A Community-Driven Validation Service for Standard Medical Imaging Objects

Digital medical imaging laboratories contain many distinct types of equipment provided by different manufacturers. Interoperability is a critical issue and the DICOM protocol is a de facto standard in those environments. However, manufacturers' implementation of the standard may have non-conformities at several levels, which will hinder systems' integration. Moreover, medical staff may be responsible for data inconsistencies when entering data. Those situations severely affect the quality of healthcare services since they can disrupt system operations. The existence of software able to confirm data quality and compliance with the DICOM standard is important for programmers, IT staff and healthcare technicians. Although there are a few solutions that try to accomplish this goal, they are unable to deal with certain situations that require user input. Furthermore, these cases usually require the setup of a working environment, which makes the sharing of validation information more difficult. This article proposes and describes the development of a Web DICOM validation service for the community. This solution requires no configuration by the user, promotes validation results share-ability in the community and preserves patient data privacy since files are de-identified on the client side.Comment: Computer Standards & Interfaces, 201

The Impacts of Structural Changes in the Labor Market: a Comparative Statics Analysis Using Heterogeneous-agent Framework

In this paper we aim at analyzing the impacts on welfare and wealth and consumption distribution across different labor market structural features. In particular, we pursue a steady-state analysis to assess the impacts of unit vacancy costs, unemployment replacement ratio or the job destruction rate, when they are changed in order to promote a given reduction in the unemployment rate. We combine a labor market search and matching framework with unions, based on Mortensen and Pissarides (1994) with a heterogeneous-agent framework close to Imrohoroglu (1989) in a closed economy model. Such approach enables the joint assessment of macroeconomic welfare and inequality together with implications derived from institutional changes in labor market. Moreover, the transition matrix between worker's states is endogenous, fully derived from labor market conditions. Using feasible calibration to the Euro Area, we conclude that different institutional changes to promote unemployment reduction have non-neutral and differentiated effects on welfare and inequality. While changing unit vacancy costs and job destruction can be ranked, changes in the unemployment benefit replacement ration involve a trade-off between gains in welfare and in consumption/income distribution.Labor market institutions, search and matching models, heterogeneous-agent models, welfare and inequality.

Treasury bond returns and U.S. political cycles

A Work Project, presented as part of the requirements for the Award of a Masters Degree in Finance from the NOVA – School of Business and EconomicsThis work-project complements the existing studies on the linkage between financial investments returns and the political cycles, by relating Treasury bond returns and Presidential cycles. Previous research shows that stock market tends to behave better during Democratic presidencies, and in this work it is shown a compatible result, with long-term Treasury bonds having higher absolute, and excess returns during Republican Administrations. This difference is not explained by business cycles and there are no significant differences in risk, as measured by the volatility of returns, between the two political cycles. Empirical evidence is also found showing that there are better economic and financial conditions to invest in T-bonds' markets during Republican than during Democratic Administrations

Successive interference cancellation in vehicular networks to relieve the negative impact of the hidden node problem

Tese de mestrado integrado. Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores (Telecomunicações). Universidade do Porto. Faculdade de Engenharia. 201

Monitoring of marine animais - development and testing of an oximetry and heartbeat sensor

