Determinaci�� de la regi�� del genoma o gens implicats en la s��ntesi del poli��ster extracel���lular present en la variant llisa de Mycobacterium vaccae mitjan��ant transformaci��

Estudi realitzat a partir d���una estada a la Universidad de Zaragoza, Espanya, entre novembre del 2007 i abril del 2008. Mycobacterium vaccae ��s un micobacteri ambiental de creixement r��pid molt estudiat pel seu inter��s com a possible ��s immunoterap��utic en el tractament de la tuberculosis i altres malalties. M.vaccae a l���igual que altres micobacteris presenta dues morfologies colonials: llisa i rugosa. M.vaccae ATCC15483T t�� origin��riament una morfologia llisa. Quant aquest es cultiva en medi s��lid a 30��C apareixen espont��niament variants rugoses estables que no reverteixen a llises. El motiu pel qual aquest proc��s t�� lloc no es coneix, encara que s���ha descrit en Mycobacterium smegmatis i en Mycobacterium avium que els l��pids de la paret cel���lular es troben involucrats en aquest canvi de morfologia colonial. L���an��lisi dels contingut en l��pids i glicol��pids de la paret cel���lular de les dos variants morfol��giques de M.vaccae, ens ha indicat que les soques llises presenten un compost extracel���lular que no es troba en les rugoses i que mitjan��ant l���an��lisi estructural d���aquest compost ha sigut identificat com un poli��ster extracel���lular de cadena llarga. El present estudi s���ha centrat en determinar els gens implicats en la s��ntesis d���aquest compost. Per a realitzar aquest an��lisi gen��tic s���ha construit una llibreria de mutants per transposici�� de la soca llisa de M. vaccae mitjan��ant un pl��smid ts/sac i un transpos��. S���han obtingut col��nies de morfologia rugosa on el pl��smid s���ha insertat en la zona del genoma que codifica per aquest compost extracel���lular. Aquests nous mutants s���han analitzat mitjan��ant t��cniques moleculars (PCR, Southern y seq��enciaci��). A m��s, s���ha construit una llibreria gen��mica amb DNA de la soca llisa en pl��smids replicatius de micobacteris derivats de pAL5000 i s���ha transformat la soca rugosa seleccionant per a un fenotip llis estudiant els gens que complementen.

La Capacidad actual de Espa��a para liderar la posici��n europea hacia Cuba

Aquest treball t�� per objecte analitzar quina ��s la capacitat actual del govern espanyol per liderar les pol��tiques europees respecte a Cuba. El per��ode escollit per a la realitzaci�� d'aquest examen s'inicia l'any 2004, moment en qu�� el PSOE es va fer amb la vict��ria en les eleccions generals i en qu�� va anunciar un canvi de rumb en l'acci�� exterior espanyola respecte de la postura promoguda pel PP en els mandats anteriors, i es perllonga fins al moment actual. El balan�� dels ��xits i fracassos obtinguts pel govern socialista fins ara, mostra una creixent p��rdua d'influ��ncia d'Espanya, davant etapes anteriors, si tradicional paper d'interlocutor avantatjat de la UE pel que fa a Cuba. la concurr��ncia de factors com l'adhesi�� dels PECO a la UE, la capacitat de la Havana per procurar nous aliats i socis estrat��gics o les innovacions introdu��des pel tractat de Lisboa en mat��ria d'acci�� exterior, ha augmentat significativament les dificultats d'Espanya per "europe��tzar" els interessos de la seva pol��tica exterior pel que fa a l'Illa

