Price volatility and quinoa consumption among smallholder producers in the Andes

The recent attention to quinoa as a nutritious food is changing the way the crop is produced and consumed by smallholders in the Andes. Price spikes and increased volatility in international quinoa prices have created a concern about quinoa consumption among Andean farm-households. The farm-household theory was used to investigate how food price changes affect household consumption and production decisions. Theoretical predictions were applied to original survey data from a quinoa-producing region of Peru. Findings suggest that the global quinoa hype and consequent price spikes did not adversely affect the consumption of this nutritious food among quinoa producers

Reality of Food Losses: A New Measurement Methodology

Measuring food loss, identifying where in the food system it occurs, and developing effective policies along every stage of the value chain are essential first steps in addressing the problem of food loss in developing countries. Food loss has been defined in many ways, and disagreement remains regarding proper terminology and measurement methodology. Although the terms “post-harvest loss,” “food loss,” and “food loss and waste” are frequently used interchangeably, they do not refer consistently to the same aspects of the problem. In addition, none of these classifications includes pre-harvest losses. Figures regarding food loss remain highly inconsistent, precise causes of food loss remain undetected, and success stories of decreasing food loss remain few. We improve over this measurement gap on food losses by developing and testing the methodology traditionally used with three new methodologies that aim to reduce the measurement error in assessing the magnitude of food loss. The methods account for losses from the pre-harvest stage through product distribution and include both quantity loss and quality deterioration. We apply the instrument to producers, middlemen, and processors in seven staple food value chains in five developing countries. Throughout the different estimation methodologies, losses at the producer level represent between 60 and 80 percent of total value chain losses, while the average loss at the middleman and processor level lies around 7 and 19 percent, respectively. Differences across methodologies are salient, especially at the producer level. While the estimation results from the three new methods implemented are close and the differences are mostly not statistically significant, the aggregate self-reported method reports systematically lower loss figures. Finally, our results show the major reasons behind the losses identified for each commodity and country. Specifically, we find that they included pests and diseases and lack of rainfall. When looking at the produce left in the field, the major reason for the loss is a lack of appropriate harvesting techniques. Finally, the loss reported at the post-harvest level is due mostly to damage done during selection, as a result of workers’ lack of training and experience in selecting the produce. Therefore, technology, improved seeds and the proper soil management techniques together with better market access could help to substantially reduce the losses at the producer level

Diseno y Desarrollo de Prototipos Roboticos para Competencias de Futbol utilizando Motores Dynamixel

This article describes the design and development of robotic prototypes for robotic soccer competitions using Dynamixel motors. Although the prototypes are not aimed at world-class competitions, they represent a significant step in the development of sports robots. Model XL430-W250 Dynamixel motors were chosen and electronic circuits were implemented using control boards such as OpenCR and Raspberry Pi 3. A crucial component was introduced: a step-up board that charges a capacitor to create a powerful kick to the ball via anelectromagnet controlled by Arduino Nano. The programming and coordination of the prototypes was carried out using the ROS environment (Robot Operating System), which allows effective integration of movements and communication. Although the prototypes were not optimized for global competition, they underwent extensive testing, evaluating their speed and maneuverability, as well as soccer tactics in the GRSim simulator. These prototypes contribute to the further development of sports robotics and illustrate the research potential in this exciting area.Comment: Febitec 2023, in Spanish languag

Interactive visuo-motor therapy system for stroke rehabilitation

We present a virtual reality (VR)-based motor neurorehabilitation system for stroke patients with upper limb paresis. It is based on two hypotheses: (1) observed actions correlated with self-generated or intended actions engage cortical motor observation, planning and execution areas ("mirror neurons”); (2) activation in damaged parts of motor cortex can be enhanced by viewing mirrored movements of non-paretic limbs. We postulate that our approach, applied during the acute post-stroke phase, facilitates motor re-learning and improves functional recovery. The patient controls a first-person view of virtual arms in tasks varying from simple (hitting objects) to complex (grasping and moving objects). The therapist adjusts weighting factors in the non-paretic limb to move the paretic virtual limb, thereby stimulating the mirror neuron system and optimizing patient motivation through graded task success. We present the system's neuroscientific background, technical details and preliminary result

