Bentonite-based LC3 low carbon cement and activation by C-S-H nucleation seeding

This study explores the feasibility of using calcined bentonitic clays in LC3-50 binders. Four commercially available bentonite rocks were thermally activated and milled to a Dv,50 of 12 ± 2 μm. Their pozzolanic activities were assessed using the R3 method, yielding total heat released values between 190 and 378 J/g-SCM, exceeding the minimum requirements for supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs). The incorporation of superplasticisers (SP) in bentonitic LC3 mortars was optimized, requiring dosages between 0.7 and 1.1 wt% (by the weight of binder) to achieve an initial slump of 200 ± 20 mm, with flow maintained for 1 h in three of them. These results dispel concerns regarding the use of SP in LC3 containing calcined bentonites. Early-age hydration reactions were accelerated using C-S-H nucleation seeding technology, which increased bentonite LC3 mortar compressive strength by 50 % at one day. The compressive mechanical strengths at 28 days of the seeded mortars were also enhanced by 15 %. To elucidate the effects of C-S-H nucleation seeding, LC3 pastes were analysed, confirming the occurrence of pozzolanic reactions at one day of hydration. The portlandite contents, determined by Rietveld quantitative phase analysis and thermal analysis, were lower than expected based on the alite hydration degree at the analysed times. Furthermore, the strength enhancing admixture systematically increased the formation of AFm-type phases, such as hemicarboaluminate, and refined the pore microstructure at one day of hydration.Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málaga / CBU

In vitro negative effects of beach-cast invasive marine seaweed Rugulopteryx okamurae across life-stages of a native foundational species

The exotic invasive seaweed Rugulopteryx okamurae (Dictyotales, Ochrophyta) have posed a serious threat to coastal and marine habitats since its appearance in 2015 in the Strait of Gibraltar. This, together with multiple global change stressors, is leading to the disappearance of native foundational seaweeds. Here we explored the potential impacts that decomposing thalli of beach-cast R. okamurae (BCRo) might have on different life-stages of a native foundational seaweed (Ericaria selaginoides, Fucales, Ochrophyta). The in vitro effects of different biomass densities of BCRo and time exposure, in combination with three warming scenarios, were assessed across single- and few-celled stages and adult thalli of the native species. We hypothesized that R. okamurae might interfere in the survival and growth of E. selaginoides either by allelopathic interactions or water acidification, due to low intracellular pH of R. okamurae tissues. Sensitivity of E. selaginoides to the exposure of BCRo was stage- and thermal-dependent and decreased during early ontogenesis. Unfertilized oospheres (female gametes) exposed to BCRo experienced apoptotic-like cell death within less than 180 s, while embryo survival and germination dropped by 50 % and 36 %, respectively. Warming effects were not additive to that of BCRo, since higher growth reductions in 7-d old juveniles of E. selaginoides were detected at lower (20 °C) but not at higher temperatures (28 °C). Adults of E. selaginoides were the less sensitive stage but their growth was up to 7-times lower under BCRo addition. BCRo acidified natural sea water proportionally to the density and incubation time, reaching a pH of 7.2 after 24 h. However, that pH was not limiting for E. selaginoides juveniles and even enhanced their growth, suggesting an alternative chemical effect.Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málaga / CBU

Goodness of Fit in the Marginal Modeling of Round-Trip Times for Networked Robot Sensor Transmissions.

When complex computations cannot be performed on board a mobile robot, sensory data must be transmitted to a remote station to be processed, and the resulting actions must be sent back to the robot to execute, forming a repeating cycle. This involves stochastic round-trip times in the case of non-deterministic network communications and/or non-hard real-time software. Since robots need to react within strict time constraints, modeling these round-trip times becomes essential for many tasks. Modern approaches for modeling sequences of data are mostly based on time-series forecasting techniques, which impose a computational cost that may be prohibitive for real-time operation, do not consider all the delay sources existing in the sw/hw system, or do not work fully online, i.e., within the time of the current round-trip. Marginal probabilistic models, on the other hand, often have a lower cost, since they discard temporal dependencies between successive measurements of round-trip times, a suitable approximation when regime changes are properly handled given the typically stationary nature of these round-trip times. In this paper we focus on the hypothesis tests needed for marginal modeling of the round-trip times in remotely operated robotic systems with the presence of abrupt changes in regimes. We analyze in depth three common models, namely Log-logistic, Log-normal, and Exponential, and propose some modifications of parameter estimators for them and new thresholds for well-known goodness-of-fit tests, which are aimed at the particularities of our setting. We then evaluate our proposal on a dataset gathered from a variety of networked robot scenarios, both real and simulated; through >2100 h of high-performance computer processing, we assess the statistical robustness and practical suitability of these methods for these kinds of robotic applications

Latent diffusion for arbitrary zoom MRI super-resolution.

