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Laparoscopic transcystic common bile duct exploration during laparoscopic cholecystectomy is the treatment of choice for patients with coexisting gallbladder and bile duct stones. Failure of this usually indicates laparoscopic choledocotomy, after which most patients are managed with primary duct closure and less frequently with T-tube placement or bilioenteric anastomosis. The objective of this paper is to describe the indications and complications of T-tube placement after laparoscopic choledocotomy in a consecutive series of single-stage management of 554 patients. Case series analysis of a prospectively collected historical database of all patients treated with T-tube drainage at Cosme Argerich Hospital from July 2008 and December 2020. Surgical indications and postoperative management will be discussed. Five hundred fifty-four patients underwent simultaneous scheduled laparoscopic cholecystectomy and common bile duct exploration during the analyzed period. One hundred thirteen (20.39%) required laparoscopic choledochotomy, after which 54 (48%) were treated with T-tube drainage, 23 for suspicion of incomplete bile duct clearance, 16 for impaired papillary drainage, 13 for inappropriate bile duct wall conditions, and 2 for lateral bile duct injuries. No significant morbidity was related to T-tube drainage. In our setting, and following a strict protocol, T-tube drainage after laparoscopic choledochotomy is a valid alternative to primary duct closure in selected patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Reproductive behaviour under natural conditions is hard to record, especially in rare and cryptic species, such as the Casuhatien anole (Pristidactylus casuhatiensis). This medium size lizard is endemic to the Sierras Australes Bonaerenses, a rocky outcrop in the Southern Pampas of Argentina. Methods: During spring and summer from 2018 to 2022, we surveyed five hills at above 600 m altitude, where specimens were known to occur. Every time we detected a courtship or copulation event, we took photographs of the specimens for their individual identification, and recorded the body temperature of the participating individuals as well as air temperature, wind speed and relative humidity. We recorded the duration in minutes of each phase of the event (immobilization, juxtaposition of the cloacae followed by copulation, and finally, restraint and separation) and described the main habitat features of the site where it happened. Results: We detected 12 reproductive events; all of them occurred in October and November, on Funke, Puntudo and Tres Picos hills, mostly between 1300 and 1700 h. The mean duration of each copulation phase was 6 min (95% CI = ± 1.4, n = 10), 4.3 min (95% CI = ± 1.8, n = 10) and 3.8 min (95% CI = ± 3.42, n = 10), respectively. Conclusion: The reproductive activity of the Casuhatien anole is concentrated in the spring, particularly in the early afternoon, following the patterns described for other species of lizards. During these events, the greatest exposure of individuals could make them more vulnerable. This, together with other features related to their reproductive behaviour revealed in this paper may contribute to the planning of conservation actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies an adjacent accumulation discrete grey model to improve the prediction of the grey model and enhance the utilization of new data. The impact of COVID-19 on the global economy is also discussed. Two cases are discussed to prove the stability of the adjacent accumulation discrete grey model, which helped the studied model attain higher forecasting accuracy. Using the adjacent accumulation discrete grey model, non-renewable energy consumption in G20 countries from 2022 to 2026 is predicted based on their consumption data from 2011 to 2021. It is proven that the adjacent accumulation exhibits sufficient accuracy and precision. Forecasting results obtained in this paper show that energy consumption of all the non-renewable sources other than coal has an increasing trend during the forecasting period, with the USA, Russia, and China being the biggest consumers. Natural gas is the most consumed non-renewable energy source between 2022 and 2026, whereas hydroelectricity is the least consumed. The USA is the biggest consumer of Nuclear energy among the G20 countries, whereas Argentina consumed only 0.1 Exajoules of nuclear energy, placing it at the end of nuclear energy consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spectroscopic measurements of the low solar corona are crucial to understanding the mechanisms that heat the corona and accelerate the solar wind, yet the lowest solar radii ( R ⊙ ) of the corona are difficult to observe. Our expedition collected narrow wavelengths of visible light at 530.3, 637.4, and 789.2 nm emitted by Fe xiv, x, and xi ions, respectively, from the total solar eclipse on 2019 July 2 at 20:40 UTC in Rodeo, Argentina with a bespoke 3-channel spectrometer. This paper describes the instrument and data calibration method that enables diagnostics out to ≈ 1.0 R ⊙ above the solar limb within a bright helmet streamer. We find that Fe x and xi lines are dominant through 0.3 R ⊙ , with Fe xiv maintaining a stronger signal at higher elevations. Thermal line width broadening is consistent with 1.5 MK for the cooler Fe x, 2 MK for Fe xi, and 3 MK for the hotter Fe xiv line, which can be interpreted as differing density scale heights within isolated, isothermal flux tubes. The Doppler measurements correspond to bulk plasma motion ranging from −12 to +2.5 km s−1, with Fe xiv moving at nearly an assumed solid body rotation rate throughout 1.0 R ⊙ . After considering coronal rotation, these measurements are likely associated with plasma motion along the dominant longitudinal orientation of the magnetic field at the streamer base within 0.4 R ⊙ . These results show that high-resolution spectroscopy of visible light offers valuable diagnostics of the low corona, and lend insight into the interconnected loop complexity within helmet streamers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we compare reparation policies in Australia and Argentina. We analyse the difference between the reparations given by their respective governments to the Argentinian victims of the 'Dirty War' and to the 'Stolen Generations' in Australia. The aim of this paper is to compare the experience of victims in Argentina and Australia in relation to reparations to demonstrate that using only one type of reparations, either material or symbolic, is unsatisfactory for victims and does not repair the harm done. We also argue that the timing and the context in which reparations are offered can play a role in the victims' satisfaction with the governments' reparation policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we developed an innovative and plural methodology for a socio-cultural assessment of ecosystem services (ES). This methodology was performed using diverse and interdependent tools applied within the framework of ethnoecology and post-normal science, with the aim of identifying ES from the perspective of local communities that inhabit different socio-ecosystems, highlighting the relevance of Indigenous and Local Knowledge (ILK). As examples of how this methodology works, we analyzed a multiple case study performed in three peasant communities of the Dry Chaco eco-region, Argentina. We identified ES in all the categories and their fundamental contributions to the particular way of life in this area. The method is flexible enough to be used in other socio-ecosystems with different environmental and social features. