A uniqueness and regularity criterion for Q-tensor models with Neumann boundary conditions

We give a regularity criterion for a $Q$-tensor system modeling a nematic Liquid Crystal, under homogeneous Neumann boundary conditions for the tensor $Q$. Starting of a criterion only imposed on the velocity field ${\bf u}$ two results are proved; the uniqueness of weak solutions and the global in time weak regularity for the time derivative $(\partial_t {\bf u},\partial_t Q)$. This paper extends the work done in [F. Guill\'en-Gonz\'alez, M.A. Rodr\'iguez-Bellido \& M.A. Rojas-Medar, Sufficient conditions for regularity and uniqueness of a 3D nematic liquid crystal model, Math. Nachr. 282 (2009), no. 6, 846-867] for a nematic Liquid Crystal model formulated in $({\bf u},{\bf d})$, where ${\bf d}$ denotes the orientation vector of the liquid crystal molecules.Comment: 13 page

Employability skills developed by non-traditional students along their undergraduate program

This paper was developed in the context of the European project EMPLOY (Enhancing the employability of non-traditional students in higher education, Erasmus Plus Program 2015-2017), a qualitative, interdisciplinary and biographical research focusing on nontraditional university students and graduates from six European countries (Sweden, Poland, United Kingdom, Ireland, Portugal and Spain). The project aims are, among others: a) to understand the employability from the perspective of students and graduates; b) to increase knowledge and understanding of the factors that promote or hinder employability; c) to explore the impact of age, gender, social class, ethnicity and disability in employment prospects of students; etc. In spite of the fact that university graduates are in better conditions when accessing to the labor market, non-traditional students might experience special difficulties related to their specific characteristics. We lack of disaggregated information related to employment rates for higher education graduates and there is not specific research which deepens in the transition process of non-traditional groups. Our study is concerned with identifying which employability skills have been developed by non-traditional students during their stay at the University of Seville. For this purpose we consider the formal learning associated to their syllabuses, the extracurricular training they have been involved in, as well as the previous work experiences. We have carried out seven biographical in-depth interviews with students of the University of Seville (4 females, 3 males), all of them studying degrees in different areas of knowledge: Pedagogy, Philosophy, Mechanical Engineering, Pharmacy, Biology and Business Management. All participants were in the final year of their undergraduate program. In addition, all of them represented different characteristics of non-traditional students: adult and mature students (3), immigrants (2) and learners with low economic and cultural capital (2). As for the results and following the classification of professional competences raised by Bunk (1994), we note that through the university syllabuses students developed the methodological competence, that is the reaction from previous experiences and problem solving skills. However, work experience and extracurricular activities promoted social competence, one that enables them to collaborate with others in a communicative and constructive way, showing interpersonal understanding. In addition, in the three training fields, the specific skills or qualifications of the job, technical competence, were also developed. Finally, it can be noted that in the three areas considered in our analysis, there is a lack in the development of the participatory competence, which refers to coordination and organisational skills, leadership and ability to make decisions and take responsibility.Unión Europea 2014-1-UK01-KA203-00184

Liaison interpreting as a discipline of specialization: training and research perspectives

En las últimas décadas la interpretación bilateral ha ido cobrando relevancia y visibilidad, siendo hoy una de las disciplinas caracterizadoras de los planes de estudio y ciclos de formación en el ámbito de las ciencias de la mediación lingüístico-cultural (con la traducción y la interpretación como protagonistas). Para esta ocasión, y desde el binomio idiomático español–italiano, proponemos presentar la interpretación bilateral que impartimos en la Sslmit de la Universidad de Bolonia, fruto de los casi 20 años de experiencia en el ejercicio profesional de dicha disciplina, estudios dedicados a la misma y su docencia, una interpretación bilateral concebida como un complejo aparato instrumental capaz de afrontar la especialización diversificada existente en el mercadoDuring the last decades liaison interpreting has been gaining increasing importance and visibility, and has nowadays become one of the main subjects (with translation and conference interpreting as protagonists) of study programs and training courses in the field of language and culture mediation. In this respect, on the Spanish-Italian language combination, I would like to present the liaison interpreting courses we hold at *Sslmit* of the University of Bologna, the result of almost 20 years of experience as professional liaison interpreter, researcher on the subject as well as trainer. Liaison interpreting is conceived in training planning as a complex set of tools aiming at facing and resolving the existing diversified specialization in the interpreting market and the multifaceted problems arising from our current society

