368 research outputs found
Catheter-based renal denervation for resistant hypertension: twenty-four month results of the EnligHTN™ I first-in-human study using a multi-electrode ablation system
No full textAbstract not availableCostas P. Tsioufis, Vasilios Papademetriou, Kyriakos S. Dimitriadis, Alexandros Kasiakogias, Dimitrios Tsiachris, Matthew I. Worthley, Ajay R. Sinhal, Derek P. Chew, Ian T. Meredith, Yuvi Malaiapan, Costas Thomopoulos, Ioannis Kallikazaros, Dimitrios Tousoulis, Stephen G. Worthle
The impact of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) policies on perceptions and behavioral intension of Greek consumers
No full textDuring the last five years Greece has witnessed the exposure of an unprecedented number of corporate related events that had a significant impact on the public opinion (huge financial scandals, various corruption accusations, etc). These events dramatically increased the negative perception of consumers towards large companies operating in Greece. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) may be considered as an effective initiative that protects and strengthens the image and reputation of implementing companies, especially at a time that their status has been severely damaged by numerous distressing reports. The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (2000) defines CSR as a business commitment that supports sustainable economic development and, at the same time, contributes to the quality of life of employees, their families, the local community and society in general. Companies that implement CSR try to establish a positive business reputation and enhance the corporate brand name by taking actions that lead in the development of a competitive advantage, while at the same time contribute to the demands of various third parties. These companies shift from solely focusing on profits and tend to include financial, environmental and social goals in their core business strategies. Therefore, many researchers argue that the CSR policy is an activity mutually beneficial for both the business and society. However, several doubts about the effectiveness of these policies are being expressed. The purpose of the present study is to measure the perceptions of consumers about Greek Large Companies (GLC) and examine the influence of the implementation of CSR policies on consumers’ perception and consumers’ behavioral intention. The results of the quantitative research (N=454) highlighted the negative perceptions of Greeks towards GLC but, at the same time, revealed the statistically significant positive effect of CSR policies on consumers’ perceptions and behavioral intention.Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, consumer’s perceptions, behavioral intention, Greece
Mises en traduction théâtrale: Valère Novarina — Dimitris Dimitriadis, contextualisations multiples d’un événement scénique
No full textTheatre in translation: Valère Novarina — Dimitris Dimitriadis , multiple contextualisations of a stage eventIn terms of theatre, translation involves not only linguistic transfers on the level of discourse signification, but also a transfer of functions in relation to other signs of theatre action. Theatre translation as a component of a whole dramatic process has to consider among other criteria the author’s playwright basic position which leads the speech action to the stage. In this context, the V. Novarina and D. Dimitriadis’ approaches present opposite points of view, with different cultural references, corresponding to a contemporary theatrical discourse which could contribute to an important extent, to the translator’s work.Theatre in translation: Valère Novarina — Dimitris Dimitriadis , multiple contextualisations of a stage eventIn terms of theatre, translation involves not only linguistic transfers on the level of discourse signification, but also a transfer of functions in relation to other signs of theatre action. Theatre translation as a component of a whole dramatic process has to consider among other criteria the author’s playwright basic position which leads the speech action to the stage. In this context, the V. Novarina and D. Dimitriadis’ approaches present opposite points of view, with different cultural references, corresponding to a contemporary theatrical discourse which could contribute to an important extent, to the translator’s work
Study and modelling of the prefractionation and distillation of work-arising-gases-derived synthetic crude oil
No full textThe purpose of this study was to create a theoretical model for the distillation of synthetic crude oil (syncrude) into straight-run naphtha, kerosene and gas oil fractions, at a scale of 235 ktfeed/year. To that end, a process model was created that receives the output of a Co-LTFT process as raw feed. The raw feed was prefractionated to remove the majority of the unreacted syngas, inert gases, light hydrocarbons (C1-C4) and water. The remaining stream was syncrude, primarily composed of alkanes and 1-alkenes in the C5-50 range.A Base Case was designed in ASPEN plus, with a distillation unit with two steam strippers and three pumparounds. The goal was to receive the syncrude and separate naphtha, kerosene and gas oil cuts, with least 90% purity and recovery of the components. The Fenske-Underwood-Gilliland method was used to estimate the number of stages and reflux ratio of the column, and the Kirkbride method was used to find an initial estimate for the feed stage. The TBP curves of the cuts were compared with similar cuts from literature and found to be similar. The Base Case underwent a sensitivity analysis in order to ascertain the effect of different design and process parameters on the separation quality and utility consumption. The parameters that were tested are cold condensate temperature, feed stage, condenser duty, feed temperature and stripping steam flow rate to the ADU. According to the sensitivity analysis results, for optimal separation between the syncrude and the other gases in the raw feed, the gases must be purged at a temperature of -70°C. Furthermore, the optimal configuration for the distillation of the given syncrude into naphtha, kerosene and gas oil fractions with at least 90% purity and recovery is as follows: The ADU has 40 equilibrium stages and a condenser duty of approximately -5.7 MW. The feed must be heated to 310°C and enter the column at stage 37. The stripping steam flow rate must be around 1.3 kg/s. Five alternative processes were modelled as well, with similar inputs to the column model, and the results of the distillate separation quality and utility consumption were documented as well. The alterations of the alternative cases include replacing the stripping steam with a reboiler in one of the strippers, adding a stripper from where an additional product was drawn, concentrating the pumparound duty on the condenser, using a vacuum distillation unit to fractionate the residue of the atmospheric distillation unit, and employing a heat integration network.The most important conclusions are listed. Firstly, the side strippers must use low pressure stripping steam instead of reboilers. Next, the minimum number of products must be drawn off in order to minimize utility consumption at a given separation quality. Furthermore, heat integration can save up to 50% in total utility consumption (heat and cooling water). It is recommended that further research, including a cost estimation, is conducted on refineries that produce on-specification final products.<br/
