Envolvimento docente na utilização de ferramentas digitais em salas de aula de conservatórios, escolas municipais e universidades

The paper’s objective is to depict the current situation regarding the use of digital tools on the part of musical education teachers and students to teach and learn music. The research tool used is a questionnaire designed and validated psychometrically by the authors, focusing on eight types of technological musical tools. The questionnaire was distributed through social networks, providing a valid sample of 274 participants in Spain. The analysis of the results reveals very little knowl edge regarding digital tools for present-day musical education. It also highlights that the age of the participants does not correlate with the type of technological resources used in classrooms, leading to the conclusion that said resources are not a factor that impede acquisition of digital competence. However, substantial differences are observed depending on the sample’s professional profile. This study intensifies the need to provide training solutions in order to improve the quality of music education systems.O objetivo do artigo é descrever a situação atual no que diz respeito à utilização de ferramentas digitais por parte de professores e alunos de educação musical para ensinar e aprender música. O instrumento de investigação utilizado é um questionário concebido e validado psicometricamente pelos autores, que incide sobre oito tipos de instrumentos musicais tecnológicos. O questionário foi distribuído através das redes sociais, o que permitiu obter uma amostra válida de 274 participantes em Espanha. A análise dos resultados revela um conhecimento muito reduzido das ferramentas digitais para a educação musical atual. Salienta também que a idade dos participantes não está correlacionada com o tipo de recursos tecnológicos utilizados nas salas de aula, o que permite concluir que esses recursos não são um fator que impeça a aquisição de competências digitais. No entanto, observam-se diferenças substanciais em função do perfil profissional da amostra. Este estudo reforça a necessidade de encontrar soluções de formação para melhorar a qualidade dos sistemas de ensino da músic

Resiliencia del profesorado de Música chileno en el contexto de pandemia de COVID-19

El presente artículo pretende dar a conocer cómo ha afectado el contexto de pandemia por COVID-19 las condiciones laborales y personales del profesorado de Música en Chile. Durante el primer año de esta pandemia, se consultó a 154 docentes de Música sobre su situación personal y profesional con el objetivo de conocer cómo estaban enfrentando el contexto educativo a distancia. Los datos recopilados y contrastados con la bibliografía consultada, permiten observar no solo una modificación y reinvención de sus prácticas educativas, sino además una importante capacidad de reinvención, de automotivación y de salir adelante. Estas capacidades se engloban en el concepto de resiliencia. Todo lo observado permite sentar las bases de una educación musical contextualizada y con la capacidad de adaptarse a la realidad y los continuos cambios que esta presenta, y donde el rol de la educación musical dentro del currículum se torna a su vez mas importante y significativo, tanto para el estudiantado, así como también para el propio desarrollo curricular del sistema educativ

Evaluación de la viabilidad del uso de los métodos de valoración económico-ambiental en un contexto espacial

Los métodos de valoración económico-ambiental son herramientas útiles de cara a la integración objetiva de los tres aspectos del territorio: ecológico, económico y social. Basándose en las reglas de mercado valoran en unidades monetarias los tres aspectos, para así hacerlos comparables tanto en el espacio como en el tiempo. Sin embargo sus resultados, hasta el momento apenas han podido ser cartografiados y, por tanto, no han sido utilizados en la planificación en un contexto espacial. El presente artículo trata de evaluar cuáles son las principales causas de que ocurra esta situación de incompatibilidad entre los métodos y su aplicación espacial, así como las posibilidades de adaptación que permitirían solventarla. Las estimaciones de valor de no-uso, o de los aspectos no tangibles como la conservación para las generaciones futuras de una determinada especie no pueden ser cartografiadas salvo quizá a una escala global. Otros aspectos ambientales podrían ser cartografiados con adaptaciones concretas que aún están por desarrollar.The economic-environmental valuation methods are useful tools to achieve the integration of the three aspects on spatial planning: ecological, economic and social. They value the three aspects in monetary units, following the market rules, to make them comparable as much spatially as temporally. However, their results cannot be mapped at now, and therefore they cannot be used in the planning in a spatial context. This paper evaluates themain causes of the incompatibility between themethods and its spatial application, as well as the possibilities of adaptation that would allow over it. Currently, estimations of no-use value, non-tangible aspects, as the preservation for the future generations of certain species, cannot be mapped except maybe in a globe scale. However, other environmental aspects could be mapped with certain adaptations that are still to be developed

