Identificada una molècula que facilitaria l'acció dels antifúngics

A causa de la similitud entre certes proteïnes dels fongs patògens i d'altres humanes, els medicaments antifúngics actuals solen estar dirigits contra característiques que estan presents en els fongs patògens i absents en els éssers humans. Un estudi ha identificat una molècula que afecta les proteïnes fúngiques però no les seves similars humanes, obrint així la possibilitat de desenvolupar fàrmacs amb suficient especificitat com per no provocar efectes secundaris indesitjats en els pacients.Debido a la similitud entre ciertas proteínas de los hongos patógenos y otras humanas, los medicamentos antifúngicos actuales suelen estar dirigidos contra características que están presentes en los hongos patógenos y ausentes en los seres humanos. Un estudio ha identificado una molécula que afecta a las proteínas fúngicas pero no a sus similares humanas, abriendo así la posibilidad de desarrollar fármacos con suficiente especificidad como para no provocar efectos secundarios indeseados en los pacientes.Due to the similarity of certain proteins from pathogenic fungi and human proteins, current antifungals are usually directed to characteristics that are present in the pathogen but absent in humans. A study has identified a molecule that affects fungal proteins but not their human counterparts, thus opening the possibility of developing drugs with sufficient specificity as to not cause unwanted side effects in patients

El rol desempeñado por el intérprete judicial en la organización del diálogo entre las partes en procedimientos judiciales penales

Este artículo versa sobre la práctica de la interpretación judicial en procedimientos penales. En él se pretende estudiar el rol que desempeña el intérprete en la organización del diálogo entre las partes presentes en la sede judicial. Lógicamente, el papel del intérprete no reemplaza la labor del juez (autoridad judicial), pero sí sirve para organizar los tiempos y facilitar la fluidez de la comunicación en contexto judicial.G.I. HUM 767 (ayudas a Grupos de Investigación de la Junta de Andalucía) / Editorial Comares (colección interlingua

How long is now?: extravíos berlineses (1993-2015)

Resumen: Tejiendo ficción y narrativa autobiográfica vuelco en este texto las experiencias de una cubana que en la década del noventa pudo al fin viajar al extranjero y conocer otras realidades. Las controvertidas emociones que desata en la protagonista de veinte años vivir junto a su amante los primeros tiempos de la reunificación entre el Este y el Oeste, tras la Caída del Muro de Berlín, es lo que intento trasmitir con este texto. Se enfrentan aquí, a través de la sutileza de las emociones, las carencias del Período Especial y el inmovilismo político mantenidos en Cuba tras el colapso del sistema socialista, con los cambios que dicho colapso provocó en Europa del Este. Traigo entonces la vivencia de una encrucijada de diversas historias con La Historia. Es lectura triste porque arrastra todo lo que nunca se tuvo, fuese la sociedad perfecta prometida en slogans y discursos, o el amor insostenible, imposible entre tanta incertidumbre y olvido.Abstract: This is not an academic essay but a text combining fiction and autobiographic notes. Here, I transmit the experiences of a Cuban woman who traveled abroad for the first time in 1993, when she and her East-German lover intended –unsuccessfully- to live together in the recently reunified Berlin. Through the subtlety of emotion, the reader will follow the confrontations between the Cuban woman, who after the collapse of the socialist system experienced Special Period’s scarcity and political stagnation in her island, and the German young man who is suddenly constraint to reorganize his life under the new capitalist order established with the reunification. This is thus a sad tale of the encounter of intimate stories with History.

Female old age in historical perspective: Vetulae of ancient Rome

Las sociedades humanas tienden a dividir el ciclo vital en varias etapas según criterios culturales concretos. En la antigua Roma, al igual que en las sociedades occidentales actuales, la etapa que precede a la muerte del sujeto, parte de la edad adulta pero al mismo tiempo distinta a ésta, era la vejez. La ancianidad ha sido tradicionalmente silenciados en los trabajos historiográficos sobre la Antigüedad, los cuales han tenido como protagonista al hombre adulto, especialmente el perteneciente a la élite. Si bien en las últimas décadas han proliferado las investigaciones relativas a otros sujetos históricos, como las mujeres o los individuos infantiles, no ocurre lo mismo con la vejez, sobre todo en el caso de las vetulae. El objetivo del presente artículo es subrayar la importancia de la vetula como sujeto histórico, presentar las diversas fuentes a través de las cuales podemos acceder a su conocimiento, y definir qué era en época romana la vejez femenina.Human societies tend to divide the life cycle into several stages according to specific cultural criteria. In ancient Rome, as in contemporary Western societies, the stage that precedes death, part of adulthood but at the same time different from it, was old age. Traditionally elders have been silenced in the historiographical works about Antiquity, which have the adult man, especially the one belonging to the elite, as the main subject. Even if the investigations about other historical agents, such as women or children, have proliferated in recent decades, it is not the case of old age, especially of vetulae. In this paper we highlight the importance of the vetula as a historical subject, we present various sources through which we can know them, and we define what female old age was in ancient Rome

