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Review and Assessment of Decarbonized Future Electricity Markets
Full text linkThe electricity sector plays a key role in achieving zero-emission targets. The required transition will lead to substantial changes in the supply, demand, and distribution of electricity but also in stakeholder roles. Future market designs may change substantially to accommodate these changes, address challenges, and take advantage of new opportunities. This paper reviews the characteristics of future carbon-neutral electricity systems and electricity market design options. To provide a guiding framework for the literature review, we transfer the complexity of electricity systems into a three-layer structure: firstly, we analyze the papers that rely on techno-economic modeling of the physical electricity system. As a case study, we analyze various studies focusing on a decarbonized European electricity system in 2050. Secondly, we review papers that investigates the economic behavior and effects of self interest-seeking stakeholderssuch as producers, network operators, and consumers. Finally, we review papers focusing on policy and market design questions that guide policymakers to achieve a target physical asset combination while considering the behavior of stakeholders. We highlight common trends and disagreements in the literature, review the main drivers of future markets, and finally provide a mapping between those drivers, challenges, and opportunities. The review concludes that the most promising next step toward a fully comprehensive assessment approach is to combine the existing approaches across topical and disciplinary boundaries
Mass conservative neural networks
Full text linkNeural networks have established themselves as a powerful tool for extracting insights from vast amounts of data. However, with increasing use
of deep learning in the natural sciences, there is also an increasing demand to incorporate domain-specific expert knowledge. In many cases, this
knowledge comes in the form of constraints expressed as partial differential
equations (PDE). In addition to possibly improving generalization capabilities, enforcing such constraints would ensure predictions that are consistent
with available domain knowledge. In this thesis, we focus on enforcing
the physical law of mass conservation in neural networks, with the aim of
modeling densities and velocities of compressible fluids. Specifically, we
enforce the continuity equation, a PDE describing mass conservation in its
local and differential form. We focus on models in continuous space and
time.
In our first contribution, we weakly enforce the continuity equation by
minimizing a PDE penalty on the so-called collocation points. Specifically,
we provide an extension to physics-informed neural networks (PINNs).
Motivated by the microscopic perspective of a fluid density, we propose
to select collocation points by sampling particles from the (normalized)
fluid density with dynamic Monte Carlo methods. This mesh-free and
adaptive sampling method improves the sample efficiency for enforcing
the continuity equation and other density-based advection-diffusion PDEs,
which we demonstrate through various experiments.
In our second contribution, we propose Lagrangian Flow Networks
(LFlows), a framework for constructing neural networks that adhere to the
continuity equation by construction. We do so by leveraging insights from
classical theory on Lagrangian flows, which allow us to model physically
consistent densities and velocities with time-conditioned diffeomorphisms,
i. e. conditional Normalizing Flows. This approach not only offers high predictive accuracy in density modeling tasks, but also proves computationally
efficient. We showcase LFlows in both 2D and 3D scenarios, and apply it to
the real-world application of bird migration modeling.
In summary, we study different approaches for incorporating PDEs,
particularly the continuity equation, into neural networks for modeling
compressible fluids. The resulting methods ensure physical consistency of
the predictions while maintaining computational efficiency
Fiona Kelly, Deborah Dempsey and Adrienne Byrt (eds), Donor-Linked Family in the Digital Age: Relatedness and Regulation, Cambridge University Press, 2023, Hardback, 280 pp., £95.00, ISBN 9781316518519
Full text linkDie Auswirkungen der Coaching-Dauer auf das Gesundheitsverhalten: Ein Vergleich zwischen 3-monatigem und 6-monatigem Online-Coaching
No full textHintergrund: Gesundheitscoachings haben das Potenzial, das Gesundheitsverhalten zu verbessern, Gesundheitskosten zu senken und medizinisches Personal zu entlasten. Dennoch ist ihre Wirksamkeit bislang wenig erforscht. Diese Masterarbeit untersucht den Einfluss der Coaching-Dauer auf das Gesundheitsverhalten, um zeitlich optimierte Interventionen zu entwickeln.
Methode: Daten aus bereits vorhandenen Datensätzen von 102 Erwachsenen (58 weiblich, 44 männlich, MAlter = 47.6 Jahre, SDAlter = 12.1 Jahre), die ein 3-monatiges oder 6-monatiges Personal Health Coaching der SalutaCoach AG wahrgenommen haben, wurden analysiert. Mittels Multipler Linearer Regression wurde die Wirkung der Coaching-Dauer auf die Gesundheitsvariablen untersucht.
