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Silicon (Si) is essential to the electronics and microelectronics industry. With it, the transistors that revolutionized electronics and are the basis of current technology, solar cells, and all semiconductor devices are manufactured. However, Si has limits since it is not considered helpful in magnetic, optical, or biomedical applications. Here is where porous silicon (PSi) exhibits its potential in those areas and increases the functionality of Si-based technology even further. Thanks to the ease with which its manufacturing parameters are modified, the physicochemical properties obtained make it attractive for application in different fields. Since the discovery of PSi luminescence in 1990, there has been a substantial increase in the research and publications carried out each year. This paper is a divulgation work on the PSi preparation, the formation of their microporous structure, and some of these most important applications., El silicio (Si) forma parte importante de la industria electrónica y de la microelectrónica. Con él se fabrican los transistores que revolucionaron la electrónica y que son la base de la tecnología actual, las celdas solares y todo tipo de dispositivos semiconductores. Sin embrago el Si tiene sus límites ya que no se considera útil en aplicaciones magnéticas, ópticas o biomédicas. Es aquí donde el silicio poroso (PSi) exhibe su potencial en esas áreas e incrementa la funcionalidad de la tecnología basada en el Si aún más allá. Gracias a la facilidad con que los parámetros de su elaboración son modificados, las propiedades fisicoquímicas que se obtienen lo hacen atractivo para su aplicación en diferentes campos. Desde el descubrimiento de la luminiscencia del PSi en 1990, se ha reportado un incremento sustancial en las investigaciones y publicaciones que cada año se realizan. Este es un trabajo de divulgación sobre la preparación, la formación de la estructura microporosa y algunas de las más importantes aplicaciones del PSi.

This work describes the mechanisms of photothermal conversion and related concepts, avoiding, as far as possible, technicalities and advanced mathematical language to make it accessible to students and professionals from diverse fields and not only to people related to science and engineering. Some of most critical applications in the field of photothermal conversion are discussed. However, the article is focused on the use of solar energy. Initially, some basic concepts are presented that are necessary to achieve a more precise description of the main topic, which is discussed in the final part of the article: the photothermal conversion mechanisms and their application in solar thermal energy. We consider this a topic of growing interest in the field of renewable energies that, due to its current relevance, is pertinent to widely disseminate and promote its understanding among students and professionals interested in knowing about this important field of knowledge., Este trabajo describe los mecanismos de conversión fototérmica y conceptos relacionados evitando, en lo posible, tecnicismos y un lenguaje matemático avanzado para hacerlo accesible a estudiantes y profesionales de campos diversos y no solo a personas relacionadas con la ciencia y la ingeniería. Se comentan algunas de las más importantes aplicaciones del campo de la conversión fototérmica, sin embargo, el artículo está enfocado hacia la del aprovechamiento de la energía solar. Inicialmente se presentan algunos conceptos básicos que son necesarios para lograr una descripción más clara del tema principal, que se trata en la parte final del artículo, los mecanismos de conversión fototérmica y su aplicación en el campo de la energía solar térmica. Consideramos que este es un tema de interés creciente en el campo de las energías renovables que, por su actual relevancia, es pertinente dar una amplia divulgación y fomentar su comprensión en estudiantes y profesionales interesados en conocer sobre este importante campo del conocimiento.

