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Authors: Hossein Aghababaei, Sergio Vitale, Giampaolo ferraioli

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In the context of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) data, polarization is an important source of information for Earth's surface monitoring . SAR Systems are often considered to transmit only one polarization. This constraint leads to either single or dual polarimetric SAR imaging modalities. Single polarimetric systems operate with a fixed single polarization of both transmitted and received electromagnetic (EM) waves, resulting in a single acquisition channel. Dual polarimetric systems, on the other hand, transmit in one fixed polarization and receive in two orthogonal polarizations, resulting in two acquisition channels. Dual polarimetric systems are obviously more informative than single polarimetric systems and are increasingly being used for a variety of remote sensing applications. In dual polarimetric systems, the choice of polarizations for the transmitter and the receiver is open. The choice of circular transmit polarization and coherent dual linear receive polarizations forms a special dual polarimetric system called hybrid polarimetry, which brings the properties of rotational invariance to geometrical orientations of features in the scene and optimizes the design of the radar in terms of reliability, mass, and power constraints. The complete characterization of target scattering, however, requires fully polarimetric data, which can be acquired with systems that transmit two orthogonal polarizations. This adds further complexity to data acquisition and shortens the coverage area or swath of fully polarimetric images compared to the swath of dual or hybrid polarimetric images. The search for solutions to augment dual polarimetric data to full polarimetric data will therefore take advantage of full characterization and exploitation of the backscattered field over a wider coverage with less system complexity. Several methods for reconstructing fully polarimetric images using hybrid polarimetric data can be found in the literature. Although the improvements achieved by the newly investigated and experimented reconstruction techniques are undeniable, the existing methods are, however, mostly based upon model assumptions (especially the assumption of reflectance symmetry), which may limit their reliability and applicability to vegetation and forest scenarios. To overcome the problems of these techniques, this paper proposes a new framework for reconstructing fully polarimetric information from hybrid polarimetric data. The framework uses Deep Learning solutions to augment hybrid polarimetric data without relying on model assumptions. A convolutional neural network (CNN) with a specific architecture and loss function is defined for this augmentation problem by focusing on different scattering properties of the polarimetric data. In particular, the method controls the CNN training process with respect to several characteristic features of polarimetric images defined by the combination of different terms in the cost or loss function. The proposed method is experimentally validated with real data sets and compared with a well-known and standard approach from the literature. From the experiments, the reconstruction performance of the proposed framework is superior to conventional reconstruction methods. The pseudo fully polarimetric data reconstructed by the proposed method also agree well with the actual fully polarimetric images acquired by radar systems, confirming the reliability and efficiency of the proposed method.

Keywords: SAR image, deep learning, convolutional neural network, deep neural network, SAR polarimetry

Procedia PDF Downloads 64

Authors: Peter. M. Kusen, Georg Wandrey, Christopher Probst, Dietrich Kohlheyer, Jochen Buchs, Jorg Pietruszkau

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Light as a stimulus provides the capability to develop regulation techniques for customizable gene expression. A great advantage is the extremely flexible and accurate dosing that can be performed in a non invasive and sterile manner even for high throughput technologies. Therefore, light regulation in a multiwell microbioreactor system was realized providing the opportunity to control gene expression with outstanding complexity. A light-regulated gene expression system in Saccharomyces cerevisiae was designed applying the strategy of caged compounds. These compounds are photo-labile protected and therefore biologically inactive regulator molecules which can be reactivated by irradiation with certain light conditions. The “caging” of a repressor molecule which is consumed after deprotection was essential to create a flexible expression system. Thereby, gene expression could be temporally repressed by irradiation and subsequent release of the active repressor molecule. Afterwards, the repressor molecule is consumed by the yeast cells leading to reactivation of gene expression. A yeast strain harboring a construct with the corresponding repressible promoter in combination with a fluorescent marker protein was applied in a Photo-BioLector platform which allows individual irradiation as well as online fluorescence and growth detection. This device was used to precisely control the repression duration by adjusting the amount of released repressor via different irradiation times. With the presented screening platform the regulation of complex expression procedures was achieved by combination of several repression/derepression intervals. In particular, a stepwise increase of temporally-constant expression levels was demonstrated which could be used to study concentration dependent effects on cell functions. Also linear expression rates with variable slopes could be shown representing a possible solution for challenging protein productions, whereby excessive production rates lead to misfolding or intoxication. Finally, the very flexible regulation enabled accurate control over the expression induction, although we used a repressible promoter. Summing up, the continuous online regulation of gene expression has the potential to synchronize gene expression levels to optimize metabolic flux, artificial enzyme cascades, growth rates for co cultivations and many other applications addicted to complex expression regulation. The developed light-regulated expression platform represents an innovative screening approach to find optimization potential for production processes.

Keywords: caged-compounds, gene expression regulation, optogenetics, photo-labile protecting group

Procedia PDF Downloads 302

Authors: Chinedu F. Anochie

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The presence of gangue particles in recovered metal concentrates has been a serious challenge to ore dressing engineers. Middlings lower the quality of concentrates, and in most cases, drastically affect the smelter terms, owing to exorbitant amounts paid by Mineral Processing industries as treatment charge. Models which encourage optimization of liberation operations have been utilized in most ore beneficiation industries to reduce the presence of locked particles in valuable concentrates. Moreover, methods such as incorporation of regrind mills, scavenger, rougher and cleaner cells, to the milling and flotation plants has been widely employed to tackle these concerns, and to optimize the grade–recovery relationship of metal concentrates. This work compared the crushing and grinding method of liberation, to the mine to mill route, by evaluating the proportion of middlings present in selectively processed complex Pb-Zn ore samples. To establish the effect of size reduction operations on the percentage of locked particles present in recovered concentrates, two similar samples of complex Pb- Zn ores were processed. Following blasting operation, the first ore sample was ground directly in a ball mill (Mine to Mill Route of Comminution), while the other sample was manually crushed, and subsequently ground in the ball mill (Crushing and Grinding Route of Comminution). The two samples were separately sieved in a mesh to obtain the desired representative particle sizes. An equal amount of each sample that would be processed in the flotation circuit was then obtained with the aid of a weighing balance. These weighed fine particles were simultaneously processed in the flotation circuit using the selective flotation technique. Sodium cyanide, Methyl isobutyl carbinol, Sodium ethyl xanthate, Copper sulphate, Sodium hydroxide, Lime and Isopropyl xanthate, were the reagents used to effect differential flotation of the two ore samples. Analysis and calculations showed that the degree of liberation obtained for the ore sample which went through the conventional crushing and grinding route of comminution, was higher than that of the directly milled run off mine (ROM) ore. Similarly, the proportion of middlings obtained from the separated galena (PbS) and sphalerite (ZnS) concentrates, were lower for the crushed and ground ore sample. A concise data which proved that the mine to mill method of size reduction is not the most ideal technique for the recovery of quality metal concentrates has been established.

Keywords: comminution, degree of liberation, middlings, mine to mill

Procedia PDF Downloads 117

Authors: A. Poukens, I. Sluyts, A. Krings, J. Swartenbroekx, D. Geeroms, J. Poukens

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Introduction and Objectives: It has been known for many years that with the administration of intravenous medication, a rather significant part of the planned to be administered infusion solution, the residual volume ( the volume that remains in the IV line and or infusion bag), does not reach the patient and is wasted. This could possibly result in under dosage and diminished therapeutic effect. Despite the important impact on the patient, the reduction of residual volume lacks attention. An optimized and clearly stated protocol concerning the reduction of residual volume in an IV line is necessary for each hospital. As described in my Master’s thesis, acquiring the degree of Master in Hospital Pharmacy, administration of intravenous medication can be optimized by reduction of the residual volume. Herewith effectiveness, user-friendliness, cost efficiency and safety were taken into account. Material and Methods: By usage of a literature study and an online questionnaire sent out to all Flemish hospitals and hospitals in the Netherlands (province Limburg), current flush methods could be mapped out. In laboratory research, possible flush methods aiming to reduce the residual volume were measured. Furthermore, a self-developed experimental method to reduce the residual volume was added to the study. The current flush methods and the self-developed experimental method were compared to each other based on cost efficiency, user-friendliness and safety. Results: There is a major difference between the Flemish and the hospitals in the Netherlands (Province Limburg) concerning the approach and method of flushing IV lines after administration of intravenous medication. The residual volumes were measured and laboratory research showed that if flushing was done minimally 1-time equivalent to the residual volume, 95 percent of glucose would be flushed through. Based on the comparison, it became clear that flushing by use of a pre-filled syringe would be the most cost-efficient, user-friendly and safest method. According to laboratory research, the self-developed experimental method is feasible and has the advantage that the remaining fraction of the medication can be administered to the patient in unchanged concentration without dilution. Furthermore, this technique can be applied regardless of the level of the residual volume. Conclusion and Recommendations: It is recommendable to revise the current infusion systems and flushing methods in most hospitals. Aside from education of the hospital staff and alignment on a uniform substantiated protocol, an optimized and clear policy on the reduction of residual volume is necessary for each hospital. It is recommended to flush all IV lines with rinsing fluid with at least the equivalent volume of the residual volume. Further laboratory and clinical research for the self-developed experimental method are needed before this method can be implemented clinically in a broader setting.

