Desenvolupament d'un memetracker - rastrejador de notícies

El projecte es centra en el desenvolupament d'un recol·lector de notícies publicades a una llarga llista de blocs ampliada contínuament pel desenvolupador i pels usuaris, afegint els seus blocs preferits. L'aplicació desenvolupada realitza una recol·lecció contínua de notícies consultant les possibles novetats que apareguin en cada un dels blocs inscrits a l'aplicació. Se'ls hi aplica un classificador per idioma i per temàtica i es relaciona amb les altres notícies existents si aquestes parlen sobre el mateix tema. En l'aplicació desenvolupada hi ha la possibilitat d'escollir entre les temàtiques ofertes i en l'idioma que ha estat publicada la notícia. Pel desenvolupament del projecte s'ha desitjat que la plataforma sigui el més compatible possible amb la tecnologia actual fent servir diversos llenguatges de programació que han permès desenvolupar cada un dels algorismes necessaris pel desenvolupament global de l'aplicació; en ordre d'ús he fet servir Php, Matlab, Html, MySql, CSS3, Javascript i XML. s'ha de destacar que el projecte aporta una comoditat per tots aquells lectors de blocs que es troben tantes vegades amb notícies ja llegides en els diferents blocs que consulten.

Men having sex with men serosorting with casual partners: who, how much, and what risk factors in Switzerland, 2007-2009.

BACKGROUND: Serosorting is practiced by men who have sex with men (MSM) to reduce human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) transmission. This study evaluates the prevalence of serosorting with casual partners, and analyses the characteristics and estimated numbers of serosorters in Switzerland 2007-2009. METHODS: Data were extracted from cross-sectional surveys conducted in 2007 and 2009 among self-selected MSM recruited online, through gay newspapers, and through gay organizations. Nested models were fitted to ascertain the appropriateness of pooling the datasets. Multiple logistic regression analysis was performed on pooled data to determine the association between serosorting and demographic, lifestyle-related, and health-related factors. Extrapolations were performed by applying proportions of various types of serosorters to Swiss population data collected in 2007. RESULTS: A significant and stable number of MSM (approximately 39% in 2007 and 2009) intentionally engage in serosorting with casual partners in Switzerland. Variables significantly associated with serosorting were: gay organization membership (aOR = 1.67), frequent internet use for sexual encounters (aOR = 1.71), having had a sexually transmitted infection (STI) at any time in the past 12 months (aOR = 1.70), HIV-positive status (aOR = 0.52), regularly frequenting sex-on-premises venues (aOR = 0.42), and unprotected anal intercourse (UAI) with partners of different or unknown HIV status in the past 12 months (aOR = 0.22). Approximately one-fifth of serosorters declared HIV negativity without being tested in the past 12 months; 15.8% reported not knowing their own HIV status. CONCLUSION: The particular risk profile of serosorters having UAI with casual partners (multiple partners, STI history, and inadequate testing frequency) requires specific preventive interventions tailored to HIV status.

From central Atlantic continental rift to Neogene uplift - western Anti-Atlas (Morocco)

P>To put constraints on the Mesozoic to recent growth of the Anti-Atlas system, we investigated the temperature-time history of rocks by applying extensive low-temperature thermochronological analysis to three Precambrian inliers along the coast and 250 km into the interior. Bedrocks yield old U-Th/He ages on zircon (248-193 Ma) and apatite (150-50 Ma) and also fission-track ages of 173-121 Ma on apatite. These datasets are interpreted as recording passive margin upward movements from central Atlantic rifting until the Early Cretaceous. A phase of sedimentary burial was evidenced for the Cretaceous-Eocene. The extension of this thin (1.5 km) basin is loosely constrained but can be extended to the western regions of northern Africa. Effects of the existing thermal perturbation of lithospheric origin 100 km below the Atlas show that the 120-60 degrees C isotherms are not much deflected. Large-scale uplift has possibly occurred in the western Anti-Atlas since c. 30 Ma and is associated with a mean denudation rate of 0.08 km Ma-1.

Improving Outcomes: A Strategy for Cancer: Third Annual Report

The third annual Improving Outcomes: A Strategy for Cancer report, in partnership with NHS England and Public Health England, reports on: significant developments in cancer screening - particularly on the first phase of introducing Bowel Scope Screening (BSS) activity to promote earlier diagnosis of symptomatic cancers through the Be Clear on Cancer campaigns and the associated work with primary and secondary care progress in ensuring better access for all to the best possible treatment significant developments in the collection and reporting of new datasets and the analysis of information to drive improvements and inform patients

Multiple imputations applied to the DREAM3 phosphoproteomics challenge: a winning strategy.

