Nonlinear model predictive control of a passenger vehicle for automated lane changes

This article presents a nonlinear Model Predictive Control (MPC) for lane changes, based on a simplified Single Track Model (STM) of the vehicle. The STM includes the position of the vehicle in global coordinates as a state so that the position of the target lane can be specified to the MPC for reference tracking. Moreover, a constraint for maintaining a safety distance with the vehicles in the target lane is included. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the MPC in scenarios with different initial conditions that demonstrate the correct implementation of the safety distance constraint

Haematological parameters in a free-ranging population of Didelphis virginiana from Mexico

The American opossum Didelphis virginiana is the marsupial species with the largest geographic distribution in North America, a very important natural host and key to the maintenance and transmission of many zoonotic pathogenic microorganisms of importance in public health, and one of the wild mammals with the greatest adaptation to the human environment, but despite all that very little is known about some physiological aspects in their free-ranging populations. In the present study, basic haematological parameters of 201 opossums from a synanthropic population of D. virginiana in a rural locality of the state of Yucatan, are first described. The average values of haemoglobin, packed cell volume, red blood cells, and eosinophils were higher in males and adults (except eosinophils) than in females and juveniles, respectively, and juvenile opossums had higher values of lymphocytes, neutrophils, and platelets than males. Non-pregnant females had significantly higher values of mean corpuscular volume, lymphocytes and platelets than pregnant ones, while red blood cell count and segmented neutrophils showed higher values in pregnant females. The establishment of the basic haematological parameters for free-ranging populations of D. virginiana is a very useful reference for both the health monitoring of the populations and further studying the host-parasite relationship of some zoonotic pathogens present in the Yucatan Peninsula

Construction of a plasmid vector based on the pMV158 replicon for cloning and inducible gene expression in Streptococcus pneumoniae

18 p.-4 fig.We report the construction of a plasmid vector designed for regulated gene expression in Streptococcus pneumoniae. The new vector, pLS1ROM, is based on the replicon of the streptococcal promiscuous rolling circle replication (RCR) plasmid pMV158. We inserted the controllable promoter PM of the S. pneumoniaemalMP operon, followed by a multi-cloning site sequence aimed to facilitate the insertion of target genes. The expression from PM is negatively regulated by the transcriptional repressor MalR, which is released from the DNA operator sequence by growing the cells in maltose-containing media. To get a highly regulated expression of the target gene, MalR was provided in cis by inserting the malR gene under control of the constitutive Ptet promoter, which in pMV158 directs expression of the tetL gene. To test the functionality of the system, we cloned the reporter gene gfp from Aequorea victoria, encoding the green fluorescent protein (GFP). Pneumococcal cells harboring the recombinant plasmid rendered GFP fluorescence in a maltose-dependent mode with undetectable background levels in the absence of the inducer. The new vector, pLS1ROM, exhibits full structural and segregational stability and constitutes a valuable tool for genetic manipulation and regulated gene expression in S. pneumoniaeThis study was supported by the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (Grants CSD2008-00013, INTERMODS to ME; BFU2007-63575 and BFU2010-19597, PNEUMOTALK to GdS) and the European Union (Grant EU-CP223111, CAREPNEUMO to ME)Peer reviewe

Interpretative journalism influences in heritage interpretation of Freeman Tilden

En 1957, el periodista estadounidense Freeman Tilden publicó su libro titulado Interpreting Our Heritage. Con el paso de los años, esta obra se convirtió en un referente para una nueva disciplina académica y profesional por lo que se considera la base teórica de la interpretación del patrimonio. Sus propuestas para comunicar al público los valores históricos y naturales de manera eficaz se enmarcan en un contexto sociocultural caracterizado por importantes cambios en la prensa debido a que los periodistas pasaron de la redacción de noticias a escribir el porqué de los hechos, sus causas y las consecuencias. Este artículo sugiere que esta nueva fórmula, propia del llamado periodismo interpretativo, presenta un paralelismo con las propuestas de Tilden y destaca la correspondencia entre ambas estrategias en un marco sociocultural común que pudo haber generado e inspirado las bases para la interpretación del patrimonio.In 1957, the American journalist Freeman Tilden published his book entitled Interpreting Our Heritage. Over the years, this work became a reference for a new academic and professional discipline so it is considered the theoretical foundations of the heritage interpretation. His proposals to communicate the historical and natural values to the public in an effective way are framed in a sociocultural context characterised by important changes in the press due to journalists shifted from writing facts to explaining the reasons of these facts, the causes and the consequences. This paper suggests that this new formula, characteristic of the so-called interpretative journalism, presents parallelism to the Tilden proposals and highlight the correspondence between both strategies due to a common sociocultural framework that could have generated and inspired the basis for the heritage interpretation

El Pecio Bou Ferrer (Villajoyosa, Comunidad Valenciana, España). Investigación, conservación y divulgación de un yacimiento subacuático excepcional (2012-2019)

Aquest projecte s’ha beneficiat de l’ajuda econòmica del LabEx Archimède en el marc del projecte «Investir l’Avenir» (ANR-11-LABX-0032-01)

El conocimiento didáctico del contenido de la indagación. Un instrumento para capturarlo

Presentamos el marco teórico de la indagación mediante un análisis histórico que abarca a John Dewey, Joseph Schwab, los Estándares sobre la Enseñanza de la Ciencia de los Estados Unidos y algunos de las más recientes contribuciones sobre el particular. Conectaremos ese análisis con el concepto de Conocimiento Didáctico del Contenido (CDC) de Shulman, en la búsqueda de un cuestionario que llamamos de “Representación del Contenido de la indagación” (ReCoI), de acuerdo con la nomenclatura que han dado John Loughran et al. (2004) a sus instrumentos para documentar el CDC. Dicho cuestionario nos ha permitido capturar las actividades de indagación que utilizan profesores de física y química en el bachillerato o en el primer semestre universitario, cuando emplean esta herramienta como estrategia didáctica central para enseñar. Se comenta en esta ponencia acerca del empleo de la ReCoI en el proceso de formación de profesores

