50 aniversario de la Escuela Diocesana de Asistentes Sociales de Valencia

El artículo resume los recuerdos y vivencias de este grupo de profesionales en el 50 aniversario del inicio de la Escuela, que se celebró en el Col-legi Oficial de Diplomats en Treball Social i Assistents Socials de Valencia.The article sums up the memories and experiences of this group of professionals at the 50th Anniversary of the school's founding, which was held at the Col-legi Oficial de Diplomats en Treball Social i Assistents Socials de Valencia

L'India nell'immaginario occidentale

[À l'origine dans / Was originally part of : Thèses et mémoires - FAS - Département de littérature comparée]L'Inde a constitué un lieu de voyage pour beaucoup d`écrivains occidentaux, en particulier, pendant les années 60-70, pour cinq intelllectuels éuropéens et americains, qui ont voyagé et écrit différents textes. Pasolini, Moravia, Paz, Ginsberg et Duras ont parlé de l'Inde en utilisant différents languages pour décrire leur réncontre avec l'Autre au délà des catégories binaires occidentales.India in the 60 and 70 has been the destination of the journey of five European and American writers who have stayed and wrote about it. Pasolini, Moravia, Ginsberg, Paz and Duras wrote of India using different languages from the travel documents, to the notes, to the essay, to the diaries up to the cinematic language. They described their encounter with the Other trying to go over the exotic stereotypes of western discourse into a space opaque and fragmented.L’India ha costituito negli anni sessanta e settanta la destinazione dela viaggio di cinque scrittori europei e american che vi hanno soggiornato e ne hanno scritto. Pasolini, Moravia, Ginsberg, Paz e Duras hanno scritto dell’India e sull’India usando linguaggi diversi che vanno dal racconto di viaggio agli appunti al diario al saggio fino ad arrivare al linguaggio cinematografico. Attraverso questi multiformi linguaggi essi descrivono il loro incontro con l’Altro andando al di là dello stereotipo e delle categorie binarie del pensiero occidentale, captando l’Altro attraverso un discorso che diventa opaco e frammentario

DIRAC framework evaluation for the Fermi\boldsymbol{Fermi}-LAT and CTA experiments

DIRAC (Distributed Infrastructure with Remote Agent Control) is a general framework for the management of tasks over distributed heterogeneous computing environments. It has been originally developed to support the production activities of the LHCb (Large Hadron Collider Beauty) experiment and today is extensively used by several particle physics and biology communities. Current ($Fermi$ Large Area Telescope -- LAT) and planned (Cherenkov Telescope Array -- CTA) new generation astrophysical/cosmological experiments, with very large processing and storage needs, are currently investigating the usability of DIRAC in this context. Each of these use cases has some peculiarities: $Fermi$-LAT will interface DIRAC to its own workflow system to allow the access to the grid resources, while CTA is using DIRAC as workflow management system for Monte Carlo production and analysis on the grid. We describe the prototype effort that we lead toward deploying a DIRAC solution for some aspects of $Fermi$-LAT and CTA needs.Comment: proceedings to CHEP 2013 conference : http://www.chep2013.org

Structural Characterization of Surfactant-Coated Bimetallic Cobalt/Nickel Nanoclusters by XPS, EXAFS, WAXS, and SAXS

Cobalt nickel bimetallic nanoparticles were synthesized by changing the sequence of the chemical reduction of Co(II) and Ni(II) ions confined in the core of bis(2-ethylhexyl)phosphate (2)., and Ni(DEHP)(2). The reduction was carried out by mixing, sequentially or contemporaneously, fixed amounts of n-heptane solution of Co(DEHP)2 and Ni(DEHP)2 micelles with a solution of sodium borohydride in ethanol at a fixed (reductant)/(total metal) molar ratio. This procedure involves the rapid formation of surfactant-coated nanoparticles, indicated as Co/Ni (Co after Ni), Ni/Co (Ni after Co), and Co + Ni (simultaneous), followed by their slow separation as nanostructures embedded in a sodium bis(2-ethylhexyl)phosphate matrix. The resulting composites, together with those obtained by reducing the n-heptane solutions of pure Co(DEHP)(2) or Ni(DEHP)(2), were characterized by XPS, EXAFS, WAXS, and SAXS. The data analysis confirms the presence of nanometer-sized surfactant-coated cobalt, nickel, and cobalt/nickel particles. As expected, the composition and internal structure of cobalt/nickel bimetallic nanoparticles are influenced by the preparation sequence as well as by the "chemical affinity" between the surfactant and the metal. However, some atomic-scale physicochemical processes play a subtle role in determining the structural features of bimetallic nanoparticles. Further effects due to the competition between nanoparticle growing process and surfactant adsorption at the nanoparticle surface were observed

Perhexiline maleate enhances antitumor efficacy of cisplatin in neuroblastoma by inducing over-expression of NDM29 ncRNA

High Risk Neuroblastoma (HR-NB) is a pediatric cancer characterized by high malignancy and remarkable cell heterogeneity within the tumour nodules. In a recent study, we demonstrated that in vitro and in vivo over-expression of the non-coding RNA NDM29 (neuroblastoma differentiation marker 29) induces NB cell differentiation, dramatically reducing their malignancy. Among gene expression changes, differentiated phenotype induced by NDM29 is characterized by decrease of the expression of ABC transporters responsible for anticancer drug resistance. Thus, the pharmacological induction of NDM29, in principle, might represent a possible novel strategy to increase cytotoxic drug responses. In this work, we identify a small molecule able to induce the expression of NDM29 in NB cells, conferring to malignant cells increased susceptibility to cisplatin cytotoxic effects. We demonstrate that the pharmacological induction of NDM29 expression in vivo enhances the antitumoral effects of chemotherapy specifically on tumour initiating/cancer stem cells sub-population, usually refractory to therapies and responsible for tumour relapse. In summary, we suggest a novel therapeutical approach possibly useful to treat very aggressive NB cases with poor prognosis. This novel pharmacological strategy aims to promote differentiation of "stem-like" cells to render them more susceptible to the killing action of cytotoxic anticancer drugs

