Network measures in civil air transport: A case study of Lufthansa

Network analysis has already a long history in operations research and quantitative social science research. In the past, much attention has been paid to shortest-route algorithms (for example, the travelling salesman problem), where the spatial configuration of networks was put in the centre of empirical investigation. Integer programming, linear and nonlinear programming turned out to offer a proper analytical toolbox. In recent years, we have seen several new trends, in particular, the rise of hub-and-spoke systems in liberalized networks, the emergence of dynamic adjustments to new competitive conditions and the increase in complexity in international networks. Furthermore, it appears that in the past decades many social, spatial and economic systems show an organized pattern characterized by network features, such as transportation, telecommunication, information or energy systems. As a consequence, much attention has recently been paid to the study of network properties emerging in many social, spatial and economic fields, as witnessed by the vast amount of literature published in the past years. Air transport is a prominent example of modern network constellations and will be addressed in this paper from a connectivity perspective. Air transport shows indeed clear network features, which impact on the way single airline carriers operate. The abundant scientific literature on airline networks has addressed this topic in terms of theoretical modelling and empirical measurements on different typologies of airline network configurations. This strand of recent research aimed to measure the network structure in relation to the effects of: (a) the market deregulation in United States in 1978 and in the European Union in the 1990s, (b) new trends in recent airline business strategies denoted as \u2018low cost\u2019 principles. Low cost carriers developed rather fast after the deregulation policy, by acquiring a competitive network advantage on traditional airlines, which consequently seemed to reorganise rapidly their airline network to respond to the new market dynamics. In this context, interesting research has emerged that mainly addressed the issue of describing and classifying networks by means of geographical concentration indices of traffic or flight frequency. These measures, such as the Gini concentration index or the Theil index, provide a proper measure of frequency or traffic concentration of the main airports in a simple, well-organized network. However, if a real-world network structure is complex, including multi-hub or mixed point-to-point and hub-spokes connections, the concentration indices may record high values for all types of structure, but fail to clearly discriminate between different network shapes. There is a need for a more appropriate measurement of connectivity structures in complex networks. Starting from the above considerations and research challenges, the present paper aims to investigate the scientific potential and applicability of a series of network connectivity/concentration indices, in order to properly typify and map out complex airline network configurations. Specifically, these various network indicators will be adopted and tested to describe the main properties \u2013 in terms of the network connectivity and configuration \u2013 of Lufthansa\u2019s airline system

Design and performance of ropes for climbing and sailing

Ropes are an important part of the equipment used by climbers, mountaineers, and sailors. On first inspection, most modern polymer ropes appear similar, and it might be assumed that their designs, construction, and properties are governed by the same requirements. In reality, the properties required of climbing ropes are dominated by the requirement that they effectively absorb and dissipate the energy of the falling climber, in a manner that it does not transmit more than a critical amount of force to his body. This requirement is met by the use of ropes with relatively low longitudinal stiffness. In contrast, most sailing ropes require high stiffness values to maximize their effectiveness and enable sailors to control sails and equipment precisely. These conflicting requirements led to the use of different classes of materials and different construction methods for the two sports. This paper reviews in detail the use of ropes, the properties required, manufacturing techniques and materials utilized, and the effect of service conditions on the performance of ropes. A survey of research that has been carried out in the field reveals what progress has been made in the development of these essential components and identifies where further work may yield benefits in the future

An Integrated TCGA Pan-Cancer Clinical Data Resource to Drive High-Quality Survival Outcome Analytics

For a decade, The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) program collected clinicopathologic annotation data along with multi-platform molecular profiles of more than 11,000 human tumors across 33 different cancer types. TCGA clinical data contain key features representing the democratized nature of the data collection process. To ensure proper use of this large clinical dataset associated with genomic features, we developed a standardized dataset named the TCGA Pan-Cancer Clinical Data Resource (TCGA-CDR), which includes four major clinical outcome endpoints. In addition to detailing major challenges and statistical limitations encountered during the effort of integrating the acquired clinical data, we present a summary that includes endpoint usage recommendations for each cancer type. These TCGA-CDR findings appear to be consistent with cancer genomics studies independent of the TCGA effort and provide opportunities for investigating cancer biology using clinical correlates at an unprecedented scale. Analysis of clinicopathologic annotations for over 11,000 cancer patients in the TCGA program leads to the generation of TCGA Clinical Data Resource, which provides recommendations of clinical outcome endpoint usage for 33 cancer types

