UN Periodico English No. 2 - Special Issue: Science and Technology

2 Health

Pig Organ Transplants

12 Environment

17 Agriculture

UN expedition prevents environmental catastrophe in Vaupés

DNA Study Of Soils to Cultivate Creole Potatoes for Exportation

22 Innovation

New Prototype to Analyze Voice Pathologies

http://www.unperiodico.unal.edu.co/en • un_periodico@unal.edu.co Bogotá D.C. - Colombia • Issue 2 • 2010

Published by Universidad Nacional de Colombia • ISSN 1657-0987 • www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Special Issue: Science and Technology

Illiterate Brain Cerebral analysis of 42 reformed guerrilleros and paramilitares (illegal counter—insurgency), illiterates and late—literates, showed how the literacy process produces structural changes in the brain. The investigation not only shows that the brain is flexible, but challenges a rooted idea about dyslexia. A linguist from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia participated in this study, published by the British magazine Nature.

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Health

Pig Organ Transplants

A laboratory in Indianapolis US is making great progress towards xenotransplantations, a technique permitting to use organs from other species,

such as pigs, to replace human organs. A Colombian scientist, participating in this project, talks about the viability of this alternative.

Patricia Barrera Silva

Standing in front of the urinal, Roger can’t get enough of the feeling of freedom when he urinates, something that, four years ago, he thought he wouldn’t get to experience again.

“Terminal renal failure” is the disease he was diagnosed with on February the 5th, 2005. He was only 22 years old. After more than 125 sessions, plugged into a hemodialysis machine, which detoxified his body (replacing only 15 percent of the function of a regular kidney), he had a new hope: his brother was going to give him a kidney.

Roger just had to wait a year for the transplant, but in Colombia there are close to 28 thousand terminal renal failure patients and, according to records from the National Health Institute, 18 thousand of them are potential candidates for a transplant.

However, the amount of available organs in the country only permits to complete 700 kidney transplants each year; for the rest of the patients the future is uncertain.

The lack of donors prompted scientists from all over the world to focus their attention on xenotransplants. Today, Canada, Australia and the United States are leading this research in the world.

The Pig, an Alternative

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The Indiana University and a group of hospitals created the Transplant Institute in the US, one of the most advanced in the country to produce clones.

Here, José Luzardo Estrada, cloning specialist graduated from the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and Animal Breeding at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, works together with a research group, looking for the most human–compatible animal species, genetically speaking.

At the beginning, they tried with chimpanzees, but these animals easily transmit diseases. Later, they tried with pigs, which after the chimpanzees, are the second most similar species to the human being in its genetic conformation and the size of its organs. They are also easy to breed.

The Indiana University specializes on the pig’s liver. In a first stage, they are looking for this organ to be used as a temporary bridge (just a few days) in patients, while a compatible human

Personal file

Unimedios

These cloned pigs were implanted with human genes (CDS), which mediate towards the immunological response and allow the organism to accept the implanted organ.

liver is found.

While the experts advance in their research, they have found that the pig has a resistant gene, GAL, which is present in all living organisms, excepting primates (humans included). This is a main issue within xenotransplantation.

When a pig’s liver is transplanted into a human being, it is destroyed in a matter of seconds because the organism uses all its antibodies against that particular gene.

The GAL gene was identified at the Indianapolis Institute, leading to the reproduction of transgenic GAL–deficient pigs with this gene blocked through cloning.

“In a microscope at a magnification of x 200, the ovule, which is between 150 and 180 mikra, is punctured with a sort of needle in order to remove its chromosomes.

This way, it turns into a sort of white sheet (genetically speaking) ready to be injected with chromosomes of the cell with the modified gene or genes,” explained Estrada.

Through this method scientist, managed to obtain cloned pigs (today resting in corrals), which is a great scientific advance for humankind.

At the moment, the immunology lab attached to the Institute is focused on the identification of other substances –such as smaller proteins– that also hinder the assimilation of transplanted organs into humans.

“It is hard to say how many

years this process will take. Science advances at a fast pace, the pig’s genome will soon be deciphered, which will accelerate the research in the transplants field,” said the scientist.

Donation: Myths and Facts A study completed between 1995 and 2002, using registers from the United Networth of Organ Sharing (UNOS), established that a cadaveric donor provides an average of 30.8 years of life, distributed among the recipients (patients) of more than eight organs that may be donated.

In Colombia, the donor rate reported by the Health National Institute (INS) has increased in the last 15 years, but it is still insufficient to cover the demand.

Depending on Chance and the Health System Daniel’s diagnosis, a 26 years old who was declared terminal patient from renal failure, coincided with the liquidation of the Social Security System and the sale of San Pedro Claver Hospital, where he was on the waiting list of the transplantation program. The administrative juncture lead to the end of the program, and his hope for a transplant was buried.

Two years passed and peritonitis almost killed him before the

Social Security System accepted to pass from a peritoneal dialysis, accomplished four times a day, to a hemodialysis, completed three times a week for four hours. Thanks to this shift he was able to study again.

Today, more than ever, Daniel longs for his kidney. “I saw several dialysis patients that after six months received the transplant.

Now they are able to eat huge meals; they recovered their lives.

The problem with my case is that my blood type is O negative, which makes it harder to find a donor.”

When he was asked if he would accept a transplant from another species, he was quite skeptical: “I would agree if it was a scientifically tested procedure, but not as a pilot project,” he warned.

Graduated Students from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, at the Top of World’s Transplants Similarly to Doctor Estrada, there are several graduate students from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia that, at the moment, direct services from prestigious hospitals around the world. One of them, Luis Alberto Mieles, is the Chief of the Transplant Service from Texas University, and Daniel Corredor, who presides over the Hispanic Medical Association of Houston. Students from the Transplant Specialization at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia are sent by the University to the former centers in order to strength their education.

Even if there are great obstacles to obtain a visa, seven students from the research branch have reached international rotation, and among them, Roger, the patient receiving the transplant and his brother Iván, the donor.

“In ten years, this seedbed is expected to become the best transplant group in Colombia,” affirms Eyner Lozano, Associated Professor at the Faculty of Medicine from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, and director of the Transplant Branch.

The initiative is of such an importance because, since 1976, Colombia is worldly acknowledged as a pioneer in the field (in 2002, Colombian doctors completed the second larynx transplant in the world). However, specialists are currently trained abroad, because the country lacks of a training program to transplant solid organs.”

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Executive Director: Carlos Alberto Patiño Villa Press Chief: Carolina Lancheros Ruiz Associate Editors: Nelly Mendivelso Rodríguez, Juliana Ariza Flórez – mjarizaf@unal.edu.co Copy Editor–Translator: Ernesto Camacho – ecamachoo@unal.edu.co Editorial Committe: Jorge Echavarría, Egberto Bermúdez, Paul Bromberg, Alexis de Greiff, Fabián Sanabria Art Editor: Ricardo González Angulo Copy Editor: Verónica Barreto, Diana Sánchez Agencia de Noticias UN Editors: Félix Enrique Blanco, Catalina Suárez Printing: Editoriales LA REPUBLICA Expressed opinions are those of the authors alone and don’t compel or compromise principles by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia or politics by the UN Periódico.

Web Page: http://www.unperiodico.unal.edu.co Mail: un_periodico@unal.edu.co Phones: (571) 316 5348 - (571) 316 5000 ext. 18384 / Fax: (571) 316 5232 Edificio Uriel Gutiérrez Carrera 45 Nº 26-85, piso 5º. Bogotá - Colombia ISNN1657-0987

Health

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Colombian Bread and Arepa with Guava

A new study demonstrates that guava’s pectin reduces “bad” cholesterol (LDL), which obstructs arteries.

Photos: Andrés Felipe Castaño/Unimedios

Help Reducing Cardiovascular Risk

Rich in vitamins A, B and C, the guava is used to prevent influenza and relieve abdominal pain. Today, pectin —a guava hidden component— helps

From now on, some of guava’s properties will be found in foods of daily consumption. A team of chemists and physicians from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia found that this fruit’s pectin helps reducing cardiovascular risk. In order to benefit from this property, they added the substance to bread and arepa (corn– based bread).

Our grandmothers knew that guava is a very nutritious fruit.

However, scientific studies had never been completed in order to confirm this conviction. Luz Patricia Restrepo, Blanca Laura Ortiz and Cecilia Anzola (chemist), together with Clara Pérez from the Lipids and Diabetes Division at the Faculty of Medicine and their students, took a step further.

The guava consumption in Colombia is very high, but its production is even greater: huge amounts are thrown away. Thus Professor Restrepo looked for a way of using this surplus.

“The idea emerged when we were updating the Nutrition Facts Label for the Instituto Colombiano de Bienestar Familiar (Colombian institution in charge of children and family welfare). The Ministry of Agriculture made an official

announcement looking for highly nutritious food. We realized that guava was a perfect choice,” said Professor Restrepo.

Even if the official Nutrition Fact Label had already established the fruit’s main components, the researchers continued the biological analysis aiming for unknown values. This is how they found that guava’s pectin (a polysaccharide soluble fiber) could be a sort of health elixir.

How to Make the Most of it?

Anzola, from the Chemical and Biochemical Study on Changes of Fresh and Processed Foods at the Chemistry Department, pointed out that they were looking for mass consumption fiber–less foods that could be improved with guava’s pectin.

Bread and arepa were the perfect candidates. The researchers mixed the pectin with the dough and gave the product to a group of 70 persons from various physical constitutions expecting to verify, through medical examination, pectin’s promising properties.

The aim was to evaluate the effects of the substance on the cholesterol levels, HDL (good cholesterol), LDL (bad cholesterol) and triglycerides in adults —divided in

three groups according to their cardiovascular risk—. During 15 days, the patients consumed the pectin– fortified bread and arepa.

According to Clara Pérez, from the Faculty of Medicine , cholesterol levels change every 8 days, 15 days would then be a perfect time– lapse for changes to be noticeable among the tested group.

“We divided the patients in three groups: younger than 24 years old, between 35 and 45 and over 50 years old —each group having its particular cardiovascular characteristics—. We also took in consideration their age, weight, waist circumference, dyslipidemia (a raise in lipid levels) or diabetes”, said Pérez.

When comparing the results of initial tests to those made after two weeks of daily pectin consumption, it was established a notorious LDL reduction and, in general, a positive impact on the patients’ lipid profile.

A Protective Layer Professor Restrepo explained that pectin creates a sort of film on the intestines, decreasing fat, cholesterol and glucose absorption.

“It also has a supplementary effect: having an appropiatte level of water absorption, pectin

induces a sensation of satiety, reducing the appetite”, said the chemist.

In addition to this investigation, the study on guava seed (often considered as a waste) study led to phenol extraction (a natural antioxidant).

Guava’s pulp contains pectin.

This edible part of the fruit was turned into acid with a Hydrochloric acid solution; it was then filtered before adding ethanol. At the end, a globule of pure pectin got extracted”, said Luz Patricia Restrepo.

The last part of the process is to take out guava’s natural color, “can you imagine a pink arepa or pink bread? That’s why we had to improve the ethanol baths to eliminate the pigment,” said the chemist.

The extracted pectin was grinded, obtaining a fine powder. It was then added into the bread and arepa dough. According to Clara Pérez, it will be great if pectin fortified corn flour becomes available everywhere.

The researchers pointed out that in order to benefit from pectin’s properties, we would be forced to consume great amounts of guava, while the pectin extract, added to bread or arepa flour will offer the same benefits. “Of course, there is no reason to stop consuming this delicious fruit,” concluded the scientist.

2010

Unimedios

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Carlos Andrey Patiño Guzmán

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to reduce cardiovascular risk.

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Health Elizabeth Vera Martínez Unimedios

To keep up with dental aesthetics some people are ready to undergo homemade whitening techniques without dentist’s supervision and abuse of products available on the market. Indeed they are getting whiter teeth, but they are also taking the risk to suffer from enamel’s erosion.

An in vitro study of human teeth completed by dentists at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia reported changes in the enamel after applying, according to label instructions, Listerine Whitening Prebrush, Plakos Whitening, and the toothpastes Plus White 5 Minute Teeth Whitening Gel and Molar White, which they all contain whitening agents.

The analysis was carried out through an electric microscopy by researchers Johanna Andrea Reyes Carrillo and John Alejandro Bohórquez Arévalo, under the direction of Rehabilitation Specialist, Paula Alejandra Baldión Elorza.

The study involved taking micro–photographs of the dental enamel before and after the application of treatments to establish, by comparison, an eventual morphology change in teeth.

Tooth Whitening at High Cost for Dental Health!

Indiscriminate use of whitening toothpaste and mouthwash may affect teeth enamel. A study confirmed

microscopic changes in its structure after certain time of use.

2010 2

We Need to Read Carefully UN Periódico consulted Johnson & Johnson. The company indicated that all the products they dis-

Photo: Andrés Felipe Castaño/Unimedios

With the consent of patients, previously informed about the study, investigators collected extracted teeth (needless to say that they were extracted for orthodontic reasons!) in a lapse of 90 days at the Surgery Clinic from the Faculty of Dentistry at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Thirty–two teeth were placed randomly in four groups, guarantying equal conditions to measure objectively the treatment effects.

The researchers standardized the brushing with a soft electrical toothbrush and regular intervals on the application of toothpaste. In the case of mouth washers, the immersion method was used.

“Comparing (through an electronic microscope) the surfaces of teeth that received a treatment with the products, to the previously obtained samples, they found that all products generated changes, from slight to moderate, on the enamel surface,” explained Baldión Elorza.

The treatment that produced the most severe changes was Listerine Whitening Prebrush, followed

by Plus White 5 Minute Teeth Whitening Gel. The toothpaste Molar White and the mouthwash Plakos Whitening injured the dental structure to a lesser extent.

The information on the list of other components from the Listerine Whitening Prebrush, and on the total concentration of hydrogen peroxide, the whitening agent, was scarce.