In various image processing tasks, enhancing resolution is a fundamental challenge, particularly along specific axes where resolution tends to be lower. This limitation can hinder the performance of models in tasks such as medical image analysis. Traditional approaches often involve interpolation techniques, but they may lead to loss of information or introduce artifacts. Recently, deep learning-based methods, especially those utilizing latent spaces, have shown promise in addressing this issue. Because typical super-resolution methods are designed for 2D images, they can easily be applied to increase resolution in two of the axes in a volumetric MRI, but not the other axis. While volumetric (3D) deep learning models for super-resolution have been proposed, they have very high computational requirements, even if the region of interest to super-resolve does not span the whole volume. In our work, we propose a novel approach that uses a diffusion latent model to increase resolution along an arbitrary axis. Our method involves transforming input images into a latent space, where a U-Net model is employed to capture high-level features. Crucially, just before decoding, we introduce a linear interpolation in the latent space to enhance resolution along the specified axis. This interpolated latent representation is then decoded by the decoder, yielding images with increased resolution, thus achieving a resolution across all axes and, therefore, an increase in resolution of the entire volume, using a 2D deep learning model rather than a fully-fledged 3D model. The proposal has been extensively tested with a wide range of brain lesions and brain tumor images of T1, T2, and FLAIR modes. The experimental comparison with several state-of-the-art methods has consistently shown the advantages of our approach.Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málaga / CBUAThis work is partially supported by the Autonomous Government of Andalusia (Spain) under project UMA20-FEDERJA-108, project name Detection, characterization and prognosis value of the non-obstructive coronary disease with deep learning, and also by the Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain, grant number PID2022-136764OA-I00, project name Automated Detection of Non Lesional Focal Epilepsy by Probabilistic Diffusion Deep Neural Models. It includes funds from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). It is also partially supported by the University of Málaga (Spain) under grants B1-2021_20, project name Detection of coronary stenosis using deep learning applied to coronary angiography; B4-2022, project name Intelligent Clinical Decision Support System for Non-Obstructive Coronary Artery Disease in Coronarographies; B1-2022_14, project name Detección de trayectorias anómalas de vehículos en cámaras de tráfico; and, by the Fundación Unicaja under project PUNI-003_2023, project name Intelligent System to Help the Clinical Diagnosis of Non-Obstructive Coronary Artery Disease in Coronary Angiography. The authors thankfully acknowledge the computer resources, technical expertise and assistance provided by the SCBI (Supercomputing and Bioinformatics) center of the University of Málaga. They also gratefully acknowledge the support of NVIDIA Corporation with the donation of an RTX A6000 GPU with 48Gb. The authors also thankfully acknowledge the grant of the Universidad de Málaga and the Instituto de Investigación Biomédica de Málaga y Plataforma en Nanomedicina-IBIMA Plataforma BIONAND

Direct Single-Dose Drug-Provocation Test Is Safe for Delabelling Penicillin Low-Risk Reactions in Adults

Background: Penicillins (PENs) are the most frequent drug-allergic reactions trigger. However, diagnostic work-up is complex and time-consuming: it requires skin testing (ST) and drug-provocation test (DPT), needing faster delabelling strategies. Although direct DPT without previous STs has shown to be safe, most of the studies are performed in children or in North American, Asian, or Oceanian adults, with few studies in the European adult population. We explored its safety in European adult patients with low-risk PEN allergy history and, additionally, analysed ST role and T-cell involvement by lymphocyte trans- formation test (LTT). Methods: We prospectively evaluated > 16 years of PEN-allergic labelled patients referred to Málaga Regional University Hospital during 2023. They reported non-immediate reactions without alarm signs and unknown reactions. Direct-single-dose DPT was performed in all patients. If positive, ST and LTT were carried out after reaction resolution. Results: We included 269 patients with the culprits being an unidentified PEN (36%), amoxicillin (AX) (32%), and AX-clavulanic acid (AX- CLV) (31%); and the symptoms maculopapular exanthema (MPE) (34%) and unknown reaction during childhood (23%). Only 16 (5.9%) had positive DPT, being 56% for AX and 44% for AX- CLV, 81% developing MPE, none severe. Most DPT-reacting patients reported cutaneous non-immediate reactions in the index reaction, and only one had an unknown childhood reaction. The mean day interval between drug administration and symptom development was lower (p = 0.002) in positive DPT than in the index reaction (2 vs 5 days). Moreover, ST was positive in only 19% and LTTs in 86.7% of positive DPT patients. Conclusions: Direct-single-dose DPT is safe for delabelling PEN allergy in non-immediate reactions without alarm signs and unknown reactions. ST had a poor diagnostic value and LTT had a high one, confirming a T-cell involvement.This study has been supported by the Institute of Health “Carlos III” of the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (grants cofounded by European Regional Development Fund) (PI21/00329); and through its programme of Redes de Investigacion Cooperativa Orientadas al Resultado en Salud (RICORS): Enfermedades Inflamatorias (RD21/0002/0008). ML holds a contract from “Juan Rodes” program (JR23/0039) from the Institute of Health “Carlos III” of the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness [grants co-funded by European Social Fund (ESF)]. PDE holds a Sara Borrell research contract by Institute of Health “Carlos III” (CD22/00112). CM holds a “Nicolas Monardes” research contract by Andalusian Regional Ministry Health (RC- 0004-2021). Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málaga/CBUA