El riure a Les dones i els dies, de Gabriel Ferrater

Treballs Finals de Grau de Filologia Catalana, Facultat de Filologia, Universitat de Barcelona, Curs: 2016-2017, Tutors: Joan Santanach Suñol i Josep Murgades BarcelóAquest treball estudia la relació que hi ha entre el fenomen del riure a Les dones i els dies, de Gabriel Ferrater, i la seva poètica. En una primera part, es valoren les diferents concepcions que ha rebut l’obra de l’autor; es considera la més adequada la de “poesia de la consciència”, i es justifica i s’argumenta. En una segona part, es fa una anàlisi aprofundida sobre els poemes en què apareix el riure pel que fa a l’efecte còmic que generen i pel que fa a les funcions del riure dels personatges que hi apareixen; es té en compte el marc poètic en què s’enquadren els textos i quin paper hi juga la veu poètica

Understanding the relationship between local environmental changes and the function of the pH Low Insertion Peptide

Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the US with over 1.7 million new cases each year. Current cancer treatments tend to also target healthy tissues due to similarities with cancerous ones, resulting in acute side effects. Early detection is the best approach towards defeating cancer, however, modern imaging techniques require sizeable samples, often implying a late stage in the disease. One common attribute of tumors is their acidic microenvironment, which can be taken advantage of. The pH Low Insertion Peptide (pHLIP) is a membrane-active peptide that can take advantage of the acidic microenvironment surrounding cancer cells. pHLIP can spontaneously fold and insert unidirectionally as a transmembrane into lipid membranes under acidic conditions. Thus, pHLIP is able to transport drugs across cancerous membranes and deliver it to the interior of the cell. Although the mechanism of insertion and exit of the peptide has been thoroughly studied through experimental and computational approaches, there are still elements of the peptide and its behavior that are not fully understood. This dissertation focuses on all-atoms molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to study the interactions between pHLIP and its environmental factors. Through High Performance Computing (HPC) at West Virginia University (WVU), we were able to map the initial stages of exit of pHLIP, determine the effect of peptide insertion on the dynamics of a complex lipid bilayer and provide new insights into the environmental factors affecting pHLIP in solution. The results reported in this dissertation will aid the future development of pHLIP-based early detection and targeting agents

Habitat-Associated Phylogenetic Community Patterns of Microbial Ammonia Oxidizers.

9 páginas, 6 figuras.Microorganisms mediating ammonia oxidation play a fundamental role in the connection between biological nitrogen fixation and anaerobic nitrogen losses. Bacteria and Archaea ammonia oxidizers (AOB and AOA, respectively) have colonized similar habitats worldwide. Ammonia oxidation is the rate-limiting step in nitrification, and the ammonia monooxygenase (Amo) is the key enzyme involved. The molecular ecology of this process has been extensively explored by surveying the gene of the subunit A of the Amo (amoA gene). In the present study, we explored the phylogenetic community ecology of AOB and AOA, analyzing 5776 amoA gene sequences from .300 isolation sources, and clustering habitats by environmental ontologies. As a whole, phylogenetic richness was larger in AOA than in AOB, and sediments contained the highest phylogenetic richness whereas marine plankton the lowest. We also observed that freshwater ammonia oxidizers were phylogenetically richer than their marine counterparts. AOA communities were more dissimilar to each other than those of AOB, and consistent monophyletic lineages were observed for sediments, soils, and marine plankton in AOA but not in AOB. The diversification patterns showed a more constant cladogenesis through time for AOB whereas AOA apparently experienced two fast diversification events separated by a long steady-state episode. The diversification rate (c statistic) for most of the habitats indicated cAOA . cAOB. Soil and sediment experienced earlier bursts of diversification whereas habitats usually eutrophic and rich in ammonium such as wastewater and sludge showed accelerated diversification rates towards the present. Overall, this work shows for the first time a global picture of the phylogenetic community structure of both AOB and AOA assemblages following the strictest analytical standards, and provides an ecological view on the differential evolutionary paths experienced by widespread ammonia-oxidizing microorganisms. The emerged picture of AOB and AOA distribution in different habitats provides a new view to understand the ecophysiology of ammonia oxidizers on Earth.This work was funded by grants PIRENA CGL2009-13318-CO2-01/BOS, and CONSOLIDER-INGENIO 2010 project GRACCIE CSD2007-00067 from the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovacio´n (MICINN), and project GECA 2009SGR361 from Generalitat de Catalunya to JC. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.Peer reviewe

High genetic diversity and high novelty in planktonic protists inhabiting inland and coastal high salinity water bodies

10 páginas, 5 figuras, 1 tabla.We analyzed the genetic diversity (18S rRNA gene) of planktonic microbial eukaryotes in 34 different coastal and inland saline ponds. A wide range of environmental conditions was covered with up to 30-fold differences in salinity concentrations (12.5–384 g L−1), and in situ temperatures (1.3–37.5 °C), and three orders of magnitude in the trophic status (i.e. chlorophyll a 50 mg L−1). Geographically distant sites were studied with contrasting salt origins, and different temporal patterns of wetting and drying. The genetic diversity was high, far beyond the few groups traditionally considered as high salinity-adapted, with sequences spread throughout eight high-rank taxonomic groups and 27 eukaryal classes. The novelty level was extremely high, with 10% of the whole dataset showing 6.5% salinity). Overall, this study shows important gaps in the current knowledge about protists inhabiting continental (hyper)saline water bodies, highlighting the need for future, more detailed investigations.This research was funded with the projects MONEGROS CGL2004-22780-E and DARKNESS CGL2012-32747 to E.O.C. from the Spanish Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad.Peer reviewe