The never-ending story of compensations for regulatory changes: the Stadtwerke München arbitration

La alteración del régimen jurídico de la energía eléctrica a partir de fuentes renovables puede producir consecuencias negativas para las expectativas económicas y para las cuentas de resul­tados de las empresas que invirtieron en aquellas instalaciones, sobre todo cuando aquellos cambios regulatorios conllevan una rebaja en el precio de la electricidad allí generada. Ante dicha situación, producida en varios países, las empresas afectadas suelen ejercer acciones legales en demanda de in­demnización. En el caso de España, que adoptó un controvertido cambio de regulación en este campo, se han generado numerosos pleitos y procedimientos de arbitraje internacional, del que el caso que se analiza constituye su último exponente, y en el que se recogen unas cuestiones y planteamientos de ex­traordinaria importancia para el futuro de estos mecanismos resolutorios de conflictosRegulatory changes concerning the generation of electricity from renewable sources can produce negative consequences for the economic expectations and for the benefits of the companies that invested in that sector, especially when those regulatory changes lead to a reduction in the price of the electricity produced in those installations. In those cases, ocurring in several countries, the affected firms usually take legal actions in demand for compensation. In the case of Spain, which adopted a controver­sial regulatory change in this field, numerous lawsuits and international arbitrations have taken place. The case presented here constitutes the latest example of such trend and includes some questions and approaches of extraordinary importance for the future of these conflict resolution mechanisms

“Education Network” a new way to teach Chemistry

The complexity of chemistry has implications for the teaching of chemistry. That chemistry is a very complex subject. The majority of the students at University think that chemistry is a difficult discipline and they have difficulty in understanding the concepts. Moreover, students' interest in chemistry decreases the first year at university. The reason for this decrease might be that the contents of chemistry laboratory classes are boring, out of date and lacking of dynamism that students experience through visual media tools. For these reasons, new programs and methodologies should be developed. Those are based on making chemistry relevant through problem solving and collaborative learning hold promise for reforming chemistry education. It is about an education according to circumstances, which is adapted to context and virtual behaviour of people. It's time to CRUSH boredom by transforming your classroom into an Escape Room adventure. School-based escape games are a great teaching tool. The students while playing, learn. The most important point is that they won’t realize they’re doing both at the same time. In this work, an educational gamification experience based on the escape room concept was developed. The first (Do It Yourself) DIY Escape Room was built the year before at Mechanical Engineer Degree started, that took more than three weeks of work. It was presented to other professors to the same subject at different degrees. That DIY Escape Room was modified and adapted to each group. Each professor changed the clues, problems and so on in order to orientate the topic as much as possible to their students.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

The Presence of Precursors of Benign Pre-B Lymphoblasts (Hematogones) in the Bone Marrow of a Paediatric Patient with Cytomegalovirus Infection

Hematogones are normal B-lymphoid precursors that multiply in the bone marrow of small children and of adults with ferropenic anaemia, neuroblastoma or idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura. They are not normally found in peripheral blood, and the immunophenotype is virtually indistinguishable from that of B lymphoblasts. We discuss the case of a 3-month infant with an active cytomegalovirus infection, with hepatitis and pancytopenia associated with 13% hematogones in the bone marrow

Colloidal stability of gadolinium-doped ceria powder in aqueous and non-aqueous media

In this work the colloidal behaviour of Ce0.9Gd0.1O2-δ powder in aqueous and non-aqueous media (ethanol) is studied. Commercial powder was characterised by particle size distribution, specific surface area measurements, X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy. Diluted suspensions were characterised by particle size distribution and zeta potential, using dynamic light scattering and laser Doppler velocimetry principles, respectively. The solubility of the powder in water as a function of pH was analysed by inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry. Colloidal stability was studied as a function of pH, type and concentration of dispersants (polyacrylic-based deflocculant in water and a phosphate ester in ethanol). The time stability of the suspensions was analysed by multiple light scattering. The most stable suspension was obtained with a phosphate ester content of 2.0wt% in ethanol. Finally, preliminary coatings have been obtained by dip coating using concentrated suspensions, which could be accessible to industrial scale so that they can be used as interlayers in solid oxide fuel cells. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd.We would like to thank grants PSE-120000-2008-0040 and MAT2009-14324-C02-01, financed by the Spanish Government (Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación) and Feder Program of the European Community, and PI/116, financed by the Aragón Government.Peer Reviewe

