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A joint sustainable order-packing vehicle routing optimisation for the cold chain e-fulfilment
Get PDFDue to the new normal caused by the pandemic, consumer behaviour has now shifted to online shopping not only for general commodities but also for food and other perishable products. Therefore, e-commerce fulfilment is now integrated with cold chain capabilities to satisfy stringent requirements on time-criticality and product quality, leading to the concept of cold chain e-fulfilment. In the cold chain e-fulfilment process, perishable orders are packed in thermal packaging solutions and delivered to consumers before the quality preservation time window. To secure a sufficient time buffer during last mile delivery, excessive use of thermal packaging materials is applied, which creates an adverse environmental impact on our eco-system. Aligning with low-carbon business practices, this study proposes a novel joint optimization model, namely the Joint Optimization of Sustainable Order Packing and Multi-Temperature Delivery Problem (JOSOPMDP), for order packing and vehicle routing decisions, where the sustainable use of thermal packaging materials is promoted without negatively influencing product quality and customer satisfaction. To evaluate its viability and performance, three sets of computational experiments are subsequently conducted. It is found that the proposed model is feasible to strike a balance between order packing and vehicle routing decisions. Compared with the traditional strategy, the average total cost and satisfaction level are improved by 3.26% and 47.88%, respectively. Consequently, this research fosters sustainable thinking in the cold chain e-fulfilment process, minimizing environmental impact
Developmental programming: preconceptional and gestational exposure of sheep to biosolids on offspring ovarian dynamics
Get PDFDevelopmental exposure to environmental chemicals perturbs establishment and maintenance of the ovarian reserve across the reproductive lifetime, leading to premature follicle depletion and ovarian aging. Considering humans are exposed to a complex mixture of environmental chemicals, real-life models assessing their cumulative impact on the ovarian reserve are needed. Biosolids are a source of a real-life mixture of environmental chemicals. While earlier studies demonstrated that grazing pregnant sheep on biosolids-treated pastures did not influence establishment of the ovarian reserve in fetal life, its impact on subsequent depletion of ovarian reserve during reproductive life of offspring is unknown. We hypothesized that developmental exposure to biosolids accelerates depletion of ovarian reserve. Ovaries were collected from F1 juveniles (9.5weeks) and adults (2.5years) born to F0 ewes grazed on control inorganic fertilizer pastures or biosolids-treated pastures from before conception and throughout gestation. The impact on follicular density, activation rate, and anti-Müllerian hormone (mediator of activation) expression by immunohistochemistry was determined. Activation rate was increased in F1 biosolids-treated pastures juveniles with a corresponding reduction in primordial follicle density. In contrast, activation rate and ovarian reserve were similar between control and F1 biosolids-treated pastures adults. The density of anti-Müllerian hormone-positive antral follicles was lower in biosolids-treated pastures juveniles, whereas anti-Müllerian hormone expression tended to be higher in antral follicles of biosolids-treated pastures adults, consistent with the changes in the ovarian reserve. These findings of detrimental effects of developmental exposure to biosolids during juvenile life that normalizes in adults is supportive of a shift in activation rate likely related to peripubertal hormonal changes
Fault-tolerant hierarchical energy management system for an electrical power system on more-electric aircraft
Get PDFThe concept of More-Electric Aircraft (MEA) has the potential to improve the environmental, economic, and reliability performance in the energy and transportation sectors. To achieve this potential, it has become a tendency to develop complex architectures of Electrical Power Systems (EPSs) for MEA to supply increasing electrical power demands. Moreover, a reliable and intelligent Energy Management System (EMS) is critical to coordinate the various EPS subsystems to ensure safe and efficient flight, following the real-time EPS operating requirements and safety criteria, while reducing the operating costs for all flight stages. This paper presents a fault-tolerant hierarchical EMS, for an innovative multi-converter-based aircraft EPS, to configure the system, ensure power distribution, and manage energy storage in multiple faulty scenarios over different time scales. There are two levels in this EMS: The High Level (HL) is based on Model Predictive Control (MPC), formulated by Mixed-Integer-Linear-Programming (MILP), to optimise the long-term EPS performance while considering future predictions; The Low Level (LL) adopts deterministic rules to cope with load changes and fault occurrences over the short term, during the HL sample intervals, with a faster clock. In particular, the LL controller contains four modes: to either cooperate with the HL online MPC or to operate independently, in either EPS normal or faulty conditions. The proposed EMS is evaluated in two cases, firstly considering load deviations in a normal operating scenario, and then considering behaviour in fault scenarios. The results indicate that the proposed EMS successfully reduces the EPS operational costs while ensuring quick responses to dynamic changes with either EPS component faults or EMS internal faults
