The Florida Room

Alexandra T. Vazquez listens to the music and history of Miami to explore the city’s sonic cultures and its material and social realities

The Wonder of Delays

Let’s get to, and celebrate loud and now, the raptor-like intensity of not being distracted that is Licia Fiol-Matta’s The Great Woman Singer. By creating the complex badass ensemble of Myrta Silva, Ruth Fernandez, La Calandria, and Lucecita, Fiol-Matta asks us: what if we start here? What if we begin with the presumption of women’s musical activity rather than from that shorthanded place of negation? A place that doesn’t begin with how women entered, but made possible, the larger musical scene. This place, the beautiful migrant non-place of this book, goes straight for the historical fact of women in music, but also suggests how criticism (as a whole) has never been able to make this presumption ordinary to talk about them in a sustained, rather than corrective way. What links these performers is their multi-decade careers—which means that we get to follow them from girlhood to golden age. The robust longevity of these musicians, of women who made and make things in colonial modernity, suggests that we have to refigure just about everything that we think we know about the culture industry. Of the wonder of Lucecita and her bendy artistry of the mid-1960s, Fiol-Matta writes: “She had arrived at the scene, but she could not be interpreted yet” (184). I love this delay that the author leaves for herself and for all us here to say: these musicians require time and new words and worlds

The Florida Room

Alexandra T. Vazquez listens to the music and history of Miami to explore the city’s sonic cultures and its material and social realities

The Florida room

Alexandra T. Vazquez listens to the music and history of Miami to explore the city’s sonic cultures and its material and social realities

The Structure of Liquid and Amorphous Hafnia.

Understanding the atomic structure of amorphous solids is important in predicting and tuning their macroscopic behavior. Here, we use a combination of high-energy X-ray diffraction, neutron diffraction, and molecular dynamics simulations to benchmark the atomic interactions in the high temperature stable liquid and low-density amorphous solid states of hafnia. The diffraction results reveal an average Hf-O coordination number of ~7 exists in both the liquid and amorphous nanoparticle forms studied. The measured pair distribution functions are compared to those generated from several simulation models in the literature. We have also performed ab initio and classical molecular dynamics simulations that show density has a strong effect on the polyhedral connectivity. The liquid shows a broad distribution of Hf-Hf interactions, while the formation of low-density amorphous nanoclusters can reproduce the sharp split peak in the Hf-Hf partial pair distribution function observed in experiment. The agglomeration of amorphous nanoparticles condensed from the gas phase is associated with the formation of both edge-sharing and corner-sharing HfO6,7 polyhedra resembling that observed in the monoclinic phase

Embedding Information Literacy Skills in Undergraduate Research Studies

In any academic context, when one mentions the term research, students immediately panic and assume this research is something they cannot do under any circumstances. This response seems fairly common among students new to undergraduate and graduate level research. The tendency on the part of the students is to make this a daunting project, impossible to complete. The faculty leaders know how to conduct research. The goal is to describe the research steps, have students practice each step, and then have them build their research work in stages. Collaboration between and among faculty in exploring and teaching research tools helped us develop a road map for students. To implement this approach to teaching research, we developed a collaborative partnership, exploring research skills that worked, refining our teaching approaches, and establishing a guided student practice component. After several years of an informal relationship, linking academic librarianship to education programs, our collaboration moved to a more formalized relationship with the permanent assignment of faculty librarian, as liaison to the School of Education graduate students. Community interest in having university students research locally based projects helped strengthen this connection. Now in our sixth year, the collaborative relationship has produced a level of improved scholarship in student research, with increased student understanding of academic research explorations linked to their own research focus. Additionally, students have improved in scholarly writing and citation skills application in their written work. Student improvement in research and writing skills is reflected in the increased number of students whose work is accepted by Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) and by professional conferences for inclusion in presentations. Systematic data collection on the effect of this collaboration needs further documentation. Persuading students of the importance of producing scholarly work has not been easily achieved. Yet, in a time where documentation is essential, we had to move students in this direction to increase their understanding and appreciation of professional research and writing. The effort continues each semester. The purpose of this article is to describe in brief the steps taken over the last six years while moving toward developing student understanding and application of the research process on their individual master’s theses. The particular focus is on assisting students in locating scholarly material in building their review of the literature as part of the graduate thesis

Las presas y los caminos del agua en Alqueva

Comunicación presentada al XXXVII Congreso Nacional de Riegos, celebrado en Don Benito del 4 al 6 de Junio de 2019 y organizada por la Asociación Española de Riegos y Drenajes y la Universidad de ExtremaduraLa presa de Alqueva, situada en el río Guadiana, en pleno Alentejo, permite crear uno embalse que, con sus 4150 hm3, se constituye como el gran origen de agua del Emprendimiento. La presa de Pedrógão, aguas abajo, crea el embalse que es el contra embalse de Alqueva. El sistema hidráulico constituido por estas dos presas es el núcleo base del Emprendimiento y la reserva estratégica de agua de la región. En su gestión integrada, se apoya el riego de 120 000 ha, el suministro público e industrial y la producción de hidroenergía de la región y el turismo. Este Emprendimiento es un instrumento fundamental para el desarrollo sostenible de la Región- teniendo asociados verdaderos nuevos caminos para el agua, materializados por grandes canales y tuberías, pero que también integran un conjunto importante de otras presas, que permiten captar los recursos hídricos locales y regularizar y derivar los caudales necesarios a los diversos beneficios del Emprendimiento. La existencia de buenas áreas agrícolas, anejas y sin restricciones ambientales significativas, el gran interés de los agricultores y asociaciones locales y la disponibilidad creada por el menor consumo de agua han creado las condiciones básicas para el incremento de las áreas beneficiadas. Además, se verificó la necesidad urgente de interconectar Alqueva con otras presas de la región. En el artículo se hace la sistematización de la información fundamental de este conjunto de presas y se discute su papel como elemento de la gestión optimizada del EFMA y de creación de disponibilidades hídricas que han permitido las nuevas áreas de riego de Alqueva

