68 research outputs found
Exploration of Spatiotemporal Expansion Pattern and Comparative Evaluation of Urban Growth Models: A Case Study of Colombo, Sri Lanka
No full textSocial Effects of Salt- Water Intrusion for Kethhena Water Intake at the Kaluganga River
No full textApplicability of working from home concept to IT organizations in Sri Lanka
No full textThe main objective of this thesis is to investigate the applicability of the working from home concept to IT organizations in Sri Lanka. Telework is a revolutionary working concept that has emerged with evolving technology. Working from home is the extreme end of telework.
In this thesis the author has selected main variables which are interrelated with the working from home concept. Those are Individual, Home, Organizational, Functional and Technological. A Carefully formulated online questionnaire was distributed among the sample population to do the quantitative analysis. A hypothesis was formed for each variable.
Individual and home variables ensure the applicability of working from home concept to IT organizations in Sri Lanka but contribution from other variables are not significant to analytics
Valuing virtue in medicine: a closer look at CanMEDS
No full textAbstract
The CanMEDS-2015 Framework outlines seven key roles expected of practicing physicians: communicator, collaborator, manager, health advocate, scholar, and professional. Critics have expressed concern about the omission of a proposed eighth role, ‘Physician as Person’ relevant to humane qualities and personal resilience of the physician. Upon further analyses, the Framework has included several virtuous attributes in the roles of a physician as professional and communicator. However, it addresses certain virtues like creativity, love, and spirituality inadequately. Drawing on literature from Positive Psychology, the author categorizes and additional set of virtues into six classes: wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendence. Based on these, the author lists virtues and concepts relevant to a ‘Virtuous Role’ for physicians. The CanMEDS Framework should integrate these virtues as a foundational or overarching role and draw from Virtue Ethics in religious and philosophical traditions. This approach is timely, giving ongoing efforts to update and develop CanMEDS2025. By adopting a Virtuous Role within CanMEDS, we aim to train physicians who are technically skilled and deeply humane, meeting society's expectations for compassionate and virtuous healthcare professional
Mud-concrete slab system for sustainable construction
No full textThe urgency of global climate emergency has drawn significant attention to the building industry over the last few years. Today, the building sector is responsible for 38% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to UNEP. 60% -70% of embodied carbon in a conventional column-beam reinforced concrete building is in its floor system. This paper discusses the possibility of constructing an earthen slab system using mud-concrete. It investigates a doubly curved shell structure, working predominantly in compression, to fulfil both environmental and economical demands in the construction industry; reducing the cost and labour expenses nearly 50% compared with that of traditional reinforced concrete slab systems. A 1 m x 1 m prototype mud-concrete slab was constructed to check the potential for modular construction with a square footprint. Poured mud-concrete shell of 50 mm thickness is the primary structural component, while a non-structural mud-concrete filling to a horizontal level 50 mm from apex was used to create a usable floor surface. Masonry mould method was used as the formwork system for the construction considering its cost effectiveness and ease of construction
Breaking Manufacturing Bottlenecks: A Document Control Project
No full textA document control project was conducted in the Manufacturing department at ***** Technologies, a San Diego biotechnology company that provides molecular diagnostics and research reagents to the hematopathology community. A 2014 quality objective for ***** Technologies dictates that a unique manufacturing batch record must be created for each cell culture processes performed by the department by the end of Quarter 1. As a result of the project detailed herein, 186 manufacturing batch records that meet current quality requirements were created and approved for the manufacturing department's cell banking and bulk cell production processes that replace the department's laboratory notebooks that have historically documented such activities. Further, the Manufacturing Work Instructions document that accompanies each batch record was updated to current department requirements. This achievement of the first part of this project represents a broken bottleneck that precluded the department from culturing the vast majority of the company's cell lines due to lack of batch records. Additionally, this achievement has increased efficiency by saving 50 labor hours for the department's supervisor from the creation and approval of affected documents. The second half of the project focused on batch records that are required that meet current quality and FDA labeling requirements for the manufacture of DNA controls included in the CE-marked in vitro diagnostic kits ***** Technologies offers to its European customers. This project achieved the created and approval of batch records for all DNA controls used in CE-marked kits. A second achievement for the second half of this project represents increased efficiency from the implementation of software that allows an author to create any amount of unique documents from a generic template. This will save the department 100 labor hours when the department creates 654 manufacturing batch records for DNA and RNA controls that ***** Technologies offers as General Purpose Reagents. This implementation will help break the second bottleneck which has prevented the manufacture of final products available for distribution or internal use due to lack of batch records
