Non-Crossing Dual Neural Network: Joint Value at Risk and Conditional Tail Expectation estimations with non-crossing conditions

When datasets present long conditional tails on their response variables, algorithms based on Quantile Regression have been widely used to assess extreme quantile behaviors. Value at Risk (VaR) and Conditional Tail Expectation (CTE) allow the evaluation of extreme events to be easily interpretable. The state-of-the-art methodologies to estimate VaR and CTE controlled by covariates are mainly based on linear quantile regression, and usually do not have in consideration non-crossing conditions across VaRs and their associated CTEs. We implement a non-crossing neural network that estimates both statistics simultaneously, for several quantile levels and ensuring a list of non-crossing conditions. We illustrate our method with a household energy consumption dataset from 2015 for quantile levels 0.9, 0.925, 0.95, 0.975 and 0.99, and show its improvements against a Monotone Composite Quantile Regression Neural Network approximation

Topological phase transitions in the gauged BPS baby Skyrme model

We demonstrate that the gauged BPS baby Skyrme model with a double vacuum potential allows for phase transitions from a non-solitonic to a solitonic phase, where the latter corresponds to a ferromagnetic liquid. Such a transition can be generated by increasing the external pressure P or by turning on an external magnetic field H. As a consequence, the topological phase where gauged BPS baby skyrmions exist, is a higher density phase. For smaller densities, obtained for smaller values of P and H, a phase without solitons is reached. We find the critical line in the P,H parameter space. Furthermore, in the soliton phase, we find the equation of state for the baby skyrmion matter V = V (P,H) at zero temperature, where V is the “volume”, i.e., area of the solitonsThe authors acknowledge financial support from the Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports, Spain (Grant No. FPA2011-22776), the Xunta de Galicia (Grant No. INCITE09.296.035PR and Conselleria de Educacion), the Spanish Consolider-Ingenio 2010 Programme CPAN (CSD2007-00042), and FEDER. Further, the authors acknowledge support from the Polish FOCUS grant (No. 42/F/AW/2014). CN thanks the Spanish Ministery of Education, Culture and Sports for financial support (grant FPU AP2010-5772)S

A comparative performance evaluation of routing protocols for flying ad-hoc networks in real conditions

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are widely used in our modern society and their development is rapidly accelerating. Flying Ad Hoc Networks (FANETs) have opened a new window of opportunity to create new value-added services. However, the characteristics that make FANETs unique, such as node mobility, node distance, energy constraints, etc., imply that several guidelines need to be considered for their successful deployment. Although numerous routing protocols have been proposed for FANETs, due to the wide range of applications in which FANETs can be applied, not all routing protocols can be used. Due to this challenge, after breaking down and classifying the different types of existing routing protocols for FANET, this paper analyzes and compares the performance of several routing protocols (Babel, BATMAN-ADV, and OLSR) in terms of throughput and packet loss in a real deployment composed of several UAV nodes using 2.4 and 5 GHz WiFi networks. The results show that Babel achieves better performance in the studied metrics than OLSR and BATMAN-ADV, while BATMAN-ADV delivers significantly lower performance. This experimental study confirms the importance of choosing the proper routing protocol for FANETs and their performance evaluation, something that will be extremely important in a few years when this type of network will be common in our day-to-day life.This research was funded by the AEI/FEDER, UE project grant TEC2016-76465-C2-1-R (AIM), project SPID202000X116746SV0 (AriSe2: FINe), and 20740/FPI/18. Fundación Séneca. Región de Murcia (Spain)

El impacto de la crisis en el emprendimiento.

El trabajo de fin de grado analiza la evolución experimentada en los emprendedores a lo largo de los últimos años, y cómo ha influido la crisis económica en esta evolución. Para este análisis comparativo se han utilizado diferentes variables, de distintos años, referidas a los emprendedores como edad, sexo, nivel de estudios, situación laboral y nivel de renta. Se han comparado estas variables y se ha tratado de analizar las razones de estos cambios en quienes buscaban emprender. También se considera relevante la comparación, mediante las mismas variables, de aquellos que han tomado la decisión de abandonar su propia actividad empresarial a lo largo de los mismos años analizados anteriormente. Asimismo, antes de abordar el análisis de las características comentadas, se trata de observar, brevemente, cual ha sido la influencia de la crisis en el emprendimiento en España y sus Comunidades Autónomas

Lithium-Ion Battery Parameter Identification via Extremum Seeking Considering Aging and Degradation

Battery parameters such as State of Charge (SoC) and State of Health (SoH) are key to modern applications; thus, there is interest in developing robust algorithms for estimating them. Most of the techniques explored to this end rely on a battery model. As batteries age, their behavior starts differing from the models, so it is vital to update such models in order to be able to track battery behavior after some time in application. This paper presents a method for performing online battery parameter tracking by using the Extremum Seeking (ES) algorithm. This algorithm fits voltage waveforms by tuning the internal parameters of an estimation model and comparing the voltage output with the real battery. The goal is to estimate the electrical parameters of the battery model and to be able to obtain them even as batteries age, when the model behaves different than the cell. To this end, a simple battery model capable of capturing degradation and different tests have been proposed to replicate real application scenarios, and the performance of the ES algorithm in such scenarios has been measured. The results are positive, obtaining converging estimations both with new and aged batteries, with accurate outputs for the intended purpose

