Dos mujeres en la genética del siglo XX : Natasha Sivertzev-Dobzhansky y María Monclús

Entre los conocimientos teóricos y prácticos del coleccionismo y la clasificación de insectos propios de la entomología, y los estudios de poblaciones, se movían los orígenes de la genética contemporánea a lo largo de los dos primeros tercios del siglo XX. Tras los logros pioneros de la genética de poblaciones en Estados Unidos y en España, dos mujeres genetistas se recuperan como protagonistas en esta presentación: Natasha Sivertzev-Dobzansky y María Monclús. Formadas en las mismas disciplinas que sus maridos, la colaboración con ellos, que suele presentarse como ayudas informales, las hizo invisibles. Los trabajos que firmaron, la correspondencia y sus nombres en los agradecimientos de publicaciones de sus parejas han permitido seguir el rastro a sus trayectorias investigadoras y dan cuenta de una historia de la genética que pone a las mujeres y sus prácticas en el centro del relato.Along the two first thirds of the XXth-century, the origins of contemporary genetics took place between the theoretical and practical knowledge coming from the collection and classification of insects that belong to entomology and population studies. Behind the pioneer achievements of population genetics in United States and in Spain, two women geneticists are retrieved in this presentation as main characters: Natasha Sivertzev-Dobzansky y María Monclús. Both were trained in the same discipline as their husbands, the natural sciences, and the collaboration with them, which is usually presented as an informal one, made them invisible. The works signed by Natasha Sivertzev-Dobzansky y María Monclús, the correspondence addressed to them and their names in the acknowledgements of their partners’ publications allow tracing their scientific careers and account for a history of genetics that focuses on woman scientist and their practices

“Today I Have Left My Armor at Home” Revisiting Jean Rhys’s Interwar Novels after the Ethical Turn

Within the critical interpretation that too often conflates life and fiction, the so-called "Jean Rhys woman" has resisted full assimilation by a feminist literary canon that advocates empowerment and agency. Browsing through Rhys's bibliography, it is interesting to note the considerable number of titles that suggest a commiserating attitude towards both the novelist and her female characters. Rhys's nomads, expatriates and zombielike figures have been analysed from the prism of postcolonial criticism as strongly inspired by the novelist's Caribbean background, their undecidable and precarious nature might be explained as part of what Butler has termed "certain exclusionary conceptions of who is normatively human". Other instances of abject corporealities can be found in Rhys's allusion to mannequins and inanimate bodies that elicited particular fascination in the interwar period, when huge numbers of injured soldiers acquired arms and legs prostheses, thus imposing new ways of thinking the body and its limits

The MIS 5 palaeoenvironmental record in the SE Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula (Río Antas, Almería, Spain)

Se realiza un estudio detallado del episodio cálido MIS 5 en la zona sureste de la Península Ibérica. Se realiza la reconstrucción paleoambiental a partir del estudio polínico y biomarcadores de un sondeo perforado en la costa de Almería. La cronología se estableció a partir del método de racemizaciónd e aminoácidos.Landwards of a MIS5 bar, a borehole core (SRA) was analyzed to establish the relationship between the lagoonal record and the raised beach deposits in the surroundings of the Antas river mouth and to reconstruct the Pleistocene palaeoenvironmental evolution 5 of the southern Mediterranean coast of the Iberian Peninsula. 63 samples were recovered for amino acid racemization dating, 86 samples for sedimentological and paleontological determination, 37 samples for pollen identification and 54 for biomarker analysis. AAR revealed that the borehole record contains MIS11, MIS6 and MIS5 deposits, the latter extensively represented. During the end of MIS6 and MIS5, a sand 10 barrier developed and created a shallow lagoon with alternating terrestrial inputs this process being common in other Mediterranean realms. Litho- and biofacies allowed the identification of distinct paleoenvironments through time, with the presence of a lagoonal environment alternating with alluvial fan progradation. Biomarkers indicated constant input from terrestrial plants, together with variable development of aquatic 15 macrophytes. The palynological content allowed the reconstruction of the paleoclimatological conditions during MIS6 and 5, with evidence of seven scenarios characterized by alternating arid and relatively humid condition

Further progress in the study of epsilon iron oxide in archaeological baked clays

