Inflorescence bud induction in Vitis vinifera L. cv. Thompson Seedless: Cytohistological events and starch accumulation in the shoot apex

Induktion von Infloreszenzen in Knospen der Sorte Sultanina (Vitis vinifera L.):Cytologisch-histologische Veränderungen und Stärkeeinlagerung im VegetationskegelAn Knospen der Sorte Sultanina (Vitis vinifera L.) wurden Schnittuntersuchungen durchgeführt, um die cytologisch-histologischen Veränderungen während des Übergangs zur Blütenbildung aufzuzeigen. Messungen erbrachten eine GröBenzunahme der Zellen, Zellkerne und Nukleolen sowie eine Zunahme der Zellwanddicke im Vegetationskegel und den Anlagen ruhender Knospen verglichen mit den entsprechenden Strukturen vegetativer Endknospen. Diese Veränderungen wurden ab der Knospe in Position 2 am Trieb (Zählung von apikal her) festgestellt. Sowohl Vegetationskegel als auch Anlagen ruhender Knospen zeigen Stärkeeinlagerung

Alloying effects on the optical properties of Ge1−x_{1-x}Six_x nanocrystals from TDDFT and comparison with effective-medium theory

We present the optical spectra of Ge$_{1-x}$Si$_x$ alloy nanocrystals calculated with time-dependent density-functional theory in the adiabatic local-density ap proximation (TDLDA). The spectra change smoothly as a function of the compositio n $x$. On the Ge side of the composition range, the lowest excitations at the ab sorption edge are almost pure Kohn-Sham independent-particle HOMO-LUMO transitio ns, while for higher Si contents strong mixing of transitions is found. Within T DLDA the first peak is slightly higher in energy than in earlier independent-par ticle calculations. However, the absorption onset and in particular its composit ion dependence is similar to independent-particle results. Moreover, classical depolarization effects are responsible for a very strong suppression of the abs orption intensity. We show that they can be taken into account in a simpler way using Maxwell-Garnett classical effective-medium theory. Emission spectra are in vestigated by calculating the absorption of excited nanocrystals at their relaxe d geometry. The structural contribution to the Stokes shift is about 0.5 eV. Th e decomposition of the emission spectra in terms of independent-particle transit ions is similar to what is found for absorption. For the emission, very weak tra nsitions are found in Ge-rich clusters well below the strong absorption onset.Comment: submitted to Phys. Rev.

Density-based mixing parameter for hybrid functionals

A very popular ab-initio scheme to calculate electronic properties in solids is the use of hybrid functionals in density functional theory (DFT) that mixes a portion of Fock exchange with DFT functionals. In spite of their success, a major problem still remains, related to the use of one single mixing parameter for all materials. Guided by physical arguments that connect the mixing parameter to the dielectric properties of the solid, and ultimately to its band gap, we propose a method to calculate this parameter from the electronic density alone. This method is able to cut significantly the error of traditional hybrid functionals for large and small gap materials, while retaining a good description of structural properties. Moreover, its implementation is simple and leads to a negligible increase of the computational time.Comment: submitte

SERVIZI DI INTERESSE ECONOMICO GENERALE E DIRITTO DELLA CONCORRENZA NELL'UNIONE EUROPEA

My dissertation deals with the topic of Services of general economic interest (SGEIs) in the European Union. The research is mainly focused on competition and State aid law aspects, in order to understand whether and to what extent an economic activity carried out by an undertaking entrusted with a public mission can be exempted from the application of competition law rules. The thesis primarily focuses on the definition of \u201cServices of general economic interest\u201d, which differs from the national concepts of \u201cpublic service\u201d. After an analysis of the pertinent case-law, it will be held that such a notion represents a balance between economic and social concerns on one hand, and between national and EU competence on the other. The dissertation then proceeds to examine the State aid rules applicable to SGEIs: it will deal in particular with the conditions of admissibility of public funding in this sector, as set out by the Court's case-law and by the Commission\u2019s decision making practice. Lastly, in the final part of the dissertation, the new Treaty legal basis relating these services will be analyzed, in order to understand whether a greater attention to social aspects has developed (or should develop) in this field

Observations of OJ 287 from the Geodetic VLBI Archive of the Washington Correlator

