Loss of the Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase type IV in dopaminoceptive neurons enhances behavioral effects of cocaine

The persistent nature of addiction has been associated with activity-induced plasticity of neurons within the striatum and nucleus accumbens (NAc). To identify the molecular processes leading to these adaptations, we performed Cre/loxP-mediated genetic ablations of two key regulators of gene expression in response to activity, the Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase IV (CaMKIV) and its postulated main target, the cAMP-responsive element binding protein (CREB). We found that acute cocaine-induced gene expression in the striatum was largely unaffected by the loss of CaMKIV. On the behavioral level, mice lacking CaMKIV in dopaminoceptive neurons displayed increased sensitivity to cocaine as evidenced by augmented expression of locomotor sensitization and enhanced conditioned place preference and reinstatement after extinction. However, the loss of CREB in the forebrain had no effect on either of these behaviors, even though it robustly blunted acute cocaine-induced transcription. To test the relevance of these observations for addiction in humans, we performed an association study of CAMK4 and CREB promoter polymorphisms with cocaine addiction in a large sample of addicts. We found that a single nucleotide polymorphism in the CAMK4 promoter was significantly associated with cocaine addiction, whereas variations in the CREB promoter regions did not correlate with drug abuse. These findings reveal a critical role for CaMKIV in the development and persistence of cocaine-induced behaviors, through mechanisms dissociated from acute effects on gene expression and CREB-dependent transcription.

Dissemination of bla(KPC-2) by the Spread of Klebsiella pneumoniae Clonal Complex 258 Clones (ST258, ST11, ST437) and Plasmids (IncFII, IncN, IncL/M) among Enterobacteriaceae Species in Brazil

This article reports the spread of bla(KPC-2) in the Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro states, facilitated by globally spread K. pneumoniae clonal complex 258 (CC258) clones (ST258, ST11, and ST437) and a diversity of plasmids (IncFII, IncN, and IncL/M, two untypeable plasmids carrying Tn4401a or Tn4401b) successfully disseminated among species of the Enterobacteriaceae (Enterobacter cloacae, Serratia marcescens, and Citrobacter freundii). It also constitutes the first description of sequence type 258 (ST258) in Brazil, which was associated with a nosocomial hospital outbreak in Ribeirao Preto city.

Find It - An Assistant Home Agent

Cognitive impaired population face with innumerable problems in their daily life. Surprisingly, they are not provided with any help to perform those tasks for which they have difficulties. As a consequence, it is necessary to develop systems that allow those people to live independently and autonomously. Living in a technological era, people could take advantage of the available technology, being provided with some solutions to their needs. This paper presents a platform that assists users with remembering where their possessions are. Mainly, an object recognition process together with an intelligent scheduling applications are integrated in an Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) environment.

On universal central extensions of Hom-Leibniz algebras

In the category of Hom-Leibniz algebras we introduce the notion of Hom-corepresentation as adequate coefficients to construct the chain complex from which we compute the Leibniz homology of Hom-Leibniz algebras. We study universal central extensions of Hom-Leibniz algebras and generalize some classical results, nevertheless it is necessary to introduce new notions of α-central extension, universal α-central extension and α-perfect Hom-Leibniz algebra due to the fact that the composition of two central extensions of Hom-Leibniz algebras is not central. We also provide the recognition criteria for these kind of universal central extensions. We prove that an α-perfect Hom-Lie algebra admits a universal α-central extension in the categories of Hom-Lie and Hom-Leibniz algebras and we obtain the relationships between both of them. In case α = Id we recover the corresponding results on universal central extensions of Leibniz algebras.

