Unmanned Transportation Applications at First Level Air Infrastructure (FLAI)

Increasing complexity of infrastructure has growing need for maintenance that is accumulating cost in the long run. This report compares the simulation of traditional transportation to an aviation alternative. The focus is on the cost effectiveness and power efficiency of Vertical/Short Take-Off and Landing (V/STOL) vehicles. Author’s motivation in this topic is from the project of designing a VTOL vehicle for multimodal transportation. The simulation of 100.000 people demonstrates efficiency of aviation infrastructure. Counting 11 billion for traditional infrastructure and 4 billion for equivalent VTOL vehicle carrying capacity. Affecting factors are energy, transportation modes, infrastructure and operation average the results. The simulation is simplistic model of infrastructure with normally distributed traffic, neglecting the effect of transition between vehicles, and the effect of wind magnitude and direction. The aviation method reduced distance up to 82% made travel time 92%, consumed 88% of the energy, when emissions show relatively equivalent quantity on both applications. The results of FLAI imply economic advantages over traditional infrastructure and suggest further research into the safe adoption of aviation infrastructure.

The risk for a new COVID-19 wave and how it depends on R 0 , the current immunity level and current restrictions

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit different regions differently. The current disease-induced immunity level î in a region approximately equals the cumulative fraction infected, which primarily depends on two factors: (i) the initial potential for COVID-19 in the region ( R 0 ), and (ii) the preventive measures put in place. Using a mathematical model including heterogeneities owing to age, social activity and susceptibility, and allowing for time-varying preventive measures, the risk for a new epidemic wave and its doubling time are investigated. Focus lies on quantifying the minimal overall effect of preventive measures p Min needed to prevent a future outbreak. It is shown that î plays a more influential roll than when immunity is obtained from vaccination. Secondly, by comparing regions with different R 0 and î it is shown that regions with lower R 0 and low î may need higher preventive measures ( p Min ) compared with regions having higher R 0 but also higher î , even when such immunity levels are far from herd immunity. Our results are illustrated on different regions but these comparisons contain lots of uncertainty due to simplistic model assumptions and insufficient data fitting, and should accordingly be interpreted with caution.

Analytic view on N body interaction in electrostatic quantum gates and decoherence effects in tight-binding model

Analytical solutions describing quantum swap and Hadamard gate are given with the use of tight-binding approximation. Decoherence effects are described analytically for 2 interacting electrons confined by local potentials with use of tight-binding simplistic model and in Schroedinger formalism with omission of spin degree of freedom. The obtained results can be generalized for the case of [Formula: see text] electrostatically interacting quantum bodies confined by local potentials ([Formula: see text]-qubit) system representing any electrostatic quantum gate with [Formula: see text] inputs/outputs. The mathematical structure of system evolution with time is specified.

Unbiased clade age estimation using a Bayesian Brownian Bridge

In a recent paper1 we presented a new model, the Bayesian Brownian Bridge (BBB), to infer clade age based on fossil evidence and modern diversity. We benchmarked the method with extensive simulations, including a wide range of diversification histories and sampling heterogeneities that go well beyond the necessarily simplistic model assumptions. Applying BBB to 198 angiosperm families, we found that their fossil record is compatible with clade origins earlier than most contemporary palaeobotanical interpretations. In particular, we estimated with high probability that crown-angiosperms originated before the Cretaceous (> 145 Ma). Budd and colleagues2 critique our study, arguing that the BBB model is biased towards older estimates when fossil data are scarce or absent, that our underlying fossil dataset is unsound, that our clade age estimates are therefore biased by early diverging lineages that are underrepresented in the fossil record, and that pooling of fossil data for analysis at higher taxonomic ranks overcomes these biases. Here, we explore their points and perform new simulations to show that their critique has no merit.

Hospital Caseload Demand in the Presence of Interventions during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Modeling Study

A surge in hospital admissions was observed in Japan in late March 2020, and the incidence of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) temporarily reduced from March to May as a result of the closure of host and hostess clubs, shortening the opening hours of bars and restaurants, and requesting a voluntary reduction of contact outside the household. To prepare for the second wave, it is vital to anticipate caseload demand, and thus, the number of required hospital beds for admitted cases and plan interventions through scenario analysis. In the present study, we analyzed the first wave data by age group so that the age-specific number of hospital admissions could be projected for the second wave. Because the age-specific patterns of the epidemic were different between urban and other areas, we analyzed datasets from two distinct cities: Osaka, where the cases were dominated by young adults, and Hokkaido, where the older adults accounted for the majority of hospitalized cases. By estimating the exponential growth rates of cases by age group and assuming probable reductions in those rates under interventions, we obtained projected epidemic curves of cases in addition to hospital admissions. We demonstrated that the longer our interventions were delayed, the higher the peak of hospital admissions. Although the approach relies on a simplistic model, the proposed framework can guide local government to secure the essential number of hospital beds for COVID-19 cases and formulate action plans.

