Grupo Lab Micorrizas

The new center of the Faculty of Engineering and Science has been presented during an international seminar.

The recent work in research, training of human capital and community outreach that has been developed at the Mycorrhizae Laboratory of the Department of Chemical Sciences and Natural Resources at the Universidad de La Frontera led to the installation of a new space for science and technology: the Research Center for Micorrhizae and Agro-environmental Sustainability (CIMYSA).

It is put together by a multidisciplinary group of experts with acknowledged experience in soil microbiology, waste management, healthy food and mining technology, among others, and an outstanding participation in national and international projects, combined with a high scientific productivity. This way, CIMYSA aims at contributing to the knowledge on mycorrhizal symbiosis by approaching topics from the biological bases to its agro-environmental and industrial use.

Another aim is the training of highly skilled human capital that is capable of working on the search of innovative solutions for different problems that are affecting natural resources, with a local, regional and global approach.

The director, Dr. Pablo Cornejo, assures that this organization joins the efforts of national and international positioning. “We will turn into the main unit in Latin America that is dedicated to research on arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis and start a new era of outreach towards the productive sector, as it has been the case with the recent formation of the company MYCONATIVA by researchers of the center.” This is the aim: “We want to consolidate a center of excellence that increases its indicators and will be a strong pillar for scientific development in our Department, Faculty and University,” he added.

In its implementation, apart from contemplating academic activities linked to high-level scientific research and the training of advanced human capital of excellence, CIMYSA will also establish different outreach actions with the productive and promoting medium, as it is the case with the realization of the IV. International Seminar on Rhizosphere Organisms and their Biotechnological Applications. This event brought national and international researchers together at the UFRO and reflects this interaction.

One of the speakers at the international seminar was Dr. Alexander Valentine of Stellenbosch University (South Africa), who is doing an internship within the framework of the project MEC-CONICYT 80170023, as well as Dr. Yasna Tapia of Universidad de Chile who is the director of the Research Ring project ACM 17002, and the postdoctoral FONDECYT researchers Silambarasan Sivagnanam (UFRO) and Daniel Chávez (Universidad de Concepción) who are doing their research work together with CIMYSA.

The new center starts to work within the established work plan which is based on arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis for the development of innovative solutions in local agriculture, as well as on the training of advanced human capital, the generation of high-quality scientific production and a strong promotion of its activities.

CIMYSA collaborators: academics of the Department of Chemical Sciences and Natural Resources of the Faculty of Engineering and Science and BIOREN-UFRO, postdoctoral researchers with external financing (FONDECYT) and participants in the doctoral programs in Natural Resource Sciences and in Agri-food Sciences and Environment. Also researchers of INIA (Institute for Agricultural Research) are included, as well as a collaboration network with foreign researchers.

escrito porWritten by: Daphne Bormann
Faculty of Engineering and Science

 

doctorados 2018 1

Portada UFRO 360

Portada UFRO 360

A total of 30 professionals graduated from the doctoral programs in different fields of knowledge.

Five years ago, the Universidad de La Frontera via the Vice-Rectorate of Research and Postgraduate Affairs started the tradition of public recognition of the Ph.D. graduates and the emphasis on their strengths and achievements.

In this year´s official ceremony, 30 professionals who have finished their Ph.D. studies at our university were awarded. In this regard, the Vice-rector of Research and Postgraduate Affairs, Dr. Eduardo Hebel, stated that this institution is proud of contributing to the training of advanced human capital for the region and the country.

“We are very pleased that we are able to recognize young men and women who made the decision of using the obtained tools for the creation of original knowledge that is relevant for Chilean society and humanity,” he stated.

Quality and continuity are two indispensable principles in Institutional Postgraduate Policies at the UFRO. The first is reflected in our program offer, since most of them are accredited by the National Accreditation Committee; and the second one is related to the vocation these programs have by interacting with the environment and answering to the demands of the most diverse sectors.

REMARKABLE RESULTS

The doctoral programs at the UFRO have reached remarkable results, such as the international accreditation of two of them, which turns them into unique programs in Chile since they are the only ones with this distinction (Doctorate in Natural Resource Sciences and the Doctorate in Science with specialization in Applied Cellular and Molecular Biology). Besides, there are the national accreditations, which are more than the national average, and the cooperation agreements with prestigious foreign universities. Some of them have resulted in double Ph.D. degree and double Ph.D. graduation options.

