The everyday states of austerity: Politics and livelihoods in Europe

This special issue addresses how working people in Southern Europe engage with austerity state formations. We argue that in order to look at people’s responses to austerity, one cannot avoid delving into the ways people engage with state formations and the co-production of state functions, material relations and ideological configurations. Whether imposed by supranation-al institutions or voluntarily endorsed by a national elite, austerity politics were concretely implemented and legitimated by state institutions, making the austerity–state nexus a “critical junction” of social reproduction (Kalb and Tak 2006).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

MODEL PCC: constructive participation and collaborative online

Este trabajo describe un modelo de didáctica online para del desarrollo de cursos, con el fin de obtener una participación activa y constructiva por parte de estudiantes universitarios. El modelo, denominado Participación Constructiva y Colaborativa (PCC), considera el aprendizaje como una co-construcción del conocimiento y tiene como objetivo acercar a los estudiantes para elaborar nuevas ideas mediante la realización de productos ya sea individuales o de grupo. A tal fin, se prevee una alternancia de actividades individuales y de grupo, siempre con el objetivo de hacer construir productos. De este modo se aprovecha el potencial de interacción colaborativa y contructiva de la red y de las diferentes posibilidades del trabajo online. El modelo ha sido elaborado en el ámbito diferentes cursos universitarios. Será presentado describiendo en primer lugar las teorías tomadas como inspiración, luego las actividades realizadas en linea y, por último, algunos análisis que demuestran su eficacia.This paper describes a model for developing online teaching courses in order to obtain an active and constructive participation by college students. The model, named Constructive and Collaborative Participation (CCP) considers learning as a co-construction of knowledge and intends to bring students closer to develop new ideas by performing products either individual or group work. For that purpose, it is envisaged to do alternative individual and group activities, always with the aim of making build products. In that way, the potential of collaborative and constructive interaction of network and the different possibilities of online work is used. The model has been created in different college courses. Firstly, it will be presented describing the theories taken as inspiration; then, the online activities and, finally, some analyzes that demonstrate its effectiveness

El modelo PCC: participación constructiva y colaborativa online

This paper describes a model for developing online teaching courses in order to obtain an active and constructive participation by college students. The model, named Constructive and Collaborative Participation (CCP) considers learning as a co-construction of knowledge and intends to bring students closer to develop new ideas by performing products either individual or group work. For that purpose, it is envisaged to do alternative individual and group activities, always with the aim of making build products. In that way, the potential of collaborative and constructive interaction of network and the different possibilities of online work is used. The model has been created in different college courses. Firstly, it will be presented describing the theories taken as inspiration; then, the online activities and, finally, some analyzes that demonstrate its effectiveness.Este trabajo describe un modelo de didáctica online para del desarrollo de cursos, con el fin de obtener una participación activa y constructiva por parte de estudiantes universitarios.  El modelo, denominado Participación Constructiva y Colaborativa (PCC), considera el aprendizaje como una co-construcción del conocimiento y tiene como objetivo acercar a los estudiantes para elaborar nuevas ideas mediante la realización de productos ya sea individuales o de grupo. A tal fin, se prevee una alternancia de actividades individuales y de grupo, siempre con el objetivo de hacer construir productos. De este modo se aprovecha el potencial de interacción colaborativa y contructiva de la red y de las diferentes posibilidades del trabajo online. El modelo ha sido elaborado en el ámbito diferentes cursos universitarios. Será presentado describiendo en primer lugar las teorías tomadas como inspiración, luego las actividades realizadas en linea y, por último, algunos análisis que demuestran su eficacia

Crisis económica, austeridad y estrategias cotidianas: proyectos de vida, modelos expertos y economía real

