Nitrogen fuelling of the pelagic food web of the Tropical Atlantic

We estimated the relative contribution of atmospheric Nitrogen (N) input (wet and dry deposition and N fixation) to the epipelagic food web by measuring N isotopes of different functional groups of epipelagic zooplankton along 23°W (17°N-4°S) and 18°N (20-24°W) in the Eastern Tropical Atlantic. Results were related to water column observations of nutrient distribution and vertical diffusive flux as well as colony abundance of Trichodesmium obtained with an Underwater Vision Profiler (UVP5). The thickness and depth of the nitracline and phosphocline proved to be significant predictors of zooplankton stable N isotope values. Atmospheric N input was highest (61% of total N) in the strongly stratified and oligotrophic region between 3 and 7°N, which featured very high depth-integrated Trichodesmium abundance (up to 9.4×104 colonies m-2), strong thermohaline stratification and low zooplankton delta15N (~2 per mil). Relative atmospheric N input was lowest south of the equatorial upwelling between 3 and 5°S (27%). Values in the Guinea Dome region and north of Cape Verde ranged between 45 and 50%, respectively. The microstructure-derived estimate of the vertical diffusive N flux in the equatorial region was about one order of magnitude higher than in any other area (approximately 8 mmol m-2 d 1). At the same time, this region received considerable atmospheric N input (35% of total). In general, zooplankton delta15N and Trichodesmium abundance were closely correlated, indicating that N fixation is the major source of atmospheric N input. Although Trichodesmium is not the only N fixing organism, its abundance can be used with high confidence to estimate the relative atmospheric N input in the tropical Atlantic (r2 = 0.95). Estimates of absolute N fixation rates are two- to tenfold higher than incubation-derived rates reported for the same regions. Our approach integrates over large spatial and temporal scales and also quantifies fixed N released as dissolved inorganic and organic N. In a global analysis, it may thus help to close the gap in oceanic N budgets.

Sharing Human-Generated Observations by Integrating HMI and the Semantic Sensor Web

Current “Internet of Things” concepts point to a future where connected objects gather meaningful information about their environment and share it with other objects and people. In particular, objects embedding Human Machine Interaction (HMI), such as mobile devices and, increasingly, connected vehicles, home appliances, urban interactive infrastructures, etc., may not only be conceived as sources of sensor information, but, through interaction with their users, they can also produce highly valuable context-aware human-generated observations. We believe that the great promise offered by combining and sharing all of the different sources of information available can be realized through the integration of HMI and Semantic Sensor Web technologies. This paper presents a technological framework that harmonizes two of the most influential HMI and Sensor Web initiatives: the W3C’s Multimodal Architecture and Interfaces (MMI) and the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Sensor Web Enablement (SWE) with its semantic extension, respectively. Although the proposed framework is general enough to be applied in a variety of connected objects integrating HMI, a particular development is presented for a connected car scenario where drivers’ observations about the traffic or their environment are shared across the Semantic Sensor Web. For implementation and evaluation purposes an on-board OSGi (Open Services Gateway Initiative) architecture was built, integrating several available HMI, Sensor Web and Semantic Web technologies. A technical performance test and a conceptual validation of the scenario with potential users are reported, with results suggesting the approach is sound

Interfaz web para BaDELE3000

El objetivo del presente Trabajo de Fin de Carrera es el estudio, diseño e implementación de una aplicación web que sirva de interfaz para una base de datos relacional llamada BaDELE3000 que trabaja actualmente con unos 3000 lexemas y sigue en fase de desarrollo. BaDELE modela conceptos y principios lingüísticos más o menos complejos, dentro del marco de la Teoría Sentido-Texto. El desarrollo de esta interfaz, permitirá a personas autorizadas, seguir nutriendo la base de datos. La memoria está formada por cinco capítulos, una bibliografía y un apéndice. Cada capítulo se divide en secciones. La sección, «Estado de la cuestión», introduce las bases linguísticas en las que se basa el modelo desarrollado, y su situación actual. En la tercera sección, «Especificación de Requisitos Software», se recogen todos los requisitos que el cliente ha transmitido al desarrollador. La siguiente sección de la memoria, «Desarrollo de la aplicación», es la más extensa. Empieza de manera teórica, describiendo los ciclos de vida en cascada y en espiral. En los siguientes apartados de la sección se explican las diferentes fases del ciclo de vida: fase de análisis, fase de diseño, centrándose en la elaboración del modelo de datos y relacional, fase de implementación, explicando las decisiones importantes en el desarrollo de la aplicación y la estructura modular de la aplicación, y por último, se trata la fase de pruebas, describiendo los tipos de pruebas ejecutados sobre el sistema y cómo se realizaron. En la quinta sección, se añaden las conclusiones obtenidas como fruto del trabajo realizado y se tratan posibles aspectos de mejora en la aplicación. En última sección, se incluye toda la bibliografía consultada y el manual de instalación y usuario de la aplicación