AI-based Multimodal Perception for Planetary Exploration Robotics

Los rovers de exploración planetaria se enfrentan a importantes desafíos al desplazarse por los terrenos desestructurados de Marte, lo que compromete el éxito de las misiones. Los retrasos en las comunicaciones Tierra-Marte hacen que sea imprescindible que los rovers tengan un alto grado de autonomía. Sin embargo, su limitada capacidad de procesamiento dificulta la integración de sistemas avanzados de Inteligencia Artificial (IA). La presente tesis aborda estos desafíos mediante el desarrollo de métodos innovadores que mejoran la percepción en tiempo real, utilizando técnicas multimodales basadas en IA adaptadas a entornos con recursos computacionales limitados. Esta tesis propone el uso de imágenes térmicas para mejorar la evaluación autónoma de la transitabilidad del terreno, ya que pueden revelar características del suelo que otros sensores no detectan. Debido a la baja resolución de los datos obtenidos por los rovers actuales, se desarrolla una metodología que simula la evaluación térmica de distintos terrenos bajo condiciones similares a las de Marte, utilizando una Cámara Ambiental Multifuncional. Este enfoque mejora la caracterización del terreno y permite estimar propiedades clave, como la inercia térmica, con resultados validados mediante datos reales de rovers. Asimismo, se desarrolla un sistema de percepción multimodal que combina imágenes a color, de profundidad y térmicas para segmentar entornos no estructurados. Validado en pruebas de campo, este sistema genera mapas de transitabilidad en tiempo real, lo que facilita la navegación autónoma. También se introduce un sistema autónomo para localizar y estimar la posición de tubos de muestra en Marte, mediante simulaciones virtuales fotorrealistas y aprendizaje profundo, optimizado para hardware de a bordo.Esta investigación mejora significativamente la autonomía de los rovers planetarios, proporcionando soluciones avanzadas para la evaluación del terreno, la navegación y la recuperación autónoma de muestras, elementos clave para optimizar el rendimiento científico de las misiones de exploración planetaria

Runtime monitoring of 5G network slicing using STAn

"This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation grant agreement PID2022-142181OB-I00 (LearnFDT) and the Spanish Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation project TSI-063000-2021-11 (5G+TACTILE-1) and the European Union Horizon 2020 Smart Networks and Services Joint Undertaking (SNS JU) under grant agreement 101096328 (6G-SANDBOX)." The most recent technology in the evolution of mobile networks is 5G, which is aimed at offering differentiated quality of service (QoS) to specific groups of users or devices. Such groups could include public safety agencies, connected vehicles, citizens streaming video content, fixed Internet of Things devices, etc. Insofar as each group has different requirements in terms of bandwidth, latency, error rate, coverage or other relevant quality indicators, the network can be divided into multiple slices, with each slice supporting a group’s requirements. Such network slicing is becoming a key feature for telecom operators, who need to face the challenge of validating its correct behavior. In this paper, we propose a monitoring system to check that a 5G network is offering slicing in the proper way. To this end, we use the tool STAn, a general purpose runtime verification tool where the requirements to be monitored are expressed using temporal formulae. The paper identifies first a list of requirements that define the expected behavior of network slicing. Then, we describe how the initial logic eLTL supported by STAn is extended to the so-called eXtended Event-driven Temporal Logic (xeLTL) in order to represent the slicing requirements. Finally, we validate that the new version of STAn and the catalogue of xeLTL formulae are suitable to monitor and check if real 5G networks properly support slicing. This way, we provide a complete new system for runtime monitoring of 5G network slicing.This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation grant agreement PID2022-142181OB-I00 (LearnFDT) and the Spanish Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation project TSI-063000-2021-11 (5G+TACTILE-1) and the European Union Horizon 2020 Smart Networks and Services Joint Undertaking (SNS JU) under grant agreement 101096328 (6G-SANDBOX)

