Lillian J. Ratliff, Carlos Barreto, Roy Dong, Henrik Ohlsson ¡ 6 authors
As smart meters continue to be deployed around the world collecting unprecedented levels of fine-grained data about consumers, we need to find mechanisms that are fair to both, (1) the electric utility who needs the data to improve their operations, and (2) the consumer who has a valuation of privacy but at the same time benefits from sharing consumption data. In this paper we address this problem by proposing privacy contracts between electric utilities and consumers with the goal of maximizing the social welfare of both. Our mathematical model designs an optimization problem between a population of users that have different valuations on privacy and the costs of operation by the utility. We then show how contracts can change depending on the probability of a privacy breach. This line of research can help inform not only current but also future smart meter collection practices.
Smart grids enable a two-way energy demand response capability through which a utility company offers its industrial customers various call options for energy load curtailment. If a customer has the capability to accurately determine whether to accept an offer or not, then in the case of accepting an offer, the customer can earn both an option premium to participate, and a strike price for load curtailments if requested. However, today most manufacturing companies lack the capability to make the correct contract decisions for given offers. This paper proposes a novel decision model based on activity-based costing (ABC) and stochastic programming, developed to accurately evaluate the impact of load curtailments and determine as to whether or not to accept an energy load curtailment offer. The proposed model specifically targets state-transition flexible and Quality-of-Service (QoS) flexible energy use activities to reduce the peak energy demand rate. An illustrative example with the proposed decision model under a call-option based energy demand response scenario is presented. As shown from the example results, the proposed decision model can be used with emerging smart grid opportunities to provide a competitive advantage to the manufacturing industry.
Contracts enable mutually suspicious parties to cooperate safely through the exchange of rights. Smart contracts are programs whose behavior enforces the terms of the contract. This paper shows how such contracts can be specified elegantly and executed safely, given an appropriate distributed, secure, persistent, and ubiquitous computational fabric. JavaScript provides the ubiquity but must be significantly extended to deal with the other aspects. The first part of this paper is a progress report on our efforts to turn JavaScript into this fabric. To demonstrate the suitability of this design, we describe an escrow exchange contract implemented in 42 lines of JavaScript code.
This paper focuses on efforts to build what policymakers call the âsmart grid,â involving 1) improved remote monitoring and automatic and remote control of facilities in high-voltage electricity transmission networks; 2) improved remote monitoring, two-way communications, and automatic and remote control of local distribution networks; and 3) installation of âsmartâ metering and associated communications capabilities on customer premises so that customers can receive real-time price information and/or take advantage of opportunities to contract with their retail supplier to manage the consumer's electricity demands remotely in response to wholesale prices and network congestion. I examine the opportunities, challenges, and uncertainties associated with investments in âsmart gridâ technologies. I discuss some basic electricity supply and demand, pricing, and physical network attributes that are critical for understanding the opportunities and challenges associated with expanding deployment of smart grid technologies. Then I cover issues associated with the deployment of these technologies at the high voltage transmission, local distribution, and end-use metering levels.
Due to the ageing and the decreasing birth rate in Japanese society, an important problem of providing nursing care for the elderly has occurred. Therefore, it is strongly desired to develop a wearable actuator to use in nursing care or rehabilitation. The purpose of this study is to develop a high-power flexible actuator with a displacement sensor which can be used in supporting a bathing. In our previous study, we proposed and tested a rubber artificial muscle with the inner diameter sensor. The inner diameter sensor consists of two electric circuit boards with two photo reflectors. Two boards are bonded together to contract the inner diameter sensor. The sensor also has a doughnutshaped bulkhead to keep a seal. The sensor is inserted into the tube of the artificial muscle. The senor is set at the end of tube. This sensor can be expected to estimate the axial direction displacement of the rubber artificial muscle, because the relation between the inner diameter and the axial directional displacement of the muscle has a strong correlation. However, if the external bending force is applied to the end of the muscle, the inner diameter sensor cannot hold at the center position of the tube. Therefore, the sensor cannot measure the inner diameter exactly. In this study, the improvement of the inner diameter sensor was executed. The improved sensor has 4 photo reflectors on the two electric circuit boards to compensate the measuring error. The position control was also carried out by using the actuator with the built-in inner diameter sensor. As a result, the axial direction displacement of the muscle could be estimated well by the tested inner diameter sensor, and a relatively good position control performance was obtained.
Abstract We study transactions in which sellers fear being underpaid because their outside option is better known to the buyer. We rationalize various observed contracts as solutions to such smart buyer problems. Key to these solutions is granting the seller upside participation. In contrast, the lemons problem calls for granting the buyer downside protection. But, in either case, the seller (buyer) receives a convex (concave) claim. Thus, contracts usually associated with the lemons problem, such as debt or cash-equity offers, can be equally well manifestations of the smart buyer problem, although the two information asymmetries have opposite cross-sectional implications. Received December 23, 2014; accepted May 23, 2016 by Editor Uday Rajan.
A series of smart hydrogels based on dual stimuli responsive star-block copolymers responding to pH and temperature were prepared via atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) employing the core-first method. They consist of poly(2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate) (PDMA) inner blocks and outer blocks comprised of poly(di(ethylene glycol) methyl ether methacrylate) (PDEGMA). The aggregation behavior of these block copolymer stars is analyzed by dependence on block length and arm number. The dual stimuli responsiveness of the stars is demonstrated by turbidity as well as dynamic light scattering on dilute aqueous solution, and the gelation behavior of concentrated aqueous solutions is studied by rheology. Above the transition temperature of the PDEGMA outer blocks the stars form flower-like aggregates in dilute solution or free-standing gels at higher concentrations. When the temperature is increased further above the transition temperature of the PDMA inner block, the aggregates start to contract and a weakening was observed for soft gels, whereas for strong gels no influence on the moduli was detected. The behavior is controlled by both concentration and pH value. In addition, we show that the minimum polymer concentration for gel formation can be lowered by quaternizing the inner block of the stars, but a second response to stimuli is lost during the procedure.
