WorldWideScience

Sample records for providing performance guarantees

  1. Human and Citizen Rights Guarantees While Providing Information Security

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Serhii Yesimov

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available With the development of information and communication technologies, issues of providing information security are becoming more and more aggravated. These are crimes related to the use of electronic computers, systems and computer networks and telecommunication networks, the propaganda of separatism and extremism, etc. While providing information security in the digital environment, the role of technical and legal human rights guarantees, due to technical means of protection, is increasing. Relying on the developers of technical means of protection determines the difference between the aforesaid concepts and the traditional approach to ensuring the protection of human and citizen rights, in which responsibilities are put on information intermediaries, owners of confidential information. Technical guarantees of human rights are a necessary component of ensuring information security, but the effectiveness of the application is provided in conjunction with the legal guarantees of human rights, as evidenced by the tendency to recognize the principles of inviolability of privacy on the basis of design decisions in the law of the European Union as legal acts. Providing information security is a legitimate goal of establishing constraints of human rights, since it can be correlated with the norms of international law. The establishment of constraints of human rights is permissible in order to attain other objectives–ensuring state security, public order, health, rights and freedoms of the person in the information sphere. The legitimacy of this goal is determined by its compliance with the objectives envisaged by international agreements ratified in an established order. The article examines the impact of the use of technical means in the field of providing information security in the aspect of following the fundamental human and civil rights in Ukraine, taking into account the legislation of the European Union and the decision of the European Court

  2. Strategic design of cost savings guarantee in energy performance contracting under uncertainty

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Deng, Qianli; Jiang, Xianglin; Cui, Qingbin; Zhang, Limao

    2015-01-01

    Highlights: • A methodology is proposed to assist Energy Service Companies to maintain competitiveness in winning bids. • Uncertainties within the energy cost savings are modeled stochastically using the Monte-Carlo simulation. • A strategic energy savings guarantee design curve is derived, where all points return as appropriate guarantees. • A campus case is presented to demonstrate the applicability for finding appropriate guaranteed savings value. - Abstract: Among the key barriers to profit in Energy Performance Contracting (EPC) are uncertainties about attaining the realized energy cost savings and potential disputes over the guaranteed cost savings. In this paper, a methodology has been proposed to assist the Energy Service Company (ESCO): (1) to evaluate the risk threshold if the guarantee has already been made, and (2) to determine the guarantee design, if the guarantee has not been made yet, that not only promises the ESCO’s profitability from EPC but also maintains its competitiveness to win the bid. Uncertainties within the energy cost savings are modeled stochastically using Monte-Carlo simulation, taking both the energy price fluctuation and the facility performance variability into account. Based on that, a strategic energy savings guarantee design curve is derived, that all the points on it would return as appropriate guarantees. Finally, a campus case is presented to demonstrate the applicability for finding the appropriate guaranteed savings value. This method is also worth popularizing in similar performance-based projects

  3. Applying Service Performance Guarantees to Reduce Risk Perception in the Purchase and Consumption of Higher Education

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nooraini Mohamad Sheriff

    2006-12-01

    Full Text Available The intangible nature of education is one contributor to consumers’ perception of risk prior to their purchase and consumption. This risk includes: functional risk, financial risk, temporal risk, physical risk, psychological risk and social risk. The presence of these risks often makes consumer evaluation prior to purchase and consumption difficult. Invoking a service guarantee is a platform available to enable higher educational institutions to minimize such risk perception so as to induce purchase. Specifically, service guarantee for higher education entails the application of teaching performance guarantee. This form of guarantee focuses on two important customer groups of higher educational institutions namely, students and faculty members, and focuses only on a specific performance aspect such as instructor’s performance. Thus, if students are dissatisfied with an instructor’s performance they are entitled to receive their money back. The imposition of such a teaching performance guarantee would implicate instructor’s accountability for certain aspects of their performance. It also establishes a mechanism to solicit feedback to better understand why and how instructors fail. Consequently, service performance guarantee creates a high level of customer focus and signals instructors’ care towards students

  4. A Network-Attached Storage System Supporting Guaranteed QoS

    Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

    KONG Hua-feng; YU Sheng-sheng; LU Hong-wei

    2005-01-01

    We propose a network-attached storage system that can support guaranteed Quality of Service (QoS), called POPNet Storage. The special policy of date access and disk scheduling is enable users to access files quickly and directly with guaranteed QoS in the POPNet Storage. The POPNet Storage implements a measurement-based admission control algorithm (PSMBAC) to determine whether to admit a new data access request stream and admit as many requests as possible while meeting the QoS guarantees to its clients. The data reconstruction algorithms in the POPNet Storage also put more emphasis on data availability and guaranteed QoS, thus it is designed to complete the data recovery as soon as possible and at the same time provide the guaranteed QoS for high-priority data access. The experiment results show that the POPNet Storage can provide more significant performance, reliability, and guaranteed QoS than conventional storage systems.

  5. Stand alone photovoltaic systems: guarantee of results

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    NONE

    1996-12-31

    This study aims to provide a guarantee of results for system performance for users of stand-alone photovoltaic (PV) systems, which have no back-up generator. The appropriate main performance criterion for PV systems is that a specified load is supplied with power either continuously or intermittently whenever the load requires power. A methodology to evaluate the power availability of stand-alone PV systems has been developed as part of the project, which encompasses power losses due to weather variations. The guarantee of results produced allows users to compare system designs from different manufacturers. (UK)

  6. Studies on the performance guarantee for the engineering barrier system on geological disposal of high-level radioactive waste

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kawakami, Susumu; Sugita, Yutaka; Kurihara, Yuji; Jintoku, Takashi; Taniguti, Naoki; Yui, Mikazu; Tanai, Kenji; Shibata, Masahiro; Honma, Nobuyuki

    2003-03-01

    In order to contribute to the safety standards and guidelines upon which a administration decides, examination for clarifying how to reflect the result obtained by future R and D was performed. From a viewpoint of the long-term safety on geological disposal, the items which should guarantee the performance of each element which constitutes disposal institutions (by this report, they are the overpack and the buffer material) were extracted, and it was shown what a performance guarantee is concretely offered about these items. Furthermore, based on the H12 report as a situation of present R and D for a method of a performance guarantee, the subjects considered that a future R and D is required were extracted. Moreover, the items of a safety standard and guideline were assumed, and the relation between these items and a performance guarantee items was arranged. One arrangement for clarifying whether to be reflected in the safety regulations and guidelines whose R and D subjects extracted from the performance guarantee items was shown. (author)

  7. Linking Financial Service Providers to Commercial Capital : How Do Guarantees Add Value?

    OpenAIRE

    Alexia Latortue; Jasmina Glisovic-Mezieres

    2008-01-01

    In microfinance, experimentation with loan guarantees began largely as an attempt to demonstrate to local banks that Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) are creditworthy. Though loan guarantees are far less common than other funding instruments, such as debt, equity, and grants, they are beginning to be used more often. This brief is based on a joint Consultative Group to Assist the Poorest (...

  8. A set-theoretic model reference adaptive control architecture for disturbance rejection and uncertainty suppression with strict performance guarantees

    Science.gov (United States)

    Arabi, Ehsan; Gruenwald, Benjamin C.; Yucelen, Tansel; Nguyen, Nhan T.

    2018-05-01

    Research in adaptive control algorithms for safety-critical applications is primarily motivated by the fact that these algorithms have the capability to suppress the effects of adverse conditions resulting from exogenous disturbances, imperfect dynamical system modelling, degraded modes of operation, and changes in system dynamics. Although government and industry agree on the potential of these algorithms in providing safety and reducing vehicle development costs, a major issue is the inability to achieve a-priori, user-defined performance guarantees with adaptive control algorithms. In this paper, a new model reference adaptive control architecture for uncertain dynamical systems is presented to address disturbance rejection and uncertainty suppression. The proposed framework is predicated on a set-theoretic adaptive controller construction using generalised restricted potential functions.The key feature of this framework allows the system error bound between the state of an uncertain dynamical system and the state of a reference model, which captures a desired closed-loop system performance, to be less than a-priori, user-defined worst-case performance bound, and hence, it has the capability to enforce strict performance guarantees. Examples are provided to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed set-theoretic model reference adaptive control architecture.

  9. Major risks and financial guarantees provided by the State in France

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Brassard, Guy

    2012-01-01

    France's system for indemnifying damage from natural catastrophe is exemplary, whether for floods, storms, or subsidence. However, France is not equipped with the financial capacity to deal with the damage resulting from an exceptional disaster, such as an earthquake on the Mediterranean coast, or a nuclear meltdown. Major catastrophes could be a significant risk to the financial stability of the State today, because the State is in fact the ultimate insurer of its citizens and its institutions. It would be wise to built up reserves in order to enhance the financial resources of the State and to provide a uniform guarantee covering major risks, whatever the cause of the damage may be. (author)

  10. A general framework for performance guaranteed green data center networking

    OpenAIRE

    Wang, Ting; Xia, Yu; Muppala, Jogesh; Hamdi, Mounir; Foufou, Sebti

    2014-01-01

    From the perspective of resource allocation and routing, this paper aims to save as much energy as possible in data center networks. We present a general framework, based on the blocking island paradigm, to try to maximize the network power conservation and minimize sacrifices of network performance and reliability. The bandwidth allocation mechanism together with power-aware routing algorithm achieve a bandwidth guaranteed tighter network. Besides, our fast efficient heuristics for allocatin...

  11. Using Multiple Paths in NoCs for Guaranteed Resource Allocation and Improved Best Effort Performance in NoCs.

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Ovadia, I.; Ha, Y.; Corporaal, H.

    2005-01-01

    Networks-on-Chips (NoCs) provide communication platforms to Systems-on-Chips (SoCs). In NoCs, channels are generally shared between traffic flows, resulting in contention. However, certain flows require delivery guarantees. Differentiated quality-of-service (QoS) is achieved by providing guaranteed

  12. On QoS guarantee in MPLS network with software deadline awareness

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gao, Yu; Jin, Yaohui; Cheng, Hong; Yu, Yingdi; Sun, Weiqiang; Guo, Wei; Hu, Weisheng

    2007-11-01

    With the increasing number of internet users, more and more real-time services are added into the network, such as IPTV, online-video, Voice over IP, etc. As we know, throughput is a highly important performance criterion for scheduling algorithms of networks. Besides throughput, these growing real-time services are very sensitive to delay variance termed as jitter. Therefore, high performance scheduling algorithm should achieve good performance in terms of throughput, delay, jitter and fairness together. Scheduling algorithm with deadline-awareness employed in packet switching plays a key role in QoS guarantees. Although traditional hard-deadline can provide guarantee on in-node delay-deadline criteria, the end-to-end delay-deadline criteria cannot be guaranteed due to the characteristic of hard-deadline, while the delay-deadline guaranteed throughput is low. Thus, soft-deadline scheduling algorithm has been proposed. In this paper, we investigate and compare the classical hard-deadline and soft-deadline switching algorithm. A new scheme "Bonus System" is proposed in order to realize the idea of soft-deadline switching algorithm. Bonus System based on soft-deadline is compared with classical Early-Deadline First scheme based on hard-deadline, which shows that Bonus System has better performance in End-to-End deadline guarantee.

  13. Marketing service guarantees for health care.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Levy, J S

    1999-01-01

    The author introduces the concept of service guarantees for application in health care and differentiates between explicit, implicit, and conditional vs. unconditional types of guarantees. An example of an unconditional guarantee of satisfaction is provided by the hospitality industry. Firms conveying an implicit guarantee are those with outstanding reputations for products such as luxury automobiles, or ultimate customer service, like Nordstrom. Federal Express and Domino's Pizza offer explicit guarantees of on-time delivery. Taking this concept into efforts to improve health care delivery involves a number of caveats. Customers invited to use exceptional service cards may use these to record either satisfaction or dissatisfaction. The cards need to provide enough specific information about issues so that "immediate action could be taken to improve processes." Front-line employees should be empowered to respond to complaints in a meaningful way to resolve the problem before the client leaves the premises.

  14. Quality guaranteed theory

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Hwang, Ui Cheol

    1988-08-01

    This book tells of introduction of quality guaranteed theory like definition of quality and quality management, quality guaranteed, requirement of quality guaranteed, contrast of QA and QC, quality of guaranteed object, activity of quality guaranteed, set-up of quality that is naturally supposed such as quality guaranteed in plan and design, check of quality guaranteed, order of claim processing and cases of claim management.

  15. Studies on the performance guarantee for the engineered barrier system on geological disposal of high-level radioactive waste. V. 2

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sugita, Yutaka; Kurihara, Yuji; Kawakami, Susumu; Jintoku, Takashi; Yui, Mikazu

    2003-05-01

    In order to contribute to the safety standards and guidelines upon which a governmental administration decide, examination for clarifying how to reflect the result obtained by future R and D was performed. From a view point of long-term safety on geological disposal, the items which should guarantee the performance of each element which constitutes disposal institutions (by this report, they are the backfill, the plug, the tunnel, and the pit) were extracted, and it was shown what a performance guarantee is concretely offered about these items. Furthermore, based on H12 report as a situation of present R and D for a method of a performance guarantee, the subjects considered that a future R and D is required were extracted. (author)

  16. Designing area optimized application-specific network-on-chip architectures while providing hard QoS guarantees.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sajid Gul Khawaja

    Full Text Available With the increase of transistors' density, popularity of System on Chip (SoC has increased exponentially. As a communication module for SoC, Network on Chip (NoC framework has been adapted as its backbone. In this paper, we propose a methodology for designing area-optimized application specific NoC while providing hard Quality of Service (QoS guarantees for real time flows. The novelty of the proposed system lies in derivation of a Mixed Integer Linear Programming model which is then used to generate a resource optimal Network on Chip (NoC topology and architecture while considering traffic and QoS requirements. We also present the micro-architectural design features used for enabling traffic and latency guarantees and discuss how the solution adapts for dynamic variations in the application traffic. The paper highlights the effectiveness of proposed method by generating resource efficient NoC solutions for both industrial and benchmark applications. The area-optimized results are generated in few seconds by proposed technique, without resorting to heuristics, even for an application with 48 traffic flows.

  17. Performance Guaranteed Inertia Emulation forDiesel-Wind System Feed Microgrid via ModelReference Control

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Melin, Alexander M. [ORNL; Zhang, Yichen [University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK), Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; Djouadi, Seddik [University of Tennessee, Knoxville (UTK), Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; Olama, Mohammed M. [ORNL

    2017-04-01

    In this paper, a model reference control based inertia emulation strategy is proposed. Desired inertia can be precisely emulated through this control strategy so that guaranteed performance is ensured. A typical frequency response model with parametrical inertia is set to be the reference model. A measurement at a specific location delivers the information of disturbance acting on the diesel-wind system to the referencemodel. The objective is for the speed of the diesel-wind system to track the reference model. Since active power variation is dominantly governed by mechanical dynamics and modes, only mechanical dynamics and states, i.e., a swing-engine-governor system plus a reduced-order wind turbine generator, are involved in the feedback control design. The controller is implemented in a three-phase diesel-wind system feed microgrid. The results show exact synthetic inertia is emulated, leading to guaranteed performance and safety bounds.

  18. Government guarantees and public debt in Croatia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anto Bajo

    2011-09-01

    Full Text Available Government fi nancial and performance guarantees have been issued in Croatia since 1996, to support funding and ensure favourable borrowing conditions in the fi nancial market for companies in majority state ownership. However, government guarantees have rarely been part of defi ned strategies and goals of public debt and risk management. Despite their steady growth, the structure of active guarantees and their infl uence on Croatian public debt are still unknown. This paper analyses the amount and structure of state guarantees, their maturities and the authority and accountability for their management, and it compares the structure of guarantees in terms of economic sectors. The main objective of the paper is to determine the infl uence of government guarantees on the public debt growth.

  19. 7 CFR 1720.14 - Nature of guarantee; acceleration of guaranteed bonds.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 7 Agriculture 11 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Nature of guarantee; acceleration of guaranteed bonds. 1720.14 Section 1720.14 Agriculture Regulations of the Department of Agriculture (Continued) RURAL... TELEPHONE PURPOSES § 1720.14 Nature of guarantee; acceleration of guaranteed bonds. (a) Any guarantee...

  20. 10 CFR 609.10 - Loan Guarantee Agreement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... accepted accounting principles and practices. The non-guaranteed portion (if any) of any Guaranteed... examination, to any pertinent books, documents, papers, and records of the Borrower, Eligible Lender or other... transferring Eligible Lender was performing these functions and transfer such functions to the new Eligible...

  1. Customer intentions to invoke service guarantees: Do excellence in service recovery, type of guarantee, and cultural orientation matter?

    OpenAIRE

    Van Vaerenbergh, Yves; De Keyser, Arne; Larivière, Bart

    2014-01-01

    Purpose – Many service providers feel confident about their service quality and thus offer service guarantees to their customers. Yet service failures are inevitable. As guarantees can only be invoked when customers report service failures, firms are given the opportunity to redress the original failure potentially influencing customer outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to provide the first empirical investigation of whether excellence in service recovery affects customers’ intentions to ...

  2. The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission's financial guarantee requirements

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Ferch, R.

    2006-01-01

    The Nuclear Safety and Control Act gives the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) the legal authority to require licensees to provide financial guarantees in order to meet the purposes of the Act. CNSC policy and guidance with regard to financial guarantees is outlined, and the current status of financial guarantee requirements as applied to various CNSC licensees is described. (author)

  3. The traceability of renewable energies: the guarantees of origin

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2017-03-01

    The guarantee of origin has been initially designed by the European Union as a mechanism of support for renewable energies. It is an electronic document which allows an electric power provider to guarantee to its client the origin of the energy it sells him. This document presents the legal background of this guarantee, briefly describes the life cycle of this guarantee, proposes a brief discussion of recent legal evolutions, and briefly discusses its future

  4. Understanding consumer response to service guarantees

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Taylor, E.L.; Cole, J.M.

    1999-01-01

    Whether the goal is customer loyalty to a competitive energy service provider or customer satisfaction with monopoly distribution services, service guarantees must be seen as one way a company can communicate with its customers about the relationship it has (or wants) with them. In short, service guarantees must be evaluated as part of a company's overall brand management strategy. To do this, a conceptual framework within which to develop and link models of service delivery and brand management is needed. This means seeing both as examples of inference management. In this article the authors first interpret findings from their research on utility service guarantees in light of the model of service delivery proposed by Smith, Bolton, and Wagner. The authors then situate this model within their own model of utility brand management. The resulting approach can be used by a utility to evaluate whether and how to adopt service guarantees as part of its overall branding strategy

  5. Understanding consumer response to service guarantees

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Taylor, E.L.; Cole, J.M.

    1999-10-01

    Whether the goal is customer loyalty to a competitive energy service provider or customer satisfaction with monopoly distribution services, service guarantees must be seen as one way a company can communicate with its customers about the relationship it has (or wants) with them. In short, service guarantees must be evaluated as part of a company's overall brand management strategy. To do this, a conceptual framework within which to develop and link models of service delivery and brand management is needed. This means seeing both as examples of inference management. In this article the authors first interpret findings from their research on utility service guarantees in light of the model of service delivery proposed by Smith, Bolton, and Wagner. The authors then situate this model within their own model of utility brand management. The resulting approach can be used by a utility to evaluate whether and how to adopt service guarantees as part of its overall branding strategy.

  6. Tracking performance and global stability guaranteed neural control of uncertain hypersonic flight vehicle

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tao Teng

    2016-02-01

    Full Text Available In this article, a global adaptive neural dynamic surface control with predefined tracking performance is developed for a class of hypersonic flight vehicles, whose accurate dynamics is hard to obtain. The control scheme developed in this paper overcomes the limitations of neural approximation region by employing a switching mechanism which incorporates an additional robust controller outside the neural approximation region to pull the transient state variables back when they overstep the neural approximation region, such that globally uniformly ultimately bounded stability can be guaranteed. Especially, the developed global adaptive neural control also improves the tracking performance by introducing an error transformation mechanism, such that both transient and steady-state performance can be shaped according to the predefined bounds. Simulation studies on the hypersonic flight vehicle validate that the designed controller has good velocity modulation and velocity stability performance.

  7. CREDIT SYSTEM AND CREDIT GUARANTEE PROGRAMS

    OpenAIRE

    Turgay GECER

    2012-01-01

    Credit system is an integrated architecture consisted of financial information, credit rating, credit risk management, receivables and credit insurance systems, credit derivative markets and credit guarantee programs. The main purpose of the credit system is to provide the functioning of all credit channels and to make it easy to access of credit sources demanded by all of real and legal persons in any economic system. Credit guarantee program, the one of prominent elements of the credit syst...

  8. Waiting time guarantee - an update

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Socha, Karolina; Bech, Mickael

    2008-01-01

    The rule of extended free choice of hospital, in force since 2002, provides patients with an option to choose a private hospital if the public system is unable to provide a treatment within the guaranteed waiting time of one month. In June 2008 the Government declared in their yearly budget agree...

  9. Probabilistic double guarantee kidnapping detection in SLAM.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tian, Yang; Ma, Shugen

    2016-01-01

    For determining whether kidnapping has happened and which type of kidnapping it is while a robot performs autonomous tasks in an unknown environment, a double guarantee kidnapping detection (DGKD) method has been proposed. The good performance of DGKD in a relative small environment is shown. However, a limitation of DGKD is found in a large-scale environment by our recent work. In order to increase the adaptability of DGKD in a large-scale environment, an improved method called probabilistic double guarantee kidnapping detection is proposed in this paper to combine probability of features' positions and the robot's posture. Simulation results demonstrate the validity and accuracy of the proposed method.

  10. Switching Fuzzy Guaranteed Cost Control for Nonlinear Networked Control Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Linqin Cai

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper deals with the problem of guaranteed cost control for a class of nonlinear networked control systems (NCSs with time-varying delay. A guaranteed cost controller design method is proposed to achieve the desired control performance based on the switched T-S fuzzy model. The switching mechanism is introduced to handle the uncertainties of NCSs. Based on Lyapunov functional approach, some sufficient conditions for the existence of state feedback robust guaranteed cost controller are presented. Simulation results show that the proposed method is effective to guarantee system’s global asymptotic stability and quality of service (QoS.

  11. Analysis of Third Party Loan Guarantee and Performance of Non-Prime Household Loans in Microfinance Banks in Kenya

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bernard Ndirangu Wachira

    2017-08-01

    Full Text Available Household loans remain the engine to productivity and economic growth globally. Non-prime household loan is essential, because it enables the borrowers with no collateral to access credit from Microfinance Banks. The survival and sustainability of non-prime household loans globally is therefore significant. Credit risk however remains the main deterrent of the soundness of Microfinance Banks. This leads to the poor performance of microfinance institutions in many economies in the world. Several countries globally are making inroad in reducing the credit risks, which lead to the poor performance of Microfinance Banks. It is still unknown why the credit risk affects the performance of non-prime household loans in the Microfinance Banks domiciled in Kenya. The reason for conducting this study is to determine the level at which the third party loan guarantee and the performance of non-prime household loans relate to the Microfinance Banks in Kenya. Particularly, this study is to determine how the amount secured by guarantee, recoveries from guarantors, percentage of loan secured, and percentage recoveries from guarantors relate to the performance of nonprime household loans in the Microfinance Banks in Kenya. The population was 516 senior management employees of the banks. The researcher conducted a multiple regression analysis for determining the relationship between the amount secured by guarantee—recoveries from guarantors, percentage granted, and percentage recoveries—and the performance of non-prime household loans. The R and R2 were used for determining the strength of the relationship and the coefficient of determination at 0.05 level of significance of variables. The result of this study reveals that there exists a strong relationship between the dependent and independent variables, thereby contradicting the null hypothesis, which states that the relationship does not exist. The percentage of the recoveries from the guarantors over the

  12. Optimal design of uptime-guarantee contracts under IGFR valuations and convex costs

    OpenAIRE

    Hezarkhni, Behzad

    2016-01-01

    An uptime-guarantee contract commits a service provider to maintain the functionality of a customer’s equipment at least for certain fraction of working time during a contracted period. This paper addresses the optimal design of uptime-guarantee contracts for the service provider when the customer’s valuation of a contract with a given guaranteed uptime level has an Increasing Generalized Failure Rate (IGFR) distribution. We first consider the case where the service provider proposes only one...

  13. Robust guaranteed cost tracking control of quadrotor UAV with uncertainties.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Xu, Zhiwei; Nian, Xiaohong; Wang, Haibo; Chen, Yinsheng

    2017-07-01

    In this paper, a robust guaranteed cost controller (RGCC) is proposed for quadrotor UAV system with uncertainties to address set-point tracking problem. A sufficient condition of the existence for RGCC is derived by Lyapunov stability theorem. The designed RGCC not only guarantees the whole closed-loop system asymptotically stable but also makes the quadratic performance level built for the closed-loop system have an upper bound irrespective to all admissible parameter uncertainties. Then, an optimal robust guaranteed cost controller is developed to minimize the upper bound of performance level. Simulation results verify the presented control algorithms possess small overshoot and short setting time, with which the quadrotor has ability to perform set-point tracking task well. Copyright © 2017 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  14. Implementation of a financial guarantee policy at the CNSC

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Barker, R.

    2011-01-01

    The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) was established in 2000 under the Nuclear Safety and Control Act (NSCA) to replace the Atomic Energy Control Board (AECB). Prior to the coming in force of the NSCA, financial guarantees associated with licensed activities were not prescribed in the Atomic Energy Control Act or its regulations. Under the NSCA, the Commission Tribunal 'the Commission' was given authority to impose conditions in licences requiring financial guarantees from licensees. Other provisions of the NSCA provided information on the application of financial guarantees and for refunds when decommissioning obligations had been met. Since 2000, the application of financial guarantees has been primarily focussed on licences issued pursuant to the Class I Nuclear Facilities Regulations and the Uranium Mines and Mills Regulations. This was to assure that the requirements for financial guarantees were initially directed at the high risk, complex facilities licensed by the CNSC. However, all licensees have not yet been required to provide a financial guarantee for all licensed facilities, activities or licence types. Additionally, CNSC expectations in relation to when financial guarantees, associated decommissioning plans and cost estimates need to be reviewed, updated and submitted, and what they should entail have been evolving, indicating a need for a clear CNSC policy on the subject. Consequently, the CNSC is proceeding with the development of a financial guarantee policy and implementation plan to assure that generators of nuclear waste will have the financial resources available to decommission nuclear facilities, operations and devices and that this activity will not fall to government as a future liability. This program will require approval by the Commission, planned for 2012. This paper will further describe this policy and its possible outcomes. (author)

  15. The Banking Counter-Guarantee. Juridical Regime

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Postolache Rada

    2009-06-01

    Full Text Available Not so much studied by the specialised literature, the banking counter-guarantee may beconfounded with the other types of guarantee which frequently go with the guaranteed obligation –simple guarantee, collateral guarantee, the confirmation of the guarantee. The counter-guarantee may bean independent or accessory obligation, as the case may be, exclusively governed by its text, accordingto the parties’ will. At the same time, it is a complex juridical act, a contract whose contents cannot beset apart from the contracts connected form an “economic” point of view. The counter-guarantee is theresult of the banking practice and is generated by the need to make amends for the flaws generated bythe direct guarantee. The present research is focused on the analysis of the banking practice, normativeacts, jurisprudence and banking juridical literature.

  16. Guaranteed cost control of polynomial fuzzy systems via a sum of squares approach.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Tanaka, Kazuo; Ohtake, Hiroshi; Wang, Hua O

    2009-04-01

    This paper presents the guaranteed cost control of polynomial fuzzy systems via a sum of squares (SOS) approach. First, we present a polynomial fuzzy model and controller that are more general representations of the well-known Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) fuzzy model and controller, respectively. Second, we derive a guaranteed cost control design condition based on polynomial Lyapunov functions. Hence, the design approach discussed in this paper is more general than the existing LMI approaches (to T-S fuzzy control system designs) based on quadratic Lyapunov functions. The design condition realizes a guaranteed cost control by minimizing the upper bound of a given performance function. In addition, the design condition in the proposed approach can be represented in terms of SOS and is numerically (partially symbolically) solved via the recent developed SOSTOOLS. To illustrate the validity of the design approach, two design examples are provided. The first example deals with a complicated nonlinear system. The second example presents micro helicopter control. Both the examples show that our approach provides more extensive design results for the existing LMI approach.

  17. Legal Status of Credit Bank Guarantee in Indonesia’s Legal Guarantee

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Erma Defiana Putriyanti

    2017-07-01

    Full Text Available The aim of this research is to analyze  about the legal status of the letter hiring as collateral for bank loans in the Indonesian security law. The method of this research is a normative juridical. The results of this research indicate that the decree hiring is not included in the objects that can be bound by pledge, fiduciary, and mortgage then hiring decree hiring is not included in the personal guarantee and corporate guarantee. Although the hiring decree is issued by a legitimate institution, the institution is not bound by an agreement between the debtor debts with the bank but when the decree was used as security for the bank. Hiring letter is not also included in the general collateral. Decree hiring is not an object and does not qualify as material that can be used as general collateral. The conclusion of this research is that the position of the decree hiring as collateral for bank loans is a new form of guarantee which is not included in the general guarantees and the specific ones. This shows that the system of legal guarantees in Indonesia is not pure anymore embrace a closed system, but has started shifting into an open system.

  18. 78 FR 79253 - CCC Export Credit Guarantee (GSM-102) Program and Facility Guarantee Program (FGP)

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-12-27

    ... been worked out in advance of the exporter's application for the payment guarantee. Foreign Financial... country of domicile must provide financial statements in accordance with prevailing accounting standards... smaller U.S. exporters. Changes are also intended to improve CCC's financial management of the program...

  19. BANK GUARANTEES

    OpenAIRE

    Vasile NEME

    2012-01-01

    The present study propose the analyse of the irrevocable commitment of a bank entity towards a determined person, through which guarantees a certain legal conduct of its client, and, in case of breach, assumes the payment obligation of a determined amount of money. This kind of legal technique it is called bank guarantee and in the usual business language it is called “Letter of Bank Guarantee”. The determined reason to choose this scientific initiative it is the frequency of this kind of fin...

  20. Guaranteed cost control of time-delay chaotic systems

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Park, Ju H.; Kwon, O.M.

    2006-01-01

    This article studies a guaranteed cost control problem for a class of time-delay chaotic systems. Attention is focused on the design of memory state feedback controllers such that the resulting closed-loop system is asymptotically stable and an adequate level of performance is also guaranteed. Using the Lyapunov method and LMI (linear matrix inequality) framework, two criteria for the existence of the controller are derived in terms of LMIs. A numerical example is given to illustrate the proposed method

  1. Mahanaxar: quality of service guarantees in high-bandwidth, real-time streaming data storage

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Bigelow, David [Los Alamos National Laboratory; Bent, John [Los Alamos National Laboratory; Chen, Hsing-Bung [Los Alamos National Laboratory; Brandt, Scott [UCSC

    2010-04-05

    Large radio telescopes, cyber-security systems monitoring real-time network traffic, and others have specialized data storage needs: guaranteed capture of an ultra-high-bandwidth data stream, retention of the data long enough to determine what is 'interesting,' retention of interesting data indefinitely, and concurrent read/write access to determine what data is interesting, without interrupting the ongoing capture of incoming data. Mahanaxar addresses this problem. Mahanaxar guarantees streaming real-time data capture at (nearly) the full rate of the raw device, allows concurrent read and write access to the device on a best-effort basis without interrupting the data capture, and retains data as long as possible given the available storage. It has built in mechanisms for reliability and indexing, can scale to meet arbitrary bandwidth requirements, and handles both small and large data elements equally well. Results from our prototype implementation shows that Mahanaxar provides both better guarantees and better performance than traditional file systems.

  2. 12 CFR 370.6 - Assessments under the Debt Guarantee Program.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... OF GENERAL POLICY TEMPORARY LIQUIDITY GUARANTEE PROGRAM § 370.6 Assessments under the Debt Guarantee... participating entity shall ensure that funds in an amount at least equal to the amount of the assessment are... institution shall provide the necessary funds for payment of its assessments. (3) Failure to take all...

  3. PRICING AND ASSESSING UNIT-LINKED INSURANCE CONTRACTS WITH INVESTMENT GUARANTEES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ciumas Cristina

    2014-07-01

    Full Text Available One of the most interesting life insurance products to have emerged in recent years in the Romanian insurance market has been the unit-linked contract. Unit-linked insurance products are life insurance policies with investment component. A unit-linked life insurance has two important components: protection and investment. The protection component refers to the insured sum in case of the occurrence of insured risks and the investment component refers to the policyholders’ account that represents the present value of the units from the chosen investment funds. Due to the financial instability caused by the Global Crisis and the amplification of market competitiveness, insurers from international markets have started to incorporate guarantees in unit-linked products. So a unit- linked life insurance policy with an asset value guarantee is an insurance policy whose benefit payable on death or at maturity consists of the greater of some guaranteed amount and the value of the units from the investment funds. One of the most challenging issues concerns the pricing of minimum death benefit and maturity benefit guarantees and the establishing of proper reserves for these guarantees. Insurers granting guarantees of this type must estimate the cost and include the cost in the premium. An important component of the activity carried out by the insurance companies is the investment of the premiums paid by policyholders in various types of assets, in order to obtain higher yields than those guaranteed by the insurance contracts, while providing the necessary liquidity for the payment of insurance claims in case of occurrence of the assumed risks. So the guaranteed benefits can be broadly matched or immunized with various types of financial assets, especially with fixed-interest instruments. According to Romanian legislation which regulates the unit-linked life insurance market, unit-linked life insurance contracts pass most of the investment risk to the

  4. 27 CFR 6.61 - Guaranteeing loans.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... OF THE TREASURY LIQUORS âTIED-HOUSEâ Unlawful Inducements Guaranteeing Loans § 6.61 Guaranteeing loans. The act by an industry member of guaranteeing any loan or the repayment of any financial...

  5. 7 CFR 1720.9 - Guarantee Agreement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... bonds. (b) The guaranteed bonds shall refer to the guarantee agreement as controlling the terms of the... the holder of the guaranteed bonds; (11) Claim procedures; (12) What constitutes a failure by the...

  6. Financial guarantee for decommissioning and nuclear waste management activities at OPG

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Van den Hengel, J.

    2006-01-01

    This paper provides an overview on the establishment and maintenance of a financial guarantee for decommissioning and nuclear waste management activities at Ontario Power Generation (OPG) in accordance with CNSC requirements. The process and timelines are documented leading to the establishment of the guarantee effective July 31, 2003. Reference plans, cost estimates, funding mechanisms and reporting mechanisms are summarized. The renewal process projected at the end of the 5-year initial financial guarantee period is also included. (author)

  7. Guaranteed Cost Finite-Time Control of Discrete-Time Positive Impulsive Switched Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Leipo Liu

    2018-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper considers the guaranteed cost finite-time boundedness of discrete-time positive impulsive switched systems. Firstly, the definition of guaranteed cost finite-time boundedness is introduced. By using the multiple linear copositive Lyapunov function (MLCLF and average dwell time (ADT approach, a state feedback controller is designed and sufficient conditions are obtained to guarantee that the corresponding closed-loop system is guaranteed cost finite-time boundedness (GCFTB. Such conditions can be solved by linear programming. Finally, a numerical example is provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed method.

  8. Certain aspects of the accounting of the bank guarantee at the principal and the beneficiary

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    L. A. Zimakova

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available For any kind of business such category as risks is peculiar. The research of this category was conducted by scientists from the different sides, certain approaches of protection against risks were developed and instruments of decrease in financial risks are offered. The bank guarantee is one of the most demanded instruments of additional financial protection today. Its active using of the commercial organizations courses questions of the organization of the detailed accounting of guarantees at the principal and the beneficiary. A little concerning the historical aspect of the bank guarantee, authors provided the overview of the determinations of "bank guarantee" characterizing it as the banking service providing distribution of responsibility between the guarantor and the principal under certain conditions. Having considered the essence of the legal nature and features of the bank guarantee recommendations about the organization of the disaggregated financial accounting on off-balance accounts were developed. In particular, need of allocation of a currency type as the directions of conducting the analytics providing correctness of reflection of cost criterion is proved. For the purpose of control of timeliness of carrying out calculations it is recommended to allocate guarantees: coincident and in coincident with primary obligation; short-term and long-term. From the point of view of nature of guarantees payment guarantees and guarantees of obligation fulfilment were allocated. These recommendations concern the beneficiary, and lack of accounting entries at a principal generates need of creation of additional registers and analytical reports which forms were offered by authors. The provided recommendations will allow obtaining transparent information on bank guarantees for the purpose of its full disclosure in the financial reporting.

  9. Do Job Security Guarantees Work?

    OpenAIRE

    Alex Bryson; Lorenzo Cappellari; Claudio Lucifora

    2004-01-01

    We investigate the effect of employer job security guarantees on employee perceptions of job security. Using linked employer-employee data from the 1998 British Workplace Employee Relations Survey, we find job security guarantees reduce employee perceptions of job insecurity. This finding is robust to endogenous selection of job security guarantees by employers engaging in organisational change and workforce reductions. Furthermore, there is no evidence that increased job security through job...

  10. ACCESS TO FINANCE FOR SMEs BY CREDIT GUARANTEE SCHEMES IN TURKEY

    OpenAIRE

    Sarigul, Hasmet

    2013-01-01

    Credit guarantee schemes assist banks in lending to SMEs by overcoming collateral problems. The guarantees are used to share the risk between the bank and the guarantee institution in an agreed ratio. Thus, the bank’s risk and operation costs are lowered and its returns increased. This encourages banks to lend to SMEs who are unable to provide adequate collateral. In our study, we investigate the relationship between SMEs, banks and CGSs. We also aimed to explain the functioning of CGSs...

  11. 29 CFR 4022.3 - Guaranteed benefits.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... 29 Labor 9 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Guaranteed benefits. 4022.3 Section 4022.3 Labor Regulations Relating to Labor (Continued) PENSION BENEFIT GUARANTY CORPORATION COVERAGE AND BENEFITS BENEFITS PAYABLE IN TERMINATED SINGLE-EMPLOYER PLANS General Provisions; Guaranteed Benefits § 4022.3 Guaranteed...

  12. GRS - Guarantee of results for grid-connected solar photovoltaic systems; GRS - Garantierte Resultate von Solarstromanlagen

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Meier, Ch.; Frei, R.

    2001-07-01

    This final report for the Swiss Federal Office of Energy describes the development of a performance guarantee for the power delivered by grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) power plant. This is important for investors, who need to be able to calculate the price of the energy produced by the PV plant. The report examines the results of various case studies and experience gained with GRS contracts developed in different countries including Switzerland, the Netherlands, France and Germany. The problems encountered, which provided feedback for the further development of the contract presented in the report, are discussed. The model contract, which proposes a framework which provides many possible variations and adaptations, is presented in detail. Various problem areas such as guaranteed energy yield, meteorological references, correction methods, failure detection, dispute settlement and many other points are covered.

  13. 20 CFR 404.230 - Guaranteed alternative.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... 20 Employees' Benefits 2 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Guaranteed alternative. 404.230 Section 404... INSURANCE (1950- ) Computing Primary Insurance Amounts Guaranteed Alternative for People Reaching Age 62 After 1978 But Before 1984 § 404.230 Guaranteed alternative. (a) General. If you reach age 62 after 1978...

  14. Cooperative Cloud Service Aware Mobile Internet Coverage Connectivity Guarantee Protocol Based on Sensor Opportunistic Coverage Mechanism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Qin Qin

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available In order to improve the Internet coverage ratio and provide connectivity guarantee, based on sensor opportunistic coverage mechanism and cooperative cloud service, we proposed the coverage connectivity guarantee protocol for mobile Internet. In this scheme, based on the opportunistic covering rules, the network coverage algorithm of high reliability and real-time security was achieved by using the opportunity of sensor nodes and the Internet mobile node. Then, the cloud service business support platform is created based on the Internet application service management capabilities and wireless sensor network communication service capabilities, which is the architecture of the cloud support layer. The cooperative cloud service aware model was proposed. Finally, we proposed the mobile Internet coverage connectivity guarantee protocol. The results of experiments demonstrate that the proposed algorithm has excellent performance, in terms of the security of the Internet and the stability, as well as coverage connectivity ability.

  15. Learning from label proportions in brain-computer interfaces: Online unsupervised learning with guarantees

    Science.gov (United States)

    Verhoeven, Thibault; Schmid, Konstantin; Müller, Klaus-Robert; Tangermann, Michael; Kindermans, Pieter-Jan

    2017-01-01

    Objective Using traditional approaches, a brain-computer interface (BCI) requires the collection of calibration data for new subjects prior to online use. Calibration time can be reduced or eliminated e.g., by subject-to-subject transfer of a pre-trained classifier or unsupervised adaptive classification methods which learn from scratch and adapt over time. While such heuristics work well in practice, none of them can provide theoretical guarantees. Our objective is to modify an event-related potential (ERP) paradigm to work in unison with the machine learning decoder, and thus to achieve a reliable unsupervised calibrationless decoding with a guarantee to recover the true class means. Method We introduce learning from label proportions (LLP) to the BCI community as a new unsupervised, and easy-to-implement classification approach for ERP-based BCIs. The LLP estimates the mean target and non-target responses based on known proportions of these two classes in different groups of the data. We present a visual ERP speller to meet the requirements of LLP. For evaluation, we ran simulations on artificially created data sets and conducted an online BCI study with 13 subjects performing a copy-spelling task. Results Theoretical considerations show that LLP is guaranteed to minimize the loss function similar to a corresponding supervised classifier. LLP performed well in simulations and in the online application, where 84.5% of characters were spelled correctly on average without prior calibration. Significance The continuously adapting LLP classifier is the first unsupervised decoder for ERP BCIs guaranteed to find the optimal decoder. This makes it an ideal solution to avoid tedious calibration sessions. Additionally, LLP works on complementary principles compared to existing unsupervised methods, opening the door for their further enhancement when combined with LLP. PMID:28407016

  16. Building Trust in a Guarantee Fund in a Challenging Institutional Environment

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Luciano Quinto Lanz

    2017-09-01

    Full Text Available Difficult access to credit is a major obstacle to micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs survival, especially in emerging countries, affecting their competitiveness. Lack of guarantees is a main reason why banks do not lend to MSMEs. Guarantee schemes provide partial credit guarantees, but often fail to win trust of banks and enterprises. This study analyzes the process of building trust between the Fundo Garantidor para Investimentos (Investment Guarantee Fund, FGI, created in 2009, and banks in Brazil. This trust was hampered by the failure of public guarantee funds created in the 1990’s. This created a challenging institutional environment to the new fund. The methodology employed was a case study, based on a qualitative approach with document analysis, semi-structured interviews and descriptive statistics. The analysis used models for building and repairing trust in inter-organizational relations and international benchmark for governance and effectiveness of guarantee schemes. The analysis showed that the FGI used other emerging countries and developed countries experience to construct adequate governance and succeeded in establishing trust with the banks. The results show that by 2017, 26 banks contract more than 32,000 operations worth 1.9 billion dollars, with additionalities comparable to the international benchmark.

  17. IMPROVING THE PROVISION OF STATE GUARANTEES UNDER CREDITS OR BONDED LOANS RAISED FOR INVESTMENT PROJECTS IMPLEMENTATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lola D. Sanginova

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Importance: Under current conditions, the Russian economy needs investment resources to ensure sustainable social and economic development. One of instruments of state-financing backing that can be used to support capital intensive, economically viable, financially and socially efficient investment projects that create "growing points" are state guarantees of theRussian Federation.Objective: The objective of this study is to identify possible ways to improve the requirements and procedures of providing state guarantees of theRussian Federationwhich contribute to the increase in the quantity and quality of investment projects of high social importance. Methods: Through the use of general scientific methods, analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction the possibility of creating a more attractive environment for principals is analyzed, measures to reduce the risk for public legal entities in providing state guarantees of theRussian Federationunder credits or bonded loans raised for investment projects implementation.Results: Principles of state guarantee support that ensure the interests of both the principals and the guarantor are defined. The basic directions for improving the mechanism how state guarantees of theRussian Federationsupport investment projects are justified. These directions include increasing availability of obtaining state guarantee support by lowering the cost of investment projects for which the state guarantees may be provided; reducing time of decision making on granting a state guarantee; increasing the creditors’ responsibility for a qualitative assessment of the creditworthiness of principals and investment projects; changing the methodology for assessing the social efficiency of investment projects; increasing the information transparency of provided state guarantees of the Russian Federation.Conclusions: The main result of this study is that under current conditions of economic turbulence state guarantees of the

  18. Guarantees come to professional service firms.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hart, C W; Schlesinger, L A; Maher, D

    1992-01-01

    Can lawyers, doctors, investment bankers, accountants, and consultants guarantee their work? Your money back if not absolutely delighted? Some professional service firms are doing exactly that, and they believe they are gaining not only satisfied customers but higher market share and improved service quality. The authors discuss the benefits and risks of unconditional and more limited guarantees. Firms that address this issue proactively now, they argue, will be less likely to rush into poorly considered guarantees later.

  19. 75 FR 4707 - Continuous Construction-Permanent Loan Guarantees Under the Section 538 Guaranteed Rural Rental...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-29

    ... permanent financing phase of a project. In addition to the proposed form of guarantee, the Agency will... financing phase of the project. This third form of guarantee is being proposed in response to input from... requests. * * * * * Lease-up period. The period of time that begins when the first unit in the project...

  20. Modeling Message Queueing Services with Reliability Guarantee in Cloud Computing Environment Using Colored Petri Nets

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jing Li

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available Motivated by the need for loosely coupled and asynchronous dissemination of information, message queues are widely used in large-scale application areas. With the advent of virtualization technology, cloud-based message queueing services (CMQSs with distributed computing and storage are widely adopted to improve availability, scalability, and reliability; however, a critical issue is its performance and the quality of service (QoS. While numerous approaches evaluating system performance are available, there is no modeling approach for estimating and analyzing the performance of CMQSs. In this paper, we employ both the analytical and simulation modeling to address the performance of CMQSs with reliability guarantee. We present a visibility-based modeling approach (VMA for simulation model using colored Petri nets (CPN. Our model incorporates the important features of message queueing services in the cloud such as replication, message consistency, resource virtualization, and especially the mechanism named visibility timeout which is adopted in the services to guarantee system reliability. Finally, we evaluate our model through different experiments under varied scenarios to obtain important performance metrics such as total message delivery time, waiting number, and components utilization. Our results reveal considerable insights into resource scheduling and system configuration for service providers to estimate and gain performance optimization.

  1. Do not pay for a Danish interest guarantee. The law of the triple blow

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Guillén, Montserrat; Konicz, Agnieszka Karolina; Perch Nielsen, Jens

    2013-01-01

    We have investigated the performance of pension schemes of with-profit policies containing a guaranteed minimum rate of return and we have found that the price of the guarantee measured in terms of lost returns is enormous. We use simple simulations rather than complex pricing methods to illustrate...... that the price of an interest guarantee is high in pension products that are currently commercialised in the market. We have found that the customer loses up to about 0.75% yearly in the rate of return when an interest guarantee is purchased, compared to the return of an equivalent saving strategy with the same...... risk at the level 95%. This can explain why such arrangements are not widely popular. Our approach can be used to inform clients, who are not experts in modern financial models, the impact of paying for an interest guarantee....

  2. A Best Practice for Developing Availability Guarantee Language in Photovoltaic (PV) O&M Agreements.

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Klise, Geoffrey Taylor [Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States); Balfour, John [High Performance PV, Phoenix, AZ (United States)

    2015-11-01

    This document outlines the foundation for developing language that can be utilized in an Equipment Availability Guarantee, typically included in an O&M services agreement between a PV system or plant owner and an O&M services provider, or operator. Many of the current PV O&M service agreement Availability Guarantees are based on contracts used for traditional power generation, which create challenges for owners and operators due to the variable nature of grid-tied photovoltaic generating technologies. This report documents language used in early PV availability guarantees and presents best practices and equations that can be used to more openly communicate how the reliability of the PV system and plant equipment can be expressed in an availability guarantee. This work will improve the bankability of PV systems by providing greater transparency into the equipment reliability state to all parties involved in an O&M services contract.

  3. 29 CFR 541.604 - Minimum guarantee plus extras.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... DEFINING AND DELIMITING THE EXEMPTIONS FOR EXECUTIVE, ADMINISTRATIVE, PROFESSIONAL, COMPUTER AND OUTSIDE SALES EMPLOYEES Salary Requirements § 541.604 Minimum guarantee plus extras. (a) An employer may provide... commission on sales. An exempt employee also may receive a percentage of the sales or profits of the employer...

  4. Communication Framework for Tele-rehabilitation Systems with QoS Guarantee

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dandanov Nikolay

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available Nowadays, there is great interest in developing telemedicine technologies. These technologies will provide health care from distance swiftly and lightly, as well as reduce the expenses for activities, such as rehabilitation. Telemedicine applications are possible due to the advances in information technologies and the ever-expanding communication network infrastructure. The network characteristics bandwidth, packet loss, latency, jitter and policies are crucial for the performance of tele-rehabilitation systems. Because in tele-rehabilitation human lives are at stake, guaranteeing the Quality of Service (QoS is important. In this paper, an approach for assuring the QoS for information transmission in tele-rehabilitation systems is proposed.

  5. 78 FR 63158 - Information Collection; Guaranteed Farm Loan Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-10-23

    ... DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE Farm Service Agency Information Collection; Guaranteed Farm Loan Program... collection associated with the Guaranteed Farm Loan Program. The amended estimate adds the merger of the information collection for the Land Contract Guarantee Program (0560-0279) into the Guaranteed Farm Loan...

  6. The pricing of bank debt guarantees

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Arping, S.

    2009-01-01

    We analyze the optimal pricing of government-sponsored bank debt guarantees within the context of an asset substitution framework. We show that the desirability of fair pricing of guarantees depends on the degree of transparency of the banking sector: in relatively opaque banking systems, fair

  7. 22 CFR 231.04 - Guarantee eligibility.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Guarantee eligibility. 231.04 Section 231.04 Foreign Relations AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT ARAB REPUBLIC OF EGYPT LOAN GUARANTEES ISSUED UNDER THE EMERGENCY WARTIME SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT OF 2003, PUBLIC LAW 108-11-STANDARD TERMS AND...