DREAM is an initiative that allows researchers to assess how well their methods or approaches can describe and predict networks of interacting molecules [1]. Each year, recently acquired datasets are released to predictors ahead of publication. Researchers typically have about three months to predict the masked data or network of interactions, using any predictive method. Predictions are assessed prior to an annual conference where the best predictions are unveiled and discussed. Here we present the strategy we used to make a winning prediction for the DREAM3 phosphoproteomics challenge. We used Amelia II, a multiple imputation software method developed by Gary King, James Honaker and Matthew Blackwell[2] in the context of social sciences to predict the 476 out of 4624 measurements that had been masked for the challenge. To chose the best possible multiple imputation parameters to apply for the challenge, we evaluated how transforming the data and varying the imputation parameters affected the ability to predict additionally masked data. We discuss the accuracy of our findings and show that multiple imputations applied to this dataset is a powerful method to accurately estimate the missing data. We postulate that multiple imputations methods might become an integral part of experimental design as a mean to achieve cost savings in experimental design or to increase the quantity of samples that could be handled for a given cost.

Poverty, inequality and policy since 1997

This study examines the impact of policy on poverty and inequality in Britain since 1997This research shows what effect policies introduced since 1997 have had on reducing poverty and inequality. It offers a considered assessment of impacts over a decade:How did policies change, before 1997 and since then?What evidence is there of impacts on key outcomes?What gaps or problems remain or emerged?The study covers a range of subjects, including public attitudes to poverty and inequality, children and early years, education, health, employment, pensions, and migrants. It measures the extent of progress and also considers future direction and pressures, particularly in the light of recession and an ageing society.The research draws on extensive analysis of policy documents, analysis by government departments and research bodies, published statistics and evaluations, analysis of large-scale datasets, micro-simulation modelling and a long-running qualitative study with residents of low-income neighbourhoods.��

From Naples 1963 to Rome 2013 - A brief review of how the International Research Group on Ostracoda (IRGO) developed as a social communication system

The 1st International Symposium on Ostracoda (ISO) was held in Naples (1963). The philosophy behind this symposium and the logical outcome of what is now known as the International Research Group on Ostracoda (IRGO) is here reviewed, namely ostracodology over the last 50 years is sociologically analysed. Three different and important historic moments for the scientific achievements of this domain are recognised. The first one, between about 1963-1983, is related to applied research for the oil industry as well as to the great interest in the better description of the marine environment by both zoologists and palaeontologists. Another important aspect during this period was the work by researchers dealing with Palaeozoic ostracods, who had their own discussion group, IRGPO. Gradually, the merger of this latter group with those dealing with post-Palaeozoic ostracods at various meetings improved communication between the two groups of specialists. A second period was approximately delineated between 1983 and 2003. During this time-slice, more emphasis was addressed to environmental research with topics such as the study of global events and long-term climate change. Ostracodologists profited also from the research "politics" within national and international programmes. Large international research teams emerged using new research methods. During the third period (2003-2013), communication and collaborative research reached a global dimension. Amongst the topics of research we cite the reconstruction of palaeoclimate using transfer functions, the building of large datasets of ostracod distributions for regional and intercontinental studies, and the implementation of actions that should lead to taxonomic harmonisation. Projects within which molecular biological techniques are routinely used, combined with sophisticated morphological information, expanded now in their importance. The documentation of the ostracod description improved through new techniques to visualise morphological details, which stimulated also communication between ostracodologists. Efforts of making available ostracod information through newsletters and electronic media are evoked.

