Claudia Colina Prisco
		Country of Birth
Institute of Neurobiology. University of Puerto Rico. Medical Sciences Campus. Supervisor: Ph.D. Joshua J. Rosenthal	I came to Puerto Rico with a J-1 Exchange Visitor Program to work as a Postdoctoral Fellow. I arrived at the island in the middle of August 2005. The purpose of this visit is to increase some know-how in the area, to interact and to learn from other investigators, to create an own style that permit me at some point of my career be an independent research. Rosenthal’s lab focuses on a form of editing mediated by the hydrolytic deamination of adenosine residues on mRNAs. By changing adenosine to inosine, which is read by the ribosome as guanosine, codons can be mutated and protein structure and function changed. At this moment, I’m studying the RNA editing of the sodium-potassium pump (Na^+, K^+-ATPase) and potassium channels from squid and how this changes in some codons affect the transporter function.	Yo soy de Venezuela, país que es conocido por sus hermosos paisajes, petróleo, gasolina barata y más recientemente por la política. Yo crecí en Caracas, una de las ciudades mas desastrosas que he visto, por la poca organización urbanística. Pero, Venezuela tiene una hermosa combinación de paisajes, entre playas, medanos, islas, sabanas, montanas, tepuyes (que significa montaña en la lengua pemón, ver foto), zonas frías y calientes y parte del amazona, entre otras cosas…. Tiene una de las cataratas más alta del mundo, llamado el Salto Angel o Kerepakupai-merú según los indígena pemones, que significa caída de agua hasta el sitio más profundo. Este cuenta con 979 m (3,212 ft) y una caída ininterrumpida de agua de 807 m (2,648 ft).
	La isla es muy bonita y la gente es muy amable. Mi experiencia en la isla es muy buena, porque no es tan diferente a algunas zonas de Venezuela. Aunque la temperatura es similar a las zonas costeras de Venezuela, es más calurosa que Caracas. Algo a lo que si es difícil acostumbrarse, es al costo de la gasolina, ya que en Venezuela puedo obtener 16 tanques llenos por el mismo costo de uno aquí…..
I received the B.Sc. with a program field in Cellular Biology in 2000 from Universidad Central de Venezuela, Thesis title: Sphingolipids as possible physiological modulators of the plasma membrane Ca^2+-ATPase. In 2004 from the same University I graduated like D.Sc. (Ph.D.) with a program field in Cellular Biology. My thesis was focus on the effect of different modulators on the intracellular calcium concentration between isolated excitable cells, Purkinje cells, and as model of non-excitable cells were used glial and Jurkat T cells. I used mostly fluorescent and biochemical approach and some electrophysiological techniques. Publications: Claudia Colina, Vincenza Cervino and Gustavo Benaim. (2002). Ceramide and sphingosine have an antagonistic effect on the plasma membrane Ca^2+-ATPase from human erythrocytes. Biochem. J. 362: 247-251. M. Mendoza, A. Mijares, H. Rojas, C. Colina, V. Cervino, R. DiPolo and G. Benaim. (2004). Evaluation of the presence of a thapsigargin sensitive calcium store in trypanosomatids using Trypanosoma evansi as a model. J. Parasitol. 90: 1181-1183. Colina, C., Flores, A., Rojas, H., Acosta, A., Garrido, M. R. Israel, A., Castillo, C., DiPolo, R. and Benaim, G. (2005). Ceramide increase cytoplasmic Ca^2+ concentration in Jurkat T cells by liberation of calcium from intracellular stores and activation of a store-operated calcium channel. Arch. Biochem. Biophys. 436: 333-345. Colina, C., Flores, A., Castillo, C., Garrido, M. del R., Israel, A., DiPolo, R. and Benaim, G. (2005). Ceramide-1-P induces Ca^2+ mobilization in Jurkat T-cells by elevation of Ins(1,4,5)-P(3) and activation of a store-operated calcium channel. Biochem Biophys Res Commun. 336: 54-60. G. Benaim, J.M. Sanders, Y. Garcia-Marchán, C. Colina, R. Lira, A.R. Caldera, G. Payares, C. Sanoja, J.M. Burgos, A. León-Rossell, J.L. Concepción, A.G. Schijman, M. Levin, E Oldfield and J.A. Urbina. (2006). Amiodarone has intrinsic anti-Trypanosoma cruzi activity and act synergistically with posaconazole. J. Med. Chem. 49: 892-899. Rojas, H., Colina, C., Benaim, G., Jaffe, E., Caputo, C. and DiPolo, R. (2006) Na^+ entry via glutamate transporter activates the reverse Na^+/Ca^2+ exchange and triggers Ca^2+i-induced Ca^2+ release in rat cerebellar Type-1 astrocytes. J. Neurochem. (en prensa) Claudia Colina, Joshua J.C. Rosenthal, Joseph A. DeGiorgis, Deepa Srikumar, Nikhila Iruku and Miguel Holmgren. (2007). Structural basis of Na^+/K^+-ATPase adaptation to marine environments. Nat. Struc. Mol. Biol. 14: 427-431.		E-mails: ccprisco@cantv.net ccolina@ivic.ve cprisco@neuro.upr.edu Telephone : 787-7214149 Ext. 273