System Restoration Navigator: A decision support tool for System Restoration

Power system restoration is well recognized as an important task to reduce the duration of a disturbance that occures in power systems. The complex tasks of emergency recovery require advanced decision support tools to enhance the resilience and, utimately, self-healing capabilities for a smart grid. A piece of software entitled “System Restoration Navigator” (SRN) has been developed based on the Generic Restoration Milestones (GRMs) concept, with the support of EPRI during the last two years. This paper addresses the development and functionality of SRN. Firstly, the basic philosophy of GRMs is introduced. Secondly, the functionality of SRN and integration of SRN with EPRI Operator Training System (OTS) are demonstrated. Thirdly, the Power and Light (PALCO) system is used to illustrate the general restoration plan and concrete restoration actions under a blackout scenario. It is believed that the development of SRN and its integration with OTS is a major step towards the on-line decision-making for system restoration.published_or_final_versio

Moth-Eye Anti-Reflection for Small Satellites

In this paper we report on the design, fabrication and characterization of a bio-inspired moth-eye antireection (AR) surface designed to operate in the space environment. Nano and micro-satellites do not generally employ active solar arrays, opting instead for pas- sive, body mounted solar panels which perform poorly at highly oblique angles. We design a moth-eye AR surface to increase power production on nano and micro-satellites by improving transmission of light, particularly at angles of incidence at or above 50◦ . We determine that during typical nano-satellite Earth observation missions (altitude 750 km, sun-synchronous orbit, 3U CubeSat configuration with surface mounted solar pan- els) the cumulative effect of increased transmission of light by moth-eye AR technology is to increase power production by 10% over each orbit. Moth-eye surface is fabricated on quartz coverglass using a combination of nano-sphere lithography, inductively coupled plasma etching and reactive ion etching techniques. The surface consists of a hexagonal array of quartz nano-cones; the spacing and height of the cones is optimized to suppress reection of incoming light for wavelengths between 350nm and 1800nm. We characterize the transmission and reection of the moth-eye AR surface as well as the performance of commercially available triple junction cells using moth-eye enhanced coverglas

The Healing Touch: Tools and Challenges for Smart Grid Restoration

Major electric power disturbances can be triggered by storms, heat waves, solar flares, and many other sources, but all have their roots in the mechanical, cyber, and human vulnerabilities of existing power grids. As shown in ?Figure 1, 2012 was a particularly bad year for extreme weather in the United States. An aging grid infrastructure only exacerbates this problem by creating new concerns over energy reliability and grid resiliency. A single storm can cost billions of U.S. dollars in terms of direct damage to the grid, and it can cause significant power outage-related costs, including lost productivity.published_or_final_versio

Detection and identification of ethanal-derived spin-trapped free radicals using headspace thermal desorption gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (TD-GC-MS)

In this study, we demonstrate a novel approach to the detection and identification of the products of spin-trapped free radicals. Hydroxyl free radicals were generated by Fenton-based chemistry in the presence of ethanal and the spin-trapping agent N-tert-butyl- -phenylnitrone (PBN). The resulting volatile compounds present in the reaction vial headspace were collected using thermal desorption (TD) and analysed by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GCMS). Eleven compounds were detected in the headspace, and their identification was aided by using either a fluorinated or deuterated analogue of PBN as an alternative spin trap and/or deuterated ethanal (CD 3CHO) as the secondary source of free radicals. The electron-ionisation (EI) mass spectra clearly demonstrate the “capture” of methyl radicals; two of the compounds detected were identified as containing one methyl group derived from ethanal, and four were shown to contain two methyl groups. This study demonstrates that sampling the reaction headspace using TD-GC-MS is a viable method for analysing products of free radical trapping, and potentially may be applied to a wide range of free radical systems

Selective, non-covalent conjugation of synthetic peptides with recombinant proteins mediated by host-guest chemistry.

The combination of potent chemical moieties with biologically active proteins is key to some of today's most innovative therapeutic drugs. In order to obviate any chemical modification of the proteins, we present a novel and powerful strategy for the selective conjugation of recombinant protein domains with synthetically derived peptides via a cucurbit[8]uril host-guest chemistry approach.We thank Alexandra Rieck, Isabelle Sermadiras, Benjamin Kemp and Jennifer Spooner for help with the expression and purification of the Fc and Tn3 domains, Jefferson Revell and Jacky Metcalfe for help with the synthesis of modified peptides and Christel Veyssier for help with the light scattering experiments. RJG was supported by the MedImmune postdoctoral program. SS was supported by ERC Starting Investigator grant ASPiRe (No. 240629).This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Royal Society of Chemistry via http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/C6CC00405

External data required timely response by the Trial Steering-Data Monitoring Committee for the NALoxone InVEstigation (N-ALIVE) pilot trial

