Avances en ecofisiología planctónica y oceanografía bioquímica en la ULPGC

[EN] This seminar will report the latest activities of the ULPGC»s Plankton Ecophysiology group (PEG). This group studies respiration, growth, nitrogen metabolism, oceanic carbon flux, deep ocean metabolism, and plankton cultivation. It works with zooplankton, phytoplankton, bacteria, and macroalgae. The premise behind the group»s investigations is that enzyme biochemistry controls an organism»s physiology that, in turn, has a strong impact on ocean chemistry and ecology. This research team (PEG) uses as foils, the metabolic theory of ecology (MTE) and Kleiber»s law to argue the fact that respiratory metabolism is controlled not by biomass, but by the respiratory electron transport system (R-ETS). It has pointed out that the reason, zooplankton respiration statistically correlates with biomass, is because biomass packages mitochondria and mitochondria package the R-ETS. It has demonstrated, experimentally with Artemia salina, the superiority of using ETS as a respiration proxy rather than using biomass. Working with bacteria it has shown the inadequacy of the MTE in describing respiration in different growth phases of bacteria and has shown that a rival model based on enzyme kinetics works much better.

The Mediterranean Diet and Nutritional Adequacy: A Review

[EN]The Mediterranean dietary pattern, through a healthy profile of fat intake, low proportion of carbohydrate, low glycemic index, high content of dietary fiber, antioxidant compounds, and anti-inflammatory effects, reduces the risk of certain pathologies, such as cancer or Cardiovascular Disease (CVD). Nutritional adequacy is the comparison between the nutrient requirement and the intake of a certain individual or population. In population groups, the prevalence of nutrient inadequacy can be assessed by the probability approach or using the Estimated Average Requirement (EAR) cut-point method