Intelligent distributed multimedia collection: content aggregation and integration

People's multimedia content is spread around their home network and content services on the Internet, such as YouTube, Flickr, Facebook. In this paper we present a system that aggregates all the multimedia content of the end user and integrates it into a unified collection for the user's convenience. The system provides location transparency of multimedia content, content filtering on player compatibility and metadata completion to aid in improved usability. This effectively enables the user to rediscover his multimedia collection without any technical knowledge. A proof-of-concept implementation known as Intelligent Distributed Multimedia Collection (IDMC) has been made that is able to detect and browse UPnP MediaServer devices as well as collect information from YouTube. This implementation also contains a media player and is able to control UPnP MediaRenderer devices remotely. Furthermore, performance has been measured to assess different ways of iterating through a multimedia collection

DYAMAND: dynamic, adaptive management of networks and devices

Consumer devices increasingly are "smart" and hence offer services that can interwork with and/or be controlled by others. However, the full exploitation of the inherent opportunities this offers, is hurdled by a number of potential limitations. First of all, the interface towards the device might be vendor and even device specific, implying that extra effort is needed to support a specific device. Standardization efforts try to avoid this problem, but within a certain standard ecosystem the level of interoperability can vary (i.e. devices carrying the same standard logo are not necessarily interoperable). Secondly, different application domains (e.g. multimedia vs. energy management) today have their own standards, thus limiting trans-sector innovation because of the additional effort required to integrate devices from traditionally different domains into novel applications. In this paper, we discuss the basic components of current so-called service discovery protocols (SDPs) and present our DYAMAND (DYnamic, Adaptive MAnagement of Networks and Devices) framework. We position this framework as a middleware layer between applications and discoverable/controllable devices, and hence aim to provide the necessary tool to overcome the (intra- and inter-domain) interoperability gaps previously sketched. Thus, we believe it can act as a catalyst enabling trans-sector innovation

Integrating personal media and digital TV with QoS guarantees using virtualized set-top boxes: architecture and performance measurements

Nowadays, users consume a lot of functionality in their home coming from a service provider located in the Internet. While the home network is typically shielded off as much as possible from the `outside world', the supplied services could be greatly extended if it was possible to use local information. In this article, an extended service is presented that integrates the user's multimedia content, scattered over multiple devices in the home network, into the Electronic Program Guide (EPG) of the Digital TV. We propose to virtualize the set-top box, by migrating all functionality except user interfacing to the service provider infrastructure. The media in the home network is discovered through standard Universal Plug and Play (UPnP), of which the QoS functionality is exploited to ensure high quality playback over the home network, that basically is out of the control of the service provider. The performance of the subsystems are analysed

Automatic fine-grained area detection for thin client systems

A

Combination of gemcitabine and cetuximab in patients with advanced cholangiocarcinoma: a phase II study

C

Design of a management infrastructure for smart grid pilot data processing and analysis

Future smart grids will combine power grid technologies with information and communication technologies to enable a more efficient, reliable and sustainable energy production and distribution. To realize such a smart grid, large scale pilot projects are currently implemented and evaluated. Such pilot projects generate an excessive amount of data that needs to be processed: energy measurements, information on available flexibility from smart devices that can be shifted in time, control signals, dynamic prices, environmental data, etc. To validate and analyze the gathered data and adjust the running experiments in real-time, an optimized data management infrastructure is needed as well as comprehensive visualization tools. In this paper we present a data management infrastructure optimized for the follow up of the large scale smart grid project called Linear. In this project a pilot in over 200 households is implemented to evaluate several business cases including the balancing of renewable energy supply and the mitigation of voltage and power issues in distribution grids. By decoupling the gathering of the incoming data, the processing and storage of the data, and the data visualization and analysis on different servers, each with their own, optimized database, we obtain an efficient system for validation of the generated data in the pilot, management of the deployed set-ups and follow-up of the ongoing experiments in real-time

An adult male patient with multiple adenomas and a hepatocellular carcinoma : mild Gycogen Storage Disease type Ia