Las promesas de bienestar y de movilidad social se han vuelto cada vez más insostenibles para amplios segmentos sociales en Europa. Diversos economistas han producido análisis y sugerido fórmulas tecnocráticas para acabar con la llamada Eurocrisis, pero todas las medidas adoptadas han conducido a mayor precariedad, generando a su vez movilizaciones sociales de diverso signo: desde luchas por la extensión de los derechos sociales hasta reacciones nacionalistas y xenófobas. Los discursos de los “expertos” se basan en modelos diseñados para generar estabilidad monetaria y crecimiento a través de mayor competición en mercados abiertos. Son perspectivas “técnicas”, producidas desde arriba, que ignoran las dinámicas políticas, sociales y culturales que operan sobre el terreno. Una tendencia relativamente extendida en Europa, en paralelo a estos modelos, consiste en utilizar estereotipos culturales para asignar atributos negativos (o positivos) a ciudadanos o a países enteros (p.ej. los griegos son perezosos, los alemanes son trabajadores). Esto esencializa las relaciones sociales y político-económicas que generan desigualdad entre regiones y grupos sociales. Sin embargo, la perspectiva antropológica nos muestra cómo los agentes sociales están inscritos en múltiples regímenes de valor y marcos institucionales que guían su comportamiento económico: marcos históricamente producidos y localmente específico

Pluripotent Stem Cells for Gene Therapy of Degenerative Muscle Diseases

Human pluripotent stem cells represent a unique source for cell-based therapies and regenerative medicine. The intrinsic features of these cells such as their easy accessibility and their capacity to be expanded indefinitely overcome some limitations of conventional adult stem cells. Furthermore, the possibility to derive patient-specific induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells in combination with the current development of gene modification methods could be used for autologous cell therapies of some genetic diseases. In particular, muscular dystrophies are considered to be a good candidate due to the lack of efficacious therapeutic treatments for patients to date, and in view of the encouraging results arising from recent preclinical studies. Some hurdles, including possible genetic instability and their efficient differentiation into muscle progenitors through vector/transgene-free methods have still to be overcome or need further optimization. Additionally, engraftment and functional contribution to muscle regeneration in pre-clinical models need to be carefully assessed before clinical translation. This review offers a summary of the advanced methods recently developed to derive muscle progenitors from pluripotent stem cells, as well as gene therapy by gene addition and gene editing methods using ZFNs, TALENs or CRISPR/Cas9. We have also discussed the main issues that need to be addressed for successful clinical translation of genetically corrected patient-specific pluripotent stem cells in autologous transplantation trials for skeletal muscle disorders

Understanding I/We positions in a blended university course: Polyphony and chronotopes as dialogical features.

This paper uses Dialogical Self Theory to explore university students’ I/We positions before and after participating in a blended course with both individual and collaborative learning activities. Two focus group discussions were held; one at the beginning and the other one at the end (18 students in total; 3 M, 15F; average age 24 years old). The focus groups were analyzed through discursive analysis by referring to the Bakhtinian concepts of chronotope and polyphony, as dialogical features of positioning. Results show that at the end of the course the polyphony became richer, including also technology. This was initially “suppressed” and became later a voice supporting both We-position and collaborative learning. A shift from initial I-positions rooted in a broad chronotope (including past, present and future) toward We-positions placed in the specific and situated chronotope of the course occurred. This result poses the question of sustainability and transferability of innovation

Diel turbidity cycles in a headwater stream: evidence of nocturnal bioturbation?

Purpose: A small number of recent studies have linked daily cycles in stream turbidity to nocturnal bioturbation by aquatic fauna, principally crayfish, and demonstrated this process can significantly impact upon water quality under baseflow conditions. Adding to this limited body of research, we use high-resolution water quality monitoring data to investigate evidence of diel turbidity cycles in a lowland, headwater stream with a known signal crayfish (Pacifastacus leniusculus) population and explore a range of potential causal mechanisms. Materials and methods: Automatic bankside monitoring stations measured turbidity and other water quality parameters at 30-min resolution at three locations on the River Blackwater, Norfolk, UK during 2013. Specifically, we focused on two 20-day periods of baseflow conditions during January and April 2013 which displayed turbidity trends typical of winter and spring seasons, respectively. The turbidity time-series, which were smoothed with 6.5 hour Savitzky-Golay filters to highlight diel trends, were correlated against temperature, stage, dissolved oxygen and pH to assess the importance of abiotic influences on turbidity. Turbidity was also calibrated against suspended particulate matter (SPM) over a wide range of values via linear regression. Results and discussion: Pronounced diel turbidity cycles were found at two of the three sites under baseflow conditions during April. Spring night-time turbidity values consistently peaked between 21:00 and 04:00 with values increasing by ~10 nephelometric turbidity units (NTU) compared with the lowest recorded daytime values which occurred between 10:00 and 14:00. This translated into statistically significant increases in median midnight SPM concentration of up to 76% compared with midday, with night-time (18:00 – 05:30) SPM loads also up to 30% higher than that recorded during the daytime (06:00 – 17:30). Relating turbidity to other water quality parameters exhibiting diel cycles revealed there to be neither any correlation that might indicate a causal link, nor any obvious mechanistic connections to explain the temporal turbidity trends. Diel turbidity cycles were less prominent at all sites during the winter. Conclusions: Considering the seasonality and timing of elevated turbidity, visual observations of crayfish activity, and an absence of mechanistic connections with other water quality parameters, the results presented here are consistent with the hypothesis that nocturnal bioturbation is responsible for generating diel turbidity cycles under baseflow conditions in headwater streams. However, further research in a variety of fluvial environments is required to better assess the spatial extent, importance and causal mechanisms of this phenomenon

