Machine learning techniques to discover genes with potential prognosis role in Alzheimer’s disease using different biological sources

Alzheimer’s disease is a complex progressive neurodegenerative brain disorder, being its prevalence ex pected to rise over the next decades. Unconventional strategies for elucidating the genetic mechanisms are necessary due to its polygenic nature. In this work, the input information sources are five: a public DNA microarray that measures expression levels of control and patient samples, repositories of known genes associated to Alzheimer’s disease, additional data, Gene Ontology and finally, a literature review or expert knowledge to validate the results. As methodology to identify genes highly related to this disease, we present the integration of three machine learning techniques: particularly, we have used decision trees, quantitative association rules and hierarchical cluster to analyze Alzheimer’s disease gene expres sion profiles to identify genes highly linked to this neurodegenerative disease, through changes in their expression levels between control and patient samples. We propose an ensemble of decision trees and quantitative association rules to find the most suitable configurations of the multi-objective evolutionary algorithm GarNet, in order to overcome the complex parametrization intrinsic to this type of algorithms. To fulfill this goal, GarNet has been executed using multiple configuration settings and the well-known C4.5 has been used to find the minimum accuracy to be satisfied. Then, GarNet is rerun to identify de pendencies between genes and their expression levels, so we are able to distinguish between healthy individuals and Alzheimer’s patients using the configurations that overcome the minimum threshold of accuracy defined by C4.5 algorithm. Finally, a hierarchical cluster analysis has been used to validate the obtained gene-Alzheimer’s Disease associations provided by GarNet. The results have shown that the ob tained rules were able to successfully characterize the underlying information, grouping relevant genes for Alzheimer Disease. The genes reported by our approach provided two well defined groups that per fectly divided the samples between healthy and Alzheimer’s Disease patients. To prove the relevance of the obtained results, a statistical test and gene expression fold-change were used. Furthermore, this rel evance has been summarized in a volcano plot, showing two clearly separated and significant groups of genes that are up or down-regulated in Alzheimer’s Disease patients. A biological knowledge integration phase was performed based on the information fusion of systematic literature review, enrichment Gene Ontology terms for the described genes found in the hippocampus of patients. Finally, a validation phase with additional data and a permutation test is carried out, being the results consistent with previous studies.Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología TIN2011-28956-C02-02Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología TIN2014-55894-C2-1-RJunta de Andalucía P11-TIC-752

Evaluating the impact of existing legislation in Europe with regard to Female Genital Mutilation