The development of hepatocellular adenomas and – more rarely – carcinoma in the liver of patients with Glycogen Storage Disease type Ia (GSDIa) is a well-known complication of the disease. The pathophysiology of adenoma and carcinoma development in these patients is, however, hitherto largely unknown and is thought to be related to the metabolic control of the patient and/or the type of mutations in the G6PC gene. We report here on a very illustrative case of adenoma and carcinoma formation in a previously undiagnosed 42year old male GSDIa patient (enzymatically and genetically proven). He had two episodes of mild hypoglycaemia in childhood, never required formal treatment, showed normal growth, and only mild lactate increases after prolonged starvation. He was a long-distance runner for most of his adult life, without the need for more than normal carbohydrate intake before/during exertion. To gain a better view on the type of adenoma formed in this patient, molecular studies were performed. We show here that in this patient with mild GSDIa without recurrent hypoglycaemic episodes, adenoma and carcinoma formation still occurred and that malignant transformation of adenoma here is associated with CTNNB1 mutations and a typical mRNA profile of a β-catenin activated lesion

Effect of the molecular adsorbent recirculating system and Prometheus devices on systemic haemodynamics and vasoactive agents in patients with acute-on-chronic alcoholic liver failure

INTRODUCTION: Patients with acute-on-chronic liver failure show an aggravated hyperdynamic circulation. We evaluated, in a controlled manner, potential changes in systemic haemodynamics induced by the molecular adsorbent recirculating system (MARS) and the Prometheus system liver detoxification devices in a group of patients with acute-on-chronic liver failure. METHODS: Eighteen patients (51.2 ± 2.3 years old; Child–Pugh score, 12.5 ± 0.2; Maddrey score, 63.1 ± 5.0; hepatic venous pressure gradient, 17.6 ± 0.9 mmHg) with biopsy-proven alcoholic cirrhosis and superimposed alcoholic hepatitis were either treated with standard medical therapy (SMT) combined with MARS (n = 6) or Prometheus (n = 6) or were treated with SMT alone (n = 6) on three consecutive days (6 hours/session). Liver tests, systemic haemodynamics and vasoactive substances were determined before and after each session. RESULTS: Groups were comparable for baseline haemodynamics and levels of vasoactive substances. Both MARS and Prometheus decreased serum bilirubin levels (P < 0.005 versus SMT), the Prometheus device being more effective than MARS (P = 0.002). Only MARS showed significant improvement in the mean arterial pressure (Δchange, +9 ± 2.4 mmHg versus -0.3 ± 2.4 mmHg with Prometheus and -5.2 ± 2.1 mmHg with SMT, P < 0.05) and in the systemic vascular resistance index (Δchange, +131.5 ± 46.2 dyne.s/cm(5)/m(2 )versus -92.8 ± 85.2 dyne.s/cm(5)/m(2)with Prometheus and -30.7 ± 32.5 dyne.s/cm(5)/m(2 )with SMT; P < 0.05), while the cardiac index and central filling remained constant. This circulatory improvement in the MARS group was paralleled by a decrease in plasma renin activity (P < 0.05), aldosterone (P < 0.03), norepinephrine (P < 0.05), vasopressin (P = 0.005) and nitrate/nitrite levels (P < 0.02). CONCLUSION: The MARS device, and not the Prometheus device, significantly attenuates the hyperdynamic circulation in acute-on-chronic liver failure, presumably by a difference in removal rate of certain vasoactive substances. These findings suggest conspicuous conceptual differences among the albumin dialysis devices

OMUS : an optimized multimedia service for the home environment

Media content in home environments is often scattered across multiple devices in the home network. As both the available multimedia devices in the home (e.g., smartphones, tablets, laptops, game consoles, etc.) and the available content (video and audio) is increasing, interconnecting desired content with available devices is becoming harder and home users are experiencing difficulties in selecting interesting content for their current context. In this paper, we start with an analysis of the home environment by means of a user study. Information handling problems are identified and requirements for a home information system formulated. To meet these requirements we propose the OMUS home information system which includes an optimized content aggregation framework, a hybrid group-based contextual recommender system, and an overall web-based user interface making both content and recommendations available for all devices across the home network. For the group recommendations we introduced distinct weights for each user and showed that by varying the weights, the coverage (i.e., items that can be returned by the recommender) considerably increases. Also the addition of genre filter functionality was proven to further boost the coverage. The OMUS system was evaluated by means of focus groups and by qualitative and quantitative performance assessment of individual parts of the system. The modularity of internal components and limited imposed hardware requirements implies flexibility as to how the OMUS system can be deployed (ranging from e.g., embedded in hardware devices or more software services based)