No description available.

Fossil fuel is presently a major source for electricity production, but it contributes significantly to Green House Gas emissions. Wind is a promising alternative, and can potentially become a major power resource in future power systems. Wind power installations are growing significantly for producing clean energy in electric power systems. As the wind penetration continues to increase to relatively high levels, it can significantly affect the overall performance and reliability of the power system. Hence, it becomes very important to accurately model the behaviour of wind, its interaction with conventional sources and also with other wind resources connected to the power system in order to conduct a realistic assessment of system reliability and benefits from wind energy utilization. When the wind penetration levels are low, all the wind energy generated is utilized to serve the load. However, at higher wind penetration levels, wind energy is spilled due to limitations in the operating reserve or ramping capability of the scheduled generating units. The system reliability and the wind energy benefits are reduced as the wind energy spillage increases due to wind curtailment. Hence, accurate wind models should be researched and developed to include wind energy curtailment in the reliability modelling, considering factors such as the system load level, priority loading order of the generating unit and response rates of the generating units. Researchers have not incorporated these factors in wind power modelling and in the adequacy evaluation of wind integrated power systems. A new analytical technique is developed in the subsequent chapters to carry out a comprehensive wind absorption capability evaluation of the power system, and also to incorporate this characteristic in reliability modelling of the system. Wind curtailments can take place not only due to generation constraints, but also due to transmission line constraints depending on the capacity and location of the wind energy resource in the power system, and the power transfer capacity of the transmission lines connected to the wind farm bus. Therefore, reliability modelling of the power system considering wind curtailments due to both generation and transmission constraints should be carried out to assess the impact of wind farms on bulk system reliability and the wind energy benefits. Wind curtailment is incorporated in the composite power system reliability evaluation by modelling the wind resource both as generation and as negative load. The techniques can be utilized to conduct system adequacy and wind energy benefit assessment both at the capacity planning stages and composite generation/transmission planning stages, incorporating wind power curtailment due to generating unit response limitations. As the wind penetration in a power system increases, the wind farms connected to the system are distributed at different geographical locations. Both analytical and Monte Carlo Simulation based techniques have previously been used by the research group at the University of Saskatchewan to include the cross correlation between the wind characteristics of different wind farms in the wind modelling for reliability evaluation of power systems. However, the combined effect of wind diversity and wind curtailments due to both transmission and generation constraints on the system reliability and wind energy benefit assessment has not been considered. The techniques developed for system adequacy and wind energy benefit assessment considering wind curtailment due to generation and transmission constraints are further modified and presented in this thesis to include wind diversity in the analysis. The developed techniques for adequacy evaluation of wind integrated power systems considering wind power curtailment and diversity should be extremely useful for system planning engineers and policy makers as wind power penetration in power systems continues to increase throughout the world.

Deregulation of the electricity industry has altered the investment landscape for new resources. Multiple resource adequacy constructs are in use today around the world and represent diverging opinions of how much interaction regulators should have on the procurement of new resources. The report compares the resource adequacy constructs in Australia, Texas, California and the Northeast of the United States and discusses the future of resource adequacy. The report concludes that a hybridized construct that blends the high offer caps of energy-only markets, the prescriptive nature of resources in capacity markets and a strong price-responsive demand will likely be the future of resource adequacy. / text

