Vida y muerte empresarial. Estudios empíricos de perdurabilidad - de la morbilidad a la perdurabilidad, estudios empresas galardonadas Premio Ave Fenix

Con esta investigación se pretende hacer una aproximación a la identificación de los pasos que utilizaron las empresas para salir de la crisis empresarial que presentaban, analizando los posibles errores que hayan afectado significativamente a la empresa, en los ámbitos económicos, sociales y morales, esto con el fin de corregirlos y aprender de ellos logrando perdurar en el mercado laboral empresarial. A estas empresas que han pasado por estos procesos de mejoras continuas son nominadas al premio Ave Fénix como empresas de resurgimiento empresarial, este galardón reconoce el esfuerzo de las empresas que logran resurgir como el Ave Fénix, al superar las dificultades que las condujeron al acuerdo de restructuración empresarial que contempla la Ley 550/1999. Con este galardón, la Universidad del Rosario en cooperación con la Superintendencia de Sociedades reconocen a las empresas que, en medio de una crisis, abocadas a un proceso de liquidación voluntaria u obligatoria, han demostrado tenacidad al resurgir - de la mano de Supersociedades - o las que se reestructuran y se establecen así como ejemplos de perdurabilidad y constancia.

Los intereses estratégicos de EEUU, Rusia, China y Japón como determinantes de la estrategia de mantenimiento de la Estructura en la Península Coreana. 2003-2013.

El propósito principal de esta monografía es ofrecer una perspectiva crítica sobre el conflicto latente en la Península Coreana, haciendo un acercamiento al mismo desde un marco teórico asentado en el realismo estructural de Kenneth Waltz. De este modo, se busca responder a cuestiones sobre los intereses estatales como fundamento básico de las estrategias de mantenimiento de la Estructura en regiones geopolíticamente sensibles. Al final, se llega a la conclusión afirmando que la Estructura ejerce una serie de funciones para garantizar su preservación mediante una acción de convergencia en la conducta de los Estados. Esta realidad ha mantenido a la Península Coreana sin un conflicto bélico en los últimos 50 años, muy a pesar de estar al borde del mismo en varias ocasiones, ya que de llegarse a presentar se rompería la estabilidad de la región, y por ende el Equilibrio de Poderes estaría en grave riesgo.

Mercado laboral calificado en Colombia: Estudio sobre el desequilibrio entre oferta y demanda de trabajo para los años 2020 y 2030

El propósito básico de esta investigación es identificar los desajustes (déficits o superávits) no estructurales entre la oferta y demanda de trabajo en Colombia para los años 2020 y 2030, así como interpretar los hallazgos y proponer elementos de estrategia para las empresas a fin de mitigar los efectos adversos del desajuste sobre su capacidad para atraer y retener talento. El argumento central del proyecto consiste en sostener que en un escenario no mayor a los 10 años la oferta de trabajo calificado en Colombia no será suficiente para (i) equilibrar el mercado y (ii) atender la demanda agregada de trabajo, debido a los cambios generacionales en la realidad demográfica del país, el bajo nivel de preparación de la fuerza laboral disponible y los altos índices de informalidad de los trabajadores y las empresas. Dentro de los resultados se presenta una proyección del comportamiento del mercado de trabajo, así como la magnitud del desequilibrio entre los agentes del mercado. Este estudio aplicado es una propuesta cuantitativa de aproximación a la crisis de talento que se revisa en otros estudios. Es un precedente sólido para profundizar con otros enfoques el futuro del trabajo en Colombia.

Serie de documentos. Facultad de Jurisprudencia N° 72. Aspectos prácticos del proceso ante el Centro Internacional de Arreglo de Diferencias relativas a Inversiones (CIADI)

Los TBI (Tratado Bilateral de Inversión) o también denominado los APPI (Acuerdo de Protección y Promoción de las Inversiones) son acuerdos que buscan la Protección y la Promoción de las inversiones que hagan los nacionales de un Estado en otro Estado conocido como el “Estado Receptor”. Los TBI y APPI fueron concebidos dentro del proceso de descolonización que le siguió a la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Esto se debe a que los Estados que habían colonizado otros territorios, ahora Estados soberanos y sus nacionales, seguían teniendo fuertes lazos e intereses económicos. Con el ánimo de protegerse de posibles expropiaciones, los Estados europeos liderados por Alemania, firmaron un número importante de TBI y APPI, no solamente con sus antiguas colonias, sino con otras. De esta manera, Alemania, Suiza, Holanda, Italia, Bélgica y Suecia suscribieron al menos cuarenta tratados de este tipo con varios Estados asiáticos, africanos y del medio oriente entre 1959 y 1965. Estados Unidos se demoró unos veinte o treinta años más, porque los estadounidenses no solamente aspiraban a obtener protección para sus inversionistas, sino que además solicitaban que se abriera y liberara la economía de los Estados firmantes. Finalmente, fue en la administración de Ronald Reagan que los Estados Unidos comenzó a suscribirlos.

