Capillary electrophoresis characterisation of a rapid prototyped PMMA chip for particle analysis

Màster en Nanociència i NanotecnologiaA rapid and cheap method has been developed for the fabrication of a capillary electrophoresis chip for the preliminary characterization of particles. The microfluidic chips were fabricated using polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) with integrated platinum electrodes without the need of using high technology microfabrication techniques. The chips were characterized using electroosmotic flow (EOF) with different channel treatments. The electrodes were characterised with impedance and conductivity measurements using both static and electrophoretic flow, respectively. Nine micron diameter particles were detected and their electrophoretic mobility determined using capillary electrophoresis and conductivity detection

The challenges of organic production and marketing in Europe and Spain. Innovative marketing to the future with quality and safety food products

In this work it explains the actual situation of organic production and marketing in Spain, studying and analyzing their evolution in the last decade of anterior century and in the first years of the new millennium. In Spain, organic production began in 70's with pioneers in Catalonia, Murcia Region and other zones. It was in 90's when it was observed a great increase in organic surfaces. A very interesting and critic date is that at the moment, more of 80% of organic products it is exporting to other European countries, USA and others foreign markets, and it is necessary a new marketing strategies and innovations to structure the organic market, give a new information to consumers, improve the investment in relation between retailers and this consumers, and improve the perception of utilities of this products. In some countries as is the case of Spain, the consumer s don't have enough information about the characteristics of organic products, organic food and organic production methodologies. They must to know all information along the benefits of organic production methodologies and their implications in environment conservation, biodiversity protection, food quality and safety, and this task must be provided by the new marketing strategies and actions.Marketing Innovation, Organic Products, Quality and Safety Food, Organic product marketing, Agribusiness, Marketing,

Los violadores y los que abusan de niños comparten un bajo nivel de actualización ejecutiva pero no de razonamiento fluido

Research findings suggest that sex offenders show worse performance than the general population in neuropsychological tests. Nevertheless, moderators such as age of the victim, use of antisocial control groups, and characteristics of administered measures have been highlighted. Here, 100 participants completed a battery of cognitive measures tapping fluid reasoning, verbal ability, and three basic executive processes (inhibition, switching, and updating). They were matched by educational level and classified in four groups: controls, non-sex offenders, rapists, and child abusers. The analyses revealed that rapists showed lower fluid reasoning scores than controls and child abusers. Furthermore, rapists and child abusers showed lower executive updating performance than controls and non-sex offenders. Importantly, child abusers did show fluid reasoning scores on a par with controls (controlling for updating differences), but their executive updating performance was equivalent to the one revealed by rapists (controlling for fluid intelligence differences). Implications of these findings for the design of efficient intervention programs are discussedLos datos de investigación empírica sugieren que los delincuentes sexuales presentan un peor desempeño que la población general en las pruebas neuropsicológicas. Aun así, se ha resaltado la influencia de variables moderadoras como la edad de la víctima, el uso de grupos control que incluyan individuos antisociales y las características de las medidas utilizadas. En este estudio cien participantes completaron una batería de pruebas cognitivas que evalúan razonamiento fluido, capacidad verbal y tres funciones ejecutivas básicas (inhibición, cambio y actualización). Los participantes estaban igualados en su nivel educativo y divididos en cuatro grupos: controles, delincuentes no sexuales, agresores sexuales con víctimas adultas y abusadores de menores. Los análisis revelaron que los agresores sexuales con víctimas adultas presentaban puntuaciones menores que los controles y los abusadores de menores en razonamiento fluido. Más aún, los agresores con víctimas adultas y los abusadores tenían peor desempeño que los controles y los delincuentes no sexuales en actualización ejecutiva. Es destacable que los abusadores de menores mostraran puntuaciones en razonamiento fluido equiparables a las de los controles (controlando estadísticamente las diferencias en actualización), pero su desempeño en actualización ejecutiva fue equivalente al mostrado por los agresores con víctimas adultas (controlando estadísticamente las diferencias en inteligencia fluida). Finalmente se discuten las implicaciones de estos resultados para el diseño de programas de intervención efectivo

