EPS09 - a New Generation of NLO and LO Nuclear Parton Distribution Functions

We present a next-to-leading order (NLO) global DGLAP analysis of nuclear parton distribution functions (nPDFs) and their uncertainties. Carrying out an NLO nPDF analysis for the first time with three different types of experimental input -- deep inelastic $\ell$+A scattering, Drell-Yan dilepton production in p+$A$ collisions, and inclusive pion production in d+Au and p+p collisions at RHIC -- we find that these data can well be described in a conventional collinear factorization framework. Although the pion production has not been traditionally included in the global analyses, we find that the shape of the nuclear modification factor $R_{\rm dAu}$ of the pion $p_T$-spectrum at midrapidity retains sensitivity to the gluon distributions, providing evidence for shadowing and EMC-effect in the nuclear gluons. We use the Hessian method to quantify the nPDF uncertainties which originate from the uncertainties in the data. In this method the sensitivity of $\chi^2$ to the variations of the fitting parameters is mapped out to orthogonal error sets which provide a user-friendly way to calculate how the nPDF uncertainties propagate to any factorizable nuclear cross-section. The obtained NLO and LO nPDFs and the corresponding error sets are collected in our new release called {\ttfamily EPS09}. These results should find applications in precision analyses of the signatures and properties of QCD matter at the LHC and RHIC.Comment: 34 pages, 16 figures. The version accepted for publicatio

Emission-aware Energy Storage Scheduling for a Greener Grid

Reducing our reliance on carbon-intensive energy sources is vital for reducing the carbon footprint of the electric grid. Although the grid is seeing increasing deployments of clean, renewable sources of energy, a significant portion of the grid demand is still met using traditional carbon-intensive energy sources. In this paper, we study the problem of using energy storage deployed in the grid to reduce the grid's carbon emissions. While energy storage has previously been used for grid optimizations such as peak shaving and smoothing intermittent sources, our insight is to use distributed storage to enable utilities to reduce their reliance on their less efficient and most carbon-intensive power plants and thereby reduce their overall emission footprint. We formulate the problem of emission-aware scheduling of distributed energy storage as an optimization problem, and use a robust optimization approach that is well-suited for handling the uncertainty in load predictions, especially in the presence of intermittent renewables such as solar and wind. We evaluate our approach using a state of the art neural network load forecasting technique and real load traces from a distribution grid with 1,341 homes. Our results show a reduction of >0.5 million kg in annual carbon emissions -- equivalent to a drop of 23.3% in our electric grid emissions.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figure, This paper will appear in the Proceedings of the ACM International Conference on Future Energy Systems (e-Energy 20) June 2020, Australi

Design and User Satisfaction of Interactive Maps for Visually Impaired People

Multimodal interactive maps are a solution for presenting spatial information to visually impaired people. In this paper, we present an interactive multimodal map prototype that is based on a tactile paper map, a multi-touch screen and audio output. We first describe the different steps for designing an interactive map: drawing and printing the tactile paper map, choice of multi-touch technology, interaction technologies and the software architecture. Then we describe the method used to assess user satisfaction. We provide data showing that an interactive map - although based on a unique, elementary, double tap interaction - has been met with a high level of user satisfaction. Interestingly, satisfaction is independent of a user's age, previous visual experience or Braille experience. This prototype will be used as a platform to design advanced interactions for spatial learning

Possibilities for pedagogy in Further Education: Harnessing the abundance of literacy

In this report, it is argued that the most salient factor in the contemporary communicative landscape is the sheer abundance and diversity of possibilities for literacy, and that the extent and nature of students' communicative resources is a central issue in education. The text outlines the conceptual underpinnings of the Literacies for Learning in Further Education project in a social view of literacy, and the associated research design, methodology and analytical framework. It elaborates on the notion of the abundance of literacies in students' everyday lives, and on the potential for harnessing these as resources for the enhancement of learning. It provides case studies of changes in practice that have been undertaken by further education staff in order to draw upon students' everyday literacy practices on Travel and Tourism and Multimedia courses. It ends with some of the broad implications for conceptualising learning that arise from researching through the lens of literacy practices

