Cacao agroforestry systems do not increase pest and disease incidence compared with monocultures under good cultural management practices

Pests and diseases threaten cacao production worldwide. Agroforestry systems are traditionally seen by farmers as one of the causes of increased pest and disease incidence, in contrast with full-sun monocultures. Cultural management practices - e.g. regular tree pruning, frequent pod harvest, regular removal of infested pods, weed management - have been reported to be crucial for pest and disease management. We performed two experiments for the purpose of assessing the effect of (i) different cacao production systems, and (ii) the frequency of harvest and removal of infested pods on the incidence of pests and diseases and on the cacao yield. The first experiment was performed in a long-term system comparison trial in Bolivia, where data on pest and disease incidence were recorded for three years in five production systems: two monocultures and two agroforestry system under organic and conventional farming, and one successional agroforestry system, i.e. a high tree density multi-strata system. Pest and disease management did not differ between systems and relied on cultural management practices. Overall, the incidence of pests and diseases did not differ between production systems, which indicated they were not the driver of yield differences between them. Across production systems, only 14% of the pods were affected by pests and diseases; 70% of these were affected by frosty pod rot. More than 80% of the pods infected by frosty pod rot were removed before the sporulation phase. In the second experiment, the effects of the frequency of harvest and removal of infected pods - every 15 days versus every 25 days - on pest and disease incidence and yield were tested in four farmers’ fields. Fortnightly harvest and diseased pod removal significantly decreased disease incidence and increased cacao yield, by 25% and 46% respectively. Our results show that cacao agroforestry systems do not increase pest and disease incidence compared with monocultures when good cultural management practices are implemented, which, in turn, can increase the productivity of the cacao plantations

Classification and prediction of whereabouts patterns from the Reality Mining dataset

n/

Valores semántico-pragmáticos de aún

Els diccionaris i les gramàtiques solen distingir entre aún temporal i aun amb valors de tipus modal-concessiu. Segons aquesta caracterització, el primer és commutable per todavía i porta accent gràfic mentre que el segon no s’accentua i és reemplaçable per hasta, incluso o siquiera. La multiplicitat de funcions i valors semàntics d’aún, ja advertida per Bello (§1217), ha portat alguns autors a incloure’l en el grup de les “partícules” (Pavon Lucero 1999), una metaclasse que engloba preposicions, adverbis i conjuncions. Altres estudis (Sánchez López 1999, Leonetti 2007 i NGRALE 2009) l’han ubicat dins la subclasse dels focalitzadors, la funció dels quals és posar de relleu l’estructura informativa de l’oració. En aquest treball, ens interessa plantejar que totes dues variants –aún temporal / aun concessiu– no representen un contrast dicotòmic sinó que comparteixen un valor quantificacional que es vincula amb el caràcter escalar que també té aquest mot. Aquesta similitud s’evidencia en els casos en què aquesta partícula incideix sobre una comparació i resulta possible tant la substitució per todavía com per incluso.Spanish dictionaries and grammar textbooks usually describe the word aún (even) as an expression of time and aun as an expression of modality (concession). In the first case, it is interchangeable with todavía (yet) and it carries an accent mark. In the second case, the word carries no accent and it is interchangeable with hasta, incluso or siquiera (until, even, (not) even). Because of its wide variety of functions and semantic values, as pointed out much earlier by Bello (§1217), some grammarians (Pavón Lucero (1999) have included aún in the group of the so called “particles”, a group formed by some prepositions, adverbs and conjunctions. Other authors (Sánchez López 1999, Leonetti 2007 y NGRALE 2009) have placed it within the subgroup of focus words, i.e. words that show the sentence information structure. This paper points out that there is no sharp contrast between these two values — aún/aun expressing time or concession— and that they actually share a sense of quantification related to the word’s incremental character. This shared value is clearly seen in sentences with a comparative structure, in which cases this word can be equally replaced by todavía or incluso

Articulating signs in the city

Diego Ferrari will introduce photographic projects evolving from his artistic concerns and research, and which have also informed his teaching of fine art approaches to photography. In his conception, photography becomes a playful process which allows for an interdisciplinary approach between photography, performance art/’happenings’ and the public space. The act of photographing becomes itself performative and challenges ideas of public and private space, and what can and cannot beenacted in the city. Ferrari will present photography from projects in Berlin, London, Barcelona and Johannesburg, where he has worked with various universities and institutions such as Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, Goldsmiths and Kingston Universities in London, Elisava Barcelona School, the House of World Cultures in Berlin and the Goethe Institute in South Africa. The work elicits an ambiguity between personal subjectivity and social objectivity as a fertile platform to reflect on the psychological as well as bodily and metaphysical relationship to the notion of public space. Cities of Light: Barcelona is co-organised by Diego Ferrari, Urban Photographers Association (UPA) / Kingston University, UK and Elisava University, Barcelona; Laura Cuch, Urban Photographers Association (UPA) / Goldsmiths, University of London and University College London; and Jean McNeil, University of East Anglia, UK; in collaboration with Institut d’Estudis Fotogràfics de Catalunya

Analysis of the Catecholaminergic Phenotype in Human SH-SY5Y and BE(2)-M17 Neuroblastoma Cell Lines upon Differentiation

