Integrated economic-hydrologic analysis of policy responses

Water is a vital resource, but also a critical limiting factor for economic and social development in many parts of the world. The recent rapid growth in human population and water use for social and economic development is increasing the pressure on water resources and the environment, as well as leading to growing conflicts among competing water use sectors (agriculture, urban, tourism, industry) and regions (Gleick et al., 2009; World Bank, 2006). In Spain, as in many other arid and semi-arid regions affected by drought and wide climate variability, irrigated agriculture is responsible for most consumptive water use and plays an important role in sustaining rural livelihoods (Varela-Ortega, 2007). Historically, the evolution of irrigation has been based on publicly-funded irrigation development plans that promoted economic growth and improved the socio-economic conditions of rural farmers in agrarian Spain, but increased environmental damage and led to excessive and inefficient exploitation of water resources (Garrido and Llamas, 2010; Varela-Ortega et al., 2010). Currently, water policies in Spain focus on rehabilitating and improving the efficiency of irrigation systems, and are moving from technocratic towards integrated water management strategies driven by the European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD).

Histoire de la terre : origines et métamorphoses du globe /

Mode of access: Internet.

Cartas de Santa Teresa de Jesus ... /

Mode of access: Internet.

Cartas de Santa Teresa de Jesus ... /

Mode of access: Internet.

Variations of local heat transfer coefficient in piped flow of viscous liquids

Measurements were carried out to determine local coefficients of heat transfer in short lengths of horizontal pipe, and in the region of an discontinuity in pipe diameter. Laminar, transitional and turbulent flow regimes were investigated, and mixtures of propylene glycol and water were used in the experiments to give a range of viscous fluids. Theoretical and empirical analyses were implemented to find how the fundamental mechanism of forced convection was modified by the secondary effects of free convection, temperature dependent viscosity, and viscous dissipation. From experiments with the short tube it was possible to determine simple empirical relationships describing the axial distribution of the local 1usselt number and its dependence on the Reynolds and Prandtl numbers. Small corrections were made to account for the secondary effects mentioned above. Two different entrance configurations were investigated to demonstrate how conditions upstream could influence the heat transfer coefficients measured downstream In experiments with a sudden contraction in pipe diameter the distribution of local 1u3se1t number depended on the Prandtl number of the fluid in a complicated way. Graphical data is presented describing this dependence for a range of fluids indicating how the local Nusselt number varied with the diameter-ratio. Ratios up to 3.34:1 were considered. With a sudden divergence in pipe diameter, it was possible to derive the axial distribution of the local Nusse1t number for a range of Reynolds and Prandtl numbers in a similar way to the convergence experiments. Difficulty was encountered in explaining some of the measurements obtained at low Reynolds numbers, and flow visualization techniques wore used to determine the complex flow patterns which could lead to the anomalous results mentioned. Tests were carried out with divergences up to 1:3.34 to find the way in which the local Nusselt number varied with the diameter ratio, and a few experiments were carried out with very large ratios up .to 14.4. A limited amount of theoretical analysis of the 'divergence' system was carried out to substantiate certain explanations of the heat transfer mechanisms postulated.

Lasting mantle scars lead to perennial plate tectonics

R.N.P. and P.J.H. are grateful for funding from an NSERC Discovery Grant. Computations were performed on the GPC supercomputer at the SciNet HPC Consortium. SciNet is funded by the Canada Foundation for Innovation under the auspices of Compute Canada, the Government of Ontario, Ontario Research Fund—Research Excellence and the University of Toronto. Numerical calculations were done using a modified version of the SOPALE (2000) software. The SOPALE modelling code was originally developed by Philippe Fullsack at Dalhousie University with Chris Beaumont and his Geodynamics group.