The Reformed Augustinians of Lower Germany and the Dynamics of the Early Reformation

After summarizing the evidence that the events in Lower Germany were a watershed in the early Reformation, this chapter turns to an analysis of how the story of Reformed Augustinians deepens our understanding of the dynamics of the early Reformation. It demonstrates how ideas were passed via Augustinian networks, and the strategic element to their dissemination. It also indicates that impulses from Lower Germany influenced Luther, raising fundamental questions about a simplistic model of the Reformation that places Wittenberg at its centre and understands Martin Luther as its sage. Finally, the chapter shows the importance of the Augustinian context, not only for its impact on Luther’s theology, but for its institutional and administrative structures, and how they facilitated the early Reformation.

Forecasting the Wuhan coronavirus (2019-nCoV) epidemics using a simple (simplistic) model

and FindingsConfirmed infection cases in mainland China were analyzed using the data up to January 28, 2020 (first 13 days of reliable confirmed cases). In addition, all available data up to February 3 were processed the same way. For the first period the cumulative number of cases followed an exponential function. However, from January 28, we discerned a downward deviation from the exponential growth. This slower-than-exponential growth was also confirmed by a steady decline of the effective reproduction number. A backtrend analysis suggested the original basic reproduction number R0 to be about 2.4 – 2.5. We used a simple logistic growth model that fitted very well with all data reported until the time of writing. Using this model and the first set of data, we estimate that the maximum cases will be about 21,000 reaching this level in mid-February. Using all available data the maximum number of cases is somewhat higher at 29,000 but its dynamics does not change. These predictions do not account for any possible other secondary sources of infection.

Amyloid formation of bovine insulin is retarded in moderately acidic pH and by addition of short-chain alcohols

Protein aggregation and amyloid formation are associated with multiple human diseases, but are also a problem in protein production. Understanding how aggregation can be modulated is therefore of importance in both medical and industrial contexts. We have used bovine insulin as a model protein to explore how amyloid formation is affected by buffer pH and by the addition of short-chain alcohols. We find that bovine insulin forms amyloid fibrils, albeit with different rates and resulting fibril morphologies, across a wide pH range (2–7). At pH 4.0, bovine insulin displayed relatively low aggregation propensity in combination with high solubility; this condition was therefore chosen as basis for further exploration of how bovine insulin’s native state can be stabilized in the presence of short-chain alcohols that are relevant because of their common use as eluents in industrial-scale chromatography purification. We found that ethanol and isopropanol are efficient modulators of bovine insulin aggregation, providing a three to four times retardation of the aggregation kinetics at 30–35% (vol/vol) concentration; we attribute this to the formation of oligomers, which we detected by AFM. We discuss this effect in terms of reduced solvent polarity and show, by circular dichroism recordings, that a concomitant change in α-helical packing of the insulin monomer occurs in ethanol. Our results extend current knowledge of how insulin aggregates, and may, although bovine insulin serves as a simplistic model, provide insights into how buffers and additives can be fine-tuned in industrial production of proteins in general and pharmaceutical insulin in particular.

Class, Style and Territory in the Drari Microcultures of Brussels

Much like Parsons’s notion of “youth culture,” the tradition of subculture developed by the Birmingham School was criticised as being too romantic, too general, and too dependent on a simplistic model based on the inside/outside binary. Since the 1990s, “post-subcultural” studies have developed which prefer to focus on agency rather than structure. A “third school” of youth cultural studies focused on medium sizes groups and their attachment to place, which they called “microcultures”. This paper, drawing from fieldwork undertaken in Brussels between 2013 and 2016 with young people, studies members of the Brussels “street culture” called the drari, while zooming in on the combinations of personalities, the events they share and the locations they make their own. Specifically, this paper argues that the drari microculture does not fit in the binary model of (post-)subcultural theory, nor in the criminological frame of urban youth gangs, by focusing on the affective and class-related phenomena internal to their practices of territory-building.