  8. 22 CFR 231.03 - The Guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false The Guarantee. 231.03 Section 231.03 Foreign Relations AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT ARAB REPUBLIC OF EGYPT LOAN GUARANTEES ISSUED UNDER THE EMERGENCY WARTIME SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT OF 2003, PUBLIC LAW 108-11-STANDARD TERMS AND CONDITIONS...

  9. 19 CFR 351.506 - Loan guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... Duties INTERNATIONAL TRADE ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE ANTIDUMPING AND COUNTERVAILING DUTIES Identification and Measurement of Countervailable Subsidies § 351.506 Loan guarantees. (a) Benefit—(1) In general. In the case of a loan guarantee, a benefit exists to the extent that the total amount a firm pays for...

  10. 77 FR 58991 - State-Level Guarantee Fee Pricing

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-09-25

    ... FEDERAL HOUSING FINANCE AGENCY [No. 2012-N-13] State-Level Guarantee Fee Pricing AGENCY: Federal... guarantee fee pricing by state. FHFA's proposal described here would adjust the upfront fees that the... final state-level guarantee fee pricing method, FHFA expects to direct the Enterprises to implement the...

  11. 13 CFR 107.1720 - Characteristics of SBA's guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Characteristics of SBA's guarantee. 107.1720 Section 107.1720 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION SMALL BUSINESS... Characteristics of SBA's guarantee. If SBA agrees to guarantee a Licensee's Debentures or Participating Securities...

  12. 7 CFR 1980.488 - Guaranteed industrial development bond issues.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... industrial plants for lease to private businesses engaged in industrial manufacturing and does not provide... 7 Agriculture 14 2010-01-01 2009-01-01 true Guaranteed industrial development bond issues. 1980..., DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE (CONTINUED) PROGRAM REGULATIONS (CONTINUED) GENERAL Business and Industrial Loan...

  13. REGIONAL RECIPROCAL GUARANTEE SOCIETIES IN VENEZUELA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Orlando J. Canelones

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available This research aims to describe the operation of services offered by the Regional Mutual Guarantee Societies (SGRs in Venezuela, and to present synthetically, the rudiments for constitution, as well as the legal basis that must rule them, through conducting an executive summary of the Law of the National System of Reciprocal Guarantees for Small and Medium Business and the Promotion, Constitution and Functioning Rules of National Mutual Funds and Guarantees and SGRs.  The methodology used in this research is documentary, through a literature review and exploration that allowed inferences about the importance of Regional SGRs in Venezuela, as financing alternative

  14. GUARANTEES OF THE RIGHT TO A FAIR CIVIL TRIAL

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Diana-Loredana Jalbă

    2015-11-01

    Full Text Available In order to ensure the effective protection of human rights and provide for more than theoretical and illusory substantive rights, the need to define the right to a fair trial is emerging, along with the necessity that litigants become aware of the guarantees established by article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Thus, the article aims to approach the ample issue regarding the litigants’ right to a fair civil trial in light of current legal regulations, and in particular, in light of the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights. Given the fact that the right to a fair civil trial involves establishing, throughout the trial, a set of rules of procedure aimed at creating a balance between the parties in the process - the so-called guarantees of a fair trial - in her scientific pursuits, the author analyzes both explicit and implicit guarantees of fair trial, highlighting relevant European standards as well as their degree of implementation in the national (procedural law.

  15. Minimum Price Guarantees In a Consumer Search Model

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    M.C.W. Janssen (Maarten); A. Parakhonyak (Alexei)

    2009-01-01

    textabstractThis paper is the first to examine the effect of minimum price guarantees in a sequential search model. Minimum price guarantees are not advertised and only known to consumers when they come to the shop. We show that in such an environment, minimum price guarantees increase the value of

  16. A Router Architecture for Connection-Oriented Service Guarantees in the MANGO Clockless Network-on-Chip

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bjerregaard, Tobias; Sparsø, Jens

    2005-01-01

    On-chip networks for future system-on-chip designs need simple, high performance implementations. In order to promote system-level integrity, guaranteed services (GS) need to be provided. We propose a network-on-chip (NoC) router architecture to support this, and demonstrate with a CMOS standard...... cell design. Our implementation is based on clockless circuit techniques, and thus inherently supports a modular, GALS-oriented design flow. Our router exploits virtual channels to provide connection-oriented GS, as well as connection-less best-effort (BE) routing. The architecture is highly flexible...

  17. Status of assessment tools on the performance guarantee contents of backfill, bulkhead, tunnel and pit

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kawakami, Susumu; Fujita, Tomoo; Yui, Mikazu

    2006-03-01

    In order to contribute to the safety standards and guidelines which a regulator will decide, a state-of-the-art assessment method is investigated and summarized in tables about performance guarantee contents of backfill, bulkhead, tunnel (access, main, connecting, disposal) and disposal pit. In addition, examples of assessment tools are described. In this report, summary of (1) basic properties of bentonite, including swelling, mechanical and hydraulic properties, (2) long-term behavior of bentonite, including extrusion/erosion into host rock, and alteration, (3) effect of high pH plume from cementitious material and (4) mechanical stability of the near-field is described. Check points, assessment methods for (based on the data obtained from the experimental results, the estimation value obtained from empirical equations and database, and the modeling calculations) and latest results of these R and D programs were also summarized. (author)

  18. Modelling the guaranteed QoS for wireless sensor networks: a network calculus approach

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yu Jianping

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Wireless sensor networks (WSNs became one of the high technology domains during the last 10 years. Real-time applications for them make it necessary to provide the guaranteed quality of service (QoS. The main contributions of this article are a system skeleton and a guaranteed QoS model that are suitable for the WSNs. To do it, we develop a sensor node model based on virtual buffer sharing and present a two-layer scheduling model using the network calculus. With the system skeleton, we develop a guaranteed QoS model, such as the upper bounds on buffer queue length/delay/effective bandwidth, and single-hop/multi-hops delay/jitter/effective bandwidth. Numerical results show the system skeleton and the guaranteed QoS model are scalable for different types of flows, including the self-similar traffic flows, and the parameters of flow regulators and service curves of sensor nodes affect them. Our proposal leads to buffer dimensioning, guaranteed QoS support and control in the WSNs.

  19. Pricing unit-linked insurance with guaranteed benefit

    Science.gov (United States)

    Iqbal, M.; Novkaniza, F.; Novita, M.

    2017-07-01

    Unit-linked insurance is an investment-linked insurance, that is, the given benefit is the premium investment out-come. Recently, the most widely marketed insurance in the industry is unit-linked insurance with guaranteed benefit. With guaranteed benefit applied, the insurance benefits form is similar to the payoff form of European call option. Thereby, pricing European call option is involved in pricing unit-linked insurance with guaranteed benefit. The dynamics of investment outcome is assumed to follow stochastic interest rate. Hence, change of measure methods is used in pricing unit-linked insurance. The discount factor with stochastic interest rate needs to be modified as well to be zero coupon bond price. Eventually, the insurance premium is calculated by equivalence principle with guaranteed benefit and insurance period explicitly given.

  20. NCA & Credit Guarantees

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    stooppn

    purposes of the National Credit Act; what the definition of a credit guarantee set out ...... Scholtz et al National Credit Act in para 8.2.4; Scott et al Law of Commerce ..... Eitelberg E "Autonomy of Documentary Credit Undertakings in South African.

  1. Incentive-compatible guaranteed renewable health insurance premiums.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Herring, Bradley; Pauly, Mark V

    2006-05-01

    Theoretical models of guaranteed renewable insurance display front-loaded premium schedules. Such schedules both cover lifetime total claims of low-risk and high-risk individuals and provide an incentive for those who remain low-risk to continue to purchase the policy. Questions have been raised of whether actual individual insurance markets in the US approximate the behavior predicted by these models, both because young consumers may not be able to "afford" front-loading and because insurers may behave strategically in ways that erode the value of protection against risk reclassification. In this paper, the optimal competitive age-based premium schedule for a benchmark guaranteed renewable health insurance policy is estimated using medical expenditure data. Several factors are shown to reduce the amount of front-loading necessary. Indeed, the resulting optimal premium path increases with age. Actual premium paths exhibited by purchasers of individual insurance are close to the optimal renewable schedule we estimate. Finally, consumer utility associated with the feature is examined.

  2. Financial Management: Emergency Steel Loan Guarantee Program

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    2001-01-01

    In a February 1, 2001 letter, you expressed concerns about repayments of federally guaranteed loans by borrowers under the Emergency Steel Loan Guarantee Program and the effect of the program on the U.S. steel industry...

  3. QoS-Guaranteed Admission Control for OFDMA-based Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Ramkumar, Venkata; Anggorojati, Bayu; Lucian, Stefan P. Andrei

    2010-01-01

    This paper proposes a novel admission control (AC) algorithm for guaranteed quality of service (QoS) to all users. The proposed solution provides better utilization of system capacity using adaptive modulation (AM). A scheduler based on a per user priority function is also given in this paper. Th...

  4. 78 FR 48135 - Information Collection; Guaranteed Farm Loan Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-08-07

    ... Information Collection; Guaranteed Farm Loan Program AGENCY: Farm Service Agency, USDA. ACTION: Notice... revision of a currently approved information collection associated with the Guaranteed Farm Loan Program. This information collection is used to make and service loans guaranteed by FSA to eligible farmers and...

  5. Financial guarantees and public debt in South Africa

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ogutu Miruka

    2015-09-01

    Full Text Available A few years since the worst of the Euro sovereign debt crisis, many nations, from Cyprus to Ireland, including South Africa are re-visiting their public debt management to avert or lessen the impact of similar such happenings in the future. There are a number of studies on risk assessments of fiscal sustainability; however, few focus on contingent liabilities and even fewer on financial guarantees. In South Africa, financial guarantees have consistently comprised just above or below 50% of all contingent liabilities since the early days of majoritarian rule. In lieu of this, the paper analyses the risks posed by financial guarantees to fiscal sustainability in South Africa. We estimate the effect of financial guarantees on public debt in South Africa via the Engle Granger and causality model with quarterly time series data obtained from the South African Reserve Bank (SARB as well as the National Treasury. The data covers the April 1997 to December 2011 period. All econometric methods were executed using the statistical software package E-Views 7. We found that no long run relationship exists between national net loan debt and financial guarantees in South Africa. The pass rate of financial guarantees significantly affects its present value. The pass rate of financial guarantees has a predicting ability in determining the present value of national net loan debt. These findings may be contrary to what would be expected in the case of South Africa considering that the country is managing the issuance of financial guarantees prudently and that at present levels, there is no need for a radical policy shift. The study therefore offers a lesson to similar merging economies on the good governance of contingent liabilities.

  6. Security Guarantees and Nuclear Non-Proliferation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bruno Tertrais

    2011-01-01

    The purpose of this paper is to discuss the value of 'security guarantees', that is, positive security assurances that include a formal or informal defense commitment, in preventing nuclear proliferation. It demonstrates that such guarantees have proven to be a very effective instrument in preventing States from going nuclear. It would thus seem logical to reinforce or extend them. However, this path is fraught with obstacles and dilemmas

  7. Security Guarantees and Nuclear Non-Proliferation

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Bruno Tertrais

    2011-07-01

    The purpose of this paper is to discuss the value of 'security guarantees', that is, positive security assurances that include a formal or informal defense commitment, in preventing nuclear proliferation. It demonstrates that such guarantees have proven to be a very effective instrument in preventing States from going nuclear. It would thus seem logical to reinforce or extend them. However, this path is fraught with obstacles and dilemmas

  8. Implementation of Guaranteed Services in the MANGO Clockless Network-on-Chip

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bjerregaard, Tobias; Sparsø, Jens

    2006-01-01

    (clockless implementation, standard socket access points, and guaranteed communication services) make MANGO suitable for a modular SoC design flow is explained. Among the advantages of using clockless circuit techniques are inherent global timing closure, low forward latency in pipelines, and zero dynamic......Shared, segmented, on-chip interconnection networks, known as networks-on-chip (NoC), may become the preferred way of interconnecting intellectual property (IP) cores in future giga-scale system-on-chip (SoC) designs. A NoC can provide the required communication bandwidth while accommodating...... the effects of scaling microchip technologies. Equally important, a NoC facilitates a truly modular and scalable design flow. The MANGO (message-passing asynchronous network-on-chip providing guaranteed services over open core protocol (OCP) interfaces) NoC is presented, and how its key characteristics...

  9. Guaranteed convergence of the Hough transform

    Science.gov (United States)

    Soffer, Menashe; Kiryati, Nahum

    1995-01-01

    The straight-line Hough Transform using normal parameterization with a continuous voting kernel is considered. It transforms the colinearity detection problem to a problem of finding the global maximum of a two dimensional function above a domain in the parameter space. The principle is similar to robust regression using fixed scale M-estimation. Unlike standard M-estimation procedures the Hough Transform does not rely on a good initial estimate of the line parameters: The global optimization problem is approached by exhaustive search on a grid that is usually as fine as computationally feasible. The global maximum of a general function above a bounded domain cannot be found by a finite number of function evaluations. Only if sufficient a-priori knowledge about the smoothness of the objective function is available, convergence to the global maximum can be guaranteed. The extraction of a-priori information and its efficient use are the main challenges in real global optimization problems. The global optimization problem in the Hough Transform is essentially how fine should the parameter space quantization be in order not to miss the true maximum. More than thirty years after Hough patented the basic algorithm, the problem is still essentially open. In this paper an attempt is made to identify a-priori information on the smoothness of the objective (Hough) function and to introduce sufficient conditions for the convergence of the Hough Transform to the global maximum. An image model with several application dependent parameters is defined. Edge point location errors as well as background noise are accounted for. Minimal parameter space quantization intervals that guarantee convergence are obtained. Focusing policies for multi-resolution Hough algorithms are developed. Theoretical support for bottom- up processing is provided. Due to the randomness of errors and noise, convergence guarantees are probabilistic.

  10. Facilitating working mothers' ability to breastfeed: global trends in guaranteeing breastfeeding breaks at work, 1995-2014.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Atabay, Efe; Moreno, Gonzalo; Nandi, Arijit; Kranz, Gabriella; Vincent, Ilona; Assi, Tina-Marie; Winfrey, Elise Marie Vaughan; Earle, Alison; Raub, Amy; Heymann, S Jody

    2015-02-01

    Mothers who work away from home tend to stop breastfeeding earlier than their nonworking counterparts due to workplace barriers. Barriers to breastfeeding discriminate against women and may lead to inequities in children's health outcomes. Guaranteeing paid breastfeeding breaks at work is 1 mechanism that can improve mothers' opportunity to breastfeed in the workplace. This study aimed to assess the trends in the share of countries guaranteeing breastfeeding breaks in the workplace and paid maternal leave that lasts until the infant is 6 months old (the World Health Organization recommended duration for exclusive breastfeeding), between 1995 and 2014. Legislation and secondary source data were collected and reviewed for 193 United Nations member states. Legislation was analyzed for content on breastfeeding breaks and maternal leave guarantees. Fifty-one countries (26.7%) in 2014 did not guarantee breastfeeding breaks in any form and 4 countries provided only unpaid breaks or breaks that did not cover the first 6 months of life; since 1995, around 15 countries (10.2%) legislated for such a policy. In 2014, out of 55 countries that did not guarantee paid breastfeeding breaks for the first 6 months after birth, 7 countries guaranteed paid maternal leave for the same duration; 48 countries (25.1%) provided neither paid maternal leave nor paid breastfeeding breaks. Progress in the number of countries guaranteeing breastfeeding breaks at work is modest. Adopting measures to facilitate breastfeeding at work can be a critical opportunity for countries to increase breastfeeding rates among the growing number of women in the labor force. © The Author(s) 2014.

  11. 42 CFR 417.937 - Loan and loan guarantee provisions.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... 42 Public Health 3 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Loan and loan guarantee provisions. 417.937 Section... HEALTH CARE PREPAYMENT PLANS Administration of Outstanding Loans and Loan Guarantees § 417.937 Loan and loan guarantee provisions. (a) Disbursement of loan proceeds. The principal amount of any loan made or...

  12. Assume-Guarantee Abstraction Refinement Meets Hybrid Systems

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bogomolov, Sergiy; Frehse, Goran; Greitschus, Marius; Grosu, Radu; Pasareanu, Corina S.; Podelski, Andreas; Strump, Thomas

    2014-01-01

    Compositional verification techniques in the assume- guarantee style have been successfully applied to transition systems to efficiently reduce the search space by leveraging the compositional nature of the systems under consideration. We adapt these techniques to the domain of hybrid systems with affine dynamics. To build assumptions we introduce an abstraction based on location merging. We integrate the assume-guarantee style analysis with automatic abstraction refinement. We have implemented our approach in the symbolic hybrid model checker SpaceEx. The evaluation shows its practical potential. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work combining assume-guarantee reasoning with automatic abstraction-refinement in the context of hybrid automata.

  13. 12 CFR 370.12 - Payment on the guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... TEMPORARY LIQUIDITY GUARANTEE PROGRAM § 370.12 Payment on the guarantee. (a) Claims for Deposits in... depositors for funds in a noninterest-bearing transaction account in an insured depository institution that...

  14. 13 CFR 120.400 - Loan Guarantee Agreements.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Loan Guarantee Agreements. 120.400 Section 120.400 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION BUSINESS LOANS Lenders § 120... specific proposed loan that a Lender may submit. The existence of a Loan Guarantee Agreement does not limit...

  15. 77 FR 38015 - Community Programs Guaranteed Loans

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-06-26

    ... section. This is based upon the Agency's experience to date in financing this type of project and the... sections, in order to clarify the types of projects that are eligible for a Community Facilities Guaranteed... Program by limiting the risk to the guaranteed loan portfolio. RHS is seeking to prohibit the financing of...

  16. Improvements Needed in Administration of the Guaranteed Student Loan Program.

    Science.gov (United States)

    General Accounting Office, Washington, DC.

    This report identifies improvements needed in administration of the guaranteed student loan program. Improvements needed are based on the fact that that lenders are not informed when student borrowers drop out of school. Alternatives for providing lenders with timely information on enrollment terminations are indicated. Additional administrative…

  17. How a Guaranteed Annual Income Could Put Food Banks Out of Business

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    J.C. Herbert Emery

    2013-12-01

    Full Text Available The federal Conservative government recently began phasing in a plan to raise the age of eligibility for Old Age Security from 65 to 67. But a more sensible move for improving the effectiveness of Canada’s social safety-net system may be to actually lower the age below 65 and rely strictly on an income test instead, regardless of age. The government could go a lot further toward the reduction of poverty in Canada by building on the success of its income supports for seniors, and making them available to poor Canadians of all ages. Canada can boast of having one of the lowest rates for poverty among seniors in the world, largely due to its guaranteed income programs for those 65 years and older. When low-income Canadians turn 65 years old and leave behind low-paying, often unstable jobs, their poverty levels drop substantially. What a guaranteed income provides, that their vulnerable job situation did not, is a form of protection against budget shocks — a sudden volatility in income or expenses without the access to savings or credit to smooth things out until stability returns. A guaranteed income provides a kind of “disaster insurance” that can protect someone in a crisis situation from going without necessities such as food or even shelter. Statistics show that the rate of Canadians experiencing “food insecurity” — that is, lack of access to food because of financial constraints — is half that among Canadians aged 65 to 69 years than it is among those aged 60 to 64. Self-reported rates of physical and mental health improve markedly as well after lowincome Canadians move from low-wage, insecure employment to a guaranteed income at the age of 65. That dramatic shift in physical and mental health indicates that expanding guaranteed income programs to younger Canadians is more than a simple cost calculation: there are potential savings to be found as poorer Canadians, given a guaranteed income, become healthier and therefore reduce

  18. What Guarantees Should Society Offer Its Youth?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Brooks, Chris

    2014-01-01

    Criticising the concept of a "youth guarantee" as it was understood by the OECD in the 1990s and recently again by the European Community, the author argues that just more schooling and training will not help, let alone guarantee a future for disadvantaged, unemployed young people. Rather any policy that wants to help youth to become…

  19. H 2 guaranteed cost control of discrete linear systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Colmenares W.

    2000-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a quadratically stabilizing output feedback controller which also assures H 2 guaranteed cost performance on a discrete linear uncertain system where the uncertainty is of the norm bounded type. The conditions are presented as a collection of linear matrix inequalities.The solution, however requires a search over a scalar parameter space.

  20. THE LETTER OF GUARANTEE FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF THE NEW CIVIL CODE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    LUMINITA TULEASCA

    2011-04-01

    Full Text Available The letter of guarantee is frequently used in the domestic and international commercial activity, first of all, for the safety offered for securing the contractual obligations without blocking the pecuniary funds and, second of all, due to the existing uniform international regulations that correspond to the needs supporting the occurrence of these types of autonomous securities.In Romania, the lack of legal policing of the letter of guarantee has created practical difficulties and offered judges the possibility to "make the law" in the litigations generated by the enforcement or by the suspension of enforcement of these contractual securities.This work analysis the regulation of the letter of guarantee provided in the New Civil Code from the perspective of its harmonization with the Uniform Rules of the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris and with the Draft Common Frame of Reference in the matter of the European private law.

  1. "Financial Innovation and Risk Management: The Cross-Guarantee Solution"

    OpenAIRE

    Bert Ely

    1995-01-01

    The cross-guarantee concept, which is summarized below, will eliminate the regulatory moral hazard that electronic technology has greatly exacerbated in recent years. The paper concludes by outlining the many benefits cross-guarantees will bring to the financial system as well as the structural and international implications of using cross-guarantees to bring market-driven regulation to the financial services sector of the American economy.

  2. On the Guarantee of the Realization of the Right to Education

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Elena A. Kashtanova

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available The article reveals the issues of the essence and content of the guarantee of the realization of the right to education, the system of guarantees for the implementation of constitutional and legal principles and norms, including those that consolidate the system of rights and freedoms of human and citizen. The Author examines the functions of guarantee (stimulating, law enforcement and law enforcement, analyzes types of guaranteesguarantees related to the very right to education and quality of education.​

  3. Economic Valuation of Sufficient and Guaranteed Irrigation Water Supply for Paddy Farms of Guilan Province

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mohammad Kavoosi Kalashami

    2014-08-01

    Full Text Available Cultivation of the strategic crop of rice highly depends to the existence of sufficient and guaranteed irrigation water, and water shortage stresses have irreparable effects on yield and quality of productions. Decrease of the Sefidrud river inflow in Guilan province which is the main source of supplying irrigation water for 171 thousand hectares under rice cropping area of this province, has been challenged sufficient and guaranteed irrigation water supply in many regions of mentioned province. Hence, in present study estimating the value that paddy farmers place on sufficient and guaranteed irrigation water supply has been considered. Economic valuation of sufficient and guaranteed irrigation water supply improves water resource management policies in demand side. Requested data set were obtained on the base of a survey and are collected from 224 paddy farms in rural regions that faced with irrigation water shortages. Then, using open-ended valuation approach and estimation of Tobit model via ML and two stages Heckman approach, eliciting paddy farmers' willingness to pay for sufficient and guaranteed irrigation water supply has been accomplished. Results revealed that farmers in investigated regions willing to pay 26.49 percent more than present costs of providing irrigation water in order to have sufficient and guaranteed irrigation water.

  4. Mitigating Provider Uncertainty in Service Provision Contracts

    Science.gov (United States)

    Smith, Chris; van Moorsel, Aad

    Uncertainty is an inherent property of open, distributed and multiparty systems. The viability of the mutually beneficial relationships which motivate these systems relies on rational decision-making by each constituent party under uncertainty. Service provision in distributed systems is one such relationship. Uncertainty is experienced by the service provider in his ability to deliver a service with selected quality level guarantees due to inherent non-determinism, such as load fluctuations and hardware failures. Statistical estimators utilized to model this non-determinism introduce additional uncertainty through sampling error. Inability of the provider to accurately model and analyze uncertainty in the quality level guarantees can result in the formation of sub-optimal service provision contracts. Emblematic consequences include loss of revenue, inefficient resource utilization and erosion of reputation and consumer trust. We propose a utility model for contract-based service provision to provide a systematic approach to optimal service provision contract formation under uncertainty. Performance prediction methods to enable the derivation of statistical estimators for quality level are introduced, with analysis of their resultant accuracy and cost.

  5. 13 CFR 120.613 - Secondary Participation Guarantee Agreement.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Secondary Participation Guarantee Agreement. 120.613 Section 120.613 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION BUSINESS LOANS Secondary Market Certificates § 120.613 Secondary Participation Guarantee Agreement. When a Lender...

  6. 48 CFR 52.247-60 - Guaranteed Shipping Characteristics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... Characteristics. 52.247-60 Section 52.247-60 Federal Acquisition Regulations System FEDERAL ACQUISITION REGULATION....247-60 Guaranteed Shipping Characteristics. As prescribed in 47.305-16(b)(1), insert the following clause: Guaranteed Shipping Characteristics (DEC 1989) (a) The offeror is requested to complete...

  7. Study of Allocation Guaranteed Time Slot Wireless Body Area Networks Based on IEEE 802.15.4

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yundra, E.; Harsono, G. D.

    2018-04-01

    This paper aims to determine the size of the Guaranteed Time Slot (GTS) on the super frame structure required for each sensor as well as to know the performance of the GTS resized system compared to the GTS standard on IEEE 802.15.4. This article proposes a scheme to improve IEEE 802.15.4 medium access control, called allocation Guaranteed Time Slot (ALGATIS). ALGATIS is expected to effectively allocate guaranteed time slot to the requested sensors, it adjusts the length of the slot in super frame duration based on the length of the packet data. This article presents a simulation experiment of IEEE 802.15.4, especially for star network, to predict the throughput of networks and average energy consumption. The simulation experiments show that the performance of ALGATIS is better than that of IEEE 802.15.4 standard in term of the throughput of networks and average energy consumption

  8. 13 CFR 120.621 - SBA guarantee of an Individual Certificate.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false SBA guarantee of an Individual Certificate. 120.621 Section 120.621 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION BUSINESS LOANS Secondary Market The Sba Guarantee of A Certificate § 120.621 SBA guarantee of an Individual...

  9. 13 CFR 120.620 - SBA guarantee of a Pool Certificate.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false SBA guarantee of a Pool Certificate. 120.620 Section 120.620 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION BUSINESS LOANS Secondary Market The Sba Guarantee of A Certificate § 120.620 SBA guarantee of a Pool Certificate...

  10. 7 CFR 4279.149 - Personal and corporate guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... guarantees are part of the collateral for the loan, but are not considered in determining whether a loan is... documents to the Agency's satisfaction that collateral, equity, cashflow, and profitability indicate an... guarantee form. When warranted by an Agency assessment of potential financial risk, Agency approved...

  11. 78 FR 13999 - Maximum Interest Rates on Guaranteed Farm Loans

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-03-04

    ..., cost-plus, flat-rate, or market based) to price guaranteed loans, provided the rates do not exceed the... (LIBOR) or the 5-year Treasury note rate, unless the lender uses a formal written risk-based pricing... cost in the form of a lower interest rate than the borrower would otherwise receive. Therefore, the FSA...

  12. 12 CFR 370.4 - Transaction Account Guarantee Program.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... GENERAL POLICY TEMPORARY LIQUIDITY GUARANTEE PROGRAM § 370.4 Transaction Account Guarantee Program. (a) In addition to the coverage afforded to depositors under 12 CFR Part 330, a depositor's funds in a noninterest... determining whether funds are in a noninterest-bearing transaction account for purposes of this section, the...

  13. Monitoring Assumptions in Assume-Guarantee Contracts

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Oleg Sokolsky

    2016-05-01

    Full Text Available Pre-deployment verification of software components with respect to behavioral specifications in the assume-guarantee form does not, in general, guarantee absence of errors at run time. This is because assumptions about the environment cannot be discharged until the environment is fixed. An intuitive approach is to complement pre-deployment verification of guarantees, up to the assumptions, with post-deployment monitoring of environment behavior to check that the assumptions are satisfied at run time. Such a monitor is typically implemented by instrumenting the application code of the component. An additional challenge for the monitoring step is that environment behaviors are typically obtained through an I/O library, which may alter the component's view of the input format. This transformation requires us to introduce a second pre-deployment verification step to ensure that alarms raised by the monitor would indeed correspond to violations of the environment assumptions. In this paper, we describe an approach for constructing monitors and verifying them against the component assumption. We also discuss limitations of instrumentation-based monitoring and potential ways to overcome it.

  14. 14 CFR 1300.23 - Participation in guaranteed loans.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... lender may distribute the risk of a portion of a loan guaranteed under the program by sale of... transferred in whole or in part; (2) The lender remains solely responsible for the administration of the loan... loans guaranteed under the program: (1) Eligible lenders; (2) Private investment funds and insurance...

  15. DJFS: Providing Highly Reliable and High‐Performance File System with Small‐Sized

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Junghoon Kim

    2017-11-01

    Full Text Available File systems and applications try to implement their own update protocols to guarantee data consistency, which is one of the most crucial aspects of computing systems. However, we found that the storage devices are substantially under‐utilized when preserving data consistency because they generate massive storage write traffic with many disk cache flush operations and force‐unit‐access (FUA commands. In this paper, we present DJFS (Delta‐Journaling File System that provides both a high level of performance and data consistency for different applications. We made three technical contributions to achieve our goal. First, to remove all storage accesses with disk cache flush operations and FUA commands, DJFS uses small‐sized NVRAM for a file system journal. Second, to reduce the access latency and space requirements of NVRAM, DJFS attempts to journal compress the differences in the modified blocks. Finally, to relieve explicit checkpointing overhead, DJFS aggressively reflects the checkpoint transactions to file system area in the unit of the specified region. Our evaluation on TPC‐C SQLite benchmark shows that, using our novel optimization schemes, DJFS outperforms Ext4 by up to 64.2 times with only 128 MB of NVRAM.

  16. The fiduciary guarantee in the Romanian and European legal context

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Cornelia Lefter

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available The importance of the fiduciary guarantee has not reached its full potential in the Romanian market, nor in the European area. The ongoing “dispute” between the fiduciary operations (familiar to the continental law and the trust (with its common -law heritage seems to be won by the latter. However, considering the express provisions on the fiduciary operations in the Romanian Civil Code entered into force in 2011, similar to the introduction of the same legal instrument in the French Civil Code in 2007, could give a boost to this ancient tool, present from the Roman era. Even if the European legal framework do not provide many rules on this institution, however, the Financial Collateral Directive raised many questions on how the fiduciary guarantees can be used in practice, and contributed to the change that followed in this area.

  17. 7 CFR 2201.28 - Participation in guaranteed Loans.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... Participation in guaranteed Loans. (a) Subject to paragraphs (b), (c) and (d) of this section, a Lender may distribute the risk of a portion of a Loan guaranteed under the Program by sale of participations therein if... in part as a result of the sale of such participations; (2) The Lender remains solely responsible for...

  18. QoE Guarantee Scheme Based on Cooperative Cognitive Cloud and Opportunistic Weight Particle Swarm

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Weihang Shi

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available It is well known that the Internet application of cloud services may be affected by the inefficiency of cloud computing and inaccurate evaluation of quality of experience (QoE seriously. In our paper, based on construction algorithms of cooperative cognitive cloud platform and optimization algorithm of opportunities weight particle swarm clustering, the QoE guarantee mechanism was proposed. The mechanism, through the sending users of requests and the cognitive neighbor users’ cooperation, combined the cooperation of subcloud platforms and constructed the optimal cloud platform with the different service. At the same time, the particle swarm optimization algorithm could be enhanced dynamically according to all kinds of opportunity request weight, which could optimize the cooperative cognitive cloud platform. Finally, the QoE guarantee scheme was proposed with the opportunity weight particle swarm optimization algorithm and collaborative cognitive cloud platform. The experimental results show that the proposed mechanism compared is superior to the QoE guarantee scheme based on cooperative cloud and QoE guarantee scheme based on particle swarm optimization, compared with optimization fitness and high cloud computing service execution efficiency and high throughput performance advantages.

  19. Massive M2M Access with Reliability Guarantees in LTE Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Madueño, Germán Corrales; Kiilerich Pratas, Nuno; Stefanovic, Cedomir

    2015-01-01

    Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communications are one of the major drivers of the cellular network evolution towards 5G systems. One of the key challenges is on how to provide reliability guarantees to each accessing device in a situation in which there is a massive number of almost-simultaneous arriva...

  20. GMG: A Guaranteed, Efficient Global Optimization Algorithm for Remote Sensing.

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    D' Helon, CD

    2004-08-18

    The monocular passive ranging (MPR) problem in remote sensing consists of identifying the precise range of an airborne target (missile, plane, etc.) from its observed radiance. This inverse problem may be set as a global optimization problem (GOP) whereby the difference between the observed and model predicted radiances is minimized over the possible ranges and atmospheric conditions. Using additional information about the error function between the predicted and observed radiances of the target, we developed GMG, a new algorithm to find the Global Minimum with a Guarantee. The new algorithm transforms the original continuous GOP into a discrete search problem, thereby guaranteeing to find the position of the global minimum in a reasonably short time. The algorithm is first applied to the golf course problem, which serves as a litmus test for its performance in the presence of both complete and degraded additional information. GMG is further assessed on a set of standard benchmark functions and then applied to various realizations of the MPR problem.

  1. Investment Guarantees in the South African Life Insurance Industry ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    This paper explores the risks faced by South African life insurance companies arising from the provision of investment guarantees in products sold. The current thinking and practice of the larger South African life insurance companies regarding investment guarantees is set out following their responses to a survey.

  2. Self-guaranteed measurement-based quantum computation

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hayashi, Masahito; Hajdušek, Michal

    2018-05-01

    In order to guarantee the output of a quantum computation, we usually assume that the component devices are trusted. However, when the total computation process is large, it is not easy to guarantee the whole system when we have scaling effects, unexpected noise, or unaccounted for correlations between several subsystems. If we do not trust the measurement basis or the prepared entangled state, we do need to be worried about such uncertainties. To this end, we propose a self-guaranteed protocol for verification of quantum computation under the scheme of measurement-based quantum computation where no prior-trusted devices (measurement basis or entangled state) are needed. The approach we present enables the implementation of verifiable quantum computation using the measurement-based model in the context of a particular instance of delegated quantum computation where the server prepares the initial computational resource and sends it to the client, who drives the computation by single-qubit measurements. Applying self-testing procedures, we are able to verify the initial resource as well as the operation of the quantum devices and hence the computation itself. The overhead of our protocol scales with the size of the initial resource state to the power of 4 times the natural logarithm of the initial state's size.

  3. 22 CFR 231.05 - Non-impairment of the Guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Non-impairment of the Guarantee. 231.05 Section 231.05 Foreign Relations AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT ARAB REPUBLIC OF EGYPT LOAN GUARANTEES ISSUED UNDER THE EMERGENCY WARTIME SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT OF 2003, PUBLIC LAW 108-11-STANDARD...

  4. 7 CFR 1493.430 - Application for a payment guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... (includes upward loading tolerance, if any); (12) Guaranteed value; (13) Guarantee fee; (14) The term length... (including packaging, if any); (8) Mean quantity, contract loading tolerance and, if the exporter chooses, a request for CCC to reserve coverage up to the maximum quantity permitted by the contract loading tolerance...

  5. 76 FR 31217 - Single Family Housing Guaranteed Loan Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-05-31

    ... Farm Service Agency 7 CFR Part 1980 RIN 0575-AC83 Single Family Housing Guaranteed Loan Program... the Rural Housing Service (RHS) Section 502 Single Family Housing Guaranteed Loan Program (SFHGLP) by eliminating the lender's published Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) rate for first mortgage loans with no...

  6. 7 CFR 1738.30 - Rural broadband access loans and loan guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... interest at a rate set by the lender consistent with the current applicable market rate for a loan of... Derivative or any Guaranteed-Amount Debt Derivative; or (B) Any holder of the Guaranteed Loan Note or any Guaranteed Loan Portion Note or any Derivative, as the case may be, having a claim to payments on the...

  7. Does a “Ceo Chairman” Guarantee Better Performance from a Firm?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Srbek Pavel

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available This paper provides a brief review of the state of knowledge in the field of agency theory. The managerial power approach assumes that a chief executive officer is able to affect the scale of his or her pay. However, Kaplan (2012 and others see a different picture of the corporate-governance landscape, hence they provide certain market-based explanations for high compensation. Our paper examines the relationship between a firm’s performance and the amount of managerial compensation, and the ability of a CEO to affect a board’s decision regarding his or her total compensation. The dataset consists of 75 companies traded in the capital market in the US. Our panel dataset covers a 10-year period from 2004 to 2013. We developed a single equation panel data model. The resulting parameter values provide a different picture of CEO power and the interconnection between a firm’s performance and CEO pay in both sectors.

  8. Probabilistic Performance Guarantees for Distributed Self-Assembly

    KAUST Repository

    Fox, Michael J.

    2015-04-01

    In distributed self-assembly, a multitude of agents seek to form copies of a particular structure, modeled here as a labeled graph. In the model, agents encounter each other in spontaneous pairwise interactions and decide whether or not to form or sever edges based on their two labels and a fixed set of local interaction rules described by a graph grammar. The objective is to converge on a graph with a maximum number of copies of a given target graph. Our main result is the introduction of a simple algorithm that achieves an asymptotically maximum yield in a probabilistic sense. Notably, agents do not need to update their labels except when forming or severing edges. This contrasts with certain existing approaches that exploit information propagating rules, effectively addressing the decision problem at the level of subgraphs as opposed to individual vertices. We are able to obey more stringent locality requirements while also providing smaller rule sets. The results can be improved upon if certain requirements on the labels are relaxed. We discuss limits of performance in self-assembly in terms of rule set characteristics and achievable maximum yield.

  9. Bank guarantee in Serbian and European legal systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pajtić Bojan L.

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available The paper analyses a bank guarantee as an institute derived from a surety contract. By issuing a bank guarantee the bank commits to the creditor that it will fulfill valid and due liabilities of a debtor, in the event of default by the debtor. This collateral demonstrates significant advantages as compared to other personal assets, particularly with regards to a higher level of protection to creditors in contractual relations. Due to the aforementioned benefit the institute has been increasingly applied in legal dealings, both in our and other legal systems. In the paper, I will point out normative solutions in terms of regulation of a bank guarantee as a specific legal activity in which there is no accessoriness, which is not the case with security. This research particularly focuses on the comparative legal analysis of this collateral.

  10. Corporate Bond Guarantees and The Value of Financial Flexibility

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Altieri, M.; Massa, M; Manconi, A

    2016-01-01

    We examine the effects of the decision of parent companies to guarantee bonds issued by their subsidiaries. The market value of the parent firm’s outstanding bonds drops five times more when it issues a guarantee for subsidiary debt than when it issues a new bond in its own name. This effect is

  11. Robust Guaranteed Cost Observer Design for Singular Markovian Jump Time-Delay Systems with Generally Incomplete Transition Probability

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yanbo Li

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper is devoted to the investigation of the design of robust guaranteed cost observer for a class of linear singular Markovian jump time-delay systems with generally incomplete transition probability. In this singular model, each transition rate can be completely unknown or only its estimate value is known. Based on stability theory of stochastic differential equations and linear matrix inequality (LMI technique, we design an observer to ensure that, for all uncertainties, the resulting augmented system is regular, impulse free, and robust stochastically stable with the proposed guaranteed cost performance. Finally, a convex optimization problem with LMI constraints is formulated to design the suboptimal guaranteed cost filters for linear singular Markovian jump time-delay systems with generally incomplete transition probability.

  12. Providing QoS guarantee in 3G wireless networks

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chuah, MooiChoo; Huang, Min; Kumar, Suresh

    2001-07-01

    The third generation networks and services present opportunities to offer multimedia applications and services that meet end-to-end quality of service requirements. In this article, we present UMTS QoS architecture and its requirements. This includes the definition of QoS parameters, traffic classes, the end-to-end data delivery model, and the mapping of end-to-end services to the services provided by the network elements of the UMTS. End-to-end QoS of a user flow is achieved by the combination of the QoS control over UMTS Domain and the IP core Network. In the Third Generation Wireless network, UMTS bearer service manager is responsible to manage radio and transport resources to QoS-enabled applications. The UMTS bearer service consists of the Radio Access Bearer Service between Mobile Terminal and SGSN and Core Network bearer service between SGSN and GGSN. The Radio Access Bearer Service is further realized by the Radio Bearer Service (mostly air interface) and Iu bearer service. For the 3G air interface, one can provide differentiated QoS via intelligent burst allocation scheme, adaptive spreading factor control and weighted fair queueing scheduling algorithms. Next, we discuss the requirements for the transport technologies in the radio access network to provide differentiated QoS to multiple classes of traffic. We discuss both ATM based and IP based transport solutions. Last but not least, we discuss how QoS mechanism is provided in the core network to ensure e2e quality of service requirements. We discuss how mobile terminals that use RSVP as QoS signaling mechanisms can be are supported in the 3G network which may implement only IETF diffserv mechanism. . We discuss how one can map UMTS QoS classes with IETF diffserv code points. We also discuss 2G/3G handover scenarios and how the 2G/3G QoS parameters can be mapped.

  13. Traffic Scheduling in WDM Passive Optical Network with Delay Guarantee

    Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

    2005-01-01

    WDM passive optical network becomes more favorable as the required bandwidth increases, but currently few media access control algorithms adapted to WDM access network. This paper presented a new scheduling algorithm for bandwidth sharing in WDM passive optical networks, which provides per-flow delay guarantee and supports variable-length packets scheduling. Through theoretical analysis and simulation, the end-to-end delay bound and throughput fairness of the algorithm was demonstrated.

  14. The Risk Management of Minimum Return Guarantees

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Antje Mahayni

    2008-05-01

    Full Text Available Contracts paying a guaranteed minimum rate of return and a fraction of a positive excess rate, which is specified relative to a benchmark portfolio, are closely related to unit-linked life-insurance products and can be considered as alternatives to direct investment in the underlying benchmark. They contain an embedded power option, and the key issue is the tractable and realistic hedging of this option, in order to rigorously justify valuation by arbitrage arguments and prevent the guarantees from becoming uncontrollable liabilities to the issuer. We show how to determine the contract parameters conservatively and implement robust risk-management strategies.

  15. Doubts raised on the validity of construction and payment guarantees

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    A construction company had been liquidated and the employer had called up the guarantee .... Due to the small size of the target populations in both the quantitative and qualitative ..... contingent liability that remains in terms of the guarantee.

  16. Would it provide Free Education?

    Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

    First page Back Continue Last page Overview Graphics. Would it provide Free Education? Would it provide Free Education? Would it provide Compulsory Education? Would it guarantee education of equitable quality? Would it prevent discrimination? Would it stop schools that promote inequality & discrimination? NO! NO!

  17. Providing delay guarantees in Bluetooth

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Ait Yaiz, R.; Heijenk, Geert; Titsworth, F.

    2003-01-01

    Bluetooth polling, also referred to as Bluetooth MAC scheduling or intra-piconet scheduling, is the mechanism that schedules the traffic between the participants in a Bluetooth network. Hence, this mechanism is highly determining with respect to the delay packets experience in a Bluetooth network.

  18. Public initiatives to support entrepreneurs: Credit guarantees versus co-funding

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Arping, S.; Lóránth, G.; Morrison, A.D.

    2008-01-01

    We analyze state-sponsored credit guarantees in a setting where entrepreneurs are capital-constrained and subject to moral hazard. In our model, guarantees can raise welfare because they reduce the cost of capital faced by entrepreneurs, and so potentially enhance entrepreneurial effort incentives.

  19. 42 CFR 57.1514 - Loan guarantee and interest subsidy agreements.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... GRANTS GRANTS FOR CONSTRUCTION OF TEACHING FACILITIES, EDUCATIONAL IMPROVEMENTS, SCHOLARSHIPS AND STUDENT LOANS Loan Guarantees and Interest Subsidies to Assist in Construction of Teaching Facilities for Health Profession Personnel § 57.1514 Loan guarantee and interest subsidy agreements. For each application for a...

  20. Comparative Analysis of Minimum Income Guaranteed Schemes within the Member States of the European Union

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Simona Maria Stănescu

    2015-09-01

    Full Text Available The commitment of the European Union (EU Member States towards accomplishing the commonly agreed goals (1997 European Employment Strategy, Lisbon 2000, and Europe 2020 is supported by a continuous assessment of domestic social policy tendencies. From this perspective, the main goal of the paper is to comparatively analyse the last safety net for the most vulnerable people. The screening of guaranteed minimum resources provides an overview of the applicable statutory basis, schemes in place, types of social benefits concerned, financing and organisation mechanisms, eligibility conditions, duration and time limits. As methodology, the article uses the MISSOC database, and due to the current lack of comparable information, recommendations for further harmonisation are included. 20 of the EU member states follow the minimum income guaranteed (MIG regulations adopted already during the pre-accession period and updated after the accession phase. Seven types of domestic regulations are in force, among which the most frequent ones are acts and laws (ten countries. Common concepts used are social, and assistance. Provided allowances are mainly focused on elderly people, unemployment benefits, pensions, allowances supporting various house related costs, and benefits for disabled people. In line with 2007, 2010, and 2014 data, the financing of guaranteed minimum resources continues to remain mainly central with a shift in 2014 towards mixed financing (both central and local. The management in 2014 continues to be mainly centrally organised but the local stakeholders are also empowered. The residency is the most frequent eligibility condition. No nationality is required in 24 EU member states, for all allowances (21 countries or for particular ones (three countries. 17 member states require no age conditions. Unlimited guaranteed minimum resources were provided in 2014 as long as the eligibility criteria were met in 23 EU member states.

  1. Compositional Synthesis of Controllers from Scenario-Based Assume-Guarantee Specifications

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Greenyer, Joel; Kindler, Ekkart

    2013-01-01

    Modern software-intensive systems often consist of multiple components that interact to fulfill complex functions in sometimes safety-critical situations. During the design, it is crucial to specify the system's requirements formally and to detect inconsistencies as early as possible in order to ...... present, in this paper, a novel assume-guarantee-style compositional synthesis technique for MSD specifications. We provide evaluation results underlining the benefit of our approach and formally justify its correctness....

  2. The Impact of Financial Support System on Technology Innovation: A Case of Technology Guarantee System in Korea

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Woo-Seok Jang

    2008-04-01

    Full Text Available We analyzed the impact of financial support system on technological innovation of small and medium manufacturing firms in Korea, with a special interest in technology guarantee system. This was done using a sample of 1,014 Korean manufacturing firms of which 43% were venture companies. Our study provides two important conclusions. First, the result of empirical analysis indicates that financial support systems have a significant influence on both product innovation and process innovation of SMEs in Korea. Second, a more important conclusion of this research is that technology guarantee system impacts on product innovation; however not on process innovation. This result implies that technology guarantee system attaches more importance to technological innovations related with product development than to those related with process enhancement.

  3. 16 CFR 239.2 - Disclosures in warranty or guarantee advertising.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... warranty coverage. These examples are for both print and broadcast advertising. These examples are... advertising. 239.2 Section 239.2 Commercial Practices FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION GUIDES AND TRADE PRACTICE RULES GUIDES FOR THE ADVERTISING OF WARRANTIES AND GUARANTEES § 239.2 Disclosures in warranty or guarantee...

  4. Several Guaranteed Descent Conjugate Gradient Methods for Unconstrained Optimization

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    San-Yang Liu

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper investigates a general form of guaranteed descent conjugate gradient methods which satisfies the descent condition gkTdk≤-1-1/4θkgk2  θk>1/4 and which is strongly convergent whenever the weak Wolfe line search is fulfilled. Moreover, we present several specific guaranteed descent conjugate gradient methods and give their numerical results for large-scale unconstrained optimization.

  5. The pricing of bank debt guarantees

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Arping, S.

    2010-01-01

    We analyze the desirability of fair pricing of government guarantees for bank liabilities. Fair pricing is desirable only if the banking sector is sufficiently transparent. In opaque banking systems, fair pricing may exacerbate banks' incentive to take excessive risks.

  6. Administrative Circular No. 13 (Rev. 3) - Guarantees for representatives of the personnel

    CERN Multimedia

    2014-01-01

    Administrative Circular No. 13 (Rev. 3) entitled “Guarantees for representatives of the personnel”, approved by the Director-General following discussion at the Standing Concertation Committee meeting of 5 December 2013 and entering into force on 1 January 2014, is available on the intranet site of the Human Resources Department (see here).   This circular is applicable to all members of the personnel. It cancels and replaces Administrative Circular No. 13 (Rev. 2) entitled “Guarantees for members of the personnel holding representative office” of November 1992. The circular was revised in order to adapt the time given to the representatives of the personnel to perform their elective mandate and to ensure more transparency in their activities, by indicating, inter alia, the percentage of time worked in the framework of their mandate, as well as the training, activities and ensuing results. Department Head Office HR Department

  7. Decentralized guaranteed cost static output feedback vibration control for piezoelectric smart structures

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jiang, Jian-ping; Li, Dong-xu

    2010-01-01

    This paper is devoted to the study of the decentralized guaranteed cost static output feedback vibration control for piezoelectric smart structures. A smart panel with collocated piezoelectric actuators and velocity sensors is modeled using a finite element method, and then the size of the model is reduced in the state space using the modal Hankel singular value. The necessary and sufficient conditions of decentralized guaranteed cost static output feedback control for the reduced system have been presented. The decentralized and centralized static output feedback matrices can be obtained from solving two linear matrix inequalities. A comparison between centralized control and decentralized control is performed in order to investigate their effectiveness in suppressing vibration of a smart panel. Numerical results show that when the system is subjected to initial displacement or white noise disturbance, the decentralized and centralized controls are both very effective and the control results are very close

  8. The Social and Consumer Standards and Guarantees in Ukraine: the Current Structural and Dynamic Characteristics

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Kolesov Oleksandr S.

