative Affects: A Study in a Sample of Spanish Children and Adolescent School Students

Nowadays, mindfulness-based interventions (MBI) have experienced a remarkable development of studies among childhood and adolescent interventions. For this reason, dispositional mindfulness (DM) measures for children and adolescents have been developed to determine the e ectiveness of MBI at this age stage. However, little is known about how key elements of DM (for example, cognitive de/fusion or experiential avoidance that both confirm psychological inflexibility) are involved in the mechanisms of the children and adolescents’ mental health outcomes. This research examined the mediating e ect of cognitive fusion between DM and anxiety and other negative emotional states in a sample of 318 Spanish primary-school students (aged between 8 and 16 years, M = 11.24, SD = 2.19, 50.8% males). Participants completed the AFQ-Y (Avoidance and Fusion Questionnaire for youth), which is a measure of psychological inflexibility that encompasses cognitive defusion and experiential avoidance; CAMM (DM for children and adolescents), PANAS-N (positive and negative a ect measure for children, Spanish version of PANASC), and STAIC (an anxiety measure for children). The study accomplished ethical standards. As MBI relevant literature has suggested, cognitive defusion was a significant mediator betweenDMand symptoms of both negative emotions and anxiety in children and adolescents. However, experiential avoidance did not show any significant mediating relationship. Probably, an improvement of the assessment of experiential avoidance is needed. MBI programs for children and adolescents may include more activities for reducing e ects of the cognitive defusion on their emotional distress

Fast feature selection aimed at high-dimensional data via hybrid-sequential-ranked searches

We address the feature subset selection problem for classification tasks. We examine the performance of two hybrid strategies that directly search on a ranked list of features and compare them with two widely used algorithms, the fast correlation based filter (FCBF) and sequential forward selection (SFS). The pro-posed hybrid approaches provide the possibility of efficiently applying any subset evaluator, with a wrap-per model included, to large and high-dimensional domains. The experiments performed show that our two strategies are competitive and can select a small subset of features without degrading the classifica-tion error or the advantages of the strategies under study

NDT-Glossary: A MDE Approach for Glossary Generation

This research paper is contextualized within the paradigm of Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) and it is specifically related to NDT. NDT is a methodology included within the MDE paradigm. The aim of this paper is to present a software tool to facilitate the work of requirements engineers during the requirements validation in a software project. The requirements validation activity takes place within the requirements phase of the life cycle in a software project. The developed tool is called NDT-Glossary and it implements an automatic procedure to generate, from the requirements defined in a project developed with the NDT methodology, the first example of the glossary of terms for this project.Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia TIN2007-67843-C06-03Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia TIN2010-20057-C03-0

Relaciones Suelo-Planta en Bosques de Abies pinsapo Boiss. Disponibilidad de Nutrientes y Estatus Nutricional

Relaciones Suelo-Planta en Bosques de Abies pinsapo Boiss. Disponibilidad de Nutrientes y Estatus Nutricional. Se han evaluado las relaciones entre las propiedades del suelo y el estado nutricional de los árboles en pinsapares del Paraje Natural Los Reales de Sierra Bermeja y del Parque Natural Sierra de las Nieves (Málaga-España). Se seleccionaron pinsapares que difieren en cuanto a su estado sucesional (masas agradativas versus maduras) y sustrato litológico (serpentinas versus calizas), en los que se evaluaron variables morfoedáficas de perfiles de suelo, y se analizaron las concentraciones de nutrientes en muestras de suelo, hojarasca y acículas. Los suelos de pinsapares calcáreos en fase agradativa (Yunquera) mostraron las menores concentraciones de macro y micronutrientes totales. Esto se correspondía con contenidos también mínimos de N y P en tejidos foliares, indicando la existencia de un estrés nutricional general, como es habitual en masas forestales en fase de exclusión de tallos (máxima competencia intraespecífica). No obstante, la presencia de relaciones N/P foliares normales implica que dicho estrés nutricional no ha desencadenado desbalances internos entre dichos nutrientes en los árboles. En pinsapares calcícolas maduros (Ronda), la mayor acumulación de materia orgánica en la hojarasca y el suelo superficial se relaciona con un aumento de la disponibilidad de nutrientes en el suelo, y una reducción en el estrés nutricional de los árboles. El pinsapar serpentinícola de Los Reales de Sierra Bermeja mostró niveles anormalmente elevados de N, y de las relaciones N/P, tanto en el suelo como en los tejidos foliares. Estos síntomas son característicos de ecosistemas forestales en una fase temprana del denominado síndrome de saturación de nitrógeno, asociado a disfunciones en el ciclo del N

