Las iglesias prefeudales en Alava: cronotipología y articulación espacial

[ES]El artículo constituye un avance de un proyecto de investigación en curso sobre las iglesias alavesas anteriores a los siglos XII-XIII,invisibles hasta la fecha a una metodología tradicionalmente de base analógica y formal. Se efectúa una nueva propuesta de análisis experimentada ya en la catedral de Santa María de Vitoria-Gasteiz y que se articula de la manera siguiente: 1. Lettura veloce de los principales momentos constructivos de los templos seleccionados con el objeto de individualizar estratigráficamente la fase o fases anteriores al periodo «románico». 2. Individualización y registro de las variables técnicas y formales más representativas de esta primera fase constructiva en cada una de las iglesias objeto de estudio. 3. Identificación numérica de las variables seleccionadas. 4. Creación de una tabla analítica que recoja la presencia o ausencia de estas variables en cada uno de los edificios a estudiar. 5. Agrupamiento de los edificios que comparten variables entre sí. 6. Transformación de las asociaciones tecnotipológicas en tablas cronotipológicas, es decir, en indicadores cronológicos. Resultado de todo ello ha sido la individualización de seis grupos de iglesias que se articulan diacrónicamente entre los siglos IX y XII. A modo de conclusión se avanzan, finalmente, algunas consideraciones interpretativas sobre la naturaleza de estos templos de época prefeudal.

Atraso e innovación tecnológicos en la siderurgia guipuzcoana durante el antiguo régimen

[ES]Durante décadas la historiografía ha considerado que la siderurgia vasca, y dentro de ella la guipuzcoana, sufrió un claro «atraso tecnológico», anclada en los métodos directos, en un momento de expansión mundial de los sistemas indirectos. El presente artículo hace un análisis diacrónico de la evolución tecnológica de la mencionada actividad entre los siglos XIII y XIX, centrando su discurso, tanto en los intentos e iniciativas innovadoras, tratando de desentrañar las verdaderas razones que llevaron dichos proyectos innovadores al éxito o al fracaso, como en las continuidades. En definitiva, se trata de matizar y relativizar el mencionado concepto.

Blood lactate in yellowfin tuna, Neothunnus macropterus, and skipjack, Katsuwonus pelamis, following capture and tagging

ENGLISH: The staff of the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission for several years has been investigating the life history, population structure, behavior and ecology of the yellowfin tuna, Neothunnus macropterus, and the skipjack, Katsuwonus pelamis, in the Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean. The tagging and subsequent recovery of these tropical tunas, to provide information on population structure, migrations, mortality rates and growth rates, are important aspects of these investigations. Broadhead (1959) and Schaefer, Chatwin and Broadhead (1961) emphasize the many difficulties involved in tagging these extremely active yet delicate fish and give considerable evidence to suggest that tagging mortality is high, perhaps as great as 60 to 80 per cent. The latter authors suggest that the rather high mortality at tagging is related to the effects of hyperactivity brought about by the tagging operation. SPANISH: El personal de la Comisión Interamericana del Atún Tropical ha estado investigando durante varios años la historia natural, la estructura de la población, los hábitos y la ecología del atún aleta amarilla, Neothunnus macropterus, y del barrilete, Katsuwonus pelamis, en el Océano Pacífico Oriental Tropical. La marcación y el subsiguiente recobro de estos atunes tropicales, lo que da información sobre la estructura de la población, los movimientos migratorios y las tasas de crecimiento y de mortalidad, son importantes aspectos de estas investigaciones. Broadhead (1959) y Schaefer, Chatwin y Broadhead (1961) destacan las muchas dificultades que hay para marcar estos peces activos en extremo pero delicados, y proporcionan considerable evidencia que sugiere que la mortalidad por la marcación es bastante alta, siendo quizás de 60 a 80 por ciento. Los autores citados sugieren que esta elevada mortalidad por la marcación está relacionada con los efectos de la hiperactividad producida por la operación de marcación.

Breeding programs on Atlantic salmon in Norway: lessons learned

An early establishment of selective breeding programs on Atlantic salmon has been crucial for the success of developing efficient and sustainable salmon farming in Norway. A national selective breeding program was initiated by AKVAFORSK at the beginning of the 1970s, by collecting fertilized eggs from more than 40 Norwegian river populations. Several private selective breeding programs were also initiated in the 1970s and 1980s. While these private programs were initiated using individual selection (i.e. massselection) to genetically improve growth, the national program was designed to gradually include all economically important traits in the breeding objective (i.e. growth, age at sexual maturation, disease resistance and quality traits) using a combined family and within-family selection strategy. Independent of which selection strategy and program design used, it is important to secure and maintain a broad genetic variation in the breeding populations to maximize selection response. It has been documented that genetically improved salmon from the national selective breeding program grow twice as fast as wild Atlantic salmon and require 25 per cent less feed, while salmon representing the private breeding programs all show an intermediate growth performance. As a result of efficient dissemination of genetically improved Atlantic salmon, the Norwegian salmon farming industry has reduced its feed costs by more than US$ 230 million per year! The national selective breeding program on Atlantic salmon was commercialized into a breeding company (AquaGen) in 1992. Five years later, several private companies and the AKVAFORSK Genetics Center (AFGC) established a second breeding company (SalmoBreed) using breeding candidates from one of the private breeding programs. These two breeding companies have similar products, but different strategies on how to organize the breeding program and to disseminate the genetically improved seed to the Norwegian salmon industry. Greater competition has increased the necessity to document the genetic gain obtained from the different programs and to market the economic benefits of farming the genetically improved breeds. Both breeding companies have organized their dissemination to get a sufficient share of the economic benefits in order to sustain and improve their breeding programs.

Lessons from the breeding program of rohu

For the first time in India, selective breeding work has been initiated at the Central Institute of Freshwater Aquaculture, Bhubaneswar, India in collaboration with the Institute of Aquaculture Research (AKVAFORSK), Norway. Rohu has been chosen as the model species because it enjoys the highest consumer preference among Indian major carps (IMC) although its performance was observed to be slower than other IMC. As this was the first ever selection work on any Indian major carp, many procedures and techniques for successful implementation of the programs were standardized (i.e. production of full-sib groups, establishment of model hatchery for selective breeding of carps, rearing of full-sib groups in partitioned nursery ponds, individual tagging with the Passive Integrated Transponder (PIT) tag, communal rearing, sampling, data analysis, field testing and dissemination of improved rohu). After four generations of selection, an average of 17 per cent higher growth per generation was observed in improved rohu.