Semantic feature-based visual attention model for pedestrian detection

Objective
Pedestrian detection under video surveillance systems has always been a hot topic in computer vision research. These systems are widely used in train stations, airports, large commercial plazas, and other public places. However, pedestrian detection remains difficult because of complex backgrounds. Given its development in recent years, the visual attention mechanism has attracted increasing attention in object detection and tracking research, and previous studies have achieved substantial progress and breakthroughs. We propose a novel pedestrian detection method based on the semantic features under the visual attention mechanism.
Method
The proposed semantic feature-based visual attention model is a spatial-temporal model that consists of two parts: the static visual attention model and the motion visual attention model. The static visual attention model in the spatial domain is constructed by combining bottom-up with top-down attention guidance. Based on the characteristics of pedestrians, the bottom-up visual attention model of Itti is improved by intensifying the orientation vectors of elementary visual features to make the visual saliency map suitable for pedestrian detection. In terms of pedestrian attributes, skin color is selected as a semantic feature for pedestrian detection. The regional and Gaussian models are adopted to construct the skin color model. Skin feature-based visual attention guidance is then proposed to complete the top-down process. The bottom-up and top-down visual attentions are linearly combined using the proper weights obtained from experiments to construct the static visual attention model in the spatial domain. The spatial-temporal visual attention model is then constructed via the motion features in the temporal domain. Based on the static visual attention model in the spatial domain, the frame difference method is combined with optical flowing to detect motion vectors. Filtering is applied to process the field of motion vectors. The saliency of motion vectors can be evaluated via motion entropy to make the selected motion feature more suitable for the spatial-temporal visual attention model.
Result
Standard datasets and practical videos are selected for the experiments. The experiments are performed on a MATLAB R2012a platform. The experimental results show that our spatial-temporal visual attention model demonstrates favorable robustness under various scenes, including indoor train station surveillance videos and outdoor scenes with swaying leaves. Our proposed model outperforms the visual attention model of Itti, the graph-based visual saliency model, the phase spectrum of quaternion Fourier transform model, and the motion channel model of Liu in terms of pedestrian detection. The proposed model achieves a 93% accuracy rate on the test video.
Conclusion
This paper proposes a novel pedestrian method based on the visual attention mechanism. A spatial-temporal visual attention model that uses low-level and semantic features is proposed to calculate the saliency map. Based on this model, the pedestrian targets can be detected through focus of attention shifts. The experimental results verify the effectiveness of the proposed attention model for detecting pedestrians.

A percepção do tempo na reabilitação urbana e arquitectónica

Dissertação de Mestrado para obtenção do grau de Mestre em Arquitectura, apresentada na Universidade de Lisboa - Faculdade de Arquitectura.

Saberes y experiencias de vida de una joven, hija de padres inmigrantes chinos y su familia en Andalucía. Un estudio biográfico

Esta tesis doctoral se centra en la reconstrucción de la biografía de una joven de origen chino y su familia en España con el objetivo de explorar las experiencias vividas, las luchas, las dificultades, los retos, los valores y las subjetividades en varios contextos sociales, locales y trasnacionales: escuela, familia, comunidad y sociedad en general. En particular, para dar respuesta a las preguntas de investigación he optado por la perspectiva biográfica como la más idónea para describir las experiencias subjetivas de las personas y comprender el significado de las mismas desde su propia perspectiva, así como las condiciones y contexto en las que se construyen/ conforman dichas experiencias (Clandinin & Connelly 1994; Cole & Knowles 2001; Denzin 1989; Roberts, 2002). La protagonista de la investigación, es una joven de origen chino nacida en España, que se ha escolarizado en el sistema educativo español y se ha socializado aquí. Sin embargo, ella es parte de la experiencia de la migración. En el momento de la investigación tenía 22 años. Los resultado se presentan en forma de relato biográfico de la protagonista y la interpretación de su vida. El relato biográfico, a su vez, se compone de seis capítulos que detallan los itinerarios de vida de la protagonista desde los primeros años de infancia hasta la juventud y describe de manera narrativa los acontecimientos más importantes y los momentos de inflexión en la vida de la protagonista, sus vivencias, sus sentimientos y emociones, sus acciones, sus luchas y sus victorias. No obstante, su voz es acompañada de la de otras personas que, de alguna manera, han influido en su trayectoria y nos aportan una visión enriquecida de su vida. Un segundo informe se ha realizado como una aproximación a la vida de la protagonista desde una perspectiva más analítica, en donde se presentan las experiencias más significativas en los contextos específicos familiares, escolares, comunitarios y sociales en general, destacando aquellos elementos positivos y negativos que han moldeado la construcción de identidad y la inclusión de la protagonista en la sociedad. Su narrativa resalta el hecho de que la diferencia cultural se transforma muchas veces en desigualdad social. Desde su posición interna tanto dentro de la comunidad china, como dentro de la sociedad española, adopta una actitud crítica, ya que a lo largo de su vida toma conciencia de las diferentes lógicas que subyacen a cada discurso y relación interétnica.