Los Hot Spots: ¿Una alternativa para reducir los niveles de delincuencia en Bogotá?

El interés de esta monografía es analizar la incidencia de la estrategia de seguridad ciudadana de los Hot Spots en los niveles de delincuencia de Bogotá durante el periodo de la Alcaldía de Samuel Moreno 2009-2011, tomando como casos de estudio la Avenida 19 y la Zona Rosa (Chicó El Lago). Esta investigación se realiza desde los conceptos teórico-prácticos que ha arrojado el modelo de Hot Spot tras su aplicación en 18 ciudades del mundo, y que sirven como herramienta para analizar las transformaciones del delito en las zonas de estudio. De esta manera se avanza hacia el resultado que permite identificar los factores que impidieron que el modelo de Hot Spots se formulara y ejecutara efectivamente y por lo tanto no disminuyera los niveles de delincuencia en Bogotá.

Face and content validity of smoking-related and matched control pictures

Smoking-related pictures and matched controls are useful tools in experimental tasks of attentional bias. Noteworthy the procedures used to produce and validate these pairs of pictures are poorly reported. This study aimed to describe the production and evidence of validity of a set of smoking-related pictures and their matched controls. Two studies were conducted to assess validity. An online internet-based survey was used to assess face validity of 12 pictures related to smoking behavior and 12 matched controls. All pictures were colored and were 95mm length x 130mm width. Participants were asked if the pictures were related or not to the smoking behavior and also rated how much each picture was related to smoking behavior. The second study investigated attentional bias in smokers (n = 47) and non-smokers (n = 50), and examined how they assessed all pictures in terms of pleasantness and the 12 smoking-related pictures in terms of relevance to their own smoking behavior. Craving was assessed before and after the experiment. Results indicate that this set of pictures are valid since smoking-related pictures were considered more related to smoking behavior compared to their matched controls. Moreover, smokers showed greater attentional bias for smoking-related pictures than non-smokers. Craving and relevance of the smoking-related pictures were higher in smokers than in non-smokers. Smokers considered smoking-related pictures them less unpleasant than non-smokers. These findings provide evidence of face and content validity of this set of pictures, which will be available to researchers, contributing to maximize the standardization of future investigations.

Deletion Analysis of 15 exons located outside and inside a “Hot Spot” in the Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy gene in Duchenne’s Muscular dystrophy patients

Introduction. Duchenne and Becker Muscular Dystrophies (DMD/DMB) are X-linked recessive diseases characterized by progressive muscle weakness and wasting, loss of motor skills and death after the second decade of life. Deletions are the most prevalent mutations that affect the dystrophin gene, which spans 79 exons.Objective: Identify deletions on the dystrophin gene in 58 patients affected with DMD.Methods: Through multiplex PCR identify deletions on the dystrophin gene in 58 patients with DMD and observe the frequency of this mutation in our population.Results: We found deletions in 1.72% of patients (1 of 58 persons). Deletions were not the principal cause of disease in our population. It is possible that duplications and point mutations caused this illness in our patients.Conclusions: The frequency of deletions in the 15 exons analyzed from the dystrophin gene was low. The predominant types of mutation in our patients` samples were not deletions as has been observed in the literature worldwide, therefore, it is important to determine other types of mutations as are duplications and point mutations.