A new meta-module for efficient reconfiguration of hinged-units modular robots

We present a robust and compact meta-module for edge-hinged modular robot units such as M-TRAN, SuperBot, SMORES, UBot, PolyBot and CKBot, as well as for central-point-hinged ones such as Molecubes and Roombots. Thanks to the rotational degrees of freedom of these units, the novel meta-module is able to expand and contract, as to double/halve its length in each dimension. Moreover, for a large class of edge-hinged robots the proposed meta-module also performs the scrunch/relax and transfer operations required by any tunneling-based reconfiguration strategy, such as those designed for Crystalline and Telecube robots. These results make it possible to apply efficient geometric reconfiguration algorithms to this type of robots. We prove the size of this new meta-module to be optimal. Its robustness and performance substantially improve over previous results.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Abordaje de las altas capacidades en Educación Infantil. Propuesta de intervención

Las personas con Altas Capacidades se caracterizan principalmente por presentar un cociente intelectual superior a la media, además de mostrar grandes capacidades y aptitudes en otras áreas intelectuales, como pueden ser en el razonamiento abstracto, la creatividad y la memoria. Todos estos aspectos contribuyen a que, en ocasiones, los alumnos con estas características tengan dificultades de adaptación durante su escolarización. En este sentido, es necesario dotar a este tipo de alumnado de las adaptaciones curriculares pertinentes para que así, puedan desarrollarse plenamente sus potencialidades desde la etapa de Educación Infantil. Por ello, el presente Trabajo de Fin de Grado tiene como objetivo principal la realización de una propuesta educativa que sirva para dar cabida a las necesidades de dichos estudiantes y potenciarlas desde una perspectiva lúdica y motivadora. Por esta razón, se ha llevado a cabo una revisión bibliográfica acerca del concepto de Altas Capacidades y los modelos explicativos, analizando de la misma manera sus características y los tipos de adaptaciones curriculares, existentes hoy en día en el ámbito de las altas capacidades. Partiendo de la fundamentación teórica, se desarrollará como propuesta educativa, un programa de enriquecimiento curricular, proponiendo una serie de actividades basadas en la metodología por rincones.High Capacity People characterize by presenting an Intelligence Quotient above average, in addition to showing bigger capacities and habilities in another intellectual areas as abstract reasoning, creativity and memory. All of these aspects often contribute to the difficulties in adaptation for said students during their education. In this sense, it is necessary to bestow appropriated curricular adaptation on this kind of students, so they can fully develop their potential since the infant's education stage. For that matter, the current thesis has as its main goal an educational proposal that serves the needs of such students and enhance them from a recreational and motivational perspective. For that reason, a bibliographic review of the concept of high capacities and explanatory models was conducted, analizing in the same way its features and the kind of curricular adaptations, existing nowadays in the high capacities field. On the basis of this teoretical foundation, a educational proposal as a curricular enrichment program will be developed, proposing a set of activities based on the methodology of corners.Grado en Educación Infanti

Influencias de la microbiota en el eje intestino-cerebro y el desarrollo de enfermedades

Intestino y cerebro se encuentran en constante comunicación dependiente de diferentes vías como son la señalización endocrina, nerviosa e inmune, de este diálogo también es partícipe la microbiota intestinal. Los microorganismos que habitan nuestro intestino conviven de forma simbiótica con el huésped y promueven un buen estado de salud. La composición de la microbiota intestinal se ve definida por multitud de factores, entre ellos la dieta, el consumo de antibióticos, procesos de infección, estrés, la propia genética, etc. El equilibrio entre las diferentes especies bacterianas asegura la homeostasis corporal ya que algunas bacterias participan en vías metabólicas concretas, otras aseguran un aporte vitamínico suficiente, producen AGCC relacionados con la salud, estimulan el sistema inmunitario, son capaces de metabolizar sustancias no digeribles por el huésped y previenen de la colonización por patógenos. Del mismo modo, los estados de disbiosis pueden afectar al correcto funcionamiento del organismo y se asocian al desarrollo de patologías que no solo afectan al intestino, sino que también alteran la regulación de los procesos inflamatorios por parte del sistema inmunológico y el correcto funcionamiento del sistema nervioso, entre otros efectos. Ejemplos de cómo las alteraciones en la microbiota afectan el bienestar son trastornos como la depresión, la enfermedad de Alzheimer, la enfermedad de Parkinson, el trastorno del espectro autista, la esclerosis múltiple, la enfermedad inflamatoria intestinal, el síndrome del intestino irritable y la obesidad. Aún queda mucho por descubrir acerca de cuáles son los mecanismos concretos mediante los cuales la microbiota es partícipe de este eje y del desarrollo de enfermedades, pero la evidencia actual nos da pistas bastante claras de cómo pueden darse estos efectos.Grado en Nutrición Humana y Dietétic