Testing is an indispensable mechanism for assuring software quality. One of the key issues in testing is to obtain a test data set that is able to effectively test an implementation. An adequate test data set consists of test cases that can expose faults in a software implementation. Mutation-based testing can be employed to obtain adequate test data sets, and numerous mutation operators have been proposed to date to measure the adequacy of test data sets that reveal functional faults. However, implementations that pass functionality tests are still vulnerable to malicious attacks. Despite the rigorous use of various existing testing techniques, many vulnerabilities are discovered after the deployment of software implementations, such as buffer overflows (BOF), SQL injections, and format string bugs (FSB). Successful exploitations of these vulnerabilities may result in severe consequences such as denial of services, application state corruptions, and information leakage. Many approaches have been proposed to detect these vulnerabilities. Unfortunately, very few approaches address the issue of testing implementations against vulnerabilities. Moreover, these approaches do not provide an indication whether a test data set is adequate for vulnerability testing or not. We believe that bringing the idea of traditional functional test adequacy to vulnerability testing can help address the issue of test adequacy. In this thesis, we apply the idea of mutation-based adequate testing to perform vulnerability testing of buffer overflows, SQL injections, and format string bugs. We propose mutation operators to force the generation of adequate test data sets for these vulnerabilities. The operators mutate source code to inject the vulnerabilities in the library function calls and unsafe implementation language elements. The mutants generated by the operators are killed by test cases that expose these vulnerabilities. We propose distinguishing or killing criteria for mutants that consider varying symptoms of exploitations. Three prototype tools are developed to automatically generate mutants and perform mutation analysis with input test cases and the effectiveness of the proposed operators is evaluated on several open source programs containing known vulnerabilities. The results indicate that the proposed operators are effective for testing the vulnerabilities, and the mutation-based vulnerability testing process ensures the quality of the applications against these vulnerabilities. / Thesis (Master, Computing) -- Queen's University, 2008-08-18 13:53:04.036

<p>Very little protection has been afforded to wetlands1 and estuaries within the South African legislative framework.2 These ecosystems are extremely important and valuable to mankind, the flora and fauna.3 The continued destruction of wetlands and estuaries is the most heinous act of environmental vandalism on a worldwide scale today.4 Wetland and estuarine loss has been accelerated and extended by human activities such as mining,5 urbanisation,6 drainage, river diversion,7 groundwater abstraction as well as climate change.8 Time is running out for so many critically important sites and for the world at large.9 Without wetlands and estuaries the biosphere10 cannot continue to do its essential work.11 Despite, the importance of a range of resources and services12 which wetlands and estuaries provide, these have been taken for granted by humans.13 As a result hereof, the maintenance of wetlands and estuaries has received low priority in many countries.14 This is further precipitated by the lack of interest and ignorance which result in the conversion of wetlands and estuaries into man-made structures.15 Research has shown that the lack of information and the awareness of the importance of these ecosystems has the made the conservation legislation for these ecosystems a toothless dragon.16 People are becoming increasingly aware17 of the loss of wetlands and estuaries, once in abundance and now merely shadows of their former nature.18 To investigate this lack of protection, the starting point would be the global level.</p>

No description available.

The significance of this research is to see if South Africa needs wetland and estuarine specific legislation to conserve these ecosystems. Indeed, South Africa is in need of wetland and estuarine specific legislat ion, to conserve wetlands and estuaries for future generations to come. The current law and policies do not suffice to conserve these service systems. South Africa does have statutes which afford protection to these ecosystems, but this protection is limited with regard to wetlands and estuaries. / Magister Legum - LLM