    2017-04-01

    Full Text Available The article attempts to generalize the theoretical approaches to the social guarantees and standards as economic categories. The classification of social guarantees is provided. The dynamic parameters for development of the social and consumer standards adopted in Ukraine were considered. An evaluation of the real poverty level under the system of criteria was carried out. The inconsistency of methods for the poverty evaluation adopted by the Ministry of Social Policy of Ukraine and contradiction of its individual indicators has been indicated. The structural characteristics of the population’s income have been determined. The relevance of the existing social guarantees to their real value in today’s economic conditions have been analyzed. Tendencies of falling of the welfare level of population, resulting in a decline in the consumer demand and a narrowing of the domestic market for goods and services, have been identified. The need to take measures to stimulate small businesses, to overcome corruption, and to deregulate the economy has been indicated.

  9. The unethical focus on access: a study of medical ethics and the waiting-time guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Karlberg, H I; Brinkmo, B-M

    2009-03-01

    All civilized societies favour ethical principles of equity. In healthcare, these principles generally focus on needs for medical care. Methods for establishing priorities among such needs are instrumental in this process. In this study, we analysed whether rules on access to healthcare, waiting-time guarantees, conflict with ethical principles of distributive justice. We interviewed directors, managers and other decision-makers of various healthcare providers of hospitals, primary care organizations and purchasing offices. We also conducted focus group interviews with professionals from a number of distinct medical areas. Our informants and their co-workers were reasonably familiar with the ethical platforms for priority-setting established by the Swedish parliament, giving the sickest patients complete priority. However, to satisfy the waiting-time guarantees, the informants often had to make priority decisions contrary to the ethical principles by favouring access before needs to keep waiting times within certain limits. The common opinion was that the waiting-time guarantee leads to crowding-out effects, overruling the ethical principles based on needs. For more than a decade, the interpretation in Sweden of the equitable principle based on medical needs has been distorted through political decisions, leading to healthcare providers giving priority to access rather than needs for care.

  10. An Electronic Commerce Strategy for MTMC’s Guaranteed Traffic Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    1992-10-01

    AD-A264 299 SELECTE October 1992 S MAY1 4 1993U C An Electronic Commerce Strategy for MTMC’s Guaranteed Traffic Program MT901R I N1. Augustine...NUMBERS An Electronic Commerce Strategy for MTMC’s Guaranteed Traffic Program C MDA903-85-C -0139 M DA903-90-C-0006 PE 0902198D 6. AUTHOR(S) M...239-1L 299-01 LMI Executive Summary AN ELECTRONIC COMMERCE STRATEGY FOR MTMC’S GUARANTEED TRAFFIC PROGRAM In 1979, the Military Traffic Management

  11. Differentiated protection services with failure probability guarantee for workflow-based applications

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhong, Yaoquan; Guo, Wei; Jin, Yaohui; Sun, Weiqiang; Hu, Weisheng

    2010-12-01

    A cost-effective and service-differentiated provisioning strategy is very desirable to service providers so that they can offer users satisfactory services, while optimizing network resource allocation. Providing differentiated protection services to connections for surviving link failure has been extensively studied in recent years. However, the differentiated protection services for workflow-based applications, which consist of many interdependent tasks, have scarcely been studied. This paper investigates the problem of providing differentiated services for workflow-based applications in optical grid. In this paper, we develop three differentiated protection services provisioning strategies which can provide security level guarantee and network-resource optimization for workflow-based applications. The simulation demonstrates that these heuristic algorithms provide protection cost-effectively while satisfying the applications' failure probability requirements.

  12. The Minimum Price Guarantee Policy before and after Real Plan

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jackelline Favro

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available This study aims to analyze the performance of the Minimum Price Guarantee Policy - MPGPin Brazil for the main agricultural products, during the 1980s and 1990s, and especially the post-Real Plan period. The research has a bibliographic and descriptive nature. The main results showed that the MPGP remains an important tool for ensuring income to farmers and the supply of selected crops in the analyzed period, but there was a reduction of public action for the new MPGP and new private instruments has revealed efficiency

  13. 78 FR 64175 - Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan Loan Guarantees Issued Under the Further Continuing Appropriations...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-10-28

    ... procedures and standard terms and conditions applicable to loan guarantees to be issued for the benefit of... Definitions. 233.03 The Guarantee. 233.04 Guarantee eligibility. 233.05 Non-impairment of the Guarantee. 233... Default; Application for Compensation; payment. 233.09 No acceleration of Eligible Notes. [[Page 64176...

  14. Guaranteed Cost Finite-Time Control of Fractional-Order Positive Switched Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Leipo Liu

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available The problem of guaranteed cost finite-time control of fractional-order positive switched systems (FOPSS is considered in this paper. Firstly, a new cost function is defined. Then, by constructing linear copositive Lyapunov functions and using the average dwell time (ADT approach, a state feedback controller and a static output feedback controller are constructed, respectively, and sufficient conditions are derived to guarantee that the corresponding closed-loop systems are guaranteed cost finite-time stable (GCFTS. Such conditions can be easily solved by linear programming. Finally, two examples are given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

  15. 13 CFR 115.18 - Refusal to issue further guarantees; suspension and termination of PSB status.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Refusal to issue further guarantees; suspension and termination of PSB status. 115.18 Section 115.18 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION SURETY BOND GUARANTEE Provisions for All Surety Bond Guarantees § 115.18 Refusal to issue further guarantees; suspension...

  16. 12 CFR 370.7 - Assessment for the Transaction Account Guarantee Program.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 12 Banks and Banking 4 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Assessment for the Transaction Account Guarantee Program. 370.7 Section 370.7 Banks and Banking FEDERAL DEPOSIT INSURANCE CORPORATION REGULATIONS AND STATEMENTS OF GENERAL POLICY TEMPORARY LIQUIDITY GUARANTEE PROGRAM § 370.7 Assessment for the...

  17. 14 CFR 272.3 - Places eligible for guaranteed essential air service.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... TRANSPORTATION (AVIATION PROCEEDINGS) ECONOMIC REGULATIONS ESSENTIAL AIR SERVICE TO THE FREELY ASSOCIATED STATES § 272.3 Places eligible for guaranteed essential air service. (a) Subject to the provisions of this part... 14 Aeronautics and Space 4 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Places eligible for guaranteed essential...

  18. Effects of Soft Loans and Credit Guarantees on Performance of Supported Firms: Evidence from the Czech Public Programme START

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ondřej Dvouletý

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available The purpose of this article was to conduct an empirical evaluation of the Czech public programme START, which was funded from the European Regional Development Fund. The programme lasted from 2007–2011, and supported new entrepreneurs through the zero interest soft loans and credit guarantees. The counterfactual analysis (using three matching techniques: propensity score, nearest neighbour, and kernel was conducted on the firm level and investigated the changes in financial performance (net profits, return on assets (ROA, return on equity (ROE, sales, assets turnover, and debt ratio of the supported firms four years after the end of intervention. The obtained findings could not support the hypothesis assuming a positive impact of the programme on the firm’s performance. On the contrary, supported companies reported on average lower sales and lower return on assets, when compared to the control group. The remaining variables could not prove any statistically significant impact of the programme. Indicators measuring firm’s profitability (net profit, return on assets, and return on equity suggested a negative influence of the programme and the variable representing debt ratio further indicated that firms that were supported by the programme reported on average higher debt ratio in comparison with the control group. Several policy implications are discussed in the study.

  19. Adaptation of failure scenario based resilience schemes toward availability guarantees

    Science.gov (United States)

    Scheffel, Matthias

    2006-07-01

    Various resilience schemes have been proposed to allow for fault-tolerant transport networks. Their common aim is to survive certain failure patterns such as node or span failures by providing alternative transmission paths. However, network operators guarantee the resulting network reliability in terms of service availability to their business customers. A maximum duration of service disruption per year must not be exceeded. We investigate an optimal design of resilient network configurations that adapts to end-to-end availability requirements. We formulate an integer linear program that minimizes the resource utilization and investigate a case study.

  20. 13 CFR 120.521 - What interest rate applies after SBA purchases its guaranteed portion?

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false What interest rate applies after... 504 Loans Sba's Purchase of A Guaranteed Portion § 120.521 What interest rate applies after SBA purchases its guaranteed portion? When SBA purchases the guaranteed portion of a fixed interest rate loan...

  1. Statistical methods for elimination of guarantee-time bias in cohort studies: a simulation study

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    In Sung Cho

    2017-08-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Aspirin has been considered to be beneficial in preventing cardiovascular diseases and cancer. Several pharmaco-epidemiology cohort studies have shown protective effects of aspirin on diseases using various statistical methods, with the Cox regression model being the most commonly used approach. However, there are some inherent limitations to the conventional Cox regression approach such as guarantee-time bias, resulting in an overestimation of the drug effect. To overcome such limitations, alternative approaches, such as the time-dependent Cox model and landmark methods have been proposed. This study aimed to compare the performance of three methods: Cox regression, time-dependent Cox model and landmark method with different landmark times in order to address the problem of guarantee-time bias. Methods Through statistical modeling and simulation studies, the performance of the above three methods were assessed in terms of type I error, bias, power, and mean squared error (MSE. In addition, the three statistical approaches were applied to a real data example from the Korean National Health Insurance Database. Effect of cumulative rosiglitazone dose on the risk of hepatocellular carcinoma was used as an example for illustration. Results In the simulated data, time-dependent Cox regression outperformed the landmark method in terms of bias and mean squared error but the type I error rates were similar. The results from real-data example showed the same patterns as the simulation findings. Conclusions While both time-dependent Cox regression model and landmark analysis are useful in resolving the problem of guarantee-time bias, time-dependent Cox regression is the most appropriate method for analyzing cumulative dose effects in pharmaco-epidemiological studies.

  2. Low-cost guaranteed-throughput communication ring for real-time streaming MPSoCs

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Dekens, B.H.J.; Kurtin, Philip Sebastian; Bekooij, Marco Jan Gerrit; Smit, Gerardus Johannes Maria

    2013-01-01

    Connection-oriented guaranteed-throughput mesh-based networks on chip have been proposed as a replacement for buses in real-time embedded multiprocessor systems such as software defined radios. Even with attractive features like throughput and latency guarantees they are not always used because

  3. Computation Offloading for Frame-Based Real-Time Tasks under Given Server Response Time Guarantees

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Anas S. M. Toma

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available Computation offloading has been adopted to improve the performance of embedded systems by offloading the computation of some tasks, especially computation-intensive tasks, to servers or clouds. This paper explores computation offloading for real-time tasks in embedded systems, provided given response time guarantees from the servers, to decide which tasks should be offloaded to get the results in time. We consider frame-based real-time tasks with the same period and relative deadline. When the execution order of the tasks is given, the problem can be solved in linear time. However, when the execution order is not specified, we prove that the problem is NP-complete. We develop a pseudo-polynomial-time algorithm for deriving feasible schedules, if they exist.  An approximation scheme is also developed to trade the error made from the algorithm and the complexity. Our algorithms are extended to minimize the period/relative deadline of the tasks for performance maximization. The algorithms are evaluated with a case study for a surveillance system and synthesized benchmarks.

  4. Resource-level QoS metric for CPU-based guarantees in cloud providers

    OpenAIRE

    Goiri Presa, Íñigo; Julià Massó, Ferran; Fitó, Josep Oriol; Macías Lloret, Mario; Guitart Fernández, Jordi

    2010-01-01

    Success of Cloud computing requires that both customers and providers can be confident that signed Service Level Agreements (SLA) are supporting their respective business activities to their best extent. Currently used SLAs fail in providing such confidence, especially when providers outsource resources to other providers. These resource providers typically support very simple metrics, or metrics that hinder an efficient exploitation of their resources. In this paper, we propose a re...

  5. 7 CFR 1720.8 - Issuance of the guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... accounting firm or federal banking regulator, annual consolidated financial statements audited by an... financial covenants, and events of default and remedies; (3) Prior to the issuance of the guarantee, the...

  6. Provider Customer Service Program - Performance Data

    Data.gov (United States)

    U.S. Department of Health & Human Services — CMS is continuously analyzing performance and quality of the Provider Customer Service Programs (PCSPs) of the contractors and will be identifying trends and making...

  7. 7 CFR 1779.73 - Replacement of loss, theft, destruction, mutilation, or defacement of Loan Note Guarantee or...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 7 Agriculture 12 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Replacement of loss, theft, destruction, mutilation..., theft, destruction, mutilation, or defacement of Loan Note Guarantee or Assignment Guarantee Agreement... circumstances of the loss, theft, or destruction of the Loan Note Guarantee or Assignment Guarantee Agreement...

  8. A high performance totally ordered multicast protocol

    Science.gov (United States)

    Montgomery, Todd; Whetten, Brian; Kaplan, Simon

    1995-01-01

    This paper presents the Reliable Multicast Protocol (RMP). RMP provides a totally ordered, reliable, atomic multicast service on top of an unreliable multicast datagram service such as IP Multicasting. RMP is fully and symmetrically distributed so that no site bears un undue portion of the communication load. RMP provides a wide range of guarantees, from unreliable delivery to totally ordered delivery, to K-resilient, majority resilient, and totally resilient atomic delivery. These QoS guarantees are selectable on a per packet basis. RMP provides many communication options, including virtual synchrony, a publisher/subscriber model of message delivery, an implicit naming service, mutually exclusive handlers for messages, and mutually exclusive locks. It has commonly been held that a large performance penalty must be paid in order to implement total ordering -- RMP discounts this. On SparcStation 10's on a 1250 KB/sec Ethernet, RMP provides totally ordered packet delivery to one destination at 842 KB/sec throughput and with 3.1 ms packet latency. The performance stays roughly constant independent of the number of destinations. For two or more destinations on a LAN, RMP provides higher throughput than any protocol that does not use multicast or broadcast.

  9. An Optimal Turkish Private Pension Plan with a Guarantee Feature

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ayşegül İşcanog̃lu-Çekiç

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available The Turkish Private Pension System is an investment system which aims to generate income for future consumption. This is a volunteer system, and the contributions are held in individual portfolios. Therefore, management of the funds is an important issue for both the participants and the insurance company. In this study, we propose an optimal private pension plan with a guarantee feature that is based on Constant Proportion Portfolio Insurance (CPPI. We derive a closed form formula for the optimal strategy with the help of dynamic programming. Moreover, our model is evaluated with numerical examples, and we compare its performance by implementing a sensitivity analysis.

  10. ADMIT: a toolbox for guaranteed model invalidation, estimation and qualitative-quantitative modeling.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Streif, Stefan; Savchenko, Anton; Rumschinski, Philipp; Borchers, Steffen; Findeisen, Rolf

    2012-05-01

    Often competing hypotheses for biochemical networks exist in the form of different mathematical models with unknown parameters. Considering available experimental data, it is then desired to reject model hypotheses that are inconsistent with the data, or to estimate the unknown parameters. However, these tasks are complicated because experimental data are typically sparse, uncertain, and are frequently only available in form of qualitative if-then observations. ADMIT (Analysis, Design and Model Invalidation Toolbox) is a MatLab(TM)-based tool for guaranteed model invalidation, state and parameter estimation. The toolbox allows the integration of quantitative measurement data, a priori knowledge of parameters and states, and qualitative information on the dynamic or steady-state behavior. A constraint satisfaction problem is automatically generated and algorithms are implemented for solving the desired estimation, invalidation or analysis tasks. The implemented methods built on convex relaxation and optimization and therefore provide guaranteed estimation results and certificates for invalidity. ADMIT, tutorials and illustrative examples are available free of charge for non-commercial use at http://ifatwww.et.uni-magdeburg.de/syst/ADMIT/

  11. 77 FR 21793 - Notice of Proposed Information Collection for Public Comment; Loan Guarantee for Indian Housing

    Science.gov (United States)

    2012-04-11

    ... Number: 2577-0200. Description of the need for the information and proposed use: The information is... service areas. Mortgage lenders approved by HUD provide borrower and lender information to HUD for... Information Collection for Public Comment; Loan Guarantee for Indian Housing AGENCY: Office of the Assistant...

  12. Optimal Guaranteed Service Time and Service Level Decision with Time and Service Level Sensitive Demand

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Sangjun Park

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available We consider a two-stage supply chain with one supplier and one retailer. The retailer sells a product to customer and the supplier provides a product in a make-to-order mode. In this case, the supplier’s decisions on service time and service level and the retailer’s decision on retail price have effects on customer demand. We develop optimization models to determine the optimal retail price, the optimal guaranteed service time, the optimal service level, and the optimal capacity to maximize the expected profit of the whole supply chain. The results of numerical experiments show that it is more profitable to determine the optimal price, the optimal guaranteed service time, and the optimal service level simultaneously and the proposed model is more profitable in service level sensitive market.

  13. European beef consumers' interest in a beef eating-quality guarantee

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Verbeke, Wim; Van Wezemael, Lyn; de Barcellos, Marcia Dutra

    2010-01-01

    and Germany to assess their opinions about beef muscle profiling and their interest in a beef eating-quality guarantee. Findings indicate that both concepts are well accepted by European beef consumers, although not unconditional. Besides acknowledging the opportunity to purchase beef with guaranteed...... tenderness, consumers express some reserve related to the possible upgrading of lower value cuts, too much standardisation, and the fact that tenderness is to some extent subjective. They further require the system to be simple, sufficiently documented and independent-party controlled. The insights obtained...

  14. 12 CFR 370.3 - Debt Guarantee Program.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... convertible debt to be issued, (C) The mandatory conversion date, (D) The conversion rate (i.e., the total... exchange rate in effect on the date that the debt is funded. (c) Calculation and reporting responsibility... guarantee expires on the earliest of the mandatory conversion date for mandatory convertible debt, the...

  15. 48 CFR 52.228-1 - Bid Guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... as accepted. (c) The amount of the bid guarantee shall be ____ percent of the bid price or $____, whichever is less. (d) If the successful bidder, upon acceptance of its bid by the Government within the period specified for acceptance, fails to execute all contractual documents or furnish executed bond(s...

  16. 78 FR 46528 - Surety Bond Guarantee Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-08-01

    ... 2013, Public Law 112-239, 126 Stat. 1632: (1) Increasing the contract amount for which SBA is... remedies under contract law, the Act, and the regulations in this part, SBA is relieved of liability in...), including the provisions that increase the contract amounts for which SBA is authorized to guarantee bonds...

  17. 5 CFR 9701.407 - Monitoring performance and providing feedback.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... feedback. 9701.407 Section 9701.407 Administrative Personnel DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY HUMAN... performance and providing feedback. In applying the requirements of the performance management system and its... organization; and (b) Provide timely periodic feedback to employees on their actual performance with respect to...

  18. Towards an integral analysis of stereotypes: Challenging the standard guarantee of impartiality

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Laura Clérico

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available The use of stereotypes to the detriment of the discriminated group should imply questioning the standard guarantee of judicial impartiality. Even taking the analysis of stereotypes seriously, the depth of its consequences has not been sufficiently taken into account in the constitutional and human rights argumentation because it has not challenged with all intensity the standard way in which the guarantee of impartiality is conceived and applied in legal practice and even by the regional court for the protection of human rights. I will defend two central theses: (1 the use of stereotypes necessarily impacts on the analysis of the guarantee of impartiality and (2 impartiality must get rid of the presumption of impartiality.

  19. Telemonitoring guaranteed performance

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Quinette, J Y [TECSOL, Perpignan (France)

    1990-01-01

    The design of any product follows 3 stages: research development and demonstration, before diffusion. The level of experimental detail required (and therefore, the number of measuring points) decreases with each stage. The demonstration phase must be the demonstration that all is running well and of the economical interest of the solar solution. That is why the real time supervision of strategic points of the installation, allowing both the rapid localization of any incident, and the establishment of detailed daily energy balance sheets, seems to be particularly well adapted to following up demonstration projects. At the end of the monitoring period, the productivity of the system must be proven; for that, collected datas must be analyzed every day, in order to make necessary corrections or adjustings and to verify as soon as possible their influence. At that stage, data analysis is more important than the accuracy of measurements. In order to simplify collected datas analysis, results are presented by 3 means: classical data sheet, with daily or hourly values, which are automatically printed; synoptic schemes, that group simplified scheme of the installation and energy and consumption flows (for weekly sheets); and the monthly results are presented on a bill (but with nothing to pay). In the following pages, you can find examples of the main presentation sheets of different installations for solar thermal heating.

  20. Probabilistic Performance Guarantees for Distributed Self-Assembly

    KAUST Repository

    Fox, Michael J.; Shamma, Jeff S.

    2015-01-01

    propagating rules, effectively addressing the decision problem at the level of subgraphs as opposed to individual vertices. We are able to obey more stringent locality requirements while also providing smaller rule sets. The results can be improved upon

  1. Analysis of Aluminum Resource Supply Structure and Guarantee Degree in China Based on Sustainable Perspective

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Shaoli Liu

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available Aluminum is a strategic mineral resource, and China’s aluminum production and consumption is fairly large. However, its supply guarantee is uncertain because of a high dependency on external raw materials. This uncertainty may expand, so finding a way to reduce the uncertainty of aluminum resource supply is especially important. This paper applies the SFA method to analyze the aluminum flows in mainland China from 1996 to 2014, and establishes a supply structure model to measure its supply guarantee degree. The results claim that: (1 China’s aluminum production can satisfy demand and even create a surplus; (2 Domestic self-productive primary and secondary aluminum increased at an annual rate of 12% and 24%; (3 The proportion of self-productive secondary aluminum in the supply structure increased from 7.7% in 1996 to 12.8% in 2014, while that of primary aluminum decreased from 79.6% to 42.8%; (4 The total supply guarantee degree decreased from 87.3% to 55.6% in this period. These results provide a feasible way to solve this plight: the proportion of secondary aluminum in the supply structure should be enhanced, and an efficient aluminum resource recycling system needs to be established as soon as possible to ensure its sustainable supply.

  2. 42 CFR 57.1507 - Limitations applicable to loan guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... FOR CONSTRUCTION OF TEACHING FACILITIES, EDUCATIONAL IMPROVEMENTS, SCHOLARSHIPS AND STUDENT LOANS Loan Guarantees and Interest Subsidies to Assist in Construction of Teaching Facilities for Health Profession...

  3. 32 CFR 151.7 - Fair trial guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-07-01

    ... MILITARY JUSTICE STATUS OF FORCES POLICIES AND INFORMATION § 151.7 Fair trial guarantees. The following is... competent interpreter when the accused does not understand the language in which the trial is conducted and does not have counsel proficient in the language both of the court and of the accused. (p) Accused is...

  4. ROMANIAN DEPOSIT GUARANTEE SCHEME AND THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE ACQUIS COMMUNAUTAIRE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Cristian Bichi

    2002-12-01

    Full Text Available This paper compares the Romanian and EU deposit insurance legislation in order to identify the changes, which are needed in order to obtain a full compatibility of the national regulations in the field of deposit protection with the corresponding European rules. The first part outlines the main features of the EU Directive 94/19/EEC on deposit guarantee schemes in order to find out to what extent Romania is bound to incorporate the relevant acquis communautaire into its national legislation. It results that the directive contains explicit harmonization provisions as regards the minimum level of protection (EUR 20,000, depositor co-insurance, types of depositors, instruments and currencies to be covered, nature of coverage, status of branches from EU and non-EU countries, the compensation period and information to depositors. The directive does not provide for the harmonization of the financial and administrative structure of the deposit guarantee schemes, Romania being free to choose from a wider range of options. The second part examines the legal environment of deposit protection in Romania. The third part identifies the measures to be taken by the Romanian authorities in order to fill in the remaining regulatory gaps in the area of deposit insurance. Finally, the fourth part contains the conclusions.

  5. ADMIT: a toolbox for guaranteed model invalidation, estimation and qualitative–quantitative modeling

    Science.gov (United States)

    Streif, Stefan; Savchenko, Anton; Rumschinski, Philipp; Borchers, Steffen; Findeisen, Rolf

    2012-01-01

    Summary: Often competing hypotheses for biochemical networks exist in the form of different mathematical models with unknown parameters. Considering available experimental data, it is then desired to reject model hypotheses that are inconsistent with the data, or to estimate the unknown parameters. However, these tasks are complicated because experimental data are typically sparse, uncertain, and are frequently only available in form of qualitative if–then observations. ADMIT (Analysis, Design and Model Invalidation Toolbox) is a MatLabTM-based tool for guaranteed model invalidation, state and parameter estimation. The toolbox allows the integration of quantitative measurement data, a priori knowledge of parameters and states, and qualitative information on the dynamic or steady-state behavior. A constraint satisfaction problem is automatically generated and algorithms are implemented for solving the desired estimation, invalidation or analysis tasks. The implemented methods built on convex relaxation and optimization and therefore provide guaranteed estimation results and certificates for invalidity. Availability: ADMIT, tutorials and illustrative examples are available free of charge for non-commercial use at http://ifatwww.et.uni-magdeburg.de/syst/ADMIT/ Contact: stefan.streif@ovgu.de PMID:22451270

  6. Interface Input/Output Automata: Splitting Assumptions from Guarantees

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Larsen, Kim Guldstrand; Nyman, Ulrik; Wasowski, Andrzej

    2006-01-01

    's \\IOAs [11], relying on a context dependent notion of refinement based on relativized language inclusion. There are two main contributions of the work. First, we explicitly separate assumptions from guarantees, increasing the modeling power of the specification language and demonstrating an interesting...

  7. National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, poverty and prices in rural India.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gaiha, Raghav; Kulkarni, Vani S; Pandey, Manoj K; Imai, Katsushi S

    2010-01-01

    The objective of this analysis is mainly to construct an intuitive measure of the performance of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) in India. The focus is on divergence between demand and supply at the district level. Some related issues addressed are: (i) whether the gap between demand and supply responds to poverty; and (ii) whether recent hikes in NREGS wages are inflationary. Our analysis confirms responsiveness of the positive gap between demand and supply to poverty. Also, apprehensions expressed about the inflationary potential of recent hikes in NREGS wages have been confirmed. More importantly, higher NREGS wages are likely to undermine self-selection of the poor in it.

  8. The impact of SMEs’ lending and credit guarantee on bank efficiency in South Korea

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lien-Wen Liang

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available This study examines how small and medium-size enterprises’ (SMEs’ lending and credit guarantee affect Korean banks’ efficiency, by employing the stochastic frontier approach on 14 banks over the period 2001–2010. When lending increases to SMEs, the findings indicate that banks’ cost efficiency decreases due to information asymmetry. However, the increased proportion of credit guarantee can improve their cost efficiency. This proves that South Korea’s credit guarantee system can indeed share SMEs’ credit risk of lending in order to help raise bank efficiency.

  9. Robust levitation control for maglev systems with guaranteed bounded airgap.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Xu, Jinquan; Chen, Ye-Hwa; Guo, Hong

    2015-11-01

    The robust control design problem for the levitation control of a nonlinear uncertain maglev system is considered. The uncertainty is (possibly) fast time-varying. The system has magnitude limitation on the airgap between the suspended chassis and the guideway in order to prevent undesirable contact. Furthermore, the (global) matching condition is not satisfied. After a three-step state transformation, a robust control scheme for the maglev vehicle is proposed, which is able to guarantee the uniform boundedness and uniform ultimate boundedness of the system, regardless of the uncertainty. The magnitude limitation of the airgap is guaranteed, regardless of the uncertainty. Copyright © 2015 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  10. The observable defects and the proper functioning guarantee in trading

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jorge Oviedo Albán

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available This paper discusses two legal mechanisms for buyer´s protection contained in the Colombian Commercial Code, parallel to building regulations, because of hidden defects in the sale, which are: guarantee by observable defects at delivery and guarantee for proper functioning. The author analyzes the poor way such actions are enshrined in the Code as a consequence of a fragmented and dispersed regime for defective compliance actions in the laws of Private Law. This paper proposes a reinterpretation of such actions from the perspective of the lack of conformity that is based on a unified system of remedies for breach, concepts embodied in modern instruments of contract law.

  11. CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING THE GUARANTEEING OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN ROMANIA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    ELENA PARASCHIV

    2012-05-01

    Full Text Available In our country existed and exists still a constant concern to respect and guarantee human rights and fundamental freedoms, especially after 1989, when Romania became a member or acceding to international or regional treaties and conventions enshrining such rights. Taking into consideration the importance of respecting human rights, we consider that is necessary to research how they are secured in Romania, because only when these guarantees are known by their beneficiaries and those involved in their protection, actions which affect these values of humanity can be avoided. In human rights, rules of international law have priority over those entered in the domestic law if they contain provisions which may be interpreted differently on the same matter, unless the Constitution or national laws contain more favourable provisions.

  12. When Justice Is Up to You. Celebrating America's Guarantee of Trial by Jury.

    Science.gov (United States)

    National Inst. for Citizen Education in the Law, Washington, DC.

    Featuring a mock trial tested in the District of Columbia, the objective of this manual is to help students learn more about the constitutional guarantee of trial by jury. Prepared as five separate lessons, the manual examines one alternative to the jury system--trial by ordeal; traces the development of the guarantee of trial by jury; explores…

  13. 7 CFR 3575.73 - Replacement of loss, theft, destruction, mutilation, or defacement of Loan Note Guarantee or...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 7 Agriculture 15 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Replacement of loss, theft, destruction, mutilation... AGRICULTURE GENERAL Community Programs Guaranteed Loans § 3575.73 Replacement of loss, theft, destruction... circumstances of the loss, theft, or destruction of the Loan Note Guarantee or Assignment Guarantee Agreement...

  14. 7 CFR 1493.40 - Application for payment guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... and allowances, if any. (11) Port value (includes upward loading tolerance, if any). (12) Guaranteed..., contract loading tolerance and, if necessary, a request for CCC to reserve coverage up to the maximum quantity permitted by the contract loading tolerance. (9) Unit sales price of the commodity, or a mechanism...

  15. The Impact of Public Guarantees on Bank Risk Taking : Evidence from a Natural Experiment

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Gropp, R.; Grundl, C.; Guttler, A.

    2010-01-01

    In 2001, government guarantees for savings banks in Germany were removed following a law suit. We use this natural experiment to examine the effect of government guarantees on bank risk taking, using a large data set of matched bank/borrower information. The results suggest that banks whose

  16. Economic valuation of a toll road concession with traffic guarantees and the abandonment option

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Frances Fischberg Blank

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Governments worldwide have been encouraging private participation in transportation infrastructure. To increase the feasibility of a project, public-private partnership (PPP may include guarantees or other support to reduce the risks for private investors. It is necessary to value these opportunities under a real options framework and thereby analyze the project's economic feasibility and risk allocation. However, within this structure, sponsors have an implicit option to abandon the project that should be simultaneously valued. Thus, this article proposes a hypothetical toll road concession in Brazil with a minimum traffic guarantee, a maximum traffic ceiling, and an implicit abandonment option. Different combinations of the minimum and maximum levels are presented, resulting in very high or even negative value added to the net present value (NPV. The abandonment option impacts the level of guarantee to be given. Governments should calibrate an optimal level of guarantees to avoid unnecessarily high costs, protect the returns of the sponsor, and lower the probability of abandonment.

  17. Nonfragile Guaranteed Cost Control and Optimization for Interconnected Systems of Neutral Type

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Heli Hu

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available The design and optimization problems of the nonfragile guaranteed cost control are investigated for a class of interconnected systems of neutral type. A novel scheme, viewing the interconnections with time-varying delays as effective information but not disturbances, is developed to decrease the conservatism. Many techniques on decomposing and magnifying the matrices are utilized to obtain the guaranteed cost of the considered system. Also, an algorithm is proposed to solve the nonlinear problem of the interconnected matrices. Based on this algorithm, the minimization of the guaranteed cost of the considered system is obtained by optimization. Further, the state feedback control is extended to the case in which the underlying system is dependent on uncertain parameters. Finally, two numerical examples are given to illustrate the proposed method, and some comparisons are made to show the advantages of the schemes of dealing with the interconnections.

  18. Monitoring and Evaluation of Cultivated Land Irrigation Guarantee Capability with Remote Sensing

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhang, C., Sr.; Huang, J.; Li, L.; Wang, H.; Zhu, D.

    2015-12-01

    Abstract: Cultivated Land Quality Grade monitoring and evaluation is an important way to improve the land production capability and ensure the country food safety. Irrigation guarantee capability is one of important aspects in the cultivated land quality monitoring and evaluation. In the current cultivated land quality monitoring processing based on field survey, the irrigation rate need much human resources investment in long investigation process. This study choses Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei as study region, taking the 1 km × 1 km grid size of cultivated land unit with a winter wheat-summer maize double cropping system as study object. A new irrigation capacity evaluation index based on the ratio of the annual irrigation requirement retrieved from MODIS data and the actual quantity of irrigation was proposed. With the years of monitoring results the irrigation guarantee capability of study area was evaluated comprehensively. The change trend of the irrigation guarantee capability index (IGCI) with the agricultural drought disaster area in rural statistical yearbook of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei area was generally consistent. The average of IGCI value, the probability of irrigation-guaranteed year and the weighted average which controlled by the irrigation demand index were used and compared in this paper. The experiment results indicate that the classification result from the present method was close to that from irrigation probability in the gradation on agriculture land quality in 2012, with overlap of 73% similar units. The method of monitoring and evaluation of cultivated land IGCI proposed in this paper has a potential in cultivated land quality level monitoring and evaluation in China. Key words: remote sensing, evapotranspiration, MODIS cultivated land quality, irrigation guarantee capability Authors: Chao Zhang, Jianxi Huang, Li Li, Hongshuo Wang, Dehai Zhu China Agricultural University zhangchaobj@gmail.com

  19. Event-Triggered Asynchronous Guaranteed Cost Control for Markov Jump Discrete-Time Neural Networks With Distributed Delay and Channel Fading.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yan, Huaicheng; Zhang, Hao; Yang, Fuwen; Zhan, Xisheng; Peng, Chen

    2017-08-18

    This paper is concerned with the guaranteed cost control problem for a class of Markov jump discrete-time neural networks (NNs) with event-triggered mechanism, asynchronous jumping, and fading channels. The Markov jump NNs are introduced to be close to reality, where the modes of the NNs and guaranteed cost controller are determined by two mutually independent Markov chains. The asynchronous phenomenon is considered, which increases the difficulty of designing required mode-dependent controller. The event-triggered mechanism is designed by comparing the relative measurement error with the last triggered state at the process of data transmission, which is used to eliminate dispensable transmission and reduce the networked energy consumption. In addition, the signal fading is considered for the effect of signal reflection and shadow in wireless networks, which is modeled by the novel Rice fading models. Some novel sufficient conditions are obtained to guarantee that the closed-loop system reaches a specified cost value under the designed jumping state feedback control law in terms of linear matrix inequalities. Finally, some simulation results are provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

  20. Delay-Dependent Guaranteed Cost Control of an Interval System with Interval Time-Varying Delay

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Xiao Min

    2009-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper concerns the problem of the delay-dependent robust stability and guaranteed cost control for an interval system with time-varying delay. The interval system with matrix factorization is provided and leads to less conservative conclusions than solving a square root. The time-varying delay is assumed to belong to an interval and the derivative of the interval time-varying delay is not a restriction, which allows a fast time-varying delay; also its applicability is broad. Based on the Lyapunov-Ktasovskii approach, a delay-dependent criterion for the existence of a state feedback controller, which guarantees the closed-loop system stability, the upper bound of cost function, and disturbance attenuation lever for all admissible uncertainties as well as out perturbation, is proposed in terms of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs. The criterion is derived by free weighting matrices that can reduce the conservatism. The effectiveness has been verified in a number example and the compute results are presented to validate the proposed design method.

  1. 13 CFR 400.214 - Participations in guaranteed loans.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ...) Subject to paragraphs (b), (c) and (d) of this section, a Lender may distribute the risk of a portion of a... the Guarantee is assigned, conveyed, sold, or transferred in whole or in part; (2) The Lender remains... Lenders; (2) Private investment funds and insurance companies that do not usually invest in commercial...

  2. Pricing and Hedging Guaranteed Returns on Mix Funds

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Vellekoop, M.H.; van de Kamp, A.A.; Post, B.A.

    2006-01-01

    Abstract In this paper we propose a valuation and hedging strategy for a guaranteed minimal rate of return on a mix fund, which participates in both bonds and stocks. For the case where a fixed amount of money is invested, we show that a European put option on the mix fund replicates the cash flows

  3. Resilient guaranteed cost control of a power system.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Soliman, Hisham M; Soliman, Mostafa H; Hassan, Mohammad F

    2014-05-01

    With the development of power system interconnection, the low-frequency oscillation is becoming more and more prominent which may cause system separation and loss of energy to consumers. This paper presents an innovative robust control for power systems in which the operating conditions are changing continuously due to load changes. However, practical implementation of robust control can be fragile due to controller inaccuracies (tolerance of resistors used with operational amplifiers). A new design of resilient (non-fragile) robust control is given that takes into consideration both model and controller uncertainties by an iterative solution of a set of linear matrix inequalities (LMI). Both uncertainties are cast into a norm-bounded structure. A sufficient condition is derived to achieve the desired settling time for damping power system oscillations in face of plant and controller uncertainties. Furthermore, an improved controller design, resilient guaranteed cost controller, is derived to achieve oscillations damping in a guaranteed cost manner. The effectiveness of the algorithm is shown for a single machine infinite bus system, and then, it is extended to multi-area power system.

  4. Asset securitization and rate of return: A study on letters of guarantee

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wu, Binghui

    2018-01-01

    Using the theory of asset securitization, we analyze the feasibility of the securitization of letters of guarantee in theory. In the process of constructing the model of rate of return of securities backed by letters of guarantee, we propose two indices: the risk probability of asset-backed securities and the loss rate of asset-backed securities to analyze the cash flow of securities. On the basis of no arbitrage principle, the expression of rate of return of securities backed by letters of guarantee is put forward. In order to study the relationship between the rate of return of securities and other influential factor in the model, a simulation experiment is designed. The experiment results show that (i) an increasing risk probability of cash flow or a short maturity date also make the return rate of securities increase and (ii) the return rate of securities is higher in economic boom than that in economic recession when other parameters remain unchanged.

  5. 7 CFR 4279.75 - Sale or assignment of guaranteed loan.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... borrower's immediate families, officers, directors, stockholders, other owners, or a parent, subsidiary or...) or any successor section will not be guaranteed. (a) Single note system. The entire loan is evidenced...

  6. DEPOSIT GUARANTEE SCHEMES JOIN FINANCIAL SAFETY-NET

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Eugen Dijmarescu

    2011-03-01

    Full Text Available Deposit Guarantee Schemes (DGS become more visible under the current conditions of the world financial markets. If those have played in the past a rather discreet role for social stability through the function of pay box following a bank failure, the recent crisis put them in a new light, once the guarantee ceiling for eligible deposits grew in order to make for the accumulation of wealth worldwide and the increased risk incurred by the leverage of banking operations. Consequently, the resources accumulated by the DGS from the member banks and their proper management make possible their involvement in pre-emptive actions aimed to avoid bankruptcies via special administration and purchase of assets and assumption of liabilities. These new attributes give DGS a role in the mechanism of financial safety-net, along the supervisors of the market. Hence, an increased preoccupation for applied corporate governance has developed and Core Principles for Effective Deposit Insurance Systems have been adopted by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision together with International Association of Deposit Insurers. Concurrently, the EU Commission has put forward a process for reviewing the Directives 94/39 and 09/14 EC, in order to make the European DGS more prepared to deal with above mentioned issues and bestow increased confidence upon depositors.

  7. Physical Profiling Performance of Air Force Primary Care Providers

    Science.gov (United States)

    2017-08-09

    AFRL-SA-WP-TR-2017-0014 Physical Profiling Performance of Air Force Primary Care Providers Anthony P. Tvaryanas1; William P...COVERED (From – To) September 2016 – January 2017 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE Physical Profiling Performance of Air Force Primary Care Providers...encounter with their primary care team. An independent medical standards subject matter expert (SME) reviewed encounters in the electronic health record

  8. Non-fragile guaranteed cost control for uncertain neutral dynamic systems with time-varying delays in state and control input

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Lien, C.-H.

    2007-01-01

    This article considers non-fragile guaranteed cost control problem for a class of uncertain neutral system with time-varying delays in both state and control input. Delay-dependent criteria are proposed to guarantee the robust stabilization of systems. Linear matrix inequality (LMI) optimization approach is used to solve the non-fragile guaranteed cost control problem. Non-fragile guaranteed cost control for unperturbed neutral system is considered in the first step. Robust non-fragile guaranteed cost control for uncertain neutral system is designed directly from the unperturbed condition. An efficient approach is proposed to design the non-fragile guaranteed cost control for uncertain neutral systems. LMI toolbox of Matlab is used to implement the proposed results. Finally, a numerical example is illustrated to show the usefulness of the proposed results

  9. 7 CFR 4290.820 - Financings in the form of guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ...-COOPERATIVE SERVICE AND RURAL UTILITIES SERVICE, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE RURAL BUSINESS INVESTMENT COMPANY...-Types of Financings § 4290.820 Financings in the form of guarantees. (a) General rule. At the request of...

  10. Further improvements in competitive guarantees for QoS buffering

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Bansal, N.; Fleischer, L.K.; Kimbrel, T.; Mahdian, M.; Schieber, B.; Sviridenko, M.; Diaz, J.; Karhumäki, J.; Lepistö, A.; Sannella, D.

    2004-01-01

    We study the behavior of algorithms for buffering packets weighted by different levels of Quality of Service (QoS) guarantees in a single queue. Buffer space is limited, and packet loss occurs when the buffer overflows. We describe a modification of the previously proposed ``preemptive greedy{''}

  11. Stabilization with guaranteed safety using Control Lyapunov–Barrier Function

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Romdlony, Muhammad Zakiyullah; Jayawardhana, Bayu

    2016-01-01

    We propose a novel nonlinear control method for solving the problem of stabilization with guaranteed safety for nonlinear systems. The design is based on the merging of the well-known Control Lyapunov Function (CLF) and the recent concept of Control Barrier Function (CBF). The proposed control

  12. Toward sensitive document release with privacy guarantees

    OpenAIRE

    David Sánchez; Montserrat Batet

    2017-01-01

    Toward sensitive document release with privacy guarantees DOI: 10.1016/j.engappai.2016.12.013 URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0952197616302408 Filiació URV: SI Inclòs a la memòria: SI Privacy has become a serious concern for modern Information Societies. The sensitive nature of much of the data that are daily exchanged or released to untrusted parties requires that responsible organizations undertake appropriate privacy protection measures. Nowadays, much...

  13. Engaging service providers in improving industry performance

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Oberth, R.

    2012-01-01

    Effective task leadership is the key to achieving results in the nuclear industry and in most other industries. One of the themes of this conference is to discuss how the nuclear industry can undertake Issue-Identification and Definition as a means of 'identifying what needs attention' and then 'defining what needs to be done to make that happen'. I will explore this theme from the perspective of the 'Service Provider' - which by the definition of this conference includes everyone not within an operating utility - meaning 'those involved in everything from inspection and repair to research and plant architecture' - basically the member companies of my association, OCI. Our members take the definition of the roles and responsibilities of the 'Service Provider' community very seriously. In the context of this discussion a key utility function is the early definition of requirements and expectations of Service Providers in supplying to these requirements. Let's explore for a moment the Service Provider role and perspective. Service Providers are by nature pro-active - they seek ways to engage with utilities (and tier one vendors) to solve problems and achieve good outcomes. They come to industry conferences like this one to learn about upcoming utility programs and supply opportunities and how they can improve performance. Service Providers particularly want to hear senior utility people comment on emerging issues even those at the very early identification stage. Some Clarification of Roles is in Order - as that is the focus of this conference: 'Issue-Identification and Definition'. 'Issue-Identification' is the utility's job - it is the utility's role to identify as early as possible 'what needs attention and what their needs and expectations are'. This takes place before service provider engagement. 'Issue-Definition' is more challenging. It means 'determining and prioritizing what needs to be done to deal with the situation at hand'. This typically involves

  14. Delay-Dependent Guaranteed Cost H∞ Control of an Interval System with Interval Time-Varying Delay

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Zhongke Shi

    2009-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper concerns the problem of the delay-dependent robust stability and guaranteed cost H∞ control for an interval system with time-varying delay. The interval system with matrix factorization is provided and leads to less conservative conclusions than solving a square root. The time-varying delay is assumed to belong to an interval and the derivative of the interval time-varying delay is not a restriction, which allows a fast time-varying delay; also its applicability is broad. Based on the Lyapunov-Ktasovskii approach, a delay-dependent criterion for the existence of a state feedback controller, which guarantees the closed-loop system stability, the upper bound of cost function, and disturbance attenuation lever for all admissible uncertainties as well as out perturbation, is proposed in terms of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs. The criterion is derived by free weighting matrices that can reduce the conservatism. The effectiveness has been verified in a number example and the compute results are presented to validate the proposed design method.

  15. Vertical Handover Algorithm for WBANs in Ubiquitous Healthcare with Quality of Service Guarantees

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dong Doan Van

    2017-03-01

    Full Text Available Recently, Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs have become an emerging technology in healthcare, where patients are equipped withwearable and implantable body sensor nodes to gather sensory information for remote monitoring. The increasing development of coordinator devices on patients enables the internetworking of WBANs in heterogeneous wireless networks to deliver physiological information that is collected at remote terminals in a timely fashion. However, in this type of network, providing a seamless handover with a guaranteed Quality of Service (QoS, especially emergency services, is a challenging task. In this paper, we proposed an effective Multi-Attribute Decision-Making (MADM handover algorithm that guarantees seamless connectivity. A patient’s mobile devices automatically connect to the best network that fulfills the QoS requirements of different types of applications. Additionally, we integrated a Content-Centric Networking (CCN processing module into different wireless networks to reduce packet loss, enhance QoS and avoid unnecessary handovers by leveraging in-network caching to achieve efficient content dissemination for ubiquitous healthcare. Simulation results proved that our proposed approach forthe model with CCN outperforms the model without CCN and Received Signal Strength Vertical Handoff (RSS-VHD in terms of the number of handovers, enhancing QoS, packet loss, and energy efficiency.

  16. A Conflict-Free Low-Jitter Guaranteed-Rate MAC Protocol for Base-Station Communications in Wireless Mesh Networks

    Science.gov (United States)

    Szymanski, T. H.

    A scheduling algorithm and MAC protocol which provides low-jitter guaranteed-rate (GR) communications between base-stations (BS) in a Wireless Mesh Network (WMN) is proposed. The protocol can provision long-term multimedia services such as VOIP, IPTV, or Video-on-Demand. The time-axis is partitioned into scheduling frames with F time-slots each. A directional antennae scheme is used to provide each directed link with a fixed transmission rate. A protocol such as IntServ is used to provision resources along an end-to-end path of BSs for GR sessions. The Guaranteed Rates between the BSs are then specified in a doubly stochastic traffic rate matrix, which is recursively decomposed to yield a low-jitter GR frame transmission schedule. In the resulting schedule, the end-to-end delay and jitter are small and bounded, and the cell loss rate due to primary scheduling conflicts is zero. For dual-channel WMNs, the MAC protocol can achieve 100% utilization, as well as near-minimal queueing delays and near minimal delay jitter. The scheduling time complexity is O(NFlogNF), where N is the number of BSs. Extensive simulation results are presented.

  17. Community oral health literacy: improving use of oral-health care guarantee in children aged 6.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marco Cornejo-Ovalle

    2013-08-01

    Full Text Available The assessment of comprehensive oral health care for children aged 6 (GES-6years showed low utilization of this guarantee, with lower use for children from municipal public schools. The empowerment and health literacy of parents improve their role as oral-health promoters for their children. Objective: To implement and to assess a strategy of empowerment and health literacy of the community about their guaranteed health rights to increase the use of GES-6years. Methods: A mixed design. Using qualitative methodology we will design a communication tool, culturally and socially appropriate to be sent to the beneficiary community of this guarantee. Using a nonrandomized community trial, this instrument designed to empower and improve oral health literacy on GES-6 guarantee, will be sent as personalized letter (intervention signed by the mayor of the municipality with a message aimed to children beneficiaries for GES -6years and another addressed to their parents/guardians. Schools would be selected from clusters (communes of the two regions selected for convenience. Communes will be randomly selected amog those whose authorities agree to participate, and will be selected as for intervention or control. Data analysis will assess the differences in the prevalence of use of this guarantee among children from municipal schools belonging to the intervention or control arm.

  18. A Unified Pricing of Variable Annuity Guarantees under the Optimal Stochastic Control Framework

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Pavel V. Shevchenko

    2016-07-01

    Full Text Available In this paper, we review pricing of the variable annuity living and death guarantees offered to retail investors in many countries. Investors purchase these products to take advantage of market growth and protect savings. We present pricing of these products via an optimal stochastic control framework and review the existing numerical methods. We also discuss pricing under the complete/incomplete financial market models, stochastic mortality and optimal/sub-optimal policyholder behavior, and in the presence of taxes. For numerical valuation of these contracts in the case of simple risky asset process, we develop a direct integration method based on the Gauss-Hermite quadratures with a one-dimensional cubic spline for calculation of the expected contract value, and a bi-cubic spline interpolation for applying the jump conditions across the contract cashflow event times. This method is easier to implement and faster when compared to the partial differential equation methods if the transition density (or its moments of the risky asset underlying the contract is known in closed form between the event times. We present accurate numerical results for pricing of a Guaranteed Minimum Accumulation Benefit (GMAB guarantee available on the market that can serve as a numerical benchmark for practitioners and researchers developing pricing of variable annuity guarantees to assess the accuracy of their numerical implementation.