Heterogeneous Mutual Knowledge Distillation for Wearable Human Activity Recognition
Get PDFRecently, numerous deep learning algorithms have addressed wearable human activity recognition (HAR), but they often struggle with efficient knowledge transfer to lightweight models for mobile devices. Knowledge distillation (KD) is a popular technique for model compression, transferring knowledge from a complex teacher to a compact student. Most existing KD algorithms consider homogeneous architectures, hindering performance in heterogeneous setups. This is an under-explored area in wearable HAR. To bridge this gap, we propose a heterogeneous mutual KD (HMKD) framework for wearable HAR. HMKD establishes mutual learning within the intermediate and output layers of both teacher and student models. To accommodate substantial structural differences between teacher and student, we employ a weighted ensemble feature approach to merge the features from their intermediate layers, enhancing knowledge exchange within them. Experimental results on the HAPT, WISDM, and UCI_HAR datasets show HMKD outperforms ten state-of-the-art KD algorithms in terms of classification accuracy. Notably, with ResNetLSTMaN as the teacher and MLP as the student, HMKD increases by 9.19% in MLP’s F1 score on the HAPT dataset
Towards sustainability and beyond with Ocean Health Science
Get PDFMarine mammals as indicators of Ocean Health provide a powerful narrative for inter-, multi- and transdisciplinary research. Collaborating researchers from the global north and south from various disciplines define and position OceanHealth as a transdisciplinary discourse among existing disciplines and propose a new solution-focused knowledge field, Ocean Health Science. This systemic approach advocates transformative thinking with the goal to heal and nurture our global Ocean and the potential for big science, encouraging the global community to take a shared stewardship responsibility
Long arcuate fascicle in wild and captive chimpanzees as a potential structural precursor of the language network
Get PDFThe arcuate fascicle (AF) is the main fibre tract in the brain for human language. It connects frontal and temporal language areas in the superior and middle temporal gyrus (MTG). The AF’s connection to the MTG was considered unique to humans and has influenced theories of the evolution of language. Here, using high-resolution diffusion MRI of post-mortem brains, we demonstrate that both wild and captive chimpanzees have a direct AF connection into the MTG, albeit weaker than in humans. This finding challenges the notion of a strictly human-specific AF morphology and suggests that language-related neural specialisation in humans likely evolved through gradual evolutionary strengthening of a pre-existing connection, rather than arising de novo. It is likely that this neural architecture supporting complex communication was already present in the last common ancestor of hominins and chimpanzees 7 million years ago, enabling the evolution of language processes in the human lineage
Implications of stochastic gas torques for asymmetric binaries in the LISA band
Get PDFGravitational waves from asymmetric mass-ratio black-hole binaries carry unique information about their astrophysical environment. For instance, the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) could potentially measure the amplitude and slope of gas torques in binaries embedded in the accretion disks of active Galactic nuclei, helping differentiate competing accretion disk models. However, this relies on simplified analytic models, which do not account for the stochastic variability of torques seen in hydrodynamic simulations. In this work, we use hydrodynamic simulations to create gravitational waveforms for extreme and intermediate mass-ratio inspirals in the LISA band. We then analyze these simulated waveforms using simpler templates that assume analytic torques, without stochastic time variability. By performing realistic Bayesian parameter estimation, we find no bias at 90% confidence in the binary parameters; however, estimates of accretion disk parameters, such as torque amplitude and slope, may be biased. Typically, the posterior distribution is centered around the average value of the torques, but when stochastic variability is large, the posterior can indicate no torques, even though they are present in the simulation. Our results suggest that while simplified analytic torque models work well for estimating binary parameters, caution is needed when using them to infer properties of the accretion disk. This work moves towards a more realistic assessment of one of the LISA science objectives, i.e., probing the properties of the astrophysical environments of black holes
Private equity buyout pricing, returns, and portfolio firm performance across UK regions
