Electronics Thermal Management in Information and Communications Technologies: Challenges and Future Directions

This paper reviews thermal management challenges encountered in a wide range of electronics cooling applications from large-scale (data center and telecommunication) to smallscale systems (personal, portable/wearable, and automotive). This paper identifies drivers for progress and immediate and future challenges based on discussions at the 3rd Workshop on Thermal Management in Telecommunication Systems and Data Centers held in Redwood City, CA, USA, on November 4–5, 2015. Participants in this workshop represented industry and academia, with backgrounds ranging from data center thermal management and energy efficiency to high-performance computing and liquid cooling, thermal management in wearable and mobile devices, and acoustic noise management. By considering a wide range of electronics cooling applications with different lengths and time scales, this paper identifies both common themes and diverging views in the thermal management community

Guidance on the Selection of Appropriate Indicators for Quantification of Antimicrobial Usage in Humans and Animals

An increasing variety of indicators of antimicrobial usage has become available in human and veterinary medicine, with no consensus on the most appropriate indicators to be used. The objective of this review is therefore to provide guidance on the selection of indicators, intended for those aiming to quantify antimicrobial usage based on sales, deliveries or reimbursement data. Depending on the study objective, different requirements apply to antimicrobial usage quantification in terms of resolution, comprehensiveness, stability over time, ability to assess exposure and comparability. If the aim is to monitor antimicrobial usage trends, it is crucial to use a robust quantification system that allows stability over time in terms of required data and provided output; to compare usage between different species or countries, comparability must be ensured between the different populations. If data are used for benchmarking, the system comprehensiveness is particularly crucial, while data collected to study the association between usage and resistance should express the exposure level and duration as a measurement of the exerted selection pressure. Antimicrobial usage is generally described as the number of technical units consumed normalized by the population at risk of being treated in a defined period. The technical units vary from number of packages to number of individuals treated daily by adding different levels of complexity such as daily dose or weight at treatment. These technical units are then related to a description of the population at risk, based either on biomass or number of individuals. Conventions and assumptions are needed for all of these calculation steps. However, there is a clear lack of standardization, resulting in poor transparency and comparability. By combining study requirements with available approaches to quantify antimicrobial usage, we provide suggestions on the most appropriate indicators and data sources to be used for a given study objective

Antimicrobial resistance of Escherichia coli and Enterococcus faecalis in housed laying-hen flocks in Europe

The aim of this study was to determine the potential association between housing type and multiple drug resistance (MDR) in Escherichia coli and Enterococcus faecalis isolates recovered from 283 laying-hen flocks. In each flock, a cloacal swab from four hens was collected and produced 1102 E. coli and 792 E. faecalis isolates. Broth microdilution was used to test susceptibility to antimicrobials. Country and housing type interacted differently with the MDR levels of both species. In the E. coli model, housing in a raised-floor system was associated with an increased risk of MDR compared to the conventional battery system [odds ratio (OR) 2·12, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1·13-3·97)]. In the E. faecalis model the MDR levels were lower in free-range systems than in conventional battery cages (OR 0·51, 95% CI 0·27-0·94). In Belgium, ceftiofur-resistant E. coli isolates were more numerous than in the other countrie

Increased virulence of Puccinia coronata f. sp.avenae populations through allele frequency changes at multiple putative Avr loci

Author summary The rust fungus Puccinia coronata f. sp. avenae (Pca), which causes crown rust disease, decimates oat (Avena sativa) production in many countries of the world. While the use of genetic resistance in crop breeding programs is the most sustainable disease management strategy to control plant disease, the release of oat varieties that display genetic resistance to Pca infection is hindered by rapid evolution of this pathogen. This study aims to determine demography and determinants of adaptive evolution in Pca to minimize the risk of disease outbreaks and enhance resistance gene stewardship. We recently published two high quality genome references of P. coronata f. sp. avenae. Here, we used these resources to direct a population genomics-based study of two temporally distant sets of pathogen collections to study genotypic changes that may explain the most recent oat crown rust epidemics across the continental US. We found that the population of Pca in 1990 is significantly different to that collected in 2015 at both genotypic and phenotypic levels. Our findings are consistent with the role of sexual and asexual reproduction in the Pca population diversity. Importantly, our work identifies genomic regions and genes that may be involved in local host adaptation which in the future may assist in the development of molecular markers and diagnosis of virulence