Also the significant number of CONICYT (Chilean Commission for Scientific and Technological Research) scholarships has positioned the UFRO in fifth place in obtaining scholarships for doctoral program financing.

HIGHEST DISTINCTION

The graduates received a diploma from the authorities that accredits their Doctor´s Degree, and the best graduate of all doctoral programs has been awarded with a special recognition. This highest distinction went to Elías Figueroa Villalobos of the doctoral program in Sciences with specialization in Applied Cellular and Molecular Biology.

He was very pleased and humble to receive this recognition and the ones who know his impeccable trajectory as a postgraduate student identify him as a scientist who is committed to the dissemination of his results and has a great work capacity. He stood out because of his excellent study performance – his final degree is 6.9 (with 7 being the highest grade possible) – and a scientific productivity that holds a promising future for him.

 

01 Margarita Cancino

Margarita Cancino Andrade, UFRO Doctorate in Psychology

“The training I received at the UFRO and in the doctoral program was excellent. Thanks to my tutor, Lucio Rehbein, I was able to go to Tufts University in Boston, where I was able to perfect my research program, successfully execute it, and, based on that, to generate new publications which were the basis for winning a Postgraduate Fondecyt, the only one in psychology at the regional level, what has been an important challenge and is the result of the training I received here.”

02 Elias Figueroa

Elías Figueroa Villalobos, UFRO Doctorate in Sciences with specialization in Applied Cellular and Molecular Biology

“I feel very privileged to have received this important recognition by the university. My time at the doctoral program has been pleasant and made me grow. In second year, I had the chance to do a double graduation with the University of Sao Paulo and it has been a positive experience during which I was able to establish important networks thanks to which I still am collaborating intensively in several publications and projects with Dr. Ricardo Pinheiro. This opportunity has been a plus that made me grow as a researcher.”

03 jorge gonzalez

Jorge González Villagra, UFRO Doctorate in Natural Resource Sciences

“It has not been easy. It has been full of studying and effort, sacrifice and dedication; not only because of growing beyond myself, but also because of contributing to the region and the country. But I am very pleased by all I achieved. At the moment, I am working in the field of plant physiology and my research line is related to the long term effects of climate change on fruit production. Now, I hope to be able to transfer this new knowledge to the students and to use it for my academic career.”

04 Carla Chavarria

Carla Chavarría Rojas, UFRO Doctorate in Educational Sciences

“I receive this achievement with a lot of happiness. These have been years of personal and family sacrifices, but for me it is tremendously rewarding because of its academic meaning. You grow as a professional and from now on a new life starts, which I want to dedicate to my research field that is oriented on social responsibility and I want to include my knowledge in undergraduate studies and also connect it with vocational topics, which is a very innovative field and presents big exploratory potential.”




escrito porWritten by: Dirección de Comunicaciones
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fondecyt pamela 1

Patients with coronary heart diseases will benefit from this new way of rehabilitation. The contribution to public health will also be significant, since it will offer more benefits at lower costs.

The cardiac rehabilitation program has been designed as a secondary prevention for survivors of cardiovascular events. Its effectiveness has been proved and it reduces mortality and posterior hospitalizations. However, it is an intervention that has been underused, mainly because of a lack of corresponding programs and the low number of patients who participate in them, especially in places of low or medium income, as it is the case in the Latin American context. Actually, only about 5 % of the Chilean patients participate in this kind of rehabilitation.

In this context, Dr. Pamela Serón of the Faculty of Medicine at the Universidad de La Frontera opts for a model of rehabilitation that is more accessible and helps the patients and the public health system of the country in a more effective or better way. “We designed a program that we want to try out as a clinical trial within the framework of a Fondecyt (Chilean National Fund for Scientific and Technological Development) project. It is basically an exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation program that involves less resources, but is supposedly as effective as the regular program,” the researcher explained.

EXERCISE AT HOME

The patients could go to a health care center and undergo a training program of no more than ten sessions in order to learn how to do the exercises, in an adequate time and intensity, followed by a second phase of distance monitoring by the person in charge of the rehabilitation.