The Marmot Review: Updated data and information 2 years on

To mark the two year anniversary since The Marmot Review ('Fair Society, Healthy Lives') was published, on the 15th of February the UCL Institute of Health Equity published new data on key health inequalities indicators at local authority level in England.Main Findings:Life Expectancy – this has historically been one of the main indicators of health inequalities.The Marmot Indicators from this year’s charts show the average life expectancy for eachlocal authority and the level of inequality within each authority area (7):-While overall life expectancy at birth in England increased by 0.3 years for both menand women between 2007-9 and 2008-10, inequalities in life expectancy betweenneighbourhoods increased by 0.1 years for men and showed no change for women-Among the 150 upper tier local authorities in England, life expectancy improved inthe majority of cases (133 areas saw improvements for men and 125 sawimprovements for women). However inequalities also increased in the majority ofareas (104 for men and 92 for women).-The largest increase in inequality in life expectancy was in West Berkshire for men(2.0 years) and inMiddlesbrough for women (2 years). The largest decreases ininequality were in Kensington and Chelsea for both men and women (1.9 and 1.1years respectively. To find out more, please read: - The press release, including key figures and main findings. - A blog by Michael Marmot about the data and it's implications. - Press coverage of the data in national and local newspapers and websites. - A powerpoint presentation on the key findings.

AgeStats.ie

The AgeStats.ie website provides an overview of selected datasets on ageing in Northern Ireland (NI) and the Republic of Ireland (RoI). It is designed to be used by researchers who are engaged in comparative research on ageing. The website has recently been updated bringing the total number of searchable surveys to 50.

Ethnicity Coding

The incidence, prevalence, and mortality of many diseases are known to vary by ethnic group.There are well documented inequities in access to prevention, treatment, and palliative health and social care services based on ethnic group. There are, too, reported differences in the quality of services received by different ethnic groups and of outcomes of treatment and care. Many of these inequities are amenable to change. However, in order to address them they must, first of all, be comprehensively defined and documented. Mainstreaming ethnic monitoring/data collection is a vital step in the process. The history of such data collection in the NHS is poor, whichever of the key datasets is examined: hospital episode statistics, general practitioner data, cancer registrations, and disease registers. While steps are now being taken to remedy some of these deficiencies, the continued non-availability of ethnic monitoring data and in some cases of compatible ethnically-coded denominator data remains a problem. In particular the lack of ethnic group in births and deaths data has been the subject of widespread comment by specialists in demography and public health and is probably the single action that could most improve the evidence based for addressing ethnic/racial inequalities in health and health care.

Challenges of phylogenetic analyses of aDNA sequences

One of the crucial steps of authentication of aDNA sequences is phylogenetic consistency. Amplified sequences should fit into the phylogenetic framework of their supposed origin. An inherent property of aDNA sequences however, is their short sequence length. Additionally, genes for aDNA studies are often chosen by their preservation potential rather than by phylogenetically informative content. This poses potential challenges regarding their analyses, and might result in an inaccurate reflection of the supposed phylogenetic history of the sequence or organism under study. In this paper some fundamental problems of phylogenetic analysis and interpretation of aDNA datasets are discussed. Suggestions for character sampling and treatment of missing data are made. The publication is the result of a talk from the 1st PAMINSA Meeting in Rio de Janeiro, July 2005.

An Ontology for Open Rubric Exchange on the Web

While the Internet has given educators access to a steady supply of Open Educational Resources, the educational rubrics commonly shared on the Web are generally in the form of static, non-semantic presentational documents or in the proprietary data structures of commercial content and learning management systems.With the advent of Semantic Web Standards, producers of online resources have a new framework to support the open exchange of software-readable datasets. Despite these advances, the state of the art of digital representation of rubrics as sharable documents has not progressed.This paper proposes an ontological model for digital rubrics. This model is built upon the Semantic Web Standards of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), principally the Resource Description Framework (RDF) and Web Ontology Language (OWL).

Iniciativas de promoción del acceso abierto en RiuNet, Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad Politécnica de Valencia

