3,579 research outputs found
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On a scale of one to five, how satisfied are you with the forensic mental health care services you received?
This book chapter is the latest of several outputs from a Department of Health funded project (£43,000) begun in 2006. At this year’s prestigious annual BSA conference (April 2011), we (Godin & Davies) will present ‘An exercise in emancipatory research’ in a symposium of mental health research. We have been invited to present our work from this project at the BSA London Medical Sociology Group. In May 2011 we will present ‘Developing a cultural understanding of inpatient risk management’. In December 2010 we presented the study at a seminar in Huddersfield University by invitation from the professor of health care risk management
Systemic analysis of production scenarios for bioethanol produced from ligno-cellulosic biomass [abstract]
Defining alternatives for non-renewable energy sources constitutes a priority to the development of our societies. One of these alternatives is biofuels production starting from energy crops, agricultural wastes, forest products or wastes. In this context, a "second generation" biofuels production, aiming at utilizing the whole plant, including ligno-cellulosic (hemicelluloses, cellulose, lignin) fractions (Ogier et al., 1999) that are not used for human food, would allow the reduction of the drawbacks of bioethanol production (Schoeling, 2007). However, numerous technical, economical, ethical and environmental questions are still pending. One of the aims of the BioEtha2 project, directed by the Walloon Agricultural Research Centre, is to define the position of bioethanol produced from ligno-cellulosic biomass among the different renewable energy alternatives that could be developed in Wallonia towards 2020. With this aim, and in order to answer the numerous questions in this field, the project aims at using tools and methods coming from the concept of "forecasting scenarios" (Sebillotte, 2002; Slegten et al., 2007; For-learn, 2008). This concept, based on a contemporary reality, aims to explore different possible scenarios for the future development of alternative sources of energy production. The principle is to evaluate, explore, possible futures of the studied problematic, through the establishment of possible evolution trajectories. We contribute to this prospective through a systemic approach (Vanloqueren, 2007) that allows lightening the existing interactions within the system "ligno-cellulosic biomass chain" without isolating it from its environment. We explain and sketch the two contexts needed to identify primary stakes. The global context includes inter-dependant and auto-regulating fields such as society, politics, technology and economy. These four fields influence each part of the "chain" with specific tools. However, the interest and possible action fields lay within the intermediary context representing the "resources" such as agriculture, forestry, "driving" elements such as mobility, mediation elements such as territories and environment and concurrent elements such as non-cellulosic biomass, the energy mix and the non-energy valorization
Distributed Formal Concept Analysis Algorithms Based on an Iterative MapReduce Framework
While many existing formal concept analysis algorithms are efficient, they
are typically unsuitable for distributed implementation. Taking the MapReduce
(MR) framework as our inspiration we introduce a distributed approach for
performing formal concept mining. Our method has its novelty in that we use a
light-weight MapReduce runtime called Twister which is better suited to
iterative algorithms than recent distributed approaches. First, we describe the
theoretical foundations underpinning our distributed formal concept analysis
approach. Second, we provide a representative exemplar of how a classic
centralized algorithm can be implemented in a distributed fashion using our
methodology: we modify Ganter's classic algorithm by introducing a family of
MR* algorithms, namely MRGanter and MRGanter+ where the prefix denotes the
algorithm's lineage. To evaluate the factors that impact distributed algorithm
performance, we compare our MR* algorithms with the state-of-the-art.