A framework for the definition of metrics for actor-dependency models

Actor-dependency models are a formalism aimed at providing intentional descriptions of processes as a network of dependency relationships among actors. This kind of models is currently widely used in the early phase of requirements engineering as well as in other contexts such as organizational analysis and business process reengineering. In this paper, we are interested in the definition of a framework for the formulation of metrics over these models. These metrics are used to analyse the models with respect to some properties that are interesting for the system being modelled, such as security, efficiency or accuracy. The metrics are defined in terms of the actors and dependencies of the model. We distinguish three different kinds of metrics that are formally defined, and then we apply the framework at two different layers of a meeting scheduler system.Postprint (published version

Assessing the Potential for Payments for Watershed Services to Reduce Poverty in Guatemala

Payments for Environmental Services (PES) are being increasingly used as conservation instruments, particularly in Latin America. PES programs seek to capture part of the benefits derived from environmental services and channel them to natural resource managers who generate these services, thus increasing their incentive to conserve them. Many have assumed that these payments would go mostly to poor land users, and thus contribute to poverty reduction. There has been little empirical verification of this assumption to date, however. The PES approach was conceptualized as a mechanism to improve the efficiency of natural resource management, and not as a mechanism for poverty reduction. Pagiola et al. (2005) identified three main questions regarding the linkages between PES and poverty: (1) Who are the actual and potential participants in PES programs, and how many of them are poor? (2) Are poorer households able to participate in PES programs? And (3) are poor households affected indirectly by PES programs? We focus here on the first question of eligibility. This study examines whether the recipients of payments for environmental services are likely to be poor. Our focus is on watershed-scale PES mechanisms in which water users make payments to service providers. In Guatemala, as in other countries, it has long been argued that land users in marginal areas such as the steep slopes of upper watersheds tend to be poor. We use data from highland Guatemala to examine this assumed close spatial correlation between areas of high poverty and areas that provide environmental services. We first identify specific watershed areas in which PES mechanisms could potentially be developed, based on the presence of major downstream water uses such as hydroelectric power generation, domestic water supply, and irrigation. We then compare these areas with the spatial distribution of poverty in the country, allowing us to ask two questions that are central to the potential for PES to reach the poor: (1) How many of the potential providers of water services are poor? The local poverty impact of a PES program on poverty will depend on whether potential providers are poor or not. And (2) how many of the poor are potential water service providers? The potential impact of PES on poverty at a national scale will depend on whether many of the poor are in fact in areas where PES mechanisms might be implemented. Even if most potential PES recipients are poor, it may be that few of the poor are potential PES recipients. We map the ‘water supply areas’ by identifying the location of the intakes from which users obtain their water and then delineating the portions of the watershed that contribute to those intakes. About 1.9 million ha have significant potential for development of PES mechanisms through the presence of major water uses. This area is under-estimated as data could only be obtained for a subset of all users. All water supply areas are not equivalent. Some have substantial potential for PES because of the importance of downstream water uses, while others have more limited potential. For each user, we collect information on the nature and magnitude of their water use and construct use-specific indices of the relative importance or “value” of water supply areas. With about 56% of its population under the poverty line, Guatemala has one of the highest poverty rates in Central America. Using the watershed-level poverty map developed by Nelson and Chomitz (2007), we analyze both the poverty rate and the poverty density in water supply areas. Our analysis shows that both the poverty rate and the poverty density in the water supply areas vary substantially. The average poverty rate in water supply areas is only 44 percent, which is lower than the national average of 53%. There is essentially no correlation between the importance of a water supply area and the poverty rate of people living within it. The total number of poor that could potentially be reached if PES mechanisms were developed in all water supply areas is about 1.76 million, or 73% of the country’s poor. This analysis only considers the potential for PES programs to reach the poor. Even where many of the potential service providers are poor, it does not follow that the poor will get the benefits. A variety of obstacles, including insecure land tenure, lack of title, small farm holdings, and lack of access to credit might limit the participation by the poor in a PES program. The extent to which these problems prove to be obstacles in practice depends on the specific characteristics of the PES program and the conditions under which it is implemented. References: Nelson and Chomitz. 2007. Environment, Development and Sustainability 9(4): 369. Pagiola et al. 2005. World Development 33(2): 237.Payments for Environmental Services (PES), watershed, poverty, Guatemala, Environmental Economics and Policy, International Development,

