A Hierarchical Agent-based Approach to Security in Smart Offices

As electronic devices become more and more pervasively integrated in our daily routine, security concerns start to become evident. In the last years, there has been an increasing interest on the topic of security in smart environments. One of the most challenging environments regarding security are smart offices due to the high number of potential users, devices and spaces, and the diversity of security roles. This paper presents a security solution for an agent-based architecture for the smart office. This security solution is potentially applicable to generic smart environments, but it suits particularly well to the smart office scenario, taking advantage of the particular characteristics of the environment to satisfy the security requirements. The result is a hierarchical, agent-based solution, flexible and scalable enough to be applicable to different smart office scenarios, from small businesses to large organizations

Strategies for offer generation and relaxation in fuzzy constraint-based negotiation models

Ministerio de Educación y Cienci

The Bañolas human mandible revisited (Gerona, Spain)

La mandíbula de Bañolas, descubierta en 1887 en Bañolas (Gerona, España), es un fósil humano sobre cuya asignación taxonómica no hay aún consenso. En diferentes estudios ha sido incluida dentro de Homo neanderthalensis {King, 1864} (Hernández-Pacheco & Obermaier, 1915; Sánchez, 1993), dentro de los ante-neandertales (de Lumley, 1971-72) y dentro de los ante-würmienses (Roth & Simon, 1993). Recientemente, Daura y colaboradores (Daura et al., 2005), en su artículo sobre la mandíbula fósil de la Cova del Gegant, sugieren que la mandíbula de Bañolas no presenta caracteres neandertales y que, dada su cronología, podría haber pertenecido a un Homo sapiens {Linneo, 1758}. Este estudio trata de arrojar luz sobre la cuestión de la asignación taxonómica de la mandíbula de Bañolas. Para ello se han utilizado caracteres morfológicos discretos que permiten discriminar entre las especies H. heidelbergensis {Schoetensack, 1908}, H. neanderthalensis y H. sapiens. La conclusión del trabajo es que los estados de los caracteres que presenta la mandíbula de Bañolas son, en su mayor parte, más frecuentes en H. sapiens que en las otras dos especies tenidas en cuenta.Since the discovery of a fossil human mandible in 1887 near the city of Bañolas (Gerona, Spain), there has been considerable disagreement among scholars as to its taxonomic allocation. In different studies the specimen has been included within Homo neanderthalensis {King, 1864} (Hernández-Pacheco & Obermaier, 1915; Sánchez, 1993), ante-Neandertals (de Lumley, 1971-72) or an ante-würmian (Roth & Simon, 1993) species. More recently, the Bañolas mandible has been argued to lack derived Neandertal traits (Daura et al., 2005). Although the mandible was found in a quarry of travertine, its exact location is unknown. Some patches of travertine adhered to the specimen have provided a geochronological age range between 17,6 to 110 kyr (Berger & Libby, 1966¸ Yokoyama et al., 1987; Julià & Bischoff, 1991; Grün et al., 2006). The only direct dating of the mandible yielded an age of 66 ± 7 kyr B.P. (Grün et al., 2006). After a recent examination of the original specimen, a number of morphological traits of this mandible has been described and compared with information from the literature regarding H. heidelbergensis {Schoetensack, 1908}, H. neanderthalensis and both fossil and extant H. sapiens {Linneo, 1758} mandibles. These characters have been considered to be of taxonomical significance to discriminate between these three species (see below for references). Despite the fragmentary condition of the Bañolas mandible, a considerable number of morphological traits can be evaluated: presence/absence of the mental trigone (Schwartz & Tattersall , 2000), shape of the anterior basal corpus (Quam & Smith, 1998), position of the digastric fossa (de Lumley, 1973), number, size and location of the mental foramen (Trinkaus, 1993), presence/absence of the retromolar space and inclination of the retromolar triangle (Franciscus & Trinkaus, 1995; Rosas, 2001), shape of the mandibular foramen (Smith, 1978), size and shape of the medial pterygoid tubercle (Antón, 1996), relative position between the condyle and the ascending ramus plane (Rosas, 2001; Nicholson & Harvati, 2006; Trinkaus, 2006), dimensions of the submental incisure (Mounier et al., 2009), location and trajectory of the mylohyoid line (Mounier et al., 2009), size of the alveolar plane (Mounier et al., 2009), shape of the gonion (Creed-Miles et al., 1996) and relative position of the lateral prominence to the dentition (Rosas, 2001; Mounier et al., 2009). The state of these characters in the Bañolas mandible is as follow: absence of mental trigone (but slight evidences of a possible mental fossa and a possible central keel) (Fig. 1), triangular anterior basal corpus shape (Figs. 1 and 3), disgastric fossa located in the posterior face of the symphysis (Figs. 1 and 3 ), a single small mental foramen placed in the upper half of the corpus and below the P4 (Fig. 2), absence of retromolar space and an oblique retromolar triangle relative to the alveolar margin (Figs. 2 and 6), small and not lib-shaped medial pteriogoid tubercle (Fig. 5), medially placed condyle relative to the ascending ramus plane (Fig. 4), large dimensions of the submental incisure (Fig. 2), mylohyoid line that starts near the M3 and follows obliquely to the alveolar margin (Fig. 4), not large (wide) alveolar plane (Fig. 6), rounded (not truncated) gonion (Figs. 2 and 4) and anteriorly placed lateral prominence (M2 and M2/ M3 septum) (Fig. 2). Regarding the mandibular foramen, it seems to present a lingula, it could confirm the presence of a normal mandibular foramen type and it would discard the possibility of an H-O mandibular foramen type (Smith, 1978) (Fig. 5). Except for the large submental incisure and the absence of mental trigone, the state of all these characters is more frequent in Homo sapiens specimens (de Lumley, 1973; Smith, 1978; Trinkaus, 1993; Franciscus & Trinkaus, 1995; Antón, 1996; Creed-Miles et al., 1996; Quam & Smith, 1998; Rosas, 2001; Nicholson & Harvati, 2006; Trinkaus, 2006; Mounier et al., 2009). The large submental incisure is a characteristic trait of Homo heidelbergensis and the absence of mental trigone is a plesiomophic character shared by Homo neanderthalensis, Homo heidelbergensis and some upper Pleistocene Homo sapiens individuals (Schwartz & Tattersall , 2000). On the view of this work our conclusion is that the Bañolas mandible shows neither derived Neandertal traits nor clear affinities to H. heidelbergensis. On the contrary, this specimen bears a greater resemblance to the H. sapiens mandibles.Depto. de Geodinámica, Estratigrafía y PaleontologíaFac. de Ciencias GeológicasTRUEpu