Neutrinos can play an important role in the evolution of the universe, modifying some of the cosmological observables. In this contribution we summarize the main aspects of cosmological relic neutrinos, and we describe how the precision of present cosmological data can be used to learn about neutrino properties, in particular their mass, providing complementary information to beta decay and neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments. We show how the analysis of current cosmological observations, such as the anisotropies of the cosmic microwave background or the distribution of large-scale structure, provides an upper bound on the sum of neutrino masses of order 1 eV or less, with very good perspectives from future cosmological measurements which are expected to be sensitive to neutrino masses well into the sub-eV range.
Christine Brandstätt, Gert Brunekreeft, Nele Friedrichsen
Smart contracts based on voluntary participation and optionality can be a low transaction cost solution to implement locational signals in distribution networks and thereby avoid network investment. This paper examines the efficiency properties of smart contracts. Based on a three-node example network we show that cases exist in which smart contracts can achieve a pareto-improvement compared to the status-quo even with voluntary participation. With the pareto improvement at least one party is better of under a smart contract without worsening the situation for anyone else. We note that this requirement is very restrictive and leaves significant potential for efficiency improvements by smart contracts untapped. We then discuss the implementation of smart contracts with incentive regulation. There are two main tasks for the regulator: allowing network operators flexibility to offer such contracts and incentivizing network operators to do so.
This report describes the process of shrinkage as it has occurred within the city of Leipzig. It examines the reasons, dynamics and patterns of change as well as the consequences for different fields of urban development and planning. The period covered in the report runs from the 1980s to the present day; in particular cases, longer or shorter time periods are considered. Over this time, Leipzig has moved from a (more or less rapidly) shrinking city until the late 1990s to a point where ist population stabilized and even returned to a slight growth during the last few years. Today, Leipzig is no longer a shrinking city. When one looks only at the total population numbers, Leipzig represents one of a few large cities in eastern Germany that have undergone reurbanization processes (Haase, A. et al. 2010). However, urban shrinkage continues to be an important topic for the city. The city is still facing the consequences of long-term shrinkage and will have to cope with it during the years to come. At the same time, shrinkage still affects some parts of the city and will also do so in the future. Moreover, Leipzig awaits a new wave of shrinkage due to ageing and a decrease in households after 2015.
đĽ ProtectedPool ⤠Web3 Smart DeFi Wallet đ . Your New DeFi Experience:: đ Secure, Smart, Simple. Double Approvals. Add extra confirmation of any transaction with 2FA solutions including Google Authenticator or hardware security keys. Self-custodial Solutions. Protected Pool is built on smart contracts that interact with wallets, not persons or companies. A new wallet - a new smart-contract. Zero Trust Protocol. No one can be trusted unless verified. Your wallet is the only way to get access to your funds.
Complex business contracts are notoriously difficult to write and read. Certainly, when litigation arises, courts scarcely have an easy time interpreting them. Indeed, contracts don't look at all as though they are written to tell a court what the parties want. Why can't smart, well-motivated lawyers do a better job? My article argues that they rationally don't try. I argue for a view of contracting in which parties aren't principally trying to set forth an agreement for a court to enforce. Rather, by leaving inartful language and ambiguity in the agreement, parties are bonding themselves not to seek precipitous recourse to litigation. The agreement entered into provides each party with grounds to bring a lawsuit if it so desires. Thus, if one party sues, the other party will virtually always have grounds to countersue. The complex transacting community has a norm against litigation in any event; bonding encourages and bolsters this norm, as well as norms of appropriate conduct throughout the contracting relationship. The contracting process, and the contract that results, thus serves importantly to create the parties' relationship and to set the stage for dispute-resolution consistent with preserving the relationship, as well as to keep available the backstop of enforcement if needed.
đĽ ProtectedPool ⤠Web3 Smart DeFi Wallet đ . Your New DeFi Experience:: đ Secure, Smart, Simple. Double Approvals. Add extra confirmation of any transaction with 2FA solutions including Google Authenticator or hardware security keys. Self-custodial Solutions. Protected Pool is built on smart contracts that interact with wallets, not persons or companies. A new wallet - a new smart-contract. Zero Trust Protocol. No one can be trusted unless verified. Your wallet is the only way to get access to your funds.
Elections around the world have become a major international concern since the inception of modern democracy. It is a fact that the success of any democracy depends largely on its electoral process. In conducting a free and credible election, the process must be transparent to be adjudged credible. The electioneering process begins with the compilation of a voter register; this register contains the details of every eligible voter as stipulated by law or guild lines that guilds the electoral process. As part of what makes up, the guidelines are age restrictions for every intended voter. It is forbidding by law in most countries for a child to register as a voter, but this is not so in reality in most countries, especially in a developing nation. Because the age restriction is not obeyed, this has resulted in the incidences of underage voters and disputed election outcomes. This work provides an efficient and effective solution for the above concerns, using multiple digital solutions. The model will be integrating a deep learning Convolutional Neural Network (CNN), an Interplanetary File System (IPFS), and an Ethereum Smart Contract Blockchain. The role of the CNN is to detect any underage individual who intends to register as a voter. The CNN is built with a pretrained dataset, and it was trained with an age classifier that grouped the age on the images on the data set into eight distinct groups. This age grouping will help the age predictive algorithm estimate and place every image on the camera in a unique age group. This will only produce a binary result, which is "eligible to voter or not eligible to vote." This outcome is based on the preset threshold cut-off on the age group. The Interplanetary File System (IPFS) will provide a large storage capacity that will allow for off-chain data storage and still provide the model with all the functionalities and benefits of the blockchain. It also provides a hashing function that will assign and identify every registered voter with a unique cryptographic Identity. This ID will prevent the storage of the same information into the database, in so doing, eliminating multiple voting. Finally, the blockchain will provide a voting platform where the model will be implemented. It will allow every registered voter with a unique ID to create an account and vote on the blockchain. The adapted CNN was tested and evaluated and shows 85.9% performance accuracy, and when compared against two other age predictive models, it recorded an increase of 1.2%. In comparison, the complete digital solution model recorded 95.3% in performance. We believe this model will perform even better when subjected to further research work.