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Customer rephasing is one of the most efficient techniques for balancing loads, reducing losses, and improving electricity quality. Traditionally, phase changes were performed by an operator, interrupting the supply during the process. Instead, a more recent approach proposes using phase switching devices that dynamically and imperceptibly transfer the customer load from one phase to another. Although this solution requires an extra investment related to these devices, it preserves the balance over time. This paper presents a new method to determine the minimum number of devices that should be installed and find their optimal allocation. The method is based on genetic algorithms and only uses data from the substation and a fraction of the customers, requiring less than 50% of penetration of smart meters to fix the imbalance problem. A new control algorithm for the switching devices is also proposed. It was designed to reduce the load imbalance while maintaining the number of changes per customer to a minimum, reducing device degradation. The method was validated through simulations using data from Tucumán province, Argentina. With at least 40% of the customers measured, it is possible to allocate the switches to less than 20% of customers and correctly reduce the load imbalance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Leptospirosis, the infectious disease caused by a spirochete bacteria, is a major public health problem worldwide. In Argentina, some regions have climatic and geographical characteristics that favor the habitat of bacteria of the Leptospira genus, whose survival strongly depends on climatic factors, enhanced by climate change, which increase the problems associated with people's health. In order to have a method to predict leptospirosis cases, in this paper, five time series forecasting methods are compared: two parametric (autoregressive integrated moving average and an alternative one that allows covariates, ARIMA and ARIMAX, respectively), two nonparametric (Nadaraya-Watson Kernel estimator, one and two kernels versions, NW-1 K and NW-2 K), and one semiparametric (semi-functional partial linear regression, SFPLR) method. For this, the number of cases of leptospirosis registered from 2009 to 2020 in three important cities of northeastern Argentina is used, as well as hydroclimatic covariates related to the presence of cases. According to the obtained results, there is no method that improves considerably the rest and can be recommended as a unique tool for leptospirosis prediction. However, in general, the NW-2 K method gets a better performance. This work, in addition to using a long-term high-quality time series, enriches the area of applications of statistical models to epidemiological leptospirosis data by the incorporation of hydroclimatic variables, and it is recommended directing further efforts in this line of research, under the context of current climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This publication is a case study of the seasonal variability of mine water drainage from the Saint Louis Tunnel (SLT) at the inactive Rico-Argentine mine site located in southwestern Colorado. It is an introductory paper for the two passive water treatment system technology evaluations contained in this issue. Mine water chemistry changes from baseflow to a snowmelt runoff event (SMRE) where snowmelt runoff follows preferential migration pathways to flush acidic weathering products from the upper mine workings to the SLT. Baseflow mine drainage is characterized as circumneutral, with Zn, Cd, Mn, and Ni concentrations primarily in the dissolved form. Dissolved Zn, Mn, Fe, and potentially Cd illustrate equilibrium with carbonate minerals. Total concentrations of Fe, Cu, Pb, and As are primarily in the suspended form and suggest sorption to Fe oxides. Mine water chemistry during the SMRE reflects mixing of circumneutral baseflow waters with more acidic waters flushing the upper mine workings. Geothermal activity provides for a consistently warm mine water discharge from the SLT. The two seasons that provide the most challenge to passive water treatment of SLT mine drainage are the SMRE period and the low flow stage of the Dolores River. Mine water flow and chemistry during SMRE are highly correlated with Dolores River flow and this site conceptual model was and will be used to assist in pilot project evaluation, water treatment system design, monitoring system design, a seasonal compliance approach, and water management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Ioannidis et al. (2020) reported a standardized estimate of scientific productivity obtained from a worldwide database of 6,880,389 scientists who published at least 5 papers picked up by the Scopus database, and elaborated a ranking of ca. 120,000 scientists by both whole trajectory (career-long) impact and their current impact at year 2019. The goal of our paper is to contextualize Latin American ecologists' contribution at the world level based on the four most scientifically productive countries in the region. Methods and findings: Ioannidis et al. (2020) proposed a composite index that is the sum of six scientometric indicators: (1) The number of allocites, (2) the h index, (3) a per capita corrected version of h, (4) the allocites received as single author, (5) those received as single + first author, and (6) those as single + first + last author. We selected data for ecologists from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico and comparatively analyzed their productivity according to the proposed index. We also compared these data with those obtained from a global sample of the top ecologists worldwide. Conclusions: Based on Ioannidis et al.'s proposition to evaluate scientific productivity we extract three lessons: (1) It does not pay to publish many papers; what counts is the number of allocites (i.e., self-citations do not add up). (2) Either be single, first, or last author; it does not pay to be in the middle of an authorship line. (3) Even worse it is to be among many co-authors because the proposed index allocates credits on a per capita basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accreditation in higher education has become omnipresent and, on many occasions, has been used as a synonym for quality assurance. The establishment of accreditation agencies as a worldwide phenomenon, however, is relatively recent in the history of higher education. Through a predominantly qualitative approach, this paper aims to analyze how programs from different academic disciplines perform in terms of the accreditation of graduate programs in Argentina and how different programs respond to the same accreditation process. Additionally, it analyzes the performance of private sector programs. As expected, academic disciplines play a vital role in the accreditation process, programmatic performance, and responses to this quality assurance mechanism while sector may not play a vital role. Surprisingly, soft pure programs perform better than both hard and soft applied programs. The results highlight the importance of considering both the paradigm (hard or soft) and level application (pure or applied) when analyzing the role of academic disciplines in higher education studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Central Volcanic Zone of the Andes (CVZA) has been the focus of volcanological research for decades, becoming a very important site to understand a number of volcanic processes. Despite most of the research in the CVZA being carried out by foreign scientists, the last two decades have seen a significant increase in contributions by regional researchers. This surge has been facilitated by the creation of new volcanic observatories, improvement of the monitoring networks, creation of postgraduate programs where new local volcanologists are trained, creation of specialized research nuclei or groups, and increasing investment in research. This article presents a review of the evolution of the contributions of the regional volcanological community to the knowledge of the CVZA in the last 20 years (2000–2019), both from research and monitoring institutions in Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile. Based on updates made by the regional groups, a new list of active/potentially active volcanoes of the CVZA is presented, as is a complete database for article published on the CVZA. We find that a significant