Abstract
The research proposes a novel technological solution for marker-based human motion capture called WirelessSyncroVision (WSV). The WSV is formed by two main modules: the visual node (WSV-V) which is based on a stereoscopic vision system and the marker node (WSV-M) that is constituted by a 6-DOF active marker. The solution synchronizes the acquisition of images in remote muti-cameras with the ON period of the active marker. This increases the robustness of the stereoscopic system to illumination changes, which is extremely relevant for programming industrial robotic-arms using a human demonstrator programming by demonstration (PbD). In addition, the research presents a robust method named Adaptive and Robust Synchronization (ARS), that is designed for temporal alignment of remote devices using a wireless network. The algorithm models the phase difference as a function of time, measuring the parameters that must be known to predict the synchronization instant between the active marker and the remote cameras. Results demonstrate that the ARS creates a balance between the real-time capability and the performance estimation of the phase difference. Therefore, this research proposes an elegant solution to synchronize image acquisition systems in real-time that is easy to implement with low operational costs; however, the major advantage of the WSV is related to its high level of flexibility since it can be extended toward to other devices besides the PbD, for instance, motion capture, motion analysis, and remote sensoring systems.

Abstract
Nowadays, the technological and scientific research related to underwater perception is focused in developing more cost-effective tools to support activities related with the inspection, search and rescue of wreckages and site exploration: devices with higher autonomy, endurance and capabilities. Currently, specific tasks are already carried out by remotely-operated vehicles (ROV) and autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV) that can be equipped with multiple sensors, including optical cameras which are extremely valuable for perceiving marine environments; however, the current perceptual capability of these vehicles is still limited. In this context, the paper presents a novel mosaicking method that composes the sea-floor from a set of visual observations. This method is called RObust and Large-scale MOSaicking (ROLAMOS) and it enables an efficient frame-to-frame motion estimation with outliers removal and consistence checking, a robust registration of monocular images and, finally, a mosaic management methodology that makes it possible to map large visual areas with a high resolution. The experiments conducted with realistic images have proven that the ROLAMOS is suitable for mapping large-scale sea-floor scenarios because the visual information is registered by managing the computational resources that are available onboard, which makes it appropriate for applications that do not have specialized computers. Further, this is a major advantage for automatic mosaic creation based on robotic applications, that require the location of objects or even structures with high detail and precision.

Abstract
The electricity sector has been subjected to major changes in the last few years. Previously, there existed a regulated system where electric companies could know beforehand the amount of energy each generator would produce, hence basing their largely operational strategy on cost minimization in order to increase their profits. In Spain, from 1988 till 1997, electricity prices were established by the 'Marco Legal Estable' Stable Legal Framework, where the Ministry of Industry and Energy acknowledged the existence of certain generation costs related to each type of technology. It was an industrial sector with no actual competition and therefore, with very few controllable risks. In the aftermath of the electricity market liberalization competition and uncertainty arose. Electricity spot prices became highly volatile due to the specific characteristics of electricity as a commodity. Long-term contracts allowed for hedge funds to act against price fluctuation in the electricity market. As a consequence, developing an accurate electricity price forecasting model is an extremely difficult task for electricity market agents. This work aims to propose a methodology to improve the limitations of those methodologies just using historical data to forecast electricity prices. In this manner, and in order to gain access to more recent data, instead of using natural gas prices and electricity load historical data, a regression model to forecast the evolution of natural gas prices, and a model based on artificial neural networks (ANN) to forecast electricity loads, are proposed. The results of these models are used as input for an electricity price forecast model. Finally, and to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methodology, several study cases applied to the Spanish market, using real price data, are presented.

Abstract
Wind power is the source of electrical energy that has grown more over the last years, with annual rate in installed capacity around 20%. Therefore, it is important to optimize the production efficiency of wind farms. In a wind farm, the electrical energy is collected at a central substation from different wind turbines placed nearby. This paper addresses the optimal design of the cable network interconnecting the turbines to the substation aiming to minimize not only the infrastructure cost but also the cost of the energy losses in the cables. Although this problem is non-linear, different integer linear programming models are proposed considering the wind farm technical constraints. The models are applied to three real cases Portuguese wind farms. The computational results show that the proposed models are able to compute the optimal solutions for all cases.

Abstract
Sugarcane is an important product to the Brazilian economy because it is the primary ingredient of ethanol which is used as a gasoline substitute. Sugarcane is aflected by many factors which can be modelled in a Bayesian Graph. This paper describes a technique to build a Causal Bayesian Network from information in news stories. The technique: extracts causal relations from news stories, converts them into an event graph, removes irrelevant information, solves structure problems, and clusters the event graph by topic distribution. Finally, the paper describes a method for generating inferences from the graph based upon evidence in agricultural news stories. The graph is evaluated through a manual inspection and with a comparison with the EMBRAPA sugarcane taxonomy.

Abstract