Fast Deployment Research Articles

Applying convolutional neural networks to speed up environmental DNA annotation in a highly diverse ecosystem

High-throughput DNA sequencing is becoming an increasingly important tool to monitor and better understand biodiversity responses to environmental changes in a standardized and reproducible way. Environmental DNA (eDNA) from organisms can be captured in ecosystem samples and sequenced using metabarcoding, but processing large volumes of eDNA data and annotating sequences to recognized taxa remains computationally expensive. Speed and accuracy are two major bottlenecks in this critical step. Here, we evaluated the ability of convolutional neural networks (CNNs) to process short eDNA sequences and associate them with taxonomic labels. Using a unique eDNA data set collected in highly diverse Tropical South America, we compared the speed and accuracy of CNNs with that of a well-known bioinformatic pipeline (OBITools) in processing a small region (60 bp) of the 12S ribosomal DNA targeting freshwater fishes. We found that the taxonomic labels from the CNNs were comparable to those from OBITools, with high correlation levels for the composition of the regional fish fauna. The CNNs enabled the processing of raw fastq files at a rate of approximately 1 million sequences per minute, which was about 150 times faster than with OBITools. Given the good performance of CNNs in the highly diverse ecosystem considered here, the development of more elaborate CNNs promises fast deployment for future biodiversity inventories using eDNA.

First Dedicated Minimally Invasive Right Atrial Retractor.

The importance of correcting tricuspid valve insufficiency in patients with left-sided valve disease is clear. In the United States, up to 30% of mitral valve operations are minimally invasive, while the data for isolated tricuspid valve is not known. A minimally invasive approach to the tricuspid valve provides faster recovery with lower transfusion rates and lower length of stay. There are no dedicated right atrial (RA) retractors for minimally invasive tricuspid valve (TV) operations. TV exposure is different from mitral given the proximity of the tricuspid anterior annulus to the cut edge of the atrium. An RA retractor should be shallow while preventing slippage of the RA roof and should be quick to deploy and remove. We created a dedicated minimally invasive RA retractor to expose the TV and RA structures (fossa ovalis and coronary sinus). The retractor is a fenestrated shallow and wide retractor with bilateral articulating "wings" to expose left and right of the atrium. This retractor is compatible with the left atrial system by USB Medical Limited (Hatboro, Pennsylvania) and has tilting capability. A three-dimensional (3D)-printed prototype was modified after evaluation by two experienced minimally invasive surgeons (MCS and RKV). Once modifications were finalized, the retractor was then deployed in surgery. The RA retractor was used in isolated TV repairs, RA myxoma resection, RA clot removal, removal of RA migrated stents, select mitral valve operations, and closure of atrial septal defects. The retractor proved effective, safe, and fast to deploy and remove and allowed for full visualization of the tricuspid valve, interatrial septum, ostia of both vena cavas, and coronary sinus. The retractor was useful in mitral valve operations with existing aortic valve prosthesis and in the small left atria. The minimally invasive RA retractor affords excellent, stable exposure of the right atrial structures with fast deployment and removal.

TEES: topology-aware execution environment service for fast and agile application deployment in HPC

TEES: topology-aware execution environment service for fast and agile application deployment in HPC

Deep Learning-Based Dynamic Computation Task Offloading for Mobile Edge Computing Networks.

This paper investigates the computation offloading problem in mobile edge computing (MEC) networks with dynamic weighted tasks. We aim to minimize the system utility of the MEC network by jointly optimizing the offloading decision and bandwidth allocation problems. The optimization of joint offloading decisions and bandwidth allocation is formulated as a mixed-integer programming (MIP) problem. In general, the problem can be efficiently generated by deep learning-based algorithms for offloading decisions and then solved by using traditional optimization methods. However, these methods are weakly adaptive to new environments and require a large number of training samples to retrain the deep learning model once the environment changes. To overcome this weakness, in this paper, we propose a deep supervised learning-based computational offloading (DSLO) algorithm for dynamic computational tasks in MEC networks. We further introduce batch normalization to speed up the model convergence process and improve the robustness of the model. Numerical results show that DSLO only requires a few training samples and can quickly adapt to new MEC scenarios. Specifically, it can achieve normalized system utility by using only four training samples per MEC scenario. Therefore, DSLO enables the fast deployment of computation offloading algorithms in future MEC networks.

