Measuring quantumness: from theory to observability in interferometric setups

We investigate the notion of quantumness based on the non-commutativity of the algebra of observables and introduce a measure of quantumness based on the mutual incompatibility of quantum states. We show that such a quantity can be experimentally measured with an interferometric setup and that, when an arbitrary bipartition of a given composite system is introduced, it detects the one-way quantum correlations restricted to one of the two subsystems. We finally show that, by combining only two projective measurements and carrying out the interference procedure, our measure becomes an efficient universal witness of quantum discord and non-classical correlations.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figur

Between the Magic of Magic and the Magic of Money: the Changing Nature of Experience in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta

When people in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta are gathered around the hearths of their houses, it is common to hear the sound and movement of the women's spindles whirring on the earth floor as they pull out threads of material, and the rhythm of men's hardwood rods rubbing continuously against the mouth of their gourd containers. It is at this point of intimacy and flowing vitality at which the familiarity of the indigenous Sierra comes alive. According to Kogi, Wiwa and Ika cosmology, there is a life force that grows in people, as much as animals and plants, which like the thread of a spindle extends from the center of the cosmos. "It is here where the Universal Mother planted her gigantic spindle across the highest peak," as she said: "this is Kalusankua, the central post of the world." This vital thread, like an umbilical cord, holds all living elements as they fulfill their fate on Earth. It is a very different strand from the one that Walter Benjamin mentions in the story of the genie who gave the boy a ball of thread and said: "This is the thread of your life. Take it. When you find time heavy on your hands, pull it out; your days will pass quick or slow, according as you unwind the ball rapidly or little by little. So long as you leave the thread alone, you will remain stationary at the same hour of your existence." But the boy started pulling the thread and before he knew it he became a man, married the girl he loved, saw his children grow up, passed over his anxieties, lived honors and profits, and then cut short his old age, all in four months and six days. Pre-Columbian materials -many times sonorous and full of detailed expressions; made of gold and copper, ceramic, jade and stone quartz of different luster and color- are said to be the medium through which people, plants and animals are able to concentrate the necessary life force to fulfill their fate on Earth. Buried all around the vast mountainous terrain of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, these ancient materials sustain the interconnections to the creative energies in the cosmos. However, as these materials are looted and pulled out of ancient indigenous grounds, they cease to hold together the center from which this vital force grows. As they are sold as commodities, they appear in the international art market, independent of their place of origin and devoid of any life force. With the new modes of industrial production, observes Karl Marx, the creative energy or central force of people disappears in the things that they produce. Matter severed from its producer acquires a second life independent of its source of energy and equivalent to all other things in the form of commodities. As capitalist societies begin to measure the output of energy in terms of this second life of things, individual skills and creative energies become irrelevant to the process of growth. "The individuals are now subordinated to social production, which exists externally to them, as a sort of fate," notes Marx in the Grundrisse in 1857. Walter Benjamin then extends this idea and points out: "In `fate' is concealed the concept of `total experience.'" He quotes the following passage in The Arcades Project: "It is not a question of `the triumph of mind over matter'...; rather, it represents the triumph of the rational and general principles of things over the energy and qualities proper to the living organism." Even though Pre-Columbian materials are not produced in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta today, they are believed to mediate the energies and qualities proper to living beings. These energies are lost as they are dug out, and as the holes in the Mother Land of the Ika, Wiwa and Kogi people grow, so does the value of these pieces in the market. It is only in the realm of the inorganic that we can begin to fathom this concept of value. Walter Benjamin's notion of a "new kind of 20th C fate" helps us observe this vast contradiction now lived in the native Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, whereby the threads that like umbilical cords connect living beings throughout their life to the sources of energy around their territory, no longer seem to be growing out of experience but rather out of money. Benjamin points out "a new field force," which opens up in the form of planning... To `plan' is henceforth possible only on a large scale, no longer on an individual scale - and this means neither for the individual nor by the individual." Property is depersonalized in such a way that it is caught up in a whirlpool, lost by one and won by another. Successes and failures arise from causes that are unanticipated, generally unintelligible, and seemingly dependent on chance. He observes this new fate as it plays out in the experience of figures like the gambler, the private collector, the student and the flanneur, that are not completely subordinated to the labor process, but are idlers residing both within and outside the marketplace, between the worlds of magic and money. He observes how "Fortuna" in the double sense of chance and riches is always on the side of these figures. When a gambler wins for example, we don't say it is a consequence of his work activity but it is a matter of luck or chance: "Fortuna" that is on his side. It is this "total experience" as Benjamin calls it, concealed in the form of "Fortuna" which feeds the gambling instincts and animates the myths that consume "guaqueros," people who dig out ancient indigenous burial sites in search of Pre-Columbian treasures, looting enchanted and dangerous places all around the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Even though guaqueros climb a mountainous terrain as high as 19,000 feet, and traverse rain forests inhabited by wild animals and plants, these treasure hunters are not so much at the mercy of the mysterious forces of nature, as at the hands of the "inexplicable" in bourgeois society. "The `inexplicable' is enthroned in bourgeois society as in a gambling hall..." notes Benjamin. Like gamblers, guaqueros are risking a hand-to hand encounter with fate, where the stake is money. They can lose or win immediate and infinite possibilities: money equivalent to anything. Only in response to such fate, like the boy with the ball of thread, is it possible to pull out the material from the place where the earth has been gestating it for centuries and bring it into a new inorganic existence. The guaqueros, like the gamblers, produce in a second, the changes that fate ordinarily effects only in the course of many years. "Isn't there a certain structure of money that can be recognized only in fate, and a certain structure of fate that can be recognized only in money?" asks Benjamin. Such encounter with this new kind of fate occurs as "immediate experience" or das Erlebnis, which comes in the form of shock and discontinuity, points out Benjamin, as opposed to "connected experience" or die Erfahrung which presupposes tradition and continuity. Idlers, like the guaqueros are open to this type of experience. They are not so much following a sequence, as attentively tracing a dynamic that leads them through the excitement of their chase, step by step from one coincidence to the next. They "follow nothing but the whim of the moment." The Ika Mamos, as much as the Kogi and Wiwa Mamas or high priests who inherit the places where these Pre-Columbian materials are buried, along with the knowledge necessary nourish and connect to the cosmic life force in them, ask: if this is the new fate of the world, then what will happen to these creative energies which need to be sustained in order for the threads of life to continue growing? Will there come a point, they ponder, when the threads of life will cease to grow and all the rivers, as much as the streams in human, plant and animal veins, will dry up? According to Ika, Wiwa and Kogi cosmology, only the ancestors can feed on these ancient materials, so the Mamas and Mamos wonder: is it that people believe they can eat gold too? It is only in terms of this "new kind of 20th Century fate," that we can begin to understand the fantastic transformations and disjunctions of the value of these materials as they move from the native sites where they are buried and nurtured, to the hands of guaqueros who dig them out and sell them. By following this passage between experience and money, Between the Magic of Magic and the Magic of Money, rather like the flanneur that moves in between spaces, inside and outside the marketplace, I want to inquire: what is the fate of these ancient materials and forces, and how does "Fortuna" in the double sense of chance and riches, then reflect back upon current Ika, Kogi and Wiwa existence