motivator has been regional volcanic unrest that has triggered new investment. Perú is the country with the highest investment in monitoring and research and is the best instrumented, Argentina is the country with the highest number of local participation in published papers in the domain of volcanology and magmatic systems, and Chilean volcanoes are the focus of the highest number of articles published. The current situation and general projections for the next decade (2020–2030) are also presented for each country, where we believe that the over the next 10 years, will be increased the monitoring and research capabilities, improved the scientific knowledge with more participation of regional institutions, and strengthen the collaboration and integrated work between CVZA countries, especially in border volcanoes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on ethnographic data collected in three informal communities, one in Argentina, one in México, and one in Ecuador, we address the long-standing question posed by Larissa Lomnitz's and Carol Stack's now-classic studies of how impoverished people not only survive but what strategies they adopt in an attempt to build a dignified life. By focusing on the diversity of strategies by which the urban poor solve the everyday problems of individual and collective reproduction, we move beyond the macro-level analysis of structural constraint and material deprivation. Our findings show a remarkable continuity in the difficulties residents of these informal communities confronted and the problem-solving strategies they resorted to. We found that networks of kin and friends continue to play a crucial role in how poor people not only survive but attempt to get ahead. Additionally, we highlight the role of patronage networks and collective action as central to strategies by which the urban poor cope with scarcity and improve their life chances, while also paying close attention to ways in which they deal with pressing issues of insecurity and violence. The paper shows that poor people's survival strategies are deeply imbricated in routine political processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the tensions between ideals about sociology (and what it ought to be) transmitted during university socialization and the everyday working activities among Argentinean sociologists. It focuses on an extreme case: that of the graduates who, lacking the opportunity or the desire to join the professoriate, became market researchers. The case is extreme because while university training provided these individuals with a set of methodological and analytical skills that proved to be useful (and profitable) when studying consumers and markets, it also encouraged a critical, world-rejecting, view of the discipline which was at odds with their professional activities. Not surprisingly, they encountered a distressing moral puzzle: were they betraying sociology's progressive values, values to which they were seriously committed? Building on E. Hughes' concept of "dirty work", this paper examines how these individuals navigated an occupation that was, at least initially, seen as morally objectionable, and the ways by which they came to imbue it with new and edifying "sociological" value. This article is based on interviews with sociologists working in market research and a socio-historical account of the School of Sociology at the University of Buenos Aires, the nation's most important program, where all our interviewees were trained. This study has implications for understanding situations in which actual professional practices are in sharp contrast with the ideals presented during university socialization, and the identity repair processes that university-trained workers undertake when dealing with deviant careers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses how the Cold War influenced the discourses on basic research and on Science and Technology Policies (STPs) of some leaders of the Argentine research community. It explores two key intersections to study the Cold War: the first between politics and policies; the second between the global and the regional/national. The basic assumption is that, just as there was no one Cold War, specific regional and national traits lent specific meanings to basic research. In dialogue with the literature on Latin American history of STPs, on Cold War and on the conceptual history of science, the paper identifies three discursive configurations around S&T: the first refers to the semi-peripheral scientific context; the second is associated with the 'democracy-totalitarianism' dichotomy, and the third is linked to the 'development-dependence' dichotomy. Finally, the paper also traces some connections between these discourses and the institutional models proposed by different key actors of the research community to implement STPs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the dynamics and stability of a flapping flag, with emphasis on the onset of flutter instability. The mathematical model is based on the one derived in a paper by Argentina and Mahadevan (Proc Nat Acad Sci 102:1829–1834, 2005). In that paper, it is reported that the effect of vortex shedding from the trailing edge of the flag, represented by the complex Theodorsen function C, has a stabilizing effect, in the sense that the critical flow speed (where flutter is initiated) is increased significantly when vortex shedding is included. The numerical eigenvalue analyses of the present paper display the opposite effect: the critical flow speed is decreased when the Theodorsen function (i.e., vortex shedding) is included. These predictions are verified by an analytical energy balance analysis, where it is proved that a small imaginary part of the Theodorsen function, C = 1 - i ϵ , 0 < ϵ ≪ 1 , has a destabilizing effect, i.e., the critical flow speed is smaller than by the so-called quasi-steady approximation C = 1 - i 0 . Furthermore, order-of-magnitude considerations show that Coriolis and centrifugal force terms in the equation of motion, previously discarded on the assumption that they are associated with very slow changes across the flag, have to be retained. Numerical results show that these terms have a significant effect on the stability of the flag; specifically, the said destabilizing effect of the vortex shedding is significantly reduced when these terms are retained. The mentioned energy balance analysis illuminates the nature of the flutter oscillations and the 'competition', at the flutter threshold, between the different types of fluid forces acting on the flag. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that political brokers pay particular attention to household size, and the age distribution of its members, when allocating scarce indivisible social benefits. Because people usually share their income with other household members, allocating a social benefit to an individual member of a household with n voters is likely to bring more political support than allocating the same benefit to an individual member of a household with n-1 voters. Based on the main Argentine household survey and on personal interviews with 120 brokers, this paper shows that brokers effectively collect information on family size and age composition and allocate scarce temporary public works programs to families with more voters, unintentionally discriminating against families with children not old enough to vote. