Hurricane María: An Agroecological Turning Point for Puerto Rico?

When Hurricane María tore through Puerto Rico on September 20, 2017, it left 17 dead, 11,000 seeking shelter, and the island’s 3.4 million people without power, water, or fresh food supplies.i It also ripped off the democratic veneer of the US’ “commonwealth,” revealing the structural vulnerability of an island that has been colonized for over half a millennium. Disasters tend to unmask both unsustainable practices and inequitable relations of power. But they can also unleash the power of solidarity and self-governance as communities—abandoned by their governments and preyed upon by disaster capitalists—come together in unexpected ways. In the aftermath of Puerto Rico’s worst social, economic and environmental catastrophe, the Puerto Rican food sovereignty movement is using agroecology to reconstruct the island’s beleaguered food system

Financiación eclesial: situación actual y perspectivas de futuro

A través del repaso de las principales normas pactadas con la Iglesia y unilaterales del Estado, este trabajo presenta la situación actual de la financiación de las entidades de la Iglesia católica en España. Particular atención merece la evolución de la asignación tributaria fijada en la Ley de Presupuestos Generales del Estado desde 1988. Este sistema de asignación tributaria ha sido sustituido en el año 2007 por uno nuevo que no dependerá cada año de la dotación presupuestaria del Estado sino exclusivamente de la voluntad de los ciudadanos al presentar la declaración del Impuesto sobre la Renta de las personas Físicas (en un porcentaje del 0,7%). En el artículo se estudia también el mecanismo de distribución de los fondos obtenidos con la asignación tributaria mediante el Fondo Común Interdiocesano. Finalmente, se explica el concepto de financiación y se apuntan sugerencias para el futuro. ------ Through the revision of the principal norms agreed with the Church and the unilateral principal norms of the State, this paper presents the actual situation of the financing of the Catholic Church entities in Spain. The evolution of the tax allowance established in the Spanish National Budget Law since 1988 deserves a particular attention. This tax allowance system has been substituted in 2007 by a new one which will not depend every year of the budget strenght of the State but exclusively of the will of the citizens while presenting the Tax declaration about the income of the physical person (in a percentage of 0,7%). The article also studies the mechanism of the distribution of the funds obtained with the tax allowance through the Interdiocesan Common Fund. Finally, the concept of financing is explained and suggestions for the future are pointed out

Lacunar fractal photon sieves

We present a new family of diffractive lenses whose structure is based on the combination of two concepts: photon sieve and fractal zone plates with variable lacunarity. The focusing properties of different members of this family are examined. It is shown that the sieves provide a smoothing effect on the higher order foci of a conventional lacunar fractal zone plate. However, the characteristic self-similar axial response of the fractal zone plates is always preserved.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure

HeteroGenius: A Framework for Hybrid Analysis of Heterogeneous Software Specifications

Nowadays, software artifacts are ubiquitous in our lives being an essential part of home appliances, cars, cell phones, and even in more critical activities like aeronautics and health sciences. In this context software failures may produce enormous losses, either economical or, in the worst case, in human lives. Software analysis is an area in software engineering concerned with the application of diverse techniques in order to prove the absence of errors in software pieces. In many cases different analysis techniques are applied by following specific methodological combinations that ensure better results. These interactions between tools are usually carried out at the user level and it is not supported by the tools. In this work we present HeteroGenius, a framework conceived to develop tools that allow users to perform hybrid analysis of heterogeneous software specifications. HeteroGenius was designed prioritising the possibility of adding new specification languages and analysis tools and enabling a synergic relation of the techniques under a graphical interface satisfying several well-known usability enhancement criteria. As a case-study we implemented the functionality of Dynamite on top of HeteroGenius.Comment: In Proceedings LAFM 2013, arXiv:1401.056

