Video games and creative convergence: from social networks to free creation platforms

La difusión de Internet y el uso masivo de las redes sociales ofrecen un panorama en el que la mayoría de medios culturales y artísticos como el cine, la literatura, la música o más recientemente los videojuegos, se han visto forzados a cambiar sus paradigmas internos. Se pasa de un modelo comunicativo vertical a uno horizontal, en el cual el usuario/consumidor pasivo se convierte en agente activo y en co-creador de sus propios contenidos, los cuales se exponen de manera masiva en las redes y en las plataformas de libre creación. A partir de los estudios que profundizan en el concepto primigenio de cultura participativa de Henry Jenkins, la presente investigación aborda el análisis de los modelos comunicativos en el videojuego y su constante evolución dentro de los entornos colaborativos digitales. Se ofrece además una exploración de la situación actual de los videojuegos como parte de una convergencia digital en constante ramificación y de total permeabilidad a las prácticas creativas del usuario que ayudan a expandir el universo del juego más allá de la pantalla. Partiendo del estudio cualitativo de la bibliografía aportada y mediante el examen de casos ejemplares de redes sociales de videojuegos como el de Assassin’s Creed Council o el del videojuego independiente Blasphemous financiado a través de la plataforma Kickstarter, se pretende demostrar que los modelos de producción de videojuegos o de cualquier obra de carácter cultural han cambiado notablemente, forzando a las empresas a seguir la estela de los patrones creativos marcados por el usuario/creador.The diffusion of the Internet and the massive use of social networks offer a panorama in which the majority of cultural media such as cinema or, more recently, videogames, have been forced to change their internal paradigms. It goes from a vertical communicative model to a horizontal one, in which the passive user / consumer becomes an active agent and co-creator of their own content, which is exposed in a massive way in the networks. From the studies that deepen in the primitive concept of participative culture of Henry Jenkins, the present investigation approaches the analysis of the communicative models in the video game and its constant evolution within the digital collaborative environments. It also offers an exploration of the current situation of video games as part of a digital convergence in constant branching and total permeability to the user's creative practices that help to expand the game universe beyond the screen. Starting from the qualitative study of the contributed bibliography and through the examination of exemplary cases of social networks like the one of Assassin's Creed Council or the one of the independent video game Blasphemous financed through the platform Kickstarter, it is tried to demonstrate that the models of production of games or of any work of a cultural nature have changed markedly, forcing companies to follow the trail of creative patterns marked by the user / creator

Evaluation of metabolism and biosignaling in the angiogenic microenvironment as potential targets for therapeutic intervention

The "re-discovery" of Warburg effect at the turn of the present millennium has been a key determinant of the current renewed interest on cancer metabolism. In fact, metabolic reprogramming has been identified as one of the hallmarks of cancer. However, cancers grow in tight contact with non-tumoral accompanying cells and the surrounding extracellular matrix, as underlined by the concept of tumor microenvironment. Endothelial cells are key components of this tumor microenvironment, since they are requested for angiogenesis, another hallmark of cancer. In this complex system, rewiring of metabolism and signaling pathway in cancer, endothelial and other accompanying cell emerges as new potential targets for therapeutic intervention. In this communication, we will present the drug discovery and characterization approach of our group and our more recent results in this field, including new modeling with an evolutionary and ecological point of view.[Our experimental work is supported by grants BIO2014-56092-R (MINECO and FEDER) and P12-CTS-1507 (Andalusian Government and FEDER) and funds from group BIO-267 (Andalusian Government). The "CIBER de Enfermedades Raras" is an initiative from the ISCIII (Spain)]. This communication has the support of a travel grant "Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech"

Modelling surgical pavilions and a unit of anaesthesia on a Chilean hospital using Specification and Description Language

This work addresses the problem of performing a formal modelling of the processes related to the surgical pavilions and an anaesthesia unit on a Chilean hospital. To perform this modelling we used Specification and Description Language (SDL). The model was very successful in order to document and to understand the tacit knowledge of the unit and facilitates the simulation.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Angle Dependence of the Transverse Thermal Conductivity in YBa2_2Cu3_3O7_7 single crystals: Doppler Effect vs. Andreev scattering

We have measured the transverse thermal conductivity $\kappa_{xy}$ of twinned and untwinned YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_7$ single crystals as a function of angle $\theta$ between the magnetic field applied parallel to the CuO$_2$ planes and the heat current direction, at different magnetic fields and temperatures. For both crystals we observed a clear twofold variation in the field-angle dependence of $\kappa_{xy}(\theta) = - \kappa^0_{xy}(T,B) \sin(2\theta)$. We have found that the oscillation amplitude $\kappa^0_{xy}$ depends on temperature and magnetic field. Our results show that $\kappa^0_{xy} = a B \ln(1/(bB))$ with the temperature- and sample-dependent parameters $a$ and $b$. We discuss our results in terms of Andreev scattering of quasiparticles by vortices and a recently proposed theory based on the Doppler shift in the quasiparticle spectrum.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

A cloud-based parallel system for locating customers in indoor malls

Advances in techniques of locating mobile users have promoted the development of marketing campaigns based on customers’ location. WiFi-based location methods have proven their usefulness in tracking and locating customers within a indoor mall. Nevertheless, in some cases the performance of these methods prevents them from being used in real scenarios. In this paper, we have faced the problem of improving the execution time and reducing the cost of one of these WiFi-based location methods. Parallel programming techniques, service-oriented technologies and the cloud computing paradigm have been combined to solve efficiently these problems. The resulting system has been deployed in the Amazon EC2 environment, evaluating different configuration and deployment options

Multicriteria evaluation by gis to determine trail hiking suitability in a natural park

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