Open access
Science, Technology, and Education in Latin America
This paper reports the results of an experiment that examines how incentive-based compensation contracts compare to flat-wage compensation contracts in motivating individual learning and performance. I use a multiperiod cognitive task where the accounting system generates information (feedback) that has both a contracting role and a belief-revision role. The results suggest that incentives enhance performance and the rate of improvement in performance by increasing both: (1) the amount of time participants devoted to the task, and (2) participants' analysis and use of information. Further, I find evidence that incentives improve performance only after considerable feedback and experience, which may help explain why many prior one-shot decision-making experiments show no incentive effects. Collectively, the results suggest that incentives induce individuals to work longer and smarter, thereby increasing the likelihood that they will develop and use the innovative strategies frequently required to perform well in complex judgment tasks and learning situations.
Reduced reimbursements from the federal government and third-party payors have threatened the financial viability of many hospitals. An increasing number of hospitals are losing money from their primary mission of caring for patients. The hospital âindustryâ is still viewed by many as inefficient. Hospitals are generally not run like businesses, nor is it really possible for them to function in the same manner because they have to provide services, to some extent unpredictable, 24 h a day, 7 days a week. Unlike businesses, they cannot increase the charges to their clients to any significant extent when their costs increase because fees are largely dictated by the federal government. For no other business is there the equivalent of capitation or dictation of prices by outside organizations as there is in the medical business. It is perhaps easier for hospital administrations to assess the productivity of their clinical laboratories than of most other hospital services. The number of tests, the number of staff, and the cost of running the service as determined by the supply and salary budgets can be readily quantified. Furthermore, these factors can be bench-marked against the performance of other institutions. However, clinical laboratories also have to contend with the absurd concept of the âbilled testâ beloved by the federal government, insurance carriers, and consulting companies lacking laboratory expertise. The âbilledâ test assigns equal weight to a multitest outpatient panel as it does to a dipstick urinalysis or to an elaborate genetic test that is labor-intensive and may take days to complete. This ridiculous concept makes comparisons of productivity between institutions impossible. Indeed, the billed test concept hides increases in productivity because one billed outpatient test may generate as much work as 12 inpatient tests. Successful efforts by hospitals to reduce their inpatient testing, because of non-reimbursability, then mask any increase in revenue-generating outpatient tests. This dual objective of reducing unnecessary inpatient testing and capitalizing on the potential for outpatient revenue has become a major charge for the responsible clinical laboratory director. Clinical laboratories everywhere have been faced with the challenge of doing more tests at less cost, i.e., boosting their productivity. Many laboratories have reached the point at which it is impossible to increase productivity using the equipment that they have. Although each generation of âautomatedâ analyzers usually provides some improvement in throughput and turnaround time for results, they do not have the ability to make the quantum improvements that are a prerequisite to significantly improving productivity. This has led to the concept of âtotal laboratory automationâ, as much a misnomer as âautomationâ is for a single laboratory instrument. Total laboratory automation goes beyond the automation of analyses but includes automation of much of the important hitherto labor-intensive manual preanalytical phase in the process. The concept was conceived in Japan and has been widely accepted there, so that many large Japanese hospitals now include robotized specimen processing and delivery systems. In the United States, only a very small proportion of even the largest hospital and reference laboratories have installed such systems. Clearly, many laboratory directors have been waiting to learn of the success, or otherwise, of the automated systems in daily operation before they, too, embark on such a major investment. Many also remain uncertain as to whether maximum centralization, as represented by total laboratory automation, is to be preferred over maximum decentralization, as represented by point-of-care testing. The 1999 Clinical Chemistry Forum was designed to present the arguments as to why a fresh approach to laboratory testing was needed and to detail the steps necessary to make the decision whether to commit to total laboratory automation and how to identify the steps involved in a successful installation. The presentations began, appropriately, with discussions of alternative approaches to coping with rapidly escalating workloads. These included total laboratory automation for both individual hospitals and for networks of hospitals. Within the laboratory, alternative approaches were presented, including the use of modular components and automation of selected fixed tasks. The topics covered included a discussion of the components of the necessary overall planning process by a senior administrator from an integrated health system. Another paper dealt with the internal marketing of the concept by the laboratory to the administration and medical staff who would have a major, and vested, interest in the successful operation of a new system. Two of the critical areas that can make or break a robotic system are the layout of the facility with its attendant demands, which involves providing an appropriate environment for both the operators and the analytical systems, and the design and implementation of a superior information system. The latter is essential for capitalizing on the rapid generation of test results. The planning for an automated laboratory entails much more than the operation of the system once it is installed. One of the difficulties in many laboratories is maintaining the daily processing and testing of specimens while a large part of the laboratoryâs space is taken out of service during construction. An especially difficult area to manage is ensuring the loyalty and productivity of staff. This is particularly true when they are aware that one of the objectives of installing a robotized laboratory is to reduce labor costs, which must inevitably impact some of the staff whose goodwill and cooperation are essential. This also is essential during all of the steps before the successful introduction of routine operation of the system on a daily basis. A majority of the forum papers are presented here in their full-length form. Four other papers are summarized below that address key problems in working toward an automated laboratory. We believe that the meeting achieved its objective of presenting all of the issues that need to be recognized by a laboratory director before embarking on the very challenging and expensive pathway leading to total laboratory automation. Although this concept has been well accepted in Japan, the small number of installations in the US to date means that those laboratory directors who have installed systems are still pioneers. We are grateful that they were willing to share their experience at the 1999 Clinical