Cell-to-cell communication within the neurovascular unit (NVU) in a model of cerebral cortex demyelination

The concept of neurovascular unit (NVU) emphasizes the critical role of cell-to-cell interaction and communication between glial, neuronal, and vascular cell components during blood-brain barrier (BBB) development, and in adult normal and pathological conditions. In this study we have analysed the involvement of the nerve glial antigen 2, NG2, a chondroitin sulphate proteoglycan, highly expressed in developing and adult CNS, in cell cross-talk within the NVU. During CNS development NG2 is expressed by activated pericyte and appears downregulated as these cells undergo terminal differentiation. NG2 has also been identified on the surface of oligodendrocyte precursor cells, OPCs, evenly distributed throughout the CNS already by the end of the first postnatal week in mice and throughout adulthood. In a previous study on cerebral cortex experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) in mice, we firstly observed and described the glia-limitans-like position of NG2-bearing OPCs that during neuroinflammation extend processes to the pial surface and acquire a perivascular arrangement, coming in contact with the wall of EAE cortex microvessels. With the aim of understanding if a subset of OPCs specifically contributes to the cell composition of the NVU during EAE, we have explored, by morphometric analyses applied to laser confocal microscopy, OPCs distribution and vascular relationships in the cerebral cortex of WT controls and naïve NG2KO and in EAE WT and EAE NG2KO mice, at both early (20 dpi) and late (40 dpi) disease stages. In EAE WT mice, juxtavascular (JV) and perivascular (PV) OPCs were identified in a higher number compared to healthy mice. On the contrary, absence of NG2 in EAE NG2 KO mice seemed to affect the proliferative response of OPCs, specifically inhibiting the emergence of the JV and PV OPC subsets. The results indicate that in WT mice during EAE, the NVU microenvironment, classically formed by perivascular astrocytes, receives the insertion of OPCs as a specific vascular subset and suggest NG2 as the molecule involved in the observed NVU damage

Superoxide is a mediator of an altruistic aging program in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Aging is believed to be a nonadaptive process that escapes the force of natural selection. Here, we challenge this dogma by showing that yeast laboratory strains and strains isolated from grapes undergo an age- and pH-dependent death with features of mammalian programmed cell death (apoptosis). After 90–99% of the population dies, a small mutant subpopulation uses the nutrients released by dead cells to grow. This adaptive regrowth is inversely correlated with protection against superoxide toxicity and life span and is associated with elevated age-dependent release of nutrients and increased mutation frequency. Computational simulations confirm that premature aging together with a relatively high mutation frequency can result in a major advantage in adaptation to changing environments. These results suggest that under conditions that model natural environments, yeast organisms undergo an altruistic and premature aging and death program, mediated in part by superoxide. The role of similar pathways in the regulation of longevity in organisms ranging from yeast to mice raises the possibility that mammals may also undergo programmed aging

Radiogenomica dell'adenocarcinoma duttale del Pancreas

Il tumore del pancreas ha una prognosi molto sfavorevole e il suo istotipo più frequente è l'adenocarcinoma duttale pancreatico (PDAC). Ci sono alcuni geni spesso mutati nella cancerogenesi del PDAC: KRAS, CDKN2a/INK4a, TP53 e DPC4/SMAD4. Lo scopo del nostro studio è trovare correlazioni tra parametri di texture analysis di TC e RM con i diversi geni mutati nel PDAC, in particolare con l'espressione di KRAS e TP53

First human case of Usutu virus neuroinvasive infection, Italy, August-September 2009.

We report the first worldwide case of Usutu virus (USUV) neuroinvasive infection in a patient with diffuse large B cell lymphoma who presented with fever and neurological symptoms and was diagnosed with meningoencephalitits. The cerebrospinal fluid was positive for USUV, and USUV was also demonstrated in serum and plasma samples by RT-PCR and sequencing. Partial sequences of the premembrane and NS5 regions of the viral genome were similar to the USUV Vienna and Budapest isolates

Análisis de condicionantes ambientales para la planificación integrada del entorno del aeropuerto internacional Córdoba, Argentina

La integración planificada de un aeropuerto con su entorno es una preocupación creciente a nivel local, dada la continua demanda de conectividad de las sociedades modernas, los cambios en las expectativas de los ciudadanos circundantes y el aumento de sus intereses por los aspectos ambientales. Dicha planificación se encuentra condicionada por ciertos factores inherentes a la actividad aeronáutica, vinculados a los aspectos ambientales derivados de esta actividad, como son la generación de ruido y de emisiones gaseosas, y las limitaciones al dominio. Asimismo, se encuentra restringida por el grado de aceptación social de las comunidades respecto a la actividad aeroportuaria. En este trabajo se abordó el análisis de los distintos condicionantes ambientales para la planificación integrada del entorno del Aeropuerto Internacional Ingeniero Aeronáutico Ambrosio B. Taravella, Córdoba, Argentina mediante metodologías innovadoras, y se exploró una estrategia de comunicación de los impactos de la actividad de este aeropuerto a las partes interesadas, con vistas a generar un proceso multi-actoral de planificación del entorno