Georreferenciando la corrupción urbanística en España

Se plantea que, en el vertiginoso incremento de la actividad urbanística acaecida en España a lo largo de la última década, el papel de la propiedad del suelo sigue teniendo un protagonismo clave en la vida económica de nuestro país. Lo inmobiliario o, en un sentido más amplio, lo urbano -pues hay que añadir las infraestructuras- se materializa sobre el soporte suelo. Pero este soporte, esta base se encuentra dividida, fragmentada por la propiedad privada, la cual, a través de una serie de hechos administrativos (planeamiento) persigue su reclasificación (de rústico a urbano), permitiendo a sus titulares la obtención de rentas millonarias. Y es en este marco en el que se fragua la llamada “corrupción urbanística”, que muestra, con claridad meridiana, la subordinación de la política a los intereses de ciertos grupos económicos (propietarios de suelo, constructores y promotores inmobiliarios). Planteado el problema, se emprendió un amplio estudio que, partiendo del análisis de las fuentes periodísticas y estadísticas oficiales (censos de población y viviendas para los años 1991, 2001 y estimaciones para 2008) y de su tratamiento en bases de datos y Sistemas de Información Geográfica (ArcGis 9.2), ha dado como resultado una variada cartografía a diferentes niveles (municipal, provincial y de comunidades autónomas) del llamado “urbanismo irregular” en España en el período 2000-2010.The last decade witnessed an increase in the urban development activity in Spain. Land ownership has played a crucial role within it. Real state processes take place (materialize) around the element of soil, but the soil turns out to be fragmented by private property. And the latter, through administrative mechanisms, pursues its relabeling from “rural” to “urban”. As a result, big owners of land obtain millionaire incomes. In this context, the so-called “urban development corruption” appears: the subordination of politics to the interests of a number of economic groups (land owners, builders and real estate promoters). A thorough study has been undertaken, which analyzed journalistic sources and official statistics. They were later introduced into a database and a Geographic Information system (Arc gis 9.2). This has yielded a cartography of “irregular urbanism” at different scales (municipal, provincial and autonomous communities) in the period from 2000 to 2010

El poblado Calcolítico de Valencina de la Concepción (Sevilla): una revisión crítica

Pretendemos demostrar como el yacimiento de valenciana de la concepción tiene una amplia ocupación que puede ser sistematizada en fases y como el calcolítico en Huelva y Sevilla se encuentra estrechamente relacionado. Las diferencias, siempre dentro de una continuidad cultural, se deben a una mayor antigüedad del yacimiento onubense de papa uvas sobre la mas reciente de valenciana de la concepción, y las lógicas adaptaciones a ecosistemas ligeramente distinto

CMB polarization as a probe of the anomalous nature of the Cold Spot

One of the most interesting explanations for the non-Gaussian Cold Spot (CS) detected in the WMAP data by Vielva et al. 2004, is that it arises from the interaction of the CMB radiation with a cosmic texture (Cruz et al. 2007b). In this case, a lack of polarization is expected in the region of the spot, as compared to the typical values associated to large fluctuations of a GIRF. In addition, other physical processes related to a non-linear evolution of the gravitational field could lead to a similar scenario. However, some of these alternative scenarios (e.g., a large void in the large scale structure) have been shown to be very unlikely. In this work we characterise the polarization properties of the Cold Spot under both hypotheses: a large Gaussian spot and an anomalous feature generated, for instance, by a cosmic texture. We propose a methodology to distinguish between them, and we discuss its discrimination power as a function of the instrumental noise level. In particular, we address the cases of current experiments, like WMAP and Planck, and others in development as QUIJOTE. We find that for an ideal experiment the Gaussian hypothesis could be rejected at a significance level better than 0.8%. While WMAP is far from providing useful information in this respect, we find that Planck will be able to reach a significance of around 7%; in addition, we show that the ground-based experiment QUIJOTE could provide a significance of around 1%. If these results are combined with the significance level found for the CS in temperature, the capability of QUIJOTE and Planck to reject the alternative hypothesis becomes 0.025% and 0.124%, respectively.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figures, accepted in MNRAS. Minor changes made to match the final versio

Impact of Spent Mushroom Substrates on the Fate of Pesticides in Soil, and Their Use for Preventing and/or Controlling Soil and Water Contamination: A Review

Intensive crop production involves a high consumption of pesticides. This is a cause of major environmental concern because the presence of pesticides in water is becoming increasingly common. Physicochemical methods based on soil modification with organic residues have been developed to enhance the immobilization and/or degradation of pesticides in agricultural soils, which may control both the diffuse and the point pollution of soils and waters. This review summarizes the influence of spent mushroom substrate (SMS) on the environmental fate of pesticides when both are simultaneously applied in agriculture. The processes of adsorption, leaching and dissipation of these compounds in SMS-amended soils were evaluated at laboratory and field scale. Relationships were established between the experimental parameters obtained and the properties of the soils, the SMS, and the pesticides in order to determine the effect that the application of SMS in agricultural soils has on the environmental impact of pesticides. Accordingly, this review highlights the use of SMS as a strategy for the prevention and/or control of soil and water contamination by pesticides to strike a balance between agricultural development and the use of these compounds.The authors are grateful to the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Projects AGL2007-61674/AGR and AGL2010-15976/AGR), and Regional Junta de Castilla y León (Project CSI03A09). J.M.M.-B. thanks Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness for his “Juan de la Cierva-Incorporación” postdoctoral contract (IJCI-2014-19538). We acknowledge support by the CSIC Open Access Publication Initiative through its Unit of Information Resources for Research (URICI)

Traditión and innovation along the 2nd Millennium B.C. in the central Guadalquivir region: I. The funerary rituals

Una cultura debe contener un conjunto de items normalizados que nos permitan reconocerla en su extensión territorial, y por sus cambios, establecer su secuencia interna. Con este argumento trataremos los yacimientos arqueológicos, ya clásicos en el valle bético; en este trabajo valoraremos las necrópolis y analizaremos en otro momento la secuencia de los poblados, durante el II milenio a.C., empleando como criterio organizador la cronología, fundamentalmente la absoluta, cuando ello sea posible.Ancient cultures must hold an ensemble of normalized items, which allow us to locate it in its territorial area and, leaning on its changes, to establish its sequence. According to this argument we will consider main archaeological sites in Andalusian Valley. In this essay we will assess necropolis and analyze the village’s sequence during II B.C. using dating as organizing criteria, absolute dating when possibl