Life cicle assessment comparison between distillation and membrane system for bioethanol purification

This study is going to compare two different ways for the bioethanol purification. Distillation is nowadays the technique used by industry, but recent studies have demonstrated that more than 60 % of the energy used for bioethanol production is due to the distillation. In order to find a more efficient technique to separate bioethanol from water, there has been developed several techniques; among them membrane system is the best situated because their low energy requirements. However, for the manufacture of the membrane several chemical products are used and this could create environmental impacts that have to be studied previous its implementation. The main objective of this study is to determine by Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) which technique has lower environmental impacts. Related with this main objective it’s going to be studied the membrane synthesis process in detail. The membrane system used in this work is a hollow-fiber that consists in thousands of membranes with diameters of 0,1 mm inside a steel vessel. The membrane is silicalite-1 zeolite and its synthesis process is going to be studied to quantify materials and energy requirements.Graduado o Graduada en Ingeniería en Diseño Mecánico por la Universidad Pública de NavarraDiseinu Mekanikoko Ingeniaritzan Graduatua Nafarroako Unibertsitate Publikoa

Procesador segmentado para fines académicos usando HDL

El documento digital no refiere asesorPublicación a texto completo no autorizada por el autorDesarrolla el diseño de un procesador segmentado con la finalidad de ayudar a los estudiantes en el aprendizaje del desempeño de este tipo de procesadores, principalmente cuando se presentan conflictos con relación a la secuencia de instrucciones utilizadas y sus dependencias. Para ello se utilizan técnicas hardware, tales como el adelantamiento de datos, inserción de burbujas, y anticipación de riesgos. Estos métodos se aplican para la arquitectura MIPS que consta de una segmentación de 5 etapas y cumple con las características de la arquitectura ISA tipo RISC empleada ampliamente en la temática de “Arquitectura de Computadoras”. El método empleado es desarrollar cada vez una nueva versión del procesador adaptado para solucionar el nuevo paradigma mostrando la mejora en su desempeño luego de hacerlo, así tendremos una versión que muestra la solución por riesgos de dependencia de datos. Otra versión del procesador para el caso en que una instrucción dependa del dato de una instrucción de carga, para finalmente realizar una última versión que solucione las dependencias debido a las bifurcaciones, que vienen a ser las más características y que presenta dificultad de asimilar en esta parte de la temática, tanto por la poca afición a la lectura del estudiantado como a la baja comprensión lectora que se tiene. El proceso de ver los eventos y simularlos más que solo verlos estáticamente permitirá una mejor y rápida comprensión de estos fenómenos así como su interacción al modificar los programas y el hardware del procesador respectivo.Tesi

Análisis de redes de coexpresión génica en "Mycobacterium tuberculosis"

Tuberculosis is a poverty-linked illness that can be lethal, especially in combination with HIV. In this work, we perform a Systems Biology approach to its causal agent, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, to try to unravel the regulatory mechanisms used as a response to the kinds of stress it usually finds in its intracellular niche, the endosomes. For this purpose, an already developed method for gene co-expression networks is applied to the publicly available data of high throughput transcriptome data for Mycobacterium tuberculosis under different conditions of stress, making a multilayer network, where each layer is a different type of stress. To find differences between the different kinds of stress, distance metrics between the conditions have been developed and an analysis of the whole multilayer network has been performed to find general and specific stress response genes. To be able to identify differences between two different types of stress, differential co-expression networks have been built. As there is no consensus on a method for this, we have developed a new method for thresholding and differential co-expression networks analysis that solves problems found in previous methods, especially those concerning loss of significant data and inability to identify genes with alternate regulatory mechanisms. To validate the biological relevance all methods, data enrichment has been performed with the obtained results, showing concordant results with already published data, such as the importance of oxidative phosphorilation for adaptation to stress, specific proteins for oxidative stress such as CysD, lower differences when comparing the stresses happening in the endosome between them than when comparing with a kind of stress from outside of the endosome (UV) and a direct correlation between ribosomal proteins and proteins responding to any stress. However, further validation and improvement is required for this method. La tuberculosis es una enfermedad ligada a la pobreza que causa la muerte, especialmente combinada con VIH. Aquí realizamos una aproximación de Biología de Sistemas al patógeno causal, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, para descubrir los mecanismos reguladores desencadenados como respuesta a los diferentes tipos de estrés de su nicho intracelular, los endosomas. Para ello, aplicamos un método ya desarrollado de redes de co-expresión génica sobre los datos transcriptómicos de “alto rendimiento” públicamente disponibles en Mycobacterium tuberculosis sometida a diversos tipos de estrés, generando una red multicapa, donde cada capa es un tipo diferente de estrés. Para hallar diferencias entre los diferentes estreses, se han desarrollado medidas de distancia entre las condiciones y se ha estudiado la red multicapa como un conjunto, para identificar genes de respuesta a estreses genéricos y específicos de estrés. Se han construido redes de co-expresión diferencial de genes para identificar diferencias entre dos tipos concretos de estrés. Al no haber consenso en un método para ello, hemos desarrollado un nuevo método para determinar un umbral de significancia y análisis de la red que resuelve algunos problemas de los métodos anteriores, especialmente los relacionados con la pérdida de datos significativos y con la incapacidad para detectar genes con mecanismos reguladores alternativos. Para validar la relevancia biológica de los métodos, se ha realizado enriquecimiento de datos con los resultados obtenidos, mostrando resultados acordes con la literatura publicada actual, como la importancia de la fosforilación oxidativa en la adaptación al estrés, proteínas específicas para el estrés oxidativo como CysD, menores diferencias entre los estreses fisiológicos del endosoma que al comparar uno de estos estreses con otro estrés de fuera del endosoma (UV) y una correlación directa entre los niveles de proteínas ribosomales y de respuesta a cualquier estrés. Sin embargo, es necesario mejorar y validar este método aún más

Kinematic analysis of a lower limb to determine the center of rotation of the knee at the sagittal plane.

