Efficiency analysis of Policies against desertification by applying DEA: a case study in the river Guadalentin catchment (Almeria, Spain)

This paper deals about an attempt to evaluate the different policies against desertification carried out during a twenty five year period (1978-2003) in the eight municipalities which compound the river Guadalentín catchment (Murcia, Spain). The approach is based on DEA and the European Environmental Agency indicator studies, the former to measure the efficiency and the second to select the best environmental indicators. The analysis has been reiterated with three different sets of outputs related to the different levels and aspects of the desertification process- from the merely soil losses to the overall desertification process in which population losses are considered. As a result a set of efficiency indexes has been obtained for each municipality, which show clearly the contribution of each action against desertification. These results are very valuable to establish future long term desertification policies in similar territories

An Empirical Study Into the Limitations and Emerging Trends of Six Sigma:Findings From a Global Survey

The purpose of this article is to identify and evaluate the limitations and emerging trends of Six Sigma from the perspectives of Six Sigma experts. The authors developed an online global survey and deployed the survey to 1250 Six Sigma experts of which 307 experts responded. The article finds integration of Six Sigma with Big Data to be the topmost among Asian, South American, and African experts, whereas European and North American experts felt Six Sigma in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises and Micro-enterprises would be very beneficial. The manufacturing sector experts nominated the topmost emerging trend as Six Sigma in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises and Micro-enterprises to be very challenging and will be rewarding if implemented properly. In the service sector, the topmost emerging trend was the integration of Six Sigma with Big Data. However, public sector experts felt variance reduction should not be the only goal of Six Sigma implementation. The that master black belts perceived Six Sigma in Small and Medium Sized Enterprises and Micro-enterprises would be advantageous, whereas Black and Green Belts perceived Integration of Six Sigma with Big Data to be topmost emerging trend

The knowledge transfer process in Six Sigma subsidiary firms

Although the operative benefits of Six Sigma methodology in the business world are well accepted, the long-term benefits of the initiative are currently under discussion. This paper aims to analyze how Six Sigma methodology is related to the knowledge transfer process, a source of competitive advantage. For this purpose, we observe how team management in Six Sigma firms differs statistically from team management proposed by other quality management initiatives, and how Six Sigma team management is related to the knowledge integration and knowledge transfer processes. An ANOVA analysis and Partial Least Squares (PLS) approach were used to analyze data from 53 European Six Sigma firms, confirming the hypotheses developed. The results confirm that Six Sigma methodology offers new possibilities to companies and that implementation of Six Sigma has a positive effect on variables that influence long-term organizational performance, such as knowledge management. Relevant academic contributions and implications for practitioners are included.This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Projects ECO2010-15885; ECO2013-47027P), Junta de Andalucia (P11-SEJ-7294) and the European Union (European Regional Development Funds)

Planificación De Entrenamiento Deportivo Orientada Al Desarrollo De Los Fundamentos Técnicos Del Baloncesto Caso: Estudiantes Categoría Intermedia Distrito Chambo – Riobamba

The present research work responds to the planning of sports training oriented towards the development of the technical fundamentals of basketball. Specifically, the study was applied in the Chambo-Riobamba district of Chimborazo, Ecuador. The study was conducted based on a previous study on the analysis of the technical fundamentals of basketball. It details the need to develop a plan that is oriented towards the students of the intermediate category of the district. Through student survey, this study aims to avert the problem that demonstrates the absence of an oriented planning that is reflected in the low sport performance in this sport. The methodology used was through direct observation. The surveys were conducted for students, coaches, and field research. As a result, it is possible to define and apply daily training plans to determine how the universe of this study was responding to the exercise plan. The plan is made up of 29 sessions divided into 1 macrocycle, 7 mesocycles, and 25 microcycles. In conclusion, we ascertain that the sports training plan is a necessary tool for the physical, psychological, and skill preparation of the athletes in the practice of the technical fundamentals of the basketball. In addition, it demonstrated better results in the district and provincial competences of the Educational Units belonging to the objective of this study

Análisis De Los Fundamentos Básicos Técnicos Del Baloncesto En El Rendimiento Deportivo De Los Estudiantes Categoría Intermedia Del Distrito Chambo - Riobamba

This research was carried out on student’s athletes of Circuito Educativo 06D01C02 Riobamba-Chambo, in Chimborazo province district. The main objective of this study is to know the basic technical fundamentals of basketball in the performance of students of the intermediate category. This however would be used to determine specifically the basics technical basis. It would also help to define the level of the basic technical fundamentals in order to make a proposal. The elaboration of a training plan is aimed at developing the technical basis for the intermediate category. Within the methodology, it is a quantitative and qualitative research. This is a field research because it will run in the scene where practical assessments will be applied to each one of the students. Additionally, it will be a documentary bibliographical mode. It will be exploratory and correlational, and would take into account the population and sample which comprises of 6 coaches, 10 monitors, and 75 students of the category. The sample was under direct observation technique. As an instrument, the survey and a closed questionnaire was applied. Later on, the processing and tabulation alternative hypothesis was accepted. It was expressed as conclusions that the basic technical foundations in this category are determined by the work of dribbling, shooting ring tray, chest pass, and defense as predominant elements. It appears that the level of the basic technical fundamentals on student is regular, which is due to inadequate training and poor methods in the teaching process

Reimplantable Microdrive for Long-Term Chronic Extracellular Recordings in Freely Moving Rats

