No Idiot Left Behind -- Little Ruri is struggling with her studies, but her elder brother Akkun, ever mindful of a good education's value, is determined to tutor her through her academic slump. There's no motivation like direct experience, and both Ruri and Akkun know perfectly well what the endgame of foolishness is. And yet--is being Yoshiko so bad? She always seems to be having so much fun. The real lesson may very well be that while scissors beats paper and rock beats scissors, stupidity never loses.

Shuichi Kagaya an ordinary high school kid in a boring little town. But when a beautiful classmate is caught in a warehouse fire, he discovers a mysterious power: He can transform into a furry dog with an oversized revolver and a zipper down his back. He saves the girl's life, sharing his secret with her. But she's searching for the sister who killed her family, and she doesn't care how degrading it gets: She will use Shuichi to accomplish her mission...

It felt so good to kiss Kijima...and now Ao-chan's head is full of impure thoughts. But, if anything, he's too good at kissing...and Ao-chan's getting suspicious. And if that's not bad enough, Ao-chan's made a powerful, well-endowed new enemy! All this and more in the hilarious, tantalizing new volume of Ao-Chan Can't Study!

The Mizusawa High Karuta Club fights through heated team matches in their pursuit of a berth in the national tournament, believing in and supporting one another the whole way. Together with her team, Chihaya is able to glimpse Omi Shrine--not in her dreams, but in person at last. What kind of overwhelming emotions could the sight make her feel? Meanwhile, Arata also steps foot on the grounds of Omi Shrine, but he carries a burden that he has yet to share with anyone. Watch as these closest of friends are driven by their passion all the way to Omi Shrine in volume 4 of Chihayafuru!

The qualification tournament for the Master Match and Queen Match draws near, which only players at the highest rank, Class A, are allowed to enter. A flustered Taichi enters a tournament alone in search of a promotion to Class A, hoping to catch up to Chihaya and Arata. But not only does he meet Arata there, Chihaya also decides to pursue Taichi so that she can cheer him on. The three are reunited by fate, but what could be going through their hearts and minds? As the three chase after their dreams, the bonds that karuta built bring them face to face once more!

Abstract: Bilingual indigenous students who attend public schools around the country are to develop English language skills as part of the suggested curriculum created by the Colombian Ministry of Education. This is the case of the Embera Chamí students in Florencia, Caquetá whose conditions for learning English differ from those of monolingual Spanish students. The purpose of this study is to analyze the difficulties and the advantages of learning English through task- and project-based learning in bilingual indigenous students. The analysis of the study was developed through the method of systematization of experience. Results suggest that the two learning approaches enhanced indigenous students’ speaking skills and facilitated vocabulary recognition. However, the students mentioned being more interesting in learning English for specific purposes. Resumen: Los estudiantes indígenas bilingües que asisten a escuelas públicas alrededor del país deben desarrollar habilidades en el idioma inglés como parte del currículo sugerido por el Ministerio de Educación Colombiano. Este es el caso de los estudiantes Embera Chamí en Florencia, Caquetá cuyas condiciones para aprender inglés difieren de los estudiantes monolingües de habla hispana. El propósito de este estudio fue analizar las dificultades y las ventajas del aprendizaje del inglés en estudiantes bilingües a través de un enfoque basado en tareas y proyectos. El análisis del estudio fue desarrollado a través del método de investigación sistematización de experiencias. Los resultados del estudio sugirieron que los dos enfoques de aprendizaje mejoraron las habilidades de habla de los estudiantes y facilitaron el reconocimiento de vocabulario. Sin embargo, ellos mencionaron estar más interesados en aprender inglés para propósitos específicos.

Abstract: Self-assembled semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) have been widely investigated as a quantum-hardware candidate which utilize the spin of a charged carrier to embody a solid-state qubit. Due to the large dipole moment of confined optical states, they are the ideal interface to encode information as flying qubits. However, the coherence time is limited by the spin coupling with the environment. A system which promises significantly longer coherence consists of logic singlet-triplet qubits formed in vertically stacked pairs of QDs, so-called quantum dot molecules (QDM). Here, a specific “sweet spot” in the applied gate voltage can be realized in which the singlet-triplet energy splitting is in first-order independent to electric and magnetic field fluctuations. Nevertheless, complications regarding non-deterministic growth and electric control are the main problem to access the sweet spot. With this master’s project, we aim to pave the path towards the growth and fabrication of an innovative QDM charge storage device which enables optical initialization of valence-band holes. We approach to control holes due to their weak hyperfine interaction. To tackle the complexity of quantum states in QDM, we developed a theoretical framework to understand the relevant physical interactions. This was employed to simulate quantum states and fit growth parameters. Dot size homogeneity and low QD density were achieved by modulation of temperature and deposition rates during growth. Moreover, Indium-flush growth technique was used to tailor dot height, hence its confinement energy. Standard and quasi-resonant photoluminescence experiments as a function of the electric field supported clear signatures of hole coupling in a quantum dot molecule.

