Interferometric inverse synthetic aperture radar experiment using an interferometric linear frequency modulated continuous wave millimetre-wave radar

D. Felguera-Martín,1 J.-T. González-Partida,1 P. Almorox-González,1 M. Burgos-García,1 and B.-P. Dorta-Naranjo2 1Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Ciudad Universitaria s/n, Grupo de Microondas y Radar. Departamento de Señales, Sistemas y Radiocomunicaciones, Madrid, Spain 2Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Departamento de Señales y Comunicaciones, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain An interferometric linear frequency modulated continuous wave (LFMCW) millimetre-wave radar is presented, along with the results of an experiment conducted to study the feasibility of using it in a future millimetre-wave interferometric inverse synthetic aperture radar (InISAR) system. First, a description of the radar is given. Then, the signal processing chain is described, with special attention to the phase unwrapping technique. The interferometric phase is obtained by unwrapping the prominent target's phase in each antenna using a sliding frame processing technique. Cell migration issues in this method are also addressed. Simulations were carried out to illustrate and assess the processing chain and to show the effects of multipath echoes on the height measurement. In the real experiment, the range, speed and height of a moving target were tracked over consecutive inverse synthetic aperture radar (ISAR) image frames, verifying the performance of the whole system

L'Università per la formazione delle educatrici e degli educatori al patrimonio storico-artistico: riflessioni a partire da una prima mappatura nazionale

L’ormai imprescindibile necessità educativa e comunicativa delle istituzioni museali invoca una sempre crescente specializza-zione dei professionisti incaricati di queste funzioni. Sebbene i re-quisiti delle educatrici e degli educatori, delle e dei responsabili dei servizi educativi siano ormai saldamente individuati, la nostra legislazione non riconosce tali figure professionali, aprendo di fatto a uno scollamento tra le necessità dei luoghi e degli istituti della cultura e i percorsi di formazione. Questi ultimi, non trovando riscon-tro nel riconoscimento professionale e dovendo rispondere a precise norme ministeriali in merito alla costruzione dei curricula formativi offerti ai vari livelli, dai diplomi di laurea ai corsi di dotto-rato, non possono che basare le proprie aperture didattiche all’educazione al patrimonio sulle sensibilità dei singoli Atenei, se non dei singoli docenti. Per verificare l’effettiva offerta formativa attualmente proposta dagli atenei nazionali è stata svolta una prima mappatura nazionale sui corsi di laurea di I e II livello, Scuole di Specializzazione e Master di I e II livello, in ambito storico-artistico

Electronically Tunable Phase Response for Phased array Patches

The design and prototyping of radiating elements with tunable phase response, for reconfigurable patch array antennas, is presented. Different options are found in the technical literature to obtain feasible reconfigurable array antennas: placing the active circuitry in the transmission lines or directly over the radiating element, obtaining the desired phase shift for each radiating element of the array. In this reported work, the second option is selected and active radiating elements at 12 GHz are designed and prototyped

Natural and anthropogenic factors in the Guadalquivir estuary affect the abundance of anchovy in the Gulf of Cadiz (SW Spain)

The Gulf of Cadiz socio-ecosystem is characterized by a focal ecosystem component –the estuary of the Guadalquivir River– that has an in uence on the marine ecosystem –serves as a nursery area– and at the same time concentrates a great number of sectoral human activities. This nursery role particularly affects the anchovy fishery, which is the most economically and culturally important fishery in the region. As a transition zone between terrestrial and marine environments, estuaries are particularly sensitive to human activities, either developed directly at the aquatic environment or its surroundings. A dam 110 km upstream from the river mouth regulates freshwater input (mainly for agriculture purposes) into the estuary with consequences on turbidity and salinity. Using time series analysis on 18 years of monthly data from an estuarine monitoring program we (1) quantify the effects that natural (plankton, temperature, winds) and anthropogenic-influenced variables (freshwater volume, turbidity, salinity) have on the abundance of anchovy larvae and juveniles, and (2) relate the abundance of these estuarine-resident early stages to the abundance of adult anchovy in the sea. Water management stands out as a key node where potentially con icting interests (agriculture, power generation, aquaculture, fisheries) converge. Linking land-based activities to its impact on stock biomass represents the main challenge to ecosystem-based management in this particular regional sea. By focusing on the effects that these activities ultimately have on the anchovy fishery –via recruitment– our study aims to contribute to the process of making the ecosystem approach operational in the Gulf of Cadiz