This monitoring would take place in the form of permanent programmed calls and text messages with the patients, in order to verify and/or remind the patient that it is time to continue with the rehabilitation exercise routine. “We want the patients to be able to continue with the exercises at their homes or wherever they feel comfortable, so they have to go less to the hospital or other healthcare centers. We think of it as a support to public health, since the patients would be able to return to their daily routines in a more natural way.”

The idea is to recruit 314 patients for the sample of the study who have cardiac diseases (acute coronary syndromes or stable coronary heart disease), who have received medical treatment, thrombolysis, angioplasty or bypass surgery and who signed the informed consent. The patients are from five different health centers in Santiago and the Araukanía Region. The design of this intervention also includes physical therapy with exercises as the main treatment, counseling regarding nutrition and tobacco use, and the standard medical referral and examination.

LESS IS MORE

The researcher pointed out that it is necessary to prove that this method, which is qualified as a hybridized cardiac rehabilitation that offers the work at a health center combined with distance monitoring of the work at home via telephone, is as effective as the conventional intervention at a health center, which needs more time and is monitored in person.

“This is a project based on the suggestions of the International Council of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation (ICCPR) for health centers and countries of low-income. And this is what we want to implement in Chile: establish new rehabilitation modalities for those patients in order to reduce the possibilities for another heart attack, hospitalizations because of new complications or the development of heart failure, that involve less resources for the health system and the patient,” Dr. Serón added.

escrito porWritten by: Lorena Espinoza Arévalo
Vice-rectorate of Research and Postgraduate Affairs

 

orquideas VIU

Javier Vidal (Construction Engineering graduate) Héctor Herrera (Ph.D. in Natural Resource Sciences) and Daniela León (Ph.D. student in Sciences with specialization in Applied Cellular and Molecular Biology) are the three winners of these initiatives.

Natural fiber for construction, the production of value-added orchids and a cream formula for the treatment of melanomas are the three initiatives the Universidad de La Frontera is going to develop within the framework of the Second Stage of Valorization of Research at Universities projects of FONDEF (Chilean Fund for the Support of Scientific and Technological Development). The investment is over 72 million Chilean pesos worth.

Javier Vidal, Héctor Herrera y Daniela León are the three winners of these initiatives. Javier is a graduate in Construction Engineering; Héctor has a Ph.D. in Natural Resource Sciences and Daniela is a Ph.D. student in Sciences with specialization in Applied Cellular and Molecular Biology.

Javier will be working on a wet alkaline method to manufacture prefabricated boards of insulating, fire-resistant, sustainable and bio-based material, made of residual natural fiber from the agricultural sector and with a thermal conductivity that is similar to the traditional materials on the Chilean market. “Nowadays, the market of thermal insulating materials is dominated by derivatives of petrochemicals and minerals which are non-renewable and have a great impact on the environment. This way, the manufacturing of insulation materials from residual natural fiber seems like a great opportunity,” he commented.

At the same time, Dr. Herrera wants to produce orchids with ornamental value by incorporating endemic mycorrhizal fungi. “The fungi promote the germination of different orchid species through co-cultivation techniques, so I could improve the germination rates and achieve the production of seedlings that are destined for ornamental purposes.”

The third project is about the creation of a cream for topical use during photodynamic therapy in skin cancer treatment. Daniela León is in charge of this project and the idea is to produce a cream for topical use based on the methyl aminolevulinate photosensitizer precursor. “My proposal is an improved formula that assures a greater long-term effectiveness in photodynamic therapy for dermatologic preneoplastic or neoplastic lesions of non-melanoma skin cancer in order to decrease the recurrence rate."

APPROVED PROJECTS

Second stage of the 7th VALORIZATION OF RESEARCH AT UNIVERSITIES CONTEST 2017 of the FONDEF-Program of CONICYT (Chilean Commission for Scientific and Technological Research).

VIU17P0192 Development of insulating boards based on residual natural fiber for their use in sustainable construction.
Amount: 24.000.000 Chilean pesos
VIU17P0185 Design of an orchid production system with added ornamental value by using endemic mycorrhizal fungi.
Amount: 24.000.000 Chilean pesos
VIU17P0139 Development of a cream for topic use with an improved formula that assures a greater effectiveness of photodynamic therapy in non-melanoma skin cancer treatment.
Amount: 24.000.000 Chilean pesos

escrito porWritten by: Lorena Espinoza
vice-rectorate of Research and Postgraduate Affairs
 

universidad de valladolid

The UFRO has participated as a benefiting institution in the Erasmus Programs of the European Union on several occasions. This time, it permitted to strengthen its partnership with University of Valladolid, Spain.

