21 research outputs found
On the book: Nikos K. Alivizatos, Pragmatists, demagogues and dreamers: politicians, intellectuals and the challenge of power
No full textΗ ανάγκη να καταλάβουμε την πραγματικότητα της Ελλάδας του εικοστού αιώνα, αλλά και της Ελλάδας της κρίσης, οδηγεί συχνά όσο και εύλογα στην υιοθέτηση μακρο-κοινωνιολογικών ερμηνευτικών σχημάτων και αναλύσεων της διεθνούς πολιτικής οικονομίας. Τέτοια σχήματα και ερμηνείες είναι προφανώς απαραίτητα, αλλά δεν αρκούν, καθώς υποδεικνύουν τις αδρές γραμμές πάνω στις οποίες κινήθηκαν οι εξελίξεις. Για να εξηγήσει κανείς πώς και γιατί επιλέχθηκε τελικά η συγκεκριμένη πορεία μιας χώρας, θα πρέπει, παράλληλα, να σκύψει πάνω στις προσωπικές πορείες των ηγετικών στελεχών και των διανοουμένων που ήταν πρωταγωνιστές των αποφάσεων ή συνδιαμορφωτές της ηγεμονίας των ιδεών, σε κάθε κρίσιμο σταυροδρόμι της πορείας της χώρας μας. Λίγοι μπορούν να αναλάβουν τέτοιο έργο, γιατί απαιτείται ο συγκερασμός της ευρυγώνιας ματιάς ενός συγγραφέα με ευρύτερη ιστορική παιδεία, με την ανάλυση που προσφέρει το μικροσκόπιο του ειδικού, που ξέρει πρόσωπα και πράγματα «από μέσα».
Ο Νίκος Κ. Αλιβιζάτος, καθηγητής του συνταγματικού δικαίου στη Νομική Σχολή του Πανεπιστημίου Αθηνών, συνδυάζει αυτές τις δύο ιδιότητες και τις θέτει στην υπηρεσία της συγγραφής ενός πανοράματος πολιτικών και διανοουμένων της Ελλάδας κατά την τελευταία εκατοπεντηκονταετία. Όλοι, κατά τον Αλιβιζάτο, μπορούν να ενταχθούν σε μια από τις εξής τρεις πολιτικές και πνευματικές παραδόσεις της σύγχρονης Ελλάδας: την αστική, τη σοσιαλδημοκρατική και την κομμουνιστική. Μέσα σε κάθε παράδοση, βρίσκει κανείς πραγματιστές, δημαγωγούς και ονειροπόλους ή συνδυασμούς αυτών. Ο καθένας τους χαρακτηρίζεται έμμεσα, παρά ρητά, από τον Αλιβιζάτο ως πραγματιστής, δημαγωγός ή ονειροπόλος, ανάλογα με τη στάση που τηρούσε απέναντι στο διαχρονικό αντικείμενο των ερευνών του συγγραφέα, δηλαδή απέναντι στους πολιτικούς θεσμούς.Αρκετούς από τους σύγχρονους πολιτικούς και διανοουμένους, τους οποίους ο Αλιβιζάτος παρουσιάζει κριτικά στο βιβλίο του, τους έχει γνωρίσει προσωπικά. Και αυτό γιατί ο ίδιος εκ καταγωγής είχε προσωπική εικόνα λαμπρών εκπροσώπων της αστικής παράδοσης (π.χ., του Θεοτοκά, του Βεγλερή, του Κουμάντου, του Καραπαναγιώτη) και ως νέος, μετά την ένταξή του στην ΕΚΟΝ «Ρήγας Φεραίος», απέκτησε στενή επαφή με διάσημους εκπροσώπους της κομμουνιστικής παράδοσης (π.χ., τον Κύρκο, τον Φιλίνη, τον Σβορώνο, τον Πουλαντζά). Επίσης, ο ίδιος, από το 1990 έως σήμερα, έχει συμβάλει ως διανοούμενος σε διάφορες εκδοχές της κεντροαριστεράς και γι’ αυτό έχει γνωρίσει και συνεργαστεί με εκπροσώπους της σοσιαλδημοκρατικής παράδοσης (π.χ., τον Σημίτη, τον Θέμελη, τον Γιαννίτση, τον Αλ. Δημαρά και βέβαια τον δάσκαλό του, Αριστόβουλο Μάνεση). Σίγουρα ο Αλιβιζάτος έχει μελετήσει το έργο όλων λεπτομερώς, παρουσιάζοντας στο παρελθόν, με διάφορες ευκαιρίες, κριτικές βιβλίων τους ή κάνοντας συνολική αποτίμηση της προσφοράς, αλλά και των λιγότερο πετυχημένων παρεμβάσεών τους.The need to understand the reality of Greece in the twentieth century, as well as the Greece of the crisis, often and reasonably leads to the adoption of macro-sociological interpretive schemes and analyses of international political economy. Such schemes and interpretations are obviously necessary, but they are not sufficient, as they indicate the broad lines along which developments moved. To explain how and why the specific course of a country was ultimately chosen, one must, at the same time, lean over the personal trajectories of the leading figures and intellectuals who were protagonists of the decisions or co-shapers of the hegemony of ideas, at each critical crossroads of our country's course. Few can undertake such a task, because it requires the combination of the wide-angle view of a writer with broader historical education, with the analysis offered by the microscope of the specialist, who knows persons and things "from within."