Modelling the effect of environmental and anthropogenic factors on the abundance of early life-history stages of the European sardine in the Guadalquivir estuary

Estuarine coastal areas play an important role in the recruitment of some small pelagic sh populations mainly when stable salinity-gradients are present. Damming of these ecosystems results in major alterations in this natural hydrological regime. Therefore, changes in the marine/freshwater balance can result in services loss, like the nursery habitat estuaries provide to small pelagic sh, such as sardines. Our previous work showed that the main important recruitment of sardine occurs in spring when this water balance is more variable. However, the drivers of sardine recruitment and particularly the interactive effects of environmental (temperature, salinity, turbidity and winds) and anthropogenic (freshwater discharges) factors are largely unknown. We modelled these effects on the abundance of sardine larvae and juveniles in the Guadalquivir estuary, the most southwestern one in the Atlantic Europe. Sardine early stages tend to occur at the most seaward and more saline sampling site in our study area. The best selected models included the freshwater ow and the wind regimen (northern-southern component) as main drivers explaining their abundance. Freshwater input –tightly controlled by a dam– had a negative short-term effect on the abundance of juvenile sardines above a critical threshold. On top of this, the wind-speed variability in the northern-southern direction showed a clear linear effect: with strong northerly winds enhancing the sardine abundance in the Guadalquivir estuary. These results contribute to the knowledge of the recruitment process of the European sardine and eventually to implementing an ecosystem approach to its fishery in the Gulf of Cadiz

Natural and land-based factors in the Guadalquivir estuary affect the abundance of anchovy in the Gulf of Cadiz (SW Spain)

The Gulf of Cadiz socio-ecosystem is characterized by a focal ecosystem component –the estuary of the Guadalquivir River– that has an influence on the marine ecosystem –serves as a nursery area– and at the same time concentrates a great number of sectoral human activities. This nursery role particularly affects the anchovy fishery, which is the most economically and culturally important fishery in the region. As a transition zone between terrestrial and marine environments, estuaries are particularly sensitive to human activities, either developed directly at the aquatic environment or its surroundings. A dam 110 km upstream from the river mouth regulates freshwater input (mainly for agriculture purposes) into the estuary with consequences on turbidity and salinity. Using time series analysis we (1) quantify the effects that natural (plankton, temperature, winds) and anthropogenic-influenced variables (freshwater discharges, turbidity, salinity) have on the abundance of anchovy larvae and juveniles, and (2) relate the abundance of these estuarine-resident early stages to the abundance of adult anchovy in the sea. Water management stands out as a key node where potentially conflicting interests (agriculture, power generation, aquaculture, fisheries) converge. Linking land-based activities to its impact on stock biomass represents the main challenge to ecosystem-based management in this particular regional sea. By focusing on the effects that these activities ultimately have on the anchovy fishery –via recruitment– our study aims to provide alternative management scenarios by quantifying tradeoffs between sectors

Augmented Reality App with AI-based Pervasive Latency Monitoring of RAN and Programmable Metro Packet-Optical Networks

Deep data plane programmability is exploited at different future 6G network technological segments to realize end-to-end application delay telemetry. For the first time, data analytics obtained by RAN controllers and metro network collectors are processed by a Multi Agent System running AI algorithms with the aim of detecting latency anomalies and their location in the network, suggesting the most appropriate recovery countermeasure. The demo is shown applied to Augmented Reality application with extreme low latency requirements