The authors would like to thank Universidad San Pablo CEU and the Cátedra de Educación Médica y humanización “Nemesio Diez” for funding the open access., Introduction: Medical education should promote the development of skills and abilities that can be applied to real-world work performance. The aim of this study is to evaluate technical and methodological knowledge, as well as physician-patient communication skills, as one of the most important transversal competencies that a good physician should acquire; all this in a reliable, accurate and objective way. Methods: We present a rubric specifically designed and implemented for the evaluation of specific and transversal competencies in the physiology practical sessions, during the second year of the medical degree. The assessment consists in two evaluation tests: 1) a theoretical test that consists of multiple-choice questions. Students must demonstrate that they have acquired adequate theoretical knowledge (specific competency “to know”); 2) a practical test, in which students are evaluated by the rubric through the simulation of a medical consultation. Thus, demonstrating their ability to execute/apply what they have learned in class (specific competency “to know how to do”). They are also evaluated on the transversal competencies that we call “communication with the patient” (transversal competency “to know how to be there”) and “dealing with the patient” (transversal competency “to know how to be”). Results: We evaluated whether there were differences in the grades obtained by students when the transversal competencies were not assessed (academic years 2017-2018 and 2018-2019; n = 289), and when the transversal competencies were assessed by applying the rubric in the academic years 2019-2020, 2021-2022, and 2022-2023 (n = 526). Furthermore, we present a student perception that supports the use of clinical simulation and our rubric as a good method within the competency learning process. Discussion: The acquisition of these competencies, starting from the first courses of undergraduate education, helps to raise the students’ awareness in the development of a more, Depto. de Genética, Fisiología y Microbiología, Fac. de Ciencias Biológicas, TRUE, pub

Wildfires are becoming more intense and frequent. This problem has tested the knowledge, response capacity, and resilience achieved by society throughout history, making it clear that they are insufficient to face this new wildfire regime. The effectiveness of the related policies mainly focused on fire suppression rather than prevention is increasingly insufficient and questionable. Consequently, there is a clear lack of tools to assess the impact of wildfire preventive actions. Therefore, it is imperative to review wildfire management practices, policies, and the tools used to support decision-making in this regard. This study performs an analysis of wildfire policies applied in the Iberian Peninsula case (Portugal and Spain), including cross-border policies and the role of road transport networks. A novel simplified methodology is included to evaluate different normal and extreme forest fire management policies in road transport infrastructures. The methodology includes different parameters related to wildfires, such as sources of exposure, identification of natural and artificial barriers, and traffic conditions that capture the economic characteristics of the studied area. The information provided by the tool is useful for strategic investment planning, resource prioritization, and evacuation time management. In addition, due to its simplicity of application, it is a useful tool for cross-border areas.

La presente investigación pretende demostrar el valor de las herramientas de comunicación de las redes sociales, en concreto de Instagram y especialmente en organizaciones del Tercer sector, en este caso una fundación, que busca atraer a los públicos y obtener fondos para las causas que quieren apoyar, Grado en Publicidad y Relaciones Públicas

A partir de la situación vivida a causa de la COVID-19 en la que tuvimos que adaptarnos a la docencia virtual, hemos descubierto el gran potencial que las herramientas disponibles en nuestro entorno nos ofrecen para poder mejorar la interacción con los alumnos y alumnas; los cuales demandan este tipo de herramientas, ya que al ser nativos tecnológicos se sienten más cómodos en su uso y les facilita un aprendizaje más dinámico. Este hecho nos llevó a solicitar dos proyectos de innovación de forma consecutiva (161 y 302) en los que se virtualizó el contenido práctico de las asignaturas de Parasitología e Inmunología de Grado, respectivamente. Dado el éxito de estas iniciativas, en este proyecto nos planteamos ampliar el uso de este tipo de herramientas en las dos asignaturas del Máster de Análisis Sanitarios en los que participan miembros de este proyecto. Al igual que en los casos anteriores, estos desarrollos se pondrán a disposición del alumnado del Máster, a través del Campus Virtual, para completar y facilitar su formación en las asignaturas de Diagnóstico Parasitológico y Micológico y Diagnóstico Inmunológico. Por otro lado, pensamos que estas herramientas podrían suponer una alternativa óptima para una posible futura docencia virtual, siendo también aplicable a los alumnos que por diferentes motivos no puedan asistir a la docencia presencial, evitando de esta forma, que nuestros alumnos y alumnas pierdan la experiencia práctica de los protocolos realizados en las diferentes técnicas de laboratorio. Dado que nos encontramos en la formación de alumnos de posgrado, en un Máster eminentemente profesionalizante, consideramos indispensable que adquieran una sólida base tanto en el diagnóstico de parásitos, como en la correcta realización de técnicas inmunológicas que posteriormente se completarán en su período práctico. Esto nos ha movido a pensar en el desarrollo de una herramienta que facilite la comprensión de los conocimientos prácticos no basada en la mera memor

