Germán Octavio López-Riquelme- PhD
- Professor (Full) at Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos
Germán Octavio López-Riquelme
- PhD
- Professor (Full) at Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos
About
70
Publications
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Introduction
I am a neuroethologist. My principal interest is social cognition and behavior. My main interest is to understand how societies and social brains work and evolve. My work involves neurophysiological, morphological and behavioral techniques in the study of social insects. I have focused mainly in olfactory sensory codification and the processing of information in the higher brain centers of insects called Mushroom Bodies, trying to stablish the structure and function of social brains.
Current institution
Additional affiliations
August 2017 - present
February 2017 - present
January 2016 - May 2016
Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos · Centro de Investigación Transdisciplinar en Psicología
Position
- Professor Levels of Cognition in Social Insects (Postgraduate course)
Education
August 2001 - September 2008
September 2000 - December 2000
August 1998 - December 1998
Publications
Publications (70)
The boundaries between disciplines are not natural, but invented. However, the history of every discipline includes processes of defense and self-definition in relation to other disciplines. Disciplines are fiercely defended by their tribes as if they were physical territories that must be protected from desecration by members of other academic tri...
Scientific article is not only the final product of research work, but also the mechanism for the dissemination of knowledge and self-correction of science, a driver and indicator of applied science, technology, and econonomic development of nations. and a discursive genre for epistemic legitimation.
Durante más de 300 años, las revistas académica...
En este capítulo realizaremos una revisión bibliográfica de la evolución,
función y mecanismos neurales de las emociones sociales como parte
de los procesos de cognición social. Por ello, pondremos las emociones
sociales como parte de los mecanismos de cognición social, evolucionados a partir de la compleja dinámica de la vida en sociedad. Enseguid...
Este trabajo constituye una introducción general a los fundamentos del estudio integrativo del comportamiento, es decir, una guía sobre el estudio de cómo la selección natural actúa sobre los mecanismos cognitivos involucrados en la generación de la conducta adaptativa, así como de los fundamentos teóricos de las diversas disciplinas y campos del c...
The successful life of insect societies has evolved from the division of labor among more or less specialized individuals, who carry out all necessary tasks for the maintenance and growth of the colony. The extreme division of labor has produced workers specialized in the removal of dead members of the colony, an evident and highly stereotyped beha...
Memory is a non-unitary cognitive process that allows us to adapt to our environment, provides us with identity, and is the basis of motor and behavioral performance. Although we usually forget things, which is a normal and important function of memory because it allows us to filter important things from superfluous ones, forgetting important aspec...
Background: Schizophrenia (SZ) is a multifactorial chronic psychiatric disorder with a worldwide prevalence of 1%. Altered expression of PLCβ occurs in SZ patients, suggesting alterations in the PLCβ/IP3/Ca²⁺ signaling pathway. This cascade regulates critical cellular processes in all cell types, including the neuronal lineage; however, there is sc...
[El presente texto fue elaborado en 2022 a partir de una invitación del editor de la revista Ludus vitalis para reconocer y testimoniar el papel de dicha revista en el ámbito académico y que, debido a la desaparición de la revista, sería parte del último número que habría de publicarse en enero de 2023, aunque no fue publicado. Se reproduce aquí de...
Schizophrenia (SZ) is a multifactorial disorder characterized by volume reduction in gray and white matter, oxidative stress, neuroinflammation, altered neurotransmission, as well as molecular deficiencies such as punctual mutation in Disrupted-in-Schizophrenia 1 protein. In this regard, it is essential to understand the underlying molecular distur...
El 9 de diciembre de 2016 fue aprobada, en sesión solemne del Consejo Universitario de la Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos (UAEM), en Cuernavaca, Morelos, México, la creación del Centro de Investigación en Ciencias Cognitivas (CINCCO). El proyecto fue presentado por un grupo de profesores investigadores provenientes de diversas áreas, ent...
Las emociones sociales son fundamentales en las relaciones sociales interindividuales específicas a largo plazo. Forman parte de la complejidad interna de una sociedad que deriva de las interacciones entre sus individuos, los patrones de relación entre ellos y sus principios de organización. Los procesos emocionales subyacen a formas complejas de i...