Criação e aplicação de um modelo baseado em Topic Maps à documentação educativa

As políticas da União Europeia para a sociedade da informação estão a promover um modelo educativo baseado na aquisição de competências e na aprendizagem ao longo da vida. A eficácia da aprendizagem neste modelo educativo assenta numa educação digital, na qual os recursos digitais estruturam, organizam e representam o seu conteúdo de acordo com as suas potencialidades educativas. Descrevem-se os passos prosseguidos na aplicação da norma ISO/IEC 13250:2000 Topic Maps como escolha para a organização e representação do conhecimento de uso educativo, adaptando a recuperação deste tipo de informação a um modelo de aprendizagem centrado no educando, tal como as actuais políticas europeias promovem. Numa primeira parte apresenta-se a análise realizada sobre as várias metodologias para a representação do conhecimento: thesaurus, mapas conceptuais e ontologias. Discutem-se as características que levaram à selecção dos Topic Maps como a metodologia a ser utilizada neste projecto. Numa segunda parte, apresenta-se a norma ISO/IEC 13250:2000 Topic Maps e discute-se de que forma nos irá auxiliar a criar um ambiente de aprendizagem centrado no educando e utilizando os recursos educativos (objectos de ensino, artigos, monografias, teses, etc) disponíveis na Web. Por fim, numa terceira parte, apresenta-se uma arquitectura funcional capaz de suportar a metodologia seleccionada e o cenário de aplicação: especificação de mapas conceptuais orientados a programas educativos dinâmicos e que reagem às interacções dos educandos; agregação de conteúdos disponíveis na Web com o objectivo de criar um repositório de objectos de ensino (utilização do protocolo OAI-PMH); definição de estratégias para a população do mapa conceptual com os conteúdos recolhidos da Internet; exploração do repositório a partir do mapa conceptual. Em conclusão, iremos demonstrar que já é possível criar um ambiente com estas características utilizando vários componentes e tecnologias existentes mas, também, que é necessário fazer algum trabalho de integração e normalização.Policies of the European Information Society are to promote an educational model based on the acquisition of skills and lifelong learning. The effectiveness of learning in this educational model is based on a digital education, in which digital resources structure, organize and represent its content according to their educational potential. We describe the steps pursued in the implementation of ISO / IEC 13250:2000 Topic Maps as the selected methodology adopted for the organization and representation of knowledge of educational use, adapting the retrieval of such information to a student-centered learning model, as the current European policies promote. The first part presents the analysis on the various methodologies for the representation of knowledge: thesaurus, concept maps and ontologies. In the following we discuss the characteristics that led to the selection of Topic Maps as the methodology to be used in this project. The second part presents the ISO / IEC 13250:2000 Topic Maps, and discusses how it will help to create an environment focused on student learning through the use of educational resources (learning objects, articles, monographs, theses, etc.) available on the Web. Finally, a third part presents a functional architecture capable of supporting the selected methodology and the application scenario: specification of concept maps, oriented educational programs and dynamic interactions that respond to the students; content aggregation available on the Web in order to create a repository of learning objects (using OAI-PMH), strategies for the population of the conceptual map with the contents collected from the Internet, holding the repository from the conceptual map. In conclusion, we demonstrate that it is possible to create an environment with these features using several existing technologies and components, but also that some work for integration and standardization is needed