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"Alonso, A"
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Space race archaeologies : photographs, biographies, and design
As the byproduct of the Cold War, the space race produced a considerable number of objects disseminated in networks, not only in the East and West but also in the Global South ? rockets, launching pads, satellite tracking stations, astronomical observatories, and several other pieces of design, machineries, and infrastructures. As they stand today, these objects are remnants of a modernity tied to secrecy, war deterrence, and mass media associated to outer space politics. By bringing together the work of architect Philipp Meuser, photographer Petr Antonov, designer Hugo Palmarola, and historian of science Asif Siddiqi, this book comes from a conference held at the Princeton University School of Architecture in March 2016 on technology and the Cold War, contesting the historiographical status of these objects in order to give value to the manner in which they came to construct current modes of subjectivity and social relations.
Book
Structure and properties of atomic nanoclusters
Atomic clusters are the bridge between molecules and the bulk matter. Following two key experiments — the observation of electronic shells in metallic clusters and the discovery of the C60 fullerence — the field of atomic clusters has experienced a rapid growth, and is now considered a mature field. The electrons of the cluster are confined to a small volume, hence, quantum effects are manifested on many properties of the clusters. Another interesting feature is that the properties often change in a non-smooth way as the number of atoms in the cluster increases. This book provides an updated overview of the field, and presents a detailed description of the structure and electronic properties of different types of clusters: Van der Waals clusters, metallic clusters, clusters of ionic materials and network clusters. The assembling of clusters is also considered, since specially stable clusters are expected to play a role in the future design and synthesis of new materials.
eBook
Social Entrepreneurship in Non-Profit and Profit Sectors : Theoretical and Empirical Perspectives
This volume examines the theoretical and empirical landscape of social entrepreneurship in both non-profit and profit sectors. It extends the traditional view of social entrepreneurship to include the environmental and institutional factors that affect the emergence of social entrepreneurship activities, such as formal laws, regulations, procedures and informal institutions. The editors aim to provide evidence and increased understanding of this growing phenomenon. Social Entrepreneurship is gaining recognition as a key element of economic and social development. It embraces a wide set of situations with a broad scope of activities in for-profit and non-profit organizations interested in social performance and/or in economically profitable performance, with an emphasis on achieving social aim. In the strict sense, social entrepreneurship corresponds to entrepreneurs whose main concern is to achieve social objectives rather than to obtain personal financial profits. However, there is still much to be learned about the dynamics and processes of social entrepreneurship. The current literature in the field has tended to focus on psychological experiences and personal characteristics, or on organizational perspectives such as resources, capabilities and leadership. This book intends to provide theoretical frameworks and empirical studies to this very new and broad field. Specifically, this book provides a collection of contemporary research in the following topics: How to create opportunity through social innovation How to detect entrepreneurial opportunity to meet social needs How to develop social entrepreneurship, while still seeking profits How to discover opportunities for different forms of social entrepreneurship Featuring contributions from around the world, this book is a valuable source for students, academics, researchers, policy makers, and professionals in the area of social entrepreneurship.
Book
A double-blind, randomized, cross-over, placebo-controlled, pilot trial with Sativex in Huntington’s disease
Huntington’s disease (HD) is a neurodegenerative disease for which there is no curative treatment available. Given that the endocannabinoid system is involved in the pathogenesis of HD mouse models, stimulation of specific targets within this signaling system has been investigated as a promising therapeutic agent in HD. We conducted a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled, cross-over pilot clinical trial with Sativex
®
, a botanical extract with an equimolecular combination of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol and cannabidiol. Both Sativex
®
and placebo were dispensed as an oral spray, to be administered up to 12 sprays/day for 12 weeks. The primary objective was safety, assessed by the absence of more severe adverse events (SAE) and no greater deterioration of motor, cognitive, behavioral and functional scales during the phase of active treatment. Secondary objectives were clinical improvement of Unified Huntington Disease Rating Scale scores. Twenty-six patients were randomized and 24 completed the trial. After ruling-out period and sequence effects, safety and tolerability were confirmed. No differences on motor (
p
= 0.286), cognitive (
p
= 0.824), behavioral (
p
= 1.0) and functional (
p
= 0.581) scores were detected during treatment with Sativex
®
as compared to placebo. No significant molecular effects were detected on the biomarker analysis. Sativex
®
is safe and well tolerated in patients with HD, with no SAE or clinical worsening. No significant symptomatic effects were detected at the prescribed dosage and for a 12-week period. Also, no significant molecular changes were observed on the biomarkers. Future study designs should consider higher doses, longer treatment periods and/or alternative cannabinoid combinations.
Clincaltrals.gov identifier: NCT01502046
Journal Article
Space-time wave packets localized in all dimensions
Optical wave packets that are localized in space and time, but nevertheless overcome diffraction and travel rigidly in free space, are a long sought-after field structure with applications ranging from microscopy and remote sensing, to nonlinear and quantum optics. However, synthesizing such wave packets requires introducing non-differentiable angular dispersion with high spectral precision in two transverse dimensions, a capability that has eluded optics to date. Here, we describe an experimental strategy capable of sculpting the spatio-temporal spectrum of a generic pulsed beam by introducing arbitrary radial chirp via two-dimensional conformal coordinate transformations of the spectrally resolved field. This procedure yields propagation-invariant ‘space-time’ wave packets localized in all dimensions, with tunable group velocity in the range from 0.7
c
to 1.8
c
in free space, and endowed with prescribed orbital angular momentum. By providing unprecedented flexibility in sculpting the three-dimensional structure of pulsed optical fields, our experimental strategy promises to be a versatile platform for the emerging enterprise of space-time optics.
