Anisotropy and percolation threshold in a multifractal support

Recently a multifractal object, $Q_{mf}$, was proposed to study percolation properties in a multifractal support. The area and the number of neighbors of the blocks of $Q_{mf}$ show a non-trivial behavior. The value of the probability of occupation at the percolation threshold, $p_{c}$, is a function of $\rho$, a parameter of $Q_{mf}$ which is related to its anisotropy. We investigate the relation between $p_{c}$ and the average number of neighbors of the blocks as well as the anisotropy of $Q_{mf}$

Energy indicators: crucial tool towards sustainability assessment

Energy has been considered an intrinsic factor to attain Sustainable Development (SD). However, it has not always been viewed, projected or recognized within sustainability’s scope. To address this issue, the use of indicators, namely Energy Indicators for Sustainable Development (EISD), allows to convey to policy-makers multidimensional implications of energy related decision-making. Besides contributing to assess current energy trends at a national level, this tool, contextualized within a country’s economic and energy mix, allows to establish a comparison between different countries. This effectively contributes to identifying common concerns and strategies to overcome barriers towards sustainable development. This paper compares the path to SD in Portugal and Brazil by making use of the EISD framework

Seismic entangled patterns analyzed via multiresolution decomposition

This article explores a method for distinguishing entangled coherent structures embedded in geophysical images. The original image is decomposed in a series of j-scale-images using multiresolution decomposition. To improve the image processing analysis each j-image is divided in l-spacial regions generating set of (j, l)-regions. At each (j, l)-region we apply a continuous wavelet transform to evaluate <i>E</i><sub>ν</sub>, the spectrum of energy. <i>E</i><sub>ν</sub> has two maxima in the original data. Otherwise, at each scale <i>E</i><sub>ν</sub> hast typically one peak. The localization of the peaks changes according to the (j, l)-region. The intensity of the peaks is linked with the presence of coherent structures, or patterns, at the respective (j, l)-region. The method is successfully applied to distinguish, in scale and region, the ground roll noise from the relevant geologic information in the signal

Driving forces for aggregate energy consumption: a cross-country approach

Although a cornerstone for development, past and current energy use has often posed a major challenge for policymakers with respect to planning and management. Within this context, in this paper an updated multi-sectorial cross-country assessment of energy consumption trends was undertaken, aiming at identifying the main drivers of changes in aggregate energy consumption. These drivers have been interpreted in the light of the policy measures that have been implemented over the years by different countries to achieve a sustainable development of the energy sector. The cross-country assessment encompasses a set of developed (United Kingdom, Portugal and Spain) and emerging (Brazil, China, and India) countries. Resorting to the Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index (LMDI) decomposition method, changes in the aggregate energy consumption were decomposed into three main explanatory effects: activity, structure and intensity. The major findings achieved reflect the relevance of intensity and activity effects in detriment of the structural effect. The assessment of energy consumption trends using the LMDI decomposition method provides critical information regarding which is the dominant factor that should be focused in policy design.This research was supported by a Marie Curie International Research Staff Exchange Scheme Fellowship within the 7th European Union Framework Programme, under project NETEP-European Brazilian Network on Energy Planning (PIRSES-GA-2013-612263). Support from CNPq is also acknowledged, as well as the support of ALGORITMI, a research Centre at the University of Minho. This work has been supported by COMPETE: POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007043 and FCT - Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia within the Project Scope: UID/CEC/00319/2013

Transferência de mudas de variedades de banana lançadas pela Embrapa Mandioca e Fruticultura.

Na fruticultura, e em especial na bananicultura, a muda deve ter identidade genética comprovada e resistência às principais doenças da cultura. Entretanto, muitos agricultores por uma série de fatores (poder econômico, desinformação, resistência, escassez de mudas, dentre outros) acabam utilizando mudas de baixa qualidade genética e fitossanitária oriundas de seu próprio bananal e ou de pomares vizinhos, aumentando o risco de ocorrência de doenças no bananal a ser implantado

Invasion Percolation Between two Sites

We investigate the process of invasion percolation between two sites (injection and extraction sites) separated by a distance r in two-dimensional lattices of size L. Our results for the non-trapping invasion percolation model indicate that the statistics of the mass of invaded clusters is significantly dependent on the local occupation probability (pressure) Pe at the extraction site. For Pe=0, we show that the mass distribution of invaded clusters P(M) follows a power-law P(M) ~ M^{-\alpha} for intermediate values of the mass M, with an exponent \alpha=1.39. When the local pressure is set to Pe=Pc, where Pc corresponds to the site percolation threshold of the lattice topology, the distribution P(M) still displays a scaling region, but with an exponent \alpha=1.02. This last behavior is consistent with previous results for the cluster statistics in standard percolation. In spite of these discrepancies, the results of our simulations indicate that the fractal dimension of the invaded cluster does not depends significantly on the local pressure Pe and it is consistent with the fractal dimension values reported for standard invasion percolation. Finally, we perform extensive numerical simulations to determine the effect of the lattice borders on the statistics of the invaded clusters and also to characterize the self-organized critical behavior of the invasion percolation process.Comment: 7 pages, 11 figures, submited for PR

Water use efficiency in bananas pome type cropsusing empirical coefficient based on leaf area.

The aim of this work was to evaluate the yield and water use efficiency (WUE) of banana ?Prata-Anã? (AAB) and ?BRS Platina? (AAAB) during two cycles of production in a semi-arid climate of Brazil (classified as Aw according Köppen)