Quantitative Observation of Magnetic Flux Distribution in New Magnetic Films for Future High Density Recording Media

International audienceOff-axis electron holography was used to observe and quantify the magnetic microstructure of a perpendicular magnetic anisotropic (PMA) recording media. Thin foils of PMA materials exhibit an interesting up and down domain configuration. These domains are found to be very stable and were observed at the same time with their stray field, closing magnetic flux in the vacuum. The magnetic moment can thus be determined locally in a volume as small as few tens of cubic nanometers

Downscaling of Hourly Climate Data for the Assessment of Building Energy Performance

In Italy, the calculation of the energy needs of buildings has been mainly based on quasi-steady state calculation procedures. Nowadays, the increasing interest in more detailed energy analysis for high-efficiency buildings requires more accurate calculation methods. In this work, starting from the hourly data of UNI 10349, the downscaling of a typical meteorological year was carried out by applying different mathematical and physical models for the main climate variables considered in the energy balance of a building to be used in dynamic simulation tools. All results were validated with one-minute measurements observed at the ENEA Research Centre in Rome, Italy. The results showed an MBE% of 0.008% and RMSE% of 0.114% using the interpolation spline method for the temperature, while, for the global horizontal irradiance, applying the novel sinusoidal–physical interpolation method showed an MBE% of −0.4% and an RMSE% of 31.8% for the 1 min observation data. In this paper, an easily implemented novel model for downscaling solar irradiance for all sky conditions that takes into account the physical aspects of atmospheric phenomena is presented

Pan-Cancer Analysis of lncRNA Regulation Supports Their Targeting of Cancer Genes in Each Tumor Context

Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are commonly dys-regulated in tumors, but only a handful are known toplay pathophysiological roles in cancer. We inferredlncRNAs that dysregulate cancer pathways, onco-genes, and tumor suppressors (cancer genes) bymodeling their effects on the activity of transcriptionfactors, RNA-binding proteins, and microRNAs in5,185 TCGA tumors and 1,019 ENCODE assays.Our predictions included hundreds of candidateonco- and tumor-suppressor lncRNAs (cancerlncRNAs) whose somatic alterations account for thedysregulation of dozens of cancer genes and path-ways in each of 14 tumor contexts. To demonstrateproof of concept, we showed that perturbations tar-geting OIP5-AS1 (an inferred tumor suppressor) andTUG1 and WT1-AS (inferred onco-lncRNAs) dysre-gulated cancer genes and altered proliferation ofbreast and gynecologic cancer cells. Our analysis in-dicates that, although most lncRNAs are dysregu-lated in a tumor-specific manner, some, includingOIP5-AS1, TUG1, NEAT1, MEG3, and TSIX, synergis-tically dysregulate cancer pathways in multiple tumorcontexts

Genomic, Pathway Network, and Immunologic Features Distinguishing Squamous Carcinomas

This integrated, multiplatform PanCancer Atlas study co-mapped and identified distinguishing molecular features of squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs) from five sites associated with smokin

Pan-cancer Alterations of the MYC Oncogene and Its Proximal Network across the Cancer Genome Atlas

Although theMYConcogene has been implicated incancer, a systematic assessment of alterations ofMYC, related transcription factors, and co-regulatoryproteins, forming the proximal MYC network (PMN),across human cancers is lacking. Using computa-tional approaches, we define genomic and proteo-mic features associated with MYC and the PMNacross the 33 cancers of The Cancer Genome Atlas.Pan-cancer, 28% of all samples had at least one ofthe MYC paralogs amplified. In contrast, the MYCantagonists MGA and MNT were the most frequentlymutated or deleted members, proposing a roleas tumor suppressors.MYCalterations were mutu-ally exclusive withPIK3CA,PTEN,APC,orBRAFalterations, suggesting that MYC is a distinct onco-genic driver. Expression analysis revealed MYC-associated pathways in tumor subtypes, such asimmune response and growth factor signaling; chro-matin, translation, and DNA replication/repair wereconserved pan-cancer. This analysis reveals insightsinto MYC biology and is a reference for biomarkersand therapeutics for cancers with alterations ofMYC or the PMN

Spatial Organization and Molecular Correlation of Tumor-Infiltrating Lymphocytes Using Deep Learning on Pathology Images

