Magnetization reversal and exchange bias effects in hard/soft ferromagnetic bilayers with orthogonal anisotropies

21 p.

The Relationship between Risk and Expected Return in Europe

Revised: 2006-07

Innovación, financiación pública y tamaño empresarial

[ES] A partir de los microdatos de la "encuesta sobre innovación tecnológica 1998-2000" se construye una base de datos con las empresas manufactureras españolas que realizan actividades de innovación. Posteriormente, mediante las pruebas Chi-cuadrado de Pearson y Mann-Whitney, contrastamos si el tamaño condiciona la participación de las empresas manufactureras innovadoras en los sistemas de ayuda pública a la innovación; asimismo, a través de los índices de Kendall y Spearman evaluamos la dirección de dicho condicionamiento. Al respecto, los contrastes realizados nos indican que la variable tamaño se encuentra relacionada con la variable financiación pública, y que son las empresas de mayor tamaño las que más se benefician de las ayudas públicas a la innovación.

Daily scale wintertime sea surface temperature and IPC-Navidad variability in the southern Bay of Biscay from 1981 to 2010

The combination of remotely sensed gappy Sea surface temperature (SST) images with the missing data filling DINEOF (data interpolating empirical orthogonal functions) technique, followed by a principal component analysis of the reconstructed data, has been used to identify the time evolution and the daily scale variability of the wintertime surface signal of the Iberian Poleward Current (IPC), or Navidad, during the 1981-2010 period. An exhaustive comparison with the existing bibliography, and the vertical temperature and salinity profiles related to its extremes over the Bay of Biscay area, show that the obtained time series accurately reflect the IPC-Navidad variability. Once a time series for the evolution of the SST signal of the current over the last decades is well established, this time series is used to propose a physical mechanism in relation to the variability of the IPC-Navidad, involving both atmospheric and oceanic variables. According to the proposed mechanism, an atmospheric circulation anomaly observed in both the 500 hPa and the surface levels generates atmospheric surface level pressure, wind-stress and heat-flux anomalies. In turn, those surface level atmospheric anomalies induce mutually coherent SST and sea level anomalies over the North Atlantic area, and locally, in the Bay of Biscay area. These anomalies, both locally over the Bay of Biscay area and over the North Atlantic, are in agreement with several mechanisms that have separately been related to the variability of the IPC-Navidad, i.e. the south-westerly winds, the joint effect of baroclinicity and relief (JEBAR) effect, the topographic beta effect and a weakened North Atlantic gyre.

The interactive brain hypothesis

Enactive approaches foreground the role of interpersonal interaction in explanations of social understanding. This motivates, in combination with a recent interest in neuroscientific studies involving actual interactions, the question of how interactive processes relate to neural mechanisms involved in social understanding. We introduce the Interactive Brain Hypothesis (IBH) in order to help map the spectrum of possible relations between social interaction and neural processes. The hypothesis states that interactive experience and skills play enabling roles in both the development and current function of social brain mechanisms, even in cases where social understanding happens in the absence of immediate interaction. We examine the plausibility of this hypothesis against developmental and neurobiological evidence and contrast it with the widespread assumption that mindreading is crucial to all social cognition. We describe the elements of social interaction that bear most directly on this hypothesis and discuss the empirical possibilities open to social neuroscience. We propose that the link between coordination dynamics and social understanding can be best grasped by studying transitions between states of coordination. These transitions form part of the self-organization of interaction processes that characterize the dynamics of social engagement. The patterns and synergies of this self-organization help explain how individuals understand each other. Various possibilities for role-taking emerge during interaction, determining a spectrum of participation. This view contrasts sharply with the observational stance that has guided research in social neuroscience until recently. We also introduce the concept of readiness to interact to describe the practices and dispositions that are summoned in situations of social significance (even if not interactive). This latter idea links interactive factors to more classical observational scenarios.