Association between asymptomatic carotid atherosclerosis and degenerative aortic stenosis.

OBJECTIVE: Degenerative aortic stenosis shows similarities with atherosclerosis. To confirm the hypothesis that aortic stenosis is an "atherosclerosis-like" disease, we investigated the association between degenerative aortic stenosis and atherosclerosis of carotid arteries. METHODS: We studied 270 consecutive patients, 135 with degenerative aortic stenosis (trans-aortic peak velocity ≥ 2 m/sec) and other 135 subjects without aortic valve disease. All patients underwent echocardiography and ultrasound scan of the supra-aortic trunks to assess the presence of plaque and/or intima-media thickening (IMT). RESULTS: Atherosclerosis of carotid arteries (IMT and plaque) was significantly more frequent in patients with aortic stenosis than in controls (95.5% vs. 66.6%, p < 0.0001). The same result was confirmed as concerns carotid plaques (69.6% vs. 42.2%, p < 0.0001). In addition, there was a significant association between aortic stenosis and degenerative carotid plaque (OR = 3.13; 95% C.I. = 1.90-5.17). Thus the presence of a linear correlation between the trans-aortic peak velocity of the cases and the thickness of the plaques and IMT was evaluated by calculating the coefficient of correlation (R = 0.15 for plaque and R = 0.53 for IMT). CONCLUSIONS: The presence of carotid atherosclerosis is associated with degenerative aortic stenosis and the severity of aortic stenosis corresponds to an increase of the thickness of plaque and IMT. This relationship is quite new. Our result strengthens the pathogenetic hypothesis "atherosclerosis-like" of degenerative aortic stenosis and suggest the ultrasound scan as a non invasive method for risk stratification in patient with aortic stenosis, with therapeutic implications especially for higher risk subgroups

