Reflections on competence and the decision-making power of the future judges Spanish Judicial School

El autor ofrece una definición y un desarrollo completo de la competencia decisoria o decisional de los jueces (formulación, contenido, secuencialización y evaluación). Parte del análisis de la Propuesta de Planificación Docente de la Escuela Judicial Española, de un trabajo de definición de competencias del “Centre d’Estudis Jurídics i Formació Especialitzada” (CEJFE) de la  Generalitat de Catalunya y de un trabajo del Claustro de Profesores del centro sobre competencias profesionales. Aplica una metodología de fijación de competencias vinculada a los estilos de aprendizaje (con base en la doctrina del aprendizaje experiencial de Kolb) y al factor “ecológico” o de contexto laboral, como referente válido para la definición de los procesos de toma de decisiones. Intenta un emparejamiento entre las competencias definidas por la Escuela Judicial (técnicas, relacionales, funcionales, analíticas y personales) y las etapas del aprendizaje, asimilando dichas etapas a las etapas del proceso decisional.The author sets a complete development of the decision making competence of judges (definition, contents, timing and assessment). The analysis goes from the Program of the Spanish Judicial School, a paper of competences definition of CEJFE (Generalitat of Catalunya: Legal Studies and Specialized Training Centre) and a work of the Trainers’ College of the Judicial School about professional competences. The author applies a methodology to fix competences referring learning styles (based in the Kolb’s Experiential learning theory) and “ecological” working context, as a good reference to define the making decisions processes. He tries to match the defined competences by the Judicial School (technical, relational, functional, analytical and personal competences) with the steps of learning, assimilating these steps with the making decisions steps

Universal multifractal description of an hourly rainfall time series from a location in southern Spain

El formalismo multifractal de turbulencia ha sido usado para llevar a cabo el análisis de la estructura temporal, para escalas desde 1 hora hasta casi 6 meses, de la serie de datos de lluvia horaria registrada durante veinticuatro años en Córdoba, localidad situada en el sur de España. Los parámetros del modelo multifractal universal fueron estimados y se obtuvo la función teórica de los momentos estadísticos. Se encontró un buen ajuste a la función empírica para un intervalo de valores de momentos, demostrándose que el modelo multifractal universal resulta adecuado para describir estadísticamente la serie temporal de lluvia registrada en CórdobaMultifractal turbulence formalism has been used to perform an analysis for scales from 1 hour to almost 6 months of the time structure of the hourly rainfall series recorded during twenty-four years in Córdoba, a location in southern Spain. The parameters of the universal multifractal model were estimated and the theoretical moments scaling exponent function was obtained exhibiting an acceptable agreement with the empirical function for a range of moments. The universal multifractal model shown itself to be a suitable tool for describing the statistics of the rainfall series recorded in Córdob

Characterization Of The Larval Stages Of Alphitobius Diaperinus (panzer) (coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) Using Head Capsule Width.

The mean width (n = 5) of the cephalic capsule instar of Alphitobius diaperinus was determined. The larvae were reared at 27 degrees C (+/- 0.1 degrees C). The result showed that A. diaperinus has eight larval instars. The head capsule of the 1st instar larvae measured x = 0.228 (SD = 0.0192) and the last instar larval measured x = 1.339 (SD = 0.0436). The developmental rate, determined by Dyar-Hutchinson's rule, was 1.29. These data may be useful for studies on phenology and age structure of A. diaperinus in the field.61112513

Commentary : sustained advocacy produces success in the Philippines

‘The Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act of 2012’ affirms women’s right to reproductive and sexual health information and services, including contraception, and mandates the government to include age and development appropriate reproductive health education for all school-going adolescents. Despite active campaigning by the Catholic Church against pro-Law Senatorial candidates, a significant number won in the 2013 elections. Civil society groups now aim to ensure that the law is translated into effective policies and programmes, shaped and evaluated against a human rights framework