Transformations induced in bulk amorphous silica by ultrafast laser direct writingTransformations induced in bulk amorphous silica by ultrafast laser direct writing

Agências Financiadoras: Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia - PTDC/FIS/102127/2008 e PTDC/FIS/102127/2008 e SFRH/BPD/78871/2011; Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovacion - FUNCOAT-CSD2008-00023-CONSOLIDER; Instituto Superior Técnico;

Genetic polymorphisms of RANTES, IL1-A, MCP-1 and TNF-A genes in patients with prostate cancer

BACKGROUND Inflammation has been implicated as an etiological factor in several human cancers, including prostate cancer. Allelic variants of the genes involved in inflammatory pathways are logical candidates as genetic determinants of prostate cancer risk. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether single nucleotide polymorphisms of genes that lead to increased levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines and chemokines are associated with an increased prostate cancer risk. METHODS A case-control study design was used to test the association between prostate cancer risk and the polymorphisms TNF-A-308 A/G (rs 1800629), RANTES-403 G/A (rs 2107538), IL1-A-889 C/T (rs 1800587) and MCP-1 2518 G/A (rs 1024611) in 296 patients diagnosed with prostate cancer and in 311 healthy controls from the same area. RESULTS Diagnosis of prostate cancer was significantly associated with TNF-A GA + AA genotype (OR, 1.61; 95% CI, 1.09-2.64) and RANTES GA + AA genotype (OR, 1.44; 95% CI, 1.09-2.38). A alleles in TNF-A and RANTES influenced prostate cancer susceptibility and acted independently of each other in these subjects. No epistatic effect was found for the combination of different polymorphisms studied. Finally, no overall association was found between prostate cancer risk and IL1-A or MCP-1 polymorphisms. CONCLUSION Our results and previously published findings on genes associated with innate immunity support the hypothesis that polymorphisms in proinflammatory genes may be important in prostate cancer development.

Effective diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease by means of large margin-based methodology.

BACKGROUND Functional brain images such as Single-Photon Emission Computed Tomography (SPECT) and Positron Emission Tomography (PET) have been widely used to guide the clinicians in the Alzheimer's Disease (AD) diagnosis. However, the subjectivity involved in their evaluation has favoured the development of Computer Aided Diagnosis (CAD) Systems. METHODS It is proposed a novel combination of feature extraction techniques to improve the diagnosis of AD. Firstly, Regions of Interest (ROIs) are selected by means of a t-test carried out on 3D Normalised Mean Square Error (NMSE) features restricted to be located within a predefined brain activation mask. In order to address the small sample-size problem, the dimension of the feature space was further reduced by: Large Margin Nearest Neighbours using a rectangular matrix (LMNN-RECT), Principal Component Analysis (PCA) or Partial Least Squares (PLS) (the two latter also analysed with a LMNN transformation). Regarding the classifiers, kernel Support Vector Machines (SVMs) and LMNN using Euclidean, Mahalanobis and Energy-based metrics were compared. RESULTS Several experiments were conducted in order to evaluate the proposed LMNN-based feature extraction algorithms and its benefits as: i) linear transformation of the PLS or PCA reduced data, ii) feature reduction technique, and iii) classifier (with Euclidean, Mahalanobis or Energy-based methodology). The system was evaluated by means of k-fold cross-validation yielding accuracy, sensitivity and specificity values of 92.78%, 91.07% and 95.12% (for SPECT) and 90.67%, 88% and 93.33% (for PET), respectively, when a NMSE-PLS-LMNN feature extraction method was used in combination with a SVM classifier, thus outperforming recently reported baseline methods. CONCLUSIONS All the proposed methods turned out to be a valid solution for the presented problem. One of the advances is the robustness of the LMNN algorithm that not only provides higher separation rate between the classes but it also makes (in combination with NMSE and PLS) this rate variation more stable. In addition, their generalization ability is another advance since several experiments were performed on two image modalities (SPECT and PET).

