Larvae of Dactylopsaron dimorphicum (Perciformes: Percophidae) from oceanic islands in the southeast Pacific

Percophids are a family of small marine benthic fishes common over soft bottoms from inshore to the outer slopes in tropical to temperate regions of the Atlantic and in the Indo-West and southeast Pacific (Reader and Neira, 1998; Okiyama, 2000). Five species belonging to four genera have been recorded around the Salas y Gómez Ridge in the southeast Pacific, all of which are endemic to the area except for Chrionema chryseres, a species which also occurs off the Hawaiian Islands and Japan (Parin, 1985, 1990; Parin et al., 1997). Of these five species, larval stages have been described only for Osopsaron karlik and Chrionema pallidum (Belyanina 1989, 1990)

Laser Path Planning and Power Control Strategies for Powder Bed Fusion Systems

In laser powder bed fusion additive manufacturing (AM) process, laser scan path, velocity, and power are some of the most important parameters affecting the build quality. Control strategies for laser path and power are implemented and tested on a prototype testbed based on industrial standard G-code type programming language (referred to as AM G-code). The proposed AM G-code demonstrates different modes which define power-velocity-position profiles, and account for the laser and scanner dynamics. AM G-code is interpreted into xy2-100 protocol and sent to the galvo scanners and laser using a custom transmitter. The actual scan path is compared with the commanded path during controlled tests. The proposed AM G-code interpreter modes are then evaluated considering the measured dynamic system response, and further discussed in contrast to commercial powder bed fusion systems.Mechanical Engineerin

The America Economic Crisis Of 2009/2010: Three Pillars Of American Strength That Will Lead To Recovery

The notion of the Fall of the American Empire (Wojtowicz, 1993) is equivalent to the Peter Principal in that positive realization will always prevail over the negative perspective. Wojtowicz (1993) contends that Isaac Asimov wrote his foundation stories to show that every empire, even the most powerful one, has to fall eventually. Lawrence Peter (1984), an educator and hierarchiologist, argued that each manager will rise to the level in which he or she will fail. Inevitably, the Peter Principal failed because it placed a negative connotation on managerial growth. The same thing holds true with the Failure of the American Empire. America cannot fail because while there are many foundations of strength that has held America together since the American Revolution, there are three pillars that will help America continue to prosper. The three pillars are the strength of the military, the excellent education system, and the spirit of democracy that has led to capitalism. The spirit of democracy as Abraham Lincoln exemplifies as “A government of people, by the people, for the people,” has kept America vibrant and open for people to rise to the highest office in the free world (Powell and Powell, 1918). In the philosophical Age of Enlightenment, John Locke, a puritan in the England of Cromwell, put forth a new civil order: law based on reason, a government deriving its power from the governed, liberty to pursue individual goals as a natural right, and private property and its use in the pursuit of happiness (Wren and Bedian, 2009). These four ideas provide the bases of how our founders designed the America of today. This paper provides an overview of the three pillars that will influence the economic recovery of America in a positive way

Modular multilevel matrix converter as solid state transformer for medium and high voltage substations

The use of power converters as solid state transformer is an attractive solution to modernize the power network, but this solution has not been fully addressed for MV and HV substations. This paper presents a customized and simple control for the Modular Multilevel Matrix Converter (M3C), specially conceived for its operation on synchronous ports, which is the case of AC substations. The control allows to transfer bidirectional active power, generate/absorb reactive power and provide ancillary services. The converter is compared to the back-to-back Modular Multilevel Converter (B2B-MMC) where the key performance indicators to carry out the comparison are power efficiency, number of semiconductor devices, passive components required, footprint, voltage cell balance, fault blocking capability and stress of components. The simulation results show the features, performance and attractiveness of the M3C topology in a 33/11 kV, 16 MW substation under different operating conditions, including grid faults and dynamic operation. The M3C presents similar efficiency and performance than the B2B-MMC, but it uses less semiconductor devices, passive components and total cell capacitor energy than the B2B-MMC, reducing cost and footprint. The experimental results show the performance of the M3C under less ideal conditions including a substation transformer saturation and power step response

Diseases due to unhealthy environments: an updated estimate of the global burden of disease attributable to environmental determinants of health

