High-Temperature Superconducting Level Meter for Liquid Argon Detectors

Capacitive devices are customarily used as probes to measure the level of noble liquids in detectors operated for neutrino studies and dark matter searches. In this work we describe the use of a high-temperature superconducting material as an alternative to control the level of a cryogenic noble liquid. Lab measurements indicate that the superconductor shows a linear behaviour, a high degree of stability and offers a very accurate determination of the liquid volume. This device is therefore a competitive instrument and shows several advantages over conventional level meters.Comment: 13 pages, 11 figures. Accepted for publication in JINS

Making decisions for frost prediction in agricultural crops in a softcomputing framework

© 2020. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ This document is the Accepted version of a Published Work that appeared in final form in Computers and Electronics in Agriculture. To access the final edited and published work see https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2020.105587Nowadays, there are many areas of daily life that can obtain benefit from technological advances and the large amounts of information stored. One of these areas is agriculture, giving place to precision agriculture. Frosts in crops are among the problems that precision agriculture tries to solve because produce great economic losses to farmers. The problem of early detection of frost is a process that involves a large amount of wheather data. However, the use of these data, both for the classification and regression task, must be carried out in an adequate way to obtain an inference with quality. A preprocessing of them is carried out in order to obtain a dataset grouping attributes that refer to the same measure in a single attribute expressed by a fuzzy value. From these fuzzy time series data we must use techniques for data analysis that are capable of manipulating them. Therefore, first a regression technique based on k-nearest neighbors in a Soft Computing framework is proposed that can deal with fuzzy data, and second, this technique and others to classification are used for the early detection of a frost from data obtained from different weather stations in the Region of Murcia (south-east Spain) with the aim of decrease the damages that these frosts can cause in crops. From the models obtained, an interpretation of the provided information is performed and the most relevant set of attributes is obtained for the anticipated prediction of a frost and of the temperature value. Several experiments are carried out on the datasets to obtain the models with the best performance in the prediction validating the results by means of a statistical analysis

The landscape of fear: Why some free-ranging rodents choose repeated live-trapping over predation risk and how it is associated with the physiological stress response

Live trapping is an essential element of field ecological studies. However, the act of trapping provides two types of conditional benefits (food from the bait when hungry, and refuge from a predator when threatened) against one type of drawback (confinement). Our understanding of how animals assess the two benefits against the lone risk determines how we interpret classic field studies in chemical ecology and wildlife management. Here, we studied wood mice responses to these risks and rewards of field trapping by examining experience through recapture and faecal corticosterone metabolites (FCM) as a physiological response indicator. Wood mice were live-trapped in two different plots subjected to two distinct phases: phase 1, absence of predator cues, and phase 2, in which traps were treated with red fox faeces. During phase 1, the recapture percentage was lower indicating that mice avoided traps while FCM levels in recaptured mice were higher. On the contrary, during phase 2, despite the total number of captures was lower we found an increase in the recapture percentage and FCM levels did not increase in recaptured mice. Our results suggest that under increased risk perception traps could be likely considered as a suitable shelter and thus, for some individuals the benefits of traps may outweigh their risks. In addition, we discovered that the effects of combining two stressors do not result in the addition of the response originated by each factor separatelyThis research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors

Psychometric properties of the mindfulness in teaching scale among Spanish teachers

Mindfulness in the educational field provides several benefits. The assessment of mindfulness is a fundamental previous step for evidence-based interventions. Therefore, the present study aimed to adapt and validate the Mindfulness in Teaching Scale (MTS) among Spanish teachers. This scale comprises 14 items on two dimensions: intrapersonal and interpersonal. The sample comprised 398 teachers (31% males, 68% females) whose ages ranged from 25 to 69 years (M = 44.14; SD = 10.16). Once the scale was adapted in Spanish, we examined its psychometric properties. To do so, we conducted a Confirmatory Factor analysis (CFA), which supported the two-factor structure. As evidence for validity, the MTS scores correlated with perceived teaching self-efficacy. The reliability values using Cronbach’s alpha were good. This scale has adequate psychometric properties and is useful for assessing mindfulness among Spanish teachers. We discuss its implications for the education field

Crown vessels and shiny white structures in dermoscopy of histoid leprosy

INTRODUCTION Leprosy is a chronic granulomatous infection caused by Mycobacterium leprae with varied clinical presentations. Owing to its low incidence, together with its myriad clinical presentations, leprosy poses a diagnostic challenge and can easily be confused with other infective and noninfective granulomatous dermatoses.1 Dermoscopy is a simple and noninvasive technique that is widely used for the diagnosis and monitoring of melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancers and many inflammatory disorders. However, the utility of this technique for the diagnosis of granulomatous diseases has only recently been demonstrated.2 Although dermoscopy shows diagnostically useful patterns in infections and inflammatory diseases with granulomatous presentations, the dermoscopic features of leprosy are poorly documented in the literature. CASE REPORT A 45-year-old Moroccan man who lived in Spain for many years, but frequently visited his country of origin, was seen at the dermatology service for skin lesions on the trunk and upper and lower extremities. The lesions, which appeared 5 years earlier, were progressive in nature, caused intense itching, and were treated with topical corticosteroids and oral antihistamines without improvement. The patient had undergone analyses 3 years earlier, but no..

Fabrication of luminescent nanostructures by electron-beam direct writing of PMMA resist

We report on the conversion of non-luminescent conventional poly(methylmethacrylate) (PMMA)-based electron-beam resists into luminescent materials when used as negative-tone resists, that is, when exposed to high electron irradiation doses. Raman spectroscopy reveals the chemical transformation induced by electron irradiation which is responsible for the observed luminescence in the visible (blue) region. The emission intensity from exposed PMMA-based patterns can be controlled by the electron irradiation dose employed to create them

Cultural dynamism and business vitality in medium-sized cities—evidence and proposals for sustainable development

This work uses tools recently designed to conduct analyses and proposals around the cultural development of medium-sized cities. The Cultural and Creative Cities Monitor model, or CCCM, is first applied to the 81 cities in Spain with between 50, 000 and 100, 000 inhabitants. We also refer to the UNESCO Culture/2030 Indicators, specifically indicator 8 (Cultural companies), to in-vestigate whether cultural dynamism is related to business vitality in those cities. Our observation of the 29 CCCM indicators and the C3 index, which synthesizes cultural performance, is explained, and these data are complemented with cultural business data (on assets, benefits, and jobs) from a sample of 13, 204 firms. The C3 index values reveal significant differences in the cultural and creative performance of the selected cities according to their location (metropolitan or non-metropolitan) and their administrative rank. Moreover, when comparing the C3 index with the indicators on business activity, evidence indicates a clear positive relationship between cultural dynamism and firm vitality. These results support the contribution of culture to the sustainable development of me-dium-sized Spanish cities and further establish the suitability of the tools used to assist cities in designing appropriate cultural policies

Testing the interaction of dark energy to dark matter through the analysis of virial relaxation of clusters Abell Clusters A586 and A1689 using realistic density profiles

Interaction between dark energy and dark matter is probed through deviation from the virial equilibrium for two relaxed clusters: A586 and A1689. The evaluation of the virial equilibrium is performed using realistic density profiles. The virial ratios found for the more realistic density profiles are consistent with the absence of interaction.Comment: 16pp 1 fig; accepted by GeR