[EN] The occurrence of ε-FeO in archaeological samples that have been subjected to high temperatures is gradually being detected by the use of micrometric structural characterization techniques. This work provides new information by revealing that the ε-FeO is formed as a response to temperature, the aggregation state and the position within the baked clay with respect to the nearest heat source. In addition, depending mainly on the atmospheric environment, the temperature reached by the combustion structure, the distance from the heating source and the particle aggregation, other iron oxide magnetic phases are produced. In the baked clay studied here, hematite is found over the whole range of samples studied but its magnetic contribution is negligible. Magnetite is observed at the sample surface, probably due to local atmospheric environment closest to the combustion source. Maghemite is found at all depths up to 6 cm below the sample surface. ε-FeO has a limited distribution, found within 2–3 cm of the sample surface. Furthermore, the viability of this compound as a palaeofield marker has been evaluated in both archaeological and synthetic samples. The results indicate that ε-FeO is able to register the direction of the magnetic field. Linear palaeointensity plots have been obtained in synthetic samples, although the value of the palaeofield could be, sometimes, overestimated.The authors also acknowledge the financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities under the projects RTI2018-095856-B-C21, CGL2017-87015-P, CGL2017-92285-EXP, CGL2017-92285-EXP/BTE, MAT2017-86540-C4-1-R, MAT2017-87072-C4-2-P and RTI2018-095303-A-C52, from Comunidad de Madrid NANOFRONTMAG S2013/MIT-2850 and NANOMAGCOST S2018/NMT-4321, and from the European Commission under H2020 frame by AMPHIBIAN Project ID: 720853. APO thanks the Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness (PTA Contract).Peer reviewe

Actualización de la base de datos arqueomagnética de Iberia y nuevas curvas de variación paleosecular para los últimos 3000 años

Trabajo presentado en la X Reunión de la Comisión de Paleomagnetismo de la Sociedad Geológica de España, celebrada del 14 al 17 de septiembre de 2017 en el valle del río Grío, Zaragoza (España)En este trabajo se presenta una actualización de la base de datos direccional de Iberia para los últimos 3000 años (Gómez-Paccard et al., 2006) y el primer catálogo de intensidad para este periodo. En direcciones, la base de datos ha aumentado en más de un 80%, incluyendo más de 10 resultados direccionales no publicados hasta la fecha. En intensidades, este estudio representa un aumento de más del 50% en la cantidad de datos de calidad disponibles (si nos referimos al primer milenio a.C., se cuadruplica el número de datos), entendiendo datos de calidad como aquellos que cumplen los siguientes criterios: a) que el número de especímenes empleados para la determinación de la paleointensidad sea igual o superior a 4; b) que el protocolo empleado sea Thellier (Thellier y Thellier, 1959) o derivados; c) que la anisotropía de la imanación termorremanente haya sido investigada y corregida. Toda esta información ha permitido desarrollar nuevas curvas de variación paleosecular de declinación, inclinación e intensidad de Iberia para los tres últimos milenios. Se ha empleado el método bootstrap (Thébault y Gallet, 2010) incluyendo la jerarquía asociada a la información estratigráfica cuando estaba disponible. Las nuevas curvas direccionales no presentan grandes diferencias con las anteriormente publicadas (Fig. 1), aunque se incrementa su precisión. En intensidad las principales diferencias aparecen en el primer milenio a.C. y en el posible doble máximo en torno a 600-800 años d.C, que no es recogido por esta curva. Las nuevas curvas de variación paleosecular suponen una mejora en las posibilidades de la datación arqueomagnética en la península ibéricaPeer reviewe

Association Between Insulin‐Like Growth Factor‐1 and Social Cognition in Huntington's Disease

Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) seems to be involved in the neural circuits associated with social cognition and brain structure.Study funded by Gerencia Regional de Salud de Castilla y Leon (Sacyl GRS 1768/A/18)

Rapid Intensity Decrease During the Second Half of the First Millennium BCE in Central Asia and Global Implications

Recent paleomagnetic studies have shown that important short-lived intensity fluctuations occurred during the first millennium BCE. However, the knowledge of the spatial and temporal extension of these features is still limited by the scarce availability of robust data. In this study we focus on the study of the intensity decrease that took place in Central Asia during the second half of the 1st millennium BCE after the high intensities that characterized the Levantine Iron Age Anomaly. Since previous archeointensities available for this period and region were obtained without accomplishing modern standards of quality, we present here new archeointensities that are derived from classical Thellier and Thellier experiments, including partial thermoremanent magnetization (pTRM) checks, thermoremanent magnetization (TRM) anisotropy and cooling rate corrections at the specimen level. The new 51 archeointensities, together with previous archeointensities, have been used to present a new local paleosecular variation curve for Central Asia. The results confirm the existence of an important geomagnetic field intensity decrease in South Uzbekistan from the 4th century BCE to the end of the 1st century BCE associated with rates of changes up to -15 mu T/century. A critical analysis of the archeointensity global database indicates that this feature was present at continental scale, from Western Europe to Central Asia. However, this trend is not identified in other regions such as Japan or Mexico. Finally, the comparison with the dipole moment derived from recent global geomagnetic field reconstructions suggests a strong influence of non-dipolar sources upon this continental intensity feature