Optimal Deployment of Mobile MSSSC in Transmission System

With the rapid development of the renewable energy source (RES), network congestion management is increasingly important for transmission system operators (TSOs). The limited transmission network capacity and traditional intervention methods result in high RES curtailment. The near-term, powerful, and flexible solutions, such as advanced flexible AC transmission systems (FACTS), are considered to mitigate the risks. The mobile modular static synchronous series compensator (MSSSC) is one of the grid-enhancing solutions. The mobility of the solution allows it to offer fast deployment and seasonal redeployability with limited cost. The demonstration of the mobile MSSSC solution has shown significant benefits for RES curtailment reduction, network congestion alleviation, and facilitating the demand and RES connection. For unlocking the true value of the mobile solution, they should be optimally allocated in the transmission networks. This paper develops a security-constrained DCOPF-based optimisation tool to investigate the optimal allocation of the mobile MSSSC solution in transmission networks. A linear mobile MSSSC model with the operation dead-band was introduced that can be used in large-scale realistic power system planning. The proposed model was implemented in the IEEE 118-bus system to assess the performance of the mobile MSSSC.

Information freshness optimization of multiple status update streams in Internet of things: Generation rate control and service rate reservation

The Internet of things (IoT) has become a key infrastructure providing up-to-date and fresh information for policy analysis and decision-making of upper-layer applications. However, there are limited sensing and communication resources in IoT devices, which significantly affects the timeliness and freshness of the updated status. This work proposes two schemes, namely, the generation rate control and service rate reservation schemes, to improve the overall information freshness of multiple status update streams at the receiver. Specifically, using the recently proposed Age of Information (AoI) as the metric for evaluating information freshness, we characterized the overall information freshness, i.e., the overall average AoI at the receiver for both schemes, by considering the urgency difference of status update and streams. Both schemes for status updates and streams, respectively, were formulated as two optimization problems. We proved that both problems are convex and the optimal generation and service rates for different streams are found by the standard convex optimization algorithm. Moreover, we proposed both approximate optimal generation and approximate optimal service rate for fast deployment in heavy and light load cases. Numerical results verify the theoretical findings and accuracy of the proposed approximate solutions, guiding the design and deployment of IoT.

Using DevOps toolchains in Agile model-driven engineering

For model-driven engineering (MDE) to become more Agile, the community needs to embrace development and operations (DevOps) practices. One of the core practices of DevOps is the use of pipelines to enable CI/CD to make teams more Agile and break down the barriers between development and operations with faster deployments. Current MDE tooling is not designed at its core to participate in DevOps pipelines. Consequently this makes the adoption of MDE in industry more difficult. In this article, we cover an industrial experience report describing how we enabled our pipelines using DevOps and MDE.

A Review Paper on: Benefits and Challenges of DevOps Developer and Modern Era

DevOps is the well-known modern methodology that most organizations used to optimize their business for better production and updated software. Nowadays, DevOps get popular due to many benefits such as Faster Deployment, Enhance the Entire Business, Optimizing the Software Quality, Stable Work Environment. Increase in Automation Efficiency, Improvement in Product Quality, Speed and Stability with Continuous Software Delivery, Less Cost of Production, Quick & Reliable Problem-Solving Strategies, and Teams Unity for Faster Production. To provide these benefits, the DevOps cycle plays an important role. On the Other hand, DevOps Implementation and adoption also come across some challenges. So, the association that wanted to adopt this methodology in their companies have to tackle these challenges. Common challenges that we studied during the review articles are Toolset Clash among Dev & Ops, Difference between the Dev and Ops Mentality, Moving from Infrastructure to Microservices, High Focus on Tools, Opposition to Change.

High-Mobility Satellite-UAV Communications: Challenges, Solutions, and Future Research Trends

Due to their fast deployment and high flexibility, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are regarded as vital enablers of various applications that include emergency rescue, telecommunications, delivery of supplies, and more. In order to connect UAVs to a core network anywhere, satellite communications is expected to provide wider backhaul coverage compared to ground wireless communications. Although UAV Communications has been studied in many technical works, high-mobility satellite-UAV communications has not been investigated well. Specifically, physical layer operations of the high-mobility satellite-UAV communication system are affected the most by high-mobility environments. In this article, we focus on the physical layer operation problem in satellite-UAV communications from three perspectives: time-varying channel estimation, the high-mobility transceiver, and high-mobility multiple access. Related key technologies, existing works, open problems, and the next development direction are introduced and surveyed. Furthermore, our proposed scheme is also discussed. Overall, this article aims to help readers understand challenges, solutions, and future research trends regarding physical layer operation issues on high-mobility satellite-UAV aerial communications.

