Creació de recursos digitals per a la innovació docent en Geologia Estructural i Tectònica

El projecte ha estat dedicat a l’elaboració d’una sèrie de recursos didàctics en format digital per a l’ensenyament de les matèries de Geologia Estructural i Tectònica en titulacions universitàries relacionades amb les Ciències de la Terra. L’objectiu és la millora de la formació i del rendiment dels estudiants mitjançant l’elaboració d’activitats de suport no presencials que fomentin l’autoaprenentatge i l’autoregulació per part de l’estudiant. Les activitats intenten aprofitar les noves eines informàtiques disponibles i fomentar l’accés mitjançant la xarxa. El material que s’elabora en el marc del projecte consisteix en: 1) un fons documental d’imatges relacionades amb la Geologia Estructural i la Tectònica amb explicació, disponibles en xarxa i accessibles per motors específics de cerca, 2) un conjunt d’exercicis i casos pràctics, alguns d’ells resolts, i 3) sortides de camp virtuals d’una regió geològica que permeten proposar activitats prèvies a una pràctica presencial de camp o desenvolupar la pràctica a nivell completament autònom. Per aconseguir aquests objectius, les tasques realitzades són: la compilació i digitalització de la base d'imatges d'exemples naturals d'estructures geològiques de deformació de que disposàvem, junt amb la redacció de material explicatiu (text i figures), la selecció d'un conjunt d'exercicis de la disciplina, i la preparació de dades de camp per a la realització de les sortides virtuals. Paral•lelament, aquest material s'ha estat processant per a la seva disposició en xarxa com un recurs lliure y obert, accessible en una website i domini específics (plataforma REDITEC).

Diagnosi ambiental de les fonts naturals de la zona nord-occidental del Vallès Oriental: el fenomen "garrafaire"

Aquest treball analitza un total de sis fonts naturals situades a la zona nord-occidental del Vallès Oriental amb l’objectiu de determinar-ne la seva freqüentació i en especial centrar-se en el fenomen “garrafaire”. S’ha elaborat un mètode de recompte d’usuaris, s’ha analitzat l’aigua a nivell físico-químic i microbiològic i s’ha portat a terme un sistema de caracterització ambiental d’aquestes fonts. La freqüentació és elevada a quatre de les sis fonts estudiades, de les que només tres són utilitzades habitualment per “garrafaires”. El volum d’ús d’aquestes fonts contrasta amb el control analític de la qualitat de l’aigua, per part de l’administració, que és inexistent en quatre d’elles i insuficient a les restants. La confiança per part dels usuaris cap a la qualitat de l’aigua també difereix dels resultats de les analítiques realitzades, en que l’aigua ha estat qualificada com a no apta per al consum humà en totes elles, exceptuant una única analítica d’una font que ha resultat apta per al consum humà. En conseqüència, caldria un pla de control i seguiment de la qualitat de l’aigua almenys en 4 de les fonts analitzades.

Sound Texture Modelling

In the PhD thesis “Sound Texture Modeling” we deal with statistical modelling or textural sounds like water, wind, rain, etc. For synthesis and classification. Our initial model is based on a wavelet tree signal decomposition and the modeling of the resulting sequence by means of a parametric probabilistic model, that can be situated within the family of models trainable via expectation maximization (hidden Markov tree model ). Our model is able to capture key characteristics of the source textures (water, rain, fire, applause, crowd chatter ), and faithfully reproduces some of the sound classes. In terms of a more general taxonomy of natural events proposed by Graver, we worked on models for natural event classification and segmentation. While the event labels comprise physical interactions between materials that do not have textural propierties in their enterity, those segmentation models can help in identifying textural portions of an audio recording useful for analysis and resynthesis. Following our work on concatenative synthesis of musical instruments, we have developed a pattern-based synthesis system, that allows to sonically explore a database of units by means of their representation in a perceptual feature space. Concatenative syntyhesis with “molecules” built from sparse atomic representations also allows capture low-level correlations in perceptual audio features, while facilitating the manipulation of textural sounds based on their physical and perceptual properties. We have approached the problem of sound texture modelling for synthesis from different directions, namely a low-level signal-theoretic point of view through a wavelet transform, and a more high-level point of view driven by perceptual audio features in the concatenative synthesis setting. The developed framework provides unified approach to the high-quality resynthesis of natural texture sounds. Our research is embedded within the Metaverse 1 European project (2008-2011), where our models are contributting as low level building blocks within a semi-automated soundscape generation system.