Right To Health As A Human Right In Times Of Covid-19

Rare are instances which entail a truly global impact. And, it is even rarer when it is marked by such immeasurable human suffering. With the onset and onslaught of Covid-19 pandemic, right to health has assumed central stage in public discourse. Health is a composite right, and an amalgamation of various underlying elements including clean environment, nutritious food, potable water, sanitary conditions. This is the true import of right to health. Thus, it cannot be viewed in a restrictive sense of relating only to timely and appropriate healthcare facilities. This conveys that health cannot be perceived in silos; and accordingly has to be necessarily conceptualized in light of certain inter-linking quintessential features. The correlation between right to health and human right is an example of it. Human rights imbibe certain natural right into the concept of right to health, like liberty and equality. Consequently, human right breathes vitality into right to health

Application of NOMA for cellular-connected UAVs: opportunities and challenges

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have gained considerable interests in numerous civil applications. To push forward its potentials, cellular-connected UAVs have been introduced. Nevertheless, cellular networks face several bottlenecks such as spectrum scarcity and limited concurrent connectivity. To address these issues, non-orthogonal multiple access (NOMA) can be adopted. NOMA provides several opportunities for cellular-connected UAVs such as larger rate region, balanced performance between system throughput and fairness, and reduced delay. In this paper, we review important findings of the related studies, and outline new opportunities and challenges in NOMA for cellular-connected UAVs. Monte-Carlo simulations are then performed to analyze the new aerial user’s (AU)’s signal characteristics and evaluate the NOMA performance for co-existence of AU and terrestrial user (TU). Our preliminary results show that NOMA is a promising strategy for cellular-connected UAVs

The Subjectivities of Wearable Sleep-Trackers - A Discourse Analysis

Self-reported quality and duration of sleep in Western populations is declining. The interest in wearable sleep-trackers that are promis- ing better sleep is growing. By wearing a device day and night the sleeper is continuously connected to a more-than-human net- work. The mass-adoption of sleep-tracking devices has an impact on the personal, social and cultural meaning of sleep. This study looks at the discourse forming around wearable sleep-trackers. This extended abstract presents how non-human subjectivities are accounted for in this discourse. Through a posthuman discourse analysis of textual and visual artefacts from interviews, academic research and popular media, six distinct roles for these non-human social agents were identified: ‘Teacher’, ‘Informant’, ‘Companion’, ‘Therapist’, ‘Coach’ and ‘Mediator’. This characterisation is a first step to understanding sleep-trackers as social agents, reorganising personal and contextual relationships with the sleeping self

Barriers and opportunities for evidence-based health service planning: the example of developing a Decision Analytic Model to plan services for sexually transmitted infections in the UK

Decision Analytic Models (DAMs) are established means of evidence-synthesis to differentiate between health interventions. They have mainly been used to inform clinical decisions and health technology assessment at the national level, yet could also inform local health service planning. For this, a DAM must take into account the needs of the local population, but also the needs of those planning its services. Drawing on our experiences from stakeholder consultations, where we presented the potential utility of a DAM for planning local health services for sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the UK, and the evidence it could use to inform decisions regarding different combinations of service provision, in terms of their costs, cost-effectiveness, and public health outcomes, we discuss the barriers perceived by stakeholders to the use of DAMs to inform service planning for local populations, including (1) a tension between individual and population perspectives; (2) reductionism; and (3) a lack of transparency regarding models, their assumptions, and the motivations of those generating models

Extreme Food-Plant Specialisation in Megabombus Bumblebees as a Product of Long Tongues Combined with Short Nesting Seasons

© 2015 Huang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ The attached file is the published version of the article

The Rewiring of Ubiquitination Targets in a Pathogenic Yeast Promotes Metabolic Flexibility, Host Colonization and Virulence

Funding: This work was funded by the European Research Council [http://erc.europa.eu/], AJPB (STRIFE Advanced Grant; C-2009-AdG-249793). The work was also supported by: the Wellcome Trust [www.wellcome.ac.uk], AJPB (080088, 097377); the UK Biotechnology and Biological Research Council [www.bbsrc.ac.uk], AJPB (BB/F00513X/1, BB/K017365/1); the CNPq-Brazil [http://cnpq.br], GMA (Science without Borders fellowship 202976/2014-9); and the National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research [www.nc3rs.org.uk], DMM (NC/K000306/1). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Acknowledgments We thank Dr. Elizabeth Johnson (Mycology Reference Laboratory, Bristol) for providing strains, and the Aberdeen Proteomics facility for the biotyping of S. cerevisiae clinical isolates, and to Euroscarf for providing S. cerevisiae strains and plasmids. We are grateful to our Microscopy Facility in the Institute of Medical Sciences for their expert help with the electron microscopy, and to our friends in the Aberdeen Fungal Group for insightful discussions.Peer reviewedPublisher PD