Ac magnetic susceptibility of a molecular magnet submonolayer directly patterned onto a microSQUID sensor

We report the controlled integration, via Dip Pen Nanolithography, of monolayer dots of ferritin-based CoO nanoparticles (12 Bohr magnetons) into the most sensitive areas of a microSQUID sensor. The nearly optimum flux coupling between these nanomagnets and the microSQUID improves the achievable sensitivity by a factor 100, enabling us to measure the linear susceptibility of the molecular array down to very low temperatures (13 mK). This method opens the possibility of applying ac susceptibility experiments to characterize two-dimensional arrays of single molecule magnets within a wide range of temperatures and frequencies.Comment: 4 pages 3 figure

Elite coaches’ approach to quantifying technical actions and relative participation in volleyball players’ performance

This study sought to identify elite coaches’ perception of the importance of technical actions and the consideration of relative participation to measure individual volleyball players’ performance. An instrument was elaborated to gather the opinions of elite coaches on the importance of technical actions reported by the data volley (excluding setting), as well as considering relative participation. Twenty elite coaches with at least three years of experience in national teams or top leagues participated in the study. Variables considered in the study were analysed using descriptive statistics and reliability was measured with Cronbach’s α and McDonald’s Omega coefficients (> .70). The results assessed the importance of scoring actions, which received values of (1 point). All errors (terminal and continuity) were scored with (−1). Non-scoring actions were given values [.00, .80], except for poor attack (−.35), poor serve (−.60), free freeball (−.60) and reception free (−.50). Relative participation was considered according to the percentage of points and/or contacts played by each athlete. We concluded that for the player’s points and/or contacts, priority is given to actions that win points directly or are excellent, followed by those that contribute to building comfortable attacks, while penalising errors

Estudio del pensamiento funcional de estudiantes de educación primaria

El objetivo de esta investigación es identificar evidencias de pensamiento funcional en estudiantes de 3º curso de Primaria, en el marco de la propuesta de innovación curricular y línea de investigación conocida como Early-Algebra (Molina, 2009). Previo a la toma de datos se realizó un análisis de los antecedentes en el tema del álgebra en relación con el pensamiento funcional, concluyendo que este tipo de pensamiento incluye la relación entre cantidades que pueden expresarse en palabras, símbolos, tablas o gráficos, y el razonamiento con estas diversas representaciones para analizar el comportamiento de la función. El pensamiento funcional se trabaja, habitualmente, en etapas posteriores a la educación primaria, por lo que actualmente no existen suficientes estudios realizados sobre su introducción en cursos tempranos

Sex chromosomal abnormalities associated with equine infertility: validation of a simple molecular screening tool in the Purebred Spanish Horse

Chromosomal abnormalities in the sex chromosome pair (ECAX and ECAY) are widely associated with reproductive problems in horses. However, a large proportion of these abnormalities remains undiagnosed due to the lack of an affordable diagnostic tool that allows for avoiding karyotyping tests. Hereby, we developed an STR (single-tandem-repeat)- based molecular method to determine the presence of the main sex chromosomal abnormalities in horses in a fast, cheap and reliable way. The frequency of five ECAXIinked (LEX026, LEX003, TKY38, TKY270 and UCDE0502) and two ECAY-Iinked (EcaYH12 and SRY) markers was characterized in 261 Purebred Spanish Horses to determine the efficiency of the methodology developed to be used as a chromosomal diagnostic tool. All the microsatellites analyzed were highly polymorphic, with a sizeable number of alleles (polymorphic information content > 0.5). Based on this variability, the methodology showed 100% sensitivity and 99.82% specificity to detect the most important sex chromosomal abnormalities reported in horses (chimerism, Turner’s syndrome and sex reversal syndromes). The method was also validated with 100% efficiency in 10 individuals previously diagnosed as chromosomally aberrant. This STR screening panel is an efficient and reliable molecular-cytogenetic tool for the early detection of sex chromosomal abnormalities in equines that could be included in breeding programs to save money, effort and time of veterinary practitioners and breeders.Facultad de Ciencias Veterinaria