Erratum: Linearly polarized probes of surface chirality [J. Chem. Phys. 103, 8296 (1995)]

We present a new nonlinear optical technique to study surface chirality. We demonstrate experimentally that the efficiency of second‐harmonic generation from isotropic chiral surfaces is different for excitation with fundamental light that is +45° and −45° linearly polarized with respect to the p‐polarized direction

Failure of a patient-centered intervention to substantially increase the identification and referral for-treatment of ambulatory emergency department patients with occult psychiatric conditions: a randomized trial [ISRCTN61514736]

BACKGROUND: We previously demonstrated that a computerized psychiatric screening interview (the PRIME-MD) can be used in the Emergency Department (ED) waiting room to identify patients with mental illness. In that trial, however, informing the ED physician of the PRIME-MD results did not increase the frequency of psychiatric diagnosis, consultation or referral. We conducted this study to determine whether telling the patient and physician the PRIME-MD result would result in the majority of PRIME-MD-diagnosed patients being directed toward treatment for their mental illness. METHODS: In this single-site RCT, consenting patients with non-specific somatic chief complaints (e.g., fatigue, back pain, etc.) completed the computerized PRIME-MD in the waiting room and were randomly assigned to one of three groups: patient and physician told PRIME-MD results, patient told PRIME-MD results, and neither told PRIME-MD results. The main outcome measure was the percentage of patients with a PRIME-MD diagnosis who received a psychiatric consultation or referral from the ED. RESULTS: 183 (5% of all ED patients) were approached. 123 eligible patients consented to participate, completed the PRIME-MD and were randomized. 95 patients had outcomes recorded. 51 (54%) had a PRIME-MD diagnosis and 8 (16%) of them were given a psychiatric consultation or referral in the ED. While the frequency of consultation or referral increased as the intervention's intensity increased (tell neither = 11% (1/9), tell patient 15% (3/20), tell patient and physician 18% (4/22)), no group came close to the 50% threshold we sought. For this reason, we stopped the trial after an interim analysis. CONCLUSION: Patients willingly completed the PRIME-MD and 54% had a PRIME-MD diagnosis. Unfortunately, at our institution, informing the patient (and physician) of the PRIME-MD results infrequently led to the patient being directed toward care for their psychiatric condition

Potential for re-emergence of wheat stem rust in the United Kingdom

This is the final version. Available on open access from Springer Nature via the DOI in this recordWheat stem rust, a devastating disease of wheat and barley caused by the fungal pathogen Puccinia graminis f. sp. tritici, was largely eradicated in Western Europe during the mid-to-late twentieth century. However, isolated outbreaks have occurred in recent years. Here we investigate whether a lack of resistance in modern European varieties, increased presence of its alternate host barberry and changes in climatic conditions could be facilitating its resurgence. We report the first wheat stem rust occurrence in the United Kingdom in nearly 60 years, with only 20% of UK wheat varieties resistant to this strain. Climate changes over the past 25 years also suggest increasingly conducive conditions for infection. Furthermore, we document the first occurrence in decades of P. graminis on barberry in the UK . Our data illustrate that wheat stem rust does occur in the UK and, when climatic conditions are conducive, could severely harm wheat and barley production.This project was funded by an institute development grant from the EI (Norwich, UK), an Industrial Partnership Award (BB/M025519/1) from the BBSRC, a European Research Council Starting Grant awarded to D.G.O.S. (number 715638), H2020 project EMPHASIS (number 634179), by the BBSRC Institute Strategic Programmes BB/J004553/1 and BB/P012574/1, the John Innes Foundation, and an African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD) fellowship to R.N.K