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces Emilia, a speech corpus created to build a female voice in Spanish spoken in Buenos Aires for the Aromo text-to-speech system. Aromo is a unit selection text-to-speech system, which employs diphones as units of synthesis. The key requirements and design criteria for Emilia were: to synthesize any text in Spanish into high-quality speech with a minimum corpus size. The text corpus was designed to guarantee the phonetic and prosodic coverage. A three-stage strategy was used: in the first stage, 741 sentences were designed with all of the syllables of Spanish spoken in Argentina, with and without stress, and in all positions within the word; in the second stage, 852 sentences were added to balance out the distribution of the diphones; and after a perceptual evaluation of the quality of synthesized speech, in the third and final stage, 625 sentences were added to achieve the specified unit coverage, and to introduce sentences with more complex syntactic and prosodic structures. Issues from all three corpus building stages are reported. The paper also presents the results from the quality perceptual evaluations of the synthesized voice. Emilia has a duration of three hours and 15 minutes; its speech quality synthesized with Aromo system is similar to the level obtained with commercial systems, with a real-time ratio less than one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we use five complementary conceptual perspectives to describe, contextualize and explain the work and accomplishments of Rabbi Marshall Meyer (1930–1993), a dynamic American expatriate and educator, public intellectual and human rights activist in Argentina, from the 1960s to the 1980s. They are as follows: internationalism and transnationalism as a trademark of Judaism; the religious mutation of Latin America; exiles and expatriates as innovators of knowledge and agents of transculturation; the supply side of religion and the religious entrepreneur; and personal characteristics and attributes of leadership. Specifically, we analyze some mechanisms that help to explain his impact in Jewish life first in Latin America, and then in the USA, like mediation, transculturalization; the place of hybridization in the development of a Jewish liberation theology; the creation of new human resources through the establishment of the Seminario Rabínico Latinoamericano as a new center for the circulation of new ideas and leaders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the current rise in acceptability and legitimacy of and participation in Chabad-Lubavitch by non-Orthodox Argentine Jews, both in Argentina and abroad. The study draws on ethnographic and qualitative interview data among three groups of Argentine Jews: those who live in the USA, those who have lived abroad but repatriated to Argentina, and frequent travelers between Argentina and other countries. The study places the migrants (permanent, transitory, or return) at the heart of the analysis and examines ways in which information about Chabad is shared among transnational networks. The result is greater attendance at Chabad enters and a rise in acceptability of the Chabad-Lubavitch, leading to an enlarged network of participants within the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, both at the center and at the margin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on fieldwork carried out between 2012 and 2015 with groups of people who protested against the government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and who self-identified as belonging to the middle class, this article analyzes some of the ways in which the mobilization of money enabled the differentiation between social groups. The paper seeks to dialogue with and contribute to studies of money by focusing on how money is socially constructed in ways that account for the moral character and multiple forms as well as meanings of monies. Rather than stressing the coexistence of different monies, the article examines how money is a contested and contingent category. In order to do so, I focus on the protests that arose after the establishment of restrictions on the purchase of dollars (known as "cepo", or the currency clamp). I focus on how middle sectors use money as a way of generating reserves (economic but also socio-political) and capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, our aim is to explore the dynamics of COVID-19 or 2019-nCOV in Argentina considering the parameter values based on the real data of this virus from March 03, 2020 to March 29, 2021 which is a data range of more than one complete year. We propose a Atangana–Baleanu type fractional-order model and simulate it by using predictor–corrector (P-C) method. First we introduce the biological nature of this virus in theoretical way and then formulate a mathematical model to define its dynamics. We use a well-known effective optimization scheme based on the renowned trust-region-reflective (TRR) method to perform the model calibration. We have plotted the real cases of COVID-19 and compared our integer-order model with the simulated data along with the calculation of basic reproductive number. Concerning fractional-order simulations, first we prove the existence and uniqueness of solution and then write the solution along with the stability of the given P-C method. A number of graphs at various fractional-order values are simulated to predict the future dynamics of the virus in Argentina which is the main contribution of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Argentine submarine ARA (Armada de la República Argentina) San Juan went missing on November 15th, 2017, with its last confirmed contact location around 600 kilometres East of Comodoro Rivadavia, Chubut, Argentina. In the days following the initiation of the multi-national search and rescue mission, the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) analysed data recorded by its International Monitoring System (IMS) sensor network for any signals that could support this effort. Two of the IMS hydrophone stations, HA10 in the central Atlantic Ocean and HA04 in the southern Indian Ocean, were found to have recorded an unusual hydroacoustic signal of unknown nature (a "hydroacoustic anomaly"), which originated from the vicinity of the last known location of the ARA San Juan. On December 1st, 2017, confirmation of the detection and localization capability of the IMS network was made possible by a calibration test involving a depth charge deployed by the Argentine Navy. Also this signal was detected by the two IMS hydrophone stations and its origin located to within 39 km of the announced deployment location. After extended search operations, on November 17th, 2018, the ARA San Juan was found on the seabed at approximately 900 metres depth less than 20 km from the location of the hydroacoustic anomaly provided by CTBTO. This paper presents the methodologies applied by CTBTO within months after the loss of the submarine, aimed at detecting, locating and characterizing the November 15th signal of unknown origin and the December 1st calibration explosion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much work on conditional cash transfer programs (CCTs) focuses on the problem of conditionality. This paper, however, looks at the significance of the cash part of the equation for Argentina's Asignación Universal por Hijo para Protección Social in the coastal city of Mar del Plata, Buenos Aires Province. Unsurprisingly, beneficiaries of cash transfers welcome these payments which have made a real difference in their life circumstances. Yet putting cash, in this case via electronic bank transfer, into the hands of Argentina's poor mothers has a range of effects over and above the obvious material benefits. Building on the insights offered by scholars of money, in particular thinking about the qualities of fungibility and anonymity, the article shows how CCTs empower while constraining; they constitute women as economic citizens while requiring their incorporation into the bank system, under the gaze of state regulation; they fail, in this instance at least, to liberate mothers from the stigma of welfare. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Argentina and Brazil report the highest incidence of the fear of crime across Latin America. Although the spread of crime and victimization may explain these trends initially, the focus in this paper is on the significance of non-criminal factors in explaining the fear of crime, such as socio-economic vulnerability, educational level and trust in people and institutions, as well as exposure to violence at one's place of residence. Using a subset of data from the 2017 edition of the Latinobarómetro survey (n = 2400), a regression analysis was conducted showing that the fear of crime is radically different between the two countries. In Argentina, as in certain European countries, people's fears of crime are positively associated with socio-economic vulnerability and in turn negatively associated with state-driven violence. The latter has a protective effect on Argentinians' feelings of insecurity, while in Brazil the fear of crime is to a greater extent a consequence of previous victimization and a general distrust in other people. Despite this key difference, our results shed light on the problem of social cohesion in both countries, suggesting that the fear of crime is a social rather than criminal issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Puerto Madryn city (Chubut province, Argentina) has strongly increased its population since 1970, but a lack of coastal management strategies has favored physical changes in the natural landscape. This situation has led to a deficit in sediment supply sources, which increases beach erosion susceptibility. This paper aims to evaluate beach erosion susceptibility through the use of geo-indicators. It also provides a susceptibility map based on geomorphological evidence and the weighting of physical geo-indicators. The final objective is to propose soft solutions that consider a comprehensive coastal management. The main anthropogenic disturbances identified were beach cleaning with bulldozer, coastal armoring, removal of dune fields (about 90% between 1942 and 2019), foredune segmentation, installation of resorts on backshore, and artificial rainfall drains towards the beach. The natural and most sensitive geo-indicators affected by human pressure—and thus the most useful for determining susceptibility—were foredune conservation and width, and backshore width. We estimate a high to moderate susceptibility to beach erosion along the coast of Puerto Madryn. As regards management policies, we propose mainly restoration, prevention, and adaptation strategies, such as the use of sand fences and new techniques for beach cleaning, all of which are aimed at promoting sedimentary balance within the dune-beach system. Besides these procedures, we recommend the consideration of preventive actions, such as a future-oriented urban planning and a program to raise popular awareness of coastal problems. The diagnostic approach based on a geo-indicator survey has provided a useful tool to help decision-making in coastal conservation initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existing macro-historical scholarship tends to assert rather than demonstrate the wider impact of nationalism. Yet, state-sponsored national ideologies permeate the broader reaches of society to varying degrees. To investigate variations in the consolidation of official nationalism, this paper combines the content analysis of school textbooks as state-regulated and picture postcards as primarily market-driven sources. Building on this novel methodological approach, we find that textbooks published in mid-twentieth-century Argentina, Mexico, and Peru promoted a similar popular nationalism that portrayed the lower classes as "true" national subjects. However, picture postcards from the same period demonstrate that the consolidation of this official national ideology varied. In Mexico and Peru, the new state-sponsored conceptions of nationhood gained presence in public life, but they did not to take hold in Argentina. We conclude that studying the top-down nationalist messages promoted by states should not be equated with studying their ideological impact in public life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the environmental dispute between Uruguay and Argentina, which can be resolved by a group of scientists. It says that the controversy, which involves a Uruguayan paper-mill complex on a shared Uruguay River, has sparked protests from many Argentinians prompting Argentina to take its neighbouring country to the International Court of Justice. It adds that a joint river monitoring was agreed by the two countries forming their common border for algal blooms and pollution.

Giardia is a parasite distributed worldwide and one of the most prevalent intestinal protozoa in Argentina. We analysed all the national information regarding the prevalence of Giardia infections in humans, animals and environmental surveys over the last 40 years. In this work, we used Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis guidelines and the period between 1980 and 2019 was defined as time lapse for inclusion of the studies. The analysis was conducted using the LILACS, PubMed, Scopus and Argentina SciELO databases employing as keywords 'Giardia' AND 'Argentina'. We also carried out a manual review of papers. Of 304 articles, 92 fitted the eligibility criteria. Giardia was reported in 15 of the 23 Argentine provinces; human prevalence was between 3.4 and 64.8%. Indigenous children and residents in peri-urban areas had the higher infection rates. In animals, Giardia was identified mainly in dogs with a prevalence of 8.9 ± 7.0%, and studies of wild animals and cattle were notably scarce. Environmental studies showed that Giardia was detected in the soil and water which may act as reservoirs for this parasite revealing the need to modify the national water treatment legislation. The identification of Giardia genetic assemblages in the studies analysed was limited and showed that genotypes AII and B were found in humans while assemblage B was mainly detected in animals. This report provides useful information on epidemiological aspects of giardiasis in Argentina that may help to define future research priorities and provides useful tools for professionals regarding actual information on the prevalence of this infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) is one of the most harmful conditions associated with consumption. Despite a high level of consumption and an elevated number of people living with an AUD, evidence from help-seeking processes in Latin America is scarce and absent in Argentina. This paper aims to describe reasons for delaying and starting help-seeking, the process of problem awareness, and the years elapsed between drinking initiation, problem awareness, and help-seeking, as perceived by a clinical, non-random sample of people with AUD (n = 51). The most frequent reason for delaying help-seeking was not believing there was a problem. The most frequent motivators for seeking help were having physical or psychological problems due to use and repeated attempts to reduce or stop use. The outcomes of this study can be useful for designing interventions to reduce help-seeking barriers and facilitate access to treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

2070 unique, homogeneous photometric and polarization observations of the microquasar in a binary system with a black hole V404 Cyg/GS2023+338 obtained in 2015 with the MASTER global network of robotic telescopes (16 robotic telescopes located at eight points on the Earth in Russia, Spain, South Africa, and Argentina) are presented. MASTER was the first telescope network to obtain optical observations of the microquasar after its gamma-ray outburst in 2015. Observations were carried out from 18:34:09 UT on June 15, 2015 until December 2015 in four polarizations and in the four standard BV RI filters. The paper presents the results of these observations and a comparative analysis of optical and X-ray data. The observations confirm the previously discovered super-long delays of the optical radiation relative to the X-ray outbursts. Possible mechanisms causing the delay in the optical variations relative to the X-ray variations are discussed. Variability of the optical polarization discovered earlier is confirmed another similar episode reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The geographical recognition of wines has been extensively attempted based on chemical parameters. However, few studies have used wine sensory properties to characterize wines according to