  19. Guarantee Funds of Credits in Romania - Necessity, Features and Networking - II

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Georgeta Dragomir

    2011-12-01

    Full Text Available In the current context, marked by financial crisis, economic recession, lack of liquidity andlow capitalization, the access tofinancing is more difficult, mainly due to the lack, insufficiency orlimited availability of guarantees. Guarantee funds represent an innovative solution, proven by theEuropean economies and recently launched in Romania. Taking over the international experience inorder to facilitate the SMEs’ access to financial resources has become a necessity in Romania, whichwas reflected by the creation of three specialized financial institutions in granting guarantees domain.These are bodies with private or publiccapital, which relate, based on agreements with commercialbanks. After a period of exposure to major risks from the lack of regulatory activity, the guaranteefunds, along with other non-banking financial institutions are absolutely governed by rules oftheNRB, according to the banking law and special laws. The analysis in this paper is based on the studyof several official documents, reports of specialized bodies, statistics and examples of good practice,summarized and interpreted in through comparison and developments. The aim is to identify anumber of issues that may lead to sensitize the responsible factors-public authorities, creditinstitutions, and specialists-to come up with new practical solutions that would stimulate thefinancing processof small entrepreneurs.

  20. Security measures effect over performance in service provider network

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    pc

    2018-03-05

    Mar 5, 2018 ... Abstract—network security is defined as a set of policies and actions taken by a ... These threats are linked with the following factors that are ... typically smaller than those in the service provider space. ... Service providers cannot manage to provide ... e the DB performance effect ... r the business needs [10].

  1. 78 FR 691 - Maximum Loan Amount for Business and Industry Guaranteed Loans in Fiscal Year 2013

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-01-04

    ... DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE Rural Business-Cooperative Service Maximum Loan Amount for Business and Industry Guaranteed Loans in Fiscal Year 2013 AGENCY: Rural Business-Cooperative Service, USDA. ACTION... and Industry (B&I) guaranteed loans of $25 million or less under certain circumstances. Due to the...

  2. 78 FR 66841 - Israel Loan Guarantees Issued Under the Emergency Wartime Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2003...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-11-07

    ... AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT 22 CFR Part 230 Israel Loan Guarantees Issued Under the... the Government of Israel on behalf of the State of Israel. Pursuant to the Emergency Wartime... International Development, may issue loan guarantees applicable to sums borrowed by the Government of Israel on...

  3. We Don’t Want to Be Officially Certified! Reasons and Implications of the Participatory Guarantee Systems

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mamen Cuéllar-Padilla

    2018-04-01

    Full Text Available Official organic regulation in Europe is based on the third-party certification system to guarantee organic products. Many critics and dissatisfactions have motivated the emergence of other guarantee systems, based on an intense implication of producers and, in some cases, consumers and other local actors, involved in localised agri-food systems. They are called Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS, and are not recognised as valid guarantee systems by the official organic regulation. In the present paper, we analyse the main differences between the PGS and the third party certification system, deepening on their differentiated social and political implications. We conclude that the procedures behind PGS generate numerous positive impacts in the territories related to local producers (and consumers empowerment and localised agri-food systems drive, while their implications make them not considered as a substitute to third party certification system, unless certain conditions of social consolidated groups and agroecological and food sovereignty perspective of food system take place.

  4. Administrative Circular No. 13 (Rev. 4) - Guarantees for representatives of the personnel

    CERN Multimedia

    Department Head Office - HR Department

    2016-01-01

    Administrative Circular No. 13 (Rev. 4) entitled "Guarantees for representatives of the personnel", approved by the Director-General following discussion in the Standing Concertation Committee meeting on 22 March 2016, will be available on 1st September 2016 via the following link: https://cds.cern.ch/record/2208527.   This revised circular cancels and replaces Administrative Circular No. 13 (Rev. 3) also entitled "Guarantees for representatives of the personnel" of January 2014. This document contains a single change to reflect the terminology under the new career structure: the term "career path" is replaced by "grade". This circular will enter into force on 1st September 2016.

  5. L’evolució del garantisme: de les garanties personals a la garantia de l’estat - The Evolution of Constitutional Guarantees: from personal guarantees to guaranteeing the State - La evolución del garantismo: de las garantías personales a la garantía del Estado

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    José Esteve Pardo

    2013-06-01

    Full Text Available La reforma constitucional per a l’estabilitat pressupostària i la contenció del dèficitLa reforma de l’article 135 de la Constitució és un moviment inèdit en el constitucionalisme, ja que per primera vegada s’orienta cap a la protecció del mateix Estat, a la sostenibilitat, davant l’exposició excessiva al crèdit extern. Les garanties constitucionals van ser primer garanties de llibertats personals, després garanties d’institucions de l’Estat o de la societat i ara, per primera vegada, garanties del mateix Estat. The Constitutional Amendment for Budgetary Stability and Deficit RestraintThe amendment of article 135 of the Constitution highlights a constitutionally unprecedented movement toward protection of the State, the State´s self-protection against external credit. Constitutional guarantees were originally guarantees of personal liberties, then guarantees of the institutions of the State or civil society, and are now for the first time self-guarantees of the State.La reforma constitucional para la estabilidad presupuestaria y contención del déficitLa reforma del artículo 135 de la Constitución es un movimiento inédito en el constitucionalismo puesto que por vez primera se orienta a la protección del propio Estado, a su sostenibilidad, ante la excesiva exposición al crédito externo. Las garantías constitucionales fueron primero garantías de libertades personales, luego garantías de instituciones del Estado o de la sociedad y ahora, por vez primera, garantías del propio Estado.

  6. 22 CFR 213.3 - Loans, guarantees, sovereign and interagency claims.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... 22 Foreign Relations 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Loans, guarantees, sovereign and interagency claims. 213.3 Section 213.3 Foreign Relations AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT CLAIMS COLLECTION... thereof, or any public international organization; (d) Claims where the CFO determines that the...

  7. An Active Queue Management for QoS Guarantee of the High Priority Service Class

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kim, Hyun Jong; Shim, Jae Chan; Kim, Hwa-Suk; Cho, Kee Seong; Choi, Seong Gon

    In this paper, we propose the active queue management mechanism (Active-WRED) for guaranteeing the quality of the high priority service class (VoIP or IPTV) in the multi-class traffic service environment. In the congestion situation, this mechanism increases the drop probability of the low priority traffic and reduces the drop probability of the high priority traffic; therefore it can guarantee the quality of the high priority service class from the poor quality by the packet loss.

  8. The structure and economic significance of government guarantees in Croatia and the European Union

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marko Primorac

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available In the aftermath of the financial crisis, when countries are facing difficulties in raising the amounts of revenue needed to cover the expenditure side of the budget, fiscal risks can pose a significant threat to the sustainability of public finance. This became particularly evident in the case of public enterprises and their liabilities, which often increased public debt because of difficulties in meeting their financial obligations. The aim of this paper is to evaluate fiscal risks from government guarantees in Croatia and the European Union in general. Moreover, the paper aims to analyse the dynamics of the value and structure of government guarantees in Croatia in the period from 2009 to first half of 2015. Particular emphasis is placed on the impact of government guarantees on direct public debt in the context of methodological changes in the registration of public debt.

  9. [Packaging: the guarantee of medicinal quality].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chaumeil, J-C

    2003-01-01

    Primary packaging guarantees the pharmaceutical quality of the medicinal preparation received by the patient. Glass bottles containing parenteral solutions for example ensure that sterility, quality and optimal stability are preserved until administration. Recent innovations in materials research has lead to improvements in parenteral infusions. Multicompartmental bags, allowing extemporaneous mixtures without opening the container, constitute an extremely beneficial advance for the patient, allowing administration of mixtures with solutions and emulsions which would be unstable if stored. Metered dose pressurized inhalers are an excellent example of drug administration devices designed specifically to ensure quality and bioavailability. These examples illustrate the important role of primary packaging and demonstrate the usefulness of research and development in this area.

  10. 13 CFR 107.820 - Financings in the form of guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Financings in the form of... BUSINESS INVESTMENT COMPANIES Financing of Small Businesses by Licensees Structuring Licensee's Financing of Eligible Small Businesses: Types of Financing § 107.820 Financings in the form of guarantees. At...

  11. Coverage and Rate of Downlink Sequence Transmissions with Reliability Guarantees

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Park, Jihong; Popovski, Petar

    2017-01-01

    Real-time distributed control is a promising application of 5G in which communication links should satisfy certain reliability guarantees. In this letter, we derive closed-form maximum average rate when a device (e.g. industrial machine) downloads a sequence of n operational commands through cell...

  12. 13 CFR 108.820 - Financings in the form of guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Financings in the form of... VENTURE CAPITAL (âNMVCâ) PROGRAM Financing of Small Businesses by NMVC Companies Structuring Nmvc Company's Financing of Eligible Small Businesses § 108.820 Financings in the form of guarantees. (a) General...

  13. Proposal of a control and quality guarantee program in radiotherapy and radiodiagnosis

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Tovar Rodas, J.A.

    1998-01-01

    In Guatemala, as regards guarantee and control of quality in the radiotherapy and radiodiagnostic areas, doesn't have until the moment, properly established, an action plan to carry out in systematic form, a program that it satisfies the design requirements and operation in an installation of this nature. However, it is well-known that the techniques that involve the employment of the ionizing radiations are powerful tools for their applications in industry, investigation and medicine; their use should be optimized and the associate risks should be evaluated to prevent them and to limit them. At the moment, the first actions of a guarantee program and quality control are carried out in the radiotherapy area for the intervention of the Secondary Laboratory of Dosimetric Calibration, but the quick growth of this area and the high number of radiodiagnosis facilities that work in the country, they outline the necessity to develop a methodology that solves the problem that is presented by the lack of controls of quality in these practices partly. The present work, presents in first plane the objectives, antecedents, forms of development, available resources and the necessities that are had in each area for the setting in march of the Quality Guarantee Program in Radiotherapy and of the Quality Control Program in Radiodiagnosis

  14. 13 CFR 120.520 - Purchase of 7(a) loan guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... condition of the collateral, plans for any type of loan workout or loan restructuring, existing liquidation activities including the sale of loan collateral, or the status of ongoing foreclosure proceedings. The... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Purchase of 7(a) loan guarantees...

  15. 7 CFR 762.129 - Percent of guarantee and maximum loss.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... loss. (a) General. The percent of guarantee will not exceed 90 percent based on the credit risk to the lender and the Agency both before and after the transaction. The Agency will determine the percentage of... PLP lenders will not be less than 80 percent. (d) Maximum loss. The maximum amount the Agency will pay...

  16. Organic Law Of Judicial Guarantees And Constitutional Control

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ernesto López Freire

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper demonstrates the various unconstitutional and fallacies of the Organic Law of Judicial guarantees and Constitutional Control. For that, there will be a comprehensive collation between the mentioned law and the Constitution of the Republic of Ecuador and force. Through this analysis shows a lack of knowledge of Ecuadorian law or legal science by their authors. This study elucidated, inter alia, the inconsistencies in matters relating to the interpretation of constitutional provisions, full compensation, material and integral; challenge administrative acts, judicial unit.

  17. An Analysis of IPsec Deployment Performance in High and Low Power Devices

    OpenAIRE

    Ronan, John; Davy, Stephen; Rossebo, Judith

    2004-01-01

    Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) use the Internet or other network service as a backbone to provide a secure connection across a potentially hostile WAN. Such security guarantees provide the motivation for VPN deployment. This security does, however, come at a performance cost brought about by the increased processing overhead. This paper presents an investigation into these overheads. In particular, this investigation will consider different user resource availability based on the client plat...

  18. Does Judge Turnover Affect Judicial Performance?

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Guerra, Alice; Tagliapietra, Claudio

    2017-01-01

    office to another after three years of mandate, and the law prescribes their transfer after ten years to guarantee their independence. Flaws in the process managing the backlog of outbound judges and the existence of asynchrony between outbound and inbound transfers produce a chain of delays...... to the disposition of court cases. Using a novel dataset on Court of Appeal Districts in Italy (2008–2012), we provide evidence of a strong negative relation between high turnover rates and judicial performance. We find that marginal increases in judge turnover rates lead to a statistically significant decrease...... in judicial performance over two years of time...

  19. Guaranteed Cost Fault-Tolerant Control for Networked Control Systems with Sensor Faults

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Qixin Zhu

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available For the large scale and complicated structure of networked control systems, time-varying sensor faults could inevitably occur when the system works in a poor environment. Guaranteed cost fault-tolerant controller for the new networked control systems with time-varying sensor faults is designed in this paper. Based on time delay of the network transmission environment, the networked control systems with sensor faults are modeled as a discrete-time system with uncertain parameters. And the model of networked control systems is related to the boundary values of the sensor faults. Moreover, using Lyapunov stability theory and linear matrix inequalities (LMI approach, the guaranteed cost fault-tolerant controller is verified to render such networked control systems asymptotically stable. Finally, simulations are included to demonstrate the theoretical results.

  20. Composite Measures of Health Care Provider Performance: A Description of Approaches

    Science.gov (United States)

    Shwartz, Michael; Restuccia, Joseph D; Rosen, Amy K

    2015-01-01

    Context Since the Institute of Medicine’s 2001 report Crossing the Quality Chasm, there has been a rapid proliferation of quality measures used in quality-monitoring, provider-profiling, and pay-for-performance (P4P) programs. Although individual performance measures are useful for identifying specific processes and outcomes for improvement and tracking progress, they do not easily provide an accessible overview of performance. Composite measures aggregate individual performance measures into a summary score. By reducing the amount of data that must be processed, they facilitate (1) benchmarking of an organization’s performance, encouraging quality improvement initiatives to match performance against high-performing organizations, and (2) profiling and P4P programs based on an organization’s overall performance. Methods We describe different approaches to creating composite measures, discuss their advantages and disadvantages, and provide examples of their use. Findings The major issues in creating composite measures are (1) whether to aggregate measures at the patient level through all-or-none approaches or the facility level, using one of the several possible weighting schemes; (2) when combining measures on different scales, how to rescale measures (using z scores, range percentages, ranks, or 5-star categorizations); and (3) whether to use shrinkage estimators, which increase precision by smoothing rates from smaller facilities but also decrease transparency. Conclusions Because provider rankings and rewards under P4P programs may be sensitive to both context and the data, careful analysis is warranted before deciding to implement a particular method. A better understanding of both when and where to use composite measures and the incentives created by composite measures are likely to be important areas of research as the use of composite measures grows. PMID:26626986

  1. Development Concept of Guaranteed Verification Electric Power System Simulation Tools and Its Realization

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Gusev Alexander

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available The analysis of existing problem reliability and verification of widespread electric power systems (EPS simulation tools is presented in this article. Everything simulation tools are based on the using of numerical methods for ordinary differential equations. Described the concept of guaranteed verification EPS simulation tools and the structure of its realization are based using the Simulator having properties of continuous , without decomposition three-phase EPS simulation in real time and on an unlimited range with guaranteed accuracy. The information from the Simulator can be verified by using data only quasi-steady-state regime received from the SCADA and such Simulator can be applied as the standard model for verification any EPS simulation tools.

  2. Pricing Rate of Return Guarantees in Regular Premium Unit Linked Insurance

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Schrager, D.F.; Pelsser, A.

    2004-01-01

    We derive general pricing formulas for Rate of Return Guarantees in Regular Premium Unit Linked Insurance under stochastic interest rates. Our main contribution focusses on the effect of stochastic interest rates. First, we show the effect of stochastic interest rates can be interpreted as, what is

  3. Guaranteed cost control of mobile sensor networks with Markov switching topologies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhao, Yuan; Guo, Ge; Ding, Lei

    2015-09-01

    This paper investigates the consensus seeking problem of mobile sensor networks (MSNs) with random switching topologies. The network communication topologies are composed of a set of directed graphs (or digraph) with a spanning tree. The switching of topologies is governed by a Markov chain. The consensus seeking problem is addressed by introducing a global topology-aware linear quadratic (LQ) cost as the performance measure. By state transformation, the consensus problem is transformed to the stabilization of a Markovian jump system with guaranteed cost. A sufficient condition for global mean-square consensus is derived in the context of stochastic stability analysis of Markovian jump systems. A computational algorithm is given to synchronously calculate both the sub-optimal consensus controller gains and the sub-minimum upper bound of the cost. The effectiveness of the proposed design method is illustrated by three numerical examples. Copyright © 2015 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  4. Psychology of nuclear safeguards. [Cannot guarantee preventing diversion, only deter

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Parker, L

    1978-08-17

    There is an essential confusion in the way we look at safeguards. They cannot guarantee to prevent diversions: at best, they can deter. While successful acts of deterrence pass unnoticed, failures will be widely publicized. Therefore, we will judge safeguards systems not on a fair balance between their successes and failures, but exclusively on what we believe to be their failures. Effectively, we will be demanding an impossibly high standard of performance, and safeguards authorities will be tempted to conceal diversions rather than disappoint our expectations. Perhaps it is appropriate that safeguards are primarily psychological instruments: Parker argues that their essence is credibility, and that this does not necessarily depend on the hard reality of their performance. Brian Johnson claimed (New Scientist, vol 74, p 189) that safeguards have engendered a sense of security by linking the commitment of many states not to develop nuclear weapons, and that the Non-Proliferation Treaty has helped condition domestic political attitudes against starting up nuclear weapons programs. Perhaps the common view that safeguards are legal instruments has served the psychological purpose of supplying a language in which states with widely differing interests can explore the fundamental incompatibility between non-proliferation and the search for convenient energy sources. If this is true then it cannot be said that the NPT is a failure, merely that its success does not correspond to its apparent purposes.

  5. Fair Valuation of Guaranteed Contracts : The Interaction Between Assets and Liabilities

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Charlier, E.; Kleynen, R.H.M.A.

    2005-01-01

    In this paper we study the investment behavior of an insurance company consisting of policy and equity holders and issuing fair valued guaranteed contracts.Building up on the work of Briys and De Varenne (1997) and De Munnik and Schotman (1994) an intertemporal stochastic asset model and an interest

  6. Ecolo Watt. Ecologic comparison of electricity providers

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    2007-09-01

    As consumers now can choose their electricity provider, Greenpeace proposes Ecolo Watt, a system which assesses the different providers, more particularly in terms of protection of the environment. This document first describes the electricity market liberalisation (principle, market opening process, a shake-up of the French electric landscape, obligations for the providers). It presents the green electricity market (original guarantees, the questionable system of green certificates, and the Eve label). It describes the methodology adopted for the Ecolo Watt comparative assessment: assessment criteria, final mark. It presents the ranking of electricity providers while analysing their energy mix, their energy policy, their energy service and sales policy, the quality and transparency of information). Detailed results are presented for each operator

  7. Design of stability-guaranteed fuzzy logic controller for nuclear steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cho, Byung Hak

    1996-02-01

    rule tables according to given learning parameters. Although the FLC introduced above can guarantee the stability of the control system, the FLC have a structural handicap that the number of rules to be determined goes numerous by adding new input variables. Thus the number of input variables are normally limited by two, or separated rules are developed for the other major variables. This means that the FLC cannot use all of the available information necessary to make the control system robust. In order to overcome these difficulties, a robust fuzzy logic gain scheduler (robust FLGS) is designed based on the synthesis of fuzzy logic inference and H ∞ technique which is one of the most commonly used one in the field of robust control system design. The robust FLGS has a set of robust control gains in a gain pool. The fuzzy inference engine chooses one of the most desirable control gain considering the S/G operatin condition. The robust gains in the gain pool are determined by the time domain H ∞ control technique such that both of the weighted H ∞ norms of the two transfer functions are minimized. One of the transfer functions is from the steam flow disturbance to the mass capacity portion of S/G level, and the other is from the steam flow disturbance to the reverse dynamics of S/G. The robustness of FLGS in the face of S/G parameter variation is checked. The result shows that the robust FLGS with H ∞ control gain is stable as long as the sign of S/G parameter is not changed due to variation. The FLGS rules are automatically generated using a genetic algorithm (GA). The genetic algorithm (GA) gives a set the gain scheduling rules that reflect given performance design specification well. The computer simulation confirms that the proposed controller shows both of guaranteed stability and good performance in terms of small overshoot and fast settling time in spite of S/G parameter variations and steam flow disturbances

  8. 76 FR 30904 - Rural Utilities Service Telecommunications Loan and Loan Guarantee Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-05-27

    ..., this new approach will give our customers increased flexibility to find and deploy technology that... DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE Rural Utilities Service Rural Utilities Service Telecommunications Loan and Loan Guarantee Program AGENCY: Rural Utilities Service, USDA. ACTION: Notice of elimination of the...

  9. Constitutional principles of the state policy in the area of guaranteeing the ownership

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ю. С. Гаєвська

    2015-05-01

    Full Text Available Problem’s setting. The economic rights and freedoms, namely the ownership have an important place in the economic system. Improvement of legal regulation concerning the state policy in the area of the ownership requires detailed regulation at the constitutional level, because of the high level of corruption and crime rate in economic relations. These negative consequences are primarily provoked by low level of democratic procedures’ efficiency and the mechanism of realizing economic rights. Analysis of recent research and publications. Some aspects of this issue have been the matter of studies of a number of Ukrainian and foreign scholars. The notion of the state policy was studied in the works of: V. Tertychka, O. Kucherenko, P. Fris, etc. Issues concerning the state policy in the economic sphere were the interest of: V. Ustimenko, V. Mamutov, V. Selivanov, O. Skupinskyi, D. Zadykhailo, Yu. Bysiah, I. Kresin and others. The objective of this paper is to determine the general principles of the state policy in the area of guaranteeing the ownership, to establish their content, place and significance for the economic system and to formulate the definition of the concept of the state policy in the area of the ownership. The main part: Development and realization of the constructive state policy in the economic sphere will lead to the stabilization of economic relations; reduce violations of the economic rights granted by the Constitution; increase the trust of public to the state apparatus; increasing the public sense of security by the state. Constitutional acts become the major legal factor in social, state and legal development. The Constitution is a source of the state economic policy; it has the policy character and performs the predictive function. The scholars repeatedly note that there is the necessity to amend the constitutional provisions of the Main Law relating to the economic system, including the allocation of a separate section

  10. Factors affecting the performance of maternal health care providers in Armenia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Voltero Lauren

    2004-06-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Background Over the last five years, international development organizations began to modify and adapt the conventional Performance Improvement Model for use in low-resource settings. This model outlines the five key factors believed to influence performance outcomes: job expectations, performance feedback, environment and tools, motivation and incentives, and knowledge and skills. Each of these factors should be supplied by the organization in which the provider works, and thus, organizational support is considered as an overarching element for analysis. Little research, domestically or internationally, has been conducted on the actual effects of each of the factors on performance outcomes and most PI practitioners assume that all the factors are needed in order for performance to improve. This study presents a unique exploration of how the factors, individually as well as in combination, affect the performance of primary reproductive health providers (nurse-midwives in two regions of Armenia. Methods Two hundred and eighty-five nurses and midwives were observed conducting real or simulated antenatal and postpartum/neonatal care services and interviewed about the presence or absence of the performance factors within their work environment. Results were analyzed to compare average performance with the existence or absence of the factors; then, multiple regression analysis was conducted with the merged datasets to obtain the best models of "predictors" of performance within each clinical service. Results Baseline results revealed that performance was sub-standard in several areas and several performance factors were deficient or nonexistent. The multivariate analysis showed that (a training in the use of the clinic tools; and (b receiving recognition from the employer or the client/community, are factors strongly associated with performance, followed by (c receiving performance feedback in postpartum care. Other – extraneous

  11. 变额年金保险中最低提取利益保证的定价模型研究%Pricing Model Study on the Guaranteed Minimum Withdrawal Benefit in Variable Annuities

    Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

    邓庆彪; 李方方

    2012-01-01

    本文对提供最低提取利益保证的变额年金保险进行了深入分析,总结了最低提取利益保证的主要特征(重置条款、奖励条款、惩罚条款),并将这些特征进行了定量的分析。本文在DanielBauer等(2006)提出的定价模型的基础上进行了创新和改进,在定价过程中加入了国外年金市场上通行的最低提取利益保证的三大主要特征,研究出一套可操作性较强的定价方法,旨在为将来国内保险公司设计开发此类产品时,提供一些建议和理论指导参考。%China has launched a pilot project on Variable Annuities since May 2010, trying to enrich the product mix and establish a multi-level product structure to cater to the need of different levels of consumers. A variable annuities policy is a financial contract between a policyholder and an insurance company which promises a stream of annuities cash flows. At the initiation of the contract, the policyholder pays a single lump sum premium to the issu er. The trusted fund is then invested in a well diversified reference portfolio of a specific class of assets. Under the policy, the insurer promises to make variable periodic payments to the policyholder on preset future dates. The variable payments would depend on the performance of the reference portfolio, thus the policyholders are provided with the equity participation. Variable Annuity products are the mainstream pension products abroad, among all the guarantees the most popular one is guaranteed minimum withdrawal benefit (GMWB) ,which is also at the greatest risk. A GMWB provides the policyholder with the right to withdraw the initial investment over a certain period of time, irrespective of investment performance, as long as annual withdrawals do not exceed a pre-specified amount. To finance these guarantees, most commonly insurers continuously deduct an option fee at a constant rate from the policyholder's ac- count value. China

  12. THE METHODOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO THE BANK DEPOSITS GUARANTEE PROBLEM SOLVING

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    O.I. Pechonik

    2006-12-01

    Full Text Available In world banking practice it is considered that it is better to solve the problem of one bank, rather than arouse the mass impressment of deposits, generating the effect of spreading the disease onto the other credit institutions. In our conditions the process of spreading was specifically reflected in flowing the financial resources of people out of the commercial banks into Sberbank, that shortened drawn resources of other banks, lowed their financial steadiness. The decision of this problem demands conducting aim-oriented policy on the safe-keeping of funds of individuals and organizations in all commercial banks. In other words, the system of deposits insurance is needed, which is based on the necessary participation of all banks and credit organizations, drawing money resources into deposits. But the legislation we have nowadays does not allow to provide in full measure the demanded guarantees to depositors, to form real mechanism of bank liquidity crisis and mass impressments of financial resources by the depositors prevention in case of negative economic market or bankruptcy.

  13. The Belgian deposit guarantee scheme in a European perspective

    OpenAIRE

    Ch. Van Nieuwenhuyze; M. D. Zachary

    2010-01-01

    During the recent financial crisis, the deposit guarantee scheme in Belgium – as in other European countries – played a role in preventing bank runs and restoring confidence : to that end, the intervention ceilings were raised substantially and the scope of the scheme was extended to include certain life insurance policies. Finally, the expansion of the system’s coverage had to be financed by a sharp increase in the contributions from financial institutions. First of all, that measure had a p...

  14. Service Level Agreement for the QoS Guaranteed Mobile IPTV Services over Mobile WiMAX Networks

    OpenAIRE

    Chowdhury, Mostafa Zaman; Trung, Bui Minh; Jang, Yeong Min; Kim, Young-Il; Ryu, Won

    2011-01-01

    While mobile IPTV services are supported through the mobile WiMAX networks, there must need some guaranteed bandwidth for the IPTV services especially if IPTV and non-IPTV services are simultaneously supported by the mobile WiMAX networks. The quality of an IPTV service definitely depends on the allocated bandwidth for that channel. However, due to the high quality IPTV services and to support of huge non-IPTV traffic over mobile WiMAX networks, it is not possible to guarantee the sufficient ...

  15. Optimal physiological structure of small neurons to guarantee stable information processing

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zeng, S. Y.; Zhang, Z. Z.; Wei, D. Q.; Luo, X. S.; Tang, W. Y.; Zeng, S. W.; Wang, R. F.

    2013-02-01

    Spike is the basic element for neuronal information processing and the spontaneous spiking frequency should be less than 1 Hz for stable information processing. If the neuronal membrane area is small, the frequency of neuronal spontaneous spiking caused by ion channel noise may be high. Therefore, it is important to suppress the deleterious spontaneous spiking of the small neurons. We find by simulation of stochastic neurons with Hodgkin-Huxley-type channels that the leakage system is critical and extremely efficient to suppress the spontaneous spiking and guarantee stable information processing of the small neurons. However, within the physiological limit the potassium system cannot do so. The suppression effect of the leakage system is super-exponential, but that of the potassium system is quasi-linear. With the minor physiological cost and the minimal consumption of metabolic energy, a slightly lower reversal potential and a relatively larger conductance of the leakage system give the optimal physiological structure to suppress the deleterious spontaneous spiking and guarantee stable information processing of small neurons, dendrites and axons.

  16. Performance analysis of switching systems

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Berg, van den R.A.

    2008-01-01

    Performance analysis is an important aspect in the design of dynamic (control) systems. Without a proper analysis of the behavior of a system, it is impossible to guarantee that a certain design satisfies the system’s requirements. For linear time-invariant systems, accurate performance analyses are

  17. End User Perceptual Distorted Scenes Enhancement Algorithm Using Partition-Based Local Color Values for QoE-Guaranteed IPTV

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kim, Jinsul

    In this letter, we propose distorted scenes enhancement algorithm in order to provide end user perceptual QoE-guaranteed IPTV service. The block edge detection with weight factor and partition-based local color values method can be applied for the degraded video frames which are affected by network transmission errors such as out of order, jitter, and packet loss to improve QoE efficiently. Based on the result of quality metric after using the distorted scenes enhancement algorithm, the distorted scenes have been restored better than others.

  18. Guaranteeing the implementation of guarantees of origin: Creating a fair mechanism for renewable electricity generation and trade in europe

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Houwing; Michiel; Vries, Laurens J. de

    2005-01-01

    With the Renewables Directive (2001/77/EC) the EU has obliged its Member States to implement the Guarantees of Origin (GO) policy instrument into their national renewable electricity support schemes. Compared to formerly existing policy instruments as tradable green certificates, GOs can in a Union broad quota obligation scheme, for example, prove to be of major value in arriving at a more transparent and efficient way of trading renewable electricity. This paper gives an overview of the most important hurdles still to be addressed, mainly being double counting issues and policy interactions. When more clarity is given from the Commission in the future and when more EU Member States implement GOs beyond the minimum requirements, international trading of renewable electricity can become truly feasible. (Author)

  19. 7 CFR 1980.443 - Collateral, personal and corporate guarantees and other requirements.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... the concurrence of FmHA or its successor agency under Public Law 103-354. (b) Personal and corporate... 7 Agriculture 14 2010-01-01 2009-01-01 true Collateral, personal and corporate guarantees and... (Continued) RURAL HOUSING SERVICE, RURAL BUSINESS-COOPERATIVE SERVICE, RURAL UTILITIES SERVICE, AND FARM...

  20. Loss Performance Modeling for Hierarchical Heterogeneous Wireless Networks With Speed-Sensitive Call Admission Control

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Huang, Qian; Huang, Yue-Cai; Ko, King-Tim

    2011-01-01

    . This approach avoids unnecessary and frequent handoff between cells and reduces signaling overheads. An approximation model with guaranteed accuracy and low computational complexity is presented for the loss performance of multiservice traffic. The accuracy of numerical results is validated by comparing......A hierarchical overlay structure is an alternative solution that integrates existing and future heterogeneous wireless networks to provide subscribers with better mobile broadband services. Traffic loss performance in such integrated heterogeneous networks is necessary for an operator's network...

  1. Guaranteeing CERN’s excellence: consolidate experience

    CERN Multimedia

    Staff Association

    2014-01-01

    For its missions CERN requires staff with solid experience in all its domains of activity The Organization has several missions: fundamental research, technical developments and innovation, training the several hundreds of associates, fellows and students, while at the same time taking care of more than 10000 users. In order to guarantee excellence in all of these areas, CERN has to put in place an efficient personnel policy. Such a policy must allow the Organization to recruit collaborators with the highest competence from all Member States, and to keep and motivate them during their entire professional career. But, more importantly, the Organization has to be able to count on a stable workforce. It needs staff with experience gained over a long period in the fields of accelerators, detectors, and operating procedures, if it is to fulfil successfully its important mission of training and knowledge transfer, which is very much appreciated by our Member states, since it highlights a visible return on invest...

  2. 13 CFR 107.1600 - SBA authority to issue and guarantee Trust Certificates.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... ADMINISTRATION SMALL BUSINESS INVESTMENT COMPANIES SBA Financial Assistance for Licensees (Leverage) Funding... guarantee by SBA of such TC is limited to the principal and interest due on the Debentures or the Redemption... to arrange public or private fundings of Leverage. SBA in its discretion may arrange for public or...

  3. 24 CFR 573.5 - Underwriting standards and availability of loan guarantee assistance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... acceptable financial risk under HUD's generally applicable loan underwriting standards based on the following: (1) The Borrower's ability to pay debt service; and (2) The value of the collateral assigned or... insufficient to make the guarantee an acceptable financial risk, or if the proposed interest rates or fees are...

  4. Measuring Provider Performance for Physicians Participating in the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Squitieri, Lee; Chung, Kevin C

    2017-07-01

    In 2017, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services began requiring all eligible providers to participate in the Quality Payment Program or face financial reimbursement penalty. The Quality Payment Program outlines two paths for provider participation: the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System and Advanced Alternative Payment Models. For the first performance period beginning in January of 2017, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services estimates that approximately 83 to 90 percent of eligible providers will not qualify for participation in an Advanced Alternative Payment Model and therefore must participate in the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System program. The Merit-Based Incentive Payment System path replaces existing quality-reporting programs and adds several new measures to evaluate providers using four categories of data: (1) quality, (2) cost/resource use, (3) improvement activities, and (4) advancing care information. These categories will be combined to calculate a weighted composite score for each provider or provider group. Composite Merit-Based Incentive Payment System scores based on 2017 performance data will be used to adjust reimbursed payment in 2019. In this article, the authors provide relevant background for understanding value-based provider performance measurement. The authors also discuss Merit-Based Incentive Payment System reporting requirements and scoring methodology to provide plastic surgeons with the necessary information to critically evaluate their own practice capabilities in the context of current performance metrics under the Quality Payment Program.

  5. Guarantee-bond: main concepts and overview of its application within the bidding process involving inactive areas with marginal accumulations of petroleum and natural gas; Seguro-garantia: conceituacao e panorama de sua aplicacao no processo licitatorio envolvendo areas inativas com acumulacoes marginais

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Eduardo, Antonio Sergio; Herrmann, Hildebrando [Universidade ERstadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), SP (Brazil); Ferreira, Doneivan Fernandes [Universidade Federal da Bahia (UFBA), Salvador, BA (Brazil)

    2008-07-01

    The Brazilian Petroleum Agency has been working on the adoption of an efficient financial guarantee system in order to ensure the fulfillment of contractual obligations in upstream-related activities. This process is aimed at: creating incentives for responsible behavior in the industry; attending current demands from society for efficiency and transparency; attending to industries demands for the maintenance of investment flows within the sector; safeguarding the government against financial liabilities caused by irresponsible or insolvent concessionaires; and keeping the sector attractive and competitive for small and medium companies. Within the bidding process for the concession of inactive areas with marginal accumulations, ANP requires two kinds of guarantees: a bidding guarantee, and a PTI guarantee (for obligations under the Initial Work Program-PTI). In both cases, the ANP allows two kinds of financial instruments: 'Seguros-Garantia' and 'Letters of Credit'. According to bidding rules, guarantees must be presented before the bidding process. This instrument ensures that the winner will sign the concession contract. The PTI guarantee ensures performance in a timely fashion. This paper describes and analyzes the instrument 'Seguro-Garantia', its evolution, existing categories, and applicability. (author)

  6. FORMATION OF THE FINANCIAL BASIS FOR GOVERNMENT GUARANTEES OF HEALTH CARE IN RUSSIA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    E. V. Sinicyna

    2014-01-01

    Full Text Available Organization of the health system of theRussian Federationin the conditions of limited fi nancial resources needed to develop and implement new methods and management mechanisms. Conducted a study in the article allowed to formulate the basic problems of development management of medical organizations and off er possible solutions through the formation of the fi nancial basis for government guarantees of health care inRussia. The article deals with the current reform in the Russian budget-insurance model of health care fi nancing, reveals the content and direction of the program of state guarantees of medical care in the new fi nancing mechanism of public services. Development and implementation of a new funding system in the management of medical organization will help to reduce costs, improve staff effi ciency, improve the quality of public health services.

  7. Fire fighting. Measures to guarantee the safety of the radioactive installations

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Orta Aguilera, R.

    1993-01-01

    The work relates the incidence of the aspects related to the fire prevention and fighting as well as the activities of rescue and saving in the radioactive facilities, with the objective of guaranteeing a strict safety regime of all installations along the country so as to reduce to the minimum the risk for the personnel, the population and the environment

  8. Dashboard report on performance on select quality indicators to cancer care providers.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Stattin, Pär; Sandin, Fredrik; Sandbäck, Torsten; Damber, Jan-Erik; Franck Lissbrant, Ingela; Robinson, David; Bratt, Ola; Lambe, Mats

    2016-01-01

    Cancer quality registers are attracting increasing attention as important, but still underutilized sources of clinical data. To optimize the use of registers in quality assurance and improvement, data have to be rapidly collected, collated and presented as actionable, at-a-glance information to the reporting departments. This article presents a dashboard performance report on select quality indicators to cancer care providers. Ten quality indicators registered on an individual patient level in the National Prostate Cancer Register of Sweden and recommended by the National Prostate Cancer Guidelines were selected. Data reported to the National Prostate Cancer Register are uploaded within 24 h to the Information Network for Cancer Care platform. Launched in 2014, "What''s Going On, Prostate Cancer" provides rapid, at-a-glance performance feedback to care providers. The indicators include time to report to the National Prostate Cancer Register, waiting times, designated clinical nurse specialist, multidisciplinary conference, adherence to guidelines for diagnostic work-up and treatment, and documentation and outcome of treatment. For each indicator, three performance levels were defined. What's Going On, a dashboard performance report on 10 selected quality indicators to cancer care providers, provides an example of how data in cancer quality registers can be transformed into condensed, at-a-glance information to be used as actionable metrics for quality assurance and improvement.

  9. 7 CFR 4290.1600 - Secretary's authority to issue and guarantee Trust Certificates.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... INVESTMENT COMPANY (âRBICâ) PROGRAM Financial Assistance for RBICs (Leverage) Funding Leverage by Use of... the timely payment of the principal and interest thereon. Any such guarantee of such TC is limited to... any TC. (b) Authority to arrange public or private fundings of Leverage. The Secretary in his or her...

  10. Costs and Performance of English Mental Health Providers.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Moran, Valerie; Jacobs, Rowena

    2017-06-01

    Despite limited resources in mental health care, there is little research exploring variations in cost performance across mental health care providers. In England, a prospective payment system for mental health care based on patient needs has been introduced with the potential to incentivise providers to control costs. The units of payment under the new system are 21 care clusters. Patients are allocated to a cluster by clinicians, and each cluster has a maximum review period. The aim of this research is to explain variations in cluster costs between mental health providers using observable patient demographic, need, social and treatment variables. We also investigate if provider-level variables explain differences in costs. The residual variation in cluster costs is compared across providers to provide insights into which providers may gain or lose under the new financial regime. The main data source is the Mental Health Minimum Data Set (MHMDS) for England for the years 2011/12 and 2012/13. Our unit of observation is the period of time spent in a care cluster and costs associated with the cluster review period are calculated from NHS Reference Cost data. Costs are modelled using multi-level log-linear and generalised linear models. The residual variation in costs at the provider level is quantified using Empirical Bayes estimates and comparative standard errors used to rank and compare providers. There are wide variations in costs across providers. We find that variables associated with higher costs include older age, black ethnicity, admission under the Mental Health Act, and higher need as reflected in the care clusters. Provider type, size, occupancy and the proportion of formal admissions at the provider-level are also found to be significantly associated with costs. After controlling for patient- and provider-level variables, significant residual variation in costs remains at the provider level. The results suggest that some providers may have to increase

  11. Aspects of No Endorsement of Annulment Provided Without Granting the Union Stable

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Juliana Franco Fulgencio Fonseca

    2015-12-01

    Full Text Available Given the importance of the endorsement in corporate economic activities, the study has the scope to analysis of change brought about by the Civil Code of 2002, which caused expressed spousal authorization requirement to validate guarantee provided by the other, except for cases of separation regime total assets. Innovation led an intense doctrinal discussion, given that the norm has brought significant changes to the guarantor and institute such a levy was not provided for in the Civil Code of 1916. It is a critical analysis of art. 1647, III of the Civil Code on the context of the general theory of debt securities and its principles, calling for the dynamism and simplicity of credit flowing. Clarify to the approval of the consequences provided without granting the marriage scope and stable, as well as the applicability or inapplicability of such a charge against the securities. The study underpins that, besides being unnecessary to grant the guarantee provided by the cohabitant in a stable relationship, even if it were necessary, would not occur invalidity of endorsement (as stipulated by the Civil Code of 2002, but the ineffectiveness have no effect before one who did not attend the act.

  12. SYSTEM OF GUARANTEED RESOLUTION OF DYNAMIC CONFLICTS OF AIRCRAFTS IN REAL TIME

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Svitlana Pavlova

    2017-03-01

    Full Text Available Purpose: The present work is devoted to improving of flight safety in civil aviation by creating and implementing a new system of resolution of dynamic conflict of aircrafts. The developed system is aimed at ensuring a guaranteed level of safety when resolution of rarefied conflict situations of aircraft in real-time. Methods: The proposed system is based on a new method of conflict resolution of aircraft on the basis of the theory of invariance. Results: The development of the system of conflict resolution of aircraft in real time and the implementation of the respective algorithms such control will ensure effective prevention of dangerous approaches. Discussion: The system is implemented as single unified equipment using satellite and radar navigation systems that will ensure the positioning of aircraft in real time. Provided that the system should be installed on all aircraft and integrated on board to properly ensure its functionality and interact with navigation systems.

  13. 42 CFR 493.53 - Notification requirements for laboratories issued a certificate for provider-performed microscopy...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... certificate for provider-performed microscopy (PPM) procedures. 493.53 Section 493.53 Public Health CENTERS... CERTIFICATION LABORATORY REQUIREMENTS Registration Certificate, Certificate for Provider-performed Microscopy... certificate for provider-performed microscopy (PPM) procedures. Laboratories issued a certificate for PPM...

  14. A Mirage or a Rural Life Line? Analysing the impact of Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Act on Women Beneficiaries of Assam

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Rituparna Bhattacharyya

    2013-05-01

    Full Text Available The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA, launched in February 2006 was renamed in October 02, 2009 as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (henceforth, MGNREGA. It is an anti-poverty flagship programme of the Government of India. The key purpose of MGNREGA is to enhance wage employment in the rural areas by providing at least 100 days of guaranteed employment to every household in a financial year.  The MGNREGA implementation status report for the financial year 2012-2013 unfolds that the programme has already provided employment to 44.9 million households across 28 districts and five union territories. Hence, it is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore the impact of MGNREGA on women beneficiaries. A plethora of research argues that MGNREGA, which promotes inclusive growth, is a vehicle of change, a lifeline for rural women. So far, however, there has been very little discussion about the impact of MGNREGA on women beneficiaries of Assam. This research is an attempt to examine the participation of women in MGNREGA, Assam. It critically looks at the issues, problems and challenges confronted by the women while working at MGNREGA. Written from a feminist perspective on gender, poverty and women’s empowerment, the research seeks to address the problems of the women beneficiaries through their lived experiences. For this, we conducted in-depth interviews with the women beneficiaries in the months of August and September, 2009 in four remote areas namely, Burka, Chandrapur, Barbhang and Muguriya, the first two situated in Kamrup, while the third and the fourth in Barpeta districts of Assam, where the programme of MGNREGA is on-going. The findings of the research suggest measures so that the programme can be made more effective in the long run.

  15. Legal basis and administrative departments for securing and guaranteeing the energy supply

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Besslich, W.

    1979-01-01

    The headline is no game with the words. It distinguishes between the securing of the supply in times of peace and the guarantee in times of defense during war which is a popular topic again and follows a linguistic term by the Bundesrat of 1915 which was kept alive up to day. (orig.) [de

  16. 13 CFR 120.210 - What percentage of a loan may SBA guarantee?

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 13 Business Credit and Assistance 1 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false What percentage of a loan may SBA guarantee? 120.210 Section 120.210 Business Credit and Assistance SMALL BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION BUSINESS... percent, except as otherwise authorized by law. [61 FR 3235, Jan. 31, 1996, as amended at 68 FR 51680, Aug...

  17. Extra-analytical quality indicators and laboratory performances.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sciacovelli, Laura; Aita, Ada; Plebani, Mario

    2017-07-01

    In the last few years much progress has been made in raising the awareness of laboratory medicine professionals about the effectiveness of quality indicators (QIs) in monitoring, and improving upon, performances in the extra-analytical phases of the Total Testing Process (TTP). An effective system for management of QIs includes the implementation of an internal assessment system and participation in inter-laboratory comparison. A well-designed internal assessment system allows the identification of critical activities and their systematic monitoring. Active participation in inter-laboratory comparison provides information on the performance level of one laboratory with respect to that of other participating laboratories. In order to guarantee the use of appropriate QIs and facilitate their implementation, many laboratories have adopted the Model of Quality Indicators (MQI) proposed by Working Group "Laboratory Errors and Patient Safety" (WG-LEPS) of IFCC, since 2008, which is the result of international consensus and continuous experimentation, and updating to meet new, constantly emerging needs. Data from participating laboratories are collected monthly and reports describing the statistical results and evaluating laboratory data, utilizing the Six Sigma metric, issued regularly. Although the results demonstrate that the processes need to be improved upon, overall the comparison with data collected in 2014 shows a general stability of quality levels and that an improvement has been achieved over time for some activities. The continuous monitoring of QI data allows identification all possible improvements, thus highlighting the value of participation in the inter-laboratory program proposed by WG-LEPS. The active participation of numerous laboratories will guarantee an ever more significant State-of-the-Art, promote the reduction of errors and improve quality of the TTP, thus guaranteeing patient safety. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Inc.

  18. Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy model identification for turbofan aero-engines with guaranteed stability

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ruichao LI

    2018-06-01

    Full Text Available This paper is concerned with identifying a Takagi-Sugeno (TS fuzzy model for turbofan aero-engines working under the maximum power status (non-afterburning. To establish the fuzzy system, theoretical contributions are made as follows. First, by fixing antecedent parameters, the estimation of consequent parameters in state-space representations is formulated as minimizing a quadratic cost function. Second, to avoid obtaining unstable identified models, a new theorem is proposed to transform the prior-knowledge of stability into constraints. Then based on the aforementioned work, the identification problem is synthesized as a constrained quadratic optimization. By solving the constrained optimization, a TS fuzzy system is identified with guaranteed stability. Finally, the proposed method is applied to the turbofan aero-engine using simulation data generated from an aerothermodynamics component-level model. Results show the identified fuzzy model achieves a high fitting accuracy while stabilities of the overall fuzzy system and all its local models are also guaranteed. Keywords: Constrained optimization, Fuzzy system, Stability, System identification, Turbofan engine

  19. Enhanced primary and secondary performance through cognitive relaying and leveraging primary feedback

    KAUST Repository

    Hamza, Doha R.; Aï ssa, Sonia

    2014-01-01

    We consider a spectrum-sharing system, where the primary terminal operates in a time-slotted fashion and is active only when it has a packet to send. The secondary terminal uses spectrum sensing results and the primary automatic repeat request (ARQ) feedback to access the channel probabilistically. To enhance the primary's system performance, the secondary user (SU) acts as a relay for the primary user (PU) in the event of transmission failure on the direct link of the latter. Closed-form expressions for the primary and secondary throughputs are obtained for the described scheme. The optimal medium access probabilities are then obtained by maximizing the secondary throughput subject to constraints that guarantee the stability of the considered queues, a minimum primary throughput, and a maximum primary queueing delay. The results clearly indicate the benefits of cognitive relaying in enhancing the throughput performance for both the PU and SU. Furthermore, by guaranteeing minimum rate and maximum delay requirements, our scheme is shown to provide a definitive notion of protection for the licensed users of the network. © 2013 IEEE.

  20. Enhanced primary and secondary performance through cognitive relaying and leveraging primary feedback

    KAUST Repository

    Hamza, Doha R.

    2014-06-01

    We consider a spectrum-sharing system, where the primary terminal operates in a time-slotted fashion and is active only when it has a packet to send. The secondary terminal uses spectrum sensing results and the primary automatic repeat request (ARQ) feedback to access the channel probabilistically. To enhance the primary\\'s system performance, the secondary user (SU) acts as a relay for the primary user (PU) in the event of transmission failure on the direct link of the latter. Closed-form expressions for the primary and secondary throughputs are obtained for the described scheme. The optimal medium access probabilities are then obtained by maximizing the secondary throughput subject to constraints that guarantee the stability of the considered queues, a minimum primary throughput, and a maximum primary queueing delay. The results clearly indicate the benefits of cognitive relaying in enhancing the throughput performance for both the PU and SU. Furthermore, by guaranteeing minimum rate and maximum delay requirements, our scheme is shown to provide a definitive notion of protection for the licensed users of the network. © 2013 IEEE.

  1. Dynamic Learning from Adaptive Neural Control of Uncertain Robots with Guaranteed Full-State Tracking Precision

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Min Wang

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available A dynamic learning method is developed for an uncertain n-link robot with unknown system dynamics, achieving predefined performance attributes on the link angular position and velocity tracking errors. For a known nonsingular initial robotic condition, performance functions and unconstrained transformation errors are employed to prevent the violation of the full-state tracking error constraints. By combining two independent Lyapunov functions and radial basis function (RBF neural network (NN approximator, a novel and simple adaptive neural control scheme is proposed for the dynamics of the unconstrained transformation errors, which guarantees uniformly ultimate boundedness of all the signals in the closed-loop system. In the steady-state control process, RBF NNs are verified to satisfy the partial persistent excitation (PE condition. Subsequently, an appropriate state transformation is adopted to achieve the accurate convergence of neural weight estimates. The corresponding experienced knowledge on unknown robotic dynamics is stored in NNs with constant neural weight values. Using the stored knowledge, a static neural learning controller is developed to improve the full-state tracking performance. A comparative simulation study on a 2-link robot illustrates the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.

  2. 25 CFR 115.803 - What information will be provided in a statement of performance?

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-01

    ... 25 Indians 1 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false What information will be provided in a statement of performance? 115.803 Section 115.803 Indians BUREAU OF INDIAN AFFAIRS, DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR FINANCIAL... provided in a statement of performance? The statement of performance will identify the source, type, and...