Mapping environmental services in Guatemala

In this paper, we use data from Guatemala to map areas that are important for the provision of indirect ecosystem services—services whose benefits are enjoyed at some distance from the ecosystem that provides them, such as watershed services (enjoyed downstream) or biodiversity conservation (enjoyed globally). These services are usually externalities from the perspective of land users, and so tend to be under-provided. Mapping the areas that supply such services links the supply and demand of ecosystem services in a spatially explicit way, allowing us to identify and prioritize areas of conservation interest.environmental services, mapping, gis, guatemala, watershed

Can payments for watershed services help save biodiversity? A spatial analysis of highland Guatemala

Payments for environmental services (PES) are a promising mechanism for conservation. PES could either provide additional funding for protected areas, pay land users to conserve biodiversity outside protected areas, or both. For PES to work, it requires a secure long-term source of financing. Obtaining payments directly for biodiversity conservation is difficult, however. In most cases, water users are the most likely such source, either directly or indirectly. Thus the potential for PES to help conserve biodiversity depends, in a large measure, on the degree to which areas of interest for conservation of water services overlap with areas of interest for conservation of biodiversity. This paper examines the extent of such overlap in the case of highland Guatemala. The results show that this potential varies substantially within the country, with some biodiversity conservation priority areas having very good potential for receiving payments, and others little or none. Overall, about a quarter of all biodiversity conservation priority areas have potential for receiving payments. Thus PES is far from being a silver bullet for biodiversity conservation, but it can make a meaningful contribution to this objective.payments for environmental services, pes, watershed, biodiversity

Comets at radio wavelengths

Comets are considered as the most primitive objects in the Solar System. Their composition provides information on the composition of the primitive solar nebula, 4.6 Gyr ago. The radio domain is a privileged tool to study the composition of cometary ices. Observations of the OH radical at 18 cm wavelength allow us to measure the water production rate. A wealth of molecules (and some of their isotopologues) coming from the sublimation of ices in the nucleus have been identified by observations in the millimetre and submillimetre domains. We present an historical review on radio observations of comets, focusing on the results from our group, and including recent observations with the Nan\c{c}ay radio telescope, the IRAM antennas, the Odin satellite, the Herschel space observatory, ALMA, and the MIRO instrument aboard the Rosetta space probe.Comment: Proceedings of URSI France scientific days, "Probing Matter with Electromagnetic Waves", 24-25 March 2015, Paris. To be published in C. R. Physiqu

Study of the charge profile of thermally poled electrets

The charge profile of thermally poled electrets has been studied using two different methods, laser induced pressure pulse (LIPP) and pulsed electroacoustic (PEA), to gain insight into the mechanisms that are activated and assess which is the most appropriate method to study the charge profile. Disc--shaped PET samples have been conventionally poled to activate both the alpha and the rho relaxation and, right after, partially discharged up to a temperature Tpd. In this way, samples with a different combination of dipolar and space charge polarization have been obtained. Both LIPP and PEA reveal asymmetric profiles for Tpd below the glass transition temperature, that progressively become antisymmetric for higher temperatures. The shape and evolution of the charge profiles can be explained assuming injection of negative carriers from the anode that enhances the trapping of positive carriers near this electrode. It can be observed that PEA is able to detect a wider variety of polarization mechanisms in the system while LIPP gives a simpler picture of the charge profile.Comment: 19 pages, 11 figure

Nota preliminar sobre la existencia del Plioceno inferior, Marino, en Mallorca (Baleares)

El examen de numerosas muestras de sondeos obtenidas a través de los terrenos post-orogénicos de Mallorca y unas pocas de Menorca, han demostrado la existencia de dos conjuntos de terrenos Miopliocenos, marinos, separados por una facies evaporítica messiniense. El más inferior, Tortonense alto o Andaluciense, se caracteriza por sus niveles con Globorotalia margaritae.El segundo, superior, de tipo más margoso, contiene Globorotalia puncticulata padana, forma del Plioceno inferior. Los lechos de base de esta época, aún lacustres, contienen un Ostrácodo característico, el Cyprideis torosa, el cual aparece nuevamente, pero entonces en mayor número, cuando el regimen marino plioceno pierde salinidad, acompañado entonces por Ammonia, Elphidium, etc., afectadas por el fenómeno de enanismo