Impact of Liver Inflammation on Bile Acid Side Chain Shortening and Amidation

Bile acid; Inflammation; Oncostatin MÀcid biliar; Inflamació; Oncostatina MÁcido biliar; Inflamación; Oncostatina MBile acid (BA) synthesis from cholesterol by hepatocytes is inhibited by inflammatory cytokines. Whether liver inflammation also affects BA side chain shortening and conjugation was investigated. In human liver cell lines (IHH, HepG2, and HepaRG), agonists of nuclear receptors including the farnesoid X receptor (FXR), liver X receptor (LXR), and peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) did not affect the expression of BA-related peroxisomal enzymes. In contrast, hepatocyte nuclear factor 4α (HNF4α) inhibition down-regulated acyl-CoA oxidase 2 (ACOX2). ACOX2 was repressed by fibroblast growth factor 19 (FGF19), which was prevented by extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) pathway inhibition. These changes were paralleled by altered BA synthesis (HPLC-MS/MS). Cytokines able to down-regulate cholesterol-7α-hydroxylase (CYP7A1) had little effect on peroxisomal enzymes involved in BA synthesis except for ACOX2 and bile acid-CoA:amino acid N-acyltransferase (BAAT), which were down-regulated, mainly by oncostatin M (OSM). This effect was prevented by Janus kinase (JAK) inhibition, which restored BA side chain shortening and conjugation. The binding of OSM to the extracellular matrix accounted for a persistent effect after culture medium replacement. In silico analysis of four databases (n = 201) and a validation cohort (n = 90) revealed an inverse relationship between liver inflammation and ACOX2/BAAT expression which was associated with changes in HNF4α levels. In conclusion, BA side chain shortening and conjugation are inhibited by inflammatory effectors. However, other mechanisms involved in BA homeostasis counterbalance any significant impact on the serum BA profile.This study was supported by the CIBERehd (EHD15PI05/2016) and Fondo de Investigaciones Sanitarias, Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Spain (PI19/00819, PI20/00189, and PI20/01663 co-funded by European Regional Development Fund/European Social Fund, “Investing in your future”); Junta de Castilla y Leon (SA074P20); Fundació Marato TV3 (Ref. 201916/31), Spain; AECC Scientific Foundation (2017/2020), Spain; Interdisciplinary Center for Clinical Research (IZKF) at the University Hospital of Wuerzburg, Germany (Project A-E-384 to H.M.H.); grants PID2019-111669-RB-I00, PID2020-115055RB-I00 from Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI), Spain; the AGAUR of the Generalidad de Cataluña SGR-2017-1112, Spain; and European Cooperation in Science & Technology (COST) Action CA17112. R.E.E was recipient of a predoctoral fellowship from “Junta de Castilla y León” and “Fondo Social Europeo” (EDU/574/2018). J.A. was recipient of a grant from Fundación Echebano (2020–2022)

Flat Tree-level Inflationary Potentials in Light of CMB and LSS Data

We use cosmic microwave background and large scale structure data to test a broad and physically well-motivated class of inflationary models: those with flat tree-level potentials (typical in supersymmetry). The non-trivial features of the potential arise from radiative corrections which give a simple logarithmic dependence on the inflaton field, making the models very predictive. We also consider a modified scenario with new physics beyond a certain high-energy cut-off showing up as non-renormalizable operators (NRO) in the inflaton field. We find that both kinds of models fit remarkably well CMB and LSS data, with very few free parameters. Besides, a large part of these models naturally predict a reasonable number of e-folds. A robust feature of these scenarios is the smallness of tensor perturbations (r < 10^{-3}). The NRO case can give a sizeable running of the spectral index while achieving a sufficient number of e-folds. We use Bayesian model comparison tools to assess the relative performance of the models. We believe that these scenarios can be considered as a standard physical class of inflationary models, on a similar footing with monomial potentials.Comment: 42 LaTeX pages, 8 figure

Community structure of caprellids (Crustacea: Amphipoda: Caprellidae) on seagrasses from southern Spain

The community structure of caprellids inhabiting two species of seagrass (Cymodocea nodosa and Zostera marina) was investigated on the Andalusian coast, southern Spain, using uni and multivariate analyses. Three meadows were selected (Almería, AL; Málaga, MA; Cádiz, CA), and changes in seagrass cover and biomass were measured from 2004 to 2005. Four caprellid species were found; the density of Caprella acanthifera, Phtisica marina and Pseudoprotella phasma was correlated to seagrass biomass. No such correlation was found for Pariambus typicus, probably because this species inhabits sediments and does not cling to the seagrass leaves. We recorded a signiWcant decrease in seagrass cover and biomass in MA due to illegal bottom trawling Wsheries. Phtisica marina and P. typicus were favoured by this perturbation and increased their densities after the trawling activities. A survey of reports on caprellids in seagrass meadows around the world showed no clear latitudinal patterns in caprellid densities (ranging from 6 to 1,000 ind/m2 per meadow) and species diversity. While caprellid abundances in seagrass meadows are often very high, the number of species per meadow is low (range 1–5).Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia de España y fondos FEDER de la Unión Europea. CGL2007-60044/BOSConsejería de Medio Ambiente y Consejería de Innovación, Ciencia y Empresa, Junta de Andalucía. P07-RNM-0252