Detecci�� i localitzaci�� d'impactes a estructures aeroespacials

Projecte de recerca elaborat a partir d���una estada a la Universidad Polit��cnica de Madrid, Espanya, entre setembre i o desembre del 2007. Actualment la ind��stria aeroespacial i aeron��utica t�� com prioritat millorar la fiabilitat de las seves estructures a trav��s del desenvolupament de nous sistemes per a la monitoritzaci�� i detecci�� d���impactes. Hi ha diverses t��cniques potencialment ��tils, i la seva aplicabilitat en una situaci�� particular dep��n cr��ticament de la mida del defecte que permet l���estructura. Qualsevol defecte canviar�� la resposta vibrat��ria de l���element estructural, aix�� com el transitori de l���ona que es propaga per l���estructura el��stica. Correlacionar aquests canvis, que poden ser detectats experimentalment amb l���ocurr��ncia del defecte, la seva localitzaci�� i quantificaci��, ��s un problema molt complex. Aquest treball explora l�����s de l'An��lisis de Components Principals (Principal Component Analysis - PCA-) basat en la formulaci�� dels estad��stics T2 i Q per tal de detectar i distingir els defectes a l'estructura, tot correlacionant els seus canvis a la resposta vibrat��ria. L���estructura utilitzada per l���estudi ��s l���ala d���una turbina d���un avi�� comercial. Aquesta ala s���excita en un extrem utilitzant un vibrador, i a la qual s'han adherit set sensors PZT a la superf��cie. S'aplica un senyal conegut i s'analitzen les respostes. Es construeix un model PCA utilitzant dades de l���estructura sense defecte. Per tal de provar el model, s'adhereix un tros d���alumini en quatre posicions diferents. Les dades dels assajos de l'estructura amb defecte es projecten sobre el model. Les components principals i les dist��ncies de Q-residual i T2-Hotelling s'utilitzaran per a l'an��lisi de les incid��ncies. Q-residual indica com de b�� s'adiu cadascuna de les mostres al model PCA, ja que ��s una mesura de la difer��ncia, o residu, entre la mostra i la seva projecci�� sobre les components principals retingudes en el model. La dist��ncia T2-Hotelling ��s una mesura de la variaci�� de cada mostra dins del model PCA, o el que vindria a ser el mateix, la dist��ncia al centre del model PCA.

The Innovation and Imitation Dichotomy in Spanish firms: do absorptive capacity and the technological frontier matter?

This paper analyses whether a firm���s absorptive capacity and its distance from the technological frontier affect the choice between innovation and imitation in innovative Spanish firms. From an extensive survey of 5,575 firms during the 2004-2009 period, we found two significant results. With regard to the role of absorptive capacity, the empirical evidence shows that when innovative firms have difficulties in accessing external information and hire skilled workers, their innovative capacity is reduced. Meanwhile, with regard to distance from the technological frontier, the firms that reduce this gap manage to increase their innovative capacity at the expense of imitation. To summarise, when we studied firms��� absorptive capacity and their relative position to the technological frontier in tandem, we found that the two factors directly affected firms' ability to innovate or imitate. Key words: R&D sources, innovation and imitation strategies, absorptive capacity, technological frontier, ordered probit.

High Growth Firms and Innovation: an empirical analysis for Spanish firms

This paper analyzes the effect of firms��� innovation activities on their growth performance. In particular, we observe how important innovation is for high-growth firms (HGFs) for an extensive sample of Spanish manufacturing and services firms. The panel data used comprises diverse waves of Spanish CIS over the the period 2004-2008. First, a probit analysis determines whether innovation affects the probability of being a high-growth firm. And second, a quantile regression technique is applied to explore the determinants and characteristics of specific groups of firms (manufacturing versus service firms and high-tech versus low-tech firms). It is revealed that R&D plays a significant role in the probability of becoming a HGF. Investment in internal and external R&D per employee has a positive impact on firm growth (although internal R&D presents a significant impact in the last quantiles, external R&D is significant up to the median). Furthermore, we show evidence that there is a positive impact of employment (sales) growth on the sales (employment) growth. Keywords: high-growth firms, firm growth, innovation activity JEL Classifications: L11, L25, O30

