139 research outputs found
Participation in a time of climate crisis
The climate crisis puts real pressure on legal guarantees of public participation in decision making. This pressure comes from a number of directions, but we are particularly concerned with the technocratic erosion of routines of participation, in a turn to expertise rather than democracy for legitimate decision making. At the same time, populists resist the constraints imposed on their power by legal rights of participation. We argue, however, that the climate crisis, while putting pressure on participation, also reinforces its necessity, and the limitations of technocratic decision making. Politics is unavoidable, even and especially in a crisis. Law, or its silence, contributes to the context, the place, and the meaning of participation, and we study its strangely underexplored role in shaping participation on the ground
State of research in automatic as-built modelling
This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Elsevier via http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.aei.2015.01.001Building Information Models (BIMs) are becoming the official standard in the construction industry for encoding, reusing, and exchanging information about structural assets. Automatically generating such representations for existing assets stirs up the interest of various industrial, academic, and governmental parties, as it is expected to have a high economic impact. The purpose of this paper is to provide a general overview of the as-built modelling process, with focus on the geometric modelling side. Relevant works from the Computer Vision, Geometry Processing, and Civil Engineering communities are presented and compared in terms of their potential to lead to automatic as-built modelling.We acknowledge the support of EPSRC Grant NMZJ/114,DARPA UPSIDE Grant A13â0895-S002, NSF CAREER Grant N. 1054127, European Grant Agreements No. 247586 and 334241. We would also like to thank NSERC Canada, Aecon, and SNC-Lavalin for financially supporting some parts of this research
Mobile health divide between clinicians and patients in cancer care: results from a cross-sectional international survey
Background: Mobile technologies are increasingly being used to manage chronic diseases, including cancer, with the promise of improving the efficiency and effectiveness of care. Among the myriad of mobile technologies in health care, we have seen an explosion of mobile apps. The rapid increase in digital health apps is not paralleled by a similar trend in usage statistics by clinicians and patients. Little is known about how much and in what ways mobile health (mHealth) apps are used by clinicians and patients for cancer care, what variables affect their use of mHealth, and what patientsâ and cliniciansâ expectations of mHealth apps are.
Objective: This study aimed to describe the patient and clinician population that uses mHealth in cancer care and to provide recommendations to app developers and regulators to generally increase the use and efficacy of mHealth apps.
Methods: Through a cross-sectional Web-based survey, we explored the current utilization rates of mHealth in cancer care and factors that explain the differences in utilization by patients and clinicians across the United States and 5 different countries in Europe. In addition, we conducted an international workshop with more than 100 stakeholders and a roundtable with key representatives of international organizations of clinicians and patients to solicit feedback on the survey results and develop insights into mHealth app development practices.
Results: A total of 1033 patients and 1116 clinicians participated in the survey. The proportion of cancer patients using mHealth (294/1033, 28.46%) was far lower than that of clinicians (859/1116, 76.97%). Accounting for age and salary level, the marginal probabilities of use at means are still significantly different between the 2 groups and were 69.8% for clinicians and 38.7% for patients using the propensity scoreâbased regression adjustment with weighting technique. Moreover, our analysis identified a gap between basic and advanced users, with a prevalent use for activities related to the automation of processes and the interaction with other individuals and a limited adoption for side-effect management and compliance monitoring in both groups.
Conclusions: mHealth apps can provide access to clinical and economic data that are low cost, easy to access, and personalized. The benefits can go as far as increasing patientsâ chances of overall survival. However, despite its potential, evidence on the actual use of mobile technologies in cancer care is not promising. If the promise of mHealth is to be fulfilled, clinician and patient usage rates will need to converge. Ideally, cancer apps should be designed in ways that strengthen the patient-physician relationship, ease physiciansâ workload, be tested for validity and effectiveness, and fit the criteria for reimbursement
EPICA Dome C electronic control system
AbstractA new deep drill has been developed within the framework of the European Programme for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA). Several versions of the EPICA drill exist. The version used at Dome Concordia (75Ë06'1" S, 123Ë23'71" E) was operated with a new electronic control system developed by the Ente per le Nuove tecnologie, l'Energia e l'Ambiente (ENEA) Research Center in Brasimone, Italy. This electronic control system was used for the first time during the 1997/98 Antarctic summer season
PENELLOPE V. The magnetospheric structure and the accretion variability of the classical T Tauri star HM Lup
HM Lup is a young M-type star that accretes material from a circumstellar
disk through a magnetosphere. Our aim is to study the inner disk structure of
HM Lup and to characterize its variability. We used spectroscopic data from
HST/STIS, X-Shooter, and ESPRESSO taken in the framework of the ULLYSES and
PENELLOPE programs, together with photometric data from TESS and AAVSO. The
2021 TESS light curve shows variability typical for young stellar objects of
the "accretion burster" type. The spectra cover the temporal evolution of the
main burst in the 2021 TESS light curve. We compared the strength and
morphology of emission lines from different species and ionization stages. We
determined the mass accretion rate from selected emission lines and from the UV
continuum excess emission at different epochs, and we examined its relation to
the photometric light curves. The emission lines in the optical spectrum of HM
Lup delineate a temperature stratification along the accretion flow. While the
wings of the H I and He I lines originate near the star, the lines of species
such as Na I, Mg I, Ca I, Ca II, Fe I, and Fe II are formed in an outer and
colder region. The shape and periodicity of the 2019 and 2021 TESS light
curves, when qualitatively compared to predictions from magnetohydrodynamic
models, suggest that HM Lup was in a regime of unstable ordered accretion
during the 2021 TESS observation due to an increase in the accretion rate.