The Spanish Report on the evaluation of existing legislation with regard to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is the result of a research project supported by the European Commision Daphne Programme. The project Evaluating the impact of existing legislation in Europe with regard to female genital mutilation, has been coordinated by the International Centre for Reproductive Health of Ghent University (Belgium) from january 2003 to march 2004. The project included as partners the Foundation for Women’s Health, Research and Development (FORWARD, United Kingdom); Lund University (Sweden); Commission pour l'Abolition des Mutilations Sexuelles, (CAMS, France), the Centre of Studies on Citizenship, Migration and Minorities of the University of Valencia (GECIM, Spain), and the above mentioned ICRH (Ghent University, Belgium) . The Spanish report is an interdisciplinary research done by the Centre of Studies on Citizenship, Migration and Minorities (University of València), directed by professor Javier De Lucas, and which counts with researchers and collaborators both, from the University of Valencia and other Universities such as University of Barcelona and University Rovira i Virgili of Tarragona; in the fields of Law (Penal Law, Constitutional Law, Theory and Philosophy of Law), Sociology and Antropology. The Group of researchers includes as well lawyers and public prosecutors. Practice of Female Genital Mutilation in Spain, like other european countries, address this rite that is introduced by immigrants from countries where the practice is prevalent (as we may see in chapter 3), as a violation of women’s rights and consider that such violation cannot be justified by respect of cultural traditions or initiation ceremonies. The increasing of immigration in Spain, has been a fact in last years, and it would be an important issue in future, increasing too the number of girls at risk in our country. In Spain, since october 2003, we have anew specific legislation, but before Female Genital Mutilation was liable too under the general offence of injuries in the Penal Code. In this Report, like in the other of the project, we have examined the possibilities and difficulties in the implementation of the spanish national legislation, in order to recommend a legislative and political strategy through Europe. page4image1440 The research methodology, common to all reports, was designed by the ICRH in its cooordination task, but was as well discussed by all the partners along the six steering commitee meetings we have had. The structure and content of report reflects the answers to following questions: 1. What is the legislation with regard to FGM in your country? Description of the legislation.; 2. What is the number of published court cases/suspected cases related to FGM in your country? What is the number of “hearsay” cases?; 3. Brief description of the practising community and the corresponding jurisdiction: number of Africans per country in the geographic area where the cases that you describe are located; 4. What is the procedure to be followed in case of a legal intervention to prevent or to penalise the performance of FGM?; 5. Is legislation applicable on FGM being implemented?; 6.What are the obstructing (favouring) factors for the implementation of legislation applicable to FGM? First of all we have compiled information about legislation applied with regard to FGM: not only general or specific criminal law, (in the case of Spain both because we have a change of law since october 2003), but also child protection procedures. In chapter 1, you may find the result: a Constitutional analysis, changes in Criminal Law, ans an introduction to Minor protection Laws. The second issue was the knowledge of court cases, police and judicial investigation in order to study how justice works. In this part, we contact key-informants, review archival records and study other reports: usually sociological, anthropological and health reports. In chapter 2 we have selected and summarized seven court cases in which we hace found enough relevant information to other parts of the report. At the same time, we need to identify the practicing communities to estimate the prevalence of women with FGM and the number of girls at risk of FGM. This was interesting not only to limit the research but to focus on a territory where there was a probability of cases in Court. We have choosen Catalonia: a community with court cases (in Barcelona and Girona) and prevalence of FGM; and Valencia, a territory without known cases and with no prevalence of FGM. This analysis is shown in chapter 3. In order to detect factors that hamper the implementation of existing legisaltion we need to know how procedures works at different levels: health services, social assistance, police, prosecution office and courts. Examining procedure laws, referral procedures, guidelines or ruled practices was not enough. We had to know what happen, who know a case, which institution examine it, which real mens they have.... To complete this, we have performe a study, interviewing key-informants with an standard interview: police, prosecutors, judges, doctors, nurses, social assistants and immigrants. Interviews were fulfilled in Valencia, Tarragona, Barcelona and Girona. Results are in Chapter 4 (procedure followed); Chapter 5 (implementation of appllicable legislation) and Chapter 6 (obstructing and favouring factors for the implementation of legislation). We had three main meetings to design the research and discuss texts and provissional results. Some of conclusions of provissional spanish report were discused in two seminars: “Ciudadania europea y conflictos culturales”, [european citizenship and cultural conflicts] (Valencia, 29, 30 and 31 october 2003); and “Violencia de género: instrumentos jurídicos en la lucha contra la discriminación de las mujeres”[Gender violence: legal instruments fighting agains women discrimination] (Valencia, 26, 27 and 28 november 2003) The study was financed by the European Commission, Daphne programme, and ran from January 2003 to March 2004 (EC-CONTRACT no 02/058/WYC). In additon, in the period we have done this study, the Centre of Studies on Citizenship, Migration and Minorities was financed with other projects related: “Indicadores y medidas para el desarrollo de políticas públicas de integración social de los inmigrantes y la garantía de sus derechos en la Comunidad Valenciana”, [indicators and measures to develop public policies for social integration of immigrants and the protection of their fundamental rights in the Land of Valencia], Project I+D “Generalitat Valenciana”; 2002-2003; "Los derechos fundamentales en las sociedades multiculturales" [fundamental rights in multicultural societies], project I+D, Subdirección General de Proyectos de Investigación, Dirección General de Investigación, Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnología, november 2002-october 2005; “Los derechos de participación como elemento de integración de los inmigrantes” [participation rights as a element of the integration of immigrants], II Convocatoria de Ayudas a la Investigación en Economía, Demografía y Estudios de Población y Estudios Europeos de la Fundacion BBVA; 2004-2005. We wish to thank all who have collaborated in this study, specially we remark the collaboration and contributions of Elena Gascón Sorribas (Sociology of Law Laboratory; University of Zaragoza); María Heras García (Public Prosecutor); Dolores Gisbert Millet (Doctor, Health Service, Valencia); Ignacio de Lucas (Public Prosecutor); Laura Matilla (Lawyer, city council of Cullera); Joan Mayoral Simón (Justice Evaluating the impact of existing legislation with regard to Female Genital Mutilation..Spanish National Report. Daphne Programme Department, Regional Government of Catalonia); Xavier Montagud (Social Services, Regional Government of Valencia); and Dolores Sabater Collado (Court Secretary). With the results of the five National Report analysis and the information about legislation in all European Union member States, the coordinators, Els Leye and Jessika Deblonde, have elaborated A comparative analysis of the different legal approaches in the 15 EU Member States, and the respective judicial outcomes in Belgium, France, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom (ICRH, 2004)