Deficits in executive and memory processes in delusional disorder: a case-control study

OBJECTIVE Delusional disorder has been traditionally considered a psychotic syndrome that does not evolve to cognitive deterioration. However, to date, very little empirical research has been done to explore cognitive executive components and memory processes in Delusional Disorder patients. This study will investigate whether patients with delusional disorder are intact in both executive function components (such as flexibility, impulsivity and updating components) and memory processes (such as immediate, short term and long term recall, learning and recognition). METHODS A large sample of patients with delusional disorder (n = 86) and a group of healthy controls (n = 343) were compared with regard to their performance in a broad battery of neuropsychological tests including Trail Making Test, Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, Colour-Word Stroop Test, and Complutense Verbal Learning Test (TAVEC). RESULTS When compared to controls, cases of delusional disorder showed a significantly poorer performance in most cognitive tests. Thus, we demonstrate deficits in flexibility, impulsivity and updating components of executive functions as well as in memory processes. These findings held significant after taking into account sex, age, educational level and premorbid IQ. CONCLUSIONS Our results do not support the traditional notion of patients with delusional disorder being cognitively intact.

Valor predictivo de los tests Boehm y Peabody en la detecci??n de futuras dificultades escolares en orden a una intervenci??n preventiva y compensadora

Se analiza la medida en que las pruebas psicopedag??gicas Boehm y Peabody predicen las dificultades en el ??mbito lectoescritor que pueden presentarse en el alumnado de Primaria. Para ello se ha desarrollado un estudio de tipo correlacional en el que se han reunido datos de alumnos desde su ingreso en la Educaci??n Infantil hasta su escolarizaci??n en el segundo ciclo de Educaci??n Primaria. La informaci??n obtenida tiene por tanto, un car??cter diacr??nico. El informe est?? constituido por una breve alusi??n te??rica al problema que se trata para situarse en el lugar preciso donde se centra la investigaci??n, descripci??n de la metodolog??a de investigaci??n, resultados y conclusiones, la discusi??n de los resultados y las propuestas. Se recogen tambi??n la bibliograf??a usada y el estudio de an??lisis de los casos utilizados. Las conclusiones afirman que existe una correlaci??n estad??sticamente significativa entre los tests Peabody y Boehm. Las correlaciones m??s altas son las que implican, de una parte a los tests Peabody y Boehm y, de otra, a las notas escolares de segundo ciclo de Educaci??n Primaria en Matem??ticas y Lengua. Las notas escolares obtenidas por los alumnos del primer ciclo de Educaci??n Primaria en Lengua y Matem??ticas no tienen una correlaci??n estad??sticamente significativa con los tests Boehm y Peabody. En el primer ciclo de Educaci??n Primaria, s??lo el test Peaboy permite predecir las notas escolares en Lengua y Matem??ticas. Estimar y determinar el rendimiento de los alumnos en las citadas asignaturas tomando como punto de partida s??lo los datos aportados por el test Peabody resulta desaconsejable dado el escaso poder predictivo de dicho test. El test Boehm, por su parte, tiene a??n menos poder predictivo sobre las notas escolares y, en el presente estudio, aparece como un mal predictor.

La memoria de la guerra civil en Conil de la Frontera (C??diz) : un proyecto de investigaci??n hist??rica con fuentes orales

Se presenta memoria final de proyecto educativo que propone la creaci??n de un archivo documental gr??fico y sonoro, montaje de una exposici??n y edici??n de un libro y un cat??logo sobre la guerra civil en la zona, como resultado de la investigaci??n extraescolar realizada con un grupo de alumnos. Se realiza en el IES Atalaya en Conil de la Frontera, C??diz. Los objetivos son: crear un modelo de investigaci??n cient??fica, t??cnica y human??stica mediante el cual fuera posible el desarrollo de aspectos educativos vivos y actuales; establecer una base de debate con una intenci??n pedag??gica cr??tica; marcar una pauta de calidad con el empleo de m??todos de trabajo actuales dentro de las ciencias sociales para la formaci??n espec??fica y la sugerencia profesional, especialmente para alumnos; provocar la renovaci??n pr??ctica docente y actualizar la formaci??n del profesorado; lograr un inter??s general por la comunidad en la que se vive y acercar las diferentes realidades sociales entre s?? a trav??s del di??logo y la cooperaci??n; formar en los valores democr??ticos a trav??s de la valoraci??n y el conocimiento de la experiencia hist??rica; rebasar el claustro t??pico de los centros de ense??anza secundaria en general. Los resultados han sido: renovaci??n de la pr??ctica docente y el compartir con el alumnado experiencias de conocer a partir de preguntas propias y de compromisos vitales; integraci??n de los aspectos culturales propios de los planes de estudios en un centro educativo oficial con una realidad hist??rica y social del pueblo; mejora del rendimiento escolar. El material producido ha sido: guiones de entrevistas, transcripciones de entrevistas, documentaci??n de hemeroteca, documentaci??n de archivos, archivos fotogr??ficos, b??squeda de informaci??n en internet, semana cultural.