Structure-Based Design of an RNase Chimera for Antimicrobial Therapy

Altres ajuts: Fundació La Marató de TV3/TV3-201803-10Bacterial resistance to antibiotics urges the development of alternative therapies. Based on the structure-function of antimicrobial members of the RNase A superfamily, we have developed a hybrid enzyme. Within this family, RNase 1 exhibits the highest catalytic activity and the lowest cytotoxicity; in contrast, RNase 3 shows the highest bactericidal action, alas with a reduced catalytic activity. Starting from both parental proteins, we designed a first RNase 3/1-v1 chimera. The construct had a catalytic activity much higher than RNase 3, unfortunately without reaching an equivalent antimicrobial activity. Thus, two new versions were created with improved antimicrobial properties. Both of these versions (RNase 3/1-v2 and -v3) incorporated an antimicrobial loop characteristic of RNase 3, while a flexible RNase 1-specific loop was removed in the latest construct. RNase 3/1-v3 acquired both higher antimicrobial and catalytic activities than previous versions, while retaining the structural determinants for interaction with the RNase inhibitor and displaying non-significant cytotoxicity. Following, we tested the constructs' ability to eradicate macrophage intracellular infection and observed an enhanced ability in both RNase 3/1-v2 and v3. Interestingly, the inhibition of intracellular infection correlates with the variants' capacity to induce autophagy. We propose RNase 3/1-v3 chimera as a promising lead for applied therapeutics

Magnetite Nanoparticles Functionalized with RNases against Intracellular Infection of Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Altres ajuts: Fundació La Marató de TV3/20180310Current treatments against bacterial infections have severe limitations, mainly due to the emergence of resistance to conventional antibiotics. In the specific case of Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains, they have shown a number of resistance mechanisms to counter most antibiotics. Human secretory RNases from the RNase A superfamily are proteins involved in a wide variety of biological functions, including antimicrobial activity. The objective of this work was to explore the intracellular antimicrobial action of an RNase 3/1 hybrid protein that combines RNase 1 high catalytic and RNase 3 bactericidal activities. To achieve this, we immobilized the RNase 3/1 hybrid on Polyetheramine (PEA)-modified magnetite nanoparticles (MNPs). The obtained nanobioconjugates were tested in macrophage-derived THP-1 cells infected with Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1. The obtained results show high antimicrobial activity of the functionalized hybrid protein (MNP-RNase 3/1) against the intracellular growth of P. aeruginosa of the functionalized hybrid protein. Moreover, the immobilization of RNase 3/1 enhances its antimicrobial and cell-penetrating activities without generating any significant cell damage. Considering the observed antibacterial activity, the immobilization of the RNase A superfamily and derived proteins represents an innovative approach for the development of new strategies using nanoparticles to deliver antimicrobials that counteract P. aeruginosa intracellular infection

Common Variants in 22 Genes Regulate Response to Metformin Intervention in Children with Obesity: A Pharmacogenetic Study of a Randomized Controlled Trial