The update of the global burden of disease attributable to the environment is presented. The study focuses on modifiable risks to show the potential health impact from environmental interventions.; Systematic literature reviews on 133 diseases and injuries were performed. Comparative risk assessments were complemented by more limited epidemiological estimates, expert opinion and information on disease transmission pathways. Population attributable fractions were used to calculate global deaths and global disease burden from environmental risks.; Twenty-three percent (95% CI: 13-34%) of global deaths and 22% (95% CI: 13-32%) of global disability adjusted life years (DALYs) were attributable to environmental risks in 2012. Sixty-eight percent of deaths and 56% of DALYs could be estimated with comparative risk assessment methods. The global disease burden attributable to the environment is now dominated by noncommunicable diseases. Susceptible ages are children under five and adults between 50 and 75 years. Country level data are presented.; Nearly a quarter of global disease burden could be prevented by reducing environmental risks. This analysis confirms that eliminating hazards and reducing environmental risks will greatly benefit our health, will contribute to attaining the recently agreed Sustainable Development Goals and will systematically require intersectoral collaboration to be successful

Critical Behavior of Disordered Systems with a Free Surface

The behavior of homogeneous and disordered systems with a free boundary is described on the basis of group theory in the two-loop approximation directly in three-dimensional space. The effect of the free boundary on the regime of the bulk critical behavior is revealed. It is shown that the boundedness of the system slightly affects the regime of the bulk critical behavior in the case of the ordinary transition, whereas this effect is more noticeable in the case of the special transition. Surface critical phenomena are described for homogeneous and disordered systems, and the critical exponents are calculated in the two-loop approximation. It is shown that the effect of impurities is insignificant in the special phase transition, whereas it is more noticeable in the ordinary phase transition. The derived critical exponents are compared with the computer-simulation results.Comment: 19 pages, 2 figure

First report of porcine respirovirus 1 in South America.

Porcine respirovirus 1 (PRV1) is an emerging virus in pigs that has been previously described in the USA and China. There are no reports of its presence in the rest of the world. The objective of this study was to determine the occurrence of PRV1 in Chile and to determine its phylogeny. Thus, we collected samples (oral fluids, nasal swabs, and lungs) from a swine influenza A virus (IAV) surveillance program, most of which belonged to pigs with respiratory disease. The samples were analyzed by RT-PCR, and the viral sequencing was obtained using RNA whole-genome sequencing approach. Maximum likelihood phylogeny was constructed with the available references. Thirty-one of 164 samples (18.9 %) were RT-PCR positive for PRV1: 62.5 % oral fluids, 19.0 % nasal swabs, and 8.6 % lungs. All 6 farms in this study had at least one positive sample, with 6-40 % of positive results per farm, which suggests that PRV1 is disseminated in Chilean swine farms. Twenty-one of 31 (677%) PRV1-positive samples were also positive for IAV, so the role of PRV1 as secondary pathogen in respiratory disease needs to be further evaluated. Near to complete genome of two PRV1s were obtained from two farms. The phylogenies, in general, showed low bootstrap support, except the concatenated genome and the L gene trees which showed clustering of the Chilean PRV1 with Asian sequences, suggesting a close genetic relationship. This is the first report of PRV1 in the Southern Hemisphere. Further studies are necessary to determine the genetic diversity of this virus in Chile

INFLUENCIA DEL TIEMPO DE AGITACIÓN EN EL PROCESO DE MODIFICACIÓN CON QUITOSANO DE UNA ARCILLA COLOMBIANA TIPO MONTMORILLONITA