“After several unanswered phone calls to Johnson & Johnson, the company that distributes the product, we decided to consult their webpage, but the information about the product is incomplete and does not indicate the exact percentages of the substance’s composition,” said Reyes.

Mouth washers and toothpastes with hydrogen peroxide

a medical follow–up.

are available to the public without a formula or

Photos: personal file

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Listerine Whitening Prebrush, the Most Severe

the treatment with Listerine Whitening.

Tooth surface before

tribute fulfill the required norms to obtain sanitary registry. “The product arrived from the United States to Colombia last year and, up to now, no injuries have been reported,” emphasized Amparo Herrera, representative of the company, who assured that all labels contain proper printed recommendations on the label.

“The information provided by the label advises to consult a specialist in case of adverse reactions.

Unfortunately, Colombians are not used to read labels, for that reason we end up using inadequate products for our type off skin, hair, and teeth,” said the representative for the multinational company.

Nevertheless, and as indicated

by Dr. Baldión, “it is not easy for common people to perceive when products generate changes on the surface of their teeth because the

Erosion and lesions on

face after treatment.

the teeth sur-

microscopic variations are not noticeable at first sight. Oral mucous (gums and tongue) may be affected as well. However the study didn’t evaluate such alterations.”

“For this reason the scientific community should fulfill its supervising and monitoring role as part of the social responsibility, that in this case, face the health of Colombians,” added Dr. Baldión.

What does Invima Say? The Institute for the Vigilance of Medicines and Foods (INVIMA) assured that products passing through quality control tests are placed under technical and clinical studies in order to issue the sanitary registry.

The decision number 516 from March 15th, 2002 —named Legis-

lative Harmonization in the Matter of Cosmetic Products– indicates in its first article the following: “products or substances to be used on any surface of the human body, epidermis, (…) lips, teeth and oral mucosa, with the purpose to clean, perfume, modify, protect or maintain good health, and prevent or correct corporal odor.”

Although article 2 establishes that products should not be harmful when applied under normal conditions, “it is obvious that Decision 516 talks, in general, about cosmetic products, without specifying for each one of them, mouth washers for instance,” adds Dentist Andrea Reyes.

According to Professor Baldión, health, duty and aesthetics should be the three pillars of dental procedures; the aim is that no one prevails over the others.

Hydrogen peroxide is also used in dental offices; however, “scientific reports describe their benefits and disadvantages. Thus, each professional is the direct responsible for the methods and materials used, and the necessary precautions that each procedure demands.”

The effects caused by the studied products may be less severe when used “at home” due to the protecting properties of saliva.

However, “we shouldn’t ignore that we found important changes (from moderate to severe) on the enamel’s surface, indicating a prevalence of these changes even at the presence of saliva,” concluded Baldión.

Health

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Through chemical modification of Giardia’s protein, an intestinal parasite known for being a public health issue for its highly contagious capacity, scientists from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia managed

to stop the process in which the parasite abandons its protecting cyst, a time when it prepares to attack the human intestine. The discovery could represent the first step to prevent this organism, transmitted principally through polluted water or contaminated food, to multiply itself.

The Attack of Dangerous Intestinal Parasite Hindered by New Procedure Patricia Barrera Silva

Species in Transition Aside from its medical repercussions and endurance, scientists have been extremely interested in the parasite’s genesis. In cellular

biology there are two principal domains: prokaryote (every bacteria is part of this) and eukaryote (plants and animals).

Scientists think that there was a transition from prokaryote organisms that started as such and then evolved to become eukaryotes, but they still don’t know exactly how it happened.

The Giardia parasite would be on its way to the transition between prokaryote and eukaryote, something that would represent a great advance to understand cell evolution, “Giardia parasite is one of the oldest euka-ryotes, for this reason it is a very interesting and useful model of study”, explains Alvarado, scientist from the Biochemical Basic Research

Lab at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

An Unmasked Parasite Alvarado isolated the parasite’s cyst in a suitable environment reproduced inside a test tube. “We immersed the cyst in an acid milieu, which works as a stimulus at 98.6°F (37°C). This is how we extracted the parasite out of the cyst,” she said.

The next step was to analyze the function of the protein’s phosphorylation during the process.

The phosphorylation is a chemical modification allowing cells to quickly change the proteins’ activity. The results were promising: “If we prevent the protein’s phos-

Cuerpos basales

Núcleo

Disco ventral

Flagelo anterior

Cuerpos medianos

Flagelo posterior Flagelo ventral

The parasite’s parts

Flagelo caudal

The actual prevalence of Giardiasis in Colombia remains unknown. One of the most recent studies, published by the Unit of Parasitology and the Department of Public Health from the Faculty of Medicine at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, covered kindergarten and school population from La Virgen, in Quipile, Cundinamarca.

The analysis concluded that the prevalence of the G. duodenalis infection has not changed significantly during the period of the study (13.60 % in 1995, 12.48% in 2001 and 15.16% in 2005). The last national study on the disease was completed in 1980, during the National Inquiry on Morbidity.

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most common environments of the Giardia parasite.

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The non-potable water, frequently used to prepare food, is one of the

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Giardia is one of the most common intestinal parasites to cause diarrhea in the world. Nevertheless, we had to wait 300 years, since its discovery in 1681, for the World Health Organization (WHO) to recognize it as a global health issue.

Every year, 2 million cases are reported from all over the world.

In 2004, the Giardia parasite, infected a whole village of 100 thousand residents in Norway, whom bore with the disease for two weeks.

Several identical episodes in other regions of the world forced WHO to allocate funds for its investigation.

Most of scientists devoted to Giardia research have devoted themselves to the cyst: the protecting shell that helps it to exit its host (human or animal) and survive in open air.

Giardia research started at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia five years ago with a doctoral thesis about the process in which the parasite, when arriving to the host’s intestine, abandons its protector cyst.

According to researcher Magda Alvarado (the thesis author), “it is a very interesting process, but we don’t know much about it because it’s not easy, nor pleasant, to study about: the cyst has to be extracted from fecal samples of patients suffering from giardiasis (the disease produced by the pathogenic protozoan).” Alvarado took the risk and established a method to study it.

The giardia parasite infects humans and mammals; it can survive in all kinds of environments and is transmitted through non potable water and contaminated food. It is resistant to common disinfectants as hypochlorite and can survive for years outside a host, due to a sort of invulnerable surrounding shield made of protein and sugar.

The cases of dysentery caused by the parasite could turn chronic and last for years. Children are the most susceptible population, and the diarrhea related to this disease may lead to malnutrition issues and delayed milestones.

phorylation at the last stage of the excysting process, the parasite won’t be able to divide,” said the scientist.

It is such an important discovery, since the parasite has on its surface a suited structure to infect the host.

It is a small type of sucker that allows it to adhere to the human intestine, causing the disease. If the division process doesn’t complete, the sucker will not be in place for the Giardia to attach to the host.

In addition, the investigation analyzed the system regulated by the calcium ion and the calmodulin protein.

The results allow us to assume that this system is involved in the parasite’s mobility, which has an important part during the infection process.

“The blocking we simulated in the laboratory throws important basic information: the molecular knowledge of this parasite’s biology allows us to understand a more complex process and, in the long term, to generate effective control strategies” said the researcher.

Some may ask themselves about the importance of Giardia’s research, since it only produces diarrhea and in 30% of the cases it doesn’t even present any symptoms. The answer is that many other parasites have resistant shields and present the same kind of excysting process.

Giardia’s mechanisms are so basic that if scientists manage to understand them, they would be able to block more evolved dangerous pathogens.

Víctor Manuel Holguín/Unimedios

Unimedios

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Health

Experts Develop Technique to Diagnose Thalassemia A study completed by a group of biochemist and pediatric oncohematologist from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, lead to a non–

expensive and accurate technique to diagnose thalassemia, a blood disease that shortens the lifespan of red blood cells, affecting bones, liver, and sometimes, confining children to be transfused for life.

Patricia Barrera Silva

In a healthy organism, red blood cells live between 90 and 120 days. However, there is a group of persons whose red blood cells have a shorter lifespan (only 40 days) due to a hemoglobin disorder known as thalassemia, affecting particularly the child population.

The hemoglobin is a complex protein composed by two alpha and two beta protein chains. In the case of healthy kids, each alpha chain has a complementary beta chain.

When there is a lack of these chains, and as a consequence, some of them remain loose, the clinical manifestation corresponds to anemia, but with an abnormal behavior.

Thus thalassemia appears.

There are four types: thalassemia trait, minor thalassemia, alpha thalassemia and beta thalassemia.

Most of thalassemia cannot be easily detected, and even for the lowest level of the disease (thalassemia trait) there was not a diagnosis test available from any laboratory.

This circumstance prompted a group of physicians and researchers from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia to develop a molecular technique that would allow accomplishing the diagnosis.

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A Heritage from the Spanish Conquest Hemoglobin deficiencies are more common in countries with high prevalence of malaria. For this reason, thalassemia is recurrent in the Equatorial Africa, where it affects 50 percent of the population, becoming a public health issue.

The disease was brought to Colombia by Spanish and Italians. Adriana Linares, one of the 50 pediatric oncohematologist of the country, points out that hemoglobin diseases are a recurrent consultation cause within the pediatric service of the Hospital de la Misericordia, in Bogotá.

“Generally we receive 3 to 4 cases each month. Those children present anemia, which becomes serious when they get 6 months old. When blood tests are completed, we detect alterations that are hard to explain,” declares the specialist.

Thalassemia causes red blood cells to break because some of their globin chains lack of their corresponding pair. When some of them remain loose, the cell rupture occurs, leading to anemia.

If the organism suffers from anemia, it sends a message to the bone marrow —blood cells producer— which works to replace

Photo Philip Salazar/Unimedios

Unimedios

Fifteen years ago, the Faculty of Medicine from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia opened

gram on Pediatric Oncohematology. Up to now, 17 students have graduated. affected cells. Even so, the abnormal cells amount keeps growing and, in addition, the bones, also cell producers, start to deform themselves, leading to noticeable alterations (especially skull, cheek bones and thorax).

A strategy to counteract the disease is the chronic transfusion of red blood cells. Even though this alternative aims to improve the anemia patient’s wellbeing, it brings complications such as iron storage.

According to Adriana Linares, a wrong analysis of the usual blood test results can lead to a regular anemia diagnosis, thus to adopt an inadequate treatment. For this reason, it is essential to know for sure when a kid suffers from thalassemia, and from what kind.

In fact, the lack of an exam leading to an accurate diagnosis prompted the research team to go back to the classrooms at the Faculty of Medicine from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, to find out, through fundamental sciences, an answer to this pediatric issue.

An Innovative Technique Professor Adriana Linares and the other specialist arrived to the

Biochemical Laboratory, where professors, undergraduate and graduate students complete their experiments.

Clinicians and researchers —an uncanny but essential scene, supported by technological tools and by the experience of biochemist Jorge Eduardo Caminos— conceived a diagnosis method called Globin Chain Balance.

Through the RP PCR technique (Polymerase Chain Reaction in real time), normally used to detect multiple pathologies, the experts extracted DNA from the nucleus of the blood cells, and through a molecular process, they duplicated it and amplified it, allowing them to detect the presence of alpha thalassemia, which is the hardest to find.

“We managed to make progress in the test that will ultimately allow us to know if a kid affected by blood diseases suffers from thalassemia,” explained Doctor Linares.

This technological advance is of great importance if we bear in mind that in some thalassemia cases, children will need blood transfusions for life. “What we do is to provide them with healthy red blood cells every 3 to 4 weeks,

the graduate pro-

so the bone marrow works better,” said Linares.

It seems complicated, but if this procedure is not accomplished in children, the symptoms of anemia would emerge; they would be unable to play or run, and may even suffer from heart failure and bone malformations.

In order to fight this kind of genetic diseases it is important to have an accurate diagnosis in the shortest delays. The parents should be well informed about the risks of having additional kids: “Even among children with thalassemia trait, where symptoms are not immediately noticeable, diagnosis is important so they don’t receive the wrong treatment,” concludes Professor Isabel Sarmiento, pediatrician and author of the doctoral thesis that lead to the development of this technique.

This project was recently awarded by the Colombian Society of Hematology and Oncology, which outlined the great advance to diagnose in real time, one of the hemoglobin diseases that concern child population and affects close to 300.000 kids every year in the world.

Technology

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BIOTA (Techno–economic analysis of bioenergy) is the new software designed by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, with the purpose to analyze and evaluate the bioenergetic potential of several countries.

Software from Universidad Nacional de Colombia is Taken as a Reference Point by the FAO

At this moment, the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales develops software to simplify the work load of seismologists and volcanologists, and at the same time to analyze faster and more precisely the daily data received from each of the digital seismological monitoring stations.

Since the Volcanological and Seismological Observatory of Colombia (divided into three regions Manizales, Pasto and Popayán) was created —right after the serious tragedy of Armero that left near 26,000 deaths, over 20,000 victims and injured, and left incalculable economic looses on November the 13th, 1985— the institute keeps an eye on all volcanoes in the country, aiming to alert and take the appropriate measures in case an avalanche of this type emerges.

It has been required a considerable amount of people in charge of monitoring 24 hours a day the signals sent by each one of the stations located in the volcanoes.

This supervision has been completed through a seismograph (drum with smoked paper in which a needle registers the signal received) and a digital system where

the server separately stores all data from each one of the stations.

The current methodology being used by seismologists has several disadvantages: there is a huge workload that needs to be handled, since they constantly have to store and classify the information received; the constant growth of a database, where events from each station are stored (and skipped if more than one provided data is from the same event); and errors in the signal’s reading process that may occur by ignorance about the event or by omission between shift changes.

One method that helps processing great amount of data and interpreting results with greater certainty is the pattern recognition and its area of multiple classificatory systems, applied also to face identification, bio–signals or classification of hyper–spectral images, among many others.