We present 27 geodetic VLBI maps of OJ 287 obtained from the archive of the Washington correlator. The observations presented here were made between 1990 October and 1996 December. During this period a sequence of six superluminal components has been identified. We measured the proper motion of these components to be approximately 0.5 mas/yr, which is about twice as high as that seen in previous VLBI observations. These results imply a higher component ejection rate than previously observed, in good agreement with the observed occurrences of radio outbursts. We have examined a possible connection between VLBI components and optical flares in the framework of a binary black hole system.Comment: 9 pages, 5 included figures, emulateapj.sty, accepted to The Astrophysical Journa

Reasoning about norms under uncertainty in dynamic environments

The behaviour of norm-autonomous agents is determined by their goals and the norms that are explicitly represented inside their minds. Thus, they require mechanisms for acquiring and accepting norms, determining when norms are relevant to their case, and making decisions about norm compliance. Up until now the existing proposals on norm-autonomous agents assume that agents interact within a deterministic environment that is certainly perceived. In practise, agents interact by means of sensors and actuators under uncertainty with non-deterministic and dynamic environments. Therefore, the existing proposals are unsuitable or, even, useless to be applied when agents have a physical presence in some real-world environment. In response to this problem we have developed the n-BDI architecture. In this paper, we propose a multi-context graded BDI architecture (called n-BDI) that models norm-autonomous agents able to deal with uncertainty in dynamic environments. The n-BDI architecture has been experimentally evaluated and the results are shown in this paper. © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

Reasoning about constitutive norms in BDI agents

Software agents can be members of different institutions along their life; they might even belong to different institutions simultaneously. For these reasons, agents need capabilities that allow them to determine the repercussion that their actions would have within the different institutions. This association between the physical word, in which agents' interactions and actions take place, and the institutional world is defined by means of constitutive norms. Currently, the problem of how agents reason about constitutive norms has been tackled from a theoretical perspective only. Thus, there is a lack of more practical proposals that allow the development of software agents capable of reasoning about constitutive norms. In this article we propose an information model, knowledge representation and an inference mechanism to enable Belief-Desire-Intention agents to reason about the consequences of their actions on the institutions and making decisions accordingly. Specifically, the information model, knowledge representation and inference mechanism proposed in this article allows agents to keep track of the institutional state given that they have a physical presence in some real-world environment. Agents have a limited and not fully believable knowledge of the physical world (i.e. they are placed in an uncertain environment). Therefore, our proposal also deals with the uncertainty of the environment. © The Author 2013. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved

Grapevine yellows diseases in Spain: eight years survey of disease spread and molecular characterization of phytoplasmas involved.

Among grapevine yellows phytoplasma diseases in Europe, flavescence dor\ue9e (FD) is the most devastating and in the last decade has reached Spanish vineyards, mainly in Catalonia. An eight-year survey was carried out in the areas where the disease has spread (Alt Empord\ue0, Catalonia, Northern Spain) and in the remaining vine-growing areas of Catalonia. Sequence analyses of a portion of the 16S-23S ribosomal DNA cistron, from selected grapevine samples from Catalonia, showed that the phytoplasmas involved in grapevine yellows belong to 16S ribosomal subgroups V-D (flavescence dor\ue9e, FD) and XII-A (bois noir, BN). A set of Spanish FD isolates collected during these years were further studied by RFLP analyses of the 16S-23S ribosomal DNA fragment, as well as the rpS3 and SecY genes. All the FD phytoplasma strains studied were related to phytoplasmas belonging to ribosomal protein subgroup rp-E

