Context-aware Assessment Using QR-codes

In this paper we present the implementation of a general mechanism to deliver tests based on mobile devices and matrix codes. The system is an extension of Siette, and has not been specifically developed for any subject matter. To evaluate the performance of the system and show some of its capabilities, we have developed a test for a second-year college course on Botany at the School of Forestry Engineering. Students were equipped with iPads and took an outdoor test on plant species identification. All students were able to take and complete the test in a reasonable time. Opinions expressed anonymously by the students in a survey about the usability of the system and the usefulness of the test were very favorable. We think that the application presented in this paper can broaden the applicability of automatic assessment techniques.The presentation of this work has been co-founded by the Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Overcoming barriers to manufacturing digitalization:Policies across EU countries

The digital transformation of manufacturing activities is expected to bring large societal benefits in terms of productivity and sustainability. However, uptake of digital technologies is slower than desirable. As a result, governments are taking action to try to overcome some of the barriers to adoption. However, the mechanisms through which government may act are quite diverse. In this paper, we compare the national strategies across the 27 countries members of the European Union. We map each country's initiative to 14 barriers to the adoption of digital technologies in manufacturing observed in the literature. We observe that most institutional efforts focus on providing funding, developing new regulatory frameworks related to data privacy and security, and creating human capital. Some known barriers to adoption observed at the firm level, such as the lack of off-the-shelf solutions, or the need for retrofitting old equipment, are largely overlooked. We do not find any relationship between the number of initiatives proposed by each country, and the country's existing level of digitalization. We conclude by proposing several policy recommendations, as well as directions for future research

Conceituações sobre formação profissional integrada

This article presents a reflection about the conceptual implications from the definition of comprehensive professional training provided by the Vocational Training Statute that regulates the SENA in order to give more lights for his understanding by instructors, apprentices, managers and other staff of the educational community of the Institution. There are 8 conceptual fronts derived from the definition.Se presenta una reflexión de las implicaciones conceptuales a partir de la definición de formación profesional integral que entrega el Estatuto de la Formación Profesional que  reglamenta al SENA con el objeto de dar más luces para su comprensión por parte de instructores, aprendices, directivos y demás personal de la comunidad educativa de la Institución. Se manejan 8 frentes conceptuales derivados de la definición.Se apresenta uma reflexão das implicações conceituais da definição de formação profissional abrangente fornecida pelo Estatuto de Formação Profissional que regula o SENA, a fim de dar mais luzes para a compreensão por instrutores, aprendizes, gerentes e outros funcionários da comunidade educativa da Instituição. Existem 8 frentes conceituais derivadas da definição

Redefining agricultural residues as bioenergy feedstocks

The use of plant biomass is a sustainable alternative to the reduction of CO2 emissions. Agricultural residues are interesting bioenergy feedstocks because they do not compete with food and add extra value to the crop, which might help to manage these residues in many regions. Breeding crops for dual production of food and bioenergy has been reported previously, but the ideal plant features are different when lignocellulosic residues are burnt for heat or electricity, or fermented for biofuel production. Stover moisture is one of the most important traits in the management of agricultural waste for bioenergy production which can be modified by genetic improvement. A delayed leaf senescence or the stay-green characteristic contributes to higher grain and biomass yield in standard, low nutrient, and drought-prone environments. In addition, the stay-green trait could be favorable for the development of dual purpose varieties because this trait could be associated with a reduction in biomass losses and lodging. On the other hand, the stay-green trait could be detrimental for the management of agricultural waste if it is associated with higher stover moisture at harvest, although this hypothesis has been insufficiently tested. In this paper, a review of traits relevant to the development of dual purpose varieties is presented with particular emphasis on stover moisture and stay-green, because less attention has been paid to these important traits in the literature. The possibility of developing new varieties for combined production is discussed from a breeding perspective.We thank A. Ordás for his valuable comments and suggestions. Marlon Caicedo recognizes a grant from Scholarship Program of the Instituto Nacional de Investigaciones Agropecuarias (INIAP) of Ecuador, Jaime Barros gratefully acknowledges a grant from University of Santiago de Compostela (Spain), and Bernardo Ordás “Ramon y Cajal” contract from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain. We acknowledge support by the CSIC Open Access Publication Initiative through its Unit of Information Resources for Research (URICI)

Quality enhancement of chilled fish by including alga Bifurcaria bifurcata extract in the icing medium

9 páginas, 4 tablasBifurcaria bifurcata is a widely extended brown macroalga, whose antimicrobial and antioxidant properties have previously been described. In this study, ethanolic extracts of B. bifurcata were included in the icing medium employed for the chilled storage of megrim (Lepidorhombus whiffiagonis). For it, two different concentrations of this brown macroalga extract (0.67 and 2.50 g lyophilized alga L−1 aqueous solution; B-1 and B-2 batches, respectively) were tested for a 14-day storage. The effect of the alga extract was compared with a counterpart batch stored in traditional ice prepared only from water (B-0 batch). Significant (p < 0.05) inhibitions of microbial activity (aerobes, psychrotrophs, lipolytic bacteria, proteolytic bacteria and Enterobacteriaceae) as well as of pH and trimethylamine formation were observed as a result of the incorporation of the alga extract in the icing medium, being this effect especially relevant in the B-2 batch. Concerning lipid damage development, a significantly (p < 0.05) lower formation of free fatty acids (lipid hydrolysis development) and of fluorescent compounds (tertiary lipid oxidation development) in samples corresponding to both alga-including batches could also be observed; this inhibitory effect was more intense in fish belonging to the B-2 batch. The icing medium proposed in this work constitutes a promising strategy in order to apply algae extracts to enhance fish quality retention during the different steps of storage and commercialization of marine speciesThis work was supported by the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC; Spain) through the project PIE 201370E001Peer reviewe