  3. Using provider performance incentives to increase HIV testing and counseling services in Rwanda.

    Science.gov (United States)

    de Walque, Damien; Gertler, Paul J; Bautista-Arredondo, Sergio; Kwan, Ada; Vermeersch, Christel; de Dieu Bizimana, Jean; Binagwaho, Agnès; Condo, Jeanine

    2015-03-01

    Paying for performance provides financial rewards to medical care providers for improvements in performance measured by utilization and quality of care indicators. In 2006, Rwanda began a pay for performance scheme to improve health services delivery, including HIV/AIDS services. Using a prospective quasi-experimental design, this study examines the scheme's impact on individual and couples HIV testing. We find a positive impact of pay for performance on HIV testing among married individuals (10.2 percentage points increase). Paying for performance also increased testing by both partners by 14.7 percentage point among discordant couples in which only one of the partners is an AIDS patient. Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier B.V.

  4. PESTEL Model Analysis and Legal Guarantee of Tourism Environmental Protection in China

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhiyong, Xian

    2017-08-01

    On the basis of summarizing the general situation of tourism environmental protection in China, this paper analyses the macro factors of tourism environmental protection by using PESTEL model. On this basis, this paper explores the improvement paths of tourism environmental protection based on PESTEL model. Finally, it puts forward the legal guarantee suggestion of tourism environment protection.

  5. Compliance Performance: Effects of a Provider Incentive Program and Coding Compliance Plan

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Tudela, Joseph A

    2004-01-01

    The purpose of this project is to study provider and coder related performance, i.e., provider compliance rate and coder productivity/accuracy rates and average dollar difference between coder and auditor, at Brooke Army Medical Center...

  6. Effects of performance measure implementation on clinical manager and provider motivation.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Damschroder, Laura J; Robinson, Claire H; Francis, Joseph; Bentley, Douglas R; Krein, Sarah L; Rosland, Ann-Marie; Hofer, Timothy P; Kerr, Eve A

    2014-12-01

    Clinical performance measurement has been a key element of efforts to transform the Veterans Health Administration (VHA). However, there are a number of signs that current performance measurement systems used within and outside the VHA may be reaching the point of maximum benefit to care and in some settings, may be resulting in negative consequences to care, including overtreatment and diminished attention to patient needs and preferences. Our research group has been involved in a long-standing partnership with the office responsible for clinical performance measurement in the VHA to understand and develop potential strategies to mitigate the unintended consequences of measurement. Our aim was to understand how the implementation of diabetes performance measures (PMs) influences management actions and day-to-day clinical practice. This is a mixed methods study design based on quantitative administrative data to select study facilities and quantitative data from semi-structured interviews. Sixty-two network-level and facility-level executives, managers, front-line providers and staff participated in the study. Qualitative content analyses were guided by a team-based consensus approach using verbatim interview transcripts. A published interpretive motivation theory framework is used to describe potential contributions of local implementation strategies to unintended consequences of PMs. Implementation strategies used by management affect providers' response to PMs, which in turn potentially undermines provision of high-quality patient-centered care. These include: 1) feedback reports to providers that are dissociated from a realistic capability to address performance gaps; 2) evaluative criteria set by managers that are at odds with patient-centered care; and 3) pressure created by managers' narrow focus on gaps in PMs that is viewed as more punitive than motivating. Next steps include working with VHA leaders to develop and test implementation approaches to help

  7. [Living wills in a nursing home, guaranteeing freedom of expression].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Marigard Guyader, Céline; Richard, Christian

    The drawing up of a living will in a nursing home for elderly people is a complex process. Not only must the resident think about the end of life, which is not easy, but the institution must be fully aware of the law. Guaranteeing the resident's expression is essential. A study enabled this subject to be reviewed in a nursing home where different players are present around the resident. It enabled professionals to reflect on their practices. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

  8. Design of stability-guaranteed fuzzy logic controller for nuclear steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cho, B.H.; No, H.C.

    1996-01-01

    A fuzzy logic controller (FLC) and a fuzzy logic filter (FLF), which have a special type of fuzzifier, inference engine, and defuzzifier, are applied to the water level control of a nuclear steam generator (S/G). It is shown that arbitrary two-input, single-output linear controllers can be adequately expressed by this FLC. A procedure to construct stability-guaranteed FLC rules is proposed. It contains the following steps: (1) the stable sector of linear feedback gains is obtained from the suboptimal concept based on LQR theory and the Lyapunov's stability criteria; (2) the stable sector of linear gains is mapped into two linear rule tables that are used as limits for the FLC rules; and (3) the construction of an FLC rule table is done by choosing certain rules that lie between these limits. This type of FLC guarantees asymptotic stability of the control system. The FLF generates a feedforward signal of S/G feedwater from the steam flow measurement using a fuzzy concept. Through computer simulation, it is found that the FLC with the FLF works better than a well-tuned PID controller with variable gains to reduce swell/shrink phenomena, especially for the water level deviation and abrupt steam flow disturbances that are typical in the existing power plants

  9. Horizontal cooperations between logistics service providers:motives, structure, performance

    OpenAIRE

    Schmoltzi, Christina; Wallenburg, Carl Marcus

    2011-01-01

    Dieser Beitrag ist mit Zustimmung des Rechteinhabers aufgrund einer (DFG geförderten) Allianz- bzw. Nationallizenz frei zugänglich. This publication is with permission of the rights owner freely accessible due to an Alliance licence and a national licence (funded by the DFG, German Research Foundation) respectively. Purpose – This paper aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the motives, structure and performance attributes of horizontal cooperations between logistics service provi...

  10. Organization and methodology applied to the control of commissioning tests to guarantee safe operation of nuclear units

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Clausner, J.P.; Jorel, M.

    1990-12-01

    This paper describes the activities of the Safety Analysis Department (DAS), which provides technical support for the French safety authorities in the specific context of analysis and control of startup test programme quality at each of the different stages of the programme. These activities combine to ensure that the objective of the startup tests is reached, in particular that the functions of each safety-related system are guaranteed in all operating configurations, that the performance levels of all components in the system comply with design criteria and that defects revealed during previous tests have been dealt with correctly. The special case of French nuclear facilities, linked to unit standardization, has made it possible to acquire a large amount of experience with the startup of the 900 MWe units and has illustrated the importance of defining a startup test programme. In 1981, a working group, comprising operating organization and safety authority representatives, studied the lessons which had to be learned from 900 MWe unit startup and the improvements which could be made and taken into account in the 1300 MWe unit startup programme. To illustrate the approach adopted by the DAS, we go on to describe the lessons learned from startup of the first 1300 MWe (P4) units

  11. Guarantee of Criminal Policy as Limited to Criminal Decisionism

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    María Belén Bonilla Albán

    2016-06-01

    Full Text Available The essay explains how the inclusion of the security of public policy in the 2008 Constitution of Ecuador as part of the constitutional state of law and justice or “guarantor state” can become a substantial limit for criminal decisionism, which is usually behind the penal policy in Latin America. Thus, the function of this collateral is to eliminate the huge space of discretion in the management of the most sensitive policy of modern state penal policy. However, the guarantee of public policy is not clear in determining the limits of punitive power; therefore, this paper seeks to explore some of the international human rights.

  12. 12 CFR 6.5 - Capital restoration plans.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... liability of the company under any guarantee required or provided in connection with any capital restoration... amount of that guarantee from any or all of the companies issuing the guarantee. (2) Failure to provide... it includes any performance guarantee described in section 38(e)(2)(C) of that Act by each company...

  13. Relationship between CEO remuneration and company financial performance in the South African retail and consumer goods sector

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Mark Bussin

    2015-04-01

    Full Text Available Purpose: This study was motivated by the need to better understand the effects of the global financial crisis in 2008 on the relationship between company financial performance and CEO guaranteed cost to company (CTC. The aim of this study was to understand the relationship between company financial performance using DuPont analysis and CEO guaranteed CTC in the South African retail and consumer goods sector. Design: The research was a quantitative, archival study of companies listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE, measured over a period of six years (2006–2011. The statistical analysis included regression and correlation analysis. Findings: The research found that CEO guaranteed CTC has shown no sensitivity towards company financial performance in terms of DuPont analysis over the six-year period, which included the global financial crises in 2008. Furthermore, a negative relationship existed between the return on equity and the guaranteed CTC of CEOs in the retail and consumer goods sector during this period. Practical implications: The findings suggest that there is misalignment between company strategy and performance and the guaranteed CTC of CEOs. A practical implication would be to have independent and competent remuneration committees ensuring alignment of the interests of a company with those of its leaders in this regard.

  14. 7 CFR 1786.35 - Loss, theft, destruction, mutilation, or defacement of RUS guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 7 Agriculture 12 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Loss, theft, destruction, mutilation, or defacement... Loans Pursuant to Section 306(A) of the RE Act § 1786.35 Loss, theft, destruction, mutilation, or... circumstances of the loss, theft, or destruction of the guarantee; and (vi) The lender or holder, shall present...

  15. Blanket guarantee, deposit insurance, and risk-shifting incentive: evidence from Indonesia

    OpenAIRE

    Kariastanto, Bayu

    2011-01-01

    Indonesia established a deposit insurance system to maintain stability in its banking sector after the abolishment of blanket guarantees in 2005. Since the insurance premiums are fixed and flat, deposit insurance may create an incentive for banks to take more risks and transfer the risks to the deposit insurer. Using an option pricing based model of deposit insurance, we compute the fair deposit insurance premiums for all banks listed on the Indonesian stock exchange. We find evidence that ba...

  16. Measuring Healthcare Providers' Performances Within Managed Competition Using Multidimensional Quality and Cost Indicators.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Portrait, France R M; van der Galiën, Onno; Van den Berg, Bernard

    2016-04-01

    The Dutch healthcare system is in transition towards managed competition. In theory, a system of managed competition involves incentives for quality and efficiency of provided care. This is mainly because health insurers contract on behalf of their clients with healthcare providers on, potentially, quality and costs. The paper develops a strategy to comprehensively analyse available multidimensional data on quality and costs to assess and report on the relative performance of healthcare providers within managed competition. We had access to individual information on 2409 clients of 19 Dutch diabetes care groups on a broad range of (outcome and process related) quality and cost indicators. We carried out a cost-consequences analysis and corrected for differences in case mix to reduce incentives for risk selection by healthcare providers. There is substantial heterogeneity between diabetes care groups' performances as measured using multidimensional indicators on quality and costs. Better quality diabetes care can be achieved with lower or higher costs. Routine monitoring using multidimensional data on quality and costs merged at the individual level would allow a systematic and comprehensive analysis of healthcare providers' performances within managed competition. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

  17. Real promise or false hope: DOE's title XVII loan Guarantee

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Massouh, Jennifer F.; Cannon, George D. Jr.; Logan, Suzanne M.; Schwartz, David L.

    2009-05-15

    While the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 expanded the DOE loan guarantee program to include certain ''shovel-ready'' projects, and appropriated $6 billion to cover the credit subsidy cost associated with these projects, it failed to resolve some of the most pressing problems facing the program. Here are some recommendations that may finally get some shovels in the ground. (author)

  18. 7 CFR 1955.12 - Acquisition of property which served as security for a loan guarantee by FmHA or its successor...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... Chattel Property § 1955.12 Acquisition of property which served as security for a loan guarantee by FmHA... 7 Agriculture 14 2010-01-01 2009-01-01 true Acquisition of property which served as security for a loan guarantee by FmHA or its successor agency under Public Law 103-354 or at sale by another...

  19. Experiences of Cultural Activities provided by the Employer in Finland

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Katinka Tuisku

    2015-03-01

    Full Text Available The increasing mental demands of healthcare work call for developing complementary health promotion strategies. Cultural leisure activities have long been recognized as a source of wellbeing and coping for employees. Yet, little is known about implementation of employer-provided cultural activities—how they are encountered and experienced. In this study, a public sector hospital department offered monthly cultural events for personnel: Theater, concerts, musicals, dance-performances, museum visits and sight-seeing. A digital questionnaire was sent to hospital staff (N = 769 to ask about their participation in employer-provided cultural activities during the past 6 months. The motives and obstacles for participation, and the quality of experience of the cultural events, were explored quantitatively and qualitatively. The main motives for participation were related to well-being, content of cultural events and invitations from employer or colleagues. For some, the participation was hampered by work-shifts and missing information. The participants experienced recreation, relaxation and psychological detachment from strain, which is essential for recovery. Community participation was more common than individual participation. Shared cultural experiences among employees may increase the social capital at workplace, but equal access for all employees should be guaranteed.

  20. Drawing a Link—Women’s Empowerment and Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act: A Study Conducted in the Goalpara District, Assam

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dr Manisha Bhattacharyya

    2016-03-01

    Full Text Available This article reports on an empirical research that examined the extent of economic empowerment gained by women engaged in Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA in the district of Goalpara, Assam. The key objective of the MGNREGA is to provide social security to rural households by guaranteeing 100 days of paid employment in public works within a year. Based on nine variables (education, land ownership, ownership of other assets, control over income contributed by a woman to her family, control over the income of the family, savings, access to credit, social participation, cash income earned from income generating activities and calculated using empowerment index, the research compared the magnitude of women’s empowerment before and after getting involved in MGNREGA. The findings suggest that while MGNREGA is an important leap to ensuring economic empowerment to rural women, but the scheme has not been implemented properly in the district—women and men not getting 100 days of employment, irregular mode of payment, very slow progress and poor quality in public works.

  1. Supply guarantee initiatives for nuclear fuel materials and services and their compatibility with the market

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Nagano, Koji

    2009-01-01

    This paper first discusses where and why those ideas for nuclear fuel supply assurance and guarantee mechanisms came out, and attempts to draw a comparison among the proposed schemes and thereby examine possible steps forward. (author)

  2. Aspects of No Endorsement of Annulment Provided Without Granting the Union Stable

    OpenAIRE

    Juliana Franco Fulgencio Fonseca

    2015-01-01

    Given the importance of the endorsement in corporate economic activities, the study has the scope to analysis of change brought about by the Civil Code of 2002, which caused expressed spousal authorization requirement to validate guarantee provided by the other, except for cases of separation regime total assets. Innovation led an intense doctrinal discussion, given that the norm has brought significant changes to the guarantor and institute such a levy was not provided for in the Civil Code ...

  3. Truss topology optimization with discrete design variables — Guaranteed global optimality and benchmark examples

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Achtziger, Wolfgang; Stolpe, Mathias

    2007-01-01

    this problem is well-studied for continuous bar areas, we consider in this study the case of discrete areas. This problem is of major practical relevance if the truss must be built from pre-produced bars with given areas. As a special case, we consider the design problem for a single available bar area, i.......e., a 0/1 problem. In contrast to the heuristic methods considered in many other approaches, our goal is to compute guaranteed globally optimal structures. This is done by a branch-and-bound method for which convergence can be proven. In this branch-and-bound framework, lower bounds of the optimal......-integer problems. The main intention of this paper is to provide optimal solutions for single and multiple load benchmark examples, which can be used for testing and validating other methods or heuristics for the treatment of this discrete topology design problem....

  4. Honeywell starts energy-management service: savings guaranteed; BOSS replaced

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Schwartz, R.

    1983-01-24

    Honeywell Inc. guarantees that its new Honeywell Service Link Operation (HSLO), a time-sharing service, will produce greater energy savings than its monthly fees. There are no front-end costs because the central computer is located at the supplier's Atlanta site, making energy management cost-affordable for facilities as small as 25,000 square feet. HSLO replaces Honeywell's Building Operations Service System (BOSS) that has a minimum-size requirement of 100,000 square feet. BOSS customers will be automatically changed to HSLO at no charge. All 21 regional computer centers will be available to users. Johnson Controls, Inc. also operates a time-sharing operation called Total Automated Building Services (TABS). (DCK)

  5. A QoS-Guaranteed Coverage Precedence Routing Algorithm for Wireless Sensor Networks

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Jiun-Chuan Lin

    2011-03-01

    Full Text Available For mission-critical applications of wireless sensor networks (WSNs involving extensive battlefield surveillance, medical healthcare, etc., it is crucial to have low-power, new protocols, methodologies and structures for transferring data and information in a network with full sensing coverage capability for an extended working period. The upmost mission is to ensure that the network is fully functional providing reliable transmission of the sensed data without the risk of data loss. WSNs have been applied to various types of mission-critical applications. Coverage preservation is one of the most essential functions to guarantee quality of service (QoS in WSNs. However, a tradeoff exists between sensing coverage and network lifetime due to the limited energy supplies of sensor nodes. In this study, we propose a routing protocol to accommodate both energy-balance and coverage-preservation for sensor nodes in WSNs. The energy consumption for radio transmissions and the residual energy over the network are taken into account when the proposed protocol determines an energy-efficient route for a packet. The simulation results demonstrate that the proposed protocol is able to increase the duration of the on-duty network and provide up to 98.3% and 85.7% of extra service time with 100% sensing coverage ratio comparing with LEACH and the LEACH-Coverage-U protocols, respectively.

  6. The Removal of the Judge as a Guarantee of Fair Criminal Justice

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Yury V. Derishev

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available The article is devoted to the institution of the removal of a judge in criminal trial proceedings, which is regarded as the most important guarantees of fair criminal justice. Based on the definition of the nature and content of the mechanism for the removal of a judge, the Authors offer an analysis of the problems of the application of law that accompany its implementation in modern criminal proceedings

  7. COMFORT PROVIDING SYSTEMS IN SPACES WITH ACOUTIC INSULATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Grzegorz KLEKOT

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available High capacities of currently available devices for sound registering and processing have generated a need for sound insulated spaces dedicated to exchange of confidential information. In such spaces, preventing propagation of vibroacoustic signals both by the way of air and construction elements entails complete insulation of the room. In order to meet this requirement, proper chemical composition of air and stabilized temperature conditions have to be guaranteed. The paper discusses questions related to the process of solving the task of providing thermal comfort and satisfying air quality in a room for confidential discussions. It presents prototype solutions of installations dedicated to stabilize human-friendly conditions inside a modular chamber provided with acoustic insulation.

  8. Performance Analysis of the Romanian Administration

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marius Constantin PROFIROIU

    2013-10-01

    Full Text Available The performance of public administration is one of the top priorities of the national governments worldwide, not only for Romania. The role of a performing management system at the level of public administration is to ensure a high quality and efficiency of the adopted policies and strategies, of the provided public services and of the administrative act itself, and to guarantee the advantage of a competitive and efficient administration both in relation to its own citizens, and in competition with other cities and countries throughout Europe and all around the world. Following these considerations, and based upon an empirical research conducted with the aid of a survey regarding ‘The analysis of the performance level of the Romanian public administration’ the article aims to (1 identify modern management tools that determine and influence the performance of Romanian public institutions, (2 analyze the effects of using project management as organizational capacity development instruments by public administration in Romania, and (3 determine the influence and effects of the external factors on the performance and development of Romanian public administration.

  9. Experimental performance evaluation of sintered Gd spheres packed beds

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Tura, A.; Nielsen, Klaus K.; Van Nong, Ngo

    2016-01-01

    Research in magnetic refrigeration heavily relies on the use of packed spheres in regenerators, however little investigation to verify that such non-monolithic arrangements guarantee a sufficiently constrained structure has yet been performed. This work presents a preliminary comparison of the pe......Research in magnetic refrigeration heavily relies on the use of packed spheres in regenerators, however little investigation to verify that such non-monolithic arrangements guarantee a sufficiently constrained structure has yet been performed. This work presents a preliminary comparison...... of the performance of AMRs consisting of Gd spheres with diameters ranging from 450-550 microns partially sintered by Spark Plasma Sintering (SPS) to similar spheres, sorted in the same size range and from the same batch, but merely packed. Pressure drop is compared at uniform temperature and at a range of heat...

  10. Federated or cached searches: providing expected performance from multiple invasive species databases

    Science.gov (United States)

    Graham, Jim; Jarnevich, Catherine S.; Simpson, Annie; Newman, Gregory J.; Stohlgren, Thomas J.

    2011-01-01

    Invasive species are a universal global problem, but the information to identify them, manage them, and prevent invasions is stored around the globe in a variety of formats. The Global Invasive Species Information Network is a consortium of organizations working toward providing seamless access to these disparate databases via the Internet. A distributed network of databases can be created using the Internet and a standard web service protocol. There are two options to provide this integration. First, federated searches are being proposed to allow users to search “deep” web documents such as databases for invasive species. A second method is to create a cache of data from the databases for searching. We compare these two methods, and show that federated searches will not provide the performance and flexibility required from users and a central cache of the datum are required to improve performance.

  11. Constitutional judges (guarantee of the Constitution and responsibility

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Francisco Javier Ansuátegui Roig

    2012-06-01

    Full Text Available My aim in this paper is to propose a reflection on the position and the importance that the constitutional judge has in the legal systems of contemporary constitutionalism. The figure of the judge responsible of protecting the Constitution is a key institution, without which we cannot understand the laws of constitutional democracies, their current lines of development, and the guarantee of rights and freedoms that constitute the normative core of these systems. Moreover, the reflection on the exercise of the powers of the judge, its scope and its justification is an important part of contemporary legal discussion, still relevant, albeit not exclusively - in the field of legal philosophy. The object of attention of my reflection is the judge who has the power of judicial review, in a scheme of defense of the Constitution, regardless the specific ways of this defense.

  12. Network performance and fault analytics for LTE wireless service providers

    CERN Document Server

    Kakadia, Deepak; Gilgur, Alexander

    2017-01-01

     This book is intended to describe how to leverage emerging technologies big data analytics and SDN, to address challenges specific to LTE and IP network performance and fault management data in order to more efficiently manage and operate an LTE wireless networks. The proposed integrated solutions permit the LTE network service provider to operate entire integrated network, from RAN to Core , from UE to application service, as one unified system and correspondingly collect and align disparate key metrics and data, using an integrated and holistic approach to network analysis. The LTE wireless network performance and fault involves the network performance and management of network elements in EUTRAN, EPC and IP transport components, not only as individual components, but also as nuances of inter-working of these components. The key metrics for EUTRAN include radio access network accessibility, retainability, integrity, availability and mobility. The key metrics for EPC include MME accessibility, mobility and...

  13. ALIENAÇÃO FIDUCIÁRIA DE IMÓVEL: APORIAS NA CONTRATAÇÃO / FIDUCIARY ASSIGNMENT FOR THE GUARANTEE OF REAL ESTATES: CONTRACTING APORIA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Erik Frederico Gramstrup

    2016-04-01

    Full Text Available This article refers to practical problems involving the compliance of the fiduciary assignment for the guarantee of real estate, according to the principles of the social function, good faith and the contractual balance, using the inductive methodology. In addition to the presentation and analysis of recent problems faced by the Brazilian Superior Court of Justice, in particular we have been identified and analyzed problems involving the contracting of the fiduciary assignment for the guarantee of real estate that are still pending Praetorian analysis, aiming for a solution in the Brazilian Law. The study demonstrates that the contract in reference is under constant unbalances, distorting its use and away from the purpose intended by the legislature. To make the technical analysis of this complex contract possible, it was necessary to retake definitions; concept; historical interpretation; legal nature and effects; and the guarantee foreclosure, not only of the fiduciary assignment for the guarantee of real estate, but also about the legal transaction and the trust property.

  14. Small Body GN&C Research Report: A Robust Model Predictive Control Algorithm with Guaranteed Resolvability

    Science.gov (United States)

    Acikmese, Behcet A.; Carson, John M., III

    2005-01-01

    A robustly stabilizing MPC (model predictive control) algorithm for uncertain nonlinear systems is developed that guarantees the resolvability of the associated finite-horizon optimal control problem in a receding-horizon implementation. The control consists of two components; (i) feedforward, and (ii) feedback part. Feed-forward control is obtained by online solution of a finite-horizon optimal control problem for the nominal system dynamics. The feedback control policy is designed off-line based on a bound on the uncertainty in the system model. The entire controller is shown to be robustly stabilizing with a region of attraction composed of initial states for which the finite-horizon optimal control problem is feasible. The controller design for this algorithm is demonstrated on a class of systems with uncertain nonlinear terms that have norm-bounded derivatives, and derivatives in polytopes. An illustrative numerical example is also provided.

  15. Oral and public confrontation as guarantee of a democratic constitutional criminal procedure

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Thiago Miranda Minagé

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available Understanding the criminal process under the aegis of a Democratic State of Law requires, in addition to a critical re-reading of institutes already consolidated in a specific system model, it is still necessary to abandon them when they have legitimacy. It should be understood that the role to be played by the parties through the contradictory is fundamental and will never be possible without the support of orality and publicity of the acts. In order to control the observance of procedural safeguards, it is necessary to establish the contradictory as true guarantor of procedural guarantees. In order to do so, only the respective guarantees will be effective, when, all and any probative production is developed publicly and orally, through a procedural rite previously established in the law. To this end, the present work begins with an analysis of the inquisitive system and its permanent interference in our current criminal process, proposing an overcoming of the current system, which is the accusatory, in view of its inability to contain inquisitive interference, proposing a new Vision of system as a way of perfecting what was then valid, based on the premise of a change of the unifying principle in order to enhance the oral and publicity of the acts.

  16. An Initial Econometric Consideration of Supply and Demand in the Guaranteed Student Loan Program.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bayus, Barry; Kendis, Kurt

    1982-01-01

    In this econometric model of the Guaranteed Student Loan Program (GSLP), supply is related to banks' liquidity and yield curves, all lenders' economic costs and returns, and Student Loan Marketing Association activity. GSLP demand is based on loan costs, family debt position, and net student need for financial aid. (RW)

  17. Learning-based adaptive prescribed performance control of postcapture space robot-target combination without inertia identifications

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wei, Caisheng; Luo, Jianjun; Dai, Honghua; Bian, Zilin; Yuan, Jianping

    2018-05-01

    In this paper, a novel learning-based adaptive attitude takeover control method is investigated for the postcapture space robot-target combination with guaranteed prescribed performance in the presence of unknown inertial properties and external disturbance. First, a new static prescribed performance controller is developed to guarantee that all the involved attitude tracking errors are uniformly ultimately bounded by quantitatively characterizing the transient and steady-state performance of the combination. Then, a learning-based supplementary adaptive strategy based on adaptive dynamic programming is introduced to improve the tracking performance of static controller in terms of robustness and adaptiveness only utilizing the input/output data of the combination. Compared with the existing works, the prominent advantage is that the unknown inertial properties are not required to identify in the development of learning-based adaptive control law, which dramatically decreases the complexity and difficulty of the relevant controller design. Moreover, the transient and steady-state performance is guaranteed a priori by designer-specialized performance functions without resorting to repeated regulations of the controller parameters. Finally, the three groups of illustrative examples are employed to verify the effectiveness of the proposed control method.

  18. Passive Guaranteed Simulation of Analog Audio Circuits: A Port-Hamiltonian Approach

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Antoine Falaize

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available We present a method that generates passive-guaranteed stable simulations of analog audio circuits from electronic schematics for real-time issues. On one hand, this method is based on a continuous-time power-balanced state-space representation structured into its energy-storing parts, dissipative parts, and external sources. On the other hand, a numerical scheme is especially designed to preserve this structure and the power balance. These state-space structures define the class of port-Hamiltonian systems. The derivation of this structured system associated with the electronic circuit is achieved by an automated analysis of the interconnection network combined with a dictionary of models for each elementary component. The numerical scheme is based on the combination of finite differences applied on the state (with respect to the time variable and on the total energy (with respect to the state. This combination provides a discrete-time version of the power balance. This set of algorithms is valid for both the linear and nonlinear case. Finally, three applications of increasing complexities are given: a diode clipper, a common-emitter bipolar-junction transistor amplifier, and a wah pedal. The results are compared to offline simulations obtained from a popular circuit simulator.

  19. Performance of Healthcare Providers Regarding Iranian Women Experiencing Physical Domestic Violence in Isfahan.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Yousefnia, Nasim; Nekuei, Nafisehsadat; Farajzadegan, Ziba; Yadegarfar, Ghasem

    2018-01-01

    Domestic violence (DV) can threaten women's health. Healthcare providers (HCPs) may be the first to come into contact with a victim of DV. Their appropriate performance regarding a DV victim can decrease its complications. The aim of the present study was to investigate HCPs' performance regarding women experiencing DV in emergency and maternity wards of hospitals in Isfahan, Iran. The present descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted among 300 HCPs working in emergency and maternity wards in hospitals in Isfahan. The participants were selected using quota random sampling from February to May 2016. A researcher-made questionnaire containing the five items of HCPs performance regarding DV (assessment, intervention, documentation, reference, and follow-up) was used to collect data. The reliability and validity of the questionnaire were confirmed, and the collected data were analyzed using SPSS software. Cronbach's alpha was used to assess the reliability of the questionnaires. To present a general description of the data (variables, mean, and standard deviation), the table of frequencies was designed. The performance of the participants regarding DV in the assessment (mean = 64.22), intervention (mean = 68.55), and reference stages (mean = 68.32) were average. However, in the documentation (mean = 72.55) and follow-up stages (mean = 23.10), their performance was good and weak respectively (criterion from 100). Based on the results, because of defects in providing services for women experiencing DV, a practical indigenous guideline should be provided to treat and support these women.

  20. Guarantee of remaining life time. Integrity of mechanical components and control of ageing phenomena

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schuler, X.; Herter, K.H.; Koenig, G.

    2012-01-01

    The life time of safety relevant systems, structures and components (SSC) of Nuclear Power Plants (NPP) is determined by two main principles. First of all the required quality has to be produced during the design and fabrication process. This means that quality has to be produced and can't be improved by excessive inspections (Basis Safety - quality through production principle). The second one is assigned to the initial quality which has to be maintained during operation. This concerns safe operation during the total life time (life time management), safety against ageing phenomena (AM - ageing management) as well as proof of integrity (e.g. break preclusion or avoidance of fracture for SSC with high safety relevance). Initiated by the Fukushima Dai-ichi event in Japan in spring 2011 for German NPP's Long Term Operation (LTO) is out of question. In June 2011 legislation took decision to phase-out from nuclear by 2022. As a fact safe operation shall be guaranteed for the remaining life time. Within this technical framework the ageing management is a key element. Depending on the safety-relevance of the SSC under observation including preventive maintenance various tasks are required in particular to clarify the mechanisms which contribute systemspecifically to the damage of the components and systems and to define their controlling parameters which have to be monitored and checked. Appropriate continuous or discontinuous measures are to be considered in this connection. The approach to ensure a high standard of quality in operation for the remaining life time and the management of the technical and organizational aspects are demonstrated and explained. The basis for ageing management to be applied to NNPs is included in Nuclear Safety Standard 1403 which describes the ageing management procedures. For SSC with high safety relevance a verification analysis for rupture preclusion (proof of integrity, integrity concept) shall be performed (Nuclear Safety Standard 3206

  1. Seamless interworking architecture for WBAN in heterogeneous wireless networks with QoS guarantees.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Khan, Pervez; Ullah, Niamat; Ullah, Sana; Kwak, Kyung Sup

    2011-10-01

    The IEEE 802.15.6 standard is a communication standard optimized for low-power and short-range in-body/on-body nodes to serve a variety of medical, consumer electronics and entertainment applications. Providing high mobility with guaranteed Quality of Service (QoS) to a WBAN user in heterogeneous wireless networks is a challenging task. A WBAN uses a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) to gather data from body sensors and forwards it to a remote server through wide range wireless networks. In this paper, we present a coexistence study of WBAN with Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN) and Wireless Wide Area Networks (WWANs). The main issue is interworking of WBAN in heterogenous wireless networks including seamless handover, QoS, emergency services, cooperation and security. We propose a Seamless Interworking Architecture (SIA) for WBAN in heterogenous wireless networks based on a cost function. The cost function is based on power consumption and data throughput costs. Our simulation results show that the proposed scheme outperforms typical approaches in terms of throughput, delay and packet loss rate.

  2. 16 CFR 1401.5 - Providing performance and technical data to purchasers by labeling.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... POINT OF PURCHASE OF PERFORMANCE AND TECHNICAL DATA § 1401.5 Providing performance and technical data to... the time of original purchase and to the first purchaser for purposes other than resale. The data... to be read and understood by ordinary individuals under normal conditions of purchase. This...

  3. Early Observations on the Performance of Windows Azure

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Zach Hill

    2011-01-01

    Full Text Available A significant open issue in cloud computing is the real performance of the infrastructure. Few, if any, cloud providers or technologies offer quantitative performance guarantees. Regardless of the potential advantages of the cloud in comparison to enterprise-deployed applications, cloud infrastructures may ultimately fail if deployed applications cannot predictably meet behavioral requirements. In this paper, we present the results of comprehensive performance experiments we conducted on Windows Azure from October 2009 to February 2010. In general, we have observed good performance of the Windows Azure mechanisms, although the average 10 min VM startup time must be accounted for in application design. We also present performance and reliability observations and analysis from our deployment of a large-scale scientific application hosted on Azure, called ModisAzure, that show unusual and sporadic VM execution slowdown of over 4× in some cases and affected up to 16% of task executions at times. In addition to a detailed performance evaluation of Windows Azure, we provide recommendations for potential users of Windows Azure based on these early observations. Although the discussion and analysis is tailored to scientific applications, the results are broadly applicable to the range of existing and future applications running in Windows Azure.

  4. 75 FR 17303 - Section 108 Community Development Loan Guarantee Program: Participation of States as Borrowers...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-04-06

    ... with access to long-term (up to 20-year) fixed-rate loans at relatively low interest rates to finance certain categories of eligible CDBG projects. Historically, section 108 guarantee authority has been... local governments in nonentitlement areas. The July 22, 2009, interim rule implemented the expansion of...

  5. 75 FR 5902 - Guarantees for Bonds and Notes Issued for Electrification or Telephone Purposes

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-02-05

    ... Submission Form,'' must be completed. (If you click on the hyperlink of the docket when the search returns it.... 3. Amend Sec. 1720.3 by adding the definition of ``Eligible Loan'' to read as follows: Sec. 1720.3 Definitions. * * * * * Eligible Loan means a loan that a guaranteed lender extends to a borrower for up to 100...

  6. Non-performance of the Severance Pay Program in Slovenia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Milan Vodopivec

    2009-03-01

    Full Text Available Combining information from the Firm Survey of Labor Costs with the information about claims filed with the Guarantee Fund by workers whose employers defaulted on their severance pay obligations, the paper analyzes the so-called non-performance problem of severance pay – the fact that coverage, and thus legal entitlement, does not guarantee the actual receipt of the benefit – as experienced in Slovenia in 2000. The findings are threefold: (i one-third of total obligations incurred by firms failed to be honored and only a small portion of defaulted severance pay claims was reimbursed by the Guarantee Fund; (ii while both men and women seem to be equally affected, workers older than 40 were disproportionally represented among those whose severance pay claims failed to be honored; and, (iii among firms that incurred severance pay liabilities, larger and more productive firms were more likely to observe their fiduciary obligations and pay them out. These findings corroborate the weaknesses of severance pay as an income protection program, pointing to the large scale of the non-performance problem and the inequities created by it.

  7. Performance of healthcare providers regarding iranian women experiencing physical domestic violence in Isfahan

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nasim Yousefnia

    2018-01-01

    Full Text Available Background: Domestic violence (DV can threaten women's health. Healthcare providers (HCPs may be the first to come into contact with a victim of DV. Their appropriate performance regarding a DV victim can decrease its complications. The aim of the present study was to investigate HCPs' performance regarding women experiencing DV in emergency and maternity wards of hospitals in Isfahan, Iran. Materials and Methods: The present descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted among 300 HCPs working in emergency and maternity wards in hospitals in Isfahan. The participants were selected using quota random sampling from February to May 2016. A researcher-made questionnaire containing the five items of HCPs performance regarding DV (assessment, intervention, documentation, reference, and follow-up was used to collect data. The reliability and validity of the questionnaire were confirmed, and the collected data were analyzed using SPSS software. Cronbach's alpha was used to assess the reliability of the questionnaires. To present a general description of the data (variables, mean, and standard deviation, the table of frequencies was designed. Results: The performance of the participants regarding DV in the assessment (mean = 64.22, intervention (mean = 68.55, and reference stages (mean = 68.32 were average. However, in the documentation (mean = 72.55 and follow-up stages (mean = 23.10, their performance was good and weak respectively (criterion from 100. Conclusions: Based on the results, because of defects in providing services for women experiencing DV, a practical indigenous guideline should be provided to treat and support these women.

  8. Tests Performed on Hydraulic Turbines at Commissioning or after Capital Repairs. Part II. Tests Performed on a 6.5 MW Kaplan Turbine

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Adrian Cuzmoş

    2015-07-01

    Full Text Available The paper presents the tests performed on a hydraulic turbine on commissioning, the devices, test methods and the results obtained from the respective tests, as well as the conclusions and recommendations resulted from these tests. This kind of tests can be performed for the verification of guarantees.

  9. Breakfast and performance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Cueto, S

    2001-12-01

    Evidence suggests that the effect of fasting on performance is not uniform, but it is dependent on the basal nutritional status of the subject. Breakfast consumption has a short-term effect in improving selected learning skills, especially work memory. School breakfast programmes have a positive effect on the nutritional status of children, on school attendance and probably on dropout rates. The effect of breakfast consumption on school performance depends on the interaction between the programme, student characteristics (malnutrition) and school organisation. Unless the school setting guarantees a minimum quality standard, the benefits of breakfast consumption will not be evident in performance in complex areas like language or maths.

  10. 7 CFR 1810.1 - Information concerning interest rates, amortization, guarantee fee, annual charge, and fixed period.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... 7 Agriculture 12 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Information concerning interest rates, amortization... UTILITIES SERVICE, AND FARM SERVICE AGENCY, DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE GENERAL REGULATIONS INTEREST RATES, TERMS, CONDITIONS, AND APPROVAL AUTHORITY Interest Rates, Amortization, Guarantee Fee, Annual Charge...

  11. 75 FR 65615 - Conditional Commitment for a Federal Loan Guarantee for Project Financing for Southwest Intertie...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-26

    ... DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Conditional Commitment for a Federal Loan Guarantee for Project Financing for... based on the analysis in the Final Environmental Impact Statement for Project Financing for Southwest... support of debt financing for transmission infrastructure investment projects located in the United States...

  12. Managing poorly performing clinicians: health care providers' willingness to pay for independent help.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Watson, Verity; Sussex, Jon; Ryan, Mandy; Tetteh, Ebenezer

    2012-03-01

    To determine the willingness to pay (WTP) of senior managers in the UK National Health Service (NHS) for services to help manage performance concerns with doctors, dentists and pharmacists. A discrete choice experiment (DCE) was used to elicit senior managers' preferences for a support service to help manage clinical performance concerns. The DCE was based on: a literature review; interviews with support service providers and clinical professional bodies; and discussion groups with managers. From the DCE responses, we estimate marginal WTP for aspects of support services. 451 NHS managers completed the DCE questionnaire. NHS managers are willing to pay for: advice, 'facilitation', and behavioural, health, clinical and organisational assessments. Telephone advice with written confirmation was valued most highly. NHS managers were willing to pay £161.56 (CI: £160.81-£162.32) per year per whole time equivalent doctor, dentist or pharmacist, for support to help manage clinical performance concerns. Marginal WTP varied across respondent subgroups but was always positive. Health care managers valued help in managing the clinicians' performance, and were willing to pay for it from their organisations' limited funds. Their WTP exceeds the current cost of a UK body providing similar support. Establishing a central body to provide such services across a health care system, with the associated economies of scale including cumulative experience, is an option that policy makers should consider seriously. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

  13. Getting more than contractually guaranteed. Five years energy conservation contracting in the clinic Bremerhaven; Mehr bekommen als vertraglich garantiert. Fuenf Jahre Energiespar-Contracting im Klinikum Bremerhaven

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Breuer, Juergen [Klinikum Bremerhaven-Reinkenheide (Germany); Habel, Birger; Harneit, Maurice; Kahmann, Lars [Siemens AG, Region Nord (Germany). Building Technologies Div.

    2012-04-15

    Most hospitals in Germany virtually throw their money out the window - for heat that could be produced more efficiently, for air that would not be worked up or for coldness which is produced at the wrong place at the wrong time and with low efficiency. Quite different in the Hospital Bremerhaven-Reinkenheide (Bremerhaven, Federal Republic of Germany): In 2004, the hospital administration decided for energetic modernization of building systems based on energy performance contracting with 25% of guaranteed conservation.

  14. Market competition, ownership, payment systems and the performance of health care providers - a panel study among Finnish occupational health services providers.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kankaanpää, Eila; Linnosmaa, Ismo; Valtonen, Hannu

    2013-10-01

    Many health care reforms rely on competition although health care differs in many respects from the assumptions of perfect competition. Finnish occupational health services provide an opportunity to study empirically competition, ownership and payment systems and the performance of providers. In these markets employers (purchasers) choose the provider and prices are market determined. The price regulation of public providers was abolished in 1995. We had data on providers from 1992, 1995, 1997, 2000 and 2004. The unbalanced panel consisted of 1145 providers and 4059 observations. Our results show that in more competitive markets providers in general offered a higher share of medical care compared to preventive services. The association between unit prices and revenues and market environment varied according to the provider type. For-profit providers had lower prices and revenues in markets with numerous providers. The public providers in more competitive regions were more sensitive to react to the abolishment of their price regulation by raising their prices. Employer governed providers had weaker association between unit prices or revenues and competition. The market share of for-profit providers was negatively associated with productivity, which was the only sign of market spillovers we found in our study.

  15. 48 CFR 1812.7000 - Prohibition on guaranteed customer bases for new commercial space hardware or services.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-10-01

    ... customer bases for new commercial space hardware or services. 1812.7000 Section 1812.7000 Federal... PLANNING ACQUISITION OF COMMERCIAL ITEMS Commercial Space Hardware or Services 1812.7000 Prohibition on guaranteed customer bases for new commercial space hardware or services. Public Law 102-139, title III...

  16. LEAN MANAGEMENT - THE WAY TO A PERFORMANT ENTERPRISE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    AMALIA VENERA TODORUŢ

    2010-01-01

    Full Text Available In this work we approached issues related to new methods of production organization such as Lean Management, a method specific for a flexible production of great success which represents the guarantee for a performant enterprise. In this paper we presented the main concepts, the application and adaptation way in different contexts, both in industry and in services. We showed a modern tendency which is taking shape more and more in the contemporary economic context, such as the integration of this concept with the Six Sigma concept, and thus we can talk about Lean Six Sigma, as an integrator method which guarantees high-class quality and lower costs.

  17. 12 CFR 325.104 - Capital restoration plans.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ... liability of the company under any guarantee required or provided in connection with any capital restoration... of the full amount of that guarantee from any or all of the companies issuing the guarantee. (2... shall be accepted unless it includes any performance guarantee described in section 38(e)(2)(C) of the...

  18. Global Environmental Governance as a Regulatory and Guarantee Criterion for Environmental Justice

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Denise Schmitt Siqueira Garcia

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available This article deals with the theme of Global Environmental Governance to the achievement of Environmental Justice, presenting as general objective to analyze the importance of the first in its public, business and civil society spheres for the regulation and guarantee of the second. Noting up at the end that the Environmental Justice, as a common humanitarian problem, presents itself as the main objective of Global Environmental Governance. In the methodology was adopted the inductive method, having been applied the techniques of the referent, category, operational concepts, bibliographical research and file.

  19. SALE OF GOODS AND ASSOCIATED GUARANTEES IN THE ROMANIAN AND EUROPEAN LEGISLATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Nicolae, GRADINARU

    2014-11-01

    Full Text Available In a market economy there are needed certain rules for products, services and commercial practices in order to satisfy consumer's requirements, while ensuring the free movement of goods and services as well as fair competition. The seller is obliged to deliver to the consumer only products which are in accordance with the contract of sale. In case of non-conformity, the consumer is entitled to have the goods brought into conformity free of charge by repair or replacement, or an appropriate price reduction or rescission of the contract for those goods. Consumer policy in the European Union enables European citizens to shop safely in all Member States. Because the internal market must guarantee the free movement of goods, persons, services and capital, there was a need for a common set of minimum rules of consumer protection valid regardless of where the purchase of goods is made in the Community. When a customer has purchased a product, the Community legislation requires that the product he receives corresponds to what he, the buyer, expressly or implicitly agreed to buy, that is to what is provided in the contract between seller and consumer. Obviously, the product must be used in a normal way.

  20. Convergence Guaranteed Nonlinear Constraint Model Predictive Control via I/O Linearization

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Xiaobing Kong

    2013-01-01

    Full Text Available Constituting reliable optimal solution is a key issue for the nonlinear constrained model predictive control. Input-output feedback linearization is a popular method in nonlinear control. By using an input-output feedback linearizing controller, the original linear input constraints will change to nonlinear constraints and sometimes the constraints are state dependent. This paper presents an iterative quadratic program (IQP routine on the continuous-time system. To guarantee its convergence, another iterative approach is incorporated. The proposed algorithm can reach a feasible solution over the entire prediction horizon. Simulation results on both a numerical example and the continuous stirred tank reactors (CSTR demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

  1. Quality Guarantee in the services that the LSCD of Guatemala lends

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Dieguez Davila, L.

    1998-01-01

    It is of supreme importance that the instruments used in the radiological protection, as well as those used in clinical dosimetry, maintain trazability to primary patterns; this way it is guaranteed that the used magnitudes are reproducible in the secondary laboratories. This premise is important, however, it is indispensable that the laboratories can establish the necessary procedures in writing to make the mensurations that are involved in the calibrations and the other services characteristic of a secondary laboratory. The present work demonstrates as all the lent services in the secondary laboratory of dosimetric calibration of Guatemala are carried out by means of the procedures of quality demanded at international level

  2. Procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance among mobile phone service providers in Kenya

    OpenAIRE

    Emily Adhiambo Okonjo; Peterson Obara Magutu; Richard Bitange Nyaoga

    2016-01-01

    The aim of this study was to establish the relationship between procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance among mobile phone service providers in Kenya. The study specifically set out to establish the extent to which mobile phone service providers have implemented procurement risk management practices and to determine the relationship between procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance. The study adopted a descriptive study design by collecting ...

  3. Guaranteed Student Loan Amendments of 1976. Ninety-fourth Congress, Second Session. Report No. 94-1232.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Congress of the U.S., Washington, DC. House.

    A report on the Guaranteed Student Loan Amendments (H.R. 14070) to Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965 considers the problems behind and implications of the loan program. Chief among the problems are the default rate, access to loans, the schools as lenders, and the role of the states in administering the program. Changes recommended…

  4. Strategy for introduction of quality guarantee in the supporting infrastructure to nucleoenergetics for a mixed association

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jimenez, P.; Fernandez, R.

    1993-01-01

    The work consists in raising and proposing and integral strategy for the assimilation of the quality guarantee by all national enterprises, companies and institutions that participate in the nucleoenergetics program and specially for a mixed association to conclude the construction, starting-up and operation of Juragua nuclear power plants

  5. Procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance among mobile phone service providers in Kenya

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Emily Adhiambo Okonjo

    2016-02-01

    Full Text Available The aim of this study was to establish the relationship between procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance among mobile phone service providers in Kenya. The study specifically set out to establish the extent to which mobile phone service providers have implemented procurement risk management practices and to determine the relationship between procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance. The study adopted a descriptive study design by collecting data from the four (4 mobile telecommunication companies in Kenya using a self-administered questionnaire. Means, standard deviation, and regression analysis were used to analyze the data collected. The study established that most of the mobile phone service providers in Kenya had implemented procurement risk management practices. It was also clear that there was a very significant relationship between procurement risk management practices and supply chain performance.

  6. Discontinuation of approval of modifications in notes, guaranteed under Title VI or VII of the Public Health Service Act, proposed to permit use of the notes as collateral for tax-exempt financings--PHS. Final rule.

    Science.gov (United States)

    1983-09-21

    The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) adds a new section to regulations for making and guaranteeing loans for construction and modernization of hospitals and medical facilities and to regulations for guaranteeing loans for the construction of teaching facilities for health professions personnel. Under these regulations HHS will not approve the modification of the terms of an existing loan guaranteed under Title VI or Title VII of the Public Health Service (PHS) Act if the modification would permit use of the guarantee (or guaranteed loan) as collateral for tax-exempt financing.

  7. Decentralized Electric Vehicle Charging Strategies for Reduced Load Variation and Guaranteed Charge Completion in Regional Distribution Grids

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Weige Zhang

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available A novel, fully decentralized strategy to coordinate charge operation of electric vehicles is proposed in this paper. Based on stochastic switching control of on-board chargers, this strategy ensures high-efficiency charging, reduces load variations to the grid during charging periods, achieves charge completion with high probability, and accomplishes approximate “valley-filling”. Further improvements on the core strategy, including individualized power management, adaptive strategies, and battery support systems, are introduced to further reduce power fluctuation variances and to guarantee charge completion. Stochastic analysis is performed to establish the main properties of the strategies and to quantitatively show the performance improvements. Compared with the existing decentralized charging strategies, the strategies proposed in this paper can be implemented without any information exchange between grid operators and electric vehicles (EVs, resulting in a communications cost reduction. Additionally, it is shown that by using stochastic charging rules, a grid-supporting battery system with a very small energy capacity can achieve substantial reduction of EV load fluctuations with high confidence. An extensive set of simulations and case studies with real-world data are used to demonstrate the benefits of the proposed strategies.

  8. Can pay-for-performance to primary care providers stimulate appropriate use of antibiotics?

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Dietrichson, Jens; Maria Ellegård, Lina; Anell, Anders

    -for-performance in a difference-in-differences analysis. Despite that the monetary incentives were small, we find that P4P significantly increased narrow-spectrum antibiotics' share of RTI antibiotics consumption. We further find larger effects in areas where there were many private providers, where the incentive was formulated...... as a penalty rather than a reward, and where all providers were close to a P4P target....

