Immigrants Responsiveness to Labor Market Conditions

Using data from the Spanish Labor Force Survey (Encuesta de Población Activa) from 1999 through 2004, we explore the role of regional employment opportunities in explaining the increasing immigrant flows of recent years despite the limited internal mobility on the part of natives. Subsequently, we investigate the policy question of whether immigration has helped reduced unemployment rate disparities across Spanish regions by attracting immigrant flows to regions offering better employment opportunities. Our results indicate that immigrants choose to reside in regions with larger employment rates and where their probability of finding a job is higher. In particular, and despite some differences depending on their origin, immigrants appear generally more responsive than their native counterparts to a higher likelihood of informal, self, or indefinite employment. More importantly, insofar the vast majority of immigrants locate in regions characterized by higher employment rates, immigration contributes to greasing the wheels of the Spanish labor market by narrowing regional unemployment rate disparities.

Unlike Physical Exercise, Modified Environment Increases the Lifespan of SOD1(G93A) Mice However Both Conditions Induce Cellular Changes

8 p.

Viability Conditions for a Compartmentalized Protometabolic System: A Semi-Empirical Approach

In this work we attempt to find out the extent to which realistic prebiotic compartments, such as fatty acid vesicles, would constrain the chemical network dynamics that could have sustained a minimal form of metabolism. We combine experimental and simulation results to establish the conditions under which a reaction network with a catalytically closed organization (more specifically, an (M, R)-system) would overcome the potential problem of self-suffocation that arises from the limited accessibility of nutrients to its internal reaction domain. The relationship between the permeability of the membrane, the lifetime of the key catalysts and their efficiency (reaction rate enhancement) turns out to be critical. In particular, we show how permeability values constrain the characteristic time scale of the bounded protometabolic processes. From this concrete and illustrative example we finally extend the discussion to a wider evolutionary context.

Effect of the A cation size disorder and synthesis conditions on the properties of an iron perovskite series

Póster presentado en The Energy and Materials Research Conference - EMR2015 celebrado en Madrid (España) entre el 25-27 de febrero de 2015

Comparison of the Transcriptional Profiles of Melanocytes from Dark and Light Skinned Individuals under Basal Conditions and Following Ultraviolet-B Irradiation

We analysed the whole-genome transcriptional profile of 6 cell lines of dark melanocytes (DM) and 6 of light melanocytes (LM) at basal conditions and after ultraviolet-B (UVB) radiation at different time points to investigate the mechanisms by which melanocytes protect human skin from the damaging effects of UVB. Further, we assessed the effect of different keratinocyte-conditioned media (KCM+ and KCM-) on melanocytes. Our results suggest that an interaction between ribosomal proteins and the P53 signaling pathway may occur in response to UVB in both DM and LM. We also observed that DM and LM show differentially expressed genes after irradiation, in particular at the first 6h after UVB. These are mainly associated with inflammatory reactions, cell survival or melanoma. Furthermore, the culture with KCM+ compared with KCM- had a noticeable effect on LM. This effect includes the activation of various signaling pathways such as the mTOR pathway, involved in the regulation of cell metabolism, growth, proliferation and survival. Finally, the comparison of the transcriptional profiles between LM and DM under basal conditions, and the application of natural selection tests in human populations allowed us to support the significant evolutionary role of MIF and ATP6V0B in the pigmentary phenotype.

Detection of particles with a cloud chamber

Cloud chambers were essential devices in early nuclear and particle physics research. Superseded by more modern detectors in actual research, they still remain very interesting pedagogical apparatus. This thesis attempts to give a global view on this topic. To do so, a review of the physical foundations of the diffusion cloud chamber, in which an alcohol is supersaturated by cooling it with a thermal reservoir, is carried out. Its main results are then applied to analyse the working conditions inside the chamber. The analysis remarks the importance of using an appropriate alcohol, such as isopropanol, as well as a strong cooling system, which for isopropanol needs to reach −40ºC. That theoretical study is complemented with experimental tests that were performed with what is the usual design of a home-made cloud chamber. An effective setup is established, which highlights details such as a grazing illumination, a direct contact with the cooling reservoir through a wide metal plate, or the importance of avoiding vapour removal. Apart from that, video results of different phenomena that cloud chamber allow to observe are also presented. Overall, it is aimed to present a physical insight that pedagogical papers usually lack.

Research on operating conditions at the catalytic reactor for the combined removal of NOx and PCDD/PCDFs from MWI plants

The management of municipal solid waste (MSW), particularly the role of incineration, is currently a subject of public debate. Incineration shows to be a good alternative of reducing the volume of waste and eliminating certain infectious components. Moreover, Municipal Waste Incinerators (MWI), are reported to be highly hygienic and apart from that MWIs are immediately effective in terms of transport (incinerators can be built close to the waste sources) and incineration's nature. Nevertheless, the emissions of many hazardous substances make the Municipal Waste Incineration (MWI) plants to be unpopular. Metals (especially lead, manganese, cadmium, chromium and mercury) are concentrated in fly and bottom ashes. Furthermore, incomplete combustion produces a wide variety of potentially hazardous organic compounds, such as aldehydes, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), chlorinated hydrocarbons including polychlorinated dibenzodioxins (PCDD) and dibenzofurans (PCDF), and even acid gases, including NOx. Many of these hazardous substances are carcinogenic and some have direct systemic toxicity.