Performance Comparison Between VoLTE and non-VoLTE Voice Calls During Mobility in Commercial Deployment: A Drive Test-Based Analysis

The optimization of network performance is vital for the delivery of services using standard cellular technologies for mobile communications. Call setup delay and User Equipment (UE) battery savings significantly influence network performance. Improving these factors is vital for ensuring optimal service delivery. In comparison to traditional circuit-switched voice calls, VoLTE (Voice over LTE) technology offers faster call setup durations and better battery-saving performance. To validate these claims, a drive test was carried out using the XCAL drive test tool to collect real-time network parameter details in VoLTE and non-VoLTE voice calls. The findings highlight the analysis of real-time network characteristics, such as the call setup delay calculation, battery-saving performance, and DRX mechanism. The study contributes to the understanding of network optimization strategies and provides insights for enhancing the quality of service (QoS) in mobile communication networks. Examining VoLTE and non-VoLTE operations, this research highlights the substantial energy savings obtained by VoLTE. Specifically, VoLTE saves approximately 60.76% of energy before the Service Request and approximately 38.97% of energy after the Service Request. Moreover, VoLTE to VoLTE calls have a 72.6% faster call setup delay than non-VoLTE-based LTE to LTE calls, because of fewer signaling messages required. Furthermore, as compared to non-VoLTE to non-VoLTE calls, VoLTE to non-VoLTE calls offer an 18.6% faster call setup delay. These results showcase the performance advantages of VoLTE and reinforce its potential for offering better services in wireless communication networks.Comment: Accepted for presentation and Publication on the IEEE 10th International Conference on Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and Informatics (EECSI 2023

Another Volte-face in Prospect?

Trust in political leaders has always been somewhat tenuous. Leaders are, in the normal run of things, expected to do what’s believed to be in the best interests of people. We expect them to tell us the truth and we reciprocate by doing what is asked of us. Arguably the best example is Winston Churchill, a leader not lacking in critics, voted ‘Greatest Briton’ in 2002 as the leader who was absolutely dogmatic in refusing toappease Adolf Hitler

Quality of life measurements for patients with chronic suppurative otitis media: Italian adaptation of "Chronic Ear Survey". La misura della qualità della vita in pazienti con otite media suppurativa cronica: adattamento in italiano del “Chronic Ear Survey”