  9. 76 FR 54454 - Issuance of Loan Guarantee to Genesis Solar, LLC, for the Genesis Solar Energy Project

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-09-01

    ... DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Issuance of Loan Guarantee to Genesis Solar, LLC, for the Genesis Solar... Energy Project (GSEP), a 250-megawatt (MW) nominal capacity solar power generating facility on.../Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Genesis Solar Energy Project, Riverside County, California...

  10. Effect of Prior Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Knowledge on Compression Performance by Hospital Providers

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Joshua N. Burkhardt

    2014-07-01

    Full Text Available Introduction: The purpose of this study was to determine cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR knowledge of hospital providers and whether knowledge affects performance of effective compressions during a simulated cardiac arrest. Methods: This cross-sectional study evaluated the CPR knowledge and performance of medical students and ED personnel with current CPR certification. We collected data regarding compression rate, hand placement, depth, and recoil via a questionnaire to determine knowledge, and then we assessed performance using 60 seconds of compressions on a simulation mannequin. Results: Data from 200 enrollments were analyzed by evaluators blinded to subject knowledge. Regarding knowledge, 94% of participants correctly identified parameters for rate, 58% for hand placement, 74% for depth, and 94% for recoil. Participants identifying an effective rate of ≥100 performed compressions at a significantly higher rate than participants identifying <100 (µ=117 vs. 94, p<0.001. Participants identifying correct hand placement performed significantly more compressions adherent to guidelines than those identifying incorrect placement (µ=86% vs. 72%, p<0.01. No significant differences were found in depth or recoil performance based on knowledge of guidelines. Conclusion: Knowledge of guidelines was variable; however, CPR knowledge significantly impacted certain aspects of performance, namely rate and hand placement, whereas depth and recoil were not affected. Depth of compressions was poor regardless of prior knowledge, and knowledge did not correlate with recoil performance. Overall performance was suboptimal and additional training may be needed to ensure consistent, effective performance and therefore better outcomes after cardiopulmonary arrest.

  11. The management of water providing strategic ecosystems. The case of the basins that supply Medellin and Bogota in Colombia

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cardenas Agudelo, Maria Fernanda

    2013-01-01

    The population growth and the urban concentration involve a sustained increment in water demand, which requires an adequate effort and management of the ecosystems that provide the liquid to guarantee a plenty future offer. The performance of the entities in charge of the management of such ecosystems and the results obtained in the basins that supply drinkable water to two cities in Colombia are analyzed; financial topics and their relation with the local community are considered. Management is delegated to governmental entities, whose work is insufficient and unsatisfactory. Thus, application of economical, legal and social tools is proposed in order to improve ecosystem's conservation and life quality of farmers that inhabit in their influence areas, partially transferring management to the local community's orbit.

  12. Basic income guarantee: a review of implications for oral health.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chen, Yi-An; Quiñonez, Carlos

    2018-12-01

    To: a) Familiarize readers with the concept of a basic income guarantee (BIG) and its different forms; b) Consider how BIG could improve oral health and decrease oral health disparities; c) Motivate readers to advocate for the evaluation of oral health outcomes in BIG experiments. Published articles and book chapters that have analyzed and reviewed data from past BIG pilot projects were examined for their findings on health and socioeconomic outcomes. Our findings suggest various areas and mechanisms whereby BIG can influence oral health-related outcomes, whether through impacts on work, illness and injury, education, a social multiplier effect, expenditure behavior, and/or mental illness and other health outcomes. Our findings illustrate the importance of assessing oral health-related outcomes in future BIG pilot projects. © 2017 American Association of Public Health Dentistry.

  13. Scalable High Performance Message Passing over InfiniBand for Open MPI

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Friedley, A; Hoefler, T; Leininger, M L; Lumsdaine, A

    2007-10-24

    InfiniBand (IB) is a popular network technology for modern high-performance computing systems. MPI implementations traditionally support IB using a reliable, connection-oriented (RC) transport. However, per-process resource usage that grows linearly with the number of processes, makes this approach prohibitive for large-scale systems. IB provides an alternative in the form of a connectionless unreliable datagram transport (UD), which allows for near-constant resource usage and initialization overhead as the process count increases. This paper describes a UD-based implementation for IB in Open MPI as a scalable alternative to existing RC-based schemes. We use the software reliability capabilities of Open MPI to provide the guaranteed delivery semantics required by MPI. Results show that UD not only requires fewer resources at scale, but also allows for shorter MPI startup times. A connectionless model also improves performance for applications that tend to send small messages to many different processes.

  14. The Guarantee Contract as a Typical Warranty Business in Brazilian Civil Law

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Fábio Siebeneichler de Andrade

    2016-12-01

    Full Text Available This paper deals with the guarantee contract, which is one of the most important forms of legal assurance business. It is one of the most widely used businesses in Brazilian negotiating practice. In this sense, considering the fact that Brazilian Private Law has gone through a renovation, by virtue of legislation such as the Civil Code of 2002 and the Consumer Protection Code, which welcomed the principle of good faith and social function of the contract, it is necessary to examine this important contract and check if it’s discipline is appropriate to the new contractual principles.

  15. 75 FR 25829 - Notice of Acceptance of Proposals for the Section 538 Multi-Family Housing Guaranteed Rural...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-05-10

    ... through the construction and permanent loan financing phases of a project. Those applications that meet... and will be in effect throughout both of the project's construction and permanent financing phases... loans. The Agency can guarantee the ``construction and permanent'' financing phases of a project. The...

  16. Experimental investigation of coolant and poisoned moderator mixing due to a simulated pressure tube/calandria tube fishmouth rupturing an overpoisoned guaranteed shutdown state

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mackinnon, J.C.; Fortman, R.A.; Hadaller, G.I.

    1997-01-01

    During a guaranteed shutdown state (GSS) in a CANDU reactor, there must be sufficient negative reactivity to ensure subcriticality in the event of a process failure. In one of the acceptable states, the reactor is kept subcritical by a high concentration of a neutron-absorbing chemical (the poison gadolinium nitrate) dissolved in the moderator (i.e., the moderator is guaranteed overpoisoned). A postulated accident scenario which is considered as a part of reactor safety analysis is the rupture of a fuel channel (i.e., a pressure tube/calandria tube break) when the reactor is in a GSS. If one of the channels in the core breaks (requiring a simultaneous failure of both the pressure tube and the surrounding calandria tube), coolant from the primary heat transport system will be discharged into the moderator, causing an associated displacement of fluid through relief ducts at the top of the calandria vessel. The incoming (unpoisoned) coolant may mix quickly with the moderator, or may mix slowly while displacing poisoned moderator through the relief ducts. The effectiveness of mixing generally depends on the break location, the coolant discharge rate and the moderator circulation. If an in-core loss of coolant accident occurred while the reactor is in this overpoisoned state, it must be guaranteed that even with the dilution of the poison by the incoming coolant the reactor will remain subcritical on both a local and global basis. This paper presents an overview of an experimental program in progress at the Moderator Test Facility at Stern Laboratories to investigate coolant/poison mixing for a simulated in-core fishmouth pressure tube/calandria tube rupture. The nominal system at the same temperature as the heavily poisoned moderator, i.e., a depressurised 'cold' state. The results presented are those obtained during the commissioning of the modified Test Facility. The contents of the paper are as follows. First, the objectives of the experimental program are

  17. Guaranteed epsilon-optimal treatment plans with the minimum number of beams for stereotactic body radiation therapy

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Yarmand, Hamed; Winey, Brian; Craft, David

    2013-01-01

    Stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) is characterized by delivering a high amount of dose in a short period of time. In SBRT the dose is delivered using open fields (e.g., beam’s-eye-view) known as ‘apertures’. Mathematical methods can be used for optimizing treatment planning for delivery of sufficient dose to the cancerous cells while keeping the dose to surrounding organs at risk (OARs) minimal. Two important elements of a treatment plan are quality and delivery time. Quality of a plan is measured based on the target coverage and dose to OARs. Delivery time heavily depends on the number of beams used in the plan as the setup times for different beam directions constitute a large portion of the delivery time. Therefore the ideal plan, in which all potential beams can be used, will be associated with a long impractical delivery time. We use the dose to OARs in the ideal plan to find the plan with the minimum number of beams which is guaranteed to be epsilon-optimal (i.e., a predetermined maximum deviation from the ideal plan is guaranteed). Since the treatment plan optimization is inherently a multi-criteria-optimization problem, the planner can navigate the ideal dose distribution Pareto surface and select a plan of desired target coverage versus OARs sparing, and then use the proposed technique to reduce the number of beams while guaranteeing epsilon-optimality. We use mixed integer programming (MIP) for optimization. To reduce the computation time for the resultant MIP, we use two heuristics: a beam elimination scheme and a family of heuristic cuts, known as ‘neighbor cuts’, based on the concept of ‘adjacent beams’. We show the effectiveness of the proposed technique on two clinical cases, a liver and a lung case. Based on our technique we propose an algorithm for fast generation of epsilon-optimal plans. (paper)

  18. Impact of Providing Compassion on Job Performance and Mental Health: The Moderating Effect of Interpersonal Relationship Quality.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chu, Li-Chuan

    2017-07-01

    To examine the relationships of providing compassion at work with job performance and mental health, as well as to identify the role of interpersonal relationship quality in moderating these relationships. This study adopted a two-stage survey completed by 235 registered nurses employed by hospitals in Taiwan. All hypotheses were tested using hierarchical regression analyses. The results show that providing compassion is an effective predictor of job performance and mental health, whereas interpersonal relationship quality can moderate the relationships of providing compassion with job performance and mental health. When nurses are frequently willing to listen, understand, and help their suffering colleagues, the enhancement engendered by providing compassion can improve the provider's job performance and mental health. Creating high-quality relationships in the workplace can strengthen the positive benefits of providing compassion. Motivating employees to spontaneously exhibit compassion is crucial to an organization. Hospitals can establish value systems, belief systems, and cultural systems that support a compassionate response to suffering. In addition, nurses can internalize altruistic belief systems into their own personal value systems through a long process of socialization in the workplace. © 2017 Sigma Theta Tau International.

  19. Providing hierarchical approach for measuring supply chain performance using AHP and DEMATEL methodologies

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Ali Najmi

    2010-06-01

    Full Text Available Measuring the performance of a supply chain is normally of a function of various parameters. Such a problem often involves in a multiple criteria decision making (MCMD problem where different criteria need to be defined and calculated, properly. During the past two decades, Analytical hierarchy procedure (AHP and DEMATEL have been some of the most popular MCDM approaches for prioritizing various attributes. The study of this paper uses a new methodology which is a combination of AHP and DEMATEL to rank various parameters affecting the performance of the supply chain. The DEMATEL is used for understanding the relationship between comparison metrics and AHP is used for the integration to provide a value for the overall performance.

  20. BUSINESS PERFORMANCE OF HEALTH TOURISM SERVICE PROVIDERS IN THE REPUBLIC OF CROATIA.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Vrkljan, Sanela; Hendija, Zvjezdana

    2016-03-01

    Health tourism can be generally divided into medical, health spa and wellness tourism. Health spa tourism services are provided in special hospitals for medical rehabilitation and health resorts, and include under medical supervision controlled use of natural healing factors and physical therapy in order to improve and preserve health. There are 13 special hospitals for medical rehabilitation and health resorts in Croatia. Most of them are financed through the state budget and lesser by sale on the market. More than half of their accommodation capacity is offered for sale on the market while the rest is under contract with the Croatian Health Insurance Fund. Domestic overnights are several times higher than foreign overnights. The aim of this study was to analyze business performance of special hospitals for medical rehabilitation and health resorts in Croatia in relation to the sources of financing and the structure of service users. The assumption was that those who are more market-oriented achieve better business performance. In proving these assumptions, an empirical research was conducted and the assumptions were tested. A positive correlation was proven in tested indicators of business performance of the analyzed service providers of health-spa tourism with a higher amount of overnight stays realized through sales on the market in relation to total overnight stays, with a greater share of foreign overnights in total of overnights and with a higher share of realized revenue on the market out of total revenue. The results of the research show that special hospitals for medical rehabilitation and health resorts that are more market-oriented are more successful in their business performance. These findings are important for planning the health and tourism policies in countries like Croatia.

  1. 75 FR 3197 - Notice of a Public Meeting on Administration of the Business and Industry Guaranteed Loan Program

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-20

    ... DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE Rural Business-Cooperative Service Notice of a Public Meeting on Administration of the Business and Industry Guaranteed Loan Program AGENCY: Rural Business-Cooperative Service, USDA. ACTION: Notice of public meeting. SUMMARY: The Rural Business-Cooperative Service (RBS), an...

  2. Warning Signals for Poor Performance Improve Human-Robot Interaction

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    van den Brule, Rik; Bijlstra, Gijsbert; Dotsch, Ron; Haselager, Pim; Wigboldus, Daniel HJ

    2016-01-01

    The present research was aimed at investigating whether human-robot interaction (HRI) can be improved by a robot’s nonverbal warning signals. Ideally, when a robot signals that it cannot guarantee good performance, people could take preventive actions to ensure the successful completion of the

  3. Act No. 23.592 adopting measures against those who arbitrarily impede the full exercise of fundamental rights and guarantees recognized in the National Constitution, 23 August 1988.

    Science.gov (United States)

    1988-01-01

    This Act provides that whoever arbitrarily impedes, obstructs, restricts, or in any other way limits the full exercise on an equal basis of fundamental rights and guarantees recognized by the National Constitution of Argentina will be obligated, at the request of the injured person, to render the discriminatory act without effect or cease in its realization and repair the moral and material damage that has resulted. To be particularly scrutinized are discriminatory acts or omissions undertaken for sexual reasons, among others. full text

  4. Influence of a carbohydrate drink on performance of military personnel in NBC protective clothing

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Dokkum, W. van; Boxtel, L.B.J. van; Dijk, M.J. van; Boer, L.C.; Beek, E.J. van der

    1996-01-01

    Background: The increased threat of nuclear, biological and chemical (NBC) weapons underlines the need of protective clothing and gas masks, but this may impair performance. Thus, attention should be focused on the nutritional requirements. Hypothesis: Optimal performance is guaranteed if the supply

  5. Pre-conceptual-schema-based patterns for deriving key performance indicators from strategic objectives

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Carlos Mario Zapata Jaramillo

    2017-05-01

    Full Text Available Performance measurement is crucial for achieving business success. Moreover, such success is also related to the fulfillment of the organizational strategic objectives. Hence, an adequate determination of relevant performance indicators—or key performance indicators (KPIs—and their relationships to organizational objectives is needed. Even though several approaches for treating KPIs and objective-KPI relationships have been proposed, they exhibit some drawbacks associated with the lack of reusability and traceability. We attempt to fill this gap by proposing a set of patterns based on pre-conceptual schemas for supporting the systematic derivation of KPIs and their relationships to organizational objectives. In this way, the proposed patterns guarantee a reusable and traceable derivation process of a set of candidate KPIs from organizational strategic objectives. Lastly, we provide a lab study in order to illustrate the usefulness of this proposal.

  6. 13 CFR 500.211 - Lender responsibilities.

    Science.gov (United States)

    2010-01-01

    ...) Monitoring. In accordance with the Guarantee the Lender shall monitor Borrower's performance under the Loan... borrower, as provided in the Guarantee; (2) Projected balance sheet, income statement, and cash flows for...

  7. Expert Meeting Report: Energy Savings You Can Bank On

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Beman, M.; Springer, J.; Smith, P.; Porse, E.

    2013-02-01

    In October 2011, ARBI organized and conducted an Experts' Meeting on the topic of performance guarantees and financing vehicles for Energy Efficiency Upgrades. The meeting brought together technical, policy, and financial experts, including researchers, experienced installation contractors, and innovative energy business leaders, in order to discuss the opportunities and challenges for the energy efficiency upgrade industry to increase market uptake of Home Energy Upgrades (HEUs) through innovative offerings, such as performance guarantees. The meeting had several primary goals. First, it sought to understand how other industries have developed successful models for financing renewable energy installations while providing performance guarantees. This has been most recently demonstrated by the solar leasing industry. Second, the meeting explored the applicability of such business models to the energy efficiency upgrade industry. Third, the meeting sought to identify technical impediments to performance guarantees for energy efficiency retrofits. Fourth, the meeting sought to provide a common framework for these goals within the context of current financing mechanisms for energy efficiency upgrades.

  8. Wind farms providing secondary frequency regulation: evaluating the performance of model-based receding horizon control

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    C. R. Shapiro

    2018-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper is an extended version of our paper presented at the 2016 TORQUE conference (Shapiro et al., 2016. We investigate the use of wind farms to provide secondary frequency regulation for a power grid using a model-based receding horizon control framework. In order to enable real-time implementation, the control actions are computed based on a time-varying one-dimensional wake model. This model describes wake advection and wake interactions, both of which play an important role in wind farm power production. In order to test the control strategy, it is implemented in a large-eddy simulation (LES model of an 84-turbine wind farm using the actuator disk turbine representation. Rotor-averaged velocity measurements at each turbine are used to provide feedback for error correction. The importance of including the dynamics of wake advection in the underlying wake model is tested by comparing the performance of this dynamic-model control approach to a comparable static-model control approach that relies on a modified Jensen model. We compare the performance of both control approaches using two types of regulation signals, RegA and RegD, which are used by PJM, an independent system operator in the eastern United States. The poor performance of the static-model control relative to the dynamic-model control demonstrates that modeling the dynamics of wake advection is key to providing the proposed type of model-based coordinated control of large wind farms. We further explore the performance of the dynamic-model control via composite performance scores used by PJM to qualify plants for regulation services or markets. Our results demonstrate that the dynamic-model-controlled wind farm consistently performs well, passing the qualification threshold for all fast-acting RegD signals. For the RegA signal, which changes over slower timescales, the dynamic-model control leads to average performance that surpasses the qualification threshold, but further

  9. Engaging Non-State Security Providers: Whither the Rule of Law?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Timothy Donais

    2017-07-01

    Full Text Available The primacy of the rule of law has long been seen as one of the essential principles of security sector reform (SSR programming, and part of the larger gospel of SSR is that the accountability of security providers is best guaranteed by embedding security governance within a rule of law framework. Acknowledging the reality of non-state security provision, however, presents a challenge to thinking about SSR as merely the extension of the rule of law into the security realm, in large part because whatever legitimacy non-state security providers possess tends to be grounded in 'extralegal' foundations. This paper – more conceptual than empirical in its approach – considers the implications of hybrid forms of security governance for thinking about the relationship between SSR and rule of law promotion, and argues that the rule of law still provides a useful source of strategic direction for SSR programming.

  10. Performance Analysis of a Neuro-PID Controller Applied to a Robot Manipulator

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Saeed Pezeshki

    2012-11-01

    Full Text Available The performance of robot manipulators with nonadaptive controllers might degrade significantly due to the open loop unstable system and the effect of some uncertainties on the robot model or environment. A novel Neural Network PID controller (NNP is proposed in order to improve the system performance and its robustness. The Neural Network (NN technique is applied to compensate for the effect of the uncertainties of the robot model. With the NN compensator introduced, the system errors and the NN weights with large dispersion are guaranteed to be bounded in the Lyapunov sense. The weights of the NN compensator are adaptively tuned. The simulation results show the effectiveness of the model validation approach and its efficiency to guarantee a stable and accurate trajectory tracking process in the presence of uncertainties.

  11. Study of the Insurance Premium Charged to Borrowers under the Guaranteed Student Loan Program. Report No. 3.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Touche Ross and Co., Washington, DC.

    Insurance premiums being charged to borrowers under the Guaranteed Student Loan (GSL) program were studied to determine if the rate exceeded the rate necessary to protect the reserves of the insurer. Attention was directed to whether historical changes in the GSL program have affected insurance premiums. Guaranty agency's sources and uses of funds…

  12. Provide a model to improve the performance of intrusion detection systems in the cloud

    OpenAIRE

    Foroogh Sedighi

    2016-01-01

    High availability of tools and service providers in cloud computing and the fact that cloud computing services are provided by internet and deal with public, have caused important challenges for new computing model. Cloud computing faces problems and challenges such as user privacy, data security, data ownership, availability of services, and recovery after breaking down, performance, scalability, programmability. So far, many different methods are presented for detection of intrusion in clou...

  13. Performance Assessment in Courts - The Swiss Case

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Andreas Lienhard

    2014-12-01

    Full Text Available Abstract Performance assessments have become commonplace in management, even in the public sector. With the increasing pressure on courts to perform while making efficient use of resources, performance assessments in the justice system are also gaining in importance. However, the need for judicial independence poses special challenges for performance assessments in courts. Against this background, this article conducts a constitutional appraisal, and contrasts the need for judicial independence with the principles governing effectiveness and efficiency, self-government and supervision, and appointment and re-appointment. A duty to guarantee justice can be derived from this that does not in principle exclude the performance assessment of judges, but even renders it essential, subject to compliance with certain requirements. In these circumstances, it seems hardly surprising that numerous countries conduct performance assessments of judges and also that various international institutions have developed principles for this purpose, a summary of which is presented – in Switzerland’s case based on a recently conducted survey. In the field of conflict between the guaranteeing justice and protecting the judiciary, the following key questions arise in particular: What is the purpose of performance assessments and what are the consequences?What is subjected to a performance assessment and what are the assessment criteria?How is performance recorded as the basis for the performance assessment?Who is subjected to a performance assessment, and must a distinction be made between judges in higher and lower courts?Who carries out the performance assessment and what methods of protecting one’s rights are available?Who should receive the results of the performance assessment?The contribution sketches out possible answers to these key questions and aims to encourage academics and practitioners to give further consideration to this subject.

  14. PROVIDING ENGLISH LANGUAGE INPUT: DECREASING STUDENTS’ ANXIETY IN READING COMPREHENSION PERFORMANCE

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Elva Yohana

    2016-11-01

    Full Text Available The primary condition for successful in second or foreign language learning is providing an adequate environment. It is as a medium of increasing the students’ language exposure in order to be able to success in acquiring second or foreign language profciency. This study was designed to propose the adequate English language input that can decrease the students’ anxiety in reading comprehension performance. Of the four skills, somehow reading can be regarded as especially important because reading is assumed to be the central means for learning new information. Some students, however, still encounter many problems in reading. It is because of their anxiety when they are reading. Providing and creating an interesting-contextual reading material and gratifed teachers can make out this problem which occurs mostly in Indonesian’s classrooms. It revealed that the younger learners of English there do not received adequate amount of the target language input in their learning of English. Hence, it suggested the adoption of extensive reading programs as the most effective means in the creation of an input-rich environment in EFL learning contexts. Besides they also give suggestion to book writers and publisher to provide myriad books that appropriate and readable for their students.

  15. Periodic capacity management under a lead-time performance constraint

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Büyükkaramikli, N.C.; Bertrand, J.W.M.; Ooijen, van H.P.G.

    2013-01-01

    In this paper, we study a production system that operates under a lead-time performance constraint which guarantees the completion of an order before a pre-determined lead-time with a certain probability. The demand arrival times and the service requirements for the orders are random. To reduce the

  16. Performance of adaptive MS-GSC in the presence of cochannel interference

    KAUST Repository

    Daghfous, Mohamed A.

    2011-07-01

    Minimum-selection generalized selection combining (MS-GSC) has been proposed as a power-saving variant of conventional generalized selection combining (GSC). Existing performance results of this scheme are limited to interference-free environments under multipath fading. This paper addresses the scenario when the received desired signal on each diversity branch is corrupted by multiple interfering signals and background noise, wherein desired and undesired signals undergo mutually independent Rayleigh fading. In the absence of perfect tracking of the instantaneous interference power on diversity branches, the adaptation thresholds that are set on the combined signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) to enhance either the spectral efficiency or power efficiency in noise-limited environments may not guarantee the target performance. This paper aims to study the effect of cochannel interference on the performance of bandwidth- and power-efficient SNR-based MS-GSC. Through the analysis, new analytical results for some important performance measures of adaptive MS-GSC schemes are presented. Numerical comparisons to clarify the impact of cochannel interference on the achieved performance of the adaptation schemes under consideration are provided. © 2011 IEEE.

  17. Guidelines for the design of the working rules of the guarantee and quality control in radiotherapy commission

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pardo, J.; Galmes, M.A.; Font, J.; Caro, J.; Serra, J.; Mata, F.; Bertan, S.; Biete, A.; Carceller, J.A.; Esco, R.; Palacios, A.; Veiras, C.; Vazquez, M.G.

    2001-01-01

    The 1566/1988 Royal Decree stated on July 17 th , focused on Quality Criteria in Radiation Therapy, was published in the Official Spanish Gazette on August 28 th . Its publication began a self-analysis process in all the Spanish Radiation Oncology Departments due to the fact that it implies the guidelines elaboration of each step of the radiation therapy process, including the patient post-treatment follow up and the equipment quality control. The Royal Decree orders the managers of the hospitals and facilities that have a radiation oncology department to create the Guarantee and Quality Control in Radiotherapy Commission. According to the Spanish law regulations, every single commission must have its own working rules based on the Chapter II, focused in 'Organos Colegiados', of the 30/1992 Law stated on November 27 th about Public Administration Legal Rules. The Guidelines for the design of the Guarantee and Quality Control in Radiotherapy Commission Working Rules here presented, have been done by consensus in Son Dureta University Hospital and afterwards sent to all Radiation Oncology Departments by the Spanish Society for Radiotherapy and Oncology. (author)

  18. The influence of system quality characteristics on health care providers' performance: Empirical evidence from Malaysia.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Mohd Salleh, Mohd Idzwan; Zakaria, Nasriah; Abdullah, Rosni

    The Ministry of Health Malaysia initiated the total hospital information system (THIS) as the first national electronic health record system for use in selected public hospitals across the country. Since its implementation 15 years ago, there has been the critical requirement for a systematic evaluation to assess its effectiveness in coping with the current system, task complexity, and rapid technological changes. The study aims to assess system quality factors to predict the performance of electronic health in a single public hospital in Malaysia. Non-probability sampling was employed for data collection among selected providers in a single hospital for two months. Data cleaning and bias checking were performed before final analysis in partial least squares-structural equation modeling. Convergent and discriminant validity assessments were satisfied the required criterions in the reflective measurement model. The structural model output revealed that the proposed adequate infrastructure, system interoperability, security control, and system compatibility were the significant predictors, where system compatibility became the most critical characteristic to influence an individual health care provider's performance. The previous DeLone and McLean information system success models should be extended to incorporate these technological factors in the medical system research domain to examine the effectiveness of modern electronic health record systems. In this study, care providers' performance was expected when the system usage fits with patients' needs that eventually increased their productivity. Copyright © 2016 King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

  19. New consumer services provided by smart metering

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Daminov Ildar

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available This paper focuses on the issues of smart metering market and considers different services provided by smart metering from consumer point of view. Firstly, smart metering deployment challenges emerging and conventional tariffs, which modify a consumer behavior and thus, the entire electric energy market can be optimized since the customer is motivated to consume less energy. Secondly, the authors illustrate changes in electricity quality, which have an impact on consumer relations with utility. Additionally, two main indices of grid resilience – SAIDI and SAIFI – are exemplified to reveal the improvement potential of smart metering implementation in certain regions of Russia that also influence the consumer. Finally, in-home display and privacy problem directly reflect the consumer’s behavior, thus the private life rights should not be violated as they are guaranteed by law.

  20. Study of the Impact of Heat Treatment Modes on Formation of Microstructure and a Given Set of Mechanical Properties of High-Strength Flat Products with Guaranteed Hardness (400 to 450 HB) from Low-Alloyed Steel

    Science.gov (United States)

    Matrosov, M. Yu; Martynov, P. G.; Goroshko, T. V.; Zvereva, M. I.; Mitrofanov, A. V.; Barabash, K. Yu

    2017-12-01

    The results of the study of influence of heat treatment modes on microstructure, size and shape of grains, mechanical properties of high-strength flat products from low-alloyed C-Mn-Cr-Si-Mo steel microalloyed by boron are presented. Heat treatment modes, which provide a combination of high impact viscosity at negative temperatures and guaranteed hardness, are determined.

  1. Performance Evaluation of Resource Management in Cloud Computing Environments.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Batista, Bruno Guazzelli; Estrella, Julio Cezar; Ferreira, Carlos Henrique Gomes; Filho, Dionisio Machado Leite; Nakamura, Luis Hideo Vasconcelos; Reiff-Marganiec, Stephan; Santana, Marcos José; Santana, Regina Helena Carlucci

    2015-01-01

    Cloud computing is a computational model in which resource providers can offer on-demand services to clients in a transparent way. However, to be able to guarantee quality of service without limiting the number of accepted requests, providers must be able to dynamically manage the available resources so that they can be optimized. This dynamic resource management is not a trivial task, since it involves meeting several challenges related to workload modeling, virtualization, performance modeling, deployment and monitoring of applications on virtualized resources. This paper carries out a performance evaluation of a module for resource management in a cloud environment that includes handling available resources during execution time and ensuring the quality of service defined in the service level agreement. An analysis was conducted of different resource configurations to define which dimension of resource scaling has a real influence on client requests. The results were used to model and implement a simulated cloud system, in which the allocated resource can be changed on-the-fly, with a corresponding change in price. In this way, the proposed module seeks to satisfy both the client by ensuring quality of service, and the provider by ensuring the best use of resources at a fair price.

  2. Performance Evaluation of Resource Management in Cloud Computing Environments.

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Bruno Guazzelli Batista

    Full Text Available Cloud computing is a computational model in which resource providers can offer on-demand services to clients in a transparent way. However, to be able to guarantee quality of service without limiting the number of accepted requests, providers must be able to dynamically manage the available resources so that they can be optimized. This dynamic resource management is not a trivial task, since it involves meeting several challenges related to workload modeling, virtualization, performance modeling, deployment and monitoring of applications on virtualized resources. This paper carries out a performance evaluation of a module for resource management in a cloud environment that includes handling available resources during execution time and ensuring the quality of service defined in the service level agreement. An analysis was conducted of different resource configurations to define which dimension of resource scaling has a real influence on client requests. The results were used to model and implement a simulated cloud system, in which the allocated resource can be changed on-the-fly, with a corresponding change in price. In this way, the proposed module seeks to satisfy both the client by ensuring quality of service, and the provider by ensuring the best use of resources at a fair price.

  3. Guaranteed Unresolved Point Source Emission and the Gamma-ray Background

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Pavlidou, Vasiliki; Siegal-Gaskins, Jennifer M.; Brown, Carolyn; Fields, Brian D.; Olinto, Angela V.

    2007-01-01

    The large majority of EGRET point sources remain without an identified low-energy counterpart, and a large fraction of these sources are most likely extragalactic. Whatever the nature of the extragalactic EGRET unidentified sources, faint unresolved objects of the same class must have a contribution to the diffuse extragalactic gamma-ray background (EGRB). Understanding this component of the EGRB, along with other guaranteed contributions from known sources (blazars and normal galaxies), is essential if we are to use this emission to constrain exotic high-energy physics. Here, we follow an empirical approach to estimate whether the contribution of unresolved unidentified sources to the EGRB is likely to be important. Additionally, we discuss how upcoming GLAST observations of EGRET unidentified sources, their fainter counterparts, and the Galactic and extragalactic diffuse backgrounds, will shed light on the nature of the EGRET unidentified sources even without any positional association of such sources with low-energy counterparts

  4. Automated Assume-Guarantee Reasoning for Omega-Regular Systems and Specifications

    Science.gov (United States)

    Chaki, Sagar; Gurfinkel, Arie

    2010-01-01

    We develop a learning-based automated Assume-Guarantee (AG) reasoning framework for verifying omega-regular properties of concurrent systems. We study the applicability of non-circular (AGNC) and circular (AG-C) AG proof rules in the context of systems with infinite behaviors. In particular, we show that AG-NC is incomplete when assumptions are restricted to strictly infinite behaviors, while AG-C remains complete. We present a general formalization, called LAG, of the learning based automated AG paradigm. We show how existing approaches for automated AG reasoning are special instances of LAG.We develop two learning algorithms for a class of systems, called infinite regular systems, that combine finite and infinite behaviors. We show that for infinity-regular systems, both AG-NC and AG-C are sound and complete. Finally, we show how to instantiate LAG to do automated AG reasoning for infinite regular, and omega-regular, systems using both AG-NC and AG-C as proof rules

  5. Relationship Between Green Logistics Tendency and Logistics Performance: A Comparative Case Study on Logistics Service Providers

    OpenAIRE

    Ayşenur DOĞRU; Cemile SOLAK FIŞKIN

    2016-01-01

    Increasing concerns related to environmental side effects of the logistics services and competition between the logistics service providers are two pressuring factors on logistics service providers. This study seeks to explore the relation between green logistics tendency and logistic performance from the perspective of logistics service providers. In order to reach this aim, two logistics service providers are investigated by comparative case study method. Findings showed the effects of g...

  6. Portuguese state university performance according to students: an efficiency analysis

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Emerson Wagner Mainardes

    2016-08-01

    Full Text Available The objective of this research project is to evaluate the performance of Portuguese state universities in accordance with the expectations and satisfactions of their students and through recourse to the DEA methodology and thus representing one of the very few studies analysing university performance based upon student perceptions. According to an output oriented Variable Returns to Scale model, handling the responses returned by 1,669 students, the results demonstrate that faculties generally attain a good relationship between student expectations and their levels of satisfaction. We furthermore conclude that university scale does not guarantee efficiency. Hence, irrespective of size, universities are able to ensure the satisfaction of their students. Finally, the results show that satisfying only certain expectations related to specific aspects does not prove sufficient to guaranteeing overall student satisfaction. The analysis also correspondingly finds that while some decision making units prove efficient in satisfying expectations on specific aspects, they fail to attain such efficiency in the overall perspective of students.

  7. Enhanced jump performance when providing augmented feedback compared to an external or internal focus of attention.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Keller, Martin; Lauber, Benedikt; Gottschalk, Marius; Taube, Wolfgang

    2015-01-01

    Factors such as an external focus of attention (EF) and augmented feedback (AF) have been shown to improve performance. However, the efficacy of providing AF to enhance motor performance has never been compared with the effects of an EF or an internal focus of attention (IF). Therefore, the aim of the present study was to identify which of the three conditions (AF, EF or IF) leads to the highest performance in a countermovement jump (CMJ). Nineteen volunteers performed 12 series of 8 maximum CMJs. Changes in jump height between conditions and within the series were analysed. Jump heights differed between conditions (P jump heights at the end of the series in AF (+1.60%) and lower jump heights at the end of the series in EF (-1.79%) and IF (-1.68%) were observed. Muscle activity did not differ between conditions. The differences between conditions and within the series provide evidence that AF leads to higher performance and better progression within one series than EF and IF. Consequently, AF seems to outperform EF and IF when maximising jump height.

  8. 76 FR 21716 - Record of Decision for Issuance of Loan Guarantees to Solar Partners I, LLC; Solar Partners II...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-04-18

    ....37 billion in loan guarantees to support the financing of the ISEGS project. The conditional... operation of this project were analyzed in the Proposed California Desert Conservation Area Plan Amendment... comments, which BLM incorporated. DOE determined that the project analyzed in the Final EIS was...

  9. Motor unit recruitment by size does not provide functional advantages for motor performance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Dideriksen, Jakob L; Farina, Dario

    2013-12-15

    It is commonly assumed that the orderly recruitment of motor units by size provides a functional advantage for the performance of movements compared with a random recruitment order. On the other hand, the excitability of a motor neuron depends on its size and this is intrinsically linked to its innervation number. A range of innervation numbers among motor neurons corresponds to a range of sizes and thus to a range of excitabilities ordered by size. Therefore, if the excitation drive is similar among motor neurons, the recruitment by size is inevitably due to the intrinsic properties of motor neurons and may not have arisen to meet functional demands. In this view, we tested the assumption that orderly recruitment is necessarily beneficial by determining if this type of recruitment produces optimal motor output. Using evolutionary algorithms and without any a priori assumptions, the parameters of neuromuscular models were optimized with respect to several criteria for motor performance. Interestingly, the optimized model parameters matched well known neuromuscular properties, but none of the optimization criteria determined a consistent recruitment order by size unless this was imposed by an association between motor neuron size and excitability. Further, when the association between size and excitability was imposed, the resultant model of recruitment did not improve the motor performance with respect to the absence of orderly recruitment. A consistent observation was that optimal solutions for a variety of criteria of motor performance always required a broad range of innervation numbers in the population of motor neurons, skewed towards the small values. These results indicate that orderly recruitment of motor units in itself does not provide substantial functional advantages for motor control. Rather, the reason for its near-universal presence in human movements is that motor functions are optimized by a broad range of innervation numbers.

  10. Use of Provider-Level Dashboards and Pay-for-Performance in Venous Thromboembolism Prophylaxis*

    Science.gov (United States)

    Michtalik, Henry J.; Carolan, Howard T.; Haut, Elliott R.; Lau, Brandyn D.; Streiff, Michael B.; Finkelstein, Joseph; Pronovost, Peter J.; Durkin, Nowella; Brotman, Daniel J.

    2014-01-01

    Background Despite safe and cost-effective venous thromboembolism (VTE) prevention measures, VTE prophylaxis rates are often suboptimal. Healthcare reform efforts emphasize transparency through programs to report performance, and payment incentives through programs to pay-for-performance. Objective To sequentially examine an individualized physician dashboard and pay-for-performance program to improve VTE prophylaxis rates amongst hospitalists. Design Retrospective analysis of 3144 inpatient admissions. After a baseline observation period, VTE prophylaxis compliance was compared during both interventions. Setting 1060-bed tertiary care medical center. Participants 38 part- and full-time academic hospitalists. Interventions A Web-based hospitalist dashboard provided VTE prophylaxis feedback. After 6 months of feedback only, a pay-for-performance program was incorporated, with graduated payouts for compliance rates of 80-100%. Measurements Prescription of American College of Chest Physicians guideline-compliant VTE prophylaxis and subsequent pay-for-performance payments. Results Monthly VTE prophylaxis compliance rates were 86% (95% CI: 85, 88), 90% (95% CI: 88, 93), and 94% (95% CI: 93, 96) during the baseline, dashboard, and combined dashboard/pay-for-performance periods, respectively. Compliance significantly improved with the use of the dashboard (p=0.01) and addition of the pay-for-performance program (p=0.01). The highest rate of improvement occurred with the dashboard (1.58%/month; p=0.01). Annual individual physician performance payments ranged from $53 to $1244 (mean $633; SD ±350). Conclusions Direct feedback using dashboards was associated with significantly improved compliance, with further improvement after incorporating an individual physician pay-for-performance program. Real-time dashboards and physician-level incentives may assist hospitals in achieving higher safety and quality benchmarks. PMID:25545690

  11. Network Congestion and Performance Management

    OpenAIRE

    Shewmaker, Andrew Glenn

    2016-01-01

    We increasingly depend on well-behaved networks in the course of every-day activities for business, community, government, science, and recreation. And with more people demanding a greater variety of services comes sharp disagreement about which needs are most important. Unfortunately, today’s technology is inadequate to guarantee the performance of dynamic and diverse workloads in such a way that we are prevented from hurting each other’s goals.No one likes waiting in traffic, whether on a r...

  12. Using Kalman Filter to Guarantee QoS Robustness of Web Server

    Institute of Scientific and Technical Information of China (English)

    2006-01-01

    The exponential growth of the Internet coupled with the increasing popularity of dynamically generated content on the World Wide Web, has created the need for more and faster Web servers capable of serving the over 100 million Internet users. To converge the control method has emerged as a promising technique to solve the Web QoS problem. In this paper, a model of adaptive session is presented and a session flow self-regulating algorism based on Kalman Filter are proposed towards Web Server. And a Web QoS self-regulating scheme is advanced. To attain the goal of on-line system identification, the optimized estimation of QoS parameters is fulfilled by utilizing Kalman Filter in full domain. The simulation results shows that the proposed scheme can guarantee the QoS with both robustness and stability .

  13. [Thermolabile drugs: pharmacist intervention as a guarantee of cold chain maintenance].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ricote-Lobera, I; Santos-Mena, B; Fraile-Gil, S; Ortiz-Martín, B; Hidalgo-Correas, F J; García-Díaz, B

    2014-05-01

    To determine whether pharmacist is able to guarantee cold chain maintenance of thermolabile drugs during transport using the available information in the reception process and to compare these results with those obtained in a subsequent intervention phase, in which the manufacturing laboratories were contacted. Intervention study, prospective and comparative"before-after". It was analyzed the storage conditions during transport of all thermolabile drugs received in a 400-bed hospital for 3 months, excluding those from clinical trials. The intervention allowed to ensure cold chain maintenance in 76,5% (n = 488) of received drugs, representing an increase of 41,8% (IC 95% 36,7-46,6%; p cold chain maintenance of received thermolabile drugs without temperature monitoring device (64,6%). Reports requested from laboratories allowed to increase significantly that percentage. Copyright AULA MEDICA EDICIONES 2014. Published by AULA MEDICA. All rights reserved.

  14. Robust approximation-free prescribed performance control for nonlinear systems and its application

    Science.gov (United States)

    Sun, Ruisheng; Na, Jing; Zhu, Bin

    2018-02-01

    This paper presents a robust prescribed performance control approach and its application to nonlinear tail-controlled missile systems with unknown dynamics and uncertainties. The idea of prescribed performance function (PPF) is incorporated into the control design, such that both the steady-state and transient control performance can be strictly guaranteed. Unlike conventional PPF-based control methods, we further tailor a recently proposed systematic control design procedure (i.e. approximation-free control) using the transformed tracking error dynamics, which provides a proportional-like control action. Hence, the function approximators (e.g. neural networks, fuzzy systems) that are widely used to address the unknown nonlinearities in the nonlinear control designs are not needed. The proposed control design leads to a robust yet simplified function approximation-free control for nonlinear systems. The closed-loop system stability and the control error convergence are all rigorously proved. Finally, comparative simulations are conducted based on nonlinear missile systems to validate the improved response and the robustness of the proposed control method.

  15. Statistical-QoS Guaranteed Energy Efficiency Optimization for Energy Harvesting Wireless Sensor Networks.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gao, Ya; Cheng, Wenchi; Zhang, Hailin

    2017-08-23

    Energy harvesting, which offers a never-ending energy supply, has emerged as a prominent technology to prolong the lifetime and reduce costs for the battery-powered wireless sensor networks. However, how to improve the energy efficiency while guaranteeing the quality of service (QoS) for energy harvesting based wireless sensor networks is still an open problem. In this paper, we develop statistical delay-bounded QoS-driven power control policies to maximize the effective energy efficiency (EEE), which is defined as the spectrum efficiency under given specified QoS constraints per unit harvested energy, for energy harvesting based wireless sensor networks. For the battery-infinite wireless sensor networks, our developed QoS-driven power control policy converges to the Energy harvesting Water Filling (E-WF) scheme and the Energy harvesting Channel Inversion (E-CI) scheme under the very loose and stringent QoS constraints, respectively. For the battery-finite wireless sensor networks, our developed QoS-driven power control policy becomes the Truncated energy harvesting Water Filling (T-WF) scheme and the Truncated energy harvesting Channel Inversion (T-CI) scheme under the very loose and stringent QoS constraints, respectively. Furthermore, we evaluate the outage probabilities to theoretically analyze the performance of our developed QoS-driven power control policies. The obtained numerical results validate our analysis and show that our developed optimal power control policies can optimize the EEE over energy harvesting based wireless sensor networks.

  16. 76 FR 62052 - Issuance of a Loan Guarantee to First Solar, Inc., for the Desert Sunlight Solar Farm Project

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-10-06

    ... DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Issuance of a Loan Guarantee to First Solar, Inc., for the Desert Sunlight Solar Farm Project AGENCY: U.S. Department of Energy. ACTION: Record of decision. SUMMARY: The U.S... The proposed DSSFP is a photovoltaic solar electrical generating facility using commercial, thin-film...

  17. Use of an identification system based on biometric data for patients requiring transfusions guarantees transfusion safety and traceability.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bennardello, Francesco; Fidone, Carmelo; Cabibbo, Sergio; Calabrese, Salvatore; Garozzo, Giovanni; Cassarino, Grazia; Antolino, Agostino; Tavolino, Giuseppe; Zisa, Nuccio; Falla, Cadigia; Drago, Giuseppe; Di Stefano, Giovanna; Bonomo, Pietro

    2009-07-01

    One of the most serious risks of blood transfusions is an error in ABO blood group compatibility, which can cause a haemolytic transfusion reaction and, in the most severe cases, the death of the patient. The frequency and type of errors observed suggest that these are inevitable, in that mistakes are inherent to human nature, unless significant changes, including the use of computerised instruments, are made to procedures. In order to identify patients who are candidates for the transfusion of blood components and to guarantee the traceability of the transfusion, the Securblood system (BBS srl) was introduced. This system records the various stages of the transfusion process, the health care workers involved and any immediate transfusion reactions. The patients and staff are identified by fingerprinting or a bar code. The system was implemented within Ragusa hospital in 16 operative units (ordinary wards, day hospital, operating theatres). In the period from August 2007 to July 2008, 7282 blood components were transfused within the hospital, of which 5606 (77%) using the Securblood system. Overall, 1777 patients were transfused. In this year of experience, no transfusion errors were recorded and each blood component was transfused to the right patient. We recorded 33 blocks of the terminals (involving 0.6% of the transfused blood components) which required the intervention of staff from the Service of Immunohaematology and Transfusion Medicine (SIMT). Most of the blocks were due to procedural errors. The Securblood system guarantees complete traceability of the transfusion process outside the SIMT and eliminates the possibility of mistaken identification of patients or blood components. The use of fingerprinting to identify health care staff (nurses and doctors) and patients obliges the staff to carry out the identification procedures directly in the presence of the patient and guarantees the presence of the doctor at the start of the transfusion.

  18. Well-being, work engagement, or both? Explaining the linkage between information provision, communication climate, and performance

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    ter Hoeven, C.; Fransen, M.

    2012-01-01

    For organizations, it is valuable to know how employees’ performance can be guaranteed. The aim of the current study was to examine whether information provision may improve employee performance by enhancing communication climate, work engagement, and employee well-being. To this end, employees (N =

  19. Does the new conceptual framework provide adequate concepts for reporting relevant information about performance?

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Brouwer, A.; Faramarzi, A; Hoogendoorn, M.

    2014-01-01

    The basic question we raise in this paper is whether the 2013 Discussion Paper (DP 2013) on the Conceptual Framework provides adequate principles for reporting an entity’s performance and what improvements could be made in light of both user needs and evidence from academic literature. DP 2013

  20. Nuclear power: status, outlook, guarantees of sustainable development

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cherkasov, A.S.

    2004-01-01

    Full text: The principal advantages of nuclear power - almost unlimited fuel resources, its high energy capacity, ecological compatibility with a possibility of high wastes concentration - determine the large-scale nuclear power development. The signs of large-scale power - a large rate (dozens of percent) in electricity production, diverse areas (electricity, heat supply, technologies, transport) and media of application (land, ocean, space), extension of number of user countries, diversified power systems (centralized, autonomous), obligatory reproduction and reuse of produced fuel - create various requirements to nuclear power installations of the future. Economic efficiency and competitiveness, safety (of reactors and fuel cycle with waste), proper characteristics of nuclear fuel reproduction, guarantees of nuclear arm's non-proliferation and, particularly, public acceptance are the conditions of such nuclear power development. The up-to-date situation is the following: the 441 nuclear power-generation units with total installed power of 377.36 GW el. (in 31 countries) supply by 1/6 part of the world electric-power consumptions. The 32 units are in stage of the construction. To the present mid-century the level of the nuclear power production, as supposed, must be increased 4-5 times at the following scenario of a regional distribution of nuclear electric powers, GW: USA, Europe and developed countries of Eastern Asia - 1000, FSU-countries - 100 and developing countries - 400

  1. The Impact of Order Source Misattribution on Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE) Performance Metrics.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gellert, George A; Catzoela, Linda; Patel, Lajja; Bruner, Kylynn; Friedman, Felix; Ramirez, Ricardo; Saucedo, Lilliana; Webster, S Luke; Gillean, John A

    2017-01-01

    One strategy to foster adoption of computerized provider order entry (CPOE) by physicians is the monthly distribution of a list identifying the number and use rate percentage of orders entered electronically versus on paper by each physician in the facility. Physicians care about CPOE use rate reports because they support the patient safety and quality improvement objectives of CPOE implementation. Certain physician groups are also motivated because they participate in contracted financial and performance arrangements that include incentive payments or financial penalties for meeting (or failing to meet) a specified CPOE use rate target. Misattribution of order sources can hinder accurate measurement of individual physician CPOE use and can thereby undermine providers' confidence in their reported performance, as well as their motivation to utilize CPOE. Misattribution of order sources also has significant patient safety, quality, and medicolegal implications. This analysis sought to evaluate the magnitude and sources of misattribution among hospitalists with high CPOE use and, if misattribution was found, to formulate strategies to prevent and reduce its recurrence, thereby ensuring the integrity and credibility of individual and facility CPOE use rate reporting. A detailed manual order source review and validation of all orders issued by one hospitalist group at a midsize community hospital was conducted for a one-month study period. We found that a small but not dismissible percentage of orders issued by hospitalists-up to 4.18 percent (95 percent confidence interval, 3.84-4.56 percent) per month-were attributed inaccurately. Sources of misattribution by department or function were as follows: nursing, 42 percent; pharmacy, 38 percent; laboratory, 15 percent; unit clerk, 3 percent; and radiology, 2 percent. Order management and protocol were the most common correct order sources that were incorrectly attributed. Order source misattribution can negatively affect

  2. 76 FR 60475 - Issuance of a Loan Guarantee to Tonopah Solar Energy, LLC, for the Crescent Dunes Solar Energy...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2011-09-29

    ... DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Issuance of a Loan Guarantee to Tonopah Solar Energy, LLC, for the Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project AGENCY: U.S. Department of Energy. ACTION: Record of decision. SUMMARY: The U... and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act), to Tonopah Solar Energy, LLC (TSE), for construction and...

