A CSR communication strategy for Ibersol: fighting hunger in Portugal

Field lab in marketing

Optical Wireless Communication for Mobile Platforms

The past few decades have witnessed the widespread adaptation of wireless devices such as cellular phones and Wifi-connected laptops, and demand for wireless communication is expected to continue to increase. Though radio frequency (RF) communication has traditionally dominated in this application space, recent decades have seen an increasing interest in the use of optical wireless (OW) communication to supplement RF communications. In contrast to RF communication technology, OW systems offer the use of largely unregulated electromagnetic spectrum and large bandwidths for communication. They also offer the potential to be highly secure against jamming and eavesdropping. Interest in OW has become especially keen in light of the maturation of light-emitting diode (LED) technology. This maturation, and the consequent emerging ubiquity of LED technology in lighting systems, has motivated the exploration of LEDs for wireless communication purposes in a wide variety of applications. Recent interest in this field has largely focused on the potential for indoor local area networks (LANs) to be realized with increasingly common LED-based lighting systems. We envision the use of LED-based OW to serve as a supplement to RF technology in communication between mobile platforms, which may include automobiles, robots, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). OW technology may be especially useful in what are known as RF-denied environments, in which RF communication may be prohibited or undesirable. The use of OW in these settings presents major challenges. In contrast to many RF systems, OWsystems that operate at ranges beyond a few meters typically require relatively precise alignment. For example, some laser-based optical wireless communication systems require alignment precision to within small fractions of a degree. This level of alignment precision can be difficult to maintain between mobile platforms. Additionally, the use of OW systems in outdoor settings presents the challenge of interference from ambient light, which can be much brighter than any LED transmitter. This thesis addresses these challenges to the use of LED-based communication between mobile platforms. We propose and analyze a dual-link LED-based system that uses one link with a wide transmission beam and relaxed alignment constraints to support a more narrow, precisely aligned, higher-data-rate link. The use of an optical link with relaxed alignment constraints to support the alignment of a more precisely aligned link motivates our exploration of a panoramic imaging receiver for estimating the range and bearing of neighboring nodes. The precision of such a system is analyzed and an experimental system is realized. Finally, we present an experimental prototype of a self-aligning LED-based link.

Theory and language of climate change communication

Climate change communication has become a salient topic in science and society. It has grown to be something like a booming industry alongside more established ‘communication enterprises’, such as health communication, risk communication, and science communication. This article situates the theory of climate change communication within theoretical developments in the field of science communication. It discusses the importance and difficulties inherent in talking about climate change to different types of publics using various types of communication tools and strategies. It engages with the difficult issue of the relationship between climate change communication and behavior change, and it focuses, in particular, on the role of language (metaphors, words, strategies, frames, and narratives) in conveying climate change issues to stakeholders. In the process, it attempts to provide an overview of emerging theories of climate change communication, theories that recently have begun to proliferate quite dramatically. In some cases, we can, therefore only provide signposts to the most relevant research that is being carried out with regard to climate change communication without being able to engage with all its aspects. We end with an assessment of how communication could be improved in light of the theories and practices discussed in this article.

Nested Sampling and its Applications in Stable Compressive Covariance Estimation and Phase Retrieval with Near-Minimal Measurements

Compressed covariance sensing using quadratic samplers is gaining increasing interest in recent literature. Covariance matrix often plays the role of a sufficient statistic in many signal and information processing tasks. However, owing to the large dimension of the data, it may become necessary to obtain a compressed sketch of the high dimensional covariance matrix to reduce the associated storage and communication costs. Nested sampling has been proposed in the past as an efficient sub-Nyquist sampling strategy that enables perfect reconstruction of the autocorrelation sequence of Wide-Sense Stationary (WSS) signals, as though it was sampled at the Nyquist rate. The key idea behind nested sampling is to exploit properties of the difference set that naturally arises in quadratic measurement model associated with covariance compression. In this thesis, we will focus on developing novel versions of nested sampling for low rank Toeplitz covariance estimation, and phase retrieval, where the latter problem finds many applications in high resolution optical imaging, X-ray crystallography and molecular imaging. The problem of low rank compressive Toeplitz covariance estimation is first shown to be fundamentally related to that of line spectrum recovery. In absence if noise, this connection can be exploited to develop a particular kind of sampler called the Generalized Nested Sampler (GNS), that can achieve optimal compression rates. In presence of bounded noise, we develop a regularization-free algorithm that provably leads to stable recovery of the high dimensional Toeplitz matrix from its order-wise minimal sketch acquired using a GNS. Contrary to existing TV-norm and nuclear norm based reconstruction algorithms, our technique does not use any tuning parameters, which can be of great practical value. The idea of nested sampling idea also finds a surprising use in the problem of phase retrieval, which has been of great interest in recent times for its convex formulation via PhaseLift, By using another modified version of nested sampling, namely the Partial Nested Fourier Sampler (PNFS), we show that with probability one, it is possible to achieve a certain conjectured lower bound on the necessary measurement size. Moreover, for sparse data, an l1 minimization based algorithm is proposed that can lead to stable phase retrieval using order-wise minimal number of measurements.