Keywords: intravenous medication, infusion therapy, IV flushing, residual volume

Procedia PDF Downloads 109

Authors: Awatef Ahmed Ben Ramadan, Aqsa Arshad

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Background: There is a huge Muslim migration movement to North America and Europe for several reasons, primarily refuge from war areas and partly to search for better work and educational chances. There are always concerns regarding first-Generation Immigrant women's health and computer literacy, an adequate understanding of the health systems, and the use of the existing healthcare technology and services effectively and efficiently. Language proficiency level, preference for cultural and traditional remedies, socioeconomic factors, fear of stereotyping, limited accessibility to health services, and general unfamiliarity with the existing health services and resources are familiar variables among these women. Aims: The current study aims to assess the health and digital literacy of first-generation Muslim women in Atlanta city. Also, the study aims to examine how the COVID-19 pandemic has encouraged the use of health information technology and increased technology awareness among the targeted women. Methods: The study design is cross-sectional correlational research. The study will be conducted to produce preliminary results that the investigators want to have to supplement an NIH grant application about leveraging information technology to reduce the health inequalities amongst the first-generation immigrant Muslim women in Atlanta City. The investigators will collect the study data in two phases using different tools. Phase one was conducted in June 2022; the investigators used tools to measure health and digital literacy amongst 42 first-generation immigrant Muslim women. Phase two was conducted in November 2022; the investigators measured the Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice (KAP) of using health information technology such as telehealth from a sample of 45 first-generation Muslim immigrant women in Atlanta; in addition, the investigators measured how the current pandemic has affected their KAP to use telemedicine and telehealth services. Both phases' study participants were recruited using convenience sampling methodology. The investigators collected around 40 of 18 years old or older first-generation Muslim immigrant women for both study phases. The study excluded Immigrants who hold work visas and second-generation immigrants. Results: At the point of submitting this abstract, the investigators are still analyzing the study data to produce preliminary results to apply for an NIH grant entitled "Leveraging Health Information Technology (Health IT) to Address and Reduce Health Care Disparities (R01 Clinical Trial Optional)". This research will be the first step of a comprehensive research project to assess and measure health and digital literacy amongst a vulnerable community group. The targeted group might have different points of view from the U.S.-born inhabitants on how to: promote their health, gain healthy lifestyles and habits, screen for diseases, adhere to health treatment and follow-up plans, perceive the importance of using available and affordable technology to communicate with their providers and improve their health, and help in making serious decisions for their health. The investigators aim to develop an educational and instructional health mobile application considering the language and cultural factors that affect immigrants' ability to access different health and social support sources, know their health rights and obligations in their communities, and improve their health behavior and behavior lifestyles.

Keywords: first-generation immigrant Muslim women, telehealth, COVID-19 pandemic, health information technology, health and digital literacy

Procedia PDF Downloads 60

Authors: Paula Quiterio, Arlete Apolinario, Celia T. Sousa, Joao Azevedo, Paula Dias, Adelio Mendes, Joao P. Araujo

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Nowadays one of the mankind's greatest challenges has been the supply of low-cost and environmentally friendly energy sources as an alternative to non-renewable fossil fuels. Hydrogen has been considered a promising solution, representing a clean and low-cost fuel. It can be produced directly from clean and abundant resources, such as sunlight and water, using photoelectrochemical cells (PECs), in a process that mimics the nature´s photosynthesis. Hematite (alpha-Fe2O3) has attracted considerable attention as a promising photoanode for solar water splitting, due to its high chemical stability, nontoxicity, availability and low band gap (2.2 eV), which allows reaching a high thermodynamic solar-to-hydrogen efficiency of 16.8 %. However, the main drawbacks of hematite such as the short hole diffusion length and the poor conductivity that lead to high electron-hole recombination result in significant PEC efficiency losses. One strategy to overcome these limitations and to increase the PEC efficiency is to use 1D nanostructures, such as nanotubes (NTs) and nanowires (NWs), which present high aspect ratios and large surface areas providing direct pathways for electron transport up to the charge collector and minimizing the recombination losses. In particular, due to the ultrathin walls of the NTs, the holes can reach the surface faster than in other nanostructures, representing a key factor for the NTs photoresponse. In this work, we prepared hematite NWs and NTs, respectively by hydrothermal process and electrochemical anodization. For hematite NWs growing, we studied the effect of variable hydrothermal conditions, different annealing temperatures and time, and the use of Ti and Sn dopants on the morphology and PEC performance. The crystalline phase characterization by X-ray diffraction was crucial to distinguish the formation of hematite and other iron oxide phases, alongside its effect on the photoanodes conductivity and consequent PEC efficiency. The conductivity of the as-prepared NWs is very low, in the order of 10-5 S cm-1, but after doping and annealing optimization it increased by a factor of 105. A high photocurrent density of 1.02 mA cm-2 at 1.45 VRHE was obtained under simulated sunlight, which is a very promising value for this kind of hematite nanostructures. The stability of the photoelectrodes was also tested, presenting good stability after several J-V measurements over time. The NTs, synthesized by fast anodizations with potentials ranging from 20-100 V, presented a linear growth of the NTs pore walls, with very low thicknesses from 10 - 18 nm. These preliminary results are also very promising for the use of hematite photoelectrodes on PEC hydrogen applications.

Keywords: hematite, nanotubes, nanowires, photoelectrochemical cells

Procedia PDF Downloads 205

Authors: Tatiana Butkova, Nikolai Kibrik, Kristina Malsagova, Alexander Izotov, Alexander Stepanov, Anna Kaysheva

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Relevance. The genetic risk of developing schizophrenia is determined by two factors: single nucleotide polymorphisms and gene copy number variations. The search for serological markers for early diagnosis of schizophrenia is driven by the fact that the first five years of the disease are accompanied by significant biological, psychological, and social changes. It is during this period that pathological processes are most amenable to correction. The aim of this study was to analyze single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) that are hypothesized to potentially influence the onset and development of the endogenous process. Materials and Methods It was analyzed 73 single nucleotide polymorphism variants. The study included 48 patients undergoing inpatient treatment at "Psychiatric Clinical Hospital No. 1" in Moscow, comprising 23 females and 25 males. Inclusion criteria: - Patients aged 18 and above. - Diagnosis according to ICD-10: F20.0, F20.2, F20.8, F21.8, F25.1, F25.2. - Voluntary informed consent from patients. Exclusion criteria included: - The presence of concurrent somatic or neurological pathology, neuroinfections, epilepsy, organic central nervous system damage of any etiology, and regular use of medication. - Substance abuse and alcohol dependence. - Women who were pregnant or breastfeeding. Clinical and psychopathological assessment was complemented by psychometric evaluation using the PANSS scale at the beginning and end of treatment. The duration of observation during therapy was 4-6 weeks. Total DNA extraction was performed using QIAamp DNA. Blood samples were processed on Illumina HiScan and genotyped for 652,297 markers on the Infinium Global Chips Screening Array-24v2.0 using the IMPUTE2 program with parameters Ne=20,000 and k=90. Additional filtration was performed based on INFO>0.5 and genotype probability>0.5. Quality control of the obtained DNA was conducted using agarose gel electrophoresis, with each tested sample having a volume of 100 µL. Results. It was observed that several SNPs exhibited gender dependence. We identified groups of single nucleotide polymorphisms with a membership of 80% or more in either the female or male gender. These SNPs included rs2661319, rs2842030, rs4606, rs11868035, rs518147, rs5993883, and rs6269.Another noteworthy finding was the limited combination of SNPs sufficient to manifest clinical symptoms leading to hospitalization. Among all 48 patients, each of whom was analyzed for deviations in 73 SNPs, it was discovered that the combination of involved SNPs in the manifestation of pronounced clinical symptoms of schizophrenia was 19±3 out of 73 possible. In study, the frequency of occurrence of single nucleotide polymorphisms also varied. The most frequently observed SNPs were rs4849127 (in 90% of cases), rs1150226 (86%), rs1414334 (75%), rs10170310 (73%), rs2857657, and rs4436578 (71%). Conclusion. Thus, the results of this study provide additional evidence that these genes may be associated with the development of schizophrenia spectrum disorders. However, it's impossible cannot rule out the hypothesis that these polymorphisms may be in linkage disequilibrium with other functionally significant polymorphisms that may actually be involved in schizophrenia spectrum disorders. It has been shown that missense SNPs by themselves are likely not causative of the disease but are in strong linkage disequilibrium with non-functional SNPs that may indeed contribute to disease predisposition.

Keywords: gene polymorphisms, genotyping, single nucleotide polymorphisms, schizophrenia.

