Teachers’ satisfaction as indicator of education system performance

We investigate the potential trade-off between some teacher characteristics, particularly teachers’ satisfaction, and different measures of pupils’ performance, in order to optimize the outputs of the Spanish education system. Our contribution to the existing literature is twofold: on the one hand, we provide estimates on the balance between teachers’ effectiveness and 4th grade students’ performance in Spain, by using recent survey data (TIMSS, 2011); on the other hand we implement a novel methodology which allows optimizing simultaneously a set of indicators on the outputs of the educational system. These analyses provide empirical evidence of the importance of investing in teacher satisfaction as a motivation mechanism for improving national educational achievement.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech. This research has been partially supported by the Andalusian Regional Ministry of Innovation, Science and Enterprise (PAI group SEJ-532). We also acknowledge the research funding provided by Andalucía-Tech (Universidad de Malaga),the Research Plan of the University of Malaga (Capacity Building Programme I+D+i of Universities 2014-2015, FEDER Funds) and by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of Spain (Research Project ECO2014-56397-P). Luis Alejandro Lopez-Agudo also acknowledges the research training provided by the “Programa de Doctorado en Economía y Empresa de la Universidad de Malaga”

Hipoacusia neurosensorial. Propuesta terapéutica alternativa en sujetos que no pueden acceder al implante coclear: lectura labial.

El presente documento ha sido elaborado como Trabajo Fin de Grado de Logopedia. El motivo del mismo es lograr concienciar a los profesionales de que nunca un paciente debe adaptarse a un método de intervención logopédico. Por ello, en los distintos puntos que componen este trabajo se busca adaptar una propuesta de intervención (entrenamiento labiolector) a un caso concreto (hipoacusia neurosensorial) teniendo en cuenta sus déficits y necesidades. A su vez se expondrán las limitaciones de la lectura labial y los recursos facilitadores que se pueden emplear para solventarlas: palabra complementada, dactilología y Autocuer.Grado en Logopedi

How to reach compromises in life satisfaction: a conflicting and multidimensional task

Recent concerns around the importance of job and life satisfaction on firms’ productivity have been brought to the policy debate in the European Union. Irrespective of the numerous scientific publications that have been studying the main determinants of workers’ life satisfaction, a gap remains on how to grasp compromises between these. The importance of finding such compromises can be particularly relevant, in face of the multiple factors, seldom intertwined and at the same time conflicting, which have a well-known influence on workers’ well-being. Therefore, policymakers should be supported with sound methodological tools to help them shape policies that will further promote workers’ life satisfaction. With this reasoning in mind, we have developed a multiobjective interval programming model through the use of econometric techniques, where four different workers’ life satisfaction determinants (i.e. satisfaction with education, present work, family life and social life) are viewed as objective functions. Furthermore, we have made a separate assessment of the factors that have an influence on life satisfaction for both genders, because of the discrepancies that might arise with this regard. Overall, we were able to conclude that female workers usually have to devote more time to their work than men to get the highest levels of satisfaction regardless of the features under evaluation. Additionally, having one child is sufficient to obtain the highest levels of well-being both for female and male workers. One of the possible implications of these findings is that the existing work-family priorities are clearly not in line with the current falling birth rates all over Europe. Thus, new supportive workplace policies should be in place that could change people’s priorities regarding their work and family life.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad under research project ECO2017-88883-R PAI group SEJ-532 Fundação para a Ciência e aTecnologia (FCT) under project grant UID/MULTI/00308/201

Ictiólogos de la Argentina : Norberto Oscar Oldani

Fil: López, Hugo Luis. División Zoología Vertebrados. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. Universidad Nacional de La Plata; ArgentinaFil: Baigún, Claudio Rafael Mariano. Instituto Tecnológico de Chascomús (IIB-INTECH). Universidad Nacional de General San Martín; Chascomús; ArgentinaFil: Ponte Gómez, Justina. División Zoología Vertebrados. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. Universidad Nacional de La Plata; Argentin