Human cell lines are often used to investigate cellular pathways relevant for physiological or pathological processes or to evaluate cell toxicity or protection induced by different compounds, including potential drugs. In this study, we analyzed and compared the differentiating activities of three agents (retinoic acid, staurosporine and 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate) on the human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y and BE(2)-M17 cell lines; the first cell line is largely used in the field of neuroscience, while the second is still poorly characterized. After evaluating their effects in terms of cell proliferation and morphology, we investigated their catecholaminergic properties by assessing the expression profiles of the major genes involved in catecholamine synthesis and storage and the cellular concentrations of the neurotransmitters dopamine and noradrenaline. Our results demonstrate that the two cell lines possess similar abilities to differentiate and acquire a neuron-like morphology. The most evident effects in SH-SY5Y cells were observed in the presence of staurosporine, while in BE(2)-M17 cells, retinoic acid induced the strongest effects. Undifferentiated SH-SY5Y and BE(2)-M17 cells are characterized by the production of both NA and DA, but their levels are considerably higher in BE(2)-M17 cells. Moreover, the NAergic phenotype appears to be more pronounced in SH-SY5Y cells, while BE(2)-M17 cells have a more prominent DAergic phenotype. Finally, the catecholamine concentration strongly increases upon differentiation induced by staurosporine in both cell lines. In conclusion, in this work the catecholaminergic phenotype of the human BE(2)-M17 cell line upon differentiation was characterized for the first time. Our data suggest that SH-SY5Y and BE(2)-M17 represent two alternative cell models for the neuroscience field

Challenges in the development and growth of small for gestational age newborns

Introduction: Being born with low birth weight (less than 2.500 gr) is considered a public health problem, with an overall world rate of about 14%. Low birth weight may result from a premature birth (< 37 weeks of gestation), from several causes of intra-uterine growth restriction or from a combination of both. Areas covered: We described how, if weight and/or length at birth are not adequate for gestational age, the newborn is considered ‘small for gestational age’ and may present several growth, hormonal and developmental peculiarities, possibly due to the growth restriction developed during pregnancy. Expert commentary: We provide a description of the possible mid-term consequences of being born small for gestational age and how to follow and provide care for these babies from a multidisciplinary point of view

Assigning UPDRS Scores in the Leg Agility Task of Parkinsonians: Can It Be Done through BSN-based Kinematic Variables?

In this paper, by characterizing the Leg Agility (LA) task, which contributes to the evaluation of the degree of severity of the Parkinson's Disease (PD), through kinematic variables (including the angular amplitude and speed of thighs' motion), we investigate the link between these variables and Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS) scores. Our investigation relies on the use of a few body-worn wireless inertial nodes and represents a first step in the design of a portable system, amenable to be integrated in Internet of Things (IoT) scenarios, for automatic detection of the degree of severity (in terms of UPDRS score) of PD. The experimental investigation is carried out considering 24 PD patients.Comment: 10 page

On the Hydrodynamic Equilibrium of a Rod in a Lattice Fluid

We model the behavior of a big (Brazil) nut in a medium of smaller nuts with a stochastic asymmetric simple exclusion dynamics of a polymer-monomer lattice system. The polymer or `rod' can move up or down in an external negative field, occupying N horizontal lattice sites where the monomers cannot enter. The monomers (at most one per site) or `fluid particles' are moving symmetrically in the horizontal plane and asymmetrically in the vertical direction, also with a negative field. For a fixed position of the rod, this lattice fluid is in equilibrium with a vertical height profile reversible for the monomers' motion. Upon `shaking' (speeding up the monomers) the motion of the `rod' dynamically decouples from that of the monomers resulting in a reversible random walk for the rod around an average height proportional to log N.Comment: 19 pages, 2 figure

Irreversible reinsurance: Minimization of Capital Injections in Presence of a Fixed Cost

We propose a model in which, in exchange to the payment of a fixed transaction cost, an insurance company can choose the retention level as well as the time at which subscribing a perpetual reinsurance contract. The surplus process of the insurance company evolves according to the diffusive approximation of the Cram\'er-Lundberg model, claims arrive at a fixed constant rate, and the distribution of their sizes is general. Furthermore, we do not specify any specific functional form of the retention level. The aim of the company is to take actions in order to minimize the sum of the expected value of the total discounted flow of capital injections needed to avoid bankruptcy and of the fixed activation cost of the reinsurance contract. We provide an explicit solution to this problem, which involves the resolution of a static nonlinear optimization problem and of an optimal stopping problem for a reflected diffusion. We then illustrate the theoretical results in the case of proportional and excess-of-loss reinsurance, by providing a numerical study of the dependency of the optimal solution with respect to the model's parameters.Comment: 23 pages, 8 figure

L'acqua nel paesaggio urbano

Exploited for requirements of defence, navigation, transport, irrigation, and the powering of mills, water has progressively diminished in importance to the extent that the relations between the city, the territory and the water systems have now greatly deteriorated. This book proposes to retrace the nature of the relations between water and the urban landscape, interpreting the shifting of the relations through images. It also analyses the use of water in contemporary landscape design, identifying the conceptual and compositional tools proper to landscape design which can inform and guide future planning