Procedia PDF Downloads 49

Authors: Philip Semaha, Zhongfang Lei, Ziwen Zhao, Sen Liu, Zhenya Zhang, Kazuya Shimizu

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The increasing generation of saline wastewater through various industrial activities is becoming a global concern for activated sludge (AS) based biological treatment which is widely applied in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). As for the AS process, an increase in wastewater salinity has negative impact on its overall performance. The advent of conventional aerobic granular sludge (AGS) or bacterial AGS biotechnology has gained much attention because of its superior performance. The development of algal-bacterial AGS could enhance better nutrients removal, potentially reduce aeration cost through symbiotic algae-bacterial activity, and thus, can also reduce overall treatment cost. Nonetheless, the potential of salt stress to decrease biomass growth, microbial activity and nutrient removal exist. Up to the present, little information is available on saline wastewater treatment by algal-bacterial AGS. To the authors’ best knowledge, a comparison of the two AGS systems has not been done to evaluate nutrients removal capacity in the context of salinity increase. This study sought to figure out the impact of salinity on the algal-bacterial AGS system in comparison to bacterial AGS one, contributing to the application of AGS technology in the real world of saline wastewater treatment. In this study, the salt concentrations tested were 0 g/L, 1 g/L, 5 g/L, 10 g/L and 15 g/L of NaCl with 24-hr artificial illuminance of approximately 97.2 µmol m¯²s¯¹, and mature bacterial and algal-bacterial AGS were used for the operation of two identical sequencing batch reactors (SBRs) with a working volume of 0.9 L each, respectively. The results showed that salinity increase caused no apparent change in the color of bacterial AGS; while for algal-bacterial AGS, its color was progressively changed from green to dark green. A consequent increase in granule diameter and fluffiness was observed in the bacterial AGS reactor with the increase of salinity in comparison to a decrease in algal-bacterial AGS diameter. However, nitrite accumulation peaked from 1.0 mg/L and 0.4 mg/L at 1 g/L NaCl in the bacterial and algal-bacterial AGS systems, respectively to 9.8 mg/L in both systems when NaCl concentration varied from 5 g/L to 15 g/L. Almost no ammonia nitrogen was detected in the effluent except at 10 g/L NaCl concentration, where it averaged 4.2 mg/L and 2.4 mg/L, respectively, in the bacterial and algal-bacterial AGS systems. Nutrients removal in the algal-bacterial system was relatively higher than the bacterial AGS in terms of nitrogen and phosphorus removals. Nonetheless, the nutrient removal rate was almost 50% or lower. Results show that algal-bacterial AGS is more adaptable to salinity increase and could be more suitable for saline wastewater treatment. Optimization of operation conditions for algal-bacterial AGS system would be important to ensure its stably high efficiency in practice.

Keywords: algal-bacterial aerobic granular sludge, bacterial aerobic granular sludge, Nutrients removal, saline wastewater, sequencing batch reactor

Procedia PDF Downloads 130

Authors: Muhammad Ather Nadeem, Bilal Ahmad Khan, Hussam F. Najeeb Alawadi, Athar Mahmood, Aneela Nijabat, Tasawer Abbas, Muhammad Habib, Abdullah

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The global prevalence of Avena fatua infestation poses a significant challenge to wheat sustainability. While chemical control stands out as an efficient and rapid way to control weeds, concerns over developing resistance in weeds and environmental pollution have led to criticisms of herbicide use. Consequently, this study was designed to address these challenges through the chemical synthesis, characterization, and optimization of chitosan-based nanoparticles containing clodinofop Propargyl and fenoxaprop-P-ethyl for the effective management of A. fatua. Utilizing the ionic gelification technique, chitosan-based nanoparticles of clodinofop Propargyl and fenoxaprop-P-ethyl were prepared. These nanoparticles were applied at the 3-4 leaf stage of Phalaris minor weed, applying seven altered doses. These nanoparticles were applied at the 3-4 leaf stage of Phalaris minor weed, applying seven altered doses (D0 (Check weeds), D1 (Recommended dose of traditional-herbicide (TH), D2 (Recommended dose of Nano-herbicide (NPs-H)), D3 (NPs-H with 05-fold lower dose), D4 ((NPs-H) with 10-fold lower dose), D5 (NPs-H with 15-fold lower dose), and D6 (NPs-H with 20-fold lower dose)). Characterization of the chitosan-containing herbicide nanoparticles (CHT-NPs) was conducted using FT-IR analysis, demonstrating a perfect match with standard parameters. UV–visible spectrum further revealed absorption peaks at 310 nm for NPs of clodinofop propargyl and at 330 nm for NPs of fenoxaprop-p-ethyl. This research aims to contribute to sustainable weed management practices by addressing the challenges associated with chemical herbicide use. The application of chitosan-based nanoparticles (CHT-NPs) containing fenoxaprop-P-ethyl and clodinofop-propargyl at the recommended dose of the standard herbicide resulted in 100% mortality and visible injury to weeds. Surprisingly, when applied at a lower dose with 5-folds, these chitosan-containing nanoparticles of clodinofop Propargyl and fenoxaprop-P-ethyl demonstrated extreme control efficacy. Furthermore, at a 10-fold lower dose compared to standard herbicides and the recommended dose of clodinofop-propargyl and fenoxaprop-P-ethyl, the chitosan-based nanoparticles exhibited comparable effects on chlorophyll content, visual injury (%), mortality (%), plant height (cm), fresh weight (g), and dry weight (g) of A. fatua. This study indicates that chitosan/tripolyphosphate-loaded nanoparticles containing clodinofop-propargyl and fenoxaprop-P-ethyl can be effectively utilized for the management of A. fatua at a 10-fold lower dose, highlighting their potential for sustainable and efficient weed control.

Keywords: mortality, chitosan-based nanoparticles, visual injury, chlorophyl contents, 5-fold lower dose.

Procedia PDF Downloads 37

Authors: Olga Maksakova

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A work with unconscious patients after acute brain damages besides special knowledge and practical skills of all the participants requires a very specific organization. A lot of said about team approach in neurorehabilitation, usually as for outpatient mode. Rehabilitologists deal with fixed patient problems or deficits (motion, speech, cognitive or emotional disorder). Team-building means superficial paradigm of management psychology. Linear mode of teamwork fits casual relationships there. Cases with deep altered states of consciousness (vegetative states, coma, and confusion) require non-linear mode of teamwork: recovery of consciousness might not be the goal due to phenomenon uncertainty. Rehabilitation team as Semi-open Complex System includes the patient as a part. Patient's response pattern becomes formed not only with brain deficits but questions-stimuli, context, and inquiring person. Teamwork is sourcing of phenomenology knowledge of patient's processes as Third-person approach is replaced with Second- and after First-person approaches. Here is a chance for real-time change. Patient’s contacts with his own body and outward things create a basement for restoration of consciousness. The most important condition is systematic feedbacks to any minimal movement or vegetative signal of the patient. Up to now, recovery work with the most severe contingent is carried out in the mode of passive physical interventions, while an effective rehabilitation team should include specially trained psychologists and psychotherapists. It is they who are able to create a network of feedbacks with the patient and inter-professional ones building up the team. Characteristics of ‘Team-Patient’ system (TPS) are energy, entropy, and complexity. Impairment of consciousness as the absence of linear contact appears together with a loss of essential functions (low energy), vegetative-visceral fits (excessive energy and low order), motor agitation (excessive energy and excessive order), etc. Techniques of teamwork are different in these cases for resulting optimization of the system condition. Directed regulation of the system complexity is one of the recovery tools. Different signs of awareness appear as a result of system self-organization. Joint meetings are an important part of teamwork. Regular or event-related discussions form the language of inter-professional communication, as well as the patient's shared mental model. Analysis of complex communication process in TPS may be useful for creation of the general theory of consciousness.

Keywords: rehabilitation team, urgent rehabilitation, severe brain damage, consciousness disorders, complex system theory

Procedia PDF Downloads 125

Authors: Naser Zouri

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Purpose: Measures of formulate and implementation strategy shows amount of product rate-market based strategic management category such as courtesy, competence, and compliance to reach the high loyalty of financial ecosystem. Despite, it solves the market place error intention to fair trade organization. Finding: Finding shows the ability of executives’ level of management to motivate and better decision-making to solve the treatments in business organization. However, it made ideal level of each interposition policy for a hypothetical household. Methodology/design. Style of questionnaire about the data collection was selected to survey of both pilot test and real research. Also, divide of questionnaire and using of Free Scale Semiconductor`s between the finance employee was famous of this instrument. Respondent`s nominated basic on non-probability sampling such as convenience sampling to answer the questionnaire. The way of realization costs to performed the questionnaire divide among the respondent`s approximately was suitable as a spend the expenditure to reach the answer but very difficult to collect data from hospital. However, items of research survey was formed of implement strategy, environment, supply chain, employee from impact of implementation strategy on reach to better financial consequences and also formulate strategy, comprehensiveness strategic design, organization performance from impression on formulate strategy and financial consequences. Practical Implication: Dynamic capability approach of formulate and implement strategy focuses on the firm-specific processes through which firms integrate, build, or reconfigure resources valuable for making a theoretical contribution. Originality/ value of research: Going beyond the current discussion, we show that case studies have the potential to extend and refine theory. We present new light on how dynamic capabilities can benefit from case study research by discovering the qualifications that shape the development of capabilities and determining the boundary conditions of the dynamic capabilities approach. Limitation of the study :Present study also relies on survey of methodology for data collection and the response perhaps connection by financial employee was difficult to responds the question because of limitation work place.