Downscaling of surface moisture flux and precipitation in the Ebro Valley (Spain) using analogues and analogues followed by random forests and multiple linear regression

In this paper, reanalysis fields from the ECMWF have been statistically downscaled to predict from large-scale atmospheric fields, surface moisture flux and daily precipitation at two observatories (Zaragoza and Tortosa, Ebro Valley, Spain) during the 1961-2001 period. Three types of downscaling models have been built: (i) analogues, (ii) analogues followed by random forests and (iii) analogues followed by multiple linear regression. The inputs consist of data (predictor fields) taken from the ERA-40 reanalysis. The predicted fields are precipitation and surface moisture flux as measured at the two observatories. With the aim to reduce the dimensionality of the problem, the ERA-40 fields have been decomposed using empirical orthogonal functions. Available daily data has been divided into two parts: a training period used to find a group of about 300 analogues to build the downscaling model (1961-1996) and a test period (19972001), where models' performance has been assessed using independent data. In the case of surface moisture flux, the models based on analogues followed by random forests do not clearly outperform those built on analogues plus multiple linear regression, while simple averages calculated from the nearest analogues found in the training period, yielded only slightly worse results. In the case of precipitation, the three types of model performed equally. These results suggest that most of the models' downscaling capabilities can be attributed to the analogues-calculation stage.

Plataforma de investigación en el ámbito de la resucitación cardio-pulmonar basada en un maniquí de entrenamiento sensorizado

[ES]Hoy en día las muertes por parada cardiorrespiratoria superan en número a otras más mediáticas como aquellas que se producen por incendios o en accidentes de tráfico, y sin embargo su repercusión es mucho menor. Este hecho debe ser motivo de preocupación ya que, con una correcta formación de la población en materia de resucitación cardíaca, muchas de estas muertes podrían ser evitadas. Con el objetivo de reducir estas estadísticas han surgido multitud de estudios y proyectos de investigación consistentes en tratar de mejorar las herramientas disponibles tanto para personal sanitario como no sanitario. En este marco se encuadra el proyecto presentado en este documento, consistente en la sensorización de un maniquí de entrenamiento para episodios de parada cardiorrespiratoria, el cual ofrecerá la posibilidad de analizar con detalle el artifact o interferencia generada por el rescatador sobre el paciente en el momento de efectuar la maniobra de resucitación, así como la interferencia causada por el contacto electrodo-piel. Paralelamente podrá ser utilizado como mero instrumento de entrenamiento para posibles situaciones reales. El porqué de la utilización de este tipo de maniquíes reside principalmente en la imposibilidad de emplear personas debido a las posibles lesiones torácicas que pueden ocurrir por las compresiones realizadas. Finalmente debe citarse el hecho de que no es imprescindible tener conocimientos médicos para poder aplicar las técnicas básicas de resucitación cardíaca, acción que incrementa las posibilidades de supervivencia de un paciente de manera excepcional, ya que cada minuto que pasa desde la parada cardiorrespiratoria la probabilidad de supervivencia disminuye en un porcentaje significativamente elevado. Tomando como base lo descrito hasta ahora, en este documento se detalla la solución técnica de la sensorización de un maniquí genérico para la adquisición de las señales de fuerza de compresión, aceleración sufrida por el pecho en tres ejes ortogonales, profundidad de compresión, impedancia entre los dos electrodos colocados sobre el pecho del paciente y señal electrocardiográfica emitida por el corazón; además, se incluye la posibilidad de inyectar una señal electrocardiográfica previamente grabada. La base de registros obtenida de estos ensayos podrá ser utilizada posteriormente para su análisis, ya que su similitud con señales extraídas en un caso real es máxima.

Physiological modules for generating discrete and rhythmic movements: action identification by a dynamic recurrent neural network