Chemistry Forum. In addition, the attendees and the readers of these Proceedings need to recognize the dedication and support given by Jean Rhame and Pamela Nash of the American Association for Clinical Chemistryâs staff, who made the meeting happen. Implementation of total automation of a laboratory is a formidable task. Not only does it ultimately require a large expenditure of money, it requires time and perseverance on the part of its proponents. Two of the papers presented at this forum addressed the very practical issues of getting buy-in from constituencies as diverse as a hospital administration to all of the individuals whose jobs may be threatened by an automated system. A third paper summarized the necessary steps for the overall planning process, and a fourth paper highlighted the critical importance of information handling in a successful robotic facility. These papers are summarized below. Julie A. Fisher, Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York City, discussed selling the concept of a totally automated laboratory to a hospitalâs administration and other stakeholders. Successful selling is based on extensive communication and detailed financial and other justifications. There are eight essential elements to successfully selling an automation concept. These are defining goals, assessing needs, obtaining stakeholder buy-in, the decision-making process, vendor selection, the financial planing process, implementation, and metrics. Continuous communication is essential throughout all phases of the project. The wishes of the laboratory must be congruent with those of the administration. The process may be protracted; the cycle between initial concept and routine operation may be as long as 6 years. The trigger for a laboratory to consider automation usually is pressure to reduce costs and improve its efficiency. Automation has the potential to enhance the economic survival of a laboratory, reduce its operating costs, improve the quality of services, and provide a safer work environment. The need for automation should be assessed in the context of whether the institution is planning to expand or to just cut costs. Every ramification must be considered. For example, contractual arrangements with unions must be taken into account. This will become particularly important when the system is fully implemented because contracts may determine who may or may not be laid off. Additionally, needs for upgrading or changing the laboratory information system and analytical instruments must be assessed. A successful automation project depends on stakeholder buy-in. The stakeholders include the laboratory staff, the hospital administration and Board of Trustees, and hospital physicians. It is important to communicate to each of the groups what automation will do for them. Each of these constituencies has different interests and concerns. The laboratory staff are most concerned about job security, but it is important to let them know that automation is a tool to help them perform their jobs differently, and perhaps better. For the administration and Board of Trustees, the focus needs to be on the financial bottom line, with emphases on the opportunity for both revenue enhancement and expense reduction. Other selling points for the administration can include the potential to perform tests for other hospitals and develop group purchasing arrangements with other hospitals for which laboratory services can be provided. Physicians are primarily concerned with turnaround times of test results as well as enhanced information. The financial planning process requires projections of revenue and expenses. A break-even analysis is essential and must demonstrate that automation will reduce costs and/or enhance revenue. Various approaches may be used. A traditional return on investment (ROI) analysis relates net income to investment capital. The formula for calculating a ROI may be refined to take into account sales as well, as in a DuPont analysis. This approach recognizes that it might not be beneficial to tie up assets, thereby lowering profitability. The same formula can be used for an expense analysis by keeping sales constant. The net profit margin increases with a reduction in expenses, and with automation, the key expense reduction is in labor. Technical productivity can be calculated by dividing the number of tests performed by the total number of paid full-time employees or equivalents (FTEs). The calculation of labor savings should take into account how the number of employees will be reduced. With layoffs, there often will be severance and/or retraining expenses to equip the laid-off employees for other jobs. Different laboratory areas will be affected differently. Thus, the laboratories in which automation will be implemented will be more impacted than others. For each laboratory area, a separate projection of staffing needs to be done. Recently, there has been a trend away from justifying automation solely on an ROI analysis because not all of the benefits can be quantified in financial terms. Automation provides added value through improved efficiency coupled with reduction in processing errors, improved turnaround times, automated repeat and reflex testing, enhanced safety, and improved specimen tracking. The active participation of stakeholders in the planning process enhances the laboratoryâs ability to sell the concept. Thus, an overall executive committee derives benefits when supported by laboratory management with information systems and instrumentation teams. It is advantageous to enlist stakeholders in vendor selection because acceptance of the system is critically dependent on the their involvement. The more people involved in different aspects of the planning process, the greater the probability of acceptance. Even during the implementation phase, it is important to involve the stakeholders, especially the staff who will be directly affected by the system. During the installation and after the system becomes operational, it is important to continue to communicate to the stakeholders. Information that should be communicated includes actual performance compared with projections, especially with regard to revenue projections and/or expense reductions, the quality of service, and whether a safer environment has been created. Patricia Abbott, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP), Philadelphia, discussed the practical aspects of creating a robotized laboratory. Because acceptance of laboratory automation by a hospitalâs administration is, to a great extent, dependent on perceived financial benefits, an accurate estimate of the number of employees needed to operate the system is required. The greatest financial returns are likely to arise from reduced labor costs. Unfortunately, the estimate of the number of staff needed to operate a robotized laboratory must be made before the laboratory has any experience with the system or its impact. One of the first steps in the planning process is to decide which tests will be performed in the automated laboratory and which will be performed elsewhere. This decision requires not only an analysis of which tests are performed at each existing bench station but the proportion of tests requested stat vs routine per shift, the number of tests per shift, and the number of technologists working on each shift on each day of the week. With automation, it becomes feasible to combine the stat and routine workbenches for the high-volume tests, but for precise planning of staffing needs, the time of receipt of specimens in the laboratory must be considered. It is also necessary to consider physician needs in deciding which instruments should be interfaced with the robotized and to assess whether greater can