Gas and dust cooling along the major axis of M 33 (HerM33es). Herschel/PACS [C II] and [O I] observations

Open Access article, published by EDP Sciences, under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Context. M 33 is a gas rich spiral galaxy of the Local Group. Its vicinity allows us to study its interstellar medium (ISM) on linear scales corresponding to the sizes of individual giant molecular clouds. Aims. We investigate the relationship between the two major gas cooling lines and the total infrared (TIR) dust continuum. Methods. We mapped the emission of gas and dust in M 33 using the far-infrared lines of [CII] and [OI](63 mu m) and the total infrared continuum. The line maps were observed with the PACS spectrometer on board the Herschel Space Observatory. These maps have 50 pc resolution and form a similar to 370 pc wide stripe along its major axis covering the sites of bright HII regions, but also more quiescent arm and inter-arm regions from the southern arm at 2 kpc galacto-centric distance to the south out to 5.7 kpc distance to the north. Full-galaxy maps of the continuum emission at 24 mu m from Spitzer/MIPS, and at 70 mu m, 100 mu m, and 160 mu m from Herschel/PACS were combined to obtain a map of the TIR. Results. TIR and [CII] intensities are correlated over more than two orders of magnitude. The range of TIR translates to a range of far ultraviolet (FUV) emission of G(0, obs)similar to 2 to 200 in units of the average Galactic radiation field. The binned [CII]/TIR ratio drops with rising TIR, with large, but decreasing scatter. The contribution of the cold neutral medium to the [CII] emission, as estimated from VLA HI data, is on average only 10%. Fits of modified black bodies to the continuum emission were used to estimate dust mass surface densities and total gas column densities. A correction for possible foreground absorption by cold gas was applied to the [OI] data before comparing it with models of photon dominated regions. Most of the ratios of [CII]/[OI] and ([CII]+[OI])/TIR are consistent with two model solutions. The median ratios are consistent with one solution at n similar to 2x10(2) cm(-3), G(0)similar to 60, and a second low-FUV solution at n similar to 10(4) cm(-3), G(0)similar to 1.5. Conclusions. The bulk of the gas along the lines-of-sight is represented by a low-density, high-FUV phase with low beam filling factors similar to 1. A fraction of the gas may, however, be represented by the second solution. © C. Kramer et al. 2020M.R. and S.V. acknowledge support by the research projects AYA2014-53506-P and AYA2017-84897-P from the Spanish Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad, from the European Regional Development Funds (FEDER) and the Junta de Andalucia (Spain) grants FQM108. This study has been partially financed by the Consejeria de Conocimiento, Investigacion y Universidad, Junta de Andalucia and European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), ref. SOMM17/6105/UGR. FST thanks the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) for support under grant number AYA2016-76219-P.Peer reviewe

Efficient Generation of Germ Line Transmitting Chimeras from C57BL/6N ES Cells by Aggregation with Outbred Host Embryos

Genetically modified mouse strains derived from embryonic stem (ES) cells have become essential tools for functional genomics and biomedical research. Large scale mutagenesis projects are producing libraries of mutant C57BL/6 (B6) ES cells to enable the functional annotation of every gene of the mouse genome. To realize the utility of these resources, efficient and accessible methods of generating mutant mice from these ES cells are necessary. Here, we describe a combination of ICR morula aggregation and a chemically-defined culture medium with widely available and accessible components for the high efficiency generation of germline transmitting chimeras from C57BL/6N ES cells. Together these methods will ease the access of the broader biomedical research community to the publicly available B6 ES cell resources

Gender Gap in Parental Leave Intentions: Evidence from 37 Countries

Despite global commitments and efforts, a gender-based division of paid and unpaid work persists. To identify how psychological factors, national policies, and the broader sociocultural context contribute to this inequality, we assessed parental-leave intentions in young adults (18–30 years old) planning to have children (N = 13,942; 8,880 identified as women; 5,062 identified as men) across 37 countries that varied in parental-leave policies and societal gender equality. In all countries, women intended to take longer leave than men. National parental-leave policies and women’s political representation partially explained cross-national variations in the gender gap. Gender gaps in leave intentions were paradoxically larger in countries with more gender-egalitarian parental-leave policies (i.e., longer leave available to both fathers and mothers). Interestingly, this cross-national variation in the gender gap was driven by cross-national variations in women’s (rather than men’s) leave intentions. Financially generous leave and gender-egalitarian policies (linked to men’s higher uptake in prior research) were not associated with leave intentions in men. Rather, men’s leave intentions were related to their individual gender attitudes. Leave intentions were inversely related to career ambitions. The potential for existing policies to foster gender equality in paid and unpaid work is discussed.Gender Gap in Parental Leave Intentions: Evidence from 37 CountriespublishedVersio