Pollen season trends in winter flowering trees in South Spain

The present work has studied the trends in pollen seasons of winter flowering trees (Alnus, Cupressaceae, Fraxinus, Populus and Ulmus) in Córdoba, Granada and Málaga (Andalusian, Spain) over the years 1994-2017. The influence of meteorological parameters in the seasonal airborne pollen has been also analyzed. Pollen concentrations were recorded using Hirst-type volumetric spore traps, following the standardized methodology of the Spanish Aerobiology Network (REA) and the European Aerobiology Society (EAS). The non-parametric Mann-Kendall test and the non-parametric Sen’s method have been used to study linear trends for pollen season timing and intensity, and for temperature and rainfall. Significance was determined using the F-test. Spearman analyses were applied to test for correlations between pollen season parameters and weather-related factors before and over the pollen season. The results obtained suggest that flowering has delayed over recent years, especially for trees with a bloom closer to spring (poplar and elm). Earlier flowering species are more influenced by the meteorological parameters before the flowering. However, species blooming later are more influenced by the meteorological parameters during the pollen season. Meteorological parameters affect more to the interior cities than the coastal city

A novel method for automatic detection and classification of movement patterns in short duration playing activities

Autonomous devices able to evaluate diverse situations without external help have become especially relevant in recent years because they can be used as an important source of relevant information about the activities performed by people (daily habits, sports performance, and health-related activities). Specifically, the use of this kind of device in childhood games might help in the early detection of developmental problems in children. In this paper, we propose a method for the detection and classification of movements performed with an object, based on an acceleration signal. This method can automatically generate patterns associated with a given movement using a set of reference signals, analyze sequences of acceleration trends, and classify the sequences according to the previously established patterns. This method has been implemented, and a series of experiments has been carried out using the data from a sensor-embedded toy. For the validation of the obtained results, we have, in parallel, developed two other classification systems based on popular techniques, i.e., a similarity search based on Euclidean distances and machine-learning techniques, specifically a support vector machine model. When comparing the results of each method, we show that our proposed method achieves a higher number of successes and higher accuracy in the detection and classification of isolated movement signals as well as in sequences of movements

Maturing Arc signatures monired by trace element and Hf isotope systematics in the early cretaceous Zacatecas volcanic field, Mexico

Mesozoic growth of continental crust along the southwestern margin of North America and its southern extension in Mexico has been partly explained by the accretion of terranes. These terranes have been considered to be fragments of exotic, intraoceanic island arcs that approached mainland Mexico after the Early Cretaceous. Trace elements and Lu-Hf isotopic systematics for primitive arc successions of the Zacatecas Volcanic Field indicate a close relationship with parts of the northern Guerrero superterrane. Major and trace element systematics of lava flows and dioritic rocks from laccoliths suggest a cogenetic origin of the Zacatecas Formation and Las Pilas Complex rocks, here combined in the Zacatecas Group. This group represents a single arc succession that evolves from a primitive to mature arc. Initial 176Hf/177Hf (age corrected to 130 Ma) ranges from 0.28296 to 0.28307, corresponding t

Effectiveness and safety of guselkumab for the treatment of psoriasis in real-world settings at 24 weeks : A retrospective, observational, multicentre study by the Spanish Psoriasis Group

Altres ajuts: Acord transformatiu CRUE-CSICData on the effectiveness and safety of a drug in real-world clinical practice complement the evidence from clinical trials, which are carried out in a different setting. Little has been published on the effectiveness and safety of guselkumab in the treatment of psoriasis in clinical practice. The ojective of this study was to assess the effectiveness and safety of guselkumab at 24 weeks in patients with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis in routine clinical practice. A retrospective, multicentre study of adult patients with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis treated with guselkumab for at least 24 weeks was carried out in Spain. We studied 343 patients, 249 of whom were followed for 24 weeks. By week 24, the mean (SD) psoriasis area severity index (PASI) had decreased from 11.1 (7.3) to 1.7 (2.8) (−9.3; [−10.2;-8.4]), 85.9% of the patients had achieved PASI score of 4 or less and 77.9% a PASI score of 2 or less. In terms of relative PASI response, 59.4% of the patients achieved a PASI-90 response and 49.0% a PASI-100 response. On multivariate analysis, two factors reduced the probability of a PASI of 2 or less at 24 weeks: a BMI ≥30 (OR, 0.44; 95% CI, 0.22-0.88) and a greater previous exposure to biologic therapy (OR, 0.69; 95% CI, [0.56-0.84]). Adverse events were rare (9.9%) and led to withdrawal from treatment in only nine patients (2.6%) by the end of the follow-up period. The results of this study confirm the high efficacy and safety of guselkumab indicated by the clinical trial data. In clinical practice, the absolute PASI score appears to be a better marker of response to treatment than the relative value

Variablity of Mechanical or Tissue Valve Implantation in Patients Undergoing Surgical Aortic Valve Replacement in Spain: National Retrospective Analysis from 2007 to 2018