Ser de donde no soy: identidades en conflicto en el ��mbito social y educativo

La incorporaci��n de los adolescentes inmigrados latinoamericanos al sistema educativo espa��ol se da en un escenario complejo en el que se presentan diversos componentes. Un ��mbito espec��fico corresponde al impacto de la experiencia migratoria en adolescentes y ni��os inmigrados; enfrentar un sistema educativo desconocido ���cuyas reglas han de irse descubriendo paulatina y, a veces, traum��ticamente��� pone a prueba las bases de la seguridad emocional e intelectual. En este trabajo se presenta algunos hallazgos de un estudio acerca de las formas que adopta la inserci��n de los adolescentes latinoamericanos en la sociedad espa��ola, llevado a cabo con adolescentes entre los 12 y 17 a��os de edad que asist��an a la Educaci��n Secundaria Obligatoria, en el curso 2005-2006, en centros educativos p��blicos y concertados en Madrid, Murcia y Valladolid. El trabajo muestra, primero, algunos elementos del contexto migratorio en el que ocurren las vivencias de los adolescentes, constituidos en inmigrantes involuntarios; y, en segundo lugar, examina algunas de las experiencias a las que los adolescentes se hallan expuestos en el ��mbito educativo y social, que asignan rasgos particulares al proceso de construcci��n de la identidad. Integrarse en el sistema educativo es uno de los primeros retos que enfrentan chicos y chicas latinos que asisten a la ESO, dado que la escuela constituye para ellos el espacio en el cual se sientan las bases para determinada socializaci��n en la vida espa��ola. En esta cobran expresi��n las dificultades que, en parte provenientes de su origen nacional y familiar, encaran los adolescentes latinoamericanos durante el proceso de inserci��n social y educativa. Todas las dificultades afloran a trav��s de las formas que adoptan los intercambios con la sociedad de acogida. Y dentro de esos intercambios importan significativamente las condiciones que el alumnado de origen extranjero encuentra en la sociedad y en las escuelas espa��olas. De una parte, la sociedad espa��ola vive con particular sensibilidad la irrupci��n migratoria y, en algunos sectores de ella, el fen��meno es respondido con manifestaciones de racismo y xenofobia que, en cierta medida, repercuten en la escuela. De otra parte, en el sistema educativo se experimentan desaf��os no resueltos, provenientes del intenso cambio social de las ��ltimas d��cadas, a los que se suma la llegada del contingente de j��venes inmigrados, para quienes no se ha desarrollado mecanismos de adaptaci��n espec��ficos. Desde una y otra vertiente proceden tensiones que recaen en el proceso de construcci��n del joven latinoamericano inmigrado, que este trabajo esboza.

Deciding where to belong: gender differences in educational trajectories and migration in a rural Spanish town

From an anthropological perspective, formal post-secondary schooling is not an abstractentity with an intrinsic value that everyone finds desirable, but rather one alternative among many that young people evaluate from their different positions in the social field. The problem discussed in this paper is the diverging life trajectories that young men and women in a concrete rural context, at the end of the 20th century, shape for themselves at the ages of 14-16, a moment of decision created by national legislation regarding mandatory education (LGE, 1970, General Education Law, and LOGSE, 1990, General Organic Law of the Education System). Despite a strong cultural norm of equal inheritance divided among all children, male and female, and despite the equal educational opportunities provided by the Spanish State, different meanings of possession and use-rights over land and the resulting culturally accepted gendered division of work converge to orient men and women differently towards post-secondary schooling. Observation of the age, gender, and civil status structure of the population led to the preliminary query: Why do men and women, in this town, behave differently with respect to migration and marriage? The main hypothesis was that women���s longer school trajectories and resulting migration and men���s anchoring in the town and their higher rates of celibacy were not drastic changes in values, in the positional-relational sense of Bourdieu (1988, 2002), but the current outcome of previously existing dissimilar relations to property that produce dissimilar mobility. Through their schooling and work choices, young men and women, at very early ages, locate themselves in, or decide to belong to, different contexts that later reveal very different possibilities of finding marriage partners. This paper is based on an ethnographic study of a small rural town (302 inhabitants in 1950; 193 in 2000) near Leon. Although this paper deals with the situation in the final decades of the 20th century, we must also consider the first half of the century, where some elements that shape this situation have their roots. Fieldwork was carried out between 1988 and 2001, in periods of differing length and intensity. The social subjects discussed here are the domestic unit and its component members. They were studied in conjunction, analyzing the life-trajectory decisions of specific persons in the framework of the domestic unit and the relations among people and property which comprise it. The tried-and-true methods of ethnographic research ���participant observation, interviews, and life-histories, etc.- were employed. Archival research was also important for producing demographic data. Demographic analysis, the analysis of the composition and transformation of domestic units, and the creation of life trajectories were among the principal techniques used. The theoretical analysis was oriented by Bourdieu���s (2002) framework of the social field, habitus, and difference.