El proceso de consolidación de la memoria fue tomado de la psicología para ser estudiado en el campo neurobiológico con la finalidad de dar cuenta de cómo se conserva la información en el cerebro a largo plazo. En principio, este programa de investigación se basó en la idea de que una vez adquirida una memoria, en condiciones normales, se vuelve es...
Real-time strategy video games (RTS-VG) require players to plan strategies by recruiting cognitive abilities such as attention, motor skills, visuospatial skills, and working memory (WM). Since playing RTS-VG depends on the maintenance of major goals and active sub-goals, as well as the dynamic review of those goals as the situation requires, the o...
Despite being a dominant vision, the anthropocentric program presents errors in the way it understands the evolution of social cognition since its comparison system is based on the human being. The ecological program, on the other hand, points out this error and proposes that the basis of the comparison should be ecological-adaptive, that is, that...
A pesar de ser una visión dominante, el programa antropocéntrico presenta errores en la manera en la que entiende la evolución de la cognición social, ya que su sistema de comparación tiene como base el ser humano. El programa ecológico, por otra parte, señala este error y propone que la base de la comparación debe ser ecológico-adaptativa, es deci...
Los videojuegos de estrategia en tiempo real (VJ-ETR) requieren que los jugadores planeen estrategias reclutando capacidades cognitivas como atención, habilidades motoras, habilidades visuoespaciales y memoria de trabajo (MT). Ya que jugar VJ-ETR depende del mantenimiento de metas principales y submetas activas, así como de la revisión dinámica de...
Schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are disabling psychiatric disorders with a worldwide prevalence of approximately 1%. Both disorders present chronic and deteriorating prognoses that impose a large burden, not only on patients but also on society and health systems. These mental illnesses share several clinical and neurobiological traits; of these...
The environmental day-night cycle is a condition imposed to all living beings on Earth. Through evolution both anatomy and physiology have adapted to this cycle by development of circadian rhythms. Additionally, as a process of vital importance, innate immunity should be optimum and thus, it is subject to tight regulation, including circadian modul...
A lo largo de la historia, la libertad de investigación siempre ha sido vulnerable, ya que tanto la ciencia en general como los científicos en particular, han sido objeto de persecución y de presiones políticas y religiosas que han tendido a censurarles. Aunque podamos creer que las presiones y la persecución científica son cosa del pasado, la libe...
En este ensayo abordaré la perenne separación y conflicto entre ambos futuros y cómo, sucesos de la magnitud de la pandemia que vivimos, revelan qué tipo de presente es el actual respecto de nuestro futuro planeado en el pasado y qué futuro tendremos si no encontramos la forma de reconciliar deseos y destino.
Aunque pequeños, los insectos sociales (abejas, avispas, hormigas y termitas) son los únicos animales —aparte de los humanos— que tienen estrategias conductuales organizadas y sofisticadas para la disposición final de sus muertos.
Using the conventional Haberkorn approach, it is evaluated the recombination of the radical pair (RP) singlet spin state to study theoretically the cytoprotective effect of an extremely-low-frequency electromagnetic field (ELF-EMF) on early stages of hepatic cancer chemically induced in rats. The proposal is that ELF-EMF modulates the interconversi...
Toda la actividad de los cerebros y de los sistemas nerviosos consta de eventos fisiológicos: liberación de sustancias químicas, activación o inhibición de actividad eléctrica, incremento del metabolismo energético, etc. Los eventos que ocurren en los cerebros de los animales son completamente diferentes a la naturaleza energética de los estímulos...
This work reviews concepts regarding oxidative stress and the mechanisms by which endogenous and exogenous factors produce reactive oxygen species (ROS). It also surveys the relationships between oxidative stress, circadian rhythms and retinal damage in humans, particularly those related to light and photodamage. In the first section, the productio...
![Figure 2. The Crecelius method to quantify [As +5 ].](profile/Eduardo-Lopez-Sandoval/publication/277077199/figure/fig1/AS:667814079766550@1536230692342/The-Crecelius-method-to-quantify-As-5_Q320.jpg)
In Zimapan Valley, Mexico, up to 1.1 mg·L-1 of arsenic concentrations have been detected in deep wells that are used as drinking water supply for almost 39,000 people, which could have been exposed to levels higher than 10 μg·L-1 of arsenic, the maximum level recommended by the World Health Organization. Chronic consumption of water contaminated wi...