Dissertação de mestrado em Engenharia Eletrónica Industrial e Computadores, Instrumentação e Microssistemas EletrónicosA monitorização marinha tem se tornado bastante popular, com muitas instituições a usar “tags”, dispositivos invasivos ou não-invasivos que são implantados em animais para monitorizar alguns parâmetros, usualmente relativos ao seu meio circundante, como a temperatura e a pressão da água, a sua localização, etc. Estes dispositivos são importantes, no entanto, são maioritariamente usados para monitorização de movimento e ainda existem muito poucos meios de monitorizar o que se está a passar dentro dos corpos durante algo como um mergulho profundo, durante caças ou para apenas verificar se o espécimen está saudável. Esta dissertação representa uma tentativa de replicar a tecnologia que é mais comumente utilizada para a medição de saturação de oxigénio e ritmo cardíaco em humanos, adaptá-la e aplicá-la em animais marinhos. O método denomina-se Oximetria de Pulso. Dois dispositivos desenvolvidos com a medição de oximetria de pulso em humanos em mente foram escolhidos, o MAX30100 e o MAX30110 da MAXIM Integrated. Foram analisados, estudados e testados in vivo num animal marinho (Raia Curva), o que deu um vislumbre de como se deve abordar o desenvolvimento de um oxímetro de pulso completo, pequeno, de baixo consumo, versátil para poder ser aplicado na maioria dos animais marinhos e capaz de ser integrado num sistema de monitorização. Os testes realizados em ambiente controlado revelaram resultados promissores relativamente ao uso desta tecnologia em animais marinhos, sem haver a necessidade de grandes adaptações, mas também demonstrou que o verdadeiro desafio é aplicá-la de tal forma que os resultados sejam viáveis.Marine monitoring has become quite popular with lots of institutions using tags, invasive or non-invasive devices that are attached to animals to monitor certain parameters, usually of their surrounding mean, like water temperature, water pressure, their location, etc. These devices are important, however, they are mostly used for motion tracking and there are still very few means of monitoring what’s going on inside of their bodies during somethings like deep dives, when they hunt or even if they are in a healthy condition. This dissertation represents an attempt to replicate the technology that is most commonly used for oxygen saturation and heart rate measurement on humans, adapt it and apply it on marine animals. This method is called Pulse Oximetry. Two devices developed for pulse oximetry measuring on humans were chosen, the MAX30100 and MAX30110, from MAXIM Integrated. They were analysed, studied, and tested in vivo on a marine animal (Undulate Ray), which gave an insight on how to approach the development of a small, non-invasive and low-power complete pulse oximeter, versatile so it can be applied in most marine animals and capable of being integrated in a monitoring system. The tests carried out in a controlled environment showed promising results about the use of this technology on marine animals without any major adaptation, but also showed that applying it in such a way that the results are viable is the real challenge.Este trabalho foi cofinanciado por fundos nacionais através da FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia no âmbito do Projeto de Investigação “ASTRIIS .: Atlantic Sustainability Through Remote and Integrated In-situ Solutions, ref.: POCI-01-0247-FEDER-046092,cofinanciado pelo Fundo Europeu de Desenvolvimento Regional –FEDER, através do SI&IDT Programas Mobilizadores, Programa Operacional de Competitividade e Internacionalização (POCI) -COMPETE 2020, do Portugal 2020,tendo como Organismo Intermédio de acompanhamento à realização do investimento, a Agência Nacional de Inovação –ANI

Nuno Gama: developing a concept store marketing and comminication strategy

CEM

The importance of Biotechnology in the health area: historical overview and future perspectives

A biotecnologia, em sentido amplo, compreende a manipulação de microrganismos, plantas e animais, com a proposta de obter processos e produtos de interesse da sociedade. Embora o termo tenha surgido no início do século XX, os processos biotecnológicos estão presentes desde os tempos antigos na produção de alimentos e bebidas fermentados. A biotecnologia também está presente desde o início da medicina. A inalação de pó de feridas de varíola humana secas ao sol ou a secreção do úbere de vacas contaminadas com varíola bovina são exemplos de técnicas antigas usadas como métodos de imunização da doença. Nesse sentido, muitos tratamentos surgiram ao longo do tempo, como vacinas, produção de penicilina, o primeiro antibiótico e produção de insulina por DNA recombinante, que revolucionaram a Medicina e possibilitaram uma melhor qualidade de vida para os seres humanos. Muitos produtos e materiais da Biotecnologia ainda estão surgindo, como andaimes em Medicina Regenerativa para recuperação de tecido ósseo, tubos de celulose bacteriana usados como vasos sanguíneos artificiais, células-tronco pluripotentes induzidas e sistemas microfisiológicos, que prometem melhorar ainda mais a medicina moderna e fornecer melhores técnicas e técnicas. terapias para vários tratamentos