The Universidad de La Frontera was granted two scholarships within the Erasmus+ KA107-36589 project, that permit that an academic and a student of the UFRO Doctorate in Agri-Food Sciences and Environment study at University of Valladolid, Spain. This creates new opportunities of international linking and academic exchange for the Universidad de La Frontera.

Dr. Pablo Cornejo and the PhD student Minerva Cordovés are going to go to Spain for their semester abroad. At the same time, we hope that new spaces for international cooperation are going to open up through their work. This is what Dr. Berta Schnettler, the academic coordinator for the Erasmus Program at UFRO, pointed out. “These scholarships keep making our university more visible in the European Union, and are a continuation of the programs Erasmus Mundus Chile Lot 17, VECCEU and LINDO – this last one has been co-coordinated by our institution.”

Dr. Schnettler pointed out that Erasmus permitted to create partnerships with other universities. Therefore, she sees these scholarships as an opportunity for the UFRO and expects that they will strengthen the link with the institution in Spain, and particularly with the Doctorate in Agri-Food and Biosystems Science and Engineering. “Erasmus is a program of tradition in the EU, which has been created in order to promote synergies between universities and a mutual enrichment in different fields of action of academic work. Therefore, we expect to move forward towards a specific agreement that contemplates cooperation in the fields of research and postgraduate studies, pointing at a double-degree program.”

The director of the International Affairs Office, Pamela Leal, also appreciates the achievement: “The Erasmus Program permitted us to create new partnerships with prestigious institutions beyond our borders and these scholarships significantly strengthen the collaboration at the academic and research level. They also allow us to create links of trust, and to open new channels which also our undergraduate and postgraduate students benefit from.”

RESEARCH AND EXCHANGE

Dr. Pablo Cornejo already scheduled his stay at University of Valladolid for next October. His interests are to specify the mutual collaboration at the institutional level and to strengthen the field of research. “Regarding our doctoral program, we are in a good position within the lines we develop and, among others, we put an emphasis on structuring and materializing the field of internationalization, since it is a requirement for those programs at present.”

Dr. Cornejo is going to participate in the doctoral program in Agri-Food and Biosystems Science and Engineering. This program and the UFRO program have a common ground, which is why the UFRO is interested in realizing joint training processes. “This is a great opportunity for the advance towards a future agreement that would permit that our doctoral students work together with a well-known European university,” he explained and added that the promotion of our fields of work and research projects and the creation of links between academics of both universities are among the actions he is going to carry out.

Another purpose of his stay is to strengthen the field of research he works in. “Since both programs are very similar, the fields of work also overlap. One of them is soil sustainability, which is a very important topic at the University of Valladolid and is related to what we do with our students at the UFRO Research Center for Mycorrhizal and Agri-environmental Sustainability (Cimysa) regarding soil quality,” he stated.

Minerva Cordovés is going to spend five months in Spain, during which she will join the research team on Advanced Technologies for Sustainable Rural Development (TADRUS). “The idea is to deepen my knowledge in the use of Geographic Information Systems as a tool for socio-environmental management in the agricultural sector, and to receive further training within the field of work of this group on environmental improvement in rural areas, based on the concept of sustainable development.”

This way, this scholarship offers her the opportunity to get to know another perspective on how to address the problem and it will be an opportunity to fundamentally contribute as a PhD student whose focus lies on the balance between agricultural production and the conservation and preservation of the environment. “It is required to be capable of seeing the problems from multiple points of view in order to deliver an innovative contribution to the problem´s solution. At the same time, the opportunity to get deeper knowledge in the advanced work in other parts of the world allows not only to get to know the existing advances, but also to detect the exiting information gaps on which I can work as a PhD student.”

She added that, during the five months she is going to spend at University of Valladolid, she hopes to advance in activities linked to new technologies in agricultural production, and to learn more about topics such as risk perception in the use of these technologies in rural environments. This would be a contribution to the development of her doctoral thesis, which she wants to do in joint supervision in order to being able to get a double degree.

 

escrito porWritten by: Jassna Sepúlveda
Communications Division UFRO