SLAM using an Imaging Sonar for Partially Structured Underwater Environments

In this paper we describe a system for underwater navigation with AUVs in partially structured environments, such as dams, ports or marine platforms. An imaging sonar is used to obtain information about the location of planar structures present in such environments. This information is incorporated into a feature-based SLAM algorithm in a two step process: (I) the full 360deg sonar scan is undistorted (to compensate for vehicle motion), thresholded and segmented to determine which measurements correspond to planar environment features and which should be ignored; and (2) SLAM proceeds once the data association is obtained: both the vehicle motion and the measurements whose correct association has been previously determined are incorporated in the SLAM algorithm. This two step delayed SLAM process allows to robustly determine the feature and vehicle locations in the presence of large amounts of spurious or unrelated measurements that might correspond to boats, rocks, etc. Preliminary experiments show the viability of the proposed approach

A hybrid method for sag source location in power network

The work presented in this paper belongs to the power quality knowledge area and deals with the voltage sags in power transmission and distribution systems. Propagating throughout the power network, voltage sags can cause plenty of problems for domestic and industrial loads that can financially cost a lot. To impose penalties to responsible party and to improve monitoring and mitigation strategies, sags must be located in the power network. With such a worthwhile objective, this paper comes up with a new method for associating a sag waveform with its origin in transmission and distribution networks. It solves this problem through developing hybrid methods which hire multiway principal component analysis (MPCA) as a dimension reduction tool. MPCA reexpresses sag waveforms in a new subspace just in a few scores. We train some well-known classifiers with these scores and exploit them for classification of future sags. The capabilities of the proposed method for dimension reduction and classification are examined using the real data gathered from three substations in Catalonia, Spain. The obtained classification rates certify the goodness and powerfulness of the developed hybrid methods as brand-new tools for sag classification

Indicator taxa of benthic diatom communities: a case study in Mediterranean streams

A key issue in the implementation of the Water Framework Directive is the classification of streams and rivers using biological quality parameters and type-specific reference conditions. Four groups of stream types were defined in NE Spain on the basis of 152 diatom samples by means of detrended correspondence analysis and classification techniques. Diatom analysis was restricted to epilithic taxa, and the sites included gradients ranging from near-natural streams to sites with poor ecological quality. The main gradient shows a clear separation of sites in relation to the degree of human influence: polluted streams (mainly located in the lowlands) differ from streams in mountainous areas and in the Pyrenees. A second gradient is related to physiographical features. Headwater streams can be distinguished by their catchment geology. The type-specific diatom taxa for the stream types studied were determined by using indicator species analysis (IndVal). The type-specific taxa from near-natural streams are coincident with the indicator taxa for high ecological status. Human impact reduced the typological heterogeneity of the diatom community composition. Overall, the diatom communities in NE Spain exhibit a regional distribution pattern that closely corresponds with that observed in river systems elsewhere. Physiographical differences are only evident in undisturbed sites, while nutrient enrichment and other human disturbances may mask the regional differences in the distribution of diatom communities

Implantación de la ISO 14001 en una planta de tratamiento de vehículos fuera de uso (VFU)

Nos hemos propuesto implantar la ISO 14001 en un centro autorizado de tratamiento de vehículos fuera de uso, denominado Recycling Gandía, S.L., con el fin de que dicho centro pueda obtener una ventaja competitiva, respecto de otros centros ubicados próximamente, dada la fuerte competencia existente. Con la implantación de un Sistema de Gestión Medioambiental y más concretamente la ISO 14001, se puede conseguir una mejora de la imagen de la empresa, un ahorro de costes, se pueden mejorar las relaciones con la Administración e incluso con las entidades financieras, se puede contribuir a la motivación de los trabajadores, se asegura el cumplimiento de la legislación ambiental. La actividad que nos ocupa, se dedica a la recepción y descontaminación de vehículos al final de su vida útil, reutilizando piezas o componentes de recambio., Los objetivos del presente trabajo van a ser fundamentalmente, el implantar el Manual de Gestión Ambiental en la planta de tratamiento de vehículos fuera de uso y el describir todos los procedimientos genéricos a seguir. Como conclusiones de este trabajo, tendremos las auditorías con las no conformidades detectadas, así como el compromiso adquirido en todos los niveles y departamentos de la empresa, lo cual se traducirá en una mejor satisfacción de los clientes y por tanto un aumento en el número de vehículos a tratar.

