Search

Understanding stem cell regulatory circuits is the next challenge in plant biology, as these cells are essential for tissue growth and organ regeneration in response to stress. In the Arabidopsis primary root apex, stem cell-specific transcription factors BRAVO and WOX5 co-localize in the quiescent centre (QC) cells, where they commonly repress cell division so that these cells can act as a reservoir to replenish surrounding stem cells, yet their molecular connection remains unknown. Genetic and biochemical analysis indicates that BRAVO and WOX5 form a transcription factor complex that modulates gene expression in the QC cells to preserve overall root growth and architecture. Furthermore, by using mathematical modelling we establish that BRAVO uses the WOX5/BRAVO complex to promote WOX5 activity in the stem cells. Our results unveil the importance of transcriptional regulatory circuits in plant stem cell development., A.I.C-D. is a recipient of a BIO2016-78955 grant from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and a European Research Council, ERC Consolidator Grant (ERC-2015-CoG – 683163). I.B-P. is funded by the FPU15/02822 grant from the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport; N.B. by the FI-DGR 2016FI_B 00472 grant from the AGAUR, Generalitat de Catalunya; and A.P-R. by the SEV-2015-0533 from the Severo Ochoa Programme for Centers of Excellence in R&D. M.I. and J.M. acknowledge support from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and FEDER (EU) through grant FIS2015-66503-C3-3-P, from Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades / Agencia Estatal de Investigación / Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional, Unión Europea through grant PGC2018-101896-B-I00 and from the Generalitat de Catalunya through Grup de Recerca Consolidat 2014 SGR 878 and 2017 SGR 1061. J.M. is funded by the Spanish Ministry of Education through BES-2016-078218. Y.S. and R.C.D. were funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgesellschaft (DFG) (grant STA12/12 1-1). A.I.C.-D.–A.C. collaboration was funded by the European Regional Development Funds and Marie Curie IRSES Project DEANN (PIRSES-GA-2013-612583). CRAG is funded by “Severo Ochoa Programme” from Centers of Excellence in R&D 2016-2019 (SEV-2015-485 0533).

Mathematical modeling of biological processes is a useful tool to draw conclusions that are contained in the data, but not directly reachable, as well as to make predictions and select the most efficient follow-up experiments. Here we outline a method to model systems of a few proteins that interact transcriptionally and/or posttranscriptionally, by representing the system as Ordinary Differential Equations and to study the model dynamics and stationary states. We exemplify this method by focusing on the regulation by the brassinosteroid (BR) signaling component BRASSINOSTEROID INSENSITIVE1 ETHYL METHYL SULFONATE SUPPRESSOR1 (BES1) of BRAVO, a quiescence-regulating transcription factor expressed in the quiescent cells of Arabidopsis thaliana roots. The method to extract the stationary states and the dynamics is provided as a Mathematica code and requires basic knowledge of the Mathematica software to be executed.

Mathematical modeling of biological processes is a useful tool to draw conclusions that are contained in the data, but not directly reachable, as well as to make predictions and select the most efficient follow-up experiments. Here we outline a method to model systems of a few proteins that interact transcriptionally and/or posttranscriptionally, by representing the system as Ordinary Differential Equations and to study the model dynamics and stationary states. We exemplify this method by focusing on the regulation by the brassinosteroid (BR) signaling component BRASSINOSTEROID INSENSITIVE1 ETHYL METHYL SULFONATE SUPPRESSOR1 (BES1) of BRAVO, a quiescence-regulating transcription factor expressed in the quiescent cells of Arabidopsis thaliana roots. The method to extract the stationary states and the dynamics is provided as a Mathematica code and requires basic knowledge of the Mathematica software to be executed., D.F. and M.I. acknowledge support from the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (Spain) and FEDER (EU) through grant FIS2015-66503-C3-3-P and from the Generalitat de Catalunya through Grup de Recerca Consolidat 2014 SGR 878. AIC-D acknowledges financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, through the ‘Severo Ochoa Programme for Centres of Excellence in R&D’ 2016–2019 (SEV-2015-0533). AIC-D is a recipient of a BIO2013-43873 grant from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and European Research Council, ERC Consolidator Grant (ERC-2015-CoG – 683163).

El articulo analiza la utilizacion de los servicios sanitarios en Cataluna en referencia a su variabilidad y a los flujos asistenciales entre territorios. Los coeficientes de variacion muestran menor dispersion territorial en hospitalizacion de agudos y atencion primaria, y mayor en atencion sociosanitaria. En el analisis territorial de los indices de penetracion emergen 5 grandes polos de atraccion. Los flujos asistenciales entre la asistencia especializada prestada en hospitales de agudos, la atencion de salud mental y la asistencia sociosanitaria no muestran una asociacion significativa. En cambio, se observa una fuerte asociacion entre el conjunto de los servicios asociados a la estructura hospitalaria de agudos (hospitalizacion, consulta externa y urgencias) y tambien entre los servicios de internamiento sociosanitario (media estancia y larga estancia). Esto lleva a pensar que la asociacion entre flujos hace referencia a servicios que habitualmente se prestan desde un mismo dispositivo asistencial, y no tanto a un patron de relacion entre territorios.