La comunicació tracta de les diferents iniciatives de promoció basades en adaptacions tècniques de la plataforma original realitzades des de la Biblioteca, amb el suport tècnic de l'Àrea de Sistemes d'Informació i Comunicació, per impulsar l'accés obert a la Universitat Politècnica de València, a través d' RiuNet, el seu dipòsit institucional. Per aconseguir promocionar l'accés obert s'han obert diverses vies de treball que permetin als membres de la comunitat universitària difondre la seva producció intel¿lectual de forma directa i senzilla. En primer lloc s'ha pretès fer de RiuNet una aplicació "pròpia" de la Universitat Politècnica de València, personalitzant la interfície per aconseguir una integració visual amb la web de la institució i permetent l'autenticació i l'accés a través de la Intranet. En segon lloc es faciliten al màxim les tasques de autoarxivament als autors de contingut, mitjançant la integració de l'aplicació de gestió de les tesis amb RiuNet, el foment, a través del programa Docència en xarxa, de la generació d'objectes d'aprenentatge, la personalització del formulari de autoarxivament, per facilitar als alumnes la càrrega dels seus projectes de fi de carrera i tesines de màster i l'elaboració de l'Acord marc, contracte únic mitjançant el qual els autors autoritzen a la Universitat a difondre tota la seva producció en RiuNet . En tercer lloc s'han realitzat les tasques tècniques necessàries per permetre la integració amb altres aplicacions per a la docència i la recerca (PoliBuscador, PoliformaT, Polimedia, Politube, l'aplicació de gestió de l'activitat de recerca). Finalment s'està posant en marxa un Bloc sobre accés obert que permet difondre aquest moviment a la Universitat. Totes aquestes "petites" accions estan aconseguint, a poc a poc, que RiuNet sigui reconegut com una eina de difusió de la producció científica i acadèmica pròpia i, per tant, que sigui utilitzat cada vegada més per la comunitat universitària.

A framework for assessing the scale of influence of environmental factors on ecological patterns

The distribution of living organisms, habitats and ecosystems is primarily driven by abiotic environmental factors that are spatially structured. Assessing the spatial structure of environmental factors, e.g., through spatial autocorrelation analyses (SAC), can thus help us understand their scale of influence on the distribution of organisms, habitats, and ecosystems. Yet SAC analyses of environmental factors are still rarely performed in biogeographic studies. Here, we describe a novel framework that combines SAC and statistical clustering to identify scales of spatial patterning of environmental factors, which can then be interpreted as the scales at which those factors influence the geographic distribution of biological and ecological features. We illustrate this new framework with datasets at different spatial or thematic resolutions. This framework is conceptually and statistically robust, providing a valuable approach to tackle a wide range of issues in ecological and environmental research and particularly when building predictors for ecological models. The new framework can significantly promote fundamental research on all spatially-structured ecological patterns. It can also foster research and application in such fields as global change ecology, conservation planning, and landscape management.

Phylogeny and circumscription of Sapindaceae revisited: molecular sequence data, morphology and biogeography support recognition of a new family, Xanthoceraceae

Background and aims Recent studies have adopted a broad definition of Sapindaceae that includes taxa traditionally placed in Aceraceae and Hippocastanaceae, achieving monophyly but yielding a family difficult to characterize and for which no obvious morphological synapomorphy exists. This expanded circumscription was necessitated by the finding that the monotypic, temperate Asian genus Xanthoceras, historically placed in Sapindaceae tribe Harpullieae, is basal within the group. Here we seek to clarify the relationships of Xanthoceras based on phylogenetic analyses using a dataset encompassing nearly 3/4 of sapindaceous genera, comparing the results with information from morphology and biogeography, in particular with respect to the other taxa placed in Harpullieae. We then re-examine the appropriateness of maintaining the current broad, morphologically heterogeneous definition of Sapindaceae and explore the advantages of an alternative family circumscription. Methods Using 243 samples representing 104 of the 142 currently recognized genera of Sapindaceae s. lat. (including all in Harpullieae), sequence data were analyzed for nuclear (ITS) and plastid (matK, rpoB, trnD-trnT, trnK-matK, trnL-trnF and trnS-trnG) markers, adopting the methodology of a recent family-wide study, performing single-gene and total evidence analyses based on maximum likelihood (ML) and maximum parsimony (MP) criteria, and applying heuristic searches developed for large datasets, viz, a new strategy implemented in RAxML (for ML) and the parsimony ratchet (for MP). Bootstrap analyses were performed for each method to test for congruence between markers. Key results Our findings support earlier suggestions that Harpullieae are polyphyletic: Xanthoceras is confirmed as sister to all other sampled taxa of Sapindaceae s. lat.; the remaining members belong to three other clades within Sapindaceae s. lat., two of which correspond respectively to the groups traditionally treated as Aceraceae and Hippocastanaceae, together forming a clade sister to the largely tropical Sapindaceae s. str., which is monophyletic and morphologically coherent provided Xanthoceras is excluded. Conclusion To overcome the difficulties of a broadly circumscribed Sapindaceae, we resurrect the historically recognized temperate families Aceraceae and Hippocastanaceae, and describe a new family, Xanthoceraceae, thus adopting a monophyletic and easily characterized circumscription of Sapindaceae nearly identical to that used for over a century.