Experiments conducted on real datasets demonstrate that MRGanter+ is efficient,
scalable and an appealing algorithm for distributed problems.Comment: 17 pages, ICFCA 201, Formal Concept Analysis 201
An Incremental Learning Method to Support the Annotation of Workflows with Data-to-Data Relations
Workflow formalisations are often focused on the representation of a process with the primary objective to support execution. However, there are scenarios where what needs to be represented is the effect of the process on the data artefacts involved, for example when reasoning over the corresponding data policies. This can be achieved by annotating the workflow with the semantic relations that occur between these data artefacts. However, manually producing such annotations is difficult and time consuming. In this paper we introduce a method based on recommendations to support users in this task. Our approach is centred on an incremental rule association mining technique that allows to compensate the cold start problem due to the lack of a training set of annotated workflows. We discuss the implementation of a tool relying on this approach and how its application on an existing repository of workflows effectively enable the generation of such annotations
The Effect of the Environment on alpha-Al_2O_3 (0001) Surface Structures
We report that calculating the Gibbs free energy of the alpha-Al_2O_3 (0001)
surfaces in equilibrium with a realistic environment containing both oxygen and
hydrogen species is essential for obtaining theoretical predictions consistent
with experimental observations. Using density-functional theory we find that
even under conditions of high oxygen partial pressure, the metal terminated
surface is surprisingly stable. An oxygen terminated alpha-Al_2O_3 (0001)
surface becomes stable only if hydrogen is present on the surface. In addition,
including hydrogen on the surface resolves discrepancies between previous
theoretical work and experimental results with respect to the magnitude and
direction of surface relaxations.Comment: 4 pages including 2 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev. Lett. Related
publications can be found at http://www.fhi-berlin.mpg.de/th/paper.htm
Electrostatic Patch Effect in Cylindrical Geometry. I. Potential and Energy between Slightly Non-Coaxial Cylinders
We study the effect of any uneven voltage distribution on two close
cylindrical conductors with parallel axes that are slightly shifted in the
radial and by any length in the axial direction. The investigation is
especially motivated by certain precision measurements, such as the Satellite
Test of the Equivalence Principle (STEP). By energy conservation, the force can
be found as the energy gradient in the vector of the shift, which requires
determining potential distribution and energy in the gap. The boundary value
problem for the potential is solved, and energy is thus found to the second
order in the small transverse shift, and to lowest order in the gap to cylinder
radius ratio. The energy consists of three parts: the usual capacitor part due
to the uniform potential difference, the one coming from the interaction
between the voltage patches and the uniform voltage difference, and the energy
of patch interaction, entirely independent of the uniform voltage. Patch effect
forces and torques in the cylindrical configuration are derived and analyzed in
the next two parts of this work.Comment: 26 pages, 1 Figure. Submitted to Classical and Quantum Gravit
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Surface structure, bonding, and dynamics: The universality of zincblende (110) potential energy surfaces
Using a tight-binding, total energy (TBTE) model we examine the hypothesis that the potential energy surfaces (PES) describing the (110) cleavage faces of the tetrahedrally coordinated, zincblende-structure compound semiconductors exhibit a common universal'' form if expressed in terms of suitably scaled parameters. TBTE calculations on both III-V and II-VI compounds reveal a linear scaling with bulk lattice constant of the geometric parameters of the reconstructed surfaces. This scaling is analogous to that found using low-energy, electron-diffraction surface-structure determination. The surface atomic force constants (found from a TBTE calculation) also scale monotonically with the lattice constant. Using TBTE models proposed previously for GaP, GaAs, GaSb, InP, and ZnSe, we find that the force constants scale as the inverse square of the bulk lattice constant. These results suggest that if distances are measured in units of the bulk lattice constant, the PES may be a universal function for the cleavage surface of zincblende-structure compound semiconductors, on average, with small fluctuations from this average occurring in individual materials. 22 refs., 5 figs., 1 tab
The effects of parasitism and body length on positioning within wild fish shoals
The influence of body length and parasitism on the positioning behaviour of individuals in wild fish shoals was investigated by a novel means of capturing entire shoals of the banded killifish (Fundulus diaphanus, Lesueur) using a grid-net that maintained the two-dimensional positions of individuals within shoals.
Fish in the front section of a shoal were larger than those in the rear.
Individuals parasitized by the digenean trematode (Crassiphiala bulboglossa, Haitsma) showed a tendency to occupy the front of shoals. Parasitized fish were also found more in peripheral positions than central ones in a significant number of shoals.
Shoal geometry was affected by the overall parasite prevalence of shoal members; shoals with high parasite prevalence displayed increasingly phallanx-like shoal formations, whereas shoals with low prevalence were more elliptical.
There was no relationship between body length and parasite abundance or prevalence in the fish population which suggests body length and parasite status are independent predictors of positioning behaviour.
Solitary individuals found outside shoals were both more likely to be parasitized and had higher parasite abundance than individuals engaged in shoaling.
Differences in the shoaling behaviour of parasitized and unparasitized fish are discussed in the context of the adaptive manipulation hypothesis
Fermat Principle in Finsler Spacetimes
It is shown that, on a manifold with a Finsler metric of Lorentzian
signature, the lightlike geodesics satisfy the following variational principle.
Among all lightlike curves from a point (emission event) to a timelike curve
(worldline of receiver), the lightlike geodesics make the arrival time
stationary. Here ``arrival time'' refers to a parametrization of the timelike
curve. This variational principle can be applied (i) to the vacuum light rays
in an alternative spacetime theory, based on Finsler geometry, and (ii) to
light rays in an anisotropic non-dispersive medium with a general-relativistic
spacetime as background.Comment: 18 pages, submitted to Gen. Rel. Gra
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