scholarly journals GODIVA2: interactive visualization of environmental data on the Web

Author(s):  
J.D Blower ◽  
K Haines ◽  
A Santokhee ◽  
C.L Liu

GODIVA2 is a dynamic website that provides visual access to several terabytes of physically distributed, four-dimensional environmental data. It allows users to explore large datasets interactively without the need to install new software or download and understand complex data. Through the use of open international standards, GODIVA2 maintains a high level of interoperability with third-party systems, allowing diverse datasets to be mutually compared. Scientists can use the system to search for features in large datasets and to diagnose the output from numerical simulations and data processing algorithms. Data providers around Europe have adopted GODIVA2 as an INSPIRE-compliant dynamic quick-view system for providing visual access to their data.

Author(s):  
Eric Golson

ABSTRACTIn September 1939, Portugal made a realist strategic choice to preserve the Portuguese Empire maintaining by its neutrality and also remaining an ally of Great Britain. While the Portuguese could rely largely on their colonies for raw materials to sustain the mainland, the country had long depended on British transportation for these goods and the Portuguese military. With the British priority now given to war transportation, Portugal's economy and Empire were particularly vulnerable. The Portuguese dictator Antonio Salazar sought to mitigate this damage by maintaining particularly friendly financial relations with the British government, including increased exports of Portuguese merchandise and services and permission to accumulate credits in Sterling to cover deficits in the balance of payments. This paper gives an improved set of comprehensive statistics for the Anglo-Portuguese and German–Portuguese relationships, reported in Pounds and according to international standards. The reported statistics include the trade in merchandise, services, capital flows, loans and third-party transfers of funds in favour of the British account. When compared with the German statistics, the Anglo-Portuguese figures show the Portuguese government favoured the British in financial relations, an active choice by Salazar to maintain the Portuguese Empire.


Geomatics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-49
Author(s):  
Mael Moreni ◽  
Jerome Theau ◽  
Samuel Foucher

The combination of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) with deep learning models has the capacity to replace manned aircrafts for wildlife surveys. However, the scarcity of animals in the wild often leads to highly unbalanced, large datasets for which even a good detection method can return a large amount of false detections. Our objectives in this paper were to design a training method that would reduce training time, decrease the number of false positives and alleviate the fine-tuning effort of an image classifier in a context of animal surveys. We acquired two highly unbalanced datasets of deer images with a UAV and trained a Resnet-18 classifier using hard-negative mining and a series of recent techniques. Our method achieved sub-decimal false positive rates on two test sets (1 false positive per 19,162 and 213,312 negatives respectively), while training on small but relevant fractions of the data. The resulting training times were therefore significantly shorter than they would have been using the whole datasets. This high level of efficiency was achieved with little tuning effort and using simple techniques. We believe this parsimonious approach to dealing with highly unbalanced, large datasets could be particularly useful to projects with either limited resources or extremely large datasets.


Blood ◽  
2001 ◽  
Vol 97 (2) ◽  
pp. 557-564 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter J. Quesenberry ◽  
Suju Zhong ◽  
Han Wang ◽  
Marc Stewart

Abstract We have previously shown that the keys to high-level nontoxic chimerism in syngeneic models are stem cell toxic, nonmyelotoxic host treatment as provided by 100-cGy whole-body irradiation and relatively high levels of marrow stem cells. This approach was unsuccessful in H-2 mismatched B6.SJL to BALB/c marrow transplants, but with tolerization, stable multilineage chimerism was obtained. Ten million B6.SJL spleen cells were infused intravenously into BALB/c hosts on day −10 and (MR-1) anti-CD40 ligand monoclonal antibody (mAb) injected intraperitoneally at varying levels on days −10, −7, −3, 0, and +3 and the BALB/c mice irradiated (100 cGy) and infused with 40 million B6.SJL/H-2 mismatched marrow cells on day 0. Stable multilineage chimerism at levels between 30% to 40% was achieved in the great majority of mice at 1.6 mg anti-CD40 ligand mAb per injection out to 64 weeks after transplantation, without graft-versus-host disease. The transplanted mice were also tolerant of donor B6.SJL, but not third-party CBA/J skin grafts at 8 to 9 and 39 to 43 weeks after marrow transplantation. These data provide a unique model for obtaining stable partial chimerism in H-2 mismatched mice, which can be applied to various clinical diseases of man such as sickle cell anemia, thalassemia, and autoimmune disorders.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 146-152
Author(s):  
E. V. ANDRIANOVA ◽  
◽  
P. S. SHCHERBACHENKO ◽  

This article discusses and analyzes the most popular standards of non-financial reporting, which has a significant impact on the transformation of the business environment. Already, domestic and foreign companies with a high level of responsibility are beginning to publish non-financial statements in addition to financial statements, which is an additional tool for communication with stakeholders and a new source of information about their activities. To date, reports of this type are clearly unregulated, there are no verification standards, however, there is already a positive trend and the active introduction of non-financial indicators in the regular reporting of companies.