Zugl.: Wien, Univ., Diss., 2009

Η μακροπρόθεσμη έκθεση της περιτοναϊκής μεμβράνης σε μη βιοσυμβατά περιτοναϊκά διαλύματα οδηγεί σε δομικές αλλαγές και στην απώλεια της υπερδιήθησης. Σκοπός της παρούσας μελέτης είναι να περιγράψουμε τις ιστολογικές αλλαγές της περιτοναϊκής μεμβράνης που παρατηρούνται: α) σε ουραιμικούς ασθενείς που ξεκινούν θεραπεία υποκατάστασης της νεφρικής λειτουργίας με περιτοναϊκή κάθαρση και β) σε ασθενείς που ήδη υποβάλλονται στη μέθοδο για ικανό χρονικό διάστημα. Επίσης να καθορίσουμε κατά πόσο οι μορφολογικές αυτές αλλαγές επηρεάζουν τα λειτουργικά χαρακτηριστικά του περιτοναίου. Μέθοδος: Στη μελέτη περιλήφθηκαν 19 ασθενείς (ομάδα Α) οι οποίοι υποβλήθηκαν σε βιοψία περιτοναίου κατά την τοποθέτηση του περιτοναϊκού καθετήρα και πριν την έναρξη της περιτοναϊκής κάθαρσης (CAPD) και 18 ασθενείς οι οποίοι υποβλήθηκαν σε βιοψία περιτοναίου μετά από 4 χρόνια σε CAPD (ομάδα Β). Οι ιστολογικές παράμετροι που ελέχθησαν ήταν η μεσοθηλιακή επιφάνεια, η υπομεσοθηλιακή ζώνη, η κατάσταση του συνδετικού ιστού και η κατάσταση των αγγείων. Για την εκτίμηση των λειτουργικών χαρακτηριστικών του περιτοναίου και της επάρκειας της μεθόδου εφαρμόσθηκαν η δοκιμασία εξισορρόπησης της περιτοναϊκής μεμβράνης (PET), η συνολική εβδομαδιαία κάθαρση κρεατινίνης (wClcr) και το συνολικό εβδομαδιαίο KT/V της ουρίας (wKT/V). Αποτελέσματα: Οι κύριες ιστολογικές αλλαγές και στις δύο ομάδες ασθενών ήταν η απώλεια των μεσοθηλιακών κυττάρων, η πάχυνση της υπομεσοθηλιακής ζώνης και η υαλίνωση των αγγείων. Το πάχος της υπομεσοθηλιακής ζώνης και στις δύο ομάδες ασθενών ήταν σημαντικά υψηλότερο έναντι φυσιολογικών μαρτύρων (630μm και 1140μm vs. 50μm αντίστοιχα, p <0.05). Αν και δε βρέθηκε σημαντική διαφορά μεταξύ των μορφολογικών αλλαγών του περιτοναίου στους ασθενείς της ομάδας Α και στους ασθενείς της ομάδας Β, υπήρξε μια τάση για σοβαρότερου βαθμού βλάβες στους τελευταίους. Το PET, η wClcr και το wKT/V δεν παρουσίασαν στατιστικά σημαντικές διαφορές στις δύο ομάδες ασθενών, ούτε στους ασθενείς της ομάδας Β κατά την έναρξη και μετά από 4 χρόνια εφαρμογής της μεθόδου. Κανένας σημαντικός συσχετισμός δεν παρατηρήθηκε μεταξύ των ιστολογικών αλλαγών και των λειτουργικών δοκιμασιών και στις δύο ομάδες ασθενών. Συμπεράσματα: Σημαντικές δομικές αλλαγές του περιτοναίου παρατηρούνται στους ουραιμικούς ασθενείς και αυτές οι αλλαγές επιδεινώνονται με την εφαρμογή της CAPD. Οι δομικές αυτές αλλαγές δεν ακολουθούνται από λειτουργικές αλλαγές κατά τη διάρκεια των πρώτων τεσσάρων ετών σε CAPD. / The long-term exposure of peritoneal membrane to bioincompatible dialysis solutions leads to structural changes and loss of ultrafiltration capability. Objective: The aim of the present study is to describe the histological changes of peritoneum that are observed: a) in uremic patients and b) in patients that are in peritoneal dialysis for a period of time. Also to determine the possible relation of histological changes with the transport characteristics of peritoneal membrane and with adequacy of dialysis. Method: Thirty nine patients (M/F=18/19) that underwent a peritoneal biopsy in the initiation of treatment (group A, N=19) or after 4 years in continous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD) (group B, N=18) were included in the study. The morphological changes of mesothelial cells and vascular compartment as well as the thickness of submesothelial collagenous zone were estimated. The relations of these changes to peritoneal equilibration test (PET) and to adequacy of dialysis (total weekly creatinine clearance (wClcr) and urea KT/V) were also investigated. Results: The main histological changes in both groups of patients were loss of mesothelial cells and decrease of normal mesothelial surface, thickening of submesothelial collagenous zone and presence of vascular hyalinosis. The thickness of submesothelial collagenous zone in both groups of patients was significantly higher compared to that of controls (630μm and 1140μm vs.50 μm respectively, p <0.05). Although no significant difference was found between morphologic changes of peritoneal membrane in uremic patients starting on CAPD and those on peritoneal dialysis for a mean period of 4 years, there was a trend towards more severe lesions in the latter. The PET, Clcr and urea KT/V were not significantly different in the two groups of patients. These parameters also showed no significant changes when examined in the initiation of CAPD and after four years in peritoneal dialysis in the same patients (group B). No significant correlations were observed between histological changes and PET, Clcr and KT/V in both groups of patients. Conclusions: Significant structural changes of peritoneal membrane are observed in uremic patients and these changes are deteriorated with CAPD treatment. Structural changes are not followed by functional changes during the first four years on CAPD.