Can You Home Again? Desertion and Control of Hometowns in Civil Wars

What allows an armed group in a civil war to prevent desertion? This paper addresses this question with a focus on control in the rearguard. Most past studies focus on motivations for desertion. They explain desertion in terms of where soldiers stand in relation to the macro themes of the war, or in terms of an inability to provide positive incentives to overcome the collective action problem. However, since individuals decide whether and how to participate in civil wars for multiple reasons, responding to a variety of local conditions in an environment of threat and violence, a focus only on macro-level motivations is incomplete. The opportunities side of the ledger deserves more attention. I therefore turn my attention to how control by an armed group eliminates soldiers��� opportunities to desert. In particular, I consider the control that an armed group maintains over soldiers��� hometowns, treating geographic terrain as an important exogenous indicator of the ease of control. Rough terrain at home affords soldiers and their families and friends advantages in ease of hiding, the difficulty of using force, and local knowledge. Based on an original dataset of soldiers from Santander Province in the Spanish Civil War, gathered from archival sources, I find statistical evidence that the rougher the terrain in a soldier���s home municipality, the more likely he is to desert. I find complementary qualitative evidence indicating that soldiers from rough-terrain communities took active advantage of their greater opportunities for evasion. This finding has important implications for the way observers interpret different soldiers��� decisions to desert or remain fighting, for the prospect that structural factors may shape the cohesion of armed groups, and for the possibility that local knowledge may be a double-edged sword, making soldiers simultaneously good at fighting and good at deserting.

Intra-Party Democracy and middle-level elites in Spain

The gradual implementation of new, more participatory and thus, more democratic mechanisms of intra-party decision-making has been pointed out by several party politics scholars. This phenomenon has been studied as the party elite���s reactions to a widespread trend in Western countries: the party membership decline. Spain is still a deviant case in both the party membership decline trend, and with regards to the introduction of more participatory and democratic decision-making mechanisms. However, the paper point out that support for intra-party democracy is quite widespread within Spanish party middle elites (party delegates). That is why the aim of this paper is to explain which factors are underpinning the supports for intra-party democracy amongst Spanish party delegates. After conducting a multivariate analysis, the results show that ideology, the involvement in intra-party experiences and the degree of pragmatism, amongst others, are factors strongly associated with the support for intraparty democracy in Spanish party middle elites.

La realitat del que succeeix di��riament als jutjats mercantils

L���informe titulat ���La realitat del que succeeix di��riament als jutjats mercantils���, fa una reflexi�� sobre la situaci�� dels jutjats mercantils pel que fa refer��ncia a c��rrega de treball durant els anys 2008 i 2009 (especialment en mat��ria de concursos de creditors) i realitza una comparativa amb les altres Comunitats Aut��nomes que tenen unes caracter��stiques similars en els aspectes anteriors a Catalunya.

���Tonnage tax��� : r��gimen especial de las entidades navieras en funci��n del tonelaje

El present treball analitzar�� el r��gim del Tonnage Tax com a resposta legislativa de la Uni�� Europea davant la continua davallada de la seva flota mercant, derivada de la compet��ncia provinent de tercers pa��sos. S���oferir�� una visi�� general d���aquest r��gim especial de l���Impost sobre Societats en l�����mbit de la Uni�� Europea prestant un especial inter��s a la regulaci�� d���aquest a Espanya, al temps que procedirem a l���estudi en detall d���una de les aplicacions pr��ctiques del Tonnage Tax a Espanya que m��s ha atret l���atenci�� dels inversors, el ���Tax Lease���.