Central nervous system abnormalities in asymptomatic young patients with S?-thalassemia
No full textTwenty-one children and young adults with sickle/-thalassemia without overt stroke were examined with magnetic resonance imaging and angiography (MRA), transcranial Doppler (TCD), visual (VEP) and median nerve somatosensory (SEP)-evoked potential recordings, and neuropsychological testing (Wechsler Intelligence Scale [WISC-III]). Eight (38%) had silent infarction in the parietooccipital cortex, deep white matter, or basal ganglia, including two of three with previous seizures. Of 17 undergoing TCD, none had maximum middle cerebral artery (MCA) velocities greater than 126cm/sec, but 9 were abnormal, with low velocities and difficulty in tracking the MCA and/or asymmetry. Three patients had abnormal MRA, one of whom also had silent infarction. One patient had pathological VEP recordings, whereas all SEP recordings were normal. WISC-III was performed in all 11 children, 4 with silent infarction: all but 1 had IQ scores greater than 85 (mean, 97.7; standard deviation, 14.2). We conclude that Greek children and young adults with S-thalassemia and no history of clinical stroke have TCD abnormalities and silent infarction similar to those reported in children and adolescents with sickle cell anemia, but cognitive function is not necessarily compromised. International collaboration is needed to establish the risk factors for central nervous system sequelae in patients with sickle cell disease, including S-thalassemia, leading to evidence-based prevention
Invariant learning for learning in the wild
No full textSubmission published under a 24 month embargo labeled 'U of I Access', the embargo will last until 2026-12-01The student, Xiaoyang Wang, accepted the attached license on 2024-12-04 at 02:22.The student, Xiaoyang Wang, submitted this Dissertation for approval on 2024-12-04 at 02:30.This Dissertation was approved for publication on 2024-12-04 at 13:32.DSpace SAF Submission Ingestion Package generated from Vireo submission #21491 on 2025-03-28 at 14:44:40Machine learning models are increasingly deployed in production (i.e., the wild) but may fail for various reasons. For example, fraud detection models can protect numerous users against phishing emails but are subject to intentional poisoning and may fail to identify novel types of phishing. Similarly, a language model provides timely answers to user questions. However, the answer quality can decrease significantly or be harmful even if minor changes apply to the questions. Common failures of machine learning models in production environments fall into two categories: (1) data quality and (2) data shift. Data quality problems can be caused by malicious adversaries that aim to corrupt machine learning models, uncurated crowdsourced data from the web, etc. Meanwhile, data shift problems often occur due to the mismatch between the offline training data and the continuously evolving data in online production environments. Tackling the data quality and shift problems requires methods that help machine learning models continuously learn generally useful patterns from the data without entangling the harmful ones. In this dissertation, we introduce invariant learning as a paradigm to meet the aforementioned requirement and address the data quality and shift problems in the wild. In particular, we first study a data quality problem with multiple data sources with mixed data qualities. Our main contribution to this problem is a novel algorithm that helps machine learning models learn invariant patterns from multiple data sources and selectively filter out the contribution of low-quality data. Then, we further study a setting that requires machine learning models to be fine-tuned (i.e., customized) to a particular data source with improved performance but does not sacrifice the invariance benefit. The last part of this dissertation applies invariant learning to an active fine-tuning problem, which requires machine learning models to continuously learn new data with improved data efficiency. Our invariance-aware approach selects subsets of data samples that invariantly benefit the full dataset with minimal neglect of unselected data samples and helps machine learning models adapt to shifting data more effectively
Demonstrating Cognition by Task Execution and Motion Planning with different algorithms for Manipulation
No full textIn this Thesis we demonstrate the whole path until the manipulation and the planning of the Baxter Robot. We start by analyzing the kinematic analysis of a six degrees of freedom robot. We build our analysis starting from the Denavit-Hartenberg method. We proceed with the kinematic equations of the robot and with the inverse kinematics as well as with a kinematic simulation of its movement with matlab. In order to reach our final goal we continue with the kinematic and dynamic analysis of the Baxter robot. We again state the Denavit-Hartenberg matrix, but this time we continue by building the dynamic model of the Baxter robot through the Euler-Lagrange equations. Moving on, we explore planning algorithms. The knowledge of which will help us in order to finally be able to formulate our path planner for the Baxter robot. We experiment ourselves by implementing four planning algorithms in different path planning problems. We construct the RRT and the RRT* algorithms in Python and we process them in different planning problems. Moving on, we also implement a planning problem in which Q-Learning and Sarsa algorithms are being used. We demonstrate how those two planning and learning algorithms work in our specified problem and we compare our results. Having knowledge on dynamic and kinematic robotic analysis and planning and motion planning algorithms we then experiment ourselves with the Baxter simulator on Gazebo. Also we plan the Baxter robot with Moveit!, getting familiar with the use of ROS as well as with the software. We add obstacles in our world and we plan our Baxter robot measuring its speed. We finally build a different plan algorithm RRT+ by focusing on searching for a secure and realizable path plan starting from the lower dimension space and then adding degrees of freedom to our Baxter robot. Concluding, we have built the desired steps for someone in order to build up the required knowledge to deal with robots and artificial intelligence planning
Use of Micro-Modulation Features in Large Vocabulary Continuous Speech Recognition Tasks
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