Nikos K. Alivizatos, professor of constitutional law at the Law School of the University of Athens, combines these two qualities and puts them at the service of writing a panorama of politicians and intellectuals of Greece during the last century and a half. All, according to Alivizatos, can be included in one of the following three political and intellectual traditions of modern Greece: the bourgeois, the social democratic and the communist. Within each tradition, one finds pragmatists, demagogues and dreamers or combinations of these. Each of them is characterized implicitly, rather than explicitly, by Alivizatos as a pragmatist, demagogue or dreamer, depending on the stance he maintained toward the diachronic object of the author's research, that is, toward political institutions. Many of the contemporary politicians and intellectuals, whom Alivizatos presents critically in his book, he has known personally. And this is because he himself by origin had personal knowledge of brilliant representatives of the bourgeois tradition (e.g., Theotokas, Vegleris, Koumantos, Karapanagiotes) and as a young man, after his inclusion in EKON "Rigas Feraios," he acquired close contact with famous representatives of the communist tradition (e.g., Kyrkos, Filinis, Svoronos, Poulantzas). Also, he himself, from 1990 to today, has contributed as an intellectual to various versions of the center-left and therefore has known and collaborated with representatives of the social democratic tradition (e.g., Simitis, Themelis, Giannitsis, Al. Dimaras and of course his teacher, Aristovoulos Manesis). Certainly Alivizatos has studied the work of all in detail, presenting in the past, on various occasions, reviews of their books or making overall assessments of their contribution, as well as of their less successful interventions
Complex liver injury induced by combined Aloe Vera and vitamin A oral supplements, as assessed by histology and the updated RUCAM
No full textA case of combined acute and chronic liver injury related to consumption of multi-ingredient nutritional oral supplements containing Aloe Vera gel and vitamin A among other vitamins, minerals and dietary elements such as fish and calamari oil in a 59-year-old female with unexplained hypertransaminasemia is reported. A unique complex liver injury was diagnosed on liver biopsy combining histological features of protracted acute hepatitis, mild manifestation of hypervitaminosis A and lipogranulomatous reaction attributed to Aloe Vera, vitamin A and lipids, respectively. Normalization of liver tests was achieved after discontinuation of all nutritional supplements. Updated Roussel Uclaf Causality Assessment Method (RUCAM) score (+8, probable) further supported herb-induced liver injury. The present case highlights the increasing incidence of complex histological liver injury linked to the constantly growing consumption of multi-ingredient dietary supplements and alternative medications. © The Author(s) 2022
Selective 4D modelling framework for spatial-temporal land information management system
No full textAetiology and outcome of acute hepatic failure in Greece: experience of two academic hospital centres
No full textIntroduction: In Western countries, the most frequent aetiology of acute liver failure (ALF) is acetaminophen overdose, while in developing countries viral infections [hepatitis A virus and hepatitis B virus (HBV)] predominate. Aim: To evaluate the epidemiology, clinical characteristics, outcome and prognostic factors of survival of patients with ALF in Greece during the last 6 years. Results: A total of 40 patients, 28 females (70%), with a median age of 37.4 +/- 18.6 years (range: 15-84) with ALF were studied. HBV infection was the cause in 53% of them (compared with 74% from a previous study reported in the early 1980s), drug toxicity in 15% and undetermined in 13%. The overall survival was 57.5%, including 94% with and 15% without liver transplantation. Forty-five per cent of our patients had emergency liver transplantation in European Centers within a median time of 3.3 days (1-9) from admission. The total bilirubin level at admission and the development of infections were found to be significantly associated with poor outcome. Conclusions: Hepatitis B virus still remains the most important cause of ALF in Greece, but shows a significant decrease as compared with studies in the early 1980s. Almost half of our patients needed emergency liver transplantation and had a very good survival rate. The other 15% of the patients presented spontaneous survival only with intensive medical support
