Factores de calidad y elementos obstaculizadores en la Planificación Didáctica en Educación Superior e incidencia en la calidad educativa

En Nicaragua la calidad educativa es pertinente para las Instituciones Universitarias porque está desarrollándose actualmente un proceso de Acreditación a Nivel Nacional dirigido por el Consejo Nacional de Universidades (CNU) Los factores de calidad del Sub Sistema de Educación Superior son diversos. Tienen como base la Planificación Didáctica para la gestión del aula. Esta es esencial para alcanzarla. La planificación didáctica es la actividad básica, constante y organizadora de la práctica docente profesional, que prevé inteligentemente las acciones de un programa de asignatura por medio de las que se crea un instrumento escrito que integra en un solo sistema objetivos, contenidos, tiempo, metodologías, recursos, estrategias y formas de evaluación de los resultados del proceso de enseñanza aprendizaje, que aseguran un mayor grado de calidad que las actividades realizadas de manera espontánea. Se investigó acerca de esos factores de calidad, de los elementos que la obstaculizan y su incidencia en la calidad educativa. Los resultados más importantes encontrados son el aspecto estructural relacionado a la función integradora, la redacción de objetivos y contenidos integrando las tres dimensiones requeridas en los programas de asignatura y la evaluación educativa relacionada a las formas y mecanismos de construcción de evidencias

Editorial: Tumor microenvironment in primary brain cancers

Primary brain tumors are most commonly detected in the late stages of the disease and there are only a few treatment opportunities. Overall survival rates are significantly low and the response to chemo/radiotherapy is not sufficient, despite surgical intervention. The tumor microenvironment (TME) regulates several brain tumor hallmarks, such as cell migration, invasiveness, proliferation, therapy resistance, stemness maintenance, immune evasion, among others. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the pro-tumoral mechanisms that are regulated by the TME in order to detect and identify new biomarkers and novel therapeutic targets.IN was supported by ANID/FONDECYT Grant 11220149 and ANID/IMII ICN09-016/ICN 2021-045. JRP was supported by grant PID2019-104766RB-C21 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033, Basque Government (IT1751-22) and University of the Basque Country (COLAB22/07)

Stem and Cancer Stem Cell Identities, Cellular Markers, Niche Environment and Response to Treatments to Unravel New Therapeutic Targets

Adult stem cells are a partially quiescent cell population responsible for natural cell renewal and are found in many different regions of the body, including the brain, teeth, bones, muscles, skin, and diverse epithelia, such as the epidermal or intestinal epithelium, among others [...

shinyCurves, a shiny web application to analyse multisource qPCR amplification data: a COVID‑19 case study

[EN]Background Quantitative, reverse transcription PCR (qRT-PCR) is currently the gold-standard for SARS-CoV-2 detection and it is also used for detection of other virus. Manual data analysis of a small number of qRT-PCR plates per day is a relatively simple task, but automated, integrative strategies are needed if a laboratory is dealing with hundreds of plates per day, as is being the case in the COVID-19 pandemic. Results Here we present shinyCurves, an online shiny-based, free software to analyze qRT-PCR amplification data from multi-plate and multi-platform formats. Our shiny application does not require any programming experience and is able to call samples Positive, Negative or Undetermined for viral infection according to a number of user-defined settings, apart from providing a complete set of melting and amplification curve plots for the visual inspection of results. Conclusions shinyCurves is a flexible, integrative and user-friendly software that speeds-up the analysis of massive qRT-PCR data from different sources, with the possibility of automatically producing and evaluating melting and amplification curve plots.This project was supported by funding from the UPV/EHU (Accion Especial "Desarrollo e implementacion del test de diagnostico para COVID-19"). The funding body did not play any roles in the study design; nor in the data collection, analysis and interpretation, or in the writing of the paper

Vasculogenesis from Human Dental Pulp Stem Cells Grown in Matrigel with Fully Defined Serum-Free Culture Media