Measurement of the magnetic field of small magnets with a smartphone: a very economical laboratory practice for introductory physics courses

In this work, we propose an inexpensive laboratory practice for an introductory physics course laboratory for any grade of science and engineering study. This practice was very well received by our students, where a smartphone (iOS, Android, or Windows) is used together with mini magnets (similar to those used on refrigerator doors), a 20 cm long school rule, a paper, and a free application (app) that needs to be downloaded and installed that measures magnetic fields using the smartphone's magnetic field sensor or magnetometer. The apps we have used are: Magnetometer (iOS), Magnetometer Metal Detector, and Physics Toolbox Magnetometer (Android). Nothing else is needed. Cost of this practice: free. The main purpose of the practice is that students determine the dependence of the component x of the magnetic field produced by different magnets (including ring magnets and sphere magnets). We obtained that the dependency of the magnetic field with the distance is of the form x-3, in total agreement with the theoretical analysis. The secondary objective is to apply the technique of least squares fit to obtain this exponent and the magnetic moment of the magnets, with the corresponding absolute error.

Arsenic Geochemitry in Warm Spring Ponds: New Field and Experimental Results

Silver Bow Creek (SBC) flows into the Warm Springs Ponds Operable Unit (WSPOU), where various containment cells are used to precipitate copper and other metals (e.g., Cd, Cu, Mn, Pb, Zn). Lime is added seasonally to increase the pH and assist in removal of metals from the water column. Although the WSPOU is effective at removing copper and other cationic trace metals, concentrations of dissolved arsenic exiting the facility are often above the site specific standard, 20 20 ug/L, during low-flow periods each summer and fall. This thesis is a continuation of arsenic geochemistry studies by Montana Tech in the WSPOU. Field work focused on Pond 3, the largest and first in the series of treatment ponds. Shallow groundwater was sampled from 8 PVC piezometers located near the south end of Pond 3. Three sediment pore-water diffusion samplers (“peepers”) were also deployed at the south end of Pond 3 to examine vertical gradients in chemistry in the top 25 cm of the pond sediment. In general, the pH and Eh values of the shallow groundwater and sediment pore-water were less than in the pond water. Concentrations of arsenic were generally higher in subsurface water, and tended to pass through a maximum (up to 530 g/L) about 10 cm below the sediment-water interface. In the peeper cells, there was a strong positive correlation between dissolved As and dissolved Fe, and an inverse correlation with sulfate. Therefore, the zone of arsenic release corresponds to a zone of bacterial Fe and sulfate reduction in the shallow, organic-rich sediment. Redox speciation of arsenic shows that arsenate (As(V)) is dominant in the pond, and arsenite (As(III)) is dominant in the subsurface water. A series of laboratory experiments with pH adjustment were completed using SBC water collected near the inlet to the WSPOU as well as water and shallow sediment collected from Pond 3. Water ± sediment mesocosms were set up in 1-L Nalgene bottles (closed system) or a 20-L aquarium (open system), both with continuous stirring. The pH of the mesocosm was adjusted by addition of NaOH or HNO3 acid. The closed system provided better pH control since the water was not in contact with the atmosphere, which prevented exchange of carbon dioxide. In both the closed and open systems, dissolved arsenic concentrations either decreased or stayed roughly the same with increase in pH to values > 11. Therefore, the release of dissolved As into the treatment ponds in low-flow periods is not due to changes in pH alone. All of these results support the hypothesis that the arsenic release in WSPOU is linked to microbial reduction of ferric oxide minerals in the organic-rich sediment. Upwards diffusion of dissolved As from the sediment pore-water into the pond water is the most likely explanation for the increase in As concentration of the WSPOU in low-flow periods.