The role of cybersecurity as a preventive measure in digital tourism and travel: a systematic literature review

The purpose of this study is to show the growing concern about cybersecurity in tourism and travel research from 2000 to August 7, 2024. The methodology used in this research adopted a systematic literature review approach based on PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) and using the Web of Science (WoS) database, as well as implement the VOSviewer software to map and show the most important themes related to cybersecurity, tourism, and travel keywords selected in this research. Findings of the current study show a growing interest in the cybersecurity topic and its relationship with tourism and travel disciplines by researchers, particularly from the beginning of COVID-19 to the present. Indeed, the growth of ‘cybersecurity’ and ‘tourism’ publications and citations the average annual up by 18% and 129%, respectively, from 2020 to 2023. While ‘cybersecurity’ and ‘travel’ publications and citations grew by 8% and 80%, respectively. Another important finding was that keyword analysis revealed the most occurring words mainly were cybersecurity; impact; AI; security; management; and tourism in the case of cybersecurity and tourism searches. Whereas for cybersecurity in travel searches were adoption; attacks; challenges; consumer; cyberattacks; hotels; management; OTAs; security; smart cities; tourism industry, among others. These findings show that studies carried out so far are tackling cybersecurity’s consequences and impact on travel and tourism activities in cities, companies, and consumers. Tourism and travel companies need to focus on prevention, not only detection and response to cyberattacks. This study is so important to know about cybersecurity as a prevention and protection tool in the tourism and travel industries because cyberattacks and cyberthreats to tourist destinations need to be taken seriously.Funding for open access charge: Universidad de Málaga/CBUA. This research received no external funding

The comic book as a didactic resource in the field of dementia

A pesar de la alta incidencia y gravedad de la demencia, la población a menudo desconoce aspectos importantes sobre la enfermedad. El cómic es una herramienta que se ha demostrado útil en la difusión de contenidos relacionados con la salud, así como en el ámbito de la enseñanza. En este estudio, se han analizado los efectos de la lectura de un cómic (Arrugas) en el estado emocional y en la motivación intrínseca por aprender sobre las demencias en una muestra universitaria. Tras analizar la fiabilidad y estructura factorial de los cuestionarios, se compararon medidas pre y post-test entre un grupo experimental, que leyó el cómic, y un grupo de control, que recibió una clase magistral sobre la demencia. Los resultados muestran que la lectura de Arrugas resultó conmovedora y satisfactoria, lo que se reflejo en un aumento significativo del afecto negativo" y de la motivación por aprender contenidos relacionados con la vejez y la demencia. Sin embargo, la ausencia de correlación entre estas variables sugiere que la emoción no fue el aspecto que favoreció el aumento de motivación tras la lectura del cómic. Futuras investigaciones podrían buscar qué elementos específicos del cómic son los que resultan motivadores para el alumnado

Effectiveness of Augmented Reality in the Teaching of Health University Students: Quasi-Experimental Study.

Proyecto de Innovación Educativa de la Universidad de Málaga (PIE22-224)We aimed to analyze the degree of usability of two augmented reality applications and to compare the academic performance between the control group and the experimental group at the Universities of Cádiz and Málaga. The students at the University of Málaga used the Zapworks augmented reality software, while those at the University of Cádiz used the Aumentaty augmented reality software for their respective experimental groups. The secondary objective was to measure the relationships between all the studied variables. Methods: This was a quasi-experimental design with a posttest as the only evaluation measure. We followed the SPIRIT (Standard Protocol Items: Recommendations for Interventional Trials) statement and the ethical and legal aspects of the Principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. An intervention was carried out using two augmented reality applications on the subject of General Procedures in Physiotherapy II at the Universities of Málaga and Cádiz. Results: A total of 199 participants took part in the study. Demographic variables, ratings, and usability were assessed, followed by statistical analysis, with the results and their interpretation being described in the study. Significant differences (P<.001) were found in the ratings at both the universities. In addition, significant differences (P<.001) were found between the experimental group and the control group. Regarding the degree of usability in the univariate analysis, no significant differences were found (P=.049). A multiple regression analysis of the rating and usability was performed. The rating showed significant differences, with a beta of 1.4 (P<.001), and usability was also significant (P=.03) in favor of the Aumentaty group.Conclusions: Significant differences were observed in those who used augmented reality compared to the control group, with higher values observed in the University of Cádiz. There are no correlations between the variables of usability and qualifications