A system for automating the interpretation of Analytical Ultracentrifuge data

In order to accelerate the development of knowledge about protein associations, further improvements to acquisition, sharing, and analysis of Analytical Ultracentrifugation (AU) data must be made. XML data formats have been defined to allow complete exchange of the information associated with an AU experiment. Extensible formats to record solution identity, instrument setup parameters, acquired data, and analysis of that data have been developed. A normalized relational database to allow storage and searching of this data has also been created. A computer program called PANDaS (Protein Association Network Data Server) was built to interact with any software conforming to the data exchange standard. Conforming software will be able to access centrifuge data with the complete context required for analysis. It is also possible to import existing data files to the database and convert them to the exchange format using the import tool described in this dissertation. Aggregation of multiple analysis results through PANDaS allows for machine-assisted interpretation of results from heterogeneous analysis techniques and multiple experiments. This common data exchange format and attendant software are necessary underpinnings that enable the diverse developers of AU analysis software to collaborate more effectively. Such collaboration facilitates the construction of a system of interacting software tools that will improve our understanding of molecular associations as the effectors of interesting biology

Distributed Ledger Technologies and Blockchain systems: Digital Currency, Smart Contract and other applications

Questo studio si propone di analizzare il complesso delle novità introdotte al sistema dei pagamenti e al trasferimento di diritti da Distributed Ledger e Blockchain, in una prospettiva che tenga conto delle applicazioni di mercato di queste innovazioni tecnologiche e della tutela giuridica degli interessi economici e delle posizioni soggettive che ne derivano. In particolar modo, l’opera vuole stimolare la discussione volta alla definizione di un quadro normativo socialmente adeguato che sostenga l’efficienza di questi strumenti in un’ottica di scambio economico globalizzato.This essay aims at analyzing the ensemble of innovation introduced by Distributed Ledger and Blockchain to the payment system and the transfer of rights, in a perspective considering the market applications of these new technologies and the legal protection of deriving economics interests and individual rights. Purposely, our dissertation aspires to encourage the discussion for the definition of a socially adequate legal framework sustaining the efficiency of these instruments in a global exchange perspective

Gestione del Workflow Clinico: analisi degli standard esistenti e proposta di nuove linee guida IHE

L'obbiettivo del lavoro di tesi è di arrivare alla definizione di un profilo IHE in grado di permettere la gestione efficace dei Workflow Clinici. In quest'ottica si è deciso di valutare gli standard presenti in letteratura individuando le caratteristiche principali dei linguaggi per la gestione di Workflow. Sulla base delle informazioni così raccolte è stata definita la struttura del Workflow Document, documento alla base delle nuove linee guida IHE proposte. All'interno del processo IHE, come in tutte le realtà che si propongono di essere centro di coordinamento di attività di ricerca cooperativa, si instaura una forte dialettica costruttiva tra le parti coinvolte; ciò ha portato alla definizione della versione definitiva del documento partendo dallo sviluppo di una prima versione elaborata presso il consorzio Arsenàl.IT. Questa proposta è caratterizzata dall'utilizzo di una composizione di standard diversi per la gestione di Workflow. Il profilo IHE così definito (che prende il nome XDW o Cross Enterprise Workflow Document) è stato approvato da IHE quale linea guida internazionale per la gestione di Workflow Cliniciope

Subsurface Characterization by Means of Geovisual Analytics

This Thesis is concerned with one of the major problems in subsurface characterizations emerging from ever-increasing loads of data in the last decades: What kind of technologies suit well for extracting novel, valid and useful knowledge from persistent data repositories for the characterization of subsurface regions and how can such technologies be implemented in an integrated, community-open software platform? In order to address those questions, an interactive, open-source software platform for geoscientific knowledge discovery has been developed, which enables domain experts to generate, optimize and validate prognostic models of the subsurface domain. Such a free tool has been missing in the geoscientific community so far. The extensible software platform GeoReVi (Geological Reservoir Virtualization) implements selected aspects of geovisual analytics with special attention being paid to an implementation of the knowledge discovery in databases process. With GeoReVi the human expert can model and visualize static and dynamic systems in the subsurface in a feedback cycle. The created models can be analyzed and parameterized by means of modern approaches from geostatistics and data mining. Hence, knowledge that is useful to both the assessment of subsurface potentials and to support decision-making during the utilization process of the subsurface regions can be extracted and exchanged in a formalized manner. The modular software application is composed of both integrated and centralized databases, a graphical user interface and a business logic. In order to fulfill the needs of low computing time in accordance with high computational complexity of spatial problems, the software system makes intense use of parallelism and asynchronous programming. The competitiveness of industry branches, which are aimed at utilizing the subsurface in unknown regions, such as the geothermal energy production or carbon capture and storage, are especially dependent on the quality of spatial forecasts for relevant rock and fluid properties. Thus, the focus of this work has been laid upon the implementation of algorithms, which enhance the predictability of properties in space under consideration of uncertainty. The software system was therefore evaluated in ample real-world scenarios by solving problems from scientific, educational and industrial projects. The implemented software system shows an excellent suitability to generically address spatial problems such as interpolation or stochastic simulation under consideration of numerical uncertainty. In this context, GeoReVi served as a tool for discovering new knowledge with special regard to investigating the heterogeneity of rock media on multiple scales of investigation. Among others, it could be demonstrated that the three-dimensional scalar fields of different petrophysical and geochemical properties in sandstone media may diverge significantly at small-scales. In fact, if the small-scale variability is not considered in field-scale projects, in which the sampling density is usually low, statistical correlations and thus empirical relationships might be feigned. Furthermore, it could be demonstrated that the simple kriging variance, which is used to simulate the natural variability in sequential simulations, systematically underestimates the intrinsic variability of the investigated sandstone media. If the small-scale variability can be determined by high-resolution sampling, it can be used to enhance conditional simulations at the scale of depositional environments