Diseño estratégico de vanguardia

La integración del diseño con la vanguardia se observa natural, esto es, el diseño es una disciplina abductiva y la vanguardia persigue fines prospectivos, es decir, en ambos casos se trata de objetivos de posibilidad futura. De tal suerte, este libro, emanado de una parte de las ponencias rigurosamente arbitradas del Coloquio Internacional de Diseño 2016, está dividido en tres secciones o capítulos, a saber, el capítulo uno relacionado con la teoría y metodología para proyectos de diseño de vanguardia, el segundo sobre la tecnología, la innovación y la sostenibilidad de vanguardia de dichos proyectos, y finalmente el último capítulo, vinculado con la gestión estratégica de proyectos de vanguardia.La historia se forja de hechos e interpretaciones, de pasados construidos y de presentes en procesos constantes, estudiados en forma estricta por las ciencias. Por su parte, el futuro ostenta la posibilidad de ser indefinidamente planeado con base en las variopintas aproximaciones teóricas y empíricas que dan fundamento a este tipo de ciencia; éstas son denominadas prospectivas y sus bases vanguardias. Resulta importante señalar, que estas posibilidades sólo permiten tener una idea hipotética de lo que será la realidad y el mundo de vida de los seres vivos y su contexto, no obstante, se trata de la única manera racional que tiene el ser humano de prever ese futuro posible. Las distintas ciencias y disciplinas nos permiten construir históricamente estas posibilidades partiendo de datos, hechos, significados y un sinfín de informaciones que le dan cuerpo y sentido a tales posibilidades. En este sentido, la vanguardia, como base del conocimiento prospectivo, observa la necesidad de ser escrita, leída y discutida en los términos más estrictos con el fin de volver las predicciones más precisas. El diseño por su parte, es definido de manera sucinta como la disciplina proyectual estratégica y sistémica de la posibilidad, dirigida a procesos de significación utilitaria y simbólica para la comprensión –o interpretación– y modificación –o proyectación– de niveles de realidad (referentes y sujetos) desde diversos aparatos teóricos y empíricos –perspectivas disciplinarias–

Voluntariado en Acción Catálogo de iniciativas de voluntariado Centros de Educación para el Desarrollo.

Este catálogo compila todas las iniciativas de voluntariado que enmarcan y orientan las acciones de más de dos mil voluntarios anuales que aportan con su tiempo y conocimiento al fortalecimiento de las comunidades, sus organizaciones sociales y comunitarias que trabajan decididamente para construir una mejor sociedad. Durante los últimos tres años hemos apostado por el fortalecimiento de esta estrategia generando nuevas modalidades, diversos escenarios para el desarrollo del voluntariado, capacitando a los 19 líderes y los voluntarios en las sedes, siempre bajo la profunda convicción de que el mundo se puede cambiar cuando mucha gente pequeña, en lugares pequeños, haciendo cosas pequeñas, logran tocar la vida de las personas que más lo necesitan

Recalcitrant carbohydrates after enzymatic hydrolysis of pretreated lignocellulosic biomass

Background: To reduce the cost of the enzymes for the hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass, two main strategies have been followed: one, the reduction of enzyme dosing by the use of more efficient and stable enzymatic cocktails; another, to include accessory enzymes in the cocktails to increase yields by reducing the recalcitrant carbohydrate fraction remaining at the end of the process. To guide this second strategy, we have explored the chemical bond composition of different fractions of recalcitrant carbohydrates after enzymatic hydrolysis. Results: Two lignocellulosic feedstocks of relevance for the biofuels industry have been analyzed, corn stover and sugarcane straw. On comparing the composition of chemical bonds of the starting pretreated material with samples after standard and forced hydrolysis (with enzyme overdosing), we obtained similar sugar and chemical bond composition. Conclusions: This suggests that the current enzymatic cocktails bear the set of enzymes needed to hydrolyze these feedstocks. From our point of view, the results show the need for a parallel fine-tuning of the enzymatic cocktails with the pretreatment process to maximize sugar release yield.Peer Reviewe

Relationship between European mitochondrial haplogroups and chronic renal allograft rejection in patients with kidney transplant

Producción CientíficaMitochondrial DNA variants may contribute to differences in mitochondrial function, leading to an altered immune system. The aim of this study was to analyze the relationship between mtDNA haplogroups and the development of chronic allograft dysfunction in patients with kidney transplant. A retrospective observational study was carried out on 261 patients who received kidney transplant (114 had stable transplant and 147 patients developed chronic allograft dysfunction). DNA samples were genotyped for 14 mtDNA polymorphisms by using Sequenom's MassARRAY platform (San Diego, CA, USA). Only European white patients within the N macro-cluster were included. Patients with haplogroups V (odds ratio (OR)=0.32; p=0.037) and J (OR=0.36; p=0.038) showed lower odds for developing CRAD than patients with haplogroup H. After adjusting for the most significant variables, haplogroups V and J tended to statistical significance (p=0.091 and p=0.067 respectively). This is a preliminary study in which mtDNA haplogroups seem to be implicated in susceptibility or protection for developing chronic allograft dysfunction.Instituto de Salud Carlos III (grants PI08/0738, PI11/00245, CD13/00013, RD12/0017/0024, CD12/00442 and CM12/00043)Junta de Castilla y León (grant GRS 234/A/08

