Recursive linear estimation for discrete time systems in the presence of different multiplicative observation noises

This paper describes a design for a least mean square error estimator in discrete time systems where the components of the state vector, in measurement equation, are corrupted by different multiplicative noises in addition to observation noise. We show how known results can be considered a particular case of the algorithm stated in this paperState estimation, multiplicative noise, uncertain observations

Spanish for Business: Past, Present, and Future (Opinion)

Spanish for Business has witnessed a lack of growth in academia for the last five years in colleges and universities that offer either a major, minor, or certificate in this area. This article follows those five years of development not only in the number of students taking Spanish for Business and Business Culture classes but also in the way administrators and other faculty members do not consider this to be an area worth research and publication. In the meantime, the number of positions advertised for faculty to teach these courses has gradually decreased during this time period

The effect of frequency-specific sound signals on the germination of maize seeds

Objective: the effects of sound treatments on the germination of maize seeds were determined. - Results: white noise and bass sounds (300 Hz) had a positive effect on the germination rate. Only 3 h treatment produced an increase of about 8%, and 5 h increased germination in about 10%. Fast-green staining shows that at least part of the effects of sound are due to a physical alteration in the integrity of the pericarp, increasing the porosity of the pericarp and facilitating oxygen availability and water and oxygen uptake. Accordingly, by removing the pericarp from the seeds the positive effect of the sound on the germination disappeared

Mortgage defaults

We incorporate house price risk and mortgages into a standard incomplete market (SIM) model. We calibrate the model to match U.S. data and we show that the model also ac- counts for non-targeted features of the data such as the distribution of down payments, the life-cycle profile of home ownership, and the mortgage default rate. In addition, we show that the average coefficients that measure the agents' ability to self-insure against income shocks are similar to those of a SIM model without housing (as presented by Kaplan and Violante, 2010). However, incorporating housing increases the values of these coefficient for younger agents, which narrows the gap between the SIM model's implications and the data. The response of consumption to house price shocks is minimal. We also study the effects of default prevention policies. Introducing a minimum down payment requirement of 15% reduces defaults on mortgages by 30%, reduces the home ownership rate up to only 0.2 percentage points (if the aggregate house price level does not adjust), and may cause house prices to decline up to 0.7% (if home ownership does not adjust). Garnishing defaulters' income in excess of 43% of median consumption for one year produces a similar decline in defaults; but, since it reduces the median equilibrium down payment from 19% to 9%, it boosts home ownership up to 4.3 percentage points (if the aggregate house price level does not adjust) and may increase house prices up to 16.1% (if home ownership does not adjust). The introduction of minimum down payments or income garnishment benefit a majority of the population.Mortgage loans ; Default (Finance)

Genome-wide identification of Reverse Transcriptase domains of recently inserted endogenous plant pararetrovirus (Caulimoviridae)

Altres ajuts: CERCA Programme/Generalitat de CatalunyaEndogenous viral elements (EVEs) are viral sequences that have been integrated into the nuclear chromosomes. Endogenous pararetrovirus (EPRV) are a class of EVEs derived from DNA viruses of the family Caulimoviridae. Previous works based on a limited number of genome assemblies demonstrated that EPRVs are abundant in plants and are present in several species. The availability of genome sequences has been immensely increased in the recent years and we took advantage of these resources to have a more extensive view of the presence of EPRVs in plant genomes. We analyzed 278 genome assemblies corresponding to 267 species (254 from Viridiplantae) using tBLASTn against a collection of conserved domains of the Reverse Transcriptases (RT) of Caulimoviridae. We concentrated our search on complete and well-conserved RT domains with an uninterrupted ORF comprising the genetic information for at least 300 amino acids. We obtained 11.527 sequences from the genomes of 202 species spanning the whole Tracheophyta clade. These elements were grouped in 57 clusters and classified in 13 genera, including a newly proposed genus we called Wendovirus. Wendoviruses are characterized by the presence of four open reading frames and two of them encode for aspartic proteinases. Comparing plant genomes, we observed important differences between the plant families and genera in the number and type of EPRVs found. In general, florendoviruses are the most abundant and widely distributed EPRVs. The presence of multiple identical RT domain sequences in some of the genomes suggests their recent amplification

Integrative meta-analysis of protein interaction data identified multiple GID/MRCTLH protein complexes in plants

GID/MRCTLH is a protein complex involved in the regulation of several cellular processes through the polyubiquitination and proteosome degradation. It has been described in yeast and mammals. Genes coding for homologous proteins are also present in plant genomes but have been little studied. BLAST analyses revealed that genes coding for members of the GID/MRCTLH complex are found in multiple copies in plants, compared to mammals and yeast. The potential structure of the Arabidopsis GID/MRCTLH complex was estimated based on the Arabidopsis protein interaction database Interactome 2.0. According to these data, Arabidopsis may contain two GID/MRCTLH complexes instead of the one described in yeast and mammals. The structure of the two Arabidopsis complexes seem to be similar to the yeast GID complex, and seem to interact with several other proteins out of the complex. These data suggest that, similarly to yeast and mammals, the plant GID/MRCTLH complexes are involved in the regulation of several cellular processes through proteosome protein degradation