Porous Bodies in Mumbai: An Analysis of the Urban Landscape in Rohinton Mistry’s Novels

Rohinton Mistry’s work mainly focuses on the life of the marginalized and their struggle to survive against human ambition and political corruption, and Mumbai is frequently the meeting point of many of his characters. In this paper, I analyze the writer’s conception of the urban landscape from an ecocritical perspective, applying material ecocriticism’s theories and exploring the city as a porous body. Cities are compounds of matter and energy in mutual transformation with human and non-human beings, living and non-living matter (Alaimo 2008, Tuana 2008, Iovino 2014). Through the application of the concept of porosity, I show how Mistry’s characters are directly affected by what happens in the city. The city, on the other side, is also deeply transformed by human ambition, the tyranny of those in power, and the dirtiness and chaos resulting from social abuse

Optimal bilinear control problem related to a chemo-repulsion system in 2D domains

In this paper we study a bilinear optimal control problem associated to a chemo-repulsion model with linear production term. We analyze the existence, uniqueness and regularity of pointwise strong solutions in a bidimensional domain. We prove the existence of an optimal solution and, using a Lagrange multipliers theorem, we derive first-order optimality conditions

Disfuncionalidad familiar y violencia escolar de los estudiantes de básica primaria de la Asociación Colegio Militar Almirante Colón de Cartagena - Bolívar

El presente trabajo tiene como objetivo establecer la relación entre la disfuncionalidad familiar y violencia escolar en los estudiantes de Básica Primaria de la Asociación Colegio Militar Almirante Colón de Cartagena - Bolívar. Para ello, la metodología se enmarca en una investigación con un enfoque cualitativo y de tipo descriptivo. Se recurrió a fuentes de información primarias y secundarias; se trabaja con una población estudiantil de la Básica Primaria Asociación Colegio Militar Almirante Colón de Cartagena - Bolívar, que oscilan entre 7 a 11 años, que han manifestado problemas de violencia escolar en la escuela. Los objetivos establecidos en el presente trabajo son en primer lugar determinar la existencia de disfunción familiar en la vida de los estudiantes, también categorizar los comportamientos de violencia escolar de los estudiantes y establecer relación con la disfunción familiar identificada. Finalmente, se proponen estrategias pedagógicas para mejorar el ambiente familiar, con el fin de minimizar la incidencia de la disfuncionalidad familiar y disminuir la violencia escolar de los estudiantes. Para dar respuesta a los objetivos planteados se utilizó como instrumento de investigación una serie de entrevistas a los docentes, los directivos del colegio y a los padres de familia de los estudiantes que presentan conductas de violencia en la escuela. Adicionalmente, mediante observación directa se evidenció cómo en las aulas y fuera de estas los estudiantes presentan conductas de violencia que van desde agresiones verbales y físicas que podrían afectar el proceso de enseñanza aprendizaje en los estudiantes de básica primaria. Palabras clave: escolar, violencia, familia, disfuncionalidadIncluye referencias bibliográficas (páginas 75-82) y anexo

The Overflow of Contained Emotions in Anita Rau Badami's The Hero's Walk : An Analysis of Affects through the Imagery of Water