Adaptación curricular grupal : organización y currículo : los principios de normalización y nivelación educativa.

Se presenta memoria final de proyecto educativo que propone el diseño de un currículo adaptado para hacer frente al alto nivel de absentismo escolar en el primer ciclo de ESO, mediante el establecimiento de determinados centros de interés y ámbitos que engloban las áreas y la implantación de una tarjeta curricular de seguimiento de cada alumno. Se realiza en el IES Pedro Muñoz Seca en El Puerto de Santa María, Cádiz. Los objetivos son: cambiar la motivación hacia el aprendizaje; crear un nuevo bloque de actitudes personales, individuales y grupales que permitan una socialización ajustada a sus expectativas; asimilar aprendizajes básicos para asumir la formación profesional básica de operarios. El proceso consta de varias fases: 1, planificación; 2, diseño de centros de interés; 3, ejecución o realización; 4, retroalimentación educativa; 5, evaluación; 6, validación del progreso en su tarjeta curricular. El resultado ha sido negativo en relación a lo esperado, sólo un porcentaje pequeño cambió su motivación hacia la escuela.

Convivencia escolar y estrategias para mejorar la dinámica de aula y la salud del profesorado.

Se presenta memoria final de proyecto educativo que propone el diseño y aplicación de estrategias y dinámicas grupales de control de aula a nivel de todo el centro, a partir del diagnóstico de los problemas de convivencia en el centro y la formación específica y orientación del profesorado. Se realiza en el IES Drago en Cádiz. Los objetivos son: mejorar la convivencia en nuestro centro, trabajando con dinámicas y estrategias novedosas; aprender estrategias de control en el aula; trabajar unidos y obtener la fuerza que una cohesión fuerte ofrece ante los alumnos; aprender de los compañeros y experimentar tras el análisis compartido las estrategias más efectivas para controlar grupos y las características de personalidad más eficaces como profesor; cuidar la salud del profesorado encontrando personalidades eficaces que puedan aportar mecanismos de afrontamiento a problemas y enfrentamiento en el aula. El proceso consta de varias fases: 1, sensibilización y análisis bibliográfico; 2, información aportada desde el exterior; 3, puesta en marcha; 4, la validación de hipótesis planteadas; 5, elaboración de 'estrategias' útiles en el aula.

El teatro' un camino para el aprendizaje.

Se presenta memoria final de proyecto educativo que propone la organización de representaciones teatrales para la formación e integración del alumnado de diferentes etnias, con déficits de aprendizaje y con necesidades educativas especiales, con la participación de diferentes áreas de conocimiento. Se realiza en el CEIP Maestro Enrique Asensi en Puente Genil, Córdoba. Los objetivos son: intentar suplir los vacíos de las etapas evolutivas no superadas; desarrollar la expresión bajo sus variadas formas; potenciar la creatividad a través de los distintos tipos de expresión coordinadas.

La motivación del escolar como factor de cambio.

Se incluyen anexos con el material utilizado en el proceso: cuestionarios, direcciones de páginas web, álbum fotográfico

Atención a la diversidad en el ámbito sociolingüístico en la ESO.

Los anexos incluyen: un modelo de escala de observación para las dificultades de aprendizaje, un ejemplo de criterios de selección del alumnado en el programa de diversificación curricular, una propuesta de adaptación curricular a una alumna