Estimation of the extreme flash flood evolution in Barcelona county from 1351 to 2005

Every year, flash floods cause economic losses and major problems for undertaking daily activity in the Catalonia region (NE Spain). Sometimes catastrophic damage and casualties occur. When a long term analysis of floods is undertaken, a question arises regarding the changing role of the vulnerability and the hazard in risk evolution. This paper sets out to give some information to deal with this question, on the basis of analysis of all the floods that have occurred in Barcelona county (Catalonia) since the 14th century, as well as the flooded area, urban evolution, impacts and the weather conditions for any of most severe events. With this objective, the identification and classification of historical floods, and characterisation of flash-floods among these, have been undertaken. Besides this, the main meteorological factors associated with recent flash floods in this city and neighbouring regions are well-known. On the other hand, the identification of rainfall trends that could explain the historical evolution of flood hazard occurrence in this city has been analysed. Finally, identification of the influence of urban development on the vulnerability to floods has been carried out. Barcelona city has been selected thanks to its long continuous data series (daily rainfall data series, since 1854; one of the longest rainfall rate series of Europe, since 1921) and for the accurate historical archive information that is available (since the Roman Empire for the urban evolution). The evolution of flood occurrence shows the existence of oscillations in the earlier and later modern-age periods that can be attributed to climatic variability, evolution of the perception threshold and changes in vulnerability. A great increase of vulnerability can be assumed for the period 1850¿1900. The analysis of the time evolution for the Barcelona rainfall series (1854¿2000) shows that no trend exists, although, due to changes in urban planning, flash-floods impact has altered over this time. The number of catastrophic flash floods has diminished, although the extraordinary ones have increased.

Automatic Prediction of Facial Trait Judgments: Appearance vs. Structural Models

Evaluating other individuals with respect to personality characteristics plays a crucial role in human relations and it is the focus of attention for research in diverse fields such as psychology and interactive computer systems. In psychology, face perception has been recognized as a key component of this evaluation system. Multiple studies suggest that observers use face information to infer personality characteristics. Interactive computer systems are trying to take advantage of these findings and apply them to increase the natural aspect of interaction and to improve the performance of interactive computer systems. Here, we experimentally test whether the automatic prediction of facial trait judgments (e.g. dominance) can be made by using the full appearance information of the face and whether a reduced representation of its structure is sufficient. We evaluate two separate approaches: a holistic representation model using the facial appearance information and a structural model constructed from the relations among facial salient points. State of the art machine learning methods are applied to a) derive a facial trait judgment model from training data and b) predict a facial trait value for any face. Furthermore, we address the issue of whether there are specific structural relations among facial points that predict perception of facial traits. Experimental results over a set of labeled data (9 different trait evaluations) and classification rules (4 rules) suggest that a) prediction of perception of facial traits is learnable by both holistic and structural approaches; b) the most reliable prediction of facial trait judgments is obtained by certain type of holistic descriptions of the face appearance; and c) for some traits such as attractiveness and extroversion, there are relationships between specific structural features and social perceptions.

Treatment of pregnant rats with oleoyl-estrone slows down pup fat deposition after weaning

BACKGROUND: In rats, oral oleoyl-estrone (OE) decreases food intake and body lipid content. The aim of this study was to determine whether OE treatment affects the energy metabolism of pregnant rats and eventually, of their pups; i.e. changes in normal growth patterns and the onset of obesity after weaning. METHODS: Pregnant Wistar rats were treated with daily intragastric gavages of OE in 0.2 ml sunflower oil from days 11 to 21 of pregnancy (i.e. 10 nmol oleoyl-estrone/g/day). Control animals received only the vehicle. Plasma and hormone metabolites were determined together with variations in cellularity of adipose tissue. RESULTS: Treatment decreased food intake and lowered weight gain during late pregnancy, mainly because of reduced adipose tissue accumulation in different sites. OE-treated pregnant rats' metabolic pattern after delivery was similar to that of controls. Neonates from OE-treated rats weighed the same as those from controls. They also maintained the same growth rate up to weaning, but pups from OE-treated rats slowed their growth rate afterwards, despite only limited differences in metabolite concentrations. CONCLUSION: The OE influences on pup growth can be partially buffered by maternal lipid mobilization during the second half of pregnancy. This maternal metabolic "imprinting" may condition the eventual accumulation of adipose tissue after weaning, and its effects can affect the regulation of body weight up to adulthood.