Benchmark of the PenRed Monte Carlo framework for HDR brachytherapy

[EN] Purpose: The purpose of this study is to validate the PenRed Monte Carlo framework for clinical applications in brachytherapy. PenRed is a C++ version of Penelope Monte Carlo code with additional tallies and utilities. Methods and materials: Six benchmarking scenarios are explored to validate the use of PenRed and its improved bachytherapy-oriented capabilities for HDR brachytherapy. A new tally allowing the evaluation of collisional kerma for any material using the track length kerma estimator and the possibility to obtain the seed positions, weights and directions processing directly the DICOM file are now implemented in the PenRed distribution. The four non-clinical test cases developed by the Joint AAPM-ESTRO-ABG-ABS WG-DCAB were evaluated by comparing local and global absorbed dose differences with respect to established reference datasets. A prostate and a palliative lung cases, were also studied. For them, absorbed dose ratios, global absorbed dose differences, and cumulative dose-volume histograms were obtained and discussed. Results: The air-kerma strength and the dose rate constant corresponding to the two sources agree with the reference datatests within 0.3% (Sk) and 0.1% (¿). With respect to the first three WG-DCAB test cases, more than 99.8% of the voxels present local (global) differences within ±1%(±0.1%) of the reference datasets. For test Case 4 reference dataset, more than 94.9%(97.5%) of voxels show an agreement within ±1%(±0.1%), better than similar benchmarking calculations in the literature. The track length kerma estimator scorer implemented increases the numerical efficiency of brachytherapy calculations two orders of magnitude, while the specific brachytherapy source allows the user to avoid the use of error-prone intermediate steps to translate the DICOM information into the simulation. In both clinical cases, only minor absorbed dose differences arise in the low-dose isodoses. 99.8% and 100% of the voxels have a global absorbed dose difference ratio within ±0.2% for the prostate and lung cases, respectively. The role played by the different segmentation and composition material in the bone structures was discussed, obtaining negligible absorbed dose differences. Dose-volume histograms were in agreement with the reference data. Conclusions: PenRed incorporates new tallies and utilities and has been validated for its use for detailed and precise high-dose-rate brachytherapy simulations.This work is partially supported by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación of Spain (MCIN) grants PID2020- 113126RB-I00 and PID2021-125096NB-I00 funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033. V. G. acknowledges partial support from AEI-MICINN under grant PID2020-1 13334GB-I00/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and by Generalitat Valenciana through the project PROMETEO/2019/087. The work has also been supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) grant RGPIN-2019-05038. Francisco Berumen acknowledges support by the Fonds de Recherche du Québec ¿ Nature et Technologies (FRQNT). J.V. and F.B. would like to acknowledge funding by MCIN/ AEI/10.13039 and the Generalitat Valenciana (GVA) grant PROMETEO/2021/064. Our colleague Prof. Vicent Giménez Gómez passed away on November 16, 2022, during the proofs of this study. We dedicate it to his memory. The Universitat de València lost a dedicated and accomplished physicist.Oliver-Gil, S.; Giménez-Alventosa, V.; Berumen, F.; Giménez, V.; Beaulieu, L.; Ballester, F.; Vijande, J. (2023). Benchmark of the PenRed Monte Carlo framework for HDR brachytherapy. Zeitschrift für Medizinische Physik. 33(4):511-528. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.zemedi.2022.11.00251152833

A virtual laboratory designed for teaching diffractive lenses

[EN] We present a virtual laboratory generated in Matlab GuiQc (Graphical User Interface) for its use in Optics courses as an informatic tool for teaching the focusing properties of a diffractive lens. This Gui allows the students to learn easily and rapidly about the influence on the focal volume of the lens construction parameters. As an example in this work we analyze fractal diffractive lenses because we found that fractal geometry is a highly motivating topic for students since it is related to a wide range of scientific and technological phenomena.[ES] En este trabajo presentamos un laboratorio virtual desarrollado en Matlab GuiQc (Interfaz Gráfica con el Usuario) para su uso en los cursos de Óptica como herramienta informática para la enseñanza de las propiedades de focalización de las lentes difractivas. Esta interfaz GUI permite a los estudiantes aprender fácil y rápidamente la influencia de los parámetros constructivos de la lente en el volumen focal. A modo de ejemplo analizamos en este trabajo lentes difractivas fractales porque hemos encontrado que la geometría fractal es un tema muy motivador para los estudiantes ya que está relacionado con un gran número de fenómenos científicos y tecnológicos.Giménez, F.; Monsoriu, J.; Furlan, W.; Pons, A. (2010). A virtual laboratory designed for teaching diffractive lenses. Modelling in Science Education and Learning. 3:29-37. doi:10.4995/msel.2010.3108SWORD2937

Knowledge about and Knowledge with: Contributions from Feminist Research to Knowledge Co-Production for Pastoral Systems

Globally, the gender dynamics of rangeland social-ecological systems have received scant attention. Further, research paradigms, methods and methodologies that leave little room for equitable engagement with research participants and genuine action-oriented research-practice partnerships dominate in pastoralist/rangeland studies. Our research is informed by a feminist philosophy of science and based on decolonial and feminist political ecology studies that focus on gendered science and knowledge production. Feminist research calls for reflection on who produces knowledge and how such knowledge is used and shared. Feminist practices such as reciprocity, care, and positionality, cultivate awareness of the power dynamics embedded in the research process and motivate us as researchers to counteract asymmetrical or extractive relationships when we identify them. In this paper we first introduce the principles of our feminist research, and then reflect on our experience as researchers and as activists or participants in the Spanish and Catalan networks of women shepherdesses and livestock operators