Planck intermediate results. VIII. Filaments between interacting clusters

About half of the baryons of the Universe are expected to be in the form of filaments of hot and low density intergalactic medium. Most of these baryons remain undetected even by the most advanced X-ray observatories which are limited in sensitivity to the diffuse low density medium. The Planck satellite has provided hundreds of detections of the hot gas in clusters of galaxies via the thermal Sunyaev-Zel'dovich (tSZ) effect and is an ideal instrument for studying extended low density media through the tSZ effect. In this paper we use the Planck data to search for signatures of a fraction of these missing baryons between pairs of galaxy clusters. Cluster pairs are good candidates for searching for the hotter and denser phase of the intergalactic medium (which is more easily observed through the SZ effect). Using an X-ray catalogue of clusters and the Planck data, we select physical pairs of clusters as candidates. Using the Planck data we construct a local map of the tSZ effect centered on each pair of galaxy clusters. ROSAT data is used to construct X-ray maps of these pairs. After having modelled and subtracted the tSZ effect and X-ray emission for each cluster in the pair we study the residuals on both the SZ and X-ray maps. For the merging cluster pair A399-A401 we observe a significant tSZ effect signal in the intercluster region beyond the virial radii of the clusters. A joint X-ray SZ analysis allows us to constrain the temperature and density of this intercluster medium. We obtain a temperature of kT = 7.1 +- 0.9, keV (consistent with previous estimates) and a baryon density of (3.7 +- 0.2)x10^-4, cm^-3. The Planck satellite mission has provided the first SZ detection of the hot and diffuse intercluster gas.Comment: Accepted by A&

Measurement of the production cross section for W-bosons in association with jets in pp collisions at s=7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

This Letter reports on a first measurement of the inclusive W + jets cross section in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV at the LHC, with the ATLAS detector. Cross sections, in both the electron and muon decay modes of the W-boson, are presented as a function of jet multiplicity and of the transverse momentum of the leading and next-to-leading jets in the event. Measurements are also presented of the ratio of cross sections sigma (W + >= n)/sigma(W + >= n - 1) for inclusive jet multiplicities n = 1-4. The results, based on an integrated luminosity of 1.3 pb(-1), have been corrected for all known detector effects and are quoted in a limited and well-defined range of jet and lepton kinematics. The measured cross sections are compared to particle-level predictions based on perturbative QCD. Next-to-leading order calculations, studied here for n <= 2, are found in good agreement with the data. Leading-order multiparton event generators, normalized to the NNLO total cross section, describe the data well for all measured jet multiplicitie

Effect-Directed Analysis of Municipal Landfill Soil Reveals Novel Developmental Toxicants in the Zebrafish Danio rerio

Effect-directed analysis (EDA) is an approach used to identify (unknown) contaminants in complex samples which cause toxicity, using a combination of biology and chemistry. The goal of this work was to apply EDA to identify developmental toxicants in soil samples collected from a former municipal landfill site. Soil samples were extracted, fractionated, and tested for developmental effects with an embryotoxicity assay in the zebrafish Danio rerio. Gas chromatograph mass selective detection (GC-MSD) chemical screening was used to reveal candidate developmental toxicants in fractions showing effects. In a parallel study, liquid chromatography-hybrid linear ion trap Orbitrap mass spectrometry was also applied to one polar subfraction (Hoogenboom et al. J. Chromatogr. A2009, 1216, 510-519). EDA resulted in the identification of a number of previously unknown developmental toxicants, which were confirmed to be present in soil by GC-MS. These included 11H-benzo[b]fluorene, 9-methylacridine, 4-azapyrene, and 2-phenylquinoline, as well as one known developmental toxicant (retene). This work revealed the presence of novel contaminants in the environment that may affect vertebrate development, which are not subject to monitoring or regulation under current soil quality assessment guidelines. © 2011 American Chemical Society