RAFCON: a Graphical Tool for Task Programming and Mission Control

There are many application fields for robotic systems including service robotics, search and rescue missions, industry and space robotics. As the scenarios in these areas grow more and more complex, there is a high demand for powerful tools to efficiently program heterogeneous robotic systems. Therefore, we created RAFCON, a graphical tool to develop robotic tasks and to be used for mission control by remotely monitoring the execution of the tasks. To define the tasks, we use state machines which support hierarchies and concurrency. Together with a library concept, even complex scenarios can be handled gracefully. RAFCON supports sophisticated debugging functionality and tightly integrates error handling and recovery mechanisms. A GUI with a powerful state machine editor makes intuitive, visual programming and fast prototyping possible. We demonstrated the capabilities of our tool in the SpaceBotCamp national robotic competition, in which our mobile robot solved all exploration and assembly challenges fully autonomously. It is therefore also a promising tool for various RoboCup leagues.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure

Transmembrane anion transport mediated by halogen-bond donors

In biology and chemistry, the transport of anions across lipid bilayer membranes is usually achieved by sophisticated supramolecular architectures. Significant size reduction of transporters is hampered by the intrinsically hydrophilic nature of typical anion-binding functionalities, hydrogen-bond donors or cations. To maximize the atom efficiency of anion transport, the hydrophobic nature, directionality, and strength of halogen bonds seem promising. Unlike the ubiquitous, structurally similar hydrogen bonds, halogen bonds have not been explored for anion transport. Here we report that transport across lipid bilayers can be achieved with small perfluorinated molecules that are equipped with strong halogen-bond donors. Transport is observed with trifluoroiodomethane (boiling point=−22 °C); that is, it acts as a 'single-carbon' transporter. Contrary to the destructive action of small-molecule detergents, transport with halogen bonds is leakage-free, cooperative, non-ohmic and highly selective, with anion/cation permeability ratios <37

Langzeit-Datenreihe (2007 - 2017) von Eddy-Kovarianz CO2- und Energieflüssen der arktischen Bayelva-Station, Spitzbergen

Die Messung von ganzjährigen CO2-, Wasser- und Energieflüssen zwischen Erdoberfläche und Atmosphäre in arktischen Regionen wird bisher nur an wenigen Standorten durchgeführt. Derartige Messungen sind aber insbesondere insofern relevant, als dass arktische Tundren bedeutende CO2-Senken darstellen, unter einem sich erwärmenden Klima möglicherweise aber zukünftig im Permafrost gespeicherten Kohlenstoff freisetzen. Durch den Einsatz bodengebundener in situ Messungen können Kohlenstoff- und Energiedynamik bilanziert werden. Des Weiteren sind die gemessenen Gas- und Energieflüsse wertvoll für die Kalibration und Validierung globaler Klimamodelle. Eine Messstation in der europäischen Arktis ist die Bayelva-Messstation (78� 55‘ N, 11� 50‘ O) nahe Ny Ålesund auf Spitzbergen. Der starke Einfluss des Nordatlantikstroms führt dort zu einem maritimen Klima mit kühlen Sommertemperaturen von durchschnittlich 5 °C im Juli und relativ milden Wintertemperaturen von -13 °C im Januar. Es handelt sich somit um eine vergleichsweise warme Permafrostregion mit Jahresmitteltemperaturen von etwa -2.5 °C. Der Jahresniederschlag liegt bei etwa 400 mm und die schneefreie Zeit beträgt typischerweise drei Monate. An der Bayelva-Station fanden von 2007 bis 2017 Messungen von Wasserdampf- und CO2-Konzentrationen (mittels open-path LiCor LI-7500 CO2 und H2O Gasanalysierer) sowie dreidimensionale Messungen der Windgeschwindigkeit (mittels Campbell CSAT 3D sonic anemometer) mit einer Messfrequenz von 20 Hz statt. Mithilfe der Eddy-Kovarianz-Software TK3 ermitteln wir hieraus halbstündliche Gas- und Energieflüsse und führen Qualitätsprüfungen durch. Erste Ergebnisse für das Jahr 2008/2009 zeigen, dass die jährliche CO2-Bilanz des Standortes nahezu bei null liegt, was durch die lange, winterliche Freisetzung von CO2 in die Atmosphäre zu erklären ist. Allerdings sind die Prozesse, welche diese winterliche CO2-Emission bedingen bisher nicht untersucht. Unser Ziel besteht daher nun darin, die Analyse der Gas- und Energieflüsse auf den gesamten Messzeitraum von 2007 bis 2017 auszuweiten. Insbesondere für die Zeiträume Oktober 2012 bis August 2014 sowie Januar 2015 bis September 2016 sind die Messreihen nahezu komplett mit Datenlücken von nur wenigen Tagen pro Zeitraum. Auf der Grundlage der entstehenden Langzeit-Datenreihe können wir durch den Klimawandel bedingte Änderungen der CO2-Flüsse von zwischenjährlicher Variabilität unterscheiden sowie saisonale und jahreszeitliche Schwankungen bilanzieren. Außerdem ermöglicht es uns der mehrjährige Datensatz die Umstände der ablaufenden Prozesse genauer zu beschreiben und dadurch möglicherweise Rückschlüsse auf deren Auslöser zu ziehen. Im weiteren Verlauf ist es zudem vorstellbar Wechselwirkungen zwischen den beobachteten Gas- und Energieflüssen und weiteren Eigenschaften verschiedener Komponenten des Klimasystems wie zum Beispiel Wolkeneigenschaften zu untersuchen