An Asynchronous Online Negotiation Mechanism for Real-Time Peer-to-Peer Electricity Markets

Participants in electricity markets are becoming more proactive owing to the fast deployment of distributed energy resources (DERs) and the further development of demand-side management (DSM), which also boosts the emergence of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) market mechanisms. Moreover, the market is also required to operate in a real-time scheme in response to changes in generation and load to maintain power balance. It is highly desirable to propose and analyse novel approaches suitable for real-time P2P market mechanisms. These are challenging since most often involving a heavy computational burden, while the time available for negotiation in real-time is very short. Our core contribution is to design and analyse a novel asynchronous online optimization framework and related real-time P2P market negotiation mechanism, which can greatly reduce the computation and communication burden from two aspects. First, a novel online consensus alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) algorithm is proposed. It significantly reduces computation since only one iteration is performed for each agent at every time period. Second, the market operates in an asynchronous mode so that all agents can freely trade without waiting for idle or inactive neighboring agents. The sublinear regret upper bound is proved for our asynchronous online algorithm, which indicates that social welfare in the market can be maximized in the long run on average (over time). Simulations show that our algorithm enjoys good convergence performance, robustness, and fairness.

An Overview of the MPEG Standard for Storage and Transport of Visual Volumetric Video-Based Coding

The increasing popularity of virtual, augmented, and mixed reality (VR/AR/MR) applications is driving the media industry to explore the creation and delivery of new immersive experiences. One of the trends is volumetric video, which allows users to explore content unconstrained by the traditional two-dimensional window of director’s view.The ISO/IEC joint technical committee 1 subcommittee 29, better known as the Moving Pictures Experts Group (MPEG), has recently finalized a group of standards, under the umbrella of Visual Volumetric Video-based Coding (V3C). These standards aim to efficiently code, store, and transport immersive content with 6 degrees of freedom. The V3C family of standards currently consists of three documents: 1) ISO/IEC 23090-5 defines the generic concepts of volumetric video-based coding and its application to dynamic point cloud data; 2) ISO/IEC 23090-12 specifies another application that enables compression of volumetric video content captured by multiple cameras; and 3) ISO/IEC 23090-10 describes how to store and deliver V3C compressed volumetric video content. Each standard leverages the capabilities of traditional 2D video coding and delivery solutions, allowing for re-use of existing infrastructures which facilitates fast deployment of volumetric video.This article provides an overview of the generic concepts of V3C, as defined in ISO/IEC 23090-5. Furthermore, it describes V3C carriage related functionalities specified in ISO/IEC 23090-10 and offers best practices for the community with respect to storage and delivery of volumetric video.

Blockchain Authentication Mechanism for Securing Internet of Things

Internet of Things is a recent potential advancement in an IT arena, consists of multiple smart things (devices) which are connected through a physical network. Cisco incorporation predicts that IoT network will connect 50 billion devices by 2020. Most of the industries are adopting IoT technology and because of its fast spreading, immense adoption and deployment current authentication mechanisms have serious disadvantages. For numerous reasons the security issues are the major hurdle in adoption and deployment of IoT on a large scale since it is highly vulnerable to attacks. In this paper we propose a Blockchain based authentication mechanism i.e. Ethereum which is a public blockchain as it has emerged as a technology that possess great capabilities of providing secure authentication, management and access control for IoT devices in a decentralized, trusty and flexible manner by creating a secure environment where the devices can identify and trust each other and only authenticated users are given permission to access them.

Atmospheric Water Harvesting by Large-Scale Radiative Cooling Cellulose-Based Fabric.

Atmospheric water harvesting (AWH) has received tremendous interest because of population growth, limited freshwater resources, and water pollution. However, key challenges remain in developing efficient, flexible, and lightweight AWH materials with scalability. Here, we demonstrated a radiative cooling fabric for AWH via its hierarchically structured cellulose network and hybrid sorption-dewing mechanisms. With 8.3% solar absorption and ∼0.9 infrared (IR) emissivity, the material can drop up to 7.5 °C below ambient temperature without energy consumption via radiative cooling. Water adsorption onto the hydrophilic functional groups of cellulose is dominated by sorption at low relative humidity (RH) and dewing at high RH. The cellulose network provides desirable mechanical properties with entangled high-aspect-ratio fibers over tens of adsorption-extraction cycles. In the field test, the cellulose sample exhibited water uptake of 1.29 kg/kg at 80% RH during the night. The profusion of radiative cooling fabric features desirable cost effectiveness and allows fast deployment into large-scale AWH applications.