Simulating use cases for the UAH autonomous electric car

2019 IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Conference (ITSC), Auckland, New Zealand, 27-30 Oct. 2019This paper presents the simulation use cases for the UAH Autonomous Electric Car, related with typical driving scenarios in urban environments, focusing on the use of hierarchical interpreted binary Petri nets in order to implement the decision making framework of an autonomous electric vehicle. First, we describe our proposal of autonomous system architecture, which is based on the open source Robot Operating System (ROS) framework that allows the fusion of multiple sensors and the real-time processing and communication of multiple processes in different embedded processors. Then, the paper focuses on the study of some of the most interesting driving scenarios such as: stop, pedestrian crossing, Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) and overtaking, illustrating both the executive module that carries out each behaviour based on Petri nets and the trajectory and linear velocity that allows to quantify the accuracy and robustness of the architecture proposal for environment perception, navigation and planning on a university Campus.Ministerio de Economía y CompetitividadComunidad de Madri

Agricultura urbana y periurbana como contribución a la estrategia de conservación de la biodiversidad de Heliconias en la región central de Cuba

New ways of sustainable production on urban and peri- urbans areas have contributed to the conservation of species diversity, as to ornamentals plants that belong to family: Heliconiaceae. For this reason we recorded nine species of Heliconia as new accessions from Central Region of Cuba, that were prospected in gardens and yards of national reference as well as from three botanical gardens in central provinces of Cuba (Cienfuegos, Villa Clara and Santi Spíritus), located in forested mountain areas. Molecular corroboration of the species collected was included, as well as a brief description of the morphological and ecological characteristics of these accessions. We show the high commercial potential they have for the island and the contribution to the territorial expansion of these species. In the propagation strategy we considered the micropropagation through biotechnological techniques of tissue culture and in vitro conservation in Cienfuegos Biofactory. The collaboration of universities and the municipal government of Cuba Central region together with the active participation of the farmers have allowed the development of new areas, gardens and home gardens, despite limited resources

2012 ranking in research in Spanish public universities

Antecedentes: para garantizar la utilidad de las políticas de promoción de la investigación de las instituciones educativas, en los últimos años se están desarrollando estudios que analizan diversos indicadores, con la intención de valorar posibles cambios en el futuro. El objetivo de este trabajo es actualizar el ranking de producción y productividad en investigación de las universidades públicas españolas, con los datos del año 2012. Método: se sigue la misma metodología que en los años anteriores. Se evalúan siete indicadores: artículos en revistas indexadas en el JCR, tramos de investigación, proyectos I+D, tesis doctorales, becas FPU, doctorados con Mención hacia la Excelencia y patentes. Resultados: en los resultados obtenidos en el ranking global se perciben diferencias entre las universidades que poseen una mayor producción (Universidad de Barcelona, Complutense de Madrid y Universidad de Granada) y las que tienen una mayor productividad (Pompeu Fabra, Pablo de Olavide y Miguel Hernández de Elche). Conclusiones: al comparar los resultados con la edición anterior de 2011 se puede ver que las tres universidades más productivas se mantienen en los mismos puestos.Background: In order to guarantee the usefulness of promotion policies for the investigation of educational institutions, in recent years studies analyzing different indicators have been developed, with the intention of valuing possible changes in the future. The objective of this work is to update the research production and productivity ranking of Spanish public universities, using data from 2012. Method: The same methodology as previous years has been followed. Seven indicators have been evaluated: articles from journals indexed in the JCR, research lines, R+D projects, doctoral theses, Spanish research and training grants, doctorate courses awarded a mention of excellence and patents. Results: Amongst the results obtained in the global ranking there are differences between the universities with a higher production (University of Barcelona, Complutense University of Madrid and the University of Granada) and those with a higher productivity (Pompeu Fabra, Pablo de Olavide and Miguel Hernández de Elche). Conclusions: When comparing the results to those of 2011, it can be observed that the three most productive universities remain in the same positions

Tecnologías de Información y Comunicación como herramientas de apoyo en los procesos académicos en instituciones de educación superior

The incorporation into learning environments of information and communication technologies has resulted in them being also used by teachers in academic management processes in the teaching-learning process applying new methods, techniques and instruments. The universities in Ecuador since the validity of the Organic Law of Higher Education and its regulations, as well as its own statutes, have been running training processes in different fields and with emphasis on the use of information and communication technologies. The objective of this research is to analyze the management of information and communication technology and its relationship with academic management at the Faculty of Administrative and Economic Sciences of the Technical University of Manabí. As a research methodology, it is based on an extensive bibliographic review on the subject of information and communication technology management in the university field, also incorporating the study of documents related to teaching processes and university management, interviews and surveys are also carried out Teachers. The result reveal the importance that teachers give to these technological tools, however, there are deficiencies in their management due to the lack of training, motivation, and improved controls in the different academic processes. Key words: management, information and communication technologies, motivation, learningLa incorporación en entornos de aprendizajes de tecnológicas de información y comunicación ha tomado como consecuencia que también sean utilizadas por los docentes en procesos de gestión académica en el proceso enseñanza-aprendizaje aplicando nuevos métodos, técnicas e instrumentos. Las universidades en el Ecuador desde la vigencia de la Ley Orgánica de Educación superior y su reglamento, así como sus propios estatutos se vienen ejecutando procesos de capacitación en diferentes ámbitos y con énfasis en el uso de las tecnologías de información y comunicación. El objetivo de esta investigación es analizar la gestión de tecnología de información, comunicación y su relación con la gestión académica en la Facultad de Ciencias Administrativas y Económicas de la Universidad Técnica de Manabí.  Como metodología investigativa se parte de una amplia revisión bibliográfica sobre el tema de la gestión tecnológica de información y comunicación en el ámbito universitario, incorporando además el estudio de documentos relacionados con los procesos de enseñanza y la gestión universitaria, además se realiza entrevistas y encuestas a docentes. Los resultados revelan la importancia que dan los docentes a estas herramientas tecnológicas, no obstante, existen deficiencias en su manejo debido a la falta de capacitación, motivación, y mejorares controles en los diferentes procesos académicos. Palabras clave: Gestión, Tecnologías de información y comunicación, motivación, aprendizaj