Through this type of techniques, Mauricio Orozco Alzate, researcher at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales, John Makario Londoño Bonilla, seismologist for the OVSM, Dutch Professor Robert Duin, and two students from the Electronic Engineering Program, developed a prototype

system of automatic surveillance based on multiple sorters.

The new software doesn’t have any precedents and with its help, researchers expect that the data systematization from stations at the Nevado Del Ruiz Volcano won’t be manually completed anymore, and that just one result will be obtained as a product of the data combination; no other information will be omitted, nor vagueness in the interpretation allowed.

According to Professor Orozco, “with the Multiple System of Classification for Automatic Identification of Volcanic Earthquakes in the Complex Cerro Machín–Cerro Bravo, and through statistical principles of pattern recognition, they may automatize seismic classification and take advantage of the multiplicity of data provided by each one of the stations, obtaining a more objective and trusty classification.”

In order to develop such a prototype, they first needed to choose three among the twelve stations at the Nevado del Ruiz, aiming to analyze their signals; those were Alfombrales, Bis and Tolda Fría.

Subsequently they created three algorithms (classifiers), one for each station, intended to

identify the most registered seismic events.

Finally, through the rules of combination (a way through which the decisions from each classifier are put together), a single decision is obtained, throwing the final result: the automatic identification of the class where the seismic event belongs. The rules of combination are applied under the assumption that, generally, a joint decision is more reliable than those taken individually.

Orozco Alzate explained that “in the first stage of the prototype’s development we chose only one volcano, three stations and three classifiers, because we wanted to see if our hypothesis worked. The advantage offered by this system is that in a near future we will include all stations and extend the classifiers’ spectrum, which only requires a re–training of the system.”

The project is expected to deliver a software prototype to be included in the daily monitoring of seismic activity from the Volcano Nevado del Ruiz and have national impact, through this use, in other observatories located in the country.

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Agencia de Noticias UN

2010

UN Develops Software for Volcano Monitoring

2

In 2008, the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales, represented by Professor Carlos Ariel Cardona Alzate, received an invitation from the Bioenergy and Food Security Program (BEFS) to contribute as a consultant in FAO for subjects related to bio–energy, alcohol production, biodiesel and biogas.

“Since then, two commitment letters between the FAO and the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales had led to some concrete results, regarding in particular, to the analysis of bio–energy potential in Africa and Peru”, Cardona Alzate explained.

“Besides, says Professor Cardona Alzate, it was clear to us that the methodological developments involved in the creation of this software should be presented through a friendly user interface, so communities located in various countries where the FAO is represented would easily evaluate their bio–energetic alternatives”.

First, the software will be im-

plemented in Tanzania (Africa) and then it will be spread to other countries, offering alternative sources of biofuel and opening the possibility of making, together, a strong foundation for economic and social development.

“Various perspectives were involved in the development of the software: techno–economic analysis, agronomy, and even risk analysis when the region is affected by lack of water”, said the Professor from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales.

Such recognition ranks the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales among the higher education institutions with greater biofuel experience, and confirms its international trajectory in the analysis of new technologies and raw materials.

“The fact that an organization such as the FAO takes a product from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia as a reference point for all its activities, corroborates its reliability and improves our research environment”, emphasized the researcher.

Photos: Andrés Almeida/Unimedios

Photo: Unimedios

Agencia de Noticias UN

8

Technology Unimedios

“Imagine a farm disconnected from the mains, where a recording system may be turned on with electricity generated in a corral by hundreds of microorganisms jammed in pig droppings,” says undergraduate student, Marco Antonio Muñoz, whom together with a group made up by professors and classmates from the Department of Biology at the Faculty of Sciences in the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, proved that with Colombian technology and good support, this dream can materialize.

In another lab at the Faculty of Engineering, a similar project is being developed by a group made up of electric, electronic and chemical engineers. After analyzing chicken, cow and pig excrements, they managed to establish that bacteria within these substances can produce energy and decontaminate water.

These are groups of young researchers, locating themselves at the top of investigation on a subject almost unknown in Colombia, but explored by institutions such as NASA, which are investing time and money in it.

For this reason this project was ranked by the Ibero–American Science and Technology Education Consortium (ISTEC) among the six best of America, in a contest supporting initiatives to produce alternative energy.

The second Project, lead by Professor Néstor Ariel Algecira at the Faculty of Engineering, won the Third Competition on Scientific, Educational and Community–Impact Synergy, organized by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

Energy Producer Bacteria

Found in Manure

Two prolific projects from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia manage to decontaminate water, create electricity, generate methane gas serving as fuel and produce organic fertilizers from microorganisms present in animal farm excrements.

Photo: Víctor Manuel Holguín/Unimedios

Carlos Andrey Patiño Guzmán

This is the prototype model that

produces alternative energy from microorganisms.

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www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Microbes and Biology Marco Arturo Muñoz assures that it has been well–known for 30 years that some stumps have the aptitude to produce energy.

Recently, this alternative has been improved with proton exchange membranes (tissues that only allow the transit of protons), installed in energy generators systems, but this factor increases the cost of the technology.

“For this reason the scientific inquiry aimed to find if, in Bogotá, this kind of systems could be developed using bacteria isolated in a biodigester (hermetically sealed tank) at the Savannah (high plateau where Bogotá is located). Literature about this particular field mentions anaerobic organisms from certain environments that accomplish this role. I realized, then, that a biodigester contains those kinds of organisms. Thus, we studied if those local bacteria were able to produce electricity,” explained Muñoz.

They completed electrochemical proofs that indeed confirmed that the bacteria contained in pig’s excrement accomplished the electron catalysis process. More specific proofs demonstrated that they were also able to produce energy.

One of the main innovations of this investigation is that they got to experiment with a biodigester located in a cold climate, which is unusual if we bear in mind that those systems require temperatures higher than 80.6 °F (27 °C) to work. The students group, lead by Professor Catalina Arévalo Ferro,

Pig manure can be used to generate electricity.

observed and confirmed as well, that in those conditions bacteria were able to produce energy.

Working with Blackwater After several months of lab tests, engineering students found analogous results. “When we tackled the problem, we thought of it as science fiction. Nevertheless, today we are reaching our goal,” said Rubén Lopez, Electric Engineering undergraduate student.

“We built a microbial fuel cell with two chambers: the first one contained residual water where we submerged the anaerobic microorganisms (organisms that don’t require oxygen to live), the second chamber collects the treated water”, points out the student.

He explains that the first problem was to find Geobacter, the most suitable microbe to produce electricity. In Colombia is very expensive to import certified stumps of these bacteria. For that reason Professor Algecira opted for local microorganisms to accomplish the same role.

Thus the students ended up experimenting with pig, chicken and bovine manure. They established that microorganisms from this organic matter were ideal for their goal.

“Each chamber has an elec- are currently trying to improve the trode (a conductor making contact efficiency of the experiment, to with non–metallic parts), an ano- create a sort of small prototype de and a cathode. The chambers produced in other countries. are connected through a cable and Both, the Biology Department a tube with a gel membrane so the and the Faculty of Engineering, microorganisms that are located have the firm conviction that this on the first chamber’s electrode sort of dispositive is essential to degrade the organic matter in the resolute electricity issues in small water,” explains López.

During the process, microor- and isolated communities, as well ganisms generate electrons that as to provide an option that rego through the electrode. Those duces to the maximum sewages electrons pass through the cable to polluting the rivers.

These first steps leading to the second chamber. At the same new discoveries rank the country time, the membrane transports at the top of alternative energy hydroniums.

When the combination of research in Latin America. hydroniums, electrons, plus the air injected through a hose reaOxygen-free ches the second comcompartment partment, it triggers a chemical reaction producing water. “We mae− Cathode Anode naged to purify the water and in addition, there was a flux of electrons, in other words, electricity.

Organic We managed to accome− matter O2 plish two functions.” e− Rodrigo Antonio Ibáñez, from the Faculty of Electric Engineering, added that measureH+ H+ H2O ments of tension and resistance were taken every Proton day. Then, they establisexchange hed, through comparatimembrane ve tables, that the dispositive was in fact generaBiofilm ting electric charges.

Carlos Fernando Hernández, electric engi- The diagram illustrates how the biodigester neer, points out that they works to generate electricity.

Technology

Organic Cells:

an Inexpensive Alternative to Capture Solar Energy

cional de Colombia, Sadewasser pointed out that the cost would be diminished through a learning curve, for this reason the study would be of great utility.

Organic Cells One way of reducing expenses is to use organic cells. César Quiñónez, PhD from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia developed a research on this subject. He used colorings available on the market at the basis of the process. “These cells are photoelectrochemical and, even if they are half as efficient, they are 100 times cheaper,” he added.

In his research, Quiñónez used indium oxide with ruthenium. The light affects the coloring that captures the photon, which remains excited and transfers the electron to the titanium oxide, transporting it through the cells. Here, unlike the physical photovoltaic modules, they use a solution, not a solid medium.

“In this case there are not electron holes, but ions, that complete the cell’s circuit,” explained the research’s author.

According to Quiñónez, even

if the efficiency of theses cells is 11 percent, lower than the average 20 percent of the physical cells, they are less expensive. In the opinion of Professor Sadewasser, it is hard for organic cells to be used for massive scale electricity, but they could be useful for small appliances, such as individual electric equipments.

Solar Energy in Colombia Colombia still relies on water sources and fossil fuel to produce electricity. The Ministry of Mines and Energy declares that photovoltaic modules have been implemented (on the late 90’s), but experience showed deficiencies in the form, sustainability and the users’ expectations.

“The results given by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia can be attributed principally to errors in the dimensioning of the autonomous systems, aspect in which the engineer participation is fundamental,” affirmed Clavijo.

Even if Colombia has great water and fossil fuel resources, these are not renewable. In fact, climatic change threatens the water

Elements such as silicon are processed through specialized equipment

in order to fabricate the panels’ layers.

resources. According to Gabriel Poveda, Professor at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, it is expected that before we get to the middle of the century, several nevados (snow covered mountains) would disappear.

Keeping in mind that the Colombian Energetic Plan (PEN 2003–2020) prompts the consuming of fossil fuels, the alternative energy will never be competitive enough,” affirms researcher Josué Clavijo.

In this context it is required a prospective vision that allows to anticipate the importance of high investments in photovoltaic modules, or alternative energy generators, that, in a long term won’t need maintenance, and won’t have environmental repercussions.

According to the Ministry of Mines and Energy, it is clear that more innovative photovoltaic alternatives should be considered.

For this reason it explores these solutions in community health centers and rural schools, as well as using hybrid systems. There even exist programs on this subject.

As claimed by this Ministry, in the case of biggest consumers, the investment and maintenance costs makes the application of photovoltaic modules unsustainable. Therefore it is required another kind of renewable generators such as gasification units, minor wind power systems, leaving to big localities the use of diesel, and in a supplementary level, renewable alternatives.

Thus, the scientific work at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, which aims to reduce costs, is fundamental. However, solutions do not depend exclusively on a single alternative, points Sadewasser.

“To provide the energy the world needs, we require a variety of technologies allowing efficient and clean electricity,” he added.

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Researchers from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia have studied for years efficient and low cost compounds to build solar cells.

2010

Clean and efficient alternative sources of energy are a common subject of discussion around the world. However, it seems a topic that usually remains unapplied and closely associated to Europe.

The dilemma that usually prevents from adopting those systems goes between efficiency and cost, often, in some countries, hand by hand with a short term perspective.

In fact, this dilemma is at the root of the implementation of alternative sources of energy that have been tested successfully, such as the photovoltaic energy and the photoelectrochemical energy, which captures solar light through solar cells and turns it into electricity. However, developed countries still discuss its use because it implies the use of chemical elements such as gallium arsenide and silicon, which increase the economical investment.

Even if in Colombia it’s not a common subject from an official perspective, researchers from the Physics and Chemistry Department at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia have studied, for several years efficient and affordable compounds to build photovoltaic modules.

One of the most recent works involves an analysis of the alloy of copper, indium, gallium and selenium, Cu (In, Ga) Se2, keeping in mind the construction of tandem cells in various levels, which would allow to capture a greater amount of solar energy.

Within the lab, the use of this compound has showed an efficiency of 20 percent, and it’s expected that at industrial scale production, it would provide 15 percent.

Josué Clavijo, researcher from the Semiconductor Materials and Solar Energy Group, at the Physics Department, explains that 14 percent of efficiency is a good performance for module. With the former quaternary compound, the economic cost would be lower, since the layer can be thinner.

There are three generations of solar cells. The first one was made of silicon. They were very efficient, but very expensive. The second generation consisted on thin layers of cells (the ones this study is about). And the third generation consists on cells that are still in earlier stages of research, using concepts such as quantum dots and tubes, and a multiple generation of excitons (quasiparticles that resist low temperatures).

The second generation of solar cells are made of two principal semiconductor layers. One has type P conductivity; the other one has type N. The last is characterized by an excess of electrons. The type P has an excess of electron holes. The combination of these two semiconductors generates a magnetic field, a fundamental aspect with in a solar cell.

“Most of the solar cells available on the market employ thin layer technology, using different materials from silicon to copper, and are processed at lower temperatures. Their efficiency is great, but they can still be improved, which requires a research on fundamental properties,” said Sascha Sadewasser, materials and energy researcher from the Helmholtz Zentrum in Berlin, Germany.

Regarding the use of the quaternary compound, which is being studied in the Universidad Na-

Solar energy is an alternative not yet received in several countries due to the high costs it implies. Colombian researchers are trying new compounds that would diminish the costs.

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Unimedios

Photos Philip Salazar/Unimedios

Magda Páez Torres

9

10 Environment Unimedios

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Although the consumption of its meat is pretty common among ethnic communities and Colombian farmers, and it also makes part of the promissory and wild species placed in captivity and exhibited in zoos, what’s known as guagua in the Cordillera Central (central mountain range), is not so.