Geochemical Assessment and Separation of Source Waters in the Upper Boulder River Watershed Near Boulder, MT

Environmental samples were collected at three surface water sites between 5/21/2011 and 11/21/2014 along the Upper Boulder River near Boulder Montana. The sites were located at Bernice (within the mountain block), near the High Ore drainage (near the mountain block/basin transition), and at the USGS Gauging Station near Boulder, Montana (within the basin). The parameters measured in the field were SC, temperature, and alkalinity with occasional pH measurements. We collected samples for anions, cations, and stable isotopes in the catchment. We identified endmembers by sampling snow and groundwater and determined from available data an approximate endmember for rain, snow, and groundwater. We used temporal and spatial variations of water chemistry and isotopes to generate an endmember mixing model. Groundwater was found to always be an important contributor to river flow and could increase by nearly an order of magnitude during large snowmelt events. This resulted in groundwater comprising ~20% of total river flow during snowmelt at all sites. At peak snowmelt we observed that near surface water contributions to the river were from a mixture of rain and snow. Soil water, though not sampled, was hypothesized to be an important part of the hydrologic story. If so, the endmember contributions determined in this study may be different. Groundwater may have the highest variation depending on water chemistry of shallow soil water.

Variational mean-field approach to the double-exchange model

It has been recently shown that the double exchange Hamiltonian, with weak antiferromagnetic interactions, has a richer variety of first- and second-order transitions than previously anticipated, and that such transitions are consistent with the magnetic properties of manganites. Here we present a thorough discussion of the variational mean-field approach that leads to these results. We also show that the effect of the Berry phase turns out to be crucial to produce first-order paramagnetic-ferromagnetic transitions near half filling with transition temperatures compatible with the experimental situation. The computation relies on two crucial facts: the use of a mean-field ansatz that retains the complexity of a system of electrons with off-diagonal disorder, not fully taken into account by the mean-field techniques, and the small but significant antiferromagnetic superexchange interaction between the localized spins.

Development of a framework to create plugins in Android Apps

The present work aims to allow developers to implement small features on a certain Android application in a fast and easy manner, as well as provide their users to install them ondemand, i.e., they can install the ones they are interested in. These small packages of features are called plugins, and the chosen development language to develop these in was JavaScript. In order to achieve that, an Android framework was developed that enables the host application to install, manage and run these plugins at runtime. This framework was designed to have a very clean and almost readable API, which allowed for better code organization and maintainability. The implementation used the Google’s engine “V8” to interpret the JavaScript code and through a set of JNI calls made that code call certain Android methods previously registered in the runtime. In order to test the framework, it was integrated with the client’s communication application RCS+ using two plugins developed alongside the framework. Although these plugins had only the more common requirements, they were proven to work successfully as intended. Concluding, the framework although successful made it clear that this kind of development through a non-native API has its set of difficulties especially regarding the implementation of complex features.

A stakeholder perspective on heritage branding and digital communication

How does an archaeological museum understand its function in a digital environment? Consumer expectations are rapidly shifting, from what used to be a passive relationship with exhibition contents, towards a different one, in which interaction, individuality and proactivity define the visitor experience. This consumer paradigm is much studied in fast moving markets, where it provokes immediately measurable impacts. In other fields, such as tourism and regional development, the very heterogeneous nature of the product to be branded makes it near to impossible for only one player to engage successfully. This systemic feature implies that museums, acting as major stakeholders, often anchor a regional brand around which SME tend to cluster, and thus assume responsibilities in constructing marketable identities. As such, the archaeological element becomes a very useful trademark. On the other hand, it also emerges erratically on the Internet, in personal blogs, commercial websites, and social networks. This forces museums to enter as a mediator, authenticating contents and providing credibility. What might be called the digital pull factor poses specific challenges to museum management: what is to be promoted, and how, in order to create and maintain a coherent presence in social media? The underlying issue this paper tries to address is how museums perceive their current and future role in digital communication.

Pedagogical interventions to overcome communication apprehension in employment interviews among career students.

