Meticulously researched and beautifully written,Fit to Be Citizens?demonstrates how both science and public health shaped the meaning of race in the early twentieth century. Through a careful ...examination of the experiences of Mexican, Japanese, and Chinese immigrants in Los Angeles, Natalia Molina illustrates the many ways local health officials used complexly constructed concerns about public health to demean, diminish, discipline, and ultimately define racial groups. She shows how the racialization of Mexican Americans was not simply a matter of legal exclusion or labor exploitation, but rather that scientific discourses and public health practices played a key role in assigning negative racial characteristics to the group. The book skillfully moves beyond the binary oppositions that usually structure works in ethnic studies by deploying comparative and relational approaches that reveal the racialization of Mexican Americans as intimately associated with the relative historical and social positions of Asian Americans, African Americans, and whites. Its rich archival grounding provides a valuable history of public health in Los Angeles, living conditions among Mexican immigrants, and the ways in which regional racial categories influence national laws and practices. Molina's compelling study advances our understanding of the complexity of racial politics, attesting that racism is not static and that different groups can occupy different places in the racial order at different times.
Waste management policy effectiveness evaluation is important to understand whether the results achieved correspond to the policy goals, as well as to identify obstacles and outline strategies for ...its implementation. Although this type of study has been done in developed countries, little research on has been done on this topic in developing countries, mainly due to lack of data. This paper aims to assess the effectiveness of the Brazilian solid waste policy (PNRS). A case study methodology has been applied to Brazil in which a solid waste policy was implanted and a database is available. An empirical statistical analysis over panel data was carried out to evaluate whether the municipal waste management key performance indicators improved or not. The findings suggest that the PNRS has not accomplished the desired changes in municipal waste management, particularly no significant upgrading was observed in the indicators studied: municipal waste generation, frequency of waste collection, rate of recyclable waste recovered, and proportion of sanitary landfills. Furthermore, the paper concludes with lessons learnt and supports the identification of constraints and strategies that can be extrapolated to other developing countries.
An important element to explain the current multi-dimensional crises is the inability of capitalist institutions to consider non-pecuniary returns to investments (NPRI) in investment decisions. ...Orthodox economics highlights the creative force of the monetary profit motive, which translates into cultural habits and political decisions leading to overinvestment in harmful activities and underinvestment in desirable sectors. The flipside of this excessive trust in the monetary profit motive and markets is the weakening of the democratic institutions and the mistrust from the citizenry. Here, an archetype of a novel instrument for democratic finance is presented, to measure NPRIs, reconciling individual and collective action, harmonizing innovation, investment, and democracy.
Drawing on phenomenological aesthetics and on the haptic aesthetics of eating as a form of everyday aesthetics, I examine the phenomenon of eating our own as meaningful in three dimensions: ...vital/natural, somatic/individual, and cross-cultural. Usually conceived as a concrete, rare, and foreign practice, I show how cannibalism is present in our daily lives, both symbolically and as a liminal possibility towards which – as Freud noticed in 1913 – we all tended as children. Cannibalism is present not only in cinematic, literary, or visual art, and in anthropological research that situates it far from “us,” but through narratives and carnal dispositifs of differentiation/assimilation of the Same and the Other, fundamental for our subjective constitution. I conclude with a reflection on how the classical aesthetics of the sovereign subject develops towards alternative models like Pelluchon’s
that re-establish the connexion and moral engagement lost by solipsism by means of alimentary metaphors, but also romanticizing them, failing to address the problem of voracity and overconsumption, both at a social and at an individual level. This is more suitably addressed by Viveiros de Castro’s idea of a cannibal cogito, but even better understood by Emmanuel Levinas’ enjoyment-contact model of subjectivity.
This article examines the deportation proceedings of Nicolas Flores to interrogate larger issues of race, citizenship, and belonging in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. The case demonstrates how concepts ...of race based on culture and biology, and the fact that Flores lacked racial capital, helped cast doubt on his citizenship and even reinscribed him as an immigrant.
The latest advances in green alternatives are being addressed with bio-based solutions, with uses and applications in new areas due to their wide potential, low cost, lightness, renewability, ...biodegradability, impact toughness, fatigue resistance, and other specific properties. Natural fibers are sustainable materials that have led researchers to test their viability as alternative reinforcements in residual polymers to meet required engineering specifications; therefore, it is essential to continue making progress in replacing conventional materials. This review is expected to provide an overview of the current scopes and future prospects of biocomposites from polymers reinforced with natural fibers with a focus on the following: i. recycling of residual polymers; ii. available natural fibers and their components in the context of engineering applications; iii. the behavior of the structural modifications of the natural fibers with the physical and chemical treatments in the matrix interaction as reinforcements of the residual polymers; and iv. applications for the development of innovative, efficient, and sustainable solutions for successful, environmentally responsible products.