Research progress on wireless sensor network (WSN) security technology

Abstract Wireless sensor network (WSN) has been a frontier technology field that integrates a variety of technologies and has a wide range of applications in the military. Network security is of great significance in military warfare. First, this paper outlines the technical advantages of the application of military based on the technical characteristics of WSN. In military applications, WSN has been used in modern military combat while WSN features easy and fast deployment, high concealment, good fault tolerance, high accuracy and other obvious advantages. Moreover, from the perspective of network security, this paper reviews the research progress of network security technology at the network level and data level. The network level includes security protocols, key management, and secure routing technology, and key management includes pre-shared key mode and random key pre-distribution mode. At the data level, error control and fault-tolerant algorithms are mainly included. Automatic retransmission and forward error correction techniques are traditional error control methods, which should be combined with the specific situation of WSN to propose the corresponding fault-tolerant mechanism. Finally, this paper summarizes the practical applications of WSN in the military. From battlefield reconnaissance and target localization monitoring to destruction effect control and anti-terrorism equipment research, network security has been a top priority. Against the background of practical military applications, this paper summarizes the research significance of network security technology.

Design Scheme of a Docker Container File Isolation against Computer Virus Spreading

With the spread of computers and Internet of Things, the destructive power of viruses gradually becomes stronger, which threaten the daily life of people. In order to effectively restrain the virus spreading and reduce economic losses, humans need to hold the law and control of the virus distribution. Docker has obtained significant attention as a lightweight virtualization container technology. Compared to traditional virtualization technologies, docker possesses the advantages of fast deployment, low resource consumption, and high migration capability. Given that the differences between various virtualization technologies and combining the characteristics in electric power systems, this paper designs a scheme of the file isolation system based on docker containers. The isolation scheme could reduce the highly dependence on the underlying operating system in the current application deployment of electric power systems and facilitate the security access to the file system between containers.

Deciding on the robotic process automation operating model: A checklist for RPA managers

Robotic process automation (RPA) has emerged as a technology promising various quick wins: fast deployment, immediate efficiency gains, and low investment requirements. While these promises have resulted in large-scale deployment of RPA in diverse industries, the choice of operating model remains tricky. This article identifies three key decisions for RPA managers: (1) the who decision, pertaining to selection of internal versus external resources for RPA development; (2) the how decision, on whether the organization will pursue RPA deployment on-premises or through the cloud; and (3) the what decision, on whether to employ proprietary RPA tools or an open-source solution. To shed light on how these decisions are made and to pinpoint their interdependencies, seven organizations’ choices connected with these three decisions are presented. The study’s main contribution is a decision checklist that can facilitate RPA managers’ navigation of the decision-making process, their gathering of relevant information, and their choice of the model best matching the organization’s needs.

Will the regime ever break? Assessing socio-political and economic pressures to climate action and European oil majors’ response (2005-2019)

ABSTRACT The extensive use of fossil fuels in recent decades is a well-known cause of the climate crisis. Climate action inevitably requires the strategic reorientation of industries that are part of the fossil fuel regime. International oil companies are central to this regime and possess the incumbent’s characteristic power and influence to steer this process. However, European international oil companies continue to invest in fossil fuels, even as they acknowledge the climate crisis imperative. Socio-political and economic dynamics can either reinforce the oil regime or pressure firms to take climate action. We aim to comprehensively analyse the dynamics between external socio-political and economic actors’ pressures to climate action on the one side, and the industry response on the other, from 2005 to 2019, using Geels Triple Embeddedness Framework. Drawing on a wide range of qualitative and quantitative longitudinal data (e.g. regulations, oil and renewables market trends, companies’ investments in oil, renewables, and low-carbon technologies), we characterised the pressures and responses of the different analytical categories and established three phases. The results indicate that policy pressure on the oil regime in this period lacked constancy and comprehensiveness. The Kyoto Protocol ratification produced an initial momentum that prompted some companies to invest in alternative fuels and renewables, but efforts faded after 2010. Societal calls for a transition from fossil fuels and divestments from oil companies have risen since 2017. Recent socio-economic pressures combined with policy pledges for net-zero emissions have prompted all companies to invest beyond fossil fuels. However, efforts are still marginal and additional advancements in climate policy are necessary to foster the renewables market and to promote the phase-out of oil. Key policy insights Europe lacks a comprehensive policy framework to support the fast deployment of available alternative fuels. Policies need to foster the development and adoption of alternatives to petrochemical products, alongside their reduction and recycling. Apart from supporting renewable energy and other alternatives to oil, policies also need to target the phase-out of oil and send a clear signal to companies.

