Viral variants that initiate and drive maturation of V1V2-directed HIV-1 broadly neutralizing antibodies.

CAPRISA, 2015.Abstract available in pdf

Short-term management of hydropower assets of the Federal Columbia River Power System

We focus on the short-term optimization of large-scale hydropower systems with a mixture of storage reservoirs and run-of-the-river projects. If sufficient operational flexibility is available within the operational constraints, the system is capable of balancing the transmission network by compensating for load fluctuations and power production of other renewables such as solar and wind resources. The proposed optimization model is based on a nonlinear system representation of the hydropower system for forecasting state trajectories over a forecast horizon in combination with nonlinear programming for computing optimal release trajectories for specific hydropower projects. We present the application of a deterministic version of the approach to the short-term management of the Federal Columbia River Power System in the Pacific Northwest of the USA during the chum spawning season. An assessment of the computational performance of the approach for different optimization algorithms shows a superior performance of the Interior Point OPTimizer (IPOPT) in combination with the HSL/MA27 linear equation solver. In particular, the scaling properties are promising and will enable an extension of the deterministic approach towards a multi-stage stochastic optimization for taking into account the forecast uncertainty

Flash flood prediction for small rivers

Rainfall-runoff models are used as an integral part of flood warning systems. Especially in small catchment areas with a fast response to intense rain, an early enough triggering of warnings requires high quality weather forecasts as well as sufficiently accurate models. A conceptual rainfall-runoff model proposed by Lorent/Gevers serves as core routine of a pilot flash flood warning system for the Truse catchment in Thuringia (Germany). A moving horizon state estimator is used in order to enable this model for online application

First testing of an AUV mission planning and guidance system for water quality monitoring and fish behavior observation in net cage fish farming

Recently, underwater vehicles have become low cost, reliable and affordable platforms for performing various underwater tasks. While many aquaculture systems are closed with no harmful output, open net cage fish farms and land-based fish farms can discharge significant amounts of wastewater containing nutrients, chemicals, and pharmaceuticals that impact on the surrounding environment. Although aquaculture development has often occurred outside a regulatory framework, government oversight is increasingly common at both the seafood quality control level, and at baseline initiatives addressing the basic problem of pollution generated by culture operations, e.g. the European marine and maritime directives. This requires regular, sustainable and cost-effective monitoring of the water quality. Such monitoring needs devices to detect the water quality in a large sea area at different depths in real time. This paper presents a concept for a guidance system for a carrier (an autonomous underwater vehicle) of such devices for the automated detection and analysis of water quality parameters