Pungente vislumbre: a triste infalibilidade da culpa

O crime do professor de Matemática, de Clarice Lispector, aborda a necessidade inconsciente de punição advinda do sentimento de culpa, que constitui elemento inexorável da psique humana. O espelhamento do homem em seu animal o conduz à aproximação de uma possível consciência deste transtorno, fato que culmina no irremissível abandono do cão. Com base nos ensaios O estranho e O mal-estar na civilização, de Sigmund Freud, almeja-se entender a origem da dolente identificação entre estes dois personagens narrada no conto, bem como o corolário da cultura, responsável pela tristeza humana com a qual o professor irremediavelmente se coaduna.

A Third Amblyomma Species and the First Tick-Borne Rickettsia in Chile

During November 2010, three ticks were collected from three dogs living in the rural area of Arica, northern Chile. Morphological analyses of the ticks in the laboratory revealed that they were most similar to Amblyomma maculatum Koch and Amblyomma triste Koch. However, because of unique metatarsal spurs, neither of the Chilean specimens could be assigned with certainty to A. maculatum or A. triste, based on external morphology. The mitochondrial 16S rRNA gene partial sequences obtained from two Chilean specimens were 99.5% identical to A. triste from Uruguay, and 99.0% identical to A. maculatum from the United States. Through phylogenetic analysis inferred from partial 16S rRNA sequences, the Chilean specimens were classified as A. triste. Molecular analyses also showed that one of the three Chilean ticks was infected by Candidatus 'Rickettsia andeanae'. These findings extend the geographical distribution of A. triste to Chile, where no tick-associated rickettsia had been reported previously.