Reasoning about constitutive norms in BDI agents

This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in Logic Journal of the IGPL following peer review. The definitive publisher-authenticated version: Criado Pacheco, N.; Argente Villaplana, E.; Noriega, P.; Botti Navarro, VJ. (2014). Reasoning about constitutive norms in BDI agents. Logic Journal of the IGPL. 22(1):66-93 is available online at: http://dx.doi.org/1093/jigpal/jzt035Software agents can be members of different institutions along their life; they might even belong to different institutions simultaneously. For these reasons, agents need capabilities that allow them to determine the repercussion that their actions would have within the different institutions. This association between the physical word, in which agents interactions and actions take place, and the institutional world is defined by means of constitutive norms. Currently, the problem of how agents reason about constitutive norms has been tackled from a theoretical perspective only. Thus, there is a lack of more practical proposals that allow the development of software agents capable of reasoning about constitutive norms. In this article we propose an information model, knowledge representation and an inference mechanism to enable Belief-Desire-Intention agents to reason about the consequences of their actions on the institutions and making decisions accordingly. Specifically, the information model, knowledge representation and inference mechanism proposed in this article allows agents to keep track of the institutional state given that they have a physical presence in some real-world environment. Agents have a limited and not fully believable knowledge of the physical world (i.e. they are placed in an uncertain environment). Therefore, our proposal also deals with the uncertainty of the environment.Criado Pacheco, N.; Argente Villaplana, E.; Noriega, P.; Botti Navarro, VJ. (2014). Reasoning about constitutive norms in BDI agents. Logic Journal of the IGPL. 22(1):66-93. doi:10.1093/jigpal/jzt035S6693221Baldi, P., Brunak, S., Chauvin, Y., Andersen, C. A. F., & Nielsen, H. (2000). Assessing the accuracy of prediction algorithms for classification: an overview. Bioinformatics, 16(5), 412-424. doi:10.1093/bioinformatics/16.5.412Bloch, I. (1996). Information combination operators for data fusion: a comparative review with classification. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics - Part A: Systems and Humans, 26(1), 52-67. doi:10.1109/3468.477860Casali, A., Godo, L., & Sierra, C. (2011). A graded BDI agent model to represent and reason about preferences. Artificial Intelligence, 175(7-8), 1468-1478. doi:10.1016/j.artint.2010.12.006Criado, N., Julián, V., Botti, V., & Argente, E. (2010). A Norm-Based Organization Management System. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 19-35. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-14962-7_2Governatori, G., & Rotolo, A. (2008). BIO logical agents: Norms, beliefs, intentions in defeasible logic. Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, 17(1), 36-69. doi:10.1007/s10458-008-9030-4Grossi, D., Aldewereld, H., Vázquez-Salceda, J., & Dignum, F. (2006). Ontological aspects of the implementation of norms in agent-based electronic institutions. Computational & Mathematical Organization Theory, 12(2-3), 251-275. doi:10.1007/s10588-006-9546-6Hübner, J. F., Boissier, O., Kitio, R., & Ricci, A. (2009). Instrumenting multi-agent organisations with organisational artifacts and agents. Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, 20(3), 369-400. doi:10.1007/s10458-009-9084-yJONES, A. J. I., & SERGOT, M. (1996). A Formal Characterisation of Institutionalised Power. Logic Journal of IGPL, 4(3), 427-443. doi:10.1093/jigpal/4.3.427Rawls, J. (1955). Two Concepts of Rules. The Philosophical Review, 64(1), 3. doi:10.2307/2182230Da Silva, V. T. (2008). From the specification to the implementation of norms: an automatic approach to generate rules from norms to govern the behavior of agents. Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems, 17(1), 113-155. doi:10.1007/s10458-008-9039-

Reasoning about norms under uncertainty in dynamic environments

The behaviour of norm-autonomous agents is determined by their goals and the norms that are explicitly represented inside their minds. Thus, they require mechanisms for acquiring and accepting norms, determining when norms are relevant to their case, and making decisions about norm compliance. Up un- til now the existing proposals on norm-autonomous agents assume that agents interact within a deterministic environment that is certainly perceived. In prac- tice, agents interact by means of sensors and actuators under uncertainty with non-deterministic and dynamic environments. Therefore, the existing propos- als are unsuitable or, even, useless to be applied when agents have a physical presence in some real-world environment. In response to this problem we have developed the n-BDI architecture. In this paper, we propose a multi -context graded BDI architecture (called n-BDI) that models norm-autonomous agents able to deal with uncertainty in dynamic environments. The n-BDI architecture has been experimentally evaluated and the results are shown in this paper.This paper was partially funded by the Spanish government under Grant CONSOLIDER-INGENIO 2010 CSD2007-00022 and the Valencian government under Project PROMETEOH/2013/019.Criado Pacheco, N.; Argente, E.; Noriega, P.; Botti Navarro, VJ. (2014). Reasoning about norms under uncertainty in dynamic environments. International Journal of Approximate Reasoning. 55(9):2049-2070. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijar.2014.02.004S2049207055