In this study we employed a dynamic recurrent neural network (DRNN) in a novel fashion to reveal characteristics of control modules underlying the generation of muscle activations when drawing figures with the outstretched arm. We asked healthy human subjects to perform four different figure-eight movements in each of two workspaces (frontal plane and sagittal plane). We then trained a DRNN to predict the movement of the wrist from information in the EMG signals from seven different muscles. We trained different instances of the same network on a single movement direction, on all four movement directions in a single movement plane, or on all eight possible movement patterns and looked at the ability of the DRNN to generalize and predict movements for trials that were not included in the training set. Within a single movement plane, a DRNN trained on one movement direction was not able to predict movements of the hand for trials in the other three directions, but a DRNN trained simultaneously on all four movement directions could generalize across movement directions within the same plane. Similarly, the DRNN was able to reproduce the kinematics of the hand for both movement planes, but only if it was trained on examples performed in each one. As we will discuss, these results indicate that there are important dynamical constraints on the mapping of EMG to hand movement that depend on both the time sequence of the movement and on the anatomical constraints of the musculoskeletal system. In a second step, we injected EMG signals constructed from different synergies derived by the PCA in order to identify the mechanical significance of each of these components. From these results, one can surmise that discrete-rhythmic movements may be constructed from three different fundamental modules, one regulating the co-activation of all muscles over the time span of the movement and two others elliciting patterns of reciprocal activation operating in orthogonal directions.

Análisis de la interferencia inducida en el electrocardiograma y señal de impedancia por compresiones torácicas sobre un maniquí.

[EN]This paper presents a project within that research field. The project consists on the development of an experimental environment comprised by a sensorized practice manikin and a management software system. Manikin model allows the simulation of cardiac arrest episodes on laboratory settings. The management software system adds the capacity to compute and analyze the characteristics of the artifact induced on the electrocardiogram and the thoracic impedance signals by chest compressions during cardiopulmonary resuscitation due to variations of the electrode-skin interface. The main reason for choosing this kind of model is the impossibility to use real people because of the risk of thoracic injuries during chest compression. Moreover, this platform could be used for training in reanimation techniques for real situations. Even laypeople with minimal training can perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation. This can reduce the response time to an emergency while the healthcare personnel arrives, which is key to improve outcomes, since with every minute the chances of survival decrease approximately 10%. It is not necessary to have medical knowledge to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation, which could increase chances of survival for a patient with an early reanimation since In this context, this paper details the technique solution for the manikin sensorisation to acquire the electrocardiogram, the impedance signal measured between the defibrillation pads placed on the patient’s chest, the compression depth, the compression force and the acceleration experienced by the chest in the three orthogonal axes. Moreover, it is possible to inject a previously recorded electrocardiogram signal.

Prisioneros de los piratas: política y propaganda en la captura de Julio César y Clodio

Este artículo se inscribe dentro del programa de perfeccionamiento postdoctoral en el extranjero del Departamento de Educación, Universidades e Investigación del Gobierno Vasco. Forma parte, asimismo, del proyecto HAR2010-21893: «El discurso sobre el imperio en la República romana: Estrategias de dominación en la oratoria diplomática»

Anisotropic expansion and SNIa: An open issue

We review the appropriateness of using SNIa observations to detect potential signatures of anisotropic expansion in the Universe. We focus on Union2 and SNLS3 SNIa datasets and use the hemispherical comparison method to detect possible anisotropic features. Unlike some previous works where nondiagonal elements of the covariance matrix were neglected, we use the full covariance matrix of the SNIa data, thus obtaining more realistic and not underestimated errors. As a matter of fact, the significance of previously claimed detections of a preferred direction in the Union2 dataset completely disappears once we include the effects of using the full covariance matrix. Moreover, we also find that such apreferred direction is aligned with the orthogonal direction of the SDSS observational plane and this suggests a clear indication that the SDSS subsample of the Union2 dataset introduces a significant bias, making the detected preferred direction unphysical. We thus find that current SNIa surveys are inappropriate to test anisotropic features due to their highly non-homogeneous angular distribution in the sky. In addition, after removal of the highest in homogeneous sub-samples, the number of SNIa is too low. Finally, we take advantage of the particular distribution of SNLS SNIa sub- sample in the SNLS3 data set, in which the observations were taken along four different directions. We fit each direction independently and find consistent results at the 1 sigma level. Although the likelihoods peak at relatively different values of Omega(m), the low number of data along each direction gives rise to large errors so that the likelihoods are sufficiently broad as to overlap within 1 sigma. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http:// creativecommons. org/licenses/by/4.0/).