  3. Humidification performance of 48 passive airway humidifiers: comparison with manufacturer data.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lellouche, François; Taillé, Solenne; Lefrançois, Frédéric; Deye, Nicolas; Maggiore, Salvatore Maurizio; Jouvet, Philippe; Ricard, Jean-Damien; Fumagalli, Bruno; Brochard, Laurent

    2009-02-01

    Heat and moisture exchangers (HMEs) are increasingly used in the ICU for gas conditioning during mechanical ventilation. Independent assessments of the humidification performance of HMEs are scarce. The aim of the present study was thus to assess the humidification performance of a large number of adult HMEs. We assessed 48 devices using a bench test apparatus that simulated real-life physiologic ventilation conditions. Thirty-two devices were described by the manufacturers as HMEs, and 16 were described as antibacterial filters. The test apparatus provided expiratory gases with an absolute humidity (AH) of 35 mg H(2)O/L. The AH of inspired gases was measured after steady state using the psychrometric method. We performed three hygrometric measurements for each device, measured their resistance, and compared our results with the manufacturer data. Of the 32 HMEs tested, only 37.5% performed well (>or= 30 mg H(2)O/L), while 25% performed poorly ( 4 mg H(2)O/L. The mean difference for the antibacterial filters was 0.2 +/- 1.4 mg H(2)O/L. The mean resistance of all the tested devices was 2.17 +/- 0.70 cm H(2)O/L/s. Several HMEs performed poorly and should not be used as HMEs. The values determined by independent assessments may be lower than the manufacturer data. Describing a device as an HME does not guarantee that it provides adequate humidification. The performance of HMEs must be verified by independent assessment.

  4. Good, better, best? A comprehensive comparison of healthcare providers' performance: An application to physiotherapy practices in primary care.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Steenhuis, Sander; Groeneweg, Niels; Koolman, Xander; Portrait, France

    2017-12-01

    Most payment methods in healthcare stimulate volume-driven care, rather than value-driven care. Value-based payment methods such as Pay-For-Performance have the potential to reduce costs and improve quality of care. Ideally, outcome indicators are used in the assessment of providers' performance. The aim of this paper is to describe the feasibility of assessing and comparing the performances of providers using a comprehensive set of quality and cost data. We had access to unique and extensive datasets containing individual data on PROMs, PREMs and costs of physiotherapy practices in Dutch primary care. We merged these datasets at the patient-level and compared the performances of these practices using case-mix corrected linear regression models. Several significant differences in performance were detected between practices. These results can be used by both physiotherapists, to improve treatment given, and insurers to support their purchasing decisions. The study demonstrates that it is feasible to compare the performance of providers using PROMs and PREMs. However, it would take an extra effort to increase usefulness and it remains unclear under which conditions this effort is cost-effective. Healthcare providers need to be aware of the added value of registering outcomes to improve their quality. Insurers need to facilitate this by designing value-based contracts with the right incentives. Only then can payment methods contribute to value-based healthcare and increase value for patients. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

  5. Interior point algorithms: guaranteed optimality for fluence map optimization in IMRT

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Aleman, Dionne M [Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, 5 King' s College Road, Toronto, ON M5S 3G8 (Canada); Glaser, Daniel [Division of Optimization and Systems Theory, Department of Mathematics, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm (Sweden); Romeijn, H Edwin [Department of Industrial and Operations Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2117 (United States); Dempsey, James F, E-mail: aleman@mie.utoronto.c, E-mail: romeijn@umich.ed, E-mail: jfdempsey@viewray.co [ViewRay, Inc. 2 Thermo Fisher Way, Village of Oakwood, OH 44146 (United States)

    2010-09-21

    One of the most widely studied problems of the intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) treatment planning problem is the fluence map optimization (FMO) problem, the problem of determining the amount of radiation intensity, or fluence, of each beamlet in each beam. For a given set of beams, the fluences of the beamlets can drastically affect the quality of the treatment plan, and thus it is critical to obtain good fluence maps for radiation delivery. Although several approaches have been shown to yield good solutions to the FMO problem, these solutions are not guaranteed to be optimal. This shortcoming can be attributed to either optimization model complexity or properties of the algorithms used to solve the optimization model. We present a convex FMO formulation and an interior point algorithm that yields an optimal treatment plan in seconds, making it a viable option for clinical applications.

  6. Interior point algorithms: guaranteed optimality for fluence map optimization in IMRT

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Aleman, Dionne M; Glaser, Daniel; Romeijn, H Edwin; Dempsey, James F

    2010-01-01

    One of the most widely studied problems of the intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) treatment planning problem is the fluence map optimization (FMO) problem, the problem of determining the amount of radiation intensity, or fluence, of each beamlet in each beam. For a given set of beams, the fluences of the beamlets can drastically affect the quality of the treatment plan, and thus it is critical to obtain good fluence maps for radiation delivery. Although several approaches have been shown to yield good solutions to the FMO problem, these solutions are not guaranteed to be optimal. This shortcoming can be attributed to either optimization model complexity or properties of the algorithms used to solve the optimization model. We present a convex FMO formulation and an interior point algorithm that yields an optimal treatment plan in seconds, making it a viable option for clinical applications.

  7. Performance Evaluation of Moving Small-Cell Network with Proactive Cache

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Young Min Kwon

    2016-01-01

    Full Text Available Due to rapid growth in mobile traffic, mobile network operators (MNOs are considering the deployment of moving small-cells (mSCs. mSC is a user-centric network which provides voice and data services during mobility. mSC can receive and forward data traffic via wireless backhaul and sidehaul links. In addition, due to the predictive nature of users demand, mSCs can proactively cache the predicted contents in off-peak-traffic periods. Due to these characteristics, MNOs consider mSCs as a cost-efficient solution to not only enhance the system capacity but also provide guaranteed quality of service (QoS requirements to moving user equipment (UE in peak-traffic periods. In this paper, we conduct extensive system level simulations to analyze the performance of mSCs with varying cache size and content popularity and their effect on wireless backhaul load. The performance evaluation confirms that the QoS of moving small-cell UE (mSUE notably improves by using mSCs together with proactive caching. We also show that the effective use of proactive cache significantly reduces the wireless backhaul load and increases the overall network capacity.

  8. Export policies for multi-domain WDM networks

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Manolova, Anna Vasileva; Ruepp, Sarah Renée

    2010-01-01

    We analyze the performance of six export policies for a multi-domain routing protocol in WDM networks. We show that providing many AS-disjoint paths for survivability and load-balancing does not necessarily guarantee the lowest connection blocking......We analyze the performance of six export policies for a multi-domain routing protocol in WDM networks. We show that providing many AS-disjoint paths for survivability and load-balancing does not necessarily guarantee the lowest connection blocking...

  9. 78 FR 20317 - Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-04-04

    ... supplying information that competitors could use to compete with companies in the United States. DATES... or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100 Million: AP087223XX and AP087223XA AGENCY: Export-Import...''), that Ex-Im Bank has received an application for final commitment for a long-term loan or financial...

  10. 78 FR 20913 - Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-04-08

    ... the transaction: To support the export of U.S. manufactured commercial aircraft to China. Brief non... EXPORT-IMPORT BANK [Public Notice 2013-0024] Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100 million: AP087801XX AGENCY: Export-Import Bank of the United...

  11. 78 FR 33090 - Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-06-03

    ...-haul passenger service from Australia to other countries. To the extent that Ex-Im Bank is reasonably... EXPORT-IMPORT BANK [Public Notice 2013-0030] Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100 Million: AP087980XX AGENCY: Export-Import Bank of the United...

  12. Effect of branding management on technology performance : a case study

    OpenAIRE

    2012-01-01

    M.Ing. This dissertation aims to identify the effects contributed by branding on organisational performance, as branding may contribute positively or negatively to the company sales performance. Many customers align quality products with certain brands only. Some organisations over price their products because they have guaranteed space in the market and had built solid relationships with their customers. Due to many different good products which do not do well in the market because of poo...

  13. Resource Isolation Method for Program’S Performance on CMP

    Science.gov (United States)

    Guan, Ti; Liu, Chunxiu; Xu, Zheng; Li, Huicong; Ma, Qiang

    2017-10-01

    Data center and cloud computing are more popular, which make more benefits for customers and the providers. However, in data center or clusters, commonly there is more than one program running on one server, but programs may interference with each other. The interference may take a little effect, however, the interference may cause serious drop down of performance. In order to avoid the performance interference problem, the mechanism of isolate resource for different programs is a better choice. In this paper we propose a light cost resource isolation method to improve program’s performance. This method uses Cgroups to set the dedicated CPU and memory resource for a program, aiming at to guarantee the program’s performance. There are three engines to realize this method: Program Monitor Engine top program’s resource usage of CPU and memory and transfer the information to Resource Assignment Engine; Resource Assignment Engine calculates the size of CPU and memory resource should be applied for the program; Cgroups Control Engine divide resource by Linux tool Cgroups, and drag program in control group for execution. The experiment result show that making use of the resource isolation method proposed by our paper, program’s performance can be improved.

  14. Guaranteed performance in reaching mode of sliding mode ...

    Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

    R. Narasimhan (Krishtel eMaging) 1461 1996 Oct 15 13:05:22

    addresses the design of constant plus proportional rate reaching law-based SMC for second-order ... Reaching mode; sliding mode controlled systems; output tracking ... The uncertainty in the input distribution function g is expressed as.

  15. THE LEGAL PROBLEMS OF ESTABLISHING THE ADDITIONAL GUARANTEES OF REALIZATION OF CONSTITUTIONAL HUMAN AND CIVIL RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS BY THE CONSTITUENT ENTITIES OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Alexander Chuklin

    2017-01-01

    Full Text Available The subject. The article focuses on the need to improve legislative and law enforcement activities related to the consolidation of constituent entities of the Russian Federation additional guarantees of realization of constitutional human and civil rights and freedoms.The purpose of the article is to identify main ways of improvement the legal regulation additional guarantees of realization of constitutional human and civil rights and freedoms by the constituent entities of the Russian Federation.The methodology. The author uses a dialectical method, a method of analysis and synthesis, a formal legal method.The results and scope of application. The lack of unity in understanding the essence of additional guarantees of realization of rights and freedoms requires not only theoretical analysis of this legal category, but a consistent system of the legislation, and corresponding to the system of law enforcement practice. The legal establishment of the additional guarantees of realization of constitutional human and civil rights and freedoms, due solely to the will of the legislator of a constituent entitiy of the Russian Federation aimed at the concretization of constitutional rights and freedoms as well as of the security mechanisms (legal conditions, means of the implementation of these rights. Features of development of the corresponding constituent entitiy of the Russian Federation should be taken into account.One of the main directions of improvement of legal regulation in this field is legislative recognition of additional guarantees of realization of constitutional human and civil rights and freedoms established by the constituent entities of the Russian Federation. This concept should be reflected in the Federal law of October 6, 1999 No. 184-FZ "On General principles of organization of legislative (representative and executive bodies of state power of constituent entities of the Russian Federation", as well as in the constitutions (charters

  16. 78 FR 69850 - Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-11-21

    ..., rail and port facilities in Australia. To the extent that Ex-Im Bank is reasonably aware, the item(s... EXPORT-IMPORT BANK [Public Notice: 2013-0054] Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100 Million: AP086750XX AGENCY: Export-Import Bank of the...

  17. Alternate symbol inversion for improved symbol synchronization in convolutionally coded systems

    Science.gov (United States)

    Simon, M. K.; Smith, J. G.

    1980-01-01

    Inverting alternate symbols of the encoder output of a convolutionally coded system provides sufficient density of symbol transitions to guarantee adequate symbol synchronizer performance, a guarantee otherwise lacking. Although alternate symbol inversion may increase or decrease the average transition density, depending on the data source model, it produces a maximum number of contiguous symbols without transition for a particular class of convolutional codes, independent of the data source model. Further, this maximum is sufficiently small to guarantee acceptable symbol synchronizer performance for typical applications. Subsequent inversion of alternate detected symbols permits proper decoding.

  18. Analysis of potential self-guarantee tests for demonstrating financial assurance by non-profit colleges, universities, and hospitals and by business firms that do not issue bonds

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Bailey, P.; Dean, C.; Collier, J.; Dasappa, V.; Goldberg, W. [ICF, Inc., Fairfax, VA (United States)

    1997-06-01

    The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) on December 29, 1993, promulgated self-guarantee requirements that materials licensees may use to demonstrate financial assurance for decommissioning costs. However, nonprofit colleges and universities, nonprofit hospitals, and for-profit firms that do not issue bonds are currently precluded, by their unique accounting and financial reporting systems, or by other features of their business practices, from using the financial tests for self-guarantors adopted by the NRC. This Report evaluates several alternative financial tests that might serve as the basis for self-guarantee by these three categories of licensees.

  19. Analysis of potential self-guarantee tests for demonstrating financial assurance by non-profit colleges, universities, and hospitals and by business firms that do not issue bonds

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Bailey, P.; Dean, C.; Collier, J.; Dasappa, V.; Goldberg, W.

    1997-06-01

    The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) on December 29, 1993, promulgated self-guarantee requirements that materials licensees may use to demonstrate financial assurance for decommissioning costs. However, nonprofit colleges and universities, nonprofit hospitals, and for-profit firms that do not issue bonds are currently precluded, by their unique accounting and financial reporting systems, or by other features of their business practices, from using the financial tests for self-guarantors adopted by the NRC. This Report evaluates several alternative financial tests that might serve as the basis for self-guarantee by these three categories of licensees

  20. Social Guarantee Programme: Principles for Classroom Procedure with Students Who Have Suffered Failure at School--The Spanish Educational System Case

    Science.gov (United States)

    Recio, R. Vazquez; Diaz, J. Ojeda

    2010-01-01

    The article explores the Social Guarantee Programmes, one measure at attending to diversity within the Spanish educational system. It is an alternative measure that aims to break away from the organisational structure of Obligatory Secondary Education, seeking an organisational model and educational strategies that pursue satisfactory results…

  1. Final disposal of radioactive wastes in Switzerland: concept and overview of Project Guarantee 1985

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anon.

    1985-01-01

    The validity of the operational licences of the existing Swiss nuclear power plants (NPP) Beznau I and II, Muehleberg, Goesgen and Leibstadt after 31st. December 1985 is, because of official requirements, dependent on the demonstration of permanent, safe management and final disposal of radioactive waste. For this purpose, the NPP companies have to prepare a so-called guarantee project and present this to the Bundesrat for review. The appropriate investigations and research have been carried out by Nagra (National Cooperative for the Storage of Radioactive Waste). The 1985 Project Gewaehr (Guarantee) is described in an eight volume report NGB 85-01 to 85-08 and individual research projects are reported on in separate NTB-series reference reports. The present volume NGB 85-01 takes the form of a self-contained project overview in which the concepts for nuclear waste management are described, the contents of the remaining volumes NGB 85-02 to 85-08 are summarized and Project conclusions are drawn from Project Gewaehr 1985. Project Gewaehr 1985 covers two repository types: Type C repository for high-level and certain alpha-containing intermediate-level waste, and Type B repository for all remaining intermediate- and low-level waste. The Project shows in detail that technical feasibility of final disposal can be assumed given presently available methods, that the technical safety barriers show a high level of efficiency and that suitable geological options are available to ensure long-term safety in Switzerland as the concept is defined by official requirements. The Project safety analyses show that the chosen disposal concepts assure the protection of mankind and the environment under all realistically anticipated conditions

  2. SOFT AND SOFTER HANDOVER PERFORMANCE OF CDMA

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Lina wati

    2010-12-01

    Full Text Available One of telecommunication providers in Indonesia applies CDMA2000 1x technology. The technology hasmany advantages such as larger channel capacity of BTS (Base Transceiver Station. On the other hand, thecapacity depends on user’s density. Therefore to guarantee voice connection when user or mobile station (MS isalways moving from one cell to others, handover technique is needed. However the technique can be failed for manyreasons. Therefore impact of call attempt on softer and soft handover performance is investigated. Hence the paperexamined soft – softer handover performance of CDMA in BTS (Base Transceiver Station, BSC, and Sectors inboth sub-urban and rural areas in Denpasar, Bali with area code of 0361.The research has been done in rural and suburban area with call area code ‘0361’. The analyses includedregression and simple linear correlation applications. The results showed that number of call attempts affected thefailure of soft and softer handover technique dominantly. Generally, average level of success both handover in bothrural and suburban area were about 99% which are above KPI (Key Performance Indicator reference at 98.50%.However in rural area, other factors such as blocking called attempt and error called number have caused the softerhandover failure.

  3. A Guide to Performance Contracting with ESCOs

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Baechler, Michael C.

    2011-09-01

    An energy services company (ESCO) can identify energy improvements, provide the capital required and installs improvements, offers turn-key installation services, and guarantees energy savings. Companies pay the ESCO back over a period of years from the energy cost savings generated from the project. Hiring an ESCO is a proven strategy for identifying and implementing energy saving capital improvements, while managing risks inherent in such projects.

  4. Use of work-life balance benefits guaranteed by law in Poland - Do size of the enterprise and gender matter?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Merecz-Kot, Dorota; Drabek, Marcin; Stańczak, Aleksander; Andysz, Aleksandra; Jacukowicz, Aleksandra

    2017-07-26

    The paper is aimed at indicating the similarities and differences in use of benefits supporting work-life balance (WLB) between women and men working in Polish small/medium and large enterprises. The sample included 556 workers (311 women, 245 men), aged 20-68 years old employed on the basis of employment contracts for at least a year in Polish enterprises. The respondents completed a questionnaire on the use of benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code, referring to their current workplaces. Women took maternity leaves and returned to the same work position after using childcare leaves more often than men. Men took leaves on demand more often than women. Our results also showed that in comparison to women working in smaller enterprises, those working in large enterprises were more likely to use almost all the analyzed WLB benefits - paid days off to take care of others, educational leaves, leaves on demand, maternity leaves and return to the same work position after childcare leave, reduction of business trips when pregnant or having young children and breastfeeding breaks. The size of enterprise, however, did not differentiate the take-up of benefits among the studied men. Our analysis brought unexpected results on the lack of common availability of the WLB benefits guaranteed by the law in the case of employees who worked on the basis of employment contracts. We also found that women used most of child rearing benefits guaranteed by the law more often than men, which might reflect still a traditional division of child care responsibilities in Poland. Med Pr 2017;68(5):575-581. This work is available in Open Access model and licensed under a CC BY-NC 3.0 PL license.

  5. 78 FR 67144 - Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100...

    Science.gov (United States)

    2013-11-08

    ... EXPORT-IMPORT BANK [Public Notice 2013-0050] Application for Final Commitment for a Long-Term Loan or Financial Guarantee in Excess of $100 Million: AP086418XX AGENCY: Export-Import Bank of the United...) of the Charter of the Export-Import Bank of the United States (``Ex-Im Bank''), that Ex-Im Bank has...

  6. An exploratory study of factors influencing resuscitation skills retention and performance among health providers.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Curran, Vernon; Fleet, Lisa; Greene, Melanie

    2012-01-01

    Resuscitation and life support skills training comprises a significant proportion of continuing education programming for health professionals. The purpose of this study was to explore the perceptions and attitudes of certified resuscitation providers toward the retention of resuscitation skills, regular skills updating, and methods for enhancing retention. A mixed-methods, explanatory study design was undertaken utilizing focus groups and an online survey-questionnaire of rural and urban health care providers. Rural providers reported less experience with real codes and lower abilities across a variety of resuscitation areas. Mock codes, practice with an instructor and a team, self-practice with a mannequin, and e-learning were popular methods for skills updating. Aspects of team performance that were felt to influence resuscitation performance included: discrepancies in skill levels, lack of communication, and team leaders not up to date on their skills. Confidence in resuscitation abilities was greatest after one had recently practiced or participated in an update or an effective debriefing session. Lowest confidence was reported when team members did not work well together, there was no clear leader of the resuscitation code, or if team members did not communicate. The study findings highlight the importance of access to update methods for improving providers' confidence and abilities, and the need for emphasis on teamwork training in resuscitation. An eclectic approach combining methods may be the best strategy for addressing the needs of health professionals across various clinical departments and geographic locales. Copyright © 2012 The Alliance for Continuing Education in the Health Professions, the Society for Academic Continuing Medical Education, and the Council on CME, Association for Hospital Medical Education.

  7. Welcome to the show: meanings of work by circus performers

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Scheila Girelli

    2017-12-01

    Full Text Available Theme/Objective: This research sought to understand  the meanings attributed to work by circus performers. Methodology: The research followed a qualitative approach of ethnographic feature. The participating observation and semi-structured interviews were the main data collection methods. Results: The circus performers identify themselves with the work they do, especially the possibility of traveling and the professional knowledge produced in their own living experience, marked by the strong affective bonding. The activities is characterized by autonomy, creativity, and freedom to negotiate their needs and participate in the decision-making. However, the work is done informally, making the access and guarantee of labor and social security rights precarious. Conclusions: The circus establishes itself as a social and labor living space, not providing a clear distinction between free time and work, social relationships, professional and families. This way of living (with allows, despite the difficulties, the perspective of giving continuity to the “circus magic” by their work.

  8. Case of two electrostatics problems: Can providing a diagram adversely impact introductory physics students’ problem solving performance?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Alexandru Maries

    2018-03-01

    Full Text Available Drawing appropriate diagrams is a useful problem solving heuristic that can transform a problem into a representation that is easier to exploit for solving it. One major focus while helping introductory physics students learn effective problem solving is to help them understand that drawing diagrams can facilitate problem solution. We conducted an investigation in which two different interventions were implemented during recitation quizzes in a large enrollment algebra-based introductory physics course. Students were either (i asked to solve problems in which the diagrams were drawn for them or (ii explicitly told to draw a diagram. A comparison group was not given any instruction regarding diagrams. We developed rubrics to score the problem solving performance of students in different intervention groups and investigated ten problems. We found that students who were provided diagrams never performed better and actually performed worse than the other students on three problems, one involving standing sound waves in a tube (discussed elsewhere and two problems in electricity which we focus on here. These two problems were the only problems in electricity that involved considerations of initial and final conditions, which may partly account for why students provided with diagrams performed significantly worse than students who were not provided with diagrams. In order to explore potential reasons for this finding, we conducted interviews with students and found that some students provided with diagrams may have spent less time on the conceptual analysis and planning stage of the problem solving process. In particular, those provided with the diagram were more likely to jump into the implementation stage of problem solving early without fully analyzing and understanding the problem, which can increase the likelihood of mistakes in solutions.

  9. Case of two electrostatics problems: Can providing a diagram adversely impact introductory physics students' problem solving performance?

    Science.gov (United States)

    Maries, Alexandru; Singh, Chandralekha

    2018-06-01

    Drawing appropriate diagrams is a useful problem solving heuristic that can transform a problem into a representation that is easier to exploit for solving it. One major focus while helping introductory physics students learn effective problem solving is to help them understand that drawing diagrams can facilitate problem solution. We conducted an investigation in which two different interventions were implemented during recitation quizzes in a large enrollment algebra-based introductory physics course. Students were either (i) asked to solve problems in which the diagrams were drawn for them or (ii) explicitly told to draw a diagram. A comparison group was not given any instruction regarding diagrams. We developed rubrics to score the problem solving performance of students in different intervention groups and investigated ten problems. We found that students who were provided diagrams never performed better and actually performed worse than the other students on three problems, one involving standing sound waves in a tube (discussed elsewhere) and two problems in electricity which we focus on here. These two problems were the only problems in electricity that involved considerations of initial and final conditions, which may partly account for why students provided with diagrams performed significantly worse than students who were not provided with diagrams. In order to explore potential reasons for this finding, we conducted interviews with students and found that some students provided with diagrams may have spent less time on the conceptual analysis and planning stage of the problem solving process. In particular, those provided with the diagram were more likely to jump into the implementation stage of problem solving early without fully analyzing and understanding the problem, which can increase the likelihood of mistakes in solutions.

  10. Real-Time Robust Adaptive Modeling and Scheduling for an Electronic Commerce Server

    Science.gov (United States)

    Du, Bing; Ruan, Chun

    With the increasing importance and pervasiveness of Internet services, it is becoming a challenge for the proliferation of electronic commerce services to provide performance guarantees under extreme overload. This paper describes a real-time optimization modeling and scheduling approach for performance guarantee of electronic commerce servers. We show that an electronic commerce server may be simulated as a multi-tank system. A robust adaptive server model is subject to unknown additive load disturbances and uncertain model matching. Overload control techniques are based on adaptive admission control to achieve timing guarantees. We evaluate the performance of the model using a complex simulation that is subjected to varying model parameters and massive overload.

  11. Model of Providing Assistive Technologies in Special Education Schools.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Lersilp, Suchitporn; Putthinoi, Supawadee; Chakpitak, Nopasit

    2015-05-14

    Most students diagnosed with disabilities in Thai special education schools received assistive technologies, but this did not guarantee the greatest benefits. The purpose of this study was to survey the provision, use and needs of assistive technologies, as well as the perspectives of key informants regarding a model of providing them in special education schools. The participants were selected by the purposive sampling method, and they comprised 120 students with visual, physical, hearing or intellectual disabilities from four special education schools in Chiang Mai, Thailand; and 24 key informants such as parents or caregivers, teachers, school principals and school therapists. The instruments consisted of an assistive technology checklist and a semi-structured interview. Results showed that a category of assistive technologies was provided for students with disabilities, with the highest being "services", followed by "media" and then "facilities". Furthermore, mostly students with physical disabilities were provided with assistive technologies, but those with visual disabilities needed it more. Finally, the model of providing assistive technologies was composed of 5 components: Collaboration; Holistic perspective; Independent management of schools; Learning systems and a production manual for users; and Development of an assistive technology center, driven by 3 major sources such as Government and Private organizations, and Schools.

  12. Use of work–life balance benefits guaranteed by law in Poland – Do size of the enterprise and gender matter?

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Dorota Merecz-Kot

    2017-10-01

    Full Text Available Background: The paper is aimed at indicating the similarities and differences in use of benefits supporting work–life balance (WLB between women and men working in Polish small/medium and large enterprises. Material and Methods: The sample included 556 workers (311 women, 245 men, aged 20–68 years old employed on the basis of employment contracts for at least a year in Polish enterprises. The respondents completed a questionnaire on the use of benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code, referring to their current workplaces. Results: Women took maternity leaves and returned to the same work position after using childcare leaves more often than men. Men took leaves on demand more often than women. Our results also showed that in comparison to women working in smaller enterprises, those working in large enterprises were more likely to use almost all the analyzed WLB benefits – paid days off to take care of others, educational leaves, leaves on demand, maternity leaves and return to the same work position after childcare leave, reduction of business trips when pregnant or having young children and breastfeeding breaks. The size of enterprise, however, did not differentiate the take-up of benefits among the studied men. Conclusions: Our analysis brought unexpected results on the lack of common availability of the WLB benefits guaranteed by the law in the case of employees who worked on the basis of employment contracts. We also found that women used most of child rearing benefits guaranteed by the law more often than men, which might reflect still a traditional division of child care responsibilities in Poland. Med Pr 2017;68(5:575–581

  13. Performance Evaluation of Sectored MPAC for 5G UE Antenna Systems

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Hekkala, Aki; Kyösti, Pekka; Kyröläinen, Jukka

    2018-01-01

    Over-the-air (OTA) test system performance evaluations is a topic to agree in the industry to be able to guarantee the comparability of the test results from different laboratories. For 5G test purposes at mmWave there are no currently metrics to be used. This paper presents both the recently...

  14. A Criteria Standard for Conflict Resolution: A Vision for Guaranteeing the Safety of Self-Separation in NextGen

    Science.gov (United States)

    Munoz, Cesar; Butler, Ricky; Narkawicz, Anthony; Maddalon, Jeffrey; Hagen, George

    2010-01-01

    Distributed approaches for conflict resolution rely on analyzing the behavior of each aircraft to ensure that system-wide safety properties are maintained. This paper presents the criteria method, which increases the quality and efficiency of a safety assurance analysis for distributed air traffic concepts. The criteria standard is shown to provide two key safety properties: safe separation when only one aircraft maneuvers and safe separation when both aircraft maneuver at the same time. This approach is complemented with strong guarantees of correct operation through formal verification. To show that an algorithm is correct, i.e., that it always meets its specified safety property, one must only show that the algorithm satisfies the criteria. Once this is done, then the algorithm inherits the safety properties of the criteria. An important consequence of this approach is that there is no requirement that both aircraft execute the same conflict resolution algorithm. Therefore, the criteria approach allows different avionics manufacturers or even different airlines to use different algorithms, each optimized according to their own proprietary concerns.

  15. Air Force Health Care Providers Incidence of Performing Testicular Exams and Instruction of Testicular Self-Exam

    National Research Council Canada - National Science Library

    Adams, Nicola

    1999-01-01

    ...) within an Air Force healthcare setting. The study is also designed to determine any significant differences among providers, Family Practice Physicians, Nurse Practitioners, and Physicians Assistants, regarding the incidence of performing...

  16. Optical simulations for design, alignment, and performance prediction of silicon pore optics for the ATHENA x-ray telescope

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Spiga, D.; Della Monica Ferreira, Desiree; Shortt, B.

    2017-01-01

    of these aspects is required in order to assess the fabrication and alignment tolerances; moreover, the achievable effective area and angular resolution depend on the mirror module design. Therefore, guaranteeing these optical performances requires: a fast design tool to find the most performing solution in terms...

  17. The Impact of Order Source Misattribution on Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE) Performance Metrics

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gellert, George A.; Catzoela, Linda; Patel, Lajja; Bruner, Kylynn; Friedman, Felix; Ramirez, Ricardo; Saucedo, Lilliana; Webster, S. Luke; Gillean, John A.

    2017-01-01

    Background One strategy to foster adoption of computerized provider order entry (CPOE) by physicians is the monthly distribution of a list identifying the number and use rate percentage of orders entered electronically versus on paper by each physician in the facility. Physicians care about CPOE use rate reports because they support the patient safety and quality improvement objectives of CPOE implementation. Certain physician groups are also motivated because they participate in contracted financial and performance arrangements that include incentive payments or financial penalties for meeting (or failing to meet) a specified CPOE use rate target. Misattribution of order sources can hinder accurate measurement of individual physician CPOE use and can thereby undermine providers’ confidence in their reported performance, as well as their motivation to utilize CPOE. Misattribution of order sources also has significant patient safety, quality, and medicolegal implications. Objective This analysis sought to evaluate the magnitude and sources of misattribution among hospitalists with high CPOE use and, if misattribution was found, to formulate strategies to prevent and reduce its recurrence, thereby ensuring the integrity and credibility of individual and facility CPOE use rate reporting. Methods A detailed manual order source review and validation of all orders issued by one hospitalist group at a midsize community hospital was conducted for a one-month study period. Results We found that a small but not dismissible percentage of orders issued by hospitalists—up to 4.18 percent (95 percent confidence interval, 3.84–4.56 percent) per month—were attributed inaccurately. Sources of misattribution by department or function were as follows: nursing, 42 percent; pharmacy, 38 percent; laboratory, 15 percent; unit clerk, 3 percent; and radiology, 2 percent. Order management and protocol were the most common correct order sources that were incorrectly attributed

  18. The documental management of the Educational Secretary as guarantee of legality in the control of the university processes

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Neyda Armenteros Arencibia

    2015-06-01

    Full Text Available The pedagogic professional formation aspires to obtain superior results in the documental management in order to guarantee the required confidence in the norms and p rocedures. The present article deal the theoretical bases that should be took into account for such aspiration, making emphasis in the characteristics of this process in the faculty of Infantile Education of the U CP the Pinar del Río.

  19. Resources transfer and centralization in Brazilian electrical sector: the reversion global reserve (RGR) and the guarantee global reserve (GGR)

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Souza Amaral Filho, J.B. de.

    1991-01-01

    This dissertation makes the analysis of resources transfer and centralization in Brazilian electrical sector, through reversion global reserve (RGR) and guarantee global reserve (GGR). RGR and GGR are funds. RGR finances sectorial investments in electric power and GGR aims the supply of deficient concessionaires. Governmental investments and the results of this application are showing. (M.V.M.). 55 refs, 2 figs, 61 tabs

  20. MOTIVATION OF ADMINISTRATIVE ACTS – GUARANTEE OF GOOD ADMINISTRATION

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Adelin Mihai ZĂGĂRIN

    2018-05-01

    Full Text Available The present article deals with the aspects of motivating administrative acts, both doctrinaire and practical, of jurisprudence. The duty of the administration to motivate its decisions is submitted in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, art. 41. In the current European legal order, the rationale for administrative acts is considered and refers to one of the most important conditions of validity of the administrative act. The Romanian Constitution ensures and emphasizes the motivation, as it is imposed by the Charter. The realization of this fundamental right to motivate administrative acts is possible by calling upon a set of values from the administration, such as transparency, professionalism and the imposition of high quality standards. Motivation is achieved where we have a good administration, and whether citizens are, among other things, respected fundamental rights and freedoms, access to information is guaranteed and motivated their decisions. Although administrative normative acts are motivated by the administration, examples that show that individual ones are unmotivated or incompletely motivated are enough, which made the various employers legally answer for the non-motivation of their decisions to terminate work relationships with several of the employees. The motivation of administrative acts is necessary, mandatory and must be done with rigor. It is highlighted that inadequate, incomplete or vicious reasoning may result in suspension or even annulment of the administrative act by the court.

  1. The guarantee of the consistency of patient information through modality worklist among PACS, RIS and imaging equipments

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Luo Min; Peng Chenglin; Wang Xiaolin; Luo Song; Lei Wenyong; Wang Kang; Wang Xuejian; Wen Hongyu; Wu Hongxing

    2003-01-01

    Objective: To realize the consistency of patient information through modality worklist among picture archiving and communication system (PACS), radiology information systems (RIS), and imaging equipments. Methods: Many digital modalities including GE Signa 1.5 T MR system, digital mammography, Agfa digital radiography, computed radiography, GE CT, and etc were installed in our hospital. Since the GE PACS system was in English version, the images were saved and the information was managed to PACS without a truly worklist. Two months later, while still using the previous PACS, the consistency of patient information was resolved through modality worklist by adopting the international advanced approach to realize thread worklist of digital imaging and communication in medicine. The information in Chinese will be transformed into information in English in RIS system and saved as the English information to worklist. Results: After the implementation and integration of PACS and RIS was achieved in my hospital, the consistency of patient information was guaranteed through modality worklist between RIS and imaging equipments and the first-rate effect was acquired. The patient information could be checked, edited, and created by using the Chinese RIS system on all diagnostic workstations. Conclusion: The consistency of patient information through modality worklist was realized among PACS, RIS, and imaging equipments, yet at present, the question of guarantee the consistency of patient information must be thought over in PACS building

  2. Making operations on standard-library containers strongly exception safe

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Katajainen, Jyrki

    2007-01-01

    -library containers to provide the strong guarantee of exception safety, instead of the default guarantee, without violating the stringent performance requirements specified in the C++ standard. In particular, we show that every strongly exception-safe operation on dynamic arrays and ordered dictionaries is only...... a constant factor slower than the corresponding default-guarantee operation. In terms of the amount of space, the overhead introduced is linear in the number of elements stored....

  3. On the network protocol performance evaluation for large scale communication system of nuclear plant

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Song, K. S.; Lee, T. H.; Kim, H. R.; Kim, D. H.; Ku, I. S.

    1998-01-01

    Computer technology has been dramatically advanced and it is now natural to apply digital network technology into nuclear plants. Communication architecture for nuclear plant defines the coordination of safety reactor control, balance of plant, subsystem utilities, and plant monitoring functions, and how they are connected and their user interface to guarantee plant performance and guarantee safety requirements. Therefore, to implement a digital network for control and monitoring systems of advanced nuclear plant needs systematic design and evaluation procedures because of responsive and hard real-time process characteristics of nuclear plant. In this paper, we evaluate several digital network protocols in terms of network delay, link failure effects to hard real-time requirements with full scale traffic

  4. Computational Performance Analysis of Nonlinear Dynamic Systems using Semi-infinite Programming

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Tor A. Johansen

    2001-01-01

    Full Text Available For nonlinear systems that satisfy certain regularity conditions it is shown that upper and lower bounds on the performance (cost function can be computed using linear or quadratic programming. The performance conditions derived from Hamilton-Jacobi inequalities are formulated as linear inequalities defined pointwise by discretizing the state-space when assuming a linearly parameterized class of functions representing the candidate performance bounds. Uncertainty with respect to some system parameters can be incorporated by also gridding the parameter set. In addition to performance analysis, the method can also be used to compute Lyapunov functions that guarantees uniform exponential stability.

  5. Performance evaluation of hospitals that provide care in the public health system, Brazil.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ramos, Marcelo Cristiano de Azevedo; da Cruz, Lucila Pedroso; Kishima, Vanessa Chaer; Pollara, Wilson Modesto; de Lira, Antônio Carlos Onofre; Couttolenc, Bernard François

    2015-01-01

    OBJECTIVE To analyze if size, administrative level, legal status, type of unit and educational activity influence the hospital network performance in providing services to the Brazilian Unified Health System. METHODS This cross-sectional study evaluated data from the Hospital Information System and the Cadastro Nacional de Estabelecimentos de Saúde (National Registry of Health Facilities), 2012, in Sao Paulo, Southeastern Brazil. We calculated performance indicators, such as: the ratio of hospital employees per bed; mean amount paid for admission; bed occupancy rate; average length of stay; bed turnover index and hospital mortality rate. Data were expressed as mean and standard deviation. The groups were compared using analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Bonferroni correction. RESULTS The hospital occupancy rate in small hospitals was lower than in medium, big and special-sized hospitals. Higher hospital occupancy rate and bed turnover index were observed in hospitals that include education in their activities. The hospital mortality rate was lower in specialized hospitals compared to general ones, despite their higher proportion of highly complex admissions. We found no differences between hospitals in the direct and indirect administration for most of the indicators analyzed. CONCLUSIONS The study indicated the importance of the scale effect on efficiency, and larger hospitals had a higher performance. Hospitals that include education in their activities had a higher operating performance, albeit with associated importance of using human resources and highly complex structures. Specialized hospitals had a significantly lower rate of mortality than general hospitals, indicating the positive effect of the volume of procedures and technology used on clinical outcomes. The analysis related to the administrative level and legal status did not show any significant performance differences between the categories of public hospitals.

  6. Performance evaluation of hospitals that provide care in the public health system, Brazil

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Marcelo Cristiano de Azevedo Ramos

    2015-01-01

    Full Text Available OBJECTIVE To analyze if size, administrative level, legal status, type of unit and educational activity influence the hospital network performance in providing services to the Brazilian Unified Health System.METHODS This cross-sectional study evaluated data from the Hospital Information System and the Cadastro Nacional de Estabelecimentos de Saúde (National Registry of Health Facilities, 2012, in Sao Paulo, Southeastern Brazil. We calculated performance indicators, such as: the ratio of hospital employees per bed; mean amount paid for admission; bed occupancy rate; average length of stay; bed turnover index and hospital mortality rate. Data were expressed as mean and standard deviation. The groups were compared using analysis of variance (ANOVA and Bonferroni correction.RESULTS The hospital occupancy rate in small hospitals was lower than in medium, big and special-sized hospitals. Higher hospital occupancy rate and bed turnover index were observed in hospitals that include education in their activities. The hospital mortality rate was lower in specialized hospitals compared to general ones, despite their higher proportion of highly complex admissions. We found no differences between hospitals in the direct and indirect administration for most of the indicators analyzed.CONCLUSIONS The study indicated the importance of the scale effect on efficiency, and larger hospitals had a higher performance. Hospitals that include education in their activities had a higher operating performance, albeit with associated importance of using human resources and highly complex structures. Specialized hospitals had a significantly lower rate of mortality than general hospitals, indicating the positive effect of the volume of procedures and technology used on clinical outcomes. The analysis related to the administrative level and legal status did not show any significant performance differences between the categories of public hospitals.

  7. A training rule which guarantees finite-region stability for a class of closed-loop neural-network control systems.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kuntanapreeda, S; Fullmer, R R

    1996-01-01

    A training method for a class of neural network controllers is presented which guarantees closed-loop system stability. The controllers are assumed to be nonlinear, feedforward, sampled-data, full-state regulators implemented as single hidden-layer neural networks. The controlled systems must be locally hermitian and observable. Stability of the closed-loop system is demonstrated by determining a Lyapunov function, which can be used to identify a finite stability region about the regulator point.

  8. Can trained lay providers perform HIV testing services? A review of national HIV testing policies.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Flynn, David E; Johnson, Cheryl; Sands, Anita; Wong, Vincent; Figueroa, Carmen; Baggaley, Rachel

    2017-01-04

    Only an estimated 54% of people living with HIV are aware of their status. Despite progress scaling up HIV testing services (HTS), a testing gap remains. Delivery of HTS by lay providers may help close this testing gap, while also increasing uptake and acceptability of HIV testing among key populations and other priority groups. 50 National HIV testing policies were collated from WHO country intelligence databases, contacts and testing program websites. Data regarding lay provider use for HTS was extracted and collated. Our search had no geographical or language restrictions. This data was then compared with reported data from the Global AIDS Response Progress Reporting (GARPR) from July 2015. Forty-two percent of countries permit lay providers to perform HIV testing and 56% permit lay providers to administer pre-and post-test counseling. Comparative analysis with GARPR found that less than half (46%) of reported data from countries were consistent with their corresponding national HIV testing policy. Given the low uptake of lay provider use globally and their proven use in increasing HIV testing, countries should consider revising policies to support lay provider testing using rapid diagnostic tests.

  9. Architecture of a Framework for Providing Information Services for Public Transport

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Gabino Padrón

    2012-04-01

    Full Text Available This paper presents OnRoute, a framework for developing and running ubiquitous software that provides information services to passengers of public transportation, including payment systems and on-route guidance services. To achieve a high level of interoperability, accessibility and context awareness, OnRoute uses the ubiquitous computing paradigm. To guarantee the quality of the software produced, the reliable software principles used in critical contexts, such as automotive systems, are also considered by the framework. The main components of its architecture (run-time, system services, software components and development discipline and how they are deployed in the transportation network (stations and vehicles are described in this paper. Finally, to illustrate the use of OnRoute, the development of a guidance service for travellers is explained.

  10. Providing Extrinsic Reward for Test Performance Undermines Long-Term Memory Acquisition

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Christof eKuhbandner

    2016-02-01

    Full Text Available Based on numerous studies showing that testing studied material can improve long-term retention more than restudying the same material, it is often suggested that the number of tests in education should be increased to enhance knowledge acquisition. However, testing in real-life educational settings often entails a high degree of extrinsic motivation of learners due to the common practice of placing important consequences on the outcome of a test. Such an effect on the motivation of learners may undermine the beneficial effects of testing on long-term memory because it has been shown that extrinsic motivation can reduce the quality of learning. To examine this issue, participants learned foreign language vocabulary words, followed by an immediate test in which one third of the words were tested and one third restudied. To manipulate extrinsic motivation during immediate testing, participants received either monetary reward contingent on test performance or no reward. After one week, memory for all words was tested. In the immediate test, reward reduced correct recall and increased commission errors, indicating that reward reduced the number of items that can benefit from successful retrieval. The results in the delayed test revealed that reward additionally reduced the gain received from successful retrieval because memory for initially successfully retrieved words was lower in the reward condition. However, testing was still more effective than restudying under reward conditions because reward undermined long-term memory for concurrently restudied material as well. These findings indicate that providing performance-contingent reward in a test can undermine long-term knowledge acquisition.

  11. Providing Extrinsic Reward for Test Performance Undermines Long-Term Memory Acquisition.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kuhbandner, Christof; Aslan, Alp; Emmerdinger, Kathrin; Murayama, Kou

    2016-01-01

    Based on numerous studies showing that testing studied material can improve long-term retention more than restudying the same material, it is often suggested that the number of tests in education should be increased to enhance knowledge acquisition. However, testing in real-life educational settings often entails a high degree of extrinsic motivation of learners due to the common practice of placing important consequences on the outcome of a test. Such an effect on the motivation of learners may undermine the beneficial effects of testing on long-term memory because it has been shown that extrinsic motivation can reduce the quality of learning. To examine this issue, participants learned foreign language vocabulary words, followed by an immediate test in which one-third of the words were tested and one-third restudied. To manipulate extrinsic motivation during immediate testing, participants received either monetary reward contingent on test performance or no reward. After 1 week, memory for all words was tested. In the immediate test, reward reduced correct recall and increased commission errors, indicating that reward reduced the number of items that can benefit from successful retrieval. The results in the delayed test revealed that reward additionally reduced the gain received from successful retrieval because memory for initially successfully retrieved words was lower in the reward condition. However, testing was still more effective than restudying under reward conditions because reward undermined long-term memory for concurrently restudied material as well. These findings indicate that providing performance-contingent reward in a test can undermine long-term knowledge acquisition.

  12. Nano-engineering of three-dimensional core/shell nanotube arrays for high performance supercapacitors

    Science.gov (United States)

    Grote, Fabian; Wen, Liaoyong; Lei, Yong

    2014-06-01

    Large-scale arrays of core/shell nanostructures are highly desirable to enhance the performance of supercapacitors. Here we demonstrate an innovative template-based fabrication technique with high structural controllability, which is capable of synthesizing well-ordered three-dimensional arrays of SnO2/MnO2 core/shell nanotubes for electrochemical energy storage in supercapacitor applications. The SnO2 core is fabricated by atomic layer deposition and provides a highly electrical conductive matrix. Subsequently a thin MnO2 shell is coated by electrochemical deposition onto the SnO2 core, which guarantees a short ion diffusion length within the shell. The core/shell structure shows an excellent electrochemical performance with a high specific capacitance of 910 F g-1 at 1 A g-1 and a good rate capability of remaining 217 F g-1 at 50 A g-1. These results shall pave the way to realize aqueous based asymmetric supercapacitors with high specific power and high specific energy.

  13. A Distributed Architecture for Sharing Ecological Data Sets with Access and Usage Control Guarantees

    DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

    Bonnet, Philippe; Gonzalez, Javier; Granados, Joel Andres

    2014-01-01

    new insights, there are signicant barriers to the realization of this vision. One of the key challenge is to allow scientists to share their data widely while retaining some form of control over who accesses this data (access control) and more importantly how it is used (usage control). Access...... and usage control is necessary to enforce existing open data policies. We have proposed the vision of trusted cells: A decentralized infrastructure, based on secure hardware running on devices equipped with trusted execution environments at the edges of the Internet. We originally described the utilization...... data sets with access and usage control guarantees. We rely on examples from terrestrial research and monitoring in the arctic in the context of the INTERACT project....

  14. Relationships among providing maternal, child, and adolescent health services; implementing various financial strategy responses; and performance of local health departments.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Issel, L Michele; Olorunsaiye, Comfort; Snebold, Laura; Handler, Arden

    2015-04-01

    We explored the relationships between local health department (LHD) structure, capacity, and macro-context variables and performance of essential public health services (EPHS). In 2012, we assessed a stratified, random sample of 195 LHDs that provided data via an online survey regarding performance of EPHS, the services provided or contracted out, the financial strategies used in response to budgetary pressures, and the extent of collaborations. We performed weighted analyses that included analysis of variance, pairwise correlations by jurisdiction population size, and linear regressions. On average, LHDs provided approximately 13 (36%) of 35 possible services either directly or by contract. Rather than cut services or externally consolidating, LHDs took steps to generate more revenue and maximize capacity. Higher LHD performance of EPHS was significantly associated with delivering more services, initiating more financial strategies, and engaging in collaboration, after adjusting for the effects of the Affordable Care Act and jurisdiction size. During changing economic and health care environments, we found that strong structural capacity enhanced local health department EPHS performance for maternal, child, and adolescent health.

  15. High-Performance All-Solid-State Na-S Battery Enabled by Casting-Annealing Technology.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Fan, Xiulin; Yue, Jie; Han, Fudong; Chen, Ji; Deng, Tao; Zhou, Xiuquan; Hou, Singyuk; Wang, Chunsheng

    2018-04-24

    Room-temperature all-solid-state Na-S batteries (ASNSBs) using sulfide solid electrolytes are a promising next-generation battery technology due to the high energy, enhanced safety, and earth abundant resources of both sodium and sulfur. Currently, the sulfide electrolyte ASNSBs are fabricated by a simple cold-pressing process leaving with high residential stress. Even worse, the large volume change of S/Na 2 S during charge/discharge cycles induces additional stress, seriously weakening the less-contacted interfaces among the solid electrolyte, active materials, and the electron conductive agent that are formed in the cold-pressing process. The high and continuous increase of the interface resistance hindered its practical application. Herein, we significantly reduce the interface resistance and eliminate the residential stress in Na 2 S cathodes by fabricating Na 2 S-Na 3 PS 4 -CMK-3 nanocomposites using melting-casting followed by stress-release annealing-precipitation process. The casting-annealing process guarantees the close contact between the Na 3 PS 4 solid electrolyte and the CMK-3 mesoporous carbon in mixed ionic/electronic conductive matrix, while the in situ precipitated Na 2 S active species from the solid electrolyte during the annealing process guarantees the interfacial contact among these three subcomponents without residential stress, which greatly reduces the interfacial resistance and enhances the electrochemical performance. The in situ synthesized Na 2 S-Na 3 PS 4 -CMK-3 composite cathode delivers a stable and highly reversible capacity of 810 mAh/g at 50 mA/g for 50 cycles at 60 °C. The present casting-annealing strategy should provide opportunities for the advancement of mechanically robust and high-performance next-generation ASNSBs.

  16. Advertising Via Mobile Terminals - Delivering Context Sensitive and Personalized Advertising While Guaranteeing Privacy

    Science.gov (United States)

    Bulander, Rebecca; Decker, Michael; Schiefer, Gunther; Kölmel, Bernhard

    Mobile terminals like cellular phones and PDAs are a promising target platform for mobile advertising: The devices are widely spread, are able to present interactive multimedia content and offer as almost permanently carried along personal communication devices a high degree of reachability. But particular because of the latter feature it is important to pay great attention to privacy aspects and avoidance of spam-messages when designing an application for mobile advertising. Furthermore the limited user interface of mobile devices is a special challenge. The following article describes the solution approach for mobile advertising developed within the project MoMa, which was funded by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Labour of Germany (BMWA). MoMa enables highly personalized and context sensitive mobile advertising while guaranteeing data protection. To achieve this we have to distinguish public and private context information.

