Impact of the cascade hydropower construction HPC on water quality of the Seyhan River, Turkey

Cascade hydropower construction is a series of hydroelectric power stations located on different sections of river. Hydropower constructions HPC in the environment have both positive and negative effect. HPCs are works that have brought enormous benefits to providing electric energy, water storage, controlling floods, irrigation, transportation, human communities, and areas of recreation, etc. These engineering works can be providing large economic development in the regions where they are located. But, dam construction converts the natural stream flow to human control. This paper summarizes the impacts of cascade HPC on water quality in the Seyhan River. Water quality data were collected and data were divided into two stage: before HPC 1995-2008 and during HPC construction 2009-2014 . Dam construction negatively affects water quality based on water quality data. The analysis results were compared with maximum permissible limit values recommended by Turkish Water Pollution Control Regulation TWPCR standards. The contents of all chemical and physical parameters are higher before construction, and water pollution was observed at HPC construction site. Also, biological oxygen demand, chloride, nitrite nitrogen, total dissolved solids and total coliform bacteria were found to be above TWPCR

Optimal offline broadcast scheduling with an energy harvesting transmitter

We consider an energy harvesting transmitter broadcasting data to two receivers. Energy and data arrivals are assumed to occur at arbitrary but known instants. The goal is to minimize the total transmission time of the packets arriving within a certain time window, using the energy that becomes available during this time. An achievable rate region with structural properties satisfied by the two-user AWGN BC capacity region is assumed. Structural properties of power and rate allocation in an optimal policy are established, as well as the uniqueness of the optimal policy under the condition that all the data of the “weaker ” user are available at the beginning. An iterative algorithm, DuOpt, based on block coordinate descent that achieves the same structural properties as the optimal is described. Investigating the ways to have the optimal schedule of two consecutive epochs in terms of energy efficiency and minimum transmission duration, it has been shown that DuOpt achieves best performance under the same special condition of uniqueness. Index Terms Packet scheduling, energy harvesting, AWGN broadcast channel, energy-efficient scheduling

Epitaxial germanium growth and electrical characterization

Low bandgap Ge homojunctions are normally used in photovoltaic multiple junction solar cells or thermo-photovoltaic cells and are usually realized by thermal diffusion, starting from an n-type or p-type substrate. However the diffusion process itself intrinsically precludes the possibility to obtain sharp junctions and to control the doping profile. A better thickness and doping control could be achieved by epitaxial deposition of Ge junctions, with the aim to obtain better photovoltaic efficiencies. Single junction epitaxial Ge cells with high efficiency could find use either in III-V multijunction high efficiency solar cells or in thermophotovoltaic devices coupled to a burner and to suitable selective emitters based on rare earth elements. The samples presented in this talk were deposited by means of Metal Organic Vapur Phase Epitaxy (MOVPE) on Ge and on GaAs using Iso-Butyl Germane (iBuGe) as organic precursor. Structures of different thickness were growth by varying the deposition temperature between 400 and 700?C on n and p-type Ge substrates and on GaAs substrate. Arsenic was used as both doping element and as surfactant: in the latter case it was found to improve the epitaxial quality at low temperature. Memory effect of AsH3 in the MOVPE reactor will be discussed. Nominally undoped Ge was found to be p-type, while n-type doping is obtained with the use of AsH3. n/p and p/n junctions were obtained by using a p or n substrate and depositing a n or p type layer, respectively. A completely epitaxial n/p junction on a p Ge substrate was also deposited. Vertical Ge/Ge mesa junctions were prepared on the above structures by using conventional photolithographic techniques. Ohmic contacts were obtained by evaporation, followed by a thermal annealing at 250 ?C for 60 seconds, of Au on the backside of the ptype substrate and by evaporation of Au dots, 400 mm in diameter, onto the n-type epilayer. 500 mm mesa structures, concentric to Au dots, were then prepared by chemical wet etching in a solution of H2O2 : H2O. I-V, C-V, DLTS and EBIC techniques were used for electrical characterization of the layers. Typical I-V characteristics of the mesa structure show rectification in the range of 104, reverse currents lower than 10-6 A at 1 V and ideality factor in the 1.008-1.010 range. The good rectifying properties indicate that the nominally undoped Ge layer is n-type. Capacitance-Voltage (C-V) measurements suggest that the doping of the epitaxial Ge layer is expected to be higher than that of the substrate