Suburban watershed nitrogen retention : estimating the effectiveness of stormwater management structures

Excess nitrogen (N) is a primary driver of freshwater and coastal eutrophication globally, and urban stormwater is a rapidly growing source of N pollution. Stormwater best management practices (BMPs) are used widely to remove excess N from runoff in urban and suburban areas, and are expected to perform under a wide variety of environmental conditions. Yet the capacity of BMPs to retain excess N varies; and both the variation and the drivers thereof are largely unknown, hindering the ability of water resource managers to meet water quality targets in a cost-effective way. Here, we use structured expert judgment (SEJ), a performance-weighted method of expert elicitation, to quantify the uncertainty in BMP performance under a range of site-specific environmental conditions and to estimate the extent to which key environmental factors influence variation in BMP performance. We hypothesized that rain event frequency and magnitude, BMP type and size, and physiographic province would significantly influence the experts’ estimates of N retention by BMPs common to suburban Piedmont and Coastal Plain watersheds of the Chesapeake Bay region. Expert knowledge indicated wide uncertainty in BMP performance, with N removal efficiencies ranging from 40%. Experts believed that the amount of rain was the primary identifiable source of variability in BMP efficiency, which is relevant given climate projections of more frequent heavy rain events in the mid-Atlantic. To assess the extent to which those projected changes might alter N export from suburban BMPs and watersheds, we combined downscaled estimates of rainfall with distributions of N loads for different-sized rain events derived from our elicitation. The model predicted higher and more variable N loads under a projected future climate regime, suggesting that current BMP regulations for reducing nutrients may be inadequate in the future

Speech perception in noise in children with dyslexia: Does speech sound disorder matter?

The aim of this observational cohort study with a control group is to compare consonant perception skills in quiet and in noise in children with typical language and learning development and in children with dyslexia, with and without Speech Sound Disorder (SSD). Three groups were included: A control group of twenty children with normal reading abilities and typical language development, twelve children with dyslexia and typical language development and thirteen children with dyslexia and SSD. All subjects received a consonant recognition test in three different listening conditions (quiet, + 10 and 0 Signal-to-Noise Ratio). In all test conditions, children with dyslexia and SSD had significantly lower consonant recognition scores than the control group and the children with dyslexia and typical language development (p <.0001). The poorer performances observed in children with dyslexia and SSD may be explained by impaired phonological processing underlying both conditions

Efficient derivation and inducible differentiation of expandable skeletal myogenic cells from human ES and patient-specific iPS cells.

Skeletal muscle is the most abundant human tissue; therefore, an unlimited availability of myogenic cells has applications in regenerative medicine and drug development. Here we detail a protocol to derive myogenic cells from human embryonic stem (ES) and induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, and we also provide evidence for its extension to human iPS cells cultured without feeder cells. The procedure, which does not require the generation of embryoid bodies or prospective cell isolation, entails four stages with different culture densities, media and surface coating. Pluripotent stem cells are disaggregated to single cells and then differentiated into expandable cells resembling human mesoangioblasts. Subsequently, transient Myod1 induction efficiently drives myogenic differentiation into multinucleated myotubes. Cells derived from patients with muscular dystrophy and differentiated using this protocol have been genetically corrected, and they were proven to have therapeutic potential in dystrophic mice. Thus, this platform has been demonstrated to be amenable to gene and cell therapy, and it could be extended to muscle tissue engineering and disease modeling