Career programs in the Cegep system base their training on various learning activities, which are followed by a practicum. The objective is to achieve a certain number of competencies, deemed necessary by the Ministry of Education, for entry-level occupations in to the workforce. The Graphic Communications program offered at Champlain College Saint-Lambert is a three-year career program that leads to employment in the field of graphics. Many students have part-time jobs during their schooling period but most of those jobs do not relate to their field of study. Several graduates stated they were unable to persuade employers to hire them for an externship or stage at the end of their program. While jobs are important for their general skills, since they are not directly related to the field, these jobs may not have given the students a suitable model for the conduct of an employment interview. Practice interviews may be one of many successful training methods to lower communication apprehension (CA) levels. CA is defined as "an individual's level of fear or anxiety associated with either real or anticipated communication with another person or persons." This paper examines the literature on CA and employment interviews and evaluates whether pedagogical interventions, including monitored phone calls to employers and practice-videotaped interviews, allow students to feel more confident about interviewing for a future job. A qualitative tool was used to gather scientific measurements of the participants' levels of CA both at the beginning and at the end of the Career Planning course. Open-ended reflective journals gathered quantitative data on the impact specific instructional strategies had on the participants. The pedagogical interventions that were examined and tested were as follows: preparation of scripts, monitored phone calls, videotaped practice interviews, and inclass access to professional assistance. Results indicate that all interventions had a positive impact on lowering levels of CA. It is clear that positive conclusions were drawn by the students as to usefulness of these activities. Overall, participants who responded to the reflective journal questions felt positive about the contribution of this preparatory career course to their CA levels. The results of the quantitative tool were consistent with previous research and the analysis of the reflective journals gave additional support to the usefulness of the interventions on students' confidence levels. Recommandations for improvements to the curriculum include the need for students to be taugh formally about metacognition and how to monitor it. Students need to be exposed to videotaped interviews more often. They should be better prepared for unexpected interview questions, and they should experience formal rehearsals with one of their instructors before the actual practice interview. Some of these recommendations have already been successfully implemented in the program's curriculum.||Résumé:Le but de ce travail était de vérifier si certaines activités pédagogiques sont efficaces pour faire baisser le niveau d'anxiété lié à la communication orale lors de leurs entrevues d'embauche. L'objectif des programmes techniques au Québec est de fournir aux étudiants un certain nombre de compétences définies par le ministèe de l'Éducation, des Loisirs et du Sport afin que ces derniers puissent fournir des services de techniciens spécialisés aux entreprises. Le programme nommé Office Systems Technology (412) du collège Champlain de Saint-Lambert, a choisi la voie de la spécialisation en microédition et hypermédia en 1999 et a changé son nom pour Graphic Communications en 2005. Les programmes techniques au Cégep incluent un stage en milieu de travail à la fin d'un programme de trois ans et par le fait même, une entrevue pour obtenir un stage en entreprise. La compétence visée par cette étude est l'intégration au marché du travail et le cheminement professionnel des étudiants. Lors d'enquêtes informelles, plusieurs étudiants du programme ont fait part de leurs difficultés à trouver un stage en fin d'études. Certains auteurs suggèrent que ces étudiants n'ont pas de modèles appropriés lors de la tenue d'une entrevue d'emploi. Ils proposent de diminuer le niveau d'anxiété lié à la communication orale lors d'entrevues d'embauche en offrant des pratiques d'entrevue aux étudiants. Cette recherche a examiné la littérature au sujet de l'anxiété de communication, plus précisément lors d'entrevues. Elle avait pour mandat d'évaluer si les activités pédagogiques d'un cours de préparation à la