Domestic deployment in the formative phase of the Chinese Electric Vehicles Sector: evolution of the policy-regimes and windows of opportunity

ABSTRACT China has been able to deploy electric vehicles at an unprecedented speed and scale. This paper explores the underlying policies during six years of sector formation, and it identifies a change in policy-regime after three years. The analysis of evolution of the policy-regimes indicates that creating, transferring, and sharing knowledge among the principal actors was key to catching up. The changing policy-regime enabled a minimum threshold of technology development required for deployment. Nevertheless, it was insufficient for pushing the sector to the global technology frontier. Key to the sector’s relative success was the government’s responsiveness to sectoral development and its ability to address production, demand, and knowledge issues simultaneously. In addition, it created synergies between policies designed to address environmental concerns and foster economic development concurrently. However, fast deployment required heavy subsidies and important policy initiatives came with potential pitfalls that may hamper international competitiveness of the sector.

Extinguishing Real Fires by Fully Autonomous Multirotor UAVs in the MBZIRC 2020 Competition

In this paper, we describe a system for combating real fires with sprayed liquid extinguishing agent using a team of multirotor UAVs. The system design relies on onboard sensors and operates without the need for human intervention throughout its complex mission, from its takeoff to landing. The core UAV platform can estimate its state, self-localize, navigate and locate and extinguishing fires. Thermal and RGB cameras are used, each with a specialized computer vision subsystem and are combined with planar LIDAR for 3D localization of fires on multistory building facades. The system conducts aerial firefighting with a software stack that addresses flight dynamics and sensor limitations and a liquid-spraying subsystem incorporating a rigidly-attached water nozzle. The approach presented in this paper was motivated by the Mohamed Bin Zayed International Robotics Challenge (MBZIRC 2020) firefighting scenario, which focused on coordinated multi-UAV teams that can autonomously combat high-rise building fires. The MBZIRC series places particular emphasis on fast and reliable deployment of robots in realistic conditions. These contests promote development of real-world applications that are greatly needed by society, but which still exceed State-of-the-Art in the robotics community. To our knowledge, our system was the only MBZIRC 2020 contender to extinguish a facade fire successfully in autonomous mode without using an RTK-GNSS system. Our approach contributed to victory in the overall competition and we have now adapted it into an industrial prototype for a firefighting UAV. A video attachment to this paper is available at http://mrs.felk.cvut.cz/fr2020firechallenge-facadefires.

Portable real-time colorimetric LAMP-device for rapid quantitative detection of nucleic acids in crude samples

Loop-mediated isothermal amplification is known for its high sensitivity, specificity and tolerance to inhibiting-substances. In this work, we developed a device for performing real-time colorimetric LAMP combining the accuracy of lab-based quantitative analysis with the simplicity of point-of-care testing. The device innovation lies on the use of a plastic tube anchored vertically on a hot surface while the side walls are exposed to a mini camera able to take snapshots of the colour change in real time during LAMP amplification. Competitive features are the rapid analysis (< 30 min), quantification over 9 log-units, crude sample-compatibility (saliva, tissue, swabs), low detection limit (< 5 copies/reaction), smartphone-operation, fast prototyping (3D-printing) and ability to select the dye of interest (Phenol red, HNB). The device’s clinical utility is demonstrated in cancer mutations-analysis during the detection of 0.01% of BRAF-V600E-to-wild-type molecules from tissue samples and COVID-19 testing with 97% (Ct < 36.8) and 98% (Ct < 30) sensitivity when using extracted RNA and nasopharyngeal-swabs, respectively. The device high technology-readiness-level makes it a suitable platform for performing any colorimetric LAMP assay; moreover, its simple and inexpensive fabrication holds promise for fast deployment and application in global diagnostics.