be through the test on different analytical the of the planning process, it is essential to assess the and interests of the laboratory staff. This is especially important the laboratory been to a of separate laboratories because there may be a need for extensive of existing on the of the staff in the laboratory at it was to staff the automated laboratory with a staff who would be to operate all of the instruments in the and who would be by staff from the areas working in their areas of expertise. this the laboratory for example, be to on the of of the technologists who would be to operate only the in the automated laboratory to become in operating technologists who been to the and laboratories would not have to the needed to operate a was to assess the of the for working in the automated laboratory, it was on a small number of staff. The for the technologists to assess their to new and for management to assess each potential for a successful to a environment with new for the individuals selected to work in the automated laboratory was each existing The not only on instruments but also on the clinical of the that were new to them and of the results of these tests. before all technologists were to the it was on a selected staff and by their before it was out to all the staff. The of the automated laboratory the laboratory to turnaround time to the the and the in as well as from a processing to a of benefits through of test results possible to the efficiency of testing by the automated laboratory. a the turnaround times for and high-volume tests between in the laboratory information system of the receipt of a specimen and its test results to is now for and for the tests. It is important to have a committee of technologists to at all of work including and in work A of the a of the planning committee once the decision to been made to that the interests of all of the staff were The planning committee has been after the system to Because the staff from different the senior management has with the management of the automated laboratory to their and has with the staff on a as well as on a to that the of the staff are and The senior management a many of the staff a and that problems were to be A committee was as a to and assess problems and The ROI for the project at was based on the of the impact of on the staff, staff were to for all even those not directly affected by the automated laboratory, so that those staff from the automated laboratory be to laboratory the and of these benefits were to them. In the number of that to be was less than been for because of a to tests from other hospitals and the A. the concept of project management as to the of a robotized laboratory. management is as the of and to project to or needs and from a project. Thus, it is a approach to the management of costs, and However, it has only been management requires of a to and manage people and other One individual is to the and is given and to manage the project to its areas of or function are involved in project and the project should have and some in all of them. The primary areas involve the management of cost, and These are by the management of and management is concerned with the of the the overall and of management involves of the necessary the of and the for the project. It is concerned with all aspects of and requires critical and/or as management planning and cost and management all of the of total quality management to that the of the project will the needs of the of the project. management the most use of the people involved in the project and includes and management includes the to the and services needed to the project. management is the function of and to The project must manage or communication so that all of the appropriate people are about the of the project at the appropriate time in the appropriate both and in Each project has a cycle which may have different of and There is no single to manage a but the approach involves the phases of implementation, and the of the concept phase, there usually is only a of a but the of this phase is the for the project. The or design phase usually is when the project is to the project and is the critical detailed planning with planning is the need to develop to and manage of the project. Two critical require the of the people who must the project and the that many individuals working on a project are not working on it The of the phase is a project which should not be The must identify all the necessary and their costs The costs must be to the individual work times and must be with to to the overall project For large such as for installation of a costs with should be as part of the overall project. for costs are of the for for for and of the for the service for the instrument. For large it is to a work which the project to identify the and to to them. A is the for the and of time and cost to be based on is now readily to identify the through the and to determine the of the project. In of the most there is the of with of the project beyond the initial This is not a as long as the project the the cost, and quality and this to the stakeholders. A potential is and to develop management must be a and one of the most to manage is through to can be to whether the can be the probability of is or The latter requires the of a the objectives of the project are it is and its to an Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York City, discussed the critical of a laboratory information system in an automated laboratory. automation involves much more than a robotic system a laboratory. The in an automated laboratory is involved in both analytical and The latter includes both preanalytical such as the processing of and specimen and such as and The provides to the quality and and results and them to the In an automated laboratory, the of the must be integrated with the of the robotic processing and the robotic The each specimen on the robotic system and the robotic process to the and to the specimen and its they might be the system. It and from the robotic system the quality of each primary specimen and the of specimen in the so that specimens may be as It is for tests to be directly into the Not only does this reduce errors, it also has the potential to improve turnaround of to the also and testing. Furthermore, it enhances and provides an accurate time of specimen Within the laboratory, from the to the robotic information and the and system However, such an approach requires or of specimens for which tests were but not on the robotic of the provides in testing and reflex specimen testing. of different of specimens on the but the need to cost and may also a in the testing process because all specimens must through a single An automated laboratory is critically dependent on a and its and system should be in to to of some part of the system. An supply by an is essential to the impact of or in The should have a of that usually share the but with each one of handling the are also needed to provide in one become or to and from the to and and other should be for rapid the system one or more and should also be Each the system should be up to This should be in the at the same time operation of the in the and of the must be with and of the a is it should be in the of the before to the part of the a with the the laboratory staff should to but then should enlist the vendor for The same should be a The staff should provide the laboratory staff with an estimate of the likely so that alternative may be In the of a the medical staff must also be function is this should be communicated to all in the same manner that the was The papers summarized when taken with the full-length papers that will provide the an of the of and with regard to laboratory automation.