carrière ont été efficaces pour faire baisser les taux d'anxiété en communication orale lors d'entrevues. En plus, une conseillère à l'emploi fut invitée à plusieurs reprises afin de fournir un support professionnel en classe, étant donné que les étudiants ne prennent pas nécessairement le temps de consulter des professionnels en raison de leurs activités personnelles trop nombreuses. Le type d'enseignement évalué est considéré comme stratégique, étant donné qu'il agit au niveau cognitif et métacognitif de l'étudiant. Le cours de préparation à l'emploi débute par la vérification des acquis antérieurs des étudiants et il tient compte de leur motivation scolaire et professionnelle. De plus, il est axé sur la construction du savoir en proposant des activités de plus en plus complexes, débutant par la rédaction de textes à utiliser lors d'appels aux employeurs, en passant par la préparation et la pratique d'appels et se terminant par des entrevues d'emploi qui serviront de modèle à perfectionner par chaque étudiant. Ces entrevues se font avec des employeurs qui ont déjà embauché des étudiants du programme de Graphic Communications au collège Champlain de Saint-Lambert et sont enregistrées sur bande vidéo afin de permettre une visualisation ultérieure et cohérente avec les objectifs visés. La méthodologie de cette recherche inclut deux outils, un quantitatif et un qualitatif. L'outil quantitatif permet de mesurer scientifiquement les taux d'appréhension en communication des étudiants au début et à la fin du cours de préparation à l'emploi. Cet outil est la fusion de deux outils, le Personal Report of Communication Apprehension ou PRCA-24, qui fut développé par McCroskey (1984), en tandem avec celui de Wongprasert & Ayres (2000), qui lui met l'accent sur les entrevues d'emploi. Les réponses à cet outil combiné sont évaluées sur une échelle Likert de cinq points. L'outil qualitatif est une série de questions auxquelles les étudiants ont répondu quatre fois lors de la session. Les réponses à ces questions ont été analysées et les commentaires des étudiants évalués. Il découle de cette analyse que les niveaux d'anxiété des étudiants qui ont participé (14) étaient définitivement à la baisse en fin de cours. La pratique téléphonique structurée, dans un laboratoire avec les téléphones, a été très révélatrice pour les étudiants. Ils ont appris comment utiliser un script comme piste de départ pour un appel et qu'il était possible de contourner certains obstacles de façon professionnelle. Ensuite, lors d'une visite d'une compagnie de graphisme, ils ont pu observer divers modèles d'emploi. Ils ont eu la possibilité de poser des questions sur le fonctionnement et les besoins de l'entreprise. Ceci facilita la rédaction de leur curriculum vitae en leur permettant de mieux décrire leurs acquis en fonction d'emplois recherchés. Par la suite, ils se sont préparés pour une pratique d'entrevue, filmée. Les interviewers avaient déjà travaillé avec le collège et avaient déjà embauché certains étudiants de ce programme, donc ils connaissaient leur potentiel. Une liste de questions possibles fut suggérée mais il n'en restait pas moins que les interviewers pouvaient les modifier, ceci étant représentatif du marché de l'emploi. Même si le collège fournit un enseignement en anglais, un des intervieweurs donna ses entrevues en français. Trois étudiants se sont portés volontaires, mais deux ont constaté qu'ils auraient dû pratiquer leur script en français avant l'entrevue pour mieux diminuer leur niveau d'anxiété. Finalement, les étudiants durent visionner leur segment d'entrevue : ceci leur a permis de voir si leur attitude non-verbale concordait avec ce qu'ils ressentaient en entrevue et d'emmener les correctifs appropriés. Les taux d'anxiété furent vérifiés une deuxième fois en fin de session et les résultats ont démontré une baisse des taux d'appréhension. Les résultats de cette étude concordent donc avec ceux trouvés dans la littérature et donnent de bonnes pistes pour l'amélioration de ce cours de préparation à la carrière. L'auteur recommande d'enseigner la métacognition de façon formelle et ainsi de faciliter la prise de conscience des apprentissages que les étudiants effectuent. De plus, les étudiants devraient être filmés en studio au moins une fois par année pour diminuer le facteur de stress causé par les caméras et finalement ils pourraient certainement bénéficier de pratiques formelles d'entrevue avec un instructeur avant l'entrevue filmée. L'augmentation des pratiques a déjà été mise en oeuvre dans le programme et des résultats positifs se sont ensuivis.