Keywords: financial ecosystem, loyalty, Malaysian market error, dynamic capability approach, rate-market, optimization intelligence strategy, courtesy, competence, compliance

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Authors: Melanie Grier, Adam Murry

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Objective: Worldwide, Indigenous Peoples experience underemployment and poverty at disproportionately higher rates than non-Indigenous people, despite similar rates of employment seeking. Euro-colonial conquest and genocidal assimilation policies are implicated as perpetuating poverty, which research consistently links to health and wellbeing disparities. Many of the contributors to poverty, such as inadequate income and lack of access to medical care, can be directly or indirectly linked to underemployment. Calls have been made to prioritize Indigenous perspectives in Industrial-Organizational (I/O) psychology research, yet the literature on Indigenous employment remains scarce. What does exist is disciplinarily diverse, topically scattered, and lacking evidence of community-based participatory research (CBPR) practices, a research project approach which prioritizes community leadership, partnership, and betterment and reduces the potential for harm. Due to the harmful colonial legacy of extractive scientific inquiry "on" rather than "with" Indigenous groups, Indigenous leaders and research funding agencies advocate for academic researchers to adopt reparative research methodologies such as CBPR to be used when studying issues pertaining to Indigenous Peoples or individuals. However, the frequency and consistency of CBPR implementation within scholarly discourse are unknown. Therefore, this project’s goal is two-fold: (1) to understand what comprises CBPR in Indigenous research and (2) to determine if CBPR has been historically used in Indigenous employment research. Method: Using a systematic literature review process, sixteen articles about CBPR use with Indigenous groups were selected, and content was analyzed to identify key components comprising CBPR usage. An Indigenous CBPR components framework was constructed and subsequently utilized to analyze the Indigenous employment empirical literature. A similar systematic literature review process was followed to search for relevant empirical articles on Indigenous employment. A total of 120 articles were identified in six global regions: Australia, New Zealand, Canada, America, the Pacific Islands, and Greenland/Norway. Each empirical study was procedurally examined and coded for criteria inclusion using content analysis directives. Results: Analysis revealed that, in total, CBPR elements were used 14% of the time in Indigenous employment research. Most studies (n=69; 58%) neglected to mention using any CBPR components, while just two studies discussed implementing all sixteen (2%). The most significant determinant of overall CBPR use was community member partnership (CP) in the research process. Studies from New Zealand were most likely to use CBPR components, followed by Canada, Australia, and America. While CBPR use did increase slowly over time, meaningful temporal trends were not found. Further, CBPR use did not directly correspond with the total number of topical articles published that year. Conclusions: Community-initiated and engaged research approaches must be better utilized in employment studies involving Indigenous Peoples. Future research efforts must be particularly attentive to community-driven objectives and research protocols, emphasizing specific areas of concern relevant to the field of I/O psychology, such as organizational support, recruitment, and selection.

Keywords: community-based participatory research, content analysis, employment, indigenous research, international, reconciliation, recruitment, reparative research, selection, systematic literature review

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Authors: Palak V. Patel, Jessica Pixley, Steven R. Feldman

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Introduction: Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most common skin cancer worldwide and requires substantial resources to treat. When choosing between indicated therapies, providers consider their associated adverse effects, efficacy, cosmesis, and function preservation. The patient’s tumor burden, infiltrative risk, and risk of tumor recurrence are also considered. Treatment cost is often left out of these discussions. This can lead to financial toxicity, which describes the harm and quality of life reductions inflicted by high care costs. Methods: We studied the guidelines set forth by the American Academy of Dermatology for the treatment of BCC. A PubMed literature search was conducted to identify the costs of each recommended therapy. We discuss costs alongside treatment efficacy and side-effect profile. Results: Surgical treatment for BCC can be cost-effective if the appropriate treatment is selected for the presenting tumor. Curettage and electrodesiccation can be used in low-grade, low-recurrence tumors in aesthetically unimportant areas. The benefits of cost-conscious care are not likely to be outweighed by the risks of poor cosmesis or tumor return ($471 BCC of the cheek). When tumor burden is limited, MMS offers better cure rates and lower recurrence rates than surgical excision, and with comparable costs (MMS $1263; SE $949). Surgical excision with permanent sections may be indicated when tumor burden is more extensive or if molecular testing is necessary. The utility of surgical excision with frozen sections, which costs substantially more than MMS without comparable outcomes, is less clear (SE with frozen sections $2334-$3085). Less data exists on non-surgical treatments for BCC. These techniques cost less, but recurrence-risk is high. Side-effects of nonsurgical treatment are limited to local skin reactions, and cosmesis is good. Cryotherapy, 5-FU, and MAL-PDT are all more affordable than surgery, but high recurrence rates increase risk of secondary financial and psychosocial burden (recurrence rates 21-39%; cost $100-270). Radiation therapy offers better clearance rates than other nonsurgical treatments but is associated with similar recurrence rates and a significantly larger financial burden ($2591-$3460 BCC of the cheek). Treatments for advanced or metastatic BCC are extremely costly, but few patients require their use, and the societal cost burden remains low. Vismodegib and sonidegib have good response rates but substantial side effects, and therapy should be combined with multidisciplinary care and palliative measures. Expert-review has found sonidegib to be the less expensive and more efficacious option (vismodegib $128,358; sonidegib $122,579). Platinum therapy, while not FDA-approved, is also effective but expensive (~91,435). Immunotherapy offers a new line of treatment in patients intolerant of hedgehog inhibitors ($683,061). Conclusion: Dermatologists working within resource-compressed practices and with resource-limited patients must prudently manage the healthcare dollar. Surgical therapies for BCC offer the lowest risk of recurrence at the most reasonable cost. Non-surgical therapies are more affordable, but high recurrence rates increase the risk of secondary financial and psychosocial burdens. Treatments for advanced BCC are incredibly costly, but the low incidence means the overall cost to the system is low.

Keywords: nonmelanoma skin cancer, basal cell skin cancer, squamous cell skin cancer, cost of care

Procedia PDF Downloads 105

Authors: Suruchi Saini, Hitender Kumar Tyagi

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With the rapid progress of the nanotechnology industry, it is becoming increasingly important to have compact semiconductor devices to function and offer the best results at various technology nodes. While performing the scaling of the device, several short-channel effects occur. To minimize these scaling limitations, some device architectures have been developed in the semiconductor industry. FinFET is one of the most promising structures. Also, the double-gate 2D Fin field effect transistor has the benefit of suppressing short channel effects (SCE) and functioning well for less than 14 nm technology nodes. In the present research, the MuGFET simulation tool is used to analyze and explain the electrical behaviour of a double-gate 2D Fin field effect transistor. The drift-diffusion and Poisson equations are solved self-consistently. Various models, such as Fermi-Dirac distribution, bandgap narrowing, carrier scattering, and concentration-dependent mobility models, are used for device simulation. The transfer and output characteristics of the double-gate 2D Fin field effect transistor are determined at 10 nm technology node. The performance parameters are extracted in terms of threshold voltage, trans-conductance, leakage current and current on-off ratio. In this paper, the device performance is analyzed at different structure parameters. The utilization of the Id-Vg curve is a robust technique that holds significant importance in the modeling of transistors, circuit design, optimization of performance, and quality control in electronic devices and integrated circuits for comprehending field-effect transistors. The FinFET structure is optimized to increase the current on-off ratio and transconductance. Through this analysis, the impact of different channel widths, source and drain lengths on the Id-Vg and transconductance is examined. Device performance was affected by the difficulty of maintaining effective gate control over the channel at decreasing feature sizes. For every set of simulations, the device's features are simulated at two different drain voltages, 50 mV and 0.7 V. In low-power and precision applications, the off-state current is a significant factor to consider. Therefore, it is crucial to minimize the off-state current to maximize circuit performance and efficiency. The findings demonstrate that the performance of the current on-off ratio is maximum with the channel width of 3 nm for a gate length of 10 nm, but there is no significant effect of source and drain length on the current on-off ratio. The transconductance value plays a pivotal role in various electronic applications and should be considered carefully. In this research, it is also concluded that the transconductance value of 340 S/m is achieved with the fin width of 3 nm at a gate length of 10 nm and 2380 S/m for the source and drain extension length of 5 nm, respectively.

Keywords: current on-off ratio, FinFET, short-channel effects, transconductance

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Authors: Domenico Panno, Antonino D’amico, Hamed Jafargholi

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This paper presents an experimental analysis of the performance of a system for freezing fish products equipped with a modulating vapour injection scroll compressor operating with R448A refrigerant. Freezing is a critical process for the preservation of seafood products, as it influences quality, food safety, and environmental sustainability. The use of a modulating scroll compressor with vapour injection, associated with the R448A refrigerant, is proposed as a solution to optimize the performance of the system, reducing energy consumption and mitigating the environmental impact. The steam injection modulating scroll compressor represents an advanced technology that allows you to adjust the compressor capacity based on the actual cooling needs of the system. Vapour injection allows the optimization of the refrigeration cycle, reducing the evaporation temperature and improving the overall efficiency of the system. The use of R448A refrigerant, with a low global warming potential (GWP), is part of an environmental sustainability perspective, helping to reduce the climate impact of the system. The aim of this research was to evaluate the performance of the system through a series of experiments conducted on a pilot plant for the freezing of fish products. Several operational variables were monitored and recorded, including evaporation temperature, condensation temperature, energy consumption, and freezing time of seafood products. The results of the experimental analysis highlighted the benefits deriving from the use of the modulating vapour injection scroll compressor with the R448A refrigerant. In particular, a significant reduction in energy consumption was recorded compared to conventional systems. The modulating capacity of the compressor made it possible to adapt the cold production to variations in the thermal load, ensuring optimal operation of the system and reducing energy waste. Furthermore, the use of an electronic expansion valve highlighted greater precision in the control of the evaporation temperature, with minimal deviation from the desired set point. This helped ensure better quality of the final product, reducing the risk of damage due to temperature changes and ensuring uniform freezing of the fish products. The freezing time of seafood has been significantly reduced thanks to the configuration of the entire system, allowing for faster production and greater production capacity of the plant. In conclusion, the use of a modulating vapour injection scroll compressor operating with R448A refrigerant has proven effective in improving the performance of a system for freezing fish products. This technology offers an optimal balance between energy efficiency, temperature control, and environmental sustainability, making it an advantageous choice for food industries.