Author(s):  
F. Geri ◽  
O. Cainelli ◽  
G. Salogni ◽  
P. Zatelli ◽  
M. Ciolli

Public and academic interest in environmental pollution caused by toxic substances and other sources, like noise, is constantly raising. To protect public health and ecosystems it is necessary to maintain the concentrations of pollutants below a safety threshold. In this context the development of models able to assess environmental pollution impact has been identified as a priority for future research. Scientific community has therefore produced many predictive models in the field. The vast majority of them needs to be run by specialists with a deep technical knowledge of the modeled phenomena in order to process the data and understand the results and it is not feasible to use this models for simple prescreening activities. Planners, evaluators and technical operators need reliable, usable and simple tools in order to carry out screening analysis of impact assessment. <br><br> The ENVIFATE software is currently under development by the Department of Civil, environmental and mechanical engineering of the University of Trento, Italy, in the frame of a project funded by the Italian Veneto Region with the aim to make available to nonspecialists screening analysis to assess the risks of a set of possible environmental pollution sources in protected areas. <br><br> The development of ENVIFATE follows these basic requirements: i) Open-Source ii) multiplatform iii) user friendly iv) GIS oriented. In order to respect these principles we have chosen to develop a plugin of QGIS, using python as a development language and creating a module for each environmental compartment analyzed: rivers, lakes, atmospheric dispersion, dispersion in groundwater and noise. <br><br> The plugin architecture is composed of a series of core functions characterized by command line interfaces that can be called from third-party applications (such as Grass GIS), connectable in custom data flows and with a high level of modularity and scalability. The base of the different models are highly tested and reliable algorithms adopted by the Italian Institute for Protection and Environmental Research (Istituto Superiore per la Protezione e la Ricerca Ambientale – ISPRA). Due to their simplicity, and for safety reasons, the structure of these models is constrained to provide conservative results, so to overestimate actual risk. This approach allows to provide statistically validated instruments to be used in different environmental contexts. All modules of the plugin provide numerical and cartographical results: in particular the command-line interface provides "static" results, or linked to a particular spatial and temporal state, while the Qgis plugins iterate the single analysis along space and time in order to provide georeferenced maps and time distributed results.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 78-87
Author(s):  
Yury Yuschenko

In the Address Programming Language (1955), the concept of indirect addressing of higher ranks (Pointers) was introduced, which allows the arbitrary connection of the computer’s RAM cells. This connection is based on standard sequences of the cell addresses in RAM and addressing sequences, which is determined by the programmer with indirect addressing. Two types of sequences allow programmers to determine an arbitrary connection of RAM cells with the arbitrary content: data, addresses, subroutines, program labels, etc. Therefore, the formed connections of cells can relate to each other. The result of connecting cells with the arbitrary content and any structure is called tree-shaped formats. Tree-shaped formats allow programmers to combine data into complex data structures that are like abstract data types. For tree-shaped formats, the concept of “review scheme” is defined, which is like the concept of “bypassing” trees. Programmers can define multiple overview diagrams for the one tree-shaped format. Programmers can create tree-shaped formats over the connected cells to define the desired overview schemes for these connected cells. The work gives a modern interpretation of the concept of tree-shaped formats in Address Programming. Tree-shaped formats are based on “stroke-operation” (pointer dereference), which was hardware implemented in the command system of computer “Kyiv”. Group operations of modernization of computer “Kyiv” addresses accelerate the processing of tree-shaped formats and are designed as organized cycles, like those in high-level imperative programming languages. The commands of computer “Kyiv”, due to operations with indirect addressing, have more capabilities than the first high-level programming language – Plankalkül. Machine commands of the computer “Kyiv” allow direct access to the i-th element of the “list” by its serial number in the same way as such access is obtained to the i-th element of the array by its index. Given examples of singly linked lists show the features of tree-shaped formats and their differences from abstract data types. The article opens a new branch of theoretical research, the purpose of which is to analyze the expe- diency of partial inclusion of Address Programming in modern programming languages.


