Tailored Systems Engineering Processes for Low Cost High Risk Missions

Given the low cost of most cubesat missions, a full implementation of the traditional space systems engineering process to cubesat missions can be detrimental to programmatic success of the cubesat. At the other extreme, cubesat missions often suffer predictable consequences from the omission of standard systems engineering processes such as risk management, configuration management, and quality assurance. In this paper we discuss a scaled systems engineering approach to cubesat missions implemented on a programmatically constrained mission. A discussion of each of the standard systems engineering processes and options for tailoring the processes for a constraint-based mission and how this varies from the typical top-down mission processes. The intent is to inform the decisions of mission developers in determining what level of rigor is appropriate for each process in their unique circumstances and mission needs. Examples of tailoring processes utilized with missions currently underway at the Air Force Research Laboratory\u27s Small Satellite Branch (AFRL/RVEN) are used to illustrate the application of the information presented

Patient's perspectives of living with a precancerous condition : monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS)

Funding for this study was provided by a Cancer Translational Research Group Young Investigator Grant. At the time of the study, Dr Charlene McShane was in receipt of a Cancer Research UK Population Sciences Research Fellowship.Peer reviewedPostprin

Modeling the effects of ecosystem changes on seagrass wrack valorization: Merging system dynamics with life cycle assessment

Seagrass meadows, while recognized as essential ecosystem service providers, are degrading worldwide. This has a profound impact on the environment but also on socioeconomic systems which hope to utilize beach-cast seagrass (wrack) as a bioresource. This study integrates system dynamics (SD) thinking with life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle costing (LCC) to understand how a degraded ecosystem feedbacks into the circular bioeconomy. An SD model was created to assess the impacts of seagrass meadow changes on wrack production and on ecosystem services accounting, considering an Italian case study of wrack deposited on a beach. Environmental and economic impacts of wrack valorization through anaerobic digestion (AD) were then determined through LCA and LCC. Finally, an extended LCC combined the results of the SD model, LCA, and LCC to demonstrate the cost of seagrass meadow degradation and the value of restoration. The results confirmed complexities in stakeholder perspective within the waste-to-resource framework. For the AD operator, meadow restoration would increase the profits from wrack valorization (23.10 €/ton), while for the municipality, meadow degradation would reduce the high costs associated with management (104.29–140.00 €/ton). When also considering the impacts on the environment and local community, valuation of ecosystem services and cost of restoration were influential. Meadow restoration with wrack valorization was the most favorable option if the natural capital of the seagrass meadows was valued appropriately (>0.065 €/m2) and direct costs of restoration could be kept relatively low (<1179 €/ha). Overall, the model resulted in a total net present cost of −3.161,462.40 € for the baseline scenario, −1,488,277.28 € for the scenario of wrack valorization, and −1,231,325.12 € for the scenario of wrack valorization and meadow restoration

Low knowledge and awareness of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance (MGUS) among general practitioners

Acknowledgements The authors would like to take this opportunity to thank the organisers of the WONCA Europe 2017 conference and the General Practitioners/Trainee’s for participating in this study. Funding At the time of writing, Dr Charlene McShane was in receipt of a Cancer Research UK Population Science Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (C51094/A18267)Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Uptake of hepatitis B-HIV co-infection screening and management in a resource limited setting.

Background: WHO hepatitis B guidelines recommend testing all new HIV patients, treating them accordingly or providing immunization. At the Infectious Diseases Institute (IDI) following an audit done in 2012, only 46% patients had been screened for hepatitis B with variable management plans therefore new internal guidelines were implemented. This study describes the uptake of hepatitis B screening and management of patients with hepatitis B and HIV con-infection after the implementation. Methods: Data included for all HIV positive patients in care at IDI by October 2015. Data are expressed as median with interquartile range (IQR) and percentages were compared using the chi square test. Statistical analysis was performed using STATA version 13. The IDI laboratory upper limit of normal for alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (ASTs) was 40 IU/ml. Results: Number of hepatitis B screening tests increased from 800 by 2012 to 1400 in 2015. By 2015 8042/8604(93.5%) patients had been screened for hepatitis B. Overall hepatitis B positive were 359 (4.6%). 166 (81.4%) hepatitis B positives were switched to a tenofovir (TDF) containing regimen. Conclusion: Our study confirms the importance of screening for hepatitis B and of using ART regimens containing tenofovir in hepatitis B co-infected patients. Whilst our program has made improvements in care still 18.6% of patients with hepatitis B were not on tenofovir regimens, 98.1% had no hepatitis B viral loads done. Clinicians should recognize the potential for hepatitis B in HIV positive patients and the importance of early diagnosis and treatment to ensure optimal management of cases and follow up

A stable isotope perspective on archaeological agricultural variability and Neolithic experimentation in India

Agriculture has been crucial in sustaining human populations in South Asia across dramatically variable environments for millennia. Until recently, however, the origins of this mode of subsistence in India have been discussed in terms of population migration and crop introduction, with limited focus on how agricultural packages were formulated and utilised in local contexts. Here, we report the first measurements of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope values in well-preserved charred crop remains from sites spanning the Neolithic/Chalcolithic to the Early Historic in two very different environmental zones: tropical East India and the semi-arid Deccan. The results show that this approach offers direct insight into prehistoric crop management under contrasting environmental constraints. Our preliminary results plausibly suggest that early farmers in India experimented with and made strategic use of water and manure resources in accordance with specific crop requirements and under varying environmental constraints. We suggest that the development of modern crop isotope baselines across India, and the application of this methodology to archaeological assemblages, has the potential to yield detailed insight into agroecology in India's past