Keywords: freezing, scroll compressor, energy efficiency, vapour injection

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Authors: Zuhal Kurt, Meral Kurt, Bilge T. Bal, Kemal Ozkan

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Shade matching and reproduction is the most important element of success in prosthetic dentistry. Until recently, shade matching procedure was implemented by dentists visual perception with the help of shade guides. Since many factors influence visual perception; tooth shade matching using visual devices (shade guides) is highly subjective and inconsistent. Subjective nature of this process has lead to the development of instrumental devices. Nowadays, colorimeters, spectrophotometers, spectroradiometers and digital image analysing systems are used for instrumental shade selection. Instrumental devices have advantages that readings are quantifiable, can obtain more rapidly and simply, objectively and precisely. However, these devices have noticeable drawbacks. For example, translucent structure and irregular surfaces of teeth lead to defects on measurement with these devices. Also between the results acquired by devices with different measurement principles may make inconsistencies. So, its obligatory to search for new methods for dental shade matching process. A computer-aided system device; digital camera has developed rapidly upon today. Currently, advances in image processing and computing have resulted in the extensive use of digital cameras for color imaging. This procedure has a much cheaper process than the use of traditional contact-type color measurement devices. Digital cameras can be taken by the place of contact-type instruments for shade selection and overcome their disadvantages. Images taken from teeth show morphology and color texture of teeth. In last decades, a new method was recommended to compare the color of shade tabs taken by a digital camera using color features. This method showed that visual and computer-aided shade matching systems should be used as concatenated. Recently using methods of feature extraction techniques are based on shape description and not used color information. However, color is mostly experienced as an essential property in depicting and extracting features from objects in the world around us. When local feature descriptors with color information are extended by concatenating color descriptor with the shape descriptor, that descriptor will be effective on visual object recognition and classification task. Therefore, the color descriptor is to be used in combination with a shape descriptor it does not need to contain any spatial information, which leads us to use local histograms. This local color histogram method is remain reliable under variation of photometric changes, geometrical changes and variation of image quality. So, coloring local feature extraction methods are used to extract features, and also the Scale Invariant Feature Transform (SIFT) descriptor used to for shape description in the proposed method. After the combination of these descriptors, the state-of-art descriptor named by Color-SIFT will be used in this study. Finally, the image feature vectors obtained from quantization algorithm are fed to classifiers such as Nearest Neighbor (KNN), Naive Bayes or Support Vector Machines (SVM) to determine label(s) of the visual object category or matching. In this study, SVM are used as classifiers for color determination and shade matching. Finally, experimental results of this method will be compared with other recent studies. It is concluded from the study that the proposed method is remarkable development on computer aided tooth shade determination system.

Keywords: classifiers, color determination, computer-aided system, tooth shade matching, feature extraction

Procedia PDF Downloads 407

Authors: Thelma Maria Melo Pinheiro, Guilherme Raposo Diniz Vieira, Sidney Matos da Silva, Leonardo Mendonça de Oliveira Queiroz, Mateus Sousa Pinheiro, Danyllo Wenceslau de Oliveira Lopes

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The present article has the objective to describe the regulatory impact analysis (RIA) of the contracting efficiency of the Brazilian transmission system usage. This contracting is made by users connected to the main transmission network and is used to guide necessary investments to supply the electrical energy demand. Therefore, an inefficient contracting of this energy amount distorts the real need for grid capacity, affecting the sector planning accuracy and resources optimization. In order to provide this efficiency, the Brazilian Electricity Regulatory Agency (ANEEL) homologated the Normative Resolution (NR) No. 666, from July 23th of 2015, which consolidated the procedures for the contracting of transmission system usage and the contracting efficiency verification. Aiming for a more efficient and rational transmission system contracting, the resolution established economic incentives denominated as Inefficiency installment for excess (IIE) and inefficiency installment for over-contracting (IIOC). The first one, IIE, is verified when the contracted demand exceeds the established regulatory limit; it is applied to consumer units, generators, and distribution companies. The second one, IIOC, is verified when the distributors over-contract their demand. Thus, the establishment of the inefficiency installments IIE and IIOC intends to avoid the agent contract less energy than necessary or more than it is needed. Knowing that RIA evaluates a regulatory intervention to verify if its goals were achieved, the results from the application of the above-mentioned normative resolution to the Brazilian transmission sector were analyzed through indicators that were created for this RIA to evaluate the contracting efficiency transmission system usage, using real data from before and after the homologation of the normative resolution in 2015. For this, indicators were used as the efficiency contracting indicator (ECI), excess of demand indicator (EDI), and over-contracting of demand indicator (ODI). The results demonstrated, through the ECI analysis, a decrease of the contracting efficiency, a behaviour that was happening even before the normative resolution of 2015. On the other side, the EDI showed a considerable decrease in the amount of excess for the distributors and a small reduction for the generators; moreover, the ODI notable decreased, which optimizes the usage of the transmission installations. Hence, with the complete evaluation from the data and indicators, it was possible to conclude that IIE is a relevant incentive for a more efficient contracting, indicating to the agents that their contracting values are not adequate to keep their service provisions for their users. The IIOC also has its relevance, to the point that it shows to the distributors that their contracting values are overestimated.

Keywords: contracting, electricity regulation, evaluation, regulatory impact analysis, transmission power system

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Authors: J. Van Engeland, C. Lavigne, S. De Jaeger

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In the light of the transition towards a more circular economy, recovery of products, parts or materials will gain in importance. Additionally, the EU proximity principle related to waste management and emissions generated by transporting large amounts of end-of-life products, shift attention to local recovery networks. The Flemish inter-communal cooperation for municipal solid waste management Meetjesland (IVM) is currently investigating the set-up of such a network. More specifically, the network encompasses the recycling of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which is collected in separate containers. When these containers are full, a truck should transport them to the processor which can recycle the PVC into new products. This paper proposes a model to optimize the container collection. The containers are located at different Civic Amenity sites (CA sites) in a certain region. Since people can drop off their waste at these CA sites, the containers will gradually fill up during a planning horizon. If a certain container is full, it has to be collected and replaced by an empty container. The collected waste is then transported to a single processor. To perform this collection and transportation of containers, the responsible firm has a set of vehicles stationed at a single depot and different personnel crews. A vehicle can load exactly one container. If a trailer is attached to the vehicle, it can load an additional container. Each day of the planning horizon, the different crews and vehicles leave the depot to collect containers at the different sites. After loading one or two containers, the crew has to drive to the processor for unloading the waste and to pick up empty containers. Afterwards, the crew can again visit sites or it can return to the depot to end its collection work for that day. All along the collection process, the crew has to respect the opening hours of the sites. In order to allow for some flexibility, a crew is allowed to wait a certain amount of time at the gate of a site until it opens. The problem described can be modelled as a variant to the PVRP-TW (Periodic Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows). However, a vehicle can at maximum load two containers, hence only two subsequent site visits are possible. For that reason, we will refer to the model as a model for building tactical waste collection schemes. The goal is to a find a schedule describing which crew should visit which CA site on which day to minimize the number of trucks and the routing costs. The model was coded in IBM CPLEX Optimization studio and applied to a number of test instances. Good results were obtained, and specific suggestions concerning route and truck costs could be made. For a large range of input parameters, collection schemes using two trucks are obtained.

Keywords: container collection, crew scheduling, mixed integer linear programming, waste management

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Authors: F. Tang, S. Boskovich, A. Raheja, Z. Aliyazicioglu, S. Bhandari, N. Tsuchiya

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Calpoly Autonomous Transportation Experience (CATE) is a driverless vehicle that we are developing to provide safe, accessible, and efficient transportation of passengers throughout the Cal Poly Pomona campus for events such as orientation tours. Unlike the other self-driving vehicles that are usually developed to operate with other vehicles and reside only on the road networks, CATE will operate exclusively on walk-paths of the campus (potentially narrow passages) with pedestrians traveling from multiple locations. Safety becomes paramount as CATE operates within the same environment as pedestrians. As driverless vehicles assume greater roles in today’s transportation, this project will contribute to autonomous driving with pedestrian traffic in a highly dynamic environment. The CATE project requires significant interdisciplinary work. Researchers from mechanical engineering, electrical engineering and computer science are working together to attack the problem from different perspectives (hardware, software and system). In this abstract, we describe the software aspects of the project, with a focus on the requirements and the major components. CATE shall provide a GUI interface for the average user to interact with the car and access its available functionalities, such as selecting a destination from any origin on campus. We have developed an interface that provides an aerial view of the campus map, the current car location, routes, and the goal location. Users can interact with CATE through audio or manual inputs. CATE shall plan routes from the origin to the selected destination for the vehicle to travel. We will use an existing aerial map for the campus and convert it to a spatial graph configuration where the vertices represent the landmarks and edges represent paths that the car should follow with some designated behaviors (such as stay on the right side of the lane or follow an edge). Graph search algorithms such as A* will be implemented as the default path planning algorithm. D* Lite will be explored to efficiently recompute the path when there are any changes to the map. CATE shall avoid any static obstacles and walking pedestrians within some safe distance. Unlike traveling along traditional roadways, CATE’s route directly coexists with pedestrians. To ensure the safety of the pedestrians, we will use sensor fusion techniques that combine data from both lidar and stereo vision for obstacle avoidance while also allowing CATE to operate along its intended route. We will also build prediction models for pedestrian traffic patterns. CATE shall improve its location and work under a GPS-denied situation. CATE relies on its GPS to give its current location, which has a precision of a few meters. We have implemented an Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF) that allows the fusion of data from multiple sensors (such as GPS, IMU, odometry) in order to increase the confidence of localization. We also noticed that GPS signals can easily get degraded or blocked on campus due to high-rise buildings or trees. UKF can also help here to generate a better state estimate. In summary, CATE will provide on-campus transportation experience that coexists with dynamic pedestrian traffic. In future work, we will extend it to multi-vehicle scenarios.

