Guidelines for testing and release procedures

Guidelines and procedures are recommended for the testing and release of the types of computer software efforts commonly performed at NASA/Ames Research Center. All recommendations are based on the premise that testing and release activities must be specifically selected for the environment, size, and purpose of each individual software project. Guidelines are presented for building a Test Plan and using formal Test Plan and Test Care Inspections on it. Frequent references are made to NASA/Ames Guidelines for Software Inspections. Guidelines are presented for selecting an Overall Test Approach and for each of the four main phases of testing: (1) Unit Testing of Components, (2) Integration Testing of Components, (3) System Integration Testing, and (4) Acceptance Testing. Tools used for testing are listed, including those available from operating systems used at Ames, specialized tools which can be developed, unit test drivers, stub module generators, and the use of format test reporting schemes

Impact of deep-sea polymetallic nodule mining on benthic microbial community and mediated biogeochemical functions

Industrial-scale mining of deep-sea polymetallic nodules will remove nodules in large areas and impact the physical integrity of the seafloor. However, environmental standards for seafloor integrity and studies of recovery from environmental impacts are still largely missing. Further we have only a poor understanding of the role of nodules in shaping benthic microbial diversity and element cycles. We revisited the deep-sea disturbance and recolonization experiment carried out with a towed plough harrow in 1989 in the Peru Basin nodule field within a circular area of approx. 3.5 km diameter (>4100 m water depth). In the experimental area, the 26 years old plough tracks were still visible and showed different types and levels of disturbance such as removal and compaction of surface sediments. Microbial communities and their diversity were studied in disturbance tracks and undisturbed sites and related to habitat integrity, remineralization rates, and carbon flow. Locally, microbial activity was reduced up to 4 times in the impacted areas. Microbial cell numbers were reduced by ~50% in fresh, and by <30% in the old tracks. Our data suggest that microbially-mediated biogeochemical functions need more than 50 years to return to undisturbed levels in the sediments. In areas with nodules (i.e., outside the disturbance tracks) microbial communities in the nodules themselves were studied. Nodule communities were distinct from sediments and showed a lower diversity and a higher proportion of sequences related to potential metal-cycling bacteria (i.e. Magnetospiraceae, Hyphomicrobiaceae), bacterial and archaeal nitrifiers (i.e. AqS1, unclassified Nitrosomonadaceae, Nitrosopumilus, Nitrospina, Nitrospira), as well as bacterial sequences typically found in ocean crust, hydrothermal deposits and sessile fauna. Our results confirm that nodules host specific microbial communities with potentially significant contributions to organic carbon remineralization and metal cycling. This study contributes to developing environmental standards for deep-sea mining and highlights the limits for maintaining and recovering ecological integrity and functions during large-scale nodule mining

Effects of a deep-sea mining experiment on seafloor microbial communities and functions after 26 years

Future supplies of rare minerals for global industries with high-tech products may depend on deep-sea mining. However, environmental standards for seafloor integrity and recovery from environmental impacts are missing. We revisited the only midsize deep-sea disturbance and recolonization experiment carried out in 1989 in the Peru Basin nodule field to compare habitat integrity, remineralization rates, and carbon flow with undisturbed sites. Plough tracks were still visible, indicating sites where sediment was either removed or compacted. Locally, microbial activity was reduced up to fourfold in the affected areas. Microbial cell numbers were reduced by ~50% in fresh “tracks” and by <30% in the old tracks. Growth estimates suggest that microbially mediated biogeochemical functions need over 50 years to return to undisturbed levels. This study contributes to developing environmental standards for deep-sea mining while addressing limits to maintaining and recovering ecological integrity during large-scale nodule mining

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency–Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research

Large expert-curated database for benchmarking document similarity detection in biomedical literature search

Document recommendation systems for locating relevant literature have mostly relied on methods developed a decade ago. This is largely due to the lack of a large offline gold-standard benchmark of relevant documents that cover a variety of research fields such that newly developed literature search techniques can be compared, improved and translated into practice. To overcome this bottleneck, we have established the RElevant LIterature SearcH consortium consisting of more than 1500 scientists from 84 countries, who have collectively annotated the relevance of over 180 000 PubMed-listed articles with regard to their respective seed (input) article/s. The majority of annotations were contributed by highly experienced, original authors of the seed articles. The collected data cover 76% of all unique PubMed Medical Subject Headings descriptors. No systematic biases were observed across different experience levels, research fields or time spent on annotations. More importantly, annotations of the same document pairs contributed by different scientists were highly concordant. We further show that the three representative baseline methods used to generate recommended articles for evaluation (Okapi Best Matching 25, Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency and PubMed Related Articles) had similar overall performances. Additionally, we found that these methods each tend to produce distinct collections of recommended articles, suggesting that a hybrid method may be required to completely capture all relevant articles. The established database server located at https://relishdb.ict.griffith.edu.au is freely available for the downloading of annotation data and the blind testing of new methods. We expect that this benchmark will be useful for stimulating the development of new powerful techniques for title and title/abstract-based search engines for relevant articles in biomedical research.Peer reviewe

Integrated analysis of bacterial and microeukaryotic communities from differentially active mud volcanoes in the Gulf of Cadiz

The present study assesses the diversity and composition of sediment bacterial and microeukaryotic communities from deep-sea mud volcanoes (MVs) associated with strike-slip faults in the South-West Iberian Margin (SWIM). We used a 16S/18S rRNA gene based pyrosequencing approach to characterize and correlate the sediment bacterial and microeukaryotic communities from MVs with differing gas seep regimes and from an additional site with no apparent seeping activity. In general, our results showed significant compositional changes of bacterial and microeukaryotic communities in sampling sites with different seepage regimes. Sediment bacterial communities were enriched with Methylococcales (putative methanotrophs) but had lower abundances of Rhodospirillales, Nitrospirales and SAR202 in the more active MVs. Within microeukaryotic communities, members of the Lobosa (lobose amoebae) were enriched in more active MVs. We also showed a strong correlation between Methylococcales populations and lobose amoeba in active MVs. This study provides baseline information on the diversity and composition of bacterial and microeukaryotic communities in deep-sea MVs associated with strike-slip faults

Castel Nuovo e il lancio della prima mina nel 1495. L'intervento determinante di Francesco di Giorgio per la sconfitta dei Francesi di Carlo VIII

Due formelle (la n. 41 e la n. 20) gi\ue0 esposte sulla facciata ad ali del palazzo ducale di Urbino vengono identificate come legate alla presa di Castel Nuovo di Napoli e alla esaltazione dell'impresa della prima mina lanciata. Conferme dell'evento vengono trovate dalle cronache del tempo e dalle tracce lasciate. Il lavoro viene citato all'interno del libro da altri Autori

Precision farming opportunit\ue0 e prospettive

Vengono brevemente descritte le opportunit\ue0 nel settore del macchine per l'agricoltura di precision