RESUMEN En este trabajo se presentan los resultados de la modificación de una arcilla tipo montmorillonita con un biopolímero policatiónico – quitosano- y la evaluación del efecto del tiempo de contacto entre arcilla y agente modificador sobre efectividad del tratamiento. Siguiendo una metodología propia, diseñada especialmente para tal fin, se obtuvieron arcillas modificadas con quitosano de alto peso molecular, empleando tiempos de agitación de 3, 6 y 12 horas. La efectividad del tratamiento de modificación fue evaluado a través de la medición del incremento en la distancia interlaminar de la arcilla, y la detección mediante FTIR de grupos funcionales característicos del quitosano en la estructura de la arcilla. En los espectros de DRX se observó que el espaciamiento interlaminar aumenta al incrementar el tiempo de contacto entre la arcilla y el modificante, conduciendo a un pronunciado desplazamiento y disminución en intensidad del pico característico correspondiente al plano (d001) de la montmorillonita. La existencia de grupos activos del quitosano en la estructura de la arcilla modificada se hizo evidente por la presencia en los espectros FTIR de bandas de absorción correspondientes a los grupos CH, NH3+, CH2 y NH2.  Palabras Claves: Organobentonita, Biopolímero, Nanocompuesto.   ABSTRACT In this work, the results for the modification of a montmorillonite-type clay with a polycationic biopolymer – chitosan- are presented, along with the evaluation of the effect of contact time between clay and modifiying agent on the effectiveness of the modification treatment. Modified clays were prepared using high molecular weight chitosan, following a specially designed methodology and applying stirring times of 3, 6 and 12 hours. The effectiveness of the modification process was evaluated by measuring the increase in the interlayer spacing of the clay, and the detection of characteristic functional groups from the chitosan in the structure of the clay. From the XRD spectra it was observed that the interlayer spacing increases with the increase in contact time between clay and modifier, leading to a pronounced shift and intensity decrease of the characteristic peak, which corresponds to the (d001) plane of montmorillonite. The existence of active groups from chitosan in the modified clay structure was evident from the presence in the Infrared Spectra of absorption bands corresponding to CH, NH3+, CH2 y NH2.  Keywords: Organobentonite, Biopolymer, Nanocomposite

Confirmatory factor analysis of the Inventory of Statements About Self-Injury in a Spanish clinical sample

Objectives: The main aim of the present study was to confirm the two‐factor structure of the Inventory of Statements About Self‐injury‐ Part II (ISAS‐II), analyze its psychometric properties and test-retest reliability of Parts I and II of the ISAS. Method: The sample was composed of 355 Spanish participants diagnosed with eating disorders or borderline personality disorder (mean age 27.89, standard deviation = 13.31; 315 women, 40 men). Two models proposed for the ISAS‐II were analyzed by means of confirmatory factorial analysis. Results: A two‐factor model was confirmed, and a model with self‐care included in the intrapersonal factor was preferable. The ISAS‐II showed positive correlations with emotional dysregulation. Test-retest reliability showed statistically significant correlations at 7 months (n = 123). Conclusion: The ISAS‐II is a valid instrument to assess nonsuicidal self‐injury in Spanish populations, making it possible to assess these behaviors, which require valid and reliable measures worldwide

Characterization of carbon nanofibers superficially modified with ethylene plasma

Nanofibras de carbón (CNFs) han sido tratadas superficialmente mediante polimerización por plasma de etileno. Después del tratamiento, las CNFs fueron caracterizadas por Espectroscopía Infrarroja de Transformada de Fourier (FTIR), Análisis Termogravimétrico (TGA), Difracción de Rayos X (WAXS) y Microscopía Electrónica de Barrido de Emisión de Campo (FESEM- Jeol JSM7401F) en modalidad de transmisión (STEM). Finalmente, las CNFs tratadas y no tratadas fueron probadas en agua, cloroformo y triclorobenceno (TCB) con la finalidad de observar el grado de dispersión de las fibras en estos solventes. El análisis por FTIR muestra señales correspondientes a la parte orgánica depositada sobre la superficie de las CNFs. En el análisis por TGA se puede apreciar una mayor pérdida en peso para las CNFs tratadas en comparación con las CNFs no tratadas. Las pruebas de dispersión muestran que las CNFs tratadas y no tratadas exhiben un comportamiento distinto en cada uno de los solventes usados. Además, los resultados obtenidos por STEM indican que las CNFs tratadas tienen diferentes características morfológicas respecto a las no tratadas.Abstract: Carbon nanofibers (CNFs) have been surface modified by plasma polymerization of ethylene. After treatment, the CNFs were characterized by spectroscopy Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR), Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA), X-ray diffraction (WAXS) and Scanning Electron Microscopy Field Emission (FESEM- Jeol JSM7401F) in transmission mode (STEM). Finally, the CNFs treated and untreated were tested in water, chloroform and trichlorobenzene (TCB) in order to observe the degree of dispersion of the fibers in these solvents. The FTIR analysis shows signals corresponding to the organic part deposited on the surface of the CNFs. In the TGA analysis can be seen a greater loss weight for treated CNFs compared to untreated CNFs. Dispersion test show that the treated and untreated CNFs exhibit a different behavior in each of the solvents used. Moreover, the results obtained by STEM indicated that treated CNFs have different morphological characteristics compared to the untreated