Keywords: driverless vehicle, path planning, sensor fusion, state estimate

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Authors: I. Berger, N. Machour, F. Portet-Koltalo

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Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) are toxic and carcinogenic pollutants produced in majority by incomplete combustion processes in industrialized and urbanized areas. After being emitted in atmosphere, these persistent contaminants are deposited to soils or sediments. Even if persistent, some can be partially degraded (photodegradation, biodegradation, chemical oxidation) and they lead to oxygenated metabolites (oxy-PAHs) which can be more toxic than their parent PAH. Oxy-PAHs are less measured than PAHs in sediments and this study aims to compare different analytical tools in order to extract and quantify a mixture of four hydroxylated PAHs (OH-PAHs) and four carbonyl PAHs (quinones) in sediments. Methodologies: Two analytical systems – HPLC with on-line UV and fluorescence detectors (HPLC-UV-FLD) and GC coupled to a mass spectrometer (GC-MS) – were compared to separate and quantify oxy-PAHs. Microwave assisted extraction (MAE) was optimized to extract oxy-PAHs from sediments. Results: First OH-PAHs and quinones were analyzed in HPLC with on-line UV and fluorimetric detectors. OH-PAHs were detected with the sensitive FLD, but the non-fluorescent quinones were detected with UV. The limits of detection (LOD)s obtained were in the range (2-3)×10-4 mg/L for OH-PAHs and (2-3)×10-3 mg/L for quinones. Second, even if GC-MS is not well adapted to the analysis of the thermodegradable OH-PAHs and quinones without any derivatization step, it was used because of the advantages of the detector in terms of identification and of GC in terms of efficiency. Without derivatization, only two of the four quinones were detected in the range 1-10 mg/L (LODs=0.3-1.2 mg/L) and LODs were neither very satisfying for the four OH-PAHs (0.18-0.6 mg/L). So two derivatization processes were optimized, comparing to literature: one for silylation of OH-PAHs, one for acetylation of quinones. Silylation using BSTFA/TCMS 99/1 was enhanced using a mixture of catalyst solvents (pyridine/ethyle acetate) and finding the appropriate reaction duration (5-60 minutes). Acetylation was optimized at different steps of the process, including the initial volume of compounds to derivatize, the added amounts of Zn (0.1-0.25 g), the nature of the derivatization product (acetic anhydride, heptafluorobutyric acid…) and the liquid/liquid extraction at the end of the process. After derivatization, LODs were decreased by a factor 3 for OH-PAHs and by a factor 4 for quinones, all the quinones being now detected. Thereafter, quinones and OH-PAHs were extracted from spiked sediments using microwave assisted extraction (MAE) followed by GC-MS analysis. Several mixtures of solvents of different volumes (10-25 mL) and using different extraction temperatures (80-120°C) were tested to obtain the best recovery yields. Satisfactory recoveries could be obtained for quinones (70-96%) and for OH-PAHs (70-104%). Temperature was a critical factor which had to be controlled to avoid oxy-PAHs degradation during the MAE extraction process. Conclusion: Even if MAE-GC-MS was satisfactory to analyze these oxy-PAHs, MAE optimization has to be carried on to obtain a most appropriate extraction solvent mixture, allowing a direct injection in the HPLC-UV-FLD system, which is more sensitive than GC-MS and does not necessitate a previous long derivatization step.

Keywords: derivatizations for GC-MS, microwave assisted extraction, on-line HPLC-UV-FLD, oxygenated PAHs, polluted sediments

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Authors: Bukra Kalayci, Geraldine Brennan

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Introduction: Over the last decade, a proliferation of literature related to textile and fashion business in the context of sustainable production and consumption has emerged. However, the economic and environmental benefits of solid waste recovery have not been comprehensively searched. Therefore at the end-of-life or end-of-use textile waste management remains a gap. Solid textile waste reuse and recycling principles of the circular economy need to be developed to close the disposal stage of the textile supply chain. The environmental problems associated with the over-production and –consumption of textile products arise. Together with growing population and fast fashion culture the share of solid textile waste in municipal waste is increasing. Focusing on post-consumer textile waste literature, this research explores the opportunities, obstacles and enablers or success factors associated with closed-loop textile business systems. Methodology: A systematic literature review was conducted in order to identify best practices and gaps from the existing body of knowledge related to closed-loop post-consumer textile waste initiatives over the last decade. Selected keywords namely: ‘cradle-to-cradle ‘, ‘circular* economy* ‘, ‘closed-loop* ‘, ‘end-of-life* ‘, ‘reverse* logistic* ‘, ‘take-back* ‘, ‘remanufacture* ‘, ‘upcycle* ‘ with the combination of (and) ‘fashion* ‘, ‘garment* ‘, ‘textile* ‘, ‘apparel* ‘, clothing* ‘ were used and the time frame of the review was set between 2005 to 2017. In order to obtain a broad coverage, Web of Knowledge and Science Direct databases were used, and peer-reviewed journal articles were chosen. The keyword search identified 299 number of papers which was further refined into 54 relevant papers that form the basis of the in-depth thematic analysis. Preliminary findings: A key finding was that the existing literature is predominantly conceptual rather than applied or empirical work. Moreover, the enablers or success factors, obstacles and opportunities to implement closed-loop systems in the textile industry were not clearly articulated and the following considerations were also largely overlooked in the literature. While the circular economy suggests multiple cycles of discarded products, components or materials, most research has to date tended to focus on a single cycle. Thus the calculations of environmental and economic benefits of closed-loop systems are limited to one cycle which does not adequately explore the feasibility or potential benefits of multiple cycles. Additionally, the time period textile products spend between point of sale, and end-of-use/end-of-life return is a crucial factor. Despite past efforts to study closed-loop textile systems a clear gap in the literature is the lack of a clear evaluation framework which enables manufacturers to clarify the reusability potential of textile products through consideration of indicators related too: quality, design, lifetime, length of time between manufacture and product return, volume of collected disposed products, material properties, and brand segment considerations (e.g. fast fashion versus luxury brands).

Keywords: circular fashion, closed loop business, product service systems, solid textile waste elimination

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Authors: Adeline Stals

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The transformation of architectural design practices has been underway for almost forty years due to the development and democratization of computer technology. New and more efficient tools are constantly being proposed to architects, amplifying a technological wave that sometimes stimulates them, sometimes overwhelms them, depending essentially on their digital culture and the context (socio-economic, structural, organizational) in which they work on a daily basis. Our focus is on VR, AR, and MR technologies dedicated to architecture. The commercialization of affordable headsets like the Oculus Rift, the HTC Vive or more low-tech like the Google CardBoard, makes it more accessible to benefit from these technologies. In that regard, researchers report the growing interest of these tools for architects, given the new perspectives they open up in terms of workflow, representation, collaboration, and client’s involvement. However, studies rarely mention the consequences of the sample studied on results. Our research provides an overview of VR, AR, and MR researches among a corpus of papers selected from conferences and journals. A closer look at the sample of these research projects highlights the necessity to take into consideration the context of studies in order to develop tools truly dedicated to the real practices of specific architect profiles. This literature review formalizes milestones for future challenges to address. The methodology applied is based on a systematic review of two sources of publications. The first one is the Cumincad database, which regroups publications from conferences exclusively about digital in architecture. Additionally, the second part of the corpus is based on journal publications. Journals have been selected considering their ranking on Scimago. Among the journals in the predefined category ‘architecture’ and in Quartile 1 for 2018 (last update when consulted), we have retained the ones related to the architectural design process: Design Studies, CoDesign, Architectural Science Review, Frontiers of Architectural Research and Archnet-IJAR. Beside those journals, IJAC, not classified in the ‘architecture’ category, is selected by the author for its adequacy with architecture and computing. For all requests, the search terms were ‘virtual reality’, ‘augmented reality’, and ‘mixed reality’ in title and/or keywords for papers published between 2015 and 2019 (included). This frame time is defined considering the fast evolution of these technologies in the past few years. Accordingly, the systematic review covers 202 publications. The literature review on studies about XR technologies establishes the state of the art of the current situation. It highlights that studies are mostly based on experimental contexts with controlled conditions (pedagogical, e.g.) or on practices established in large architectural offices of international renown. However, few studies focus on the strategies and practices developed by offices of smaller size, which represent the largest part of the market. Indeed, a European survey studying the architectural profession in Europe in 2018 reveals that 99% of offices are composed of less than ten people, and 71% of only one person. The study also showed that the number of medium-sized offices is continuously decreasing in favour of smaller structures. In doing so, a frontier seems to remain between the worlds of research and practice, especially for the majority of small architectural practices having a modest use of technology. This paper constitutes a reference for the next step of the research and for further worldwide researches by facilitating their contextualization.

