Estimating reliability by application of matrix representation

Technique based upon matrix representation and matrix collapsing calculates the probability of successfully completing manned missions and of returning the spacecrew safely to earth. This technique provides analytic expressions for each subsystem, making it possible to relate changes in subsystem reliability directly to mission success and crew safety

Sunflower Planting Date Trial

Sunflower is a relatively new crop for the Northeast, and producers are interested in growing this crop for both the oil and seed meal. These products can be used for fuel, feed and food. Sunflower can yield well here in Vermont, but pest pressures often compromise strong yields. Altering planting dates may help to mitigate some of these pest pressures by getting the plants through a vulnerable growth stage before or after the most active periods in a pest’s lifecycle. In addition, certain varieties may be impacted differently by alterations in planting date. Because Vermont has a short growing season, there is only so much flexibility when shifting planting dates and still expecting a viable harvest, so the maturity of a sunflower variety becomes a crucial factor. Two sunflower varieties with different maturities were assessed in this study evaluating the impacts of five varying planting dates on stand characteristics, pest damage, and seed and oil yield

Start/stop switches for testing detonation velocity of explosives

Printed-circuit process produces ordnance-initiated start/stop switches. Method is faster and less costly than fabriction by hand, and produces switches of uniform quality

GNSS-free outdoor localization techniques for resource-constrained IoT architectures : a literature review

Large-scale deployments of the Internet of Things (IoT) are adopted for performance improvement and cost reduction in several application domains. The four main IoT application domains covered throughout this article are smart cities, smart transportation, smart healthcare, and smart manufacturing. To increase IoT applicability, data generated by the IoT devices need to be time-stamped and spatially contextualized. LPWANs have become an attractive solution for outdoor localization and received significant attention from the research community due to low-power, low-cost, and long-range communication. In addition, its signals can be used for communication and localization simultaneously. There are different proposed localization methods to obtain the IoT relative location. Each category of these proposed methods has pros and cons that make them useful for specific IoT systems. Nevertheless, there are some limitations in proposed localization methods that need to be eliminated to meet the IoT ecosystem needs completely. This has motivated this work and provided the following contributions: (1) definition of the main requirements and limitations of outdoor localization techniques for the IoT ecosystem, (2) description of the most relevant GNSS-free outdoor localization methods with a focus on LPWAN technologies, (3) survey the most relevant methods used within the IoT ecosystem for improving GNSS-free localization accuracy, and (4) discussion covering the open challenges and future directions within the field. Some of the important open issues that have different requirements in different IoT systems include energy consumption, security and privacy, accuracy, and scalability. This paper provides an overview of research works that have been published between 2018 to July 2021 and made available through the Google Scholar database.5311-8814-F0ED | Sara Maria da Cruz Maia de Oliveira PaivaN/

Planning and urban climate: the example of the metropolitan area of Barcelona

Cities have a special role in Climate Change (CC). According to the Center for Human Settlements (UNHABITAT) cities stand for 75% of global energy consumption, as well as 80% of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). The contribution of urbanisation to climate change has two sides. On the one hand, the urban generation of GHG, which contributes in a decisive way to the global warming; and on the other hand, the radiation generated by the surface of the urbanised land, which determines a certain sensible and latent heat flow due to the type of urban roofs, as well as their degree of humidity. Although the climate of cities depends mainly on factors of regional character, the local and micro-scale factors, such as the different characteristics of the urban structure, the topography and surface of the ground cover, vegetation, as well as the anthropogenic heat generated by urban metabolism, among other factors, can modify the regional climate and generate urban microclimates. There are significant differences in the climate of urban areas compared to rural areas: the urban heat island (UHI) describes the influence of urban surfaces on the temperature patterns in contrast to the surrounding areas. Despite there is a high consensus that urban planning has a fundamental role to study, coordinate and implement measures to improve the urban climate for facing the climate change effect, the professionals still does not seem have internalized it. The Metropolitan Plan of Barcelona is now in process. The new plan for the metropolitan area should direct the urban development of 36 municipalities, bringing together about 3.5 million inhabitants. For the first time, the aim is to include climate assessment in urban planning in Barcelona in order to mitigate the effects of the UHI. The present paper shows the results of the research project developed at the Technical University of Catalonia (Urban CLIM-PLAN) directed to build a set of physical and urban models of UHI in order to integrate them into a platform for multiscale simulation of the climate system of the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona. The paper shows the methodology used to definePeer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Index to NASA Tech Briefs, 1975

