A remote monitoring and control system for ecosystem replication experiments

In this dissertation the implementation of remote monitoring and control for multiple and independent experiments, namely, ecosystem replication experiments, is described, first by presenting the main concepts behind the system architecture, and ultimately its design, and secondly by discussing its implementation. The system architecture makes use of IEEE 802.15.4 Standard for Wireless Communications, a BeagleBone Black as the central coordinator for the experiments, Arduinos as the monitoring and control device for each experiment, a Web Database for data storing, and a Website to be used as a Human Machine Interface

Palliative care for life-limited children and young adults: the role of medical care in the development of children’s and young adults’ hospice services.

Paediatric Palliative Medicine [PPM] within children’s and young adults’ [CYA] hospices has developed in an ad hoc manner. To date, clear description and classification of PPM service provision within CYA hospices has been absent (Help the Hospices Commission 2013; TfSL 2013). National guidelines state that specialist children’s palliative care services will include a Consultant in PPM (NHS England 2013; NICE 2016c). However there is limited research into the benefits of this (Mitchell et al. 2017). The aims of this study were to: (1) Describe and classify existing approaches to PPM service provision in CYA hospices across the UK, (2) Explore how CYA hospices respond when a child with a life-limiting or life-threatening condition [LLLTC] has unstable symptoms, is deteriorating or is dying, and (3) Determine if and how varying approaches to PPM service provision in CYA hospices impact on abilities to respond when a child with a LLLTC has unstable symptoms, is deteriorating or is dying. A mixed methods survey was conducted by telephone interview with leaders of CYA hospices. The convergent mixed methods design included quantitative, qualitative and case scenario data collection. A comparative case study approach guided analysis of case scenario data and data integration. 31 interviews were conducted, relating to 28 CYA hospice services, representing 34 inpatient units and 25 community services. Thematic analysis identified two overarching themes: Increasing complexity of care needs and Diversity in PPM approaches. Quantitative analysis demonstrated participating hospices supporting children with significant complex medical needs. All participating inpatient units provided some medical cover but with a diverse range of approaches and limited specialist PPM involvement. Participating hospices employed 0-13 doctors each, providing 0-120 hours medical presence weekly plus on call. 159 doctors were identified as working in CYA hospices; 63.5% were GPs. Only 27.5% of doctors working in participating CYA hospices had specialist training in PPM. The majority of CYAs’ hospices (67.9%) did not have involvement from a PPM consultant. A geographic-specialist classification of approaches to PPM service provision by CYA hospices was developed. Case scenario analysis identified a diverse range of responses by CYA hospices when a child with a LLLTC has unstable symptoms, is deteriorating or is dying. The impact of specialist PPM indicates a unique function of regional specialist CYA hospices as distinct from regional non-specialist, local specialist and local non-specialist CYA hospices. Findings demonstrate the diversity in amount and specialism of medical service provision in CYA hospices. Alongside this the complexity in medical needs of CYAs with LLLTC is increasing. The geographical-specialist classification of PPM service provision within CYA hospices could be used as a foundation for future recommendations for a networked approach to PPM within CYA hospices in order to promote equity and maximum positive impact for children with LLLTC

Aeronautical engineering: A continuing bibliography with indexes (supplement 284)

This bibliography lists 974 reports, articles, and other documents introduced into the NASA scientific and technical information system in Oct. 1992. The coverage includes documents on design, construction, evaluation, testing, operation, and performance of aircraft (including aircraft engines) and associated components, equipment, and systems. It also includes research and development in aerodynamics, aeronautics, and ground support equipment for aeronautical vehicles