Human complement is the first line of defence against invading pathogens and is involved in tissue homeostasis. Complement-targeted therapies to treat several diseases caused by a dysregulated ...complement are highly desirable. Despite huge efforts invested in their development, only very few are currently available, and a deeper understanding of the numerous interactions and complement regulation mechanisms is indispensable. Two important complement regulators are human Factor H (FH) and Factor H-related protein 1 (FHR1). MFHR1 and MFHR13, two promising therapeutic candidates based on these regulators, combine the dimerization and C5-regulatory domains of FHR1 with the central C3-regulatory and cell surface-recognition domains of FH. Here, we used AlphaFold2 to model the structure of these two synthetic regulators. Moreover, we used AlphaFold-Multimer (AFM) to study possible interactions of C3 fragments and membrane attack complex (MAC) components C5, C7 and C9 in complex with FHR1, MFHR1, MFHR13 as well as the best-known MAC regulators vitronectin (Vn), clusterin and CD59, whose experimental structures remain undetermined. AFM successfully predicted the binding interfaces of FHR1 and the synthetic regulators with C3 fragments and suggested binding to C3. The models revealed structural differences in binding to these ligands through different interfaces. Additionally, AFM predictions of Vn, clusterin or CD59 with C7 or C9 agreed with previously published experimental results. Because the role of FHR1 as MAC regulator has been controversial, we analysed possible interactions with C5, C7 and C9. AFM predicted interactions of FHR1 with proteins of the terminal complement complex (TCC) as indicated by experimental observations, and located the interfaces in FHR11–2 and FHR14–5. According to AFM prediction, FHR1 might partially block the C3b binding site in C5, inhibiting C5 activation, and block C5b-7 complex formation and C9 polymerization, with similar mechanisms of action as clusterin and vitronectin. Here, we generate hypotheses and give the basis for the design of rational approaches to understand the molecular mechanism of MAC inhibition, which will facilitate the development of further complement therapeutics.
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Sex hormones significantly impact women's lives. Throughout the different stages of life, from menarche to menopause and all stages in between, women experience dramatic fluctuations in the levels of ...progesterone and estradiol, among other hormones. These fluctuations affect the body as a whole, including the central nervous system (CNS). In the CNS, sex hormones act via steroid receptors. They also have an effect on different neurotransmitters such as GABA, serotonin, dopamine, and glutamate. Additionally, studies show that sex hormones and their metabolites influence brain areas that regulate mood, behavior, and cognitive abilities. This review emphasizes the benefits a proper hormonal balance during the different stages of life has in the CNS. To achieve this goal, it is essential that hormone levels are evaluated considering a woman's age and ovulatory status, so that a correct diagnosis and treatment can be made. Knowledge of steroid hormone activity in the brain will give women and health providers an important tool for improving their health and well-being.
How Race Is Made in America examines Mexican Americans—from 1924, when American law drastically reduced immigration into the United States, to 1965, when many quotas were abolished—to understand how ...broad themes of race and citizenship are constructed. These years shaped the emergence of what Natalia Molina describes as an immigration regime, which defined the racial categories that continue to influence perceptions in the United States about Mexican Americans, race, and ethnicity.Molina demonstrates that despite the multiplicity of influences that help shape our concept of race, common themes prevail. Examining legal, political, social, and cultural sources related to immigration, she advances the theory that our understanding of race is socially constructed in relational ways—that is, in correspondence to other groups. Molina introduces and explains her central theory, racial scripts, which highlights the ways in which the lives of racialized groups are linked across time and space and thereby affect one another. How Race Is Made in America also shows that these racial scripts are easily adopted and adapted t o apply to different racial groups.
Amphibian and reptile diversity from Isla Santay (Durán, Ecuador) has been underestimated due to the lack of monitoring throughout the island. Historically, this island has also been affected by ...anthropic landscape changes which limit the occurrence of certain species and favors the dispersion of opportunistic or more tolerant species. Such species dynamics tend to be more evident on islands, since their isolation limits species' mobility. We present an updated checklist of the herpetofauna of Isla Santay Durán, Ecuador, and report for the first time the occurrence of two introduced species,
Anolis sagrei
Duméril & Bibron, 1837, Brown Anole, and
Hemydactylus frenatus
Duméril & Bibron, 1836.
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