2,577 research outputs found
Report drawn up on behalf of the Committee on Development and Cooperation on the consequences of drought in Southern Africa. Working Documents 1984-85, Document 1-212/84, 7 May 1984
The Gödel and the Splitting Translations
When the new research area of logic programming and non-monotonic reasoning emerged at the end of the 1980s, it focused notably on the study of mathematical relations between different non-monotonic formalisms, especially between the semantics of stable models and various non-monotonic modal logics. Given the many and varied embeddings of stable models into systems of modal logic, the modal interpretation of logic programming connectives and rules became the dominant view until well into the new century. Recently, modal interpretations are once again receiving attention in the context of hybrid theories that combine reasoning with non-monotonic rules and ontologies or external knowledge bases. In this talk I explain how familiar embeddings of stable models into modal logics can be seen as special cases of two translations that are very well-known in non-classical logic. They are, first, the translation used by Godel in 1933 to em- ¨ bed Heyting’s intuitionistic logic H into a modal provability logic equivalent to Lewis’s S4; second, the splitting translation, known since the mid-1970s, that allows one to embed extensions of S4 into extensions of the non-reflexive logic, K4. By composing the two translations one can obtain (Goldblatt, 1978) an adequate provability interpretation of H within the Goedel-Loeb logic GL, the system shown by Solovay (1976) to capture precisely the provability predicate of Peano Arithmetic. These two translations and their composition not only apply to monotonic logics extending H and S4, they also apply in several relevant cases to non-monotonic logics built upon such extensions, including equilibrium logic, non-monotonic S4F and autoepistemic logic. The embeddings obtained are not merely faithful and modular, they are based on fully recursive translations applicable to arbitrary logical formulas. Besides providing a uniform picture of some older results in LPNMR, the translations yield a perspective from which some new logics of belief emerge in a natural wa
The visceral response to underbody blast
Blast is the most common cause of injury and death in contemporary warfare. Blast
injuries may be categorised based upon their mechanism with underbody blast
describing the effect of an explosive device detonating underneath a vehicle. Torso
injuries are highly lethal within this environment and yet their mechanism in response
to underbody blast is poorly understood. This work seeks to understand the pattern and
mechanism of these injuries and to link them to physical underbody blast loading
parameters in order to enable mitigation and prevention of serious injury and death.
An analysis of the United Kingdom Joint Theatre Trauma Registry for underbody blast
events demonstrates that torso injury is a major cause of morbidity and mortality from
such incidents. Mediastinal injury, including those trauma to the heart and thoracic great
vessels is shown confer the greatest lethality within this complex environment.
This work explores the need for a novel in vivo model of underbody loading in order to
explore the mechanisms of severe torso injury and to define the relationship between
the “dose” of underbody loading and resultant injury. The work includes the
development of a new rig which causes underbody blast analogous vertical accelerations
upon a seated rat model.
Injuries causes by this loading to both the chest and abdomen can be best predicted by
the examining the kinematic response of the torso to the loading. Axial compression of
the torso, a previously undescribed injury metric is shown to be the best predictor of
injury. The ability of these results to translate to a human model is explored in detail,
with focus upon the biomechanical rationale; that torso organ injuries occur through
both direct compression and shearing of tethering attachments.
Survivability of underbody blast could be improved by applying these principles to the
design and modification of seats, vehicles and posture.Open Acces
Orbital Parameter Determination for Wide Stellar Binary Systems in the Age of Gaia
The orbits of binary stars and planets, particularly eccentricities and
inclinations, encode the angular momentum within these systems. Within stellar
multiple systems, the magnitude and (mis)alignment of angular momentum vectors
among stars, disks, and planets probes the complex dynamical processes guiding
their formation and evolution. The accuracy of the \textit{Gaia} catalog can be
exploited to enable comparison of binary orbits with known planet or disk
inclinations without costly long-term astrometric campaigns. We show that
\textit{Gaia} astrometry can place meaningful limits on orbital elements in
cases with reliable astrometry, and discuss metrics for assessing the
reliability of \textit{Gaia} DR2 solutions for orbit fitting. We demonstrate
our method by determining orbital elements for three systems (DS Tuc AB, GK/GI
Tau, and Kepler-25/KOI-1803) using \textit{Gaia} astrometry alone. We show that
DS Tuc AB's orbit is nearly aligned with the orbit of DS Tuc Ab, GK/GI Tau's
orbit might be misaligned with their respective protoplanetary disks, and the
Kepler-25/KOI-1803 orbit is not aligned with either component's transiting
planetary system. We also demonstrate cases where \textit{Gaia} astrometry
alone fails to provide useful constraints on orbital elements. To enable
broader application of this technique, we introduce the python tool
\texttt{lofti\_gaiaDR2} to allow users to easily determine orbital element
posteriors.Comment: 18 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
The obesity paradigm and the role of health services in obesity prevention:a grounded theory approach
Disease activity and cognition in rheumatoid arthritis : an open label pilot study