Impact of opioid-free analgesia on pain severity and patient satisfaction after discharge from surgery: multispecialty, prospective cohort study in 25 countries

Background: Balancing opioid stewardship and the need for adequate analgesia following discharge after surgery is challenging. This study aimed to compare the outcomes for patients discharged with opioid versus opioid-free analgesia after common surgical procedures.Methods: This international, multicentre, prospective cohort study collected data from patients undergoing common acute and elective general surgical, urological, gynaecological, and orthopaedic procedures. The primary outcomes were patient-reported time in severe pain measured on a numerical analogue scale from 0 to 100% and patient-reported satisfaction with pain relief during the first week following discharge. Data were collected by in-hospital chart review and patient telephone interview 1 week after discharge.Results: The study recruited 4273 patients from 144 centres in 25 countries; 1311 patients (30.7%) were prescribed opioid analgesia at discharge. Patients reported being in severe pain for 10 (i.q.r. 1-30)% of the first week after discharge and rated satisfaction with analgesia as 90 (i.q.r. 80-100) of 100. After adjustment for confounders, opioid analgesia on discharge was independently associated with increased pain severity (risk ratio 1.52, 95% c.i. 1.31 to 1.76; P < 0.001) and re-presentation to healthcare providers owing to side-effects of medication (OR 2.38, 95% c.i. 1.36 to 4.17; P = 0.004), but not with satisfaction with analgesia (beta coefficient 0.92, 95% c.i. -1.52 to 3.36; P = 0.468) compared with opioid-free analgesia. Although opioid prescribing varied greatly between high-income and low- and middle-income countries, patient-reported outcomes did not.Conclusion: Opioid analgesia prescription on surgical discharge is associated with a higher risk of re-presentation owing to side-effects of medication and increased patient-reported pain, but not with changes in patient-reported satisfaction. Opioid-free discharge analgesia should be adopted routinely

Epidemiology of intra-abdominal infection and sepsis in critically ill patients: “AbSeS”, a multinational observational cohort study and ESICM Trials Group Project

Purpose: To describe the epidemiology of intra-abdominal infection in an international cohort of ICU patients according to a new system that classifies cases according to setting of infection acquisition (community-acquired, early onset hospital-acquired, and late-onset hospital-acquired), anatomical disruption (absent or present with localized or diffuse peritonitis), and severity of disease expression (infection, sepsis, and septic shock). Methods: We performed a multicenter (n = 309), observational, epidemiological study including adult ICU patients diagnosed with intra-abdominal infection. Risk factors for mortality were assessed by logistic regression analysis. Results: The cohort included 2621 patients. Setting of infection acquisition was community-acquired in 31.6%, early onset hospital-acquired in 25%, and late-onset hospital-acquired in 43.4% of patients. Overall prevalence of antimicrobial resistance was 26.3% and difficult-to-treat resistant Gram-negative bacteria 4.3%, with great variation according to geographic region. No difference in prevalence of antimicrobial resistance was observed according to setting of infection acquisition. Overall mortality was 29.1%. Independent risk factors for mortality included late-onset hospital-acquired infection, diffuse peritonitis, sepsis, septic shock, older age, malnutrition, liver failure, congestive heart failure, antimicrobial resistance (either methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, vancomycin-resistant enterococci, extended-spectrum beta-lactamase-producing Gram-negative bacteria, or carbapenem-resistant Gram-negative bacteria) and source control failure evidenced by either the need for surgical revision or persistent inflammation. Conclusion: This multinational, heterogeneous cohort of ICU patients with intra-abdominal infection revealed that setting of infection acquisition, anatomical disruption, and severity of disease expression are disease-specific phenotypic characteristics associated with outcome, irrespective of the type of infection. Antimicrobial resistance is equally common in community-acquired as in hospital-acquired infection