Keywords: architectural design, literature review, SME, XR technologies

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Authors: Peter Falanga

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During the process of de-Stalinization that began in 1956 with the Twentieth Congress of the Soviet Communist Party, many filmmakers in Hungary chose to explore their country’s political discomforts by using Socialist Realism as a negative model against which they could react to the dominating ideology. A renewed national film industry and a more permissive political regime would allow filmmakers to take to task the plight of the preceding generation who had experienced the fatal political turmoil of both World Wars and the purges of Stalin. What follows is no longer the multigenerational unity found in Socialist Realism wherein both the old and the young embrace Stalin’s revolutionary optimism; instead, the protagonists are parentless, and thus their connection to the previous generation is partially severed. In these films, violent historical forces leave one generation to search for both a connection with their family’s past, and for moral guidance to direct their future. István Szabó’s Father (1966), Márta Mészáros Diary for My Children (1984), and Pál Gábor’s Angi Vera (1978) each consider the fraught relationship between successive generations through the lens of postwar youth. A characteristic each of their protagonist’s share is that they are all missing one or both parents, and cope with familial loss either through recalling memories of their parents in dream-like sequences, or, in the case of Angi Vera, through embracing the surrogate paternalism that the Communist Party promises to provide. This paper considers the argument these films present about the progress of Hungarian history, and how this topic is explored in more recent films that similarly focus on the transmission of generational values. Scholars such as László Strausz and John Cunningham have written on the continuous concern with the transmission of generational values in more recent films such as István Szabó’s Sunshine (1999), Béla Tarr’s Werckmeister Harmonies (2000), György Pálfi’s Taxidermia (2006), Ágnes Kocsis’ Pál Adrienn (2010), and Kornél Mundruczó’s Evolution (2021). These films, they argue, make intimate portrayals of the various sweeping political changes in Hungary’s history and question how these epochs or events have impacted Hungarian identities. If these films attempt to personalize historical shifts of Hungary, then what is the significance of featuring characters who have lost one or both parents? An attempt to understand this coherent trend in Hungarian cinema will profit from examining the earlier, celebrated films of Szabó, Mészáros, and Gábor, who inaugurated this preoccupation with generational values. The pervasive interplay of dreams and memory in their films invites an additional element to their argument concerning historical progression. This paper incorporates Richard Teniman’s notion of the “dialectics of memory” in which memory is in a constant process of negation and reinvention to explain why these Directors prefer to explore Hungarian identity through the disarranged form of psychological realism over the linear causality structure of historical realism.

Keywords: film theory, Eastern European Studies, film history, Eastern European History

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Authors: Szymon Rutkowski, Tomasz Korbak

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We present a reinforcement-learning-based method of training neural machine translation models without parallel corpora. The standard encoder-decoder approach to machine translation suffers from two problems we aim to address. First, it needs parallel corpora, which are scarce, especially for low-resource languages. Second, it lacks psychological plausibility of learning procedure: learning a foreign language is about learning to communicate useful information, not merely learning to transduce from one language’s 'encoding' to another. We instead pose the problem of learning to translate as learning a policy in a communication game between two agents: the translator and the classifier. The classifier is trained beforehand on a natural language inference task (determining the entailment relation between a premise and a hypothesis) in the target language. The translator produces a sequence of actions that correspond to generating translations of both the hypothesis and premise, which are then passed to the classifier. The translator is rewarded for classifier’s performance on determining entailment between sentences translated by the translator to disciple’s native language. Translator’s performance thus reflects its ability to communicate useful information to the classifier. In effect, we train a machine translation model without the need for parallel corpora altogether. While similar reinforcement learning formulations for zero-shot translation were proposed before, there is a number of improvements we introduce. While prior research aimed at grounding the translation task in the physical world by evaluating agents on an image captioning task, we found that using a linguistic task is more sample-efficient. Natural language inference (also known as recognizing textual entailment) captures semantic properties of sentence pairs that are poorly correlated with semantic similarity, thus enforcing basic understanding of the role played by compositionality. It has been shown that models trained recognizing textual entailment produce high-quality general-purpose sentence embeddings transferrable to other tasks. We use stanford natural language inference (SNLI) dataset as well as its analogous datasets for French (XNLI) and Polish (CDSCorpus). Textual entailment corpora can be obtained relatively easily for any language, which makes our approach more extensible to low-resource languages than traditional approaches based on parallel corpora. We evaluated a number of reinforcement learning algorithms (including policy gradients and actor-critic) to solve the problem of translator’s policy optimization and found that our attempts yield some promising improvements over previous approaches to reinforcement-learning based zero-shot machine translation.

Keywords: agent-based language learning, low-resource translation, natural language inference, neural machine translation, reinforcement learning

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Authors: Nabil Al-Zaqri

Abstract:

Semiconductor photocatalysts with surface defects display incredible light absorption bandwidth, and these defects function as highly active sites for oxidation processes by interacting with the surface band structure. Accordingly, engineering the photocatalyst with surface oxygen vacancies will enhance the semiconductor nanostructure's photocatalytic efficiency. Herein, a CeO2₋ₓ nanostructure is designed under the influence of low-frequency ultrasonic waves to create surface oxygen vacancies. This approach enhances the photocatalytic efficiency compared to many heterostructures while keeping the intrinsiccrystal structure intact. Ultrasonic waves induce the acoustic cavitation effect leading to the dissemination of active elements on the surface, which results in vacancy formation in conjunction with larger surface area and smaller particle size. The structural analysis of CeO₂₋ₓ revealed higher crystallinity, as well as morphological optimization, and the presence of oxygen vacancies is verified through Raman, X-rayphotoelectron spectroscopy, temperature-programmed reduction, photoluminescence, and electron spinresonance analyses. Oxygen vacancies accelerate the redox cycle between Ce₄+ and Ce₃+ by prolongingphotogenerated charge recombination. The ultrasound-treated pristine CeO₂ sample achieved excellenthydrogen production showing a quantum efficiency of 1.125% and efficient organic degradation. Ourpromising findings demonstrated that ultrasonic treatment causes the formation of surface oxygenvacancies and improves photocatalytic hydrogen evolution and pollution degradation. Conclusion: Defect engineering of the ceria nanoparticles with oxygen vacancies was achieved for the first time using low-frequency ultrasound treatment. The U-CeO₂₋ₓsample showed high crystallinity, and morphological changes were observed. Due to the acoustic cavitation effect, a larger surface area and small particle size were observed. The ultrasound treatment causes particle aggregation and surface defects leading to oxygen vacancy formation. The XPS, Raman spectroscopy, PL spectroscopy, and ESR results confirm the presence of oxygen vacancies. The ultrasound-treated sample was also examined for pollutant degradation, where 1O₂was found to be the major active species. Hence, the ultrasound treatment influences efficient photocatalysts for superior hydrogen evolution and an excellent photocatalytic degradation of contaminants. The prepared nanostructure showed excellent stability and recyclability. This work could pave the way for a unique post-synthesis strategy intended for efficient photocatalytic nanostructures.

Keywords: surface defect, CeO₂₋ₓ, photocatalytic, water treatment, H₂ production

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Authors: Benjamin Blat Belmonte, Stephan Rinderknecht

Abstract:

The transition to electric vehicles (EVs) stands at the forefront of innovative strategies designed to address environmental concerns and reduce fossil fuel dependency. As the number of EVs on the roads increases, so too does the potential for their integration into energy markets. This research dives deep into the transformative possibilities of using electric vehicle fleets, specifically electric bus fleets, not just as consumers but as active participants in the energy market. This paper investigates the feasibility and grid effects of electric vehicle fleet operators in the energy market. Our objective centers around a comprehensive exploration of the sector coupling domain, with an emphasis on the economic potential in both electricity and balancing markets. Methodologically, our approach combines data mining techniques with thorough pre-processing, pulling from a rich repository of electricity and balancing market data. Our findings are grounded in the actual operational realities of the bus fleet operator in Darmstadt, Germany. We employ a Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) approach, with the bulk of the computations being processed on the High-Performance Computing (HPC) platform ‘Lichtenbergcluster’. Our findings underscore the compelling economic potential of EV fleets in the energy market. With electric buses becoming more prevalent, the considerable size of these fleets, paired with their substantial battery capacity, opens up new horizons for energy market participation. Notably, our research reveals that economic viability is not the sole advantage. Participating actively in the energy market also translates into pronounced positive effects on grid stabilization. Essentially, EV fleet operators can serve a dual purpose: facilitating transport while simultaneously playing an instrumental role in enhancing grid reliability and resilience. This research highlights the symbiotic relationship between the growth of EV fleets and the stabilization of the energy grid. Such systems could lead to both commercial and ecological advantages, reinforcing the value of electric bus fleets in the broader landscape of sustainable energy solutions. In conclusion, the electrification of transport offers more than just a means to reduce local greenhouse gas emissions. By positioning electric vehicle fleet operators as active participants in the energy market, there lies a powerful opportunity to drive forward the energy transition. This study serves as a testament to the synergistic potential of EV fleets in bolstering both economic viability and grid stabilization, signaling a promising trajectory for future sector coupling endeavors.