A cooperative game approach applied to the furniture supply chain of clusters for improving its competitive value: A case study

The paper studies a cooperative game, which is being played among the firms, involved in furniture industries, belonging to the same cluster. Due to the increased competition at the local and global levels, cooperation among the business entities is practically the only way to survive in the cluster. Consequently, a cooperative game model is proposed for the firms, associated in a vertical channel, where its performance indices are measured by one of its indicators of competitiveness at an entrepreneurial level versus the value of the cluster itself. As a case study, a competitive value analysis is done for the Colombian furniture cluster by indicating the characteristics and existing conditions of the cluster in the department of Atlantico in Colombia. Moreover, this paper analyzes and establishes an optimal feasible solution of cooperative game among the principal firms using Shapley value method

Gobernanza, centro secundario de convergencia e interacción social, en el distrito de San Juan de Miraflores –Lima 2020

El presente trabajo de investigación de la tesis, se enfoca en la educación desde la inclusión del deporte para los jóvenes adolescentes, considerando el aspecto urbanístico, haciendo usos de espacios de interacción de la comunidad. Bajo estos términos se propone calidad educativa como objetivo la igualdad, gratuito y accesibilidad, reduciendo la taza de maltrato psicológico de los adolescentes escolares. Se establece el diseño de un centro educativo en el distrito de San Juan de Miraflores en base a la pedagogía de una institución educativa básica regular, absolviendo la demanda de la población y déficit de espacios educativos de calidad, fortaleciendo con equipamientos, talleres, deportivos, formando a los adolescentes en los altos estándares de disciplina. El efecto obtenido de la tesis, fue atreves de las instituciones competentes, la cual se llegó la determinación la relación paralela entre la educación y las actividades físicas recreativa, culturales, ecológicas de calidad. Además, la implementación de espacios multifuncionales, fácil de adaptarse a los usos de la comunidad

Una revisión de los programas de intervención grupal con víctimas de violencia de género

La violencia de género es un problema personal y social grave, con múltiples consecuencias para las mujeres maltratadas. Los estudios de intervención para ayudar a estas personas son escasos y desde aproximaciones diversas. Se ha realizado aquí una revisión sistemática de los tratamientos aplicados en grupo a mujeres que han sido objeto de violencia de género. Se han revisado las bases de datos de Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, ResearchGate, además de literatura gris. Del total de trabajos se han seleccionado 34 de ellos que sí eran estudios con datos de efica-cia, agrupados por el tipo de intervención: terapias cognitivo-conductuales (22), terapias contextuales (4) y programas diversos (8). Los resultados muestran que las terapias cognitivo-conductuales son eficaces para reducir las conductas de ansiedad, estrés y trastorno de estrés postraumático, con distintos tamaños del efecto y seguimientos hasta 12 meses. Las terapias contextuales son prometedoras en este campo y permiten una aplicación adaptada a la persona. Las demás terapias muestran eficacia en algunos casos, aunque partan de teorías diferentes utilizan también técnicas de la terapia cognitivo-conductual. Se concluye sobre la necesidad de investigar los componentes específicos de las terapias, y realizar estudios con diseños de grupos aleatorizados.Gender violence is a serious personal and social problem, with multiple consequences for abused women. Inter-vention studies to help these people, are scarce and from different approaches. We have carried out a systematic review of the treatments applied in groups to women who have been in gender violence. The data bases of Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, Dialnet and grey literature were reviewed. From the papers found, 34 of them have been select because they were studies with data about efficacy, grouped by the type of intervention: cognitive-behavioural therapies (22), contextual therapies (4), and diverse programmes (8). The results showed that cognitive-behavioural therapies are effective in reducing anxiety, stress, and PTSD behaviours, with varying effect sized and follow-ups to 12 months. Contextual therapies are promising in this field and can be addressed in an individualized way. The other therapies sowed efficacy in some cases, although each is based on different theories, they also use techniques from cognitive-behavioural therapies. We concluded that there is a need for research on the specific components of the therapies, and more studies with randomized group designs