Credit bureaus between risk-management, creditworthiness assessment and prudential supervision

"This text may be downloaded for personal research purposes only. Any additional reproduction for other purposes, whether in hard copy or electronically, requires the consent of the author. If cited or quoted, reference should be made to the full name of the author, the title, the working paper or other series, the year, and the publisher."This paper discusses the role and operations of consumer Credit Bureaus in the European Union in the context of the economic theories, policies and law within which they work. Across Europe there is no common practice of sharing the credit data of consumers which can be used for several purposes. Mostly, they are used by the lending industry as a practice of creditworthiness assessment or as a risk-management tool to underwrite borrowing decisions or price risk. However, the type, breath, and depth of information differ greatly from country to country. In some Member States, consumer data are part of a broader information centralisation system for the prudential supervision of banks and the financial system as a whole. Despite EU rules on credit to consumers for the creation of the internal market, the underlying consumer data infrastructure remains fragmented at national level, failing to achieve univocal, common, or defined policy objectives under a harmonised legal framework. Likewise, the establishment of the Banking Union and the prudential supervision of the Euro area demand standardisation and convergence of the data used to measure debt levels, arrears, and delinquencies. The many functions and usages of credit data suggest that the policy goals to be achieved should inform the legal and institutional framework of Credit Bureaus, as well as the design and use of the databases. This is also because fundamental rights and consumer protection concerns arise from the sharing of credit data and their expanding use

Measuring Gravito-magnetic Effects by Multi Ring-Laser Gyroscope

We propose an under-ground experiment to detect the general relativistic effects due to the curvature of space-time around the Earth (de Sitter effect) and to rotation of the planet (dragging of the inertial frames or Lense-Thirring effect). It is based on the comparison between the IERS value of the Earth rotation vector and corresponding measurements obtained by a tri-axial laser detector of rotation. The proposed detector consists of six large ring-lasers arranged along three orthogonal axes. In about two years of data taking, the 1% sensitivity required for the measurement of the Lense-Thirring drag can be reached with square rings of 6 $m$ side, assuming a shot noise limited sensitivity ($20 prad/s/\sqrt{Hz}$). The multi-gyros system, composed of rings whose planes are perpendicular to one or the other of three orthogonal axes, can be built in several ways. Here, we consider cubic and octahedron structures. The symmetries of the proposed configurations provide mathematical relations that can be used to study the stability of the scale factors, the relative orientations or the ring-laser planes, very important to get rid of systematics in long-term measurements, which are required in order to determine the relativistic effects.Comment: 24 pages, 26 Postscript figure

Drugs in early clinical development for the treatment of osteosarcoma

Introduction: Osteosarcomas are the main malignant primary bone tumours found in children and young adults. Conventional treatment is based on diagnosis and resection surgery, combined with polychemotherapy. This is a protocol that was established in the 1970s. Unfortunately, this therapeutic approach has reached a plateau of efficacy and the patient survival rate has not improved in the last four decades. New therapeutic approaches are thus required to improve the prognosis for osteosarcoma patients. Areas covered: From the databases available and published scientific literature, the present review gives an overview of the drugs currently in early clinical development for the treatment of osteosarcoma. For each drug, a short description is given of the relevant scientific data supporting its development. Expert opinion: Multidrug targeted approaches are set to emerge, given the heterogeneity of osteosarcoma subtypes and the multitude of therapeutic responses. The key role played by the microenvironment in the disease increases the number of therapeutic targets (such as macrophages or osteoclasts), as well as the master proteins that control cell proliferation or cell death. Ongoing phase I/II trials are important steps, not only for identifying new therapies with greater safety and efficacy, but also for better defining the role played by the microenvironment in the pathogenesis of osteosarcoma