Aetiology and outcome of acute hepatic failure in Greece: experience of two academic hospital centres
No full textEnergy-efficient design and implementation of turbo codes for wireless sensor network
No full textThe objective of this thesis is to apply near Shannon limit Error-Correcting Codes (ECCs), particularly the turbo-like codes, to energy-constrained wireless devices, for the purpose of extending their lifetime. Conventionally, sophisticated ECCs are applied to applications, such as mobile telephone networks or satellite television networks, to facilitate long range and high throughput wireless communication. For low power applications, such as Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), these ECCs were considered due to their high decoder complexities. In particular, the energy efficiency of the sensor nodes in WSNs is one of the most important factors in their design. The processing energy consumption required by high complexity ECCs decoders is a significant drawback, which impacts upon the overall energy consumption of the system. However, as Integrated Circuit (IC) processing technology is scaled down, the processing energy consumed by hardware resources reduces exponentially. As a result, near Shannon limit ECCs have recently begun to be considered for use in WSNs to reduce the transmission energy consumption [1,2]. However, to ensure that the transmission energy consumption reduction granted by the employed ECC makes a positive improvement on the overall energy efficiency of the system, the processing energy consumption must still be carefully considered.The main subject of this thesis is to optimise the design of turbo codes at both an algorithmic and a hardware implementation level for WSN scenarios. The communication requirements of the target WSN applications, such as communication distance, channel throughput, network scale, transmission frequency, network topology, etc, are investigated. Those requirements are important factors for designing a channel coding system. Especially when energy resources are limited, the trade-off between the requirements placed on different parameters must be carefully considered, in order to minimise the overall energy consumption. Moreover, based on this investigation, the advantages of employing near Shannon limit ECCs in WSNs are discussed. Low complexity and energy-efficient hardware implementations of the ECC decoders are essential for the target applications
Το ζήτημα του υποχρεωτικού εμβολιασμού υπό το φως του εθνικού και ενωσιακού δικαίου, της ΕΣΔΑ και μιας σύγχρονης πανδημίας.
No full textΟ σκοπός της παρούσας μελέτης είναι η διερεύνηση του ζητήματος της υποχρεωτικότητας του εμβολιασμού σε τρία (3) δικαιικά συστήματα: α) στην ελληνική έννομη τάξη, β) στην έννομη τάξη της Ευρωπαϊκής Ένωσης και γ) στο πλαίσιο του δικαίου της Ευρωπαϊκής Σύμβασης των Δικαιωμάτων του Ανθρώπου (ΕΣΔΑ), καθώς και της Σύμβασης του Οβιέδο, ως ειδικότερων εκφάνσεων του νομοθετικού πλαισίου του Συμβουλίου της Ευρώπης. Σε κάθε ένα από τα ανωτέρω συστήματα εξετάζεται ο υποχρεωτικός εμβολιασμός τόσο υπό φυσιολογικές υγειονομικές συνθήκες όσο και υπό τις έκτακτες υγειονομικές περιστάσεις που προκλήθηκαν από την πανδημία του κορωνοϊού Covid-19. Από μεθοδολογική σκοπιά, ερευνάται το ισχύον ρυθμιστικό πλαίσιο και οι σημαντικότερες δικαστικές αποφάσεις σχετικά με το ζήτημα, με βάση την γενική θεωρία των συνταγματικών δικαιωμάτων, ιδίως των περιορισμών τους για την προστασία σκοπών δημοσίου συμφέροντος. Στο πλαίσιο αυτό μελετήθηκαν οι ακόλουθες πηγές: νομοθεσία και διοικητικές πράξεις, διεθνείς συμβάσεις, νομολογία, νομικά συγγράμματα, αρθρογραφία επιστημονικών περιοδικών και ημερήσιων εφημερίδων και απομαγνητοφωνήσεις διαδικτυακών σεμιναρίων. Το σχετικό υλικό αντλήθηκε από τις Βιβλιοθήκες του Εθνικού και Καποδιστριακού Πανεπιστημίου Αθηνών (ΕΚΠΑ) (Βιβλιοθήκη Τμήματος Πολιτικής Επιστήμης και Δημόσιας Διοίκησης και Βιβλιοθήκη της Νομικής Σχολής), τη