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SIDNEY W. MINTZ came to Barrio Jauca in Santa Isabel in 1948 as a student of anthropology and returned during the late 1950s to research rural communities. One of the books that came out of his research, Worker in the Cane: A Puerto Rican Life History, was controversial because some social scientists questioned his methods, which included befriending his subjects of study.
Over the years, Mintz amassed a collection of more than 6,000 volumes of books, manuscripts, unpublished theses, newspapers, magazines, collections of letters, and anthropological artifacts. In 2001 Mintz donated his collection to the College of Social Sciences at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus.
Sponsored by the Institutional Research Fund, the Sidney W. Mintz Collection Bibliography and Document Guide Project Team, comprised of anthropologist María Isabel Quiñones, technology and information sciences specialist Betsaida Vélez Natal, and historian Humberto García Muñiz, in collaboration with psychologist Antonio Díaz Royo, sociologist Juan J. Baldrich, and graduate students Marla Isabel Pagán and Rhode Suriano, is classifying the material and creating a matrix document. Once the matrix document is created, a graphic designer will create a user-friendly Web page. By the end of 2005, users should be able to access to the collection, which will be located temporarily in a new Social Science building, Beatriz Lasalle.
sargasso@prtc.net
Haitian Beliefs About Sexuality is Key in AIDS Prevention
by Suzanna Engman
IN A TWIST on the usual campaigns to prevent AIDS, a pilot project in Haiti depicts one-minute video clips of women discussing the pleasures of sex with men who use foreplay and take responsibility for protecting them from the HIV virus by using condoms. The Public Service Announcements are the result of research done by the Center for Psychological Services and Research (CUSEP by its Spanish Acronym), a part of the Department of Psychology at University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus.
 CUSEP has been working with nongovernmental and government agencies in Haiti for the past six years to study and help curb the spread of AIDS. The Caribbean is one of the fastest growing regions in the number of new AIDS cases per year, outranked only by Sub-Saharan Africa. Of the nations in the Caribbean, Haiti has been most affected by the AIDS virus.
In Haiti the HIV virus is transmitted mainly via heterosexual relations, says Blanca Ortiz, Ph.D., the CUSEP community psychologist who began Pwoje Ayiti-Póto Riko. "We know after 23 years of the HIV epidemic that by changing individual behavior only, we won't stop the HIV epidemic. We need to transform social norms about gender and sexuality."
Ortiz conducted a preliminary study of 100 heterosexual men in Haiti. "We found that men believed that a woman's vagina should be tight and dry for them to be considered an ideal sexual partner." That social norm, Ortiz says, puts women at a greater risk for contracting AIDS. In the next study in Haiti Ortiz found statistical evidence that beliefs are significantly related to behavior.
Presently the Center is seeking funding to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention in Haiti that will include a media campaign and community-based work.
http://graduados.uprrp.edu/cusep
blortiz@uprrp.edu
Dengue Genome May be Clue to Control of the Virus
by Suzanna Engman
WHILE SOME MOSQUITO-BORNE DISEASES have been virtually eradicated, the dengue virus is increasing in frequency and severity in the tropics, and researchers are looking at ways to control dengue epidemics that now affect tens of millions of people annually. This goal may be achieved through molecular research–sequencing the virus's genome.
Aedes aegypti mosquito photo courtesy of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dengue Branch in Puerto Rico.
Using virus samples collected and frozen by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Dengue Branch in Puerto Rico since the late 1970s, researchers from universities in the Caribbean and worldwide have traced the genetic history of two of the four types of dengue virus since the first virus-laden mosquitoes appeared on the island. "Considering the speed at which viruses evolve, this collection represents a living fossil record of dengue's genetic changes," says biologist, Shannon Bennett, Ph.D., who has been sequencing decades' worth of dengue genomes for the past four years. By recording the changes in over 3,000 samples and finding correlations between RNA mutations and outbreaks of the disease, Bennett hopes to be able to predict which virus changes lead to epidemics.
While researchers can observe and record virus mutations at the molecular level, nobody presently knows what these changes will bring, says Bennett. "But we can now ask better questions. We can, for example, correlate specific changes in a poorly known gene with a big outbreak of Dengue 4 in 1998. The next step is to test in the laboratory viruses bearing a genetic mutation to identify the gene's function and determine if the mutation causes increased virulence.
Eventually, with a better understanding of genetic function, we could develop treatments that impair the virus's life cycle or identify important factors in vaccine design."
Shannon N. Bennett held a postdoctoral position at UPR, RP for five years. She is now associate professor of biology at the University of Hawaii.
sbennett@hawaii.edu
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