Maintaining protein homeostasis: early and late endosomal dual recycling for the maintenance of intracellular pools of the plasma membrane protein Chs3

[EN] The major chitin synthase activity in yeast cells, Chs3, has become a paradigm in the study of the intracellular traffic of transmembrane proteins due to its tightly regulated trafficking. This includes an efficient mechanism for the maintenance of an extensive reservoir of Chs3 at the trans-Golgi network/EE, which allows for the timely delivery of the protein to the plasma membrane. Here we show that this intracellular reservoir of Chs3 is maintained not only by its efficient AP-1-mediated recycling, but also by recycling through the retromer complex, which interacts with Chs3 at a defined region in its N-terminal cytosolic domain. Moreover, the N-terminal ubiquitination of Chs3 at the plasma membrane by Rsp5/Art4 distinctly labels the protein and regulates its retromer-mediated recycling by enabling Chs3 to be recognized by the ESCRT machinery and degraded in the vacuole. Therefore the combined action of two independent but redundant endocytic recycling mechanisms, together with distinct labels for vacuolar degradation, determines the final fate of the intracellular traffic of the Chs3 protein, allowing yeast cells to regulate morphogenesis, depending on environmental constraints

A new meta-module design for efficient reconfiguration of modular robots

This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Autonomous Robots. The final authenticated version is available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10514-021-09977-6We propose a new meta-module design for two important classes of modular robots. The new metamodule is three-dimensional, robust and compact, improving on the previously proposed one. It applies to socalled “edge-hinged” modular robot units, such as MTRAN, SuperBot, SMORES, UBot, PolyBot and CKBot, as well as to so-called “central-point-hinged” modular robot units, which include Molecubes and Roombots. The new meta-module uses the rotational degrees of freedom of these two types of robot units in order to expand and contract, as to double or halve its length in each of the two directions of its three dimensions, therefore simulating the capabilities of Crystalline and Telecube robots. Furthermore, in the edge-hinged case we prove that the novel meta-module can also perform the scrunch, relax and transfer moves that are necessary in any tunnelingbased reconfiguration algorithm for expanding/contracting modular robots such as Crystalline and Telecube. This implies that the use of meta-meta-modules is unnecessary, and that currently existing efficient reconfiguration algorithms can be applied to a much larger set of modular robots than initially intended.This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sk lodowska-Curie grant agreement No 734922. I.P. was supported by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF): W1230. V.S. and R.S. were supported by projects MINECO MTM2015-63791-R and Gen. Cat. 2017SGR1640. R.S. was also supported by MINECO through the Ram´on y Cajal program.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Assessing the natural circulation of canine vector-borne pathogens in foxes, ticks and fleas in protected areas of Argentine Patagonia with negligible dog participation

We collected blood and/or ectoparasites from 49 South American grey foxes (Lycalopex griseus) and two Andean foxes (L. culpaeus) caught in two National Parks of southern Argentine Patagonia (Bosques Petrificados, BPNP; and Monte León, MLNP) where dogs are nearly absent (density < 0.01 dog/km2). Common ectoparasites were the flea Pulex irritans (88% prevalence) and the tick Amblyomma tigrinum (29%). Conventional PCR and sequencing of 49 blood samples, 299 fleas analysed in 78 pools, and 21 ticks revealed the presence of DNA of the following canine vector-borne pathogens: in grey foxes, Rickettsia sp. (3%), hemoplasmas (8%), including Mycoplasma haemocanis, and Hepatozoon sp. (50%); in P. irritans, Bartonella spp. (72% of flea pools from 76% of foxes), mostly B. vinsonii subsp. berkhoffii but also B. rochalimae, Anaplasmataceae (Wolbachia sp.; 60% and 54%), and M. haemocanis/haemofelis (29% and 18%); and in A. tigrinum, Hepatozoon sp. (33% of ticks in 4 of 7 foxes). No piroplasmid DNA was detected in any sample. Andean foxes were negative for all tested pathogens. Two different Hepatozoon haplotypes were detected: the most prevalent was phylogenetically associated with H. felis, and the other with H. americanum and related sequences. Amblyomma tigrinum and Hepatozoon sp. were more abundant and/or prevalent in BPNP than in colder MLNP, 300 km southwards, perhaps located close to the limit for tick suitability. Bartonella v. berkhoffii was also significantly more prevalent in fleas of foxes in BPNP than in MLNP. This study provides novel information about natural host-pathogen associations in wildlife, markedly extends the distribution area in South America of arthropods and vector-borne pathogens of veterinary and public health interest, and contributes preliminary evidence about the potential role of A. tigrinum and P. irritans as vectors, respectively, for potentially new species of Hepatozoon from Lycalopex spp. and for M. haemocanis that should be further investigated.Fil: Millán, Javier Maximiliano. Universidad Andrés Bello; ChileFil: Travaini, Alejandro. Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia Austral. Unidad Académica Caleta Olivia. Centro de Investigaciones Puerto Deseado; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Cevidanes, Aitor. Universidad Andrés Bello; ChileFil: Sacristán, Irene. Universidad Andrés Bello; ChileFil: Rodríguez, Alejandro. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Estación Biológica de Doñana; Españ

