Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is a chronic metabolic disease caused by the autoimmune destruction of insulin‐producing β‐cells. Ever since the 1920s, the fate of patients suffering from T1D was dramatically ...improved owing to the isolation and production of insulin, and the scientific field has largely progressed as a result of the evidence gathered about its underpinnings and mechanisms. The last years have seen this knowledge transformed into actual antigen‐specific immunotherapies with potential to restore selectively the breach of tolerance to β‐cell autoantigens and halt the autoimmune aggression. However, so far, the results of both prevention and reversion trials in T1D have been rather discouraging, so there is still an urgent need to optimize those immunotherapies and their associated factors, for example, posology and administration patterns, route and timing. In this review, we look back on what has been achieved in the last century and identify the main autoantigens driving the autoimmune attack in T1D. Then, we take a deep dive into the numerous antigen‐specific immunotherapies trialed and the ones still at a preclinical phase, ranging from peptides, proteins and agent combinations to gene transfer, nanoparticles, cell‐based strategies and novel approaches exploiting naturally occurring tolerogenic processes. Finally, we provide insight into the several features to be considered in a T1D clinical trial, the ideal time point for intervention and the biomarkers needed for monitoring the successful regulatory effect of the antigen‐specific immunotherapy. Although further research and optimization remain imperative, the development of a therapeutic armamentarium against T1D autoimmunity is certainly advancing with a confident step.
In this review, we take a deep dive into the numerous antigen‐specific immunotherapies for type 1 diabetes, ranging from peptides, proteins and agent combinations to gene transfer, nanoparticles, cell‐based strategies and novel approaches exploiting naturally occurring tolerogenic processes. Moreover, we provide insight about the several features to be considered in a clinical trial, the ideal time point for intervention and the biomarkers needed for monitoring the successful effect of the immunotherapy. Although further research is required, the development of a therapeutic strategy against type 1 diabetes is certainly advancing with a confident step.
One of the most important challenges of this decade is the Internet of Things (IoT), which aims to enable things to be connected anytime, anyplace, with anything and anyone, ideally using any ...path/network and any service. IoT systems are usually composed of heterogeneous and interconnected lightweight devices that support applications that are subject to change in their external environment and in the functioning of these devices. The management of the variability of these changes, autonomously, is a challenge in the development of these systems. Agents are a good option for developing self-managed IoT systems due to their distributed nature, context-awareness and self-adaptation. Our goal is to enhance the development of IoT applications using agents and software product lines (SPL). Specifically, we propose to use Self-StarMASMAS, multi-agent system) agents and to define an SPL process using the Common Variability Language. In this contribution, we propose an SPL process for Self-StarMAS, paying particular attention to agents embedded in sensor motes.
Green computing is a growing trend in computing, pursuing the goal of helping software developers to be more aware and produce energy-efficient software. This is especially relevant for ...battery-powered mobile applications, where a minimal energy consumption is desired to both mitigate the greenhouse effect and extend the battery lifetime. In this paper, we analyze the energy consumption and execution time of cryptographic primitives in Android devices. Our ultimate goal is to help Android application developers, especially those who are not experts in security, to choose the most energy-efficient cryptographic algorithms considering different security providers and security transformations. Information to make a tradeoff between energy and time consumption is also provided, being especially useful when the differences in energy consumption of different alternatives are not so significant. We have conducted our experiments with an energy profiling tool based on the PowerTutor application, which has been adapted to automate the energy profiling. Our results show that this type of power consumption studies is necessary, because selecting the most energy-efficient configuration depends on many factors, and some of the choices are not obvious to developers.
Larvae of Sardina pilchardus were obtained in captivity from fertilized eggs captured in the wild and grown in a 10000-L tank. Isochrysis galbana, Artemia franciscana and live zooplankton were used ...as prey during the first two weeks; afterwards, the animals were fed on Artemia metanauplii enriched with Isochrysis galbana. A dry feed (Gemma 0.4 and 0.8) from Skretting S.A. (Burgos, Espana) was supplied from the 3rd to the 18th month. The total length reached by sardines at one year of life was 162.02+ or -9.49 mm, corresponding to a wet weight of 36.12+ or -10.82 g. Total length of the last survivor individual at 18 months was 182.37 mm. An 18-month experiment of sardine culture is described for the first time, and the growth data reported can help to determine its potential as a candidate for marine aquaculture.