Researchers reached this conclusion after fifteen years of monitoring and performing an intense and modern analysis, which allowed the characterization of the Cuniculus hernandezi. The new species is hidden behind its similarity to the guagua, Cuniculus taczanowskii.

Thus it was indicated by investigators José Joaquín Castro from the Universidad Distrital Francisco José de Caldas; Juan Bautista López, from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Medellín, and Francisco Becerra; experts who also defined the great importance of this discovery for zoology and the recognition of promissory species. In the long term, they expect the new species to serve as a model organism for medical applications, due to the great and interesting biological characteristics regarding its wound healing and immunological defenses.

“The species is a source of nutritional animal protein and demands a sustainable technical breeding. For this reason, to benefit from its meat, described as juicy and with a high protein value (even superior to the brangus cattle, one of the most appreciated in the world), breeding centers of Cuniculus hernandezi are required,” said López Ortíz, graduate professor of Biotechnology at the Universidad Nacional in Medellín.

The work of the expert team exceeded the achievements obtained by another group of scientists that back in 1975 studied the same rodent. Scientists from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia established that is not only one but two different species —one that inhabits the Central Mountain Range (Cuniculus hernandezi), the other, the Eastern Mountain Range (Cuniculus taczanowskii)—; besides, it was confirmed that the common guagua from rural zones is endemic from Antioquia and is physical, morphological and genetically different from the ones that inhabit the Bogotá Savannah.

The discovery was verified through biometry tests that determined significant differences between the skulls of the two species.

These, together with molecular analysis and cytogenetic tests, turned out to be forceful arguments.

In addition, phylogeographic studies ratified that the physical barriers between the Central and Eastern mountain ranges prevent both populations to cross and engage in reproductive processes.

New Discovery:

Third Biggest Rodent in the World An animal of more than 14 pounds of weight, with juicy meat of high protein value and great potential for medical applications due to its biological strategies for wound healing, amazed the world science. This is the third biggest rodent in the world, and was found in Antioquia by investigators from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and Universidad Distrital. The analysis of its mitochondrial DNA allowed confirming the discovery of the new species.

Photos: personal file

Elizabeth Cañas Rodríguez

use of an specialized software and a digital caliper used to relate dimensions from each part of the body and the cranial, ears, post limbs, tail’s length and weight’s evaluation,” explained López Ortiz.

Interdisciplinary studies confirmed the existence of both kinds of guagua species in Colombia, showing the need for a preservation program, establishing technical breeding to reintroduce specimens at apt zones for their survival.

“This would allow us to benefit from their meat, which will surely find a market everywhere around the world. It would also improve the technical breeding of the species, because the production is slow due to the length of gestation, that lasts 5 months and only provides a maximum of two offspring by female,” said

the Professor from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

A Double Revelation The discovery of new rodent species represents an advance, not only for the Colombian scientific community, but for the rest of the world. At the Congress of the Colombian Association of Biological Sciences realized in Popayán, the importance of this new report for the medicine, the conservation of desert ecosystems and the nutritional chain, where C. hernandezi fulfills a significant role, were presented.

“Cuniculus hernandezi is the third biggest rodent in the world, after the capybara and the Guagua de Cola. It weights over 14 pounds.

Although it is more common to recognize new species among small rodents, the same doesn’t apply to

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2010

DNA Tests Within recognition of the new species, researchers resorted to molecular comparison studies completed at farms from La Calera and the Universidad Nacional in Medellín, and to the extraction of mitochondrial DNA samples from species resting at the Natural Sciences Museum of the University.

“Cutting edge technology and scientific methods were used. The morphological analysis implied the

Just behind the chigüiro and the guagua de cola,

dezi is the third biggest rodent in the world.

the Cuniculus hernan-

the big ones,” agreed the experts.

Professor José Joaquín Castro added: “With the work carried out in Colombia, we are leading the study of these animals. Even though in other regions from South America, such as Bolivia and Peru, these rodents are popular, they are not object of scientific research.”

Aside from their great impact in the economy of Colombia, the new species offers special biological characteristics. “By observing ten specimens in captivity that we used for investigation in the zone of La Calera in Bogotá, it was established that when they are wounded, their injuries don’t get infected nor become inflamed: they have an amazing regenerative capacity. In fact we didn’t use any type of antibiotics or medicines because the injuries cured and healed by themselves.”

Biologist Juan Pablo Gómez, who works at the Santa Fe Zoo, indicated that the Cuniculus hernandezi is an attraction of the Nocturne Safari realized at the institution. “Studies about these rodent mammals are scarce in the country, in spite of their promising characteristics. In this sense, the research developed by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and the Universidad Distrital is very important because it contributes to the biodiversity knowledge in the country.”

Environment

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Waste Flowers Turned

Photo: Víctor Manuel Holguín/Unimedios

into Biodegradable Styrofoam

Through the workshop of Recyclable Vegetal Material in Pulp and Paper from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, a researcher team found a solution to the treatment of floriculture residues.

veloped between the Technological Investigations Institute from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and Asocolflores, these residues may have multiple uses, even as decorative articles. dity spots when the flowers travel abroad, thus they present better quality,” said Garzón.

The Social Component The results encouraged the Colombian Association of Flower Exporters (Asocolflores) to officially support this project and, through the Agriculture Ministry, focus its development in favor of the floriculturist community.

According to Garzón, “importers of Colombian flowers, such as Japan and the European Union, demand that manpower (near to 3,000 floriculturists) should work under optimal conditions. It is the only way to do business with them.

In that sense, the project is framed in a social and environmental responsibility, where the community has an opportunity to perform a complimentary task to their activity,” he emphasized.

The research line of this work has involved, not only members of the Institute of Technological Investigations at the Faculty of Arts from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, but also students from different areas of the Industrial Design and Chemistry Departments.

One of the participants is Ómar Bolívar, who just graduated at the Industrial Design program.

“With this proposal, we offer an alternative to composting, which is the current waste treatment, but one that contaminates and damages the land’s quality. It is an expensive task, but necessary in order to achieve international standards,” said the designer attached to the University.

Another application of this new material is the making of seedbeds (similar to small boxes) which allow plants to germinate

The new material may be used

in decorative articles and biodegradable Styrofoam.

directly in the land. Due to its great biodegradable capacity, the flower’s root may freely grow, and not as it currently happens because they use plastic bags that, when removed (to protect the land’s condition), affect the plant.

Step by Step Bolívar explains that the residues used to elaborate materials are recycled from the flowers, fulfilling the quantity and quality requirements of the product. “The stem of any flower may be employed, although roses and carnations cultivated in the Savannah of Bogotá are the ones mainly used.

The most important factor is the cellulose within each plant.”

Lignin (compound that constitutes the plants’ cell walls) is retired from the stems and cooked in a kettle with caustic soda. The material is mixed in a big blender, which strikes the fibbers so they

interlace. This way cellulose pulp is produced.

The process is divided in two lines, which is also subordinated to the product. For example, to elaborate paper and cardboard of several weights intended to wrap the flowers, a frame with a line cloth that sinks in a bathtub with the cellulous material is used. A press squeezes it and, in a dying tunnel, after 15 minutes, it gets to its final stage.

In a German press, adapted for this process by professionals of the Technological Investigations at the Universidad Nacional, the biodegradable Styrofoam is prepared.

Due to this tool seed plots, disposable households and isolated thermoacoustic materials, among other products, can be made.

“At the moment we are concluding a factory’s assembly to increase productivity. Next April we will show to the farmers, tangible results to definitely consolidate the work,” said Bolívar.

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Luis Eduardo Garzón, professor at the Plastic Arts School from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, leads one of the most important projects in the country related to the flower industry.

Due to the work of professionals from the Institute of Technological Investigations at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and the Colombian Association of Floriculturist (Asocolflores), the flowers’ sector —second line on Colombian exports— will manage to give good use to its vegetal waste (mainly stems) and create alternative raw materials that can be used, for instance, as packing for exportation flowers and seed plots for seedling germination.

The goal is to benefit from the waste produced by different processes in this sector. This waste currently ascends to 1,700 annual tons.

“The achieved quality of the product depends on the kind of flower we use. The main advantage it presents is the biodegradability and its easy decomposition, which is completed within a week and not within 200 years, as it happens with other materials,” said Professor Garzón.

This is the final stage of a project that, as remembered by Professor Garzón, began over ten years ago at his workshop for Recyclable Vegetal Material of Pulp and Paper: “Floriculturists who attended the class indicated their concern for the enormous problem caused by the waste produced by their activity. As a result of the material accumulation, they were generating leachate that contaminated water, land and even cattle,” assures the Professor.

Cattle’s contamination is caused by the chemicals of the liquid dispersed within the animal organism, contaminating their milk and meat: products consumed by the human that may end up affecting its health.

“Since then, we began to elaborate products that carried positive results. It is not about a conventional writing paper, but a high quality envelope. The material has excellent absorption properties that eliminate remaining humi-

The near 1,700 tonnes of vegetal residues annually produced by the floriculturist industry in the country may be transformed into a biodegradable material similar to Styrofoam. Due to a project de-

2010

Unimedios

2

Francisco Tafur

12 Environment

UN Expedition Prevents Environ Elizabeth Vera Martínez

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2010

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Unimedios

The invasion of great mining projects, particularly gold extraction, in the Yaigojé–Apaporis region —where more than 20 indigenous communities settle—, threatened biodiversity and the ecosystem due to the ecological and cultural importance of the area.

The Indigenous Captains Association of the zone requested to National Parks to declare their territory a protected area, including a great portion of the Taraira Mountain Rage and the mythical Jirijirimo, in order to prevent an environmental disaster. For this reason, they needed a biodiversity inventory to be completed, but they didn’t want a different institution, aside from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, to execute it.

A group of researchers, experts in flora and fauna from the Natural Sciences Institute (ICN) at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, took the challenge and went inside the Vaupés jungle in a 20 days journey to explore the zone and describe most of the species inhabiting these ecosystems. They were also assisted by a botanical specialist from the Amazonian Institute of Scientific Investigation (Sinchi).

“It is the first time that an indigenous community asks for scientists to visit their territory and collect biological samples. Aside from that, they pointed out that they wanted the study to be completed

by UN scientists, to guarantee the information’s quality,” said Professor Gonzalo Andrade, project’s director.

The results worked in favor of the zone’s declaration as a natural reserve and, additionally, reported new discoveries and distribution registries of different species in the region, whose only description was completed by Richard Evan Schultes, a botanist who, around 1941, classified more than 2,000 plants.

Camilo Guío, public official at the Territorial Direction of National Parks in Amazonía–Orinoquía, affirmed that these communities have always been threatened. During July, 2007, the Colombian Institute of Geology and Mining (Ingeominas) granted a concession to extract gold in 10,000 hectares of the Taraira Mountainous area (Vaupés).

UN Periódico consulted with the Hiring and Mining Titration Subdivision of Ingeominas about the given concessions and their awareness on the 169 OIT agreements, which demands, among other things, the previous consultation with indigenous populations. The agreement stands that communities and tribes have to be consulted in relation to matters that directly affect them.

They may participate —forewarned, informed and free— on all the development processes and politics that concern them.

There are two versions of the agreement’s concession, according to the direction and mining service contracts from September: in the first one, the organization allotted five concessions to exploit titanium, iron, clay, niobium and gold in the region of Vaupés. For the gold’s extraction an area of 1,999 hectares in

Almost 2,510 flora and fauna species, among which were found 63 new for science and 60 threaten ones, are part of a study developed by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia that lead the Yaigojé–Apaporis zone, located in Vaupés,

to be declared a protected area. The research prevented this natural reserve to become a goldmine, granted by Ingeominas to a single contractor.

Epipedobates femoralis

the Taraira region¹ was yielded.

In the second listings, five gold concessions were included, for a total of six, adjudged to the same contractor, adding a total of 42,143 hectares to be exploited in the Taraira region.

Gnetum sp. nov.

Caligo sp.

Discoveries of the Expedition Around 225 bird species, 105 fish, 79 reptiles and amphibians, 322 butterflies and 1,682 flowers were collected by INC and Sinchi experts.

They managed to collect visual and audio registries of 225 bird species from 48 different families, besides a collection of 65 specimens from 52 species, said Professor Gary Styles, bird expert.

“The collections allowed them to register new information on the bio–geographic affinities between the various species and the zone,” he said.

According to the investigator,

this area is very rich in biodiversity and some units represent distribution extensions of their respective species, including the species registry of Mosquerito, Myiophobus fasciatus, found for the first time at the east part of the Andes. “We managed to complete essential chorology information (from the distribution area) for the country,” he added.

A couple of hummingbird species was registered. They usually live in low lands, but this time, the almost unknown species was found at the high part of the forest. Interesting data was obtained about the behavior of the tiny species Discosura langsdorffi while it visited the Guama flowers: “This

Environment

13

nmental Catastrophe in Vaupés lombia. At least 17 of them have restricted distribution to the sheltered area,” said Julio Betancur.

Scientists also discovered five new species categorized as vulnerable, which means that they face a moderate risk of extinction or deterioration of their populations at medium term; among them are the following: Aechmea politii, Navia fontoides, Navia heliophila y Sequentia serrata, from the Bromedialceae family, and Costus fissicalyx, from the Costaceae family.

Another 24 supplementary species were located in the category of almost threaten.

During the 20 days of the expedition, 99 fish species were collected and six of them were identified corresponding to seven orders and 28 families. Three of them are new for Colombia, one of them is endemic (Uatumanesis) from the Uatuma’s river basin, in

World-wide Inventory

Phaethornis ruber (reddish hermit)

these, 14 are part of the first zone’s registry even thought they were already registered elsewhere in Colombia.

At Yaigojé–Apaporis, eight unknown species for the Colombian territory were found, and today, those are considered endemic from this territory. The collection was complemented by six new species for science. “They’ve never been described before, it’s a discovery, not only for this zone, but for Colombia and the world,” explained Gonzalo Andrade, butterfly expert.

