Ruta del Peregrino

Artículo sobre la Ruta del Peregrino en Jalisco, México. La Ruta del Peregrino tiene 117 kilometros de largo, y es una ruta de peregrinación popular en México que antes tenía poca infraestructura. A través de nuevas estaciones de servicio y monumentos arquitectónicos, ahora es atractiva no sólo durante las fiestas religiosas. -------------------- ABSTRACT: "Every year, especially at Easter, more than 2 million people come from all over Mexico to walk along 117 kilometers of the western mountain range in Jalisco, from the village of Ameca to the sanctuary of the Virgin of the Rosary in Talpa de Allende." Recognizing the importance of this religious tourism the State of Jalisco "commissioned a master plan from Dereik Dellkamp and Tatiana Bilbao for the strategic incorporation of spaces for worship, leisure and services with functional infrastructure for the pilgrims' needs." As a result, 15 interventions have been created, including chapels, rest stops and pavilions. [Quotes from Arquine, Autumn 2010].

Reconstructing the Timing and Dispersion Routes of HIV-1 Subtype B Epidemics in The Caribbean and Central America: A Phylogenetic Story.

The Caribbean and Central America are among the regions with highest HIV-1B prevalence worldwide. Despite of this high virus burden, little is known about the timing and the migration patterns of HIV-1B in these regions. Migration is one of the major processes shaping the genetic structure of virus populations. Thus, reconstruction of epidemiological network may contribute to understand HIV-1B evolution and reduce virus prevalence. We have investigated the spatio-temporal dynamics of the HIV-1B epidemic in The Caribbean and Central America using 1,610 HIV-1B partial pol sequences from 13 Caribbean and 5 Central American countries. Timing of HIV-1B introduction and virus evolutionary rates, as well as the spatial genetic structure of the HIV-1B populations and the virus migration patterns were inferred. Results revealed that in The Caribbean and Central America most of the HIV-1B variability was generated since the 80 s. At odds with previous data suggesting that Haiti was the origin of the epidemic in The Caribbean, our reconstruction indicated that the virus could have been disseminated from Puerto Rico and Antigua. These two countries connected two distinguishable migration areas corresponding to the (mainly Spanish-colonized) Easter and (mainly British-colonized) Western islands, which indicates that virus migration patterns are determined by geographical barriers and by the movement of human populations among culturally related countries. Similar factors shaped the migration of HIV-1B in Central America. The HIV-1B population was significantly structured according to the country of origin, and the genetic diversity in each country was associated with the virus prevalence in both regions, which suggests that virus populations evolve mainly through genetic drift. Thus, our work contributes to the understanding of HIV-1B evolution and dispersion pattern in the Americas, and its relationship with the geography of the area and the movements of human populations.