Get PDFPrior empirical investigations of private equity activity indicates that it is concentrated in central financial hubs. Using comprehensive UK data on deal valuations, companies’ financial performance, and estimates of returns on buyout transactions, we study regional variations in deal pricing, portfolio firm performance, and deal returns. Our findings show that PE sponsors pay higher valuations for buyout targets in London and the South East relative to other UK regions. However, portfolio companies located in London and the South East do not exhibit greater gains in productivity and operating performance than their peers in peripheral regions. Our results also suggest that buyout returns are similar across UK regions
Evaluating the Protective Effects of a Pet Supplement Containing Calcium Carbonate, Magnesium Hydroxide and Natural Ingredients (Gastrik Pet ® , Candioli S.r.l.) on Gastric Cells and Cytotoxicity Reduction under Hyperacidity Conditions: An In Vitro Study
Get PDFEffective acid suppression is crucial for treating gastritis in pets. This in vitro study aimed to evaluate and compare the protective effects of two products on gastric cells under conditions of high acidity: 1) a supplement (Gastrik Pet®, Candioli srl) containing selected natural ingredients including Promugel®(a complex of mucilage protecting the mucosa from gastric acidity: Guar meal, Psyllium (Plantago Ovata L.), Trigonella foenum-graecum L.) and antacid salts (calcium carbonate and magnesium hydroxide) and 2) sucralfate, a treatment used in human and veterinary medicine. Gastrik Pet® showed superior efficacy in protecting gastric cells from acid-induced cytotoxicity at all concentrations tested compared to sucralfate. These results suggest that this natural pet supplement could be a promising option for managing gastritis-related conditions in pets. Further research, including in vivo studies, is needed to confirm these findings and assess its clinical potential
The NExpo Study: A protocol of behavioural, physiological, and neuroimaging measures to assess the effects of noise exposure on the auditory pathway
Get PDFBackground: Noise exposure is the main cause of preventable hearing loss worldwide. Findings from animal studies suggest that even moderate noise exposure can cause substantial damage to the cochlear nerve without any noticeable hair cell damage. Crucially, such damage need not affect sensitivity to quiet sounds and therefore may be difficult to diagnose. It is currently unclear which are the most sensitive physiological measures for early identification of noise-induced damage to the auditory system. The NExpo Study is a cross-sectional cohort study focussing on physiological, behavioural, and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) measures of the effects of noise exposure.Objective: This paper introduces the NExpo Study, which aims to determine the functional and structural consequences of damage to the human peripheral and central auditory system resulting from cumulative lifetime noise exposure. The primary objective is to determine the neural correlates of noise exposure in the peripheral (cochlear nerve) and central (auditory brainstem and auditory cortex) auditory system. Secondary objectives are to assess the relative contributions of age and elevated audiometric thresholds to these observed neural correlates of damage, and the degree of association between structural and functional MRI measures of the auditory pathways and measures of peripheral and central auditory function.Methods and Analysis: Lifetime noise exposure is estimated using the Noise Exposure Structured Interview. Auditory function is assessed using extended high-frequency audiometry, distortion-product otoacoustic emissions, middle ear muscle reflexes, the auditory brainstem response, and speech reception thresholds in noise. MRI measures include magnetic resonance neurography and Diffusion Tensor Imaging (DTI) of the cochlear nerve, and central measures of T1 myelination mapping, brain morphometry, DTI, and resting state functional MRI. The primary analyses employ between-group comparisons for these measures.Sample Description: The project plans to recruit 200 healthy adult volunteers, in four groups of 50 participants, based on their pure-tone hearing thresholds and lifetime noise exposure. Group 1: 18-19 years, normal hearing and low noise exposure; Group 2: 30-50 years, normal hearing for their age and low noise exposure; Group 3: 30-50 years, normal hearing for their age and high noise exposure; Group 4: 30-50 years, suspected noise-induced hearing loss and high noise exposure. Conclusion: Our comprehensive study, combining behavioural, physiological, and neuroimaging data, will contribute to the understanding of the mechanisms of auditory damage due to noise exposure. Results may inform diagnostic procedures, enabling the early identification of noise-induced auditory damage by detecting early changes in central auditory structure and processing. This approach could facilitate the provision of personalised advice regarding ear defence and monitoring for further damage, thus reducing the global impact of noise-induced auditory damage
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