Measurement of χ c1 and χ c2 production with s√ = 7 TeV pp collisions at ATLAS

The prompt and non-prompt production cross-sections for the χ c1 and χ c2 charmonium states are measured in pp collisions at s√ = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector at the LHC using 4.5 fb−1 of integrated luminosity. The χ c states are reconstructed through the radiative decay χ c → J/ψγ (with J/ψ → μ + μ −) where photons are reconstructed from γ → e + e − conversions. The production rate of the χ c2 state relative to the χ c1 state is measured for prompt and non-prompt χ c as a function of J/ψ transverse momentum. The prompt χ c cross-sections are combined with existing measurements of prompt J/ψ production to derive the fraction of prompt J/ψ produced in feed-down from χ c decays. The fractions of χ c1 and χ c2 produced in b-hadron decays are also measured

Measurements of fiducial and differential cross sections for Higgs boson production in the diphoton decay channel at s√=8 TeV with ATLAS

Measurements of fiducial and differential cross sections are presented for Higgs boson production in proton-proton collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of s√=8 TeV. The analysis is performed in the H → γγ decay channel using 20.3 fb−1 of data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider. The signal is extracted using a fit to the diphoton invariant mass spectrum assuming that the width of the resonance is much smaller than the experimental resolution. The signal yields are corrected for the effects of detector inefficiency and resolution. The pp → H → γγ fiducial cross section is measured to be 43.2 ±9.4(stat.) − 2.9 + 3.2 (syst.) ±1.2(lumi)fb for a Higgs boson of mass 125.4GeV decaying to two isolated photons that have transverse momentum greater than 35% and 25% of the diphoton invariant mass and each with absolute pseudorapidity less than 2.37. Four additional fiducial cross sections and two cross-section limits are presented in phase space regions that test the theoretical modelling of different Higgs boson production mechanisms, or are sensitive to physics beyond the Standard Model. Differential cross sections are also presented, as a function of variables related to the diphoton kinematics and the jet activity produced in the Higgs boson events. The observed spectra are statistically limited but broadly in line with the theoretical expectations

Measurement of the production of a W boson in association with a charm quark in pp collisions at √s = 7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The production of a W boson in association with a single charm quark is studied using 4.6 fb−1 of pp collision data at s√ = 7 TeV collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider. In events in which a W boson decays to an electron or muon, the charm quark is tagged either by its semileptonic decay to a muon or by the presence of a charmed meson. The integrated and differential cross sections as a function of the pseudorapidity of the lepton from the W-boson decay are measured. Results are compared to the predictions of next-to-leading-order QCD calculations obtained from various parton distribution function parameterisations. The ratio of the strange-to-down sea-quark distributions is determined to be 0.96+0.26−0.30 at Q 2 = 1.9 GeV2, which supports the hypothesis of an SU(3)-symmetric composition of the light-quark sea. Additionally, the cross-section ratio σ(W + +c¯¯)/σ(W − + c) is compared to the predictions obtained using parton distribution function parameterisations with different assumptions about the s−s¯¯¯ quark asymmetry

Search for squarks and gluinos in events with isolated leptons, jets and missing transverse momentum at s√=8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

The results of a search for supersymmetry in final states containing at least one isolated lepton (electron or muon), jets and large missing transverse momentum with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider are reported. The search is based on proton-proton collision data at a centre-of-mass energy s√=8 TeV collected in 2012, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 20 fb−1. No significant excess above the Standard Model expectation is observed. Limits are set on supersymmetric particle masses for various supersymmetric models. Depending on the model, the search excludes gluino masses up to 1.32 TeV and squark masses up to 840 GeV. Limits are also set on the parameters of a minimal universal extra dimension model, excluding a compactification radius of 1/R c = 950 GeV for a cut-off scale times radius (ΛR c) of approximately 30