Il Chronic Ear Survey (CES) è una misura specifica della Qualità della Vita (QoL) nei pazienti affetti da Otite Media Suppurativa Cronica (CSOM). È un questionario composto da 13 domande che indagano frequenza, durata e severità dei sintomi associati a questa malattia. Il CES genera tre sottoscale con rispettivo punteggio che riguardano limitazioni nelle attività fisiche e sociali, sintomi e trattamento medico. Attraverso le risposte ottenute dai pazienti è possibile ricavare un punteggio che va da 0 a 100; il punteggio più alto indica una QoL migliore, mentre quello più basso indica una QoL peggiore. Il questionario è stato creato in lingua inglese. Lo scopo del lavoro è di validare in lingua italiana il CES. La traduzione è stata condotta seguendo le linee guida internazionali. La versione italiana del CES (CES-I) è stata proposta a 54 pazienti con CSOM. Nello stesso tempo, è stato somministrato a tutti i pazienti anche il questionario SF-36. Un modello trasversale è stato usato per esaminare la consistenza interna (Cronbach alpha) e la validità esterna (coefficiente di Pearson). Per confermare la validità esterna del CES-I è stato poi analizzato il test di correlazione di Pearson considerando il punteggio totale, le singole sottoscale del CES e le 8 scale dello Short Form Health Survey (SF-36). Il coefficiente di Cronbach è stato pari a 0.737. Il coefficiente di correlazione interno ha dato un risultato pari a 0.737 (95% CI: 0.600-0.835, p < 0.001) di media e 0.412 (95% CI: 0.237-0.559, p < 0.001) per le singole misure. Sulla base dei nostri risultati il questionario CES-I è risultato essere concorde con l’originale in lingua inglese e può essere considerato uno strumento adeguato per valutare la Qualità della Vita nei pazienti con CSOM di lingua italianaThe chronic ear survey (CES) is a sensitive and disease specific quality of life (QoL) measurement tool in patients with chronic suppurative otitis media (CSOM). It is a 13-item survey that evaluates the frequency, duration and severity of problems associated with this disease. It is composed of three subscales that describe activity restrictions, symptoms and medical resource utilisation. Based on patient's answers, it is possible to obtain a score resulting in a scale ranging from 0 to 100; the highest indicates the best health, while the lowest denotes poor health. The questionnaire was originally created in English. The aim of this study is to validate the CES questionnaire in Italian (CES-I). Translation was made following international guidelines. The application follows the stages of translation from English to Italian and linguistic adaptation, and grammatical and idiomatic equivalence review. The CES-I and the Short Form Health Survey 36 (SF-36) questionnaires were administered to 54 patients with CSOM. A cross-sectional design was used to examine the internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) and concurrent validity (Pearson's product moment correlation). To confirm the external validity of CES-I, Pearson correlation coefficient, considering the total score and single subscales of CES and the 8 scales of the SF-36, was calculated. Cronbach's alpha coefficient for internal consistency was 0.737. The intraclass correlation coefficient, measured through mixed effects, was 0.737 (95% CI: 0.600-0.835, p < 0.001) for average measures and 0.412 (95% CI: 0.273-0.559, p < 0.001) for individual measures. According to our results, CES-I is a reliable tool for evaluation of QoL in patients with CSOM among the Italian-speaking population

Animal agency in Le Quattro volte

Le Quattro Volte (2010) – translated as ‘The Four Turns’ – tracks what the director Michelangelo Frammartino describes as ‘the journey of a soul’ through Pythagorean processes of transmigration, as the narrative focus shifts from an elderly goatherd to a kid goat to a tree to a batch of charcoal. While Le Quattro Volte thus extends its attention across human, animal, vegetable and mineral realms, I wish to focus in this essay on the nonhuman animals – the dog, goats, ants and snails – that populate the film. Le Quattro Volte might appear to invest uncritically in an image of pastoral idyll through its nostalgic focus on farming practices in Calabria (the region of Italy in which the film is set), thereby undermining any progressive positioning of animals as agents or political beings. Yet while Le Quattro Volte takes risks, not only in its nostalgic rural vision but also in its mystical positioning of life cycles, the film balances this, I argue here, with a democratizing mode of human-animal representation. Drawing on the work of Jane Bennett, I explore questions of animal agency in the context of what I call Frammartino’s ‘horizontalist’ aesthetics – a mode of cinematic presentation that works against speciesist hierarchies of being. I read questions of animal agency, objectification and performance both within and against this horizontalist aesthetics in order to consider Le Quattro Volte’s cinematic and democratic re-imagining of cross-species relationality.This is the author's accepted manuscript and will be under embargo for 24 months until after the date of publication. The final version is available from OUP at http://screen.oxfordjournals.org/content/56/1/108.ful

Faculty concert: Atlantic Brass Quintet, February 16, 1999

This is the concert program of the Faculty Concert of the Atlantic Brass Quintet performance on Tuesday, February 16, 1999 at 8:00 p.m., at the Tsai Performance Center, 685 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts. Works performed were Mini Overture by Witold Lutoslawski, Keyboard Music by Johann Sebastian Bach, Brass Quintet by Ira Taxin, Volte from Terpsichore by Michael Praetorius, Music for Brass Quintet by Gunther Schuller, and Brass Band Music from Around the World. Digitization for Boston University Concert Programs was supported by the Boston University Humanities Library Endowed Fund

Second-order closures for compressible turbulence

This viewgraph presentation discusses project description, turbulence models, and computational engine and results for second-order closures for compressible turbulence