The most suitable mechanism of action of electromagnetic fields (EMF) on biological systems is the effect on the radical pair (RP) recombination through the Zeeman effect and hyperfine interaction, which changes the rate of reactions or the product distribution. Enzyme reactions with RP intermediates can be altered by EMF, like those catalyzed by c...
The most suitable mechanism of action of electromagnetic fields (EMF) on biological systems is the effect on the radical pair (RP) recombination through the Zeeman effect and hyperfine interaction, which changes the rate of reactions or the product distribution. Enzyme reactions with RP intermediates can be altered by EMF, like those catalyzed by c...
In this work, the general organization of the olfactory pathways from antennal lobes (AL) and its topographic representation in the mushroom bodies (MBs) of hymenopteran social insects are described and discussed to elucidate the organization of the olfactory pathway and the meaning of its specialized structure in social insects.
Introduction. Chemical carcinogenesis is a multi-step process characterized by the electrophile attack to DNA, which produces mutations, resulting in malignant transformation of normal cells. Once into the organism, most chemical carcinogens suffer a metabolic activation by the cytochrome P450 enzymes, a heme-thiolate family protein that usually de...
Introduction. Chemical carcinogenesis is a multi-step process characterized by the electrophile attack to DNA, which produces mutations, resulting in malignant transformation of normal cells. Once into the organism, most chemical carcinogens suffer a metabolic activation by the cytochrome P450 enzymes, a heme-thiolate family protein that usually de...
Los insectos sociales son excepcionales debido a su dominancia ecológica. Su historia evolutiva quizá sea la de mayor éxito entre los metazoarios terrestres. Su éxito se debe a la organización social basada en la división del trabajo. Los insectos sociales viven en sociedades, complejos sistemas constituidos principalmente por conespecíficos. El pr...
In this work, the organization of the antennal lobes (ALs) and its topographic representation in the mushroom bodies (MBs) in soldiers of two species of ants has been compared. Morphologic comparison between these species suggests that ALs of A. mexicana could be more specialized than that of C. ocreatus at the expense of general capabilities. In b...
Este manuscrito versa sobre los insectos como alimento.
Sin embargo, no pretendo que todos los lectores se conviertan a la entomofagia (término que significa alimentarse de insectos), aunque estaría complacido si aquellos lectores que tienen aversión a los insectos, cambiaran de opinión después de leer este trabajo.
Xopamiyolcamolli: gastronomía d...
Los cuerpos fungiformes (CFs) son centros cerebrales de integración multisensorial de los insectos involucrados en el aprendizaje y memoria. Están compuestos de neuronas llamadas células Kenyon cuyas dendritas forman un extenso neuropilo. Se ha reportado la correlación entre el tamaño y complejidad de los CFs y la complejidad conductual, principalm...
Reseña escrita por Luis Alberto Vargas, Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas y Facultad de Medicina, UNAM
Germán López Riquelme es un biólogo quien se apasionó por la entomofagia y nos ofrece un interesante libro donde el tema es tratado de manera integral y distinta a la de otros autores. El título de la obra es un neologismo en náhuatl qu...
Olfaction is the main sensory modality in ants. Food, prey, trails, pheromones, nestmates and non-nestmates are detected by olfactory receptors on antennae; thus, olfactory information is essential for social organization in ants. It is assumed that kin and colony membership recognition depends on cuticular hydrocarbons detected by olfaction. To de...
Los ritmos circadianos en los seres vivos están basados en oscilaciones endógenas autosostenidas capaces de sincronizarse a señales extrernas. Estos ritmos organizan temporalmente los procesos fisiológicos permitiendo a los animales anticiparse a las fluctuaciones entre el día y la noche. En las hormigas existe un claro sentido del tiempo, con vari...
The successful life of ants has evolved due to the division of reproductive labor among fertile (queens) and sterile individuals (workers), and to the support labor by different kinds of workers. Because of this and their age on Earth, ants represent an evolutionary issue in relation to their ability for social development and to survive natural ca...
The most important sense organs of ants are the chemoreceptors located at the sensilla of the antennae, as they are used to detect airborne compounds, in particular the pheromones that regulate their social activities. The average response of the antennae to odorants, called electroantennogram (EAG), has been used as indicative of their detection,...