Beyond sample curation and basic pathologic characterization, the digitized H&E-stained images of TCGA samples remain underutilized. To highlight this resource, we present mappings of tumorinfiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) based on H&E images from 13 TCGA tumor types. These TIL maps are derived through computational staining using a convolutional neural network trained to classify patches of images. Affinity propagation revealed local spatial structure in TIL patterns and correlation with overall survival. TIL map structural patterns were grouped using standard histopathological parameters. These patterns are enriched in particular T cell subpopulations derived from molecular measures. TIL densities and spatial structure were differentially enriched among tumor types, immune subtypes, and tumor molecular subtypes, implying that spatial infiltrate state could reflect particular tumor cell aberration states. Obtaining spatial lymphocytic patterns linked to the rich genomic characterization of TCGA samples demonstrates one use for the TCGA image archives with insights into the tumor-immune microenvironment

Indice di severità climatica: classificazione dei comuni italiani ai fini della climatizzazione estiva degli edifici

L'applicazione del Dlgs.192/05, prevede che ai fini della certificazione energetica in edilizia, sia valutato il fabbisogno di energia primaria di un edificio, e successivamente, sia assegnata ad esso, in funzione di tale parametro, una classe di efficienza energetica. Al momento, in Italia, sono stati fissati i limiti al fabbisogno solo per quanto riguarda la climatizzazione invernale. Il territorio nazionale è stato suddiviso, infatti, in zone climatiche invernali in conformità a un indice climatico, definito dai gradi-giorno invernali, e sono stati individuati i valori limite del fabbisogno energetico su tale base. La diffusione dei sistemi di condizionamento estivi, con il conseguente aumento dei consumi energetici, rende necessario procedere, anche in tal caso, alla definizione di zone climatiche estive contraddistinte da un indice di severità climatica estivo. La definizione di questo indice estivo presenta maggiori difficoltà rispetto al corrispondente indice invernale giacché le variabili climatiche di cui tenere conto sono più numerose e più complesse da valutare. Nei precedenti lavori è stata proposta una prima applicazione di tale indice ed è stata verificata la validità del modello matematico utilizzato, prendendo in esame, per il calcolo del fabbisogno energetico per il raffrescamento estivo al variare delle caratteristiche climatiche (temperatura, radiazione solare e umidità), prima un edificio residenziale, e in seguito, un edificio del terziario ad uso ufficio situati in venti località di riferimento; ne è conseguita la assegnazione di 101 capoluoghi di provincia a sette zone climatiche estive (da A a G) di indice di severità estivo e, quindi, di fabbisogno energetico crescente. Nel presente lavoro sono descritte le modalità di calcolo seguite per l'estensione della valutazione dell'Indice di Severità a tutti i comuni italiani: partendo dai dati climatici riportati nella UNI 10349/94 per 101 province italiane, e seguendo, di massima e là dove possibile, i criteri di interpolazione dei dati esposti nella norma, sono state valutate per le varie località in esame, le tre grandezze climatiche fondamentali: Temperatura, Irradiazione solare e Umidità specifica. Successivamente è stato possibile calcolare l'Indice di Severità Climatica e assegnare, in funzione di esso, una classe climatica agli 8094 comuni italiani.The application in Italy of the European Directive 2002/91/CE, about the energy performance of buildings, through the Dlgs.192/05 and Dlgs.311/06, provide for the energy certification in building. The certification means the calculation of a parameter, the building specific requirement of primary energy, and the successive allocation of the building, as function of the value of such parameter, to a certain energy efficiency class. At the moment just limits for heating energy need in winter, have been fixed. The national territory has been subdivided, in fact, in winter climatic zones in compliance with an index of climatic severity (heating degree-day) and limit values for the energy requirements has been set. The spread of the summer air conditioning systems, with the consequent increase of the energy consumptions, renders necessary to proceed, also in such case, to the definition of summer climatic zones by a summer index of climatic severity. The summer index definition involves greater difficulties regarding the correspondent winter index since climatic variables, in this case, are more numerous and complex to estimate. In a previous reports a first application of such index has been proposed, and has been tested the effectiveness of mathematical model, taking into account a residential building and an office building, to evaluate the cooling energy need: in this way, have been classified the Italian provincial capitals in summer climatic zone. This work describes the calculation method to extend the Severity Climatic Index at all Italian towns: starting from climate data given on the UNI 10349, and following the interpolation methods described in the standard, have been evaluated the main climate parameters for each town: air temperature, specific humidity and solar radiation. Subsequently has been calculated the Severity Climatic Index and a climate class has been assigned to each Italian town