Smart contracts combine protocols with user interfaces to formalize and secure relationships over computer networks. Objectives and principles for the design of these systems are derived from legal principles, economic theory, and theories of reliable and secure protocols. Similarities and differences between smart contracts and traditional business procedures based on written contracts, controls, and static forms are discussed. By using cryptographic and other security mechanisms, we can secure many algorithmically specifiable relationships from breach by principals, and from eavesdropping or malicious interference by third parties, up to considerations of time, user interface, and completeness of the algorithmic specification. This article discusses protocols with application in important contracting areas, including credit, content rights management, payment systems, and contracts with bearer.
We present a protocol for controlling a shared ATM multicast tree supporting many-to-many communication. The protocol supports one or several ATM virtual channel connections (VCCs) of the many-to-many type. The number of VCCs is independent of the number of endpoints. The protocol guarantees that there is no interleaving on any VCC of the tree. The protocol also guarantees that the traffic contract associated with the VCCs is respected, thus making it possible to use ordinary VCCs of the constant bit rate (CBR), variable bit rate (VBR), or unspecified bit rate (UBR) class. No resequencing server or cell buffering inside the network is required, and all cell forwarding is performed at the ATM layer. We describe the protocol both informally and formally.
B. Balamurugan, T. Poongodi, M. R. Manu, S. Karthikeyan ¡ 5 authors
The moving image archive of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) includes a copy of the film The Double Day (1975), cataloged in the series Moving Images Relating to International Development Programs and Activities, 1979â1991, a collection of more than eight hundred titles âcreated to provide information on assistance programs supported by the Agency for International Development (AID).â1 Yet, The Double Day does not, in fact, directly depict or engage with any specific development or aid initiative. Instead, the filmâdirected by US-based Brazilian filmmaker Helena Solberg as part of the International Womenâs Film Project collective and described as âthe first Latin American feminist documentaryââexamines the gendered dynamics of paid and unpaid labor through the testimonies of women from Argentina, Bolivia, Venezuela, and Mexico.2 Its presence in the USAID archive is likely a consequence of its funding history, having received support from the Inter-American Foundation, a USAID-affiliated entity; the development agencies of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden; the United Nations Development Program; and US philanthropist Calvin Cafritz.3These transnational funding structures not only enabled the filmâs production but also determined its archival destination, which renders legible its place within the history of international development.4 The Double Dayâs institutional trajectory reflects the shifting configurations of aid, gender, and media during a historic moment when women were being repositioned at the center of what Arturo Escobar has described as developmentâs âregimes of visuality.â5 Especially relevant to The Double Dayâs production and exhibition was the international institutional framework of Women in Development (WID). Emerging in the early 1970s and culminating in United Nationsâ proclamation of 1975 as International Womenâs Year, WID emphasized womenâs participation in the global economy as both an index and mechanism of development. Indeed, The Double Day premiered at the World Conference of the International Womenâs Year, held in Mexico City.6 Within this context, the film forms part of a broader trajectory of media use by international organizations that intensified during the 1970sâas best exemplified by Media Habitat, a collection of 236 documentary films commissioned by the United Nations to represent urban and rural development initiatives for the 1976 Habitat Conference on Human Settlements in Vancouver. As a policy-shaping initiative, Media Habitat primarily featured films from the Global South intended not only to illustrate but also to help codify standardized audiovisual markers of âunderdevelopmentâ that determined access to the emerging global economic order and to international aid.7Framed in relation to these international institutions and their operations, The Double Day could similarly be considered âdevelopment mediaââexemplifying the type of nonfiction media produced and distributed outside of the commercial film circuits whose aspects and subcategories have been variously described in scholarship as nontheatrical, useful, sponsored, institutional, industrial, educational, or nonprofessional/amateur.8 Scholars working in this area have emphasized the institutional contexts of such mediaâs production and exhibition infrastructures as shaping its instrumentalized effects. From a feminist perspective, such an approach is crucial to grappling with the broader question of how âgender impacts [these worksâ] shape, content, and trajectories.â9 Yet we also argue that, taken in isolation, the institutional and infrastructural contexts are insufficient to account for the complex relationship between media and development, potentially not only limiting our understanding of the reach and impact of development but also distorting our interpretive conclusions. For example, to categorize The Double Day as âdevelopment mediaâ is to overlook the filmâs place within Solbergâs directorial oeuvre, as well as within the histories of both transnational womenâs filmmaking and radical Latin American documentary cinema to which it simultaneously belongs. Such exclusive framing is especially limiting given that women globally were disproportionately engaged in nonfiction production throughout the twentieth centuryâsometimes by political choice but more often due to structural exclusions from fiction filmmaking. Even in nonfiction historiography, however, institutional media has remained particularly marginal, reinforcing hierarchies that separate such works from the aesthetic and authorial frameworks through which film history has been constructed.10 This marginalization not only tends to erase womenâs contributions but also presumes a âweakâ or derivative authorship, rendering these films unworthy of the interpretive attention needed to apprehend their aesthetic and political complexity.11 The same dynamic is likely to structure assumptions about âdevelopment mediaâ as well.Categorizing The Double Day exclusively within this category would further prompt us to assume top-down institutional analyses that have been characteristic of both institutional media methodologies and the scholarship on development at large. This, in turn, would risk obscuring this filmâs radical Marxist approach to womenâs labor as well as its concrete contribution to activism and its attendant grassroot structures. In Mexico City, The Double Day became a catalyst for feminist solidarity in practice when one of the filmâs protagonists, Bolivian activist and trade unionist Domitila Barrios de Chungara, was invited to participate in the Tribune of Non-Governmental Organizations held alongside the official UN conference.12 There, Barrios de Chungara challenged Western feminist priorities by reframing the debate around labor, class, and imperialism, helping to articulate a shared Third World feminist agenda that significantly departed from the developmentalist vision of the United Nations and USAID.13 Seen through the lens of activist media, The Double Day helped forge transnational solidarity networks by enabling information exchange across the diverse voices that shaped its makingâfrom the women featured in the film to the activists who circulated itârevealing a considerably more dynamic