It has been proposed that the electroretinogram (ERG) amplitude circadian rhythm results of a mutually entrained bilateral system of oscillators which are coupled and synchronized by brain putative pacemakers and their neural input to the eyestalk neurosecretory system responsible of the humoral modulation of retina. Some authors have proposed the...
This thesis studied the neurobiological basis of division of labor, chemical communication and behavioral specialization in the ant Atta mexicana. Chromatography and bioassays methods revealed oleic acid as the chemical signal that both emanates from ant corpses releasing necrophoric behavior, performed mainly by workers refered as “undertakers”. T...
The relationship between scent composition and antennal sensitivity in different castes of Atta mexicana is investigated under laboratory conditions. Extracts of dead ants are analysed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry to identify the compounds presumably responsible for the specific undertaking behaviour. Oleic acid is identified as one comp...
“Los más importantes de los alimentos que tomaban los mexicanos diariamente eran el maíz, el frijol, el chile y la calabaza”, dice el Códice Florentino. Desde tiempos prehispánicos, estos alimentos se han combinado de distintas maneras entre ellos y con otros ingredientes diversos, como carnes de varios animales e incluso carne humana, enriqueciend...
Este artículo versa sobre los insectos como alimento. Sin embargo, no pretendo que todos los lectores se conviertan a la entomofagia (término que significa alimentarse de insectos), aunque estaría complacido si aquellos lectores que les tienen aversión, cambiaran de opinión después de leer este trabajo. No pretendo que los lectores decidan de pront...
We studied the circadian variation of the electroretinogram (ERG) response of individual isolated ants of two castes: major workers and virgin queens of the species Campanotus atriceps subjected to different experimental light protocols. The experiments demonstrated that both castes of this species show similar ERG endogenous circadian rhythms able...
Division of labor among castes characterizes ants like other social insects. It has been proposed that the individual probability to be engaged in one task depends on the probability to be exposed to the task and the sensitivity of the worker to stimuli associated to task. As olfaction is the main sensorial modality to the ants, the objective of th...
Mushroom bodies (MB) are involved in learning and memory and in most insects receive prominent olfactory input. The objective of this work was to determine the general structure of the antennal (olfactory) lobes (AL), and its efferent connections to the MB calyx. The structure of the AL was compared in workers, queens and males of the ant Camponotu...
In insects, the mushroom bodies control complex behavior and are involved in learning and memory. In Hymenoptera (wasps, bees, and ants) they receive multisensory input from the eyes, antennae and mouthparts. Direct pathways from the optic lobes to the mushroom bodies' collar region comprise several different classes of neurons that supply visual i...
The mushroom bodies, central neuropils in the arthropod brain, are involved in learning and memory and in the control of complex behavior. In most insects, the mushroom bodies receive direct olfactory input in their calyx region. In Hymenoptera, olfactory input is layered in the calyx. In ants, several layers can be discriminated that correspond to...
"Los más importantes de los alimentos que tomaban los mexicanos diariamente eran el maíz, el frijol, el chile y la calabaza", dice el Códice Florentino. Desde tiempos pre-hispánicos, estos alimentos se han combinado de distin-tas maneras entre ellos y con otros ingredientes diversos, como carnes de varios animales e incluso carne humana, enriquecie...
Los cuerpos fungiformes (CF) están involucrados en el aprendizaje y memoria, y en muchos insectos reciben prominentes aferencias olfativas. El objetivo de este trabajo fue determinar la estructura general de los lóbulos (olfativos) antenales (LA), y de sus conexiones eferentes hacia el cáliz de los CFs. La estructura de los lóbulos antenales de obr...
Aunque la construcción de nidos encerrados en cavidades contribuyó a la expansión geográfica de los insectos sociales, también implicó la necesidad de incrementar las conductas de limpieza, como la remoción de los cadáveres, con lo que disminuye la posibilidad del surgimiento de enfermedades. El comportamiento necroforético es uno de los patrones c...
Algunas especies de hormigas han desarrollado sorprendentes mecanismos que dependen de la acción de las mandíbulas y de las antenas. Tales mecanismos, llamados mandíbulas de trampa, evolucionaron primero como un sistema de caza y secundariamente como defensa. Estas hormigas, como las del género Odontomachus, poseen largas mandíbulas dentadas en la...