their geographical origin. This paper presents a machine learning study to classify and to find the most important sensory descriptors of Cabernet Sauvignon, Syrah, Tannat, and Merlot wines from Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay. Four feature selection methods (F score, relief, χ 2 , and random forest importance) were used to generate the order of importance of the sensory descriptors. The feature subsets were generated based on the feature selection ranking order to use as input features for the support vector machines classifier. Very good results with 85–100% accuracy were achieved, and the results showed that few sensory descriptors discriminate the origin of wines better than when using all the descriptors and that there is a specific subset of most important features to each wine variety. As far as we know, this is the first study to analyze South American wines based solely on sensory descriptors and support vector machines along with feature selection methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an analysis of archaeological materials found at the mining sites Minas Paramillos Sur and Mina La Atala, located in the Paramillos de Uspallata and Divisadero Largo's reserve. The goals of this research are to document consumption patterns of the mining proletariat and to make comparative intra- and inter-site comparisons of artifact trends. Within the framework of historical archaeology, we analyze these artifacts in the successive stages of occupation and within sociocultural contexts marked by peripheral industrial capitalism. In order to do this, we take into account three central elements: the environment, sociocultural practices (diets, techniques, and production technologies, personal care, spatial distribution, etc.), and the political-economic context. The results show that the mining populations of northwestern Mendoza in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries worked in precarious conditions and were socially marginalized by a hegemonic discourse of greater economic development in the province. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between “marginal” and “mainstream” science has, in recent decades, become a matter of discussion. Traditional perspectives must be reexamined in the wake of transformations in the international circulation of knowledge and the subsequent diversification of scientific “peripherality”. Argentina represents an interesting case with which to explore the structure of “peripheral centres” and new forms of scientific development. While it has recently experienced an expansion in terms of institutionalization, professionalization, and internationalization, that process has been coupled with entrenchment of existing institutional asymmetries and persistent intra-national inequalities; academic prestige is distributed according to opposite principles of legitimation (local/international). Our main task is to explore the current state of research capacities pursuant to that expansion in order to analyze the diverse styles in which knowledge is produced. In our analysis, we make critical use of Bourdieu’s concept of field and the Latin American category of “structural heterogeneity,” while also focusing on the question of circulation. The paper outlines how professionalization has developed locally over time, and the historical tension between the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research and the public universities. It describes the current structure of the scientific field in terms of researchers, institutes, publishing circuits, and institutional evaluative cultures. It focuses on geographical asymmetries in order to assess the distribution of new human and material resources throughout the country. Finally, it addresses the current situation under the new government, and raises concern over recent regressive actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we identify 37 companies that produce nano-enabled products in Argentina. We locate the products of these firms in terms of both their economic sector and position in a value chain. The research was done through a four-step methodology. Firstly, an inventory of firms was created. Secondly, the firms were classified by their economic sector, following the United Nations economic classification. Thirdly, the firms were located within a simple nanotechnology value chain. Finally, the products were classified according to their final destination, being either means of production or final consumer products. The results show that healthcare, cosmetics, and medicine is the most represented sector along the value chain, followed by electronics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following paper explores the experience of narrative Foresight applied to the use of the scenario method in Argentina in the light of the contributions of critical Future Studies concerning the narrative dimension in the last years. This research is specifically focused on analyzing applications of the scenario method in an institute of technology development in Argentina ('Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria') using the causal layered analysis as a method of examination and adopting the narrative Foresight approach. We analyze how the narrative approach permeates the scenario method in the process of development, thus increasing the potential usefulness and impact of the method. Moreover, we also reflect on the utility of this approach in order to increase the strategic vision of complex organizations which are shaped, to a great extent, by linear schemes of thought where the empiric dimension of reality operates with a value of truth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I study strategic voting behavior in the Argentine Senate election for the City of Buenos Aires in 2013. I estimate and analyze the voter transition matrix between the primary and general elections using a Bayesian hierarchical model for ecological inference, utilizing a rich data set of ballot box data. The results show that strategic behavior is not widespread among the electorate in Buenos Aires. In particular, at least 75 % of voters who had the opportunity to avoid vote wasting by behaving strategically did not. I also find high levels of vote wasting when analyzing other provinces during the same election cycle. These results suggest that these electorates might be composed of a mixture of voters with strategic and expressive motivations, where the expressive factions dominate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study area is La Colacha sub-basins from Arroyos Menores basins, natural areas at West and South of Río Cuarto in Province of Córdoba of Argentina, fertile with loess soils and monsoon temperate climate, but with soil erosions including regressive gullies that degrade them progressively. Cultivated gently since some hundred 60 years coordinated action planning has become necessary to conserve lands while keeping good agro-production. Some of the authors were engineers trained here and other had former experience in Salta, Argentina, using a set of Decision Theory Methods, (DTM), to consider the possible systems of soil uses and actions to be recommended. After having improved data on soils and on hydrology for the study area, they have adapted as academic study these DTM for Arroyos Menores areas where gully erosions are severe, also intending to offer better view for the necessary planning to have policies of actions and uses, done by the local society decision and services, and in part by land owners. This paper concentrates on the application of a set of discrete multi-criteria models (MCDM), where alternatives were global, considering soil conservation and hydrologic management actions, and main types of use of soil, and where criteria were about the diverse consequences, grouped as environmental, economic, and social. As methods they have used for the sub areas PROMETHEE with sets of weights, comparing results with ELECTRE with same data and weights, and with AHP method needing comparisons of criteria by