To apply planning criteria on a territorial level, with a forward-looking approach and taking into account the specificities of each location, in the Health Map of Catalonia, scenarios have been constructed for the development and adaptation of services for the 2015 horizon. The territorial scale is that of the 37 areas into which Catalonia has been divided in order to promote a new form of decentralised, combined decision- making, through the Territorial Health Governments. The new territorial health organisation is the substrate which must enable the relationship between professionals and services that share the same reference population to be coordinated. This article deals with the methodology for constructing the scenarios, and a summary is given of the principal action proposals which arise from the map in the aforementioned 37 territories. Detailed content of the territorial scenarios is also given, based on two practical cases.

Referred to by: Josep Vilarrasa-Blasi, Mary-Paz González-García, David Frigola, Norma Fàbregas-Vallvé, Konstantinos G. Alexiou, Nuria López-Bigas, Susana Rivas, Alain Jauneau, Jan U. Lohmann, Philip N. Benfey, Marta Ibañes, Ana I. Caño-Delgado Regulation of Plant Stem Cell Quiescence by a Brassinosteroid Signaling Module Developmental Cell, Volume 33, Issue 2, 20 April 2015, Pages 238., The quiescent center (QC) maintains the activity of the surrounding stem cells within the root stem cell niche, yet specific molecular players sustaining the low rate of QC cell division remain poorly understood. Here, we identified a R2R3-MYB transcription factor, BRAVO (BRASSINOSTEROIDS AT VASCULAR AND ORGANIZING CENTER), acting as a cell-specific repressor of QC divisions in the primary root of Arabidopsis. Ectopic BRAVO expression restricts overall root growth and ceases root regeneration upon damage of the stem cells, demonstrating the role of BRAVO in counteracting Brassinosteroid (BR)-mediated cell division in the QC cells. Interestingly, BR-regulated transcription factor BES1 (BRI1-EMS SUPRESSOR 1) directly represses and physically interacts with BRAVO in vivo, creating a switch that modulates QC divisions at the root stem cell niche. Together, our results define a mechanism for BR-mediated regulation of stem cell quiescence in plants., J.V.-B. and N.F.-V. are funded by FI PhD fellowship from the Generalitat de Catalunya (GC) in the A.I.C.-D. laboratory. J.V.-B. received a short-term fellowship (BE1-00924) in the Lohmann (J.U.L.) laboratory supported by the SFB873 of the DFG. Research by D.F and M.I. is funded by FIS2012-37655-C02-02 by the Spanish Ministry de Economy and Competitiveness and 2009SGR14 from GC, and D.F. has a PhD fellowship (FPU-AP2009-3736). S.R. is funded by the Laboratoire d’Excellence (LABEX) TULIP (ANR-10-LABX-41). M.-P.G.-G. received a “Juan de la Cierva” postdoctoral contract from the Spanish Ministry of Science in the Ana Caño (A.I.C.-D.) laboratory, and an HFSP short-term fellowship in the Benfey (P.N.B.) laboratory. P.N.B. is funded by NSF Arabidopsis 2010 grant. Work in the Ana Caño (A.I.C.-D.) laboratory is funded by a BIO2010/007 grant from the Spanish Ministry of Innovation and Science and a Marie-Curie Initial Training Network “BRAVISSIMO” (grant no. PITN-GA-2008-215118).

This article analyses the use of healthcare services in Catalonia with reference to their variability and cross-territory healthcare flows. The coefficients of variation show a lower degree of territorial dispersion in acute-care and primary-care hospitalisation, and a greater degree in social-healthcare. In the territorial analysis of the penetration indices, five large attraction poles are salient. There is no significant association among healthcare flows between the specialised healthcare given in acute healthcare hospitals, mental healthcare and social-healthcare, whereas a strong association was observed between the set of services associated to the acute-care hospital structure (hospitalisation, outpatient service and emergency care) and also among the social healthcare internment services (medium and long-term stays). This would seem to suggest that the association between flows refers to services that are habitually rendered from one single healthcare mechanism, and not so much to a pattern of cross-territory relations.

To apply planning criteria on a territorial level, with a forward-looking approach and taking into account the specificities of each location, in the Health Map of Catalonia, scenarios have been constructed for the development and adaptation of services for the 2015 horizon. The territorial scale is that of the 37 areas into which Catalonia has been divided in order to promote a new form of decentralised, combined decision- making, through the Territorial Health Governments. The new territorial health organisation is the substrate which must enable the relationship between professionals and services that share the same reference population to be coordinated. This article deals with the methodology for constructing the scenarios, and a summary is given of the principal action proposals which arise from the map in the aforementioned 37 territories. Detailed content of the territorial scenarios is also given, based on two practical cases.