Submitted by BRUNA EVELYN BUENO DE MORAIS null (bruninha_fisio_btu@hotmail.com.br) on 2018-04-04T23:49:21Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertacao Mestrado.pdf: 2901617 bytes, checksum: 7115c5d432efdb7d486f289b990a699f (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Luciana Pizzani null (luciana@btu.unesp.br) on 2018-04-06T14:24:21Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 morais_beb_me_bot.pdf: 2901617 bytes, checksum: 7115c5d432efdb7d486f289b990a699f (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-04-06T14:24:21Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 morais_beb_me_bot.pdf: 2901617 bytes, checksum: 7115c5d432efdb7d486f289b990a699f (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-02-28 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / Introdução: A DPOC é uma doença progressiva e que requer tratamento farmacológico para o controle dos sintomas respiratórios. Entretanto, são escassos dados brasileiros que avaliaram o uso de fármacos conforme a gravidade da doença e que verificaram sua adesão ao tratamento da DPOC. Objetivo: Avaliar a adequação, aderência e técnica do tratamento farmacológico pulmonar em relação à gravidade nos pacientes com DPOC. Métodos: Foram avaliados 181 pacientes com DPOC leve a muito grave (47,5 % sexo masculino) com idade: 67,7 ± 9,8 anos e volume expiratório forçado no primeiro segundo (VEF1): 44,6 ± 17,1%. Todos pacientes foram avaliados quanto à adequação farmacológica (GOLD 2017), magnitude da dispneia (Medical ResearchCouncil Modificado – MMRC), Questionário COPD Assessment Test (CAT), frequência de exacerbações no último ano, aderência referida aos fármacos inalatórios e a verificação da técnica dos dispositivos inalatórios. Resultados: Do total de pacientes avaliados, ao separar pela gravidade GOLD, obtivemos GOLD I = 9, GOLD II = 48, GOLD III = 62 e GOLD IV = 62 e ao separar pelos grupos sintomáticos, obtivemos: A = 40, B = 112, C = 5 e D= 24. Em relação à adequação ao tratamento farmacológico pulmonar, 40% do grupo A e 72,5% do grupo B estavam utilizando corticoide inalatório sem história de exacerbações no último ano. Quanto à aderência referida ao tratamento e à técnica do dispositivo inalatório, observamos que a maioria estava aderente (78%) e realizavam a técnica de maneira adequada (64 %). Conclusão: Há utilização de excesso de corticoide inalatório nos pacientes com doença mais leve. Entretanto, a maioria dos pacientes aderem ao tratamento e fazem o uso de dispositivo inalatório corretamente. / Background: COPD is a progressive disease and requires pharmacological treatment to control respiratory symptoms. However, there are few Brazilian data that evaluated the use of pharmacological treatment according to the disease severity or verified their adherence to COPD treatment. Objective: To evaluate the adequacy, adherence and technique of pulmonary pharmacological treatment in relation to severity in COPD patients. Methods: We evaluated 181 patients with mild to very severe COPD (47.5% male) with age: 67.7 ± 9.8 years old and forced expiratory volume in the first second (FEV1): 44.6 ± 17.1%. All patients were evaluated by pharmacological adequacy (GOLD 2017), dyspnea’s magnitude (Medical Research Council Modified - MMRC), COPD Assessment Test (CAT), frequency of exacerbations in the last year, adherence to inhaled pharmacological treatment and technique’s verification devices. Results: We obtained GOLD I = 9, GOLD II = 48, GOLD III = 62 and GOLD IV = 62, and when separated by symptomatic groups, we obtained: A = 40, B = 112, C = 5 and D = 24. Regarding the suitability for pulmonary pharmacological treatment, 40% of group A and 72.5% of group B were using inhaled corticosteroids with no history of exacerbations in the last year. Regarding the adherence to the treatment and technique of the inhaler device, we observed that the majority were adherent (78%) and performed the technique adequately (64%). Conclusion: There is an excess of inhaled corticosteroids in patients with milder disease. However, most patients adhere to treatment and use inhaled device correctly. Key-words: COPD, adherence, adequacy, technique, inhalation device / 40101002