The Vice of Lust and its Impact on Intellectual Knowledge in the Teachings of Some Fathers of the Church

The question I want to put forth is whether the pleasure that ensues upon lust, regardless it being moderate or excessive, is so strong that it has the power to overwhelm the mind, bringing it into a state that prevents it from approaching reality serenely, and depriving it of clarity and the mental sharpness required to make right decisions and to attain a more accurate understanding of reality. I analyze the question stating as a conclusion that according to John Chrysostom, Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine of Hippo and Gregory the Great, the regulation of sexual desire, which is proper to chastity, anthropologically predisposes the intellect to greater clarity in order to know the truth, whereas lust is unsuitable to attain this knowledge

Image processing and experimental techniques to characterize the hydraulic performance of grate inlets

This Doctoral Thesis dissertation concerns two main research topic: the analysis of the flow velocity pattern in the nearness of a grate inlet through Surface Flow Image Velocimetry (SFIV) technique and the study of overflow of surcharged sewer system through grate inlets. Concerning the first main issue, a methodology able to reproduce the velocity field and, consequently, the flow distribution around the grate inlet, has been proposed. This methodology can be used by inlet manufacturers to improve the design of their products in order to collect as much water as possible in case of storms. In fact, water is collected by two main mechanisms: the frontal flow where the amount of water is intercepted through the upper part of the inlet (orthogonal to the flow direction), and the lateral flow where the flow is intercepted through the lateral side of the inlet (parallel to the main flow direction). As demonstrated and discussed in this thesis, this lateral inflow, due to the transversal component of the flow, is around a 20 - 30% respect to the 70 - 80% of the frontal flow. The second main issue treated in this thesis has been the behavior of the overflow by grate inlet due to pressured sewer systems. The estimation of grate inlet discharge coefficients and the head energy loss in this kind of situation could be very important to provide useful values to be used by commercial numerical code that nowadays use common default values assuming orifice or weir approaches. The experimental campaigns related to the two main topics were carried out using a physical model in real scale located in the Hydraulic Laboratory of the Technical University of Catalonia. It is important to consider that the SFIV technique method could be also extrapolated to other applications in the fields of hydraulic engineering like rivers and costal engineering.Esta tesis doctoral trata dos temas principales: el análisis del patrón de velocidad de flujo en la proximidad de una reja de alcantarillado a través de la técnica de la velocimetría por imagen del flujo de superficie (en inglés Surface Flow Image Velocimetry, SFIV) y la salida de un flujo por una reja producido por la entrada en carga de un sistema de alcantarillado. En cuanto a la primera cuestión, se propuso una metodología capaz de reproducir el campo de velocidad y, consecuentemente, la distribución del caudal alrededor del sumidero. Esta metodología puede ser utilizada por los fabricantes de rejas de alcantarillado para poder mejorar el diseño de sus productos y así poder recoger la mayor cantidad de agua posible durante eventos de lluvia. De hecho, el agua es interceptada a través de dos mecanismos principales: el flujo frontal donde la cantidad de agua es interceptada a través de la parte aguas arriba de la reja (lado ortogonal a la dirección del flujo), y el flujo lateral donde el flujo es interceptado a través del lado lateral de la reja (lado paralelo a la dirección principal del caudal). Como se demuestra y se discute en esta tesis, esta afluencia lateral, debido al componente transversal del flujo, es alrededor de un 20-30% respecto al 70-80% del flujo frontal. La segunda cuestión principal tratada en esta tesis ha sido el comportamiento del flujo producido por la entrada en carga de un colector de alcantarillado y la salida de dicho flujo al exterior a través de una reja de alcantarillado. La estimación de los coeficientes de descarga de la reja y la pérdida de energía hidráulica en estas condiciones podrían ser muy importantes para proporcionar valores útiles para ser utilizados por códigos numéricos comerciales que hoy en día utilizan valores predeterminados comunes asumiendo enfoques hidráulicos de tipo orificio o vertedero. Las campañas experimentales relacionadas con los dos temas principales se llevaron a cabo utilizando un modelo físico en escala real ubicado en el laboratorio hidráulico de la Universidad Politécnica de Cataluña. Es importante tener en cuenta que el método de la técnica SFIV podría ser también extrapolado a otras aplicaciones en los campos de la ingeniería hidráulica como la ingeniería de ríos o la ingeniería costera.Postprint (published version

Mixing in convective thermal fluxes in unsteady nonhomogeneous flows generating complex three dimensional vorticity patterns

Diffusion and scaling of the velocity and vorticity in a thermoelectric driven heating and cooling experimental device is presented in order to map the different patterns and transitions between two and three dimensional convection in an enclosure with complex driven flows. The size of the water tank is of 0.2 x 0.2 x 0.1 m and the heat sources or sinks can be regulated both in power and sign [1-3]. The thermal convective driven flows are generated by means of Peltier effects in 4 wall extended positions of 0.05 x 0.05 cm each. The parameter range of convective cell array varies strongly with the Topology of the boundary conditions. Side heat and momentum fluxes are a function of Rayleigh, Peclet and Nusselt numbers, [4-6] Visualizations are performed by PIV, Particle tracking and shadowgraph. The structure of the flow is shown by setting up a convective flow generated by buoyant heat fluxes. The experiments described here investigate high Prandtl number mixing using brine and fresh water in order to form a density interface and low Prandtl number mixing with temperature gradients. The evolution of the mixing fronts are compared and the topological characteristics of the merging of the convective structures are examined for different configurations. Based on two dimensional Vorticity spectral analysis, new techniques can be very useful to determine the evolution of scales considering the multi-fractal structure of the convective flows.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Quantifying the effects of data augmentation and stain color normalization in convolutional neural networks for computational pathology