A well-conserved Plasmodium falciparum var gene shows an unusual stage-specific transcript pattern

The var multicopy gene family encodes Plasmodium falciparum erythrocyte membrane protein 1 (PfEMP1) variant antigens, which, through their ability to adhere to a variety of host receptors, are thought to be important virulence factors. The predominant expression of a single cytoadherent PfEMP1 type on an infected red blood cell, and the switching between different PfEMP1 types to evade host protective antibody responses, are processes thought to be controlled at the transcriptional level. Contradictory data have been published on the timing of var gene transcription. Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) data suggested that transcription of the predominant var gene occurs in the later (pigmented trophozoite) stages, whereas Northern blot data indicated such transcripts only in early (ring) stages. We investigated this discrepancy by Northern blot, with probes covering a diverse var gene repertoire. We confirm that almost all var transcript types were detected only in ring stages. However, one type, the well-conserved varCSA transcript, was present constitutively in different laboratory parasites and does not appear to undergo antigenic variation. Although varCSA has been shown to encode a chondroitin sulphate A (CSA)-binding PfEMP1, we find that the presence of full-length varCSA transcripts does not correlate with the CSA-binding phenotype

Epistatic control of intrinsic resistance by virulence genes in <i>Listeria</i>

<div><p>Elucidating the relationships between antimicrobial resistance and virulence is key to understanding the evolution and population dynamics of resistant pathogens. Here, we show that the susceptibility of the gram-positive bacterium <i>Listeria monocytogenes</i> to the antibiotic fosfomycin is a complex trait involving interactions between resistance and virulence genes and the environment. We found that a FosX enzyme encoded in the listerial core genome confers intrinsic fosfomycin resistance to both pathogenic and non-pathogenic <i>Listeria</i> spp. However, in the genomic context of the pathogenic <i>L</i>. <i>monocytogenes</i>, FosX-mediated resistance is epistatically suppressed by two members of the PrfA virulence regulon, <i>hpt</i> and <i>prfA</i>, which upon activation by host signals induce increased fosfomycin influx into the bacterial cell. Consequently, in infection conditions, most <i>L</i>. <i>monocytogenes</i> isolates become susceptible to fosfomycin despite possessing a gene that confers high-level resistance to the drug. Our study establishes the molecular basis of an epistatic interaction between virulence and resistance genes controlling bacterial susceptibility to an antibiotic. The reported findings provide the rationale for the introduction of fosfomycin in the treatment of <i>Listeria</i> infections even though these bacteria are intrinsically resistant to the antibiotic <i>in vitro</i>.</p></div

Structural variability of E. coli thioredoxin captured in the crystal structures of single-point mutants

Thioredoxin is a ubiquitous small protein that catalyzes redox reactions of protein thiols. Additionally, thioredoxin from E. coli (EcTRX) is a widely-used model for structure-function studies. In a previous paper, we characterized several single-point mutants of the C-terminal helix (CTH) that alter global stability of EcTRX. However, spectroscopic signatures and enzymatic activity for some of these mutants were found essentially unaffected. A comprehensive structural characterization at the atomic level of these near-invariant mutants can provide detailed information about structural variability of EcTRX. We address this point through the determination of the crystal structures of four point-mutants, whose mutations occurs within or near the CTH, namely L94A, E101G, N106A and L107A. These structures are mostly unaffected compared with the wild-type variant. Notably, the E101G mutant presents a large region with two alternative traces for the backbone of the same chain. It represents a significant shift in backbone positions. Enzymatic activity measurements and conformational dynamics studies monitored by NMR and molecular dynamic simulations show that E101G mutation results in a small effect in the structural features of the protein. We hypothesize that these alternative conformations represent samples of the native-state ensemble of EcTRX, specifically the magnitude and location of conformational heterogeneity.Fil: Noguera, Martín Ezequiel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas "Prof. Alejandro C. Paladini". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Vazquez, Diego Sebastian. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas "Prof. Alejandro C. Paladini". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Ferrer Sueta, Gerardo. Universidad de la República; UruguayFil: Agudelo Suarez, William Armando. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas "Prof. Alejandro C. Paladini". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Howard, Eduardo Ignacio. Université de Strasbourg; Francia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Rasia, Rodolfo Maximiliano. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Rosario. Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Rosario. Universidad Nacional de Rosario. Facultad de Ciencias Bioquímicas y Farmacéuticas. Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Rosario; ArgentinaFil: Manta, Bruno. Universidad de la República; UruguayFil: Cousido Siah, Alexandra. Université de Strasbourg; FranciaFil: Mitschler, André. Université de Strasbourg; FranciaFil: Podjarny, Alberto Daniel. Université de Strasbourg; FranciaFil: Santos, Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas "Prof. Alejandro C. Paladini". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas; Argentin