Blogs: en la vanguardia de la nueva generación web

El artículo afronta el análisis de ciertos aspectos sociales y "culturales" del fenómeno blog; y lo hace con la ayuda metodológica de un modelo, el Nuevo Entorno Tecnosocial (NET) y el enfoque sociotécnico de dos "blogólogos", estudiosos de la nueva realidad de la Red (Universal Digital). Tras repasar algunas definiciones, se destacan los aspectos principales de una posible cultura blog emergente y se relacionan con las propiedades del NET. Inmediatamente después de un breve paréntesis práctico dedicado a las personas que se adentran por vez primera en la blogosfera, se presentan algunas reflexiones acerca de los blogs como evolución de las comunidades virtuales y los cambios experimentados por los habitantes de la infociudad que nace inmersa en el NET, para terminar con la inquietante cuestión de si entre esos cambios no se incluirá también una gradual transformación de la estructura y forma de la inteligencia humana

Blogs: On the Cutting Edge of the Next-generation Web

This article analyses a number of social and cultural aspects of the blog phenomenon with the methodological aid of a complexity model, the New Techno-social Environment (hereinafter also referred to by its Spanish acronym, NET, or Nuevo Entorno Tecnosocial) together with the socio-technical approach of the two blogologist authors. Both authors are researchers interested in the new reality of the Digital Universal Network (DUN). After a review of some basic definitions, the article moves on to highlight some key characteristics of an emerging blog culture and relates them to the properties of the NET. Then, after a brief practical parenthesis for people entering the blogosphere for the first time, we present some reflections on blogs as an evolution of virtual communities and on the changes experienced by the inhabitants of the infocity emerging from within the NET. The article concludes with a somewhat disturbing question; whether among these changes there might not be a gradual transformation of the structure and form of human intelligence.

Competence Monitoring in Project Teams by using Web based portfolio management systems

This paper reports a learning experience related to the acquisition of project management competences. Students from three different universities and backgrounds, cooperate in a common project that drives the learning-teaching process. Previous related works on this initiative have already evaluated the goodness of this multidisciplinary, project-based learning approach in the context of a new educative paradigm. Yet the innovative experience has allowed the authors to define a rubric in order to measure specific competences in project management. The study shows the rubric’s main aspects as well as competence acquisition evaluation alternatives, based in the metrics defined. Key indicators and specific reports obtained from data base fields in the web tool will support this work. As a result, new competences can be assessed, such ones like teamwork, problem solving, communication and leadership. Final goal is to provide an overall competence map to the students at the same time they improve their skills.

Desing and Validation of a Light Inference System to Support Embedded Context Reasoning

Embedded context management in resource-constrained devices (e.g. mobile phones, autonomous sensors or smart objects) imposes special requirements in terms of lightness for data modelling and reasoning. In this paper, we explore the state-of-the-art on data representation and reasoning tools for embedded mobile reasoning and propose a light inference system (LIS) aiming at simplifying embedded inference processes offering a set of functionalities to avoid redundancy in context management operations. The system is part of a service-oriented mobile software framework, conceived to facilitate the creation of context-aware applications—it decouples sensor data acquisition and context processing from the application logic. LIS, composed of several modules, encapsulates existing lightweight tools for ontology data management and rule-based reasoning, and it is ready to run on Java-enabled handheld devices. Data management and reasoning processes are designed to handle a general ontology that enables communication among framework components. Both the applications running on top of the framework and the framework components themselves can configure the rule and query sets in order to retrieve the information they need from LIS. In order to test LIS features in a real application scenario, an ‘Activity Monitor’ has been designed and implemented: a personal health-persuasive application that provides feedback on the user’s lifestyle, combining data from physical and virtual sensors. In this case of use, LIS is used to timely evaluate the user’s activity level, to decide on the convenience of triggering notifications and to determine the best interface or channel to deliver these context-aware alerts.d