Founder mutation in Lynch syndrome

El síndrome de Lynch es la más frecuente de las neoplasias colorrectales hereditarias. Se origina por mutaciones germinales deletéreas familia-específicas en los genes que codifican proteínas de reparación del ADN: MLH1 (homólogo humano de mutL), MSH2 y MSH6 (homólogo humano de mutS 2 y 6, respectivamente), PMS2 (homólogo humano de PMS1 2) y MUTYH (homólogo humano de la ADN-glycosilasa mutY). La mutación c.2252_2253delAA, p.Lys751Serfs*3 en el exón 19 del gen MLH1 segrega con un haplotipo descripto en la región norte de Italia y cuyo origen fue atribuido a un efecto fundador. Esta mutación co-segrega con características típicas del síndrome de Lynch, incluyendo afectación temprana y múltiples tumores primarios en el mismo individuo, una alta frecuencia de cáncer pancreático, elevada inestabilidad microsatelital y falta de expresión de PMS2. En el presente trabajo se comunica dicha mutación en una paciente argentina con adenocarcinoma endometroide de útero en cuya historia familiar existen antecedentes de cáncer de colon diagnosticado antes de los 50 años en familiares de primer grado, reuniendo los criterios de Ámsterdam I y síndrome de Lynch II. Los polimorfismos presentes en la paciente coinciden con el haplotipo descripto en una región del norte de Italia. El alto grado de patogenicidad asociada a esta mutación hace imprescindible el estudio de todos los integrantes de las familias con cáncer hereditario permitiendo el diagnóstico genético pre-sintomático, la instauración de tratamientos o conductas preventivas y su seguimientoLynch syndrome is the most frequent syndrome in hereditary colorectal cancer, a family-specific deleterious mutations in genes encoding DNA reparation proteins: MLH1 (mutL homolog 1), MSH2, MSH6 (mutS homolog 2 y 6, respectively), PMS2 (PMS1 homolog 2, mismatch repair system component) y MUTYH (mutY DNA glycosylase). The c.2252_2253delAA, p.Lys751Serfs*3 mutation in MLH1 gene segregates with a haplotype reported in the northern region of Italy and whose origin was attributed to a founder effect. This mutation co-segregates with typical characteristics of Lynch syndrome, including early age at onset and multiple primary tumors in the same individual, a high frequency of pancreatic cancer, high microsatellite instability and lack of PMS2 expression. This report describes a mutation in an Argentinian patient with endometrioid adenocarcinoma of uterus. Her first-degree relatives had a history of colon cancer diagnosed before 50 years, fulfilling the Amsterdam Criteria I and Lynch syndrome II. The high pathogenicity associated to this mutation makes necessary the study of all members from families with hereditary cancer, allowing pre-symptomatic genetic diagnosis, early assessment and the instauration of preventive treatments.Fil: Cajal, Andrea. Hospital Italiano. Instituto de Ciencias Básicas y Medicina Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Piñero, Tamara Alejandra. Hospital Italiano. Instituto de Ciencias Básicas y Medicina Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Verzura, Alicia. Hospital Italiano; ArgentinaFil: Santino, Juan Pablo. Hospital Italiano; ArgentinaFil: Solano, Angela Rosario. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Medicina. Instituto de Investigaciones Biomédicas; Argentina. Centro de Educación Médica e Investigaciones Clínicas “Norberto Quirno”; ArgentinaFil: Kalfayan, Pablo G.. Hospital Italiano; ArgentinaFil: Ferro, Fabiana Alejandra. Hospital Italiano; ArgentinaFil: Vaccaro, Carlos A.. Hospital Italiano; Argentin