Ergebnisse: Es wurden mittels der multiplen linearen Regression keine statistisch signifikanten Unterschiede zwischen der 3- und 6-monatigen Coaching-Dauer festgestellt. Deskriptiv zeigte die 6-monatige Gruppe grössere Verbesserungen bei BMI (-1.19 vs. -0.31), Gewichtsreduktion (-3.62 kg vs. -0.95 kg) und im Movement-Score im Bereich der körperlichen Aktivität (+194.12 vs. +104.69 Minuten). Die 3-monatige Gruppe erzielte bessere Ergebnisse beim Fitnesslevel (+0.93 vs. +0.88), Ernährungsverhalten (+3.05 vs. +2.51), Stressbewältigung (-1.16 vs. -0.18) und Resilienz (+2.99 vs. +1.68).
Schlussfolgerung: Die Studie zeigt, dass sowohl die 3- als auch die 6-monatige Coaching-Dauer zu positiven Verhaltensänderungen in den Bereichen Gewicht, körperliche Aktivität, Ernährung und mentaler Gesundheit führen kann. Während längere Interventionen tendenziell stärkere Effekte auf das Gewichtsmanagement und die körperliche Aktivität aufweisen, scheinen kürzere Programme bessere Ergebnisse in der Stressbewältigung und Ernährung zu erzielen. Trotz fehlender statistischer Signifikanz unterstreicht die Studie die Bedeutung von individualisierten Gesundheitscoachings, die auf die spezifischen Bedürfnisse der Teilnehmenden zugeschnitten sind. Zukünftige Forschung sollte den isolierten Einfluss von Coaching-Dauer und Sitzungsanzahl sowie die Langzeitwirkung von Coaching untersuchen, um gezieltere Empfehlungen für verschiedene Zielgruppen abzuleiten
La grippe pandémique dans l'institutionnalisation de la santé publique en Suisse, 1874-1920
No full textZur Gesellschaft Ägyptens in der Ramessidenzeit
Full text linkDie Studie hat sich die Analyse der nicht-elitären Schichten der altägyptischen Gesellschaft in der Späten Bronzezeit, genauer in der Ramessidenzeit, ca. 1280-1070 BCE zum Ziel gesetzt. In der Ramessidenzeit, welche zur spätbronzezeitlichen Periode von imperialen Grossreichen im Nahen Osten zählt, bildete Ägypten einen imperialen Staat, der, neben seinem Kernland im ägyptischen Niltal und dem Nildelta, weite Teile des nubischen Niltals im Süden sowie im Nordosten grosse Teile Palästinas, des Libanon und des südlichen Syrien beherrschte. Im altägyptischen Kernland lebe eine Bevölkerung von etwa drei Millionen. Das Ziel dieser Studie bildet also die Analyse der gesellschaftlichen Strukturen, in welchen diese Bewohner im Kernland lebten
Blurring the Blue Line: African Police, Emergency and the Struggle for Independence in Colonial Northern Matabeleland, 1959-1980
No full textThis historical study examines the different ways through which African police forces mediated the process of decolonization and the expansion of the nation-state in Zimbabwe between 1960-1990. Using Alltagsgeschichte as a methodological lens, I investigate African police “self-understandings” and their “situated subjectivities” as bureaucrats of the colonial and post-colonial states they served. By exploring the quotidian interactions of the supposed collaborators; between the structures and hierarchies of colonial and post-colonial states on one hand, and the broad sections of the colonial African society, on the other, I seek to understand how African police navigated and negotiated their lives and work vis-a-vis the particular ambiguities of decolonisation in a settler context. Consequently, I conceptualise African police as political actors whose personal motivations as well as their outlook on law and authority and visions of the nation-state have contributed to the formation of the nation-state in Zimbabwe. By placing African police at the centre of analysis, this study seeks to argue that this group of subjects shaped the process of decolonisation and the post-independence recasting of the nation-state in more complex and multifarious ways than existing research acknowledges.
Broadly, examining Zimbabwe’s violent and drawn-out decolonisation process through the lens of African police intermediaries contributes to historiography on colonial policing and everyday life in former settler colonial states. Trapped in the polarised binaries of collaboration and resistance, existing historical studies on the matter, whether written from the stand-point of empire or as institutional histories, have been preoccupied with the coercive nature of policing as central to controlling colonial societies and maintain the authority of alien rule. Neither of these perspectives left much room for systematically studying the socio-political histories of agents like police during the crises of decolonisation in Africa beyond common-place stereotypes. Secondly, by extending into the post-independence era, it not only makes critical empirical contributions to literature on intermediaries in the late colonial years but also stretches the category to new frontiers.