Βιβλιοθήκη του Κέντρου Ευρωπαϊκού και Συνταγματικού Δικαίου – Ίδρυμα Θεμιστοκλή και Δημήτρη Τσάτσου, το διαδίκτυο [Βάση Νομικών Δεδομένων «NOMOS», Βάση Νομολογιακών Δεδομένων «HUDOC», ιστοσελίδα Ομίλου «Αριστόβουλος Μάνεσης» (Constitutionalism.gr), Syntagmawatch.gr, ιστοσελίδες εφημερίδων κλπ.)] και το προσωπικό αρχείο της γράφουσας. Εξ απόψεως δομής, μετά τις εισαγωγικές παρατηρήσεις, η εργασία διαρθρώνεται στα ακόλουθα πέντε (5) βασικά Κεφάλαια: προσδιορισμός της έννοιας του υποχρεωτικού εμβολιασμού (Κεφάλαιο 1), η ελληνική έννομη τάξη (Κεφάλαιο 2), η ενωσιακή έννομη τάξη (Κεφάλαιο 3), το νομικό καθεστώς του Συμβουλίου της Ευρώπης (Κεφάλαιο 4) και τα τελικά συμπεράσματα της έρευνας (Κεφάλαιο 5). Η μελέτη ολοκληρώνεται με τον πίνακα των βιβλιογραφικών αναφορών.The purpose of this study is to investigate the subject of mandatory vaccination in three (3) legal systems: a) the greek jurisdiction, b) the European Union’s (EU) legal framework and c) that of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), as well as the Oviedo Convention, exemplary of the Council of Europe's legal regime. In each of the aforementioned systems, mandatory vaccination is examined under both normal and emergency sanitary conditions, such as those originating from the Covid-19 pandemic. From a methodological approach/Methodologically, the current regulatory framework and the most important court decisions pertinent to the subject are explored, on the basis of the general theory of constitutional rights and particularly their restrictions for purposes of public interest. To this end, the following sources have been studied: legislation and administrative acts, international conventions, case law, legal scholarship, articles in scientific journals and daily newspapers, as well as transcriptions of webinars. This material derives from the libraries of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA-EKPA) (Department of Political Sciences and Public Administration, as well as Laws Department), the Library of the Center for European Constitutional Law – Themistokles and Dimitris Tsatsos Foundation, the internet (legal database of “NOMOS”, case law database of “HUDOC”, website of the “Aristovoulos Manesis” Company [Constitutionalism.gr], Syntagmawatch.gr, newspaper websites etc.)] and the personal files of the author. Structurally, after the introductory remarks, the essay is organized into five (5) main chapters: definition of the term of mandatory vaccination (Chapter 1), the greek jurisdiction order (Chapter 2), the EU’s legal framework (Chapter 3), the Council of Europe's legal regime (Chapter 4) and the final conclusions of the research (Chapter 5). The study is concluded with the chart of the bibliographical references
A sensor classification strategy for robotic manipulators
No full textIn practice the robotic manipulators present some degree of unwanted vibrations. The
advent of lightweight arm manipulators, mainly in the aerospace industry, where weight is
an important issue, leads to the problem of intense vibrations. On the other hand, robots
interacting with the environment often generate impacts that propagate through the
mechanical structure and produce also vibrations.
In order to analyze these phenomena a robot signal acquisition system was developed. The
manipulator motion produces vibrations, either from the structural modes or from endeffector
impacts. The instrumentation system acquires signals from several sensors that
capture the joint positions, mass accelerations, forces and moments, and electrical currents
in the motors. Afterwards, an analysis package, running off-line, reads the data recorded by
the acquisition system and extracts the signal characteristics.
Due to the multiplicity of sensors, the data obtained can be redundant because the same
type of information may be seen by two or more sensors. Because of the price of the sensors,
this aspect can be considered in order to reduce the cost of the system. On the other hand,
the placement of the sensors is an important issue in order to obtain the suitable signals of
the vibration phenomenon. Moreover, the study of these issues can help in the design
optimization of the acquisition system. In this line of thought a sensor classification scheme
is presented.