Chaos-based true random number generators

Random number (bit) generators are crucial to secure communications, data transfer and storage, and electronic transactions, to carry out stochastic simulations and to many other applications. As software generated random sequences are not truly random, fast entropy sources such as quantum systems or classically chaotic systems can be viable alternatives provided they generate high-quality random sequences sufficiently fast. The discovery of spontaneous chaos in semiconductor superlattices at room temperature has produced a valuable nanotechnology option. Here we explain a mathematical model to describe spontaneous chaos in semiconductor superlattices at room temperature, solve it numerically to reveal the origin and characteristics of chaotic oscillations, and discuss the limitations of the model in view of known experiments. We also explain how to extract verified random bits from the analog chaotic signal produced by the superlattice.This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad grants FIS2011-28838-C02-01 and MTM2014-56948-C2-2-P

Madrid, villa y corte, ante la Peste de Valencia de 1647-1648

Peer reviewe

Biogeographical revision of Argentina (Andean and Neotropical Regions): an analysis using freshwater fishes

The following zoogeographic provinces are proposed for Argentine freshwater fish fauna following the International Code of Area Nomenclature: Andean Cuyan, Patagonian, Aymaran, Great Rivers and Pampean. The former two are placed within the Andean Subregion of the Austral Region, and the latter three within the Neotropical Subregion of the Holotropical Region. These provinces, based on results coinciding with PAE and cluster analysis, represent the first classification of Argentine provinces based on objective methods. Some small regions of endemism and some localities remain separated from the proposed regions. The new scheme includes valuable empirical information from previous schemes, and is in agreement with ecological zones and other environmental arrangements proposed earlier.Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Muse

First ground penetrating radar survey on Monte Perdido glacier (Pyrenees)

Producción CientíficaThe project “The Monte Perdido Glacier: Monitoring the glacial dynamic and the associated cryospheric processes as indicators of global change” (National Park´s 2013 Fund) aims to study the recent dynamic and degradation of this ice mass, using geomatic and geophysical techniques in order to estimate thickness and potential volumetric variations. We present the first ground penetrating radar survey, carried out on the northwest section of the lower Monte Perdido Glacier. The survey was conducted along a 270 m transect, using three antennas of different frequencies -500, 200 and 50 MHz- that enabled us to study the glacier´s structure at various maximum depths and spatial resolutions. The results show a first section composed by several seasonal snow layers (2015-2016 winter and spring), a clear snow/ice transition layer, an ice layer and a final basal zone characterised by typical sub-glacial till sediments.Ministerio de Agricultura y Pesca, Alimentación y Medio Ambiente (project 844/2013)Junta de Extremadura - Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional (grant GR15107

Jaw tissues segmentation in dental 3D CT images using fuzzy-connectedness and morphological processing

The success of oral surgery is subject to accurate advanced planning. In order to properly plan for dental surgery or a suitable implant placement, it is necessary an accurate segmentation of the jaw tissues: the teeth, the cortical bone, the trabecular core and over all, the inferior alveolar nerve. This manuscript presents a new automatic method that is based on fuzzy connectedness object extraction and mathematical morphology processing. The method uses computed tomography data to extract different views of the jaw: a pseudo-orthopantomographic view to estimate the path of the nerve and cross-sectional views to segment the jaw tissues. The method has been tested in a groundtruth set consisting of more than 9000 cross-sections from 20 different patients and has been evaluated using four similarity indicators (the Jaccard index, Dice's coefficient, point-to-point and point-to-curve distances), achieving promising results in all of them (0.726 ± 0.031, 0.840 ± 0.019, 0.144 ± 0.023 mm and 0.163 ± 0.025 mm, respectively). The method has proven to be significantly automated and accurate, with errors around 5% (of the diameter of the nerve), and is easily integrable in current dental planning systems. © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd.This work has been supported by the project MIRACLE (DPI2007-66782-C03-01-AR07) of Spanish Ministerio de Educacion y Ciencia.Llorens Rodríguez, R.; Naranjo Ornedo, V.; López-Mir, F.; Alcañiz Raya, ML. (2012). Jaw tissues segmentation in dental 3D CT images using fuzzy-connectedness and morphological processing. Computer Methods and Programs in Biomedicine. 108(2):832-843. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmpb.2012.05.014832843108