Mendelian Randomisation Confirms the Role of Y-Chromosome Loss in Alzheimer’s Disease Aetiopathogenesis in Men

Mosaic loss of chromosome Y (mLOY) is a common ageing-related somatic event and has been previously associated with Alzheimer’s disease (AD). However, mLOY estimation from genotype microarray data only reflects the mLOY degree of subjects at the moment of DNA sampling. Therefore, mLOY phenotype associations with AD can be severely age-confounded in the context of genome-wide association studies. Here, we applied Mendelian randomisation to construct an age-independent mLOY polygenic risk score (mloy-PRS) using 114 autosomal variants. The mloy-PRS instrument was associated with an 80% increase in mLOY risk per standard deviation unit (p = 4.22 × 10−20) and was orthogonal with age. We found that a higher genetic risk for mLOY was associated with faster progression to AD in men with mild cognitive impairment (hazard ratio (HR) = 1.23, p = 0.01). Importantly, mloy-PRS had no effect on AD conversion or risk in the female group, suggesting that these associations are caused by the inherent loss of the Y chromosome. Additionally, the blood mLOY phenotype in men was associated with increased cerebrospinal fluid levels of total tau and phosphorylated tau181 in subjects with mild cognitive impairment and dementia. Our results strongly suggest that mLOY is involved in AD pathogenesis.P.G.-G. (Pablo García-González) is supported by CIBERNED employment plan CNV-304-PRF-866. CIBERNED is integrated into ISCIII (Instituto de Salud Carlos III). I.d.R is supported by a national grant from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III FI20/00215. A.C. (Amanda Cano) acknowledges the support of the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation, and Universities under the grant Juan de la Cierva (FJC2018-036012-I). M.B. (Mercé Boada) and A.R. (Agustín Ruiz) are also supported by national grants PI13/02434, PI16/01861, PI17/01474, PI19/01240, and PI19/01301. The Genome Research @ Fundació ACE project (GR@ACE) is supported by Grifols SA, Fundación bancaria “La Caixa”, Fundació ACE, and CIBERNED. Acción Estratégica en Salud is integrated into the Spanish National R + D + I Plan and funded by ISCIII (Instituto de Salud Carlos III)—Subdirección General de Evaluación—and the Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (FEDER—“Una manera de hacer Europa”). Genotyping of the ACE MCI-EADB samples was performed in the context of EADB (European Alzheimer DNA biobank) funded by the JPco-fuND FP-829-029 (ZonMW project number 733051061). This work was supported by a grant (European Alzheimer DNA BioBank, EADB) from the EU Joint Program—Neurodegenerative Disease Research (JPND). Partial funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málag

CIBERER : Spanish national network for research on rare diseases: A highly productive collaborative initiative

Altres ajuts: Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII); Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación.CIBER (Center for Biomedical Network Research; Centro de Investigación Biomédica En Red) is a public national consortium created in 2006 under the umbrella of the Spanish National Institute of Health Carlos III (ISCIII). This innovative research structure comprises 11 different specific areas dedicated to the main public health priorities in the National Health System. CIBERER, the thematic area of CIBER focused on rare diseases (RDs) currently consists of 75 research groups belonging to universities, research centers, and hospitals of the entire country. CIBERER's mission is to be a center prioritizing and favoring collaboration and cooperation between biomedical and clinical research groups, with special emphasis on the aspects of genetic, molecular, biochemical, and cellular research of RDs. This research is the basis for providing new tools for the diagnosis and therapy of low-prevalence diseases, in line with the International Rare Diseases Research Consortium (IRDiRC) objectives, thus favoring translational research between the scientific environment of the laboratory and the clinical setting of health centers. In this article, we intend to review CIBERER's 15-year journey and summarize the main results obtained in terms of internationalization, scientific production, contributions toward the discovery of new therapies and novel genes associated to diseases, cooperation with patients' associations and many other topics related to RD research