Several authors have addressed the subject of the sensor classification scheme. White
(White, 1987) presents a flexible and comprehensive categorizing scheme that is useful for
describing and comparing sensors. The author organizes the sensors according to several
aspects: measurands, technological aspects, detection means, conversion phenomena, sensor
materials and fields of application. Michahelles and Schiele (Michahelles & Schiele, 2003)
systematize the use of sensor technology. They identified several dimensions of sensing that
represent the sensing goals for physical interaction. A conceptual framework is introduced
that allows categorizing existing sensors and evaluates their utility in various applications.
This framework not only guides application designers for choosing meaningful sensor subsets, but also can inspire new systems and leads to the evaluation of existing
applications.
Today’s technology offers a wide variety of sensors. In order to use all the data from the
diversity of sensors a framework of integration is needed. Sensor fusion, fuzzy logic, and
neural networks are often mentioned when dealing with problem of combing information
from several sensors to get a more general picture of a given situation. The study of data
fusion has been receiving considerable attention (Esteban et al., 2005; Luo & Kay, 1990). A
survey of the state of the art in sensor fusion for robotics can be found in (Hackett & Shah,
1990). Henderson and Shilcrat (Henderson & Shilcrat, 1984) introduced the concept of logic
sensor that defines an abstract specification of the sensors to integrate in a multisensor
system.
The recent developments of micro electro mechanical sensors (MEMS) with unwired
communication capabilities allow a sensor network with interesting capacity. This
technology was applied in several applications (Arampatzis & Manesis, 2005), including
robotics. Cheekiralla and Engels (Cheekiralla & Engels, 2005) propose a classification of the
unwired sensor networks according to its functionalities and properties.
This paper presents a development of a sensor classification scheme based on the frequency
spectrum of the signals and on a statistical metrics.
Bearing these ideas in mind, this paper is organized as follows. Section 2 describes briefly
the robotic system enhanced with the instrumentation setup. Section 3 presents the
experimental results. Finally, section 4 draws the main conclusions and points out future
work
Publisher Correction: SARS-CoV-2 Omicron is an immune escape variant with an altered cell entry pathway (Nature Microbiology, (2022), 7, 8, (1161-1179), 10.1038/s41564-022-01143-7)
No full text\ua9 The Author(s) 2022.In the version of this article initially published, the author affiliation information was incomplete, neglecting to note that Brian J. Willett, Joe Grove, Oscar A. MacLean, Craig Wilkie, Giuditta De Lorenzo, Wilhelm Furnon, Diego Cantoni, Sam Scott, Nicola Logan and Shirin Ashraf contributed equally and that John Haughney, David L. Robertson, Massimo Palmarini, Surajit Ray and Emma C. Thomson jointly supervised the work, as now indicated in the HTML and PDF versions of the article
COVID-19 due to the B.1.617.2 (Delta) variant compared to B.1.1.7 (Alpha) variant of SARS-CoV-2: a prospective observational cohort study
No full textThe Delta (B.1.617.2) variant was the predominant UK circulating SARS-CoV-2 strain between May and December 2021. How Delta infection compares with previous variants is unknown. This prospective observational cohort study assessed symptomatic adults participating in the app-based COVID Symptom Study who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 from May 26 to July 1, 2021 (Delta overwhelmingly the predominant circulating UK variant), compared (1:1, age- and sex-matched) with individuals presenting from December 28, 2020 to May 6, 2021 (Alpha (B.1.1.7) the predominant variant). We assessed illness (symptoms, duration, presentation to hospital) during Alpha- and Delta-predominant timeframes; and transmission, reinfection, and vaccine effectiveness during the Delta-predominant period. 3581 individuals (aged 18 to 100 years) from each timeframe were assessed. The seven most frequent symptoms were common to both variants. Within the first 28 days of illness, some symptoms were more common with Delta versus Alpha infection (including fever, sore throat, and headache) and some vice versa (dyspnoea). Symptom burden in the first week was higher with Delta versus Alpha infection; however, the odds of any given symptom lasting ≥ 7 days was either lower or unchanged. Illness duration ≥ 28 days was lower with Delta versus Alpha infection, though unchanged in unvaccinated individuals. Hospitalisation for COVID-19 was unchanged. The Delta variant appeared more (1.49) transmissible than Alpha. Re-infections were low in all UK regions. Vaccination markedly reduced the risk of Delta infection (by 69-84%). We conclude that COVID-19 from Delta or Alpha infections is similar. The Delta variant is more transmissible than Alpha; however, current vaccines showed good efficacy against disease. This research framework can be useful for future comparisons with new emerging variants. © 2022, The Author(s)