Gender Gap in Parental Leave Intentions: Evidence from 37 Countries

Despite global commitments and efforts, a gender-based division of paid and unpaid work persists. To identify how psychological factors, national policies, and the broader sociocultural context contribute to this inequality, we assessed parental-leave intentions in young adults (18–30 years old) planning to have children (N = 13,942; 8,880 identified as women; 5,062 identified as men) across 37 countries that varied in parental-leave policies and societal gender equality. In all countries, women intended to take longer leave than men. National parental-leave policies and women’s political representation partially explained cross-national variations in the gender gap. Gender gaps in leave intentions were paradoxically larger in countries with more gender-egalitarian parental-leave policies (i.e., longer leave available to both fathers and mothers). Interestingly, this cross-national variation in the gender gap was driven by cross-national variations in women’s (rather than men’s) leave intentions. Financially generous leave and gender-egalitarian policies (linked to men’s higher uptake in prior research) were not associated with leave intentions in men. Rather, men’s leave intentions were related to their individual gender attitudes. Leave intentions were inversely related to career ambitions. The potential for existing policies to foster gender equality in paid and unpaid work is discussed

Measurement-induced entanglement and teleportation on a noisy quantum processor

Measurement has a special role in quantum theory: by collapsing the wavefunction it can enable phenomena such as teleportation and thereby alter the "arrow of time" that constrains unitary evolution. When integrated in many-body dynamics, measurements can lead to emergent patterns of quantum information in space-time that go beyond established paradigms for characterizing phases, either in or out of equilibrium. On present-day NISQ processors, the experimental realization of this physics is challenging due to noise, hardware limitations, and the stochastic nature of quantum measurement. Here we address each of these experimental challenges and investigate measurement-induced quantum information phases on up to 70 superconducting qubits. By leveraging the interchangeability of space and time, we use a duality mapping, to avoid mid-circuit measurement and access different manifestations of the underlying phases -- from entanglement scaling to measurement-induced teleportation -- in a unified way. We obtain finite-size signatures of a phase transition with a decoding protocol that correlates the experimental measurement record with classical simulation data. The phases display sharply different sensitivity to noise, which we exploit to turn an inherent hardware limitation into a useful diagnostic. Our work demonstrates an approach to realize measurement-induced physics at scales that are at the limits of current NISQ processors

Non-Abelian braiding of graph vertices in a superconducting processor

Indistinguishability of particles is a fundamental principle of quantum mechanics. For all elementary and quasiparticles observed to date - including fermions, bosons, and Abelian anyons - this principle guarantees that the braiding of identical particles leaves the system unchanged. However, in two spatial dimensions, an intriguing possibility exists: braiding of non-Abelian anyons causes rotations in a space of topologically degenerate wavefunctions. Hence, it can change the observables of the system without violating the principle of indistinguishability. Despite the well developed mathematical description of non-Abelian anyons and numerous theoretical proposals, the experimental observation of their exchange statistics has remained elusive for decades. Controllable many-body quantum states generated on quantum processors offer another path for exploring these fundamental phenomena. While efforts on conventional solid-state platforms typically involve Hamiltonian dynamics of quasi-particles, superconducting quantum processors allow for directly manipulating the many-body wavefunction via unitary gates. Building on predictions that stabilizer codes can host projective non-Abelian Ising anyons, we implement a generalized stabilizer code and unitary protocol to create and braid them. This allows us to experimentally verify the fusion rules of the anyons and braid them to realize their statistics. We then study the prospect of employing the anyons for quantum computation and utilize braiding to create an entangled state of anyons encoding three logical qubits. Our work provides new insights about non-Abelian braiding and - through the future inclusion of error correction to achieve topological protection - could open a path toward fault-tolerant quantum computing