OCDB: a database collecting genes, miRNAs and drugs for obsessive-compulsive disorder

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a psychiatric condition characterized by intrusive and unwilling thoughts (obsessions) giving rise to anxiety. The patients feel obliged to perform a behavior (compulsions) induced by the obsessions. The World Health Organization ranks OCD as one of the 10 most disabling medical conditions. In the class of Anxiety Disorders, OCD is a pathology that shows an hereditary component. Consequently, an online resource collecting and integrating scientific discoveries and genetic evidence about OCD would be helpful to improve the current knowledge on this disorder. We have developed a manually curated database, OCD Database (OCDB), collecting the relations between candidate genes in OCD, microRNAs (miRNAs) involved in the pathophysiology of OCD and drugs used in its treatments. We have screened articles from PubMed and MEDLINE. For each gene, the bibliographic references with a brief description of the gene and the experimental conditions are shown. The database also lists the polymorphisms within genes and its chromosomal regions. OCDB data is enriched with both validated and predicted miRNA-target and drug-target information. The transcription factors regulations, which are also included, are taken from David and TransmiR. Moreover, a scoring function ranks the relevance of data in the OCDB context. The database is also integrated with the main online resources (PubMed, Entrez-gene, HGNC, dbSNP, DrugBank, miRBase, PubChem, Kegg, Disease-ontology and ChEBI). The web interface has been developed using phpMyAdmin and Bootstrap software. This allows (i) to browse data by category and (ii) to navigate in the database by searching genes, miRNAs, drugs, SNPs, regions, drug targets and articles. The data can be exported in textual format as well as the whole database in.sql or tabular format. OCDB is an essential resource to support genome-wide analysis, genetic and pharmacological studies. It also facilitates the evaluation of genetic data in OCD and the detection of alternative treatments

VIRGO: visualization of A-to-I RNA editing sites in genomic sequences.

RNA Editing is a type of post-transcriptional modification that takes place in the eukaryotes. It alters the sequence of primary RNA transcripts by deleting, inserting or modifying residues. Several forms of RNA editing have been discovered including A-to-I, C-to-U, U-to-C and G-to-A. In recent years, the application of global approaches to the study of A-to-I editing, including high throughput sequencing, has led to important advances. However, in spite of enormous efforts, the real biological mechanism underlying this phenomenon remains unknown.In this work, we present VIRGO (http://atlas.dmi.unict.it/virgo webcite), a web-based tool that maps Ato-G mismatches between genomic and EST sequences as candidate A-to-I editing sites. VIRGO is built on top of a knowledge-base integrating information of genes from UCSC, EST of NCBI, SNPs, DARNED, and Next Generations Sequencing data. The tool is equipped with a user-friendly interface allowing users to analyze genomic sequences in order to identify candidate A-to-I editing sites

Prevalence of Dal blood type and dog erythrocyte antigens (DEA) 1, 4, and 7 in canine blood donors in Italy and Spain

BackgroundThe aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of Dal, and DEA 1, 4, 7 blood types, in a population of canine blood donors from Italy and Spain. Three hundred and twenty blood donor dogs receiving an annual health evaluation were included in the study. DEA 1 blood type was determined using an immunochromatographic strip technique while Dal, DEA 4 and 7 blood types were determined with polyclonal antisera using agglutination on gel columns.ResultsOut of 320 dogs blood typed 7 (2 Cane Corso and 5 Doberman Pinschers) (2.2%) were Dal negative; 137 (42.8%) were positive for DEA 1; 320 (100%) were positive for DEA 4 and 43 (13.4%) were positive for DEA 7.ConclusionThis study showed a similar prevalence of DEA 1, 7 and 4 to that reported in previous studies in the same, and in different, geographic areas, and provides new data on the prevalence of the Dal blood group in Italy and Spain. There was no significant difference (P=0.8409) between prevalence of Dal negative blood types found in our population (2.2%) and the prevalence reported in a canine blood donor population from the USA (2.5%). Our study identified Dal negative dogs in a previously tested breed i.e. Doberman Pinschers, but also the Cane Corso breed was found to have Dal negative dogs