| 1. |
- Blösch, Günter, et al.
(författare)
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Twenty-three unsolved problems in hydrology (UPH) - a community perspective
- 2019
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Ingår i: Hydrological Sciences Journal. - : Informa UK Limited. - 0262-6667 .- 2150-3435. ; 64:10, s. 1141-1158
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper is the outcome of a community initiative to identify major unsolved scientific problems in hydrology motivated by a need for stronger harmonisation of research efforts. The procedure involved a public consultation through online media, followed by two workshops through which a large number of potential science questions were collated, prioritised, and synthesised. In spite of the diversity of the participants (230 scientists in total), the process revealed much about community priorities and the state of our science: a preference for continuity in research questions rather than radical departures or redirections from past and current work. Questions remain focused on the process-based understanding of hydrological variability and causality at all space and time scales. Increased attention to environmental change drives a new emphasis on understanding how change propagates across interfaces within the hydrological system and across disciplinary boundaries. In particular, the expansion of the human footprint raises a new set of questions related to human interactions with nature and water cycle feedbacks in the context of complex water management problems. We hope that this reflection and synthesis of the 23 unsolved problems in hydrology will help guide research efforts for some years to come.
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| 2. |
- Bonelli, Andrea, et al.
(författare)
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Aortic valve stenosis and cardiac amyloidosis : A misleading association
- 2021
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Ingår i: Journal of Clinical Medicine. - : MDPI. - 2077-0383. ; 10:18
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- The association between aortic stenosis (AS) and cardiac amyloidosis (CA) is more frequent than expected. Albeit rare, CA, particularly the transthyretin (ATTR) form, is commonly found in elderly people. ATTR-CA is also the most prevalent form in patients with AS. These conditions share pathophysiological, clinical and imaging findings, making the diagnostic process very challenging. To date, a multiparametric evaluation is suggested in order to detect patients with both AS and CA and choose the best therapeutic option. Given the accuracy of modern non-invasive techniques (i.e., bone scintigraphy), early diagnosis of CA is possible. Flow-charts with the main CA findings which may help clinicians in the diagnostic process have been proposed. The prognostic impact of the combination of AS and CA is not fully known; however, new available specific treatments of ATTR-CA have changed the natural history of the disease and have some impact on the decision-making process for the management of AS. Hence the relevance of detecting these two conditions when simultaneously present. The specific features helping the detection of AS-CA association are discussed in this review, focusing on the shared pathophysiological characteristics and the common clinical and imaging hallmarks.
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| 3. |
- Dorigo, Tommaso, et al.
(författare)
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Toward the end-to-end optimization of particle physics instruments with differentiable programming
- 2023
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Ingår i: Reviews in Physics. - 2405-4283. ; 10
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- The full optimization of the design and operation of instruments whose functioning relies on the interaction of radiation with matter is a super-human task, due to the large dimensionality of the space of possible choices for geometry, detection technology, materials, data-acquisition, and information-extraction techniques, and the interdependence of the related parameters. On the other hand, massive potential gains in performance over standard, “experience-driven” layouts are in principle within our reach if an objective function fully aligned with the final goals of the instrument is maximized through a systematic search of the configuration space. The stochastic nature of the involved quantum processes make the modeling of these systems an intractable problem from a classical statistics point of view, yet the construction of a fully differentiable pipeline and the use of deep learning techniques may allow the simultaneous optimization of all design parameters. In this white paper, we lay down our plans for the design of a modular and versatile modeling tool for the end-to-end optimization of complex instruments for particle physics experiments as well as industrial and medical applications that share the detection of radiation as their basic ingredient. We consider a selected set of use cases to highlight the specific needs of different applications.
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| 4. |
- Faridghasemnia, Mohamadreza, 1991-, et al.
(författare)
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Capturing Frame-Like Object Descriptors in Human Augmented Mapping
- 2019
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Ingår i: AI*IA 2019 - Advances in Artificial Intelligence. - Cham : Springer. - 9783030351656 - 9783030351663 ; , s. 392-404
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- The model of an environment plays a crucial role in autonomous mobile robots, by providing them with the necessary task-relevant information. As robots become more intelligent, they need a richer and more expressive environment model. This model is a map that contains a structured description of the environment that can be used as the robot’s knowledge for several tasks, such as planning and reasoning. In this work, we propose a framework that allows to capture important environment descriptors, such as functionality and ownership of the robot’s surrounding objects, through verbal interaction. Specifically, we propose a corpus of verbal descriptions annotated with frame-like structures. We use the proposed dataset to train two multi-task neural architectures. We compare the two architectures through an experimental evaluation, discussing the design choices. Finally, we describe the creation of a simple interactive interface with our system, implemented through the trained model. The novelties of this work are: (i) the definition of a new problem, i.e., addressing different object descriptors, that plays a crucial role for the robot’s tasks accomplishment; (ii) a specialized corpus to support the creation of rich Semantic Maps; (iii) the design of different neural architectures, and their experimental evaluation over the proposed dataset; (iv) a simple interface for the actual usage of the proposed resources.
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| 5. |
- Forzieri, Giovanni, et al.