More specifically, the approach complicates several narratives in the historiography of African nationalism and decolonisation. Firstly, it allows us to re-think the binaries of collaboration and resistance, as well as domination. This can show the complex agency of state bureaucracies and their clients in the context of the colonial retreat and the making of the nation-state. This multiplicity of choice and action, I argue, is essential to understanding the micro-processes of decolonisation in former settler colonial state. In particular, I aim to demonstrate how individuals on the ground viewed emancipation, and the subtleties, ambiguities and ambivalences produced by the heterogeneity of thought and action. Interpreting decolonisation thus moves away from interpretations of liberation struggles that emphasize the bifurcation of winners and losers. Instead, we attain a nuanced analysis which draws out the multiplicity of stakes and shifting loyalties in a spectrum of political possibilities. Lastly, the study provides a useful foundation from which to comprehend both the complexities of law enforcement and the dynamics of history and memory in contemporary Zimbabwe and African politics.
The study will use material from various archival collections in UK, South Africa and Harare. In addition, oral interviews with retired African police and their immediate families will be used extensively in order to corroborate archival material. I shall also consult various such as newspapers, crime and court records, autobiographies, novels and memoirs
Violent Encounters: Practices and Perceptions of Violence in Southern Namibia and the Northern Cape, c. 1880-1910
No full textViolence was a central force in the establishment and upholding of colonial rule, but is rarely studied systematically as a research subject in its own right. The project addresses this gap by exploring practices and perceptions of violence, particularly everyday violence, in late nineteenth and early twentieth century southwestern Africa.
Everyday violence unquestionably played a crucial role in the border region of southern Namibia and the northern Cape: Africans’ day-to-day struggles with and resistance to violent colonial oppression, seizure of land and livestock as well as conscription into forced labour in the agrarian settler economy coincided with conflicts within and between African polities revolving around political power and influence, social status and economic wealth.
The project explores how and in what ways practices of (everyday) violence such as shooting, flogging or beating and the meanings ascribed to them were (re)shaped in the border region between c. 1880 and 1910. African actors, especially Nama-Oorlam and Herero groups, are at the center of its focus. In order to gain insights into the different actor's habits of using violent practices and to discern possible shifts, the project seeks to closely describe everyday violent practices and to situate them in the historical context of African pastoralism, settler colonialism and colonial state-building. Adopting an entangled history perspective and drawing on frontier and borderland concepts, the project furthermore explores whether there were instances of mutual learning and adaptation between African, Afrikaner and European actors in the course of their (violent) encounters.
The study will thus contribute to a growing body of scholarly literature in Africanist and European colonial historiography discussing shared practices of colonial violence and the role of mutual observation and knowledge transfers. The empirical analysis of everyday violent practices shifts the attention away from extreme violence, combat and warfare and de-centers previous approaches solely focusing on European colonial actors. Such a perspective yields new insights into the (trans)formation of social relations in southwestern Africa around the turn of the century and into the role of violence in settler colonialism more broadly. Furthermore, the project intervenes with questions on the character and dynamic of settler colonialism as well as on the formation of polities within settler colonial contexts.
The project builds on a multitude of different printed, archival and oral sources. Extensive archival research will be conducted in Windhoek, Cape Town, London, Wuppertal and Berlin. In order to discern African voices and their agency from colonial documents, a variety of reading methods will be applied and combined with oral evidence
Die Umsetzung positiver Schutzpflichten nach Art. 8 EMRK in privatrechtlichen Arbeitsverhältnissen im Schweizer Recht
Full text linkPflichten zur staatlichen Intervention zum Schutze der Menschenrechte haben in der jüngeren Rechtsprechung des EGMR immer verstärkter Einzug ins Arbeitsrecht gefunden. Die Dissertation von Balthasar Müller enthält eine detaillierte Analyse der bestehenden Rechtsprechung des EGMR zum Recht auf Achtung des Privat- und Familienlebens nach Art. 8 EMRK im Arbeitskontext. Der Autor stellt die daraus eruierten Prinzipien und Anforderungen aus der Rechtsprechung des EGMR der aktuellen Rechtslage in der Schweiz gegenüber. Er kommt zum Schluss, dass sowohl Gesetz wie auch Rechtsprechung in gewissen Punkten Anpassungen bedürften und solche in der Zukunft notwendig sein werden