Among the most representative species are the Panacea prola, of exotic colors such as blue and iridescent green, and the Catonephele chromis, of dark colors such

Photo: Gary Stiles

322 samples of butterflies corresponding to 5 families and 10 subfamilies were collected. From

The Richest Families The team in charge of the plant inventory was composed by Dairon Cárdenas López, from the Sinchi and Julio Betancur, from

Philodendron sp. nov.

the Brazilian Amazon.

Many of them are miniature species that don’t surpass five centimeters at their adult stage. Many others are frequently used for consumption, such as the Tambaqui or Cachama, Sábalo, Pintadillo, Pirarucú, and Tucunaré. There are also other species commonly used as ornamental, such as Mojarra, Arauana, Runners and Cuchas.

There is a great and interesting diversity of mullets (known in the region as Omimas) which have ten different species in the zone.

Additionally, four fishes’ registries were reported and four supplementary are to be confirmed as new for science, six of them threatened and registered in the Colombian Red Book of Fishes from

the ICN. They found 1,682 species of vascular plants, corresponding to 630 genres and 137 different families.

Twelve species were classified as new for science and they belong to the families of Quiches (Bromeliaceae), Caimitos (Sapotaceae), and Gloxinias (Gesneriaceae), Yagé (Malpighiaceae), Anturios (Araceae), Cucharo (Clusiaceae) and the Sietecueros (Melastomataceae).

Among the Magnoliophyta registries, the dicotyledons gather the greatest vegetal diversity: with 96 families and 1,299 species, followed by the monocotyledons, with 23 families and 321 species.

“From all the species found in the Yaigojé–Apaporis’ shelter, we detected 45 endemic from Co-

der of Brazil.

The Colombian Academy of Exact, Physic and Natural Sciences was the institution in charge to declare the Yaigojé–Apaporis area as a National Park, based on the results from this monumental investigation that gave an account of the valuable natural patrimony in this area. But this inventory goes beyond, because it aims to become a strategy to better understand conservation, incorporating a key concept: human population.

1 http://www.ingeominas.gov.co/content/ view/872/361/lang,es/. Mining certificate list, signed by the Minning Service Direction, pending for a Requirements act to be ratified, September 2009

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

The Fish from Vaupés

Fresh Waters.

“Although the amount of fish is not as high as in other areas of the Colombian Amazon, their composition has a great biological importance,” said Fernando Arbeláez, fish expert.

The expeditionary also emphasized the characteristic of low conductivity and high acidity of these waters, with a high content of fulvic and humic acid, frequent in waters draining sandy grounds.

Photos: Julio Betancur

as brown or black with orange and yellow spots or lines.

Professor Styles added that Yaigojé is a zone of great butterfly diversity; therefore the inventory constitutes an important contribution for indigenous communities and preservation of their territory.

Yaigojé does not only possess big gold resources, it also has great diversity of amphibians and reptiles. Sixty three species of frogs, five lizard species and eleven serpent species were collected.

The expeditionary John D. Lynch, professor at the ICN, assures that the climatic conditions they worked under were not the most appropriates to perform a collection of amphibians, and indicators prove that there are more species to be listed.

“We observed very small and unusual frogs from the Synapturanus rabus species. They hide between the roots of trees and in the forest’s sand,” said the scientist.

The collection is complemented by six tadpole’s species, Dendropsophus y Scinax, which belongs to registered species in other areas of Vaupés and the bor-

2010

The Amazonian ethnic groups, Macuna, Cabillarí, Tanimuca, Barazano, Tuyuca and Jujúp Macú, among many others, live in the Yaigojé–Apaporis area.

Further Affluence from Yaigojé

2

hummingbird settles at the inflorescences to avoid the attack of bigger and more dominant species,” said Professor Styles.

Other kinds of hummingbirds were found; one of them weights three grams and is known as “Tail of thundering lira,” another one known as “Reddish hermit,” is noticeable by the male’s size, which doesn’t surpass 2 grams.

Also, during its route through the small and isolated savannah, Professor Styles identified two typical species from these environments: the Manakin, Xenopipo atronitens and the Alagoas Antwren Myrmotherula cherriei. Another interesting registry was one of a male Euler's Flycatcher (small bird), Lathrotriccus euleri, under reproductive conditions. It was a surprising fact because this bird has only been seen in Colombia during its non reproductive austral migratory activity.

According to residents of the zone, this time of the year is considered the end of summer and the beginning of the rainy season.

Perhaps, for that reason he observed interesting aspects such as reproductive activity and plumages change. “For birds in general, the shedding time was almost finished and the reproductive one was just beginning,” explained the Professor, who also reported a magpie, known as “blackchest carrique.”

14 Science Cerebral analysis of 42 reformed guerrilleros and paramilitares (illegal counter–insurgency), illiterates and late–literates, showed how the literacy process produces structural changes in the brain.

The investigation not only shows that the brain is flexible, but challenges a rooted idea about dyslexia. A linguist from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia participated in this study, published by the British magazine Nature.

Images: Alfonso Lozano

Illiterate Brain

The image on the left shows activity on the cortical areas of language (grey matter) in

of white matter activated after the literacy process.

Luis Miguel Palacio

2

2010

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Unimedios

After learning to read and write, not the human being, nor his brain, remain unchanged. The Basque Center on Cognition Brain and Language at Donostia–San Sebastiá, Spain, the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at the University College in London, gathered forces to develop this transcendental study that explores one of the brain’s greatest mysteries.

Last October, the prestigious magazine Nature published an article titled “An Anatomical Signature for Literacy.” Among the authors were the linguist Silvia Baquero Castellanos and Doctor Alfonso Lozano, both from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

The investigation began with the brain analysis from a group of retired guerrilleros and paramilitares, whom after fighting against each other in the middle of an irrational war, were reunited in a learning process. Leaving the mastery of weapons behind them, they struggle in a clumsy but heroic way in order to write their first word.

Looking for an Anatomical Signature The investigation’s first phase was lead by Professor Baquero, from the Linguistics Department at the Universidad Nacional de Co-

lombia. She established the directions for detecting illiterate individuals without cognitive troubles.

The first targeted categories were illiterate children and students of continuing education. However, both categories were soon discarded because, according to Baquero, “children’s brain grows constantly.

On the other hand most people registered at illiterate adult education programs are women over 60, which increases the risk of finding individuals with problems related with neuro–degeneration, such as Alzheimer disease.”

This is how the illiterate variable was isolated in the reformed subversives (from 20 to 28 years old) who made part, at that time, of a continuing education program. The 42 countrymen and countrywomen, who took part in the Colombian armed conflict, passed several tests to determine if they suffer from cognitive troubles, mental retardation or depression.

Later, Doctor Alfonso Lozano, from the Faculty of Medicine at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, conducted the magnetic resonances of the 20 first illiterates’ brains, and 22 supplementary morphological resonances of a second group of reformed subversives that just had learned how to read. According to the Doctor, resonances “allowed a tridimensional reconstruction of the brain”. The goal was to study the hypothetical changes in zones involved in the learning process.

The images were analyzed for

a scale from yellow to red. On the right we can see the connections

almost two years at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging in London by a group lead by Spanish scientist Manuel Carreiras, director of the Basque Center on Cognition Brain and Language. Together, with other neuro–image experts, they established, after comparing the images of the illiterate with the images of the late–literate that the brain’s structure changes after learning to read and write.

More Grey and White Matter The study shows that brains of participants who learned to read and write had greater grey matter density (related to information processing) in five posterior sections associated with language sounds, meaning and visual association of complex objects.

The second discovery is directly related to the reading ability, and at the same time, with a considerable increase of the white matter (permitting the communication between the sections of the brains) in the splenium of the corpus callosum, which connects the two hemispheres and leads to the incapacity of reading when damaged.

New Lights The examination of illiterate brains throws new lights on a structure known as the angular gyrus, involved in the audition process and the visual compre-

hension of language. Even though its participation in the reading process was well known, Professor Baquero explained that “this study demonstrates that the angular gyrus provides an anticipation of words, during the reading process, starting from the meaning (…), this means that it helps us identify a word without reading it entirely so we don’t have to spell it, as we did when we were learning to read, to make out the sense.”

Another contribution brought by the research is related to the great progress on the comprehension of cognitive troubles such as dyslexia. The studies show that whoever suffers from this condition has a lesser density of grey and white matter exactly in the same regions that were particularly developed in the literate brains, pointing to the hypothesis that the non development of these areas may be a consequence of being illiterate, instead of the cause, as it was common belief.

Even if the human being spent more than 500 years trying to elucidate the brain’s mysteries, scientists estimate that, up to now, we only know one percent of the total potential of this organ. Perhaps, at the end of the XXI century, great discoveries will be done. Right now, the present study represents a milestone tracing the path of present and future generations of scientists.

Science

15

New Technique to Produce

Ethanol By-products Aside from biomass, other secondary products, such as glue, lacquer, perfumes and even nail polish, among many others substances derived from amyl acetate, can be extracted within ethanol production. Researchers implemented a new, clean an inexpensive technique permitting to obtain the compound. Ángela María Betancourt Jaramillo

Energy Conservation At the moment, the conventional process to obtain amyl acetate is completed through a system, in which fusel oil and acetic acid are mixed, one in greater quantity than the other. Then, the resulting product is purified in order to eliminate all the residues, involving a high energy consumption and additional environmental pollution.

Scientist from the Research Group Application for New Technologies, decided to apply an alternative method to transform these substances and obtain the acetate: the membrane technology, which allows capturing and transporting, in a selective way, the chosen compounds through the membranes, leading to obtaining pure acetate.

According to the research on the field and international publications, there isn’t in Colombia another group using membranes to this aim. In South America there are few

scientists working on the matter, which makes more profitable the project developed by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia.

“We favor the production of this acetate by removing the water generated during the reaction, using the membranes, which unlike other separation processes, allow high energy efficiency in such a way that the energy consumption gets reduced to a 70 percent compared to the conventional distillation.

Thus, this process manages to reduce acetates’ total production costs by 30 percent,” said researcher Fontalvo Alzate.

This method also contributes by elaborating a process in accord with the promotion of Green Chemistry, reducing pollution through the design of environmental friendly products. Thus the development of new energy efficient processes and the generation of new biomass are favored.

The project, which is about to be concluded, aims to reach a company interested to implement the new technology at commercial levels. Last September it was presented at the Colombian Chemical Engineering Congress in Medellín.

At this occasion they showed the design tools implemented during the process: being a new technology, the design methods are not yet standardized. Creativity and rigor earned the researchers the recognition of the scientific community, which granted them with the Best Address Award.

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Not only sugar fermentation produces ethanol. The microorganisms within the process generate

the scientist.

Chemical engineering students, Miguel Duque Bernal, Jesús David Quintero and their colleague Javier Fontalvo Alzate considered combining the synergy from both reaction and separation processes within a group of membranes, where the amyl alcohol, one of the components of the fusel oil, will react with acetic acid to form the amyl acetate ester.

The former has various applications, such as additive for cements, glues, paper covers, lacquers, perfumes, plastic–wood, nail polish, among many other commercial products.

2010

Lacquers and Glues among Other Products

heavier alcohols, known as fusel oil, a mélange of amyls, isobutylene, and propane 1–ol, that allow obtaining compounds of high added value.

After the Government’s injunction to include ethanol in gasoline, it became necessary to increase this alcohol’s production in the country and therefore fusel oil production. “The situation prompted us to look for alternatives to use this oil, by obtaining high value added compounds, such as amyl acetate,” points out Professor Miguel Angel Gómez García, from the Research Group of Applications for New Technologies (GIANT), at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales.

For this reason, together with his research group, Professor Gómez formulated the possibility to develop the process through an innovative “membrane” technology.

“Even though this oil is produced in low quantities —for 1,000 liters of ethanol, correspond five liters of the by–product—, its disposition gets problematic because alcohol production tends to increase,” says

2

The production of this fuel is expected to reduce gas dependence, create new jobs in the agricultural sector and launch the country to a strategic place in the world of ethanol production. At the moment, Colombia produces around 1.5 million liters per day.

Ethanol is an alcohol that can be produced from three raw materials: sucrose (sugar cane, molasses and sweet sorghum), starches (corn, wheat and barley) and tubers (cassava, potato, sweet potato). In Colombia it is principally made out of sugar cane molasses’ fermentation, used to produce alcoholic beverages.

It is known that Brazil and USA lead the world’s production of biomasses. Its value lies in the fact that it helps saving the environment by reducing carbon dioxide net emissions to the atmosphere.

For this reason, in countries such as Colombia, the legislation aims to extend the use of bio fuel.

The Law 693 from 2001 commands that “gasoline distributed in cities with more than 500 thousand inhabitants should contain at least 10 percent of oxygenated alcohol.”

Refineries have been compelled to use ethanol. Hence, its production is expected to duplicate by 2012.

Photos: Andrés Almeida/Unimedios

Unimedios

Photo: Carmenza Duque

16 Science

In an octocoral such as this, researchers found chemical compounds with anti–inflammatory properties that

Magda Páez Torres

Unimeidos

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

In the sea of San Andrés and Providencia, Colombia hoards an invaluable source of molecules apt to fight health issues, and useful for the industry of ship’s paint, even though it only seems a mere marine species.

Octocorals are a marine, colonial organism formed by small polyps with eight tentacles each, known as Pseudopterogorgia elisabethae, which inhabits the Caribbean but whose presence has only been important in the country for the last 8 years, when researchers from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and the Study And Use Of Marine Natural Products Research Group started an exploration and analysis on the matter, bringing light in the country about this previously disregarded species.

This variety of octocoral has been studied in places such as the Bahamas and Jamaica. However, scientists from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia have found various chemical compounds with important biological properties, particularly its excellent anti–inflammatory activity.

