Potential use of space-based lightning detection in electric power systems

Information about lightning activity and its parameters is necessary to design and evaluate the lightning protection of an electrical power system. This information can be obtained from ground-based lightning detection networks that provide information on cloud-to-ground lightning strikes with a location accuracy of few hundred meters. Recently, the first satellite-based lightning optical detectors are operating continuously from geostationary orbits. These imagers observe the luminosity escaping from clouds to detect and locate total lightning activity with a spatial accuracy of several kilometers. This allows delineating the initiation and propagation (sometimes over tens to hundreds of kilometers before striking the ground) not observable by the ground-based networks. In this paper, we explore the use of this new technology for lightning protection in power systems. We focus on tall objects such as wind turbines and overhead transmission lines. We show how the optical detections allow identifying lightning flashes that likely produce continuing currents. This provides additional information for the identification of dangerous events and also can be used to estimate the number of upward-flashes from tall objects triggered by a nearby flash. The analysis of a transmission line shows the concentration of faults in the areas of high total lightning flash density. We found regional variations of the optical energy of the flashes along the line.This work was supported by research grants ESP2017-86263-C4-2-R funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033 and by “ERDF A way of making Europe”, by the “European Union”; and Grants PID2019- 109269RB-C42 and ENE2017-91636-EXP funded by MCIN/AEI/ 10.13039/501100011033. S. Goodman was in part supported by NASA Grant 80NSSC18K1689. M. M. F. Saba was in part supported by research grants 2012/15375–7 and 2013/05784–0, from Sao ˜ Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP). S. Visacro was supported by a research grant (307381/2019–6) of the Brazilian National Council of Technological and Scientific Development (CNPq). The GLM data are available from the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) and Cloud Service Providers (e.g., Amazon Web Services, AWS). The LIS data are available from the NASA GHRC Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) (https:// https://ghrc.nsstc.nasa.gov/home/access-data. The power system information for the 500 kV transmission line is provided by ISA-INTERCOLOMBIA and is supported by L. Porras.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Patient knowledge of fecal calprotectin in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) : an observational study in Mexico

Background: Fecal calprotectin (FC) can be a valuable tool to optimize health care for patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). The objective of this observational study was to determine the level of knowledge of the FC test in Mexican patients with IBD. Methods: A self-report questionnaire was distributed via Facebook to patients with IBD. The survey consisted of 15 questions in two categories: the first category assessed knowledge of IBD diagnosis, and the second category assessed knowledge of the FC test. Results: In total, 460 patients with IBD participated, of which 83.9% (386) had ulcerative colitis (UC) and 16.0% (74) had Crohn’s disease (CD). Regarding IBD diagnosis, 41.9% of participants stated that they did not know of a non-invasive test for fecal matter to identify inflammation of the colon. Regarding the FC test, 57.5% (UC) and 58.1% (CD) stated that they did not know about the test. Additionally, 65.8% (UC) and 51.3% (CD) of participants stated that they had never received the FC test and 82.6% (UC) and 77.0% (CD) recognized that the FC test was difficult to access in their medical practice. Furthermore, 66% (UC) and 52.7% (CD) of participants noted that their specialist doctor had never suggested the FC test to them, yet 89.1% (UC) and 87.8% (CD) stated that they would prefer FC analysis for their IBD follow-up assessments. Conclusions: There is little knowledge of the FC biomarker among Mexican patients with IBD. This suggests the need for greater dissemination of its use and scope as a biomarker in IBD

Gut dysbiosis and clinical phases of pancolitis in patients with ulcerative colitis

Ulcerative colitis (UC) is a frequent type of inflammatory bowel disease, characterized by periods of remission and exacerbation. Gut dysbiosis may influence pathophysiology and clinical response in UC. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether gut microbiota is related to the active and remission phases of pancolitis in patients with UC as well as in healthy participants. Fecal samples were obtained from 18 patients with UC and clinical‐endoscopic evidenced pancolitis (active phase n = 9 and remission phase n = 9), as well as 15 healthy participants. After fecal DNA extraction, the 16S rRNA gene was amplified and sequenced (Illumina MiSeq), operational taxonomic units were analyzed with the QIIME software. Gut microbiota composition revealed a higher abundance of the phyla Proteobacteria and Fusobacteria in active pancolitis, as compared with remission and healthy participants. Likewise, a marked abundance of the genus Bilophila and Fusobacteria were present in active pancolitis, whereas a higher abundance of Faecalibacterium characterized both remission and healthy participants. LEfSe analysis showed that the genus Roseburia and Faecalibacterium were enriched in remission pancolitis, and genera Bilophila and Fusobacterium were enriched in active pancolitis. The relative abundance of Fecalibacterium and Roseburia showed a higher correlation with fecal calprotectin, while Bilophila and Fusobacterium showed AUCs (area under the curve) of 0.917 and 0.988 for active vs. remission pancolitis. The results of our study highlight the relation of gut dysbiosis with clinically relevant phases of pancolitis in patients with UC. Particularly, Fecalibacterium, Roseburia, Bilophila, and Fusobacterium were identified as genera highly related to the different clinical phases of pancolitis