Acknowledgements This work was supported in part by NIHR Newcastle Biomedical Research Centre. Funding for this study was provided by Abbott Laboratories. Abbott Laboratories were not involved in study design; in the collection, analysis and interpretation of data; or in the writing of the report.Peer reviewedPublisher PD
Improved Parametric Empirical Determination of Module Short Circuit Current for Modelling and Optimization of Solar Photovoltaic Systems
Correct modelling of solar photovoltaic (PV) system yields is necessary to optimize system design, improve reliability of projected outputs to ensure favourable project financing and to facilitate proper operations and maintenance. An improved methodology for fine resolution modelling of PV systems is presented using module short-circuit current (Isc) at 5-minute time-scales, and clearly identifies pertinent error mechanisms that arise when working at this high resolution. This work used a modified version of the Sandia array performance model, and introduces new factors to the calculation of Isc to account for identified error mechanisms, including instrumentation alignment, spectral, and module power tolerance errors. A simple methodology was introduced and verified where specific module parameters can be derived solely from properly filtered performance time series data. In particular, this paper focused on methodologies for determining the predicted Isc for a variety of solar PV module types. These methods of regressive analysis significantly reduced the error of the predicted model, and demonstrate the need for this form of modelling when evaluating long term PV array performance. This methodology has applications for current systems operators, which will enable the extraction of useful module parameters from existing data in addition to more precise continuous monitoring of existing systems, and can also be used to more accurately model and optimize new systems
Dcc --help: Generating Context-Aware Compiler Error Explanations with Large Language Models
In the challenging field of introductory programming, high enrollments and
failure rates drive us to explore tools and systems to enhance student
outcomes, especially automated tools that scale to large cohorts. This paper
presents and evaluates the dcc --help tool, an integration of a Large Language
Model (LLM) into the Debugging C Compiler (DCC) to generate unique,
novice-focused explanations tailored to each error. dcc --help prompts an LLM
with contextual information of compile- and run-time error occurrences,
including the source code, error location and standard compiler error message.
The LLM is instructed to generate novice-focused, actionable error explanations
and guidance, designed to help students understand and resolve problems without
providing solutions. dcc --help was deployed to our CS1 and CS2 courses, with
2,565 students using the tool over 64,000 times in ten weeks. We analysed a
subset of these error/explanation pairs to evaluate their properties, including
conceptual correctness, relevancy, and overall quality. We found that the
LLM-generated explanations were conceptually accurate in 90% of compile-time
and 75% of run-time cases, but often disregarded the instruction not to provide
solutions in code. Our findings, observations and reflections following
deployment indicate that dcc-help provides novel opportunities for scaffolding
students' introduction to programming.Comment: 7 pages, 2 figures. Accepted in SIGCSE'2
Obesity prevention and the role of hospital and community-based health services: A scoping review
Background: Control of obesity is an important priority to reduce the burden of chronic disease. Clinical guidelines focus on the role of primary healthcare in obesity prevention. The purpose of this scoping review is to examine what the published literature indicates about the role of hospital and community based health services in adult obesity prevention in order to map the evidence and identify gaps in existing research.
Methods: Databases were searched for articles published in English between 2006 and 2016 and screened against inclusion and exclusion criteria. Further papers were highlighted through a manual search of the reference lists. Included papers evaluated interventions aimed at preventing overweight and obesity in adults that were implemented within and/or by hospital and community health services; were an empirical description of obesity prevention within a health setting or reported health staff perceptions of obesity and obesity prevention.
Results: The evidence supports screening for obesity of all healthcare patients, combined with referral to appropriate intervention services but indicates that health professionals do not typically adopt this practice. As well as practical issues such as time and resourcing, implementation is impacted by health professionals’ views about the causes of obesity and doubts about the benefits of the health sector intervening once someone is already obese. As well as lacking confidence or knowledge about how to integrate prevention into clinical care, health professional judgements about who might benefit from prevention and negative views about effectiveness of prevention hinder the implementation of practice guidelines. This is compounded by an often prevailing view that preventing obesity is a matter of personal responsibility and choice.
Conclusions: This review highlights that whilst a population health approach is important to address the complexity of obesity, it is important that the remit of health services is extended beyond medical treatment to incorporate obesity prevention through screening and referral. Further research into the role of health services in obesity prevention should take a systems approach to examine how health service structures, policy and practice interrelationships, and service delivery boundaries, processes and perspectives impact on changing models of care
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