2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 591-601 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nermeen F. Shehata ◽  
Khaled M. Dahawy

This report is a case study of corporate governance disclosure in Egypt. The study employs the benchmark of good practices in corporate governance disclosure developed by the Intergovernmental Working Group of Experts on International Standards of Accounting and Reporting (ISAR). This benchmark consists of fifty two disclosure items covering five subject areas and is based on a sample of the top 29 listed companies in Egypt. This study is complimentary to an earlier study conducted in 2007: 2007 Review of the implementation status of corporate governance disclosures: case study Egypt. This report compares the results of the current study to the 2007 study. This study finds the average disclosure level is less than half of the items in the ISAR benchmark. While nine items in the ISAR benchmark were disclosed by more than two-thirds of the companies in the study, forty items were disclosed by less than half. The absolute number of disclosure items found for each company ranged from 5 to 43, indicating a high level of variability between ‘best practice’ companies and companies with minimal disclosure practices. The study concludes that while the sample has relatively high rates of disclosure for few items, and the average disclosures in 2010 almost doubled the 2005 average disclosures in Egypt for several categories, they are still low levels compared to the average emerging markets levels. Policy options discussed include penalizing companies for undisclosed items, and providing education and training for executives and directors to enhance the awareness of the rapidly evolving regulatory environment, as well as the underlying importance of corporate governance disclosure


2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (12) ◽  
pp. 776-781
Author(s):  
Sang Hyun Kim ◽  
Jung Yul Park

The purpose of this study is to identify the historical background and status of continuing medical education (CME) in Korea, and to establish a method for improving CME in the future. Currently, the CME in Korea presents several problems that need to be addressed, such as the appropriateness of the annual required credits, maintenance of simple refresher training, insufficient online education, and evaluation and accreditation of educational institutions. Solutions are offered in the form of increased time for the required credits, introduction of social competency topics and education methods, improvement of online education, evaluation to improve the quality of CME, and introduction of a systematic and appropriate evaluation and accreditation system. CME and continuing professional development (CPD) are not only obligations stipulated in the medical law, but also professional requisites in terms of securing autonomy through self-development and self-regulation. It aims to enlighten the high level of professionalism required by the international community. It is an essential requirement and ultimately promotes and protects the physical, mental, and social health of people worldwide. In order to cope with the international standards of CME/CPD that ensure high quality treatment and patient safety, it is crucial to reform the continuing medical education system by securing the physicians’ professionalism. To this end, authors propose the improvement and implementation of CME system in Korea based on internal review and benchmarks of the internationally recognized CME/CPD systems that meet global standards.


2011 ◽  
Vol 12 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 127-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
JOACHIM SCHIMPF ◽  
KISH SHEN

AbstractECLiPSe is a Prolog-based programming system, aimed at the development and deployment of constraint programming applications. It is also used for teaching most aspects of combinatorial problem solving, for example, problem modelling, constraint programming, mathematical programming and search techniques. It uses an extended Prolog as its high-level modelling and control language, complemented by several constraint solver libraries, interfaces to third-party solvers, an integrated development environment and interfaces for embedding into host environments. This paper discusses language extensions, implementation aspects, components, and tools that we consider relevant on the way from Logic Programming to Constraint Logic Programming.


Author(s):  
Nur Amirah Borhan ◽  
Noryati Ahmad

Purpose This study aims to identify the determinants of Malaysian corporate Sukuk rating and attempts to find out which determinant has the most significant impact. Design/methodology/approach The framework tries to establish a relationship between firm’s size, profitability, Sukuk guarantee status and types of Sukuk with Sukuk rating from the perspective of Agency Theory and Information Asymmetry Theory. The data consist of 43 Sukuk issuances from 2006 to 2015. Multinomial Logistic Regression Model is then used to find out the significant determinants of Sukuk rating. Findings The study found that only three variables significantly impact Sukuk rating. The results show that a guaranteed Sukuk Ijarah or a guaranteed Sukuk Musyarakah that is issued by a highly profitable firm has a higher likelihood of getting rating AAA or rating AA as compared to getting rating A. A type of Sukuk, particularly Sukuk Murabahah, is the most significant variable influencing Sukuk rating. However, firm size is not a significant determinant of Sukuk rating in the context of this study. Research limitations implications The first limitation of the study is the relatively small sample size. Second, the study only tested four independent variables. Practical implications Several implications are derived from the results of the study. First, new firms that are planning to issue Sukuk should consistently maintain a high level of profit and consider issuing debt-based Sukuk to ensure that the issued Sukuk have higher rating. To increase the likelihood of getting higher rating, they should also consider providing a third-party guarantor. As for existing Sukuk issuers that are in lower rating category, they should increase their profitability to be upgraded to higher rating category. Second, risk-adverse investors should invest in highly profitable, guaranteed and debt-based Sukuk, as these Sukuk are likely to be in higher rating category and provide guarantee in terms of capital payments during liquidation or bankruptcy. Third, to reduce information asymmetry, policymakers should make it compulsory for all Sukuk issuers to have their Sukuk rated annually and make it mandatory for all rating agencies in Malaysia to publish their Sukuk rating methodologies. Originality/value This paper helps to expand the limited existing literature about the determinants of Sukuk rating, particularly for the Malaysian corporate Sukuk.


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