Metformin is a first-line oral antidiabetic agent that has shown additional effects in treating obesity and metabolic syndrome. Inter-individual variability in metformin response could be partially explained by the genetic component. Here, we aimed to test whether common genetic variants can predict the response to metformin intervention in obese children. The study was a multicenter and double-blind randomized controlled trial that was stratified according to sex and pubertal status in 160 children with obesity. Children were randomly assigned to receive either metformin (1g/d) or placebo for six months after meeting the defined inclusion criteria. We conducted a post hoc genotyping study in 124 individuals (59 placebo, 65 treated) comprising finally 231 genetic variants in candidate genes. We provide evidence for 28 common variants as promising pharmacogenetics regulators of metformin response in terms of a wide range of anthropometric and biochemical outcomes, including body mass index (BMI) Z-score, and glucose, lipid, and inflammatory traits. Although no association remained statistically significant after multiple-test correction, our findings support previously reported variants in metformin transporters or targets as well as identify novel and promising loci, such as the ADYC3 and the BDNF genes, with plausible biological relation to the metformin’s action mechanism. Trial Registration: Registered on the European Clinical Trials Database (EudraCT, ID: 2010-023061-21) on 14 November 2011 (URL: https://www.clinicaltrialsregister.eu/ctr-search/trial/2010-023061-21/ES).This research was funded by the Spanish Ministry of Health, Social and Equality, General Department for Pharmacy and Health Products (codes and beneficiaries: EC10-243, Ramón Cañete, Reina Sofía Hospital, Córdoba; EC10-056, Ángel Gil, University of Granada and Virgen de las Nieves University Hospital, Granada; EC10-281, Rosaura Leis, Clinic University Hospital of Santiago, Santiago de Compostela; and EC10-227, Gloria Bueno, Lozano Blesa University Clinical Hospital, Zaragoza

Impact of BCR-ABL1 Transcript Type on Response, Treatment-Free Remission Rate and Survival in Chronic Myeloid Leukemia Patients Treated with Imatinib

The most frequent BCR-ABL1-p210 transcripts in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) are e14a2 and e13a2. Imatinib (IM) is the most common first-line tyrosine-kinase inhibitor (TKI) used to treat CML. Some studies suggest that BCR-ABL1 transcript types confer different responses to IM. The objective of this study was to correlate the expression of e14a2 or e13a2 to clinical characteristics, cumulative cytogenetic and molecular responses to IM, acquisition of deep molecular response (DMR) and its duration (sDMR), progression rate (CIP), overall survival (OS), and treatment-free remission (TFR) rate. We studied 202 CML patients, 76 expressing the e13a2 and 126 the e14a2, and correlated the differential transcript expression with the above-mentioned parameters. There were no differences in the cumulative incidence of cytogenetic responses nor in the acquisition of DMR and sDMR between the two groups, but the e14a2 transcript had a positive impact on molecular response during the first 6 months, whereas the e13a2 was associated with improved long-term OS. No correlation was observed between the transcript type and TFR rate

The mitochondrial negative regulator MCJ is a therapeutic target for acetaminophen-induced liver injury

Acetaminophen (APAP) is the active component of many medications used to treat pain and fever worldwide. Its overuse provokes liver injury and it is the second most common cause of liver failure. Mitochondrial dysfunction contributes to APAP-induced liver injury but the mechanism by which APAP causes hepatocyte toxicity is not completely understood. Therefore, we lack efficient therapeutic strategies to treat this pathology. Here we show that APAP interferes with the formation of mitochondrial respiratory supercomplexes via the mitochondrial negative regulator MCJ, and leads to decreased production of ATP and increased generation of ROS. In vivo treatment with an inhibitor of MCJ expression protects liver from acetaminophen-induced liver injury at a time when N-acetylcysteine, the standard therapy, has no efficacy. We also show elevated levels of MCJ in the liver of patients with acetaminophen overdose. We suggest that MCJ may represent a therapeutic target to prevent and rescue liver injury caused by acetaminophen

Genomic mutation profile in progressive chronic lymphocytic leukemia patients prior to first-line chemoimmunotherapy with FCR and rituximab maintenance (REM)

Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia (CLL) is the most prevalent leukemia in Western countries and is notable for its variable clinical course. This variability is partly reflected by the mutational status of IGHV genes. Many CLL samples have been studied in recent years by next-generation sequencing. These studies have identified recurrent somatic mutations in NOTCH1, SF3B1, ATM, TP53, BIRC3 and others genes that play roles in cell cycle, DNA repair, RNA metabolism and splicing. In this study, we have taken a deep-targeted massive sequencing approach to analyze the impact of mutations in the most frequently mutated genes in patients with CLL enrolled in the REM (rituximab en mantenimiento) clinical trial. The mutational status of our patients with CLL, except for the TP53 gene, does not seem to affect the good results obtained with maintenance therapy with rituximab after front-line FCR treatment