Propagation-invariant wave packets confined in space and time can be useful for optical sensing, imaging, and nonlinear and quantum optics. Here the authors demonstrate control over the angular dispersion of optical wave packets in two-transverse dimensions to synthesize space-time wave packets localized in all dimensions.
Journal Article
The One Health Approach to Toxoplasmosis: Epidemiology, Control, and Prevention Strategies
One Health is a collaborative, interdisciplinary effort that seeks optimal health for people, animals, plants, and the environment. Toxoplasmosis, caused by Toxoplasma gondii, is an intracellular protozoan infection distributed worldwide, with a heteroxenous life cycle that practically affects all homeotherms and in which felines act as definitive reservoirs. Herein, we review the natural history of T. gondii, its transmission and impacts in humans, domestic animals, wildlife both terrestrial and aquatic, and ecosystems. The epidemiology, prevention, and control strategies are reviewed, with the objective of facilitating awareness of this disease and promoting transdisciplinary collaborations, integrative research, and capacity building among universities, government agencies, NGOs, policy makers, practicing physicians, veterinarians, and the general public.
Journal Article
Shaping caustics into propagation-invariant light
Structured light has revolutionized optical particle manipulation, nano-scaled material processing, and high-resolution imaging. In particular, propagation-invariant light fields such as Bessel, Airy, or Mathieu beams show high robustness and have a self-healing nature. To generalize such beneficial features, these light fields can be understood in terms of caustics. However, only simple caustics have found applications in material processing, optical trapping, or cell microscopy. Thus, these technologies would greatly benefit from methods to engineer arbitrary intensity shapes well beyond the standard families of caustics. We introduce a general approach to arbitrarily shape propagation-invariant beams by smart beam design based on caustics. We develop two complementary methods, and demonstrate various propagation-invariant beams experimentally, ranging from simple geometric shapes to complex image configurations such as words. Our approach generalizes caustic light from the currently known small subset to a complete set of tailored propagation-invariant caustics with intensities concentrated around any desired curve.
Propagation-invariant beams have been up to now only available in a few realizations or for specific applications. Here, the authors demonstrate two methods for generating propagation-invariant beams with fully customizable intensity profiles in a comprehensive way inspired by geometrical optics.
Journal Article
Swings and roundabouts: optical Poincaré spheres for polarization and Gaussian beams
The connection between Poincaré spheres for polarization and Gaussian beams is explored, focusing on the interpretation of elliptic polarization in terms of the isotropic two-dimensional harmonic oscillator in Hamiltonian mechanics, its canonical quantization and semiclassical interpretation. This leads to the interpretation of structured Gaussian modes, the Hermite–Gaussian, Laguerre–Gaussian and generalized Hermite–Laguerre–Gaussian modes as eigenfunctions of operators corresponding to the classical constants of motion of the two-dimensional oscillator, which acquire an extra significance as families of classical ellipses upon semiclassical quantization.
This article is part of the themed issue ‘Optical orbital angular momentum’.
Journal Article
The formin INF2 in disease: progress from 10 years of research
Formins are a conserved family of proteins that primarily act to form linear polymers of actin. Despite their importance to the normal functioning of the cytoskeleton, for a long time, the only two formin genes known to be a genetic cause of human disorders were
DIAPH1
and
DIAPH3
, whose mutation causes two distinct forms of hereditary deafness. In the last 10 years, however, the formin INF2 has emerged as an important target of mutations responsible for the appearance of focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, which are histological lesions associated with glomerulus degeneration that often leads to end-stage renal disease. In some rare cases, focal segmental glomerulosclerosis concurs with Charcot–Marie–Tooth disease, which is a degenerative neurological disorder affecting peripheral nerves. All known
INF2
gene mutations causing disease map to the exons encoding the amino-terminal domain. In this review, we summarize the structure, biochemical features and functions of INF2, conduct a systematic and comprehensive analysis of the pathogenic INF2 mutations, including a detailed study exon-by-exon of patient cases and mutations, address the impact of the pathogenic mutations on the structure, regulation and known functions of INF2, draw a series of conclusions that could be useful for INF2-related disease diagnosis, and suggest lines of research for future work on the molecular mechanisms by which INF2 causes disease.
Journal Article
Microbiome of Pacific Whiteleg shrimp reveals differential bacterial community composition between Wild, Aquacultured and AHPND/EMS outbreak conditions
Crustaceans form the second largest subphylum on Earth, which includes
Litopeneaus vannamei
(Pacific whiteleg shrimp), one of the most cultured shrimp worldwide. Despite efforts to study the shrimp microbiota, little is known about it from shrimp obtained from the open sea and the role that aquaculture plays in microbiota remodeling. Here, the microbiota from the hepatopancreas and intestine of wild type (wt) and aquacultured whiteleg shrimp and pond sediment from hatcheries were characterized using sequencing of seven hypervariable regions of the 16S rRNA gene. Cultured shrimp with AHPND/EMS disease symptoms were also included. We found that (i) microbiota and their predicted metagenomic functions were different between wt and cultured shrimp; (ii) independent of the shrimp source, the microbiota of the hepatopancreas and intestine was different; (iii) the microbial diversity between the sediment and intestines of cultured shrimp was similar; and (iv) associated to an early development of AHPND/EMS disease, we found changes in the microbiome and the appearance of disease-specific bacteria. Notably, under cultured conditions, we identified bacterial taxa enriched in healthy shrimp, such as
Faecalibacterium prausnitzii
and
Pantoea agglomerans
, and communities enriched in diseased shrimp, such as
Aeromonas taiwanensis
,
Simiduia agarivorans
and
Photobacterium angustum
.
Journal Article