This paper presents a two-stage simheuristics-based framework for optimizing bridge maintenance scheduling strategies in a highway transportation network under uncertainty considering bridge life-cycle reliability and the effects of different maintenance interventions. The design variables of the optimal bridge maintenance scheduling problem are the preventive maintenance schedules for all bridges in the network, with the conflicting objectives of minimizing total maintenance cost and total travel time over the life cycle of bridges. The outcome of the first stage of the framework is a Pareto front of deterministic optimal solutions, which are then tested in the second stage to measure their performance under uncertainty., Integral Design & Management, Transport and Planning

The Digital Twin (DT) concept, as understood nowadays, appeared in the early 2000s as an attempt to create virtual replicas of physical assets, such as bridges, that can be used to examine, monitor and manage their performance. Up to this day, it has been successfully applied in the fields of aeronautics, manufacturing, medicine, and more recently, in the architecture, engineering, and construction industry. The DT of a bridge requires the creation of a virtual replica of the real-life asset, along with the connection and feedback of information channel between the two of them. This connection is currently achieved through the generation of real-time data by the placement of sensors in the real bridge and the application of structural health monitoring techniques to analyze such data. This connection could result in a complex, time-consuming, and expensive process which would hinder the creation of DT prototypes for development purposes in the bridge engineering field. This paper aims at exploring the currently available synthetic data generation methodologies and tools, which could be used as a faster and a more economically feasible alternative to real monitoring, for the creation and development of DT prototypes of bridges, for both industry and research-oriented purposes. A synthetic data generation framework is proposed that can produce FAIR benchmark databases that are based on Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reuse, which could be used in the prototyping of bridge DTs. Finally, tentative future improvements in this topic are discussed., This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 101066739., Integral Design & Management

Digital twins (DTs) are virtual replicas of physical assets that can be used to monitor and manage their performance. To date, the DT concept has been effectively implemented in various industries, including aeronautics, manufacturing, medicine, and more recently, in the architecture, engineering, and construction sector. In the latter, these assets can be related to buildings, bridges, or other important infrastructures of the built environment. Although the creation of synthetic benchmark datasets for the validation of novel damage detection approaches has been attempted in the past, such alternatives are not easily findable or accessible. Thus, a new synthetic data generation framework is proposed within the DT paradigm context, that can produce FAIR benchmark databases that are characterized by Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reuse. This paper aims at exploring the uncertainty types, sources, and quantification approaches involved in the synthetic data generation methodologies and tools of the intended framework which could be used as a faster and cheaper alternative to real monitoring, for the creation and development of DT prototypes of bridges for both industry and research-oriented purposes. This work also highlights the benefits and drawbacks of implementing synthetic data for these purposes and points out tentative future improvements in the field., Integral Design & Management

The use of sensitivity analysis is essential in model development for the purposes of calibration, verification, factor prioritization, and mechanism reduction. While most contributions to sensitivity methods focus on the average model response, this paper proposes a new sensitivity method focusing on the extreme response and structural limit states, which combines an extreme-oriented sensitivity method with polynomial chaos expansion. This enables engineers to perform sensitivity analysis near given limit states and visualize the relevance of input factors to different design criteria and corresponding thresholds. The polynomial chaos expansion is used to approximate the model output and alleviate the computational cost in sensitivity analysis, which features sparsity and adaptivity to enhance efficiency. The accuracy and efficiency of the method are verified in a truss structure, which is then illustrated on a dynamic train–track–bridge system. The role of the input factors in response variability is clarified, which differs in terms of the design criteria chosen for sensitivity analysis. The method incorporates multi-scenarios and can thus be useful to support decision-making in design and management of engineering structures., Integral Design & Management, Engineering Structures

