Search results for "CASE"
showing 10 items of 3855 documents
Reviewing the role of ecosystems services in the sustainability of the urban environment: A multi-country analysis
2020
The urban environment is characterised by many pressures caused by population growth, transport (and its related emissions), and the damage to green areas. Yet, there is a variety of ecosystem services available in urban areas, which may be deployed to ameliorate the current problems and foster their sustainability. This paper reviews the role of ecosystem services as tools for sustainability, based on an urban setting. It also describes a series of multi-country case studies, where an assessment of their functions using a set of benefits valuation approaches such as health benefits, economic benefits, social benefits and benefits to climate resilience, are provided, along with an appraisal…
Modeling the natural gas supply chain for sustainable growth policy
2020
Abstract Natural gas has been used globally as a transitional fuel for supporting a green-energy-supply strategy, which has been questioned for the intermittence and lack of reliability of renewables. This paper proposes a System Dynamics model for assessing alternative security of supply policy along the natural gas value chain. The model incorporates demand, transport, production and reserves of natural gas variables according to a systemic perspective. It also includes a module for evaluating the effect of natural gas price on the demand and supply levels, respectively. Alternative supply policies are evaluated under different scenarios. The chosen case-study focuses on the Colombian nat…
Economic feasibility of stationary electrochemical storages for electric bill management applications: The Italian scenario
2016
Battery energy storage systems (BESSs) are expected to become a fundamental element of the electricity infrastructure, thanks to their ability to decouple generation and demand over time. BESSs can also be used to store electricity during low-price hours, when the demand is low, and to meet the demand during peak hours, thus leading to savings for the consumer. This work focuses on the economic viability of BESS from the point of view of the electricity customer. The analysis refers to a lithium-ion (Li-ion), an advanced lead-acid, a zinc-based, a sodium-sulphur (NaS) and a flow battery. The total investment and replacement costs are estimated in order to calculate the cumulated cash flow, …
Distributed adaptive leader–follower and leaderless consensus control of a class of strict-feedback nonlinear systems : a unified approach
2020
In this paper, distributed adaptive consensus for a class of strict-feedback nonlinear systems under directed topology condition is investigated. Both leader–follower and leaderless cases are considered in a unified framework. To design distributed controller for each subsystem, a local compensatory variable is generated based on the signals collected from its neighbors. Such a technique enables us to solve the leader–follower consensus and leaderless consensus problems in a unified framework. And it further allows us to treat the leaderless consensus as a special case of the leader–follower consensus. For leader–follower consensus, the assumption that the leader trajectory is linearly para…
The Advantage of Digital Decision Making for Strategic Decisions – Proofed by a Supply Chain Case
2017
This paper will discuss the advantage of decision making supported by a digital system and will provide an overview of an empiric analysis researched on this topic. Decision making in organizations is a significant system implied task of managers and therefore a broad area in scientific research, not only in the disciplines management or business studies – even from technical to humanistic disciplines. Nowadays the trend of digitalization captures all areas of life especially in business, as well as the typical management task of decision making. Triggered by the digitalization trend business will move toward an autonomous decision making of machines or cyber systems. The important step tow…
Networked Bio-Inspired Evolutionary Dynamics on a Multi-Population
2019
We consider a multi-population, represented by a network of groups of individuals. Every player of each group can choose between two options, and we study the problem of reaching consensus. The dynamics not only depend on the dynamics within the group, but they also depend on the topology of the network, so neighboring groups influence individuals as well. First, we develop a mathematical model of this networked bio-inspired evolutionary behavior and we study its steady-state. We look at the special case where the underlying network topology is a regular and unweighted graph and show that the steady-state is a consensus equilibrium. A sufficient condition for exponential stability is given.…
DESDEO: The Modular and Open Source Framework for Interactive Multiobjective Optimization
2021
Interactive multiobjective optimization methods incorporate preferences from a human decision maker in the optimization process iteratively. This allows the decision maker to focus on a subset of solutions, learn about the underlying trade-offs among the conflicting objective functions in the problem and adjust preferences during the solution process. Incorporating preference information allows computing only solutions that are interesting to the decision maker, decreasing computation time significantly. Thus, interactive methods have many strengths making them viable for various applications. However, there is a lack of existing software frameworks to apply and experiment with interactive …
Measuring the quality of humanitarian information products: Insights from the 2015 Nepal earthquake
2018
Information plays a critical role in humanitarian assistance. It has become a product that is shared for multiple purposes such as situational awareness, decision-making, coordination, reporting, and attracting funding. In the aftermath of sudden onset disasters, humanitarians are constrained with huge workload, time pressure, and uncertainties and thus, information products are often criticized with respect to quality issues. In this paper, we aim at developing an empirically grounded framework that can measure the quality of information products through accuracy, objectivity, completeness, and consistency. We validate the framework with the help of practitioners and apply it to the inform…
AN EFFECTIVE NEUROFEEDBACK TRAINING, WITH CORTISOL CORRELATES, IN A CLINICAL CASE OF ANXIETY
2017
Background and objectives: Neurofeedback treatments have shown successful results in anxiety disorders. Thus, the effectiveness of a beta1 Neurofeedback protocol was tested in a longitudinal clinical case study. Design and methods: A participant suffering from an anxiety syndrome was treated with 10 sessions of Neurofeedback, which protocol consisted in uptraining beta1 rhythm (16-21 Hz) while downtraining theta (4-8 Hz) band. For each of the 10 sessions the state anxiety and salivary cortisol levels were measured in a pre/post design. Initial and final examinations of anxiety symptoms and sustained attention performance were taken in addition. 
 Results: The final evaluation showed th…
Palliative Endoscopic Esophageal Stenting for Malignant Esophageal Tumour Complications: A Clinical Case and Single Centre Experience in Latvia
2020
Abstract Esophageal stenting is used in patients with malignant esophageal tumours to reduce dysphagia and inanition. The objective of this study was to analyse the main reasons for esophageal stenting in Rīga East Clinical University Hospital (RECUH) and their association with dysphagia and mortality. A cross-sectional study of all patients hospitalised in RECUH who received esophageal self-expanding metal stents (SEMS) from October 2013 to December 2015 was performed. A total of 29 patients, 24 (82.8%) male and 5 (17.2%) female, with mean age 63.7 ± 11.3 years, underwent the procedure. The most common indications for stenting were tumour-related stenosis (52.9%) and fistulae (17.6%). Mean…