Extracellular recordings of electrical activity in freely moving rats are fundamental to understand brain function in health and disease. Such recordings require a small-size, lightweight device that includes movable electrodes (microdrive) to record either a new set of neurons every day or the same set of neurons over time. Ideally, microdrives should be easy to implant, allowing precise and smooth displacement of electrodes. The main caveat of most commercially available microdrives is their relatively short half-life span, in average ranging from weeks to a month. For most experiments, recording days–weeks is sufficient, but when the experiment depends on training animals for several months, it is crucial to develop new approaches. Here, we present a low-cost, reusable, and reimplantable device design as a solution to extend chronic recordings to long-term. This device is composed of a baseplate that is permanently fixed to the rodent’s skull, as well as a reusable and replaceable microdrive that can be attached and detached from the baseplate, allowing its implantation and reimplantation. Reimplanting this microdrive is particularly convenient when no clear neuronal signal is present, or when the signal gradually decays across days. Our microdrive incorporates a mechanism for moving a 16 tungsten-wire bundle within a small (∼15 mm3) lightweight device (∼4 g). We present details of the design, manufacturing, and assembly processes. As a proof of concept, we show that recordings of the nucleus accumbens core (NAcc) in a freely behaving rat are stable over a month. Additionally, during a lever-press task, we found, as expected, that NAc single-unit activity was associated with rewarded lever presses. Furthermore, we also show that NAc shell (NAcSh) responses evoked by freely licking for sucrose, consistent with our previously published results, were conserved from a first implant to a second microdrive reimplant in the same rat, notably showing reimplantation is possible without overtly affecting the functional responses of the area of interest. In sum, here we present a novel microdrive design (low-cost, small size, and light weight) that can be used for long-term chronic recordings and reimplanted in freely behaving rats

Aedes albopictus appearance in epizootic areas of jungle yellw fever in south-eastern and southern regions of Brazil (Diptera; Culicidae)

Durante estudo biológico e ecológico sobre mosquitos levado a cabo em área com registro de epidemia de febre amarela silvestre e epizootia em macacos, foram encontrados adultos de Aedes Albopictus. A tendência da espécie para invadir ambiente extradomiciliar potencializa a chance de infecção natural, ao tempo em que evolui para formar um elo entre focos naturais de vírus e o ambiente urbano. Esta Nota Técnica representa um alerta aos gestores dos três poderes públicos sobre perspectivas de mudanças no perfil epidemiológico atual da febre amarela no BrasilDuring biological and ecological study on mosquitoes carried out on area with registers of epidemic of jungle yellow fever and monkey epizootic were found some adults of Aedes albopictus. The tendency of this species to invade the extra-domicile environment brings out the possibility of natural infection, and at the same time evolving to form a link between natural focus of the virus and the urban environment. This Technical Note represents an alert to the three government levels about the perspectives of changes in the actual epidemiological profile of yellow fever in Brazi

Improving Fingerprint Verification Using Minutiae Triplets

Improving fingerprint matching algorithms is an active and important research area in fingerprint recognition. Algorithms based on minutia triplets, an important matcher family, present some drawbacks that impact their accuracy, such as dependency to the order of minutiae in the feature, insensitivity to the reflection of minutiae triplets, and insensitivity to the directions of the minutiae relative to the sides of the triangle. To alleviate these drawbacks, we introduce in this paper a novel fingerprint matching algorithm, named M3gl. This algorithm contains three components: a new feature representation containing clockwise-arranged minutiae without a central minutia, a new similarity measure that shifts the triplets to find the best minutiae correspondence, and a global matching procedure that selects the alignment by maximizing the amount of global matching minutiae. To make M3gl faster, it includes some optimizations to discard non-matching minutia triplets without comparing the whole representation. In comparison with six verification algorithms, M3gl achieves the highest accuracy in the lowest matching time, using FVC2002 and FVC2004 databases

Improving the serodiagnosis of canine Leishmania infantum infection in geographical areas of Brazil with different disease prevalence

Serodiagnosis of Leishmania infantum infection in dogs relies on the detection of antibodies against leishmanial crude extracts or parasitic defined antigens. The expansion of canine leishmaniasis from geographical areas of Brazil in which the infection is endemic to regions in which the disease is emerging is occurring. This fact makes necessary the analysis of the serodiagnostic capabilities of different leishmanial preparations in distinct geographical locations. In this article sera from dogs infected with Leishmania and showing the clinical form of the disease, were collected in three distinct Brazilian States and were tested against soluble leishmanial antigens or seven parasite individual antigens produced as recombinant proteins. We show that the recognition of soluble leishmanial antigens by sera from these animals was influenced by the geographical location of the infected dogs. Efficacy of the diagnosis based on this crude parasite preparation was higher in newly endemic regions when compared with areas of high disease endemicity. We also show that the use of three of the recombinant proteins, namely parasite surface kinetoplastid membrane protein of 11 kDa (KMP-11), and two members of the P protein family (P2a and P0), can improve the degree of sensitivity without adversely affecting the specificity of the diagnostic assays for canine leishmaniasis, independently of the geographical area of residence. In addition, sera from dogs clinically healthy but infected were also assayed with some of the antigen preparations. We demonstrate that the use of these proteins can help to the serodiagnosis of Leishmania infected animals with subclinical infections. Finally, we propose a diagnostic protocol using a combination of KMP-11, P2a y P0, together with total leishmanial extractsThis work was supported by the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (Brazil) within the call“CNPq/MS/SCTIE/DECIT N° 32/2014 - Pesquisas sobre Leishmanioses”grant number reference 467389/2014-4. Institutional grants from the Fundación Ramón Areces and Banco de Santander to the CBMSO are also acknowledged. TC received scholarship from Fundação de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado de Santa Catarina–FAPES