An Approach to Predict Shear Modulus of Soils in the Range of 10\u3csup\u3e-6\u3c/sup\u3e to 10\u3csup\u3e-2\u3c/sup\u3e Strain Levels

This paper presents the results of several resonant column tests carried out in a large variety of soils, including lateritic and saprolitic tropical soils. The data analysed are restricted to the strain dependence of shear modulus in the range of 10-6 to 10-2. Despite the different isotropic consolidated stresses, degrees of saturation and overconsolidation ratios applied for the different types of soil, all the test results fit very well in a previous proposed normalised curve of G/G0 as a function of γ/γ0.7, where γ0.7 is the shear strain corresponding to a value of G≈0.7 x G0. The hyperbolic stress-strain equation can conveniently describe this fitting. Simple practical relationships are also proposed for tropical soils to the prediction of G0 and γ0.7 allowing with the normalised curve to estimate shear modulus in the strain range relevant to the service state of many civil engineering structures

Solos urbanos residenciais do bairro Jardim Paulista, Campina Grande do Sul (PR) /

Inclui apęndiceOrientadora: Celina WisniewskiCo-orientadores: Renato Marques e Marcelo Ricardo de LimaInclui bibliografiaÁrea de concentraçăo: Qualidade e sustentabilidade ambienta

Compensatory Transcriptional Response of Fischerella thermalis to Thermal Damage of the Photosynthetic Electron Transfer Chain

Key organisms in the environment, such as oxygenic photosynthetic primary producers (photosynthetic eukaryotes and cyanobacteria), are responsible for fixing most of the carbon globally. However, they are affected by environmental conditions, such as temperature, which in turn affect their distribution. Globally, the cyanobacterium Fischerella thermalis is one of the main primary producers in terrestrial hot springs with thermal gradients up to 60 °C, but the mechanisms by which F. thermalis maintains its photosynthetic activity at these high temperatures are not known. In this study, we used molecular approaches and bioinformatics, in addition to photophysiological analyses, to determine the genetic activity associated with the energy metabolism of F. thermalis both in situ and in high-temperature (40 °C to 65 °C) cultures. Our results show that photosynthesis of F. thermalis decays with temperature, while increased transcriptional activity of genes encoding photosystem II reaction center proteins, such as PsbA (D1), could help overcome thermal damage at up to 60 °C. We observed that F. thermalis tends to lose copies of the standard G4 D1 isoform while maintaining the recently described D1INT isoform, suggesting a preference for photoresistant isoforms in response to the thermal gradient. The transcriptional activity and metabolic characteristics of F. thermalis, as measured by metatranscriptomics, further suggest that carbon metabolism occurs in parallel with photosynthesis, thereby assisting in energy acquisition under high temperatures at which other photosynthetic organisms cannot survive. This study reveals that, to cope with the harsh conditions of hot springs, F. thermalis has several compensatory adaptations, and provides emerging evidence for mixotrophic metabolism as being potentially relevant to the thermotolerance of this species. Ultimately, this work increases our knowledge about thermal adaptation strategies of cyanobacteria

Combining abilities in maize for the length of the internode basal ring, the entry point of the Mediterranean corn borer larvae

Length of the internode basal ring (LIBR) in maize is a morphological character that has been associated with resistance to Mediterranean corn borer (MCB), Sesamia nonagrioides Lef. The present study is the first research to evaluate the usefulness of this trait in breeding programmes. Six maize hybrids, from a complete diallel set of four inbred lines (two resistant and two susceptible to MCB), were evaluated under early and late sowing conditions at three locations in northwestern Spain. General and specific combining ability (GCA and SCA, respectively) for LIBR were estimated, and LIBR correlations with grain yield and other important agronomic traits were evaluated. Hybrid by environment interactions were not significant for LIBR and the sums of squares partitioning indicated a greater GCA effect (95%), suggesting that this trait is stable and shows important additive effects for this set of hybrids. Correlation coefficients not only indicate that selection for increasing LIBR could enhance grain yield and other related plant traits (height and silking) but also an increase in the MCB susceptibility. Based on the limited number genotypes evaluated, LIBR could be modified by selection; however, if LIBR is used as an indirect selection criterion to improve MCB resistance, then some negative effects on yield may be expected.MICINNEuropean Social FundThis research was supported by the National Plan for Research and Development of Spain (Proje cts Cod. AGL2006-13140, AGL 2009-09611). J. Barros acknowledges a grant from the Ministry of Science and Innovation (Spain). R. Santiago acknowledges a postdoctoral contract “Juan de la Cierva” partially financed by the European Social Fund.Peer Reviewe