Advances in morphometrics in archaeobotany

Morphometric analysis offers an alternative or augmentation to traditional archaeobotanical methods to address differences within and between plant species and their remains, refining and enhancing taxonomic resolution. Morphometrics, the measurement of size and shape, and the multivariate statistical analysis of generated quantitative variables, have long played a major role in biological research, including plant taxonomy and systematics, although its application in archaeobotany is relatively recent. Over the last few decades there has been an increasing interest in the use of morphometrics for analysing a varied range of archaeological plant materials (mainly seeds, pollen, phytoliths, and starch grains). In particular, morphometrics have contributed to the study of the domestication and spread of many cereals world-wide, as well as that of other taxa including legumes, underground storage organs (USO), and fruits (such as olives, grapes, and dates). This paper reviews current methodologies, recent applications, and advances in the use of morphometrics in archaeobotanical research, discusses its role in exploring major research questions, and suggests possible future directions for its use

Basic student nurse perceptions about clinical instructor caring

Abstract: Background: Caring is the core of nursing and should be cultivated in student nurses. However, there are serious concerns about the caring concern in the clinical environment and in nursing education. Clinical instructors are ideally positioned to care for student nurses so that they in turn, can learn to care for their patients. Methods: A descriptive, comparative, cross-sectional and correlational quantitative research design with convenience sampling was conducted to describe the perceptions of junior student nurses (n ¼ 148) and senior student nurses (n ¼ 168) regarding clinical instructor caring. A structured self administered questionnaire using the Nursing Student Perceptions of Instructor Caring (NSPIC) (Wade & Kasper, 2006) was used. Descriptive statistics and hypotheses testing using parametric and non parametric methods were conducted. The reliability of the NSPIC was determined..

Integrating Audiovisual Immersion Into Pediatric Radiation Therapy Across Multiple Centers: Methodology, Timeliness, and Cost of the Audiovisual-Assisted Therapeutic Ambience in Radiation Therapy Prospective Multi-Institutional Trial.

PURPOSE: The Audiovisual-Assisted Therapeutic Ambience in Radiotherapy (AVATAR) trial was a prospective multicenter study (NCT03991156) examining the combination of video immersion with radiation therapy and was successfully conducted through the collaboration of pediatric radiation oncology teams at 10 institutions independent of any pre-existing consortium. We sought to analyze and report the methodology of trial conception and development, process map, and cost. METHODS AND MATERIALS: The study enrolled patients aged 3 to 10 years preparing to undergo radiation therapy, integrated the combination of AVATAR-based video immersion with radiation therapy at each institution, and offered AVATAR use as an alternative to anesthesia, with rates of anesthesia use and outcomes of serial standardized anxiety and quality-of-life assessments assessed among the 81 children enrolled. A process map was created based on the trial timeline with the following components: study development time (time from conception of the trial to the accrual of the first patient, including design phase, agreement and approval phase, and site preparation phase), and accrual duration time (time from the first to last accrual). Costs and institutional success rates were calculated. RESULTS: Time from inception of study to last accrual was 3.6 years (1313 days). The study development time was 417 days (31.7%), and accrual duration time was 896 days (68.3%), with the final 50% of accrual occurring in <6 months. Equipment cost was approximately $550 per institution and was covered by funding from the lead study institution. All 10 centers were successful with AVATAR implementation, defined as ≥50% of patients able to avoid anesthesia with the use of AVATAR, including centers with both photon and proton therapy. CONCLUSIONS: This report elaborates on the methodology and timeline of trial conception and development using data from a previously published supportive care study combining video immersion with radiation therapy among 10 cooperating pediatric oncology institutions. It highlights the potential for multicenter collaborations on prospective trials integrating supportive care therapies with radiation therapy

Demonstration of a Hybrid Space Architecture During RIMPAC 2020

The Micro-Satellite Military Utility (MSMU) Project Arrangement (PA) is an agreement under the Responsive Space Capabilities (RSC) Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that involves the Departments and Ministries of Defence of Australia, Canada, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, United Kingdom and United States. MSMU’s charter is to inform a space enterprise that provides military users with reliable access to a broad spectrum of information in an opportunistic environment. Research and Development teams from MSMU partner nations supported Exercise Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) 2020 which took place 17 to 31 August 2020 in the Hawaiian region. RIMPAC 2020 provided an opportunity to explore the military utility of a Hybrid Space Architecture (HSA) of satellites including traditional government and commercial satellites, as well as micro-satellites and nanosatellites, by leveraging contributions across the MSMU partner nations. The objective was to continue testing the hypothesis that an HSA, mostly composed of small satellites, can bring significant value to the operational theatre. The MSMU PA partner nations have leveraged several multi-national exercises, with the first being the Exercise RIMPAC 2018. Previous exercises enabled multinational technology advancements, interoperability testing, process refinement, and capability developments to make advancements towards MSMU’s goal to address the warfighter’s need for diverse ISR capabilities. The most recent accomplishment was a major integration effort across mission planning tools, space-based Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) data providers, and exploitation tools. The MSMU team accessed ~256 space-based sensors (EO – Electro Optical, SAR – Synthetic Aperture Radar, AIS – Automatic Identification System) to collect maritime domain and ISR data over a harbor, airfields and open sea. Data was exploited via international channels in order to determine the success rate of capturing pertinent data to be later exploited and disseminated. This paper describes results from the experiment and offers insights into the HSA military utility