authors, getting somehow compatible results, but finding that the 'weighted PROMETHEE II' was the more adapted for the present study. The system and results are very global, and are offered as indications for planning, that will require using detailed engineering and administration aspects for series of local singular actions or for management pursued in time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers an ethnographically grounded analysis of the transformative possibilities of the Argentinean empresas recuperadas (ERs), which speaks to current debates on the 'social economy'. The ERs emerged in a context shaped by the crisis of neoliberalism and of the Argentinean political system and a huge upsurge in popular self-organisation. In response to widespread factory closures, thousands of workers occupied abandoned companies, forming cooperatives and often introducing assembly-based decision-making. By 2002, they established a national organisation, which connected workers' struggles to a wider movement for institutional change. However, by 2006, the organisation had fragmented and many ERs had reinstalled traditional control methods. Much of the literature divides between idealistic and deterministic interpretations, which conceive as a technical material process. The paper proposes an alternative, a concept of labour as a process of creating value-subjective needs and values, and surplus value-which links organisations to society. Conceiving the 'politics of value creation' highlights continuities within the financial management and institutional relations of many ERs, but most importantly, it also recognises the different ways in which emerging social identities articulated a new need for control. Through two case studies, the paper explores the social processes through which these actors shaped their cooperatives in very different ways-highlighting innovations in accounting techniques and state-society relations. This reveals why a focus on accounting can enable anthropologists to recognise the general limitations of cooperatives and also their specific cultural diversity. In conclusion, the paper reconciles current discussions on the concept of the social economy by theorising it as the internal socialisation of capitalism and as an institutional expression of new cultural needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper illustrates an application of soft system dynamics methodology (SSDM). SSDM arose as a fusion of two well-known methodologies in the systems movement: system dynamics (SD) and soft systems methodology (SSM). SSDM includes 10 steps to orchestrate and implant change in social systems, based on a multimethodological and multiparadigmatic approach as an outcome of the combination of the mentioned methodologies. After a brief introduction, the paper starts by briefly explaining SSM and SD, their stages and their problematical issues as systemic methodologies, then goes on to explain SSDM, its philosophical roots and stages, ending with a comparison among the three. It then introduces the citizen insecurity problem in Argentina, specifically in Mendoza Province, where SSDM was applied to analyze this issue. The paper concludes with an explanation of the learning points that arose from the use of SSDM in this study and suggestions for further research on citizen security and SSDM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I propose a few epistemological and methodological reflexions to account for intercultural daily communication. These reflexions emerged during a sociological research in Mendoza, Argentina, with Huarpes Indigenous students at the University of Cuyo. I observed that Indigenous people became quasi 'ethnographers' of diverse environments. To make intelligible their classmates' behavior, and to account for their own behavior, Huarpes follow, in diverse environments and interactions, public rules of meaning. The objective of this paper is twofold: (a) to stress the methodological scope of ordinary communication and ordinary reasoning in order to study understanding between people from different groups and categories, and (b) to contest a kind of 'pessimist' standpoint in social sciences and philosophy according to which the use of ordinary language reduces possibilities for understanding. Interviews, participant observation in natural situations, and a review of literature about language and understanding are the basis of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The following is a sociological report on a particular segment of an opera audience. Its purpose is to explicate the processes of initiation in an activity typically considered “high culture.” It differs from other accounts of cultural consumption in that it is concerned not with the correspondence between social background and taste, but with the processes whereby taste is assembled. Drawing upon an 18-month-long ethnography on opera fans in Buenos Aires, this paper has two aims. First, it shows that passionate opera fans enjoy opera based on their belief that opera is something that needs to be learned in order to be properly enjoyed. Second, it describes three diverse instances in which people learn about opera. Furthermore, this paper also has a theoretical objective: to extend and refine the classic model of affiliation and initiation into cultural practices established by Howard Becker with his case study of marijuana use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the common trauma of systematic human rights violations under military rule, Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay have responded in markedly different ways to their troubling pasts. This paper explains differences in human rights policies over time and across countries by looking at varying domestic conditions, including the ideological orientation of the governing party and the structure of party competition, as well as constraints and opportunities presented by external events. Government support for human rights derives in part from ideological proclivity but even more from the ability to build popular support for such a policy. Conservative and center-right politicians lack credibility among voters on human rights and therefore have little political incentive to adopt an activist stance on this issue. Leftist politicians are ideologically predisposed toward championing human rights but may be hamstrung by concerns about alienating centrist voters. Leftist politicians will only come out strongly in favor of human rights when they enjoy a clear political majority; leftist leaders who rely upon centrist allies will adopt a low-profile approach to human rights. Conversely, centrist political leaders who rely upon leftist allies have a strong political incentive to emphasize human rights. Once political momentum begins to shift to the right, however, centrist politicians will downplay human rights. Finally, external events may significantly alter national discourse on human rights, allowing cautious governments to gain political cover for more progressive human rights policy. By drawing attention to the important role of ideology and the structure of party competition, this paper offers a more complete explanation of the sources of human rights policy. It also provides a novel perspective on the ways in which external and international influences are filtered through national political systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children's perception of their parents' behavior is very important for their adjustment. Raising a child with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) can be particularly challenging. However, little is known about how children with ADHD perceive their parents' childrearing style. The main purpose of this paper is to study how children with ADHD perceive acceptance and control in parent-child relationships and this perception's relationship with inattention, hyperactivity/impulsivity, and externalizing behaviors. Participants were children between 7 and 13 years old with ADHD who were attending psychotherapy (ADHD), children without ADHD