Estrategia y plan de mercadeo de la empresa YouTube

Esta investigación describe la situación de cómo Youtube se ha convertido a partir de sus estrategias y plan de mercadeo en la plataforma número uno en variedad de clips de películas, vídeos musicales, video de blogs, entre otros; llegando a popularizarse como una red social. Las redes sociales han desarrollado una nueva forma de comunicar y son una herramienta fundamental para la creación de conocimiento colectivo, es el caso de YouTube buscador de contenido audiovisual y red social que permite a millones de usuarios conectarse alrededor del mundo. Esta plataforma rompe las barreras culturales y de comunicación que anteriormente existían a falta de internet. En este sentido se pretende analizar a YouTube desde una perspectiva administrativa enfocada en el área de mercadeo.

Agronomic performance of selected sweet potato cultivars under greenhouse and field infested with meloigogyne incognita and soilborne insect pests.

The root knot nematode (RKN), Meloidogyne incognita, is widespread worldwide and a major pathogen of several cultivated crops. The use of resistant genotypes is the most effective and environmentally sound way to manage RKN. In this study, we screened 16 selected sweet potato cultivars including Amanda, Bárbara, Beatriz, Beauregard, Brazlândia Branca, Brazlândia Rosada, Brazlândia Roxa, BRS Amélia, BRS Cuia, BRS Rubissol, Carolina Vitória, Duda, Júlia, Marcela, PA-26/2009, and Princesa obtained from Embrapa and Universidade Federal do Tocantins? germplasm bank. Studies were conducted under greenhouse and field conditions and the agronomic performance of the cultivars was evaluated in a nematode and soilborne insect-infested field. All 16 sweet potato cultivars tested were rated as resistant to this nematode both under greenhouse and field conditions with reproduction factors < 1. In the field infested with M. incognita, sweet potato cultivars Duda, BRS Amélia, Beauregard, Brazlândia Rosada, and Brazlândia Roxa stood out as superior cultivars, with average yield ranging from 26 to 47 tons per ha. Overall, most cultivars exhibited a fusiform to near fusiform root shape, a good characteristic for the market, and were moderately affected by insects (attack incidence 1 to 30%). As global demand for energy continues to rise, selecting new cultivars of sweet potatoes with increased resistance to nematode diseases and with high yield will be important for food security and biofuel production.

Intelligent Sensor Systems for Structural Health Monitoring Applications

The convergence between the recent developments in sensing technologies, data science, signal processing and advanced modelling has fostered a new paradigm to the Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of engineered structures, which is the one based on intelligent sensors, i.e., embedded devices capable of stream processing data and/or performing structural inference in a self-contained and near-sensor manner. To efficiently exploit these intelligent sensor units for full-scale structural assessment, a joint effort is required to deal with instrumental aspects related to signal acquisition, conditioning and digitalization, and those pertaining to data management, data analytics and information sharing. In this framework, the main goal of this Thesis is to tackle the multi-faceted nature of the monitoring process, via a full-scale optimization of the hardware and software resources involved by the {SHM} system. The pursuit of this objective has required the investigation of both: i) transversal aspects common to multiple application domains at different abstraction levels (such as knowledge distillation, networking solutions, microsystem {HW} architectures), and ii) the specificities of the monitoring methodologies (vibrations, guided waves, acoustic emission monitoring). The key tools adopted in the proposed monitoring frameworks belong to the embedded signal processing field: namely, graph signal processing, compressed sensing, ARMA System Identification, digital data communication and TinyML.

Analysis and Evaluation of Tiny Machine Learning applications

The aim of TinyML is to bring the capability of Machine Learning to ultra-low-power devices, typically under a milliwatt, and with this it breaks the traditional power barrier that prevents the widely distributed machine intelligence. TinyML allows greater reactivity and privacy by conducting inference on the computer and near-sensor while avoiding the energy cost associated with wireless communication, which is far higher at this scale than that of computing. In addition, TinyML’s efficiency makes a class of smart, battery-powered, always-on applications that can revolutionize the collection and processing of data in real time. This emerging field, which is the end of a lot of innovation, is ready to speed up its growth in the coming years. In this thesis, we deploy three model on a microcontroller. For the model, datasets are retrieved from an online repository and are preprocessed as per our requirement. The model is then trained on the split of preprocessed data at its best to get the most accuracy out of it. Later the trained model is converted to C language to make it possible to deploy on the microcontroller. Finally, we take step towards incorporating the model into the microcontroller by implementing and evaluating an interface for the user to utilize the microcontroller’s sensors. In our thesis, we will have 4 chapters. The first will give us an introduction of TinyML. The second chapter will help setup the TinyML Environment. The third chapter will be about a major use of TinyML in Wake Word Detection. The final chapter will deal with Gesture Recognition in TinyML.