Keywords: electric vehicle fleet, sector coupling, optimization, electricity market, balancing market

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Authors: Mathieu Bourdeau, Philippe Basset, Julien Waeytens, Elyes Nefzaoui

Abstract:

As residential buildings account for a third of the overall energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in Europe, building energy modeling is an essential tool to reach energy efficiency goals. In the energy modeling process, calibration is a mandatory step to obtain accurate and reliable energy simulations. Nevertheless, the comparison between simulation results and the actual building energy behavior often highlights a significant performance gap. The literature discusses different origins of energy performance gaps, from building design to building operation. Then, building operation description in energy models, especially energy usages and users’ behavior, plays an important role in the reliability of simulations but is also the most accessible target for post-occupancy energy management and optimization. Therefore, the present study aims to discuss results on the calibration ofresidential building energy models using real operation data. Data are collected through a sensor network of more than 180 sensors and advanced energy meters deployed in three collective residential buildings undergoing major retrofit actions. The sensor network is implemented at building scale and in an eight-apartment sample. Data are collected for over one year and half and coverbuilding energy behavior – thermal and electricity, indoor environment, inhabitants’ comfort, occupancy, occupants behavior and energy uses, and local weather. Building energy simulations are performed using a physics-based building energy modeling software (Pleaides software), where the buildings’features are implemented according to the buildingsthermal regulation code compliance study and the retrofit project technical files. Sensitivity analyses are performed to highlight the most energy-driving building features regarding each end-use. These features are then compared with the collected post-occupancy data. Energy-driving features are progressively replaced with field data for a step-by-step calibration of the energy model. Results of this study provide an analysis of energy performance gap on an existing residential case study under deep retrofit actions. It highlights the impact of the different building features on the energy behavior and the performance gap in this context, such as temperature setpoints, indoor occupancy, the building envelopeproperties but also domestic hot water usage or heat gains from electric appliances. The benefits of inputting field data from an extensive instrumentation campaign instead of standardized scenarios are also described. Finally, the exhaustive instrumentation solution provides useful insights on the needs, advantages, and shortcomings of the implemented sensor network for its replicability on a larger scale and for different use cases.

Keywords: calibration, building energy modeling, performance gap, sensor network

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Authors: Kiran Datta, Daniella Holland-Hart, Anthony Byrne

Abstract:

Introduction: Oesophago-gastric (OG) cancers are the fifth commonest in the UK, accounting for over 12,000 deaths each year. Most patients will present at later stages of the disease, with only 21% of patients with stage 4 disease surviving longer than a year. As a result, many patients are unsuitable for curative surgery and instead receive palliative treatment to improve prognosis and symptom burden. However, palliative chemotherapy can result in significant toxicity: almost half of the patients are unable to complete their chemotherapy regimen, with this proportion rising significantly in older and frailer patients. In addition, clinical trials often exclude older and frailer patients due to strict inclusion criteria, meaning there is limited evidence to guide which patients are most likely to benefit from palliative chemotherapy. Inappropriate chemotherapy administration is at odds with the goals of palliative treatment and care, which are to improve quality of life, and this also represents a significant resource expenditure. This literature review aimed to examine and appraise evidence regarding treatment resilience in order to guide clinicians in identifying the most suitable candidates for palliative chemotherapy. Factors influencing treatment resilience were assessed, as measured by completion rates, dose reductions, and toxicities. Methods: This literature review was conducted using rapid review methodology, utilising modified systematic methods. A literature search was performed across the MEDLINE, EMBASE, and Cochrane Library databases, with results limited to papers within the last 15 years and available in English. Key inclusion criteria included: 1) participants with either oesophageal, gastro-oesophageal junction, or gastric cancers; 2) patients treated with palliative chemotherapy; 3) available data evaluating the association between baseline participant characteristics and treatment resilience. Results: Of the 2326 papers returned, 11 reports of 10 studies were included in this review after excluding duplicates and irrelevant papers. Treatment resilience factors that were assessed included: age, performance status, frailty, inflammatory markers, and sarcopenia. Age was generally a poor predictor for how well patients would tolerate chemotherapy, while poor performance status was a better indicator of the need for dose reduction and treatment non-completion. Frailty was assessed across one cohort using multiple screening tools and was an effective marker of the risk of toxicity and the requirement for dose reduction. Inflammatory markers included lymphopenia and the Glasgow Prognostic Score, which assessed inflammation and hypoalbuminaemia. Although quick to obtain and interpret, these findings appeared less reliable due to the inclusion of patients treated with palliative radiotherapy. Sarcopenia and body composition were often associated with chemotherapy toxicity but not the rate of regimen completion. Conclusion: This review demonstrates that there are numerous measures that can estimate the ability of patients with oesophago-gastric cancer to tolerate palliative chemotherapy, and these should be incorporated into clinical assessments to promote personalised decision-making around treatment. Age should not be a barrier to receiving chemotherapy and older and frailer patients should be included in future clinical trials to better represent typical patients with oesophago-gastric cancers. Decisions regarding palliative treatment should be guided by these factors identified as well as patient preference.

Keywords: frailty, oesophago-gastric cancer, palliative chemotherapy, treatment resilience

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Authors: Funda Erdem Şahnali, Ş. Özgür Atayılmaz, Tolga N. Aynur

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Almost all of the domestic refrigerators operate on the principle of the vapor compression refrigeration cycle and removal of heat from the refrigerator cabinets is done via one of the two methods: natural convection or forced convection. In this study, airflow and temperature distributions inside a 375L no-frost type larder cabinet, in which cooling is provided by forced convection, are evaluated both experimentally and numerically. Airflow rate, compressor capacity and temperature distribution in the cooling chamber are known to be some of the most important factors that affect the cooling performance and energy consumption of a refrigerator. The objective of this study is to evaluate the original temperature distribution in the larder cabinet, and investigate for better temperature distribution solutions throughout the refrigerator domain via system optimizations that could provide uniform temperature distribution. The flow visualization and airflow velocity measurements inside the original refrigerator are performed via Stereoscopic Particle Image Velocimetry (SPIV). In addition, airflow and temperature distributions are investigated numerically with Ansys Fluent. In order to study the heat transfer inside the aforementioned refrigerator, forced convection theories covering the following cases are applied: closed rectangular cavity representing heat transfer inside the refrigerating compartment. The cavity volume has been represented with finite volume elements and is solved computationally with appropriate momentum and energy equations (Navier-Stokes equations). The 3D model is analyzed as transient, with k-ε turbulence model and SIMPLE pressure-velocity coupling for turbulent flow situation. The results obtained with the 3D numerical simulations are in quite good agreement with the experimental airflow measurements using the SPIV technique. After Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis of the baseline case, the effects of three parameters: compressor capacity, fan rotational speed and type of shelf (glass or wire) are studied on the energy consumption; pull down time, temperature distributions in the cabinet. For each case, energy consumption based on experimental results is calculated. After the analysis, the main effective parameters for temperature distribution inside a cabin and energy consumption based on CFD simulation are determined and simulation results are supplied for Design of Experiments (DOE) as input data for optimization. The best configuration with minimum energy consumption that provides minimum temperature difference between the shelves inside the cabinet is determined.

Keywords: air distribution, CFD, DOE, energy consumption, experimental, larder cabinet, refrigeration, uniform temperature

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Authors: Artem Kim, Clara Savary, Christele Dubourg, Wilfrid Carre, Houda Hamdi-Roze, Valerie Dupé, Sylvie Odent, Marie De Tayrac, Veronique David

Abstract:

Holoprosencephaly (HPE) is a rare congenital brain malformation resulting from the incomplete separation of the two cerebral hemispheres. It is characterized by a wide phenotypic spectrum and a high degree of locus heterogeneity. Genetic defects in 16 genes have already been implicated in HPE, but account for only 30% of cases, suggesting that a large part of genetic factors remains to be discovered. HPE has been recently redefined as a complex multigenic disorder, requiring the joint effect of multiple mutational events in genes belonging to one or several developmental pathways. The onset of HPE may result from accumulation of the effects of multiple rare variants in functionally-related genes, each conferring a moderate increase in the risk of HPE onset. In order to decipher the genetic basis of HPE, unconventional patterns of inheritance involving multiple genetic factors need to be considered. The primary objective of this study was to uncover possible disease causing combinations of multiple rare variants underlying HPE by performing trio-based Whole Exome Sequencing (WES) of familial cases where no molecular diagnosis could be established. 39 families were selected with no fully-penetrant causal mutation in known HPE gene, no chromosomic aberrations/copy number variants and without any implication of environmental factors. As the main challenge was to identify disease-related variants among a large number of nonpathogenic polymorphisms detected by WES classical scheme, a novel variant prioritization approach was established. It combined WES filtering with complementary gene-level approaches: transcriptome-driven (RNA-Seq data) and clinically-driven (public clinical data) strategies. Briefly, a filtering approach was performed to select variants compatible with disease segregation, population frequency and pathogenicity prediction to identify an exhaustive list of rare deleterious variants. The exome search space was then reduced by restricting the analysis to candidate genes identified by either transcriptome-driven strategy (genes sharing highly similar expression patterns with known HPE genes during cerebral development) or clinically-driven strategy (genes associated to phenotypes of interest overlapping with HPE). Deeper analyses of candidate variants were then performed on a family-by-family basis. These included the exploration of clinical information, expression studies, variant characteristics, recurrence of mutated genes and available biological knowledge. A novel bioinformatics pipeline was designed. Applied to the 39 families, this final integrated workflow identified an average of 11 candidate variants per family. Most of candidate variants were inherited from asymptomatic parents suggesting a multigenic inheritance pattern requiring the association of multiple mutational events. The manual analysis highlighted 5 new strong HPE candidate genes showing recurrences in distinct families. Functional validations of these genes are foreseen.

Keywords: complex genetic disorder, holoprosencephaly, multiple rare variants, whole exome sequencing

Procedia PDF Downloads 181