The retrieval of moving images at Spanish film archives: the oversight of content analysis

In the field of library and information science, content analysis is a crucial task for an effective retrieval of information by users at an archive. In this research, we analyse the current state of this task and the possibilities of retrieval of film information at six Spanish important film archives, interviewing their responsible librarians for film cataloguing and comparing the content fields inside their film cataloguing records used by each one of these six organizations

Reseña de "La narrativa de Miguel Ángel Asturias: una revisión crítica" de Saúl Hurtado Heras

Dentro de la literatura es frecuente encontrarnos con estudios que, lejos de fortalecer al autor con su obra literaria, lo condenan al olvido, al rechazo o a la exaltación de lugares comunes apreciados por la crítica. Pero si pensamos que tanto la vitalidad de la obra literaria como la vigencia del autor radican en la capacidad de la crítica de instrumentar y hacer viable desde el discurso literario un abordaje de la realidad, entenderemos por qué una obra perdurará y tomará mayor fuerza pese a las adversidades del tiempo y otras circunstancias contextuales. Ejemplo de ello es Miguel Ángel Asturias, quien en los últimos años refrenda una revitalización en su producción artística por la cantidad y calidad de estudios críticos sobre su trabajo literario. Pues este escritor guatemalteco ofrece un abanico de aportes que pueden ser apreciados desde diferentes ángulos, ya sea desde la crítica literaria, la visión sociológica, el enfoque antropológico o la tan degustada lingüística. De tal forma que para referirnos al trabajo de Miguel Ángel Asturias requiere, por principio de cuentas, un verdadero interés y conocimiento respecto a su producción artística

Applying stress-testing on value at risk (VaR) methodologies

In recent years, Value at Risk (VaR) methodologies, i. e., Parametric VaR, Historical Simulation and the Monte Carlo Simulation have experienced spectacular growth within the new regulatory framework which is Basle II. Moreover, complementary analyses such a Stress-testing and Back-testing have also demonstrated their usefulness for financial risk managers. In this paper, we develop an empirical Stress-Testing exercise by using two historical scenarios of crisis. In particular, we analyze the impact of the 11-S attacks (2001) and the Latin America crisis (2002) on the level of risk, previously calculated by different statistical methods. Consequently, we have selected a Spanish stock portfolio in order to focus on market risk

Large Amplitude Harmonic Driving of Highly Coherent Flux Qubits

The device for the Josephson flux qubit (DJFQ) can be considered as a solid state artificial atom with multiple energy levels. When a large amplitude harmonic excitation is applied to the system, transitions at the energy levels avoided crossings produce visible changes in the qubit population over many driven periods that are accompanied by a rich pattern of interference phenomena. We present a Floquet treatment of the periodically time-dependent Schr\"odinger equation of the strongly driven qubit beyond the standard two levels approach. For low amplitudes, the average probability of a given sign of the persistent current qubit exhibits, as a function of the static flux detuning and the driving amplitude, Landau-Zener-St\"uckelberg interference patterns that evolve into complex diamond-like patterns for large amplitudes. In the case of highly coherent flux qubits we find that the higher order diamonds can not be simply described relying on a two-level approximations. In addition we propose a new spectroscopic method based on starting the system in the first excited state instead of in the ground state, which can give further information on the energy level spectrum and dynamics in the case of highly coherent flux qubits. We compare our numerical results with recent experiments that perform amplitude spectroscopy to probe the energy spectrum of the artificial atom.Comment: 12 Pages and 12 Figures Phys. Rev. B (in press

Recycling of construction and demolition waste generated by building infrastructure for the production of glassy materials

The use of waste materials generated by construction and demolition industry to yield valuable glassy materials, i.e. enamel for glazed ceramic tiles and cellular glasses is presented in this study. Both types of materials are produced by one-step treatment at moderate temperatures after simple waste chemical composition adjust. The enamels are manufactured directly from the initial waste powder by melting, while the expanded materials result from mixing of the vitreous material obtained after waste vitrification with an adequate foaming agent and posterior thermal treatment. Through the manuscript the feasibility of one step production of second generation profit materials is discussed in order to help achieving sustainable development and environmental protectio

Sustainability drivers, barriers and outcomes: Evidence from European High Performance Manufacturing Industries

Implementing sustainability practices has become a requirement to be able to operate in several markets since the legal requirements are increasing and society (as well as customers) values sustainability behaviors more. The aims of this paper are (1) to analyze the impact that drivers and barriers have on Environmental practices implemented in the high performance manufacturing industries, (2) to identify the relevant drivers and barriers for these environmental practices, and finally, (3) to study the influence that Environmental practices have on companies´ Financial Performance. To carry out our research, we shall consider a European database of companies involved in the High Performance Manufacturing project. Partial Least Squares (PLS) will be used to test our hypotheses

Locally Minimal Topological Groups 2

We continue in this paper the study of locally minimal groups started in \cite{LocMin}. The minimality criterion for dense subgroups of compact groups is extended to local minimality. Using this criterion we characterize the compact abelian groups containing dense countable locally minimal subgroups, as well as those containing dense locally minimal subgroups of countable free-rank. We also characterize the compact abelian groups whose torsion part is dense and locally minimal. We call a topological group $G$ {\it almost minimal} if it has a closed, minimal normal subgroup $N$ such that the quotient group $G/N$ is uniformly free from small subgroups. The class of almost minimal groups includes all locally compact groups, and is contained in the class of locally minimal groups. On the other hand, we provide examples of countable precompact metrizable locally minimal groups which are not almost minimal. Some other significant properties of this new class are obtained