“We found almost 10 compounds with new structures, from the pseudopterosin and seco– pseudopterosin (some of them already known as anti–inflammatory agents or cosmetics ingredients), and other sugar–less diterpenes with better biological activity than the one previously reported by the chemistry literature. In addition, two different chemotypes were established for P. elisabethae: chemotype 1, for the Providencia specimens, and the chemotype 2 for the San Andrés specimens,” said Professor Carmenza Duque, director of the Research Group at the Chemistry Department.

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2010

Anti–inflammatory Activity Through in vivo tests and by using mediators associated with inflammation, the anti–inflammatory properties from pure and composed extracts were evaluated.

“The results showed a high efficiency, close to the one presented by indometacin, one of the most effective medicines to control inflammation,” affirmed Alba Lucía Valenzuela and Hebelin Correa, researchers at the Doctoral Program

could be implemented in the pharmaceutical industry.

Octocorals

with Medicinal Properties At the sea bottom of Archipelago of San Andrés and Providencia , there is a variety of octocoral,

which scientists from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia study in such detail that they’ve already discovered molecules with excellent anti–inflammatory, anti–microbial , anti–fouling and anti– cancer properties. in Pharmaceutical Sciences, and Chemistry, respectively.

Tests with neutrofiles and macrophages, cells related to inflammation, were completed in the laboratory. In this case, the pure compounds showed more than a 59 percent of efficiency: Pseudopterosin U and Q were the ones with best anti–inflammatory activity, even though, all of them showed properties at different levels.

These molecules could get to be of great benefit for the creation of new pharmaceutical products intended to treat burns and inflammations related to stress and wound healing, among many others. They can also have a high value within the cosmetics industry, because they have a high antioxidant capacity.

Against Cancer In order to expand knowledge about the potential of these organisms, more studies began, using compounds with octocorals from San Andrés and Providencia, aiming to discover other biological properties that could have anti– cancer activity.

Assisted by Fabio Aristizábal, from the Pharmaceutics Department, the research group completed tests with cell lines.

They tested different molecules that showed differential activity, in other words, some of them were more effective in particular cases, which would be an alternative to

treat some sorts of cancer.

Now we have to keep analyzing the mechanisms to establish the feasibility of producing medicaments at long term, “affirmed Aristizábal.

Additional Properties One of the issues faced by objects that are submerged in the sea, such as ships, is the adhesion of biotic matter on living or inert surfaces (fouling). This process corrodes the surfaces, representing big issues for the naval industry.

According to Professor Duque, the annual costs implied by fighting the fouling, within the naval industry, are near to 5 billion dollars.

Therefore, scientists have been working to find anti–fouling substances that would protect surfaces, diminishing the economic impact. At the moment, they use synthetic coatings that repel the fouling adhesion, but most of them are highly toxic.

This research aims for natural products that, instead of killing the organisms, repel them, allowing to produce environmental friendly additives. The study on this octocorals, established that the species is a good source of anti–fouling substances, such as the pseudopterisines Q and U, which showed an efficient response.

Limited Stock Although the benefits of Pseudopterogorgia elisabethae are

great, the panorama started to dim when researcher Mónica Puyana found for both chemotypes less than one specimen per square meter, after a series of population density studies.

“The current populations don’t even resist an initial harvesting. If we use it to develop some sort of medicine or anti–fouling painting additive, we would exterminate the species,” insisted Professor Carmenza Duque, director of the investigation.

Thus, Hebelin Correa concentrates her doctoral thesis to the research of microorganisms that could be responsible for the production of these biological active substances.

According to Professor Duque, if the Project is successful, there would be a promising path within the research of a sustainable source of these compounds, which would not implicate the direct extraction from their natural environment. It is easier to cultivate the microorganism than to cultivate the whole macroorganism, or to use expensive and complicated chemical synthesis procedures. Thus, the progress on medical treatments would improve.

These types of researches constitute a paradigm in bioprospective studies, scarce in Colombia, which prompts the country to learn and benefit from its marine biodiversity.

Agriculture

to Cultivate

Creole Potatoes for Exportation Through massive gene sequencing, nowadays is possible to establish with enough detail the microbial diversity of soils where Creole Potato is cultivated.

It is a significant advance that’ll lead to new strategies for farmers to maximize the exportation potential of the native Colombian product, using fewer chemicals.

Micro-adjustments Professor Uribe says that in order to reach the required degree of description, they isolated the ribonucleic acids associated to present microorganisms in the soil of Creole Potatoes, such as fungi and bacteria.

They amplified the molecular marker Gen 16S, related to protein synthesis, at the laboratory. “This allows us to have a well conserved marker through an evolutionary chain, for that reason this is commonly used in phylogenetics” explains the biologist.

The research was completed with cultures of Creole Potatoes at the Subachoque municipality, where fertilizers have been used for

According to the IBUN, around 2008, Creole

Potato cultures represented only 10 percent of the 15,000 hectares of potatoes growth in Colombia.

almost 15 years, and with organic cultures located in Tenjo, where no chemical substances are used.

The aim was to compare active microorganisms of conventional plantations to the ones in organic plantations and detect tendencies from each. For example, it was found that in the organic fields some microorganisms are over expressed. Researchers also

managed to establish correlations with cultivable microorganisms.

The team is also identifying cultivable and non–cultivable microorganisms involved in various biochemical cycles. For instance, there are advances in which the microorganisms take part in the various nitrogen cycles, a key element in fertilizing.

“We saw that some of them

Less is More Producers of Creole Potato usually add between 1,500 and 2,000 kilograms of fertilizers per hectare. Some experts, including Dr. Uribe, consider this as a waste because the objectives are not totally fulfilled. On the other hand, they turn into leachates, affecting underground sources of water or producing polluting vapors.

Today, potato producers endure a rise in the fertilizers’ cost (related to the energetic crisis). Uribe adds that the cost of nitrogen fixation is connected with oil price.

The alternatives offered by studies such as the one completed at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in conjunction with researchers from Corpogen, Universidad de los Andes and the Corporation for Biological Investigations (CIB) from Medellín, are really important. Their main goal is to use nature, with the help of biotechnology, to benefit the farmer.

“The Creole Potato is a strategic product for Colombia: potential markets have already been targeted in Europe and Japan, where this potato’s texture is appreciated in gourmet cuisine,” emphasizes the scientist.

He adds that an achievement of this investigation is the interdisciplinary perspective involved in a precise case through a relatively new strategy: the massive sequencing of microorganisms. Thus, a new diversity in the potato’s field has been identified.

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

DNA Study Of Soils

2010

Known in France as Dorée des Andes or Golden Potato in the English–speaking countries, Colombian native papa criolla —typical food in the national cuisine— is one of the most promissory products for exportation. Nevertheless, due to specific characteristics of the soils where it’s cultivated and their particular treatment, sales outside the country have been limited.

One of the reasons for this is the excessive use of fertilizers and chemicals for plague control, which exceeds international certification standards.

A project financed by the Ministry of Agriculture and Cenicafé (National Centre on Coffee Research), in which the Universidad Nacional de Colombia participates among other national institutions, uses the analysis of bacteria’s DNA to look for alternatives and reduce the use of aggressive substances.

Daniel Uribe, coordinator at the Agricultural Microbiology Group from the Biotechnology Institute at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia (IBUN), assures that this is the first time that a complete map of active microorganisms’ population in the high Andean soil is associated to a culture such as Creole Potatoes.

This represents a significant advance because, starting from this detailed description, they may soon develop a soil’s diagnosis system and determine what kind of genetic arrangements should be made at microorganisms to improve, for example, nitrogen or phosphorous assimilation, or even carbon degradation.

As a matter of fact, commercial fertilizers are looking to improve the soil’s benefits in some aspects like a greater nitrogen fixation, indispensable for the growth of plants, but they still have high economic and ecological costs.

participate in all the assimilation processes of the nitrogen cycle, such as nitrogen fixation, ammonification and nitrification. It is important to get to know which one of those groups prevailed in the cycle in order to understand the processes behind and be able to manipulate them for the benefit of farmers,” says Uribe, Doctor in microbiology.

With this information on hand, scientists will be able to put together a micro–adjustment, a relatively new system allowing to place in a very small membrane of five by two centimeters a great amount of DNA sequences (between two thousand and five thousand), genes associated to the present biochemical cycles in soils of the Creole Potato.

“This advance would lead to high quality microbial diagnosis, and to the design of regulations allowing farmers to improve their fertilizers, and at the end is going to be reflected in various economic benefits,” says Professor Daniel Uribe.

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Unimedios

Photo: Unimedios

Carlos Andrey Patiño Guzmán

17

18 Agriculture

A Voracious

Photo: Víctor Manuel Holguín/Unimedios

Microorganism on the Market

The nematode controls the moth and the potato’s white worm,

reducing by 60 percent the production costs implied by the use of pesticides.

Colombian farmers will have a biological product able to control insects, bacteria and possibly fungi that attack potato, sugar cane and citrus cultures.

It is a nematode (microorganism) that will be produced at industrial scale. www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Laura Marcela Fuertes Sánchez

2010

Unimedios

Tecia solanivora, better known as the potato’s moth, is one of the pest insects that most affects this culture in Colombia. Its action is such that it has gotten to damage one hundred percent of the tubercles in fields and warehouses. However, a solution has been found. It is the Steinernema feltiae nematode (a species of microscopic worm that consumes roots), which fights it directly and diminishes the use of chemical substances to control it.

After ten years of analyzing the nematode’s behaviour, researchers at the Agronomy Faculty at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, established that not only the potato’s moth is one of its favourite foods, but also plagues such as Premnotrypes vorax, known as the potato white worm, Plutella xylostella or diamondback moth; Spodoptera or corn armyworm, and the widely known coffee borer beetle, among many others of economic significance.

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How Does it Do it?

In the potato’s moth case, when a nematode is released on the ground, it has the capacity to

find the space inside the tubercle where the larva has entered, then it follows the same passage, finds it and eats it.

Through this, it is helped by a symbiont bacteria named Xenorhabdus bovienii, which is liberated when the nematode is inside the larva. “It digests the insect and prepares a sort of compote from which the nematode is fed, this way it obtains all proteins, carbohydrates and other requirements for its growth,” as described by Marina Sánchez de Prager, titular professor at UN Palmira.

It is a very important nematode for clean agriculture, because its use brings together environmental and economic benefits. “A clear example is the control of the potato’s moth and white worm, where its being used, and may reduce between 50 and 60 percent of the production costs compared to the chemical pesticide,” affirmed Julio César Parada Santamaría, biology doctoral student at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá and associated scientist on the project.

A Jump towards Biotechnology The knowledge accumulated at national and international

spheres about the virtues of Steinernema feltiae confirms its roll as a biological controller.

For that reason, this work’s goal was to surpass the basic investigation about biology, ecology, behaviour and live production –through the larvae breeding that serves it as food– to its biological application, aiming a commercial potential.

“It is necessary for farmers affected by plagues to learn about this, so the use of this nematode is stimulated as a biotechnological tool helping to control them,” says Marina Sánchez.

Nowadays, researchers expect to open the doors, through biotechnological methods, that will allow them to produce the nematode Steinernema feltiae and its symbiotic bacteria in vitro, with the required quality and quantity standards, to become a profitable and productive business. A bioreactor is considered the most suitable technological alternative for its production; its role would be to ‘replace’ the larva that serves as food for the nematode.

Parada Santamaría describes the artefact as an airlift type “a tank of approximately 35 cm of diameter and 100 cm of height, where we are going to manipulate and control temperature conditions, nutrients, oxygenation, and

optimize chemical and physical conditions that we know guarantee development and reproduction of this organism.”

The bioreactor’s operation aims to simulate the larva’s inside, so the nematode grows and develops itself in the tank. “It has been an arduous work, still in process, that has allowed training undergraduate, graduate and doctoral students in biology, chemistry, chemical engineering and agronomy fields,” he added.

The company that partnered the investigation will receive the bioreactor, the necessary knowledge and technology for its operation. “We may produce the nematode without larvae, through a high initial investment, but projecting less production costs in the future. This way, an alternative for biological control will be offered to Colombian farmers, who will diminish production costs and will have environmental advantages,” assured Jades Jiménez Velázquez, general manager for Productos Biológicos Perkins Ltda.

“A series of biological products will derivate from this project, which, after the implementation, could replace more than 50 percent of the chemical products used to control soil (and some aerial) plagues.”

Innovation

19

UN Investigators

Design a Powerful Industrial Laser

Optics, electricity, electronics and thermodynamics were combined in order to develop a high power laser of great efficiency and low energy consumption that allows doing cuts, welds, engravings and flawless perforations in wood, plastic, glass, paper, leather and thin metallic lamina; a contribution to the national industry by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Medellín.

Saving Energy The company Corte Aceros has four lasers that work with Carbon Dioxide (CO2), high power ma-

chines that can reach 5,000 watts.

The first prototype of the laser was developed by the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Medellín and its power can go from 0 to 110 watts –in continuous wave mode– that allows a higher flexibility in the use of light materials. At the moment they are working on a pulsed mode option, for which they expect to multiply the power one hundred times.

This laser significantly diminishes the energy consumption because it doesn’t use conventio-

nal high voltage sources, necessary to provide primary energy to the laser’s active medium. “We have configured solid state sources incorporated in a new concept of power elevation, which would have great impact in aspects related to downsizing, easiness in the control of high voltages and significant reduction of energy consumption,” says Bastidas.

Another advantage of the new device is its compact size, because most lasers available on the market used for welding and cutting metals have a volume of 8 cubic meters, whereas the laser developed by the Universidad Nacional in Medellín would only occupy 2 cubic meters.

A carbon dioxide (CO2) laser of high optical power intended for industrial applications has a value on the international market that oscillates between 100 thousand and 1 million dollars, according to its characteristics.

The value of the industrial laser developed by investigators from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia is one tenth of these prices, depending on the case.