Animación a la lectura : literatura a través del cine

El objeto del proyecto consiste en fomentar y estimular el gusto y el hábito lector de los alumnos y al mismo tiempo, mejorar sus competencias lectoras como grado de compresión, capacidad de abstracción de ideas principales, capacidad de resumen y opinión personal. La actividad se desarrolla en dos ramas. La primera, orientada a alumnos del primer ciclo de la ESO que consiste en la lectura de distintos libros y en la posterior exposición de la resultante expresión plástica desarrollada a raíz del contenido de las lecturas. Y la segunda, dirigida a los alumnos de primero de Bachillerato, que consiste en visualizar obras literarias llevadas al cine, además de la lectura. El plan de trabajo consiste en participar en concursos donde se valora la cantidad y calidad de la creación literaria y plástica desarrollada por los alumnos durante el proyecto. La colaboración de la biblioteca del centro y del departamento de lengua han sido decisivas para ampliar la oferta literaria en la que basar los trabajos. Para la evaluación siguen los criterios de participación, grado de comprensión lectora, frecuencia del uso de la biblioteca y fondos en préstamo. Los instrumentos para la recogida de esta información son estadísticos..Madrid (Comunidad Autónoma). Consejería de Educación. Dirección General de Mejora de la Calidad de la EnseñanzaMadridMadrid (Comunidad Autónoma). Subdirección General de Formación del Profesorado. CRIF Las Acacias; General Ricardos 179 - 28025 Madrid; Tel. + 34915250893ES

Adherence to a Supplemented Mediterranean Diet Drives Changes in the Gut Microbiota of HIV-1-Infected Individuals

Objective: The health effects of a supplemented Mediterranean diet (SMD) with extra-virgin olive oil (EVOO) and nuts are well documented in non-HIV-infected individuals. We hypothesised that the benefits of an SMD could be mediated by changes in the gut microbiota, even in those with an altered intestinal microbiota such as people living with HIV. Design: Individuals living with HIV (n = 102) were randomised to receive an SMD with 50 g/day of EVOO and 30 g/day of walnuts (SMD group) or continue with their regular diet (control group) for 12 weeks. Methods: Adherence to the Mediterranean diet was assessed using the validated 14-item MD-Adherence-Screener (MEDAS) from the PREDIMED study. A sub-study classifying the participants according to their MEDAS scores was performed. Results: The lipid profile was improved in the SMD group vs. that in the control group (delta-total cholesterol and delta-B-lipoprotein). The immune activation (CD4+HLADR+CD38+ and CD8+HLADR+CD38+ cells) and IFN-γ-producing T-cells significantly decreased at week 12 compared to the baseline in the SMD group but not in the control group. The gut microbiota in those from the high-adherence group presented significantly high diversity and richness at the end of the intervention. Succinivibrio and Bifidobacterium abundances were influenced by the adherence to the MD and significantly correlated with Treg cells. Conclusion: The Mediterranean diet improved metabolic parameters, immune activation, Treg function, and the gut microbiota composition in HIV-1-infected individuals. Further, Mediterranean diet increased the Bifidobacterium abundances after the intervention, and it was associated to a beneficial profile

Adherence to a Supplemented Mediterranean Diet Drives Changes in the Gut Microbiota of HIV-1-Infected Individuals

Objective: The health effects of a supplemented Mediterranean diet (SMD) with extra-virgin olive oil (EVOO) and nuts are well documented in non-HIV-infected individuals. We hypothesised that the benefits of an SMD could be mediated by changes in the gut microbiota, even in those with an altered intestinal microbiota such as people living with HIV. Design: Individuals living with HIV (n = 102) were randomised to receive an SMD with 50 g/day of EVOO and 30 g/day of walnuts (SMD group) or continue with their regular diet (control group) for 12 weeks. Methods: Adherence to the Mediterranean diet was assessed using the validated 14-item MD-Adherence-Screener (MEDAS) from the PREDIMED study. A sub-study classifying the participants according to their MEDAS scores was performed. Results: The lipid profile was improved in the SMD group vs. that in the control group (delta-total cholesterol and delta-B-lipoprotein). The immune activation (CD4+HLADR+CD38+ and CD8+HLADR+CD38+ cells) and IFN-γ-producing T-cells significantly decreased at week 12 compared to the baseline in the SMD group but not in the control group. The gut microbiota in those from the high-adherence group presented significantly high diversity and richness at the end of the intervention. Succinivibrio and Bifidobacterium abundances were influenced by the adherence to the MD and significantly correlated with Treg cells. Conclusion: The Mediterranean diet improved metabolic parameters, immune activation, Treg function, and the gut microbiota composition in HIV-1-infected individuals. Further, Mediterranean diet increased the Bifidobacterium abundances after the intervention, and it was associated to a beneficial profile