Abstract: Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are small chains of amino acids with the ability to cause bacterial death. AMPs are usually amphiphilic but diverse in charge and structure. The mechanism or mechanisms that AMPs implement to kill bacteria are still under discussion. Studies in model membranes have widely demonstrated the capacity of AMPs to interact with and disrupt the bacterial cell membrane. There are however, good reasons to suspect that AMP interactions with nonmembrane components of bacteria are important. For instance, there is an enormous discrepancy between the peptide to lipid molar ratio (P:L) necessary to generate membrane disruption in model systems (1:100), and the P:L necessary to stop bacterial growth, i.e. the minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC) (10-100:1). One potential explanation for this discrepancy is that AMPs may interact with non-membrane components of the bacterial cell envelope. The peptidoglycan (PGN) layer is one of the primary non-membrane components of Gram-positive bacterial cell envelopes and is responsible for cell shape and stability. Currently, there is an open discussion about whether PGN can entrap AMPs and prevent them from reaching the cell membrane or, instead promote the accumulation of AMPs on the cell membrane. The primary experimental approach employed in this thesis was 2H NMR spectroscopy of intact bacteria with 2H-labeled membranes. Specifically, since the quadrupolar splittings obtained from the spectra are proportional to the order parameter of the lipid acyl chains, the spectra reflect the structure and dynamics of the membrane. In particular, 2H NMR spectroscopy allows us to characterize the disruption of lipid bilayers caused by AMPs. In this study, different methods to grow 2H-membrane-enriched bacteria were optimized to obtain 2H NMR spectra of E. coli LA8, E. coli JM109 and B. subtilis. Additionally, 2H NMR was used to observe the level of disruption of the cell membrane of B. subtilis caused by the presence of different AMPs, MSI-78 and BP100. Both MSI-78 and BP100 caused the same level of membrane disruption at similar concentrations. Separately, comparison of the 2H NMR spectra of B. subtilis with intact and compromised PGN layers showed no differences. The lack of change in the spectra of PGN-compromised and PGN intact bacteria indicates that there is no change in the dynamics or structure of the lipid bilayer even with a weakened PGN layer. Finally, the disruption caused by MSI-78 and BP100 was measured in B. subtilis with a compromised PGN layer. The results indicate that there is no change in the level of membrane disruption caused by MSI-78 and BP100 when the PGN layer is partially removed.

Abstract: Armed conflicts affect almost every aspect of a country’s economy. Although the characteristics of armed conflicts are highly heterogenous, all of them have devastating effects on human capital, social infrastructure, burden of disease and population displacement. Health systems are invariably affected in countries stressed by armed conflicts. Several mechanisms might weaken health systems during the conflict: destruction of health infrastructure, loss of health professionals, interruptions on the supply of drugs and other medical devices or lack of funding as a result of the conflict itself. Decreases in the utilization of healthcare services further add to the suffering of these populations. This research finds that although preventive services might not be directly affected in areas affected by armed conflicts in Colombia, the utilization of non-preventive services might be directly affected. The hypotheses that might explain this phenomenon are discussed and recommendations for further research at made at the end of this report.

Abstract: Born in 1953 in Paris, Sophie Calle is a French artist who has exhibited extensively throughout the world since the late 1970s. She has been described as a conceptual artist, a photographer, a movie director or even detective; her work has a very recognizable shape that includes altering the means of expression. Douleur exquise narrates the break-up of a love affair the artist went through in 1984. Where the artist decides to begin a journey to alleviate her suffering, the work contrasts Sophie Calle’s own feelings with anonymous people’s answers to the question “Which was the day when I suffered the most?”. Towards her own recovering, she develops a very intricate ritual which fades away as her texts darken to the point of completely disappearing, symbolising a return to life. Our analysis is divided in three specific parts that aim to understand the process in which the artist can overcome her grief by comparing her own suffering to the others’ in the context of a ritual. The book concretizes the result of the shared exercise that explores the possibilities of literature from different angles, that we analyze under two types of interaction with respect to the ritual: it appears from the fact of having relativized collective mourning from a structure that will be reviewed in this work. To this end, it was necessary to analyze the way in which the two stories interact (that of Calle and that of the interrogated ones) by finding the peculiarities of the result: a possible structure and the elements involved, considering always that it concerns a collective exercise that pushes the boundaries between the personal and the public.