interplay between institutional and grassroots or contingent media practices.Moreover, the filmâs Latin American contextâreflected in Solbergâs formation in Brazil as the only woman in Cinema Novo, its focus on women from across the region, and its premiere and key reception in Mexico Cityârequires grappling with the regional specificities of the very notion of development in its multiple iterations.14 Far from being an epistemological and political framework imposed solely by the Global North, both the practices of development and the theoretical foundations of developmentalism (understood as a broad and polysemic set of discourses) were shaped through the active participation of Latin American economists.15 Within this iteration, underdevelopment, as a constitutive notion of developmentalism, became central to a distinctly critical strand, which by the late 1960s became known as the dependency theory.16 This same approach is reflected in some of the best-known Latin American radical film manifestos of the time, arising precisely from the same milieus to which Solberg belonged.17These various considerations of the filmâs history illustrate the methodological challenges confronting feminist scholars seeking to assess the impact of development on media projects, theories, and practices. To disregard the developmentalist context of such works by emphasizing their political aesthetics and affects risks reproducing a romanticized narrative of heroic resistance (albeit from a feminist perspective). Yet to engage exclusively with their institutional and material infrastructures risks naturalizing developmentalismâs political and epistemological foundations at the expense of the goals and beliefs of the many women who participated in these projects. The contradictions and ambivalences that animate such histories call for feminist frameworks capable of holding both institutional complicity and radical possibility in view.This challenge resonates with ongoing debates about the politics of the archive and what Allyson Field has termed âthe practice of informed speculation.â18 As she reminds us, feminist, queer, and decolonial methodologies have long taught us to âpress at the limitsâ of the archive to âinoculate our scholarship against our evidenceâs afflictions.â19 The concern that the evidence we draw on in our analysis reproduces the very structures and blind spots of the dominant ideology and therefore shapes and delimits our interpretation becomes particularly urgent when engaging the developmentalist media corpus. Informed speculation offers an alternative by inviting the experimental, creative, and speculative rewriting of history, mobilizing the archive âin a project that runs counter to the original purpose, or the imperative to preserve, or the conditions that led to erasure.â20 Yet, as Field cautions, such speculative gestures must remain grounded in a deep and âintimate familiarity with the archiveâ that we are working with and against. Building on this imperative, we suggest that the developmentalist archive, in particular, demands expansion and critical reconsideration in ways that unsettle the very disciplinary frameworks through which it has been studied as well as the larger institutional contexts for such knowledge production.Our focus on The Double Day in the opening of this introduction thus foregrounds the entanglements of institutional and grassroots forces, local and international contexts, structural and interpersonal relations, and creative and economic factors that have shaped not only this film but the broader ecosystem of development media projectsâand their preservationâover time. Addressing such a constellation involves transgressing methodologically entrenched divisions between political economy and aesthetics, between material infrastructures and affective regimes; reckoning with divergent periodizations across film history and world economics; and situating these within the local specificities of womenâs movements and international institutional programs. It also demands attentiveness to the coexistence of multiple, and sometimes competing, understandings of developmentâeach historically, geographically, and ideologically situated.We imagine this special issue as an opening toward a critical dialogue, not only about how such an approach might be enacted in practice but also about the far-reaching ways development paradigms have shaped both our objects of study and the contours of the field itself. The decision to center institutionally sponsored films across all the essays in this issue is deliberate and enables us to highlight institutional critique as a vital methodological imperative within our analytical framework. Created within the frameworks of international organizations, state agencies, or NGOs, these filmsâ histories make legible the institutional logics that underwrite their production. Yet our critique does not stop at these specific entities. Rather, we argue for a broader interrogation of the political conditions and institutional infrastructures that shape media and knowledge production more generally. This includes contemporary corporations embedded in the digital platform economy, from streaming services to the rapid expansion of AI. Equally critical is a reflexive examination of academia itself, where departments of economics, political science, and centers for development have played a formative role in producing and legitimizing developmentalist theories and policy frameworks. While the humanities and arts have at times offered critical alternatives, they have also frequently mirrored and reinforced many of the same developmentalist assumptions. A feminist analysis of the nexus between development and media must therefore unsettle not only dominant archives but also the institutional and disciplinary foundations of our own scholarly practices.As scholars, we share the complex position of navigating the same tensions between institutional complicity and emancipatory aspiration as many of the media-makers whose work we study. Mirroring our subjects is also the transnational, collective mode of this special issueâs own production as it emerges from an ongoing informal working group we have sustained over several years. While relying on institutional and disciplinary affordancesâsuch as university funding for conferences or access to academic publishing platformsâwe have been working toward creating a community that exceeds, and often resists, the prevailing logics of our academic institutions. Our aim has been to create a space for shared inquiry and mutual support that pushes back against disciplinary siloing and technocratic neoliberal assessment modes of both labor and knowledge productionâand this certainly extends to our experience collaborating with the journal editors throughout the publication process. Our goal has been to examine both the persistence and variability of developmentalism, understood as what Gustavo Esteva calls a âpowerful but fragile semantic constellation,â as a conceptual formation that has historically inspired, legitimized, and mobilized media projects across Asia, Africa, and Latin America.21 And gendered biopolitics, from population control to gender mainstreaming, have remained integral to development policies and media practices, recurring across formats from institutional newsreels to film festivals.We share the conviction that, far beyond the history of nonfiction institutional media, development (as both a broad ideological project and a network of material and institutional practices) and developmentalism (as a set of discourses and theoretical models associated with development) have exerted a far-reaching influence on film and media cultures at large. As such, they must be treated as a major force in shaping global film and media systems and also the many ongoing assumptions behind their critical discourses. The discipline of communication studies was founded on modernization theory governed by Cold War goals of dissemination of Western liberal democracy around the world, while âan area studies framework allowed compartmentalizing Western and non-Western outcomes of technologies that were always claimed to be universal.