In this article, Anita Rau Badami's second novel, The Hero's Walk (2000), is analysed through the perspective of the field of affects. This analysis examines how the author, through the imagery of water, presents the non-physical reality of feelings and emotions. Water is the most receptive of the elements, a source of continuous, intimate and transitory metamorphoses. In the form of storms, floods, and other types of natural phenomena related to this element, it is possible to observe how Badami makes use of a metaphorical conceptualisation of intense emotional states related to the psychological trauma that arises from the loss of a loved one. For the purpose of analysis, several important sources in the field of affect theory and water symbolism will be considered. Special emphasis will also be placed on the body (and the house as an integral extension of it) as a receptacle for contained emotions in the processing of pain.El presente artículo tiene como objetivo analizar la segunda novela de Anita Rau Badami, The Hero's Walk (2000) desde el ámbito de los afectos, estudiando cómo la autora, a través de la imaginería del agua, presenta la realidad no física de los sentimientos y las emociones. El agua es el más receptivo de los elementos, fuente de continuas metamorfosis íntimas y transitorias. En forma de tormentas, inundaciones y otros tipos de fenómenos naturales relacionados con este elemento, observamos cómo Badami hace uso de una conceptualización metafórica de intensos estados emocionales relacionados con el trauma psicológico derivado de la pérdida de un ser querido. Para el análisis se tendrán en cuenta diversas fuentes de gran relevancia en el campo de la teoría de los afectos y el simbolismo del agua como forma de expresar las emociones. Asimismo, se hará también especial hincapié en el cuerpo (y la casa como extensión del mismo) como receptáculo de emociones contenidas en el encausamiento del dolor

Indoor Air Quality Assessment: Comparison of Ventilation Scenarios for Retrofitting Classrooms in a Hot Climate

Current energy e ciency policies in buildings foster the promotion of energy retrofitting of the existing stock. In southern Spain, the most extensive public sector is that of educational buildings, which is especially subject to significant internal loads due to high occupancy. A large fraction of the energy retrofit strategies conducted to date have focused on energy aspects and indoor thermal comfort, repeatedly disregarding indoor air quality criteria. This research assesses indoor air quality in a school located in the Mediterranean area, with the objective of promoting di erent ventilation scenarios, based on occupancy patterns and carbon dioxide levels monitored on site. Results show that manual ventilation cannot guarantee minimum indoor quality levels following current standards. A constant ventilation based on CO2 levels allows 15% more thermal comfort hours a year to be reached, compared to CO2-based optimized demand-controlled ventilation. Nevertheless, the latter ensures 35% annual energy savings, compared to a constant CO2-based ventilation, and 37% more annual energy savings over that of a constant ventilation rate of outdoor air per person

Efficiently Storing Well-Composed Polyhedral Complexes Computed Over 3D Binary Images

A 3D binary image I can be naturally represented by a combinatorial-algebraic structure called cubical complex and denoted by Q(I ), whose basic building blocks are vertices, edges, square faces and cubes. In Gonzalez-Diaz et al. (Discret Appl Math 183:59–77, 2015), we presented a method to “locally repair” Q(I ) to obtain a polyhedral complex P(I ) (whose basic building blocks are vertices, edges, specific polygons and polyhedra), homotopy equivalent to Q(I ), satisfying that its boundary surface is a 2D manifold. P(I ) is called a well-composed polyhedral complex over the picture I . Besides, we developed a new codification system for P(I ), encoding geometric information of the cells of P(I ) under the form of a 3D grayscale image, and the boundary face relations of the cells of P(I ) under the form of a set of structuring elements. In this paper, we build upon (Gonzalez-Diaz et al. 2015) and prove that, to retrieve topological and geometric information of P(I ), it is enough to store just one 3D point per polyhedron and hence neither grayscale image nor set of structuring elements are needed. From this “minimal” codification of P(I ), we finally present a method to compute the 2-cells in the boundary surface of P(I ).Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad MTM2015-67072-

Encoding Specific 3D Polyhedral Complexes Using 3D Binary Images

We build upon the work developed in [4] in which we presented a method to “locally repair” the cubical complex Q(I) associated to a 3D binary image I, to obtain a “well-composed” polyhedral complex P(I), homotopy equivalent to Q(I). There, we developed a new codification system for P(I), called ExtendedCubeMap (ECM) representation, that encodes: (1) the (geometric) information of the cells of P(I) (i.e., which cells are presented and where), under the form of a 3D grayscale image gP ; (2) the boundary face relations between the cells of P(I), under the form of a set BP of structuring elements. In this paper, we simplify ECM representations, proving that geometric and topological information of cells can be encoded using just a 3D binary image, without the need of using colors or sets of structuring elements. We also outline a possible application in which well-composed polyhedral complexes can be useful.Junta de Andalucía FQM-369Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad MTM2012-32706Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad MTM2015-67072-