The prison-based N-ALIVE pilot trial had undertaken to notify the Research Ethics Committee and participants if we had reason to believe that the N-ALIVE pilot trial would not proceed to the main trial. In this paper, we describe how external data for the third year of before/after evaluation from Scotland's National Naloxone Programme, a related public health policy, were anticipated by eliciting prior opinion about the Scottish results in the month prior to their release as official statistics. We summarise how deliberations by the N-ALIVE Trial Steering-Data Monitoring Committee (TS-DMC) on N-ALIVE's own interim data, together with those on naloxone-on-release (NOR) from Scotland, led to the decision to cease randomization in the N-ALIVE pilot trial and recommend to local Principal Investigators that NOR be offered to already-randomized prisoners who had not yet been released

WPA position statement on prisoner mental and public health care

As a group, prisoners have a tendency not to engage effectively with healthcare services while they are in the community because they have so many other competing priorities. Other priorities may include access to adequate finance, finding a place to sleep that is dry and safe, having sufficient food for themselves and their families, or the need to meet existing addictions. However, as a group, they present with high levels of health morbidity across domains of physical and mental health and addictions. It is widely established that screening people for healthcare conditions at the point when they are received into prison can assist in identifying a range of medical conditions. Although the process has limitations, the practice of screening is recommended internationally. After screening has taken place, healthcare services are meant to be provided in prisons to the same extent and quality as would be available in the community, yet across the world, there have often been problems in ensuring the adequacy of prison healthcare systems. Prison healthcare departments have often lagged behind regarding funding, and many countries have reported problems with the quality and consistency of delivery. Also, issues with training and continuous professional development are often cited as problematic in this area. This curriculum has been prepared to assist countries in ensuring that systems are in place for the effective training and continuous professional development of staff. It is meant to assist those who design such programs for local use

Novel loci affecting iron homeostasis and their effects in individuals at risk for hemochromatosis

Variation in body iron is associated with or causes diseases, including anaemia and iron overload. Here, we analyse genetic association data on biochemical markers of iron status from 11 European-population studies, with replication in eight additional cohorts (total up to 48,972 subjects). We find 11 genome-wide-significant (

Replication and Characterization of Association between ABO SNPs and Red Blood Cell Traits by Meta-Analysis in Europeans.

Red blood cell (RBC) traits are routinely measured in clinical practice as important markers of health. Deviations from the physiological ranges are usually a sign of disease, although variation between healthy individuals also occurs, at least partly due to genetic factors. Recent large scale genetic studies identified loci associated with one or more of these traits; further characterization of known loci and identification of new loci is necessary to better understand their role in health and disease and to identify potential molecular mechanisms. We performed meta-analysis of Metabochip association results for six RBC traits-hemoglobin concentration (Hb), hematocrit (Hct), mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH), mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC), mean corpuscular volume (MCV) and red blood cell count (RCC)-in 11 093 Europeans from seven studies of the UCL-LSHTM-Edinburgh-Bristol (UCLEB) Consortium. We identified 394 non-overlapping SNPs in five loci at genome-wide significance: 6p22.1-6p21.33 (with HFE among others), 6q23.2 (with HBS1L among others), 6q23.3 (contains no genes), 9q34.3 (only ABO gene) and 22q13.1 (with TMPRSS6 among others), replicating previous findings of association with RBC traits at these loci and extending them by imputation to 1000 Genomes. We further characterized associations between ABO SNPs and three traits: hemoglobin, hematocrit and red blood cell count, replicating them in an independent cohort. Conditional analyses indicated the independent association of each of these traits with ABO SNPs and a role for blood group O in mediating the association. The 15 most significant RBC-associated ABO SNPs were also associated with five cardiometabolic traits, with discordance in the direction of effect between groups of traits, suggesting that ABO may act through more than one mechanism to influence cardiometabolic risk.British Heart Foundation (Grant ID: RG/10/12/28456, RG/08/013/25942, RG/13/16/30528, RG/98002, RG/07/008/23674); Medical Research Council (Grant ID: G0000934, G0500877, MC_UU_12019/1, K013351); Wellcome Trust (Grant ID: 068545/Z/02, 097451/Z/11/Z); European Commission Framework Programme 6 (Grant ID: 018996); French Ministry of Research; Department of Health Policy Research Programme (England); Chief Scientist Office of Scotland (Grant ID: CZB/4/672, CZQ/1/38); National Institute on Ageing (NIA) (Grant ID: AG1764406S1, 5RO1AG13196); Pfizer plc (Unrestricted Investigator Led Grant); Diabetes UK (Clinical Research Fellowship 10/0003985); Stroke Association; National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (5RO1HL036310); Agency for Health Care Policy Research (HS06516); John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Networks on Successful Midlife Development and Socio-economic Status and Health; Swiss National Science Foundation (33CSCO-122661); GlaxoSmithKline. Faculty of Biology and Medicine of Lausanne,Switzerland.This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Public Library of Science (PLOS) via http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.015691