Introduction to Development Engineering

This open access textbook introduces the emerging field of Development Engineering and its constituent theories, methods, and applications. It is both a teaching text for students and a resource for researchers and practitioners engaged in the design and scaling of technologies for low-resource communities. The scope is broad, ranging from the development of mobile applications for low-literacy users to hardware and software solutions for providing electricity and water in remote settings. It is also highly interdisciplinary, drawing on methods and theory from the social sciences as well as engineering and the natural sciences. The opening section reviews the history of “technology-for-development” research, and presents a framework that formalizes this body of work and begins its transformation into an academic discipline. It identifies common challenges in development and explains the book’s iterative approach of “innovation, implementation, evaluation, adaptation.” Each of the next six thematic sections focuses on a different sector: energy and environment; market performance; education and labor; water, sanitation and health; digital governance; and connectivity. These thematic sections contain case studies from landmark research that directly integrates engineering innovation with technically rigorous methods from the social sciences. Each case study describes the design, evaluation, and/or scaling of a technology in the field and follows a single form, with common elements and discussion questions, to create continuity and pedagogical consistency. Together, they highlight successful solutions to development challenges, while also analyzing the rarely discussed failures. The book concludes by reiterating the core principles of development engineering illustrated in the case studies, highlighting common challenges that engineers and scientists will face in designing technology interventions that sustainably accelerate economic development. Development Engineering provides, for the first time, a coherent intellectual framework for attacking the challenges of poverty and global climate change through the design of better technologies. It offers the rigorous discipline needed to channel the energy of a new generation of scientists and engineers toward advancing social justice and improved living conditions in low-resource communities around the world

Introduction to development engineering: a framework with applications from the field

This open access textbook introduces the emerging field of Development Engineering and its constituent theories, methods, and applications. It is both a teaching text for students and a resource for researchers and practitioners engaged in the design and scaling of technologies for low-resource communities. The scope is broad, ranging from the development of mobile applications for low-literacy users to hardware and software solutions for providing electricity and water in remote settings. It is also highly interdisciplinary, drawing on methods and theory from the social sciences as well as engineering and the natural sciences. The opening section reviews the history of “technology-for-development” research, and presents a framework that formalizes this body of work and begins its transformation into an academic discipline. It identifies common challenges in development and explains the book’s iterative approach of “innovation, implementation, evaluation, adaptation.” Each of the next six thematic sections focuses on a different sector: energy and environment; market performance; education and labor; water, sanitation and health; digital governance; and connectivity. These thematic sections contain case studies from landmark research that directly integrates engineering innovation with technically rigorous methods from the social sciences. Each case study describes the design, evaluation, and/or scaling of a technology in the field and follows a single form, with common elements and discussion questions, to create continuity and pedagogical consistency. Together, they highlight successful solutions to development challenges, while also analyzing the rarely discussed failures. The book concludes by reiterating the core principles of development engineering illustrated in the case studies, highlighting common challenges that engineers and scientists will face in designing technology interventions that sustainably accelerate economic development. Development Engineering provides, for the first time, a coherent intellectual framework for attacking the challenges of poverty and global climate change through the design of better technologies. It offers the rigorous discipline needed to channel the energy of a new generation of scientists and engineers toward advancing social justice and improved living conditions in low-resource communities around the world

Energy efficiency in content delivery networks

The increasing popularity of bandwidth-intensive video Internet services has positioned Content Distribution Networks (CDNs) in the limelight as the emerging provider platforms for video delivery. The goal of CDNs is to maximise the availability of content in the network while maintaining the quality of experience expected by users. This is a challenging task due to the scattered nature of video content sources and destinations. Furthermore, the high energy consumption associated with content distribution calls for developing energy-efficient solutions able to cater for the future Internet. This thesis addresses the problem of content placement and update while considering energy consumption in CDNs. First, this work contributed a new energy-efficient caching scheme that stores the most popular content at the edge of the core network and optimises the size of cached content to minimise energy usage. It takes into account the trend of daily traffic and recommends putting inactive segments of caches in sleep-mode during off-peak hours. Our results showed that power minimisation is achieved by deploying switch-off capable caches, and the trend of active cache segments over the time of day follows the trend of traffic. Second, the study explores different content popularity distributions and determines their influence on power consumption. The distribution of content popularity dictates the resultant cache hit ratio achieved by storing a certain number of videos. Therefore, it directly influences the power consumption of the cache. The evaluation results indicated that under video services where the popularity of content is very diverse, the optimum solution is to store the few most popular videos in caches. In contrast, when video popularities are similar, the most power efficient scheme is either to cache the whole library or to avoid caching completely depending on the size of the video library. Third, this thesis contributed an evaluation of the power consumption of the network under real world TV data and considering standard and high definition TV programmes. We proposed a cache replacement algorithm based on the predictable nature of TV viewings. The time-driven proactive cache replacement algorithm replaces cache contents several times a day to minimise power consumption. The algorithm achieves major power savings on top of the power reductions introduced by caching. CDNs are expected to continue to be the backbone for Internet video applications. This work has shown that storing the right amount of popular videos in core caches reduces from 42% to 72% of network power consumption considering a range of content popularity distributions. Maintaining up-to-date cache contents reduces up to 48% and 86% of power consumption considering fixed and sleep-mode capable caches, respectively. Reducing the energy consumption of CDNs provides a valuable contribution for future green video delivery