(författare)
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The Database of European Forest Insect and Disease Disturbances: DEFID2
- 2023
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Ingår i: Global Change Biology. - 1365-2486. ; 29:21, s. 6040-6065
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Insect and disease outbreaks in forests are biotic disturbances that can profoundly alter ecosystem dynamics. In many parts of the world, these disturbance regimes are intensifying as the climate changes and shifts the distribution of species and biomes. As a result, key forest ecosystem services, such as carbon sequestration, regulation of water flows, wood production, protection of soils, and the conservation of biodiversity, could be increasingly compromised. Despite the relevance of these detrimental effects, there are currently no spatially detailed databases that record insect and disease disturbances on forests at the pan-European scale. Here, we present the new Database of European Forest Insect and Disease Disturbances (DEFID2). It comprises over 650,000 harmonized georeferenced records, mapped as polygons or points, of insects and disease disturbances that occurred between 1963 and 2021 in European forests. The records currently span eight different countries and were acquired through diverse methods (e.g., ground surveys, remote sensing techniques). The records in DEFID2 are described by a set of qualitative attributes, including severity and patterns of damage symptoms, agents, host tree species, climate-driven trigger factors, silvicultural practices, and eventual sanitary interventions. They are further complemented with a satellite-based quantitative characterization of the affected forest areas based on Landsat Normalized Burn Ratio time series, and damage metrics derived from them using the LandTrendr spectral–temporal segmentation algorithm (including onset, duration, magnitude, and rate of the disturbance), and possible interactions with windthrow and wildfire events. The DEFID2 database is a novel resource for many large-scale applications dealing with biotic disturbances. It offers a unique contribution to design networks of experiments, improve our understanding of ecological processes underlying biotic forest disturbances, monitor their dynamics, and enhance their representation in land-climate models. Further data sharing is encouraged to extend and improve the DEFID2 database continuously. The database is freely available at https://jeodpp.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ftp/jrc-opendata/FOREST/DISTURBANCES/DEFID2/.
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| 6. |
- Ituarte-Lima, Claudia, et al.
(författare)
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Just Pathways to Sustainability: From Environmental Human Rights Defenders to Biosphere Defenders
- 2023
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Ingår i: Environmental policy and law. - 0378-777X. ; 53:5-6, s. 347-366
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- People form part of the biosphere - the biosphere being the whole intertwined network of life on Earth. While there is convergence on the need for societal change for just sustainability and a healthy biosphere, the pathways to achieve these transformations remain relatively unclear. Through legal interpretation, conceptual and thematic analysis of academic and grey literature, we seek to answer the following two questions: (a) how does the concept of Biosphere Defender enable a deeper and distinct understanding of who environmental defenders are and their role in just sustainability transformations? and (b) how does international human rights law contribute to specify the content of biosphere defenders’ rights? To address these questions, we first critically review the scope and limitations of the notion of Environmental Human Rights Defenders (EHRD) in human rights narratives in international law and policy. We examine how understandings of EHRD portray those defending their land and environment and what limitations this concept has in terms of possibilities for reflecting on transformations towards just sustainability. Second, we propose an alternative and/or complementary understanding of EHRD by using the concept of Biosphere Defenders. We also develop the Defend-Biosphere Framework to analyse the role of these actors as agents of change in pathways towards just sustainability. Third, to empirically illustrate the role of Biosphere Defenders, and the use of the Defend-Biosphere Framework we present two case studies from Latin America analyzing initiatives catalyzed by rural people who are defending their lands and territories while generating new ways to relate to socio-ecological systems and engage with the State and the economy. In both case studies, we find that relational values of solidarity, responsibility, and care (between human and other living beings) are central in understanding Biosphere Defenders’ initiatives creating pathways towards just sustainability. The findings of this article are of particular relevance to the implementation of the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment in the context of the Escazu Agreement on access to information, public participation and access to justice in environmental matters in Latin America and the Caribbean, the Aarhus Convention on access to information, public participation and access to justice in environmental matters and the Montreal-Kunming Global Biodiversity Framework in particular Target 22 (access to information, participation, access to justice and environmental defenders) and Target 23 (gender equality).
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| 7. |
- Manzanal, Mabel, et al.
(författare)
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Desarrollo, territorio y desigualdad en la globalización. Sus variadas expresiones en conflicto en el nordeste de Misiones, Argentina
- 2010
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Ingår i: XI Seminario Internacional de la RII. - 9789507741890 ; , s. 1-27
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Abstract in Spanish En el presente trabajo buscamos poner en cuestión la relación entre desarrollo, desigualdad y territorio en el contexto actual de la globalización y en el marco de las políticas públicas dirigidas, supuestamente, a favorecer a los actores sociales de menores recursos. Para ello nos centramos en un estudio de caso en el nordeste de la provincia de Misiones, Argentina. Aquí la actividad tabacalera, la forestación y la agricultura familiar alternativa (orientada a la producción de alimentos) entran en disputa por el territorio, dando lugar a conflictos por la ocupación de tierras privadas y cuyo análisis y devenir muestra: a. las transformaciones territoriales resultantes de los procesos de avance de la globalización en ámbitos locales; b. y las formas como dichas transformaciones condicionan y limitan las propias propuestas de desarrollo, originadas desde la política pública para paliar la desigualdad social.
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