Attitudes of students of a health sciences university towards the extension of smoke-free policies at the university campuses of Barcelona

OBJECTIVE: To assess attitudes towards the extension of outdoor smoke-free areas on university campuses. METHODS: Cross-sectional study (n=384) conducted using a questionnaire administered to medical and nursing students in Barcelona in 2014. Information was obtained pertaining to support for indoor and outdoor smoking bans on university campuses, and the importance of acting as role models. Logistic regression analyses were performed to examine agreement. RESULTS: Most of the students agreed on the importance of health professionals and students as role models (74.9% and 64.1%, respectively) although there were statistically significant differences by smoking status and age. 90% of students reported exposure to smoke on campus. Students expressed strong support for indoor smoke-free policies (97.9%). However, only 39.3% of participants supported regulation of outdoor smoking for university campuses. Non-smokers (OR=12.315; 95% CI: 5.377-28.204) and students ≥22 years old (OR=3.001; 95% CI: 1.439-6.257) were the strongest supporters. CONCLUSIONS: The students supported indoor smoke-free policies for universities. However, support for extending smoke-free regulations to outdoor areas of university campuses was limited. It is necessary to educate students about tobacco control and emphasise their importance as role models before extending outdoor smoke-free legislation at university campuses

Use of ultrasonication to increase germination rates of Arabidopsis seeds

Background: Arabidopsis thaliana is widely used as model organism in plant biology. Although not of agronomic significance, it offers important advantages for basic research in genetics and molecular biology including the availability of a large number of mutants and genetically modified lines. However, Arabidopsis seed longevity is limited and seeds stored for more than 10 years usually show a very low capacity for germination. - Results: the influence of ultrasonic stimulation was investigated on the germination of A. thaliana L. seeds. All experiments have been performed using a frequency of 45 kHz at constant temperature (24 °C). No germination rate differences were observed when using freshly collected seeds. However, using artificially deteriorated seeds, our results show that short ultrasonic stimulation (<1 min) significantly increased germination. Ultrasonic stimulation application of 30 s is the optimal treatment. A significant increase in the germination rate was also verified in naturally aged seeds after ultrasonic stimulation. Scanning electron microscopy observations showed an increase in the presence of pores in the seed coat after sonication that may be the cause, at least in part, of the increase in germination. The ultrasound treated seeds developed normally to mature fertile plants. - Conclusions: ultrasound technology can be used to enhance the germination process of old Arabidopsis seeds without negatively affecting seedling development. This effect seems to be, at least in part, due to the opening of pores in the seed coat. The use of ultrasonic stimulation in Arabidopsis seeds may contribute to the recovering of long time stored lines

OSL dating of mortars from constructive phases of the old chapel San Breixo de Ouvigo (NW Spain)

[Abstract] The use of optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating on ancient mortars have provided increasing knowledge of the history of buildings in the last years. In this work, we apply OSL dating on mortars of a key building for the history of NW Spain: the old chapel of San Breixo de Ouvigo. After archaeological excavations, more than 40 years ago, it was generally accepted that this building preserves, at least, a Late Roman (4th and 5th centuries) constructive phase with later modifications introduced in the Early and Late Middle Ages. However, neither stratigraphical nor chronological evidence confirmed this interpretation. Five samples from three different constructive phases have been taken for OSL dating. Small quartz multi-grain aliquots were used for dating. Results provide ages in agreement with expectations for the mortars of the Late Roman phase but, they show the need of a new interpretation of the chronological model assigned to the building. Such model could be corroborated in a next phase of the project that intends to characterize the mortars and using radiocarbon dating

Global-local word embedding for text classification

Only humans can understand and comprehend the actual meaning that underlies natural written language, whereas machines can form semantic relationships only after humans have provided the parameters that are necessary to model the meaning. To enable computer models to access the underlying meaning in written language, accurate and sufficient document representation is crucial. Recent word embedding approaches have drawn much attention to text mining research. One of the main benefits of such approaches is the use of global corpuses with the generation of pre-trained word vectors. Although very effective, these approaches have their disadvantages, namely sole reliance on pre-trained word vectors that may neglect the local context and increase word ambiguity. In this thesis, four new document representation approaches are introduced to mitigate the risk of word ambiguity and inject a local context into globally pre-trained word vectors. The proposed approaches, which are frameworks for document representation while using word embedding learning features for the task of text classification, are: Content Tree Word Embedding; Composed Maximum Spanning Content Tree; Embedding-based Word Clustering; and Autoencoder-based Word Embedding. The results show improvement in the F_score accuracy measure for a document classification task applied to IMDB Movie Reviews, Hate Speech Identification, 20 Newsgroups, Reuters-21578, and AG News as benchmark datasets in comparison to using three deep learning-based word embedding approaches, namely GloVe, Word2Vec, and fastText, as well as two other document representations: LSA and Random word embedding