The first laser ever constructed dates from 1964. In Colombia, during the 80’s and the 90’s, some universities reported the construction of the first CO2 lasers, with didactic and investigative aims.

The researchers explain that a laser is a light amplifier that integrates three fundamental parts: first, the primary energy source that must provide a high electric power; second, the active medium, a solid, liquid or gaseous substance in charge to absorb the primary energy and transform it into light; and third, the optical resonator made up by an enclosure of particular geometry that contains the active medium, and that has a pair of mirrors: here the generated light is amplified by the multiple reflections. Part of this luminous energy is strategically extracted to constitute the laser’s radiation.

“Due to its unique characteristics, like high directionality, great concentration of luminous energy, high coherence, narrow bandwidth and uniformed polarization, the laser’s radiation becomes an exceptional tool to be used in a great number of industrial processes,” Professor Bastidas emphasizes.

Thus, the system developed by the researchers at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Medellín is integrated by a solid state electrical generator, an electronic controller, a cylindrical resonator with mirrors (one is partially transparent) at both ends, the CO2 active medium and a water cooling system.

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Laser’s ABC

2010

The innovative industrial laser was developed by the Lasers and Spectroscopy Group from the Physics School at the Universidad Nacional in Medellín, and is able to cut up to 10 different materials at the same time, with the same precision and quality of a specific laser intended for one material. The best part is that it consumes a minimum of energy. These qualities launch the laser as one of the most significant contributions to science in the country, during the last couple of years because it will replace the expensive and inflexible imported devices used in the industry.

In Colombia, the use of lasers for the development of industrial processes thrives every day, due to the advantages it provides in relation to the savings of raw materials, to the precision and speed in the cut when they are connected to industrial machinery, which offers higher speed and effectiveness at work.

Nevertheless, the complexity of imported lasers technology has an impact on the production costs because, by lacking of the know– how, the purchaser is forced to pay for technical support.

In this sense, the one hundred percent Colombian–made laser represents a guarantee by itself, and has an added value facing international competition.

“The laser we designed may be used in light work (cut, perforation, writing and engraving) and in heavy work (perforation, cut and weld of metal lamina). It may also be used in a wide variety of materials such as textiles, plastics, paper, glass, wood and steel among others,” explains Álvaro Bastidas Gustín, coordinator of the Lasers and Optic Spectroscopy Group.

Persuaded of the advance that this scientific accomplishment represents, the scientist says: “We can offer technical support and maintenance of the equipment in our country, which implies more competitiveness and technological quality.”

His comment is corroborated

by John Ferney Escobar Marulanda, industrial technical adviser at the company Corte Aceros, for whom the academic innovation is “an exceptional contribution: having a laser developed in the country that would cut several types of materials is such an advantage.”

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Unimedios

Photos: personal file

Gimena Ruiz Pérez

20 Innovation

2010

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

First, there is euphoria, lucidity, mental quickness and the feeling of being indestructible. Exhilaration will continue for half an hour, after which anxiety emerges without warning and the need to have more cocaine to keep pace will hit, strike until it buries you into the deepest depression. Thus, between highs and falls, 15 to 20 million cocaine consumers spend their days in the world, according to the United Nations.

Consumers, willing to pay any price, and producers from developing countries, which refuse to stop earning the astronomical gains from illegal traffic, nourish the cocaine’s market. The powerful alkaloid obtained from the processing of the coca leave, cultivated in Colombia, Bolivia and Peru, congregates multilateral efforts to end its production, traffic and consumption.

Nevertheless the thousands of dollars involved in this game prompt traffickers to become more ingenious in order to avoid international controls. Nowadays, cocaine isn’t only camouflaged in jackets and porcelains, nor in the organism of the “mules,” today the challenge at immigration checkpoints involves chemistry, because the white dust is concealed as a substitute of other chemicals in the production of different materials such as synthetic polymers, used to make typical rubber rugs.

Taking into consideration the situation, experts from the General Public Prosecutors’ Office saw the necessity to establish a practical and precise method to allow them identifying and quantifying the amount of cocaine contained in the seized synthetic polymers. This was the challenge that Dorelly Bonilla and Luisa Peñuela, chemical pharmacists at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, undertook four years ago for their graduation project.

“In order to muffle rugs, the polymer, within the very complex mix of substances that compose it, is added with calcium carbonate, which provides it with its flexible properties. Drug traffickers began to use cocaine instead of carbonate of calcium, due to its similar appearance (white dust),” explains Professor Jaime Rojas, chemical pharmacist who advised the two students during their research, along with Professor Noralba Sierra, Professor at the Pharmaceutics Department at the University.

On the other hand, Josías Díaz, forensic scientist at the General’s Prosecutor Office, who participated in the method’s validation at the Chemistry Lab of the institution, affirms that in 2004, each semester, they seized between 10 and 15 shipments of cocaine camouflaged in polymers, while today that number decreased to one or two. Díaz explained that drug traffickers resort to a cyclical use of the different techniques to camouflage the product, in order to remain unpredictable: what was used five years ago is used today, and what was used yesterday would be used again in five years, for this reason the analyzing methods don’t loose validity.

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The Drug Polymer With assistance from the Faculty of Engineering at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, the two young chemists undertook the task

New Method

to Detect Cocaine A method developed by two Colombian chemical pharmacists allows identifying and quantifying the cocaine that “ingenious” drug traffickers hide in synthetic rubber rugs and other polymers.

National and international authorities are now using this method.

Photo: Andrés Felipe Castaño/Unimedios

Unimedios

Jaime Rojas, Professor at the Department of Pharmaceutics at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, next to the

spectrophotometer, an equipment used to test the validity of the new method.

Photos: personal file

Vanessa Molina Medina

to elaborate the drug fighting polymer by developing the analytic method based on the material. For the mixture, they used styrene as a monometer, hydrogen peroxide as an indicator, and polysorbate 20 emulsion and laurel sodium sulfate as stabilizers. The final product was a natural copolymer latex to which cocaine hydrochloride was added to.

After establishing the characteristics of the seized polymer, the extraction of the alkaloid got standardized, which, according to Díaz at the Prosecutor’s office, was used to be completed by using all the complete seized material (rubber rug), which was demanding and expensive for the great amount of reagents involved in the task. Bonilla and Peñuela reduced the polymer into one millimeter particles through a wet grinding process, to do the extraction with only 500 milligrams of the sample. It was established that the maximum recovery of the alkaloid occurs from the second hour of agitation with 50 milliliters of sulfuric acid from a concentration of 0.5 N. To quantify the extracted co-

caine, an ultraviolet spectrophotometry was completed, which consist of comparing through a spectrophotometer (machine that measures light) the absorbed radiation by a solution that contains an unknown amount of a substance (in this case cocaine), and one that contains a known quantity of the same substance.

According to Professor Rojas, to measure the absorption, the substance should be dissolved in a solvent such as water, methanol, chloroform or alcohol, among others, depending on the characteristics of the sample. For this case, sulfuric acid was used and they determined that the spectrophotometry manages to detect cocaine within the polymer, because the spectra of ultraviolet absorption from the material are practically inexistent at 233 nanometers, the wavelength of cocaine’s maximum absorption. This, in terms of the method’s validation, means that it is selective facing the polymer components.

Nevertheless, there could be a disruption in the quantification

of cocaine if this one is mixed with ephedrine, caffeine, lidocaine, procaine and phenacetin, adulterant substances with which the alkaloid is usually mixed. In these cases it would be necessary to use the chromatographic techniques that are applied in the separation of complex mixtures.

In order to validate the analytic method, it was also important to evaluate the minimal detectable concentration and the minimal quantifiable concentration of the substance in the matrix, values that were determined in 1.6 ppm (particle per million) and 4 ppm, respectively. Besides parameters such as the exactitude, precision, linearity and robustness of the validation’s method were stated.

Today, the method validated

by Bonilla and Peñuela as their graduation project is not only used by the General Public Prosecutors Office, but, according to Díaz, given the practicality and precision of the method, it’s being used by the National Police and the Dijin and even in other countries such as Israel.

Innovation

Italy, with 438 million dollars in exports, and Spain with 356 millions, lead the global market of porcelain stoneware. China, a giant of massive industry, follows them very closely. United States, one of the major consumers buys a great part of Europe’s production, close to 80 percent.

These factors were judiciously analyzed by Rincón. He saw in them a potential advantage for Colombia to get in the US business with an emblematic ceramic product: il gres porcellanato.

In addition, Europe’s ceramic production is very expensive. The manufacture of a single square meter of porcelain stoneware costs from 3.5 to 4£, due in part to the raw materials they need to import from countries such as Turkey or Ukraine. “This price doesn’t include the marketing costs,” adds Rincón.

First, in order to develop enamel with good physical, mechanical and esthetical qualities, he studied glass–ceramic systems, along with the application of technologies from advanced materials such as Sol–gel process (fine chemistry tools that allow modeling materials at a nanometric scale).

Using this technology, he obtained an amorphous homogeneous dust (xerogel), which, once under heat treatments, allowed the devitrification (glass particles changing into more resistant crystals of porcelain stoneware) of the glass finish, all this, hoping to create enamel with a more resistant and nonslip microstructure. “The chemical composition, structure and microstructure of the developed vitreous systems was established; physic–chemical properties of the product, such as refractive index, tenacity, resistance to abrasion, erosion, damaging chemical agents and stains were evaluated,” explains Rincón.

During this process, improvements on the product were demonstrated. The following step was to determine if the raw base

to Create High Quality Ceramics

A larger and more resistant top–quality floor tile, made of recycled paper and completely elaborated with Colombian raw materials, is planned to compete with the dominant European ceramics market. It was developed by a PhD from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, bringing together science, technology and creativity to benefit the productive sector.

material to produce the porcelain stoneware was available in the country, and in fact, a good amount of it, compatible with the current ceramic process, was found.

Then, they determined, that not only it was possible to develop this product in the country with the highest quality standards, but also to make it from Colombian raw materials.

With Recycled Paper Rincón’s investigation didn’t confine to the chemical aspect.

When he was studying the European market, he realized that, during the molding and decorating processes of the uncooked ceramic piece, there were significant losses of the product caused by

breakages.

“There had been experiments to improve the pre–cook resistance, but these didn’t led to a definitive solution. We decided to try something that seemed crazy, but that ultimately gave us the results we were searching for: we incorporated recycled paper fibers into the mixture. This has already been done to improve the characteristics of cements, but hadn’t been applied to the traditional ceramic process, especially when you are searching for a high whiteness in the ceramic.”

The investigator says that the argillaceous materials, with which the ceramic is elaborated, have organic matter such as roots or grass traces. These traces are responsible for the known black hearts, a source of several structural and esthetic

Method – fiber reinforced ceramic Fiber Ficelle

Atomizing

Grinding

Mixing

Binding Particulate production Pressing Unfired samples

Firing Fired samples

imperfections on the floor tile.

Those are generated when carbon dioxide caused by the combustion of organic matter during the firing process, is encapsulated in the support or it can’t exit through the fused enamel. The question for the researcher was: Does the paper’s fiber increases the occurrence of these defects?

The PhD in Chemistry assures that, together with his team, they found a method that allows recycled paper to grant a greater resistance to the unfired porcelain stoneware.

He keeps the details of the process secret, due to the commitment he has with the endorsing company, but affirms that: “The properties of the fired product aren’t affected, nor the porosity increases.

This would allow to market thinner and greater ceramic floor tiles. Paper fiber stops the growth of cracks, anchoring it, preventing its propagation and growing.”

“This is one of the first doctoral works at the Chemistry Department that tries to get closer to the industry with a project that allows a real tangible development. It is an important contribution, and an example for other students. Undergraduate and graduate students should follow this path when they choose a subject,” says Javier Rincón.

And he concludes: “In Europe, it is clear that University and Companies should work together, through research, in favor of innovation. They know it is the only way to differentiate their products in the market, position them and grant them an added value.”

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Hard Floor

Recycled Paper

2010

At the beginning the idea was not very attractive: Why should we study about porcelain stoneware if the use of it remains incipient in Colombia? Instead, it is very usual to find this kind of ceramic in Nordic countries, where it is used to cover floors and facades.

But the idea kept ringing in the head of Rolando Javier Rincón Ortiz, PhD in Chemistry from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, so he raised the question again: Why can’t we research about high tech products having an international big market and evaluate its viability within the country?

With support from the Red Cyted, an Spanish Institution endorsing initiatives that approaches academy with industry, Rincón got it his way and contributed with important advances to the manufacture of traditional ceramics.

His goal: to demonstrate that with science technology and inventiveness, aid, Colombia may give the world a more resistant, inexpensive and competitive material. He achieved his purpose, and now a private company, who backed him up from the beginning of the research, is preparing a pilot plant to take this development at industrial scale.

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Unimedios

Photo: Andrés Felipe Castaño/Unimedios

Carlos Andrey Patiño Guzmán

21

22 Innovation

New Prototype to Analyze Voice Pathologies

Nowadays, the voice can be analyzed to discover related diseases and to find the adequate treatment on time. Mirla is a technological tool

Photo: Andrés Almeida/Unimedios

Control and processing of digital waves at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales.

that allows performing computerized acoustic analysis of the voice. It is a new device bringing support to medical science.

Acoustic voice analysis.

Analysis and voice wave projected in the software.

Fanny Lucía Pedraza Valencia

2

2010

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Unimedios

Loss of power and clarity, hoarseness and the effort someone takes to speak, could be now measured through an innovative diagnosis system that detects voice pathologies. It is a tool for medical support that allows specialists to study a voice’s quality through acoustic and noise analysis.

The Mirla (blackbird in Spanish) is able to classify organic injuries, functional troubles of the oral cavity, functional dysphonias and psychogenic dysphonias.

