Cloudlet-based just-in-time indexing of IoT video

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Towards a multimedia remote viewer for mobile thin clients

Be there a traditional mobile user wanting to connect to a remote multimedia server. In order to allow them to enjoy the same user experience remotely (play, interact, edit, store and share capabilities) as in a traditional fixed LAN environment, several dead-locks are to be dealt with: (1) a heavy and heterogeneous content should be sent through a bandwidth constrained network; (2) the displayed content should be of good quality; (3) user interaction should be processed in real-time and (4) the complexity of the practical solution should not exceed the features of the mobile client in terms of CPU, memory and battery. The present paper takes this challenge and presents a fully operational MPEG-4 BiFS solution

On the Feasibility of Using Current Data Centre Infrastructure for Latency-sensitive Applications

IEEE It has been claimed that the deployment of fog and edge computing infrastructure is a necessity to make high-performance cloud-based applications a possibility. However, there are a large number of middle-ground latency-sensitive applications such as online gaming, interactive photo editing and multimedia conferencing that require servers deployed closer to users than in globally centralised clouds but do not necessarily need the extreme low-latency provided by a new infrastructure of micro data centres located at the network edge, e.g. in base stations and ISP Points of Presence. In this paper we analyse a snapshot of today & #x0027;s data centres and the distribution of users around the globe and conclude that existing infrastructure provides a sufficiently distributed platform for middle-ground applications requiring a response time of $20-200\;ms$ . However, while placement and selection of edge servers for extreme low-latency applications is a relatively straightforward matter of choosing the closest, providing a high quality of experience for middle-ground latency applications that use the more widespread distribution of today & #x0027;s data centres, as we advocate in this paper, raises new management challenges to develop algorithms for optimising the placement of and the per-request selection between replicated service instances

Incidence and drug treatment of emotional distress after cancer diagnosis : a matched primary care case-control study

Notes This work is published under the standard license to publish agreement. After 12 months the work will become freely available and the license terms will switch to a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

The Photodetector Array Camera and Spectrometer (PACS) on the Herschel Space Observatory

The Photodetector Array Camera and Spectrometer (PACS) is one of the three science instruments on ESA's far infrared and submillimetre observatory. It employs two Ge:Ga photoconductor arrays (stressed and unstressed) with 16x25 pixels, each, and two filled silicon bolometer arrays with 16x32 and 32x64 pixels, respectively, to perform integral-field spectroscopy and imaging photometry in the 60-210\mu\ m wavelength regime. In photometry mode, it simultaneously images two bands, 60-85\mu\ m or 85-125\mu\m and 125-210\mu\ m, over a field of view of ~1.75'x3.5', with close to Nyquist beam sampling in each band. In spectroscopy mode, it images a field of 47"x47", resolved into 5x5 pixels, with an instantaneous spectral coverage of ~1500km/s and a spectral resolution of ~175km/s. We summarise the design of the instrument, describe observing modes, calibration, and data analysis methods, and present our current assessment of the in-orbit performance of the instrument based on the Performance Verification tests. PACS is fully operational, and the achieved performance is close to or better than the pre-launch predictions

The breadth of primary care: a systematic literature review of its core dimensions

Background: Even though there is general agreement that primary care is the linchpin of effective health care delivery, to date no efforts have been made to systematically review the scientific evidence supporting this supposition. The aim of this study was to examine the breadth of primary care by identifying its core dimensions and to assess the evidence for their interrelations and their relevance to outcomes at (primary) health system level. Methods: A systematic review of the primary care literature was carried out, restricted to English language journals reporting original research or systematic reviews. Studies published between 2003 and July 2008 were searched in MEDLINE, Embase, Cochrane Library, CINAHL, King's Fund Database, IDEAS Database, and EconLit. Results: Eighty-five studies were identified. This review was able to provide insight in the complexity of primary care as a multidimensional system, by identifying ten core dimensions that constitute a primary care system. The structure of a primary care system consists of three dimensions: 1. governance; 2. economic conditions; and 3. workforce development. The primary care process is determined by four dimensions: 4. access; 5. continuity of care; 6. coordination of care; and 7. comprehensiveness of care. The outcome of a primary care system includes three dimensions: 8. quality of care; 9. efficiency care; and 10. equity in health. There is a considerable evidence base showing that primary care contributes through its dimensions to overall health system performance and health. Conclusions: A primary care system can be defined and approached as a multidimensional system contributing to overall health system performance and health

Buprenorphine versus dihydrocodeine for opiate detoxification in primary care: a randomised controlled trial

Background Many drug users present to primary care requesting detoxification from illicit opiates. There are a number of detoxification agents but no recommended drug of choice. The purpose of this study is to compare buprenorphine with dihydrocodeine for detoxification from illicit opiates in primary care. Methods Open label randomised controlled trial in NHS Primary Care (General Practices), Leeds, UK. Sixty consenting adults using illicit opiates received either daily sublingual buprenorphine or daily oral dihydrocodeine. Reducing regimens for both interventions were at the discretion of prescribing doctor within a standard regimen of not more than 15 days. Primary outcome was abstinence from illicit opiates at final prescription as indicated by a urine sample. Secondary outcomes during detoxification period and at three and six months post detoxification were recorded. Results Only 23% completed the prescribed course of detoxification medication and gave a urine sample on collection of their final prescription. Risk of non-completion of detoxification was reduced if allocated buprenorphine (68% vs 88%, RR 0.58 CI 0.35–0.96, p = 0.065). A higher proportion of people allocated to buprenorphine provided a clean urine sample compared with those who received dihydrocodeine (21% vs 3%, RR 2.06 CI 1.33–3.21, p = 0.028). People allocated to buprenorphine had fewer visits to professional carers during detoxification and more were abstinent at three months (10 vs 4, RR 1.55 CI 0.96–2.52) and six months post detoxification (7 vs 3, RR 1.45 CI 0.84–2.49). Conclusion Informative randomised trials evaluating routine care within the primary care setting are possible amongst drug using populations. This small study generates unique data on commonly used treatment regimens

Coherent collective behaviour emerging from decentralised balancing of social feedback and noise

Decentralised systems composed of a large number of locally interacting agents often rely on coherent behaviour to execute coordinated tasks. Agents cooperate to reach a coherent collective behaviour by aligning their individual behaviour to the one of their neighbours. However, system noise, determined by factors such as individual exploration or errors, hampers and reduces collective coherence. The possibility to overcome noise and reach collective coherence is determined by the strength of social feedback, i.e. the number of communication links. On the one hand, scarce social feedback may lead to a noise-driven system and consequently incoherent behaviour within the group. On the other hand, excessively strong social feedback may require unnecessary computing by individual agents and/or may nullify the possible benefits of noise. In this study, we investigate the delicate balance between social feedback and noise, and its relationship with collective coherence. We perform our analysis through a locust-inspired case study of coherently marching agents, modelling the binary collective decision-making problem of symmetry breaking. For this case study, we analytically approximate the minimal number of communication links necessary to attain maximum collective coherence. To validate our findings, we simulate a 500-robot swarm and obtain good agreement between theoretical results and physics-based simulations. We illustrate through simulation experiments how the robot swarm, using a decentralised algorithm, can adaptively reach coherence for various noise levels by regulating the number of communication links. Moreover, we show that when the system is disrupted by increasing and decreasing the robot density, the robot swarm adaptively responds to these changes in real time. This decentralised adaptive behaviour indicates that the derived relationship between social feedback, noise and coherence is robust and swarm size independent