Grapevine under deficit irrigation: hints from physiological and molecular data

Background - A large proportion of vineyards are located in regions with seasonal drought (e.g. Mediterraneantype climates) where soil and atmospheric water deficits, together with high temperatures, exert large constraints on yield and quality. The increasing demand for vineyard irrigation requires an improvement in the efficiency of water use. Deficit irrigation has emerged as a potential strategy to allow crops to withstand mild water stress with little or no decreases of yield, and potentially a positive impact on fruit quality. Understanding the physiological and molecular bases of grapevine responses to mild to moderate water deficits is fundamental to optimize deficit irrigation management and identify the most suitable varieties to those conditions. Scope - How the whole plant acclimatizes to water scarcity and how short- and long-distance chemical and hydraulic signals intervene are reviewed. Chemical compounds synthesized in drying roots are shown to act as long-distance signals inducing leaf stomatal closure and/or restricting leaf growth. This explains why some plants endure soil drying without significant changes in shoot water status. The control of plant water potential by stomatal aperture via feed-forward mechanisms is associated with ‘isohydric’ behaviour in contrast to ‘anysohydric’ behaviour in which lower plant water potentials are attained. This review discusses differences in this respect between grapevines varieties and experimental conditions. Mild water deficits also exert direct and/or indirect (via the light environment around grape clusters) effects on berry development and composition; a higher content of skin-based constituents (e.g. tannins and anthocyanins) has generally being reported. Regulation under water deficit of genes and proteins of the various metabolic pathways responsible for berry composition and therefore wine quality are reviewed

Deficit irrigation in Mediterranean environment. What lessons have we learnt from grapevine studies ?

Libro de Actas - X Simposium Hispano Português de Relaciones Hidricas, 2010Deficit irrigation techniques, implying that water is supplied at levels below full crop evapotranspiration throughout the growing season or in specific phenological stages, such as regulated deficit irrigation (RDI) or partial root drying (PRD), emerged as potential strategies to increase water savings with marginal decreases of yield and likely positive impact on fruit quality. Understanding the physiological and molecular bases for plant responses to mild to moderate water deficits is of utmost importance to modulate the appropriate balance between vegetative and reproductive development, to improve crop water-use efficiency and to control fruit quality. It is acknowledged that the timing and intensity of the response to soil and atmospheric water deficits, namely in what concerns stomatal control, depends greatly on the genotype. This has profound implications in irrigation management, in particular the timing and amount of irrigation to optimize source-sink relationships and achieve optimal fruit quality in each variety. Mild water deficits also exert direct and/or indirect (via the light environment in the cluster zone) effects on berry development and composition. A current research challenge is determining how the environment, in particular water deficits, regulates genes and proteins of the various metabolic pathways responsible for berry composition and therefore for wine qualit

Decapod crustacean larval communities in the Balearic Sea (western Mediterranean): Seasonal composition, horizontal and vertical distribution patterns

Decapod crustaceans are the main target species of deepwater bottomtrawl fisheries in the Balearic Sea but little is known about their larval stages. This work focuses on the species composition of the decapod larval community, describing the main spatio-temporal assemblages and assessing their vertical distribution. Mesozooplankton sampling was carried out using depth-stratified sampling devices at two stations located over the shelf break and themid slope, in the north-western and southern Mallorca in late autumn 2009 and summer 2010. Differences among decapod larvae communities, in terms of composition, adult's habitat such as pelagic or benthic, and distribution patternswere observed between seasons, areas and station. Results showed that for both seasonsmost species and developmental stages aggregatedwithin the upperwater column (above 75 mdepth) and showed higher biodiversity in summer compared to late autumn. Most abundant species were pelagic prawns (e.g., Sergestidae) occurring in both seasons and areas. The larval assemblages' distributions were different between seasonal hydrographic scenarios and during situations of stratified and non-stratified water column. The vertical distribution patterns of different larval developmental stages in respect to the adult's habitat were analyzed in relation to environmental variables. Fluorescence had the highest explanatory power. Four clearly different vertical patterns were identified: two corresponding to late autumn, which were common for all the main larval groups and other two in summer, one corresponding to larvae of coastal benthic and the second to pelagic species larvae.Versión del editor2,655

Size dependent predation in piscivorous larval stages of three tuna species

The bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus) is a heavily fished temperate tuna that spawns in the Mediterranean Sea; the area off the Balearic Islands is a key spawning area. Other abundant tunas, including albacore (Thunnus alalunga) and the small bullet tuna (Auxis rochei) spawn in the same area. The three species temporally overlap during the summer spawning period of the adults. Because they are clearly piscivorous already at very early larval stages, we expect strong interactions both in terms of a direct predator–prey relationship and as competitors for food resources. In this study, we focus on understanding the size dependent trophic interactions among the three species at the different developmental larval stages. First, we describe the environmental and biological scenarios where different size stages of the three species co-occur through the application of generalized additive model (GAM) analyses to field data collected during cruise surveys in 2004–2005. We then develop an individual_based model (IBM) to evaluate inter- and intraspecific predation rates considering size structured prey and predator fields in the framework of piscivorous behaviour. The results demonstrate how predation mortality rates influence the spawning location of the three speci