Introduction to Development Engineering

This open access textbook introduces the emerging field of Development Engineering and its constituent theories, methods, and applications. It is both a teaching text for students and a resource for researchers and practitioners engaged in the design and scaling of technologies for low-resource communities. The scope is broad, ranging from the development of mobile applications for low-literacy users to hardware and software solutions for providing electricity and water in remote settings. It is also highly interdisciplinary, drawing on methods and theory from the social sciences as well as engineering and the natural sciences. The opening section reviews the history of “technology-for-development” research, and presents a framework that formalizes this body of work and begins its transformation into an academic discipline. It identifies common challenges in development and explains the book’s iterative approach of “innovation, implementation, evaluation, adaptation.” Each of the next six thematic sections focuses on a different sector: energy and environment; market performance; education and labor; water, sanitation and health; digital governance; and connectivity. These thematic sections contain case studies from landmark research that directly integrates engineering innovation with technically rigorous methods from the social sciences. Each case study describes the design, evaluation, and/or scaling of a technology in the field and follows a single form, with common elements and discussion questions, to create continuity and pedagogical consistency. Together, they highlight successful solutions to development challenges, while also analyzing the rarely discussed failures. The book concludes by reiterating the core principles of development engineering illustrated in the case studies, highlighting common challenges that engineers and scientists will face in designing technology interventions that sustainably accelerate economic development. Development Engineering provides, for the first time, a coherent intellectual framework for attacking the challenges of poverty and global climate change through the design of better technologies. It offers the rigorous discipline needed to channel the energy of a new generation of scientists and engineers toward advancing social justice and improved living conditions in low-resource communities around the world

The Internet of Things: A Review of Enabled Technologies and Future Challenges

The Internet of Things (IoT) is an emerging classical model, envisioned as a system of billions of small interconnected devices for posing the state-of-the-art findings to real-world glitches. Over the last decade, there has been an increasing research concentration in the IoT as an essential design of the constant convergence between human behaviors and their images on Information Technology. With the development of technologies, the IoT drives the deployment of across-the-board and self-organizing wireless networks. The IoT model is progressing toward the notion of a cyber-physical world, where things can be originated, driven, intermixed, and modernized to facilitate the emergence of any feasible association. This paper provides a summary of the existing IoT research that underlines enabling technologies, such as fog computing, wireless sensor networks, data mining, context awareness, real-time analytics, virtual reality, and cellular communications. Also, we present the lessons learned after acquiring a thorough representation of the subject. Thus, by identifying numerous open research challenges, it is presumed to drag more consideration into this novel paradigm. 2013 IEEE.This work was supported by Institute for Information and communications Technology Promotion (IITP) grant funded by the Korea government(MSIT) (No. 2018-0-01411, A Micro-Service IoTWare Framework Technology Development for Ultra small IoT Device).Scopus2-s2.0-8505888625

AI Applications to Power Systems

Today, the flow of electricity is bidirectional, and not all electricity is centrally produced in large power plants. With the growing emergence of prosumers and microgrids, the amount of electricity produced by sources other than large, traditional power plants is ever-increasing. These alternative sources include photovoltaic (PV), wind turbine (WT), geothermal, and biomass renewable generation plants. Some renewable energy resources (solar PV and wind turbine generation) are highly dependent on natural processes and parameters (wind speed, wind direction, temperature, solar irradiation, humidity, etc.). Thus, the outputs are so stochastic in nature. New data-science-inspired real-time solutions are needed in order to co-develop digital twins of large intermittent renewable plants whose services can be globally delivered