Stain variation is a phenomenon observed when distinct pathology laboratories stain tissue slides that exhibit similar but not identical color appearance. Due to this color shift between laboratories, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) trained with images from one lab often underperform on unseen images from the other lab. Several techniques have been proposed to reduce the generalization error, mainly grouped into two categories: stain color augmentation and stain color normalization. The former simulates a wide variety of realistic stain variations during training, producing stain-invariant CNNs. The latter aims to match training and test color distributions in order to reduce stain variation. For the first time, we compared some of these techniques and quantified their effect on CNN classification performance using a heterogeneous dataset of hematoxylin and eosin histopathology images from 4 organs and 9 pathology laboratories. Additionally, we propose a novel unsupervised method to perform stain color normalization using a neural network. Based on our experimental results, we provide practical guidelines on how to use stain color augmentation and stain color normalization in future computational pathology applications.Comment: Accepted in the Medical Image Analysis journa

Clustering Weblogs on the Basis of a Topic Detection Method

In recent years we have seen a vast increase in the volume of information published on weblog sites and also the creation of new web technologies where people discuss actual events. The need for automatic tools to organize this massive amount of information is clear, but the particular characteristics of weblogs such as shortness and overlapping vocabulary make this task difficult. In this work, we present a novel methodology to cluster weblog posts according to the topics discussed therein. This methodology is based on a generative probabilistic model in conjunction with a Self-Term Expansion methodology. We present our results which demonstrate a considerable improvement over the baseline

Quantification of energy loss in two grated inlets under pressure

Grated inlets have the normal function of collecting the surface runoff into sewer networks, but when the flow exceeds the capacity of the sewer pipes and conduits get pressurized, an outflow from the sewer manholes and grates can occur. In this case, the grate produces an energy loss in the outflow from sewer to street that could be hydraulically quantified characterizing this kind of flow. Energy loss analysis in trash racks can be found in technical literature, but no specific studies on sewer grate inlets have been found. For this reason, some experiments in full scale were developed in the hydraulic laboratory of the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC) in order to quantify hydraulic energy losses associated with flow through grated inlets during surcharging conditions. The main goal of this research work was to experimentally quantify the values of the local loss coefficient k for two different surcharged real scale grated inlets existing in Barcelona. For the tested overflows between 20 and 50 L/s, a range from 0.25 to 3.41 was observed for k coefficients under different average velocities of reference and different flow conditions.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Time for change: a new training programme for morpho-molecular pathologists?

The evolution of cellular pathology as a specialty has always been driven by technological developments and the clinical relevance of incorporating novel investigations into diagnostic practice. In recent years, the molecular characterisation of cancer has become of crucial relevance in patient treatment both for predictive testing and subclassification of certain tumours. Much of this has become possible due to the availability of next-generation sequencing technologies and the whole-genome sequencing of tumours is now being rolled out into clinical practice in England via the 100 000 Genome Project. The effective integration of cellular pathology reporting and genomic characterisation is crucial to ensure the morphological and genomic data are interpreted in the relevant context, though despite this, in many UK centres molecular testing is entirely detached from cellular pathology departments. The CM-Path initiative recognises there is a genomics knowledge and skills gap within cellular pathology that needs to be bridged through an upskilling of the current workforce and a redesign of pathology training. Bridging this gap will allow the development of an integrated 'morphomolecular pathology' specialty, which can maintain the relevance of cellular pathology at the centre of cancer patient management and allow the pathology community to continue to be a major influence in cancer discovery as well as playing a driving role in the delivery of precision medicine approaches. Here, several alternative models of pathology training, designed to address this challenge, are presented and appraised

Thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura

Thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura (TTP) is a disease with a high rate of mortality if a proper treatment is not instated. Plasmapheresis with plasmatic exchange is the treatment of choice. Diagnosis is performed demonstrating microangiopathic hemolytic anemia, a negative direct Coombs test and thrombocytopenia. Among the clinical data, neurological and renal alterations stand out. When there is a reasonable suspicion in the diagnosis, plasmapheresis must be initiated immediately. There are different diseases that may be similar to the TTP signs and symptoms, especially in pregnant women. TTP has a high risk of relapse and may leave sequelae

Multifractal analysis of a wake for a single wind turbine

Wind energy is an important component of renewable energy sources. Studying of turbulent wakes for wind turbines and interactions with Atmospheric Boundary Layer is an urgent problem. The theory of chaos and fractal geometry with some research in fluid dynamics will change profoundly the scope of complex scale to scale transport in theory of turbulence, in particular when body forces, such as stratification and rotation are important. For this reason, we present some preliminary ideas and some results of the analysis of the structure function and multi-fractal behaviour of the evolution of turbulence in the wake of a single wind turbine through the scaling analysis using the program ImaCalc. The analysis of fractal dimension was performed on the results of a numerical simulation consisting on a Large-Eddy Simulation and Lagrangian Dynamic Smagorinsky Mode (LDSM)l for the wind turbine wakes in the Atmospheric Boundary Layer by OpenFoam software. The role of intermittency in wind turbine technology in the stratified Atmosphere is also discussed.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version