Efficient mining of discriminative molecular fragments

Frequent pattern discovery in structured data is receiving an increasing attention in many application areas of sciences. However, the computational complexity and the large amount of data to be explored often make the sequential algorithms unsuitable. In this context high performance distributed computing becomes a very interesting and promising approach. In this paper we present a parallel formulation of the frequent subgraph mining problem to discover interesting patterns in molecular compounds. The application is characterized by a highly irregular tree-structured computation. No estimation is available for task workloads, which show a power-law distribution in a wide range. The proposed approach allows dynamic resource aggregation and provides fault and latency tolerance. These features make the distributed application suitable for multi-domain heterogeneous environments, such as computational Grids. The distributed application has been evaluated on the well known National Cancer Institute’s HIV-screening dataset.

Field evaluation of systemic inducing resistance chemicals at different growth stages for the control of apple (Venturia inaequalis) and pear (Venturia pirina) scab

Two field trials were conducted using established apple (Malus cv. Golden Delicious) and pear (Pyrus communis 'Williams' Bon Chretien') to assess the efficacy of three commercially available systemic inducing resistance (SIR) products, Messenger (a.i. Harpin protein), Phoenix (a.i. Potassium phosphite) and Rigel (a.i. Salicylic acid derivative) applied at four different growth stages of tree development (bud break, green cluster, 90% petal fall, early fruitlet) against the foliar pathogens Venturia inaequalis and Venturia pirina which cause apple and pear scab respectively. A conventional synthetic fungicide (penconazole) used within the UK for apple and pear scab control was included for comparison. Little efficacy as scab protectants was demonstrated when each SIR product and penconazole was applied at only two growth stages (bud break, green cluster). However when the above compounds were applied at three or more growth stages efficacy as scab protectants was confirmed. The synthetic fungicide penconazole provided greatest protection against apple and pear scab in both the 2006 and 2007 field trials. There was little difference in the magnitude of scab protection conferred by each SIR agent. Results suggest application of at least three sprays during bud break to early fruitlet formation with an appropriate SIR agent may provide a useful addition to existing methods of apple and pear scab management under field conditions. (C) 2009 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Cancellation of siren noise from two way voice communications inside emergency vehicles

Sirens used by police, fire and paramedic vehicles have been designed so that they can be heard over large distances, but unfortunately the siren noise enters the vehicle and corrupts intelligibility of voice communications from the emergency vehicle to the control room. Often the siren needs to be turned off to enable the control room to hear what is being said. This paper discusses a siren noise filter system that is capable of removing the siren noise picked up by the two-way radio microphone inside the vehicle. The removal of the siren noise improves the response time for emergency vehicles and thus save lives. To date, the system has been trialed within a fire tender in a non-emergency situation, with good results.

Passive urban ventilation by combined buoyancy-driven slope flow and wall flow: Parametric CFD studies on idealized city models

This paper reports the results of a parametric CFD study on idealized city models to investigate the potential of slope flow in ventilating a city located in a mountainous region when the background synoptic wind is absent. Examples of such a city include Tokyo in Japan, Los Angeles and Phoenix in the US, and Hong Kong. Two types of buoyancy-driven flow are considered, i.e., slope flow from the mountain slope (katabatic wind at night and anabatic wind in the daytime), and wall flow due to heated/cooled urban surfaces. The combined buoyancy-driven flow system can serve the purpose of dispersing the accumulated urban air pollutants when the background wind is weak or absent. The microscopic picture of ventilation performance within the urban structures was evaluated in terms of air change rate (ACH) and age of air. The simulation results reveal that the slope flow plays an important role in ventilating the urban area, especially in calm conditions. Katabatic flow at night is conducive to mitigating the nocturnal urban heat island. In the present parametric study, the mountain slope angle and mountain height are assumed to be constant, and the changing variables are heating/cooling intensity and building height. For a typical mountain of 500 m inclined at an angle of 20° to the horizontal level, the interactive structure is very much dependent on the ratio of heating/cooling intensity as well as building height. When the building is lower than 60 m, the slope wind dominates. When the building is as high as 100 m, the contribution from the urban wall flow cannot be ignored. It is found that katabatic wind can be very beneficial to the thermal environment as well as air quality at the pedestrian level. The air change rate for the pedestrian volume can be as high as 300 ACH.