who were attending psychotherapy (APG), and children with unknown ADHD status who were not attending psychotherapy (NPG). Furthermore, one parent of each child participated in the study. An analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed that children with ADHD perceived higher levels of pathological control in their relationships with their mothers than did APG and NPG children. NPG children perceived higher extreme autonomy than ADHD and APG children. Linear regression analyses revealed that the perception of pathological parental control and extreme autonomy predicted externalizing symptoms in children with ADHD. The perception of maternal acceptance and pathological control predicted inattention in APG children. Also, perceived maternal pathological control and perceived paternal acceptance predicted externalizing symptoms in APG children. Thus, these results show the importance of taking into account children's perception of their relationships with their parents in addition to parental reports of their own behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to discuss conceptual and methodological issues related with the archaeological study of lithic landscapes and exemplify the approach with a case study (artifact distribution data from east-central Argentina). A lithic landscape-understood as the co-occurrence, in a given geographic space, of different structural units each one composed by a raw material source and the complete set of unmodified and human-modified pieces of rock extracted from that source and then transported, used, and discarded across the landscape ( i.e., a scatter area)-can be modeled using kriging, a geostatistical interpolation tool useful for integrating scattered information into coherent spatial models. The case study allows for the examination and discussion of, on one hand, the relationships between the type and location of the sources and the size and shape of the respective scatter areas and, on the other, the reciprocal relationships between different raw materials and sources. It is concluded that a proper description of the spatial structure of a lithic landscape is the needed baseline from which to evaluate different explanatory models. Such models should take into account different sets of initial conditions and generative mechanisms, in order to cope with the pervasive problem of equifinality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper shows that contract archaeology activities geared to large mining projects in Argentina articulates with a global discourse on heritage that seeks to patrimonialize places of Indigenous memory. However, these hegemonic moves for the creation of a sense of the 'real'-which positions mining as an unavoidable and even desired 'reality' and mining corporations as sensitive and responsible actors-are confronted by counter-hegemonic forces, among which current narratives of aboriginality are prominent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Scaling biodiversity patterns has been recognized lately as a very important issue in the search of global processes; however coexistence and assemblage patterns are typically approached at a single spatial scale. Here, we examined coexistence and co-occurrence patterns of desert small mammal communities across different spatial scales in the search of general community patterns. We sampled small mammals in Monte desert (Argentina, South America) for small spatial scales and reviewed published papers from other worldwide deserts for large spatial scale analyses. We used classic community estimators (Shannon, Richness), rank abundance curves and fitting distributions to analyze species coexistence and co-occurrence patterns. Assemblage patterns were analyzed evaluating nestedness across spatial scales and among deserts. Worldwide desert small mammal assemblages are characterized mainly by low species richness and high variation in species composition. The central Monte desert of Argentina showed a consistent assemblage pattern across spatial scales, with a generalist species being the most abundant and widely distributed, accompanied by other subordinate and more narrowly distributed species. All Monte desert communities were significantly nested, with nestedness increasing with scale from patch to regional. Assemblage and coexistence patterns were similar when comparing worldwide deserts despite differences in total richness and faunal singularity. The degree of nestedness varied among worldwide deserts; however all of them showed a consistent nested pattern. Differences in the degree of nestedness could be a result of different regulating factors depending on the desert and scale. These results highlight the importance of including multiscale approaches when dealing with processes that structure desert communities. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Zooarchaeological works in the city lack of a specific theoretical and methodological framework to understand its faunal assemblages. The different analyses were done in most cases following procedures that had been developed for hunter-gatherer contexts. In this paper, we evaluate some questions related to this issue, encompassed in the acquisition mode and the characteristics of the archaeological record. Finally, an example from two sites in La Boca, Buenos Aires city, Argentina is given in order to understand some of these questions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyzes concept formation and its empirical and theoretical implications for the study of subnational undemocratic regimes. The paper argues that extant conceptualizations of subnational political regimes, which generally draw on a strategy of 'conceptual expansion' have important drawbacks for the study of subnational undemocratic regimes (SURs). To overcome these shortcomings, the article claims for a strategy of 'conceptual separation' that disaggregates political regimes into two orthogonal dimensions, i.e., the access to and the exercise of state power. Drawing on original evidence from Argentina and Mexico, the article demonstrates that the strategy of conceptual separation helps researchers to (1) avoid truncation of the universe of cases for analysis, (2) obtain new and more precise information about the actual magnitude of the uneven territorialization of democracy, (3) recognize the existence of two ideal type domains of SURs: patrimonial and bureaucratic, and (4) gain more analytic leverage to identify the causal mechanisms that explain regime continuity within and across SUR types. In-depth case studies of the state of Puebla (Mexico) and the province of San Luis (Argentina) demonstrate empirically the workings of the mechanisms that account for regime continuity in bureaucratic-like SURs. The article also demonstrates the potential of distinguishing between SUR types for the study of SUR origins and SUR change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Eoplacognathus pseudoplanus Zone is defined by a conodont fauna composed by E. pseudoplanus (Viira) and Dzikodus tablepointensis (Stouge) among others in the Central Precordillera, Sierra de La Trampra region. We revised the biostratigraphical distribution and control biofacies of the conodonts D. tablepointensis and E. pseudoplanus in the Middle Ordovician of the Precordillera. This study confirms that these species has a similar biostratigraphical distribution to those of equivalent age in south-central China, Baltica and Midcontinent region. We also corroborate that the presence of D. tablepointensis is accurately positioned in the E. pseudoplanus Zone. In this paper we discuss for the first time the morphological affinities of D. tablepointensis and E. pseudoplanus elements from the Precordillera with those same species from southcentral China and Baltica. On the other hand, we review the genus 'Polonodus' galerus Albanesi and propose it as Kallidontus? galerus (Albanesi), extending the biostratigraphical record of the genus Kallidontus from the late Tremadocian to middle Darriwilian. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]