Secure, Mobile Visual Sensor Networks Architecture

As Wireless Sensor Network-based solutions are proliferating they are facing new challenges: they must be capable of adapting to rapidly changing environments and requirements while their nodes should have low power consumption as they usually run on batteries. Moreover, the security aspect is crucial since they frequently transmit and process very sensitive data, while it is important to be able to support real-time video or processed images over their limited bandwidth links. SMART targets to design and implement a highly reconfigurable Wireless Visual Sensor Node (WVSN) defined as a miniaturized, light-weight, secure, low-cost, battery powered sensing device, enriched with video and data compression capabilities

A branch and efficiency algorithm for the optimal design of supply chain networks

Supply chain operations directly affect service levels. Decision on amendment of facilities is generally decided based on overall cost, leaving out the efficiency of each unit. Decomposing the supply chain superstructure, efficiency analysis of the facilities (warehouses or distribution centers) that serve customers can be easily implemented. With the proposed algorithm, the selection of a facility is based on service level maximization and not just cost minimization as this analysis filters all the feasible solutions utilizing Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) technique. Through multiple iterations, solutions are filtered via DEA and only the efficient ones are selected leading to cost minimization. In this work, the problem of optimal supply chain networks design is addressed based on a DEA based algorithm. A Branch and Efficiency (B&E) algorithm is deployed for the solution of this problem. Based on this DEA approach, each solution (potentially installed warehouse, plant etc) is treated as a Decision Making Unit, thus is characterized by inputs and outputs. The algorithm through additional constraints named “efficiency cuts”, selects only efficient solutions providing better objective function values. The applicability of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated through illustrative examples

CRISPR in context : towards a socially responsible debate on embryo editing

Following the birth in 2018 of two babies from embryos altered using CRISPR-Cas9, human germline gene editing (GGE) moved from abstract concern to reality. He Jiankui, the scientist responsible, has been roundly condemned by most scientific, legal and ethical commentators. However, opinions remain divided on whether GGE could be acceptably used in the future, and how, or if it should be prohibited entirely. The many reviews, summits, positions statements and high-level meetings that have accompanied the emergence of CRISPR technology acknowledge this, calling for greater public engagement to help reach a consensus on how to proceed. These calls are laudable but far from unproblematic. Consensus is not only hugely challenging to reach, but difficult to measure and to know when it might be achieved. Engagement is clearly desirable, but engagement strategies need to avoid the limitations of previous encounters between publics and biotechnology. Here we set CRISPR in the context of the biotechnology and fertility industries to illustrate the lessons to be learned. In particular we demonstrate the importance of avoiding a ‘deficit mode’ in which resistance is attributed to a lack of public understanding of science, addressing the separation of technical safety criteria from ethical and social matters, and ensuring the scope of the debate includes the political-economic context in which science is conducted and new products and services are brought to market. Through this history, we draw on Mary Douglas’ classic anthropological notion of ‘matter out of place’ to explain why biotechnologies evoke feelings of unease and anxiety, and recommend this as a model for rehabilitating lay apprehension about novel biological technologies as legitimate matters of concern in future engagement exercises about GGE