The generation of vasculature is one of the most important challenges in tissue engineering and regeneration. Human dental pulp stem cells (hDPSCs) are some of the most promising stem cell types to induce vasculogenesis and angiogenesis as they not only secrete vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) but can also differentiate in vitro into both endotheliocytes and pericytes in serum-free culture media. Moreover, hDPSCs can generate complete blood vessels containing both endothelial and mural layers in vivo, upon transplantation into the adult brain. However, many of the serum free media employed for the growth of hDPSCs contain supplements of an undisclosed composition. This generates uncertainty as to which of its precise components are necessary and which are dispensable for the vascular differentiation of hDPSCs, and also hinders the transfer of basic research findings to clinical cell therapy. In this work, we designed and tested new endothelial differentiation media with a fully defined composition using standard basal culture media supplemented with a mixture of B27, heparin and growth factors, including VEGF-A165 at different concentrations. We also optimized an in vitro Matrigel assay to characterize both the ability of hDPSCs to differentiate to vascular cells and their capacity to generate vascular tubules in 3D cultures. The description of a fully defined serum-free culture medium for the induction of vasculogenesis using human adult stem cells highlights its potential as a relevant innovation for tissue engineering applications. In conclusion, we achieved efficient vasculogenesis starting from hDPSCs using serum-free culture media with a fully defined composition, which is applicable for human cell therapy purposes.This work was financed by the «Ramón y Cajal» program RYC-2013-13450 (JRP); UPV/EHU (GIU16/66, UFI 11/44 and COLAB19/03; FU); MINECO Retos I + D + I (SAF2015-70866-R; JRP, PID2019-104766RB-C21; JRP); Basque Government (GV/EJ; IT831-13; GI) TERSAFURNA-2020333039 and ELKARTEK KK-2019-00093. J.L. has a grant from UPV/EHU (DOKBERRI 2019(DOCREC19/49)). I.I. has a grant from the Basque Government (PRE_2019_2_0300 or GIU16/66)

Human DenPulp Stem Cells Grown in Neurogenic Media Differentiate Into Endothelial Cells and Promote Neovasculogenesis in the Mouse Brain

Dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs) have the capacity to give rise to cells with neuronal-like phenotypes, suggesting their use in brain cell therapies. In the present work, we wanted to address the phenotypic fate of adult genetically unmodified human DPSCs cultured in Neurocult (TM) (Stem Cell Technologies), a cell culture medium without serum which can be alternatively supplemented for the expansion and/or differentiation of adult neural stem cells (NSCs). Our results show that non-genetically modified human adult DPSCs cultured with Neurocult NS-A proliferation supplement generated neurosphere-like dentospheres expressing the NSC markers Nestin and glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), but also the vascular endothelial cell marker CD31. Remarkably, 1 month after intracranial graft into athymic nude mice, human CD31+/CD146+ and Nestin+ DPSC-derived cells were found tightly associated with both the endothelial and pericyte layers of brain vasculature, forming full blood vessels of human origin which showed an increased laminin staining. These results are the first demonstration that DPSC-derived cells contributed to the generation of neovasculature within brain tissue, and that Neurocult and other related serum-free cell culture media may constitute a fast and efficient way to obtain endothelial cells from human DPSCs.This work was funded by "Ramon y Cajal" program RYC-2013-13450 (JRP) and RYC 2012-11137 (JME); Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness SAF2015-70866-R; UPV/EHU (GIU16/66, UFI 11/44); and Basque Government (GV/EJ; IT831-13). JL and OP-A obtained a Ph.D. fellowship from the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU)

Advances and Perspectives in Dental Pulp Stem Cell Based Neuroregeneration Therapies

Human dental pulp stem cells (hDPSCs) are some of the most promising stem cell types for regenerative therapies given their ability to grow in the absence of serum and their realistic possibility to be used in autologous grafts. In this review, we describe the particular advantages of hDPSCs for neuroregenerative cell therapies. We thoroughly discuss the knowledge about their embryonic origin and characteristics of their postnatal niche, as well as the current status of cell culture protocols to maximize their multilineage differentiation potential, highlighting some common issues when assessing neuronal differentiation fates of hDPSCs. We also review the recent progress on neuroprotective and immunomodulatory capacity of hDPSCs and their secreted extracellular vesicles, as well as their combination with scaffold materials to improve their functional integration on the injured central nervous system (CNS) and peripheral nervous system (PNS). Finally, we offer some perspectives on the current and possible future applications of hDPSCs in neuroregenerative cell therapies.This research was supported by MICINN retos I+D+i (PID2019-104766RB-C21 and RYC-2013-13450, to J.R.P.) and UPV/EHU (GIU16/66 and PPGA20/22, to F.U., G.I.; and COLAB19/03 and IKERTU-2020.0155, to F.U., J.R.S.). Y.P. was funded by a Bikaintek PhD grant from the Basque Government (20-AF-W2-2018-00001)

Identification of the profile of franchisee preferred by the franchisors that operate in the Spanish market

In this recent work we try to identify the characteristics of the franchisee profile that are preferred by the franchisor that operate in the spanish market. Franchisee profile is configured by several personal and business characteristics. This study is important because the franchisor must to do a correct selection of franchisees. In other case, when exist an error in the selection of franchisee will be produced the failure of the point of sale and as consequence the deterioration of the image of mark of the franchisor will be produced. We use Conjoint Analysis methodology to research preferences of franchisor about profile of franchisee. The conclusions obtained show the relative important of the franchisee attributes and the characteristics that configured this profile