The severe effects of extreme wildfire events in recent years have shown that the fire suppression approach is not enough to solve the problem. An alternative to dealing with this issue is to accept the impossibility of eliminating wildfire hazards and focus on preparing systems to be more resilient. However, existing decision-making tools based on resilience present important drawbacks that make them inadequate for this task. This paper proposes a new approach and methodology for the resilience assessment of road traffic networks to wildfires that overcomes the main drawbacks, paying attention to the different functions of the system and the acceptance of a specific loss of performance. The latter is done through the introduction of dynamic thresholds that reflect the different requirements of the system under different wildfire conditions, including normal and extreme fires. The methodology is exemplified for five traffic networks. The results support the relevance of appropriate wildfire management through the adaptation of the natural and built environment to increase the capacity of the traffic networks to cope with wildfires., Integral Design & Management, Safety and Security Science

Bridge infrastructure has great economic, social, and cultural value. Nevertheless, many of the infrastructural assets are in poor conservation condition as has been recently evidenced by the collapse of several bridges worldwide. The objective of this systematic review is to collect and synthesize state-of-the-art knowledge and information about how bridge information modeling, finite element modeling, and bridge health monitoring are combined and used in the creation of digital twins (DT) of bridges, and how these models could generate damage scenarios to be used by anomaly detection algorithms for damage detection on bridges, especially in bridges with cultural heritage value. A total of 76 relevant studies from 2017 up to 2022 have been taken into account in this review. The synthesis results show a consensus toward the future adoption of DT for bridge design, management, and operation among the scientific community and bridge practitioners. The main gaps identified are related to the lack of software interoperability, the required improvement of the performance of anomaly-detection algorithms, and the approach definition to be adopted for the integration of DT at the macro scale. Other potential developments are related to the implementation of Industry 5.0 concepts and ideas within DT frameworks., Integral Design & Management

Transition zones such as level crossing and bridge approaches are critical links in railway networks due to higher degradation rates and maintenance needs. In this context, parametric optimization has been applied to improve the design in transition zones; however, it requires a more computationally efficient tool to support repetitive function evaluations, since the involved vehicle–track dynamic simulations are becoming more expensive to evaluate. For this purpose, a surrogate-based simulation methodology is proposed to search for an optimal combination of parameters relevant to the geometry and elasticity of track structures. Specifically, the presented methodology integrates finite element (FE)-based modeling with surrogate-assisted optimization: (1) the FE model is developed to characterize the dynamic behavior of a level crossing under a moving vehicle; (2) the optimization problem is formulated upon this mechanical model by extending the expensive FE simulations to an adaptive surrogate modeling scheme. This integration facilitates efficient exploration of the track design space (thereby reducing the computational cost), and a reasonable balance can be achieved between solution quality and computational effort. The methodology is applied to a Dutch railway case. Results show that compared to a reference design, the optimized design significantly improves performance indicators relevant to wheel–rail contact forces and energy dissipation in the ballast layer. The solution brings great potential in achieving a more desirable vehicle–track interaction and improving the connecting performance between level crossings and transitions. The methodology is applicable to other railway structures and may also contribute to improvements in current track design practices., Integral Design & Management, Engineering Structures

Series estimadas de población y producción para el período anterior a la revolución industrial, Índice de hojas - Índice de series - Cuadros - Notas

The field of prebiotic chemistry has been dedicated over decades to finding abiotic routes towards the molecular components of life. There is nowadays a handful of prebiotically plausible scenarios that enable the laboratory synthesis of most amino acids, fatty acids, simple sugars, nucleotides and core metabolites of extant living organisms. The major bottleneck then seems to be the self-organization of those building blocks into systems that can self-sustain. The purpose of this tutorial review is having a close look, guided by experimental research, into the main synthetic pathways of prebiotic chemistry, suggesting how they could be wired through common intermediates and catalytic cycles, as well as how recursively changing conditions could help them engage in self-organized and dissipative networks/assemblies (i.e., systems that consume chemical or physical energy from their environment to maintain their internal organization in a dynamic steady state out of equilibrium). In the article we also pay attention to the implications of this view for the emergence of homochirality. The revealed connectivity between those prebiotic routes should constitute the basis for a robust research program towards the bottom-up implementation of protometabolic systems, taken as a central part of the origins-of-life problem. In addition, this approach should foster further exploration of control mechanisms to tame the combinatorial explosion that typically occurs in mixtures of various reactive precursors, thus regulating the functional integration of their respective chemistries into self-sustaining protocellular assemblies.