Currently, museums provide their visitors with interactive tour guide applications that can be installed in mobile devices and provide timely tailor-made multimedia information about exhibits on ...display. In this paper, we argue that mobile devices not only could provide help to visitors, but also to museum staff. Our goal is to integrate, within the same system, multimedia tour guides with the management facilities required by museums. In this paper, we present iMuseumA (intelligent museum with agents), a mobile-based solution to customize visits and perform context-aware management tasks. iMuseumA follows an agent-based approach, which makes it possible to interact easily with the museum environment and make decisions based on its current status. This system is currently deployed in the Museum of Informatics at the Informatics School of the University of Málaga, and its main contributions are: (i) a mobile application that provides management facilities to museum staff by means of sensing and processing environmental data; (ii) providing an integrated solution for visitors, tour guides and museum staff that allows coordination and communication enrichment among different groups of users; (iii) using and benefiting from group communication for heterogeneous groups of users that can be created on demand.
RESUMEN: La identidad docente desempeña un papel fundamental en el ejercicio de la profesión. El objetivo de este estudio es mostrar las propiedades psicométricas de la Escala de Medida de la ...Identidad Docente para ser empleada en investigaciones en el contexto chileno y aportar lineamientos para la utilización de este instrumento en el contexto hispanoparlante. Participaron 242 estudiantes de la carrera de Pedagogía en Educación Especial de 10 universidades chilenas. Se empleó el procedimiento de traducción y retrotraducción, obteniendo evidencia de validez de contenido mediante el juicio de expertos y el índice de concordancia V de Aiken. A través de un análisis factorial confirmatorio, se comprueba un buen nivel de ajuste del instrumento, mientras que la consistencia interna es verificada mediante el Coeficiente de Omega (ω), evidenciando buenos índices de confiabilidad. Los hallazgos muestran que la versión traducida y adaptada de la escala es válida y fiable para ser empleada en estudiantes universitarios de Pedagogía en Chile, pudiendo contribuir a la comprensión del desarrollo de la identidad docente en futuros profesores
ABSTRACT: Teacher identity plays a fundamental role in the exercise of the profession. Te aim of this study is to show the psychometric properties of the Teacher Identity Measurement Scale for use in research in the Chilean context and to provide guidelines for the use of this instrument in the Spanish-speaking context. A sample of 242 Special Education Preservice Teachers from ten Chilean universities participated in the study. Te translation and back-translation procedure was used, obtaining evidence of content validity through expert judgment and Aiken’s V concordance index. Trough a confirmatory factor analysis, a good level of adjustment of the instrument was verified, while the internal consistency was verified through the McDonald’s Omega Coefficient (ω), evidencing good reliability indexes. Te findings show that the translated and adapted version of the scale is valid and reliable to be used in university student teachers in Chile, and can contribute to the understanding of the development of the teachers identity during initial teachers training.
Providing security and privacy to wireless sensor nodes (WSNs) is very challenging, due to the heterogeneity of sensor nodes and their limited capabilities in terms of energy, processing power and ...memory. The applications for these systems run in a myriad of sensors with different low-level programming abstractions, limited capabilities and different routing protocols. This means that applications for WSNs need mechanisms for self-adaptation and for self-protection based on the dynamic adaptation of the algorithms used to provide security. Dynamic software product lines (DSPLs) allow managing both variability and dynamic software adaptation, so they can be considered a key technology in successfully developing self-protected WSN applications. In this paper, we propose a self-protection solution for WSNs based on the combination of the INTER-TRUST security framework (a solution for the dynamic negotiation and deployment of security policies) and the FamiWare middleware (a DSPL approach to automatically configure and reconfigure instances of a middleware for WSNs).We evaluate our approach using a case study from the intelligent transportation system domain.
In the Future Internet, applications based on Wireless Sensor Networks will have to support reconfiguration with minimum human intervention, depending on dynamic context changes in their environment. ...These situations create a need for building these applications as adaptive software and including techniques that allow the context acquisition and decisions about adaptation. However, contexts use to be made up of complex information acquired from heterogeneous devices and user characteristics, making them difficult to manage. So, instead of building context-aware applications from scratch, we propose to use FamiWare, a family of middleware for Ambient Intelligence specifically designed to be aware of contexts in sensor and smartphone devices. It provides both, several monitoring services to acquire contexts from devices and users, and a context-awareness service to analyze and detect context changes. However, the current version of FamiWare does not allow the automatic incorporation related to the management of new contexts into the FamiWare family. To overcome this shortcoming, in this work, we first present how to model the context using a metamodel to define the contexts that must to be taken into account in an instantiation of FamiWare for a certain Ambient Intelligence system. Then, to configure a new context-aware version of FamiWare and to generate code ready-to-install within heterogeneous devices, we define a mapping that automatically transforms metamodel elements defining contexts into elements of the FamiWare family, and we also use the FamiWare configuration process to customize the new context-aware variant. Finally, we evaluate the benefits of our process, and we analyze both that the new version of the middleware works as expected and that it manages the contexts in an efficient way.
The authors wish to update the Acknowledgments in their paper published in Sensors 1, doi:10.3390/s150305251, website: http://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/15/3/5251. ...
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