En esta investigación se establece una metodología que permite describir el movimiento de miembros inferiores usando cadenas cinemáticas cerradas. Este análisis es realizado con el objetivo de determinar la posición del centro de rotación (CR) de la rodilla localizado en el plano sagital. Un paciente sano y sin antecedentes patológicos realizó pruebas de flexión-extensión con uno de sus miembros inferiores. Cuando el paciente realizo el movimiento articular (la flexo-extensión) un dispositivo de video y un programa (World In motion v4.0) determinan la posición de cuatro marcadores pasivos ubicados en el miembro inferior. Los datos obtenidos de los marcadores son utilizados en un modelo propuesto que permite localizar la posición del CR de la rodilla. En este estudio se concluye que el CR de la rodilla presenta movimiento relativo respecto a un punto fijo marcado en un miembro inferior. Los resultados comprueban que el CR de la rodilla delimitado en el plano sagital no presenta comportamiento de una junta completa (junta con un grado de libertad) como ha sido presentado en otros estudios. Abstract A methodology is established in this research which permits to describe the movement of a lower limb using closed kinematic chains. This analysis is developed with the aim to determine the location of the center of rotation (CR) of the knee joint in the sagittal plane. Flexion-extension tests were carried out on one of the lower limbs of a healthy patient without pathological antecedents. When the patient does articular movement (flexion-extension), a video equipment and a software determine the position of four passive markers installed on the lower limb. The information obtained from the markers is applied to the proposed model which allows to locate the center of rotation of the knee joint. Hence it was concluded that the CR of the knee joint undergoes a relative movement with respect to the fixed point marked on the lower limb. The results prove that the knee joint established in the sagittal plane does not show the behavior of a complete joint (a joint with one degree of freedom) as it has been described in other studies

Hermite spatial variations for the solution to the stochastic heat equation

In this paper, we study the Hermite spatial variations for the solution to the stochastic heat equation with space-time white noise. We prove that these variations satisfy a central limit theorem and we obtain almost sure central limit theorem

Analysis of the tensile fracture properties of ultra-high-strength fiber-reinforced concrete with different types of steel fibers by X-ray tomography

This study is concerned with the analysis of the tensile properties of an ultra-high-strength fiber-reinforced concrete manufactured with short and long steel fibers. The analysis involve using different techniques - from mechanical tests to X-ray computed tomography - to relate the observed variation of the mechanical properties of the mixes with their porosity. A comprehensive study of the porosity distribution was conducted on the basis of the analysis of X-ray computed tomography images and porosimetry. The study shows the influence of the type of fiber used in the reinforcement on the pore size and distribution of the concrete matrix and consequently on its tensile properties. The tensile properties are obtained with an inverse analysis method available in the literature that yielded the first-cracking tensile strength (f t ) and the ultimate tensile strength (f tu ) and related with the inner structure of the concrete matrix. Our results prove that the tensile properties, especially the first-cracking strength, vary depending on the fibers used. These findings help mix designers make a decision about the type of fibers that should be used when a high first-cracking tensile strength is needed and make it possible to quantify the effect of the fiber.Ministerio de Economía y competitividad BIA2016-75431-RMinisterio de Economía y Competitividad DPI2015-66534-RAcademia de Ciencias de la República Checa 16-18702

Coffee husk mulch on soil erosion and runoff: experiences under rainfall simulation experiment

[EN] The high erosion rates found in the agriculture land make valuable the use of mulches to control the soil and water losses. Coffee husk (Coffea canephora var. robusta) can be one of those mulches. This paper evaluates how to apply the mulch in order to obtain the best effectiveness. An experimental factorial design 4×3×2 with two replicates was designed in a greenhouse with a total number of 48 cases. All the samples were deposited in trays of 0.51m2 and applied a simulated rain of 122mmh−1 during 21 min. The factors examined were the following: four soil classes; three treatments buried (B), surface (S) and non-residue (C) and the presence (WC) or absence (WOC) of the soil surface crusting. The coffee husk residue (S and B treatments) reduced runoff by 10.2 and 46% respectively, soil losses by 78.3 and 88.7% and sediment concentration by 77 and 84.4 %. The infiltration rate increased on average by 104 and 167 %, and time to runoff by 1.58 and 2.07 min respectively. Coffee husk is an efficient mulch to reduce the soil and water losses, although it could not completely cushion the influence of crust.Moreno-Ramón, H.; Quizembe, S.; Ibañez Asensio, S. (2014). Coffee husk mulch on soil erosion and runoff: experiences under rainfall simulation experiment. Solid Earth and Discussions. 5:851-862. doi:10.5194/se-5-851-2014S8518625Abdelkadir, A. and Yimer, F.: Soil water property variations in three adjacent land use types in the Rift Valley area of Ethiopia, J. Arid Environ., 75, 1067–1071, 2011.Adekalu, K. O., Okunade, D. A., and Osunbitan, J. A.: Compaction and mulching effects on soil loss and runoff from two southwestern Nigeria agriculture soils, Geoderma, 137, 226–230, 2006.Bakr, N., Weindorf, D. C., Zhu, Y., Arceneaux, A. E., and Selim, H. M.: Evaluation of compost/mulch as highway embankment erosion control in Louisiana at the plot-scale, J. Hydrol., 468–469, 257–267, 2012.Bekalo, S. 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