This index contains abstracts and four indexes--subject, personal author, originating Center, and Tech Brief number--for 1975 Tech Briefs

Topside Pipeline Design for Slug Attenuation and Increased Oil Production

In oil and gas production system, slugging is frequently encountered when gas-liquid mixtures are transported through a common pipeline-riser system. This phenomenon usually manifests in significant fluctuation of flow and pressure which can impact the production system negatively. Topside choking is usually employed as a mitigation technique but with its attendant reduction in production capacity. The objective of this study therefore is to investigate the optimisation of topside pipeline diameter and choking for effective slug attenuation and optimised oil production. In this paper, a new method for slug flow attenuation has been proposed. The potential of using effective topside pipeline- diameter design for slug flow attenuation was theoretically shown. Numerical studies were also done to show that the concept can indeed be adapted for effective slug attenuation using an industrial software. Experimental studies were conducted in a 4” pipeline -riser system to validate the numerical and theoretical studies. The results showed that the optimised design of topside pipe diameter has potential for slug flow attenuation at larger valve opening which effectively translates to lower pressure and increased oil production. For the case studied, up to 49% reduction in the pressure drop across the topside choke valve was reported which practically implied increased flow capacity. An optimum volume which satisfied size, system stability and production constraints was obtained

Estimates of gene ensemble noise highlight critical pathways and predict disease severity in H1N1, COVID-19 and mortality in sepsis patients

Finding novel biomarkers for human pathologies and predicting clinical outcomes for patients is challenging. This stems from the heterogeneous response of individuals to disease and is reflected in the inter-individual variability of gene expression responses that obscures differential gene expression analysis. Here, we developed an alternative approach that could be applied to dissect the disease-associated molecular changes. We define gene ensemble noise as a measure that represents a variance for a collection of genes encoding for either members of known biological pathways or subunits of annotated protein complexes and calculated within an individual. The gene ensemble noise allows for the holistic identification and interpretation of gene expression disbalance on the level of gene networks and systems. By comparing gene expression data from COVID-19, H1N1, and sepsis patients we identified common disturbances in a number of pathways and protein complexes relevant to the sepsis pathology. Among others, these include the mitochondrial respiratory chain complex I and peroxisomes. This suggests a Warburg effect and oxidative stress as common hallmarks of the immune host-pathogen response. Finally, we showed that gene ensemble noise could successfully be applied for the prediction of clinical outcome namely, the mortality of patients. Thus, we conclude that gene ensemble noise represents a promising approach for the investigation of molecular mechanisms of pathology through a prism of alterations in the coherent expression of gene circuits

Quality of life is associated with chronic inflammation in schizophrenia: a cross-sectional study

International audienceInflammation may play a crucial role in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia. However, the association between chronic inflammation and health outcomes in schizophrenia remains unclear, particularly for patient-reported outcomes. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between quality of life (QoL) and chronic inflammation assessed using C -Reactive Protein (CRP) in patients with schizophrenia. Two hundred and fifty six patients with schizophrenia were enrolled in this study. After adjusting for key socio-demographic and clinical confounding factors, patients with high levels of CRP (>3.0 mg/l) had a lower QoL than patients with normal CRP levels (OR = 0.97, 95% CI = 0.94-0.99). An investigation of the dimensions of QoL revealed that psychological well-being, physical well-being and sentimental life were the most salient features of QoL associated with CRP. Significant associations were found between lower educational level (OR = 4.15, 95% CI = 1.55-11.07), higher body mass index (OR = 1.16, 95% CI = 1.06-1.28), higher Fagerstrom score (OR = 1.22, 95% CI = 1.01-1.47) and high levels of CRP. After replications with longitudinal approaches, the association between QoL and chronic inflammation may offer interesting interventional prospects to act both on inflammation and QoL in patients with schizophrenia