Breaking Manufacturing Bottlenecks: A Document Control Project
No full textA document control project was conducted in the Manufacturing department at *****\ud
Technologies, a San Diego biotechnology company that provides molecular\ud
diagnostics and research reagents to the hematopathology community. A 2014\ud
quality objective for ***** Technologies dictates that a unique manufacturing batch\ud
record must be created for each cell culture processes performed by the department\ud
by the end of Quarter 1. As a result of the project detailed herein, 186 manufacturing\ud
batch records that meet current quality requirements were created and approved for\ud
the manufacturing department's cell banking and bulk cell production processes that\ud
replace the department's laboratory notebooks that have historically documented\ud
such activities. Further, the Manufacturing Work Instructions document that\ud
accompanies each batch record was updated to current department requirements.\ud
This achievement of the first part of this project represents a broken bottleneck that\ud
precluded the department from culturing the vast majority of the company's cell lines\ud
due to lack of batch records. Additionally, this achievement has increased efficiency\ud
by saving 50 labor hours for the department's supervisor from the creation and\ud
approval of affected documents. The second half of the project focused on batch\ud
records that are required that meet current quality and FDA labeling requirements\ud
for the manufacture of DNA controls included in the CE-marked in vitro diagnostic\ud
kits ***** Technologies offers to its European customers. This project achieved the\ud
created and approval of batch records for all DNA controls\ud
used in CE-marked kits. A second achievement for the second half of this project\ud
represents increased efficiency from the implementation of software that allows an\ud
author to create any amount of unique documents from a generic template. This will\ud
save the department 100 labor hours when the department creates 654\ud
manufacturing batch records for DNA and RNA controls that ***** Technologies\ud
offers as General Purpose Reagents. This implementation will help break the second\ud
bottleneck which has prevented the manufacture of final products available for\ud
distribution or internal use due to lack of batch records.Biotechnolog
Electrospray printing: Unravelling the history of a support free three-dimensional additive manufacturing technology
No full textIn this perspective article the author highlights a revolutionary technology, which makes reality, the ability to print true three-dimensional architectures, containing self-standing and self-supporting overhangs in the nano and micrometer scale, without the need for supports of any kind. There have been many attempts to achieve this feature in the rapid prototyping/additive manufacturing fields but has been met with little or no success. Current approaches to three-dimensional printing of self-standing and overhanging architectures have been achieved with the use of some form of supporting mould, secondary process or structure which could be either in the form of a viscous liquid or a solid structure to the coupling of lasers, temperature etc. Unfortunately, the use of such methodologies brings with them many issues and limitations, while destroying the concept of additive manufacturing. Note the author here defines additive manufacturing as a technology able to add materials when required during the fabrication of a 3D architecture without the need for external assistance or supports. These limitations in classical fabrication processes, restricts the use of advanced materials such as living biological cells to sensitive biomolecules to many others, for the forming of three-dimensional biological and non-biological architectures, whilst also increasing the costs and materials waste, which are required for acting as moulds, supports etc
Reinforcement learning based traffic optimization at an intersection with GLOSA
No full textTraffic flow optimization at an intersection helps to maintain a smooth urban traffic flow. It can reduce travel time and emission. Regularly, new algorithms are introduced to control approaching vehicles and traffic light phases. Reinforcement learning and traffic optimization is a novel combination that is used by the research community. This thesis suggests a methodology to reduce travel time and emission of vehicles for a specific intersection design. Here the author provides a clear solution by considering the driving route of approaching the vehicle to the intersection. By using reinforcement learning and route information, this research suggests a vehicle ordering mechanism in order to improve the throughput of the intersection. Before proposing the solution, the author gives a thorough research review of previous studies. Various findings regarding various Reinforcement learning algorithms and how it has used to traffic optimization are explained in Literature review. Further, the author is using GLOSA as a baseline to evaluate the new solution. Several types of GLOSA variations are discussed in this report. A new approach, which can be seen as an extension of the existing GLOSA algorithms, is described in the concept chapter. A deep Q network approach and a rule-based policy are introduced as the solution. The proposed solution was implemented and evaluated. The author was able to achieve promising results from a rule-based policy approach. Further, the issues related to both approaches were discussed in detail and solutions were given to further improve the proposed solutions
Unspooling the history of cell electrospinning
No full textThis opinion article wishes to highlight the thoughts that led to the discovery of cell electrospinning. The author will briefly highlight the advantages this technology has over its competing technologies, in particular demonstrating cell electrospinning living vessel architectures having all the primary cell types found in native vessels/arteries
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