Practical experiences and value of applying software analytics to manage quality

Abstract Background: Despite the growth in the use of software analytics platforms in industry, little empirical evidence is available about the challenges that practitioners face and the value that these platforms provide. Aim: The goal of this research is to explore the benefits of using a software analytics platform for practitioners managing quality. Method: In a technology transfer project, a software analytics platform was incrementally developed between academic and industrial partners to address their software quality problems. This paper focuses on exploring the value provided by this software analytics platform in two pilot projects. Results: Practitioners emphasized major benefits including the improvement of product quality and process performance and an increased awareness of product readiness. They especially perceived the semi-automated functionality of generating quality requirements by the software analytics platform as the benefit with the highest impact and most novel value for them. Conclusions: Practitioners can benefit from modern software analytics platforms, especially if they have time to adopt such a platform carefully and integrate it into their quality assurance activities

Desarrollo de página web multimedia interactiva para apoyo docente en materias del área Química-Física

Realización proyecto: Departamento de Química y Física. Universidad de Salamanca. Lugar trabajo principal: Faculta de Farmacía. Objetivo: Diseñar y desarrollar una página web, elaborar contenidos de apoyo docente. Materiales elaborados: memoria, CD-ROM para demostracción, programa HTML de página web. Materiales utilizados: Ordenador PC y periférico, editor HTML: Frontpage de Microsoft. El documento no está publicado.Junta de Castilla y León. Dirección General de Universidades e Investigación. Monasterio Ntra. Sra. del Prado. Autovia Puente Colgante s/n. 47071 Valladolid. Teléfono: 983-41.18.87Castilla y LeónES

Continuously assessing and improving software quality with software analytics tools:a case study

Abstract In the last decade, modern data analytics technologies have enabled the creation of software analytics tools offering real-time visualization of various aspects related to software development and usage. These tools seem to be particularly attractive for companies doing agile software development. However, the information provided by the available tools is neither aggregated nor connected to higher quality goals. At the same time, assessing and improving the software quality has also been the key targets for the software engineering community, yielding several proposals for standards and software quality models. Integrating such quality models into software analytics tools could close the gap by providing the connection to higher quality goals. This paper aims at understanding whether the integration of quality models into software analytics tools provides understandable, reliable, useful, and relevant information at the right level of detail about the quality of a process or product and whether practitioners intend to use it. Over the course of more than a year, four companies involved in this case study deployed such a tool to assess and improve software quality in several projects. We used standardized measurement instruments to elicit the perception of 22 practitioners regarding their use of the tool. We complemented the findings with debriefing sessions held at the companies. In addition, we discussed challenges and lessons learned with four practitioners leading the use of the tool. The quantitative and qualitative analyses provided positive results, i.e., the practitioners’ perception with regard to the tool’s understandability, reliability, usefulness, and relevance was positive. Individual statements support the statistical findings, and constructive feedback can be used for future improvements. We conclude that the potential for future adoption of quality models within software analytics tools definitely exists and encourage other practitioners to use the presented seven challenges and seven lessons learned and adopt them in their companies

Data-driven and tool-supported elicitation of quality requirements in agile companies

Abstract Quality requirements (QRs) are a key artifact needed to ensure the quality and success of a software system. Despite their importance, QRs rarely get the same degree of attention as their functional counterpart in agile software development (ASD) projects. Moreover, crucial information that can be obtained from software development repositories (e.g., JIRA, GitHub) is not fully exploited, or is even neglected, in QR elicitation activities. In this work, we present a data-driven tooled approach for the semi-automatic generation and documentation of QRs in the context of ASD. The approach is based on the declaration of thresholds over quality-related issues, whose violation triggers user-defined alerts. These alerts are used to browse a catalog of QR patterns that are presented to the ASD team by means of a dashboard that implements several analysis techniques. Once selected, the patterns generate the QRs, which are documented and stored in the product backlog. The full approach is implemented via a configurable platform. Over the course of 1 year, four companies differing in size and profile followed this approach and deployed the platform in their premises to semi-automatically generate QRs in several projects. We used standardized measurement instruments to elicit the perception of 22 practitioners regarding their use of the tool. The quantitative and qualitative analyses yielded positive results; i.e., the practitioners’ perception with regard to the tool’s understandability, reliability, usefulness, and relevance was positive. We conclude that the results show potential for future adoption of data-driven elicitation of QRs in agile companies and encourage other practitioners to use the presented tool and adopt it in their companies

New era of lightning detection from space: application to electric power systems

Information about lightning activity and its parameters is necessary to design and evaluate the lightning protection of an electrical power system. This information can be obtained from ground-based lightning detection networks that provide information on cloud-to-ground lightning strikes with a location accuracy of few hundred meters. Recently, the first satellite-based lightning optical detectors are operating continuously from geostationary orbits. These imagers observe the luminosity escaping from clouds to detect and locate total lightning activity with a spatial accuracy of several kilometers. This allows delineating the initiation and propagation (sometimes over tens to hundreds of kilometers before striking the ground) not observable by the ground-based networks. In this paper, we explore the use of this new technology for lightning protection in power systems.This work was supported by research grants from the Spanish Ministry of Economy and the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER): ESP2017-86263-C4-2-R and PID2019-109269RB-C42. S. Goodman was in part supported by NASA Grant 80NSSC18K1689.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version