Large-scale high head pico hydropower potential assessment

Due to a lack of site-related information, Pico hydropower (PHP) has hardly been a projectable resource so far. This is particularly true for large area PHP potential information that could open a perspective to increase the size of development projects by aggregating individual PHP installations. The present work is extending the capabilities of GIS based hydropower potential assessment into the PHP domain through a GIS based PHP potential assessment procedure that facilitates the discrimination of areas without high head PHP potential against areas with PHP potential and against areas with so called “favorable PHP potential”. The basic unit of the spatial output is determined by the underlying PHP potential definition of this work: a standardized PHP installation and the required hydraulic source, together called standard unit, are located on an area of one square kilometer. The gradation of the output is a consequence of the verification techniques. Several large area PHP potential field assessment methods, based on contemplative analysis techniques, are developed in this work. Field assessments were conducted in Yunnan Province/China, Costa Rica, Ecuador and Sri Lanka. The aim for all field assessments is to get a comprehensive view on the PHP potential distribution of the entire country/province. Application of the GIS based PHP potential assessment procedure is aimed at the global tropical and subtropical regions

Cranioencephalic functional lymphoid units in glioblastoma

The ecosystem of brain tumors is considered immunosuppressed, but our current knowledge may be incomplete. Here we analyzed clinical cell and tissue specimens derived from patients presenting with glioblastoma or nonmalignant intracranial disease to report that the cranial bone (CB) marrow, in juxtaposition to treatment-naive glioblastoma tumors, harbors active lymphoid populations at the time of initial diagnosis. Clinical and anatomical imaging, single-cell molecular and immune cell profiling and quantification of tumor reactivity identified CD8+ T cell clonotypes in the CB that were also found in the tumor. These were characterized by acute and durable antitumor response rooted in the entire T cell developmental spectrum. In contrast to distal bone marrow, the CB niche proximal to the tumor showed increased frequencies of tumor-reactive CD8+ effector types expressing the lymphoid egress marker S1PR1. In line with this, cranial enhancement of CXCR4 radiolabel may serve as a surrogate marker indicating focal association with improved progression-free survival. The data of this study advocate preservation and further exploitation of these cranioencephalic units for the clinical care of glioblastoma