Dealing with Semantic Heterogeneity Issues on the Web

The Semantic Web is an extension of the traditional Web in which meaning of information is well defined, thus allowing a better interaction between people and computers. To accomplish its goals, mechanisms are required to make explicit the semantics of Web resources, to be automatically processed by software agents (this semantics being described by means of online ontologies). Nevertheless, issues arise caused by the semantic heterogeneity that naturally happens on the Web, namely redundancy and ambiguity. For tackling these issues, we present an approach to discover and represent, in a non-redundant way, the intended meaning of words in Web applications, while taking into account the (often unstructured) context in which they appear. To that end, we have developed novel ontology matching, clustering, and disambiguation techniques. Our work is intended to help bridge the gap between syntax and semantics for the Semantic Web construction

Aula Web "Pensamiento Matemático". Un complemento a la enseñanza de las matemáticas

Al igual que otras asignaturas pero quizás de manera más pronunciada las matemáticas, están viendo reducidos en gran medida sus créditos en los nuevos planes de estudios. Por ello, ofertar acciones que posibiliten alcanzar competencias relacionadas con esta y otras ciencias básicas resulta de gran utilidad. Con este propósito, desde el Grupo de Innovación Educativa de la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid “Pensamiento Matemático”, se ofrece a los alumnos un “Aula de Pensamiento Matemático”. En ella se presentan una serie de actividades on-line que permiten la capacitación de los alumnos en diversas competencias transversales, la mayoría relacionadas con el pensamiento matemático.

DBpedia spotlight: shedding light on the web of documents

Interlinking text documents with Linked Open Data enables the Web of Data to be used as background knowledge within document-oriented applications such as search and faceted browsing. As a step towards interconnecting the Web of Documents with the Web of Data, we developed DBpedia Spotlight, a system for automatically annotating text documents with DBpedia URIs. DBpedia Spotlight allows users to congure the annotations to their specic needs through the DBpedia Ontology and quality measures such as prominence, topical pertinence, contextual ambiguity and disambiguation condence. We compare our approach with the state of the art in disambiguation, and evaluate our results in light of three baselines and six publicly available annotation systems, demonstrating the competitiveness of our system. DBpedia Spotlight is shared as open source and deployed as a Web Service freely available for public use.

EuroPineDB: a high-coverage web database for maritime pine transcriptome

Pinus pinaster is an economically and ecologically important species that is becoming a woody gymnosperm model. Its enormous genome size makes whole-genome sequencing approaches are hard to apply. Therefore, the expressed portion of the genome has to be characterised and the results and annotations have to be stored in dedicated databases.

Gobernanza 2.0: Más allá de la Administración Electrónica, hacia un Gobierno de Nueva Generación

En el artículo introduciremos en primer lugar el nuevo entorno en que se enmarca el cambio sustancial en la naturaleza de la Web tal y como la conocemos. Adoptaremos para ello un enfoque híbrido, diseccionando con un poco más de detalle los elementos tecnológicos, socioeconómicos, administrativos y legislativos que, a nuestro parecer, pueden conformar el contexto que enmarcaría un escenario factible para la introducción de una Gobernanza 2.0 ?de nueva generación? capaz de integrar de una manera sostenible ?ecosistémicamente viable? tecnologías y procesos que soporten de forma natural el paso de una era post-industrial de la información en la que vivimos hace unos años, hacia una sociedad de la información, poblada por verdaderos infociudadanos (nativos digitales en una creciente mayoría) y que debería ser sólo el paso previo para la última utopía: la sociedad del conocimiento, un estadio de la evolución sociotécnica al que se pretende llegar por el ancestral método de la profecía autocumplida, ignorando una realidad vigente considerablemente compleja.