Wildfires have become a source of concern for society due to the increase in frequency, intensity, and unpredictability. This has caused serious impacts all over the world, even in areas where this type of problem did not occur before. Studies on the adaptation of critical infrastructure have been conducted to reduce the impacts of this type of hazard influenced by climate change. However, there are currently no tools to evaluate adaptation measures and their influence on the resilience of transport infrastructure to wildfires. Therefore, this paper proposes the application of a simplified methodology to assess the priority level in interventions on bridge networks and the effectiveness of different adaptation measures. The methodology is applied to a case study in Portugal. In that sense, the results show that adaptation measures such as changing vegetation management policy and implementing wildfire spread barriers effectively reduce the exposure of bridges. Therefore, this tool can be very useful for stakeholders and practitioners supporting wildfire management in terms of adaptation measures., Integral Design & Management, Safety and Security Science

Climate change is leading to a rise in the occurrence and intensity of wildfires, exacerbated by the growing encroachment of communities into the natural environment, posing challenges to our global capacity to respond to wildfires. During wildfire events, road transport infrastructure becomes crucial for the evacuation of people and accessibility to an emergency by first responders. Nevertheless, resilience management of transportation infrastructure affected by wildfires is poorly considered, despite its relevant role and high exposure to wildfires. Therefore, this study proposes a new methodology to estimate the priority level for wildfire preparation by combining exposure and criticality of road transportation infrastructure to wildfire hazards with consideration of different wildfire categories. The analysis is conducted at the system level considering interdependencies and redundancies among infrastructure components and using a geographic information system (GIS) to automate the modelling process and visualization of results. The proposed methodology is applied to a case study in the Leiria region of Portugal, demonstrating its utility in prioritizing economic resources and decision-making for areas requiring preparation. This approach can serve as a resilience-based tool for decision-making, supporting the implementation of effective adaptation strategies to enhance wildfire resilience.

Wildfires are becoming more intense and frequent. This problem has tested the knowledge, response capacity, and resilience achieved by society throughout history, making it clear that they are insufficient to face this new wildfire regime. The effectiveness of the related policies mainly focused on fire suppression rather than prevention is increasingly insufficient and questionable. Consequently, there is a clear lack of tools to assess the impact of wildfire preventive actions. Therefore, it is imperative to review wildfire management practices, policies, and the tools used to support decision-making in this regard. This study performs an analysis of wildfire policies applied in the Iberian Peninsula case (Portugal and Spain), including cross-border policies and the role of road transport networks. A novel simplified methodology is included to evaluate different normal and extreme forest fire management policies in road transport infrastructures. The methodology includes different parameters related to wildfires, such as sources of exposure, identification of natural and artificial barriers, and traffic conditions that capture the economic characteristics of the studied area. The information provided by the tool is useful for strategic investment planning, resource prioritization, and evacuation time management. In addition, due to its simplicity of application, it is a useful tool for cross-border areas.

The severe effects of extreme wildfire events in recent years have shown that the fire suppression approach is not enough to solve the problem. An alternative to dealing with this issue is to accept the impossibility of eliminating wildfire hazards and focus on preparing systems to be more resilient. However, existing decision-making tools based on resilience present important drawbacks that make them inadequate for this task. This paper proposes a new approach and methodology for the resilience assessment of road traffic networks to wildfires that overcomes the main drawbacks, paying attention to the different functions of the system and the acceptance of a specific loss of performance. The latter is done through the introduction of dynamic thresholds that reflect the different requirements of the system under different wildfire conditions, including normal and extreme fires. The methodology is exemplified for five traffic networks. The results support the relevance of appropriate wildfire management through the adaptation of the natural and built environment to increase the capacity of the traffic networks to cope with wildfires.