According to Electronic Engineer Julián David Arias Londoño, doctoral student at the engineering program with emphasis on Automatics at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Manizales, “any person with a medium level of vocal activity, for instance, a street vendor or a mother of a numerous family, is susceptible to present hoarseness, one of the most common symptoms within organic pathologies.”

Nevertheless, clarified the researcher, people who most frequently present this affection are teachers, due to the average of five continuous hours of vocal activity, aggravated sometimes by problems related to bad classrooms’ acoustics and numerous groups of students.

People with frequent leisure activities at noisy places don’t escape either from voice alterations, due to the fact that they find themselves forced to realize great voice efforts to keep a conversation; those with alcohol and cigarette

consumption habits are prone to develop serious problems.

The type of pathologies this system is based on is within the organic injuries’ group, such as nodules, polyps, edemas, carcinomas, cancer and vocal cord paralysis. When one or several of this pathologies are not treated, the person may suffer a change in their voice’s perception (diminution in the fundamental frequency), from communicative problems due to vocal cord paresis, up to the total loss of voice.

In addition, some studies show that 45 percent of consultations related to voice problems are linked to former diseases. The remaining group is related to alteration or language loss produced by brain damage or language development problems in children.

Sustained Vowels This prototype is considered a novelty because it includes additional information from the analysis of nonlinear dynamics to pathological voices. This feature differentiates it from others that, even thought are based on recognition, management and diagnosis of the voice, analyze the spectrum

Phoneme /a/

Phoneme /e/

Approximation of the contour using

according to tone and frequency.

The academic work group in Control and Digital Signal Processing in Manizales based its studies on the use of sustained vowels and the sound a person produces when pronouncing them, in order to make the system applicable and useful.

To realize this analysis, the patient’s voice should be recorded while pronouncing different words, syllables or letters.

The acoustic study is completed through software that identifies in detail velopharyngeal inadequacy.

When the process is over, the investigator analyses characteristics from the voice and specifies the pathologies it suffers or it may suffer from.

“The investigation is directed towards the construction of a support system for medical diagnosis that’ll allow an automatic discrimination between normal and pathological voices. Above all, to automatically detect the voices’ quality level within the scale of measurement GRBAS (G: Grade, R: Rough, B: Breath, A: Asthenic, and S: Strain), developed by the Japanese Society Speech Therapy and Phoniatrics, which is at this moment the most recognizedon this field,” added the engineer.

Phoneme /i/

Even thought automatic detection of voice diseases is a popular research field for many groups in the world, commercial systems for acoustics analysis have not been implemented yet.

For this reason, the research group developed the prototype of acoustic analysis MIRLA, similar to commercial software such as the Computerized Speech Lab or Dr. Speech. Various tests were performed with the system at the Rafael Henao Toro Children’s Hospital in Manizales and it is currently being used by language therapists at the medical center. “In spite of these, the prototype doesn’t implement yet an automatic detection stage of vocal pathologies. To incorporate this stage we have to reach a more polished state with an improved and more reliable automatic system, a phase in which we are currently working on,” said Julián David Arias Londoño.

These investigations, as well as the work to improve characterization of voice signals, are techniques that give additional information to be used in later stages of classification and, therefore, improve performance and find alternatives to prevent diverse pathologies.

Phoneme /o/

a vertical gradient technique (kid suffering from cleft lip).

Phoneme /u/

Innovation

23

Ráquira (municipality from Boyacá, Colombia) residents would be forced to stop eating in order to avoid pollution. Their ceramics rudi-

mentary baking coal furnace positioned the village as the fourth with the most polluted air in Colombia. Taking account of this problem, a research team from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia created a furnace that revolutionizes ceramics firing while taking care of the environment.

Green Energy Furnace

to Cook Crafts

Luis Miguel Palacio

100 chimneys with an aspersion mechanism that catches the particulate matter of the remaining coal furnaces before it gets propelled into the open air. “We expect that in 10 years coal furnaces would have disappeared from this area,” he said.

Unimedios

are directly related to the air’s quality. In a report sent by the Mayor’s Office to the General Comptroller’s Office, “during 2007 there were 459 cases of sick children under four years old with pulmonary chronic disease and 380 with acute respiratory infection. This number is alarming if you keep in mind that according to the DANE (administrative department of statistics), Ráquira had approximately 12,800 inhabitants that year and 75 percent of its economy is based on crafts: to stop firing ceramics would be a catastrophe for the families’ economy.

Gas Furnace According to Carlos Pineda, Planning Secretary for the municipality, from the 180 certified furnaces working in the urban and rural area of Ráquira, only 25 of them work with gas combustion (most of them with propane), due

to a lack of an industrial network shifting all furnaces to this modality, which are working at the limit of their capacity. “Since 2002 we have pointed out the subject, but Ráquira’s case is a difficult one because most people have their own furnace at home,” said Pineda.

Aristóbulo Rodriguez, the biggest clay merchant in Ráquira (exporting his own line to the US and Europe), said that an industrial zone is not “viable.” As told by Armando Salinas, businessman of the region: “It is practically impossible.” They both alleged that each craftsman should be able to handle his furnace due to the fragility of the pieces before the firing.

Mayor Reyes Manuel Suarez managed to guarantee a project with Ingeominas (Colombian Institute of Geology and Mining) for $670 million pesos to replace 28 coal furnaces with propane and natural gas furnaces. The mayor wants to start a project to adjust

Ráquira has close to 155 coal furnaces polluting

dangerous particles.

the environment with

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Photo: Andrés Felipe Castaño/Unimedios

At this temperature there is no breakage risk.

2010

Before kneading the clay, the craftsman has already visualized the manufacture. On his potter’s wheel, he elaborates a graceful vase that will leave the Colombian mountains to embellish a Madrilenian balcony.

The complete process starts when a piece enters the furnace and lasts up to three days. First, it is necessary to cook the figures at 900°C (1652 °F) for 30 hours.

Then, it is imperative to wait up to 48 hours, so the clay cools down before it’s taken out to the ambient temperature. It is precisely during those 30 hours that the coal furnace ejects the continual smoke; the hot gases and particulate matter are released to the air, impregnating the bodies of Ráquira residents.

According to Yeidi Espitia, a rural doctor at the Health Center in San Antonio de la Pared, more than 90 percent of medical consultations during September of 2009 were caused by respiratory diseases, such as viral rhinopharyngitis and allergic conjunctivitis, which

One of the advantages of the furnace is that, once the ceramics are fully fired, they can be immediately taken out because they are at 300°C (572°F).

Taking notice of the artisan’s dilemma, a research team of mechanical engineers from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Fabio Sierra and Luis Alejandro Pirabán, designed an efficient furnace through a concept that’ll revolutionize crafts production.

The invention consists of a shell with four revolving chambers made of refractory brick. Modelled pieces get in the first chamber, then the furnace gets turned and they go to the dry area, it turns on again and they get in the baking chamber, the process finishes in the cooling chamber.

Each turn takes about an hour and a half, meanwhile, another group enters the first chamber to start an additional group of ceramics.

This way, the drying, baking and cooling processes that currently last up to three days, will take only five hours.

At times like these, while the efforts for an efficient way to obtain energy emerge all over the world, energy is being wasted in Ráquira. At a coal or gas furnace, the energy used in firing ceramics is liberated to the environment at 400°C (752°F) and 500°C (932°F).

These gases could be reused to reduce energy consumption, maximize economic gains and diminish the environmental effects that contribute to global heating.

According to Sierra and Pirabán, the new furnace helps to take full advantage of energy and diminishes up to 320°C the temperature of gases expelled to the environment by the coal furnace. Inside the revolving furnace, the hot gases that come out from the firing chamber go through the cooling chamber before getting released at 180°C. Through this energy circulation up to 40 percent of fuel is saved compared to a coal furnace, reducing the pollution, increasing the ceramic’s quality, and getting rid of coal residues.

Some people wonder why Chinese have invaded the world with low–cost crafts. It is simple: they incorporated engineering into their production processes. Would Ráquira take the challenge? Or would they keep using half–measures for an extreme heat problem?

2

Current Situation

The UN Prototype

Photo: Víctor Manuel Holguín/Unimedios

Due to a 2008 decree, Ráquira, a small town in Boyacá, known in the world for its clay crafts, turns off the contaminating coal furnaces every weekend. By Monday, the town is submerged again into a deadly whiff of black smoke that gets residents sick.

This measure was taken by the municipality, after reviewing the 2007 Air Quality Report completed by the IDEAM (Environmental Information System of Colombia) and the Ministry of Environment, Housing and Territorial Development, which demonstrates that particulate matter under 10 micrometres (which passes directly to the respiratory system) and the total amount of particles suspended in the air exceeded the permitted levels of annual concentration in this city.

The problem doesn’t seem coming to an end because even though there’s a decree that bans construction of coal furnaces in rural and urban zones, last September and October, twenty of these devices, were sealed for being illegally built after the norm.

But, are these measures enough when there are more than 155 coal furnaces uninterruptedly contaminating from Monday to Friday? Will the switch to gas combustion offset the environmental, health and energy issues entailed by this economic activity?

24 Media

Media from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia: Keeping Pace with Technology

Scientific, academic and cultural productions from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, as well as their related debates are getting a universal dimension, due to innovative media such as Prisma TV (online TV channel) and the UN Radio Web (online radio).

Magda Paéz Torres

www.prismatv.unal.edu.co

2

2010

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news

Information technology is not a futuristic dream anymore, nor a privilege of the biggest media groups. The Universidad Nacional de Colombia, through its Media and Communications Unit: UNIMEDIOS benefits from the virtual possibilities and from its own infrastructure to provide knowledge, science and debates to different audiences in the country and the world.

Today, UNIMEDIOS consolidates on the Web with two different products: Prisma TV and UN Radio Web. They are both articulated but each has its own information, exposing interesting subjects with an academic perspective to different audiences.

About a year ago, when incursions in virtual TV were still embryonic in Colombia, Prisma TV was born (www.prismatv.unal.edu.co), a Web channel with a 24 hour a day program schedule.

Through short broadcasts about scientific, academic, cultural and technological advances from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, but also including current events and opinion programs at national level, Prisma TV provides the audience with an alternative that does not confine to the current broadcast: the viewer can access to a program on demand.

Several series, such as Mente Nueva (New Mind, about Colombian scientific research), Banderas en Marte (Flags on Mars, about the life projects of young people from Bogotá), Realizadores (about film directors linked to the University), Arquitectónico (about architecture and national buildings), and Vibrason (about music bands), are part of Prisma TV. Since its founding, the channel has two talk shows: 360º, about international subjects, and Al ruedo (In the Arena), about national events. Among the new programs that will be added to the list are, Ni más ni menos (No Less, no More) covering economic issues.

Various experts from different universities and organizations participate of these informative broadcasts, which they have prompted with interesting debates on transversal subjects for the country and the world. The live schedule changes every week depending on the new available programs.

“This is a way of transmitting the University’s production, so the results of institutional work aren’t confined to the classroom, but get to reach different places. For this reason we take advantage of every tool the new technology offers,” said Alexandra Reyes, UN Television director.

Likewise, Reyes outlined the channels’ independence related to subject treatment, due to the fact that its infrastructure and the servers belong to the Institution.

Seven campuses from the

Photos: Andrés Felipe Castaño/Unimedios

Unimedios

The Agencia de Noticias UN is another virtual product from the Media and Communications Unit (UNIMEDIOS). It publi-

shes daily information about science, technology, arts, culture and sports, among many other subjects of national interest.

Universidad Nacional de Colombia (Manizales, Palmira, Bogotá, Medellín, Amazonia, Orinoquia and Caribe) can access the provided information. First, due to the amplitude of the channel, and also to their own informative production. Soon, the Tumaco campus (the eight), will also integrate the process.

The channel has a tool permitting to transmit various live events. It was tested successfully during the annual report of the University’s President and during some academic lectures.

In addition, three Prisma TV products were nominated this year to the India Catalina Awards in the Best University Production category, with Colección Pizano o la peregrinación de los testigos de yeso (The Pizano Collection, or the Plaster Witness Pilgrimage), and Best Science and Technology production with Concepto X.

Virtual Radio With its radio station in Bogotá and Medellín, UN Radio’s audience increases from day to day.

In its informative block, everyday political, economical, scientific, technological and cultural events from the country and the world pass through the exhaustive analysis of experts, as well as information about academic, cultural and scientific events from the University. And off course, the music lovers also have a fringe of their own with an assorted and selected music programming.

The radio station from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia transcended the national borders, two years ago,with a project that has consolidated itself in the virtual world: UN Radio Web (http://www.unradioweb.unal. edu.co/), that has its own programming, independent from the Medellín and Bogotá programs, and that may be accessed online.

Through this wide virtual space, it is possible to consult courses, lectures and journalistic programs.

The programming consists of six hours rotating four times a day, due to the hour differences among countries. “The great amount of information circulating on the Web forces us to define criteria

to choose our offer, considering what other stations don’t provide in their programming,” said Carlos Raigoso, UN Radio director.

The idea is that all the information that in the past was confined to the campus, reaches the widest possible audience and people that couldn’t access this information, would be able to access it from wherever they are.

This year, among the multiple activities and lectures transmitted

by UN Radio Web, are the ones related to the Bicentennial of the Independence, a subject to which the Universidad Nacional de Colombia has devoted part of its itinerary and academic production.

“It is a way of offering access to information and knowledge and pass it to other publics that are not strictly academic,” pointed out Raigoso.

Thus the Universidad Nacional de Colombia strengthens its Web presence and benefits from new technologies in order to, from a journalistic perspective, communicate the academic and research production on daily basis.

www.agenciadenoticias.unal.edu.co/english-news The Agencia de Noticias UN is another virtual product from the Media and Communications Unit (UNIMEDIOS). It publishes daily information about science, technology, arts, culture and sports, among many other subjects of interest.

http://www.unradioweb. unal.edu.co/

The site has close to 1,800 visitors a day, and its news are reproduced by several printed, audiovisual and online national and international media.