Effect of mountain breeze in ventilating the city under calm and neutral atmospheric environment: Interaction of airflow structures and ventilation efficiency

Many modern cities locate in the mountainous areas, like Hong Kong, Phoenix City and Los Angles. It is confirmed in the literature that the mountain wind system developed by differential heating or cooling can be very beneficial in ventilating the city nearby and alleviating the UHI effect. However, the direct interaction of mountain wind with the natural-convection circulation due to heated urban surfaces has not been studied, to our best knowledge. This kind of unique interaction of two kinds of airflow structures under calm and neutral atmospheric environment is investigated in this paper by CFD approach. A physical model comprising a simple mountain and three long building blocks (forming two street canyons) is firstly developed. Different airflow structures are identified within the conditions of different mountain-building height ratios (R=Hm/Hb) by varying building height but fixing mountain height. It is found that the higher ventilation rate in the street canyons is expected in the cases of smaller mountain-building ratios, indicating the stronger natural convection due to increasing heated building surfaces. However, there is the highest air change rate (ACH) in the lowest-building-height case and most of the air is advective into the street canyon through the top open area, highlighting the important role played by the mountain wind. In terms of the ventilation efficiency, it is shown that the smallest R case enjoys the best air change efficiency followed by the highest R case, while the worst ventilative street canyons occur at the middle R case. In the end, a gap across the streets is introduced in the modeling. The existence of the gap can greatly channel the mountain wind and distribute the air into streets nearby. Thus the ACH can be doubled and air quality can be significantly improved.

Prediction of Staphylococcus aureus antimicrobial resistance by whole-genome sequencing

Whole-genome sequencing (WGS) could potentially provide a single platform for extracting all the information required to predict an organism’s phenotype. However, its ability to provide accurate predictions has not yet been demonstrated in large independent studies of specific organisms. In this study, we aimed to develop a genotypic prediction method for antimicrobial susceptibilities. The whole genomes of 501 unrelated Staphylococcus aureus isolates were sequenced, and the assembled genomes were interrogated using BLASTn for a panel of known resistance determinants (chromosomal mutations and genes carried on plasmids). Results were compared with phenotypic susceptibility testing for 12 commonly used antimicrobial agents (penicillin, methicillin, erythromycin, clindamycin, tetracycline, ciprofloxacin, vancomycin, trimethoprim, gentamicin, fusidic acid, rifampin, and mupirocin) performed by the routine clinical laboratory. We investigated discrepancies by repeat susceptibility testing and manual inspection of the sequences and used this information to optimize the resistance determinant panel and BLASTn algorithm. We then tested performance of the optimized tool in an independent validation set of 491 unrelated isolates, with phenotypic results obtained in duplicate by automated broth dilution (BD Phoenix) and disc diffusion. In the validation set, the overall sensitivity and specificity of the genomic prediction method were 0.97 (95% confidence interval [95% CI], 0.95 to 0.98) and 0.99 (95% CI, 0.99 to 1), respectively, compared to standard susceptibility testing methods. The very major error rate was 0.5%, and the major error rate was 0.7%. WGS was as sensitive and specific as routine antimicrobial susceptibility testing methods. WGS is a promising alternative to culture methods for resistance prediction in S. aureus and ultimately other major bacterial pathogens.

The impact of date palm fruits and their component polyphenols, on gut microbial ecology, bacterial metabolites and colon cancer cell proliferation

The fruit of the date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) is a rich source of dietary fibre and polyphenols. We have investigated gut bacterial changes induced by the whole date fruit extract (digested date extract; DDE) and its polyphenol-rich extract (date polyphenol extract; DPE) using faecal, pH-controlled, mixed batch cultures mimicking the distal part of the human large intestine, and utilising an array of microbial group-specific 16S rRNA oligonucleotide probes. Fluorescence microscopic enumeration indicated that there was a significant increase in the growth of bifidobacteria in response to both treatments, whilst whole dates also increased bacteroides at 24 h and the total bacterial counts at later fermentation time points when compared with DPE alone. Bacterial metabolism of whole date fruit led to the production of SCFA, with acetate significantly increasing following bacterial incubation with DDE. In addition, the production of flavonoid aglycones (myricetin, luteolin, quercetin and apigenin) and the anthocyanidin petunidin in less than 1 h was also observed. Lastly, the potential of DDE, DPE and metabolites to inhibit Caco-2 cell growth was investigated, indicating that both were capable of potentially acting as antiproliferative agents in vitro, following a 48 h exposure. This potential to inhibit growth was reduced following fermentation. Together these data suggest that consumption of date fruits may enhance colon health by increasing beneficial bacterial growth and inhibiting the proliferation of colon cancer cells. This is an early suggestion that date intake by humans may aid in the maintenance of bowel health and even the reduction of colorectal cancer development.

Experiential learning from entrepreneurial failure

This paper examines the phenomenon of 'entrepreneurial failure' from a UK regionally-based qualitative study, being that of explanations for failure provided by entrepreneurial CEOs. This paper contends that there are valuable lessons to be learned, from explanations provided of failure, that may reduce the very high recorded mortality rates of entrepreneurial businesses, in particular that of nascent entrepreneurs. Our intention is to make nascent entrepreneurs and their advisors more aware of the consequences of the likely personal risks they will be assuming, especially before they embark on their new business ventures. This paper focuses strongly on entrepreneurial 'personality characteristics' which can detrimentally influence the quality of decision-making. We provide data of some 'experiential learning from failure' from our case studies, that were compiled from interviews with the former directors, following their completion of the questionnaire survey. We describe 'failed entrepreneurs' who have successfully restarted their businesses as 'phoenix' entrepreneurs.