On the Selection of Non-Invasive Methods Based on Speech Analysis Oriented to Automatic Alzheimer Disease Diagnosis

The work presented here is part of a larger study to identify novel technologies and biomarkers for early Alzheimer disease (AD) detection and it focuses on evaluating the suitability of a new approach for early AD diagnosis by non-invasive methods. The purpose is to examine in a pilot study the potential of applying intelligent algorithms to speech features obtained from suspected patients in order to contribute to the improvement of diagnosis of AD and its degree of severity. In this sense, Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) have been used for the automatic classification of the two classes (AD and control subjects). Two human issues have been analyzed for feature selection: Spontaneous Speech and Emotional Response. Not only linear features but also non-linear ones, such as Fractal Dimension, have been explored. The approach is non invasive, low cost and without any side effects. Obtained experimental results were very satisfactory and promising for early diagnosis and classification of AD patients.

Visual SLAM for 3D large-scale seabed acquisition employing underwater vehicles

This paper presents a novel technique to align partial 3D reconstructions of the seabed acquired by a stereo camera mounted on an autonomous underwater vehicle. Vehicle localization and seabed mapping is performed simultaneously by means of an Extended Kalman Filter. Passive landmarks are detected on the images and characterized considering 2D and 3D features. Landmarks are re-observed while the robot is navigating and data association becomes easier but robust. Once the survey is completed, vehicle trajectory is smoothed by a Rauch-Tung-Striebel filter obtaining an even better alignment of the 3D views and yet a large-scale acquisition of the seabed

Aproximación al reajuste automático de centroides mediante la heurística de Lloyd para resolver el problema de las K-Medias

Peer-reviewed

Problematic Internet use in British adolescents: An exploration of the addictive symptomatology

Research into online addictions has increased substantially over the last decade, particularly amongst youth. This study adapted the Problematic Internet Entertainment Use Scale for Adolescents [PIEUSA] for use with a British population. The adapted scale was used to (i) validate the instrument for English-speaking adolescent samples, (ii) estimate the prevalence of adolescent online problem users and describe their profile, and (iii) assess the accuracy of the scale"s classification of symptomatology. A survey was administered to 1097 adolescents aged between 11 and 18 years. The results indicated that (i) reliability of the adapted scale was excellent; factor validity showed unidimensionality, and construct validity was adequate. The findings also indicated that (ii) prevalence of online problem users was 5.2% and that they were more likely to younger males that engaged in online gaming for more than two hours most days. The majority of online problem users displayed negative addictive symptoms, especially"loss of control" and"conflict". The adapted scale showed (iii) very good sensitivity, specificity, and classification accuracy, and was able to clearly differentiate between problem and non-problem users. The results suggest certain differences between adolescent and adult online problem users based in the predominance of slightly different psychological components.

Implantación de la ISO 14001 en una planta de tratamiento de vehículos fuera de uso (VFU)

Nos hemos propuesto implantar la ISO 14001 en un centro autorizado de tratamiento de vehículos fuera de uso, denominado Recycling Gandía, S.L., con el fin de que dicho centro pueda obtener una ventaja competitiva, respecto de otros centros ubicados próximamente, dada la fuerte competencia existente. Con la implantación de un Sistema de Gestión Medioambiental y más concretamente la ISO 14001, se puede conseguir una mejora de la imagen de la empresa, un ahorro de costes, se pueden mejorar las relaciones con la Administración e incluso con las entidades financieras, se puede contribuir a la motivación de los trabajadores, se asegura el cumplimiento de la legislación ambiental. La actividad que nos ocupa, se dedica a la recepción y descontaminación de vehículos al final de su vida útil, reutilizando piezas o componentes de recambio., Los objetivos del presente trabajo van a ser fundamentalmente, el implantar el Manual de Gestión Ambiental en la planta de tratamiento de vehículos fuera de uso y el describir todos los procedimientos genéricos a seguir. Como conclusiones de este trabajo, tendremos las auditorías con las no conformidades detectadas, así como el compromiso adquirido en todos los niveles y departamentos de la empresa, lo cual se traducirá en una mejor satisfacción de los clientes y por tanto un aumento en el número de vehículos a tratar.