SliceNet: end-to-end cognitive network slicing and slice management framework in virtualised multi-domain, multi-tenant 5G networks

©2018 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.Network slicing has emerged as a major new networking paradigm for meeting the diverse requirements of various vertical businesses in virtualised and softwarised 5G networks. SliceNet is a project of the EU 5G Infrastructure Public Private Partnership (5G PPP) and focuses on network slicing as a cornerstone technology in 5G networks, and addresses the associated challenges in managing, controlling and orchestrating the new services for users especially vertical sectors, thereby maximising the potential of 5G infrastructures and their services by leveraging advanced software networking and cognitive network management. This paper presents the vision of the SliceNet project, highlighting the gaps in existing work and challenges, the proposed overall architecture, proposed technical approaches, and use cases.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Enable advanced QoS-aware network slicing in 5G networks for slice-based media use cases

© 2019 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.Media use cases for emergency services require mission-critical levels of reliability for the delivery of media-rich services, such as video streaming. With the upcoming deployment of the fifth generation (5G) networks, a wide variety of applications and services with heterogeneous performance requirements are expected to be supported, and any migration of mission-critical services to 5G networks presents significant challenges in the quality of service (QoS), for emergency service operators. This paper presents a novel SliceNet framework, based on advanced and customizable network slicing to address some of the highlighted challenges in migrating eHealth telemedicine services to 5G networks. An overview of the framework outlines the technical approaches in beyond the state-of-the-art network slicing. Subsequently, this paper emphasizes the design and prototyping of a media-centric eHealth use case, focusing on a set of innovative enablers toward achieving end-to-end QoS-aware network slicing capabilities, required by this demanding use case. Experimental results empirically validate the prototyped enablers and demonstrate the applicability of the proposed framework in such media-rich use cases.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Infusion and decoction of wild German chamomile: bioactivity and characterization of organic acids and phenolic compounds

Natural products represent a rich source of biologically active compounds and are an example of molecular diversity, with recognised potential in drug discovery. Herein, the methanol extract of Matricaria recutita L. (German chamomile) and its decoction and infusion (the most consumed preparations of this herb) were submitted to an analysis of phytochemicals and bioactivity evaluation. The antioxidant activity was determined by free radicals scavenging activity, reducing power and inhibition of lipid peroxidation; the antitumour potential was tested in human tumour cell lines (breast, lung, colon, cervical and hepatocellular carcinomas), and the hepatotoxicity was evaluated using a porcine liver primary cell culture (non-tumour cells). All the samples revealed antioxidant properties. The decoction exhibited no antitumour activity (GI(50)>400 μg/mL) which could indicate that this bioactivity might be related to compounds (including phenolic compounds) that were not extracted or that were affected by the decoction procedure. Both plant methanol extract and infusion showed inhibitory activity to the growth of HCT-15 (GI(50) 250.24 and 298.23 μg/mL, respectively) and HeLa (GI(50) 259.36 and 277.67 μg/mL, respectively) cell lines, without hepatotoxicity (GI(50)>400 μg/mL). Infusion and decoction gave higher contents of organic acids (24.42 and 23.35 g/100g dw). Otherwise, the plant methanol extract contained the highest amounts of both phenolic acids (3.99 g/100g dw) and flavonoids (2.59 g/100g dw). The major compound found in all the preparations was luteolin O-acylhexoside. Overall, German chamomile contains important phytochemicals with bioactive properties (mainly antitumour potential selective to colon and cervical carcinoma cell lines) to be explored in the pharmaceutical, food and cosmetics industries.The authors are grateful to strategic project PEst-OE/AGR/UI0690/2011 for financial support to CIMO. R. Guimaraes, L. Barros and R. Calhelha thank FCT, POPH-QREN and FSE for their Grants (SFRH/BD/78307/2011, SFRH/BPD/4609/2008 and SFRH/BPD/68344/2010). The GIP-USAL is financially supported by the Consolider-Ingenio 2010 Programme (FUN-C-FOOD, CSD2007-00063). M. Duenas thanks the Spanish "Ramon y Cajal" Programme for a contract

Effects of Genital Ulcer Disease and Herpes Simplex Virus Type 2 on the Efficacy of Male Circumcision for HIV Prevention: Analyses from the Rakai Trials

Ron Gray and colleagues analyze data from two circumcision trials in Uganda to assess how HSV-2 status and genital ulcer disease affect the procedure's ability to reduce HIV infection

How students perceive medical competences: a cross-cultural study between the Medical Course in Portugal and African Portuguese Speaking Countries

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>A global effort has been made in the last years to establish a set of core competences that define the essential professional competence of a physician. Regardless of the environment, culture or medical education conditions, a set of core competences is required for medical practice worldwide. Evaluation of educational program is always needed to assure the best training for medical students and ultimately best care for patients. The aim of this study was to determine in what extent medical students in Portugal and Portuguese speaking African countries, felt they have acquired the core competences to start their clinical practice. For this reason, it was created a measurement tool to evaluate self-perceived competences, in different domains, across Portuguese and Portuguese-speaking African medical schools.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The information was collected through a questionnaire that defines the knowledge, attitudes and skills that future doctors should acquire. The Cronbach's Alpha and Principal Components Analysis (PCA) were used to evaluate the reliability of the questionnaire. In order to remove possible confounding effect, individual scores were standardized by country.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The order of the domain's scores was similar between countries. After standardization, Personal Attitudes and Professional Behavior showed median scores above the country global median and Knowledge alone showed median score below the country global median. In Portugal, Clinical Skills showed score below the global median. In Angola, Clinical Skills and General Skills showed a similar result. There were only significant differences between countries in Personal Attitudes (p < 0.001) and Professional Behavior (p = 0.043).</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The reliability of the instrument in Portuguese and Portuguese-speaking African medical schools was confirmed. Students have perceived their level of competence in personal attitudes in a high level and in opposite, knowledge and clinical skills with some weaknesses.</p

Experiência, teoria e ação : práticas pedagógicas de ensino de língua portuguesa

-Este livro apresenta ações pedagógicas de ensino de língua portuguesa e literatura implementadas no âmbito do Mestrado Profissional em Letras da Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora. Em uma perspectiva de pesquisa ação, foram desenvolvidas intervenções em sala de aula de ensino básico, pautadas em abordagens teóricas recentes. As motivações, etapas de intervenção, bases teóricas, experiências e resultados das intervenções são expostos e discutidos na obra como forma de incentivar a replicação de ações exitosas de ensino de língua materna