Universal Reconfiguration of Facet-Connected Modular Robots by Pivots: The O(1) Musketeers

We present the first universal reconfiguration algorithm for transforming a modular robot between any two facet-connected square-grid configurations using pivot moves. More precisely, we show that five extra "helper" modules ("musketeers") suffice to reconfigure the remaining n modules between any two given configurations. Our algorithm uses O(n^2) pivot moves, which is worst-case optimal. Previous reconfiguration algorithms either require less restrictive "sliding" moves, do not preserve facet-connectivity, or for the setting we consider, could only handle a small subset of configurations defined by a local forbidden pattern. Configurations with the forbidden pattern do have disconnected reconfiguration graphs (discrete configuration spaces), and indeed we show that they can have an exponential number of connected components. But forbidding the local pattern throughout the configuration is far from necessary, as we show that just a constant number of added modules (placed to be freely reconfigurable) suffice for universal reconfigurability. We also classify three different models of natural pivot moves that preserve facet-connectivity, and show separations between these models

Ingression Progression Complexes Control Extracellular Matrix Remodelling during Cytokinesis in Budding Yeast

Eukaryotic cells must coordinate contraction of the actomyosin ring at the division site together with ingression of the plasma membrane and remodelling of the extracellular matrix (ECM) to support cytokinesis, but the underlying mechanisms are still poorly understood. In eukaryotes, glycosyltransferases that synthesise ECM polysaccharides are emerging as key factors during cytokinesis. The budding yeast chitin synthase Chs2 makes the primary septum, a special layer of the ECM, which is an essential process during cell division. Here we isolated a group of actomyosin ring components that form complexes together with Chs2 at the cleavage site at the end of the cell cycle, which we named ‘ingression progression complexes’ (IPCs). In addition to type II myosin, the IQGAP protein Iqg1 and Chs2, IPCs contain the F-BAR protein Hof1, and the cytokinesis regulators Inn1 and Cyk3. We describe the molecular mechanism by which chitin synthase is activated by direct association of the C2 domain of Inn1, and the transglutaminase-like domain of Cyk3, with the catalytic domain of Chs2. We used an experimental system to find a previously unanticipated role for the C-terminus of Inn1 in preventing the untimely activation of Chs2 at the cleavage site until Cyk3 releases the block on Chs2 activity during late mitosis. These findings support a model for the co-ordinated regulation of cell division in budding yeast, in which IPCs play a central role

Study of different chiral columns for the enantiomeric separation of azoles using supercritical fluid chromatography

Producción CientíficaThe enantiomeric separation of antifungal compounds is an arduous task in pharmaceutical and biomedical fields due to the different properties that each diastereoisomer presents. The enantioseparation of a group of fungicides (sulconazole, bifonazole, triadimefon and triadimenol) using supercritical fluid chromatography was achieved in this work. For this goal, four different chiral columns based on polysaccharide derivatives, as well as the effect of different chromatographic parameters such as temperature, type and percentage of organic modifier (methanol, ethanol and isopropanol), were thoroughly investigated. The inversion of the elution order of enantiomers as a result of a change in the stationary phase or organic modifier was also evaluated by employing a circular dichroism detector. The best separation conditions, in terms of the enantioresolution and analysis time, were obtained with the Lux® Cellulose-2 column using isopropanol as the organic modifier