Driade space: an agent based simulation model for the analysis of the firm demography and the localization patterns in urban areas

An agent based model of firm mobility is presented in which diverse types of firms decide their geographical localization in function of some spatial variables. Although as much the regional economy as the geography have studied in depth the rules of localization of the companies, many of the complex behaviors that are observed in the reality are still, in great measure, unexplained. The simulation based on agents constitutes a new approach to the problem, allowing to integrate in the models of economy regional aspects of great relevance that, for its high complexity, could not be included in the analysis more than in qualitative terms. In the Driade Space model the demography of firms is considered in a wide sense: number of firms, entries and exits, distribution of sizes as well as the spatial density of firms. The entry of new companies in each period depends on the evolution of the market. The number of these is function of the profitability observed in the sector in the previous period and the height of the entry barriers. The companies are rational and they act on the variables within their reach in function of their objectives and of the limited information they have on the evolution of the market and the behavior of their competitors. This way, the companies in the moment of their entrance decide the localization they expect that will be more profitable considering their own characteristics while in the successive periods they decide on their investments and their production. The costs of the companies are not fixed; they depend not only on the production level and on the price of the used productive factors but also on the price of the land. The derived economies of the initial decision of localization are also considered. The characteristics of the territory where the firms are located are not static but rather evolve depending on the applied policies, demographic variables and the localization of the companies. Although the exits of the companies depend mainly on their profitability, they are also affected by random aspects. When the companies exit the market they leave a free space that can be covered by other companies favoring this way new entries. The model presented allows showing the endogenous rules of firm localization as well as the effects in the medium and the long term of the public policies.

A revision of the neotropical genus Anahi Martínez (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae: Melolonthinae) with the description of two new species

El género Anahi Martínez del sur del Neotrópico es comprensivamente revisado y ahora contiene tres especies: A. dentata Ocampo & Ruiz- Manzanos especie nueva, A. guaraniticus Martínez y A. oblivia Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos especie nueva. Las nuevas especies extienden la distribución del género de Paraguay y Bolivia a Argentina. A. guaraniticus es redescripta y se amplían los caracteres que definen el género para incluir A. dentata y A. oblivia. Se proveen descripciones, ilustraciones diagnósticas, mapas de distribución y una clave para todas las especies del género. La biogeografía del género y su posición sistemática entre los Melolonthinae son tratados en este artículo. El género Anahi Martínez del sur del Neotrópico es comprensivamente revisado y ahora contiene tres especies: A. dentata Ocampo & Ruiz- Manzanos especie nueva, A. guaraniticus Martínez y A. oblivia Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos especie nueva. Las nuevas especies extienden la distribución del género de Paraguay y Bolivia a Argentina. A. guaraniticus es redescripta y se amplían los caracteres que definen el género para incluir A. dentata y A. oblivia. Se proveen descripciones, ilustraciones diagnósticas, mapas de distribución y una clave para todas las especies del género. La biogeografía del género y su posición sistemática entre los Melolonthinae son tratados en este artículo. The southern Neotropical genus Anahi Martínez is comprehensively revised and now includes three species: A. dentata Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos new species, A. guaraniticus Martínez, and A. oblivia Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos new species. The new species extend the distribution of the genus from Paraguay and Bolivia to Argentina. A. guaraniticus is redescribed and the characters that define the genus are extended to include A. dentata and A. oblivia. Descriptions, diagnosis illustrations, distribution maps and a key to all species of the genus are provided. The biogeography of the genus and its systematic placement within Melolonthinae are here discussed. The southern Neotropical genus Anahi Martínez is comprehensively revised and now includes three species: A. dentata Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos new species, A. guaraniticus Martínez, and A. oblivia Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos new species. The new species extend the distribution of the genus from Paraguay and Bolivia to Argentina. A. guaraniticus is redescribed and the characters that define the genus are extended to include A. dentata and A. oblivia. Descriptions, diagnosis illustrations, distribution maps and a key to all species of the genus are provided. The biogeography of the genus and its systematic placement within Melolonthinae are here discussed.The southern Neotropical genus Anahi Martínez is comprehensively revised and now includes three species: A. dentata Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos new species, A. guaraniticus Martínez, and A. oblivia Ocampo & Ruiz-Manzanos new species. The new species extend the distribution of the genus from Paraguay and Bolivia to Argentina. A. guaraniticus is redescribed and the characters that define the genus are extended to included, dentata and A. oblivia. Descriptions, diagnosis illustrations, distribution maps and a key to all species of the genus are provided. The biogeography of the genus and its systematic placement within Melolonthinae are here discussed.Fil: Ocampo, Federico Carlos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. University of Nebraska State Museum; Estados UnidosFil: Ruiz Manzanos, Eider. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones de las Zonas Áridas. Provincia de Mendoza. Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones de las Zonas Áridas. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones de las Zonas Áridas; Argentin