Although HM Lup is not an extreme accretor, it shows enhanced emission in the
metallic species during this high accretion state that is produced by a density
enhancement in the outer part of the accretion flow.Comment: 15 pages, 14 figures. Accepted for publication in A&
Predictors of antiproliferative effect of lanreotide autogel in advanced gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms
PURPOSE: The antiproliferative properties of lanreotide autogel (LAN) in gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine neoplasms (GEP NENs) were demonstrated in the CLARINET study. However, there is limited literature regarding factors that affect progression-free survival (PFS) in patients with GEP NENs treated with LAN. METHODS: We identified a total of 191 treatment-naive patients with advanced GEP NENs and positive SSTR uptake on imaging (Octreoscan or 68Gallium DOTATATE Positron Emission Tomography [68GaPET]) who received first-line LAN monotherapy, albeit at various starting doses (60, 90 or 120âmg/month). A group of 102 patients who initiated treatment at the standard dose of 120âmg/month were included in the study and further evaluated by univariate and multivariate analyses to identify predictors of PFS. RESULTS: The location of tumour primary was in the small bowel in 63 (62%), pancreas in 31 (30%) and colon/rectum in 8 patients (8%). The tumours were well-differentiated, and the majority were grade 1 (52%), or 2 (38%). About 60% of cases had progressive disease at the time of treatment initiation. Most patients with available pretreatment nuclear medicine imaging (Octreoscan or 68Ga PET) had a Krenning score of 3 (44%) or 4 (50%). The median PFS for the entire cohort was 19 months (95% CI 12, 26 months). The univariate analysis demonstrated that grade 2 tumours, progressive disease at baseline and metastatic liver disease were associated with a significantly shorter PFS, while other evaluated variables did not affect PFS at a statistically significant level. However, at multivariate analysis only the tumour grade remained statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: The current study showed that, of many evaluated variables, only the tumour grade was predictive of PFS duration and this should be considered during patient selection for treatment
Mobile health divide between clinicians and patients in cancer care:Results from a cross-sectional international survey
Background: Mobile technologies are increasingly being used to manage chronic diseases, including cancer, with the promise of improving the efficiency and effectiveness of care. Among the myriad of mobile technologies in health care, we have seen an explosion of mobile apps. The rapid increase in digital health apps is not paralleled by a similar trend in usage statistics by clinicians and patients. Little is known about how much and in what ways mobile health (mHealth) apps are used by clinicians and patients for cancer care, what variables affect their use of mHealth, and what patientsâ and cliniciansâ expectations of mHealth apps are. Objective: This study aimed to describe the patient and clinician population that uses mHealth in cancer care and to provide recommendations to app developers and regulators to generally increase the use and efficacy of mHealth apps. Methods: Through a cross-sectional Web-based survey, we explored the current utilization rates of mHealth in cancer care and factors that explain the differences in utilization by patients and clinicians across the United States and 5 different countries in Europe. In addition, we conducted an international workshop with more than 100 stakeholders and a roundtable with key representatives of international organizations of clinicians and patients to solicit feedback on the survey results and develop insights into mHealth app development practices. Results: A total of 1033 patients and 1116 clinicians participated in the survey. The proportion of cancer patients using mHealth (294/1033, 28.46%) was far lower than that of clinicians (859/1116, 76.97%). Accounting for age and salary level, the marginal probabilities of use at means are still significantly different between the 2 groups and were 69.8% for clinicians and 38.7% for patients using the propensity scoreâbased regression adjustment with weighting technique. Moreover, our analysis identified a gap between basic and advanced users, with a prevalent use for activities related to the automation of processes and the interaction with other individuals and a limited adoption for side-effect management and compliance monitoring in both groups. Conclusions: mHealth apps can provide access to clinical and economic data that are low cost, easy to access, and personalized. The benefits can go as far as increasing patientsâ chances of overall survival. However, despite its potential, evidence on the actual use of mobile technologies in cancer care is not promising. If the promise of mHealth is to be fulfilled, clinician and patient usage rates will need to converge. Ideally, cancer apps should be designed in ways that strengthen the patient-physician relationship, ease physiciansâ workload, be tested for validity and effectiveness, and fit the criteria for reimbursement
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