Background: There is no robust evidence regarding the types of valves implanted among patients undergoing surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) in Spain. Methods: All cases of patients undergoing SAVR ± coronary artery bypass grafting from January 2007 to December 2018 in the public Spanish National Health System were included. We analyzed the trends of SAVR volume, risk profile and type of implanted valve across time and place. Using multivariable logistic regression, we identified factors associated with biological SAVR. Results: In total, 62,870 episodes of SAVR in 15 Spanish territories were included. In 35,693 (56.8%), a tissue valve was implanted. The annual volume of procedures increased from 107.3/million (2007) to 128.6 (2017). In 2018, it fell to 108.5. Age increased and Charlson’s comorbity index worsened throughout the study period. Tissue valve implantation increased in most regions. After adjusting for other covariates, we observed a high variability in aortic valve implantation across different regions, with differences of as much as 20-fold in the use of tissue valves. Conclusions: Between 2007 and 2018, we detected a significant increase in the use of bioprostheses in patients undergoing SAVR in Spain, and a great variability in the types of valve between the Spanish territories, which was not explained by the different risk profiles of patients

Genotype, environment and their interaction on olive

Resumen del trabajo presentado en la 6th International Conference on the Olive Tree and Olive Products, celebrada en Sevilla (España) del 15 al 19 de octubre de 2018.The wide olive genetic patrimony has revealed high variability for most of the agronomic and oil quality traits of interest in olive growing. Few studies, however, have addressed the interaction of this variability with the environment, a subject of particular interest considering the natural high instability of the Mediterranean climate and the challenge of the predicted climate change. The current work presents results on the interaction between genotype and environment from multi-environment trials of olive cultivars and breeding selections, planted in different edaphoclimatic conditions of Andalusia, Southern Peninsular Spain and Canary Islands. For most of the agronomic and oil quality characters evaluated (flowering phenology, flower quality, pattern of oil accumulation, fatty acid composition and phenol content and composition), significant genotype and environment effects have been observed. For example, olive cultivars grown in Tenerife under much milder winter temperatures than in the Iberian Peninsula showed substantially earlierflowering and oil accumulation. Only in the case of flowering phenology was no significant genotype effect found. Furthermore, a strong genotype x environment effect was highly consistent in all characters considered. Regarding resistance to disease, such as Verticillium wilt, the variability of results from both natural and artificial inoculations also tends to indicate a considerable environmental effect and the need for careful testing of disease evolution. All this information strongly suggests the necessity of comparative trials of olive cultivars for both adequate choice of cultivar and final selection in breeding programs

Associations between eating speed, diet quality, adiposity, and cardiometabolic risk factors

Objective: To assess the associations between eating speed, adiposity, cardiometabolic risk factors, and diet quality in a cohort of Spanish preschool-children. Study design: A cross-sectional study in 1371 preschool age children (49% girls; mean age, 4.8 ± 1.0 years) from the Childhood Obesity Risk Assessment Longitudinal Study (CORALS) cohort was conducted. After exclusions, 956 participants were included in the analyses. The eating speed was estimated by summing the total minutes used in each of the 3 main meals and then categorized into slow, moderate, or fast. Multiple linear and logistic regression models were fitted to assess the β-coefficient, or OR and 95% CI, between eating speed and body mass index, waist circumference, fat mass index (FMI), blood pressure, fasting plasma glucose, and lipid profile. Results: Compared with participants in the slow-eating category, those in the fast-eating category had a higher prevalence risk of overweight/obesity (OR, 2.9; 95% CI, 1.8-4.4; P < .01); larger waist circumference (β, 2.6 cm; 95% CI, 1.5-3.8 cm); and greater FMI (β, 0.3 kg/m2; 95% CI, 0.1-0.5 kg/m2), systolic blood pressure (β, 2.8 mmHg; 95% CI, 0.6-4.9 mmHg), and fasting plasma glucose levels (β, 2.7 mg/dL, 95% CI, 1.2-4.2 mg/dL) but lower adherence to the Mediterranean diet (β, −0.5 points; 95% CI, −0.9 to −0.1 points). Conclusions: Eating fast is associated with higher adiposity, certain cardiometabolic risk factors, and lower adherence to a Mediterranean diet. Further long-term and interventional studies are warranted to confirm these associations