  17. Applying WHO's 'workforce indicators of staffing need' (WISN) method to calculate the health worker requirements for India's maternal and child health service guarantees in Orissa State.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hagopian, Amy; Mohanty, Manmath K; Das, Abhijit; House, Peter J

    2012-01-01

    In one district of Orissa state, we used the World Health Organization's Workforce Indicators of Staffing Need (WISN) method to calculate the number of health workers required to achieve the maternal and child health 'service guarantees' of India's National Rural Health Mission (NRHM). We measured the difference between this ideal number and current staffing levels. We collected census data, routine health information data and government reports to calculate demand for maternal and child health services. By conducting 54 interviews with physicians and midwives, and six focus groups, we were able to calculate the time required to perform necessary health care tasks. We also interviewed 10 new mothers to cross-check these estimates at a global level and get assessments of quality of care. For 18 service centres of Ganjam District, we found 357 health workers in our six cadre categories, to serve a population of 1.02 million. Total demand for the MCH services guaranteed under India's NRHM outpaced supply for every category of health worker but one. To properly serve the study population, the health workforce supply should be enhanced by 43 additional physicians, 15 nurses and 80 nurse midwives. Those numbers probably under-estimate the need, as they assume away geographic barriers. Our study established time standards in minutes for each MCH activity promised by the NRHM, which could be applied elsewhere in India by government planners and civil society advocates. Our calculations indicate significant numbers of new health workers are required to deliver the services promised by the NRHM.

  18. Understanding the motivations of health-care providers in performing female genital mutilation: an integrative review of the literature.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Doucet, Marie-Hélène; Pallitto, Christina; Groleau, Danielle

    2017-03-23

    Female genital mutilation (FGM) is a traditional harmful practice that can cause severe physical and psychological damages to girls and women. Increasingly, trained health-care providers carry out the practice at the request of families. It is important to understand the motivations of providers in order to reduce the medicalization of FGM. This integrative review identifies, appraises and summarizes qualitative and quantitative literature exploring the factors that are associated with the medicalization of FGM and/or re-infibulation. Literature searches were conducted in PubMed, CINAHL and grey literature databases. Hand searches of identified studies were also examined. The "CASP Qualitative Research Checklist" and the "STROBE Statement" were used to assess the methodological quality of the qualitative and quantitative studies respectively. A total of 354 articles were reviewed for inclusion. Fourteen (14) studies, conducted in countries where FGM is largely practiced as well as in countries hosting migrants from these regions, were included. The main findings about the motivations of health-care providers to practice FGM were: (1) the belief that performing FGM would be less harmful for girls or women than the procedure being performed by a traditional practitioner (the so-called "harm reduction" perspective); (2) the belief that the practice was justified for cultural reasons; (3) the financial gains of performing the procedure; (4) responding to requests of the community or feeling pressured by the community to perform FGM. The main reasons given by health-care providers for not performing FGM were that they (1) are concerned about the risks that FGM can cause for girls' and women's health; (2) are preoccupied by the legal sanctions that might result from performing FGM; and (3) consider FGM to be a "bad practice". The findings of this review can inform public health program planners, policy makers and researchers to adapt or create strategies to end

  19. An empirical investigation on factors influencing on insurance issued by export guarantee funds

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Naser Azad

    2013-07-01

    Full Text Available This paper attempts to find important factors influencing on insurance issued by export guarantee funds. The study uses factor analysis to detect important factors based on a questionnaire in Likert scale. The study has determined four factors including risk management, customer oriented, quality management and trade management. The first factor is associated with risk management and it includes four sub-factors. The factors include being responsive, reliability, service quality and customer detection and reliability plays the most important factor. The second factor is associated with being customer oriented where the factor includes four components including cost recognition, access, marketing knowledge and the level of management training. The third factor is associated with quality management, which includes four variables including responsiveness, reliability, quality of services and customer recognition. Finally, the last factor is associated with trade management, which includes three variables including trade risk, insurance premium and currency.

  20. Feedback providing improvement strategies and reflection on feedback use: Effects on students' writing motivation, process, and performance

    NARCIS (Netherlands)

    Duijnhouwer, H.; Prins, F.J.; Stokking, K.M.

    2012-01-01

    This study investigated the effects of feedback providing improvement strategies and a reflection assignment on students’ writing motivation, process, and performance. Students in the experimental feedback condition (n = 41) received feedback including improvement strategies, whereas students in the

  1. MODTURCCLAS analysis of moderator poison/coolant mixing in the calandria due to a pressure tube/calandria tube guillotine rupture during an overpoisoned guaranteed shutdown state

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Mackinnon, J.C.; Szymanski, J.K.; Balog, G.

    1996-01-01

    This paper reports the results of a study to investigate moderator poison/coolant mixing due to a guillotine rupture of a fuel channel when the reactor is in an overpoisoned guaranteed shutdown state. The analysis, performed using MODTURC C LAS, allowed for study of the mixing characteristics and the spatial and temporal evolution of the concentration fields. Results for simulated breaks at three channel locations show that the poison in the vessel is quite well mixed throughout the transient, resulting in no extensive regions of low poison concentration. MODTURC C LAS calculations show that at all three break locations investigated, the displacement of poison from the vessel through the relief ducts is less than that calculated by both the simple uniform mixing model and piston mixing model. This result is expected to hold for all break locations in the core. (author)

  2. Provider Monitoring and Pay-for-Performance When Multiple Providers Affect Outcomes: An Application to Renal Dialysis

    Science.gov (United States)

    Hirth, Richard A; Turenne, Marc N; Wheeler, John RC; Pan, Qing; Ma, Yu; Messana, Joseph M

    2009-01-01

    Objective To characterize the influence of dialysis facilities and nephrologists on resource use and patient outcomes in the dialysis population and to illustrate how such information can be used to inform payment system design. Data Sources Medicare claims for all hemodialysis patients for whom Medicare was the primary payer in 2004, combined with the Medicare Enrollment Database and the CMS Medical Evidence Form (CMS Form 2728), which is completed at onset of renal replacement therapy. Study Design Resource use (mainly drugs and laboratory tests) per dialysis session and two clinical outcomes (achieving targets for anemia management and dose of dialysis) were modeled at the patient level with random effects for nephrologist and dialysis facility, controlling for patient characteristics. Results For each measure, both the physician and the facility had significant effects. However, facilities were more influential than physicians, as measured by the standard deviation of the random effects. Conclusions The success of tools such as P4P and provider profiling relies upon the identification of providers most able to enhance efficiency and quality. This paper demonstrates a method for determining the extent to which variation in health care costs and quality of care can be attributed to physicians and institutional providers. Because variation in quality and cost attributable to facilities is consistently larger than that attributable to physicians, if provider profiling or financial incentives are targeted to only one type of provider, the facility appears to be the appropriate locus. PMID:19555398

  3. Influence of gestational age on dead space and alveolar ventilation in preterm infants ventilated with volume guarantee.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Neumann, Roland P; Pillow, Jane J; Thamrin, Cindy; Larcombe, Alexander N; Hall, Graham L; Schulzke, Sven M

    2015-01-01

    Ventilated preterm infant lungs are vulnerable to overdistension and underinflation. The optimal ventilator-delivered tidal volume (VT) in these infants is unknown and may depend on the extent of alveolarisation at birth. We aimed to calculate respiratory dead space (VD) from the molar mass (MM) signal of an ultrasonic flowmeter (VD,MM) in very preterm infants on volume-targeted ventilation (VT target, 4-5 ml/kg) and to study the association between gestational age (GA) and VD,MM-to-VT ratio (VD,MM/VT), alveolar tidal volume (VA) and alveolar minute volume (AMV). This was a single-centre, prospective, observational, cohort study in a neonatal intensive care unit. Tidal breathing analysis was performed in ventilated very preterm infants (GA range 23-32 weeks) on day 1 of life. Valid measurements were obtained in 43/51 (87%) infants. Tidal breathing variables were analysed using multivariable linear regression. VD,MM/VT was negatively associated with GA after adjusting for birth weight Z score (p volume guarantee setting of 4-5 ml/kg in the Dräger Babylog® 8000 plus ventilator may be inappropriate as a universal target across the GA range of 23-32 weeks. Differences between measured and set VT and the dependence of this difference on GA require further investigation. © 2014 S. Karger AG, Basel.

  4. The fine tuning of carotenoid–chlorophyll interactions in light-harvesting complexes: an important requisite to guarantee efficient photoprotection via triplet–triplet energy transfer in the complex balance of the energy transfer processes

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Di Valentin, Marilena; Carbonera, Donatella

    2017-01-01

    Triplet–triplet energy transfer (TTET) from the chlorophyll to the carotenoid triplet state is the process exploited by photosynthetic systems to protect themselves from singlet oxygen formation under light-stress conditions. A deep comprehension of the molecular strategies adopted to guarantee TTET efficiency, while at the same time maintaining minimal energy loss and efficient light-harvesting capability, is still lacking. The paramagnetic nature of the triplet state makes electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) the method of choice when investigating TTET. In this review, we focus on our extended comparative study of two photosynthetic antenna complexes, the Peridinin–chlorophyll a -protein of dinoflagellates and the light-harvesting complex II of higher plants, in order to point out important aspects of the molecular design adopted in the photoprotection strategy. We have demonstrated that a proper analysis of the EPR data allows one to identify the pigments involved in TTET and, consequently, gain an insight into the structure of the photoprotective sites. The structural information has been complemented by a detailed description of the electronic structure provided by hyperfine spectroscopy. All these elements represent the fundamental building blocks toward a deeper understanding of the requirements for efficient photoprotection, which is fundamental to guarantee the prolonged energy conversion action of photosynthesis. (topical review)

  5. Comfort in High-Performance Homes in a Hot-Humid Climate

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Poerschke, A. [IBACOS, Inc., Pittsburgh, PA (United States); Beach, R. [IBACOS, Inc., Pittsburgh, PA (United States)

    2016-01-22

    "9IBACOS monitored 37 homes during the late summer and early fall of 2014 in a hot and humid climate to better understand indoor comfort conditions. These homes were constructed in the last several years by four home builders that offered a comfort and performance guarantee for the homes. The homes were located in one of four cities: Tampa, Florida; Orlando, Florida; Houston, Texas; and San Antonio, Texas. Temperature and humidity data were collected from the thermostat and each room of the house using small, battery-powered data loggers. To understand system runtime and its impact on comfort, supply air temperature also was measured on a 1-minute interval. Overall, the group of homes only exceeded a room-to-room temperature difference of 6 degrees F for 5% of the time. For 80% of the time, the rooms in each house were within 4 degrees F of each other. Additionally, the impact of system runtime on comfort is discussed. Finally, measurements made at the thermostat were used to better understand the occupant operation of each cooling system's thermostat setpoint. Builders were questioned on their perceived impact of offering a comfort and performance guarantee. Their feedback, which generally indicates a positive perception, has been summarized in the report.

  6. Modeling and performance analysis for composite network–compute service provisioning in software-defined cloud environments

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Qiang Duan

    2015-08-01

    Full Text Available The crucial role of networking in Cloud computing calls for a holistic vision of both networking and computing systems that leads to composite network–compute service provisioning. Software-Defined Network (SDN is a fundamental advancement in networking that enables network programmability. SDN and software-defined compute/storage systems form a Software-Defined Cloud Environment (SDCE that may greatly facilitate composite network–compute service provisioning to Cloud users. Therefore, networking and computing systems need to be modeled and analyzed as composite service provisioning systems in order to obtain thorough understanding about service performance in SDCEs. In this paper, a novel approach for modeling composite network–compute service capabilities and a technique for evaluating composite network–compute service performance are developed. The analytic method proposed in this paper is general and agnostic to service implementation technologies; thus is applicable to a wide variety of network–compute services in SDCEs. The results obtained in this paper provide useful guidelines for federated control and management of networking and computing resources to achieve Cloud service performance guarantees.

  7. Using a quality improvement model to enhance providers' performance in maternal and newborn health care: a post-only intervention and comparison design.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Ayalew, Firew; Eyassu, Gizachew; Seyoum, Negash; van Roosmalen, Jos; Bazant, Eva; Kim, Young Mi; Tekleberhan, Alemnesh; Gibson, Hannah; Daniel, Ephrem; Stekelenburg, Jelle

    2017-04-12

    The Standards Based Management and Recognition (SBM-R © ) approach to quality improvement has been implemented in Ethiopia to strengthen routine maternal and newborn health (MNH) services. This evaluation assessed the effect of the intervention on MNH providers' performance of routine antenatal care (ANC), uncomplicated labor and delivery and immediate postnatal care (PNC) services. A post-only evaluation design was conducted at three hospitals and eight health centers implementing SBM-R and the same number of comparison health facilities. Structured checklists were used to observe MNH providers' performance on ANC (236 provider-client interactions), uncomplicated labor and delivery (226 provider-client interactions), and immediate PNC services in the six hours after delivery (232 provider-client interactions); observations were divided equally between intervention and comparison groups. Main outcomes were provider performance scores, calculated as the percentage of essential tasks in each service area completed by providers. Multilevel analysis was used to calculate adjusted mean percentage performance scores and standard errors to compare intervention and comparison groups. There was no statistically significant difference between intervention and comparison facilities in overall mean performance scores for ANC services (63.4% at intervention facilities versus 61.0% at comparison facilities, p = 0.650) or in any specific ANC skill area. MNH providers' overall mean performance score for uncomplicated labor and delivery care was 11.9 percentage points higher in the intervention than in the comparison group (77.5% versus 65.6%; p = 0.002). Overall mean performance scores for immediate PNC were 22.2 percentage points higher at intervention than at comparison facilities (72.8% versus 50.6%; p = 0.001); and there was a significant difference of 22 percentage points between intervention and comparison facilities for each PNC skill area: care for the newborn

  8. Human Resource Management Practice and Organizational Performance: Case Study from Hormuud Telecom in Mogadishu-Somalia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Abdulkadir Mohamud Dahie

    2017-06-01

    Full Text Available Organizational performance is getting more and more important, especially in a market with greater competition and dynamic. Organizational performance is measured through different indicators. It guarantees the continuity of the organization to be competitive in a global marketplace. Normally, the implementation of performance indicators achieved through human resources. Human resources are the key for keeping the organization in the market. These human resources need to be managed effectively to achieve the required performance of the organization. It is necessary to manage strategically the human resources and to adapt at its strategy with organizational strategy. The aim of this study is to investigate the influence of recruitment and selection on organizational performance, to examine the role of compensation and reward on organizational performance as well as the effect of performance appraisal management on organizational performance at Hormuud Telecom in Mogadishu-Somalia. The researcher utilized convenient sampling to collect 100 questionnaires from Hormuud Telecom in Mogadishu, Somalia. These respondents were provided a questionnaire with four main construct which measuring recruitment and selection, compensation and reward, performance appraisal management and organizational performance. However, using correlation coefficient, the study found that organizational performance (Dependent variable had significant positive influence with three dimensions of independent variable. The result of regression analysis found that three constructs had statistically significant, positive, and straight effects with organizational performance.

  9. Communication Framework for Tele-rehabilitation Systems with QoS Guarantee

    OpenAIRE

    Dandanov Nikolay; Semov Plamen; Ivanov Antoni; Christoff Nicole; Poulkov Vladimir

    2017-01-01

    Nowadays, there is great interest in developing telemedicine technologies. These technologies will provide health care from distance swiftly and lightly, as well as reduce the expenses for activities, such as rehabilitation. Telemedicine applications are possible due to the advances in information technologies and the ever-expanding communication network infrastructure. The network characteristics bandwidth, packet loss, latency, jitter and policies are crucial for the performance of tele-reh...

  10. Wind farms providing secondary frequency regulation: Evaluating the performance of model-based receding horizon control

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Shapiro, Carl R.; Meneveau, Charles; Gayme, Dennice F.; Meyers, Johan

    2016-01-01

    We investigate the use of wind farms to provide secondary frequency regulation for a power grid. Our approach uses model-based receding horizon control of a wind farm that is tested using a large eddy simulation (LES) framework. In order to enable real-time implementation, the control actions are computed based on a time-varying one-dimensional wake model. This model describes wake advection and interactions, both of which play an important role in wind farm power production. This controller is implemented in an LES model of an 84-turbine wind farm represented by actuator disk turbine models. Differences between the velocities at each turbine predicted by the wake model and measured in LES are used for closed-loop feedback. The controller is tested on two types of regulation signals, “RegA” and “RegD”, obtained from PJM, an independent system operator in the eastern United States. Composite performance scores, which are used by PJM to qualify plants for regulation, are used to evaluate the performance of the controlled wind farm. Our results demonstrate that the controlled wind farm consistently performs well, passing the qualification threshold for all fastacting RegD signals. For the RegA signal, which changes over slower time scales, the controlled wind farm's average performance surpasses the threshold, but further work is needed to enable the controlled system to achieve qualifying performance all of the time. (paper)

  11. An adaptive toolkit for image quality evaluation in system performance test of digital breast tomosynthesis

    Science.gov (United States)

    Zhang, Guozhi; Petrov, Dimitar; Marshall, Nicholas; Bosmans, Hilde

    2017-03-01

    Digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) is a relatively new diagnostic imaging modality for women. Currently, various models of DBT systems are available on the market and the number of installations is rapidly increasing. EUREF, the European Reference Organization for Quality Assured Breast Screening and Diagnostic Services, has proposed a preliminary Guideline - protocol for the quality control of the physical and technical aspects of digital breast tomosynthesis systems, with an ultimate aim of providing limiting values guaranteeing proper performance for different applications of DBT. In this work, we introduce an adaptive toolkit developed in accordance with this guideline to facilitate the process of image quality evaluation in DBT performance test. This toolkit implements robust algorithms to quantify various technical parameters of DBT images and provides a convenient user interface in practice. Each test is built into a separate module with configurations set corresponding to the European guideline, which can be easily adapted to different settings and extended with additional tests. This toolkit largely improves the efficiency for image quality evaluation of DBT. It is also going to evolve with the development of protocols in quality control of DBT systems.

  12. Feedback Providing Improvement Strategies and Reflection on Feedback Use: Effects on Students' Writing Motivation, Process, and Performance

    Science.gov (United States)

    Duijnhouwer, Hendrien; Prins, Frans J.; Stokking, Karel M.

    2012-01-01

    This study investigated the effects of feedback providing improvement strategies and a reflection assignment on students' writing motivation, process, and performance. Students in the experimental feedback condition (n = 41) received feedback including improvement strategies, whereas students in the control feedback condition (n = 41) received…

  13. Providers' perceptions of the implementation of a performance ...

    African Journals Online (AJOL)

    partly due to the lack of a system for reminding providers that patients were due to complete the ... system was feasible to implement as part of standard practice in ... Although the SAATSA is completed by the patients, in cases where they have ... platform is an important goal for this initiative; in the short term we are trying to ...

  14. [The current situation regarding guarantees of legal rights to social welfare and nursing care in Japan: based on an analysis of adjudications spanning the period 1960 to 2005].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Matsuzawa, Akemi; Tamiya, Nanako; Wakino, Koutaro

    2009-06-01

    To clarify whether people who need social care are legally guaranteed a "right to receive nursing-care services" as a living right in Japan. Using the database "Judicial Information System on CD-ROM" and journals which cover judicial precedents, such as "Supreme Court Reports" and "Judicial Reports", we searched for adjudications from 1960 to 2005 with 'living rights' as key words. The complete content of these adjudications was ascertained by reference to the journals. We then assessed whether a "right to receive nursing-care services" was specifically discussed in each of the adjudications by determining how the courts interpreted Article 25 of the Constitution in the verdicts and whether or not there was specific discussion of legal rights in each case. Of 210 adjudications extracted from the database, 23 (11.0%) specifically discussed the right to some sort of social security. No specific reference was made in the remaining 187 decisions (89.0%), and plaintiffs' claims were rejected. Whereas the "right to nursing care" was specifically discussed in no decisions before 1992, it was discussed in 4 decisions (40.0%) from 1993 onwards, resulting in plaintiffs' demands being partly granted. The content of the decisions covered issues that included anxiety about future nursing care, the practice of nursing homes of placing several elderly people in one room, ill-defined standards and low pay for home nursing-care workers, provision of nursing-care services based on the assumption that nursing care would be provided by family members, and self-determination and independence of the severely handicapped. A "right to receive nursing-care services" has not been fully guaranteed in the legal sense. However, such a right, included as a living right, is a primary right with a constitutional basis. Although this right has been specifically discussed in only a minority of adjudications, there has been a recent tendency for more emphasis. Both elderly and handicapped persons

  15. Performance of static var compensator control type thyristor controlled reactor and thyristor switched capacitor

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Araujo, Josias M. de; Yung, Chou Shaw; Rose, Eber H; Pantoja, Antonio L.A. [ELETRONORTE, Belem, PA (Brazil); Fouesnant, Thomas; Boissier, Luc

    1994-12-31

    This paper has the objective of presenting the philosophy of Static Var Compensator (SVC) Control as well the necessary adjustments in the project of control system to guarantee suitable performance under different operating conditions. The verification on the performance of the SVC control has been done by Transient Network Analyzer (TNA/CEPEL) studies, commissioning tests and a factory tests. The SVC is the type of Thyristor Controlled Reactor (TCR) and Thyristor Switched Capacitor (TSC). (author) 3 refs., 12 figs.

  16. Performance validation of commercially available mobile waste-assay systems: Preliminary report

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Schanfein, M.; Bonner, C.; Maez, R.

    1997-01-01

    Prior to disposal, nuclear waste must be accurately characterized to identify and quantify the radioactive content to reduce the radioactive hazard to the public. Validation of the waste-assay systems' performance is critical for establishing the credibility of the assay results for storage and disposal purposes. Canberra Nuclear has evaluated regulations worldwide and identified standard, modular, neutron- and gamma-waste-assay systems that can be used to characterize a large portion of existing and newly generated transuranic (TRU) and low-level waste. Before making claims of guaranteeing any system's performance for specific waste types, the standardized systems' performance be evaluated. 7 figs., 11 tabs

  17. Performance validation of commercially available mobile waste-assay systems: Preliminary report

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Schanfein, M.; Bonner, C.; Maez, R. [Los Alamos National Lab., NM (United States)] [and others

    1997-11-01

    Prior to disposal, nuclear waste must be accurately characterized to identify and quantify the radioactive content to reduce the radioactive hazard to the public. Validation of the waste-assay systems` performance is critical for establishing the credibility of the assay results for storage and disposal purposes. Canberra Nuclear has evaluated regulations worldwide and identified standard, modular, neutron- and gamma-waste-assay systems that can be used to characterize a large portion of existing and newly generated transuranic (TRU) and low-level waste. Before making claims of guaranteeing any system`s performance for specific waste types, the standardized systems` performance be evaluated. 7 figs., 11 tabs.

  18. Money-back guarantee warranty policy with preventive maintenance strategy for sensor-embedded remanufactured products

    Science.gov (United States)

    Alqahtani, Ammar Y.; Gupta, Surendra M.

    2018-01-01

    In today's global environment, technology is constantly evolving. Being able to stay up-to-date with the very latest technological advances can be extremely hard to accomplish. As a result of these changes and developments in technology, which often come unexpectedly, consumers are frequently tempted to update their devices to the very latest model. The result is that the life cycle of a product is becoming shorter and shorter than before. Manufacturers attempt to respond to consumers' concerns involving environmental issues as well as the more governmentally stringent environmental legislations by establishing facilities which include the minimization of the totality of waste relocated to landfills by recovering materials and components from returned, or End-Of-Life products and reuse them to build a remanufactured product, and/or novel components. With the rapid growth of interest in remanufactured products' market, offering warranty for remanufactured products and components is becoming a necessity for remanufacturer in order to meet customers' requirement and as a marketing mechanism. During that process, maintenance policies are of great importance in order to reduce the warranty cost on the remanufacturer. In this paper, an optimization simulation model for remanufactured items sold with one-dimensional non-renewing money-back guarantee (MBG) warranty policy is proposed from the view of remanufacturer, in which, an End-Of-Life product is subjected to upgrade action at the end of its past life and during the warranty period, preventive maintenance actions are carried out when the remaining life of the product reaches a pre-specified value so that the remanufacturer's expected profit can be maximized. Finally, a numerical example and design of experiment analysis are provided to demonstrate the proposed approach.

  19. Dynamic Performance of the ITER Reactive Power Compensation System

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Sheng Zhicai; Fu Peng; Xu Liuwei

    2011-01-01

    Dynamic performance of a reactive power compensation (RPC) system for the international thermonuclear experimental reactor (ITER) power supply is presented. Static var compensators (SVCs) are adopted to mitigate voltage fluctuation and reduce the reactive power down to a level acceptable for the French/European 400 kV grid. A voltage feedback and load power feedforward controller for SVC is proposed, with the feedforward loop intended to guarantee short response time and the feedback loop ensuring good dynamics and steady characteristics of SVC. A mean filter was chosen to measure the control signals to improve the dynamic response. The dynamic performance of the SVC is verified by simulations using PSCAD/EMTDC codes.

  20. DO FINANCIAL STATEMENTS PROVIDE ADEQUATE INFORMATION ABOUT THE CAPITALIZATION OF COSTS RELATED TO INTANGIBLE ASSETS?: AN EMPIRICAL RESEARCH ON ITALIAN LISTED COMPANIES

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Stefania Vignini

    2015-11-01

    Full Text Available The aim of our research is to verify if Italian listed companies financial statements provide adequate information about the capitalization of costs related to intangible assets and if the information provided are reliable. Moreover, we investigated if they merely comply with law or provide additional information on cost capitalization and reveal if internal control systems (especially managerial accounting systems or other information systems are applied to support the measurement process and the cost control, thus guaranteeing the verifiability and representational faithfulness of the information disclosed. This paper is an empirical analysis and is concerned to investigate the financial statements of 250 Italian listed companies.

  1. Use of work-life balance benefits guaranteed by law in Poland - Do size of the enterprise and gender matter?

    OpenAIRE

    Merecz-Kot, Dorota; Drabek, Marcin; Stanczak, Aleksander; Andysz, Aleksandra; Jacukowicz, Aleksandra

    2017-01-01

    Background: The paper is aimed at indicating the similarities and differences in use of benefits supporting work–life balance (WLB) between women and men working in Polish small/medium and large enterprises. Material and Methods: The sample included 556 workers (311 women, 245 men), aged 20–68 years old employed on the basis of employment contracts for at least a year in Polish enterprises. The respondents completed a questionnaire on the use of benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code, ...

  2. Should trained lay providers perform HIV testing? A systematic review to inform World Health Organization guidelines.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Kennedy, C E; Yeh, P T; Johnson, C; Baggaley, R

    2017-12-01

    New strategies for HIV testing services (HTS) are needed to achieve UN 90-90-90 targets, including diagnosis of 90% of people living with HIV. Task-sharing HTS to trained lay providers may alleviate health worker shortages and better reach target groups. We conducted a systematic review of studies evaluating HTS by lay providers using rapid diagnostic tests (RDTs). Peer-reviewed articles were included if they compared HTS using RDTs performed by trained lay providers to HTS by health professionals, or to no intervention. We also reviewed data on end-users' values and preferences around lay providers preforming HTS. Searching was conducted through 10 online databases, reviewing reference lists, and contacting experts. Screening and data abstraction were conducted in duplicate using systematic methods. Of 6113 unique citations identified, 5 studies were included in the effectiveness review and 6 in the values and preferences review. One US-based randomized trial found patients' uptake of HTS doubled with lay providers (57% vs. 27%, percent difference: 30, 95% confidence interval: 27-32, p lay providers. Studies from Cambodia, Malawi, and South Africa comparing testing quality between lay providers and laboratory staff found little discordance and high sensitivity and specificity (≥98%). Values and preferences studies generally found support for lay providers conducting HTS, particularly in non-hypothetical scenarios. Based on evidence supporting using trained lay providers, a WHO expert panel recommended lay providers be allowed to conduct HTS using HIV RDTs. Uptake of this recommendation could expand HIV testing to more people globally.

  3. Design of stability-guaranteed neurofuzzy logic controller for nuclear steam generators

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Cho, B.H.; No, H.C.

    1996-01-01

    A neurofuzzy logic controller (NFLC), which is implemented by using a multilayer neural network with special types of fuzzifier, inference engine and defuzzifier, is applied to the water level control of a nuclear steam generator (SG). This type of NFLC has the structural advantage that arbitrary two-input, single-output linear controllers can be adequately mapped into a set of specific control rules of the NFLC. In order to design a stability-guaranteed NFLC, the stable sector of the given linear gain is obtained from Lyapunov's stability criteria. Then this sector is mapped into two linear rule tables that are used as the limits of NFLC control rules. The automatic generation of NFLC rule tables is accomplished by using the back-error-propagation (BEP) algorithm. There are two separate paths for the error back propagation in the SG. One considers the level dynamics depending on the tank capacity and the other takes into account the reverse dynamics of the SG. The amounts of error back propagated through these paths show opposite effects in the BEP algorithm from each other for the swell-shrink phenomenon. Through computer simulation it is found that the BEP algorithm adequately generates NFLC rule tables according to given learning parameters. (orig.)

  4. GUARANTEE ON ALL THE ASSETS OF THE DEBTOR IN INSOLVENCY PROCEEDINGS

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Roxana Anca Adam

    2013-11-01

    Full Text Available Unsecured creditors in the insolvency of the debtor's creditors are those who do not have collateral security against the debtor's assets and who are not accompanied by liens privileges whose claims are current at the opening proceedings and claims us for current activities during observation. In the matter of the bankruptcy secured creditors set for secured debts are claims receiving collateral on the debtor's property, whether it is the primary obligor or third party guarantee to persons benefiting from collateral. The secured creditor's secured claim in the insolvency procedure is given by the value of collateral assessment arising after the opening of insolvency proceedings the debtor. These special legal provisions contained in the bankruptcy, derogating from the common law, they often generate different practical situations and have created jurisprudence. In judicial practice of insolvency have encountered situations where the creditor security budget, which requires to be entered in the final table of the debtor in the category of secured creditors, the debt claim, warranty claims for his claim is the universality of the debtor's assets. The study on which we focused includes analysis of these categories of claims in insolvency proceedings and the solutions adopted in judicial practice.

  5. [Independent ethics committees for clinical research in Argentina. An evaluation and a system to guarantee their independence].

    Science.gov (United States)

    Gonorazky, Sergio E

    2008-01-01

    The Administración Nacional de Medicamentos, Alimentos y Tecnología Médica de la República Argentina (ANMAT) requires that an independent ethics committee of sponsors and/or researchers must previously evaluate and approve all the new pharmacological research protocols carried out on human beings. However, due to the lucrative nature of the evaluation, and because the selection of the Independent Ethics Committee is carried out by the sponsors and/or researchers, the assumed autonomy of the former can be reduced to merely a relationship of "service provider-customer". The Institutional Review Board of the Mar del Plata s Community Hospital has evaluated, between 2005 and 2006, thirty three research protocols (with their corresponding information sheets for patients and informed consent forms) previously approved by a non-institutional Independent Ethics Committee. The median number of objections made by the Institutional Review Board, which prompted the previously mentioned protocols to be modified in order to be approved, was of three per protocol. In other words, the accreditation of an Independent Ethics Committee requires a system that guarantees actual independence from the sponsors and/or researchers, as well as management control mechanisms that may lead them into an eventual loss of accreditation. Several measures are proposed in order to correct the deficiencies of the present system.

  6. Multidimensional Monitoring of Recovery Status and Implications for Performance.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Heidari, Jahan; Beckmann, Jürgen; Bertollo, Maurizio; Brink, Michel; Kallus, Wolfgang; Robazza, Claudio; Kellmann, Michael

    2018-03-15

    Monitoring of recovery in the context of athletic performance has gained significant importance during recent years. As a systematic process of data collection and evaluation, the monitoring of recovery can be implemented for various purposes. It may aid to prevent negative outcomes of training or competition, such as underrecovery, overtraining, or injuries. Further, it aims at establishing routines and strategies necessary to guarantee athletes' readiness for performance by restoring their depleted resources. Comprehensive monitoring of recovery ideally encompasses a multidimensional approach, thereby considering biological, psychological, and social monitoring methods. From a biological perspective, physiological (e.g., cardiac parameters), biochemical (e.g., creatine kinase), hormonal (e.g., salivary cortisol) and immunological (e.g., immunoglobulin A) markers can be taken into account to operationalize training loads and recovery needs. Psychological approaches suggest the application of validated and reliable psychometric questionnaires (e.g., Recovery-Stress Questionnaire for Athletes) to measure a subjective perception of recovery as well as the subjective degree of training- or competition-induced fatigue. Social aspects also play a role in performance monitoring and may hence provide essential performance-related information. The implementation of a monitoring routine within athletic environments represents a continuous process which functions as an effective addition to training and depends on a range of conditions (e.g., organizational regulations, commitment of athletes). Current research in the field of monitoring aims at establishing individualized monitoring regimes that are referring to intraindividual reference values with the help of innovative technological devices.

  7. Fault-tolerance performance evaluation of fieldbus for NPCS network of KNGR

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Jung, Hyun Gi

    1999-02-01

    In contrast with conventional fieldbus researches which are focused merely on real time performance, this study aims to evaluate the real-time performance of the communication system including fault-tolerant mechanisms. Maintaining performance in presence of recoverable faults is very important because the communication network will be applied to next generation NPP(Nuclear Power Plant). In order to guarantee the performance of NPP communication network, the time characteristics of the target system in presence of recoverable fault should be investigated. If the time characteristics meet the requirements of the system, the faults will be recovered by fieldbus recovery mechanisms and the system will be safe. If the time characteristics can not meet the requirements, the faults in the fieldbus can propagate to system failure. In this study, for the purpose of investigating the time characteristics of fieldbus, the recoverable faults are classified and then the formulas which represent delays including recovery mechanisms and the simulation model are developed. In order to validate the proposed approach, the simulation model is applied to the Korea Next Generation Reactor (KNGR) NSSS Process Control System (NPCS). The results of the simulation provide reasonable delay characteristics of the fault cases with recovery mechanisms. Using the outcome of the simulation and the system requirements, we also can calculate the failure propagation probability from fieldbus to outer system

  8. Improving the performance of solar still by using nanofluids and providing vacuum

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Kabeel, A.E.; Omara, Z.M.; Essa, F.A.

    2014-01-01

    Highlights: • Modified solar still integrated with an external condenser and used nanofluids were studied. • The results obtained that using cuprous oxide increased the distilled productivity by 133.64%. • Using the aluminum oxide–water nanofluid increased the distillate productivity of the modified still by 125.0%. - Abstract: The experimental modifications were carried out into the conventional solar still, considerably increasing the distillate water productivity. The effects of using different types of nanomaterials on the performance of solar still were studied. The investigated solid nanoparticles are the cuprous and aluminum oxides. The performance was investigated at different weight fraction concentrations of nanoparticles in the basin water with and without providing vacuum. These additions and modifications greatly improve the evaporation and condensation rates and hence the distillate yield was augmented. The research was conducted for range of concentrations starting from 0.02% to 0.2% with a step of 0.02%. The maxima productivity was obtained for using the cuprous oxide nanoparticles with a concentration of 0.2% with operating the vacuum fan. The results obtained that using cuprous oxide nanoparticles increased the distilled productivity by 133.64% and 93.87% with and without the fan respectively. On the other hand, using aluminum oxide nanoparticles enhanced the distillate by 125.0% and 88.97% with and without the fan respectively as compared to the conventional still. The estimated cost of 1.0 l of distillate are approximately 0.035$, 0.045$ when using the cuprous oxide nanomaterial with and without the fan and, as well as the aluminum oxide nanoparticles, 0.038$ and 0.051$ respectively, and for the conventional still is 0.048$

  9. The role of kaizen in creating radical performance results in a logistics service provider

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Erez Agmoni

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available Background: This study investigates the role of an incremental change in organizational process in creating radical performance results in a service provider company. The role of Kaizen is established prominently in manufacturing, but is nascent in service applications. This study examines the impact of introducing Kaizen as an ODI tool-how it is applied, how it works, and whether participants believe it helps service groups form more effective working relationships that result in significant performance improvements. Methods: Exploring the evolving role of Kaizen in service contexts, this study explores a variety of facets of human communication in the context of continuous improvement and teamwork inter-organizationally. The paper consists of an archival study and an action research case study. A pre-intervention study consisting of observations, interviews, and submission of questionnaires to employees of a manufacturing and air-sea freight firm was conducted. A Kaizen intervention occurred subsequently, and a post-intervention study was then conducted. Results: Radical improvements in both companies such as 30% financial growth, 81% productivity improvement and more are demonstrated in this paper. Conclusions: Findings offer unique insights into the effects of Kaizen in creating radical performance improvements in a service company and its customer. Both qualitative and quantitative results of business, satisfaction, and productivity suggest time invested in introducing Kaizen into a service organization helps the companies improve relationships and improve the bottom line dramatically.

  10. Multiplexing Low and High QoS Workloads in Virtual Environments

    Science.gov (United States)

    Verboven, Sam; Vanmechelen, Kurt; Broeckhove, Jan

    Virtualization technology has introduced new ways for managing IT infrastructure. The flexible deployment of applications through self-contained virtual machine images has removed the barriers for multiplexing, suspending and migrating applications with their entire execution environment, allowing for a more efficient use of the infrastructure. These developments have given rise to an important challenge regarding the optimal scheduling of virtual machine workloads. In this paper, we specifically address the VM scheduling problem in which workloads that require guaranteed levels of CPU performance are mixed with workloads that do not require such guarantees. We introduce a framework to analyze this scheduling problem and evaluate to what extent such mixed service delivery is beneficial for a provider of virtualized IT infrastructure. Traditionally providers offer IT resources under a guaranteed and fixed performance profile, which can lead to underutilization. The findings of our simulation study show that through proper tuning of a limited set of parameters, the proposed scheduling algorithm allows for a significant increase in utilization without sacrificing on performance dependability.

  11. Performance Analysis of Quality-of-Service Controls in a Cell-Cluster-Based Wireless ATM Network

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Cho, Young Jong [Ajou University, Suwon (Korea, Republic of)

    1997-04-01

    In this paper, an efficient cell-cluster-based call control scheme with guaranteed quality-of-service(QoS) provision ing is presented for next generation wireless ATM networks and its performance is mathematically analyzed using the open queuing network. With the cell-cluster-based call control, at the time a mobile connection is admitted to the network, a virtual cell is constructed by choosing a group of neighboring base stations to which the call may probabilistic ally hand over and by assigning to the call a collection of virtual paths between the base stations. Within a micro cell/pico cell environment, it is seen that the cell-cluster-based call control can support effectively a very high rate of handovers, provides very high system capacity, and guarantees a high degree of frequency reuse over the same geographical region without requiring the intervention of the network call control processor each time a handover occurs. But since mobiles, once admitted, are free to roam within the virtual cell, congestion condition occurs in which the number of calls to be handled by one base station exceeds the cell sites` capacity of radio channel and consequently a predefined QoS provision cannot be guaranteed. So, there must be a call admission control function to limit the number of calls existing in a cell-cluster such that required QoS objectives are met. As call acceptance criteria for constant-bit-rate or realtime variable-bit-rate ATM connections, we define four mobile QoS metrics: new-call blocking probability, wireless channel utilization efficiency, congestion probability and normalized average congestion duration. In addition, for QoS provision ing to available-bit-rate, unspecified-bit-rate or non-realtime variable-bit-rate connections, we further define another QoS metric, the minimum threshold breaking probability. By using the open network queuing model, we derive closed form expressions for the five QoS metrics defined above and show that they can be

  12. Project Guarantee 1985. Repository for low- and intermediate-level radioactive waste: construction and operation

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Anon.

    1985-01-01

    A constructional engineering project study aimed at clarification of the feasibility of a repository for low- and intermediate-level radioactive waste (type B repository) has been carried out; the study is based on a model data-set derived from the geological, rock mechanical and topographical characterictics of one of Nagra's planned exploration areas. Final storage is effected in subterranean rock caverns accessed by horizontal tunnel. The reception area also is sited below the surface. Storage is conceived in such a way that, after closure of the repository, maintenance and supervision can be dispensed with and a guarantee of high long-term safety can nevertheless be provided. The envisaged repository consists of an entry tunnel for road vehicles and a reception area with a series of caverns for receiving waste, for additional technical facilities and for the production of the concrete back-fill material. The connecting tunnel is serviced by a tunnel railway and the actual repository area consists of several storage caverns. The repository is intended to accomodate a total of 200'000 m3 of solidified low- and intermediate-level waste. Valanginian marl is assumed as the host rock, although it would also be basically possible to house the proposed installations in other host rocks. The excavated material will total around 1'000'000 m3. The construction time for the whole installation is estimated as about 7 years and a working team of around 30 people will be required for the estimated 60-year operational duration. The project described in the present report justifies the conclusion that construction of a repository for low-and intermediate-level radioactive waste is feasible with present-day technology. This conclusion takes into consideration quantitative and operational constraints as well as geological and hydrogeological data relevant to constructional engineering. The latter are derived from a model data-set based on a specific locality

  13. Block Storage Service: Status and Performance

    CERN Document Server

    Van der Ster, Daniel

    2014-01-01

    This memo summarizes the current status of the Ceph block storage service as it is used for OpenStack Cinder Volumes and Glance Images as of May 2014. We present the block storage activity on the current cluster, measuring IOPS and latencies, and present a cost/benefit analysis of using SSDs to optimize the cost and performance efficiency of the service. During tests in collaboration with IT-CF, we have concluded that by adding SSDs as the synchronous write journals (used to guarantee data durability), we are able increase the IOPS capacity by 4-5 times, at a cost of decreasing the available volume by 20%. Further, the testing has shown that the Ceph implementation is able to operate at the limit of the hardware performance; software-induced performance limitations were not yet observed in either the spinning disk or SSD configurations. In addition, we believe that increasing small write performance with SSDs is applicable only to the block storage use-case; high-bandwidth use-cases such as physics data stora...

  14. Good laboratory practices guarantee biosafety in the Sierra Leone-China friendship biosafety laboratory.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Wang, Qin; Zhou, Wei-Min; Zhang, Yong; Wang, Huan-Yu; Du, Hai-Jun; Nie, Kai; Song, Jing-Dong; Xiao, Kang; Lei, Wen-Wen; Guo, Jian-Qiang; Wei, He-Jiang; Cai, Kun; Wang, Yan-Hai; Wu, Jiang; Kamara, Gerard; Kamara, Idrissa; Wei, Qiang; Liang, Mi-Fang; Wu, Gui-Zhen; Dong, Xiao-Ping

    2016-06-23

    The outbreak of Ebola virus disease (EVD) in West Africa between 2014 and 2015 was the largest EDV epidemic since the identification of Ebola virus (EBOV) in 1976, and the countries most strongly affected were Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Liberia. The Sierra Leone-China Friendship Biological Safety Laboratory (SLE-CHN Biosafety Lab), a fixed Biosafety Level 3 laboratory in the capital city of Sierra Leone, was established by the Chinese government and has been active in EBOV detection since 11 March 2015. Complete management and program documents were created for the SLE-CHN Biosafety Lab, and it was divided into four zones (the green, yellow, brown, and red zones) based on the risk assessment. Different types of safe and appropriate personnel protection equipment (PPE) are used in different zones of the laboratory, and it fully meets the Biosafety Level 3 laboratory standards of the World Health Organization. Good preparedness, comprehensive risk assessment and operation documents, appropriate PPE, effective monitoring and intensive training, together with well-designed and reasonable laboratory sectioning are essential for guaranteeing biosafety.

  15. Ensuring sustained user quality in buildings. Success contracting with functional tendering of the building services equipment guarantees quality for 15 years; Nutzerqualitaet in Gebaeuden dauerhaft sicherstellen. Erfolgscontracting mit funktionaler Ausschreibung ermoeglicht eine 15-jaehrige Garantie auf die Gebaeudetechnik

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Milles, Uwe

    2012-07-01

    Until now, buildings regularly require more energy and provide less user quality in practice than was to be expected from the installed technology during the planning. That has structural reasons. The naerco research project has investigated this aspect and developed the success contracting concept: pre-defined energy and quality parameters are contracted out as part of a function-based tender. A contractor guarantees their realisation for 15 years. The contractual process also includes continual control of the agreed values and a bonus-malus system.

  16. Evaluation of Heat Removal Performance of Passive Decay Heat Removal system for S-CO{sub 2} Cooled Micro Modular Reactor

    Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

    Moon, Jangsik; Lee, Jeong Ik; Jeong, Yong Hoon [KAIST, Daejeon (Korea, Republic of)

    2015-05-15

    The modular systems is able to be transported by large trailer. Moreover, dry cooling system is applied for waste heat removal. The characteristics of MMR takes wide range of construction area from coast to desert, isolated area and disaster area. In MMR, Passive decay heat removal system (PDHRS) is necessary for taking the advantage on selection of construction area where external support cannot be offered. The PDHRS guarantees to protect MMR without external support. In this research, PDHRS of MMR is introduced and decay heat removal performance is analyzed. The PDHRS guarantees integrity of reactor coolant system. The high level of decay heat (2 MW) can be removed by PDHRS without offsite power.

  17. Is radiation protection for the unborn child guaranteed by radiation protection for female workers?

    International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

    Nosske, C.; Karcher, K.

    2003-01-01

    ICRP Publication 88 recommends doses to embryo and fetus from intakes of radionuclides by the mother for various intake scenarios. Mainly by answering the question 'Is radiation protection for the unborn child guaranteed by radiation protection for female workers?' it has been assessed if the intake scenarios given in ICRP Publication 88 are adequate for radiation protection purposes. This is generally the case, but the consideration of an additional chronic intake scenario for early pregnancy would be helpful. It is demonstrated that following chronic intake by inhalation, for most radionuclides radiation protection for (female) workers is also adequate for protection of the unborn child, considered as a member of the public. However, there are a number of radionuclides for which possible intakes in routine operations should be more restricted (up to 1% of the annual limits on intake for workers in the case of nickel isotopes) to ensure radiation protection for the unborn child. (author)

  18. Realization of Human Rights Guarantees in Civil Proceedings in Russia

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Badma V. Sangadzhiev

    2016-09-01

    Full Text Available Civil legal proceedings are conducted according to the federal laws existing during consideration and permission of a civil case (making of separate legal proceedings or execution of court decrees. In case of lack of the regulation of a procedural law governing the relations which arose during civil legal proceedings, federal courts of the general jurisdiction and magistrate's courts apply the regulation governing the similar relations (analogy of the law. In the absence of such regulation of the judge work proceeding from the general principles of implementation of justice in the Russian Federation (analogy is right. Dispositions of general constitutional guarantees (which don't belong directly to judicial system, however their sense can quite be applied to judicial process of consideration of civil cases contain in the following articles of the Constitution of Russia: 17, 19, 29 and 45. Judicial activities are characterized by the major indicators: quality and efficiency (observance of procedural terms. According to the conventional principles and rules of international law to be an offender without unjustifiable delay constitutes one of the fundamental human rights inseparably linked with the right to fair legal proceeding. In a sense of the constitutional regulation, first, everyone has the right, but isn't obliged to protect the rights, secondly, to protect by all methods which aren't forbidden by the law. It is thought, the last purchases the force and the importance not as ascertaining (or transfer these methods in the law and as availability of real mechanisms of their use by the individual and availability of use.

  19. Availability and the use of work-life balance benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code among workers employed on the basis of employment contracts in small and medium enterprises

    Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

    Aleksandra Andysz

    2016-08-01

    Full Text Available Objectives: Polish Labour Code provides employees with a range of solutions (benefits supporting them in achieving balance between work and private life. This paper was aimed at indicating availability and the use of legal benefits supporting work-life balance (WLB among Polish workers of small and medium enterprises. Material and Methods: The study sample included 219 respondents, aged 22–64, working in small and medium enterprises and employed on the basis of employment contracts for at least a year. The respondents completed a questionnaire on availability and the use of benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code, referring to their current workplaces. Results: Most frequently the studied employees took sick leave because of one’s own illness and leave on demand. In our sample, 45% of the women took maternity leave and 26% of the men took paternity leave. The respondents took educational and parental leave the least frequently. More than half of the respondents (58% did not return to the same position after leave devoted to childcare, even though they had such a possibility. Conclusions: In fact, most of work-life balance benefits guaranteed by law were available to the employees of small and medium enterprises, regardless of their gender. Availability and the use of the majority of benefits were similar among the women and men. Availability of benefits depended on the specificity of industry and a profession, thus, future research on work-life balance policy should control for variables related to the character of work.

  20. Availability and the use of work-life balance benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code among workers employed on the basis of employment contracts in small and medium enterprises.

    Science.gov (United States)

    Andysz, Aleksandra; Jacukowicz, Aleksandra; Stańczak, Aleksander; Drabek, Marcin

    2016-01-01

    Polish Labour Code provides employees with a range of solutions (benefits) supporting them in achieving balance between work and private life. This paper was aimed at indicating availability and the use of legal benefits supporting work-life balance (WLB) among Polish workers of small and medium enterprises. The study sample included 219 respondents, aged 22-64, working in small and medium enterprises and employed on the basis of employment contracts for at least a year. The respondents completed a questionnaire on availability and the use of benefits guaranteed by the Polish Labour Code, referring to their current workplaces. Most frequently the studied employees took sick leave because of one's own illness and leave on demand. In our sample, 45% of the women took maternity leave and 26% of the men took paternity leave. The respondents took educational and parental leave the least frequently. More than half of the respondents (58%) did not return to the same position after leave devoted to childcare, even though they had such a possibility. In fact, most of work-life balance benefits guaranteed by law were available to the employees of small and medium enterprises, regardless of their gender. Availability and the use of the majority of benefits were similar among the women and men. Availability of benefits depended on the specificity of industry and a profession, thus, future research on work-life balance policy should control for variables related to the character of work. This work is available in Open Access model and licensed under a CC BY-NC 3.0 PL license.