The Ochodaeidae of Argentina (Coleoptera, Scarabaeoidea)

The Ochodaeidae (Coleoptera: Scarabaeoidea) of Argentina are revised. Previously, two species of Ochodaeinae were known from the country, both in the genus Parochodaeus Nikolajev: P. campsognathus (Arrow) and P. cornutus (Ohaus). An additional 7 species of Parochodaeus from Argentina are described here as new. In addition, Gauchodaeus patagonicus, new genus and new species in the subfamily Chaetocanthinae, is described. "is is the #rst record of the subfamily Chaetocanthinae in South America. Redescriptions, diagnoses, and maps are provided for each species. We also provide a key to genera and a key to species of Parochodaeus of Argentina. With this work, the number of ochodaeid species known from Argentina is increased from 2 to 10.Fil: Paulsen, M. J.. University of Nebraska; Estados UnidosFil: Ocampo, Federico Carlos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Mendoza. Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones de las Zonas Áridas. Provincia de Mendoza. Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones de las Zonas Áridas. Universidad Nacional de Cuyo. Instituto Argentino de Investigaciones de las Zonas Áridas; Argentin

EXPLORING ALTERNATIVES FOR ESTIMATING SYSTEMS OF EQUATIONS WITH MULTIPLE CENSORED VARIABLES: FARM OUTPUT SUPPLY AND INPUT DEMAND

This paper explores two alternatives for estimating systems of equations with multiple censored variables: Maximum Simulated Likelihood and a two-step technique that seems to be well suited for large samples. The empirical part of the paper estimates a system of cost, cost shares and revenue shares equations of Italian farms using both approaches.Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,

Multi-Tenant Virtual GPUs for Optimising Performance of a Financial Risk Application

Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) are becoming popular accelerators in modern High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters. Installing GPUs on each node of the cluster is not efficient resulting in high costs and power consumption as well as underutilisation of the accelerator. The research reported in this paper is motivated towards the use of few physical GPUs by providing cluster nodes access to remote GPUs on-demand for a financial risk application. We hypothesise that sharing GPUs between several nodes, referred to as multi-tenancy, reduces the execution time and energy consumed by an application. Two data transfer modes between the CPU and the GPUs, namely concurrent and sequential, are explored. The key result from the experiments is that multi-tenancy with few physical GPUs using sequential data transfers lowers the execution time and the energy consumed, thereby improving the overall performance of the application.Comment: Accepted to the Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing (JPDC), 10 June 201

Acceleration-as-a-Service: Exploiting Virtualised GPUs for a Financial Application

'How can GPU acceleration be obtained as a service in a cluster?' This question has become increasingly significant due to the inefficiency of installing GPUs on all nodes of a cluster. The research reported in this paper is motivated to address the above question by employing rCUDA (remote CUDA), a framework that facilitates Acceleration-as-a-Service (AaaS), such that the nodes of a cluster can request the acceleration of a set of remote GPUs on demand. The rCUDA framework exploits virtualisation and ensures that multiple nodes can share the same GPU. In this paper we test the feasibility of the rCUDA framework on a real-world application employed in the financial risk industry that can benefit from AaaS in the production setting. The results confirm the feasibility of rCUDA and highlight that rCUDA achieves similar performance compared to CUDA, provides consistent results, and more importantly, allows for a single application to benefit from all the GPUs available in the cluster without loosing efficiency.Comment: 11th IEEE International Conference on eScience (IEEE eScience) - Munich, Germany, 201

Triggering magnetar outbursts in 3D force-free simulations

In this letter, we present the first 3D force-free general relativity simulations of the magnetosphere dynamics related to the magnetar outburst/flare phenomenology. Starting from an initial dipole configuration, we adiabatically increase the helicity by twisting the footprints of a spot on the stellar surface and follow the succession of quasi-equilibrium states until a critical twist is reached. Twisting beyond that point triggers instabilities that results in the rapid expansion of magnetic field lines, followed by reconnection, as observed in previous axi-symmetric simulations. If the injection of magnetic helicity goes on, the process is recurrent, periodically releasing a similar amount of energy, of the order of a few % of the total magnetic energy. From our current distribution, we estimate the local temperature assuming that dissipation occurs mainly in the highly resistive outermost layer of the neutron star. We find that the temperature smoothly increases with injected twist, being larger for spots located in the tropical regions than in polar regions, and rather independent of their sizes. After the injection of helicity ceases, the magnetosphere relaxes to a new stable state, in which the persistent currents maintain the footprints area slightly hotter than before the onset of the instability.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure

The Idea of Epistemic Community From the Standpoint of Rortian Conversationalism

In Knowledge in a Social World1 Alvin Goldman distinguishes between two complementary areas of epistemology: individualistic epistemology and social epistemology. The former focuses on the conditions under which an individual is capable of acquiring knowledge by himself, with no need of interacting with others. The latter examines the conditions of cognitive exchange between individuals, along with the epistemic undertakings carried on by social groups. Meanwhile, in Knowledge by Agreement2 , Martin Kush claims that the first of these areas is a dead philosophical goal, since all knowledge must be understood in communitarian terms. I want to emphasize that, even when these perspectives show a significant difference in focus, both are in need of an account of the concept of epistemic community. It is usually pointed out that the lack of conceptual accuracy regarding it is a characteristic deficit of perspectives that merge epistemology into sociology or politics. Goldman’s acknowledgment of the need of a social epistemology, even when it is located within a general frame that keeps positioning perception (object of study of an individualistic epistemology) as the basis of the cognitive undertaking, accounts for the unavoidability in contemporary epistemology of the urge of answering the question of “what is an epistemic community?”Fil: Penelas, Federico Carlos. Universidad de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas. - Sociedad Argentina de Análisis Filosófico. Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas; Argentin

The Firs Rortians in Argentina: Eduardo Rabossi and Alicia Páez

La historia de la recepción de la obra de Richard Rorty en la Argentina no puede contarse sin hacer referencia a Eduardo Rabossi y Alicia Páez, quienes deben ser considerados como los primeros Rortianos en dicho país. Rabossi fue uno de los más importantes filósofos analíticos de Latinoamérica. Páez fue una filósofa principalmente formada en el pensamiento francés que falleció prematuramente a principos de los ´90. Argumentaré que el que sea posible contar una historia que tenga a estas figuras tan dispares como protagonistas es parte de lo que llamaré “Efecto Rorty,” esto es, la apertura de la posibilidad de un diálogo crítico entre tradiciones filosóficas.The history of the reception of Richard Rorty´s work in Argentina can not be told without referring to Eduardo Rabossi and Alicia Páez, who must be considered as the first Argentine Rortians. Rabossi was one of the most important analytical philosophers in Latin America. Páez was a philosopher primarily educated in French thought who prematurely died at the beginning of the Nineties. I will show that the fact that it is possible to tell a story with two so different leading characters is part of what I will call “the Rortian Effect,” which is the opening to the possibility for a critical dialogue between philosophical traditions.Não se pode contar a história da recepção da obra de Richard Rorty na Argentina sem fazer referência a Eduardo Rabossi e Alicia Páez, que devem ser considerados como os primeiros rortyanos desse país. Rabossi foi um dos mais importantes filósofos analíticos da América Latina. Páez foi uma filósofa que se formou pricipalmente no pensamento francês, tendo falecido prematuramente no começo dos anos 90. Argumentarei que o fato de que se pode contar uma história que tem essas figuras tão díspares como protagonistas é parte do que chamarei "Efeito Rorty," isto é, a abertura da possibilidade de um diálogo crítico entre tradições filosóficas.Fil: Penelas, Federico Carlos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas. - Sociedad Argentina de Análisis Filosófico. Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas; Argentin

The Idea of Epistemic Community From the Standpoint of Rortian Conversationalism

In Knowledge in a Social World1 Alvin Goldman distinguishes between two complementary areas of epistemology: individualistic epistemology and social epistemology. The former focuses on the conditions under which an individual is capable of acquiring knowledge by himself, with no need of interacting with others. The latter examines the conditions of cognitive exchange between individuals, along with the epistemic undertakings carried on by social groups. Meanwhile, in Knowledge by Agreement2 , Martin Kush claims that the first of these areas is a dead philosophical goal, since all knowledge must be understood in communitarian terms. I want to emphasize that, even when these perspectives show a significant difference in focus, both are in need of an account of the concept of epistemic community. It is usually pointed out that the lack of conceptual accuracy regarding it is a characteristic deficit of perspectives that merge epistemology into sociology or politics. Goldman’s acknowledgment of the need of a social epistemology, even when it is located within a general frame that keeps positioning perception (object of study of an individualistic epistemology) as the basis of the cognitive undertaking, accounts for the unavoidability in contemporary epistemology of the urge of answering the question of “what is an epistemic community?”Fil: Penelas, Federico Carlos. Universidad de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas. - Sociedad Argentina de Análisis Filosófico. Instituto de Investigaciones Filosóficas; Argentin