30,088 research outputs found
The SPHERE data center: a reference for high contrast imaging processing
The objective of the SPHERE Data Center is to optimize the scientific return
of SPHERE at the VLT, by providing optimized reduction procedures, services to
users and publicly available reduced data. This paper describes our motivation,
the implementation of the service (partners, infrastructure and developments),
services, description of the on-line data, and future developments. The SPHERE
Data Center is operational and has already provided reduced data with a good
reactivity to many observers. The first public reduced data have been made
available in 2017. The SPHERE Data Center is gathering a strong expertise on
SPHERE data and is in a very good position to propose new reduced data in the
future, as well as improved reduction procedures.Comment: SF2A proceeding
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Construction safety and digital design: a review
As digital technologies become widely used in designing buildings and infrastructure, questions arise about
their impacts on construction safety. This review explores relationships between construction safety and
digital design practices with the aim of fostering and directing further research. It surveys state-of-the-art
research on databases, virtual reality, geographic information systems, 4D CAD, building information
modeling and sensing technologies, finding various digital tools for addressing safety issues in the
construction phase, but few tools to support design for construction safety. It also considers a literature on
safety critical, digital and design practices that raises a general concern about ‘mindlessness’ in the use of
technologies, and has implications for the emerging research agenda around construction safety and digital
design. Bringing these strands of literature together suggests new kinds of interventions, such as the
development of tools and processes for using digital models to promote mindfulness through multi-party
collaboration on safet
Internet of Things-aided Smart Grid: Technologies, Architectures, Applications, Prototypes, and Future Research Directions
Traditional power grids are being transformed into Smart Grids (SGs) to
address the issues in existing power system due to uni-directional information
flow, energy wastage, growing energy demand, reliability and security. SGs
offer bi-directional energy flow between service providers and consumers,
involving power generation, transmission, distribution and utilization systems.
SGs employ various devices for the monitoring, analysis and control of the
grid, deployed at power plants, distribution centers and in consumers' premises
in a very large number. Hence, an SG requires connectivity, automation and the
tracking of such devices. This is achieved with the help of Internet of Things
(IoT). IoT helps SG systems to support various network functions throughout the
generation, transmission, distribution and consumption of energy by
incorporating IoT devices (such as sensors, actuators and smart meters), as
well as by providing the connectivity, automation and tracking for such
devices. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive survey on IoT-aided SG
systems, which includes the existing architectures, applications and prototypes
of IoT-aided SG systems. This survey also highlights the open issues,
challenges and future research directions for IoT-aided SG systems
HATSouth: a global network of fully automated identical wide-field telescopes
HATSouth is the world's first network of automated and homogeneous telescopes
that is capable of year-round 24-hour monitoring of positions over an entire
hemisphere of the sky. The primary scientific goal of the network is to
discover and characterize a large number of transiting extrasolar planets,
reaching out to long periods and down to small planetary radii. HATSouth
achieves this by monitoring extended areas on the sky, deriving high precision
light curves for a large number of stars, searching for the signature of
planetary transits, and confirming planetary candidates with larger telescopes.
HATSouth employs 6 telescope units spread over 3 locations with large longitude
separation in the southern hemisphere (Las Campanas Observatory, Chile; HESS
site, Namibia; Siding Spring Observatory, Australia). Each of the HATSouth
units holds four 0.18m diameter f/2.8 focal ratio telescope tubes on a common
mount producing an 8.2x8.2 arcdeg field, imaged using four 4Kx4K CCD cameras
and Sloan r filters, to give a pixel scale of 3.7 arcsec/pixel. The HATSouth
network is capable of continuously monitoring 128 square arc-degrees. We
present the technical details of the network, summarize operations, and present
weather statistics for the 3 sites. On average each of the 6 HATSouth units has
conducted observations on ~500 nights over a 2-year time period, yielding a
total of more than 1million science frames at 4 minute integration time, and
observing ~10.65 hours per day on average. We describe the scheme of our data
transfer and reduction from raw pixel images to trend-filtered light curves and
transiting planet candidates. Photometric precision reaches ~6 mmag at 4-minute
cadence for the brightest non-saturated stars at r~10.5. We present detailed
transit recovery simulations to determine the expected yield of transiting
planets from HATSouth. (abridged)Comment: 25 pages, 11 figures, 1 table, submitted to PAS
Catalog of Approaches to Impact Measurement: Assessing Social Impact in Private Ventures
To inform action impact investors could take to measure impact in a coordinated manner, The Rockefeller Foundation commissioned the study of impact assessment approaches presented here.It is natural to hope to find a single, turnkey solution that can address all measurement needs. In this study we conducted a survey of impact investors and complemented it with seven years of experience in the field of impact investing to discover what these investors want from impact measurement, and conducted in-depth interviews with over twenty entities that have developed and implemented approaches to measuring impact. Our survey of existing approaches was thorough but surely is not comprehensive; however the approaches are a good representation of the current state of play. What we found is that there is not one single measurement answer. Instead the answer depends on what solution is most appropriate for a particular investor's "impact profile" defined as the investor's level of risk tolerance and desired financial return, the particular sector in which the investor operates, geography, and credibility level of information about impact that the investor requires
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