Plan de comunicaci��n para el lanzamiento de la marca pa��s : Colombia

Aquest treball realitza un estudi de la imatge actual de la marca pa��s ���Col��mbia���, amb la finalitat de desenvolupar un Pla de Comunicaci�� per al llan��ament d'aquesta marca a Espanya. Per aconseguir aquest objectiu s'analitza l'actual entorn colombi��, els seus recursos naturals, la seva situaci�� social i l'actual aflu��ncia de turistes al pa��s. Tamb�� s'analitza el mercat espanyol com a mercat d'origen. En el Pla de Comunicaci�� Global, es planteja l'actual problema d'imatge que t�� Col��mbia a Espanya, i com el seu passat, i la resson��ncia que el mateix ha tingut gr��cies als mitjans de comunicaci��, han fet que Col��mbia no sigui una de entre les destinacions triades pels espanyols, a causa de la percepci�� que es t�� de tur��sme d'alt risc.

Suboptimal Management of Coronary Risk in Daily Clinical Practice: Results from a Mediterranean Cohort of HIV-Infected Patients With Myocardial Infarction

Background: The incidence of cardiovascular events in HIV patients has fallen. Methods: We identified 81 patients with a history of coronary events from 2 hospitals in Spain to evaluate management of CVRF before and after the event. Results: The prevalence of coronary events was 2.15%. At the time of the coronary event, CVRF were highly prevalent. Decrease in total cholesterol (P=0.025) and LDLc(P=0.004) was observed. LDLc and HDLc were determined and the percentage of patients with LDLc &100 mg/dL remained stable at the last visit. Conclusions: The prevalence of coronary disease in our cohort was low. Although CVRF were highly.

Quantificaci�� de l'error com��s pels models de n��xol ecol��gic al predir la distribuci�� d'especies generalistes

Report for the scientific sojourn carried out at the University of California at Berkeley, from September to December 2007. Environmental niche modelling (ENM) techniques are powerful tools to predict species potential distributions. In the last ten years, a plethora of novel methodological approaches and modelling techniques have been developed. During three months, I stayed at the University of California, Berkeley, working under the supervision of Dr. David R. Vieites. The aim of our work was to quantify the error committed by these techniques, but also to test how an increase in the sample size affects the resultant predictions. Using MaxEnt software we generated distribution predictive maps, from different sample sizes, of the Eurasian quail (Coturnix coturnix) in the Iberian Peninsula. The quail is a generalist species from a climatic point of view, but an habitat specialist. The resultant distribution maps were compared with the real distribution of the species. This distribution was obtained from recent bird atlases from Spain and Portugal. Results show that ENM techniques can have important errors when predicting the species distribution of generalist species. Moreover, an increase of sample size is not necessary related with a better performance of the models. We conclude that a deep knowledge of the species��� biology and the variables affecting their distribution is crucial for an optimal modelling. The lack of this knowledge can induce to wrong conclusions.

El mercado laboral espa��ol : un an��lisis comparativo con Alemania y Estados Unidos

L���economia espanyola s���ha vist especialment afectada per la recent crisis: encara que la caiguda de l���activitat productiva ha estat m��s aviat lleu, la taxa d���atur s���ha disparat fins a nivells per damunt el 20%. Aix�� manifesta una alt��ssima sensibilitat de l���ocupaci�� davant variacions de la producci��, motivada per un mal ajustament del mercat laboral quan es produeixen pertorbacions a l���economia. En contraposici��, l���atur no ha augmentat en exc��s a Alemanya i Estats Units, malgrat haver sofert caigudes de la producci�� bastant significatives. Aix�� ha estat possible gr��cies a una s��lida estructura econ��mica i a una gran flexibilitat del mercat. Una de les claus es troba a que, mentre Alemanya i Estats Units aconsegueixen mantenir una economia altament competitiva basada en l���industria amb un alt grau d���intensitat tecnol��gica i en els serveis especialitzats, el model productiu espanyol es basa en activitats intensives en m�� d���obra i de baixa productivitat. No obstant, encara que el model productiu associat a activitats de baixa productivitat ��s el principal causant de la falta de competitivitat empresarial i la volatilitat de l���ocupaci��, existeixen altres elements que introdueixen rigiditats i inefici��ncies al mercat laboral espanyol, com la distorsi�� als nivells educatius, l���alta temporalitat, la rigiditat salarial, l���elevat cost de l���acomiadament i la inefic��cia del contracte a temps parcial.