â22 Despite critique from postcolonial and critical race studies, many of these frameworks have remained foundational for media theory.23 In historical scholarship, as we increasingly move beyond âmodernityâ as a dominant conceptual anchor, engaging with practices and discourses of development opens more precise analytical pathways. These film and mediaâs entanglements with the logics of and economic and the associated with as well as their conceptual underdevelopment, and impact in as diverse as and of media aesthetic and paradigms in film and film and funding are developmentalist assumptions to the they to underwrite the narrative and logics of and global media from the structure of the film to the cultures of argue that a examination of the historical entanglements between film and developmentalist aesthetics, modes of as well as infrastructures and critical the and that our contemporary media is a of the historical contours of development as a field of inquiry embedded within a of some of the methodologies by the featured in this special a of this complex history, to the larger at in media, development, and gender all its development a it as an of be with practices as divergent as and in In as we work on this the of the of the USAID the ideological that have the history of international the and of this on the global its a from development as a global practice and as an institutional and which over the has as a with its own media Yet or does not erase the historical impact of these the contradictions they have reflected and over the as the of development several crucial to the economic theories of development initiatives to and through the of the development an international policy framework at from the Global to the of the Global the by the political role of and the of the International the on was challenged by dependency theory and at development as global structural the neoliberal of the the Programs by the and World imposed and as conditions for and forms of assistance became known as the major markers for international development development has moving beyond economic to such as the Human Development and the Development and from international organizations such as the United Nations to a broader network of These frameworks increasingly of and liberal of and with what in many ways to various while the of the to developmentâs epistemological more scholarship has toward a of its and material the field has to a of and critical by and scholars, which development as a dynamic of conceptual and political to these the studies in this special issue call for sustained analysis in place of In we draw from a of and that in of of gender and to this special issue engage that and from Mexico to contemporary specific local historical of global distinctly feminist methodologies as well as attention to studies that this issue a in the global history of development on and documentary work in Mexico how early women infrastructures as of while US films an early of state and transnational on a outside the Global as the of developmentalist both the and markers of development media, its to the and Latin central grounded in archival also womenâs in transnational and the methodological of archives on study of the series to a a digital media not by but by women not as but as subjects and within circuits of neoliberal and the aesthetics and of how developmentâs has models of to contemporary neoliberal paradigms of and analysis how digital and gender and practices, discourses on and their of these essays the of some of the historical of developmentalist as the question of the role of the state within such on a notion of economic as a and the dominant of development that the state as the for and through infrastructural projects. This understanding of development was shared across both of the as well as in the Third The United and the increasingly mobilized international in the of the modes of international at the postcolonial of policy and ideological These programs were at the expansion of their and of while with the and decolonial of The conceptual between modernization and development that the Cold in of and hierarchies of that long and As an of postcolonial their role as of international aid concern about the of Western development projects. In alternative across the Global South that to structural between and through policies of and In many they were further the global structures. In Latin for example, this approach was through organizations such as the United Nations for Latin and the both developmentalist projects and their have taken many forms historically, and they have and they have been to a of projects, and postcolonial and development has been and in ways and with frequently political While many of these alternative frameworks the embedded in dominant Western they often technocratic and assumptions. gender and gender as for the of to be shaped by This becomes particularly in the media that of development where women frequently a crucial associated with and women were as both the subjects and of their participation in the and labor often as the index of In this study of from the 1970s how women were as of this as these about womenâs urban and recurring and of a within the own of and critique that official examination of archives and enables a feminist interrogation of their mobilizing a of the in the of contribution to this issue similarly the of a dynamic within as well as across ideological the of womenâs and the media of the and as active in labor and as integral to the technocratic women became of as their labor remained a of and analysis and archival with attention to the specific of and It also transnational that as a and affective a nexus of and practices through which gender, media, and developmentalism one film not as a but as part of the of alongside and work a broader concern of this special media as a of developmentalist projects. The debates the World and which international such as the United Nations and a critical historical for such primarily by postcolonial and of the for the of media and communication infrastructures in as to counter Western The a between and economic how systems of media and reinforced global hierarchies of and in an agenda that supported and alternative media infrastructures across postcolonial contexts, the framework gender as an analytical This âgender in the 1970s by of the Women in Development in relation to The Double its political critique of with its broader to center women in development policy through and This was also in of media, which was shaped by its international reach and audiovisual production and and and Yet, as WID institutional it also to the and of the womenâs development programs often by in These were by a of studies, and on and the to of womenâs presence and through the of their economic and In this on the filmmaker this history directly by the and of for women by the WID framework during the with and agencies the of and against Women in at the of the neoliberal turn, when institutional media often the only to access and support to projects. The an by this dynamic as of the from the Global South are to engage with the developmentalist assumptions funding models that their similarly the as a in developmentalist media history by the of and centers on the Film a between of and the attention toward the and labor by and work was foundational the of and the of audiovisual aid, as both a of development projects and a critical for their the in this issue argue for a with media, gender, and developmentalism as an field of that is and shaped by feminist and methodologies and that challenge the entanglements between academic knowledge production and and technocratic development And while methodological these dynamics at the structural the of feminist in media and cinema by this the very a